March “for Science” — an attempt to replace the failing Earth Day

Today, the misnomer “March for Science” is trying to take over the aging faded Earth Day. It’s an attempt to steal the good brand “Science” yet again for other causes.

Once upon a time, Earth Day used to mean something. Back in 1970, 20 million people took part, 12,000 events were held:

 Congress took the day off, and two-thirds of its members — Democrat and Republican alike — spoke at Earth Day events. The Today show devoted 10 hours of airtime to Earth Day.

Can anyone imagine both sides of politics cheering the March for Science?

By 2013, Time Magazine noted how irrelevant it was:

Earth Daze, what happened to the environmental movement?

It’s Earth Day, though you could be forgiven if you missed it

So, lo, along comes another name “March for Science”. Same political motivations, different guise.

9.7 out of 10 based on 93 ratings

151 comments to March “for Science” — an attempt to replace the failing Earth Day

  • #

    There is an Earth Day event here at Squaw Valley tomorrow. I’m going to have to hassle a few greenies and challenge their beliefs.

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      Yonniestone

      You want to point out the possibility of ‘Squaw’ being a derogatory term for Native Americans, that should net a few scalps for starters.

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        Rereke Whakaaro

        Worse still, the word “squaw” is sexist, since it refers to female native Americans.

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        • #
          TedM

          I wasn’t aware that there was anything wrong with being female, or native american, or even both. Just how prejudiced are these politically correct types?

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          • #

            TedM,
            “Just how prejudiced are these politically correct types?”
            Very. I was out with a mixed race woman the other day and someone asked if she was black, when I replied, ‘Why would I care, what do you think I am, a Democrat?”

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        • #
          Sam Pyeatte

          The valley between two peaks…fitting.

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      • #
        John of Cloverdale, WA, Australia

        Actually squaw is not offensive but translates roughly from Indian languages to woman (suprise). So maybe they should call it Woman Valley.

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        • #
          Yonniestone

          That’s just down the road from Twin Peaks and the Naval Base.

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          Phil R

          But then that’s sexist, misogynistic and genderist, and possibly nativist and racist to boot. (Darn, I’m sure “boot” is a trigger for something. Now I’m ridden with white guilt.) 🙁

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    • #
      Roy Hogue

      I’m going to have to hassle a few greenies and challenge their beliefs.

      All very nice until you realize that most of them don’t want their treasured beliefs challenged. After all, they have their ducks all lined up in the form of gurus, experts and authorities who all preach exactly the same party line, whereas we, being individuals don’t have a single party line we can give them. And that’s a kind of insecurity that many will not let themselves get into.

      When Heartland sends me a book entitled, WHY SCIENTISTS DISAGREE ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING, I know we’re in trouble. The first thing that comes to someone’s mind is, well, if they disagree that means they don’t know because if they knew they wouldn’t disagree.

      It’s the same in politics. The party Democrat has only one line it feeds you. There’s no significant difference in position. Between one and the other it’s only a matter of degree, not kind. There’s great security in aligning yourself with that. While all you see the Republicans doing is debating how to solve problems but you have Democrats who already know what to do, which do you choose?

      I have a local forum as I’ve already said and my adventures in trying to get someone to do one simple thing are a real eye opener. People will not readily open themselves up to a different point of view even when I say all I want them to do is study the skeptic’s position and learn what’s going on so they can make up their own mind. I don’t want anyone to take my word for it. I want them to look at evidence or the lack thereof. But pulling teeth might be easier.

      On the other hand, there’s hope because several have kept talking to me.

      Wish me luck.

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      • #
        Roy Hogue

        And I should point out that time magazine isn’t an unbiased observer just in case someone didn’t notice. They gave up the job of simply chronicling things as they happen, a job they did very well, to become an advocacy publication, a job they also do quite well but it’s not the right job and Time now isn’t the Time of the past.

        It’s a sore blow to good journalism.

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      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        When Heartland sends me a book entitled, WHY SCIENTISTS DISAGREE ABOUT AL WARMING, I know we’re in trouble.

        Au contrare.

        Most of the significant discoveries in science have historically been fraught with argument and infighting. It is all about ego’s and whose name will go down in history as having being the discoverer, of x-rays, white blood cells or whatever.

        Weather, in the grand scheme of things, is generally a chaotic system, where the most experienced practitioners can only guess probabilities of what is going to happen tomorrow. Blow that up to the scale of planetary climate, and it is no wonder that scientists disagree. They all want to be “the discoverer” of the root cause of climate disruption, and therefore the designer of the optimum solution to being able to control the climate.

        When Heartland sends me a book entitled, “ALL SCIENTISTS NOW AGREE ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING”, I will know that we are at the end of days, and facing Armageddon.

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        • #
          Roy Hogue

          Au contrare.

          right back at you.

          Well RW, Forgive my disagreement for long enough to hear me out.

          You and I know that science and knowledge accumulation in general both work that way. But when I’m talking to someone who hands me desmogblog and sks as support for global warming, I know it’s otherwise for quite possibly huge percentage of the human race. There are no hooks in the education and experience of many people on which to hang that fine point where it can make a difference in what they think. When someone commands jump, they ask how high instead of why? They believe the authority or even just a public opinion poll. And before you say it, I know that’s not true for everyone but I see it all the time.

          Uncertainty in someone who wants to be an authority, who wants you to follow what they tell you to do is an insecure feeling at best. Chaotic, or maybe I should just call it complex things cause uncertainty — they certainly do in me. And if someone comes along saying follow me, I know what they do. They follow.

          It may not have been this way for you but I started out an underdog, no chance for a 4-year college degree, in fact not even knowing I should want to go farther than high school. No one encouraged me to push myself or want to do any particular thing with my life. It was OK to coast so I coasted along. I went to work in a dead end job out of high school but I had one stroke of good luck. I soon realized I would have only 2 steps up in that job and there I would be for the rest of my working life. And it was an easy job for me to master so I would make those steps fairly soon. Another problem was that I was only employable by bowling alleys and there aren’t exactly hundreds of them around. It was that realization that started me back to school. I didn’t even know what I should study so I took the battery of aptitude tests and let that determine what I did. That was in the fall 0f 1957 or the spring of 1958, don’t remember which anymore. I was first a forestry major then an EE major and finally a computer science major. I finally got that BS in computer science in 1985. The MS followed in 1988.

