I've taken the liberty of starting a thread specifically for the AGW hardcore...that is, those who just can't, or won't accept that the debate isn't over, and that humanoids are responsible for global warming.

All the links I post here are bona fide, card carrying, denier bashing, global warming zealot blogs or websites. Some are genuinely scientifically based, such as Gavin Schmidt's. Others are just clever sites to con you out of your hard earned dollars...but you have to decide which is real, and ....which is an illusion.

You can't just read one side and know the truth. Science IS both sides of argument, and sometimes 3 sides. The beauty of science is its constant evolution.



Starting with WorldChanging:

Climate "skepticism" is not a morally defensible position. The debate is over, and it's been over for quite some time, especially on this blog.

We will delete comments which deny the absolutely overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change, just as we would delete comments which questioned the reality of the Holocaust or the equal mental capacities and worth of human beings of different ethnic groups. Such "debates" are merely the morally indefensible trying to cover itself in the cloth of intellectual tolerance.

So, if you're a climate skeptic, you may be well-intentioned and you're certainly welcome to your opinion, but we're not interested.

Thanks.

http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/008132.html

Gavin Schmidt, Michael Mann, Casper Ammann are principle hosts of Real Climate...Climate science from climate scientists

http://www.realclimate.org/

This might just get you thinking for your self again http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/

It did me! I've been a global warming alarmist since the 60s, but no more.

I've reviewed the science with a newly open mind.

Here it is: http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/ read it, then tell me where you stand.

(wrong)

bradcan
Thanks for the link
But common sense and logic are feeble tools against panic .

Dave

Reality Check
The Global Warming Debate Is Over. It's Real, Inexorable, and Headed Our Way


"In 1995, more than 2,000 scientists from 100 countries reported to the United Nations that our burning of oil, coal and natural gas is changing the Earth's climate. Five years later, many of the same researchers are very troubled by two things: The climate is changing much more quickly than they projected even a few years ago; and the systems of the planet are far more sensitive to even a very small degree of warming than they had realized. Average U.S. temperatures, the report said, will rise by five to 10 degrees Fahrenheit (F) by the end of the 21st century."

http://www.emagazine.com/view/?1049

my comments:

....In actuality, many of those aforementioned scientists who were submitting authors to the IPCC contested the language of the IPCC editors. In many instances where the IPCC used the terms "likely", "very likely", or "probable" the contributing scientists, those that were the very authors of the scientific papers and journals used to base the AR4 and SPM upon, objected and in many cases their objections were rejected.

The fact is, and well documented, that the Summary For Policy Makers (SPM) was released 3 months prior to the release of the underlying report upon which the SPM was based....and in the IPCC's own words....

"Changes (other than grammatical or minor editorial changes) made after acceptance by the Working Group or the Panel shall be those necessary to ensure consistency with the Summary for Policymakers or the Overview Chapter."--from the IPCC procedural document

?????? The literal translation is that the science is to conform to the policy. As noted climatologist Tim Ball states, "This is like an Executive writing a summary and then having employees write a report that agrees with the summary."

Gray and McIntyre's objections were repeatedly rejected, even when they pointed out that the IPCC's own statements were inconsistent. Richard Lindzen's work is cited by the IPCC, and he disagrees with them.

Even Penn & Teller are skeptical..........
http://www.climatechangefraud.com/content/view/178/218/

(click on part 1)

Scientific consensus is not the same as scientific proof. Its just an opinion poll of scientists. I know some of they guys on the UN list personally and they work in fields with zero connection to climate. One of them was a freakin sociologist who lied about the existance of his Ph.D. another is a pharmakinetisist. He can tell you how drugs are metabolised, but certainly knows less about the climate than I do and he would tell you that if he met you.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

The evidence shows that temperature and CO2 concentrations have a correlation of between .4 and .9. It also shows a lag of about 800 years between the two events.

The higher probability scenario is therefore that temperature increase causes increased levels in CO2.

The only actual hard evidence is that the earth's temperature has increase by .7 degrees F since the start of the industrial revolution. This is well within the reading error of a thermometer. The instrument used by the various Empire outposts to measure this rise in temperature.

If one looks at the actual records themselves at the British Museum one can see that jumps of 1 or 2 degrees on average took place when one colonial officer retired and another replaced him. The same thermometer was used but one guy simply read it differently than the other.

Al Gore's inability to to report anything but the most extreme of temperature rises has made his position a joke.

