The Sunday Rumble: 6.8.17

Talking of Mr. Roberts ... that's Andrew Roberts, the historian ... which I was doing a couple of posts below, I am making slow but fairly steady progress with his biography of the late, great Lord Salisbury.  Given that it runs to 938 pages, weighs a ton and that I am recovering from a hernia operation, you will understand my tardiness!  My initial response to Salisbury's very early years in politics and journalism is that he makes every modern, so-called conservative look positively anarchistic.  Perhaps the main characteristic that shines, or perhaps glares, through his early writings is his vituperative fury aimed at anyone of any party who failed to live up to his ideals of High Church and High Toryism.  He even makes the late Auberon Waugh look like a bit of a wuss!

 

Are the Dems beginning to realise their mistakes?   I ask because whilst the majority of them continue to shriek and whine like banshees against Trump, there are a few quiet, still voices suggesting that their demented harangues are doing them more harm than good.

Politico has this to say:

Democrats are increasingly conflicted about how forcefully to press the issue of possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

Fearful of alienating voters who appear more concerned about the economy and health care, Democrats campaigning in districts across the country are de-emphasizing Russia in their rhetoric — and some are warning that a persistent focus on the Russia investigation could backfire.

As seen, and heard, from 'over here', their hysteria is hardly impressive!

 

Never play cards with an Aussie!   No, no, no, I don't mean that they would cheat at poker, I wouldn't dream of suggesting such a thing, especially as every Aussie I ever met was roughly twice my size!  No, I am referring to what are called 'smart cards' which, apparently, are built into several Australian temperature recording stations.  They have been programmed to 'disappear' any cold readings that do not comply with what the 'Warmer' fanatics in their Weather Bureau think is proper and which might cast doubt on their insistence that the globe is warming dangerously.  Read all about it!  Why does the phrase 'lying liars' occur to me?

 

Have a sick bag handy:   I have no views on Usain Bolt, the sprinter, because I gave up following athletics decades ago when it became clear that it was a farrago in which the 'sport' was reduced to whether or not our drug cheat can beat your drug cheat.  The fact that there probably were some totally clean athletes taking part only sickened me the more.  Anyway, yesterday we witnessed a two-times drug cheat, Justin Gatlin, win a Gold Medal at the IAAF World Championship.  If Lord Seb Coe wasn't such an arse-licking, international jet-setter he would have resigned from the IAAF years ago.

 

Of course she's a woman, she can't make up her mind!   The Mirror has a story which at first reading you might assume came from its satirical humour section but, alas, it is all too true.  It concerns a lad called Brad who insisted he was female and at vast expense - er, that's mine and your expense! - was turned into a girl.  'She' then changed her mind and decided she was a boy after all and so - voila! - she was changed back and another few thousand quid was spent.  Quite where they found the necessary bits is not clear!  Now, he, she or it have decided that she is indeed a woman and so it's off to the medics yet again.  Accuracy warning!  To be honest this story has me confused so if you want to be sure of the facts go read The Mirror for yourself.  I gather he/she hails from Hull so if you find yourself 'ooooop north' and at a loose end, have a care!

 

Kamm's the man!   I have mentioned Oliver Kamm before on this blog because he was an enormous example to me in my very early days of blogging.  Back then he was a blogger but one of obviously very high intellectual ability.  Me, being me, had the temerity to cross swords with him because, alas and alack, he was a Labour party supporter.  Needless to say, I usually limped off wounded!  Anyway, his ferocious intellectual skills allied to a pellucid writing style soon came to the attention of The Times and today he is one of their leader writers and a columnist.  He has a piece at CAPX which like most of what he writes is well worth reading.

 

No more Rumbles today!

 

 

Comments

[AussieD]

https://thepointman.wordpress.com/

Agree with him or not he is always worth reading.

[Whitewall]

"High Toryism"?? Aka Whiggism of the 17th and 18th centuries maybe? Wasn't it the Whig party or at least Whig ideals that built modern Britain...meaning the Empire of the 18th and 19th centuries?? Lots of questions I know, but I'm axing. When "High" anything is mentioned, I get nervous as I am a 'low' sort.

[AussieD]

The Australian Bureau of Altered Temperatures is being taken apart by some pretty smart people who understand the Gerbil Worming fraud.