          Along that path I had to learn the hard way to ask why, not how high, when told to jump. And if I had studied anything but the subjects I did, all of which required some math, chemistry and physics and especially computer science which demands a lot of analytic ability, sometimes with nothing to go on when you start ***, I would be fair prey for desmogblog and sks to this very day.

          So yes, I think the appeal of the authority that is of one mind, can say we know exactly how to do it, is extremely strong. The uncertainty is something most don’t want. It scares them — still scares me too but I know how to deal with it now.

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          • #
            Roy Hogue

            *** When I was handed the assignment to do some real computer graphics programming using OpenGL I knew only two things about the subject: 1) how to spell it; 2) if it was useful someone would have written a good book and if I got that book I would soon know what the author knew. It took 3 months of study, 3 books and a struggle with debugging without the necessary tools to turn in a working version of what the boss wanted — there was a lot more work after that to get to the end product. You and I would tackle something like that without a problem with it but the person I’m debating with, well, I’m not certain but I doubt it. We shall see.

            Which leads me to ask, how do you begin to talk someone out of dependence on desmogblog and sks? Help! 🙂 Seriously.

            Funny thing is, out of numerous links I was handed back as evidence was this from Watt’s Up With That? giving hard numbers from a reliable source. So there’s some reliance on hard numbers but no grip on the fact that some unusually high temperatures prove nothing.

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            • #
              sophocles

              Roy Hogue said:

              Which leads me to ask, how do you begin to talk someone out of dependence on desmogblog and sks?

              Gee Roy: you do know how to ask hard questions!
              🙂
              Send them here? Notrickszone?
              Hockeyschtick.blogspot.com might overload them, its a bit intellectual with all the papers it publishes and links to …

              Shaviv’s Sciencebits.com is pretty good. It’s not going to blow too many mental circuits at once because it’s not purely climate, there’s other interesting stuff in there as well. And they may get the idea that the galaxy doesn’t care about CO2, it’s just colateral damage, while it messes with our climate.

              If de-sb and skeptikal skience are the limits of their reading then there’s no point in playing “Spot the Inconsistencies and Contradictions on Hot Whopper,” is there? They wouldn’t even get the pun in the title.

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      • #

        It’s always fun when you ask them to name a climate scientist and they come with Al Gore said …

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    • #
      Geoff

      In plants
      Many experiments have suggested that leaf tissues of living plants emit methane. Eg.

      Title: Methane emissions from terrestrial plants under aerobic conditions
      Authors: Keppler, Frank; Hamilton, John T. G.; Braß, Marc; Röckmann, Thomas

      Affiliation: AA(Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Saupfercheckweg 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany), AB(Department of Agriculture and Rural Development for Northern Ireland, Agriculture, Food and Environmental Science Division, Newforge Lane, Belfast BT9 5PX, UK), AC(Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Saupfercheckweg 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany), AD(Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Saupfercheckweg 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany)
      Publication: Nature, Volume 439, Issue 7073, pp. 187-191 (2006). (Nature Homepage)

      Publication Date: 01/2006
      Origin: NATURE

      DOI: 10.1038/nature04420

      Bibliographic Code: 2006Natur.439..187K

      Abstract
      Methane is an important greenhouse gas and its atmospheric concentration has almost tripled since pre-industrial times. It plays a central role in atmospheric oxidation chemistry and affects stratospheric ozone and water vapour levels. Most of the methane from natural sources in Earth’s atmosphere is thought to originate from biological processes in anoxic environments. Here we demonstrate using stable carbon isotopes that methane is readily formed in situ in terrestrial plants under oxic conditions by a hitherto unrecognized process. Significant methane emissions from both intact plants and detached leaves were observed during incubation experiments in the laboratory and in the field. If our measurements are typical for short-lived biomass and scaled on a global basis, we estimate a methane source strength of 62-236Tgyr-1 for living plants and 1-7Tgyr-1 for plant litter (1Tg = 1012g). We suggest that this newly identified source may have important implications for the global methane budget and may call for a reconsideration of the role of natural methane sources in past climate change.

      http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2006Natur.439..187K

      Effects of elevated pressure on rate of photosynthesis during plant growth.
      Takeishi H1, Hayashi J, Okazawa A, Harada K, Hirata K, Kobayashi A, Akamatsu F.
      Author information
      Abstract
      The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of an artificially controlled environment, particularly elevated total pressure, on net photosynthesis and respiration during plant growth. Pressure directly affects not only cells and organelles in leaves but also the diffusion coefficients and degrees of solubility of CO2 and O2. In this study, the effects of elevated total pressure on the rates of net photosynthesis and respiration of a model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana, were investigated in a chamber that newly developed in this study to control the total pressure. The results clearly showed that the rate of respiration decreased linearly with increasing total pressure at a high humidity. The rate of respiration decreased linearly with increasing total pressure up to 0.2 MPa (2 ATM), and increased with increasing total pressure from 0.3 to 0.5 MPa at a low humidity. The rate of net photosynthesis decreased linearly with increasing total pressure under a constant partial pressure of CO2 at 40 Pa. On the other hand, the rate of net photosynthesis was clearly increased by up to 1.6-fold with increasing total pressure and partial pressure of CO2.

      https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23994480

      In summary, more CO2, more leaves. More leaves, more atmospheric methane. Is it a problem? No-one knows and few are investigating it. The simple act by government of planting trees to “mitigate global warming” by capturing carbon may cause global warming. Methane is a strong greenhouse gas. While carbon dioxide is typically painted as the bad boy of greenhouse gases, methane is roughly 30 times more potent as a heat-trapping gas.

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  • #

    It’s basically just another charity event. Support science, send money.

    I suspect that the majority who go to these events probably know as much about science as an Antifa supporter knows about tolerance.

    Here’s exhibit one: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-04-22/john-hewson-pleads-for-politicians-to-go-back-to-evidence/8463782.

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    • #
      el gordo

      “None of us would know that climate was an issue if the scientists hadn’t told us.”

      Yep, he got that right.

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      • #
        Dennis

        But the better informed people would know that climate changing and weather events are part of natural Earth Cycles.

