If you throw enough of other-peoples-money at something you too can neutralize top talent and produce mediocrity.
Where are the young Cleese’s and Idle’s now?
They [John Cleese and Eric Idle] say the British broadcaster would not be brave enough to take a risk on them these days.
Cleese says the BBC has completely “screwed up comedy” because it has become a bureaucracy and “bureaucrats shouldn’t be in charge of comedy”.
IDLE: “Executives do not on the whole do well with comedy. They can’t understand it, they can’t read it, they can’t spot it.”
CLEESE: “But they think they can because they spend their whole time talking to other executives about what’s working. It’s like a martian trying to understand sex.”
Cleese on political correctness:
“Political correctness is a bit like granny or your maiden aunt arriving at a party when you’re all having a good time,” John Cleese said.
“She comes in and they all start buttoning up and becoming self conscious and behaving properly and then when she leaves you can have fun again.
“Well a lot of humour is just about enjoying life, it’s spontaneity. We’re always teasing each other. It’s with affection. It’s nasty teasing we don’t want. There’s certain jokes that are mean and actually not funny.”
— John Cleese rules out Fawlty Towers musical, says BBC has ‘screwed up comedy’
In November he said he said he’d never work for the BBC again…” a large proportion of the commissioning editors have no idea what they’re doing.”
Consider this an unthreaded post…
CLEESE seems to have a source of knowledge I am not familiar with. How does he know Martians don’t have sex?
100
He may be thinking of Barbarella, i certainly do from time to time.
310
Typical Aussies – no concept of concentrating on what is important.
40
attainment of concentration……whatever.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death
“Postman distinguishes the Orwellian vision of the future, in which totalitarian governments seize individual rights, from that offered by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World, where people medicate themselves into bliss, thereby voluntarily sacrificing their rights. Drawing an analogy with the latter scenario, Postman sees television’s entertainment value as a present-day “soma”, by means of which the citizens’ rights are exchanged for consumers’ entertainment.”
30
Forgot to mention George Orwell
From Youtube: “Published on Jan 31, 2016
“John Cleese: Political Correctness Can Lead to an Orwellian Nightmare “
From the YouTube transcript: (Note. The transcript has errors and not what John said exactly. In saying that…………… The video of John Cleese speaking does not have/contain bits of him saying any words whatsoever other than the words that he did in actual fact say.
“Transcript – I’m offended every day. For example, the British newspapers every day offend me with their laziness, their nastiness and they’re in accuracy, but I’m not going to expect someone to stop that happening I just simply speak out about it. Sometimes when people are offended they want – you can just come in and say right stop that to whoever it is offending them. And, of course, as a former chairman of the BBC one said, “There are some people who I wish to offend.” And I think there’s truth in that too. So the idea that you have to be protected from any kind of uncomfortable emotion is what I absolutely do not subscribed to. And a fellow who I helped write two books about psychology and psychiatry was a renowned psychiatrist called Robert Skinner said something very interesting to me. He said, “If people can’t control their own emotions then they have to start trying to control other people’s behavior.” And when you’re around super sensitive people you cannot relax and be spontaneous because you have no idea what’s going to upset them next. And that’s why I’ve been warned recently don’t to go to most university campuses because the political correctness has been taken from being a good idea, which is let’s not be mean in particular to people who are not able to look after themselves very well, that’s a good idea, to the point where any kind of criticism or any individual or group could be labeled cruel.”
And now for something completely completely, different……
20
What a fascinating statement!
He said, “If people can’t control their own emotions then they have to start trying to control other people’s behavior.”
Is that what’s going on with bureaucrats and people running companies these days?
Hmmm…got gut dysbiosis?
00
I guess it’s the same with many bureaucrats:”a large proportion of them have no idea of what they are doing”.
Can you imagine any media organisation running the “Black and White Minstrels” these days? It was perfectly harmless satire when I was young, but today one would never hear the end of it. Haven’t heard Paul Robson singing “Old Man River” for a while either.
200
R O,
My goodness “the Black & White Minstrels” WOW that’s a blast from my UK past. Yeh! that and the Golliwog in Noddy books would not get past the censors. What about comedy shows like “Love Thy Neighbour” or “’till Death do us part” or the American equivalent “All in the Family”? Very funny shows.
“’till Death Do Us Part” even poked fun at white people. My goodness would I get upset by being called “snowflake” I THINK NOT.
For years after migrating to Australia I got called a POMMIE BASTARD. Did I care? NO.
200
I liked Bill and Ben … The flower was always offering them something smokable.
150
What about being called a ‘silly old moo’? In context, it was far funnier, and more witty than some of the things which pass for comedy now.
I really can’t imagine Kingswood Country being made today either. It made fun of an awful lot of people, although as ‘the left’ still actively encourage the denigration and belittling of Christianity, then maybe they could get away with the jokes about the Catholic nuns, but talk of wogs and concrete aboriginals called Neville would be a step too far.
One just has to look at the fuss over the latest Australia Day tv commercial about eating lamb. The furore about the perceived “violence” against vegans was patently absurd (and that’s coming from someone who is a vegetarian), but the noisy minority had to have their case heard.
In some attempt to play Devils advocate, the School of Comedy (sort of BBC, but not quite), Little Britain (BBC), and Peep Show (BBC) were not exactly politically correct, and were still funny (to me), so maybe it’s not the end of the world.
110
I was trying to imagine someone like Kenny Everett trying to get going today…..would be shut down ( except the slightly dodgy bits, which would be bundled up and taught in “safe schools”….*sound of hey hey its satureday whip crack*…)
/biting sarc
61
Cue for “all in the best possible taste”
10
Hells bells mate,
If I was a lefty [Snip] I would claim to hav been racially villified for 40 years.
Pommie bastard indeed!!!!!!
As a racist who has travelled through 52 countries with harmony and tolerance then bugger the p.c. Brigade and the Woodentops!!!
[we’d like the words to be a bit more classy than that.]ED
00
Or maybe they do have sex but fain lack of knowledge because they are such tight assed bastards!
80
Martians or bureaucrats?
60
Same as same as … neither are on this planet.
100
There’s a great Uranus line in there somewhere……
30
This ties in with a book I was bought for Christmas. Can I still mention Christmas in this PC world? It is “And on that bombshell” by Richard Porter and is about his work as “script editor” on the BBC’s Top Gear programme.
When the programme started winning huge audiences the BBC thought it would be a good idea to distil the essence of the programme and sprinkle it on some other programmes. To this end, they organised brainstorming sessions with the Top Gear team which, needless to say, the team did not take very seriously.
It was as if they thought Top Gear was working to a formula which could be easily extracted. They were oblivious to the chemistry of not only the presenters but also their main production colleagues. The whole team are anarchic and work off each other. It is not something you can bottle and re-distribute.
It might also explain why I thought many of my managers at work had no sense of humour!
250
It reminds me of the failure that was Top Gear Australia and Top Gear USA. They wanted to mimic rather than understand the basics.
My two cents worth was that it was Jeremy Clarkson’s sense of humour that made it work. Just stupid was not good enough. A lot of thought that failed at the last moment made the funniest jokes. The others just thought that the plebs liked stupid.
170
No joking, it’s blooming serious.
140
Sadly you are right, FB.
Where has all the comedy gone?
Imagine what those old BBC comedians would do to the warmists and their philosophy.
They would develop a whole new comedy industry on just that alone and crucify them because of the stupidity of their “science”.
Apart from John Cleese, the Goons would have the world in stitches.
They are well aware of this and the modern
system is engineered to prevent it at all costs.
340
Spangled Drongo,
Not to mention some of my favorites from “Sunday Night at the Palldium” UK 1950’s – Dave King never failed to have us ROTF, Tommy Trinder and a host of others. Anyway comedy these days is just about sex and violence.
R-COO- K+
70
Yes, Ron, they were great.
What a ball they would have. I can just hear the two Ronnies getting “warmed up”.
80
…so long as they stay away from ‘The Phantom Raspberry Blower’.
40
Sadly Ronnie Barker no longer with us But Ronnie Corbett is I think. I’m a Ronnie too. LOL
31
Without the canned laughter there wouldn’t be any.
60
I’m pretty sure “S N at The L P” was live! and the laughter live. But I stand corrected if not.
10
OOppps
“Sunday Night at the London Palladium”
10
Dave King was the funniest comedian I have ever heard. He went to America in the 60’s and by the time he got back to England comedy had changed and he never reegained his popularity. Sad.
R-COO- K+
20
Spangled drongo, most of the comedians these days are part of the problem.
90
Comedy has disappeared because all the grim Leftist bigots are in charge. Comedy is about differences between people and in the PC world of the Leftists, there are no differences. Therefore, comedy is a hate crime.
Consider the themes of the Fawlty Towers series: they ridiculed dumb Spaniards, humorless Germans, flash Americans, homosexual Greeks, promiscuous French, lazy and thick Irishmen, the deaf, the mentally ill, the old, the afflicted, even the dead. Of course, the British didn’t come out looking too good, either.
You can’t appreciate humour unless you can accept your own essential absurdity. Put another way; you can’t laugh at others unless you can laugh at yourself. And the over-riding characteristic of the PC Leftist is their own self-regard and pomposity.
Their idea of humour is a conservative in a wheelchair unable to reach the button in the lift to get to his floor…..
181
It’s hard to be truly funny if you’re a self-righteous leftist prig.
141
All self-righteous prigs are truely funny.
They just don’t do humour.
70
Apropos restraints on free speech Law 18c I like
this scene in the film ‘The Name of the Rose.’…
Jorge de Burgos: Laughter is a devilish wind which
deforms, uh, the lineaments of the face and makes men
look like monkeys.
William of Baskerville: Monkeys do not laugh. Laughter
is particular to men.
Jorge de Burgos: As is sin. Christ never laughed.
William of Baskerville: Can we be so sure?
Jorge de Burgos: There is nothing in the Scriptures to
say that he did.
William of Baskerville: And there’s nothing in the
Scriptures to say that he did not. Why, even the saints
have been known to employ comedy, to ridicule the
enemies of the Faith. For example, when the pagans
plunged St. Maurice into the boiling water, he
complained that his bath was too cold. The Sultan put
his hand in… scalded himself.
William of Baskerville: But what is so alarming about
laughter?
Jorge de Burgos: Laughter kills fear, and without
fear there can be no faith, because without fear of
the Devil there is no more need of God
90
Thanks Beth. One of my favourite novels.
20
Yes Peter, and the film was pretty good too.
10
They do rather gloss over the fact that while it is smart to fear God, God encourages joy….no wonder the PC crowd hate christianity….
