Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

"Bill Wright" wrote in message
...

"Java Jive" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 6 Apr 2008 14:42:21 +0100, "Steve Thackery"
Neither Nigel Lawson, nor Bill, nor others here, are a climate
scientists, so none are qualified to speak on such issues.
We are all entitled to discuss this, because the way the alleged
climate change is being allowed to degrade our lives and affluence
owes more to politics, band-wagoning, and career-building than it does
to science.

Of course people determined to take a biased position on an issue
will
always ignore the body of evidence, however large, that contradicts
their views, and select only that evidence that seems to support
t -
like those who deny The Holocaust read mainly Nazi propaganda, or
racists selectively quote some of the work of Hans Eysenck out of
context. This thread seems to be a case in point.
In fact, it's quite hard to find anything to read that takes an
even-handed view of the alleged climate change because everyone in the
media is **** scared that if they are seen to be backing something
that goes against the pseudo-religious orthodoxy their career will be
affected adversely.

I've seen this all before. A few years ago you couldn't get a
sensible discussion about immigration because the media collectively
found the topic too hot to handle, in case someone said they were
being racist. It's still a bit touchy in that respect.

In the 70s and 80s we all sat watching endless programmes about global
cooling -- how the world was going to end up in a big lump of ice.

What you lot in your twenties and thirties need to know is that my
generation have been around long enough to have heard so much bull****
from the media and from the powers-that-be that we are total cynics.
All the media people do is keep their noses clean and look forward to
their pensions. And I've been privvy to many indiscretions from
members of the de facto ruling class that would really open your eyes.
Basically they're all looking after No. 1, and ******** to the rest of
us, who most of them have the greatest contempt for.

As long as global warming fears can be used to give spurious
'respectability' to commercial concerns they'll all shout how green
they are. Look, the other day I was in M & S at York, in the café.
There were huge notices boasting about how green M & S is, all about
how they recycle their bags and so forth. We had a simple meal for two
(just sandwiches and a bun) and at the end we had a tray absolutely
full of plastic wrappers. In other words, they pay lip service but
that's all, because they know that if they wrap things less well
people will eat elsewhere. I took some pictures of the rubbish and the
notices, and there were quite a few other people of my age around, so
we ended up talking about it. We all agreed that the greeny craze is
just a con on the public to tax us more and reduce our standard of
living. The concensus was that it's a craze that fools younger people
because they are so naive.

My generation were brought up in the spirit of the Beveridge Report.
We were brainwashed to be bolshie! By God we're going to be a problem
in the years to come! For one thing we all think we're middle class,
so we aren't going to be kicked around the way our parents were. We
won't lay on a trolley in a hospital corridor for hours without
kicking up some ****! And we won't let any government **** up our
retirement years by using greeny ******** as an excuse to take away
our hard-earned standard of living. And don't forget, there are a hell
of a lot of us. In the elections of 2010-2030 the retired vote will be
massive. Of course in the elections of 2030-2050 the Muslim vote will
be very significant. So after that there most likely won't be
elections. Thank God I'll be dead.

Bill




Written from a totally cynical standpoint - and I agree with every word
of it!

Well trousered that man.


--
Woody

harrogate three at ntlworld dot com

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

"Java Jive" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 6 Apr 2008 14:42:21 +0100, "Steve Thackery"
wrote:
(in the interests of logic, original quotes out of order)

Nigel Lawson has
written a book questioning the science and politics of global
warming.

Perhaps he needs some money to keep himself in the style to which he
has become accustomed?

he couldn't find ONE publisher in the UK to publish the
book!

Perhaps in contrast to the author, UK publishers thought it might
lose
money rather than make any?

Bill, myself and several others here are
sceptical about the issue ("bad science [snip]", to quote Bill).

Neither Nigel Lawson, nor Bill, nor others here, are a climate
scientists, so none are qualified to speak on such issues.

Nor are political activists and politicians but they are the ones who
are steamrollering through ever more ridicules 'environmental'
legislation. :~(


In this group there have been frequent complaints that the BBC is
run
by "bean counters" rather than "technical people" - etc, etc -
with
few, if any, voicing disagreement with such posts. How strange,
therefore, that certain members of the group should rush to buy a
book
on a scientific topic written by someone whose training was not that
of a scientist, not even that of a bean counter, but, even worse, a
bean counter journalist!