Meanwhile the biggest US network promoter of wind energy is NBC, the third largest producer of wind turbines and the largest producer of natural gas powered generators is GE. Who also owns NBC. Can ya see the link here!

Its got nothing to do with real science and everything to do with greed.

That being the case, figure out something to machine that you can sell to the alternative energy cause. It isn't stoppable, so we may as well all make a nice living from it.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Too bad we gave back the .7 degree this year already.

As for the alternative energy machine, it doesn't have to really work. All you need is lots of political pull and some prestige. Energy Conversion Devices comes to mind. I remember when the former CEO of General Motors sat on the board, and the local paper dutifully printed an article written by him detailing the coming Hydrogen Economy. Nobody cared that hydrogen isn't a fuel. The tax and stock swindle went on anyway, and continues unabated, even though the noise about using hydrogen as a fuel (which it isn't) has died down. They just received a huge tax gift from the state of Michigan to build a plant that will produce energy-negative solar power panels. I haven't checked since a few months ago, but up to that time, you still couldn't go on their website and buy anything that they make and sell. Just stock info, and a whole lot of ordure about alternative energy. The cashing-in has been going on for a long time now, and with farm subsidies and HUGE grants to ADM, they are busily getting ever more people lined up at the tax dollar trough. Those who invest in these companies deserve the fleecing they are certain to get. The politicians who dole out this money and the press that fawns over them for being socially responsible deserve much worse, and for me to say what they deserve would be in bad taste.

--97T--

..... using hydrogen as a fuel (which it isn't)....--97T--

I have a reputation for being picky and pedantic so I may as well confirm it.

Hydrogen can be, is, a fuel, but it is not an energy source. Most people confuse the two.

OK, let's go there, because I know you're very good at it.

I make the distinction between "fuel" and "energy carrier" as follows:

Fuel is something you can obtain from nature, getting more usable energy for your purposes than it takes to get it and transform it into a usable form, because nature has stored the energy in it and it remains only for the energy to be captured and liberated somehow.

An energy carrier is a means of transporting or storing the energy originally obtained from the fuel.

So, by my meaning a river, the wind, the sun, oil, and coal qualify as examples of fuels (or potential fuels if they can be harnessed efficiently).

And a battery, electricity, compressed air, or hydrogen are energy carriers. Although they might seem like fuel in a strictly localized sense, in the larger view, they cannot be, since they only store or transport energy that we must ourselves first capture somewhere else and impart to them (with losses, made up for by convenience).

Deeper into semantics, I expect that the concept of 'fuel' is a human-oriented concept, presupposing the idea of who it is for and what its purpose is, wrapped up with concept of efficiency measured by energy returned versus energy expended to get it. So, hydrogen could be considered a fuel by the thief who steals it, but never by the person who has to buy it or produce it. You can run an oil rig off the energy it delivers, but I've never found a hydrogen well to invest in.

In sum, the way I use the term, the idea of "fuel" subsumes the concept of "energy source", combining it with the concept of "useful".

Do you think I've got it backward?

I hope everything is going well for you up there in your neck of the woods. Cheers,

--97T--

......Do you agree?.....--97T--

Not necessarily.:)

But I am getting too old and mellow to bother arguing.

It's past my bedtime, so I'm off for a snooze. Good night to you and yours.

--97T--
I'm gettin' old too!

Fuel is something consumed to produce energy. Energy only flows one way, from hot to cold.

The more potential energy in the fuel souce the more heat it can produce. If it takes one fuel to create another, there is always a loss of some of the energy used. The problem with alternative fuels is that they are often so outrageously energy expensive to produce.

The idiocy of some of the 'solutions' to not using petroleum as a fuel source does nothing short of amaze me.

This forum has given me more hope than just about anything in recent years about the debate about climate change and its solution in alternative energy sources. My reasoning is that it is probable that the people on this forum are more representative of what the general public really thinks and understands than all of the rubbish ginned up by the press and the government.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Sorry to get pedantic, but it's only fuel if you get more energy out than it takes to get it.

The distinction is crucial because that's how they pull the old switcheroo on the public, pushing devices that take many years to return the energy it takes to make them (if they don't break) as 'alternative energy'. And pushing taxohol, err, alcohol, which barely breaks even if at all, and only exists because of huge subsidies.

If you have to put more energy into producing it than you can get out of it, it ain't a fuel, it's an energy carrier like electricity, only it's wasteful and feeds the tax pigs. You'd be money ahead to use a real fuel for less money, and burn half the money you save. You'd have more energy and more money, too.

Sorry to harp on that, but the public needs to learn to make that distinction.