51
You’ve nailed it there
Satire MUST be censored
40
Us colleges are just about there:
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/06/10/living/seinfeld-comedy-colleges-feat/
Many comedians avoid US Colleges because of the overblown PC brigades. Quite Orwellian when people are too afraid to voice certain ideas, even in jest, let alone think the ideas.
The best comedians should challenge norms, push boundaries and most of all, make the audience think. If they are trapped within the tight PC boundaries of people who may be offended, then the task is damn near impossible. It’s no joke…
40
Henri Bergson on humour.comedy
is strictly human, comedy is
a survival mechanism, what
makes us laugh is rigidity
of attitude.
https://beththeserf.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/19th-edition-serf-under_ground-journal/
10
I have only commented once before on Joe’s website and it was about comedy.I have noted that a lot of comedians will joke about taboo subjects
“its their stock in trade ” e.g. like drugs etc (though I find none of that funny) but when it comes to the climate change meme they are either silent or go with the line that skeptics are Dumbos.
161
However, any an all ‘humour’ directed at conservatives is always considered funny and wholeheartedly allowed.
180
…just don’t mention The War.
90
Don’t mention the warm. Smiley face.
101
That fact that “humour” in this country is directed at conservatives almost exclusively is well demonstrated by the Melbourne based, so called “stand up comics”. Whenever I accidentally turn on one of those ABC “comedy” programs the “jokes” almost always seem to be aimed at what most visitors to this site would term “normal” people and attitudes.
The lefty audiences love it, apparently, judging by the peals of raucous laughter. It would never work the other way though, if the joker on the stage poked fun at some of the establishment’s sacred cows, like gender bending, welfare recipients or, heaven forbid, climate change.
160
I remembered that I’d kept a link about insights into Leftist and conservative comedians (or lack of the latter): http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/02/why-theres-no-conservative-jon-stewart/385480/. Whilst I can tolerate most of those mentioned in the article, there’s one, John Oliver, who I simply can’t stand.
20
Back in the mid-eighties we were “treated” to a visit to The Last Laugh in Melbourne. It was appalling, sleazy, nasty, totally unfunny. The people who took us there were mortified; they hadn’t realised the type of so-called humour. I couldn’t wait to get out of it into the fresh (in Melbourne?!) air and try to shake the dirty feeling off me. I felt thoroughly polluted by it.
I don’t watch TV “humour”, it is not what I mean by the term.
Fair’s fair though, there are one or two things Auntie Beeb does well, not many. The Antiques Road Show is brilliant; it’s great fun even if you are not particularly interested in antiques. Andy the Glass man is hilarious to listen to and watch as well as knowing his stuff.
30
More of your tax money
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2016/02/original-project-veritas-report-on-taxpayer-funding-for-labor-party-volunteers-working-on-us-democra.html
90
How Good is Wind Energy
Both major Australian political parties support “renewable energy”, based on the premise there will be a reduction in “carbon emissions” which are allegedly causing global warming. Labor’s goal is 50% renewable by 2030.
In S.E. Australia we have an inter-connected electricity grid with inputs of electricity from solar, wind, hydro and fossil fuel generation. Actual data can be viewed from the ANEMO website, energy.anero.id.au, over various timeframes and by means of generation.
The registed capacities for generation are:
Fossil fuel…….38,970 GW
Hydro…………..8,035 GW
Wind……………3,669 GW
Solar…………….123 GW
Total………….50,797 GW
The output for these methods of generation is displayed pictorially as 0-30% green, 30-60% yellow, 60-90% brown and > 90% purple.
Therefore it is possible at a glance to view production without any reference to figures. For most of the days of February Wind Energy was green and yellow; Hydro was green, yellow and brown, and Fossil fuel was mainly purple and brown. Solar production was insignificant.
February production figures were:
Wind……..from 0 to 2,400GW with an approx. mean of 1,000 GW
Hydro…….from 600 to 3,500 GW with an approx. mean of 2,000 GW
Fossil……from 16,000 to 26,000 GW with an approx. mean of 20,000 GW
With both Fossil fuel and Hydro generation there is a daily pattern with minimum production around 3 am. and maximum production around 6 pm. to cater for the demand. However, with Wind generation there is no regular pattern for production at all.
Looking at the February data for Wind production there are a series of peaks and troughs: 10 of the days experienced periods of only 10% production, and for 17 days there were periods with less than 20%. There was one day when there was a hour or so without any significant production from any of the wind farms. Overall production was about 27% of the rated capacity for the month.
Clearly, Wind energy is never going to replace fossil fuel generation to provide regular 24/7 electricity and back-up generation will be required for 70-75% of the time to avoid “black-outs”. As well, it is a costly form of electricity generation really only suited for isolated communities which have diesel back-up such as King Is. This is the reality of Wind Energy which seems to have captured the imagination of our politicians and bureaucrats who share the same epitaph of BBC editors ” a large proportion don’t know they are doing”
240
Birds of a feather….from departments of warm flatus, what would you expect?
/celebration of non-PC
90
I was looking at the current figures for Wind Energy: they were generating 380 MW midday yesterday, it rose to 1150 MW at 9 pm, and by 10 am. this morning had dropped to 500 MW and is still heading south. Not a bad effort for 39 Windfarms scattered over SE Aust. with a capacity of 3,669 MW! Really have we saved any carbon emissions remembering the coal stations still burn about the same amount of coal operating normally or on spinning reserve?
140
Robert O;
“based on the premise there will be a reduction in “carbon emissions” which are allegedly causing global warming.
Labor’s goal is 50% renewable by 2030.”
You will never get on the ABC with jokes like that.
60
For Tony in Aus
” Allan MacRae
February 27, 2016 at 9:32 am
On Energy:
I have worked in the energy industry for most of my career.
When challenged on the global warming question by green fanatics, I explain that that fossil fuels keep their families from freezing and starving to death.
Cheap abundant reliable energy is the lifeblood of society – it IS that simple.
Furthermore, I suggest that recognition of this reality is an ethical and a professional obligation.
The following numbers are from the 2015 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, for the year 2014:
http://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/pdf/energy-economics/statistical-review-2015/bp-statistical-review-of-world-energy-2015-primary-energy-section.pdf
Global Primary Energy Consumption by Fuel is 86% Fossil Fuel (Oil, Coal and Natural Gas),
4% Nuclear,
7% Hydro,
and 2% Renewables.
That 2% for Renewables is vastly exaggerated, and would be less than 1% if intermittent wind and solar power were not forced into the electrical grid ahead of cheaper and more reliable conventional power. ”
And the rest of the comment at
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/02/27/exxon-stands-up-to-the-green-bullies/
210
If you want to make watts on topic with Monty Python, try this post instead http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/02/28/the-complicity-of-journals-and-magazines-in-pushing-flawed-ipcc-climate-science/
Maybe mention of Velikovsky was timed to coincide with Feb 29 for some cosmological reason.
10
John Cleese should be able to make up for the BBC without any trouble. He’s probably the funniest guy I’ve ever seen. Mix him with some others and he’s unstoppable.
It’s a shame that the BBC has become so PC that one of the all time greats in comedy has to say something like,
190
It’s also a shame that Cleese’s forum gets taken away with the BBC unwilling to take a risk anymore. (double :-()
100
The managerial class has not only screwed up the BBC, but ABC also. Is there one, just one, genuinely funny show on ABC these days?
They are also active in the commercial sector, hence the current travails of Woollies. Having screwed up Dick Smith, they repeated their efforts with Masters, and even some Thomas Dux stores are now headed for the chop. To highlight their gross incompetence, the newly appointed CEO is sending the top management team off the boot camp to relearn the fundamentals of retailing.
We live in testing times!
71
It’s a bit daft to accuse the Beeb of screwing up comedy. That would only be possible if people went to the beeb for comedy in the first place.
I don’t, I go there for my daily dose of bias, bollocks and cr@p.
If they stuck to their charter, I might forgive them for extorting my money, harbouring sex abusers and employing ridiculous blowhards in senior positions. But they don’t.
So I don’t.
210
Jokes are always made at someone’s expense. They are all sexist, racist, elitist or just ridicule except for puns which only seem to work in English. In this new world of the twits on twitter, there is great pressure to conform. We all have to think the same on Global Warming, social mores, race, migration, popular issues. Some subjects are completely taboo and I would be moderated for just naming a religion common to one billion people.
After the war there was a great revulsion at food rations, depression, cultural straightjackets. People wanted short skirts, colour in clothes and furniture and cars, crazy music, crazy dancing and to make fun of the stiff upper lip. It was illegal then, which was the attraction but who could stop Carnaby Street, the beatles or the evil Rolling Stones, Andy Warhol and pop music, Monty Python? It was a movement which offended the establishment. Good. The one word the Pythons used to describe themselves was Silly. The world wanted Silly.
Now we are told what to think. Global warming, uncontrolled economic migration, renewable energy, sexism. All quite silly but the promoters are deadly serious. Windmills do not work. Solar panels are toys, useful only in remote locations. Certain religious sects are extremely dangerous but not to be discussed. Children are even being taught at school that gender is a choice and this project is government funded. The worst is that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, even if all life on earth is made from Carbon Dioxide. No one is laughing. Ignorance of science has become a religion.
So it is not just the BBC. It has permeated science. Professional scientists unless they are independent or retired cannot speak out. You cannot mention religion, except to criticize Christianity as if it was the root of all evil (that will not be moderated as it offends no one). As for LGBTI people know what the letters mean when they do not understand DNA. Then you get comedians who refuse to see the funny side of anything where political correctness has corrupted comedy. The BBC could not wait to get rid of the very funny Jeremy Clarkson because he sometimes offended people, even whole countries.
Now the twits are telling us we are cooking the planet, that petrol is the entire problem and we need to move to 100% sustainable immediately without any idea how funny, how ridiculous that is and politicians are racing to please these ignorant extremists and the LGBTI. What is Intersex anyway? Do I really want to know? Is it funny?
391
Thank you TdeF. Agree with every single word you said. I’m going to frame your comment and send it straight to the pool room. As for the PCers, tell’em they’re dreamin’.
I’ve been wondering about that intersex thing also. Not so much afraid to ask as afraid of the answer.
130
AFIK the term ‘Intersex’ relates to the biological phenomena we know as hermaphrodite or people born with an imbalance of X & Y chromosomes that can lead to a person having partial characteristics or sexual organs of the other sex, Intersex is different to Transgender where the person identifies as another sex psychologically sometimes resulting in cross dressing, hormone replacement therapy or sex reassignment surgery the latter where a man essentially goes in with a hotdog and comes out with a taco.
120
Thanks. I shouldn’t have asked. It wasn’t funny, just confusing. Now we have to be kind to hermaphrodites but first you have to ask if someone is a hermaphrodite? Is that a question on the census? How many toilets do we have to have now? Male, Female, Confused?
