Humans are hard wired for stupidity according to Yale University fellow

A lot of what is posited as science is really nothing more than conjecture, and blatant rationalisations are just as common. Read this article from Yale University and you will hear that 'Humans have been wired by evolution to respond to the most immediate threats, ones they can hear or smell or see".

This would be amusing if the implications of such quackery were not so common in the media. The implication is that our conceptual faculty has a tendency towards the concrete, range-of-the-moment thinking, i.e. like feeding your children, and in the process neglecting the more abstract issues like climate change.

The reality is that this is true. But we are not starving. Humans have a great deal of leisure or free time these days, and surviving the next few decades, and ensuring their kids survive is important. The reality is that most of them are not conceptual, not for genetic 'hardwired' reasons, but as a matter of choice. Interestingly, most of them share the same collectivist philosophies of socialism, environmentalism, animal liberation, liberalism, democracy and conservatism that are 'concrete-bound'. If you are wondering if I left anyone out....I most certainly did....the fringe 'idiots' who know how to think critically. They have since time began been very unpopular...just ask Galileo. Critics are not liked by hysterical people with political agendas.

What difference would it make if people were more conceptual thinkers? Well, for a start they might repudiate the welfare state which shackles productive people, which leads governments to favours immigration and economic stimulus rather than productivity-based economic growth which would result in more R&D and less consumption, which people engage in because they need some physical means of overcoming their repression and anxiety. Such is the state of our distorted, 'secular' collectivist-quasi capitalist state. Don't expect any integrity from it. Don't expect any respect for facts, you will not get it based on contemporary values. The nature of government has to be changed first. Representative democracy has to be repudiated for a consensus or meritocratic based system.

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Andrew Sheldon www.sheldonthinks.com

Where is the climate change consensus?

I want to quote another sample of poor scientific reporting from Google Answers about the significance of 'peer reviewed' climate change articles posted in scientific journals. A person asked the following question:

"I am interested in learning about scientists who have have completed studies about global warming. Of those that submit to peer review, what percentage of them show that global warming is both (a) man-made and (b) expected to have a severe negative impact to mankind?

The reason that I ask is that a relative told me she believed it was about 99% of scientists believed that global warming was real and caused by humans...and that the remaining 1% were the fringe idiots. And, although i know nothing about the subject, her number seemed too high".

The response was:

"That hypothesis was tested by analyzing 928 abstracts, published in refereed scientific journals between 1993 and 2003, and listed in the ISI database with the keywords "climate change" (9).

The 928 papers were divided into six categories: explicit endorsement of the consensus position, evaluation of impacts, mitigation proposals, methods, paleoclimate analysis, and rejection of the consensus position. Of all the papers, 75% fell into the first three categories, either explicitly or implicitly accepting the consensus view; 25% dealt with methods or paleoclimate, taking no position on current anthropogenic climate change. Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position. Admittedly, authors evaluating impacts, developing methods, or studying paleoclimatic change might believe that current climate change is natural. However, none of these papers argued that point"... Source: www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686.

There are several problems with this response that ought to be evident to any critical thinking scientists. These include:

1. Science is not a popularity contest. I would suggest just a fraction of scientists are critical thinkers, and most are publicly-funded academics, so they have great sympathy for the nanny state, so there is a plausible professional bias emerging because of their implied values.

2. The pollster postulated a 'false alternative' by implying that there was sufficient evidence to take a valid position on climate change. i.e. There might be 10,000 scientific researchers who would not compromise their integrity by 'shooting from the hip' by rendering scientific assertions when there was inadequate research to support either hypothesis....that the climate is warming because of humanity or not, and how significant it is. The implication is that the 'politically hysterical' scientists who are friends with Al Gore et al are the ones who attract all the media, because we all know the media loves a good story.

Then you get the community concerned, environmentalists who have a tendency towards the tragic, and school kids are all being mobilised to support an issue for which there is inadequate research to support either hypothesis. This is the state of our stupid political system. This is a source of great content for the media, and of course unthinking politicians respond in kind. See a previous article which showed Rob Oakshotte, an MP in the Australian parliament, attending a seminar by an environmentalist (i.e. not a scientist) on population control. That MP holds the balance of power in the Australian parliament. Do you think he paid a visit to some Climate Change skeptic at James Cook University? I doubt it. I agree, they are hard to find when a contrary position is so 'politically unpopular' and the media will not publish your story because anyone with a contrary opinion is considered a 'nutter' or a 'fringe idiot'.

