Comments | hipgunslinger: I like to watch the American public talk about things...

hipgunslinger

I like to watch the American public talk about things...

Mar 24, 2010 20:44

Perhaps the most frustratingly amusing thing about the entire global warming "debate" that seems to rage in the world these days is that the argument seems to largely be waged on the plain of ideas ( Read more... )

Comments 7

liberpolly March 25 2010, 06:01:08 UTC

so what conclusion did you reach on global warming?

hipgunslinger March 25 2010, 06:54:57 UTC

I'm honestly much more appreciative of Morrison's opinion that I was several months ago. The stolen "climategate" e-mails were a classic example of how the public and scientific research seem to be incapable of actually having a dialogue at the moment. Several months after the fact I've read some articles written by people of genuine stature and repute assuring me as a reader that the data released in the climategate e-mails was not uncommon to be discarded in the presentation of scientific data, and in the aforementioned Morrison article, they damn well should have INCLUDED that information in the published material as people can't be expected to shrug off unincluded material as being 'necessary to the scientific process ( ... )

liberpolly March 26 2010, 01:55:12 UTC

> Several months after the fact I've read some articles written by people of genuine stature and repute assuring me as a reader that the data released in the climategate e-mails was not uncommon to be discarded in the presentation of scientific data ( ... )

hipgunslinger March 26 2010, 08:50:11 UTC

Oh, I agree entirely on the nuclear reactor front... I'm just not sure I trust politicians to move quickly enough when (or indeed if) it becomes a problem ( ... )

Thread 6

yrsuchariot March 26 2010, 02:03:34 UTC

One thing that I am realizing as I get older is how limited some people's cognitive abilities are. Some people are limited because it's in their DNA and others are limited by their own mental laziness.

I also wonder how much the ubiquity of religious thought factors in. Religion teaches people to believe things without any rational proof or support. Some people are very good at compartmentalizing that, but others are dreadful at it. For a lot of people, how they subjectively feel is more important than what actually is. They don't require any extrinsic evidence because they believe that global warming is a myth or that health care is bad or that homosexuals are destroying society.

Political partisanship exacerbates the situation because people believe in their political party and don't feel the need to actually examine the issues and come to any sort of objective conclusion on their own. And let's face it, a lot of issues are very complex. A lot of people couldn't read and understand a serious article on global warming. They are ( ... )