151
Oh no apparently you cannot use the term ‘hermaphrodite’ as its considered offensive to the Intersexual community, no joke 🙁
Caitlyn Jenner has decided to parody an old life motto wrongly attributed to James Dean,
60
How can “hermaphrodite” be considered offensive, for goodness’ sake? It is a combination of Greek male and female god and goddess names to describe someone showing a mixture of male and female characteristics. I lose all patience with the 1d1ocy of PC. The purveyors of PC seem to lack a grounding in basic education that was considered to be normal in the olden days when I was young.
Grumpy Old Annie.
80
Biologically though it refers to different things
00
Maybe the trick is to use the Monty Python approach and just amke all the PC stuff look silly…..when the PC crowd is being laughed at, no one will take them seriously….
40
At a party back in the 70’s I asked a girl if she was intersex.
She said: Your place or mine . . .
00
Very well said TdeF. this one’s for you mate https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFBOQzSk14c
50
Yes, we’re all individuals.
.. I’m not.
40
If it’s not too personal a question, are you a Virgin? ..
How much more bloody personal can you get? ..
Yes, Must be. Must be.
60
The punch line sums up the whole fiasco. (pick any fiasco).
20
Close, but I suggest that Monty Python in general, and John Cleese in particular, targeted stupid!ty for their needle-sharp satire
Life of Brian made me curl up on the floor in such paroxysms of laughter my wife became fearful for my breathing. And it wasn’t only christianity that was satirised, all religions were castigated for their innate, insane stupid!ty. [I use ! to avoid being censored here]
They did a short skit on The Upper Class Twit of the Year. Everytime I see or hear David Cameron, this skit is irrepressibly brought to mind
Sharp satire is the masterful antidote to authoritarian stupid!ty. The leftoid brigade with their PC trappings cannot bear it, so it is essentially banned
Cleese in particular is a satiric genius. The PC pushers hate him with a passion
230
I also meant to add that the sequence in Life of Brian where Pontius Pilate becomes righteously wrathful when he perceives his own guards covertly laughing at his lisp is pure, breathtaking comic genius … never bettered
Authority being laughed at … it finds that unbearable
150
No, TdeF. “Carbon dioxide is a pollutant” is not the worst. That will get sorted out a long time before the notion that gender is a matter of choice will. This notion should be knocked on the head.
51
Perhaps you’re not sufficiently effluent in another language.
40
“Perhaps you’re not sufficiently effluent in another language”
That’s not a pun, it’s a malapropism – but really funny though!
20
Almost a homophone so nearly a pun. My whole family’s been effluent for years.
20
I always thought effluent was a biggish sort of animal with a big trunk.
20
Why does it need a trunk? Animals don’t have to wear anything in public.
30
I’ve set out a theoretical basis for humour on my blog:
http://scottishsceptic.co.uk/2015/11/09/social-boundary-theory-of-humour/
What it says, is if you don’t share a common set of social values – then you are unlikely to find “their” humour funny. This suggests the BBC bosses may find their comedy completely hilarious – whereas when the last time I listened to the BBC I was finding fewer and fewer things worth laughing at.
80
Can’t say that I know about the BBC killing comedy. But they certainly seem to find killer rabbits everywhere. The heat is gonna kill you, the cold is gonna kill you, the lack of bumble bees is gonna kill you. So far, about the only thing that isn’t likely to kill you (according to them) is those of the IS LAMBS persuasion. And that, they flatly get wrong …
60
Free speech is the cornerstone of democracy – without it, democracy fails, liberty dies, and freedom becomes a memory.
18C and other PC ridiculous attempts to reduce offense are toxic to our society, and should be destroyed utterly.
180
The moderators of The Conversation respect and can recognise sarcasm.
/sarc
50
The cowards won the day on 18c.
They now need to have it turned against them.
When’s the first white woman going to use 18c against a few of the cowards?
70
OK Mod. The stem I was commenting on has gone to the big waste bin in the sky. Perhaps you’d like to send my comment there too.
It is not relevant here.
20
It’s true. Whenever I watch a classic BBC comedy – Python, Fawlty Towers, Reggie Perrin, Are you being served etc, I find myself thinking “they wouldn’t be allowed to say that these days”.
120
Nor would they have the wit to think of saying that these days.
40
The jaw dropping comedy for the last few years has been South Park. I know Los Angeles humour is lame but I wonder seriously why the South Park writers are not in jail or bankrupted by law suits in lawyer land. The writers have no fear. Cartman is evil personified. Some of the scripts defy belief and the one about man-bear-pig ex Vice President Al Gore is a scream. Global warming is just one of the topics including sexual identify, racial identity and political correctness. They invented a Nazi style Tolerance Camp for children, where “Intolerance will not be tolerated”. Nothing is sacred and no one.
So there is the official US humour and then there is the underground humour. Even Saturday night live was far more challenging than most British comedy and far less interested in history, word play and social classes. However you have to be careful when talking to Americans as there are so many subcultures who disagree totally, especially in the Bible belt. It is easy to offend. Feel your way carefully when the conversation turns to humour.
Warren Mitchell, the great British actor who just died at 89 with the final eulogy by Mel Gibson was a character from hell in To Death do us Part. He said people think the English like to laugh at themselves but in fact like everyone else, they like to laugh at other people. So in his opinion he was given the role because he was Jewish and did not look English, a real insight into humour.
90
Mel Brooks The Producers ???
Spring-time-for-you-know-who
in-you-know-where?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4ht5we3qzY
40
The Producers, the funniest thing I have ever seen [snip].
20
Sustainable Volvos. Now that’s funny.
Volvo Group ended its relationship with the National Mining Association (NMA) today, after learning of the coal and mining lobby group’s attacks on President Obama’s Clean Power Plan.
Expect a Volvos made of bamboo soon to save the us from Global Warming.
60
I’ll hang on to my present well-built, well-maintained and long-lasting Volvo, thanks all the same. If the Volvo company ever want to sell us another, they’d better drop this new nonsense. As far as I am concerned, the present and previous models are/were sustainable. They don’t/didn’t need replacing every 5 minutes.
30
Some very interesting comments in this article about “The Pause” also an article in The Australian today.
This article is particularly “odd” because I have read it like 3 times and I think Mann is supporting the existence of the pause??
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/did-global-warming-slow-down-in-the-2000s-or-not/
30
I read his final word and there is no admission that the pause is anything.
30
Sure, but he does state he is prepared to support the pause if the data confirms it… that in itself is either an amazing turn around or more likely a setup for one of his court cases where he can say “look I argued in favour of following the data right here in this article”….
Its just all very odd…
41
Climate Depot is running this story, seems the whole cabal have put on sack cloth.
http://junkscience.com/2016/02/warmists-mann-santer-et-al-admit-skeptics-correct-on-pause-in-new-nature-paper/
40
“seems the whole cabal have put on sack cloth.”
Lol yup… must be something in the water
40
We have the Klimatariat on the run and at the end of the plateau there is a precipice, they will have no answer for a global cooling trend.
By my calculation they only have a year up their sleeve to come up with some excuses, to match the 63 for the hiatus.
51
I notice that Joanne mentions at the bottom of the text that we should also think of this Thread as also being Unthreaded, and in a way, I suppose I think of this as humour, because every time I see a news report like this ….. it makes me laugh!
Some of you may have seen a TV News piece during the week about how a new Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) Plant has come on line in Nevada in the U.S. and how this plant could be the way of the future. This is the Crescent Dunes plant, and the report mentioned that a similar plant could be coming soon to Australia.
Well, there were a few things that were not mentioned in the report, and I’d like to highlight them.
They didn’t really mention the total power Nameplate. It’s 110MW, and they drive the generator with a specially designed turbine capable of driving a 125MW generator. This is similar to the Ivanpah plant, and it seems they may have learned a lesson from that as Ivanpah is having no end of trouble trying to keep their 125MW generator going just with the solar capability alone, so here, they have put in a smaller generator and the turbine can drive the lighter weight of that generator.
The news piece just quoted the blurb from the operators that it has ten hours of molten salt heat storage, and can actually supply its power long into the night. What they cleverly did not say was that ten hours of heat storage with the capability to deliver power long into the night is only for around perhaps 30 days a year at the most, and that’s at the height of Summer, because in Winter, it would most probably not have enough heat in the system to drive the generator ….. AND divert heat to storage as well for non daylight operation.
This can be better explained by the diagram at this link, and it is reasonably self explanatory, but if you have any questions about it, just ask away. Note specifically at the top it states ….. typical Summer day. This diagram, whilst for a Spanish plant can be used as a good guide to this Crescent Dunes Plant, as the Nameplate is almost the same, 100/110MW.
From the diagram, note how the actual power delivered after heat storage is the bottom of all those curves, that solid red line indicating a relatively flat 100MW for approximately 20 hours, but be careful even with this, as again, this is just a model, and very few plants have ever achieved what these models indicate.
The Capacity Factor (CF) was not mentioned, understandably, as no one, especially a journalist, actually understands what that term means. That CF is around 41 to 45%, but again, be very aware that this also is just a modelled figure, as virtually no CSP plant has achieved its modelled CF, So, extrapolating this CF out to the average daily operational time across a whole year, then that 45% equates to only 10.8 hours a day, so harking back to the ten hours of storage claim, (only for that short time in Mid Summer) then you can now see that there will be days when the actual power delivery will be very low indeed.
The actual power delivery will be around 500GWH per year, and again, be aware that this also is only a modelled figure as well.
There’s so much which can be said about this plant to refute the claims, but consider this.
Even at that claimed total power delivery of 500GWH, when you compare it with Bayswater at 17,500GWH, then you would need 35 of these plants just to deliver the same power as Bayswater, but that comparison is just on the numbers alone as Bayswater can deliver its power on demand, while this plant barely averages 10 hours a day, some better some worse. So, the total power delivered by this solar plant in one full year can be delivered by Bayswater in 10.4 days of normal year round operation, but keep in mind there are (many times) when Bayswater has all four units operational for sometimes weeks on end, so with all 4 units running Bayswater will deliver the same power in 7.9 days.
The cost was also not mentioned, but they have just received a loan guarantee for $US1.3 Billion, so harking back to the (by the numbers) Bayswater example, then, the same power delivery will cost in the vicinity of $65 Billion when converted to Australian Dollars ….. just to (well, sort of anyway) replace the ONE coal fired power plant..
Watching a report like this on the TV gives an impression not borne out by the facts. These plants are immensely costly, for very little actual power delivery.
Tony.
