Soaking in money — a fake “independent” unscientific Conversation

What kind of organization receives all its funding from one source, then claims to be “independent?” (Yes, spot another GONGO idea).

 

The Conversation trumpets that it is “Independent” but it’s funded with $6 million from … the Government. As Tim Blair said “it’s a baby ABC“. (A Government organized “non government” organisation).

The Conversation gets 20,000 readers a day (apparently). According to the Alexa Stats, I single-handedly get about half the global traffic they do. They have an entire nation of university staff to help write stories. I’ve had ten guest authors and have written over 700 posts myself.

(If what they do costs $6 million, does that mean my site is worth $3m? Am I grossly underpaid, or are they grossly overpaid?)

This is another example of the self-growing-cycle of big-government. The site is dominated with stories that favor statist-big-government policies. They break laws of logic and reason, claim that experts are writing, but we non-experts working from home can point out the errors of those with professorships in our spare time, and with no PhD.

Consider the wit and wisdom of one Stefan Lewandowsky — who writes as a Professorial Fellow of a misnamed topic called “cognitive science”. If ever you needed evidence that the science of psychology was not the same as the science of physics, look no further. Lewandowsky is case study number one in reasons to eject the School of Psychology back to the Faculty of the Arts.*

When another scientist impersonated someone else, stole documents, possibly created a fake document, and published it all online, Lewandowsky argues this is morally all OK and it passes The Conversation’s editorial bar. He compares the lies to allied efforts to conceal the D-Day landing in World War II. So the morals of science and war are equivalent? Perhaps Lewandowsky has not noticed the two fields have slightly different aims?

Science is solely for the pursuit of truth, so he who uses lies (or specious ad homs) cheats himself and all those who fund or follow him. Deceit may win a war, but it won’t help humanity master the atmosphere.

Lewandowsky also thinks that anyone who disagrees with the government is mad, just like in the old Soviet Union. It all fits.

Presumably he lectures with these same ethical standards too — thus leaving a trail of students who think that if their research is for “the greater good” (and whose isn’t?) then it’s OK to steal or fake results? Is that the aim of The University of Western Australia — to fake their way to higher knowledge? Is cheating on exams any different? Would you hire one of Lewandowsky’s students?

What is science when cognitive scientists talk of “climate denial machines”? Dear Stephan, can you define that term scientifically, or even in plain English? Which “climate” is this machine denying? Can you name a single person who denies we have a climate, or that is it changing? Have you any empirical evidence to back up that claim, or it is just the dribbling speculations of a delusional cult-fan who gets promotions and status, not through reason or evidence, but by being the most active sycophant of a grant-winning theory?

Lewandowsky’s writing on The Conversation is not just ethically infantile (war = science), it’s sloppy and unresearched too. He claims that “According to the Heartland Institute, “junk science” is the research that has linked tobacco to lung cancer”, not realizing that Heartland have never claimed that tobacco doesn’t cause cancer. Perhaps Heartland’s position of assessing studies, different diseases, ages of death and odds ratios is a bit too old fashioned for Stefan? He demonizes them by oversimplifying what they do to the point where he speaks untruths. Heartland are mostly concerned about getting evidence on the issue of second hand smoke, and on the equity of cigarette taxes that go far beyond recouping costs of healthcare for smoking related illness. Their approach is far more scientific than Lewandowsky’s, which involves making inaccurate sweeping statements on topics he knows little about. It is indeed unresearched activist statements like his that are the “junk science” noble groups like Heartland oppose, and Heartland do it to serve the public, with volunteered funding. On the other hand, Lewandowsky uses funding extracted from the public by threat of force to offer us illogical, poorly studied, unreferenced and confused arguments in order to justify squandering more funds taken from the public. Wonderfully moral of you Stephan. Quite the parasite on the public purse.

Freedom loving business and enterprising people in the West need to wake up and face the fact that big-government grows more big-government. Governauctus infinititus — it’s practically a natural law that the tax-take from the regulating class will never shrink of it’s own accord. They will take, take and take until… something stops them. Something outside the government must push back. But who represents the voters if the House of Representatives  represents itself?

Who will argue for higher learning when our universities endorse thieves, fakers and cheats? It’s time to ask other university staff at UWA if they have a problem with this policy, and if they don’t protest, it’s time to stop funding all the “professors” who promote anti-science.

So it’s time, time for business world Australia to wake up. (It’s time we put some thought and resources into fighting back.)

Please commenters, every time The Conversation claims to be independent, lets remind them how dependent they are on the Government. Let’s ask them to find only voluntary financial backers who earn their money (as opposed to helping themselves to other people’s), and then see how “independent” they really are.

 

Hat tip to Jaymez. Merci!

Lewandowsky is a source of much fun on this blog:  Peer review denial and the abuse of science |   The death of reason at UWA | Lewandowsky: the ABC parades a witchdoctor again | Learn how not to reason at the University of Western Australia | The hypocrisy of the annointedName-calling fairy dust: “Conspiracy Theorist” | Picasso Brain Syndrome |

*If there are any psychologists who disagree, do speak up. I’m especially interested to hear from psychologists at UWA who understand what the scientific method is.

9.1 out of 10 based on 140 ratings

227 comments to Soaking in money — a fake “independent” unscientific Conversation

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    Geoff Sherrington

    Post-natural science reminds me of the psychic with dementia who hypothesised that projections could be forgotten before they were stated, then stated that he had forgotten this projected hypothesis before proving it.

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      Boobialla

      Lewandowsky also thinks that anyone who disagrees with the government is mad, just like in the old Soviet Union. It all fits.

      Oh dear. Red = green. It all fits. So deep.

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      Boobialla

      So why do you have a guide for commenting that says: “The fastest way to lose your freedom to comment, is with ad hominem arguments” when the post they’re commenting on is pretty much an ad hominem attack on Lewandowsky?

      ———————-
      Boobialla, your repeat comments are thread bombing. Learn the technical definition of an ad hom before you complain about them. – Jo

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        Boobialla

        Yep I’m thread bombing to make a point: you’re letting through a lot of personal attacks on Lewandowsky in your comments – I can only guess but it would seem to me they are fuelled by the tone of your post. #9 is particularly odious: “Professor Lewendowsky is doing for the good reputation University Academics as Paedophiles did for Catholic Priests.” Not to mention the implication that he encourages cheating. I’m just asking: is this what you promote at this site?

        ————

        Lewandowsky promotes himself as a member of UWA’s science team, yet he breaks tenets of science and basic laws of reason and namecalls unapologetically. He does great harm to the reputation of science, psychology, and UWA. I linked in the article to numerous posts where I have shown him repeatedly breaching laws of reason, not to mention good manners. — Jo

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  • #
    Len

    Good post, Jo. With these people like Lewandowsky promoting the Global warming hoax, many of those with various degrees believe that as they would not cheat, they judge others like Lewandowsky with their own values to not cheat. When people realise the cheating and corruption that is going on, it will devalue the status and value in society of all university degrees. Sometimes people put too much prestige into the PhD.

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      Boobialla

      Apparently the fastest way to lose your freedom to comment, is with ad hominem arguments.


      This is not an ad hom either. – Jo

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  • #
    incoherent rambler

    My opinion in the last thread maybe applies.

    I might add that I think sceptics have been suckered into arguing about theory. e.g. feedbacks, radiation … The issues are (as I see it) :
    1. Do we have substantial empirical (unadjusted) evidence for an unusual rise in temperatures, that would lead to catastrophe?
    2. What empirical evidence do we have that indicates that the CET (for example) has been impacted by CO2.
    3. Have any of the temperature datasets been manipulated inappropriately?

    As Plimer (I think, paraphrasing) said “if you torture a model long enough, it will eventually confess and produce desired result”.
    I believe that the data fiddling by BoM, CSIRO and others scotches the CAGW hypothesis, it should be enough that all discussion of CAGW stops once we know the data is corrupted. No metrics, no argument.

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    • #

      Not quite. The problem is that when you point out the paucity of the evidence for temperature rise and how this as been spindled folded and mutilated beyond reason, the alarmist crowd say “but CO2 is a greenhouse gas, there’s more of it now and therefore the temperature MUST be rising”.

      The physical process and scale of this is important to understand so that the alarmist nonsense can be refuted.

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      ghl

      I feel that you are right, but it will take a royal commission to prove it.

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    Rick Bradford

    What we are dealing with here with people like Lewandowsky is a phenomenon known as ‘malignant narcissism’.

    A psychiatrist explains:

    But there is in society today a disguised type of narcissism that masks itself in a selfless, compassionate concern for others, yet is really all about fueling the need to feel superior and to exert control and power over others.

    This second type of narcissism is more subtle, but equally (if not more so in human history) destructive and dysfunctional as the first [selfish narcissism – RB]. It derives from an aggressive idealism/utopianism which is pursued despite the misery it causes in other people’s lives; and despite the dead bodies it leaves behind. This malignant narcissism is always justified because it is “for your own good”; or, “for the common good”; or, “to make the world and people better.” 

    Along with the selfish narcissist (whose overt preoccupation is “ME, ME, ME!” and using others for their own aggrandizement and reward), the selfless narcissist (“LOOK AT HOW WONDERFUL I AM FOR MAKING YOU BETTER!”) does not see other people as distinct individuals with needs and desires of their own, but only as fodder for the expression of some IDEAL; or as pawns to achieve the utopian fantasies of their own ideology. And because they think they are the “superior” ones who know what is best for all, if they happen to benefit financially, socially and culturally–all the better! They deserve it for their extraordinary compassion and good works. 

    People with this malignantly narcissistic defect completely reject the needs of the individual and enslave him or her to the service of their IDEAL. Eventually, the enslavement–whether religious or secular–snuffs out human ambition, confidence, energy, self-esteem, and life. These mindlessly malignant “do-gooders” do far more harm than good and their ideologies can lead to genocidal practices and unbelievable atrocities on a grand scale, all in the name of an IDEAL or GOD.

    With that knowledge in mind, there is no need to be surprised at any of the strokes these folks pull.

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    • #
      Ian Hill

      In any situation where there are groups of people doing voluntary work all these things emerge and the bigger the group the more pronounced it is. It could be for the school canteen, your kid’s football match or something far bigger like a community event. I once worked as a volunteer in the office for the Masters Games along with dozens of others and while for the most part it was enjoyable work, occasionally you’d come across another volunteer with an attitude of “I’m better than you because I’m going to be an official volunteer at the Sydney Olympics”.

      On the smaller scale, at school events there’s usually one who lands the best job and will do anything to cling to it. The real heroes are those who clean the toilets without complaint.

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    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      Excellent point Rick, and well made. Although I have to mention that the site you link to is hardly impartial – my personal opinions notwithstanding.

      I have also had conversations with medical folks along the same lines.

      One hypothesised that the condition could be brought on by extreme frustration – wanting an outcome very badly, and being constantly denied it. That would also fit with what we observe. One of my missions in life is to be one of the sources of that frustration, because eventually these people implode and become an embarrassment to the cause they serve. In that way we remove a piece from the board.

      He compares the lies to allied efforts to conceal the D-Day landing in World War II. Let’s ponder the cognitive processes that think the morals of science and war are equivalent?

      He and others of his ilk do see it as a war. It is a war of ideologies, with propaganda and fifth column activists being the primary weapons. The battens, tear gas and water cannon will come later. But all will be justified in Lewandowsky’s eyes. On that basis, I too see it as a war. You resist or you capitulate. It is a simple choice.

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    • #
      Winston

      Many scientists, doctors and other academics fantasize about being at the vanguard of some elitist revolution where ignorance and boorish behavior of the troglodytes is banished in favor of a technocratic utopia. What they fail to take into account is the extent of their own inhumanity, their own small mindedness and lack of imagination and intelligence, the weakness of centralist economies, the dangers of Orwellian statist control, the merits of diversity in an open society, and the flame of human ingenuity that necessarily will be extinguished in the collateral damage of such a “revolution”. It’s the choice between sterile authoritarianism on the one hand and freedom, self-determination and diversity on the other.

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      Byron

      Excellent post Rick , I think C.S.Lewis describes the malignant narcissist type most eloquently :

      Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
      C. S. Lewis (1898 – 1963)

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      lmwd

      Every time I’ve read anything that Lewandowsky has written I’m left shaking my head and thinking that this man is in need of a psychologist.

      In my time I’ve come across a number of psychologists and while most do their work to help others there is another sort who get into this field essentially to understand themselves or as others here have pointed out, to feel power over others. In other words, they are not quite right themselves and this is why they were attracted to this discipline in the first place.

      I once worked with a man who was a company psych and can I tell you, I would diagnose him as an organisation psychopath. He used his knowledge to manipulate others, prone to lying, a Jekyll and Hyde character etc. I learned the hard way to always have conversations with him on speaker phone with my boss present as a silent witness, and I wasn’t the only one (in every branch across this country) who figured out this was a necessary strategy when dealing with him. He was pure calculated venom if you stood in this way. He just about took that company down in the end when he demanded the top position and they wouldn’t give it to him….for obvious reasons as he had made so many enemies. No one trusted him with his jaw dropping bald faced lies and years of cynical manipulations. He was a Dr…….. So he had all the right degrees….

      So back to my main point. I get the feeling Lewandowsky, for all his qualifications, isn’t quite right….

      He calls us nuts…..Ahhh, a classic case of projection.

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      Paul S

      Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm – but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it. Because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves. ( The Cocktail Party – T.S Eliot )

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      Boobialla

      I’m told that the fastest way to lose your freedom to comment, is with ad hominem arguments.

      —————-
      REPLY: look up the definition of ad hom before you post it. Learn to reason. Jo

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      • #
        Boobialla

        argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person supporting it.

        (You still have not provided evidence that the blog writer was doing it therefore you are being considered a troll by me unless you can…..) CTS

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    Faye of Fingal Head

    They will take, take and take until… something stops them. Something outside the government must push back.

    On Sunday, 1st July, the day the Carbon Tax starts, it would be great show of strength if ordinary Australians came out in huge numbers to protest right around Australia. The government is so stupid it thinks their “compensation” payments will shut us up.

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    • #
      old44

      Labor are counting on their supporters to see the “compensation” as a gift and the price rises as oppression by the capitalist overlords, and Labor never overestimates the intelligence of its voters.

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  • #

    It has always been ‘only about the money’.

    The Science has become the excuse, the fall back, the reason.

    The Science has been latched onto by every step in this food chain, but only to protect the money that is flowing in rivers to every step of that food chain.

    They ask us to accept that Science on faith, the most complex science that they never explain so it can be understood by the average person. It’s always openly referred to as the absolute imperative behind the need for …… well, everything.

    When it comes to the Science, I am one of those average people, and I really do WANT to understand it, and if it’s beyond me, then it must be way beyond the average punter.

    However, there is one aspect of the Science that I do know, and every time I mention it, I get laughed at, told I’m a fool, and then discounted. The best part of all that is in doing that, they have opened themselves up for the ultimate ridicule.

    That tidbit of science that I do know is not the complex science we are asked to accept on virtual blind faith. It’s not the province of PhD’s.

    It’s the most basic science that every one of us learned in the first year of High School as a 13 year old, and then just as promptly, immediately forgot.

    When you burn one ton of coal, you get 2.86 tons of Carbon Dioxide. (CO2)

    True, at High School that Science teacher never mentioned this at all. He/She did however mention the Atomic table of elements in those first days of Science, and as Oxygen weighs just that tad more than Carbon, when you add two atoms of Oxygen to one atom of Carbon, you more than triple the weight of the original Carbon atom, and as coal is basically all Carbon, that multiplier is in fact 2.86 on average.

    I first posted on that at my home site in December of 2008, and to this day, that Post is visited every day, and in fact is one of our highest rating Posts, so obviously it must be high on a Google search engine page somewhere.

    That Post is at this link:

    Why Does One Ton Of Coal Make 2.86 Tons Of Carbon Dioxide?

    I was even asked by American Thinker to submit a reworded original to their site and that was in November of 2010 at the following Link:

    High School Science and Cap and Trade Legislation

    So, there are people out there, average every day people wanting to know the Science. All they are being told is that it is the reason that they need to do what it is they tell you needs to be done. It supports politics. It supports Renewable Power. It supports Universities. It supports Government funding. It supports, well, everything really.

    But most of all it (the Science) supports the money, and at every step of the way, that source of money, those rivers of gold, needs to be protected.

    Science has become the very convenient fall back, and after all, there really is no reason to discuss the Science anyway, because, er, the debate is closed.

    Tony.

    Post Script – Hey, don’t believe me? Take this link and scroll down a little to the heading titled Coal Combustion and Carbon Dioxide Emissions, and it’s in Para 4 there.
    Mind you, that ‘bastion of truth’, Wikipedia, tries to make it even worse for coal, quoting their figure at a multiplier of 2.92

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    • #

      Awesome comment, Tony!

      I have harped on the FACT that it is about the money (and almost always is) only to be viewed by my fellow skeptics as some kind of a cynic!

      Then again, I am not the intellectual Titan that you are! I always enjoy reading your comments. Thank you.

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      • #

        Thanks Eddy, (got the spelling right this time)

        But really:

        Then again, I am not the intellectual Titan that you are!

        Intellectual Titan! WTF! Christ! I’m not even a Minnow yet.

        When people ask me what qualifications I have, all I can say is mumble mumble Associate Diploma of Electrical Engineering.

        Almost sounds like a Graduation Certificate from A Kindergarten.

        Intellectual Titan.

        Thank you, but if I’m an intellectual Titan, then I’m standing on the shoulders of people who really are.