For a good look at the reality of weather/climate see http://joannenova.com.au/

[Whitewall]

Dems realize their mistake? Never! They over play everything to keep their mentally ill base stirred up. Middle America isn't listening. It's the economy stupid!

To help their base cope, these are springing up: https://pjmedia.com/trending/2017/08/05/professional-cuddling-a-growing-industry-because-trump/

[Bob]

There's no point going on about how phony you think AGW might be. The transition to renewable is inevitable because of economics:

"Clean energy grew at a record pace as the United States added 22GW of capacity — the equivalent of 11 Hoover Dams — to the grid from renewable sources last year, significantly trumping new fossil fuel additions, according to a new report.

The report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE) cites the declining cost of wind and solar power, largely due to advances in technology, as prime reasons for the rapid adoption of renewables. The cost of building large utility-scale solar photovoltaic power plants for example has been fallen by 50% in just five years."

http://time.com/4662116/renewable-energy-fossil-fuels-growth/

You believe in "free" markets, right? Would one of you explain why you're so emotionally invested in the idea AGW is a hoax? Are you fossil fuel executives and investors? Do you enjoy sending money to oil kingdoms and Russia's oligarchy? What?

By the way, in the 1970's and '80's tobacco companies used the same PR techniques to deny the link between their product's use and cancer. Would linking elitist and conspiratorial scientists to cancer research still make you take up a two pack a day habit?

[David Duff]

"Free markets"? If the government gave me as many hand-outs as, say, Solyndra and Al Gore, I would dig my own coalmine in my back garden!

[JK]

"[B]ecause I gave up following athletics decades ago."

Decades ago?

Oh yeah right, this is D&N and, David Duff is the host.

http://duffandnonsense.typepad.com/duff_nonsense/2014/09/in-which-i-switch-sports.html

[David Duff]

JK, you are hereby granted the Honorary Freedom of D&N for reminding me of that old post which, I just know, will bring great pleasure to the dirty old men, ooops, sorry, I mean the distinguished Gentlemen who attend here so regularly!

[Peter G]

Good luck with that electoral defense. The Democrats have to stop being mean to us or we or they will lose the elections in 2018! So why are you not encouraging the Democrats to continue exactly as they are considering you feel that any left wing government is not merely the first long step to communism but it's actual arrival. What's the plan Stan? Still trying to get the Democrats to adopt racist and sexist policies to make them more appealing to Republican voters? Can't be anything related to fiscal conservatism, the Republicans are about to blow that theory of government out of the water.

[TheBigHenry]

Bob,

"There's no point going on about how phony you think AGW might be. The transition to renewable is inevitable because of economics ..."

I agree with you in part.

The point of "going on about ...", however, is that, along with metabolizing low-entropy energy, excreting high-entropy waste, sleeping, f*cking, and playing bridge, self-expression is what sentient beings do for a living. Whether or not "going on about ..." will have any significant impact on how soon the inevitable transition to "renewable" low-entropy energy will transpire is another matter.

The ultimate arbiter of what happens in this universe is, of course, the Second Law of Thermodynamics. No point in going on unless one accepts this incontrovertible fact.

Our home planet can, in principle, sustain life for as long as our sun shines (another five billion years, give or take). This is because our closed thermodynamic-system Earth is blessed with the external low-entropy energy of sunshine.

In the meantime, before the transition from finite internal (to Earth) sources of fossil-fuel energy to (essentially) infinite external sunshine, how humanity deals with the inevitable transition will be determined by supply, demand, domestic and international politics, the perverse machinations of rogue individuals, consortiums, and states, and whether or not the Chicago Cubs can win another World Series.

[Bob]

David, just don't come crying to me when you get black lung.

[Peter G]

Bob expecting consistency from David is a bit of a complete and totally unrealistic expectation. This is a man who worships Thatcher, the woman who had no use for coal and pushed the generation of electricity by nuclear power. This is also the man who tells us he is old enough to remember the Great Smog event of London that killed twelve thousand people or so. In a single event mind you. You my confidently expect that, at some point, he will hold forth on the terrible Anti-smoking campaigns that he learned of at the Daily Caller that are a conspiracy to deprive us all of the life extending benefits of tobacco.