230
It is true Tony,
We are stuck in some sort of bizarre comedy. The reason I am not laughing is that all this irrational behaviour is going to come back and bite us. Sadly the nonsense is not over just yet.
100
Some of you may question that in the current climate, Bayswater might not be as fully operational as it once was and that all four units might not be running at the same time, considering that the Plant is now more than 30 years old.
It’s a regular occurrence that all 4 units are running at the same time.
In fact, right now, Sunday 28Feb2016 at 11AM, all four of Bayswater’s units are delivering, as are three of the four units at the nearby Liddell Plant which is now 45 years old.
Add together the coal consumption at just Bayswater’s four units, and the plant is burning one Tonne of coal every ….. 3.3 SECONDS.
Stand up and put your arms out in front of you, and make your arms into a 90 degree angle. Fill in the opposite side to you make an imaginary square.
Now fill that square area to your full height.
That is (approximately) one tonne of coal.
That is being burned every 3.3 seconds.
If all 7 of these units (Bayswater and Liddell) remain running, they will deliver the yearly total power delivery for this Solar Plant in three days.
Tony.
130
Warwick Hughes on Tasmania.
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=4331
20
It says they are in trouble with the electricity supply and mentions the problem of BassLink is still baffling everybody. What it doesn’t say is that the running down of dam levels to 22% before summer is a very poor decision in the first place, and to blame it on low rainfall is not truthful since average rainfall fell over the west coast catchments for the past three years. In fact dam levels haven’t changed much for at least 12 months.
If anyone is interested look up Hydro Lake levels and then peruse the official announcements from 2013 onwards. And political statements made by Minister Groom and Premier Hodgman about energy security are little more than fiction.
70
I think what looks easy on paer or in theory becomes horrifally complex in reality, similar to take a 2 year old out for the day…..then factor in sleep time, feeding, anppies, transport and tiored parents, and the whole exercise headache ramp up exponentially.
The whole alt. power exercise seems to be of the same ilk – the issues with managing sustained output, cost, interconnection with existing systems etc, means a radical overheaul of many things….that and expected rolling blackouts.
One comment made was that smart meters can be used to load shed to hide the mess…..and then try and get industry to run on unstable power…..
I think the greenies are big on their ideas, but short of actually nutting out what it means.
40
A solution to Basslink is in the queue. You’ll have to wait until the start of April to read the details. 😉
30
Tony:
As I understand it, the spanish soar heat plants don’t even attempt to run during winter.
40
You also need to factor in the preheating these CSP systems need to get going in the mornings. In Spain, this is done by gas and power generated by the preheating is included in the “solar” power output of the plant (up to 15% of the total output).
Lots more info on CSP in Spain (and how effective it isn’t) here
http://euanmearns.com/a-review-of-concentrated-solar-power-csp-in-spain/
The whole site is excellent (aside from some of the comment entries)
30
As well as mooting a CSP plant for SA, apparently, SolarReserve is
http://reneweconomy.com.au/2016/solarreserve-proposes-110mw-solar-tower-and-storage-plant-for-australia-16693
Strangely, I cannot find any reference to this anywhere except by Giles Parkinson. I wonder if he has confused himself with China’s CSP plans by 2020 for itself.
http://social.csptoday.com/markets/influx-pv-firms-china-csp-set-boost-funding-cut-tech-costs
They’d better get cracking through, given the small size of the installations that are currently under way (listed in the article above)
10
Thanks Tony,
I always appreciate your, expertise and insight into reports such as this. I’m an industrial chemist with some electrical knowledge but your explanations are pure gold.
R-COO- K+
10
A British vote to stay would seal their fate,
For decades in an E.U. superstate.
The Bureau hooked on climate-change and man,
Should work instead on data-sets for A.N.N..
If you find the N.I.W.A. forecasts poor,
Just switch to reading almanacks by Moore.
The B.B.C. spends wads of other’s money,
On P.C. comedy that isn’t funny.
150
In the early 70’s, I had a cricketing friend who was a school teacher at a single teacher primary school, at Swan Bay, near Karuah, just North of Raymomd Terrace. He had access to his school’s (original) black and white video tape recorder, and he taped all of the Pythons, and we would watch them at his home most Sundays, and he had all of them, right back to Series One. When Oz converted to colour TV, the first program was Countdown, but very few might remember that colour TV in Oz was introduced by the ABC on that midnight by Auntie Jack and crew in a short sketch of 5 minutes as B&W ended and colour rolled in from the top of screen. Then they had Countdown, and the next program directly following that was Monty Python, now in colour.
I loved all those old Python programs, and I also loved Auntie Jack, which, a little like Fawlty Towers, had very few episodes, and only ran for three relatively short series. Auntie Jack also spawned some spinoffs as well, Gunston, Wollongong The Brave, and Flash Nick From Jindivik. This last one, Flash Nick was the last TV outing for John Meillon, and he was just brilliant as the straight man for Graeme Bond and Rory O’Donoghue’s madness, and oddly, the way Meillon as the straight man bounced off those other two was ever so subtly humour of itself.
Sadly, those Flash Nick episodes vanished, thanks to executives, who, as mentioned here, have no concept of humour. In the ABC management instigated economy drive, the Master tapes, which were expensive things for TV studios were, umm, taped over with other programs, something that also happened to Ian Meldrum’s Countdown in 76/7, proving that executives again have no idea what really is funny enough to be considered worthy of saving for the sake of posterity, as now we don’t have those originals we can look back on.
Again, imagine Bond and O’Donoghue pitching this to the ABC now. Even with the ABC so willing to spend our money on what I now consider to be just plain dross in the guise of humour, they would be shown the door. What passes now for humour on the ABC is just out and out cr@p.
You want funny. Watch The Two Ronnies. Now, that really is funny. Some of Ronnie Barker’s humour is so subtle, it gets missed.
Tony.
120
Imagine trying to get away with this today, from Python. It combines my love of cricket with black humour.
The Legendary Batsmen Of The Kalahari
Tony.
100
Loved that! Funny.
20
Did you ever watch Dave Allen At Large?
There’s no way that show would be produced today.
50
Ooh yes! Hilarious. It was a favourite of a priest friend. Dave Allen smoked and drank on set too!!
20
And then there was Father Ted.
Soooo seriously funny.
As I mentioned in an earlier Unthreaded, I got a rep in the 70’s while still only young and in the RAAF as being a little odd, because I watched virtually only the ABC. They had so much good humour in those days, virtually all of it from the Beeb.
I found it odd that many many years later, all the rights to these programs were all snapped up be the Commercial channels here in Oz, and they all gained fairly big audiences. Those Air Force guys would then talk about the shows at work, and when asked if I watched, my reply was that I saw the show, years and years ago on the ABC.
Tony.
50
Sadly Father Jack passed away yesterday.
After watching Father Ted my family started to call me Father Jack – must have something to do with my liking for Jacobs Creek!
20
Perhaps your polychromatic vocabulary. 😉
21
The BBC’s sycophantic and fawning attitude towards Super-paedophiles like Jimmy Saville, climate change advocates, EU fanatics and its own massed ranks of overpaid PC obsessed bureaucrats make it an organisation totally unfit for purpose.
161
23…?
20
Here is a question that someone may have considered already.
Milankovitch cycles are supposed to explain some long term climate changes like the Ice Ages. The shortest cycle is the elliptical orbit of the earth. Perigee ( nearest) the sun occurs in January. The difference in total solar irradiance is about 90 W/m2 between perigee and apogee. There is a shorter and smaller monthly cycle due to the moon which amounts to about 20W/m2. The Earth and Moon wobble around a common barycentre.
The variations be seen in the NASA SORCE satellite measurements.
The odd thing is that the variation in TSI does not show up in the Earth temperature measurements. It may be that the annual cycle is just visible in the RSS temp series, but I cannot see it in UAH..
Has anyone else noticed that?
30
Please read past posts.
This site is pretty much dedicated to showing that the TSI variation does show up in the temp series – just 11 years later.
20
Thanks Joe,
Good answer but not quite what I was talking about. David Evans is looking long term using sun spots as a proxy for some sort of solar variation. TSI is assumed to be fairly stable over decade time scales. But measurements are less that decades old.
A TSI variation of 90kW/m2 during a year is a lot . The response should show up almost immediately (imho). I was thinking that the problem might be with the global temperature estimations/ calculations.
30
Peter C:
Yes, and I can’t explain why it doesn’t show up in the climate. I assume that the oceans act as a sort of ‘flywheel’ or buffer.
The 100,000 year Milankovitch cycle supposedly affects isolation even more but the timing is out. See 10,000 year problem although the variation from the Devil’s Hole timings and the Eemian is more like 17,000 years. Something that is always glossed over.
And if you want to journey on the wild side try
http://milesmathis.com/eccen.html
(I make no comment on whether it is true or loony)
50
I say loony.
Thanks
00
As this is an unthreaded equivalent, I thought I’d mention wind turbines. I recently discovered that there are 7MW turbines available, and it made me wonder…
Maybe I do not pay much attention to these things, but it seems like the majority of wind farms in Australia use 2-3MW turbines, which seems a bit silly when there are 6-7MW versions available for offshore purposes, albeit with larger blades (~75-80m, vs 50-60m for a 2-3MW system).
Is it something to do with the wind conditions, or is it related to something completely artificial, like height restrictions, or government subsidies, where fewer turbines = less taxpayers cash = unhappy landowners who get paid less for fewer turbines…? It seems to me that if such turbines can be built to withstand offshore conditions, then it should be much easier/simpler/cheaper to install the same equipment onshore.
Of course, I assume there is some sort of underlying logic to wind farms (aside from obscene profits via government cash for the owners), which is a very large mistake on my part.
30
The turbines above 5MW are reasonably recent (few years) in on shore format but have been available in offshore format for a while longer.
When matching turbines to a site, the process usually starts about 1-2 years ahead of construction, a detailed profile of wind patterns in the local area is constructed using “met masts” positioned around the site. From that data turbines are chosen that are likely to make the most efficient use of the wind assets in the area. Sometimes local variations may even dictate two or more different capacities or types to be deployed on the one windfarm to try and gain efficiencies. The other factors like planning regulations, height restrictions, wind shear etc etc will all finally inform the choices made.
So it could be that in Australia it has been assessed that turbines larger than 3MW like the Vestas V112s at Macarthur are the maximum size/efficiency right now that have been assessed as fitting our conditions.
I worked for Vestas for a few years, this is a summary of the process they use to determine which units to deploy at which sites.
https://www.vestas.com/en/products_and_services/options_and_solutions#!plant-optimisation
There are also specialist “wind prospectors” who will work all this out first, then present a developed plan to investors for construction.
http://www.windprospect.com.au/
50
James Murphy;
the smaller ones (2 -2.5MW) are cheaper to buy, cost less to install and to repair. Mostly a function of the volume of production and that the Chinese and Indians make these sizes.