        Tony.

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        • #
          Winston

          You know what your problem is Tony?

          You have only the wisdom of experience, practical application and technological knowledge to fall back on, when a glossy piece of paper (signifying your passage through the survival course of indoctrination that is tertiary education) would obviously give your opinions much more “weight”.

          By way of supporting that argument from a personal perspective, I believe I am a much better medico for eschewing 90% of the garbage I was taught in the course of my degree in favour of my own mettle and intuitiveness. The quickest way to get people killed in my profession is to follow some generic flow chart of homogenised investigation strategies or “management plans”, which more reflect the prejudices of government lackeys, rather than the intellectual curiosity of the “hunt” for the correct diagnosis and management based on an understanding of the patient as an individual. I much prefer to trust my right brain intuitive processes than my left brain which is prone to confirmation bias and “missing the forest for the trees”.

          Once upon a time, society recognised the value of the practical and pragmatic intellect such as yours as equal, if not occasionally superior, to the intellect that allows one to absorb a vast array of facts and regurgitate them with often only superficial understanding. So, Tony, I would support Eddy and suggest that you shouldn’t be so modest. And to some extent we all stand on the shoulders of giants, it’s just that only some have the humility to acknowledge that fact.

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          • #

            Thanks Winston.

            As a startling example of what Winston said here, and in fact from his field, Medicine, I have had experience with this , and I understand that this involves something intensely personal, both for me and more importantly, my good lady wife.

            She has Epilepsy, originally diagnosed in 1971 (9 years before we met) after the original catastrophic seizure event.

            It took two years to stabilise and all they had then were the drugs that they had access to at the time, and she was placed on a ‘tri therapy’ of the three drugs that were available.

            In 1996, she had her appendix out, and as expected, her epilepsy played up when subjected to the anaesthetic. Unknown to me, the hospital called in a Consultant Neurologist, and after recovery from the operation we were tasked to visit him.

            He mentioned that the tri therapy that she was on was old style, and there were new single therapies that were much better.

            We then proceeded down Months of procedures (just tests) and he changed her medication, four times in all to newer single therapies, none of which worked, and in fact made the situation worse, and here I meant back to the catastrophic early days of her epilepsy.

            This specialist was dumbfounded and ended up referring her to the hospital in Sydney where they were in the early days of the operation that Wally Lewis so successfully had.

            We drove to Sydney and spent three and a half weeks, agonising for her hooked up all day most days to testing equipment and off any medication. probed by Doctors Specialists and Professors.

            No result. Absolutely nothing. Barely even an apology as we were shuffled out for the drive back to the Gold Coast. Just staying on the most recent mediation she was offered, now the fifth new medication.

            All this had taken seven months and cost us close to $10K of our own money, which we couldn’t afford, and couldn’t get back from either the Government scheme or her Private fund, and which we had to take out a personal loan for.

            Now back at square one and in fact with her epilepsy almost out of control, I was at a loss.

            Her three children, bless their hearts (really) saw me and said ‘Dad, we want a second opinion.’

            I was really pissed off at that, because she had now had almost 30 or 40 considered opinions.

            Grudgingly I acceded to their request, and they lined up a new GP for her to visit. I virtually didn’t want to hear a word he had to say until he said ‘Has anyone mentioned that we could put her back on her original tri therapy.’

            It was so simple.

            We got lost in the ‘need for change’ because this is new, and what she has is old.

            Within a fortnight she was back to normal, and has been ever since.

            We left our old GP, one of the strong ‘advisors’ for the ‘need to change’ on the spot without even a goodbye, and have been with Jim for nearly all that time, except now we live in Rockhampton.

            The moral of this is that sometimes, what we did for so many years may in fact be the correct way of doing things.

            The same applies here with CAGW.

            The need for change, for the sake of change, and because something needs to be done, may in fact be not really correct.

            So Winston, thanks for the encouragement.

            People look at what I have to say as being on the sidelines of all this debate on GAGW and the Science.

            However, what I have to offer is in fact the end result of this mindless rush to change things away from what has worked to something new that patently just does not work, or in fact, cannot replace what was once the way we did things.

            And hey, sorry to get so personal here.

            Tony.

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          Len

          I remember the TV Programme “All creatures big and small”. There was an English Farmer who attended a two week course at Oxford university run by the Veterinary Professor. The head vet at the local village veterinary clinic said of this farmer “Some learn more in two weeks than others learn at University in four years!” There is no reason that with your diploma you can’t mix it with the best.

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        Gee Aye

        awesome and nothing to do with the subject.

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          Gee Aye

          by the way basic rules of molarity are still part of the curriculum. You can spin this story, TONY a million times (and you are well on your way) but a million times it will be wrong. I asked my son’s year ten class exactly your question, I asked it after they’d learned about mass and atomic numbers and avagadro’s constant from their teacher and they all (yes all) answered a question about the mass of C02 produced from carbon (with some obvious caveats and restrictions) correctly.

          So your average jo in the street can’t answer this well. So what? These people do other things and are probably not spending much of their lives on blogs thinking of ways to belittle your knowledge of important things that they know about that you don’t.

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            Dave

            .
            GeeAye

            Read down and you are answered – see – John F. Hultquists question and Tonys answer to you question!

            Using statements like “molarity are still part of the curriculum”,

            “You can spin this story, TONY a million times (and you are well on your way) but a million times it will be wrong.”

            But getting to basics – and keeping in mind your thoughts – why did you ask about “the mass of C02 produced from carbon” – GeeAye – what is the mass of CO2 from Carbon??????????? Wrong question!

            How do you get the mass of CO2 from CARBON without burning/dissolving/ mixing it! Please include caveats and restrictions you asked your year 10 class!

            What worries me is your terminology “mass of C02” is very incorrect? Why are you asking all these questions and giving emotive experiences straight after TONYFROMOZ makes a post? And it is obvious in many other threads!

            BTW – Where’s your BLOG gone?

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            Gee Aye

            just trying to decipher your post. is your problem that I wrote “carbon”(i.e. the element in its pure form) rather than a “carbon source’ (i.e. coal, wood etc)?

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            Gee Aye

            caveats are exactly as you surmised…. if burned and it is 100% but what if burning produces othe carbon by products. It gets students to think about real world situations rather than a simple and real world unrealised equation like C + 02 = CO2 (although even the simple curriculum story is not as simple as this).

            This all has nothing to do with independent thought being able to flourish in any environment, whether it is a blog, a government funded outlet or at the local bar. Even if the blog is funded by a single source, the government is left right or centre or the pub supplies the drinks for free… a person can still write/speak/blog with full independence.

            I’m staggered that there are people that can’t understand this and this blog post gives no evidence that “The Conversation” blogs are not independent. Well at least no evidence that isn’t just trivially saying that no one is truly idependent. I think we all know this.

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          • #
            Dave

            .
            Yup!

            What was the question you asked the year 10 class?

            the mass of C02 produced from carbon (wood)
            the mass of C02 produced from carbon (coal)
            the mass of C02 produced from carbon (gas)
            etc

            Your experience that you gave in 6.1.2.1 is rather useless if the caveats and restrictions aren’t included! Please state the question asked of the Year 10 class – that’s all GeeAye!

            Don’t forget to include if it was burnt, dissolved etc!

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            Gee Aye

            you want a transcript? My point was that TonyfromOz does several misleading things. First he makes the claim that a lack of knowledge about CO2 production is poor (yes but so?) and important (is it?). Second is the implication that the next generation is not being equipped to think about these things (my dissertation to year 10s- and above for that matter- is broadly described to you and that is as much of my life as I want to describe to a person called Dave. I’ll live with the derision my lack of openness brings).

            Finally Tony gives no citation or primary data for his figures, which may well be right (but so? This is never really said except as a smug aside), and just uses these to imply that the fact the this is not known (but he knows it) is a failure of society in some vague way.

            Finally finally I am really bothered by his sentences as paragraphs writing style.

            The last sentence was a joke.

            NYUK.

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            Dave

            .
            GeeAye

            What correct answer did the Year 10 sudents give to your question?

            I have read your reply! No answer yet!
            Then you say

            I’m staggered that there are people that can’t understand this and this blog post gives no evidence that “The Conversation” blogs are not independent.

            Oh so very WRONG! I gave an answer at 32 – how do you explain some 85% of comments are from (Government institutions) bureaucrats on this site!

            Independant government site? Yes!
            Independant site? NO!

            Explain all the partner relationships – they are all on The Constipati Conversation website!

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            Dave

            .
            GeeAye – The history so far:
            All this (below) from one question about what your 10 year old got asked????

            TonyfromOz does several misleading things
            As follows by GeeAye in 6.1.2.1.5

            1. That a lack of knowledge about CO2 production is poor!
            2. That a lack of knowledge about CO2 production is poor and it is important!
            3. The implication that the next generation is not being equipped to think about these things!
            4. Tony gives no citation or primary data for his figures!
            just uses these to imply that the fact the this is not known (but he knows it) is a failure of society in some vague way!
            5. (GeeAye’s opinion – quote) I am really bothered by his sentences as paragraphs writing style!

            GeeAye – You have given a critial citation on your problem with another commenter from this site (I disagree with your view point) – and at no point have you backed this up with fact (nothing at all really) – but back to the original question regarding Carbon when burnt – please explain how Tony is wrong – I have in previous posts asked Tony the same question as John F. Hultquist below – and I cannot understand how he (Tony) has the patience to keep responding – yet he does! (Thank you Tony).

            I also believe that your view on The Conversation is also wrong:

            That there are people that can’t understand this and this blog post gives no evidence that “The Conversation” blogs are not independent.

            Please provide some backup (truck talk for proof) for your claims in 1 to 5 please GeeAye?

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            Gee,

            had you bothered to read even the very next comment, 6.2.1, you will see the Primary citation, and had you bothered to take the link, that explains it in full.

            Every single time I have been asked about this, I have referred either directly to that link, or to a Post that contains those links.

            I’m not relying on people believing me.

            What I am relying upon is people’s ability to read.

            When I first started commenting here people mentioned the (lack of) spacing in my comments.

            It’s not a ‘sentence as paragraph style’. It’s spacing out the text for ease of reading.

            As to lack of knowledge about CO2 production. This 2.86 tons is one of the most frequently responded to things that I mention.

            The second most frequent is people’s absolute disbelief about how much coal a typical large scale coal fired power plant does burn.

            On average 6.5 million tons a year, and at 2.86 tons of CO2 on average, that equates on average to one ton of CO2 being emitted from that plant every 1.7 seconds.

            The number of times people have replied ‘Bullshit’ to that I have lost count of. People just have no concept of that whatsoever.

            So, with both points it’s just so easy to discount anything TonyfromOz says because it’s just plain crap, just not to be believed.

            Perhaps now you can see why I mention it so often. Not to big note me, but to impress upon people that the production of CO2 is on two scales, one of them, monumentally huge as with the emissions I have just mentioned from the one plant, and the second that even whilst so monumentally huge, it is absolutely insignificantly tiny, 392PPM, or 0.039% of the overall total Atmosphere.

            This has never been about ME.

            Tony.

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          Mark D.

          You must be trying out for a moderator job?

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      John F. Hultquist

      Regarding carbon and its combustion:
      The maximum multiplier is 3.667 but because fuels are not 100% carbon the range is less than that number, and your 2.86 fits. However, I don’t find where you got this number. See here for a table of fuels:
      Coal is presented as an average in this table)

      http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/co2-emission-fuels-d_1085.html

      In the following article, coal is presented in three chunks:
      http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/classification-coal-d_164.html

      “Typical Fixed Carbon Content in Coal”
      Anthracite Coal : 80.5 – 85.7 weight %
      Bituminous Coal : 44.9-78.2 weight %
      Lignite Coal : 31.4 weight %

      ** The large table in this link is for placing coals into classes based on volatile matter and is not the same as the percentage of carbon.

      Your “2.86 tons” estimate is in here somewhere but the “multiplier of 2.92” very likely fits in also. One’s assumptions of how much of many classes of coal gets used must be known to say one is “right” and one is “wrong.” If you or someone else (not of the UN, Gore, or Hansen ‘cause’) has done these sorts of estimates and calculations – I haven’t found it.

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        John,
        as I mentioned in the Post Script of the original Comment, the link is as follows.

        http://www.eia.gov/coal/production/quarterly/co2_article/co2.html

        It’s from that monstrously huge database from the U.S. that deals with everything related to energy, The EIA (Energy Information Administration)

        Whenever I mention this 2.86 multiplier, this has always been my reference, and I (nearly) always use the word ‘average’ with that multiplier, as the numbers are different (but similar) for differing coals.

        Incidentally, the oddest thing has been happening at that site over the last year, 18 Months. I’ve been using the site now for four years, and it’s always been just bland information. Recently, it seems to be being ‘whitewashed’ to better reflect the current political administration’s, er, views.

        Whereas before it was just that info, now it seems there is a subtle thing creeping in that somehow, coal is really bad, and the same subtlety applies with Nuclear Power as well. It’s not something I can point at, because the database is so huge.

        Pages have just disappeared and been replaced by the new ones.

        Even this simple page about coal combustion that I have linked to here disappeared for around three months to be replaced recently by this new page which is much longer.

        That info that specifically mentions the 2.86 multiplier was once in the third of three simple paragraphs, and while still three paragraphs, it has had more info added and has had subtle details added to it.

        I suppose you can use website saving facilities, but this site is (quite literally) millions of pages, and getting bigger, and also now being whitewashed.

        If there is a way to make coal look bad, then everybody is doing it now, and how better to start than with the Government’s own websites.

        Tony.

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        Geoff Sherrington

        Small point, but when talking of the combustion of coal, one assumes pure coal rather than the variable impure gunk within it while knowing in the background that coals are mostly quite impure. The logic question was correctly phrased by Tony, as in the sense that some kids don’t know that milk comes out of a cow’s udder, whether the cow is pure or not. C + 02 gives CO2, 12 tonnes gives 44 tonnes, multiplier 3.7 on a molecular basis, all slightly rounded.

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      Ian Hill

      Every time I see something like this I want to ask “to what extent does the removal of oxygen to create the CO2 offset the “greenhouse effect”?

      So you’ve gained those tons of CO2, but you have lost plenty of O2.

      A quick google check told me that O2 is NOT a greenhouse gas because it doesn’t have three atoms. But that’s just a definition. Can O2 behave like one anyway?

      I came across a site where someone did an experiment with three bottles filled with (1) dry air, (2) half tap water and half air and (3) half carbonated water and half CO2 respectively. He then turned on a nearby heater and showed small fishtank thermometers attached to each bottle registering the temperature change. The CO2 bottle heated up the slowest and was the fastest to return to the starting temperature after the heater was turned off. He claimed that this proves the “greenhouse effect” (inasmuch as CO2 is the culprit) does not exist.

      It would seem that oxygen and nitrogen have more effect in heating up and later retarding cooling, if only because they are there in vastly superior amounts. OK, what’s the catch?

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        bobl

        The answer is yes, and no. O2 and N2 arent greenhouse gasses in the sense that it they slow the release of terrestrailly generated heat to space via radiation. They are transparent to this energy. They can however contribute to the temperature of the planet because they receive inbound solar energy in the UV range and turn that into heat, which can then be emitted by water (or CO2) in the infrared. Remember this when someone next carries on about how solar insolation (in the IR range) hasn’t changed and therefore the sun can’t be causing temperaturee rise. The Sun is much more variable in the UV spectrum, and this energy is intercepted by O2 and N2

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    Joe V.

    ” The government is so stupid it thinks their “compensation” payments will shut us up.”

    Well either they will, or they won’t.
    Suggests a slogan to get people out there,to ‘welcome’ the new carbon tax.
    Your government thinks you’re stupid. Stupid enough to swallow this carbon tax. Get out there and show them who is?

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      gnome

      That egregious little creep Henderson put it fairly well on Insiders this morning when he said so many Green voters are on the gumment teat but don’t know where the money in our society comes form. They think because the gumment’s got money, it can finance whatever it wants without doing any harm to its source.

      Its one of those perceptual biases (like global warming itself). When I read “carbon price” I know I am reading a warmist opinion, and when I read “carbon tax”, the opposite. When I read “carbon price compensation” I read it as the destruction of part of the productive economy. The destruction will last, but the compensation will be inflated away. They just don’t know it yet.

      Luckily (and partly in response to Tony’s comment at 6 above) people still look for information, and although believers become converts to scepticism, have you ever heard of a sceptic being converted to being a believer?

      Time is on our side (in more ways than one).

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    What kind of organization receives all its funding from one source, then claims to be “independent?” (Just another GONGO idea).

    Great post, Jo (as if I would expect other wise ;-)) These people, unfortunately, live by the “other” golden rule. He who has the gold makes the rules!

    By the way, I clicked on GONGO and I learned something new today! Thank you, Jo!

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      ISTM that UWA is now a money-making and make-work venture, lacking students per sé, but with lots of customers who expect to receive a useful “education”. Depending on the meaning of “useful”, one can certainly suffer by degrees, but actually being more useful to those who sponsor such an expensive education is increasingly questionable. And high-profile personalities such as Lewandoofsky only call the true value more into question.

      Although the short-term goal of UWA of continued funding is preserved by playing the climate game, the long-term one, as a reputable institution suffers as the quality of graduates declines.

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    Jaymez

    This site is helping in the fight against Government policies which will not make a jot of difference to global climate while causing significant damage to our economy and the lives of many people. That makes this site worth a damn site more than $3m if you ask me Jo.

