The first four words in this Wednesday's article in the Australian :
In 1633 Galileo Galilei
There is no point in reading further.
More like this
In announcements and press efforts this past month, the Vatican is promoting Galileo as a symbol of collaboration between science and religion. The initiative is part of a larger campaign by the Vatican to repair the Pope's image on matters of science and to promote dialogue on the relationship…
Events
1633 - Galileo Galilei is tried before the Inquisition.
Births
1842 - James Dewar, Scottish chemist
Deaths
1884 - Leopold Fitzinger, Austrian zoologist
Events
1633 - The formal inquest of Galileo Galilei by the Inquisition begins.
1937 - Sir Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft
1961 - Yuri Gagarin becomes the first man to fly in space.
Births
1748 - Antoine Laurent de Jussieu, French botanist
1852 -…
Events
1633 - The Holy Office in Rome forces Galileo Galilei to recant his heliocentrism.
1978 - Charon, a satellite of the dwarf planet Pluto, is discovered.
Births
1871 - William McDougall, British psychologist and polymath
1887 - Julian Huxley, British biologist
Deaths
1429 - Ghiyath al-Kashi…
Zowie! It's the environmentalism-is-a-religion theme! That one is such a wild, goofy date even the Wall Street Journal hasn't done more than buy her a drink -- though with the new ownership that may change.
I like the way he's publishing an article in a newspaper about how people are completely unable to do what he's doing. How did he manage to sneak it past, I wonder. There is only one rational explanation: Bryant Macfie is a ninja.
Actually, the first four words are the title: "Blessed are the Sceptics."
Which, truth to be told, might well produce the same reaction if one expected a science column.
In sixteen thirty-three,Galileo GalileiTo quote Thomas Huxley,makes it apostasy;
The Inquisition,a newer religionenvironmental activism,conventional wisdom.
Jeez, this is hard. Why can't this be as easy to mould into "found poetry" as Rumsfeld's unknown-unknowns speech?
Points for mentioning Giordano Bruno, though.
From the article:
So does the earth orbit the sun or not? Is the Argument over? Is the science settled? Or should we constantly be considering alternative theories?
-mark.
Re: #6 - ugh. This weekend, after finding out that I study evolutionary biology, I had a guy (probably in his 50s, well-educated, upper-middle-class guy) ask me, "So, is that true? Evolution? Is it proven?" Thank you, baby Jesus, for allowing ignorance to spread across the planet under your banner.
#6 and #7 make very good points....
However, if we are talking about the phrase "The debate is over", I agree it shouldn't be used.
The debate over GW? The debate over AGW? The debate over natural forcings? The debate over the accuracies of readings? The debate over interpreting data? The debate over the amount of predicted future warming or cooling? The debate over speculative catastrophies? The debate over how much time we have? The debate over whether or not changing a light bulb will help save a Polar Bear?
#6....The science is settled on the Earth orbiting the sun, but the debate continues on how the orbital eccentricities of the earth and variations in the Sun's output effect GW.
#7....The science confirming evolutionary processes is clear (to most of us), however, there is still plenty of room for debating all the mechanisms involved.
There's no debate here in *science*, which IMO is the only debate that matters.
The "debate" is one side doing science and dealing with facts as they are and the other side denying facts and dealing in fantasy.
Oh dear...
Although I always enjoyed the irony that a well documented consequence of atmospheric radiative transfer is portrayed as "religion", yet we are always happy to attribute any percieved warming/cooling to handwavy, unsupported theories involving cosmic ray flux... or undetected changes in solar output... or PDO changes...
The science is settled on whether or not solar irradiance variations could change global average temperatures. Of course they could, if they occurred. But is this what has been occurring recently?
Nope.
The "debate" is one side doing science and dealing with facts as they are and the other side denying facts and dealing in fantasy.
The latter would be the warm-mongers and enviro-whackos.
Your all missing the really interesting aspect of that article:
It's written by Perth philanthropist Bryant Macfie, who is funding a research partnership between the Institute of Public Affairs and the University of Queensland, in which they fund 'scientists' who buck the concensus (as apposed to all the others who are apparently mindless drones who conduct their research with dutiful adherence to a grand scientific orthodoxy).