50
The subsidy is the same. The output is the same. But the smaller turbines are cheaper to buy and install. The choice is simple.
50
Installation becomes a logistical issue beyond a 3.5 MW wind turbine due to the sheer size and weight of the components.
The length of the blades is a particularly difficult issue which is why they are now investigating multi part blades that can be assembled onsite and even on site production of blades. Of course this all adds to the cost of the blades and also increases the possibility of blade failure due to either the joins or reduction in QA outside a factory.
Offshore, these issues are far less of a concern
50
Genuine pompous fools take themselves very seriously.
The Puritans were notorious for their lack of humour,all the way up to burning women who mocked them.
Just more evidence the BBC are members of the Cult of Calamitous Climate, truly brainwashed members have no doubt therefore no room for humour.
Think of any true believer, you have ever argued with….
It takes humility to laugh at yourself.
There has to be room in your world for the possibility you are mistaken.
Look to the Eco-Nasties,Green louts,Gangrene…Government Climatologists….Certainty is their forte.
102
Which is why satire is regarded by these people as dangerous, subversive, offensive …
Barry Humphries left Oz for the UK for this reason, amongst many others of course
80
The Greens, and others of their political ilk might not actually burn people at the stake, but they wilfully destroy careers, and genuinely celebrate the deaths of those who dare to oppose them. They are the new Puritans, or perhaps just a continuation.
81
As this is to be considered unthreaded…
Following on from the LGBTI or whatever the in group of letters is, in the discussion above I do have to wonder just how far we could take this identity stuff. It seems they want to say that if a person identifies as another sex, or is it gender, I can’t get the hang of it, then we have to accept it and not just accept it but go on and on about never offending the very easily offendable.
Now if I came up with the idea that I identified with being royalty/ the president/ the prime minister/ absolutely rich/director of some top 100 company or whatever bizarre identity I came up with, then that should be accepted, pandered to and never contradicted by the fact that I’m a pensioner, female and without the heredity/skills and background necessary to be that person I identified as. I can just imagine if I insisted that my identity as Queen of the realm means that I should have the palace, the income, the servants and the role of Queen and you, the media, and anyone else must not under any circumstances throw my beliefs about myself into doubt as only I can know who I am and you must all be respectful of me and my beliefs under every circumstance!
No one would accept me as Queen or any of the alternatives I gave above and if I insisted on being treated as that person in the light of evidence to the contrary then I would be hospitalised, medicated with no attention given to me at all except at a face to face level and probably made fun of.
So how did we get to the stage of telling children they don’t have to go along with the evidence of their bodies? Why do we want to confuse the hell out of them suggesting that although they may have all the equipment of one sex they may not “really” be that sex. Why do we have to overtly sexualise everything at such a young age. And this stuff is being paid for by the government of Australia. What is the big deal about not being fully one thing or another? Decades ago I accepted I was bisexual, but it hasn’t had any impact overall on my marriage of nearly 50 years. However had I been bombarded with the whole range of options from before puberty I would have become totally confused and my life be made hell by identity politics. Instead I have lived an ordinary life, with an ordinary career, with highlights and difficult times made easier by having a life long committed partner whom I love dearly. My identity doesn’t relate to the fact that under different circumstances I might have made different life choices and my identity has been all the better for that.
So why are some bizarre identities acceptable and other bizarre identities not acceptable. What societal rules do we need?
My own thoughts are to go get a life outside of one’s sexuality. Go get a job, a career, a supportive social group, accept responsibility for providing for yourself and your family and enjoy life, without making the acceptance of responsibility and life enjoyment dependent on other’s acceptance of your identity, bizarre or otherwise.
90
I recently dubbed anyone who is not boring old hetro as “rainbow alphabet”. I think it covers everyone without being overly assumptive.
60
Funny thing I’ve found is that people who want to identify as whatever sexual group they want give the impression they are open and accepting to all alternate views when the opposite is often the case, try telling them you believe nature intended male and female to be natural partners for the purpose of procreation and all other unions are a glitch in the system and watch the outrage at you daring to have an opinion!, equality is a one way street to some.
Look at the massive culture clash of social values occurring in Europe now, why this is happening is very simple regarding the fundamental values for both beliefs, one promotes a caring god, treating others equally, showing compassion not violence, respecting all laws and the promise of eternal peace upon death.
The other promotes distain for others unlike them, legalised violence by laws approve by a prophet, a male dominated society based on carnal pleasures, the promise of paradise and further carnal rewards if they die committing or enabling violent acts against others deemed enemies innocent or otherwise.
Gee who could have foreseen any problems there?
80
In the second lot, there is the additional problem of arranged/forced marriages, where your likely spouse is your first cousin (in the UK, this is over 60%). While this is legal, it is genetically inadvisable – so imagine the genetic damage this creates by following the same practice generation after generation.
80
Colour? What colour?
60
As this is to be considered unthreaded…
Following on from the LGBTI or whatever the in group of letters is, in the discussion above I do have to wonder just how far we could take this identity stuff. It seems they want to say that if a person identifies as another sex, or is it gender, I can’t get the hang of it, then we have to accept it and not just accept it but go on and on about never offending the very easily offendable.
Now if I came up with the idea that I identified with being royalty/ the president/ the prime minister/ absolutely rich/director of some top 100 company or whatever bizarre identity I came up with, then that should be accepted, pandered to and never contradicted by the fact that I’m a pensioner, female and without the heredity/skills and background necessary to be that person I identified as. I can just imagine if I insisted that my identity as Queen of the realm means that I should have the palace, the income, the servants and the role of Queen and you, the media, and anyone else must not under any circumstances throw my beliefs about myself into doubt as only I can know who I am and you must all be respectful of me and my beliefs under every circumstance!
No one would accept me as Queen or any of the alternatives I gave above and if I insisted on being treated as that person in the light of evidence to the contrary then I would be hospitalised, medicated with no attention given to me at all except at a face to face level and probably made fun of.
So how did we get to the stage of telling children they don’t have to go along with the evidence of their bodies? Why do we want to confuse the hell out of them suggesting that although they may have all the equipment of one sex they may not “really” be that sex. Why do we have to overtly sexualise everything at such a young age. And this stuff is being paid for by the government of Australia. What is the big deal about not being fully one thing or another? Decades ago I accepted I was bisexual, but it hasn’t had any impact overall on my marriage of nearly 50 years. However had I been bombarded with the whole range of options from before puberty I would have become totally confused and my life be made hell by identity politics. Instead I have lived an ordinary life, with an ordinary career, with highlights and difficult times made easier by having a life long committed partner whom I love dearly. My identity doesn’t relate to the fact that under different circumstances I might have made different life choices and my identity has been all the better for that.
So why are some bizarre identities acceptable and other bizarre identities not acceptable. What societal rules do we need?
My own thoughts are to go get a life outside of one’s sexuality. Go get a job, a career, a supportive social group, accept responsibility for providing for yourself and your family and enjoy life, without making the acceptance of responsibility and life enjoyment dependent on other’s acceptance of your identity, bizarre or otherwise.
50
It’s psientific, with a silent “p” from wherever your whim wishes (or whooshes).
40
***these two lines from the CSIRO report certainly made me laugh:
27 Feb: HuffPo: James Bullen: Australia’s Future Is Digital, Agile, And Full Of Robots, New Report Finds
The analysis, from the CSIRO’s data innovation department Data61 and industry bodies including the Australian Computer Society (ACS), outlines a ‘perfect storm’ of conditions which together mean the makeup of the country’s workplace is shifting faster and more dramatically than ever before.
These conditions include steep growth in computing power, an ageing population, and a post-mining boom economy that is transitioning into the exportation of innovation and knowledge, not coal and uranium…
“There is a future where the promises of artificial intelligence come to fruition and the vast majority of human tasks are performed better, faster, more safely and more cheaply by robots…
***The report found there would be more demand for people with science, technology, engineering and mathematics knowledge in future.
***They are the sectors with the biggest increases in job numbers and wages…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2016/02/27/digital-workplace-aus_n_9323248.html
50
Apparently by 2050 hubots will be doing 40% of work now enjoyed by humans.
50
And if recharged by solar panels, those hubots will only be working 30% of the day.
Who’d have thought hubots would be taking advantage of the 8 hour day.
00
An excellent description of the engineers, geologists, geotechnicians, financiers and others already in the mining industry
So: what, me worry ? (Acknowledgement to Alfred E Neumann)
One would expect that the greenies will deny this to the bottom of their fungal toenails
51
Ian,
Way back in the 1980s we discovered the porphyry copper/gold deposits NE of Parked NSW. Three of these have been/are being mined. Our chief mining engineer, Dr Ernest Miller, instigated a block caving mining method with underground recovery. One day an unplanned fall of a big block of rock from the upper underground cavern caused an air blast that killed 4 miners.
Since then the technology direction has been towards robot mining. Around about now that should be 100% no miners underground, with the essence of the work conducted from an office in Perth.
I did not think I would see this in my lifetime. Some key parts were earlier developed for high grade uranium mining underground esp in Canada. Quite remarkable.
Geoff.
60
real or not, CAGW would be win/win for insurers, as if we didn’t know:
27 Feb: Business Insider: Akin Oyedele: Warren Buffett says it’s ‘highly likely’ climate change poses a major problem for the planet
In his latest letter to holders, Buffet addressed the topic of climate change as there is a proxy proposal for Berkshire to discuss how climate change could affect its insurance business at its upcoming meeting.
Buffett writes that he is not denying the science showing that climate change will likely be a problem.
But he’s just not 100% certain that it will be…
Buffett adds that Berkshire Hathaway’s insurance business stands to benefit from an increase in property damage caused by the effects of climate change.
Insurance policies, Buffett writes, are typically written for one year and repriced each year to account for shifting risks. And so, if risks — from climate change or otherwise — go up, so will premiums…
Buffett: “As a citizen, you may understandably find climate change keeping you up nights. As a homeowner in a low-lying area, you may wish to consider moving. But when you are thinking only as a shareholder of a major insurer, climate change should not be on your list of worries.”
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/warren-buffett-on-climate-change-2016-2?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter?r=US&IR=T
20
‘And so, if risks — from climate change or otherwise — go up, so will premiums…’
And if the risks suddenly go away, when they discover CO2 doesn’t cause global warming, then premiums will fall. Pigs can fly too.