But he is (like others, including you) entitled to his views, can you
not see the difference between someone airing personal opinion and
someone in a position of authority acting on personal/party opinions -
the classic example of this is the mixed up thinking on recycling,
political dogma has over taken the pure science of what needs to be
done and how in the UK. If his book makes people think, even if his
(personal) end conclusions are woefully wide of the mark, he will have
achieved something worthwhile - in fact just making people discuss the
subject he has gone some way towards that and the book hasn't even
been published in the UK yet!

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

"Woody" wrote in message
...
"Bill Wright" wrote in message
...
Written from a totally cynical standpoint - and I agree with every word of
it!

Ohh, it's wonderful to find out I'm not the only one in the world! You
always think it's just you don't you? Then you realise there are other boys
in the playground with similar dispositions . . .


Well trousered that man.
Not sure what that means, but thank you.

Bill

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

"Bill Wright" wrote in message
...

snip

So after that there most likely won't be elections. Thank God I'll
be dead.


That rather sums up the head in the sand "Climate Change doesn't
exist" mentality of some of the older generations...

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

In article , Bill Wright wrote:
Look, the other day I was in M & S at York, in the café. There were*
huge notices boasting about how green M & S is, all about how they recycle*
their bags and so forth. We had a simple meal for two (just sandwiches and a*
bun) and at the end we had a tray absolutely full of plastic wrappers. In*
other words, they pay lip service but that's all, because they know that if*
they wrap things less well people will eat elsewhere.

Twenty-five years ago in any works canteen you would be served using china
crockery, metal cutlery and tea out of a real teapot. Now it's nearly all
throwaway plastic (unless you're management of course). Perhaps some bean-
counter has worked out that it's cheaper to discard plastic which has had a
useful life of a few hours than to pay human beings to wash the dishes.

Rod.

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

I've already plonked Bill, so I'll let most of his rubbish go straight
through to the trash, where it belongs ...

On Mon, 07 Apr 2008 06:36:07 GMT, "Woody" wrote:

"Bill Wright" wrote in message
...

"Java Jive" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 6 Apr 2008 14:42:21 +0100, "Steve Thackery"
Neither Nigel Lawson, nor Bill, nor others here, are a climate
scientists, so none are qualified to speak on such issues.
We are all entitled to discuss this

Of course you are, but not here, find yourselves a more appropriate
forum where such posts are on-topic. I was merely pointing out that
neither you nor Nigel Lawson should be considered experts, that being
cynical doesn't make you an expert. (I grant that the 'speak' above
should perhaps have been actually written 'speak with authority', as
by common parlance it was intended to be read.)

In fact, it's quite hard to find anything to read that takes an
even-handed view of the alleged climate change because everyone in the
media is **** scared that if they are seen to be backing something
that goes against the pseudo-religious orthodoxy their career will be
affected adversely.

I've seen this all before.

So have I. The difference between us is that when I see a report that
doesn't make scientific sense, I try to find a better report or go
back to the original source, and if I see an example of business
'greenwash', I try to spend my money elsewhere.

A lack of counter-global-warming viewpoint probably simply reflects
the increasing consensus of the scientific community(*).

I am probably even more cynical than yourself on issues such as
business 'greenwash, but such practices shouldn't be allowed to
distract from the facts that MMGW is now accepted as fact by the
scientific community, and that we need to address it, and address it
adequately.

What you lot in your twenties and thirties

Stereotyping is not thought, it's the lazy man's substitute for
thought, it is not being arsed to think. Anyway, I am in my 50s.

Written from a totally cynical standpoint

As was my post.

and I agree with every word
of it!

You need to be more discriminating.

* As far as the reporting of scientific issues is concerned, probably
the BBC are more even-handed than most. Ignoring the big story news
bulletin headlines and concentrating on their Tech/Science RSS feeds,
and programmes such as 'Science In Action', they are *mostly* quite
good. The worst things about them and science reporting in general
a
1) Dumbing down and over-simplification.
2) The atrocious journalese now prevalent, which conveys less meaning
and is more tiresome to read than the good English of former years.

1 has been mentioned many times here, here's a current example of 2:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7329444.stm

If you read the first six paragraphs of the original report, I hope
you would agree that they would convey better meaning, flow more
naturally, and be easier to read, if paragraphed and presented in a
logical order, such as:

"""
A controversial theory of physics may explain some aspects of galaxy
behaviour better than more widely accepted ideas.

