Re: religion help

In article <h0br98$398$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Remus Shepherd <remus@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

David Friedman <ddfr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Remus Shepherd <remus@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
No. I do not see that happening now. Scientists in the US are
breathing *much* easier since the change of administration.
The test of such a claim by politicians only comes when scientists
produce a result that the politicians don't like. Have there been any
clear examples?

In the four months since this new administration started, no, I
don't know of any examples.

I mentioned the case of arctic sea ice. If you look at a graph of the
anomaly--the difference between sea ice extent in a particular month and
its past average--it looks as though the ten year decline reversed
itself about a year and half ago. I have seen no public statements by
any of the relevant scientists of that conclusion--have you? I got onto
it after noticing a JPL page that asserted the precise opposite--that
the recent data show the shrinkage of arctic sea ice to be continuing.
The JPL is funded by NASA.

Interesting, because I just found a NASA page on how sea ice is
increasing:

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2005/sea_ice.htmlo

Remove the final o from the URL.

That's about antarctic sea ice, which has apparently been gradually
increasing for the past thirty years. The more recent stories, at least
the ones I've seen, all contain the explanation that it's somehow due to
the ozone hole, and the prediction that the expansion will be reversed
over the next century or so as the ozone hole closes. For instance:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090421101629.htm

Of course it's from 2005 so it doesn't prove either of our points.
To muddy things even more, an increase of sea ice is predicted in one
of the climate change models because of increased moisture at the poles.
So this particular example isn't going to help us decide what's 'good
science' and 'bad science' no matter how it's presented.

And it came out under the previous administration.

My point isn't really about good science vs bad science. At any given
time, there will be a range of defensible scientific views. What I am
suggesting is that any administration will use its influence, in
particular over funding, to push some views--those it believes in, or
those it wants other people to believe in--and minimize others. At the
same time, both the administration and other people, most obviously the
media, will be using their influence to get publicity for some views and
not others.

With the result that reasonable people are properly skeptical of claims
along the lines of "Science proves that humans are responsible for a
substantial rise in global temperature, which will have very serious
negative results unless something major is done to stop it."

The claim might be true--but it could be made, with same authority so
far as the evidence available to the lay reader is concerned, if it
wasn't. Such claims were made with such authority in the past with
regard to quite a lot of things, ranging from the immediate peril of
overpopulation to the dreadful effects of masturbation to the
desirability of substituting margarine for butter in order to reduce the
risk of a heart attack.

All three of those were false--the third, as we now know, lethally false
since the margarine being substituted was hydrogenated, and transfats
turn out to be more dangerous than saturated fats, not less.

Which is why I object to your claim that people who reject AGW don't
believe in science. They don't know enough about the evidence to know
whether science supports the theory or not--and it isn't even entirely
clear to me that you do. Have you actually investigated for yourself the
various arguments offered in criticism of AGW, and determined that they
are all bogus? If you want a large sample--mentioned by one person,
denied by another, with no substantial evidence by either--read through
the very long comment thread on my blog post:

http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/2009/05/sea-ice-ii-reading-graphs.html

A good deal of the point I was making in the two related posts and my
contributions to the discussion was that both sides, in practice, are
running mostly on faith, because it requires a lot of effort and a lot
of expertise to actually evaluate the evidence and arguments for
oneself.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of
_Future Imperfect: Technology and Freedom in an Uncertain World_,
Cambridge University Press.
.