41
28 Feb: UK Daily Mail: David Rose: Why your diesel car is the greatest con of them all: It’s touted as a low-carbon fuel but it’s cost tens of thousands of lives…and made our air even filthier
•’Green’ policies accused of triggering a ‘public health disaster’ in the UK
•Huge shift to diesel vehicles to cut greenhouse gas emissions is a ‘con’
•Rise in diesel cars directly causing diabetes, autism and cancer – report
•Top scientist said move to diesel is having catastrophic consequences
Tens of thousands of people are dying every year because repeated warnings about the dangers of diesel cars and wood-burning for heating were ignored by successive governments trying to make Britain ‘greener’, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Ironically, the policies have only made our air dirtier. They are accused of triggering a ‘public health disaster’, with the huge shift to diesel vehicles to try to cut greenhouse gas emissions denounced as a ‘con’…
Professor Jonathan Grigg, vice chair of the report by the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, told this newspaper that the move to diesel vehicles in the mistaken belief this would cut greenhouse gas emissions is having catastrophic consequences…
‘This is a public health disaster,’ said Grigg, who is professor of paediatric respiratory and environmental medicine at Queen Mary University in London. ‘The tragedy is that people have bought diesel cars thinking they are protecting the environment, whereas toxic emissions from diesel engines are causing death and disease. It is understandable that buyers now feel they were conned.’…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3467612/Why-diesel-car-greatest-s-touted-low-carbon-fuel-s-cost-tens-thousands-lives-air-filthier.html
40
Well that is a good list of damaging diseases placed at the door of diesel fuel! Is there evidence? Professor Jonathon Grigg has some explaining to do. The disease I was expecting to see at the very top of the of the list was chronic lung diseases eg emphysema.! Lung cancer only came in at No 3 after autism!
50
Yes Peter C,
Professor Jonathon Grigg appears to be playing from the ‘all risk is bad risk’ deck of cards. As I’m sure he is well aware, when explaining risk keep away from actual figures and context to maximize the perceived fear.
Also always emphasize childhood diseases over later-life illnesses, as the guilt-trip multiplier effect ratchets-up a few more notches if the very young, or better still the ‘yet to be born’, are implicated — regardless of how slight the true risk is.
30
NOT AT ALL FUNNY –
former Lord Mayor surely, Jeffrey Evans is now in that post:
27 Feb: UK Independent: Tom Bawden: Councils should use bonds to fund green infrastructure projects, says Lord Mayor of London
Councils should use bonds to fund much needed green infrastructure projects such as renewable energy and flood defences, according to the Lord Mayor of London. The UK’s first council solar bond was launched last week, and Sir Roger Gifford said there was tremendous scope for the country to follow the lead of the US and Swede, where municipalities have raised billions of pounds for green projects by selling bonds to the public…
***Furthermore, the profits they make generate income for the council, which can be spent on other services such as libraries and reduce the need for spending cuts or tax increases…
Sir Roger added: “There is great potential for the UK to follow the Scandinavian or North America models. Mostly obviously for wind, but also for wave, solar and biofuel power – all those forms of renewable energy are perfect for this kind of climate-friendly financing. Waste management, water management, better water grids, better electricity grids, sustainable transport, sustainable housing – all of them are also excellent, as is air-pollution prevention.” …
***Sir Roger is also chairman of the Green Finance Initiative, set up to make London the capital of environmentally friendly banking after world leaders agreed to take strong action to tackle global warming in the Paris Agreement in December…
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/councils-should-use-bonds-to-fund-green-infrastructure-projects-says-lord-mayor-of-london-a6900236.html
14 Jan: UNEP: UK Global Hub for Green Finance, New UNEP Report Says
The report, entitled The UK: global hub, local dynamics – mapping the transition to a sustainable financial system (LINK) profiles the actions that have been taken over the past 15 years to make environmental and social factors a core part of banking, capital markets, investment and insurance…
http://www.unep.org/newscentre/default.aspx?DocumentID=26862&ArticleID=35822
multiple links, etc:
UNEP Finance Initiative
UNEP FI is a global partnership between UNEP and the financial sector. Over 200 institutions, including banks, insurers and fund managers, work with UNEP to understand the impacts of environmental and social considerations on financial performance…
http://www.unepfi.org/
20
Apart from “I’m sorry I haven’t a clue”, BBC so-called comedy is just left-wing clap-trap, with no humour whatsoever.
The BBC would love to kill “I’m sorry I haven’t a clue”.
92
Here’s some non-PC BBC comedy hosted by the inimitable Humphrey Lyttelton sadly now deceased.
The programme is still going but is not quite the same somehow.
60
Thanks for the link, manalive. I’ve added it to my favourites so that I can sit back later to enjoy it.
ISIHAC with Humph was, and still is, one of the funniest shows ever put on by dear old Auntie and, to be fair, Jack Dee does a pretty good job of hosting it despite the obvious fact that he can’t be his predecessor. Nobody could.
ISIHAC was probably the least PC show ever made by the BBC and a few of its executives must have been strangely cheered when Mr Lyttelton moved on.
I can only surmise that Samantha had enough casting-couch tales lodged with her lawyers to stay the, otherwise, inevitable programming execution from the BBC schedule. Although, given the nature of the alphabetized gender-inclusive nature of its top executives, perhaps Sven had more of a hand in the process.
40
Neil Postman Are We Amusing Ourselves to Death Part I, Dec. 1985
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRabb6_Gr2Y
10
I is old and forgot to add this link for all those young-at-heart, old fogies, forgive me.
http://tunein.com/radio/British-Comedy-Channel—ROK-Classic-Radio-s131693/
In a nutshell, this site plays 24×7, BBC half-hour, comedy shows from days of yore.
ISIHAC, Goons, Steptoe, Clithero Kid, Arthur Haynes, Hut 33, Fawlty Towers, Dads Army, Just a Minute etc. and etc. Not every show will rock your boat but many will if you’re of a certain age!
It even has old radio adverts, some delightfully non-PC and, apart from the occasional short current piece when you first tune in, it’s ad free!
30
23 Feb: Bloomberg: The Trickle of U.S. Oil Exports Is Already Shifting Global Power
by Joe Carroll & Harry Weber
After 40 years on sidelines, U.S. crude oil sails the seas
Saudis and Russians stand to be losers from end of export ban
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-23/-liquid-freedom-sails-from-texas-tilting-power-in-global-oil
23 Feb: BBC: Matt McGrath: ‘Limited role’ for natural gas in UK future energy mix
The use of natural gas for electricity generation in the UK may have to decline significantly over the next 30 years, according to a new study.
Without carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology, gas-fired electricity would have to fall to 10% of the mix to meet emissions targets for 2050.
The new study also warns that current government policies will deter investment in gas.
The report has been published by the UK Energy Research Centre…
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-35632075
20
24 Feb: Russia Today: Saudi Arabia declares open war on shale
Riyadh says it will not reduce crude production at its own expense and that high-cost American oil producers should make the cuts.
The high-cost producers in question are US shale fields, Canada’s oil sands and deepwater projects. And this is the first time al-Naimi has so openly talked about Saudi Arabia’s oil policy.
“The producers of these high-cost barrels must find a way to lower their costs, borrow cash or liquidate,” al-Naimi said at the IHS CERAWeek conference.
“It sounds harsh, and unfortunately it is, but it is a more efficient way to rebalance markets. Cutting low-cost production to subsidize higher-cost supplies only delays an inevitable reckoning,” he added.
According to al-Naimi, Riyadh is ready to pump oil at $20 per barrel and still be profitable. “We don’t want to, but if we have to, we will,” he said…
https://www.rt.com/business/333448-saudi-arabia-oil-shale-iran/?utm_source=browser&utm_medium=aplication_chrome&utm_campaign=chrome
same story, completely different headline!
24 Feb: CNN: Matt Egan: Saudi Arabia tries to make nice with U.S. shale oil
America’s once-booming shale oil industry is in the emergency room.
And many believe Ali al-Naimi put it there. But you wouldn’t know it from hearing the Saudi oil minister speak.
“I welcome additional supplies — including shale oil,” al-Naimi said on Tuesday.
That’s a funny comment considering that Saudi Arabia has turned the screws on U.S. shale producers since late 2014…
War or not, it’s clear who the Saudis want to bear the brunt of the painful “rebalancing” act currently taking place in the oil markets. They even point to so-called “expensive” producers like U.S. shale companies and deepwater drillers that need higher prices to turn a profit.
Al-Naimi correctly noted that sky-high oil prices years ago unleashed a wave of investment that created the new technology underpinning the shale boom. It’s what led U.S. production to nearly double in the past decade, helping create the current supply glut.
“The producers of these high-cost barrels will find a way to cut costs, borrow or liquidate. It sounds harsh — and unfortunately it is — but it is the more efficient way to rebalance markets,” al-Naimi said…
Yet OPEC’s strategy has failed to kill the American oil boom — at least so far. U.S. production has slowed, but remained near all-time highs at the end of 2015…
http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/24/investing/saudi-arabia-us-shale-oil/
Obama turning his back on fossil fuels? hardly.
40
a final piece. read alongside Bloomberg’s ” The Trickle of U.S. Oil Exports Is Already Shifting Global Power” posted in comment #37, which also deals with Australia.
the Bloomberg piece is a must-read:
26 Feb: Reuters: Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen: As U.S. shale exports begin, Australia readies world’s costliest gas project
The timing couldn’t be worse for the first production of natural gas from Australia’s $54 billion Gorgon project – the world’s most expensive…
Even so, six more large LNG plants are coming on stream in Australia alone between 2015 and 2017, putting it on track to overtake Qatar as the world’s top sea-borne exporter of the gas by the end of the decade.
At full capacity, the plants will add 53 million tonnes of LNG per year, equal to one-fifth of global production last year or the annual gas needs of Germany, Europe’s biggest consumer of the fuel…
Along with extra consumption from existing buyers like India and China, analysts expect newcomers including Poland, Morocco and the Philippines to add 50 million tonnes per annum of demand by 2020, a figure dwarfed by the 120 million tonnes a year of new LNG is scheduled to come online by then…
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-australia-lng-gorgon-idUSKCN0VY0OY?virtualBrandChannel=11563
no wonder they want to kill coal.
50
Laughter, is a release of pent up emotion, it acts to ease tension it is also good to laugh.
laughter can be bleak and it shouts in defiance at, in derision of the vicissitudes of life and laughter pokes fun at the human condition.
Having said that.
We have to live, enforced thus, hammered into, an anodyne world, a comatose induced state; where all life is being squeezed out of the populace, taught what to think, what to say and indeed how to say it.
Alack! Paradoxically, that stream of unconsciousness that is twitter, where the left vent their spleen – is an engine of hate and fury. #Whatever happened to their sanitized cozy world view of peace and joy to all things and maybe – even, to men?
All forms of totalitarianism strive to control and absolutely.