So this guy is putting up wads of money to back his skepticism, and has used it to convince a University to come along for the ride.
It'll be really interested to see what kind of research they fund and who the researchers will be. Going by this article their primary criteria is that the fundees are mavericks in their field. I wonder how they will deal with other considerations like the quality of research output, the political implications of the research, and the plausibilitiy of the idea. Given that the Institute of public affairs is involved, compatibility with libertarian economics is probably the uppermost consideration.
Interesting place for the University of Queensland to be heading! And who get to make the decisions about what gets funded, Macfie or the University of Queensland. Perhaps they will be starting up their own journal, that'll be worth a look for laughs.
Who's going to break it to The Oz and others that in the Galileo analogy, they aren't Galileo, they're the traditionalists holding out against science.
"In 1633 Galileo Galilei"
There is no point in reading further.
I got slightly further into than that, but not much. Decided to scratch my arse and gaze out the window instead, much more productive and satisfying use of my time.
[Note to self: Must stop reading The Rag formerly known as The Australian, even if it is only the free online version.]
I'm looking forward to the day The Australian moves into C20 and discovers Velikovsky, whose book 'Worlds in collision' purported to show that various astronomical events recorded in the Old Testament actually happened. Astronomers were furious about it, threatening the publishers etc. "In 1952 Immanuel Velikovsky..."
There's a story that an astronomer said to an archaeologist about the book 'The astronomy is rubbish, but I am very impressed with the archaeology' and the archaeologist replied 'I was going to say something very similar.'
"It is not enough to wear the mantle of Galileo: that you be persecuted by an unkind establishment. You must also be right." -- Robert L. Park
Well, I think the cause is still a subject of debate, that is, unless someone has found a graviton recently. Just like the cause of any warming is a subject of debate.
Intelligent Grappling.
And anyway... global warming doesn't exist, and it's caused by the sun?
Heck, never mind. There's only one thing you need to know: Al Gore is the Pinko Hitlerist Inquisition!
Bi,
You forgot to mention that Al Gore is fat.
Says the Austrailian's author: "First, to provide a haven for our scholars without ideological or commercial interference and with no prescription as to the end point of their inquiries"
He hasn't quite topped Ben Stein or Mark Mathis in "liar points" but its a great start. One look at the IPA website pretty much removes that hypocritical statement. Per commenters above, U of Queensland is not going to look good here. The inquiry itself would be fine but the obvious bias from a private foundation (in terms of demanded outcomes of "research") is not easily defended amongst peers.
Win points for Tim for "There is no point in reading further"; succinct that.
There was another story yesterday with more details:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23657735-2702,00.html
Here's a UQ page on the scholarships:
http://www.uq.edu.au/grad-school/ipa-phd-scholarships
It says in part:
====================
Personal skills and attributes should include:
1. The ability to access, analyse and evaluate data in topical areas;
2. Well-developed oral and written communication skills;
3. The ability to participate in the public debate on environmental issues; and
4. An understanding of evidence-based non-partisan assessments.
====================
The public debate part seems a little strange to me.
Hmm... is AUD 350,000 enough for doing any actual stuff with crops and trees? Are Marohasy and pals making any further offers to give more money?
#12 rfguy; you link the Lockwood and Frolich paper; Svensmark and Friis-Christensen did reply to that and were critiqued by Tamino in his usual take no prisoners fashion. However Lockwood & Frohlich were also critiqued by Ken Gregory at the Science and Public policy site.
Sloan and Wolfendale have also had a go at the cosmic ray theory and their views are critiqued here:
http://www.sciencebits.com/SloanAndWolfendale
It does seem remarkable that Lockwood found no further solar imput after 1987; even disregarding cosmic rays and TSI variation, it is established that less solar activity, such as we are enjoying now, means less solar UV and much less X-Ray flux; since these are preferentially absorbed in the stratosphere, less of them will mean cooler coditions there, which is apparently what Aqua is finding. A cooler stratosphere will condense, increase jet-stream strengh and drag polar air towards the equator, with the result of global cooling.