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Andrew Sheldon www.sheldonthinks.com

Scientific journalism reaches a new low

Does science get any more ridiculous than science reporting. We live in a world where science is considered a political football, or a popularity contest. Science is based on evidence and testing of hypotheses. It it not a majority vote, and judging from this article in the Guardian, it is not a decision flung from one team to another depending on the daily balance of power.

Read this article, as journalism doesn't get any more pathetic. The author seems to believe that because a scientists has shifted from the Climate Skeptics to Climate Sensationalists, that this marks a turning point in the debate.

Before it was enough that a group of IPCC scientists believed that global warming is man-made. That was sufficient to call it a day and waste billions of dollars on remedial measures. Now, we are down to one guys opinion.

One needs to appreciate that not all scientists are of equal credibility. Some are more salesmen than researchers. Some are critical thinkers, whilst others are just plan old, unaccountable academics with little accountability for what they produce. They will give a degree to anyone these days. Everyone gets a "C" in most universities, and those mediocrities eventually end up in academia because they can get unconditional love and a safe salary package. That is the quality of the army fighting for global warming....and with their sense of life, they are able 'bedfellows' for political bureaucrats and ministerial meddlers.

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Andrew Sheldon www.sheldonthinks.com

Climate change is not recession-proof

A NZ Herald survey has shown that NZ's are growing increasing sceptical of the climate change assertions - that humans are driving the planet towards a run-away greenhouse effect. The fact that there is any human impact does not even mean that there need even be a runaway effect because CO2 is a fertiliser for plants, not a pollutant. The human population growth rate is declining with increasing prosperity, and our consumption patterns are also set to change.

People also ought to ponder why consumption rates are so high. There is a 'human values' component to this issue which people don't even challenge. The ethics involved are startling because we are being asked to embrace the save ethical system as Adolf Hitler. In the 1930s Adolf Hitler was a huge exponent of animal rights. You can argue that he was not so much a great proponent of animals. I would suggest elevating animal rights was his way of undermining human rights. The same can be said of the environment. This issue is not about protecting humanity from climate change, otherwise we would simply use common law to mount a class action against companies based on the 'evidence'. The reason why we are being 'guilt-induced' with pseudo-science from politically-motivated, uncritical thinking academics, is that these people have a tragic sense of life, and they are so loathing of humanity, they would find a crisis if they were paid to. Governments of course want a 'legislated' solution so they can control the process. A tax is not going to do anything because emitters can merely pass on the costs to consumers. It reduces wealth by funding a lot of unnecessary remedial measures. Unnecessary because there is no credible evidence that humanity is having a discernible impact on the climate.

This survey shows that most people have downgraded the importance of climate change. This is not surprising because it is a recession. The survey however also shows that the number of people who believe no climate change problem exists has increased from 17.5% to 19.3% in the last year. This might be because they repudiate the trumped up evidence, or it might be because they want to cynically repudiate climate change to allay any guilt resulting from their conflicting values. i.e. their short term economic values vs their long term, conceptual moral values. I'm not suggesting that concepts are purely a long term tool, but rather that people are inclined to take concrete steps to resolve concrete problems having already developed a long range plan.

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Andrew Sheldon www.sheldonthinks.com

What if global warming cause is anthropogenic?

Here is an interesting question - I did not read about it on Political Forum.com, but I will post a response to it:

The fact is that if there was a anthropogenic cause for global warming it would not make a difference because any 'negative externality' has to be established on the basis that the trend is destined to cause harm to specific individuals. The fact that the process of change takes so long and change is occurring anyway tends to underpin any such consideration.

An argument could also be made that CO2 is a fertiliser to plants, and that enrichening the atmosphere will eventually result in stimulated plant growth, and higher temperatures would result in more evaporation, cloud formation and precipitation, resulting in greater oxidation (i.e. usually by carbolic acid, i.e. CO2) and more reflection of UV back into space.

The greatest obstacle to the current climate change debate is the lack of a compelling 'causation' for it. I would however suggest solar flares is far more credible as a cause.

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Andrew Sheldon www.sheldonthinks.com