Re: OT: interesting global warming quote found elsewhwere

On Tue, 05 Aug 2008 09:56:49 +0100, Martin Brown
<|||newspam|||@nezumi.demon.co.uk> wrote:

John Larkin wrote:
On Mon, 04 Aug 2008 09:21:50 +0100, Martin Brown
<|||newspam|||@nezumi.demon.co.uk> wrote:

Experience is the worst teacher.
Not at all. Experience is exactly how we (and now computers) learn about
the external world. the most powerful methods available at present are
based on Bayesian statistics and do everything these days from classify
spam to guess about how to balance a portfolio.

The problem with experience is that most people pick a few - sometimes
one - essentially random experience and decide that's the general
case. Especially in the case of bad experiences.

So are you saying that you never learn anything from your successes or
your mistakes?

You have made it abundantly clear that you prefer blind faith in your
rigid political ideology to any evidence that science has to offer.

Now we are facing a serious defect of observation. I respect science
when it respects itself, which it doesn't always do.

I am entirely apolitical. I belong to no party. I don't vote because I
have no desire to influence other peoples' lives, and because I'm
happy playing the game by any rules. I do like to observe systems
working and try to understand the dynamics, and decide what will work
best. I am very liberal but not at all leftist. I donate a lot of
money to helping real people, especially the poorest ones.

What do you do, personally, the help the less fortunate of the world?


And I've worked on, and contributed to the design of, some of the
biggest science and industrial programs in history. I work with
scientists all the time, and sometimes they fly in just to brainstorm
with us. The only thing I'm rigid about is conservation of energy.


Experience should show us points in a range of possibilities. For most
people, it has the opposite effect.

Consider the space shuttles. Both the SRB seals and the external tank
insulations were known, continuous hazards. But successive flights
accumulated confidence, when they should have accumulated terror.
Again, a failure of experience.

The tiles were also known to be a source of single point failures too.
The amazing thing is that we have only lost two shuttles so far. Saturn
V was a much better more reliable launch system (although not reusable).

I grew up in New Orleans, and it was common knowledge that a storm
that took Katrina's path would fill the lake and dump it onto the
entire city. What did they do? Eat, drink, and be merry.

I thought they made a token effort in New Orleans to reinforce the
levees. And the old French quarter was sensibly on higher ground.

That was natural. When Bienville founded the city, the Indians let him
have New Orleans because they considered it uninhabitable, what with
the mud and the mosquitoes. He picked a spot near the natural river
levee that was a few feet above sea level. They later built up the
river and lake levees to protect the city, then cut a bunch of canals
to make sure it would flood. The canal levees failed after Katrina.


Same in Tokyo and San Francisco. If you live in a danger zone you just
get on with it and hope for the best (I did).

We're in SF. We gutted our old building and put lot of plywood and
concrete and steel into it. All the shelving is bolted to the walls.
That's better than hoping.




In your wilful ignorance in the next breath you will deny that there is
any possibilty of an AGW induced catastrophe. Do you see the contradiction?

I don't deny any possibility. I suggest that there is a good cance
that the models are crap, that AGW isn't happening, and that the
"science" is bad. The fact that skepticism isn't allowed over this
issue is a fed flag that the "science" is twisted.

Seriously, think about who, in the AGW debate, is denying
possibilities.

I have seen enough of the science to be convinced that we will pay
dearly for failing to make the no regrets energy savings now.

It is abundantly clear the US fossil fuel lobby has managed to persuade
even some intelligent people to ignore what genuine scientists have to
say. And Joe Six pack will continue drive his SUV until he can't afford
to (which won't be long now).

The unavailable cars now include the Smart Car (2 year waiting list)
and the Honda Fit (I bought my wife one about a year ago.)


As things stand the big oil price hikes may do more to help in the fight
against AGW than anything else. Shame about the lack of political
leadership but then if you will elect a bumbling idiot for president.

The phenomenon to which you refer is called "negative feedback."

I prefer too little political leadership to too much. The smaller
number of bumbling idiots in control, the better.

But I suspect history will be kind to W, and give him and his people
credit for vision that not many people can see now. Clinton won't do
as well.


Which one of the big 3 US automakers do you fancy to go bust first?

Don't much care. I've never owned an American car. They're klunky and
ugly. If I had the choice, it would be Chrysler for sure... they make
the hugest and ugliest vehicles on the planet. GM next.



But yes, I really doubt that a little warming, if it is happening,
manmade or otherwise, will cause some "tipping point" catastrophe. All
sorts of real-life problems, from kidney stones to jellyfish to beach
erosion, is being blamed on AGW, and it's silly.

It may not cause a tipping point catastrophe. I personally don't think
it will. Unless the clathrates and methane in permafrost get destablised
- after that all bets are off. CH4 is a much more potent GHG whilst it
lasts in the atmosphere.

I have tried to break one of the AGW computer models by putting an large
impulse of CO2 into the atmosphere. It took a few hundred years to
stabilise. And that is the problem. Raised CO2 concentration now in the
atmosphere will continue to cause warming for a long time into the
future. This goes way beyond the normal political horizon of 5 years.

But a little more CO2 will make a lot of plants happy. We were close
to running out.

Only in Larkin fantasy world.

Look at the graphs. The recent 350 PPM was unprecedented. In past
ages, a couple thousand PPM was more common. How would you like living
on water with 350 PPM of food dissolved in it?

Why does everyone assume that a little warming will have universally
ghastly consequences? Human history suggests otherwise. Cold kills,
warm nurtures.


John

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