NASA have also noted how solar flux can produce marked regional effects which in turn have global consequences:
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/shindell_06/
From the UQ site you find potential supervisors.
http://www.law.uq.edu.au/suri-ratnapala
And when did global warming supposedly "stop"? Not 1987, even by you inactivists' own account. But let's ignore that, you didn't see anything, and oh look here's a totally different talking point, woo!
= =
disinterested observer:
Wow, I'm starting to like the look of this already...
Soft X ray is absorbed in the ionosphere and mesosphere and there only a teensy amount coming from the sun in W/m2, fortunately. VUV (vacuum ultraviolet (100-200 nm) is absorbed in the mesosphere and the upper part of the stratosphere, UV-C (200-300 nm) is absorbed in the mid stratosphere ~ 20 km. Now you have to get that energy down into the troposphere. There is some interesting work on this, but efficiency is far from 100% and the absolute amount of variation in W/m2 is very small.
Good try but people actually know stuff here. The walls are getting coated with your spaghetti so how about catching up.
#26:
I'm sure there are many blog posts "critiquing" the science, but do you have any links to peer-reviewed publications that do so?
How about papers published on the link between UV and X-ray flux and stratospheric temperature?
From the Nasa site:
Looks like marked regional effects with little global consequence to me.
Haha, Tim, I'm laughing out loud here, best summary of the year!
In 1633 Galileo Galilei ... discovered an inconvenient truth.
We need to embrace the Galileo example, because of, in Michel Tobis' words, it's intellectual (truth against special interests), not social (one against many) analogy.
In the same vein as some denialists say "the climate has changed before". Yes, it has, and the effects have been drastic like sea levels tens of meters higher - all the more reason to be concerned of the current change.
Galileo is a relevant example because of how science was attacked by religion. Nowadays science is attacked by industry (since money making and "the economy" is the real main religion currently).
It would have of course helped more if Galileo had had thousands of other people having done similar observations and analyses, ending up to the same conclusion, all published in the literature and most verifiable...
saurabh, flaunting his anti-Christian bigotry, posts:
Most Christians have no problem with evolution, saurabh. And there have been atheists who didn't accept it or who championed crackpot alternatives to natural selection; e.g. Arthur Koestler and Trofim D. Lysenko.
@Barton (#35):
Indeed - globally...
Indeed there have. But the overwhelming majority of creationists and cdesign proponentsists claim Christianity.
The USA is overwhelmingly Christian - far more so than any other Western democracy. The USA has far lower acceptance rates for evolutionary theory than any other Western democracy; it even has - get this - debate within its school system about whether evolutionary biology has a place in the curriculum. As for what happens to teachers caught teaching evolution in the Bible Belt...
Like it or not, the major force keeping Americans ignorant of evolutionary biology marches under the banner of christianity. There is no bigotry in pointing that out, even in forceful terms. It's also interesting that the same states that were quick to pass anti-evolution laws in the early part of the 20th century were also the states most zealous in passing and enforcing eugenics laws...the Bible Belt states.
Eli; the walls are getting covered with my spaghetti? You mean like the scene in "The Odd Couple" when Walter throws Jack's luiguni?
How about Ka-Kit Tung's and Charles D. Camp's latest piece on solar influences? I was rather taken with Scafetta and West's effort, but RC says it is no good; and who am I to say otherwise?
WotWot (#16):
The Australian does offer at least one reasonable voice - Barry Williams'(of the Aus Skeptics) blog.
cohenite,
You mean their claim to have extracted a signal for a 0.18K
variability between solar min and max?
Underwhelming.
Who indeed, cohenite.
FYI the jets have been found to be moving toward the poles (an effect related to the expansion of the tropics). Even so there's more cold air moving equatorwards, you say? Hmm, I detect a contradiction. Cite for that claim?