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        • #
          el gordo

          The Gleissberg cycle is running late, even accounting for a ten year lag.

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          • #
            Graham Richards

            I had a Gleissberg cycle but the one pedal fell off!

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            • #
              sophocles

              Graham Richards said:

              had a Gleissberg cycle but the one pedal fell off!

              That’s rough. You’ll have to wait another 70 to 100 years before you can get another one.

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          • #
            sophocles

            el gordo said:

            The Gleissberg cycle is running late,

            Well, you know what these modern day cycles are like. Don’t worry about it. It will either catch up or not. If they’re not cast in plastic, they’re ignored.

            Then again: it might have been replaced by Prof Zharkova’s New Maunder Minimum. That’s due in 15 years +/- a bit.

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  • #

    I saw the article at the ABC Media site, and needless to say I was enthralled by the following: (my bolding here)(also note how they change Luke Briscoe, a male in the article, and showing an image of a male, into Ms Briscoe, so I guess that’s ABC Science I guess)

    Among those throwing their support behind the March for Science is Luke Briscoe, chief executive of Indigi Lab, which works to get more recognition for Indigenous science.

    Ms Briscoe said Indigenous science, a form of science in its own right, needed to be better understood in Western culture.

    The honeybee dance from where I’m from in Kuku Yalanji country in far north Queensland, that dance talks about how the bees are sustaining our ecologies,” he said.

    “It’s passing on those customs and traditions that our sciences are embedded in and … it’s hard to really put value and monetise the importance of that in a Western world.”

    Please excuse my cynicism in this politically correct modernist World.

    And also, there’s John Hewson, putting his hand up too, saying ….. pick me pick me.

    Jeez, wouldn’t I love to ask him some hard engineering questions about his solar power plant.

    Tony.

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    • #
      Dennis

      His father was a fitter and turner so, maybe the son knows at least how to turn and twist?

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    • #
      Geoffrey Williams

      I heard Hewson on the radio this morning. Not one single argument to justify the claims of man-made climate change.
      All ‘climate politics’ rhetoric for today’s march, with the questions spoon fed from the ABC’s very own Sabra Lane. Such Crap!!!
      GeoffW

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      • #
        Dennis

        He was unable to explain his GST proposal when he was Leader Of The Opposition when asked by a journalist.

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        Geoffrey Williams

        My error; the BBC interviewer was Elizabeth Jackson and not Sabra Lane. See Pat’s blog at 3# below. Well done Pat . .
        GeoffW

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    • #

      John Hewson, a dodged bullet suffering froma acute relevance deprivation, once an economic ‘dry’ now a major shill for Big Green and all the fashionable waste and carpetbaggery.

      John, tell us how much carbon tax there would be on…oh, I dunno…a birthday cake, for example…

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    • #
      Roy Hogue

      Indigenous science

      Hey Tony,

      Did this guy happen to say what Indigenous science is by any chance? I’ve heard of everything from climate science and political science to social science and just plain science too but what does he mean by Indigenous science?

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      • #
        llew jones

        Roy was passing the TV someone else was watching in our kitchen a day or so ago. It was tuned to our ABC and what caused me to stop was the male Indigenous person telling the interviewer that the West needs to take more notice of Indigenous (Aboriginal) culture. He then told the viewers that his culture taught that the Murray River (one of the larger rivers in Aus that separates part of Victoria and New South Wales) was created by the Murray Cod. (Presumably a fish that swims in that river) So one can readily see why we need more of these marches for science if we really want to get some important science out there.

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        Rereke Whakaaro

        It is the branches of medicine and science practised by a shaman or a witch-doctor.

        Some of it is well aligned with mainstream science or medicine (the use of poultices to draw out certain poisons, or prevent infections, for example).

        But most of it is faith healing due to applied psychology. The placebo effect works more often that people might think. I have recently changed my placebo to one with a much stronger formulation, and I feel much better, as a result.

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      • #
        Roy Hogue

        Thanks guys. I thought it was about that way.

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      James

      What does John Hewson, and Al Gore have in common? They both believe in global warming, and they both failed to become head of government!

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      • #
        Roy Hogue

        Unfortunately at least Al Gore has managed to become the head of something and it looks more like a snake than anything else. No, make that a nightmare.

        He’s still at it and still no doubt managing to make money at it, so maybe we’re in the wrong racket? I don’t know about anyone else but I’m never going to die rich by staying honest.

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  • #
    OriginalSteve

    Earth day is kind of like a large pagan pointless gathering of the clueless….

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      Yonniestone

      As a pagan I find that offensive, my Norse ancestors could at least tell rain from someone whizzing down your back.

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    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      Well, we already have Sun day, and Moon day, and Saturn day, so why not have an Earth day, once every week? I vote for getting rid of Thor’s day – I never liked Thor, he makes thunder storms.

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      • #
        Rereke Whakaaro

        Or was that Wotan? I find gods so confusing.

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        • #
          sophocles

          You got it right, Rereke. Thor was “The Thunderer” wielding his great hammer Mjolnir to make the skies rumbly.

          Woden (Odin)is rather one-eyed … having given up one eye in order to see Truth. (Wednesday)

          and Freya would send greenies apoplectic. From Wikipedia:

          In Norse mythology, Freyja (/ˈfreɪə/; Old Norse for “(the) Lady”) is a goddess associated with love, sex, beauty, fertility, gold, seiðr, war, and death. Freyja is the owner of the necklace Brísingamen, rides a chariot pulled by two cats, keeps the boar Hildisvíni by her side, possesses a cloak of falcon feathers (Valshamr), and, by her husband Óðr, is the mother of two daughters, Hnoss and Gersemi. Along with her brother Freyr (Old Norse the “Lord”), her father Njörðr, and her mother (Njörðr’s sister, unnamed in sources), she is a member of the Vanir. Stemming from Old Norse Freyja, modern forms of the name include Freya, Freyia, and Freja.

          A busy girl.

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          • #
            PeterPetrum

            I see what you mean – her father and mother were brother and sister. Thayt’s taking LGBTXYZ to the full extreme, is it not?

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            • #
              sophocles

              Shhh! Don’t let the cats out of the boar or the boar out from under the cloak.