All forms of totalitarianism, are marked by a distinct dearth of what might be termed humour. Autocrats, crackpots, despots whether they be as was Chairman Mao, the Kommissars of Brussels or the Green party in Australia, a bloke who runs down Zimbabwe would demand to control the narrative and all of what is seen and said. Again, there is no allowance made, no room for laughter, particularly if its aimed barbs are targeted at the head of the party, its leader.
Alternative comedy?
As in all things the beeb seeks control because it is controlled, this is the new order and so deigned by the overmasters who define and dictate how we shall think, eat, sleep and what thoughts can travel through our cerebral cortex. The PC brigade, whether it be the pols, nu jokists, your local council, quangos and just about any official body paid for by the taxpayer, demand conformity and in this the beeb is their advertiser and chief apologist.
In Britain, you can laugh but strictly on PC terms ie only are allowed to laugh at certain facets of life and poor scorn on certain people. A good example and illustrative, would be Margaret Thatcher, where the only modern female prime minister is seen by some of the chatterati as fair game for just about any brickbat they can conjure up.
I thought it was quite disturbing that after the death of Maggie, the left wing screaming harpies decided it was a good idea to release a song entitled and written for a childrens’ musical, it highlights in stark relief, what is the groupthink of the extreme left wing and of its warped, hypocritical upside down misanthropic vision.
The beeb encapsulates left wing sarcasm which is supposed to pass as humour. Where you can only laugh at certain things deemed right and fitting but where spontaneity is totally frowned on. The luvvie comedians work from script and play to canned audiences full of ‘right on kids’ who wouldn’t know how to behave if they ever heard a real gag.
That’s what Cleese and Idle were driving at, the trouble is – even these two giants of bbc comedy (as was) can’t speak the truth – for fear of enraging the PC brigage. How ironic.
50
what a complete scam.
***consumers would be paying more than the penalties if the renewables do go ahead! better to just pay the penalties?
28 Feb: SMH: Tom Arup: Australia risks missing clean power goals, with households to pick up the bill
Australia risks not hitting its 2020 renewable energy target with analysts now forecasting that interim goals will be missed – a situation that will trigger penalties that households will have to pay…
If an annual shortfall occurs major energy players are required to pay penalties to the federal government, with the costs being passed on to consumers.
Advisory firm Green Energy Markets calculates falling short of the target would cost the average household $5 in Victoria and $8 in NSW on their quarterly power bill.
***That is on top of the otherwise expected costs of meeting the renewable energy goal…
Green Energy Markets says commitments for 4400 megawatts worth of large-scale renewable energy projects is needed this year to avoid penalties in 2018…
“In order for us to meet the [2020] target something has to change, ” said Marco Stella, a senior broker at another firm, TFS Green Australia.
“Either people have to start committing to projects or financiers and project proponents need to be prepared to take on more risk.”
“It is an enormous amount of generation that still has to be built. And because we have been doing nothing for years the requirements are getting larger and larger.”…READ ALL
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australia-risks-missing-clean-power-goals-with-households-to-pick-up-the-tab-20160225-gn3d9w.html
40
Years ago the local PP Board (now morphed into LLS) prosecuted a farmer who refused to do anything about rabbits on his property. The rabbits were so bad that the Board were allowed to enter the offenders property and destroy them before the court case was heard.
When the matter finally did go to court, the farmer was found guilty and fined one third of the amount it had cost the PP Board in materials to exterminate the rabbits.
Yes Pat, sometimes it is better to just pay penalties!
20
I just saw this from pat: (my bolding here)
That’s at least 9 huge scale wind plants (of 500MW for each plant) and they want commitments for that this year.
It will never happen, even if the Government just decided to pay for the lot themselves.
The current already existing Nameplate total for EVERY wind plant in Australia is 3669MW, so this calls for commitments of more than the current total ….. just in this year.
The prospective cost is in the vicinity of $18 Billion.
And even if all of these hoped for proposals were to be approved ….. TOMORROW, they still would not be constructed and delivering power before 2020, as there’s at least a five to seven year lead time on them from thought bubble to power delivery stage.
4400MW of wind power. You know, around the same actual yearly power delivery as TWO units at Bayswater.
This is the Green Energy Markets thought bubble on steroids.
It will never happen.
Tony.
40
BBC – Boring Bland Corporation
I totally agree with the great Pythoneers Cleese and Idle.
Having grown up with shows like Not the Nine O’Clock News, the Two Ronnies, Fawlty Towers, and many more memorable comedy series I wondered how in todays politically correct and pseudo “multicultural” modern Britain, the BBC had managed itself.
Obviously it has not, and the now the sanitary and sterile BBC, is filled with mediocre and uninspiring content approved by visionless bosses and put into production by its humorless and talentless producers.
The BBC is obviously dead !
..and despite the whole edifice beginning to smell, the funeral has still not been scheduled.
50
ScotsmaninUtah,
It was not just the BBC, the British independence are no better.
The writing was on the wall in the late 1990s when UK’s Channel 4 news satire ‘Brass Eye’ was taken off the air.
Yes the do-gooders really hated a program that took so many pot-shots at their inflated moral hubris, a program that made you think as you chuckled or squirmed in embarrassment, — a clever, funny, truly moral program that opened-up the public arena to the bigger questions. A program that questioned the moral foundations of celebrities and the public’s opinions and attitudes.
50
Oops,
that should be ‘British independents’ not ‘ the British independence’.
30
Tom,
I agree , it seems the British are no longer in favor of freedom of expression.
I am optimistic though , common sense is one of those canny feedbacks that may well see a return to truthful broadcasting
00
Delingpole does his bit
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/28/study-the-pause-in-global-warming-is-real/
With more to come by that article
40
As one comment says
“Good comments in here”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2016/02/muzzled-scienti.html#comments
10
“rocking the energy debate …”
http://pindanpost.com/2016/02/27/rocking-the-energy-debate/
20
Speaking of comedy, as we were… you could not make this up (sorry if its been shared)
Cruise the Kimberly in luxury with Prof. Tim to support the climate council.
https://inspiredadventures.com.au/events/climate-council-kimberley-expedition-2016/
30
Oh a warning. When you visit the site, a little disciple will try and “make contact” with you. Its quite cute and left me wondering if they are like barefooted with a nice flowing robe and flowers in their hair.
30
The BBC’s Weekend Unchuckled?
40
Monckton on Bob Carter’s peal.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/02/27/ghent-cathedral-bells-ring-out-bob-carters-peal/
30
For TdeF and any other cyclists. I’ve just come across Hadland’s Blog. He has written and published books about Sturmey-Archer and the Moulton Spaceframe.
30
I came across it because we have some common ancestry and he has done a lot of genealogical research. Some scary discoveries!
30
Thanks. I had forgotten about Sturmey-Archer. That was a long time ago but I should have guessed there would be a club. Now people on high tech bikes are cheating with Lithium batteries and motors in the frames, which is as worrying as it is amazing.
50
We sold my old Raleigh bike with 3-speed Sturmey-Archer before returning to Aus. A pity really.
50
Annie / TdeF
Was that the 3 speed in the hub system?
With the little chain going in the axle?
They were great – had one at school like this!
40
Yes Dave, having just checked with my husband as he was the one who did the bike maintenance! I’m not the bike guru. :)I was the user, although haven’t cycled since riding around the peaceful back roads of our part of Gloucestershire. There is an old Puch awaiting me but it has a bent fork which needs replacing.
20
Just looked at your pic…that’s the one!
20
WOW I had 3 bikes with Sturmey-Archer gears. 2 in the UK and one in Oz. Then I went on to derailleurs.
R-COO_ K+
50
Had a 3 speed purple dragster bike with that geared hub setup, it had a T-bar shifter on the top tube, thought I was the Fonz! 🙂
50
u want comedy?
28 Feb: Toronto Star: Tyler Hamilton: Climate change is wreaking havoc on our mental health, experts say
Climate change is causing chaos in the environment and beyond; experts are warning we’re “not even close to being prepared” for the damage it does to our mental health
As a provincial coroner and past palliative care physician, Dr. David Ouchterlony has seen suffering and death up close, experiences that have occasionally led to brief moments of sadness. But Ouchterlony describes such emotions as “trivial” compared to the dread he feels when thoughts about climate change linger, as they often do. He worries almost obsessively about a future he won’t see. How will younger generations be affected? Why are we failing to act on the threat?
“I was completely blind to it, and then five years ago it just hit me,” Ouchterlony, 74, said. “I went through this stage of losing sleep, thinking about my grandchild, wondering what I could do.”
He described the feeling as an “absence of hope” characterized by despair and, at times, exhausting guilt. Some researchers have called it a “pre-traumatic” stress disorder that, in some, is feeding anxiety and depressive thoughts.
Ouchterlony isn’t alone…AND ON AND ON AND ON…
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2016/02/28/climate-change-is-wreaking-havoc-on-our-mental-health-experts.html
30
Well the media has pretty much achieved the campaign of terror it set out on, it would seem.
30
Yeh its wrecking my mental health trying to convince alarmist and their believers that they are wrong.
R-Coo- K+
31
That brick wall aint gettin any softer is it Ron? 🙂
20
First World Problem
‘But Ouchterlony describes such emotions as “trivial” compared to the dread he feels when thoughts about climate change linger, as they often do. He worries almost obsessively about a future he won’t see.’
20
uh-oh, Tyler doubles down:
28 Feb: Toronto Star: Tyler Hamilton: For normally stoic farmers, the stress of climate change can be too much to bear
Farms are on the front lines of climate change, and few people confront the stresses of extreme weather as intimately as farmers.
Planting crops year to year is becoming a “roll of the dice,” said Keller, a third-generation farmer.
“The weather we tend to experience lately seems to be at one extreme or the other — drought or flooding, -40 C or 35 C. These unpredictable and extreme weather patterns add to all the other stressors farmers experience and deal with.”…
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2016/02/28/for-normally-stoic-farmers-the-stress-of-climate-change-can-be-too-much-to-bear.html
30
Funny, that. We were with BIL visiting the Creston Valley in British Columbia. There was a heap of snow just after our visit, in early October, but he mentioned that it was also commonly 38C iin summer. I believe that it is a major fruit growing area; there were certainly plenty of apple stalls along the road.
20
There are many analogous political and psychological phenomena that run parallel in the two politicized pseudo-sciences, economics and climate-change. Here one is described, nominally about economics, but equally about climate-change:
More (about both “sciences”) at http://jayhanson.org/page162.htm
31
I used to have an Epicycle. No hub gears and before Sturmey Archer. Still it was essential to understanding the universe at the time. Newton spoiled a lot of fun and the Epicycle people went out of business. The Climate Changed for them. Most saw this as natural variation.
