…the psychologist Gary Marcus has recently put it, “it is facile to dismiss science itself. The most careful scientists, and the best science journalists, realize that all science is provisional. There will always be things that we haven’t figured out yet, and even some that we get wrong.” But science is not just about conclusions, he argues, which are occasionally (or even frequently) incorrect. Instead, “It’s about a methodology for investigation, which includes, at its core, a relentless drive towards questioning that which came before.” You can both “love science,” he concludes, “and question it.”
I agree with Marcus. In fact, I agree with him so much that I would like to go a step further: if you love science, you had better question it, and question it well, so it can live up to its potential.
And it is with that in mind that I bring up the subject of bullshit.
The term ‘Settled Science’ is a political construct.
And can be compared to Lysenkoism.
Good article reiterating what many people in this forum have identified before. It particularly pertains to the modern “environmental” movement and especially AGW nonsense. The acolytes of this rubbish simply bury the field in such an avalanche of dross that few reasonable people have the time or energy to refute any of the particulars let alone the entire debris field. Add to that the deliberate attacks launched against anyone so much as asking an embarrassing question and the bullshit swamp is left undrained due to the constant fighting off of the alligators attacking anyone who attempts to undertake the task. Further add an educational system which promotes emotional thinking over hard reasoning and recognition of the errors of logic and one produces a perfect toxic stew of bullshit served up to the scientifically illiterate. The result is billions squandered on useless windmills, the poorest and most vulnerable of the third world denied the benefits of cheap electrical energy, and children left blind from being denied an easy source of vitamin A such as golden rice.
“Settled” science has long been an issue throughout history. Certain views and concepts become official government policy or adopted as religious doctrine. The presentation of contrary data which fits any observations that are one might make is seen as an act of heresy. The opposition to the scientific writings of Copernicus and Galileo is one example of that.
Why should the debate over “climate change” be any different?
The checks and balances that used to make science self correcting are gone. Problems: Perverse incentives that reward bad research, academic conformity that severely limits skeptical debate, political correctness and the crybully culture that basically criminalizes any deviation from progressive thought. Today’s universities have all but extinguished free thought and free speech.
From what I’ve read only about 20-30% of published, peer reviewed research can be verified (not surprising given the academic environment). That’s in social science. I’m not sure what it is in physical science. There’s very little downside to bad research as long as it isn’t challenging progressive orthodoxy and a whole lot of upside. Career advancement, grants, speaking engagements and awards all hinge on publishing dramatic findings. Ones that conform to the rigid conformity of modern academics (see the heterodox academy). Meanwhile, there’s little reward for overturning bad research or challenging the underlying bias.
I’m usually cynical about politics and optimistic about science. I still that good research in applied science and technology is being done but most of that will come from outside the university environment. There’s still pockets of sanity in university level research (vaccines and some medical research) but they are the exception. The future of science belongs to institutions not bound by the progressive straight jacket.
So true. And it’s for this reason that any “peer-reviewed” research that claims to “support” the AGW theory should be dismissed out of hand.
Those of us with more critical thinking skills — like the many educated folks here on SDA — know better: it’s been proven time and again that the science behind AGW is a load of bull, and it’s been shown that the enviro-wackos (including NASA and the national academies of science) are all biased and self-serving.
I’m sick of the Media Party trying to tell me that “the science is settled” when I know that so-called “climate change” is a worldwide, coordinated, socialist conspiracy aimed at redistributing wealth away from hard-working private sector-employed conservatives in the West towards an unholy alliance of progressives, global political elites, and developing nations. This is an indisputable fact, and nothing will change my mind.
To properly assess the true value of science in our society you must first consider the available alternatives. Without ANY doubt, scientific methodology is by far the best tool we currently have to accurately and unbiasly decipher the world around us. Maybe the only one.
BUT, an MMGW denier myself, I believe this particular scientific community has completely put aside integrity and honesty in favor of furthering a PC agenda. It’s the same reason I never accept scientist’s claims made in the name of commerce at face value. These “scientists of fortune” have also created a very handy excuse for an agendized few to deny all the sciences and thus remain in their little cocoons of superstition.
Where I shake my head in disbelief is when certain zealots still preach that all all the scientific branches, paleontology, astronomy, geology, astrophysics, biology, etc, etc have NOT been seeking the truth but all have been conspiring together for decades to lie about the earth’s age and mankind’s origins.