              Gods can do anthing, that’s why they’re gods and we aren’t.

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        Graeme No.3

        I think we should indeed get rid of someone who liked Gore so much.

        The only problem is that we, in Australia at least, could wind up with a Flannery day – and he makes rain storms.

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    • #

      March of the lemmings.

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  • #
    Oliver K. Manuel

    The March for Science is sponsored by the US National Academy of Sciences. It is a blantent attempt by the US NAS to manipulate the public to keep President Trump from draining the NAS swamp of pseudo-scientists.

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  • #
    J Cuttance

    What about a day for cringe worthy moral high ground claiming attention seekers who want to coerce even more out of productive people and grant themselves status and money.
    Oh wait…

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  • #
    Geoffrey Williams

    I’ll be lighting my house up like a Xmas tree for 1 hour tonight just to put the message out about the rubbish symbolism that I believe’earth hour’ to be.
    GeoffW

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      Graeme No.3

      Is Earth Day tonight? Of course being in South Australia sitting around in the dark has lost a lot of its appeal.

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      • #
        OriginalSteve

        Good one….

        Of course in north Korea, its earth hour every hour…..I’m sure the greenies will feel right at home…oh wait….birds of a feather….

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      James

      I am in South Australia right now. I am glad to report that SA did not do another North Korea with the electricity yesterday!

      00

  • #

    Good to see that in the U.S. the marches are specifically aimed at being only about Science, and won’t get hijacked by special interest groups with another agenda, just specifically about the Science.

    Umm, wait a minute. What’s this tweet I see.

    Tony.

    PostScript – NoDAPL Indian interest group No Dakota Access Pipe Line, and the others are pretty much self explanatory. Critical, eh!

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    • #
      sophocles

      TonyfromOz said:

      in the U.S. the marches are specifically aimed at being only about Science, and won’t get hijacked by special interest groups with another agenda,

      Optimist. Look what happened when the organisers discovered Bill Nye was not only male but white! That’s when the wheels fell off for me and I keep laughing about it a lot and often.

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  • #
    • #

      How cool is this. One day coal free, well, sort of anyway, as coal still made 1%, so added to Nuclear and CCGT (CO2 emitting gas fired plants) then those three supplied just on 81% of power. The three other sources and the four Interconnectors made up another 5%.

      Wind came in at 5.6%, Solar 1% and Biomass 7.1%, so renewables made up 13.7%.

      Keep in mind that nearly all of that Biomass is the wood pellet fired Drax plant.

      Note how the truth is always more factual than the umm, facts screamed out at the top of the voice when there is a news story like this.

      Tony.

      Source

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      • #
        OriginalSteve

        Yes I heard it on the radio….letting go of your parent for a few seconds while learning to ride is very different to riding fully by yourself…..

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  • #
    John F. Hultquist

    After the last one (name?; Mother’s !) I thought marching could not get any sillier.
    I won’t make this mistake again.

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  • #
    STJOHNOFGRAFTON

    I take it that this March for Science claptrap does not embrace the ethos of the Scientific Method.

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  • #
    Leo Morgan

    This is not a photo of this year’s Earth Day run. It’s a previous year. It’s still a concrete image of the way environmental events damage the thing they claim to be defending.
    http://i.imgur.com/pNMS6.jpg

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    • #
      Ian Hill

      Sorry to be a spoilsport Leo but it’s the nature of the beast. Drink stations are necessary at running events and no doubt someone had been contracted to clean up when it was over.

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      • #
        Leo Morgan

        It’s been decades since I went running. But when we did, we carried our own bottles or used the bins.

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      • #
        Phil R

        Ian,

        Not an Earth Day fan, but agree on this one. My son and I have volunteered for several local races in the last couple years as a fund raiser for his baseball team. A couple times we worked at a drink station. They were at least this messy and we did the cleanup.

        Leo,

        Many still carry their own water bottles, but in a lot of races there are different levels of runners (and walkers), but I’m sure you know that (if you’ve run in one race, it’s one more than I have :)). Most of these people don’t have water bottles.

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        • #
          Ian Hill

          Hi Phil, by coincidence I ran in a 25km trail event this morning in a national park near Adelaide (and don’t my legs know it!) which was “cup free”. I can’t be bothered carrying water or a container (why add extra weight) and thought my cupped hands would do. The attendent at the 10km water station was happy to turn on the tap while I held my hands together. Cost me about 20 seconds but was worth it. Had a successful run for my age.

          I’ve also helped at water stations many times. Getting it to the swift leaders (who don’t stop) is quite an art!

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  • #
    pat

    the full, almost incoherent Hewson.
    funny how theirABC can’t understand much of the public sees them as purveyors of FakeNews:

    22 Apr: ABC AM: Australian politicians are becoming more flagrantly dishonest says former Liberal leader John Hewson
    ELIZABETH JACKSON: Why have you decided to get involved in this (March for Science)?
    JOHN HEWSON: Well, my life has been public policy, I guess: evidence-based public policy. And when I’ve seen the lack of evidence being used as the basis of public policy, that was an initial motivation…

    ELIZABETH JACKSON: So is the gap between science and the public? Or between science and our politicians? I wonder whether you see a problem with Australian politicians not practicing evidence-based thinking?
    JOHN HEWSON: Yes, I do. I mean, you know, obviously I’m a social scientist. But I say in the climate change area, which is an example of, you know, where scientists have done what they don’t normally do, actually. And the scientists actually agree there. They normally disagree with each other: contest each other’s hypotheses, contest each other’s theories.
    And so, I mean, in the climate change debate 97 per cent of peer-assessed climate scientists have come together and said, “We have an urgent problem: a significant problem.” They’ve been backed up by a host of other scientists and other commentators and other analysts…

    ELIZABETH JACKSON: Have we reached a point in Australia where science and facts are considered to be of equal – or perhaps even lesser – value than opinions and intuition?
    JOHN HEWSON: Yes, there’s a very significant shift, I think, away from fact to opinion. And you know, in this sort of post-truth, fake news world (laughs) you make up your own facts to back your argument. You quite often see that in public debate.
    I mean, I see a lot of vested interests in different debates having models that prove, as they say, prove their position: whereas, in fact, the models seem to have been designed starting with the conclusion they wanted, rather than an objective analysis of the evidence and so on…
    http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2016/s4657161.htm

    numbers don’t look impressive. thousands???