10
Well off topic but I thought some might be interested.
Andrew Bolts column is having kittens today as there are many comments on Cardinal Pell’s testimony (not trial). I had two attempts to mention something that I found interesting, that was moderated out this morning. I don’t know if it is the offending comment but I’ll post it again here.
This is part of a comment on Miranda Devine’s blog.
Gives it away that its political rather than about the children.
If your not convinced, this is the attitude that the BBC and ABC really have towards abuse of children.
THE ABC & PEDOPHILIA – A SHORT HISTORY
The news out of London late last night was dominated by the report of former judge Dame Jane Smith on pedophilia at the BBC – focusing on the case of entertainer Jimmy Savile (1926- 2011).
Dame Jane concluded that “certain junior and middle-ranking individuals were aware of Savile’s inappropriate sexual conduct in connection with his work for the BBC”. However, she “found no evidence that the BBC, as a corporate body, was aware of Savile’s inappropriate sexual conduct in connection with his work for the BBC”. Savile’s targets at the BBC included girls and boys as young as eight.
Dame Jane Smith’s findings about BBC management’s knowledge of Savile’s offending have been challenged already – but not refuted.
How different with Australia’s very own ABC – where four decades ago the ABC’s chairman publicly supported pederasty. As MWD has documented, in 1975 the (then) ABC chairman – Professor Richard Downing – declared that “the community” should “know” that “in general, men will sleep with young boys”. Professor Downing was appointed ABC chairman by Gough Whitlam’s Labor government – at a time when current ABC chairman James Spigelman was Mr Whitlam’s communications adviser.
On 19 July 1975 Professor Downing had a letter published in the Sydney Morning Herald – signed in his official position as ABC chairman – in which he defended an ABC radio program which had interviewed three self-declared pederasts in the ABC’s Sydney studios. The radio program, titled Lateline, was presented by Richard Neville, who made no criticism of the pederasts’ crimes. All this is documented in K.S. Inglis’ This is the ABC (MUP, 1983) and, in more detail, in MWD.
In 2016, ABC Chairman Jim Spigelman is not responsible for what one of his predecessors did or said in 1975. However, it is notable that on two occasions Mr Spigelman has rejected MWD’s suggestion that he should distance the contemporary ABC from the views proclaimed by Professor Downing, on behalf of the ABC, in 1975.
50
Having grown up in Ballarat I could say a lot on this subject but I respect the mods here too much to give them grief, I will point out that many rural cities are still very small towns and rife with much small town gossip and urban myth, this quasi moral trial of Pell is a result of such boorish crap.
30
Yes.
Small town snark seems to have a life of its own
20
I still remember a man in my home town being harassed, nicknamed the fruitfly . No idea of what it was for and 50/50 whether it was true or some deviant projecting to harass the man.
I copped it when I went back to live there. Talked to someone in the morning about what was wrong with teaching and brought up an anecdote about a friend of my brothers who had to face the registration board for indecent contact with a student. Touched her leg when pointing out that they were torn.
I mentioned that I accidentally poked a student in the breast but because she didn’t get into trouble again in the class, I never heard anything about it again.
The story turned into I was sacked for molesting a student by the afternoon.
20
Bolt would disagree http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/cardinal-george-pell-went-by-the-book-and-not-the-heart/news-story/d991048345a7b669ce9fd078a31e5f68#load-story-comments
Ballarat’s protestant schools really need examining too
00
global governance? what global governance?
28 Feb: Reuters: Alister Doyle: Global group to assess human impact on nature over three years
A global scientific group on Sunday launched a three-year assessment of mankind’s impact on nature to help protect plants and animals from threats ranging from pollution to climate change.
The study, due in 2019, would examine biodiverstiy, from bacteria to blue whales, and “ecosystem services”, which range from the value of coral reefs as nurseries for fish to the role of forests in absorbing greenhouse gases…
The new assessment by the 124-nation Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), set up in 2012, is part of the solution to understand how human activities are affecting the planet.
“IPBES’S goal is to give policymakers and all of society a more complete understanding of how people and nature interact,” Simon Ferrier of Australia’s national science agency CSIRO, and a senior IPBES official, said in a statement.
He added that the IPBES studies would help guide policy decisions in future. At a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, IPBES also approved a new approach to help evaluate policy options…
IPBES also chose British atmospheric scientist Robert Watson, a former chair of the U.N.’s panel on climate change and former IPBES vice-chair, as its new chair, succeeding Zakri Abdul Hamid of Malaysia.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-environment-nature-idUSKCN0W10RX
28 Feb: OneWorld: Assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem services launched
from IPBES
Sir Robert Watson, the organization’s former Vice-Chair and the former Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, was elected Chair of IPBES by acclamation. Dr. Watson serves as Director of Strategic Development at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of East Anglia…
New IPBES Vice Chairs…
New IPBES Bureau Members…
Quotes from supporting organizations…
The work of IPBES is supported by a Secretariat based in Bonn, Germany. It is placed under the auspices of these four United Nations programmes/organisations: United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP); United Nations Educational, Scientific and Development Organization (UNESCO); Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
http://oneworld.org/2016/02/28/assessment-of-biodiversity-and-ecosystem-services-launched/
20
Times will be paywalled, so here goes with another MSM beat-up:
28 Feb: UK Mirror: Simon Keegan: Leonardo DiCaprio considers quitting acting to battle global warming
As well as being a legendary actor, Leo is passionate about the environment and the dangers of global warming…
He has even talked about whether or not he would consider having kids with so much uncertainty in the planet’s future…
He told the Sunday Times: “Do you mean do I want to bring children into a world like this?”
“If it happens, it happens. I’d prefer not to get into specifics about it, just because then it becomes something that’s misquoted. But, yeah. I don’t know. To articulate how I feel about it is just gonna be misunderstood.”
“I had a friend say, ‘Well, if you’re really this passionate about environmentalism, quit acting.
PHOTO Dicaprio at a Bloomberg Philanthropies event, COP21
“But you soon realise that one hand shakes the other, and being an artist gives you a platform.
“Not that necessarily people will take anything that I say seriously, but it gives you a voice.”…
http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/leonardo-dicaprio-considers-quitting-acting-7457521
20
Comment by ferdberple at Watts might be of interest.
‘The surface temperature of Venus is better predicted by the surface pressure than it is by CO2. The same calculation applied both to Earth and Venus matched observations. This argues strongly that surface temperatures are a function of the distance from the sun, the gravitational force of the planet, and the height of the atmospheric convection.
‘The increase in surface temperature as compared to what is predicted for a black body, is the conversion of PE to KE as a result of convection (the lapse rate). This warms the surface at the expense of cooling the upper atmosphere, as compare to the isothermal atmosphere predicted by conduction. This was the standard model of atmospheric and surface temperatures before radiation became popular as an explanation for everything.’
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I could understand the first paragraph.
The second may have been written by ferdberple
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The first par is for us laymen and the second for David Evans.
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Sceptics alive and well
http://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=toolt&th=405095
and comments
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Leonardo DiCaprio wins the Oscar for best actor and puts the occasion to good use
But when will he give up his own jet setting lifestyle?
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Looking for references that the warming of the 1930′ was not anthropogenic.
Can anyone help?
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Since the current warming isn’t anthropogenic, the likelihood that the warming of the 30s was, can be considered zero. No references are necessary for that. If you want some material on the current warming, in addition to the material presented by Jo, then check these two.
http://www.john-daly.com/
http://www.c3headlines.com/
There’s also this one, somewhat less technical but invariably quite informative.
http://antigreen.blogspot.com/
And then there are videos by the scientists themselves, like these three.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCy_UOjEir0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gmc5w2I-FCA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VDDNgl-UPk
Enjoy.
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http://notrickszone.com/2016/02/29/ice-breaker-which-helped-rescue-turneys-ship-of-fools-gets-jammed-in-meters-thick-summertime-antarctic-sea-ice/#sthash.J5sO2Sxd.dpbs
More fun to be had
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Jo, there is LESS money available per show than ever before. That’s because of the democratization of TV, and why there so much sodding reality TV – because it is relatively cheap to make. What has created mediocrity has been the diversification of supply. There are now so many channels all vying for peoples attention any one channel can’t attract the budgets it requires. TV is risky and expensive. In real terms, program making and the fees people who make then can attract has been declining for years.
I agree with Cleese – the PC culture in the BBC is stultifying and I myself have been victim of the cowardly culture that has pervaded it since the Gilligan affair. Greg Dyke was a superb chief and since he was forced to resign the BBC lost its mojo. It meant truly innovative and interesting programs that I was directly involved with myself were not recommissioned. It’s started to improve again because its charter specifically encourages innovation – and there is so much talent and imagination out there – it gets through.
There is still great comedy and content being made. Sherlock has been hugely successful, Orphan Black, The Office, Extras – they were pretty edgy shows. How about PLanet Earth, The Blue Planet, Life on Earth – they were amazing and no one else in the world coming close to that sort of natural world documentation. But while I have detected a slight improvement in the atmosphere in general especially since the Gilligan affair the BBC controllers have become extremely risk averse – which is the opposite of what they are supposed to do. So I sympathise entirely with JC’s comments.
The Beeb is still a pretty damn good institution. It produces nearly the only content I can be bothered watching. It’s massive and makes monumental cluster f**kups. But it is even more a beacon in a sea of mediocrity thanks to its charter.
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John Cleese has become the embodiment of [snip, prefer those] he used to parody.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIz4KrZottM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR3eUjD6y6o
[Editorial discretion was applied. We much prefer the substituted term. Thanks.] AZ
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TO THE EDITORS
Here’s a snippet from an interview with Cleese.
Talking about a show Cleese says he has in the works:
Complain to Cleese about my use of the term that you edited out. It’s his worldview, after all.
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2ND TO THE EDITORS
I’ll try to keep your sensitivities in mind in future posts. You do have a legitimate point, so I’ll do my best to accommodate it.
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Say hypocrites Cleese and Idle, who have made a pretty penny suckling at the BBC teat.
As for me, the BBC is utterly irrelevant, and so cannot “kill” comedy or anything else for me. Why do these guys see the BBC as something hallowed, to be cherished and preserved? The BBC was obsolete the second that private independent TV companies came along. It has been able to exist ever since then only by taking money by force, which of course it has then used to produce whatever the duck it likes, with no expense spared. Damn that corrective text.
So, Cleese and Idle: I love you; you were and are comedy geniuses. But you were funded by dirty money, taken by the coercive threat of a large fine or prison for any TV viewers who didn’t cough up. I have never bought a TV Permit, and so have never contributed to this Leftist, self-grandising, propagandist, pompous old dodo, and I never will.
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