To then claim the earth is only 6,000 years old in spite of the overwhelming evidence gathered to the contrary by multiple branches of science is the very definition of denial. Especially puzzling since many major religions have accepted Evolution as compatible with their faith. And, especially when those proposing the “Theory of Flintstones” offer no viable proof of their own theory. A triceratops with a saddle on it at the entrance of the Creationist Museum is as much tangible proof as they can muster. I am still chuckling at a comment made here yesterday about God making the rocks only appear billions of years old. I mean, wow!
I believe in modern scientific methodology but always look at it with the exact same open skepticism as I do religion and partisan politics. That is why I am a MMGW denier. That is why the faarr right scares me almost as much as the faarr left. That is why I believe Evolution is by leaps and bounds the best provable explanation yet. That is why I believe the major religions are completely and utterly mired in horseshit.
If watching the apparent fraud of MMGW take over and slowly destroy western society doesn’t ring the alarm bells as to the real dangers of people blissfully practicing blind faith, what the frig more do people need to see?
Evolution is by leaps and bounds the best provable explanation yet.
Heh, the Cambrian explosion turns Darwin’s evolutionary tree on it’s head. A biological Ponzi scheme, more to less…and then they have the problem of why evolution stopped.
No wonder so many believe in AGW.
A lie is halfway around the world, before truth gets its boots on.
Lying gives a short-term advantage,longterm loss.
Herd beasts love certitude.
Lo the Emperors New Clothes.
Now that was a nicely writ article but most people understand this instinctively.
We trust and only verify when we start to doubt.
CAGW,catastrophic anthropogenic global warming, is a beautiful example of Bull Shit.
Science is repeatedly alluded to but never actually used,pure politics/religion or gaming the marks.
The current “world economy” is mostly BS as well.
The scientific method is an amazing tool, but is so discomforting to our complacency that we shun the use and teaching there of.
To honestly apply this tool self honesty must be embraced.
Green hysteria, transcending common sentiments on a “clean”, relatively “sustainable” environment has enabled the old left to combine with the younger progressives to replace Christianity, critical thinking, and liberty to essentially justify a reversion back to feudal theocracy (statism of either variety, socialism and or fascism). Given the cultural dominance of the institutional left, I see nothing reversing this civilization-destroying phenomenon short of economic collapse of the bankrupt welfare-nanny-green theocratic state. Liberty will likely only be refreshed after a revolution, something to which the bovine Canadian masses would be quite averse.
Science, moreover its perversion, comes from the welfare-nanny-theocratic state. It has been bought and paid for with stolen loot.
The Cambrian “explosion” is further evidence for evolution, not an argument against it. Holy ignorance, Batman!
I swear strad, if God himself appeared to you and claimed he designed evolution you would tell him to go get stuffed. Evolution is one of the most retested and reaffirmed scientific theories mankind has discovered and it is currently taught in most Christian schools.
Educate yourself, man.
http://www.evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/VIIB1cCambrian.shtml
“An “explosion”?
The term “explosion” may be a bit of a misnomer. Cambrian life did not evolve in the blink of an eye. The Cambrian was preceded by many millions of years of evolution, and many of the animal phyla actually diverged during the Precambrian.
The animals of the Cambrian did not appear out of thin air. Animal fossils from before the Cambrian have been found.”
If evolution is true, one wonders why it stopped…there should be a living line, continuously evolving, all the way from one celled life to higher life forms.
If it’s true, why did it stop?
Anyway, it makes a great precedent in how to fool people into believing in AGW.
The 1968 Democratic convention was an American Communist revolt against the Cold war Foreign policy that opposed the spread of Communism. Viet-Nam was an example of the angst. The Communists LOST the argument on the convention floor & Democrats lost the Election to Nixon.. The Mayor of Chicago was a Democrat, but not a Communist and the riot was forcibly put down…
The Communist agenda since 1968 has been to suspend the American Republic & join a Global Socialist Government.. The UN agenda, first Global Cooling & then AGW are both communist constructs….The only science involved is political science.. How to fund a global Government without a violent revolution
The Convention in Philadelphia will be a repeat of Chicago.. But this time the Communist’s will demand that all the UN AGW policies be forcibly enacted. The Progressive Democrat methods have failed.. A full scale riot will take place during the administrations of a Communist President, and Communist City Major.