    PICS/TWEETS: 22 Apr: ABC: March for Science participants hoping to send strong message to political leaders
    By Kathleen Calderwood
    PHOTO: Thousands?? of people filled Philip St in Sydney for the March for Science
    Among the thousands attending the Sydney rally was former Liberal leader John Hewson, who told AM ahead of the march he was concerned about “the lack of evidence being used as the basis of public policy”…
    From other news sites:
    •Huffington Post: After the March for Science, It’s Time to Get Political
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-04-22/march-for-science-australians-join-worldwide-movement/8463800

    nice of theirABC to link to HuffPo piece by CAGW activits, Jamie Henn, Co-founder and Strategic Communications Director, 350.org and 350 Action, which ends with the following:

    “It’s going to take activism, protest, and movement building. That’s why we need you out at the Peoples Climate March on April 29th. The breakthroughs required to address the climate crisis aren’t just in the laboratory, they’re in our political system. Getting those breakthroughs is up to us. Let’s march.”

    theirABC gets a billion plus $$$ to push this rubbish.

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    • #
      Graeme No.3

      “full, almost incoherent Hewson”??? What evidence have you that he was drunk?

      Actually what he is reported as having said (corrected as necessary). “obviously I’m a social scientist. But I say in the climate change area, which is an example of.. where scientists have done what they don’t normally do. …The “scientists” actually agree there. Scientists normally disagree with each other: contest each other’s hypotheses, contest each other’s theories”.

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      TdeF

      Amazing. It is extraordinary how warmists try to hold the moral high ground.

      “Yes, there’s a very significant shift, I think, away from fact to opinion. And you know, in this sort of post-truth, fake news world (laughs) you make up your own facts to back your argument. You quite often see that in public debate.”

      They are the victims of unscientific opinion, post-truth, fake news etc and then happily says 97% agree on Climate Change, Global Warming which he promotes without any facts at all.

      The total lack of objectivity, rational thinking and even facts is justified by the idea that he is a “social scientist” which somehow exempts him from having to provide any support for his absurd opinions. The man who could not explain his GST is equally incompetent in explaining his views.

      This is especially hypocritical when he gets his income from the very opinions and fake science he peddles.

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      • #

        Warmists trying to hold the high moral ground? March
        of the Very Concerned Cli-Scientists and other Earth Day
        activists …tramp, tramp, tramp along the high-way.

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  • #
    pat

    21 Apr: UK Telegraph: Henry Bodkin: UK weather: Snow and storms to strike Britain with low temperatures lasting for weeks
    Eleanor Bell, from The Weather Channel: “Temperatures will be around 2 to 5 degrees below normal for the time of year over the UK and 4 to 7 degrees below normal for northern mainland Europe” …
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/21/snow-storms-strike-uk-low-temperatures-lasting-weeks/

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  • #
    ROM

    From Jo’s headline post link;
    .

    “TIME”

    Earth Daze: What Happened to the Environmental Movement?

    By;
    Bryan Walsh @bryanrwalsh

    Bryan Walsh @ brainwashed

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    RAH

    Anthony Watts and certified member of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Kenji the dog, were going to go and march to mock them. But now the supposed science theme of the march has gone off the rails and mutated into a general leftists/democrat victim cause march having nothing to do with science so Mr. Watts has decided to stay home and avoid the total kooks that are bound to end up making up a good proportion of the marchers.

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/21/why-i-decided-not-to-take-kenji-to-the-dc-march-for-science/

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      Geoffrey Williams

      Good decision for Anthony Watts, otherwise every man and his dog would be there!!
      GeoffW

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      Yonniestone

      Reading the link it appears these people are seriously hung up about white males in general, about 10 years ago I was hospitalised for 5 days near death, from recollection of the people that saved me colour, looks or accents meant nothing to me as I marvelled in their abilities, I was taught to treat as you find and this tenet has served me well throughout life.

      I often find people that obsess about such things are either projecting or fearful of change themselves.

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      • #
        RAH

        Yonnistone

        You have to understand the social/political conditions in the US now. The Democrat party was for most of my of my life time, considered to be the party of the working man. Their support from labor unions was monolithic. This was the case even as late as the contested presidential election of 2000. Al Gore’s people called the Unions wanting protesters to support the recounts in Florida and they responded by sending bus loads of their paid ranters and thugs.

        Those days have passed because the democrats gave up supporting the old bastions of organized labor and went with declaring their selves the party of every victim cause they could find or fabricate. Kind of hard to maintain the pretense of representing the interests of the AFL/CIO and Teamsters when your supporting illegal immigrants that will take their jobs. Kind of hard to claim your for coal miners when you’ve declared a war on coal. etc. So now the constituency of the democrats are the illegal immigrants, rabid femanists, LGBT and such. And of course the blacks who can’t seem to break away from the leftists plantation. This is one reason why Trump took states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.

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        • #
          John F. Hultquist

          This is one reason …

          Just thinking another reason is that Hillary is the worst kind of female Canine.
          [Can I write that here? Don’t want to crash the system.]

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          Yonniestone

          RAH that is exactly how it played out in Australia, when you consider scientific principles occur the same over the planet its not surprising left wing politics would effect democratic systems in the same manner.

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    • #
      Mary E

      The only “science” being marched for was the Global Warming last-gasp grasp on relevance and – of course – funding. Other scientists, in their political naivete, perhaps, may have joined in the march, thinking oh ho, Science will be Sexy and Hip! but the entire BS idea wasn’t for -science- or the scientific method or scientists – just the warmists, the green blob that has hijacked the once-good name of environmentalist, intent on destroying the earth in their efforts to “save” it, and the crazed idealogues of the far-left fringe who think THEY are the only proper way to be and will do all but (so far) murder to ensure the rest of us go along. Fascism from the opposite side, perhaps.

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  • #
    warcroft

    Sorry to cut in but you sceptic types need a lesson science.
    And who better to give that lesson than Bill Nye, Science Guy, Save the World Guy!

    Bill Nye’s new Netflix series ‘Bill Nye Saves the World’ commenced today! Yay!
    The first, non homogenised, fact laden episode is on… dun dun dun… Climate Change!