    The Conversation boasts “The Conversation is powered by 2,635 leading academics from top institutions working with professional editors.” Yet they let the tripe from Lewandowsky be printed. He is one of the founding members so maybe he gets whatever he wants printed, all on the taxpayers dime!

    Giving tacit approval to unethical, unscientific, and reportedly illegal behaviour if the transgressor believes it is in the social good – which it seems only the saintly Lewandowsky can determine – does not reflect very well on:

    – Lewandowsky and anyone else in the Cognitive Science field if they would all support his justification,
    – The University of WA who allow Lewandowsky to identify himself as a professor at their institute, and
    – Current and past UWA psychology students who have had these poor standards as examples while studying there.

    Professor Lewendowsky is doing for the good reputation University Academics as Paedophiles did for Catholic Priests. used to be held in, in the same way certain Priests and Bishops destroyed the credibility in the eyes of the population.

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      Bruce of Newcastle

      In these days of publish or perish articles at Conversation are probably CV’able.

      You can see why this might be important:

      “[University of Sydney] management retrospectively introduced a new performance test, just to purge staff. Anyone who hadn’t published at least four articles in less than three years was threatened.”

      Which interests me as a former denizen, though I left for the private sector after postgrad.

      Sounds like some of the more rusted on SU types may get to experience the private sector also. Perish the thought.

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      Boobialla

      The fastest way to lose your freedom to comment, is with ad hominem arguments.

      —–

      Except Jaymez did not make an ad hom argument. Jaymez did not say Lewandowsky is wrong because he is …. – Jo

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    “While there was no uniformity of motivation, there was one thing each and every one of us shared and that was the moment. The moment was when you realised that if you were going to commit yourself to fighting the thing, you were going to lose some friends, you were going to be isolated, you were going to take some professional damage, you were going to be ridiculed, you were going to spend a lot of your free time on it, you were never going to make a buck out of it, the chances of you winning were remote and even if by some miracle you did, nobody would ever remember your efforts anyway. We’d all had that moment and we’d all made the decision to fight it anyway.”

    http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/the-climate-wars-revisited-or-no-truce-with-kings/

    You’ve either got the right stuff or you ain’t. You have Jo.

    Pointman

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    TimiBoy

    Truly, if they keep pushing things the way they are, if it’s War they want, it’s War they’re going to get! I have 7 very average, normal Staff. They dig holes with excavators for a living. They are hopping mad that it is getting too expensive to live, and if it keeps going, well, I don’t know WHAT they’ll do. I imagine they are a pretty representative crowd. Really this CAGW stuff is the ultimate in foolishness, and it puts the Scientists smack bang in front of the wall when the Revolution comes! Again. They never learn, do they?

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    Graeme No.3

    Lewandowsky [snip] [snip] [snip]. Only someone like JB would believe {snip] [snip]

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    Robert

    very well written Jo…..clearly Prof Lewandowsky has forfeited the right to independent thought and now doubt takes advice from “experts”.

    My current definition of an expert is someone who does not have all the answers but is certain that with adequate funding they can find them…..generally applies to bureaucrats!

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    Yup, event horizon stuff. Never mind, have some Stevie Nicks anyway.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apIUeIYh6-g&feature=related

    Pointman

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    amcoz

    Great post Jo.

    I wonder whether that Due-Liar has ever been subjected to the Loser’s so0called cognitive science?

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    Minister for Enlightenment

    Its high time that the broom was put through the way tax payers money is handed over to these thoroughly disgraceful academic elitist dills.

    Their logical thinking abilities are so poor and their connections with reality so unworldy one wonders what the ARGC’s are doing giving them even a dollar to peddle the crap that Lewandowsky has under his name

    I do truly fear for the future of this country when on the one hand we read the puerile rubbish the Lewandowskys are allowed to put to together, but on the other hand learn that our freedoms of speech are being curtailed by a malicious Labor govt

    Why dont these academic dopes speak up about that I wonder ..or are they a a part of this curtailment scheme.

    Wouldnt surprise me in the least if they are

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    The ‘Conversation’ never has ever been about a balanced conversation and a well considered science based discussion. You only need to spend five minutes trying to engage people in debate on there to appreciate it is just a political mouthpiece utilizing the argument from authority technique.

    It does nothing to truly educate and only seeks to direct your thinking along those required to support the current political narrative. I would encourage the next government to completely de-fund it and put the money saved into much more positively productive endeavors.

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    Doug Proctor

    Have you noticed that when academics write socially oriented, i.e. left-wing, liberal or quasi-communist, papers, they are free-thinkers, positive contributors to society, but when they write business/pragmatism oriented, i.e. “right-wing”, conservative or quasi-capitalist (no: they are always deemed PURE capitalists) they are reactionary tools of the government/Big Oil/Industrial State status quo?

    It is weird. The world operates by fundamental capitalist principles of meritocracy. You work harder, you get more. You might disagree, and it is true that entrenched groups consistently do better than the un-entrenched, but those entrenched groups at some time earned their positions by hard work, sacrifice and skill (the original aristocracy earned their positions by fighting for the king or others). Go to any country and you will find that, regardless of the political system, the ones who rose to power got there by determination and effort. That is capitalism in operation – it isn’t just about money. It is about making an effort that is rewarded proportional to the effort. Yet the respected academics are those that oppose the way the world works.

    The economic and social policies that dominate this century and next will be those that reflect peoples’ willingness to work, i.e. pay, for things that bring benefit proportional to the cost, i.e. negative impacts. The ones who are “respected”, at least officially, are those that say, no, we should/will/must pay/work bizarre amounts to deflect a danger than no one can actually see, let alone determine the cost outcome.

    The CAGW believers like to liken opposition to “pre-emptive” action to the days before WWII, when a firm stance by the West could have stopped both German and Japanese expansionist, military operations. But this is not the same. In 1938/1939, both Germany and Japan were actively building and expanding their empires, at great cost to their neighbours. Germany had taken the Sudentland, annexed/taken over Austria. Japan occupied large parts of China. Both had active war machines in operation. Germany had practised in Spain and Japan, in Nanjing, among other areas. The threat was present, not future. Unlike the global warming scenarios.

    Guilt. A genetic tag that goes back to when Man was prey, not predator. So says Barbara Ehrenreich in Blood Rites (1997), explaining why we both hate war and conduct war with a religious excitement. What I see in the liberal press is exactly that guilt. They are expressing the genetic character that feels guilty about becoming the monsters in the savannah that we once feared. We are the creatures that killed and kept the gazelle that we needed to eat, the forest fire that denuded the land of the home that we once had. The academics – including Gore, whose intellect is not necessarily up to the common group – are “in touch” with their “inner nature”, they are proud to say. Yes, they are. But what they are in touch with is the self-loathing, the cognitive dissonance, that comes from realising that the days where we feared the lion and tiger are become the days where the lion and tiger fear us. We have met the enemy and he is us, as Pogo noted in the non-funny, funny pages.

    The practical man and the mature man have a simple answer. Get over it. Move on. We are not going back and, really, we don’t want to. We don’t have to destroy the world, yes, but going back to being prey, not predator, while being intellectually/deeply emotionally satisfying, is foolish.

    As the song says: Get a haircut and get a real job.

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      Plain Jane

      I like your post Doug. I think it is spot on with the self loathing/original sin message. That theory about human behaviour has explaining power.

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    Great article, Jo. You are definitely worth more than $3 million p.a. Post-modern academia sticks together, unable to comprehend that by covering up, or by not speaking against, the charlatans in academic gowns, the opprobrium doesn’t go away. I guess that they have already set the cause of science back by at least hundred years. Welcome, the Church of Gore and flannery’s flagellanti! I was about to write that the scientists are afraid to speak, but the real scientists never were.

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    […] Soaking in money — a fake “independent” unscientific Conversation […]

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    memoryvault

    .
    I for one think The Conversation is a great idea.

    When this Age of Madness ultimately collapses into the Reign of Terror which must inevitably follow, the Contributing Author list and their published articles at The Conversation will make it just that much easier for the enraged peasants to know where to send the tumbril to collect those with an appointment with their carbon-free destiny.

    Could turn out to be almost as useful for the purpose as Hansard.

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    Michael

    Tobacco taxes nowhere near cover the proven health costs of tobacco. The proven effects of second hand smoke such as increased susceptibility to addiction of tobacco by children give plenty of reason to ban it without needing to draw the long bow of cancer.

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      John Brookes

      Hmm, your not one of the tobacco alarmists are you Michael? You do realise that none of this stuff has ever been proved, and its all just a scam to raise tax for big government?

      Mind you, Lewandowski would be fascinated as to why you had (at the time I read your comment) 3 thumbs down. Why would climate skeptics be on the side of big tobacco? Clearly it isn’t based on any actual understanding of the facts, so the support for big tobacco must be psychologically based.

      I find those three thumbs down say a lot more than Jo’s article.

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        debbie

        No John,
        They indicate that Michael missed the point.
        It appears you did too.
        Both of you are assuming that more tax money will solve the problem.
        On what solid evidence would you base that assumption?
        No one said tobacco wasn’t a social health problem.

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      mareeS

      By all means let’s ban tobacco, Michael. It’s horribly smelly and very off-putting when one is dining. While we’re at it, why not ban smelly people who don’t bathe regularly or use deodorant, as they’re also horribly smelly and very off-putting when one is dining?

      Putting such silliness aside, how are you about pot? If tobacco is bad for health (and it demonstrably is) then so is pot, and it’s an entirely unregulated smoking substance apart from fines for possession and dealing. In fact, I can be fined far more for growing unlicensed tobacco in the backyard ($25,000 per plant) than I can be fined for a couple of mariujana plants for personal use.

      Back in the teenage days when I dabbled in both substances, rollies of Drum were far easier on the throat and lungs than rollies of dope. Not to mention what dope apparently does to one’s brain as well as one’s lungs. But for some weird reason, dope is still more acceptable than tobacco to certain types.

      In a sensible world both drugs would be regulated and taxed equally, because they’re both easy to cultivate and they’re both harmful to health.

      Before anyone asks, I haven’t bothered with either substance in 35 years.

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    ursus augustus

    I recently had a conversation with a former student of Lewandowsky’s who had just graduated as a clinical psychologist at UWA. The student spoke highly of Lewandowsky’s work in psychology research and he certainly appears to have a substantive body of work to his name generally. When I broached the subject of Lewandowsky’s writings about climate and the “psychology” of “deniers” I got a wry , knowing smile, a rolling of the eyes and an acknowledgement that the good professor runs away at the mouth on the subject. The student was very happy to have taken the clinical route ( i.e. NOT the research route) to a post grad ( Doctoral) qualification I gathered.

    There is hope.

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      Michael

      But Ursus, the real issue is Lewandowsky’s position on ethics which seems to be I don’t have any- cheat and do whatever you want if you think you are right (everyone). The student didn’t answer that.

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      Jaymez

      Not only what Michael said, but there are a whole raft of students doing useless arts degrees where they take a few units from here and there, particularly from the Social Sciences department. All you have to do to pass the units is tow the party (left wing) line. Students at that age are very impressionable so they come away thinking that they are intellectually superior to those silly sceptics.

      Read Rick Bradford’s post at #4 for a wonderful explanation of how they feel.

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    Minister for Enlightenment

    Lewandowsky would improve his credibilty a little if he was supportive of the campaign against the Finkelstein/Gillard/Swan attacks on our Freedom of Speech and support the IPA in battling this insidious move by the ignoramus Laborites

    But I bet he doesnt, and I bet the Conversation doesnt either.

    Last thing the academics want is lay people, ie tax payers, outside the tent pissing in.

    http://support.ipa.org.au/

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    debbie

    Great post Jo,
    Also thankyou Tony for your calm, common sense perspective on the CAGW debate.
    It does appear to be about manufacturing ways to get one’s hands in the publuc purse.
    Those of us who live in the ‘real world’ and actually produce wealth and pay significant amounts into that public purse need to know that there are people like you who point out it does not make sense to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
    Lately that poor baby seems to be drowning in the bathwater however!
    Maybe we just need to pull the plug?

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    Bob Malloy

    Off Topic,
    The Newcastle Herald on Saturday featured a piece on the upcoming “I Can Change Your Mind About Climate Change”. For a Fairfax paper I found this article balanced, quoting Professor Murry Salby, fairly and without dissent.

    Professor Salby, with 30years of research in atmosphere and climate matters, says humans emit about 5gigatonnes a year of carbon. The oceans emit about 90gigatonnes and the land 60gigatonnes, with most of these emissions balanced by natural carbon sinks.

    This week, he told H2 Review ‘‘the temperature dependence of net CO2 emission clearly accounts for changes in the observed record from one year to the next – changes that are plainly incoherent with human emission’’. He says anyone who thinks the science is settled is ‘‘in Fantasia’’, and that ‘‘science without discourse isn’t science, it’s advocacy’’.

    In a past post Jo highlighted the speech Murry Salby gave at the Sydney Institute,

    on the other hand climate activist Anna Rose still seems to be poorly informed about skeptics their numbers and growing resistance to climate alarmism.

    Now married and living in Sydney, Rose has become a leading figure among environmental campaigners. She says people tried to talk her out of debating Minchin, who she describes as ‘‘one of the remaining few high-profile climate sceptics in Australia’’.

    She also claims a part victory over Minchin when she states, “he does seem to have partly changed his mind, accepting that a doubling of CO2 does cause warming of at least 1.2° Celsius”

    Obviously she doesn’t come here or she would know most skeptics concede CO2 contributes to rising temperatures of up to the above mentioned 1.2° per doubling of CO2.

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      John Brookes

      Yes, Salby gave a talk and we got to hear the audio. But we didn’t see any graphs, references etc. Given this was some time ago, and nothing to support his position has appeared since then, we can safely assume that there is absolutely nothing behind his assertions.

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      Bob Malloy

      A word for Jo.

      (If what they do costs $6 million, does that mean my site is worth $3m? Am I grossly underpaid, or are they grossly overpaid?)

      Maybe you should go cap in hand to Clive Palmer. Some commenters at the Newcastle Herald seem to think he pays cash for comment.

      Something more interesting than the actual debate about climate change are the factors behind it. The vast majority of independent scientists around the world agree 100% that human activity has affected the worlds climate pattern. From ice caps to bird migrations and even plant growth around Australia’s snowy mountains. This is detailed research that entails countless specimens and man hours in the fields not someone sitting back and saying hmmm this might affect that. These scientists don’t have any personal agendas like mining and agricultural personalities and industries. Have any of you sceptics actually looked into who funds the handful of scientists who have ‘researched’ and found ‘no evidence’ of human impact? Yup, you guessed it, the people like Clive Palmer who are happy to sit back and reap 90 % of the rewards of an industry that would be directly affected if the worlds leaders actually took action against climate change. Research, not listening to Channel Ten news or radio shock jocks and reading The Australian/Telegraph for your facts will help the cause of being better informed and aware of the world you live in.

      Submitted via iPhone App
      Posted by Catherine, 14/04/2012 7:02:07 PM
      ALL that these “climate sceptics” on here who keep on denying the existence of ANY proven effects from man’s activities on the worlds environments and climate have demonstrated to me so far ~ IS how easy it has been for the oil, mining and developer’s lobbyists and propagandists to fool and “lead on” that band of rednecks and conservatives who have no understanding of either science or engineering…

      THEY keep on parroting the “junk” science from the polluters ~ immune to the fact that this makes them look as ignorant and foolish as the dark-green “doomsayers” and Chicken Littles.
      Posted by Bovver Boy, 14/04/2012 7:45:13 PM, on The Herald

      sarc/off

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    John Brookes

    Look, climate “skeptics” are fascinating from a scientific point of view. Such a wide range of beliefs with only one thing in common – “CO2 didn’t do it”. Occasionally you get a brave “skeptic” like Wes George who starts calling out his fellow travellers on their stupid beliefs. But generally its just a disparate, loosely organised rabble united only in their dislike of the central theme of AGW. Oddly, “skeptics” seem to gravitate towards right wing beliefs.

    As always, a bit of balance is required. The “greens” are like the polar opposite of the “skeptics”. They too have all sorts of weird and wonderful beliefs, and are only united by a general feeling of guilt about mankind. They tend to embrace left wing causes. As a result, I like them more…

    Both groups deserve to be studied by psychologists.

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      BobC

      John Brookes
      April 15, 2012 at 1:57 pm · Reply
      Look, climate “skeptics” are fascinating from a scientific point of view. Such a wide range of beliefs with only one thing in common – “CO2 didn’t do it”.

      Yeah Brooksey — if you are a scientific illiterate, I guess the lack of unaniminity would impress you. You are also impressed by consensus for the same reason.

      You would probably have tried to keep the deck chairs on the Titanic in neat rows, as that would have seemed to you to be the biggest problem.

      But, you’re not even competent at sociological observation — the one thing (most) skeptics have in common (those who have some understanding of science, that is) is that the AGW case rests on unsupported (in fact, by now largely falsified) hypotheses. You talking about science and politics is both a hoot and psychological projection, since it is the warmists who have rejected science and empirical fact and elevated a political agenda over any actual knowledge of the world.

      Anyone with a working knowledge of science (who is not bought-and-paid-for by the Green Agenda) knows we really don’t know very much about the climate — certainly not enough to be able to predict it (which the warmists have amply demonstrated by their inability to do so). It may even be that the climate is, in principle, unpredictable over more than a short time scale — certainly the real scientists who began the numerical studies of the Earth’s weather systems thought that was a real possibility, and nothing that has been accomplished in the field since has determined otherwise.