I love these "environmentalism is a religion" accusations. The irony is that the AGW denialists use similar tactics to the creationists/IDists, who are obviously driven by their own uncritical religious beliefs. Indeed, the creationists/IDists regularly accuse biologists of being religious zealots.
Jerry Coyne noted the annoying tendency of creationists to raise doubts and demand more and more evidence of evolution, while never providing any for their own positions. And, here we find Bryant Macfie using the same tactic, while not providing a shred of evidence for his own anti-AGW position (which he conveniently doesn't admit, but you know he holds it).
How about it?
-mark.
rfguy; true enough; but it establishes a solar imput, which was my point.
Have climate scientists ever denied there is a solar input to climate change? As far as it can be measured it's been included. Being measured, solar changes are small in comparison to other measured changes in climate forcings. You only get to imply it's a major forcing by ignoring or devaluing the other measured forcings and assigning the difference to unmeasured interactions of sun and atmosphere. That is not sound science. Galileo is remembered as great because he was right. He also lived at a time when scientific inquiry was next to non-existent. Inquiry, performed by many people trained as scientists, using scientific methods, within institutions with long histories of successful scientific work should not be ignored or dismissed so casually. If the "flaws" in AGW are so clear and obvious AGW would have collapsed like the house of cards the denialist claim it is, long before now. It hasn't and won't without much better science as a basis and using science to clarify things brings us back to the science we have now.
The funny thing is, the scientists researching AGW were the Galileo's of their day. The accepted science was that CO2 would not cause any problems, they overturned the orthodoxy.
MJ, 38.
Fair enough. But it is not enough of a sop from the editors to get me to read The Oz anymore.
Barton,
I am not an anti-christian bigot, and I did not mean to imply that all Christians are ignorant. However, it is true that there are a few vocal Christians who advance an ignorant philosophy in the name of Christianity, and it's that I'm deploring. I find plenty to respect in Christianity otherwise.
Don't waste your time trying to discuss religion rationallly with Levinson.
He may appear rational on other topics but he's a frothing mad religious loon.
It's simply not worth the energy expended.
Robin Levitt posts:
Let me see if I can reproduce your reasoning.
Some Christians are anti-evolution. Therefore Christianity itself is suspect.
Isn't that like, "Some black people are criminals, therefore black people are suspect?"
Let me try it your way: "Like it or not, the major force keeping Americans afraid of crime marches under the banner of negritude."
Nah, doesn't work.
Ian Gould posts, in his usual charming manner:
Darn right. I.e., I am a Christian, and you know that all Christians are anti-evolution crackpots who want to establish a theocracy and execute gays. Well, not on Ian Gould's watch, darn it!
[tracking shot of Gould putting on WWI-era helmet, shouldering rifle with bayonet, and marching determinedly around and around the building housing the biology department, bringing curious stares from the students]
@Barton:
That didn't come within shouting distance, let alone touching distance, of connecting.
And this gets you a 15-yard penalty with loss of down for a personal foul. Next attempted smear gets exclusion from the game.
Not it doesn't, does it. Try again, this time paying attention to the argument made, not the argument you'd prefer to address. Or not - this is after all Tim's blog, and if he doesn't want the discussion to continue...
Well, you see... to BPL,
1) any criticism of any group of Christians who does stupid things under the banner of Christianity
2) is automatically an attack on all Christians
3) and is therefore a personal attack on BPL himself.
Some form of persecution complex here, or what? (Yes, I'm referring to you specifically, BPL...)
No. SOME christians. And they're politically active, having just released a film accusing "darwinism" as being responsible for the Holocaust and Stalinism, which opened in 1,000 theaters. And they're ON RECORD wanting to displace science with theology in the science classroom. And they're ACTIVELY WORKING to pass legislation to advance that goal in the South (such a bill just passed House and Senate in Florida, though they were unable to reconcile the bills before the session adjourned, and one such bill is on the table in Louisiana, and serious efforts are underway to force textbooks - already weak on the teaching of evolution in many cases due to Christian opposition - to "teach the controversy" in Texas, which would have national repercussions given the size of the Texas market).