    Science superhero Bill Nye plans to save the world by cultivating a superpower that exists in everyone: critical thinking.

    “We want you to learn how to evaluate evidence,” said Nye “Critical thinking is a crucial everyday skill.”


    Article at LiveScience.com

    And for a serious critique of the series here is the Reddit r/Science sub.

    Was Bill Nye ever a scientist? I know he did mechanical engineering at school and occasionally likes to look at stars. But I always thought he was an “actor”.

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      Yonniestone

      We have Netflix but I think we’ll pass on o’l Bill, have a look at Five Came Back a true story about remarkable characters that displayed uncommon patriotism and sacrifice, how many in Hollywood today would do the same?

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    • #
      Graeme No.3

      Critical thinking??????? Has he thought that one through? What happens when people start examining Global Warming/Climate Change for the actual evidence using critical thinking (e.g.is that claim backed by facts)?
      He could doom the whole thing, although a few gullibles will still believe.

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      • #
        Yonniestone

        Must’ve got confused with Critical Theory, in better times he would’ve been hoisted by his own Gulag.

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  • #
    Wayne Job

    If in science what you are doing is is repeatable and demonstrably so you are doing real science. If what you are doing is unprovable, unrepeatable or just a thought bubble your science is theoretical only.
    CAGW has thus far proved to be only a theory held by a fringe group that somehow using propaganda have hoodwinked many in government to get funds. The offshoot of hangers on is even worse as they are using superanuation funds to suck money from idiot governments to build wind turbines.

    Put everything on an even footing in OZ we would have mainly coal making power. It is so sad that so many have been fooled by so few.

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  • #
    Rod McLaughlin

    O/T, but here’s the Guardian reviving the old story about creeks in the Himalaya being produced mainly by ice melting:

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/22/the-ice-stupas-of-ladakh-solving-water-crisis-in-the-high-desert-of-himalaya

    Actually it’s snow. The IPCC made the same mistake.

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    • #
      Graeme No.3

      Sorry Rod:
      I must have missed something. If it is cold enough to freeze water into ice, how is it warm enough to melt snow? OK I understand that the Sun might have some effect except that in AGW dogma the sun’s output hasn’t altered.
      (they may have got that idea from Murdoch’s Sun newspaper).

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    thingadonta

    Humanity hasn’t seem to have learned that moral instincts are one of the most unreliable ways of gauging the accuracy or objectivity of a particular set of ideas or causes.

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  • #

    I´m quite sure that this placards with scientific principles like these will not be seen in the march for science:

    §1 A scientific argument consists of clearly stated premises, inferences and conclusions.

    §2 A scientific premise is verifiable. Premises and their sources are identified and readily available for independent verification.

    §3 A scientific inference is logically valid.

    §4 A scientific conclusion is deduced by application of axioms, definitions and theorems or measured properties and scientific concepts that have already been verified or validated.

    §5 A scientific concept consists of statements that are logically valid conclusions deduced from premises that are themselves logically valid conclusions, axioms, definitions or theorems.

    §6 A scientific concept is well-defined and has a well-defined capability of prediction within a well-defined context.

    §7 A scientific concept can only be validated by comparison of predictions deduced from that concept with measurement results. Whenever predictions differ from measurement results, by more than the combined uncertainty of the measurement results and the claimed capability of the concept, there must be something wrong with the concept – or the test of it.

    §8 A scientific concept can only be referred to as validated for the context covered by the validating tests.

    §9 A scientific statement is based on verifiable data. Data and precise information about how that data was obtained are readily available for independent verification. Whenever data are corrected or disregarded, both uncorrected and corrected data are provided together with a scientific argument for the correction.

    §10 A scientific measurement report contains traceable values, units and stated uncertainty for well-defined measurands in a well-defined context.

    §11 A scientific prediction report contains values, units and claimed capability for well-defined measurands in a well-defined context.

    (For a full account with definitions and explanation see: https://principlesofscience.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/the-principles-of-science-v7-5 )

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  • #
    TdeF

    I have to confess to never having marched after school days, certainly not in support of anything or protest of anything else. In the life of an ultra large modern city, marches hope for attention by disrupting the lives of others and traffic and getting on the news. Sure 100,000 people might notice each other, but what does that achieve? A few miles away life goes on unchanged. Larger crowds at the football and more traffic.

    Also the idea is obviously that Trump is anti Climate Change, anti the bloated environmental movement which has long exceeded any
    reasonable size and power and has grabbed the mantle of science away from real scientists. So the march is against Trump and to promote the idea that anyone who identifies as a climate scientist is a climate scientist, like the Australian Climate Council.

    Otherwise how did Tim Flannery with a very basic degree in English and a PhD in observing kangaroos get to be Australia’s Chief Climate Scientist above all the qualified hard scientists and meteorologists in the Bureau of Meteorology? How did it happen that economists and psychologists and even mechanical engineers like Bill Nye and Chemical engineers like Will Steffen get to lecture us as experts in climate?

    These transparent carpetbaggers, opportunists like Hewson and Flannery and Gore avoid facts. A march to support their fake science appeals to no one, not even the black shirts of the left.

    If marching would bring back rational science, science funding and emphasis in our schools, not extreme environmentalism, I would march. It is in fact an anti real science, anti Trump march.

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  • #
    Roy Hogue

    Off topic… …or maybe not.

    Can anyone shoot this down?

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    • #
      Roy Hogue

      I admit I can’t. But it looks too simple.

      Help!

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      • #
        Yonniestone

        Even with a complex atmospheric system like Earth’s every component should have the KISS principle applied to prove its function beyond a doubt, even then that known could alter with continuous discoveries of these components that alter the chain of events, this idea must be held as a reality not a personal failure.

        Those that ‘March for Science’ have missed that important step and are going nowhere with real progression.

        ‘Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. In the first stage of life the mind is frivolous and easily distracted; it misses progress by failing in consecutiveness and persistence. This is the condition of children and barbarians, in whom instinct has learned nothing from experience.’

        GEORGE SANTAYANA.

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    • #

      First paragraph in your linked article states:

      “Why on earth do we attribute any heating of the oceans to carbon dioxide, when there is a far more obvious culprit, and when such a straightforward examination of the thermodynamics render it impossible.”

      violates principle §1 (See comment #21) (§1 A scientific argument consists of clearly stated premises, inferences and conclusions.)