      In a field this embryonic, it is consensus that signals junk science (there not being enough real information to generate a scientific consensus), not divergence of opinion.

      For instance, how do you reconcile the fact that the warmists are pushing for society to severely limit anthropogenic CO2 emissions (while similarly limiting Human liberty), when it is easy to show, using their own models, that emission restrictions are far and away the least cost effective method of dealing with climatic change. (And that’s assuming that their models are right, which they most certainly are not.) It is a simple step to realize that the reason for trying to limit energy use is not climate, since it won’t have a measurable effect for any possible reduction. Also, the “Tipping Points” arguments are not based on any data or even current GCM models, but are the intellectual equivalent of the crazed guy on the street corner holding a sign saying “The World is Ending!” (Try to find a model that predicts one.)

      ****************

      But really, this is just one more attempt by you to avoid actually engaging anyone about the actual science — not a particularly effective tactic, but what else can you do if the facts are all against you? Perhaps someday you will let us know (if you even know yourself) what drives you to support this irrational crusade.

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        Streetcred

        BobC, the warmista can’t get past the simple hurdle that CO2 has followed warming by up to 800 years. That’s not even getting to first base credibility … they can argue whatever they like about GHG theory and the physics of back-radiation but they need to get past first base before. The Shakun 2012 attempt has already been destroyed.

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      Sonny

      John, this comment is pure trolling and adds no value whatsoever.
      But it makes sense that you gravitate toward the greens “which you like more” rather than the skeptics.

      Remember, this is an issue of science. CO2 either did it (did what exactly?) or did not. Man is either affecting the climate in a significant way or is not. The world doesn’t give two shits about individuals personal beliefs and which social groups they align themselves with.

      You’ve picked your side John. I’m sure you have wonderful green friends with engaging discussions about the virtues of feeling guilty for being alive. But on the science, you are wrong.

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      Gee Aye

      i fear you are right. It is terrible how sceptics are dragged down by other sceptics

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      Winston

      Both groups deserve to be studied by psychologists.

      Just exactly which group of lunatics do you belong to, John? Sometimes your vacuousness in these matters is particularly galling, considering that when points of contention are raised within the climate debate you are uniformly and regularly wiped off the mat by people like Bob and Cohenite, to name but 2. Yet you feel sufficiently confident in your perceived superiority that you able to deride those who have repeatedly bested you in matters of science as somehow being in need of psychological profiling. Why, because they disagree with your opinion? How tragically sad! That sort of logic is exactly why the loose affiliation of skeptically minded fight the “me-tooism” of siccophants like yourself- those who’ve never had an original thought in their lives that they haven’t had sought permission from their controllers to espouse.

      Genuinely grounded psychologists would have a field day with your particular brand of certainty, JB, in matters which are not only greatly uncertain, but also lack sensible evidentiary support when given appropriate scrutiny. For example, your apparent unwavering faith in the face of the fact that mitigation against CO2 in the methods proposed with Carbon taxation makes absolutely no sense and achieves little if anything in actually reducing emissions, but instead will in the immediate term open up our democratic society here in Oz (which has thus far achieved admirable levels of prosperity and tolerance) to an era of unparalleled economic regression and social upheaval by precipitating a local fiscal crisis, and quite probably help bring forth a global financial depression (when it is applied more widely as planned )that is obviously imminent for anyone with cursory economic understanding. Yet others need psychological analysis? I’m sure the participants at the Wanassee conference thought there was nothing wrong with their psychopathology either, John, when discussing their “final solution”. What penance are you planning to perform to obviate your conscience should you be an active participant in ruining the country, which our forebears toiled admirably to build, within the space of a generation just through your own pig-headed stupidity.

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        John Brookes

        Winston, I defer to people who have spent years of their life working on climate science. No apologies for that. I’m not certain that they are right, but I am certain that most “skeptics” do not have the expertise to know what they are talking about. Maybe cohenite does…

        I love having original thoughts, but very few (if any) are actually original. Many others have had them before. But if brave “skeptics” with their Galileo complexes want to believe that they are having genuinely original thoughts, good luck to them.

        “your own pig-headed stupidity”. No point flattering me Winston 🙂

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          Sonny

          John we know you defer to authority figures in the pay of government to inform your views on climate. You don’t need to apolgize but spare us the boredom of repeating yourself.

          Expertise doesn’t mean anything. It is a piece of paper to hide behind. But when climate scientists cluck up the science and get the predictions wrong we can all see it. And the vast majority of Australians see it. That’s why belief in CAGW decreases year on year.

          What genuine original thoughts are required to dispel CAGW hysteria?
          All it takes is the most basic investigation into the history of our climate, a realization that climate science is a political science, and that people are primarily motivated by wealth, friendships and power.

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            Sonny

            And a little bed time reading of the climate gate emails I and II.

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            John Brookes

            Expertise doesn’t mean anything. It is a piece of paper to hide behind.

            Really? So the bloke who fixes your car doesn’t need skill, just a piece of paper? The engineers who design bridges don’t have to be experts, just so long as they have a certificate?

            Ahhh, the blissful ignorance of the middle aged male who looks at others and thinks, “I could do that”.

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            Sonny

            A John you have it all backward.
            Climate scientists expertise IS the piece of paper AND NOTHING MORE.
            I’m an automotive engineer John so I find your analogies bemusing to say the least.

            I’ll explain the difference between a climate science “expert” and an engineering “expert”.
            You see John engineers make stuff that is of benefit for mankind (e.g. motorcars).
            In order for a motorcar to sell well it needs to work reliably. Thus it’s construction must be based on the successful application of science. E.g dynamical mechanics, thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, electronics, control systems, material science, etc etc etc.
            An engineering expert is somebody who has spent YEARS practicing in industry and successfully delivering projects on time and on budget. Sure, they start out with a degree “piece of paper”, but this is simply a prerequisite to entry into the field.

            Now, compare this to climate change “experts”. For starters many such “climate change experts” have no relevant scientific training (e.g Tim Flannery).

            The ones that have degrees that are relevant live out their lives in universities and then later, working for the government. They never have to prove that their theories are correct through APPLICATION to real world products or problems. Their predictions or “projections” are conveniently set decades out. Their scientific papers are began with DISCLAIMERS to protect them against liability should governments act on the information they provide. Another major difference is that I get my salary from a company whom people buy their products willingly an voluntarily. There is a free market here. There are lots of car companies competing. Climate centrists get their salary from GOVERNMENT that is from ordinary citizens who must compulsorily buy their “products and servces”.
            I am no engineering expert even though I have a degree and have worked in the field for a number of years (ironically in climate control systems).

            Here’s a question for you John.
            What product or service do climate change scientists provide individuals in Australia?
            What is the BENEFIT breakdown for individuals who must PAY ADDITIONAL TAXES. Where is the accountability If their theories are wrong? Where is the competition?

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            Sonny

            And that’s not a rhetorical question John. We know you tend to cherry pick the posts you respond to but I am calling you out RIGHT NOW.

            1. What product or service do Australian climate scientists offer the Australian people and how is this a fair exchange for the massive amount of tax dollars that go toward climate change along with increased taxes, increased utility bills and job layoffs.
            2. How are climate scientists held accountable if their product or service fails to provide value and if their predictions are 70 years ahead and they have legal protection through disclaimers.
            3. How can climate scientists be considered “experts” if their is no productive industry outside of academia and no possibility of them ever being proved wrong?
            4. How are the conclusions of climate scientists independent if they are paid for directly by government who would seem to have vested interest in using climate change as an excuse for increased taxes?
            5. Why should the Auatralian people have any confidence when the predictions put forward to us have been so spectacularly wrong so far?
            6. How does it make sense to believe in global warming Wen there has been no global warming for 10 – 15 years.

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            Sonny

            Yet again John,

            You refuse to answer relevant and straightforward questions. Did you not notice this post? Or do you just ignore difficult questions – much like your climate idols.

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          Winston, I defer to people who have spent years of their life working on climate science. No apologies for that.

          Used car salesmen spend years of their lives selling cars…ooops
          Ken Lay spent years of his life building ENRON….oooops
          Richard Nixon spent years of his life as a politician…ooops
          Jan H Schon was on the way to a Nobel in nanotechnology…ooops
          John brookes spent years of his life taking others word…ooops

          No apology for that.

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          Winston

          Like Lewandowsky? Garnaut? Surely you jest! Climate science is a very nascent applied science, and being in its formative era only now in the process of establishing understanding which certainly does not give it’s proponents omniscience, or papal infallibility. To become a climate scientist, you could not be skeptical of anthropogenic CO2 contributing to climate change, no matter how brilliant or committed you might be.

          By that logic John, Lamarck being the most august biologist in the 1800s should have been accepted without question when proposing inheritance of acquired characteristics prior to Darwin’s evolutionary theories purely on the basis of deferring to his greater knowledge, reputation and lifelong dedication to science. The answer to that question should be obvious, but I’m sure you’ll find a way to avoiding incorporating this in your ongoing faith based approach to what is a very important issue, worthy of critical appraisal and involvement of those with the analytical skills to contribute to the debate. I’ve yet to see anything from you that would encourage me to change my view, but I welcome any cogent argument to the contrary provided it is empirically based, avoids data manipulation and fallacious arguments, and isn’t tainted by zealotry and polemicism. I’m still patiently waiting.

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          bobl

          John,

          This is exavtly where you get things so wrong, one should NEVER defer to Authority. You should, learn about the facts and do the math yourself. When you finally do that, you will become a sceptic too, until then you have no credibility.

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      Look, climate “skeptics” are fascinating from a scientific point of view. Such a wide range of beliefs with only one thing in common – “CO2 didn’t do it”.

      Ha haha hahaha funny you should mention this John. I’m also fascinated by human behaviour, but unlike the armchair lemming that you are, I carried out a study of MORONS. Here is what I’ve found….

      Hurricane Katrina…..CO2 did it.
      Cyclone Yasi….CO2 did it.
      A warm spell in Moscow….CO2 did it.
      A bit of ice calves in the Antarctic….CO2 did it.
      Floods in Australia (who would have thought)…CO2 did it.
      Drought in Australia (who would have thought)….CO2 did it.
      A mild winter in Europe….CO2 did it.
      Europe is snowed under…..CO2 did it.
      Mild winter somewhere…CO2 did it.
      Cold winter somewhere…CO2 did it.
      Cool summer somewhere…CO2 did it.
      Hot summer somewhere…CO2 did it.
      A dead polar bear sighted from an airplane….CO2 did it.
      Tornados in America (who would have thought)…CO2 did it.
      Researchers can’t find a couple of dime sized frogs…CO2 killed ’em.
      El Nino bleaches coral (who would have thought)…CO2 did it.
      Sharks cross breeding….CO2 did it.
      My tea tastes different(seriously)….CO2 did it.
      Poor women turn to prostitution (seriously)….CO2 did it.
      Itchier poison ivy (seriously)…CO2 did it.
      John Brookes can’t think for himself (seriously)….CO2 did it.

      You get the idea?

      I’ll put up my study of MORONS against your study of sceptics anytime John

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        The Moon's a Balloon

        Indeed, and don’t forget the “Warmlist”, a complete list of things caused by global warming, MUST BE SEEN CLICK HERE

        😆

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        wes george

        Baa,

        You’ve hit on the reason why CAGW isn’t any more a real scientific practice (or theory) than Freudian psychology….because everything is evidence for it.

        I found that those of my friends who were admirers of Marx, Freud, and Adler, were impressed by a number of points common to these theories, and especially by their apparent explanatory power. These theories appear to be able to explain practically everything that happened within the fields to which they referred. The study of any of them seemed to have the effect of an intellectual conversion or revelation, open your eyes to a new truth hidden from those not yet initiated. Once your eyes were thus opened you saw confirmed instances everywhere: the world was full of verifications of the theory. Whatever happened always confirmed it. Thus its truth appeared manifest; and unbelievers were clearly people who did not want to see the manifest truth; who refuse to see it, either because it was against their class interest, or because of their repressions which were still “un-analyzed” and crying aloud for treatment.

        The most characteristic element in this situation seemed to me the incessant stream of confirmations, of observations which “verified” the theories in question; and this point was constantly emphasize by their adherents. A Marxist could not open a newspaper without finding on every page confirming evidence for his interpretation of history; not only in the news, but also in its presentation — which revealed the class bias of the paper — and especially of course what the paper did not say. The Freudian analysts emphasized that their theories were constantly verified by their “clinical observations.” As for Adler, I was much impressed by a personal experience. Once, in 1919, I reported to him a case which to me did not seem particularly Adlerian, but which he found no difficulty in analyzing in terms of his theory of inferiority feelings, Although he had not even seen the child. Slightly shocked, I asked him how he could be so sure. “Because of my thousandfold experience,” he replied; whereupon I could not help saying: “And with this new case, I suppose, your experience has become thousand-and-one-fold.”

        –Karl Popper, Science as Falsification

        http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/popper_falsification.html

        Make time to read the whole thing…It’s the crux of the matter.

        Because if we – as a nation – so pathetically fail to discern the true outlines of natural science…. If our leading institutions of learning and culture condone fraud as an authentic method of persuasion and epistemology… What other much greater tragedies are we unwittingly stumbling towards?

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      Catamon

      Both groups deserve to be studied by psychologists.

      I’m sure there are loads of research grants around for for those kinds of studies. 🙂

      And looking at why some people inhabit parts of the political spectrum that are, shall we say, somewhat away from the center on any axis is an important thing to do in terms of learning what makes people tick.

      Then of course, we @ the Collective can manipulate them better. 🙂

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        Sonny

        Oh please! Climate science is first and foremost politicized by the left wing adopting it and nurturing it into the irresponsible teenager Donna Leframbois describes perfectly.
        The only reason skeptics tend to the right is a response to the insane ideology that mutilated science into propoganda for some perverse actualization of a global repressive socialist regime headed by the UN.

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          Catamon

          Wow Sonny, Great rant!

          Reminds me of those early 80’s Resistance and Socialist Left meetings where we would dutifully listen to and appear t be impressed by sweet young thangs running off at the mouth just like that.

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    Off topic I know, but worthy of a mention all the same.

    Ah Lyndon Johnson!

    That famous visit to Oz he made.

    He’s in Sydney driving down the parade in his honour. In the back seat with him is that crooked Liberal Premier Bob Askin.

    In front of the car are anti war protestors bitching about Vietnam.

    Bob Askin screams out to the driver “Run over the bastards.”

    LBJ nearly has apoplexy.

    Incidentally, I’m not anti Labor or pro Liberal just because I give that impression sometimes.

    I’ll give dues to whoever does ‘good work’ and bemoan when that good work is (almost) undone.

    The single most perfect example of this is the Sydney Opera House.

    Without Joe Cahill (Labor) it would never have been built, and Askin from Opposition slagged off nearly every day about it, mainly as a political football. When Askin got in, he handballed the lot to his fellow Liberal hit man (William) Davis Hughes.

    Had the building not already been so advanced it would have been canned. As it was, it was butchered, something not rectified until much later.

    This whole Opera House saga is a story well worth reading, and is from a truly wonderful book from 1999 by Phillip Drew, “The Masterpiece. Jorn Utzon. A Secret Life” and I urge those with an interest to get the book, now most probably only available from your Library.

    I summed it up when Utzon passed away in 2008 at the following Post:

    Jørn Utzon 1918 – 2008

    There’s good and bad on both sides of politics.

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      brc

      I know the Opera house is a sacred cow, now. But it is yet another example of people building monuments to their greatness. The Opera house went massively over budget and had all sorts of problems. In hindsight it is widely accepted that the pain was worth the gain of an international icon.

      But plenty of ‘supposed’ international icons just become giant money pits which have sucked prosperity from the long-suffering taxpayers and into the hands of those who are controlling the cheque books. When I visited the Vatican, instead of being overawed at the place, I was disgusted at the amounts of money regular people were separated from in order to build a massive temple to a religion that it’s high priests built to enjoy for themselves. The place is obscene and vulgar in my opinion, and points back to a time when most people gave up a portion of their income for the church, and a great deal of those givings went not into their local area, nor in help with the poor and needy, but instead into a massive, gold-leafed palace in Rome.

      My point here is that the Opera house is a fluke – a combination of the perfect building plot and a talented architect that became an icon long after the cost was forgotten. Yet the Opera house gets used as justification for all sorts of ridiculous, expensive projects which are less about the people and more about the ‘leaders’ who commission them, thinking they can pick a winner. But it’s a silly justification – like pointing to a lottery winner as an example to keep gambling. And it leads to such sloppy thinking that gives us back-of-the-envelope wouldn’t-it-be-nice schemes like an NBN or high speed railway.

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        While I don’t want to disagree with what you say, there are some points here that need addressing.

        Utzon, besides being the architect was also one of the major prime movers in keeping costs down.

        What is forgotten here is that the vast budget over run was due more to the runaway inflation at the time.

        Also, it was perceived as a cash cow by construction companies who vastly inflated their costs for their work on the project.

        Utzon himself was instrumental in finding, testing and evaluating some of the new materials used in the construction. In fact, he never stopped working flat out on not only his own work, but on the work of many others.

        He was also acutely aware of the political ramifications of the building itself, and resigned to the fact that no matter what happened, he would get the blame, mainly because Askin used it as a daily football.

        When finally elected, Askin virtually dumped any association with it, and left it to Davis Hughes, who all along had stated that the ONLY thing he wanted to do was to get rid of Utzon.

