A little reworking on this opening paragraph from Monbiot and let’s see how it scans:
Creationists and climate change
deniersalarmists have this in common: they don’t answer their critics. They make what they say are definitive refutations of the science. When these refutations are shown to be nonsense, they do not seek to defend them. They simply switch to another line of attack. They never retract, never apologise, never explain, just raise the volume, keep moving and hope that people won’t notice the trail of broken claims in their wake.
Indeed.
You know how they have been pumping out these scare stories for several years now, i.e. “If we don’t cut emissions by x% then temperatures will rise by y degrees by the year 20-z”?
Somebody ought to track down the more foolish pronouncements, which are already long overdue for a reality check, I’m sure that somebody must have promised eternal doom by the year 2010 back in the 1990s, and email them for a response.
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Parallels between creationists and climate change skeptics are never going to stand up to scrutiny, they are fundamentally different. One group believe in a particular theory, the other group either reject, or are skeptical of a theory. This is very much like the nonsense parallels between atheists and the religious
I don’t entirely go that, ChrisM, it’s all very well and good from the viewpoint of our better-developed thinking function, of course, but when the affects kick in and name-calling starts, then you see the common emotional ground on which these desperate “true believers” in /every/ inadequate reality-description stand (and slip on their asses in the spilled blood!) It’s a good show, of course, but I certainly don’t care for these types treating me to any of their basically bullying two-valued so-called “reasoning”:
“If you ain’t part of the solution, you’re part of the problem!”
Balls to that, how’s about “WE’RE the tertium non datur and you two-sided enthusiasts ARE a binful of old panty liners”?
(People absolutely willfully refuse to fully comprehend Aristotle, he was /not/ claiming his model of “reason” to be the be- and the end-all; rather, like, Machiavelli, he was saying, implicitly: /Here/ is the “law” of the excluded middle at work, the miserable intellectual /actual/ condition of Average Man, all loaded down with his unending power-need to get over on “His” Wife by all means, in all of the wretched endless argumentation & bitching.)
Sorry Emmett, in which case you don’t appreciate the scientific method. It thrives on people trying to poke holes in theories. The honest seeker after truth should be pleased when people look for problems with their theories. Strong theories live to fight another day. Weak theories get discarded. To proclaim “you’re just being difficult” to those who find a fault in a theory is not scientific. And the motives for those doing the poking is neither here nor there. All that matters is that the ppoint being raised is valid.
No disagreement on any of that, ChrisM, only I perceive also in time ahead — courtesy of that selfsame scientific method (‘way of knowing’, eg) — we will actually get at even better tools. The peeps into To-morrow after which method then dutifully must follow with its proofs and discards are indispensable, however, and indeed remain the ‘irrational’ or rather /non-rational/, third factor, like the flash of the kingfisher across the pound. Declarations by me about your ‘being difficult’ couldn’t even happen if indeed I didn’t have a bit of that knavery of my own by which to perceive yours, and I must saythat’s doubtless a good thing. Otherwise, we’d all be in a moral kindergarten forever, in the clutches in this case of ‘scientific’ maniacs who no longer would need to at least try to disguise their moral insanity.
As to motives and purposes, the push of the past and the pull of the present, these in History at least are /the/ decisive factors. This is indeed detestable but it is also the real thing. There is much to be gained in a careful meditation I find on the four-fold image, of: wrong person-wrong method, wrong person-right method, right person-wrong method and right – right (EVERY time, then anyway!) Again, quite apart from our admittedly privileged better-than-average thinking abilities, on the emotional and indeed objective feeling side, ad hominem argument is in society always the decisive one. I do not necesarily defend or oppose this, in other words, it all depends on who indeed is making the argument, very much so. If the purpose is truly progress, and hopefully to persuade (whilst not de-railing anyone from their duty to their own personality) then while we certainly cannot hope to get rid of them soon, we must carefully sort real value from the neuroses. THAT I daresy is the subjective problem that plagues us all, and necessarily I must begin always with myself. Mainly the emotionalism is a load of rubbish (people do because of poor education more often than not confuse affects for /value/), but that is just a neutral empirical fact when viewed in the right (which is to say most-useful) way:
We above all cannot hope further to progress our method if we do not so to speak try out new ways to fit all of the pieces into the puzzle, albeit in other patterns than we are reassured by because of our prior conditioning. This is not to say that some of of us are not more fortunate in our influences, nor that something or other, a concept, principle or general idea, is not to be ‘thrown out’ for immediate functional reasons, or even for a decisive period during the epoch of a further evolution of any particular mode of thought. There is such a thing as practicality, after all — but it must stand obediently always in service to the shared joy in the ever-renewing mind of men and the universe, or we are all done for.
As to the momentarily-discredited ideas and even general notions of any period, alas, cats and sins aren’t the only things to return.
I did not mean to put words in your mouth by implying that you had said I was “just being difficult”. I wasn’t in fact quoting anyone’s exact words, I was however paraphrasing the likes of Monbiot when they take issue with anyone who makes SPECIFIC challenges to aspects of MMCC.
More reworking:
Most of the prominent climate change alarmists who are not qualified in an appropriate field have a similar profile: men whose professional careers in their chosen field are going nowhere. Attaching to climate science looks like a guaranteed formula for achieving the public recognition they never possessed. Such people will keep emerging for as long as the media are credulous enough to take them seriously.
On the whole I’d be inclined to conclude that creationists and AGW alarmists are fruit from the same tree. Both operate from the standpoint of belief rather than evidence. Objective critical thinkers they ain’t.
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