      The following statement violates §3 (A scientific inference is logically valid.)

      “Let’s put this amount of energy in perspective. If we all turned off all our appliances and went and lived in caves, and then devoted every coal, nuclear, gas, hydro, wind and solar power plant to just heating the ocean, it would take a breathtaking 32,000 years to heat the ocean by just this 1˚C!

      In short, our influence on our climate, even if we really tried, is miniscule!”

      The reason why he violates §3 is:

      There is no logical or physical relation between the ability of CO2 to absorb energy and the amount of energy used by humans.

      You go – shoot him down. 🙂

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      • #
        Roy Hogue

        Thank you. I have copied out the entire text of your reply to a file I can refer to as I type my rebuttal.

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        • #

          I went over to see if I could join in on the discussion, I see that comments are closed on that article (from back in February).
          It is no longer possible to make any comments. See you around. 🙂

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    • #
      Phil R

      It’s out of my area of expertise and I can’t shoot it down, but a few thoughts that maybe you or someone else can build on. First, it looks somewhat as a misdirection. I skimmed the article, but he seems to be talking about warming up the total ocean volume. I think most of the ocean warming occurs in the surface layer, in which case the volume of ocean interacting with the atmosphere is much less.

      Light can penetrate the ocean to several hundred feet (I think), although IR radiation is absorbed in the ocean skin layer (mm’s or less, I think). Anyway, whether one thinks CO2 can do what it’s supposed to do or not, I think the heat transfer is supposed to be between the CO2/air/ocean surface (and near surface).

      If I’m wrong, please go easy on me.

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      • #
        Roy Hogue

        Phil,

        I think you’re right. It’s talking about warming the oceans and probably isn’t relevant to the climate change problem. See what I said to TdeF below.

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    • #
      TdeF

      Why do you want to shoot it down? It is correct. The mass of the ocean is 340x that of the air above without talking specific heat. The idea that the air gets hot and heats the ocean, Flannery’s ocean stole my Warming is ridiculous. Firstly the air is not hotter by even 1C on average in the last century and would not heat the water and secondly the oceans are too heavy to change, given you have to divide by 340.

      So the ocean rising however is not to do with heat expansion but the melting of ice which is on land. Sea ice, the Arctic is irrelevant. All that matters is Greenland and Antarctica, both massive and covered with up to 4km of ice. Antarctica alone is the size of South America, or two Australias, a ocean literally in the air. However with average temperatures of -50C in winter and -25C in Summer, it is going nowwhere and is actually expanding rapidly. That is why the Greens talk about the irrelevant Arctic.

      We also have simple explanations for the last 2500 years of temperature change, all based on the sun. You have Christopher Monckton’s study of clouds over the Pacific which alone could explain the late 20th century slight rise in air temperature. Then you have Prof Weiss’s modelling the entire range with just the 250 year De Vries cycle and the 25 year Pacific Decadal Oscillation.

      My own contribution is that you can prove there is no fossil fuel CO2 in the air by simple measurement of C14. Each to his expertise, the physical chemist who says there is denial of simple physical chemistry principles of heating, Dr Evans with his modelling of CO2 in the atmosphere and my own little physics which shows that even if CO2 heated the planet, we have no control over CO2 levels at all.

      The last is self evident. After 30 years of spending tens of trillions of dollars to reduce CO2 levels there is no discernible effect. South Australia has committed great harm and their CO2 is no lower? 98% of all CO2 comes from overseas and we are sending $3Bn a year overseas? Why?

      It is not about preventing man made global warming. It never was. To quote Tony Abbott, it is socialism masquerading as environmentalism. This time with the complete coooperation of the Green Industrial complex, China, the trading banks like Turnbull’s Goldmann Sachs and openly communist Green politicians who engender fear of the Ecopolypse to get elected and want the destruction of our country and revolution.

      None of the fantasy of man made Global Warming makes sense. 97% people of people who said it does cannot add or multiply, including not least Tim Flannery, Al Gore and Barack Obama.

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    • #
      Rick Will

      The oceans heat the atmosphere apart from the occasional temperature inversion above the surface. So the whole basis of the argument is flawed.

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      • #
        Robber

        The average temperature of the ocean surface waters is about 17 degrees Celsius.
        The average air temperature is about 15 degrees Celsius.

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    • #
      sophocles

      I can pick one or maybe two small holes. The author appears a little careless rather than mistaken. It tweaks my pedantic streak. I can sympathise though; with this keyboard, it happens to me all the time. 😉

      CO2 cannot warm the oceans: 98.8% of the planet’s free CO2 is dissolved in the oceans, which is ever so slightly more than what is in the air. (0.2%) It’s at the same temperature as the water.

      Any atmospheric molecule of CO2 carrying more thermal energy than the water molecules of the water’s surface will be rising not falling so it won’t come near the cold water. Any water molecule which carries thermal energy able to break free (become water vapour) will also rise, carrying its heat of vapourisation with it. That’s humidity.

      And another problem is that air sits on top of water – how would hot air heat deep into the ocean? Even if the surface warmed, the warm water would just sit on top of the cold water.

      The warmists claimed downward welling radiation which is rubbish. None of them have actually measured it.

      The warm water surrenders some heat to colder air molecules which come into contact with it. The newly heated air rises, immediately, taking its heat with it (think: hot air balloons, think updraughts ). It’s called convection and its caused by Brownian Motion. Warmer molecules move faster. Hot air at the surface of the water cannot heat the water because it will not come into contact with it. It will rise almost instantly which takes it away, out of contact with the water and carrying it’s heat away with it. Air colder than the surface of the water sinks and can come into contact with the surface of the water. It will immediately absorb heat from the water and will immediately rise.

      Only air of the same or lower temperature than the water will come into contact with it.

      The direct result of this is that in summer it is hot and in winter it is cold. In winter we run the heaters in our cars, and in summer the air conditioners. In winter the polar caps freeze over and in summer 60-70% of them melt (about ten million square kilometres). In summer the water is warmer and winter it is cooler (ask any surfer).