--97T--

.....Sorry to harp on that, but the public needs to learn to make that distinction.

--97T--

Okay, get onto Morton Thiokol (I think that is the name) and tell them they do not make Solid Fuel Booster Rockets they make Solid Energy Carrier Booster Rockets. :)

Aha, good one. Now, where do they mine that stuff?

'Nite!

--97T--

I make the distinction between "fuel" and "energy carrier" as follows:

Fuel is something you can obtain from nature, getting more usable energy for your purposes than it takes to get it and transform it into a usable form, because nature has stored the energy in it and it remains only for the energy to be captured and liberated somehow.


I would define a fuel as a reducing agent that can release useful energy when combined with an oxidizing agent, usually by means of high temperature combustion.

An economically viable fuel is one that takes less energy to obtain than is released when burnt and where that energy released is worth more than it cost to obtain and utilize the fuel.

Rockets are sometimes propelled by burning fuels. The space shuttle has a massive liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen propulsion system that cost a boat load of money (perhaps more than the mission is really worth), but I think here the H2 is clearly a fuel. A solid "propellant" usually contains both the oxidizer and reducing agent and needs no air. Other fuels, such as kerosine may be used as a "propellant" if a separate oxidizer is added.

If hydrogen is not a fuel because it is obtained synthetically, then all of the gasoline other than that obtained by means of distilation is also not a fuel. A lot of gasoline is made by cracking long carbon chains, and in some cases recombining them with hydrogen - this is clearly true for the coal from oil process such as used by SASOL. If this process cost more than the fuel is worth, that makes the whole operation questionable, but synthetic fuel works just like petroleum distilate.

Fuels have high energy densities and by definition carry a lot of chemical potential energy, but are useless without oxidizers. A battery is an energy carrier because it can be (re)charged and there is no flame...

http://w3.sasol.com/annual2001/br_synfuels.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_fuel

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=rocket+fuel


EDIT Durn you guys are quick. It took me half an hour to come up with this post...

It's not whether it's synthetic, it's whether it provides a net energy gain or not. If it doesn't, it still might be used for convenience, like compressed air, steam, or chemical solid rocket propellants.

But you wouldn't be able to use them if they were the only thing you had.

Even the things that I stubbornly maintain are fuels, are really only energy carriage or storage mechanisms, I admit. The difference is that mother nature put the energy in for us. From the food we eat to the way we power our civilization, if it didn't already exist in a higher energy state for easy conversion to our benefit, the concept of fuel as such couldn't even exist.

If we lived on a planet where everything were already reduced to its lowest energy level, all ashes, and no solar radiation, there would be no fuel (and no "us"), and therefore no means to extract energy to put into energy carrier schemes.

It takes a lot of fuel to make hydrogen.

So I tell hydrogen buffs, "Hydrogen is not a fuel. It's an energy carrier like electricity, but it's a lot more wasteful and less convenient than electricity, so it's not even a good energy carrier. There's more hydrogen in a gallon of gasoline than there is in a gallon of liquid hydrogen. And the only hydrogen economy that will ever exist besides industrial uses will be tax and stock swindles foisted upon an ignorant public."

Cheers,

--97T--

Hi,

I'm sorry but you are not being pedantic you are being incorrect. Ethanol from corn is a fuel even though it takes way more energy to make it and therefore costs more than its real market value when compared to gasoline. The form of the fuel or the thermo-kinetics required to turn its raw materials into a fuel are not relevant to its definition.

The distinction I think you made earlier about energy carriers is interesting and I think I agree with you on that point.

The only reason to look at alternative fuels and energy, is the belief that somehow using them will cause less CO2 to be formed.

I'm sure we both agree that for the most part therefore alternative fuels do not meet that requirement.

Part of the problem is that the actual lifetime environmental foot-print of solar panels and wind-turbines simply are not examined in any 'real' way.

Vestas says the lifetime carbon dioxide foot-print of a 1.5 wind-turbine is paid back in 9 months. However they go on to state that this is true only if you allow them to pass back the carbon foot of the materials used to make the wind-turbine back onto the guys who make those materials. Pretty convenient for Vestas because making wind-turbines uses dozens of tons of fibreglass, vinyl-ester resins, balsa core, methacrylate or epoxy adhesives, steel, etc. There is a load of carbon emitted in the processing of those materials.