[David Duff]

Sorry, Bob, did I say that coal was to be preferred to oil/gas/nuclear? No, I didn't think so and the chances of catching 'black lung' is minimal these days since the use of domestic coal fires in the UK disappeared during the '50s.

However, your and the 'Greenie' claim that global temps are increasing because of CO2 emissions (mostly from East Asia) are a load of blx! The Asians are pumping out CO2 at INCREASING levels and yet global temps are barely moving which is why the Greenie fanatics in the Australian Weather Bureau (and elsewhere) are desperately trying to hide the fact. Wise up, Buddy, you're being had!

[David Duff]

TBH, you keep introducing the Second Law and the dreaded 'entropy'. It is a subject that both fascinates and sort of horrifies me, as much for its inevitability as anything. I first came across it years ago when first I saw Stoppard's play "Arcadia" and then actually had the privilege of directing it. It is a prospect that tends to diminish worries over local 'alarums and excursions' because in the end everything will end for everyone and everything. A sobering thought which is why I need a drink!

[Peter G]

Don't worry you pretty litlle very likely bald pate about it David. Henry does not have the slightest idea of what he is talking about. If you had taken any first year university course in physics you would know what a closed thermodynamical system is. The earth is not a closed system. Big sun. Lots of energy. You can't actually say a close system is closed except for the part that makes it completely not a closed system.

Here you go though: if you imagined a closed envelope through which no energy could pass but was filled with gas and a single hot piece of metal then eventually the temperature would be everywhere equal and the energy distributed uniformly. This works with both classical and quantum thermodynamics. Not that tough to comprehend. Entropy has to do with reversibility of processes. So ask yourself how likely it is that the described closed system would reve se itself, the gas become colder and the metal heat up again?

[TheBigHenry]

David,

I can not, in all honesty, take credit for introducing the Second Law. That high honor belongs to several great scientists of the 19th Century, including Ludwig Boltzmann.

Do not be alarmed by it, however. Its destructive power is indeed inexorable but it is not going to kill you or anyone else here. Certainly not before next Tuesday!

[David Duff]

Yes, Henry, I do realise that but even so it is hard to accept that even if we, by which I mean the universe, did start from nothing, that is where we, and it, will end - with nothing! No heat, no light, no movement, no energy -nothing at all!

Er, make mine a large one!

[Bob]

TBH, "going on about" is not so much like fcking as it is like wnking. We can probably rest assured that by the time the Cubs win another World Series the night games will be illuminated by fusion power.

-

David, you should hope to strike oil, natural gas, or uranium in your garden then, but I suspect you still wouldn't be any better for the wear.

-

Peter, David is consistent in his distrust of science because it is sometimes represented by scientists he finds personally objectionable. He doesn't like Richard Dawkins, therefore he considers the theory of evolution to be a load of blx too. Give credit where it's due.

[Loz]

"Would one of you explain why you're so emotionally invested in the idea AGW is a hoax?"

It's nothing to do with emotion ...

(1) Because the models used by AGW proponents as the "proof" of AGW and any type of warming and cooling are proven to be useless (mathematical chaos - hat tip to Godel and co) ...

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/13/the-chaos-theoretic-argument-that-undermines-climate-change-modelling/

(2) Because it is not possible for something in the future to cause something in the past.

Carbon follows warming in the climate process. Carbon lags behind warming by 1,000 or so years. As a peak warm period reaches its climax, the temperature starts to drop while carbon keeps rising for 1,000 years more. Likewise, at a cooling trough the temperature starts to rise while carbon keeps dropping or 1,000 years more.

Therefore, it is not possible to say that carbon causes warming because the warming occurs before the carbon. Unless, of course, you believe that warming says to itself "Hey, look, carbon is going to go down 1,000 years in the future, so why don't I go down first?"!

It might be possible to say that warming causes carbon, because carbon occurs after warming. But that would even be a step too far, because it might just be correlation.

But to say that carbon causes warming in the climate process when warming precedes carbon in the time line is the sort of utter lies and garbage that only scientists, materialists, and mechanists not reconciled to Gödel's proof and the limitations of their own method would claim.

