Saturday, January 16, 2010

A few ways to tell if your climate change denier doesnt have a clue what he/she is talking about

Climate change is an incredibly complex issue. It is no wonder why so many people seem to have no clue what to make of all the conflicting statements. In general, if you are familiar with the scientific/peer-review process and you put just a little bit of time into the research, it should be pretty obvious that the global warming deniers are just another highly organized/well funded anti-science movement with the goal of confusing and misinforming the public. However, with all the "scientific" sounding arguments that deniers use, it can get overwhelming to determine if the individual is trying to "talk over your head."

But there are a few ways to tell if your climate change denier doesn't have a clue what he/she is talking about:

1: They bring up the 31K "scientists" that deny AGW. They are uncritically accepting the scam known as the Global Warming Petition Project (uncritical acceptance of claims).

2: They bring up the argument that we haven's surpassed the 1998 temp. Not only is it highly unlikely they've actually looked at the NASA GISS Surface Temp Analysis. It also shows they have a general lack of knowledge about El Nino/La Nina cycle and 5 year mean (cherry picking). This argument has also been addressed and dismissed by the more academic climate change denialists. They have predicted that it will blow up in the denialists' faces.


3: They say that, because CO2 makes up such a small part of the atmosphere, it must not be that important. This should seem illogical right off the bat without even basic knowledge of climate science. Imagine if you made this very same argument to a police officer who pulls you over with a 0.1% BAC. The argument means nothing out of context. The small amount of CO2 in our atmosphere means the difference between the world we live in and a frozen planet.

4: They devolve the argument into politics. The argument is about SCIENCE, not politics. (red herring) They also frequently bring up Al Gore, a politician not a climate scientist. Although Al Gore is credited with helping to bring the Global Warming issue to the public sphere, his statements are frequently exaggerated or outdated.

5: They claim that climate scientists are creating a scientific conspiracy to get grant money (This one is a gem used by nearly EVERY promoter of pseudoscience! It is illogical (without sufficient evidence) as you could say that doctors are purposely making us sick, etc... It also ignores the fact that these researchers spent 8+ years in college, over $100k in tuition/fees/college expenses, and turned down $100k+ corporate/government jobs to pursue a meager $40k-$60k doing research at a university. Does this sound like the character of scammer? argument is baseless). One of the popular modern pieces of "evidence" is the "Climategate" collection of stolen emails. I Love this one because it shows just how easy it is for the right wing side of the media to exploit scientifically ignorant uncritical Americans who don't even want to ask what a "trick" is or what "decline" the scientists are actually "hiding".

Now there are a whole host of other arguments, many of them dead giveaways as well. But these are so horrendously illogical or just straight-up wrong that it is nearly impossible to conclude the denier really knows what he's talking about. Here are a few good sources of clear rebuttals to common denier arguments:

Skeptical Science
Peter Sinclair's Greenman Studios
RealClimate

Monday, January 11, 2010

Creationists should be careful when citing a link between Darwin and the Holocaust.

Here is Darwin’s connection to the Holocaust:

1: Darwin Introduced the theory of evolution by means of natural selection in 1859.

2: Herbert Spencer coined the idea of "survival of the fittest," 5 years later and tried to do exactly what Darwin wrote AGAINST, applied Natural Selection to his preexisting beliefs on sociology.
3: In 1883, a year after Darwin's death, Francis Galton (Darwin’s cousin) introduced the idea of Eugenics as a scientific analysis of selective breeding in humans, as opposed to Darwin’s focus on animals/plants.

4: Victorian Era upper class bigots combined and perverted Eugenics and Spencer’s theory to create the concept of Social Darwinism, which survived long after the scientific basis for Eugenics (eliminating disease) was dis-proven. Social Darwinism by this time had become more remnant of ARTIFICIAL selection, which had been around long before Darwin’s time.

5: This perversion known as “Social Darwinism” became a mechanism Hitler used to justify his preconceived notions about a “superior race.” Hitler never directly sources Darwin for any idea and actually condemns Darwin’s books to be burned.

Here is the [historical figure called] “Jesus’” link to the Holocaust:

1: Various Ancient Roman age writers wrote books about a figure known as Jesus, who may or may not have existed (whether or not he existed is not relevant as this is based on the historical figure). We call these books the New Testament.

2. Hitler claimed to be directly “influenced” by the bigotry against Jews in the New Testament and claimed his hatred of Jews was justified by the stories of the New Testament. However, just as with Social Darwinism, this influence was likely a way to justify his preexisting beliefs about a “superior race.” Although this is almost certainly a perversion of New Testament themes (arguable), it is a common theme throughout his personal writings and speeches.

So which link is stronger? A perversion of a perversion of a perversion of Darwin’s SCIENTIFIC (not normative) theories, or a perversion (maybe of a perversion) of the teachings of the figure “Jesus?”

So to creationists: “People who live in glass houses should not throw stones”