Now on ScienceBlogs: HeartlandGate: Anti-Science Institute's Insider Reveals Secrets
An irregular exploration of the struggle between the power of rational discourse and the scientific method on one hand, and the forces of superstition and dogma on the other. Mostly regarding climate change, though.
James Hrynyshyn is a freelance science journalist and communications consultant based in western North Carolina, where he tries to put degrees in marine biology and journalism to good use.
The Demon-Haunted World:
Science as a Candle
in the Dark,
by Carl Sagan
(A
review)
The Doubter's Companion:
by John Ralston Saul (Excerpts)
Skeptic Magazine: www.skeptic.com
Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal: www.csicop.org
A poem by Yehuda Amichai:
The
Place
Where We Are Right
The Meaning of the
Island of Doubt
By doubting we come to inquiry; and through inquiry we perceive truth.
--- Peter Abelard
Undisguised clarity is easily mistaken for arrogance.
-- Richard Dawkins
As for evolution, it happened. Deal with it.
-- Michael Shermer.
"There is no need to sally forth, for it remains true that those things
which make us human are, curiously enough, always close at hand.
Resolve, then, that on this very ground, with small flags waving, and
tiny blasts of tinny trumpets, we have met the enemy, and not only may
he be ours, he may be us."
--Walt Kelly
December 30, 2009
Category: climate
It's taken me a while to assemble something cogent about the outcome of the CoP15, the Copenhagen conference that produced what some are calling "better than nothing." There are those who consider it a complete failure because the final accord,...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 1:23 PM • 30 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 29, 2009
Category: climate
I really should do this more often, but probably won't manage it again for another five years, so... Thank you for reading this blog. There's a long list of regular readers and commenters who have helped make the Island of...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 10:11 AM • 8 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 22, 2009
Category: climate
Deferring to experts is not the same as committing the logical fallacy of making an argument from authority, it's just acceptance of one's own ignorance.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 12:28 PM • 27 Comments • 1 TrackBacks
December 17, 2009
Category: climate
James Randi has corrected himself. After this week's Swift blog post that verged on climate change denialism, he now writes that his observation that the world has cooled over the last 150 years was supposed to have said "warmed." And...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 3:23 PM • 18 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: climate
I've run out of anything useful to say about Copenhagen. This graphic, from "Climate Interactive" tells you just about everything you need to know....
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 1:21 PM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: medicine
I know we're just hours away from the nail-biting climax of the Copenhagen conference at which the fate of humanity hangs in the balance (or not), but a Daily Kos post explaining why efforts to reform health insurance in the...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 9:05 AM • 7 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 16, 2009
Category: climate
Perhaps Randi, who is very good at finding simple explanations for chicanery masquerading as magic, is just too skeptical of anything that requires a post-graduate degree to understand.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 1:57 PM • 44 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 15, 2009
Category: climate
Following yesterday's Yes Men hoax, in which Canada's position on greenhouse-gas emissions was mocked, the country's minister of the environment seems to have become a persona non grata. At least, that's how it looked to a Toronto Star blogger reporting...
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 2:27 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: climate
Andy managed to rise above the limitations of the business more often than not. His departure will leave the New York Times with a major challenge.
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 10:55 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 14, 2009
Category: climate
Was this just the result of Environment Canada's press staff working too fast?
Posted by James Hrynyshyn at 10:37 AM • 14 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
