a bit of mischief behind, and in, AskMe

June 28, 2006 2:11 PM

I suspect a bit of mischief behind this post. I rather like it.
posted by Neiltupper to Bugs at 2:11 PM (27 comments total)

Apparently everyone's on crack today.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 2:13 PM on June 28, 2006

Oops. Not to bugs of course. Etiquette/Policy.
posted by Neiltupper at 2:15 PM on June 28, 2006

Crack makes you paranoid, right?
posted by keswick at 2:15 PM on June 28, 2006

I...bit...mischief's behind. I rather liked it.
posted by cortex at 2:19 PM on June 28, 2006

That thread needs a cleanup.
posted by cribcage at 2:30 PM on June 28, 2006

You think they're being disingenous to make a point, or is that just what you want to believe?
posted by smackfu at 2:32 PM on June 28, 2006

dbarefoot's a reasonable guy. I doubt he's trolling.
posted by russilwvong at 2:39 PM on June 28, 2006

I don't think it's mischievous, though I wish people would help the person with some book recommendations and lay off the preaching.

Being skeptical is a good thing, and reading "the other side" is important for figuring out why someone might not believe global warming nor want to do anything about it.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 2:39 PM on June 28, 2006

I may be dancing barefoot, but I am not dbarefoot. ;-P
posted by mischief at 3:33 PM on June 28, 2006

Well, he asked that the books be "reasonable." If the scientific consensus is that global warming is occurring and is harmful, to say otherwise isn't very reasonable, is it? I assume this is why some people are reacting in a way that might seem preachy.

Why not just read the report linked to from the National Academy of Sciences if you want to know what's really going on? Surely that would be more informative than countering Agenda A with Agenda B.
posted by 912 Greens at 3:47 PM on June 28, 2006

I read the question as give me the most credible book that thinks global warming isn't a problem.

A bunch of answers I removed were along the lines of "what?! no one disputes global warming that has a brain!" and really, he wanted to know what the other side thinks, what their most credible resource is so he could see what they are claiming (and possibly, how to refute it).
posted by mathowie (staff) at 3:55 PM on June 28, 2006

I'm sorry for my contribution to the derail.

Unfortunately, global warming is a political issue, not just a scientific one. I'm as strong as advocate as anyone for a greater response to it, but that doesnt extend to turning what is still science into a religion (There is no dissent! Everyone believes this! Its as airtight as the Law of Gravity!") Bullshit.
posted by vacapinta at 4:07 PM on June 28, 2006

So, it was thought crime after all?
posted by timeistight at 4:08 PM on June 28, 2006

So, what happened to that ten minute editing window?
posted by timeistight at 4:16 PM on June 28, 2006

Yeah, it seemed like a reasonable question to me. It looks like he want to know if there exist books skeptical of human caused global warming that are written in good faith.
posted by atrazine at 4:28 PM on June 28, 2006

vacapinta, your post in that thread is astoundingly clueless. Dissent on evolution? Dissent on the big bang? On "most everything in Science"? Please. You have no idea what you're talking about. You don't understand the issue and you don't understand the scientific process. Still, I'll refrain from commenting on that little trainwreck. Like with most things, people will find exactly what they're looking for.
posted by nixerman at 6:07 PM on June 28, 2006

I had mischief behind me once.



Very gentle, but I think he may have stolen my wallet.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 6:41 PM on June 28, 2006

nixerman, ease up on vacapinta. I have a masters degree in SCIENCE! and I agree with him that every breakthrough is met with skepticism. That's what science does -- it asks you to back up your claims and only after repeated observations by multiple parties do crazy new ideas become considered established theory. Darwin's hypothesis wasn't welcomed with open arms in the 1880s, it took a while before it was accepted. There's nothing wrong with saying that yeah, the big bang was considered crackpot for a few years when it was new.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:11 PM on June 28, 2006 [1 favorite]

No mischief intended, really. I'm not sure how to prove that, except to say that I posed a similar question to the folks at DeSmogBlog. Mind you, they didn't blog about it, they just replied to me privately.

I'm skeptical by nature (see also electoral polling or, I don't know, Buy Nothing Day). While I'm something of a centrist, I've got a history of supporting environmental causes and I've voted Green in the last two Canadian elections.

So, no mischief. I just want to learn the facts and decide for myself (as best as I can) about the scope and urgency of the problem.
posted by dbarefoot at 8:11 PM on June 28, 2006

Thanks dbarefoot. I certainly accept your sincerity. It's just that it could be a quite clever way to point out the dearth of science behind global warming denial.

Lomborg's book is the only one I've found which addresses it with any rigour at all, and I'm much more convinced by his critics.
posted by Neiltupper at 9:31 PM on June 28, 2006

I don't know if I trust this dbarefoot fellow. After all, he's clearly totally unreasonable, coming in here and explaining that he's really just intelligent and and industrious enough to see both sides of an issue. feh!
posted by shmegegge at 9:54 PM on June 28, 2006

I posted a now-deleted comment that there aren't any. I stand by it.

I've read a lot on the subject of climate change, and as near as I can tell there aren't two scientific sides to the issue.

Sure, you can dig up people like this guy, who thinks it's all solar flares, though these guys seem a wee bit more credible and disagree.

The closest to honest skepticism that I've seen is differences in the modeling of what the exact effects will be, and what the timeline is. Also, there are some who take a faith-based approach that everything will correct itself via mechanisms that they cannot identify or explain.

But that said, I've never seen a credible book that starts with the premise that climate change, as generally accepted by modern science, is untrue.
posted by Tacos Are Pretty Great at 11:44 PM on June 28, 2006

mathowie, that's certainly true and if that's what vacapinta was saying then he's right and I apologize. His comment struck me as saying that there's significant ongoing dissent about every major theory which is definitely the case. (Especially in the case of evolution which is now foundational. I'd also point out that climate change was controversial 10- years ago, not so much today among actual scientists.) I suppose what bothers me about a lot of the answers in that thread is that they're very shallow. Perhaps the green just doesn't do in-depth scientific debate well.
posted by nixerman at 12:14 AM on June 29, 2006

"I have a masters degree in SCIENCE!"

I hope that's how you word it on your resume.
posted by graventy at 1:25 AM on June 29, 2006 [1 favorite]

"I have a masters degree in WHOOP-ASS!"

I feel the memes a-stirring.
posted by NinjaTadpole at 2:08 AM on June 29, 2006

and you don't understand the scientific process.

i don't want to beat a dead horse in the mouth, since you've apologized for it already, but just want to point out that while i have no idea what vacapinta does for a living, he's clearly been educated to some extent in physics and probably does understand the scientific process quite well. hang out in the nerd threads on askme often enough and you can figure out who the scientists are. (:
posted by sergeant sandwich at 3:11 AM on June 29, 2006

Darwin's ideas were accepted more quickly than commonly thought. Arendt's Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution is good on this.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:58 PM on June 29, 2006