So, BPL, rather than pretend that an attack on SOME Christians who are very active and, IMO, very DANGEROUS, is an attack on Christianity at large, why not do something positive?
Like FIGHT THOSE CHRISTIANS who ARE anti-science. Rather than make enemies of those who make the obvious point that such christians 1) exist 2) have tangible political power in the US 3) aren't sitting on their ass and are doing everything they can to promote a somewhat medieval world view down our throats and 4) lastly but perhaps not least, would claim that you are not a Christian because you accept modern biological science.
Three things on religion.
1. Bryant Macfie implying Giordano Bruno was martyred for heliocentrist views is as slanted as the IPA climate line. Bruno's heresies were theological, apparently things like denying the virginity of Mary, asserting the eventual
redemption of Satan, and it looks a bit like denying the divinity of Christ.
2. Robin Levett linking linking US Christianity to anti-evolution is missing the point that when the world's richest nation won't provide decent health care for many of it's own people, it is a long way from the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. US Christianity is more political
than religious.
3. Getting back to the Australian, Christopher Pearson sank to new depths on 29-30/12/07 by fabricating a quote from the Pope's Peace Day message, as "fears over man-made emissions melting ice caps .. were nothing more than scaremongering"
(recylcling a distorted UK Daily Mail summary as a quote).
@Ian:
Do you see me disagreeing with the last proposition? Or indeed the commentary on healthcare? Both, however, are irrelevant to the question of whether people calling themselves Christians are attempting to prevent teaching of evolutionary biology in the USA - for religious reasons. In other words, you are missing the point.
The last proposition is however more relevant to the issue of why the USA is so resistant to the science in AGW...
dhogaza, a little more cluelessly than usual, posts:
It's a shame you don't frequent AOL, dhogaza. Or the web, apparently. Otherwise you'd know that my arguments against creationism are all over both.
And frankly, I just don't feel creationism is that much of a threat. Every time attempts to feed it into the public schools has gone to court, the creationists have had their collective ass handed to them (most recently by a Bush-appointed Republican judge in Dover PA). It would indeed be bad to teach creationism in biology courses, but those who think this is likely to happen any time soon have a distorted view of American politics, I think.
I see ... you're anti-christian, too, then. Must be, if you're to maintain consistency, since that's your knee-jerk reaction to any criticism of specific christian acts here.
It happens frequently in the United States, today. And more frequently, the teaching of evolution is suppressed in order to avoid a backlash from christian fundamentalists.
This is well-documented. The Dover school district was stupid beyond belief and got spanked in court as a result, but individual teachers in many districts quietly teach creationism and are never challenged in court.
A biology teacher did get fired here in Oregon a couple of years ago for openly teaching creationism in high school biology class. But this is Oregon, not the South ...
You're wearing blinders, BPL, faith-induced blinders.
Oh, Ian, it's terribly religious, it just has nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus. That's not contradictory, you know? But it's obvious to those of us living in the US that Christian Fundamentalism, as mostly frequently practiced here, is focused on the Old Testament, with only lip-service given to the teachings of Christ.
If they were focused on Christ, they wouldn't care so deeply about the six days of Genesis.
The one thing they seem to hold dear is that Christ sacrificed himself for our sins, which they interpret as being a get-out-of-hell-free card. How else does one explain the pathological "lying for Jesus" approach so favored by conservative fundamentalists in their attacks on geology, biology, physics etc?
dhogaza posts:
Ah, so creationism is a "specific[ally] christian act?" But you're not an anti-Christian bigot, oh no.
I love how the anti-Christian bigots always get very indignant when you point out that they're anti-Christian bigots. Any Christian who protests when his people are attacked is "wearing... faith-induced blinders."
And you're wearing a white sheet and hood, dhogaza. Which doesn't much surprise me.
In this country, yes, it is a fundamentalist christian point of view, and it is fundamentalist christians who are trying to push creationism into science class in public schools, and you are a fucking idiot to pretend otherwise in front of a group of well-informed readers like most who visit this site.
And pointing out this obvious fact does not make me an anti-Christian bigot.