The bigger problem I think we also agree on, that is most people are too incurious to actually look at the global climate issue to the point where they can have anything more than a completely baseless opinion on the topic.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

[QUOTE=dynosor;483492]I would define a fuel as a reducing agent that can release useful energy when combined with an oxidizing agent, usually by means of high temperature combustion.

Your definition completely takes all forms of nuclear energy out of the fuel category. There is no oxygen required to get energy from Uranium.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

.....Your definition completely takes all forms of nuclear energy out of the fuel category. There is no oxygen required to get energy from Uranium.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Hi,

I'm sorry but you are not being pedantic you are being incorrect....

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Yippee! An ally, of sorts, if I am not being presumptuous. :)

97T I think you have encountered someone even more nit picky than me.

I don't see eye to eye with him on all his posts but if he can out nit picky me I will concede defeat in this area.

Don't be offended Bloefeld, I am perfectly happy to take reciprocal joshing, and worse without suffering.

[quote=dynosor;483492]
Your definition completely takes all forms of nuclear energy out of the fuel category. There is no oxygen required to get energy from Uranium.



Darn, and I thought my statement was so well thought out :)

Ok, fuel is anything that is consumed to release useful energy. If that release is chemical, net mass inside the system remains constant; if nuclear, some mass is converted to energy.

Is that better?

[quote=bloefeld;483671]


Darn, and I thought my statement was so well thought out :)

Ok, fuel is anything that is consumed to release useful energy. If that release is chemical, net mass inside the system remains constant; if nuclear, some mass is converted to energy.

Is that better?

A fuel is any substance that can, in itself, or in combination with other substance(s), undergo electronic or nuclear transitions that release chemical or nuclear potential energy, in the form of heat or electrical potential energy, in a controllable manner.

An explosive is the same thing with the addition of 'un' in front of the controllable.

Actually you do get a mass change with the release of chemical potential energy, very small though. You have to have a mass change, Albert said so.

I think we are all getting a bit pedantic. Which invokes one of my favourite bumper stickers "Eschew Pedantry."

The good thing is that everyone has managed to not get booged down by being offended and defencive. And I might be getting a tad too nicky-picky.

The humour is the necessary ingredient to keeping it so, and I especially appreciate, that it is in abundance here.

To add some fuel to the fire, what is the difference between a battery, which is just a medium to store potential energy, and the same amount of energy stored in gasoline? Why would one not simply categorize them as the same thing instead of making an artificial distinction between fuel and its storage medium?

Or am I missing something?

Cheers,

Bloefeld

PS, I just figured out the distinction I think. The analogy would be electricity to battery and gasoline to gas tank.

Fuel vs Not-Fuel?
...that's not an argument...

THIS is an argument!!
YouTube - Einstein's Idiots # 8 -- The H-Atom

Particle vs Wave vs Cloud vs String....
...don't make no difference to me, long as my check clears and I don't get hit by a flyin' coffee cup!!

....To add some fuel to the fire, what is the difference between a battery, which is just a medium to store potential energy, and the same amount of energy stored in gasoline?.......


PS, I just figured out the distinction I think. The analogy would be electricity to battery and gasoline to gas tank.

Not entirely; the battery hosts an electrochemical reaction which converts chemical potential energy to electrical energy. The gas tank does not host any reaction (you hope).

A battery is an energy storage device as opposed to an energy storage medium, aka fuel.

But how about the flow through batteries, Google 'VRB Systems', is the electrolyte that flows through these a fuel? It has an equivalent relationship to the 'battery' which it flows through as hydrogen has to a fuel cell.

To end; what is wrong with being pedantic and insisting that people say what they mean, mean what they say and all use the same conventions for nomenclature. If I ask you to bore a 5" hole to within two tenths what variation will I accept? Hint: I am a Machinist (among other things).

If I ask you to bore a 5" hole to within two tenths what variation will I accept?


Your verbal "spec" is 4.9 to 5.1", but you will probably accept something outside of that.

By "tenth", you don't mean 1/10,000" do you? That is gonna cost you.

Your verbal "spec" is 4.9 to 5.1", but you will probably accept something outside of that.

By "tenth", you don't mean 1/10,000" do you? That is gonna cost you.

When a Machinist says tenth to another Machinist it is understood as 1/10 of a thousandth of an inch, 0.0001"; within two tenths is +/-0.0002".

Why should it 'cost', plus/minus two tenths is well within the capacity of a decent CNC lathe or mill.

When communicating to non-machinists it is necessary to be pedantic and spell it out to avoid ambiguity.

Why should it 'cost', plus/minus two tenths is well within the capacity of a decent CNC lathe or mill.