        After Utzon was ‘artfully’ tossed, then the costs really did soar, and Davis Hughes then proceeded to butcher that structure in order to cut costs, something he failed to do, comprehensively.

        In 1968, Davis Hughes set in stone the final cost for the Opera House at $85 Million, an enormous amount at that time. When Utzon was asked if the cost was right, he replied that he could have built the Opera House to his original plans, with the Performing Arts Centre, with the underground car park, and still had Millions left over. The final cost blew out to $110 Million.

        Runaway Inflation was the major cause of the immense cost blow out.

        Utzon will always be remembered, his name synonymous with that wonderful structure.

        Davis Who?????

        Tony.

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          Kevin Moore

          Tony,

          Do you remember Rufus Youngblood, one of Johnsons minders?

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            Yeah I distinctly remember him.

            Harness Horse of the year 1987. Backed him myself a couple of times.

            Didn’t know he ran shotgun for the President though.

            Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

            No sorry. I don’t remember that name.

            I just remember that wonderful anecdote. I can just imagine Bob Askin foaming at the mouth. If Rufus was there I guess he might have said “Give me the wheel. Hey it’s on the wrong side of the car.”

            Tony.

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            Kevin Moore

            Even presidential visits weren’t always like this. When Lyndon Baines Johnson visited Australia in 1966, anti-war protesters crowded him wherever he went. In Melbourne, his limousine was pelted with paint bombs, and his gloriously named bodyguard Rufus Youngblood found himself covered in red paint.

            Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/a-stroll-through-history-and-more-familiar-times-20111202-1ob7q.html#ixzz1s6GDngv7

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          brc

          Your knowledge is obviously more comprehensive than mine, and I have always felt for Utzon, who I feel was treated poorly in the manner that CY O’Connor was treated for the Goldfields pipeline.

          I guess my point with the Opera house was twofold: it gets used as justification for all sorts of unworthy projects, and the very nature of the political footballing was that construction projects get used as vanity developments for politicians rather than actual uses for the people the costs were extracted from.

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        manalive

        brc’s cranky remarks about the Vatican (presumably meaning Vatican City which includes the Basilica, Sistine Chapel, Library etc. and all accompanying art treasures) defy comment.
        The Sydney Opera House is a wonderful structure, but only one of many remarkable concrete structures of the time, Nervi’s work e.g. Palazzetto dell Sport (1957) and Stubbin’s Berlin Congress Hall (1957) immediately come to mind. The Opera House’s site adds to it’s cachet.
        The annual inflation rate during its construction (1960-1972) remained around 3%, the cost escalation was due to the totally unrealistic initial estimate, based on an unbuildable pure concrete shell construction (as I recall).

        Incidentally, Lewandowsky misquoted Churchill: “In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.”

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          manalive,

          that’s why that book I mentioned is such an excellent read.

          Utzon worked on most of that stuff himself, and was hands on at virtually every step along the way, especially in the fabrication of the materials used in the shells.

          Quintin Lake has some wonderful close up images of the shells, showing the individual tiles, and Utzon was instrumental in almost single handedly bringing them into being.

          Those images are at the following two links:

          http://blog.quintinlake.com/2010/03/03/abstract-images-of-the-tiled-fan-pattern-on-the-roof-sydney-opera-house-australia/

          http://blog.quintinlake.com/2010/03/03/into-silent-skies-images-of-sydney-opera-house-roof-shells-australia/

          Oddly, the Wikipedia entry bears almost no resemblance whatsoever to the way Phillip Drew wrote about it, and Drew interviewed all the ‘principals’ directly.

          He was hamstrung by exactly what brc alluded to, and he always knew that mere politics would end up being the master and he just the unwanted slave.

          Tony.

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          brc

          No, they don’t defy comment. You can comment. It forces people to really sit back and think about the massive public buildings that surround us all. Everyone just assumes that’s a good thing. Look at the Pyramids, right? The Colosseum? All considered wonders, but in reality are soaked in the blood of thousands of innocents. Yes, it’s great to stand in the shadow of these structures and marvel at the ingenuity of the building, or perhaps the aesthetic, but in doing so we sometimes skip over the reason it is there, or how it came about, which is precisely what the aesthetic was trying to achieve.

          Just because the Vatican contains the Sistine Chapel, doesn’t give the rest of the overdone mess a pass. If you’re a Catholic, I can probably understand getting offended at my remarks. I’m not suggesting tearing the thing down. Just trying to get people to look past the visuals of a building to the reasons for buildings like this existing (to enhance their own prestige at the expense of others). We are all disgusted at the opulence of Saddam Husseins palaces, yet sometimes we fail to apply these own standards to our own societies just because we happen to like the building, or the person that commissioned it.

          I would rather look at a thousand private conceived and funded visions of architects than one state building where the people paying for it weren’t given a choice. Yes, I’m being provocative because sometimes I like to do that. But it’s worth thinking about.

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        manalive

        Oh, fair enough brc.
        TonyfromOz reminds me. One feature of the S.O.H. which adds greatly to its visual appeal is the clever choice of white tile cladding — a brilliant idea (literally) which Utzon probably derived from Islamic architecture.
        He visited Iran in 1958 in connection with his work for the Melli Bank.

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    Amfortas

    Many years ago, after a 20 year military Officer career, I changed field and became a Psychologist. For the next 25 years I practiced, first in Industry and then in the ‘personal’ areas. But eventually I ended that career.

    Whilst the Universities were churning out 22 year old ‘human’ experts with the cradle marks still on their bums, and heads full of PC / feminist / socialist nonesense, I was being overwhelmed with ‘patients’ and clients suffering from the damage those ‘experts’ were doing to so many people. Many were in the Maw of the Family Court system and being destroyed by those uneducated narcissistic ‘Professionals’.

    I no longer continue in that once- insightful profession.

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      Rereke Whakaaro

      Amfortas,

      It is a shame you are no longer practicing. We need more experience of what it is like to be “working point”, in so many fields that are overrun by post-modern thinking.

      They should never have gotten rid of the draft/national service.

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    belfast

    Just a muse:
    Alternative Science – climate science, psychology…..
    It will go the way of Alternate Medicine?

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    dogstar060763

    What amazes me is how so many ‘left-thinking’ people who must surely consider themselves socially-minded, considerate individuals, never seem able to stand back from their relentless politically-motivated hectoring and see themselves the way others do. How did so many presumably well-meaning academics, scientists, etc mire – and ally – themselves in CAGW’s publicly-funded state authoritarianism? Does it never occur to any of them that they may just have become a huge part of the problem, acting (as so many of them do )as ‘useful idiots’ to the cause? When did it become acceptable to promote a mere hypothesis as a proven scientific fact, to divest oneself of all moral and scientific responsibility in pursuit of a shadowy social/political project such as the hardly-ever-mentioned-but-still-very-much-alive Agenda 21?

    I have trouble accepting that so many educated, presumably sane individuals could abandon all pretence of scientific independence, inquiry and integrity quite so readily – and yet here we are. And come Rio+20 we can expect to see them all, sans all sense of reality and moral responsibility, cavorting about in that expensive sunny beach resort once again, endlessly hyperventilating (and endlessly self-congratulatory) before the world’s uncritical media at vast taxpayer expense whilst lecturing the rest of us on the impending ‘catastrophe’ headed our way in the, you know, near future. Or something. Maybe.

    And whilst that’s all very good for their ever-growing Air Miles portfolio, it does kinda leave a the rest of us quite entitled to our own view on CAGW, since we happen to be the ones picking up the bill for it all. Not, of course, that we’ve ever had any choice in the matter.

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      Len

      Dogstar, it is simply the money.

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      Kinkykeith

      Hi Dogstar

      It is the money that drives the AGW thing for sure but most of the believers don’t profit that way.

      They need to be part of the group; the need to be part of something shared with a high emotional content, what could be better than saving the planet; especially when someone else is paying for it.

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        The Moon's a Balloon

        This is correct, the “feeling of belonging to the tribe” is one of the most powerful of Human emotions, and is ruthlessly exploited by those Alarmists.

        When other organisations like the “Moonies” for example use these techniques, they are rightly branded as mesmerizing cults. Yet when the so called “Green Environmental” movement is hijacked by the self same type of egotistical, crypto-fascist, pseudo-religious, neo-cultist maniacs, must we all defer to their crazy hype? I don’t think so.

        Humans have a longing to belong, just please make sure you give your allegience to the team who is most honest with you. Do not be allured by the false glamour of false prophets, whose only desire is to make a profit.

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    jonathan frodsham

    A global warming alarmist dies and goes to heaven. As he is about to enter through the pearly gates when Angel Paul stops him and says “I know of you, you can’t come in here, you are one of those miserable scum bag warmists who have been scamming the realists and never give anything to anyone.” The wamist says “ No I am not, well, just last year I gave $15 to the WWF, $10 to Greenpeace and $5 to Al Gore. Hmm says Paul that’s $30, Right says the warmist 30 bucks. Ok says Paul I might let you in but I have to go and ask God first. Sometime later Paul reappears and the warmist asks “Well what did God say? Can I come in?” Paul reaching inside a pocket in his wing and throwing something at him says ‘God says here is your 30 bucks back now F—k off.”

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    Peter Miller

    Out of mild curiosity, I looked up The Conversation on the Web and found this classic alarmist article on how seaweed is threatened with extinction by climate change. It was obviously another of those “Gimme some more grant money” articles, so I followed it into Current Biology, as indicated below. Well, after 10 minutes of searching I gave up as I could find no reference to the article.

    Anyhow, the sixth word of paragraph 3 is the most important word in this Conversation summary of the article, as it is the “get out of jail free” card when the prediction inevitably fails to materialise.

    “The results published in the latest edition of Current Biology predict that, given future warming, up to one quarter of species in southern Australian waters might retract towards extinction.

    The researchers studied a database of more than 20,000 herbarium records of macroalgae collected in Australia since the 1940s, and found changes in seaweed communities in both the Indian and Pacific Oceans, consistent with rapid warming over the past decades.

    “We found that continued warming MIGHT drive potentially hundreds of species towards the edge of the Australian continent beyond which there is no refuge,” Assistant Professor Wernberg said.

    The researchers believe while some species may be able to make some adjustments to cope with natural cooling and warming cycles, the predicted rate and strength of warming in the coming decades is likely to force many retreating species further south and beyond the limits of available habitat.

    “The potential for global extinctions is concerning because one quarter of all macroalgal species in the world are found off Australia and these marine habitats support equally unique fish and invertebrate communities,” Assistant Professor Wernberg said.

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      The Moon's a Balloon

      Yes Peter, it’s fencing with words. A meaningless hokum, and actually Buncombe in the defined sense of that word. Fatuous drivel, used as a kind of filibuster, and designed to baffle and confuse. Slabbering dog-whistle politicking, and a trite example at that.

      😮

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    Dave

    .
    The Conversation – a joke on everyone!
    It is not the Founding Partners, The Strategic Partners or The Members that make this a success according to the Alexa Stats, it is the CONTENT MEMBERS at the bottom of the page!

    All the government bodies, health, unis, CSIRO, federal government bodies, state government bodies and NGO’s etc are on this list! All with little ICONS (Little round red O’s) on their desktops compliments of all the IT department media groups that the bureaucrats suddenly can publish, be recognised, and generally give a hit rate of 20,000 per day. Even post their job vacancies with this group!!!

    If joannenova.com.au had this sort of data base of readers instantly at your disposal – the 12th Annual Blog Award would have been “BEST GLOBAL”.

    To explain further – a friend works in local government (council) and one day he has the desktop logo on his laptop! With communications (instructions) to utilise this site as a CONTENT Partner??? He can now publish his own rubbish on this as part of his CV that will be recognised for promotion!!!

    ALSO – notice The Conversation runs the edu.au not org.au or gov.au – WHY! Because they symbolise themselves above the common government and the pelbs that are ruled by it! As a business (very small) I would have to pay these people $220 per month to get a job opportunity with them – but why would I? Their reader base are parasites!

    Read most of the posts (articles) on this site and they are all bureaucrats or bureaucratic loving people that thrive on the income of government! The majority of articles range between 3 and 6 comments – one or two have up to 37 plus – and the rest 0 to 3 comments!

    Go to any article and read the back slapping nature these THE CONVERSATIONALISTS have in the comments – good grief – it’s SOOOOOOOO boring! (Fingers down mouth)

    I’ve actually joined up as an AUTHOR (AND SCEPTIC) – but I doubt that I will get published (The title of my article was “Let’s start a D9 Bulldozer Political Party to Bulldoze Canberra“)! Everyone join up and publish garbage – may as well because that’s all there is at the momment!

    The Constipation (sorry Conversation) will end up a NON-website with only greedy promotion (GUVMENT) seeking people reading it!

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      memoryvault

      .
      The Constipation – love it.

      For “information” that’s just too hard to pass.

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        memoryvault,

        they could always work it out with a pencil.

        Tony.

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          Bob Malloy

          they could always work it out with a pencil.

          Old tradesman joke there Tony,

          In a past life as a Heavy Vehicle/Plant mechanic, if someone was having problems removing an uncooperative mounting pin/bush from a dozzer or such, some smart ass always came up with get a pen and paper and draw it out.

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          memoryvault

          .
          Reminds me of the only comment my grandfather (a Rat of Tobruk) would make about the war:

          Grandad – “There we were, pushing ’em back with bullets”.

          Wide-eyed youth – “The Germans?”

          Grandad – “No son, the piles”.

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          The Moon's a Balloon

          For God’s Sake gentlemen, is this what we are reduced to? Is that the strength of repartee now in here, asinine toilet humour remarks? Put some effort in people.
          😉

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            Kinkykeith

            Hi The Moon’s a Balloon

            I think the reason for all the 60s “constipated Accountant” type repartee is that it reminds us of old times when Science was science and Global Warming (well at least half the Globe) was just summer.

            Reminds me; did you hear about the constipated Treasury Official at Fort Knox?; He had piles of gold.

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      What most seem to have is “intellectual” onanism. The web site provides yet another means by which they can massage egos until they reach mutual satisfaction or they tire of one doing it in public.

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    alex

    Great post Ms. Nova. No, you are not underpaid. Those schyentischt are actually grossly overpaid. They have to be. The lie needs a lot of effort to grease and launch while the Truth does not need any efforts at all to tell. The lie needs backing by many for it to be acepted as ‘truth’. To convict an innocent man, a lot of ‘witnesses’are required,costing lots of Judas’ silver pieces, but only one truth-telling witness is needed to clear up the innocent from being unjustly found guilty.

    There is a natural unwritten law which says that ultimately, no matter how powerful evil is, rightousness will always prevail over evil. The truth will always prevail over the lie. Science will always prevail over alchemy, which is what UWA is doing at the moment. But look at whats happening in OZ itself. The left is losing all the way. It does not even exist anymore in QL. Next stop, the federal parliament. In the US, Mitt Romney is leading the polls while Obama’s gorillas are having great fun with prostitutes.

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    Beautiful! I’ve put up a post and a link back to this over at my place. These clowns have degraded science for long enough.

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    Tim

    I hope you’re not inferring that Stephan Lewandowsky receives funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation and is not acquainted with their Funding Regulations:

    2 The SNSF penalises violations of the rules and principles listed above based on Article 45 of the Funding Regulations. Examples of violations include tendentious propaganda, manipulation, dissimulation, fraud and disinformation.

    Shame on you.

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      tendentious propaganda…tick
      manipulation…tick
      dissimulation…tick
      fraud and disinformation….Question mark plus tick.

      thanks for bringing those up.

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    Bob Malloy

    Comment for Tony,

    Spitfires buried in Burma during war to be returned to UK
    Twenty iconic Spitfire aircraft buried in Burma during the Second World War are to be repatriated to Britain after an intervention by David Cameron.

    H/T Crusader Rabbit

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    Dave

    If you’re interested in knowing what passes for research over at the UWA cognitive science department I highly recommend looking at,

    http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2012/3/26/opengate-josh-158.html?currentPage=4#comments

    See post “Apr 2, 2012 at 7:05 AM | David”, it concerns a project which Stefan undertook with the assistance of John Cook.

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    Catamon

    On the other hand, Lewandowsky uses funding extracted from the public by threat of force

    Can you justify that statement or is this an expression of that idiot notion that all tax if theft??

    Let’s ask them to find only voluntary financial backers who earn their money

    LOL! And business backed funding would never be from vested interests would it?

    I do love some of your more humorous posts Jo, but you have to make sure they don’t cross the line into laughable whining whingefullness.

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      BobC

      Catamon
      April 15, 2012 at 10:45 pm · Reply

      “On the other hand, Lewandowsky uses funding extracted from the public by threat of force”

      Can you justify that statement or is this an expression of that idiot notion that all tax if theft??

      No, it’s an expression of the obvious fact that government force is behind tax collection — it’s not voluntary. In that sense, it is like theft; Because it is ordered (in democracies, anyway) by elected representatives it is unlike theft — but it still uses the threat of government force. Proposing strawman arguments that Jo didn’t make is a pathetic argument tactic, but not surprising coming from you.

      I do love some of your more humorous posts Jo, but you have to make sure they don’t cross the line into laughable whining whingefullness.

      I think many of us here would be amused by your attempting to prove Jo wrong by refusing to pay your taxes. Keep a journal and let us know if physical force ever enters into the government’s response. Be sure to send it before you are incarcerated.

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        Catamon

        So you reckon she is alluding to the idiot notion that tax is theft? Thanks for that Bob.

        Does seem a bit silly over the top as a comment to me though. Seems that The Conversations funding has really upset her.