SoD

[JK]

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-canada-jails-deaths-insight-idUSKBN1AJ19V

[David Duff]

Bob, I'm surprised at you! I don't like Richard Dawkins because he frequently talks twaddle on various subjects and because he came up with the silliest non-scientific idea of all time, er, outside of religion, that is - 'the selfish gene'! None of that precludes my acceptance (until a better idea comes along) that natural selection is the driver of the evolution of differing species.

[Hank]

David

I doubt this will get much play in your Exiting Isles, especially since it does not get much play in the main stream US press. There is some hope.

http://legalinsurrection.com/2017/08/while-media-obsesses-over-russia-trump-continues-reshaping-federal-judiciary/

Related, A few weeks ago when Mr. Trump sent an Tweet that raised a major ruckus, he signed three substantive Executive Orders.

[JK]

Might David, find this of some interest:

https://havechanged.blogspot.com/2017/08/hardy-as-churchill.html

[TheBigHenry]

PG,

My intelligence has been insulted before by other assholes, but seldom without prior provocation. The Earth would be a closed system if not for the Sun's external continuing source of low-entropy energy, which is also the a priori source of the useful energy stored in all our fossil fuel.

Your mama wears combat boots, bitch.
____________________________

David,

Take heart. There are alternative endings to what had begun with the Big Bang, including the Big Crunch, and the latter could also lead to the Big Bounce (the next iteration of the Big Bang). It all depends on the value of the Cosmological Constant, which Big Al considered having been his greatest blunder (but wasn't).
____________________________

Bob,

I took "going on about ..." to be a form of self-expression, but I guess fcking and wnking are also. You are right about the Cubs ...

[TheBigHenry]

David,

Where I wrote (@Sunday, 06 August 2017 at 17:30) "... our closed thermodynamic-system Earth is blessed with the external low-entropy energy of sunshine", please insert the word "otherwise" between the words "our" and "closed" such that it reads: "... our otherwise closed thermodynamic-system Earth is blessed with the external low-entropy energy of sunshine".

[Bob]

Yes, there was carbon around before warming, just not so much of it:

But, you know, it's NASA and NOAA, a bunch of scientists who don't realize the importance of Gödel:

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/carbon-dioxide/

[TheBigHenry]

PG,

You based your insult of my intelligence on my one-word typographical omission, so I will take back my insult of your mama.

But you are still an asshole of the first magnitude, bitch.

[Bob]

David, I'm glad you're not burdening yourself with another form of science denial. Dawkins gets an 'E' for effort. "Selfish" is a clumsy metaphor, but sensationalism sells books.

[Peter G]

Well Big Henry so far you have displayed a general lack of understanding of basic physics that would grace an arts student. Still waiting to hear what's wrong with the isotope studies that underlie so much of climate science. It has nothing whatsoever to do with my age btw.

[Peter G]

Oh and btw Henry explicitly stating that the earth is a closed system is not an error of omission. It's just completely wrong

[TheBigHenry]

It was quite clear, even with my omission, what I meant, asshole. I know the difference between a closed and an open system, you stupid twat.

And your mama does wear combat boots, bitch.

[AussieD]

Don't worry you pretty litlle very likely bald pate about it David

You patronizing prick. If you have an argument put it and be prepared to defend it but patronizing people does not make your argument any more correct.

Oh and either proof read your material or get a decent spell check on your computer.

[AussieD]

But, you know, it's NASA and NOAA, a bunch of scientists who don't realize the importance of Gödel:

www.washingtontimes.com/.../climate-change-whistleblower-alleges-noaa-manipula/

[Loz]

"Yes, there was carbon around before warming, just not so much of it"

It's to be noted that the medieval warming period was 800 years or so ago, so yes, we can expect more carbon to be around today per the correlation that carbon follows warming by 800-1000 years.

Not that the amount of carbon around matters, of course. And even if mankind adds to it, it still doesn't matter, and can't matter, with regard to warming, because it happens after warming. You won't cure a cold by blowing your nose.

Scientists really need to get causality under their belt, I mean, it's an embarrassment, such a core competency epic fail.

SoD

[backofanenvelope]

AussieD "You patronizing prick".

Come on folks, don't feed the Troll!

[David Duff]

Gentlemen, I totter off to bed and then wake up this morning to find the saloon has been wreaked! Calm down, dears, it's a conversation not a debate in Parliament of Congress, God forbid! Fierce I like, ferocious I don't.

