Daniel Pinchbeck, How Soon is Now, Heavy-Handed Climate Apocalypse Stuff |343|

One of the predicted effects of climate change is that we should begin to see more climatic extremes. And that is happening....look to the recent floods in Peru. During the first part of January, there was a developed El Nina off the coast. In a little over two months, the Nina disappeared, and an El Nino formed....very warm water. My friend (who is an earth scientist) says he has never observed this before. So we are seeing more extreme oscillations between high and low air temperatures (today it is 85 .... way too warm for early spring in SW New Mexico) and tomorrow it will be 50 with rain. This is happening all across the globe. Here is another example. During the years of the California drought, there was a large body of warm water off the coast of the northwest US. It disappeared last year...and now we have floods in CA and the northwest. Are the two related? Certainly ocean circulation is a big driver of weather. Who knows. Just some observations.

I have a problem with this sort of argument. Unless one can solidly define and catalogue extreme weather events (a possibly impossible task) it would be impossible to tell whether they are really increasing. We've had an extreme low in hurricane activity the last decade, so aren't we just cherry picking according to our confirmation bias? Every time it's a hot summer day in Texas (surprise...Texas is hot) people still blame global warming. Anytime any extreme weather event from Peru to Paris occurs, the news media will pick it up and attach it to the narrative of global warming followed by "scientists say global warming is partly to blame, and expect more of this in the future".
 
Here's the thing as I see it.... so do you. (as in collective 'you') :)

If the consensus is as split as 'deniers' say it is then basically it becomes a 'he said, she said'.
However, to overcome that bit of sticky wicket, 'deniers' (for want of a better word) have to claim that all GW proponents (man made or otherwise) are all part of some vast globalist agenda conspiracy

A Straw Man argument which is as common as it is invalid. Persisent and massive falsehoods do not require any global conspiracy - a simple innate human drive to percieve themselves as absolutely intellectually correct, morally superior and/or spiritually advanced, being intensified by a social feedback from supporters and followers (especially these supporters and followers are high-level types with supporters and followers of their own), a blindness to opposition produced by political power and strong economic incentives are enough to turn even the most obviosly mistaken concept into an "undeniable and settled truth".

This of course, do not rule out the possibility of multiple, (relatively) mutually independent, (relatively) local conspiracies by (relatively) small groups of people who do not want for any contradictory evidence and argumentation to appear in public. And, even in case of such local conspirators, they may still sincerely believe that their clandestine and deceptive practices are morally justified since the contradictory evidence and argumentation simply MUST be somehow wrong; while its wrongness is not provable right now, it MUST be proven some day in the future; so, it would be better to push it under cover until the moment of supposed refutation, to prevent it from poisoning the minds of unwashed masses (and potential elite renegades).

P.S. And, to make it clear - my position on catastrophic anthropogenic global waming / climate change is neutral, since I haven't studied it in enough detail to form a strong opinion. I, however, apalled by hysteria, hostility, politisation, commercialisation, dogmatism, demands for censorship and persecution, vilification, defamation, and enthusiastic rejection of freedoms of speech and inquiry which accompany this debate.
 
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I'm fairly agnostic on the matter. I figure 'reality' will eventually reveal just who had the correct hypothesis in the whole matter.

That being said, I'm just not seeing who is supposedly on the 'right side of history' in the matter. If I'm reading right, there seems a claim to a certain underdog
status and target of persecution by the 'denier' group. On the contrary, they appear to be very vociferous! As well, here the US where it is strongly politicized, we have almost an entire party... and its voting base... screaming bloody murder on what they think of who and what is causing or not causing GW.

IIRC I asked in the other thread about as to whether the opposing GW side has it's own 'climategates'....iow...if any of their corporate special interests, funder's, scientists, etc have been exposed to playing fast and loose on their claims. I don't know cuz no one responded.

However, I'm sure if I bothered to google, there'd be thousands to support that just as there is for every other pov. :)
 
I don't think you know what Marxism actually is.

Based upon both history and what I see in the world today, I think Marxism is an improved slave management system installed by Oligarchs to extract resources from the Proletariat so they can live comfortably and further their goal of a One-World totalitarian government run by Elites claiming to be a benevolent Intellectual Class.

Of course, I know this account probably differs from the schooling you received from the Fabians at Oxford.
 
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'deniers' (for want of a better word)
That is a smear word. Someone in 'denial' is someone refusing to recognize evidence. Instead of repeating such smears, why not use a more neutral word such as 'skeptics'.