        Nope, i’m happy enough to pay my taxes Bob. Govts doing a pretty good job with them at the moment. I’ll start complaining about it when the right wing nutjobbies get back in again. Thats how it works isn’t it???

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          Andrew McRae

          I’ll start complaining about it when the right wing nutjobbies get back in again.

          Really?
          Can we have your absolute ironclad guarantee that you won’t complain about anything here for another 17 months?

          Pretty please?

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            catamon

            Nah Andrew, I think people need to distinguish between complaint and comments that they disagree with. Some people aren’t particularly discerning.

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          BobC

          Catamon
          April 16, 2012 at 12:57 am · Reply
          So you reckon she is alluding to the idiot notion that tax is theft? Thanks for that Bob.

          No Catamon, that’s your idiot notion — Jo was referring to the fact that tax collection is backed by government force.

          Let’s add “Lacks reading comprehension ability” to your resume.

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            catamon

            Jo was referring to the fact that tax collection is backed by government force.

            Ah i see oh wisest of ones. Not Theft. Robbery.

            The taking of money or goods in the possession of another, from his or her person or immediate presence, by force or intimidation.

            Its still an idiot notion in the context of the OP.

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            BobC

            catamon
            April 16, 2012 at 1:15 pm

            Ah i see oh wisest of ones. Not Theft. Robbery.

            The Strawman Argument seems to be the only bullet in your gun.

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            catamon

            Bob, if you are going to try and argue “Strawman” maybe you should read and comprehend the OP, or even just the concept of context if that’s not too difficult for you.

            The OP:

            Prominent in the O, in fact beginning it, is that The Conversation is Government funded (ie TAX) and Jo is pissed about that.

            She then goes on to attack Lewandowsky, disparaging him, the institution he works at, and any students he may be involved with. Gets a bit rantish actually??

            She then makes a pretty extraordinary accusation that he:

            uses funding extracted from the public by threat of force

            Now, given thats a pretty obvious reference to the Govts powers to compel people to pay tax and i think we agree on it.

            Then we get treated to a little more ranting on the evils of Big Govt (booga, booga).

            Oh, and possibly a direct appeal to St Gina of the Rocks for salvation??

            Freedom loving business and enterprising people in the West

            LOL! It humorous gems like that which keep me coming back here!

            So actually, by bringing up the old and much used “all tax is theft” (which to be technically correct i acknowledge i should have re-phrased as: all tax is robbery ), i’m not actually making any kind of straw-man argument. All the concepts are there in the OP, and in fact used in the same context of the phrase i used.

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            BobC

            catamon
            April 16, 2012 at 3:14 pm

            She [Jo] then makes a pretty extraordinary accusation that he:

            “uses funding extracted from the public by threat of force”

            Now, given thats a pretty obvious reference to the Govts powers to compel people to pay tax and i think we agree on it.

            So, which is it? Is it ‘extraordinary’, or is it so ‘obvious’ that we ‘agree on it’? Your inability to construct a coherent argument is what is obvious here.

            So actually, by bringing up the old and much used “all tax is theft” (which to be technically correct i acknowledge i should have re-phrased as: all tax is robbery ), i’m not actually making any kind of straw-man argument.

            Well, actually you ARE making a straw-man argument, as Jo didn’t say that taxation was either theft or robbery. Nor did I make any argument that could be honestly construed as such. I pointed out that, although taxation was enforced by threat (and use, eventually) of government force, it was different (in democracies) from theft (and robbery also, as should be obvious) in that there was a collective agreement embodied in the actions of elected representatives of the taxed.

            Are you trying to argue that taxation isn’t backed up by threat and use of government force? If so, I invite you to try the experiment I outlined in post #39.1 — that should clear things up for you.

            If you want to maintain that “taxation is robbery”, have at it — we don’t share your naivete about economics and politics, however, so to assign Jo (or myself) that belief IS a strawman.

            “Freedom loving business and enterprising people in the West”

            LOL! It humorous gems like that which keep me coming back here!

            Perhaps someday you can let us in on the joke — or is this one of those things that is just part of the “Progressive Religion”, and therefore has no logical basis?

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          Andrew

          It should be blindingly clear that Catamon has never considered how or where wealth comes from. She/he seems to believe that it is governments that generate wealth. That if it wasn’t for governments, there would be no businesses, no trade, no commerce, no wealth – so what’s the problem in government coercing money from people and businesses?

          She/he seems to have never thought it possible that people have always and will always come together to conduct voluntary exchange and trade (ie. free trade). That it is free trade and commerce and all that comes from these activities that generates jobs, new inventions, new products, new services, medicines, food, longer and better lives. In otherwords, the origin of all wealth.

          If you explain to catamonadn people like John Brookes that it is competition between businesses for customers that is the driving force for low prices, new products and thsu the catalysts for job creation, job specialisation – which in turn increases productivity et.c etc … and that all of this arises from volunatary exchange and trade – and that was and remains the driving force for civilisation and ordered society – and that NONE of this has ever required government involvement AT ALL, they couldn’t possibly imagine it.

          The idea that the ordinary people, in the pursuit of their self-interests, can enter into voluntary trade and in so-doing, generate wealth and opportunity for many others besides – this is beyond the thinking of the Catamon’s, the John Brookes’ of the world…

          They have grown up and continued on in life with a child-like view of the world: that there needs to be someone to tell them what to think, how to behave, what to do, what not to do etc. etc. And like the good socialist voters they are – to always be envious of others who have the drive and ideas to take risks with capital to produce things and services that people want to, and in doing so, generate wealth and jobs, and products, and new services, and better, longer more fulfilling lives etc. etc. – they can’t imagine such things….

          The child-like thinkers they are they shout: It’s not fair!!. These people love coercive government because they need it. They themselves depend upon the coercive powers of government because they lack the capability, imagination and drive required to do anything for themsleves.It should be of no surprise that it is people like this who tend to “believe” in the government-sponsored hysteria of dangerous climate change…

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            catamon

            that there needs to be someone to tell them what to think, how to behave, what to do, what not to do etc. etc.

            Thank the Dogs i have you!! XX

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      Kevin Moore

      Part of comments on the US situation which is more than likely the same here as regards the direction in which your income taxes head –

      http://truthintaxation.us/?tax_inform=whereTaxesGo

      But, if the Grace Commission is correct, then not one penny of income tax money is actually being spent on services the American People expect their government to provide.

      So what is funding government? Tax researcher Richard Standring believes the U.S. funds itself with loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

      The IMF?
      The IMF was created at the United Nations Monetary and Financial conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, July 12, 1944. Per Title 22, Section 286 U.S. Code, the U.S. became an IMF member in 1945.

      Standring followed checks naming the IRS as the payee. He claims the checks go to a Federal Reserve bank, a private banking institution that has never been audited. The money then goes to the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and is deposited into what is called a “Quad Zero” account. It is from this account that IRS tax refunds are distributed (per 22 USC 286 and 31 CFR 11, section 214.7).

      According to Standring’s research, whatever is left over is then transferred to the IMF. From there the money is redistributed among countries throughout the world—including the U.S.—in the form of loans. These loans must then be paid back to IMF bankers at interest.

      ….According to the U.S. Bureau of the Public Debt, Americans were in the red $1.663 trillion in 1984. Twenty years later the debt has increased nearly five-fold to $7.1 trillion.

      Inferences
      1.Government waste is no secret.
      2.In 1984 the Grace Commission accurately predicted $multi-trillion government debt by 2000.
      3.The IMF, not the American people, is funding the operations of government through loan capital it receives, in part, through taxation of Americans’ wages.
      4.With every dollar paid to the IRS in taxes, America’s debt to the IMF increases—with interest.
      5.Paying wage taxes supports global banking, not the U.S. government or Americans….

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        John Brookes

        But, if the Grace Commission is correct, then not one penny of income tax money is actually being spent on services the American People expect their government to provide.

        So if one penny goes to health, education, defence, etc etc, then the Grace Commision is incorrect? So whatever the Grace Commission is, one can conclude that it is a load of rubbish. And since that is the opening sentence, it would seem entirely reasonable to assume that all that follows is rubbish too.

        Why am I not surprised?

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        BobC

        Kevin Moore
        April 16, 2012 at 7:19 am · Reply

        “But, if the Grace Commission is correct, then not one penny of income tax money is actually being spent on services the American People expect their government to provide.”

        Money if fungible Kevin — it’s not possible to say what tax money funds vs. what borrowed money funds. If Grace and Anderson were that ignorant of economics, then their report is probably not much good.

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    Try posting this on The Con (I’ve been banned nine times, so I give up, but it is genuine from a source I can trust, so maybe someone else can copy it there.)

    Genuine statement through current NASA employee …

    “My son is a nuclear physicist with NASA and knows GHG theory is bogus and NASA distorts AGW data. BHO won’t allow Civil Servants to express skepticism. James Hanson is actual spokesman for NASA on GHG theory, picked by Al Gore and BHO”

    This was said by a father to a contact I have who spoke personally with that father on April 13th.

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      Tim

      “BHO won’t allow Civil Servants to express skepticism”
      Perhaps we could replicate BHO with CSIRO?

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    Andrew McRae

    a misnamed topic called “cognitive science”. If ever you needed evidence that the science of psychology was not the same as the science of physics

    Whoah hold on a second there. You want to diss all of Cognitive Science because you’re upset with Applied Psychology?

    Cognitive Science is totally legit. I’m no expert (having taken only two subjects on it at Uni), but I know enough to know that Cog Sci takes in Philosophy of mind, Psychology, Neurology, and aspects of Computer Science. The success of artificial neural networks in solving a variety of problems (eg categorisation and sensor filtering) is a practical achievement of Cog Sci. Perception experiments on synaesthesia, fMRI observations of mental decisions in realtime, memory experiments on autistic savants and post-lobotomy patients, and the IBM supercomputer that has reached the neural complexity of simulating an entire cat’s brain, are all signs of progress in Cog Sci. The areas of Human-Computer Interaction design and conventional product design have both benefited from models of cognition which come from Cog Sci, just ask Canon who funded a lab for HCI in Brisbane for ten years. That “Scene Mode” button on Canon cameras… works because of Cog Sci. And that’s just some examples I can remember without doing any research or literature checks.

    Okay, therapeutic Psychology is typically a bunch of voodoo in practice (since ultimately the patient cures themselves), but let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water. Cog Sci and Psychology are NOT the same thing.
    We can accept Cog Sci and reject Guessin’ Stefan, that combination is quite okay. Recommended actually.

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      John Brookes

      I’m sorry Andrew, but having actually studied the subject, you are, by the rules of this blog, an “expert”. Hence you are pushing a vested interest, and your views will be ignored.

      But seriously, thanks for the info.

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      • #
        Winston

        I’m sorry Andrew, but having actually studied the subject, you are, by the rules of this blog, an “expert”. Hence you are pushing a vested interest, and your views will be ignored.

        You really are getting tiresome, John.

        Just answer me this question John. Just for argument’s sake- If your beloved climate experts were wrong about anthropogenic CO2 causing significant climate impacts as has previously been claimed, would they freely admit it given the amount of money that has been invested in pursuing this line of reasoning?

        It is a simple question which goes to honesty versus self interest, not to mention ongoing funding of their branch of scientific endeavour. It also goes to your naivety and/or honesty in answering that question. A simple yes or no will suffice. I’m interested in your opinion, as an “expert” of course.

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          John Brookes

          If climate experts were wrong, some would admit it, some would not, and some would say, “Look, a bear!”.

          Now how could I have given that answer with a yes or a no?

          Same deal with “skeptics” of course.

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            Winston

            So, if you admit you were wrong and CAGW doesn’t exist and AGW is a storm in a teacup, then you are Richard Lindzen for example, who no longer warrants being called a top flight climate scientist that he is, because now he’s a filthy denier in the pay of big tobacco, or big oil, or big banana, or big anything….Or labelled a failed meteorologist as Anthony Watts was, or a failed academic if you are a Tim Ball, etc, etc

            So,you see the problem don’t you, John? If you honestly believe you had the wrong end of the stick, and own up, you are cast out of the Church of Climatology and are made a pariah or figure of derision and ridicule- you are no longer a member of the club, no longer on the Xmas card list, or cannon fodder for lesser scientists in rants like this-

            “So Bob, you agree with me that Salby is unsubstantiated rubbish”

            You can therefore no longer be a climate scientist because you broke ranks, you can’t merely still agree to disagree as should be the case in a proper field of scientific endeavour.

            I think when historians look back on this whole shameful incident in the history of scientific inquiry, they will hopefully see that the nasty undercurrent of bullying, intimidation, narrow mindedness and marginalisation that was the antithesis of appropriate scientific behaviour which had it’s origins in the warmist camp- commencing perhaps for me with the gloating of Phil Jones at John Daly’s death, the nasty derision of Gavin Schmidt on the Skeptical Science blog to anyone who had the temerity to ask polite questions challenging his view of climate science, through to Gleick’s pathetic attempts to smear Heartland through fraud and deception.

            So, when you pontificate about us deferring to climate scientists, John, you seem to have been very selective how this is applied. But then one rule for your side, one rule for us, isn’t that right old fella?

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            John Brookes

            There are some honourable “skeptics” who deserve to be listened to because they have a consistent position that is not obviously wrong. Those who contest the size and sign of feedbacks could be included in this group. The trouble with most who question AGW is that they chop and change position rather often. Hence they aren’t taken seriously.

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            Sonny

            Is this the strategy? Fained flattery followed by hypocritical condemnation?
            Climate change scientists chop and change positions assuming that the public are goldfish with three second memories.
            “it will be hot and dry. WAIT we always said it could be wet and cold!”
            John you spend a lot of time on this site. Far too much for someone who doesn’t take our position “seriously”.

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      wes george

      Good on ya, Andrew! Thanks for that.

      When someone as intellectually and ethically vacuous as Stefan poses as representing a whole line of scientific inquiry, we would be in error to dismiss the inquiry rather than the man.

      Fact is, the “cognitive sciences” which explore the manifold question of how we know what we know strongly favours the skeptical position not only in terms of the climate debate but in every field of active research.

      For instance, the idea of a “consensus of experts,” which the Warmists are so enthralled with, is a logically fallacy.

      Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts

      –Richard Feynman

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        Andrew McRae

        Interesting story: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-04-17/science-fuels-push-for-education-re-think/3952496

        The Australian Broadcasting Communists are all too keen to use Cog Sci to “reshape young minds”. (shudder)

        Even Gonski’s name came up. The interviewer was not giving Garret an easy ride, but at the same time demands an expansion of government controlled pre-schools on the affordability argument.

        On the face of it, if the neuroscience behind this is solid then rewriting the entire education system can only be good. But I don’t think people will endorse experimenting on an entire generation.

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    Kevin Moore

    Greens call for Global Governance by the UN and end of National Sovereignty to fight Climate Change.

    http://wideshut.co.uk/australian-green-party-calls-for-global-governance/

    ….Secondly, this policy gives clear indication of the possible direction of the political process. The Australian Green Party proclaims “a commitment to the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325”. In other words, the UN Security Council will decide Australian public policy. Don’t worry, though, it was only United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441 that led to the Iraq war. It’s not as if there have been any unpopular United Nations resolutions…

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    brc

    Completely O/T but I was reading an article in the weekend Australian about adult literacy in Australia. The last survey done along with OECD partners indicated that 46% of Australian adults had low literacy. However, other people pointed to the UN reports which list Australia at 96% literacy.

    However, the UN reports didn’t actually do any data collection or testing. In fact that just modelled the figure based on average wealth and the fact Australia has a ‘free’ education system.

    So on one hand we have a detailed data collection and analysis giving us one figure. And we have the UN modelling it based on a couple of data points and some assumptions.

    Now, tell me where I have seen that before?

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    pat

    15 April: SMH: NSW drops carbon tax challenge
    THE passage of the carbon tax has received a boost, with legal advice to NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell suggesting that a High Court challenge to block the tax would fail…
    Sources confirmed advice had come back that a legal challenge would be likely to fail in proving the carbon tax was unconstitutional…
    The reluctance of NSW to challenge the controversial tax is likely to slow momentum for a High Court bid. Victoria, like NSW, has said it would consider joining a Queensland bid.
    The West Australian Premier, Colin Barnett, has stated publicly that his advice is that a bid would fail. The Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman, said he would not act without at least one other state with him in alliance.
    http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/nsw-drops-carbon-tax-challenge-20120414-1×041.html

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    pat

    15 April: UK Telegraph: Rowena Mason: Conservatives plot re-think on countryside wind turbines
    Ministers are preparing to veto major new wind farms in the British countryside and cut back their subsidies, according to senior Government sources
    The decision to pull back from onshore wind farms comes after more than 100 backbench Conservative MPs mounted a rebellion against turbines blighting rural areas earlier this year.
    Greg Barker, the Climate Change Minister, also said this weekend Britain has “the wind we need” either being built, developed or in planning.
    “It’s about being balanced and sensible,” he said. “We inherited a policy from the last government which was unbalanced in favour of onshore wind.
    “There have been some installations in insensitive or unsuitable locations – too close to houses, or in an area of outstanding natural beauty.”…
    This means the number of wind farms built in the British countryside could still double from the current level.
    However, it is understood senior Conservatives in the Coalition are behind a determination to scale back support for onshore wind power, amid fears the turbines are deeply unpopular in rural areas. There is also concern that subsidising so many different types of “green” energy is adding too much to energy bills…
    The news comes as leading Conservatives launched a behind-the-scenes attempt to kill the Coalition’s so-called “conservatory tax”…
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/9205892/Conservatives-plot-re-think-on-countryside-wind-turbines.html

    15 April: UK Daily Mail: Jason Groves: Conservatory tax to be axed for being ‘an attack on aspiration’ (and ministers signal a retreat on charity tax relief too)
    Ministers are to scrap plans for a ‘conservatory tax’ following a massive Tory backlash.
    A senior Government source told the Mail that the proposals are ‘dead in the water’…
    Some pilot studies have found that the cost of energy efficiency measures is far higher than the savings on bills…
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2130237/Conservatory-tax-axed-Ministers-signal-retreat-charity-tax-relief-too.html

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    Kevin Moore

    http://barnabyisright.com/

    The Fix Is In – Premiers’ Bow To Bankers’ Carbon Derivatives Scam

    You know those Liberal Party state opposition leaders, who promised to fight the carbon tax if only you would elect them premier?