When communicating to non-machinists it is necessary to be pedantic and spell it out to avoid ambiguity.


To achieve and measure tolerances of "tenths" requires temperature control on a 5" diameter piece of steel or aluminum - assuming it has a minimum wall thickness, then large enough to contain a 5" diameter hole... Do you keep your CNC machines and measurement tools at 20 degrees C or is the part made from invar?

Your question was "If I ask you to bore a 5" hole to within two tenths what variation will I accept?" Notice I asked about your "verbal spec"? If you are serious about tolerancing, put it on a drawing to form the basis of your business contract. If it is important or expensive, "ask" in writing using numbers!

....If it is important or expensive, "ask" in writing!

Sheesh talk about being picky!!!!!!!!!!

My question was not even aimed at you.

The question was posed in the context of pedantry and conventions for nomenclature; go back and read the post. You are allowed to follow the words with your finger and mouth them if it helps you get the point.

I am well aware of thermal expansion, and if I was specifying a tolerance of plus or minus two tenths on a diameter of five inches I gues I would have to specify a temperature for completeness.

You amuse me, this is not the first time you have taken an antagonistic attitude to something I have posted when it was not really necessary. I suggest you learn to mellow out and if you don't like what I post then don't read it.

You amuse me... The question was posed in the context of pedantry


That is why I do it. My response is an illustration of pedantry in action. As seen in its natural habitat; on the hoof, as it were. :)

NIST standard calibration is at 68deg F, but many companies have gone to using 74deg F as a standard for manufacturing and QC,, as a practical measure.

I always love getting tolerances that the end user can't measure, and they won't know if the part's right or not anyway.

...........................but back to my consensus focus....

"....As Deltoid quickly noticed the most egregious error is a completely arbitrary reduction (by 66%) of the radiative forcing due to CO2. He amusingly justifies this with reference to tropical troposphere temperatures - neglecting of course that temperatures change in response to forcing and are not the forcing itself. And of course, he ignores the evidence that the temperature changes are in fact rather uncertain, and may well be much more in accord with the models than he thinks...."
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/07/once-more-unto-the-bray/#more-583

...my comments...
But an increase in temp would have a forcing effect(it's in the feedback, which is part of the whole "tipping point" theory).....then there's the statement that "temperature changes are rather uncertain..." Huh? I thought that was what this was all about. Temp changes WERE certain, and that's why we've spent $2Billion on research to prove it.

Huh? I thought that was what this was all about. Temp changes WERE certain, and that's why we've spent $2Billion on research to prove it.


The King of Consensus has spoken: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/30/AR2008033001880.html?hpid=topnews (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/30/AR2008033001880.html?hpid=topnews)

"Former vice president Al Gore will launch a three-year, $300 million campaign Wednesday aimed at mobilizing Americans to push for aggressive reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, a move that ranks as one of the most ambitious and costly public advocacy campaigns in U.S. history."


If only a very few people still disagree that GW is a problem, why does Gore need to spend $300 million to persuade them about anything? Why doesn't he just ignore them if there is already a consensus?

Because the $300M is just the advertising budget for Gore's carbon offsetting business. http://www.generationim.com/philosophy/

You'll keep in mind that Gore has a "zero carbon footprint"...that's because he takes the money out of his left pocket and puts it in his right pocket..the one labeled GIM.

The list of partners in GIM is most enlightening, giving real insight into the motives for Gore's moves. Behind the scenes it's profit, profit, profit. ....

...All at your, your, your expense.

....Then again, you could invest your money, if you're really a believer...

CT Investment Partners LLP is the fund management advisory business which advises Carbon Trust Investments on its investment activity. It also supports the Carbon Trust on its activities with the Low Carbon Seed Fund venture with Imperial Innovations and Shell Foundation. It is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. To contact the fund advisory team please send an email to invest@carbontrust.co.uk or phone +44 (0)20 7170 7000.

http://www.carbontrust.co.uk/investments/venturecapital/CTInvestmentPartners.htm

They've got a great portfolio!!

I took a weekend off to move all my equipment to a new location, starting a new enterprise. Going from being an employee to risking everything again. So I just got caught up on reading the posts here.

I suppose the consensus is now that I can regard steam, electricity, and elevated mass as fuels?

I liked the video linked to above. Conventional science has a few other contradictions (meaning perhaps gaps in my own understanding, of course) besides those mentioned in it.

--97T--

I....I suppose the consensus is now that I can regard steam, electricity, and elevated mass as fuels?...
--97T--

No, read the definitions proposed for fuels(s).

