Trump vs Clinton Round 3. Probably the biggest debate ever.

[claig]

Oct 20th 2 am UK time.

Last chance for the Establishment to stop the Trump surge in the polls.
World leaders will be watching, Establishments will be tuning in on the edge of their seats in trepidation.

People will be laughing, diving into the popcorn and knocking back the alcohol.

Round 3. Rock'n'roll.

kaija its all establishment lies.....

part of me would like to invite WW to my lab for a day so I could go through the process of collecting this strange stuff called 'data' and the way in which we then examine the data and then form a hypothesis, design a new experiment, test it, then publish to let others know what we did, let them attempt to reproduce it and confirm (or not obviously).

But then I realise what a total waste of time and effort it would be.

If anyone ELSE fancies a tour of biophysics lab then let me know .

We have a new spectrometer, that for reasons best known to the manufacturer lights up blue when its measuring....it also beeps to let you know its done, which is pleasing.

Ice perhaps you missed the post earlier where I mentioned about changing my mind from thinking like you lot.

Ice I agree. I think that there are all manner of heuristics involved but the beauty of the scientific method is that it allows the scientist to correct for them. Also, it allows the researcher to change their mind in the face of evidence as part of the process. Carl Sagan's famous quote that science is unique in this, relative to politics or religion, springs to mind. I wonder if politics creates partisanship in the sense that there's no mechanism to change one's mind once the process is underway, which results in favouratism of the party position over evidence.

Anyway, up too late again. It's been very interesting. Good night!

WW yes I am, I am upset with myself. It is so mind bendingly stupid to do the same thing twice and expect a different result.

In this case the stupid thing I have done is engage with a thread with you on it. This has resulted once again in provoking in me a powerful sense of despair for the human race and its inability to raise itself to any sensible level of rationality, alongside anger at wasting time trying to change the above.

four I think one of my biggest sources of daily despair is that I respect politicians for admitting their new intervention didn't work, or that on closer examination their policy wasn't right...I despair because there apparently aren't enough people who feel the same way as me to actually allow politicians to operate efficiently and to make good evidence based decisions for the common good without losing their jobs.

Arf don't worry ice you could always go and watch newsnight

Or maybe I'll go and watch qvc cos that's all I can manage

You should read Matt Ridleys Royal society lecture - would be helpful for perspective

IceBeing, I believe there are a great many people who feel as you do and who just now are feeling acutely aware of it. It is really crucial for us all to keep up the pressure on our MPs and make our voices heard. I am optimistic that the anti-intellectualism which is currently pervading political discourse is close to reaching a tipping point, and a backlash will come as people remember that "experts" are not some hostile elite but the people who cure our illnesses, enable us to seek justice, educate our children etc.

Read Matt Ridleys lecture. You really need to.

Give us a précis.

IceBeing is your tour open to those of us with a maths/engineering background who are fully onboard with anthropogenic climate change, due to a very strong interest in meteorology? I'd be really interested in a tour of a biophysics lab.

Renewables subsidies do not achieve decarbonisation
Switching to biodiesel/ethanol/using solar power in cloudy countries/wind power increases emissions
Trillion dollars spent on two decades of climate policy reduced emissions by less the one per cent
20 % rise in German rnewables= no change in emissions
Earth sciences prof at Georgia tech quoted on futility of modifying climate by reducing emissions

you can add a correlation between non-believe in climate change and anti-vaxing too. The causal factor there is the obvious complete denial of the value of the scientific method.

And the main causal factor for the complete denial of the value of the scientific method (among people with some education) comes down to intellectual laziness or lack of reasoning capacities. Hence my earlier, rather blunter post.

WW do you know who Matt Ridley is?

Hint: Ridley is not a climate science. His day job was in banking ... Ever heard of a Northern Rock?

Ugh, typos (it's early) but you get my meaning.

How does he propose climate is changed?

Or do nothing and invest in dealing with the consequences?

It brings us to the start. One thing is to doubt climate change, another is to doubt we can do anything about it or disagree on what can be done.

First, it's stupid to deny. It has already occurred and the best predictions say it will continue, although people may disagree on the speed, or the causes (human activity emissions is highly likely).
The second, it's up for discussion. Nobody ever dealt with this and people don't know how to deal with it.
So far only some governments have worried enough to act. They have acted by financial encouragement and laws.
Any effects will be long term, so mostly for our children.
The technology has advanced, ahem, tremendously in the last few years. LED are very common now, for example.
You also missed water based sources of energy.
We'll see and people will keep talking, but the main hurdle to cross in the last decades has been to convince governments that climate change is happening and that they must do something now that will only see effects in 20 years or more.

It's hilarious when some people equate climate change with establishment. It's been very far from it.
The establishment has been oil and coal based. Rooting to continue their use is madness for many reasons.

Btw, I've woken up with period pain. It would be stupid to deny it is happening and my best prediction is that it will continue.
I know pain killers act on pain, so I take one to get better. Any half arsed attempt will only reduce my pain by 1%. I need full measures (the maximum dose) to achieve any meaningful reduction in pain. But it will only take effect in 30 min, so I don't see immediate effects, but I know I have to act now or my future will be painful.
If I continued as I was, I'd be doomed.

How's that for a metaphor?

Have a sugar pill, lweji that'll sort you out

Did anyone see the gala dinner speeches.
Trump and his usual lack of sense of humour, sitting with arms crossed. Boring Hillary was actually funnier, alhough she clearly lacks in that department. She's no Obama.

Don't be ridiculous of course
I guess you had a worried little Google when you read those figures

so apart from the ad hominem moment there which I will overlook your reaction is - doesn't matter if it's useless because it's the right thing to do ? ( I admit you used a lot more words but just to say the same thing)

Because that just sounds knee jerk left wing woolliness. And of course no thought to what a trillion dollars could actually have been sort on to improve humanity's lot.

Actually, we need a third way - an 'open' science or 'open' politics (bit of an idealist, me). Yesterday, I read about Facebook banning an animated educational video showing women how to check their breasts for lumps on account of it being offensive. Wtf? We also have cases of medics turning a blind eye to things like FGM despite evidence that it's harmful. Clearly, political decisions are trumping scientific ones. Why? The taxpayers need an explanation. How can we possibly reject science in favour of superstition? Why aren't the posters on here who are so incensed about the climate change or homeopathic medicine debates equally vociferous about decisions which reject science in favour of superstition in other spheres?

www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/20/facebook-bans-swedish-breast-cancer-awareness-video-for-being-offensive

If you think he's wrong about everything by dint of being a viscount perhaps you disagree with him about climate change being real.

Sorry, not "taxpayers" but "the public".

Why aren't the posters on here who are so incensed about the climate change or homeopathic medicine debates equally vociferous about decisions which reject science in favour of superstition in other spheres?

That's funny, actually.
Because each one of us has thr mission in life to ve vociferous about every little instance and every topic.

Despite your claims that you want to know about transmission of knowledge, you seem to have got very little of the distinction between knowledge and how it's applied.