    As predicted here on this blog, they are all talk, no action, when it comes to actually fighting the bankers’ CO2 derivatives scam, despite plenty of expert legal advice that there are solid grounds to challenge the legislation in the High Court.

    From the Age (emphasis added):

    NSW drops carbon tax challenge

    THE passage of the carbon tax has received a boost, with legal advice to NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell suggesting that a High Court challenge to block the tax would fail.

    On Friday, Mr O’Farrell said NSW would consider joining a potential bid by Queensland to block the July 1 implementation of the carbon tax in the courts.

    Note well: O’Farrell’s original, loud and oft-repeated pre-election promise was not conditional on having another State premier to hold his hand.

    But The Sun-Herald understands Mr O’Farrell has already abandoned any thought of leading an assault on the Gillard government. Sources confirmed advice had come back that a legal challenge would be likely to fail in proving the carbon tax was unconstitutional.

    So, advice that you are “likely” to fail is sufficient reason to not fulfill your pre-election promise, hey Bazza? Sounds like a convenient excuse from a twisting and turning liar to me.

    Mr O’Farrell has made political mileage out of the carbon tax since it was announced. Last week, the NSW Energy Minister, Chris Hartcher, blamed the upcoming impost for the 16 per cent electricity price rises approved by the independent pricing regulator.

    The reluctance of NSW to challenge the controversial tax is likely to slow momentum for a High Court bid. Victoria, like NSW, has said it would consider joining a Queensland bid.

    The West Australian Premier, Colin Barnett, has stated publicly that his advice is that a bid would fail. The Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman, said he would not act without at least one other state with him in alliance.

    The fix is in.

    Unsurprising. And just what this blogger predicted.

    Because when all the major political parties are beholden for the loans they need to run their election campaigns, to the banksters who are behind the global drive for a new, legal, yet wholly unregulated, unmonitored CO2 derivatives casino, you know in advance what the outcome will be.

    Know thy real enemy.

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    pat

    another Friday 13 resignation!

    13 April: David Suzuki Org: An open letter from Dr. David Suzuki
    Dear friends,
    Some of you may have seen media coverage about my decision to step off the board of directors of the David Suzuki Foundation. I am writing to tell you more about this and what it means…
    But I have reached a point in my life where I would like to consider myself an elder. I want to speak freely without fear that my words will be deemed too political, and harm the organization of which I am so proud. I am keenly aware that some governments, industries and special interest groups are working hard to silence us. They use threats to the Foundation’s charitable status in attempts to mute its powerful voice on issues that matter deeply to you and many other Canadians.
    This bullying demonstrates how important it is to speak out.
    The Foundation’s science-based, solutions-oriented research and educational work has enriched our democracy and reflected Canadian values for two decades. While not always happily received by governments or industrial interests, this work is strictly non-partisan, as required by the laws governing charities, and has made the Foundation one of the most trusted environmental voices in Canada.
    Our opponents, however, are redoubling their efforts to marginalize the Foundation by getting at me, personally…
    http://www.davidsuzuki.org/blogs/panther-lounge/2012/04/an-open-letter-from-david-suzuki/

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    pat

    Kevin Moore –

    when Barnaby Joyce didn’t become Shadow Environment spokesman, it was obvious the Coalition was playing games. we have Malcolm Turnbull making non-stop pronouncements on the CAGW/environment, which is not even his portfolio, and yet not being censured, while the Coalition’s Environment spokesman, Greg Hunt, is virtually silent. that Hunt worked for the McKinsey & Co, a company with many fingers in the CAGW pie, says so much:

    Wikipedia: Greg Hunt
    He worked for McKinsey & Company (1999–2001) and was Director of Strategy at the World Economic Forum in Geneva 2000-01.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Hunt

    look how the Carbon Cowboys are now co-opting the word “Bubble” which an ETS would create in the financial sector, to mean the fossil fuels still in the ground! shameless.

    29 March: Business Day South Africa: Climate report stands in the way of any commodities boom
    About 80% of carbon fuel reserves need to stay in ground if UN’s temperature target for the world is to be maintained, writes Sue Blaine
    UP TO 80% of declared global coal, oil and gas reserves, worth an estimated $22-trillion, would have to remain in the ground if the damaging effects of global warming were to be staved off, research warns.
    This is revealed in the Carbon Tracker Initiative, a project of Investor Watch, a nonprofit company that aims to align capital markets with efforts to tackle climate change…
    Carbon Tracker’s report, Unburnable Carbon — Are the world’s financial markets carrying a carbon bubble?, warns that to reduce to 20% the chance of exceeding the 2° C target, the world has to limit greenhouse gas emissions to the equivalent of 886 gigaton s (Gt) of carbon dioxide. Calculations of global emissions published in the scientific peer review journal Nature indicate the world had already emitted the equivalent of 321Gt of carbon dioxide in the first decade of this century…
    Carbon Tracker’s position is supported by Bill McKibben, a professor at the US’s Middlebury College and founder of climate campaign 350.org. He says : “In ecological terms it would be extremely prudent to write off $20-trillion worth of those reserves. In economic terms, of course, it would be a disaster, first and foremost for shareholders and executives of companies .”…
    Mr Leaton says oil, gas and coal companies are in a tight spot because their share price is tied to their known reserves. Analysis by McKinsey and the Carbon Trust, a UK-based nonprofit firm set up to assist business and public sectors cut emissions, says a company’s reserves contribute about 50% of the financial value attributed to it by investors.
    Sustainable investment advisor Graham Sinclair and KPMG resource economist Rohitesh Dhawan believe research such as the Carbon Bubble report is important because it informs debate, increasing knowledge of the full price of the commodities. “In the long run, it is our hope and expectation that policy makers will align the requirements of science, in the form of a carbon budget, with policies designed to promote action that contains emissions to required levels.” …
    http://www.businessday.co.za/Articles/Content.aspx?id=168489

    check out the Team on this page as well:

    Carbon Tracker Initiative: Donors
    The work of Carbon Tracker has been made possible by the vision and openness to innovation shown by the following organisations:
    ◦The Rockefeller Brothers Fund
    ◦The Growald Family Fund
    ◦The Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust
    ◦The Polden Puckham Charitable Foundation
    ◦The Tellus Mater Foundation
    http://www.carbontracker.org/team

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      Kevin Moore

      It is easy to assume that Barnaby Joyce is the author,but unfortunately [sometimes] the name of the blog confuses.

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    Alice Thermopolis

    ANALYSE THIS!

    Thanks Jo

    Another question for UWA: How does it justify funding SL’s (and Carmen Lawrence’s) Shaping Tomorrow’s World eco-activist blog:
    http://shapingtomorrowsworld.org/?

    Appropriation of “climate change” by social psychologists, economists, religious institutions, etc, as rationale for promoting other agendas now a global phenomenon.

    SL/UWA not alone. CSIRO’s Iain Walker, group leader/behavioural stuff, was professor of psychology at Murdoch University. He is driving regional studies on public understanding of CC in Swan River catchment, Hunter Valley.

    Trying to figure out “best” ways of duping/persuading scientifically-illiterate communities to accept alarmist nonsense. Scary images (melting icebergs, etc) – and “compensation” – seem to work best.

    Alice

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    KeithH

    “What kind of organization receives all its funding from one source, then claims to be “independent?” Try Fair Work Australia! Created by the Labor Party under legislation designed by Julia Gillard, who has had the final say on most of the appointments, heavily dominated by ex-Union hacks, known Labor “friends”(?), some of whom**, had they spoken out more about what they knew about the huge loss of AWU funds by fraud in the 1990’s could have at the very least, severely embarrassed several Labor MP’s. The whole organisation funded by the Labor/Green government using taxpayer money and so far (in)famous only for taking over three years to investigate the alleged Thomson HSU credit card fraud and dumping an 1100 page dossier of unusable “findings” on the desk of the DPP.

    And what spin-doctored response do we get from the Prime Minister, all her Ministers and other Labor MPs? ‘I’m not commenting on matters that are in the hands of Fair Work Australia’ who are “completely independent of Government”!

    Then Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd told The 7.30 Report back in April 2007.“I will not be Prime Minister of this country and appoint some to staff the key positions in this body,” “I will not stand by and have this body become the agency of ex-trade union officials. People will be appointed on their merit.”

    In a May 2007 National Press Club address, then Deputy Opposition Leader Julia Gillard made similar promises “Our new industrial umpire will be independent of unions, business and government. It will definitely not be a return to the old industrial relations club. Appointments will not favour one side over the other. Labor will remove all perceptions of bias.”

    There is a growing disquiet in the legal fraternity throughout Australia concerning the applicant requirements and qualifications deemed necessary by those appointing commissioners to FWA. Many unsuccessful applicants know that they or their acquaintances who have unsuccessfully sought appointment, could run rings around many of those appointed in necessary experience and ability, yet have been unable to even make the “reserve list” for future appointment.

    IMHO, there is a huge boil here that for all our sakes, urgently needs lancing whilst we still retain the freedom to do so. For those who would like to “shoot the messenger” I’ll just say I’d raise these concerns whatever Party was in power!

    ** All matters raised here are on the public record so you can do your own search. Some hints. Look for affidavits and other documents lodged by Union officials calling for further action and investigations and even a Royal Commision into the AWU fraud. Note where some of these people have finished up. Look into the background of others and their former association with those influential in making appointments to FWA. If this country has become one in which its citizens have become too afraid to speak up where they see injustice and possible corruption, then I’m glad my remaining years are limited but I weep for those who will be forced to live in such an environment in the future!

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      Len

      Hi Keith. Speaking of boils reminds me of Barry Humphries’ character, Lance Bolyle, National Secretary of the ACUNT. Do you know if he was ever appointed to the FWA?

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    crakar24

    OT as always…………..

    The booga booga continues

    http://iceagenow.info/2012/04/emperor-penguins-previously-believed/

    and before anyone tries to digress and talks about the Arctic ice

    http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_stddev_timeseries.png

    cheers

    crakar24

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    Andrew

    Excellent post.

    As you have alluded to, history is repleat with examples of big government begetting bigger government… right up, at least, until the system collapses under the weight of parasites (eg. Soviet union 1980s) and/ or until the pitch-forks come out (eg. Great Britain in the 1640s; the United States in the 1780s; France in the 1790s).

    One way or another one or both of these outcomes awaits us now… better we return to evidence-based decision-making rather than continue down the road of politically motivated hysteria, in clear contradiction to the available evidence, and fanned by self-serving liars, shills, and propagandists….

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    JMD

    does that mean my site is worth $3m

    You’re not thinking like a banker. Issue some floating rate notes, maybe some tranched collateralised debt obligations. Hell, Goldman Sachs will probably underwrite it for you, before selling its portfolio of your stock to unsuspecting chumps after it issues a buy rating on it.

    I want money…doo doo doo… that’s what I want!

    For those interested I recently read a book on Neuroplasicity titled The Brain that Changes Itself. Some of it is not easy going but for something written by a psychologist its scientific methodology is pretty good. Except the bit at the end where he tries to argue neuroplasticity casts doubt on the theory of evolution. I forgive him for that though, he’s just a psychologist.

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    If anyone wants to use this argument on the Con or elsewhere you are welcome to copy …

     
    As I have said, the standard S-B equations still work and my hypothesis is not trying to change these. So I thought I’d set out the following not using my hypothesis at all – just standard physics, which shows why the effect of carbon dioxide on surface temperatures is zero.

    1. No solid, liquid or gas can radiate more than a perfect blackbody.

    2. A gas will radiate certain frequencies only, but the intensity of each frequency will still be limited by the Planck function, which itself is a function of temperature. (S-B is derived from the integral of the Planck function.)

    3. So, depending on the temperature of the region, carbon dioxide will emit at frequencies which may well be (and usually will be) off to one side or the other under a Planck curve – thus strongly attenuated.

    4. Hence, over all temperatures in the atmosphere, the mean intensity of carbon dioxide radiation falls a long way short of a true blackbody. (Whereas a blackbody radiates with the full filled in area under the curve, CO2 has just a few thin lines, most of which are not near the top of the curve, but instead have lower intensity at the sides.)

    5. Hence its emissivity must be very small. I suspect most likely less than 0.01.

    6. When using standard S-B calculations to determine the effect on the rate of radiative cooling, you need to take into account both the temperature of the region from which the radiation comes, and the emissivity.

    7. So, when such low figures for emissivity are used in the standard S-B calculations it is obvious that carbon dioxide can have very little effect.

    8. Considering the fact that some radiation from the surface goes through the atmospheric window to space, the remaining radiative cooling is well under half (maybe under 30%) of all surface cooling processes.

    9. The effect of carbon dioxide is absolutely minuscule and, even then, it only affects the cooling effect of radiation that is absorbed by itself in the atmosphere.

    10. Various considerations (such as in the Appendix of my paper linked from my site) present very plausible reasons for other non-radiative cooling rates to increase. Thus the effect on overall cooling rates is most likely zero.

     

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      Bruce of Newcastle

      I usually don’t comment on radiative stuff, but the first two points are incorrect. I know what you mean but the language should be tuned.

      Examples which negate the statements are 1. lasers and 2. heat – hot gases radiate at more than just Lyman style bands or etc (ie CO2 vibrational modes). Solar spectrum is near to a black body, but it’s gas the whole way down (if you count plasma as a gas).

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        The Moon's a Balloon

        Are you saying that The Sun is a ball of plasma, because actually this is not the case. As to modelling of the Earth as a black body, this is entirely disingenuous because it isn’t modelled as a rotating sphere with one side exposed to The Sun at all, but as a 1/4 flat disc approximation. This may be locically correct in some perverse fashion, but actually leads to hokum and bogus results from these so called models, or radiative simulations. CO2 is an irrelevancy, a red herring. NOBODY has proved the so called AGW CO2 Greenhouse hypothesis. All the panic is based upon phoney results from manipulated computer predictions, based upon risibly bogus data.

        See also Miatello’s critique of Spencer’s Cloud Work over at that other thread.

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          The Moon's a Balloon

          Oh and it is worth seeing this report …

          “There is currently no evidence that increased human-based emissions of carbon dioxide or other “greenhouse gases” have any measurable effect on the climate. This view is based upon my experience as an expert reviewer of all of the Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate and an intimate knowledge of everything in them.” – Dr Vincent Gray.

          Read the Full Article

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          Bruce of Newcastle

          “Are you saying that The Sun is a ball of plasma”

          No, didn’t say that.

          As to CO2’s greenhouse effect I note that Lindzen quotes climate sensitivity as equivalent to a 2XCO2 of 0.7 C. Which is not to say it is necessarily due to CO2. But it is due to something. And that something operates on both a short term and long term basis. I betray my empirical bias.

          Empirically the duck, to me, sounds like a duck. But not much of one.

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            The only “something” is natural climate cycles, and it is irrelevant to talk about sensitivity. Such cycles are now well established in peer-reviewed studies by Nicola Scafetta, for example, linked from my paper.

            Maybe you could start by reading the Appendix of that peer-reviewed paper where I discuss climate trends and cycles. Then you will see why the 10 points I made above are supported by empirical results, and the processes involved by a domestic microwave oven whose low frequency radiation is not absorbed in the usual sense whereby its energy is converted to thermal energy at the atomic level.

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        Lasers are not spontaneously emitting bodies and nor do they violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because energy is added to the system. The inversion necessary for stimulated emission in a laser has the effect of making the laser act more like a far hotter body, albeit it with an extremely attenuated frequency distribution quite unlike a Planck function. My hypothesis explains exactly why and how laser radiation heats various targets. There is a FAQ about lasers in the Appendix of my paper, for example.

        I consider that it is perfectly obvious in (1) that I am talking about spontaneous emission, especially seeing that I am making a comparison with a blackbody. In any event, even in the case of a hot gas, the emission does not exceed that of a blackbody at the same temperature. The Sun’s spectrum does not exceed that of a blackbody, for example. Its frequency distribution is well “filled in” because there are numerous different gases, just as there are 90 odd elements in the Earth, and, yes, some radiation due to acceleration of electrons in molecular collisions, vibrations etc, all as a result of high kinetic energy. But if the latter processes were significant with the low KE at atmospheric temperatures, then there would be significant radiation from oxygen and nitrogen as well. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.

        The same comment applies to the second statement which is also obviously talking about spontaneous emission in the atmosphere. Seeing that I am clearly discussing radiation from a cold atmosphere, you are merely introducing red herrings.

        Anyway, if that’s the best you can do, I could just add a qualification that I am referring only to spontaneous emission by gases in the atmosphere and presumably you’d then be happy with these first two statements.

        I take it then that you could not fault the other eight points and so, with the suggested qualification of the first two, you presumably agree with the overall conclusion.

