Climategate continued

Here is a good editorial from the Wall Street Journal on this. It kind of says what I said earlier, if the science was so good why was any of this necessary. When Eddington tested Einstein's theory of simple relativity the results were what they were. Once it was proven, there was nothing to hide from and no fear of other scientists verifying the results. One difference here is we are dealing with probabilities and not solid facts, but something strong enough to act on and to take drastic measures based on, should be strong enough to survive a certain level scrutiny, don't you think?

I have just been wondering as this starts to unravel if more people may come out of the woodwork. For years AGW proponents have been intimidating people who might otherwise speak up questioning AGW. Skeptics risked being labeled as "deniers". As these cracks have been forming it may encourage others to reveal what they know. I don't have a lot of faith that this will turn the tide of the AGW debate. People who control government funding are still going to fund studies favorable to AGW. There is so much momentum behind AGW belief in popular culture that I don't think it can stop on a dime. To tell you the truth I don't know for certain what is real with regard to AGW and from what I have seen in the last week and a half neither does anyone else. What I do know is many people have jumped on the AGW train in the last decade without much concern for examining if it is real or not. There has been almost a religious fervour that has shouted down any real debate. Absent also has been any cost benefit analysis as to what level of global warming could be acceptable. No level of global warming is tolerable and all steps need to be taken regardless of the outcome or cost. If this means spending trillions of dollars with negligible affect, slowing our technological development, lowering our standard of living then so be it. If it means developing nations be prevented from reaching the standard of living of the US and people die due to lack of electricity and all that it brings then so be it. This is not acceptable. Millions may die as a result of AGW policies, that have not been been debated, and are based on questionable scientific evidence.

Maybe India, China, Russia and some other contries who have basically said up yours when it has been suggested they jump on the AGW train as will take an interest in disproving AGW. My personal opinion is AGW actually worked in their favor. If your competitors (us) want to run a race with weights tied around their ankles, why stop them. The populations of these countries were either more concerned with economic development or the leaders were in a position not to care what their citizens wanted.

Anyhow, I don't think this is going to be over just yet.

Meanwhile in another Universe

Steven Seagal is a cop?

In real life?

This seems to prove the theory of multiple Universes with different outcomes. So how do I get back to mine?

Climategate

I have been all over the internet reading about climeategate today and one thing has me puzzled. Here is a sample of what I found. One of the arguments, one of the more popular arguments anyway is that this is isolated and whatever happened East Anglia is only data that has been tested and verified by other scientists at other research centers. If this is the case then why the need to; a. hide data from FOI requests that would have been tested elsewhere and b. "hide the decline"? Was East Anglia the only research center that found a decline? If no other centers found declines then why not? If East Anglia had bad computer code, bad data or bad tests, why were they not concerned to cross check their results with other research centers. It just seems

Nothing Penetrates

You know, if they found emails from Christ discussing with his disciples how the water to wine thing was a simple trick with food dye, I think Christians would be quicker to lose faith than these global warming believers.

Taggart Transcontinental Waffles?

Don't tell me Rand was right and it is going to begin with waffles? Not sure what the production problems are but I find it kind of chilling in a way.

What could happen?

I'm sure nothing can go wrong with this. I saw a scientist on the History Channel talking about the LHC and how the risk is minimal because mini black holes evaporate much to quickly and eat to slowly to be a danger. This comforted me for about the expected lifespan of a mini-black hole until I realized no one has ever actually observed one and measured its lifespan or how fast it eats including the guy telling me all this in great detail. All speculation is based on theory and theories are never wrong, right? If we new definitively how mini-black holes worked we probably would not need the LHC to tell us that. Well, if they are wrong at least we may get the answer to another question, why no other intelligent life has been detected given the predictions of Drake's equation.