Big difference. But if you're that desperate to be aggrieved, go for it.
I don't dispute that creationists in the US are overwhelmingly Christian fundamentalists. What I dispute is that creationism is somehow characteristically Christian. You can't seem to grasp this point no matter how many ways I make it.
Let me try again.
A bunch of splinter-group Mormons have been found who practice polygamy. All the members of that group are splinter-group Mormons.
Does this make polygamy a "characteristically Mormon" problem?
Do you understand why a Mormon might object to such a statement?
Do you understand what a fallacy of composition is?
BPL, let's try a different analogy. Islamic terrorists are bad, right? They blow up building and hack off people's heads and have no disregard for life in general. So we denounce Islamic terrorists. Does that mean a moderate Muslim is suddenly justified in screaming persecution?
Yet screaming persecution is exactly what you're doing.
Christian fuckheads are a subset of Christians. Pointing out that this subset exists says nothing about those Christians not belonging to that subset.
You can't seem to grasp this point no matter how many ways various people here point that out.
dhogaza, to call creationism "characteristically Christian" is not to point to a small subset of Christians.
And bi, why, if I object to an anti-Christian statement, does that constitute "screaming persecution?" Where have I said I was being persecuted? It doesn't help your case to make stuff up.
@Barton:
Of course it is; unless you claim that the subset of Christians who are creationist is not a small one?
If he had called Christianity "typically Creationist" then that might be different - but he didn't.
It was the paranoia involved in not only seeing the statement as anti-Christian, but describing it as bigotry, that constituted "screaming persecution".
Shall we just leave it that Christians in the USA in the present day are the largest and most persecuted majority in North American history?
Chuckle, that's a good one. As we all know, it's impossible to be elected President in this country if you're Christian! And you have to be at least agnostic to get into the US Senate!
Shall we just leave it that Christians in the USA in the present day are the largest and most persecuted majority in North American history?
Persecuted majority. Awwwwww. I feel so bad for the white Christians in our country. Stuck in ghettos, performing low-wage jobs, stuck with riding the bus, all those Title IX b!tches taking your job and voting, all those minorities getting equal rights, having to enroll in the army due to no job prospects. Tough to be you, huh, "Levett"?
Best,
D
Riobin Levett posts:
You know, if you continually have to resort to straw-man arguments, it indicates that you have no good way to argue against the real argument.
@Barton:
If you can't tell the difference between a straw man argument and good old-fashioned snark, you have no business telling others how to argue.
Indeed, since you have failed to address any of my arguments - apart from by constructing straw men - perhaps you should take a good hard look at your sensitivities on this topic?
D.
"I feel so bad for the white Christians in our country. Stuck in ghettos, performing low-wage jobs, stuck with riding the bus, all those Title IX b!tches taking your job and voting, all those minorities getting equal rights, having to enroll in the army due to no job prospects."
How many people can you insult in one sentence?
Answer.....everybody.
Dano - I do believe Levett was making a joke (made me laugh, at least).
BPL:
You don't have a real argument, all you do is to greet comments that some christians aren't deserving of the name with accusations of anti-christian bigotry?
And, hey, have you cleaned up the historically false crap on your website, yet?
@dhogaza:
I'm seriously worried if there was any doubt...
Sarcasm is the bastard brother of irony.
That said, the layers of irony here are killing me.
"BPL, let's try a different analogy. Islamic terrorists are bad, right? They blow up building and hack off people's heads and have no disregard for life in general. So we denounce Islamic terrorists. Does that mean a moderate Muslim is suddenly justified in screaming persecution?"
noty at all - because THEY DESERVE IT.
Levinson after all is the man who opined here that the principal barrier to peace in the middle east was that Israel wasn't killing enough Palestinians.
Remember, they're guilty of being Muslim meaning they deserve to die, Disagreement with this charming sentiment is undoubtedly further proof of anti-Christian bigotry.
Robin,
Eat me.
Ian Gould posts:
That's a flat lie, Ian. Don't you have any shame?
@Barton:
When you're ready to address the issues, let me know.