Steam could be considered an energy carrier but it is not a fuels because it does not undergo a chemical or nuclear change just a phase change.

Electricity is a form of potential energy arising from the separation of charge; i.e., arising from the electrical force.

Elevated mass is gravitational potential energy arisinf from the gravitational force.

My guess is that you are using the word 'consensus' tounge-in-cheek?

Yes, it was tongue-in-cheek.

To civilization at large, fuel is something that nature put the energy into, that we can use. If civilization at large tries to use anything else as fuel, it must first find real fuel to get the energy to put into it. Whether it burns or not.

The New Messiah was in my state yesterday, with a 'serious speech' on energy policy. Billions of dollars promised to the car companies to make electric cars. It's just insane! And irritating that our public schools turn out people that just accept this stuff uncritically.

--97T--

Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere:
Steps for Understanding and Reconciling Differences
Final Report, Synthesis and Assessment Product 1.1

http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-1/finalreport/default.htm

[QUOTE=Geof;483822]Not entirely; the battery hosts an electrochemical reaction which converts chemical potential energy to electrical energy. The gas tank does not host any reaction (you hope).

A battery is an energy storage device as opposed to an energy storage medium, aka fuel.

I can see your point, but what about an actually useful battery that one could recharge. The recharge energy could be thought of as the fuel that makes the chemical reaction possible.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

When a Machinist says tenth to another Machinist it is understood as 1/10 of a thousandth of an inch, 0.0001"; within two tenths is +/-0.0002".

Why should it 'cost', plus/minus two tenths is well within the capacity of a decent CNC lathe or mill.

When communicating to non-machinists it is necessary to be pedantic and spell it out to avoid ambiguity.

As a non-machinist, that is a very useful bit of information. Thanks,

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Yes, it was tongue-in-cheek.

To civilization at large, fuel is something that nature put the energy into, that we can use. If civilization at large tries to use anything else as fuel, it must first find real fuel to get the energy to put into it. Whether it burns or not.

The New Messiah was in my state yesterday, with a 'serious speech' on energy policy. Billions of dollars promised to the car companies to make electric cars. It's just insane! And irritating that our public schools turn out people that just accept this stuff uncritically.

--97T--

This Obama thing is something that we of a certain age in Canada are more than aware of. We had Pierre Elliot Trudeau the Canadian Obama of the latter part of last century.

The result is the Canada of today. We may never get over it. We have universal health-care, which is great unless you actually really need health-care. If you need a diagnosis of something that hasn't actually more or less killed you, be prepared to wait months or even years to see a specialist. Of course it takes about 25% of the treasure of the country.

Forget about freedom of speech, if you say something that might offend someone, you are frog-walked in front of a quasi-judicial board (both National and Provincial) where you are forced to prove your innocence because you are assumed guilty. You have no recourse to their decisions.

The 'African American's' of Canada are the French in Quebec. If you were a 25 year old with a masters degree in some or other soft science and wished to advance in the Federal Bureaucracy, you had best have been born in the Ottawa - Quebec City corridor, or you ain't going anywhere.

However here is what I find amazing in the US Presidential Election (for the past few years I have been lucky enough to spend the winter in Southern California) is that notwithstanding that the press is bent on getting the Obamarama elected, he is still in a dead heat with an old white guy.

I think the folks down there are lying when they give their opinions to pollsters; I think when they pull the lever (or whatever it is) in November, lots of them are going to say "there is no way I am voting for the black guy." He helps this cause by having no actual policy on anything that isn't subject to change in a heart-beat. He is the pure cynic, in that he will say anything to get elected. Even the most bone-headed people eventually figure out that they can't buy something without first having some inkling of what it will do.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

I've spent a lot of time doing business in Canada, the politics there are as inexplicable to me as they are here. Just like here, you usually can't find anyone willing to admit that they voted for the looters. By the way, here along the border, the health care industry does a fine side business of catering to Canadians who come across and pay cash. Our political machine is working hard to put an end to that by instituting a similar system here (it's immoral for people with money to get medical care while others have to beg and wait, the premise is that everybody has the right to the products of another's labor).

I wouldn't overestimate the racism factor in the presidential race. The Muslim factor and the fact that he lied about it might be his undoing, though. On the other hand, he is directly promising to steal billions from the oil companies and give it directly to voters. This is a logic and morality test for America: if the voters can't figure out that this will make their energy prices zoom further out of reach, and if they figure it is OK to just steal money from one set of people and give it to another, and that translates into enough votes, then you have your premonition for the future right there in front of you.