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          Bruce of Newcastle

          Doug – I have not studied the radiative side sufficiently which is why I usually don’t comment on that aspect, so I didn’t comment on your points 3-10.

          My original comment was (I hoped) to be constructive criticism, since you said “If anyone wants to use this argument on the Con or elsewhere…”. Clever people inhabit the Con. In my experience an argument is best made when you have minimised the distraction points of purchase for the climate consensusees to grab onto. Teflon-coated your argument, in other words. As I said, your first two points should be wordsmithed a bit to remove those distractive points of purchase I described.

          As to cycles, I fully agree. But with the proviso that I think Dr Scafetta has under-weighted solar magnetic effect, so in my opinion there will be a more pronounced cooling than he predicts. I used the biggest such oceanic cycle for my own model (although it has limited effect over a long time base it has a very big effect over 30 or 100 year timelines which consensus climateers like to use). But at the same time I don’t think it will cool as much as David Archibald forecasts, as my analysis of the Maunder suggests there is a ‘floor’ to the solar magnetic caused temperature drop (ie there’re only so many GCR’s out there, at some point their impact will plateau).

          But my other point is this. There is a discrepancy between the temperature record and solar + cycles that is consistent with Lindzen’s value for CO2 sensitivity. Furthermore both he and Spencer measure a direct radiative response to forcing events via the ERBE and CERES instruments respectively. This data requires an explanation – one frontrunner explanation is CO2 and its fellows.

          But before anyone cries warmist, note that on those values of sensitivity you’d get maybe 1.5 C of warming out of the burning of every extractable chunk of coal, breath of gas and cup of oil on the planet. Stuff all.

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            OK. thanks Bruce. I’ve been banned so many times due to censorship on the Con that I gave up.

            I first discussed cycles in my original site early last year – http://earth-climate.com

            Here’s a copy of a post regarding cycles which I just wrote on Roy Spencer’s site when someone cherry-picked the last 40 years.

            You can’t look at a period as short as 40 years because there is a pronounced 60 year cycle for which there was about 30 years of warming leading up to 1998, and there is now to be 30 years of cooling from 1998. However, there is also a ~1000 year cycle which is still rising at about 0.05 C per decade but should reach a maximum within 50 to 200 years (which should be about 0.4 to 0.8 C higher than the present trend) followed by about 500 years of cooling.

            Carbon dioxide has such low emissivity that is has absolutely no measureable effect on climate. The whole concept of using S-B calculations is based on integrating the Planck curve for a blackbody radiating at all frequencies under its Planck curve. So S-B gives that solid area. If you replace that solid area with a few thin spectral lines for CO2 you don’t have much area at all. And, furthermore, the main 15 micron radiation from CO2 is only at a maximum in the Planck curve when the temperature in the region is about -80 deg.C. You will only find such temperatures up near the mesopause, which is above the stratopause which itself is above tropopause which is taken to be the TOA. At normal troposphere temperatures, the 15 micron line is way out to the side of the Planck curve, and thus strongly attenuated. Need I say more? Well, I have in my paper linked from my site if you’re interested.

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      cohenite

      Of interest is the issue of monochromatic radiative equilibrium which is defined as every gas in a gas body is in equilibrium in respect of its absorption and emmisivity with the air above and below it; or in otherwords the wavelengths of radiation are balanced at every layer.

      That this is impossible because there is no known natural mechanism which can produce it does not mean that there cannot be a general radiative balance between layers despite there being particular imbalances at particular wavelengths. The significance for this for CO2 and AGW is that there may be a radiative imbalance at the 14.9um wavelength at the same time that there is an overall radiative balance over the whole spectrum.

      There are well known mechanisms for overall radiative balance between layers of air. For instance as CO2 is increased the relative proportion of H2O emissivity [and to be clear here that is a measure of its heating/+ve feedback capacity] decreases. So when these gases are present together, the total radiation due to both is somewhat less than the sum of the separately calculated effects because each gas is somewhat opaque to radiation from the other in the wavelength regions 2.7 and 14.9um wavelengths.

      In this respect Doug’s first point, as Bruce suggests, does need work, perhaps along the lines that the emmisivity of a gas can be reduced by external factors and that the heating from a particular gas radiative imbalance can be mitigated.

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        See second paragraph in this post replying to Bruce just above.

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        Firstly, the 15 micron band for CO2 has its peak intensity at about -80 deg.C which is only found near the mesopause – ie above the stratosphere.

        The radiation from a gas is still restricted in intensity by the Planck curve for a blackbody at that temperature, because nothing can radiate greater intensity at any frequency than a blackbody can.

        So gases just have a few spectral lines, rarely corresponding to the peak in the Planck curve and so usually with attenuated intensity because, for the current temperature, they are located off to one side or the other of the peak in the Planck curve.

        No radiation from a cooler source can actually transfer thermal energy to a warmer target. You can see this because there is no energy left over and, besides, it would violate the SLoT as explained in my paper linked from my site.

        However, radiation from a cooler blackbody can be effective in slowing just the radiative cooling of the surface. Hence a wooden table on your back lawn may prevent frost forming on the ground below it. However, gases like CO2 only have spectral lines, so the “area” of these lines is very much less than the filled in area under the Planck curve which represents a true blackbody. We deduce that emissivity for a gas is very low (< 0.02 probably) and so it has very little effect on rates of radiative cooling. Other sensible heat cooling is not affected and can accelerate to compensate.
         

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    Kevin Moore

    http://www.sosnews.org/

    The Great Aussie Super Scam

    Did you know Compulsory Superannuation (SGC) that must be paid by employers is a ‘super’ scam to take from the low-income earner and give to the high-income earner? … Did you know the government use your super?
    [More]

    Mar 28, 2012
    Flannery Bullshit now moves to Cattle Farting Control

    Tim Flannery failed Nostradamus of taxpayer funded Australia climate change, engineer to government on carbon tax, now has a home for his proven bullshit. Again taxpayer funded he is engineering control for farting cattle polluting the atmosphere, yes on your money …
    [More]

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      The Moon's a Balloon

      Yes Flannery is a waffling Jeremiah.
      Remember these quotes from Flannelry [sic] ….

      “Picture an eight-storey building by a beach, then imagine waves lapping its roof.” (The Age, 2006)
      “Anyone with a coastal view from their bedroom window, or their kitchen window, or wherever, is likely to lose their house as a result of that change, so anywhere, any coastal cities, coastal areas, are in grave danger.” (WWF interview, 2007)
      “I think there is a fair chance Perth will be the 21st century’s first ghost metropolis. Its whole primary production is in dire straits.” (The Sydney Morning Herald, 2004)
      “The water problem is so severe for Adelaide that it may run out of water by early 2009.” (Jetstar magazine, 2008). (Adelaide’s water storages are now 53 per cent full)

      This man is an EMBARRASSMENT to Australia. We should get rid of Flannelry, and replace him by a real environmentalist to advise the Government. Somebody like Les Hiddens “The Bush Tucker Man”, for instance would do a far better job.

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        Andrew

        Let’s just get rid of government and the entire super-structure of parasites who consider themselves entitled to live off the backs of the productive members of society.

        There is NOTHING that governments do that cannot be done by citizens and by businesses under system of free market capitalism. The protection of the individual; of his/her liberty; and of his/her private property rights – these are the only foundations required fo rsociety to operate peacefully and productively. Governments did not make civilistion and they are not required for civilisation to continue and to function well. In fact, they are a major impediment to it. History is clear: they are a war-mongering, theiving class of over-regulating, coercive parasites. They always have been and awlays will be.

        The only reason they exist at all is because humans are relatively easy to herd. And because we are essentially a herd animal, we are susecptible to control and coercian by tyrants and their parasitical helpers. Somehow, people will have to find a way to ensure that the tyrants and their parasitical adherents never have the opportunity to be herders. Written constitutions and Bill’s of Rights perhaps provide some protection (particularly the right to bear arms) but after 200 years of operation in the US it is clear that written rules alone are not sufficient.

        The only lasting solution is to have a system that explicitly DISALLOWS government of any sort. A small number of enforceable laws concerned with individual protections, private property rights and liberty; and an armed citizen army (eg. of the type relied on by the Swiss) for self-defence – these are the necessities.

        Sooner or later the tyrants and the parasites who insist it is only they who are capable of running our lives will have to go, preferably, whilst we still retain some freedoms and some wealth. But this is not likely to happen voluntarily. Parasites never leave their host voluntarily – unless it is to find a new host. But someday, it this will have to happen if we are not to become fully enslaved and without any rights at all.

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    Hesperian

    Joanne,

    Completely O/T (apologies).

    Regarding James Delingpole’s visit to Perth, I’ve sent three emails to your “events” email address and haven’t had a single response. Is anyone reading those emails?

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        Hesperian

        Thanks Bernd, at least I’m not being ignored singularly.

        My wife and I want to attend, but as we are hillbillies from Roleystone, it’s too far to drive if we don’t know that seats will be available. If we did arrive and found that no booking had been made for us, my wife would make me walk home, and it’s a bit of a steep climb up the Darling Scarp.

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      All good points, and I’m sorry. I did reply – but too late for some people. I regret that I was away from my desk almost every day since I did the delingpole post, I mistakenly thought I had replied to emails, and it was only at lunch time I discovered there were dozens of emails trapped in the Cpanel. It took me three hours with emergency phone help, to find them and get them out. I need a secretary. Actually, I need a whole foundation to support me.

      I was so busy organising it, that I’m only reading these comments now.

      However volunteers have come out to help so we’ll be setting up a perth group to help organise these things. Obviously, it’s more than I can do with all the other committments.

      As it happens, we had just the right amount, full, and no one turned away. A good evening. My apologies to those who missed out because of my email glitch 🙁

      Jo

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    pete50

    Lewandowsky spouts an appalling load of rubbish, with what I can only think is simply, saying what is not the case with the intension to deceive.

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      The Moon's a Balloon

      Yep, I liked this thread Picasso Brain Syndrome from March 2010 on Jo Nova’s website here, which explains the contorted thinking of Lewandowski, in a way that can be understood by most, yet does he understand his own rational logic, or is just a rambling sycophantic adherant to the gravy train of lies and deceit ?

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    pat

    17 April: Age: Brian Robins: Biggest carbon emitter slashes asset value as tax looms
    The state-owned power generator has cut asset values by more than a third, to $1.1 billion from $1.86 billion, by booking a heavy $700 million write-off in the first such big financial hit due to the looming carbon tax introduction.
    As the nation’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide, Macquarie Generation faces a direct annual tax of $460 million, which will flow into the government’s coffers, if it maintains electricity output at present levels….
    The company has indicated it may buy some of its electricity from the wholesale market if it decides this could help improve its bottom line…

    Victoria has dirtier coal-fired power stations as they use brown coal, which emits more carbon dioxide. As a result, its generators will receive hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation from the federal government, which will allow them to continue polluting.
    Hazelwood power station, which is owned by European investors, is to receive $266 million in compensation, Yallourn, which is owned by Hong Kong’s China Light and Power, is to receive $257 million, while Loy Yang A, in which AGL wants to buy control, is to receive $240 million.
    The only NSW power station to receive support from the federal government is a small producer, Redbank, which is to receive just $8.8 million.
    ”This loss of value is a direct hit to New South Wales as a result of federal Labor’s carbon tax,” said NSW Finance Minister and Acting Treasurer Greg Pearce.
    ”The biggest question,” said Mr Pearce, ”is why is the Commonwealth compensating Victoria for the impact of the carbon tax to the tune of $2 billion and NSW is not getting anything.”
    http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/biggest-carbon-emitter-slashes-asset-value-as-tax-looms-20120416-1x3t9.html

    a couple of nights ago Sky Business Channel was constantly running a news ticker saying aussies see stock market as best investment option this year!! u have to laugh.

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    pat

    don’t pay it. simple.

    17 April: Gulf Times: Europe carbon tax will hit Gulf carriers the hardest, says Qatar
    We are carriers that will be penalised because we will be emitting more CO2 than our peers in Europe because we will be introducing more aircraft,” al-Baker told industry experts at an aviation summit in Abu Dhabi.
    Middle East airlines including Qatar Airways, Dubai-based Emirates and Abu Dhabi’s Etihad are among the fastest growing in the world with scores of new planes on order, and al-Baker expressed concern the ETS would unfairly punish these carriers.
    “This is just unfortunately a cover up for the inefficiencies of the European Union in the management of their finances,” he said, adding the tax was unnecessary and a “cover up” for Europe’s current financial woes…
    http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=499746&version=1&template_id=48&parent_id=28

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    pat

    ABC says Ludwig “defends” decision with the condition of “destocking”, yet he appears to be suggesting otherwise surely:

    17 April: ABC: Steven Schubert: Ludwig defends Henbury Station carbon plan
    Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig has defended the Federal Government’s decision to help a private company buy a Northern Territory cattle station to try to produce carbon credits.
    The Federal Opposition and some Territory pastoralists say they’re concerned about the decision to give $9 million to RM Williams Agricultural Holdings to purchase Henbury Station, south-west of Alice Springs, on the condition the land is destocked.
    But Senator Ludwig says there’s no reason the cattle and carbon farming industries can’t live side by side.
    “I think there’s room for all,” he said… http://www.abc.net.au/rural/news/content/201204/s3479101.htm

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    pat

    this is ridiculous, given we are already committed without even knowing what the rules will be:

    16 April: Reuters: Barbara Lewis: UPDATE 1-EU carbon trading reform proposal this yr-Oettinger
    Writing by Nina Chestney; editing by James Jukwey
    The European Commission is likely to prepare a legal proposal on reforming its emissions trading scheme (EU ETS) before the end of the year, EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said on Monday.
    Speaking at a European Wind Energy Association conference in Copenhagen, Oettinger said the 27-nation bloc’s trading scheme was failing to set a strong enough price to encourage investment in low carbon energy…
    The European Parliament has called on the commission to draw up a plan to withdraw a certain number of permits from the scheme, but there is still division among member states…
    Oettinger did not specify what the commission would propose but said the the trading scheme needed to be more immune to shocks, referring to the fact that caps on emissions were set too high and the system’s design failed to properly account for the effects of recession…
    One way of introducing tighter caps would be for the EU to target a 30 percent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 instead of the current aim of 20 percent.

    Poland, which as a heavy user of carbon-intensive coal fiercely opposes anything that could drive up the price of carbon permits, in March vetoed an attempt by the Danish presidency to get agreement on more ambitious milestones for carbon reduction.
    Responsibility for reform of the ETS falls under the EU Commission’s climate division, rather than energy, although it has ramifications for energy policy…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/16/carbon-eu-idUSL6E8FGBRW20120416

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    Grumpyoldman2

    Everybody wants to be a scientist these days. Won’t be long before Macquarie dictionary comes up with a PC definition to accommodate.

    Economists are to the Economy, as Astrologers are to Astronomy, as Psychologists are to Psychiatry. These “-ists” try desperately to tabulate and graph and show cause and effects that can be anything their fertile minds and feeble training demand. Most obtain post graduate status (PhDs even) by taking up “research” in pc fields that carry funding by zealot organisations with their own agendas and very little to do with science.

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    Bollocks

    The late British journalist Malcolm Muggeride years ago derided the psycho-therapeutic industry as western society’s version of the African witch doctor. He bemoaned the credulity of modern man and also opined that the educated were the most stupid people he’d ever come across. It is quite amusing to realize that the tired leftist hacks who’ve run the good ship Fairfax aground, are now swarming over the decks of the Conversation, or should that read Diktat? Onya Jo, keep up the sterling work.

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    “Professorial Fellow,” Stefan Lewandowsky, compares the lies to allied efforts to conceal the D-Day landing in World War Two. So the morals of science and war are equivalent? Perhaps Lewandowsky has not noticed the two fields have slightly different aims …?

    Perhaps the author of this piece has not noticed that the fascist gang of whom America’s then president, Dwight Eisenhower, so passionately warned, is alive and well in its modern manifestation, only one branch of which includes the Fifteen-Trillion-Dollar fraud: the Mann-Made “Climate Change” Industrial Complex.

    Imagine Mr Eisenhower had said:

    QUOTE: ” … In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the ‘science’ industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

    We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge, increasingly-centralized, authoritarian-regulatory and bureaucratic government and (as one example) “climate-change” machinery of “science” with our nation’s peaceful methods and goals, so that security and Individual Liberty may prosper together.

    Akin to and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-“science” posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

    In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by and/or at the direction of the Federal Government, Tim Flannery.

    Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by vast armies of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, Penn State, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research, Michael Sandusky … um .. Mann. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract has become a “scientifically-peer-reviewed” substitute for intellectual integrity, IPPC. For every old blackboard there are now thousands of computers.

    The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations and the Power Of Money, is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.

    Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific technological elite, Mr Lewandowsky.

    It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system — ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.

    Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society’s future, you and I and our government must avoid the impulse to live only for today, Mr Rudd, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow, Ms Gillard. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren, Mr Swan, without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow ….” END QUOTE (and apologies)

    Brian Richard Allen
    Lost Angels Califobamacated 90028
    And The Very Far Abroad

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    Jonathan Frodsham

    There are not many living people I despise. The dead? I have plenty, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot etc. The living? Well; only a few, Lewandowsky is at the top of my list. The thing is a scumbag of the first degree. Good on you Jo for continuing to expose him. UWA has lost a heck of a lot of credibility with his rantings. He seems to forget it is people like me who pay the taxes that pay him. His type is oblivious to the fact that he is supposed to be of public service.

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