If Americans know what is coming…. they will enjoy the SHOW intended to shock them…
I see a lot of similarities between young earth creationists and young earth warmists. God did it/humans did it; the earth is 6000 years old/highest temp in recorded history (approx 200 years). Arguing with either also usually devolves into them preaching, being absusive or having an emotional hissy fit instead of a factual, respectful debate.
The difference is the creationists are harmless. Live and let live applies because they aren’t making demands on anyone. Creationists do make life more difficult for CAGW skeptics and lukewarmers for obvious reasons (it’s like alien abduction believers being on your side of an argument). Thankfully I think a Venn diagram of similarities between CAGW lukewarmers/skeptics and creationists have a very small overlap.
I think evolution is occurring in humans and other species. Mutations are random, mostly useless, occasionally negative and ,once in a while,positive. Even positive mutations would take many, many generations before being noticeable, if it persists at all. Regular Darwinian evolution occurs at a glacial pace. The exception is the hypotheses of punctuated equilibrium – a fast rate of evolution in response to environmental factors. Cambrian explosion, perhaps?
The evolutionists have used exactly the same kind of circular reasoning as the warmists…the theory is used to subjectively colour the facts. The subjectively coloured facts, in turn, are used to prove the theory.
Exactly the same process in both instances…the fact both evolution and AGW have stopped proves both of them wrong.
Come now people. God created the universe in 6 days and on the 7th he rested.
What did he do with the rest of the time that was allocated to him for the project??
Hmmmm–Let’s see now. There was the earthquake in Chile, a butterfly that was hovering over a flower in Canada causing a deluge in Mississippi, then there was the parting of the sea. Ooops, almost forgot, Jesus walking on water. Sadly, he can’t do that anymore now that he has holes in his feet………………
Now we have your insignificant opinion on that, any ideas on why AGW and evolution stopped?
Now that I know that stadivarious is the superior being and (most likely) knows the Creator on a first name basis, I will continue on with my walk through life and my investigation into the theory of evolution, before it does indeed, stop!
And speaking of insignificance, how can anyone claim that evolution has ”stoppped” when we know not what is beyond our nearest planets??
I’d better stop before they ”burns” a cross on my front lawn!
Indeed, evolution has never stopped and only an agendized troglodyte mired in bigotry would insist on spreading outright lies to the contrary. Also, for anyone here confused by his other lies on evolution, the only gaps in “timelines” are where more fossils are waiting to be unearthed and documented.
The good news is every Christian relative and friend in my life accepts evolution as accurate(OK, all but one….but then he also allowed his church to brainwash him into believing that his wife is his property…so he hardly warrants counting). It is now mostly a part of many Christian belief systems, certainly taught in Christian schools. Cripes, I was taught evolution in the Catholic school system back in the seventies!
As LC Bennett eluded to, the biggest problem with people spreading idiocy unchallenged on a site like this is that it makes all us Conservatives look like f*cking idiots. Thanks to all who didn’t allow that to happen on this particular thread.
Indeed, evolution has never stopped and only an agendized troglodyte mired in bigotry would insist on spreading outright lies to the contrary.
Of course evolution has stopped…just as AGW has stopped. There isn’t a living, continuously evolving line of creatures climbing out of the swamps, all in a line, evolving and marching toward higher life forms. Where the highest lifeforms could subjectively interpret fossils using a made up theory, thereby proving the theory. Just as in AGW… Therefore it stopped.
…the biggest problem with people spreading idiocy unchallenged on a site like this is that it makes all us Conservatives look like f*cking idiots.
I know, so many subscribe to the AGW fantasy…who use their theory to adjust the facts, proving their theory. Fundamentalist theory thumpers…
If evolution would have stopped, would we be discussing this over the internet?? I hardly think so!!
Evolution-fundamentalists talk a big Cause & Effect game, except when it comes to the biggest effect of them all – the creation of the universe – which they believe to be random chance. A causeless cause. How scientific! And if they claim “deterministic chaos” it’s not actually random. Sounds almost, dare I say, supernatural! Bitterly clinging to their beakers!
Speaking of butterflies, how about Biston betularia, the British moth that evolved to a dark colour to hide on the soot-stained walls during the Industrial Revolution and then evolved back to white when pollution was reduced?
Yeah, that was a total scam. Pepper moths don’t rest on tree trunks. Kettlewell had to glue the two he took a photograph of to the tree trunk. And, there aren’t only two forms of pepper moth. There are light and dark and every shade between.
Anyway, birds can see UV light…another evolutionist fraud.