Re: OT: interesting global warming quote found elsewhwere

On Wed, 06 Aug 2008 19:01:26 +0100, Martin Brown
<|||newspam|||@nezumi.demon.co.uk> wrote:

John Larkin wrote:
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.

Science is done by humans - egos and other personal factors can get in
the way. Hoyles Steady State cosmology vs Lemaitres Big Bang (a
derogatory term Hoyle coined to mock it but which stuck) being one
example that is now far enough back to have a perspective on it.
Although you can still find a few dissenters if you look hard enough.

Boltzmann had a particularly hard time with his statistical mechanics ideas.

But eventually the data wins out as experimental evidence mounts up.

Unfortunately, climate is hard to experiment on. The impulse response
of a big volcanic event is interesting, but unfortunately the dust and
the CO2 are entangled.




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.

How strange. I had you down as a rich neocon living in a gated community
of like minded folk surrounded by razor wire and armed guards. And with
a do not educate the poor mentality. JimT even more so.

I am glad to see that you approve of giving poor people a decent
education. Too bad that US public schools are not able to do that.

I went to public schools. All were good, and my high school was
superb. My kid went to mostly public schools, which were excellent,
and a Catholic high school (we're not religious, it's just that those
Jesuits are good at whatever they do.)

Since most people go to public school, and the US
economy/technology/science are doing fine, the schools can't be all
that bad.



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

I don't see the relevance but since you ask in my spare time I am
secretary for a UK registered charity. Last few years also involved as a
volunteer supervising offenders doing work in our community.

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.

We have some common ground here too.

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.

Anchored to bedrock and then you stand a chance. On the landfill areas
the ground will fluidise when a big quake hits. Smashed up wooden homes
burn all too easily.

Our building is sitting on sand. An official liquefaction zone begins
just across the street. We poured three huge concrete footings and ran
steel frames all the way to the roof. It may be damaged in an
earthquake, but it probably won't pancake. I've tried earthquakes,
tornadoes, and hurricanes, and I prefer earthquakes.



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.)

Shame. I don't think they anticipated this rush to small cars.

Smart cars are cute - the first ones appeared in Belgium when I was
living there. They even survive mad Belgian driving despite being small.
Not sure I would like to drive one in the US though.

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.

Don't you think having someone intelligent as President might be helpful?
"Being There" was a Hollywood movie not a plan for running the USA.

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.

I suspect he will go down as the worst and dumbest President in the
history of the USA. His coterie of malevolent Neocon zealots are worse
and have seriously damaged the reputation of the USA across the world.

W is inarticulate, but he's not dumb. He did better in college than
Gore or Kerry, so we *did* elect the smartest guy available, twice.

I'm not sure what you mean by "reputation", and then I'm not sure I'd
care. As the most powerful country on Earth, the only way to be
popular is by emasculating ourselves. The Soviets and the Nazis and
the Maoists and Pol Pot didn't like us much either.

Besides, we're getting more popular in Europe, as the Russians again
threaten (deja vu Cold War), and in China and India, as their
economies benefit from our trade.



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.

I think I favour removing Chryslers first too. They really work hard at
maximising ugliness. More unexpected common ground...

I kind of have a soft spot for Ford. My first ever car.

Again this is odd. What do you drive then? I had expected at least an
armoured Hummer H1, probably with a Confederate flag painted on the
roof. I have a BMW which does about 55mpg on my mix of driving.

VW Rabbit. Wife has the FIT, kid a Toyota Echo.


I expect you will be accused of Un-American activities for describing US
cars as klunky and ugly. Their cornering inability is legendary.

Lately the US cars are pretty good, handling and reliability.



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?

Plants can tolerate a very wide range of CO2 concentration. They don't
like modern concentrations of oxygen much (at least C3 plants don't).

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

Depends just how warm it gets.
BTW You seem to be admitting here that it (AGW) is happening.

I'm skeptical. There's reasonable doubt we have warming going on at
all. The only really reliable data is satellite, and there's not much
history there. The simulations are absurd.

Too bad we don't have long-term solar output data. The Sun is a
chaotic system, too.


For the UK a little warming would probably be good provided that the
Atlantic conveyor (aka Gulf Stream) doesn't shut down or shift course.
We can already grow grapes and make commercial wine again near York
(latitude 54N just like the Romans did). Sea level rise will hurt though
- Londons flood defences will need a lot of work.

Russia will do well, but the US grain belt will likely end up as desert.


Now you're taking a flakey climate model and projecting it into
weather, and we *know* the weather models are worthless.


Grain farmers will probably be the first US lobby group to accept that
AGW is real.

Longer term scorching the equatorial forest and lungs of the planet (or
clear cutting them to grow biofuels) will not do us much good.

Again, dire consequences. Bummer, huh?

John

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