Phew, is that an analogy?

Pugwash said...

log man said...

In the same way, Gillard didn't lie...

Gillard agreed to take on a job, under a certain set of conditions. She has not stood by these conditions. Indeed, she has invented a completely new set of conditions for herself so that she may fulfill her own selfish goal of being Prime Minister.

pugsly, that's the government WE voted in.

Look, Gillard stood for government on a Labor platform. Abbott for government on a Liberal/Coalition platform. Greens likewise.

WE didn't vote any of them in. All bets went out the window at that point.

So if you lot want to blame someone, go look in the mirror.

Pugwash said...

Yes, SOG, government was formed by elected members. This is simple.

Unfortunately, some of those elected members threw away all credibility by completely changing (one foot, one hand triple back loop, followed by a stalled forward is the equivalent in windsurfing) the policies that got them there in the first place - SO - who are they representing? The people who voted for them? Or, their own selfish interests?

Sure, there are still those that want to support those members, and there are those that do not. I think the do nots are represented in the opinion polls. Was that lowest ever satisfaction for the Labs?

Very hard to say as the labs do not have policies so they can't be assessed by the voters!

Yep... that's the one. You want 'er

GreenPat said...

Pugwash said...


Ultimately, we should stop talking politics on SB, coz politics ain't fun

Yeah, where are the moderators on this one? Slackers.

Yea!!

Ok my final point: www.un.org/en/development/desa/policy/wess/wess_current/2011wess_chapter1.pdf

The pdf describes the reason for the carbon tax, along with the nice disproven CO2 hockey stick... basically they need to reduce our wealth so that more people can live on Earth... simple as that. They describe how a reduction of income won't affect our life expectancy.

P19: Limits to growth in developed countries
first, acceptance of limits by developed countries would make it easier for the world as a whole to stay within the Earth's carrying capacity;
second, acceptance of such limits by developed countries would result in a freeing up of more space for the growth of developing countries, thereby facilitating convergence upward;
third, acceptance of limits by developed countries would also facilitate convergence downward, through a more rapid reduction of the ecological footprint in developed countries;

$23 a ton is the starting point, doesn't matter who you vote, it's a done deal without a World War and disband of the UN.

Welcome to your future...

Pugwash said...

I will stop beating up the Labs in response to other posts, as soon as those that keep starting posts and pimping the Labs stuff stop

Where's the fun in that?

For example, taking life expectancy as an objective measure of the quality of life, it can be seen that life expectancy does not increase much beyond a per capita income level of about $10,000

Y'all better hope the US$ goes up.

@SomeOtherGuy: you can start by giving all your money to charity. But you won't, will you... oh and then when your living on the streets, I'll give you a history book and hopefully you'll learn socialism doesn't work.

^^^^

Yeah, I can understand that cynical viewpoint. I often go there myself. But there's also a certain amount of pragmatism in there... I'd bet any of them in government would tell you that they won't get any of their policies through in opposition.

FlySurfer said...

oh and then when your living on the streets, I'll give you a history book and hopefully you'll learn socialism doesn't work.

Sweden.

There! I finally managed to get that one in.

WHO IS TALKING ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING ????

Latest report from Surfers Paradise !! Gold Coast !!!

Waves are freezing right now in mid air

Struggling? We're about as rich as we've ever been. Yes, some people are doing it tough but surely that is because the disparity in income and possessions between rich and poor is much bigger than it used to be.

If we can't fix things when we're richer than we ever were, when will we fix them?

It's depressing to read the posts from people who disbelieve the scientific consensus. Yes, the consensus is not always right, but it certainly is the vast majority of the time.

The arrogance in people who don't work in climate science but assume that they know better than the vast majority of those who do is not just amazing, but depressing. How far up yourself do you have to be to assume that although you've never studied a field, you know more than the very smart people who have spent decades studying and researching in that area?

I'm married to a scientist (working a different area) and her colleagues are the most dedicated and intellectual bunch of workers I have ever met. They are extremely sceptical as a bunch and love nothing more than challenging each others ideas. The idea that they just agree with each other for the sake of doing so is just crap. They test each other's ideas so that they can reject the wrong beliefs and evolve better ones.