GW proponents (man made or otherwise) are all part of some vast globalist agenda conspiracy
Strawman above, nobody here claimed that all of this is a vast globalist agenda. But at the upper levels of course it is a globalist agenda, it is by definition a globe-spanning tax system they want to introduce.

And since we're talking about terms, they don't tend to call it "global warming" any more. They call it "climate change"... That way, if the globe doesn't stay exactly the same temperature they'll be 'correct' either way.

I'm sure if I bothered to google, there'd be thousands to support that just as there is for every other pov. :)
Not an argument.

Internet subverting global government or rather power? Maybe for the interim but I see mass control and dystopia ahead. :)
Why the smiley face for that? Did you make a typo or what?
 
Here's the thing as I see it.... so do you. (as in collective 'you') :)

If the consensus is as split as 'deniers' say it is then basically it becomes a 'he said, she said'.
However, to overcome that bit of sticky wicket, 'deniers' (for want of a better word) have to claim that all GW proponents (man made or otherwise) are all part of some vast globalist agenda conspiracy
Not really.

The issue partly boils down to the abuse of statistics and computer modeling - which is clear. Indeed, it was the statistician Steve McIntyre who did a lot of the work exposing what has gone on.

I don't think most people are involved in a conspiracy - they just don't look at what they are doing very critically. If for example temperatures don't rise as fast as expected, you assume there must be an answer and get someone to tweak the model a bit. You just don't worry about the possibility that your model is flexible enough to fit anything.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/confessions-of-a-computer-modeler-1404861351

(This has gone behind a paywall - sorry)

David
 
Weird... I couldn't think of the word skeptic. Anyway, all I see is more rationalizing and word play disguised as your truth.
PS... lighten up. :) :) :)
 
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Not really.

The issue partly boils down to the abuse of statistics and computer modeling - which is clear. Indeed, it was the statistician Steve McIntyre who did a lot of the work exposing what has gone on.

I don't think most people are involved in a conspiracy - they just don't look at what they are doing very critically. If for example temperatures don't rise as fast as expected, you assume there must be an answer and get someone to tweak the model a bit. You just don't worry about the possibility that your model is flexible enough to fit anything.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/confessions-of-a-computer-modeler-1404861351

(This has gone behind a paywall - sorry)

David


My 'problem' is that I can find as many that says he's baloney as who'd support it. That's my issue. Everyone just cite's things that support their pov.
 
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I have my own opinions on which governmental policies would be for the best. But I think anger, hate and intolerance are a much bigger danger than incompetent government. Given the choice between having all the right policies in place or having people on both sides drop the animosity they have for people who disagree with them, I think it would be much better if people would give up their anger and hate of the other side. If that happened, government would work a lot better. The demagogues would lose their power.and we could settle questions through democratic processes. The "best" policy is often only an opinion about what "best" is and therefore sometimes the best solution is the democratic solution. If picking the right policy wasn't made into an issue of winning or losing a political battle against "enemies" in the other party, then people would be more willing to admit it when policies don't work and they would be more willing to try something different.
 
My 'problem' is is that I can find as many that says he's baloney as who'd support it. That's my issue.

It doesn't matter what any consensus might be. What matters is the evidence. Yet you admittedly can't even be 'bothered' to do an internet search and instead come up with non-arguments and smiley faces about your reaction to 'mass control and dystopia'...
 
It doesn't matter what any consensus might be. What matters is the evidence. Yet you admittedly can't even be 'bothered' to do an internet search and instead come up with non-arguments and smiley faces about your reaction to 'mass control and dystopia'...

This is how I envision all those smiles
aMw2dvX_700b.jpg
 
It doesn't matter what any consensus might be. What matters is the evidence. Yet you admittedly can't even be 'bothered' to do an internet search and instead come up with non-arguments and smiley faces about your reaction to 'mass control and dystopia'...

You don't have any 'evidence'. Like everyone else you pick and choose so cut the baloney. And whats your obsession with a flip comment I
made about the internet. You don't agree? Are you from the future or something?

John Titor... is that you??? :) :) :) :)
 
On getting the public interested in issues of interest/concern to Skeptiko listeners...which issues? Conspiracy theories? Parapsychology? Whether or not every person in academia has read NDE reports? Whether Jesus really existed?

I think the truth is different listeners are interested in different things, so it would be hard to get the outside world to consider it as a whole when many listeners would disagree with different points.

If it is perfect, and I think it may be, I think it helps to have a worldview that 'believes' in consciousness surviving death. If we're here to learn and grow, there would be very little point if everything was hunky dory, there wouldn't be anything to grow from. I like this idea, it makes sense.