You aren't immune, someday they will cast their envious eye on the resources of Canada. Do a little research on the 'thing that isn't', the North American Union. Its' existence has been roundly denied since Ron Paul supporters were branded as conspiracy theorists for calling attention to it. Too bad the leaders from Canada, the U.S., and Mexico had a little party and published their plans, too late to take it back. Puppeteers have been laying the groundwork behind the scenes for years. They plan a new currency and an end to national sovereignty, a la EU style. The plan deserves your vocal opposition!

The 'consensus' will come about naturally when both of our dollars reach parity with the peso.

--97T--

..... And irritating that our public schools turn out people that just accept this stuff uncritically.

--97T--

Only 'irritating'? You must have been sucking a Prozac pill to phrase it that mildly.:D

The idea that Obamarama could set up Obamastan, while unlikely an outcome, is very frightening.

Universal health-care is dreadful everywhere it is practised. It rations health-care by waiting list. I had a problem with one of my eyes. It took me 11 months to see an eye specialist. In Lajolla, the past two years, I phone up an eye specialist and have a complete check-up. I can usually get an appointment within a couple of days. It costs me a few hundred bucks. But I know that he has set down a base-line on the condition of my eye and has done some sort of exotic sonogram to check for any sign of macular degeneration.

I live in a city of about a million people. I doubt if that gizmo even exists here.

We go on and on about how universal health-care makes us superior to American's without one thought to the fact that basically all of the medical technology we use in Canada was invented in the US. Our drug prices are lower because we ignore the patent rights of drug companies and make generic drugs and pay nothing for the R & D that goes into them.

You may find he book "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" by Robert Nozick interesting. It is nearly impenetrable but worth the work. It is the theory of justice that we should be using. Instead we have fallen pray to that of John Rawls. The result is that the concept of minimal state has disappeared and in its stead is the expectation that there is little or no barrier in the coercion of individuals to full fill the 'needs' of the commons. So, Obama literally cannot see the moral wrong in stealing the money of the shareholders of the oil industry and giving it to every schmuck who can't fill his gas tank.

Another perplexing thing to me is that American's continually complain about off-shoring good jobs; then they are willing to accept this sort of scam, which will result in the loss of hundreds of thousands of highly paying jobs in the oil industry as it simply scrams from America.

This is proved, again in Canada, by the early 80's implementation of the National Energy Program. It allowed the Federal Government to take 25% of any oil play without compensating the owners of the play. All exploration in Alberta stopped in about 2 weeks. Most workable drilling rigs simply drove across the border to work in places like Texas, Louisiana, Kansas, Montana and Colorado. In an instant we lost an entire generation of drilling skill that still has not been completely replaced. The same holds true for the capital infrastructure of the oil industry and all of the ancillary businesses that support it. This pushed Alberta into a deep recession that lasted until the Trudeau government was chucked and the Mulroony Conservatives came to power.

Cheers,

Tony

Geof,

When will they start putting Prozac in the drinking water?

Tony,

Extremely well written and informative. I'll check out that book. I agree that only a completely perverted sense of justice allows the insanity to rage on. It's dangerous, not just because of policy, but a mob with this kind of mentality will kill without compunction. I didn't know about the National Energy Program and the exodus of skill. Our politicians owe the Canadian government a vote of thanks for leading the way on energy and health care policy.

I don't know if it's still true, but a few years ago, in the Detroit area alone, we had more CAT scan machines in the three counties here than were available in all of Canada. Parents were bringing children who suffered head injuries across the border. We're doing all we can to destroy everything that supports our life, so that we can reach parity. We're supposed to feel guilty about any measure of success we attain.

--97T--

"..Some of the most prominent deniers in the game have made themselves famous criticizing Michael Mann's work. But here's the deal: Michael Mann DOES the work. He's not a journalist or politician (Christ Monckton); he's not an Philip Morris and Exxon Mobil consultant (Fred Singer); he's not a stock promoter and amateur statistician (Steve McIntyre). He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Meteorology and Geosciences at Pennsylvania State University and the rarest thing in the very public debate about climate change: someone who knows what he's talking about..."
--Richard Littlemore

http://www.desmogblog.com/

See!?! Associate Professor at PSU trumps Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at MIT

It must be tough for the intellectually lazy to figure out which wise-man authority to follow. I guess the easiest thing to do is to look around, see which way the crowd is going, and join in, casting faith in the tones of authority and the crowd's momentum. Once the crowd is of a single mind, cracks in the edifice will be glossed over; nobody wants to be made to appear foolish, so those who point out contradictions will be castigated and shunned. The worst attacks will come from those who actually know the least. It's easier to pick on the loner who stands out, even if he happens to be right. Right and wrong don't matter when someone disagrees with the crowd and the good name and intentions of the authority are being challenged!