      Oops. If we take this literally and saw 60-70% of the Antarctic polar ice cap melt (and he said in an earlier paragraph: “Southern Hemisphere” so he’s mixed the hemispheres up) I think high tide would be lapping around the foot of Ayers Rock.
      But that amount of ice would take a much much longer time than one season, quite a few thousand years, to melt, so it’s winter again and freezing again while it’s not even started thinking about melting. Whew. Saved by thermal inertia.

      That’s about it. I’ve no complaints about any of the rest of the article; it seems pretty good to me.

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  • #
    Mark M

    Andrew B Watkins, ‘climatologist’ @BoM goes marching, takes photos, and says …

    “Science stops for no one…”

    https://twitter.com/windjunky/status/855633759776849921

    Well it does at the CSIRO, where they stopped science for a “crafternoon” …

    https://twitter.com/CSIROStaff/status/855343972205477888

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  • #
    Robber

    According to Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary, the definition of science is:

    “knowledge attained through study or practice,” or
    “knowledge covering general truths of the operation of general laws, esp. as obtained and tested through scientific method [and] concerned with the physical world.”

    The Scientific Method is a process used to design and perform experiments. It helps to minimize experimental errors and bias, and increase confidence in the accuracy of your results.

    OBSERVATION is first step, so that you know how you want to go about your research.

    HYPOTHESIS is the answer you think you’ll find.

    PREDICTION is your specific belief about the scientific idea: If my hypothesis is true, then I predict we will discover this.

    EXPERIMENT is the tool that you invent to answer the question, and

    CONCLUSION is the answer that the experiment gives.

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  • #
    Another Ian

    “Earth Day is the longest ongoing celebration of Hitler’s birthday, since 1970.

    Here are some of the genocidal fantasies from the organizers of the first Earth Day.”

    https://realclimatescience.com/2017/04/happy-earth-day/

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  • #
    Gordon

    Well it is a good thing I looked in on Joannova today because I would not have know it was Earth Day. Nothing happening in Canada that I am aware of. I will just dig in the garden and make my own earth day.

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  • #
    • #
      clipe

      I think this bodes ill for Michael Mann who will find Canadian courts, like Weaver did, are quite rigorous in getting things right…eventually.

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    • #
      clipe

      I liked this bit from the NP article.

      All were about the current state of climate science and the political response to it, specifically about the consequences of Climategate, a scandal over the leak of emails from the University of East Anglia that gave a glimpse into the correspondence of the scientists preparing the IPCC reports.

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  • #
    Mark M

    Sou, @hotwhopper, home of 97% cognitive dissonance, has photos from Melbourne with this quote:

    “Humans aren’t the only people who value science. This lovely dog does, too.
    He barked and danced whenever we cheered the speakers.”

    Wait. What?

    Pet dogs as bad for planet as driving 4x4s, book claims

    Owners should consider doing without, downsizing or even eating their pets to help save the planet, according to a new book.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/climatechange/6416683/Pet-dogs-as-bad-for-planet-as-driving-4x4s-book-claims.html

    Cognitive dissonance dialled to eleventy!

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  • #
    el gordo

    The deity hates the denialati, we sort of already knew that.

    https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2017/04/god-hates-deniers.jpg

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    • #
      Annie

      I wonder how they know?!

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      • #
        sophocles

        Annie asked “I wonder how they know?”
        The deity always knows. It’s not hard.

        My dictionary defines denier and its the only definition, as one who denies a religion . It’s an Oxford dictionary so I like to believe it.

        According to our ancestors, who suffered from a multiplicity of gods and goddesses until Paul did them a big favour by rolling them all into one Big Daddy, a god faded away if not worshipped. Their vigour depended on worshippers, the more the better, and the more vigorous the deity. The power of prayer is a double-edged sword. So when denied, you bet they/he know because the prayers dwindle.

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  • #
    Dave in the States

    I had a good laugh today. While coming back from the gym I saw a handful of people and their young kids doing the march for science in my small town. I recognized them as a few school teachers. The lady was yelling at the top of her lungs: “Stand up for science!” while holding up a banner proclaiming that ” the science isn’t just for liberals” (In the USA “liberal” has come to mean leftist or socialist). People were driving by in their large SUVs completely ignoring them.

    I went home and fired up my V8 Ford and drove down to the car show being held this day. Hundreds of people were milling around examining the gasoline guzzling, glorious sounding, ground thumping, hotrods that modern science and engineering has made part of American culture, and put in the hands of a host Americans from all walks of life.

    The contrast could not have been more stark.

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    • #
      Dave in the States

      I forgot to mention that the handful of school teachers and their young children were bundled up in jackets and hoodies while on the march. It has been unseasonably cool this April.

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  • #
    2dogs

    Comment further here:

    https://becandid.com/p/YMxlEoVZWdt

    These precious snowflakes have no idea.

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  • #
    Asmilwho

    “So, lo, along comes another name “March for Science”. Same political motivations, different guise.”

    To quote an unnamed SDS radical from the US:
    “The “issue” is never the issue. The issue is revolution.”

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  • #
    theRealUniverse

    Just saw a vid of this insane march, on SBS news, (in some undefined western country – prob UK or USA) showing a sign of one protester saying “science facts”. I nearly split myself laughing. Mate, what factual ‘facts’ re you talking about? The ‘facts’ you dont understand real world evidence! The ‘fact’ that science isn’t consensus driven….

    Also from Piers C. on Weatheraction
    See Piers Corbyn says:
    “Don’t be conned by EarthDay (Lenin’s Birthday) ScienceMarch – 22April”
    also..Piers Corbyn criticizes Prof Stephen Hawking for backing #ClimateHoax

    My view..Hawking should know better! Maybe Prof Cox had a word in his ear. 😉

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  • #

    […] Jo Nova notes what the March for Science is attempting to accomplish […]

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  • #
    QuantumSam

    Nearly all of the people who quote Dwight Eisenhower’s farewell address point to his admonition against the Military Industrial Complex.

    While they misconstrue his admonition, they also overlook a more direct admonition – watch out for the scientific-technological elite, i.e. Bill Nye, Neil Degrasse Tyson, Al Gore, etc. In Eisenhower’s farewell address he says – Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

    Well public policy has become captive to that elite and we must liberate it.

    20