Astronomer Garry Angus, from St Andrews University, presented details
of a study of eight 'dwarf' galaxies at the UK National Astronomy
Meeting in Belfast.

The study proposes Modified Newtonian Dynamics (Mond) effects, as an
alternative to the widely accepted theory of dark matter, to explain
the dynamics of such galaxies.
"""

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

I've already plonked Bill, so I'll let most of his rubbish go straight
through to the trash, where it belongs ...

Hah! Obviously you're an open-minded kind of guy, without prejudice and
willing to listen to dissenting points of view. (NOT).

I don't claim to know much about climate science. However, I am old enough
and experienced enough to recognise when something smells dodgy.

The problem faced by scientists is that their funding is determined to a
large extent by politics (in the larger, human sense). At the moment we DO
have a degree of cultural hysteria about global warming. And the problem is
that - if a scientist wants funding - they've pretty well got to jump onto
that bandwagon.

This, sadly, has so often been the case for science, but this current
situation is certainly pretty severe. For instance, suppose a scientist
asked for funding to study.....

"The breeding habits of tree squirrels"

....they may well find it quite tough to get funding. Now imagine they
reworded their study to.....

"The effects of global warming on the breeding habits of tree squirrels"

....they would be FAR more likely to get funding. (Admit it - you know
that's true).

So OF COURSE most scientists are jumping on the global warming bandwagon!
The "market" for their research is hungry for ANYTHING to do with global
warming, so that is where they target their "products". This does NOT in
itself make global warming a big problem.

Can you see that crucial difference?

Let me finish by saying that I am NOT a head-in-the-sand global warming
naysayer. At the moment I am unconvinced but open-minded. However, I get
VERY concerned when I see the scientific community so powerfully in thrall
to what is, essentially, a political fervor. In these circumstances we CAN
expect to see some bad science. Why? Because scientists are human, and
science is hard. And science progresses by stumbling in and out of numerous
blind alleys on its way forward.

Just because lots of scientists are banging on about human-induced global
warming doesn't make it true. It just means they are responding to the
political climate and the "market" for their research. Which they must, if
they want more funding.

SteveT

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

Bill Wright wrote:

In fact, it's quite hard to find anything to read that takes an even-handed
view [...]

I thoroughly recommend David MacKay's forthcoming book "Sustainable
Energy - Without the Hot Air". You can download a draft version from
http://www.withouthotair.com/.

--
Andy

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

Of course people determined to take a biased position on an issue will
always ignore the body of evidence, however large, that contradicts
their views, and select only that evidence that seems to support it.......

I disagree. My position (and, I believe, Bill's), is simply that I am
unconvinced but open-minded. I am also concerned.

My concern is that much of the science is driven by political hysteria,
which is a VERY bad way to ensure good science gets done.

The "body of evidence" you refer to is astonishingly weak. There is plenty
of evidence that the globe is getting warmer, but the evidence that it is
HUMANS WHO ARE CAUSING IT is extremely weak, and almost all of it is arrived
at by climate modelling.

Bearing in mind how unreliable our weather forecasts are (which also use
computer models), we should be sceptical (but not entirely dismissive) of
computerised climate models.

So, "sceptical" is the way to be about the evidence; and "concerned" is the
way to be about the political pressure on the scientific community (because
it can lead to bad science).

SteveT

Seriously OT - primarily for Bill
 

There were huge notices boasting about how green M & S is, all about how
they recycle their bags and so forth. We had a simple meal for two (just
sandwiches and a bun) and at the end we had a tray absolutely full of
plastic wrappers.

Hear, hear! I was nauseated when Gordon Brown announced he wanted to ban
carrier bags. What a complete load of ********.

OK, we can all agree that there is too much landfill going on, especially of
materials which won't bio-degrade. IF we want to take this issue seriously,
then we should undertake a SERIOUS review of all the sources. In
particular, the massive overuse of packaging materials in most walks of
life.

I could live with discouraging the use of carrier bags IF it were part of a
much larger, and properly serious, initiative to reduce packaging waste
throughout the retail industry. Indeed, I suspect we would all welcome
that.

But to think that banning carrier bags is a worthwhile thing, whilst
completely ignoring every other source of packaging waste, is stupid and
inane, and is nothing other than lip-service.

SteveT