--97T--

Perhaps you've noticed Littlemore's emphasis on funding or vocation for the "deniers", while CV and credentials is for the AGW side....

Classic...

So, if the world's largest insurance company finances a study by a qualified scientist, it's valid. But if an oil company finances a study by a qualified scientist, it's tainted.

From John Holdren of Harvard Kennedy School:

"Members of the public who are tempted to be swayed by the denier fringe should ask themselves how it is possible, if human-caused climate change is just a hoax, that:

The leaderships of the national academies of sciences of the United States, Britain, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, Russia, China, and India, among others, are on record saying that global climate change is real, caused mainly by humans, and reason for early, concerted action.

This is also the overwhelming majority view among the faculty members of the earth sciences departments at every first-rank university in the world.

All three of holders of the one Nobel prize in science that has been awarded for studies of the atmosphere (the 1995 chemistry prize to Paul Crutzen, Sherwood Rowland, and Mario Molina, for figuring out what was happening to stratospheric ozone) are leaders in the climate-change scientific mainstream.

U.S. polls indicate that most of the amateur skeptics are Republicans. These Republican skeptics should wonder how the presidential candidate John McCain could have been taken in. He has castigated the Bush administration for wasting eight years in inaction on climate change, and the policies he says he would implement as president include early and deep cuts in U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions. (Barack Obama’s position is similar.)

The extent of unfounded skepticism about the disruption of global climate by human-produced greenhouse gases is not just regrettable, it is dangerous. It has delayed - and continues to delay - the development of the political consensus that will be needed if society is to embrace remedies commensurate with the challenge."

John P. Holdren is Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy and Director of the Program on Science, Technology, and Public Policy at the Kennedy School, Professor of Environmental Science and Public Policy in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University, Director of the Woods Hole Research Center

....I wonder if he's a Democrat???

John Holdren of course is not any sort of scientist either.

It is his political ilk that cannot seem to understand the difference between an opinion poll taken by scientists and proof.

So what if he thinks most global climate change skeptics are Republicans, I find that to be no issue at all. Perhaps the difference is that Republicans think differently on most issues than Democrats do; that may be why their are the too parties.

His dubious assumption is that only Democrats think correctly. That in my opinion is the mark of many Democrats; they suppose themselves to have higher intelligence and thus are smarter than Republicans. Thereby making them better at running everything.

John should carefully examine statements of this sort before letting them see the light of day. It makes him not only pompous sounding, but wrong.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

He has his PhD from Berkley, but darned if I can find out what in. He did an undergrad and masters at MIT in some sort of physics and perhaps knew something about plasma physics. He worked for a little while at Lockheed doing re-entry physics.

Other than that it seems he has been a doom-sayer about every environmental cause since the early 70's. He hangs around with Paul Erlich, whose book "The Population Bomb" predicted that the population of the US would be about 20.1 million people by 2000 or so. Idiotically he used the concept of financial compound interest to predict population growth. He was too stupid to simply look at historical trends and see that population growth has always been linear. So he did a compounding of population growth instead of a linear regression. He and Holdren also placed a famous wager about the increase in price in real dollar terms of five metals. They bet the prices would go up, while the taker of the bet Julian Simon said they would all decrease in price. Simon was correct, in some cases even without taking inflation into account. Holdren and Erlich made their prediction based on the metals becoming more scarce in the Earth's crust as they were depleted. They failed to consider that the Earth's crust is pretty freaking big.

It is little wonder that he is supported by Teresa Heinz and the Kennedy School for moronic styles of government.

The article you site is from the Herald Tribune, so that it was published, with its left-wing cant, is not surprising. Nor of course his ranting about how sceptics are Republican's.

I wrote him an email about it. You should too. It will be fun to see him explain to me the difference between a scientific proof and a poll of scientists. Just Google his name and you will get all kinds of self-puffery about him.

Cheers,

Bloefeld

Paul Erlich, whose book "The Population Bomb" predicted that the population of the US would be about 20.1 million people by 2000 or so. Idiotically he used the concept of financial compound interest to predict population growth.


This prediction must have included a devaluation adjustment for inflation?:)