Most people's scepticism about science seems to be founded on ignorance and prejudice, which is just mind-boggling considering our lives rest on its creations. The fuel we use is found by scientific methods and extracted by scientific methods. If we go windsurfing, we use carbon masts, mylar sails, epoxy boards and GPSs - all the fruits of science. Most of us would have died of diseases such as smallpox before we were old enough to write these posts if it wasn't for science - and of course if it wasn't for science we wouldn't have an internet, or computers, or electricity to power them.

To live in this day but reject the scientific consensus without expert knowledge is just illogical

Chris 249: reading your post is quite depressing. You read like so many of our generation unwilling to rationally question the information they receive.

The TV said the scientific community said the world is getting warmer, so it is.
And those who question the information are simply viewed as flat Earther's.

We've gone through this a 100 times on this forum. Those who are paid to say it's getting hotter say it's getting hotter.

Those who aren't paid to say it, say "Hey that doesn't make sense we need to expand the research. What's the Sun doing? What's happening inside the Earth? Lets build some detailed models and start playing with gas ratios. Why is the Earth cooling?"

FlySurfer said...

Chris 249: reading your post is quite depressing. You read like so many of our generation unwilling to rationally question the information they receive.

The TV said the scientific community said the world is getting warmer, so it is.
And those who question the information are simply viewed as flat Earther's.

We've gone through this a 100 times on this forum. Those who are paid to say it's getting hotter say it's getting hotter.

Those who aren't paid to say it, say "Hey that doesn't make sense we need to expand the research. What's the Sun doing? What's happening inside the Earth? Lets build some detailed models and start playing with gas ratios. Why is the Earth cooling?"

I find it depressing that so many people assume that they know more about everything than everyone else - even those people who have spent years learning about a specialised field.

I specifically noted "Yes, the consensus is not always right" so I am quite willing to admit that it can be wrong. The fact that you are implying I get my knowledge from the TV (something I barely ever watch) could be a minor bit of evidence to show that you jump to conclusions yourself.

I am very willing to rationally question the information I believe. Many of my family have scientific backgrounds and the basis of the entire scientific method is based on questioning, asking and testing. I am aware of the reservations some people have about it, such as Kuhn's paradigm shift theory, although I don't believe in that model. You could also look at Eddington's eclipse measurements, or Mendel's dodgy data as examples to show that science is not always clear.

However, to assume that a layperson can read a few articles and suddenly know more than those who have spent decades learning about the same field of science is illogical. Maybe it occurs (I'm not sure of examples, though) but the overwhelming majority of times, the scientists are right.

What do you do for a job? If I just read a bit and questioned stuff, would I know more about your job than you do? Do you know more about medicine than the average surgeon? Do you know more about windsurfing than the PWA sailors? Do you know more about how to drive a F1 car than Webber and his competitors? Do you know more about carbon layups than the guys who build masts?

If you do reckon a layman will know more than most surgeons, most of the PWA sailors, most F1 racers and most mastmakers know about their professions, then no real discussion is possible.

If you don't think Joe Average can read a bit and then start hacking into brains, winning Monaco, sailing Jaws or crafting carbon masts then why would you believe that you can read a bit and decide that the consensus of the climate scientists is wrong? Yes, as I clearly said in my earlier post the consensus may not always be right, but to what extent is it practical and reasonable to assume that laypeople can easily get it right when most scientists get it wrong?

There is a difference between an unquestioning belief in authority and the rational belief that most of the very intelligent people who work in a very complex field are likely to be correct.

For a living I take on the Federal Government, and occasionally for windsurfing I take on organisations like the NSW Government and Yachting Australia. I have no problems at all with questioning authority, but I also respect very smart people and believe that most of them are right when they do huge amounts of study in an area.

Where is your factual evidence for the last two paragraphs? My wife and I depend on science funding for a lot of our household income and her career so I'm quite well aware of the funding issue and how it works - get a few scientists out for drinks and you get a lot of chat about it - but whether it actually creates the climate consensus is a very different matter.

You could use the same argument against any major scientific field. If I recall correctly, Taffy Bowen largely made Australian astronomy a world force by smart politicking and getting good funding - does that mean you have to discount the consensus of astronomers? If you are going to disbelieve the climate consensus, why not disbelieve the consensus of modern astronomy?

Yes, questioning knowledge is useful, but saying "they are stupid, I know more than they do because I've spent a fraction as much time trying to learn about their field" seems rather useless.

Its not about carbon, its about class, rich vs poor.