On Sun, 9 Oct 2011 14:28:59 +1100, "Trevor Wilson"
wrote:
Jeff Liebermann wrote:
On Fri, 7 Oct 2011 19:49:49 +1100, "Trevor Wilson"
wrote:
**Because a 1000+ dissenting scientists is a MINISCULE proportion of
all those who hold degrees in science. Utterly insignificant, in
fact. Think MILLIONS.
Not quite millions.
31,487 Scientists who have their doubts.
http://www.petitionproject.org
**Strawman noted.
What strawman? A straw man is a component of an argument and is an
informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.
How does citing a petition signed by 31,487 alleged scientists
constitute a misrepresentation of YOUR position.
Not much experience in climate reseach.
No never answered my question. What would you consider to be the
minimum qualifications necessary to have an opinion in the matter? A
college degree? Ability to understand the data massaging? Carnal
knowledge of statistics?
Incidentally, the last time I checked, representative democracy only
requires that the voter be able to read (but not necessarily
understand) the ballot, and sign their own name. There's no minimum
standard for intelligence, logic, political experience, or even that
they understand English. If the founding fathers wanted the
government run by academics, they would have done things quite
differently.
My guess is at least half the list of signers are bogus. That's not a
wild guess. That's from experience working with the local elections
officials counting petitions and ballots (before computers made voter
fraud easy. At the time, a typical local ballot petition would
require about 25,000 valid signatures. There was not enough time or
resources to check everyone, so we picked out a few "sheets" of
signatures, each of which had either 20 or 40 signatures. Based on
the ratio of valid to signatures on a sheet, we extrapolated the total
number of valid signatures. If it exceeded 25,000, the petition was
deemed valid. If low or close, we grabbed another few more random
sheets and did it again. From experience, at least half the
signatures were bogus. On politically volatile issues, which tends to
invite fraud, we were lucky to get 20% of the signatures valid.
So, using 20-50% valid, would 6,300 to 15,700 valid signatures be
sufficient?
And, just to reiterate: The total number of science degree holders on the
planet number in the MILLIONS. 39,000 is a pitiful number.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Petition
True. Quantity is not a great substitute for quality, but in this
case, I think it's sufficient to demonstrate that not everyone is a
true believer in the IPCC view of global warming.
So, if I want to know about orthopaedics, I'll consult with someone like Dr
Apfleback. If I want to know about climate science, I'll consult the people
who specialise in that area.
Apparently, you haven't had much dealings with the medical profession.
My experiences have been that much of the medical profession leans
towards useless procedures, defensive medicine, and padding the bill.
If I want to know something about medicine, I will ask the medical
profession for their opinion, do my own research, and then decide for
myself. Throwing oneself to the mercy of the medical profession is
suicide.
Same with climate experts. These are often the same people that can't
predict tomorrows weather successfully, but are expected to do the
same 100 years in the future. Yes, I know that there's a difference
between weather prediction and climate research, but if you look
carefully, you'll see that almost everyone with weather experience is
now also considered an expert on climate (because that is where the
funding goes). Passing our economy and our lifestyle into the hands
of the climatologist is equally dangerous. Following their lead, we
may solve or delay global warming, but at what price?
The real question is this: Why did you choose to bring up the long
discedited 'Oregon Petition'?
Please show me where it has been discredited? I did some digging and
all I could find was a bunch of unsubstantiated rubbish and word
games, such as:
http://debunking.pbworks.com/w/page/17102969/Oregon%20Petition
If you use the same criteria that the elections commission uses for
petitions, and samples the signatories, the petition would be anywhere
from 20-50% valid, which I consider good enough.
It's amazingly difficult to verify credentials and degrees.
**It is, yet you'll note that I managed one, chosen more or less at random,
with a Google search. I selected a slightly unusual name.
I have a calculator, with a substantial collection of known bugs. Duz
that make the calculator useless?
http://www.hpmuseum.org/cgi-sys/cgiwrap/hpmuseum/articles.cgi?read=735
Of course not. Even if half the buttons were broken, there would
still be enough functionality left to make the calculator usable. Same
with a petition. Even if half the signatures are bogus, the remainder
is sufficient to make the petition useful.
**The Oregon Petition has been very comprehensively debunked. Using it as an
example is putting your claims on very shakey ground.
Please show me where it has been discredited. Finding a few invalid
names does not magically discredit the entire petition.
Since the head of the IPCC, Rajendra K.
Pachauri, is an economist, and shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Al
Gore, a professional politician, precisely what qualifications do you
believe are required in order to have an opinion on the subject?
**ANYONE may have an opinion. ANYONE may present the science. Science is
science. Although helpful, a science degree is not essential to present
solid evidence of a specific area of science. When a specialist in a
particular area of scientific research makes a claim, it makes perfect sense
to take careful notice of that claim. When a non-specialist makes a claim,
it makes perfect sense to dispense with that clima, unless there is some
compelling science to accompany it.
You avoided my question. Precisely what qualifications do you believe
are required in order to have an opinion on the subject? That doesn't
mean an uninformed opinion, but rather one that you would consider to
be authoritative? Do they need to have a degree? Experience in
writing papers? Well known in their specialty? Involved in weather
or climate in some manner?
Wisdom does not come from experts. It comes from those who question
the experts.
What is your problem with Spencer?
**I have serious problems with anyone that embraces 'Creation Science' as
part of their belief system. Creationism is the most debunked, discredited
and utterly banal religious belief system on the planet. Spence is a
religious loon, who embraces 'Creation Science'.
So, you only listen to those who completely agree with your values? If
I ran background checks on my favorite scientists, politicians, and
engineers, I would find a very mixed bag of religions, party
affiliations, philosophies, and mystical practices. The mistake
you're making is that you're judging the person, not the content. Man
has fought many revolutions and wars in the name of freedom of speech,
thought, religion, philosophy, and economics. Now that almost anyone
has the right to an opinion, without risk of official retaliation, you
offer the principle that only those that are academically qualified,
politically correct, and follow the correct religions, are considered
authoritative.
**Certainly. Trouble is, Spencer is a mover and a shaker in the denialist
camp. He is a big target.
I'm not sure what you mean by "target". Assassination is not a useful
method of argumentation.
Climatologists usually don't do their
own statistics
**Don't they?
Some do, most don't. One of the reasons you see a large number of
names as authors on global warming papers is that the effort usually
involves a team of specialists. Sometimes its in collaboration with
other climatologists, but usually some of the names are statisticians,
professional writers, proof readers, and editors.
and have minimal
involvement in actual contents of the report.
**I don't know if that is the case. Do you have any evidence to support that
claim?
Not directly. Try reading the book "Disconnect" by Devra Davis:
http://www.amazon.com/Disconnect-Radiation-Industry-HasDone-Protect/dp/0525951946
The author is an epidemiologist, and one of the authors of the IPCC
working group III (Mitigation) report.
http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg3/index.php?idp=353
In her book, she details how some cell phone research reports were
allegedly edited to conform to the position of those paying the bills.
By the time the various reports were published, they had allegedly
been edited sufficiently that even the authors would have difficulty
recognizing their own work. In one case, the summary and conclusion
were changed to show a result different from what the data
demonstrated. These anecdotes were meant to alarm the readers, but is
really a fair description of how things are done in research.
--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060
http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558