Sadly Steve I must disagree - Isn't this how things like serfdom, the caste system, and slavery were justified? That there was a Plan to it all?

I just don't see this planet as an effective school to learn any particular lesson, though admittedly I suspect if there is an afterlife the chaos/injustice that permeates this level of reality is found there too.

=-=-=

Also Pinchbeck is an odd-duck, I think there's a lot of us who loved Breaking Open the Head who were amazed the same guy wrote the narcissistic dreck that is 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl.
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I have my own opinions on which governmental policies would be for the best. But I think anger, hate and intolerance are a much bigger danger than incompetent government. Given the choice between having all the right policies in place or having people on both sides drop the animosity they have for people who disagree with them, I think it would be much better if people would give up their anger and hate of the other side. If that happened, government would work a lot better. The demagogues would lose their power.and we could settle questions through democratic processes. The "best" policy is often only an opinion about what "best" is and therefore sometimes the best solution is the democratic solution. If picking the right policy wasn't made into an issue of winning or losing a political battle against "enemies" in the other party, then people would be more willing to admit it when policies don't work and they would be more willing to try something different.

I've been thinking about this issue too, esp. related to the question Alex asked at the end of the interview:

What do you think we can do to increase the chances that intelligent people will be able to have real dialogues (about issues of concern to Skeptiko listeners?) and get past the polarising political situation we're currently in? Do you think that will happen, or do you think we are fundamentally stuck in a way that is not going to immediately fix itself?

I'd say things are fundamentally stuck and for reasons that are deep-rooted; for example:
-The U.S., and the "West" generally, is an empire under a different name.
-Words have been so twisted, in an Orwellian way, such that civil discourse about evidence is becoming more difficult.
-The Internet has fostered an increased number of alternative-minded people on one hand, yet many people still follow the corporate media; and the divide between these two groups appears to be growing.
-There is a wide-spread belief that science is about consensus and that politics is also this way (aka "democracy"), a system in which 51% of the people can dictate to the rest.

There is thus forced-association on many levels, and this causes huge and unnecessary conflict. E.g., foreign countries are forced to have Western military there. The self-described Nations within the U.S. are forced to be part of the United States (see for instance David Mathisen's blog on the Sioux and how they were forced by Trump to have a pipeline put over their bulldozed sacred sites: http://www.starmythworld.com/mathis...e-cant-be-conscious-if-we-suffer-from-amnesia

The list goes on... fundamentalist Christians etc. forcing their association (missionaries) on foreign cultures all over the world, and anyone who disagrees is an "infidel".

It's a monomaniacal mindset, dividing the world into dichotomies: "orthodox" vs "heretic", and "believer" vs "infidel". And one sees this in terms of theology of course, but the mindset is also present with political parties, science, SJW activities, etc.
 
You don't have any 'evidence'. Like everyone else you pick and choose so cut the baloney.

There is plenty of evidence, and I also addressed those pushing for a global tax system and that they changed their term from "global warming" to "climate change".

To someone paying attention that should mean something, but you admittedly can't be 'bothered' doing an internet search.

There's no point in communicating with you, because you don't even try to follow the evidence.
 
There is plenty of evidence, and I also addressed those pushing for a global tax system and that they changed their term from "global warming" to "climate change".

To someone paying attention that should mean something, but you admittedly can't be 'bothered' doing an internet search.

There's no point in communicating with you, because you don't even try to follow the evidence.

They must've been consulting with Frank Luntz then apparently. They changed the language. Gee, that's never been done before. While I personally find that totally manipulative, it's not particularly shocking as it's unfortunately the basis for all persuasion.

Heavy researching 'climate change' is not something I'm interested in doing with my time. Regardless, a cursory search (and just being alive) is enough to know that 'your' evidence is no more different than 'their' evidence. It's all predicated on what you want to believe. Can't be helped.... I have my own s*** I like to believe and find evidence for.
Truth will out eventually soon though, as climate is not like some branch of far out speculative physics
 
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Based upon both history and what I see in the world today, I think Marxism is an improved slave management system installed by Oligarchs to extract resources from the Proletariat so they can live comfortably and further their goal of a One-World totalitarian government run by Elites claiming to be a benevolent Intellectual Class.

Of course, I know this account probably differs from the schooling you received from the Fabians at Oxford.

This version of Marxism can only exist in someone's head if they never bothered to read any Marx.

Everything you described above completely goes against Marx's writings. Where did you get this from? Whoever or wherever you are getting this from is fooling you.
 
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