[Loz]

Yippee, for once it's not me getting a clip round the ear!

SoD

[David Duff]

Stick around, kid, you ain't seen nuttin' yet!

[Bob]

SoD,

The amount of carbon has been fairly constant. The problem is that so much more of it is now in the atmosphere. It's likely you're putting me on, but if you really believe what you're typing it would be a good idea to take a run at understanding the greenhouse effect.

-

AussieD,

There are scientists out there with all kinds of motivations. That's the beauty of the scientific method: They get called out for fudging numbers, measurements, or just wrong ideas. The most famous case I can think of is Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann's claims they had created cold fusion in 1989. Their results couldn't be reproduced by other scientists and were discredited. The vast majority of climatologists agree.

[David Duff]

And there-in, Bob, lies the difference. No scientist can reproduce the Pons/Fleishmann experiment so none of them accept it. Very carefully, and accurately, you describe "a vast majority of climatologists" agreeing with AGW - BUT NOT ALL! And there-in lies the weakness. As well as the many general scientists who doubt it as well.

[Bob]

You misunderstand, David. I've worked around a lot of scientists and there are some that believe all kinds of goofy things. Unanimity isn't required for an idea to be considered true in the scientific community, or any other community I can think of. Keep in mind science is a human activity. Most scientists love nothing more than to punch holes in others' ideas, and there will probably never be 100% agreement on anything.

[David Duff]

And of course, Bob, not everyone, or even possibly a majority, who call themselves 'scientists' actually are! More like 'technicians', really, which I suspect most climatologists are!

[Bob]

David, you can be sure a lot of people working on climate change problems are technicians. A lot of the work doesn't require the highest levels of skill. Not everyone in an army is a general. Or even a corporal.

[Loz]

The greenhouse effect is valid in that if you have two jam jars, one with more carbon in it than the other, and you shine light on them, the jam jar with more carbon gets warmer.

Problem is the earth's climate process isn't linear like that. There are many more forcers than the one linear greenhouse gas effect, and they're all hitting off each other in an impenetrable feedback. It's mathematical chaos, deep mathematical chaos.

Take a long look at that chart in the wattsupwiththat link above. It is sublime. It is the counter to every authoritarian, scientist, and materialist. The golden turd that Libertarians can hurl at them, forever and ever Amen: -

The more you add your cranky bossy-boots forcers to the climate model, the more you stress Occam's Razor, you pass a point where your models become increasingly more unreliable, until they become useless. The sun here, the greenhouse effect there, convection this, retreating ice coverage that, and the other. Each one pushes you deeper into uselessness.

Thank you, Dear God(el). You don't play with dice Sir, you play with non-linear mathematics. And you hand it to us like Excalibur, to defend us from tyranny.

SoD

[Bob]

SoD, so if I understand your point, everything is so complex that nothing can ever be known, except to authoritarians. Please explain how you know that.

-

David, actually the PF experiment is still being studied:

"The rejection of the claims of Fleischmann and Pons was a convenient way to re-establish self-consistency and order. Local energy and momentum conservation remains a foundation of nuclear physics, the energy from a nuclear reaction is expressed as energetic particles, and
Fleischmann and Pons could safely be cast out of the scientific community with their scientific reputations destroyed. The only problem with this tidy solution is that the thermal anomalies claimed by Fleischmann and Pons continue to be seen in the laboratory in a very large number of experiments carried out by those who have continued to study the problem."

That's from an MIT paper:

http://www.rle.mit.edu/media/pr151/34.pdf

[Whitewall]

"the more you stress Occam's Razor, you pass a point where your models become increasingly more unreliable, until they become useless."

And that is the point where the whole thing strays into political science/ economics and then culture which allows it to become religious dogma.

[Bob]

The whole point of science is that it is not religion. The twain might meet in individuals, but as enterprises they never will.

[Whitewall]

"The whole point of science is that it is not religion"

Ain't it the damn truth! But lo and behold it-climate- is now pseudo religious doctrine which is the form it must take to be injected into the culture and thereby into politics which is always downstream from culture.

[Bob]

If you have a profound belief in that, it's true for you and all that matters.