Bow wow

Everyone on the right seems to be going nuts over the Obama bow. Mostly concern seems to be that we are appearing week. Bow or no bow we are weak. Incredibly week. Everyone knows this. We are in debt to China for huge sums of money. I know we bowed to the Japanese emperor not the Chinese. Do you think the Chinese will be jealous? Not sure but I think we owe the Japanese some money also, just not as much. I wonder what the money the Chinese lend to us buys them. Seems to me they have a very strong hand in any negotiation. They can simply (probably not a simple as it seems) stop buying our debt. Or worse, try to call us on it. If we never bow again, does it matter?

2012

I've been looking forward to seeing the movie 2012. I might try to talk the wife into going this weekend. She is not much into disaster movies so it will be a hard sell. Personally it doesn't bother me. I like watching movies and shows about the end of the world.

Part of the reason is we are all going to die at some point. Going out with everyone else in an end that has good special effects doesn't seem to me to be any worse than wasting away with a horrible illness or gradually watching everthing being taken away from you as you die from old age. Death is usually a solitary thing so going out with everyone else might not be so lonely. This is not to say I have a death wish. Far from it. My goal is to live long enough to see science make death optional. Then to live long enough to experience everything I want to experience, to gain all the knowledge I want or can and then when I am satisfied to simply decide ok I am done.

As for end of the world scenarios, I guess I would want to avoid those that have long prolonged painful deaths possibly involving starvation. Gamma ray bursts, asteroid impacts if you are not at ground zero, likewise super volcanos, robot revolutions (I have no illusions about our chances against advanced AI despite all the Terminator movies), basically any end that cannot be observed with a final glass (or bottle) of scotch and a pack of cigarrettes (I'm a closet occasional smoker). Advanced warning would probably not be a good thing either, months or years of waiting watching society unravel as our impending doom approached might be like hell on earth. I'm not sure what this leaves as an option. The sun suddenly exploding, a rogue planet appearing out of nowhere and smashing into earth, suddenly discovering the laws of physics are not as permanent as we thought as we all go drifting out into space. Hey it could happen, we only know the effects of the laws of physics, not the cause.

Anyhow, I was saying I kinda want to see this movie.

Bad Grades

I heard about this story on Leno then saw it on Drudge. I think the only problem is it is not progressive enough. What about poor students who can't afford to buy better grades. I think it should be changed. Here is what I would propose:

1. Students from households below the poverty line automatically get a one letter grade bump.

2.Students from households above the poverty line must pay $20 to prevent their grade from dropping one letter grade. Paying an additional $20 will increase their grade by one letter grade.

3. Students from households earning more than $100k a year must pay an additional $20 to raise a poor students grade before they can pay to have their own grade raised.

Problem solved and best of all it is a life lesson in how the world really functions.

Miscellaneous Thoughts

Anyone else think that Jeff Bridges should do a movie as W.C. Fields? I keep seeing commercials for Kia where he does the voice over. I can almost imagine him saying "get away from me kid, you bother me".

I saw this morning that General George Casey cautioned against a backlash against muslims. That was my first thought too. It reminded me of the time after the Oaklahoma city bombing when President Clinton cautioned against a backlash against militias and talk radio.

I saw or seem to remember, at various points during the day, various people blathering on how diversity is part of the military's strength. If we get any stronger, we are going to need more bullet proof vests.

I had an idea this morning that I don't think has any chance in occuring. How about a constitutional amendment barring the federal government from preventing people from buying their own healthcare. Not health insurance, healthcare. If you want some treatment or medicine that the government will not pay for, the government cannot stop you from paying a doctor to treat you. I think most people would support this. It would kind of put the shoe on the other foot. Voting against it could be painted as being for the government denying people healthcare.

If or should I say when healthcare reform passes with the public option, the next step should be to try and create ways to circumvent the process. I believe in England they have allowed private medicine where people who can afford it can opt out at least on the benefits side.

Are Youth for Human Rights and Scientology linked? How come I always see their commericals together on TV?

Oh well, can't keep my eyes open, time for bed.