Looking through comments to the latest article at WUWT, it's clear that the general view of Anthony Watts' fans think that science deniers are incapable of getting into academia. Every comment implies that a university job in whatever field, which entails going to conferences, is restricted to people who accept climate science. Deniers are incapable of getting a job at a university, according to WUWT-ers. At best, they are in such a tiny minority that they don't count.This is a rather strange position for science deniers to take though it does make sense, in a weird way. WUWT fans are assuming people who deny science don't do PhDs or post-docs, let alone make a career for themselves as a lecturer and/or researcher. They assume that science deniers do not have the inclination (or the wherewithal) to do academic research.
If you want evidence, see for yourself. Eric Worrall has copied and pasted some of an article at Huffington Post, written by two academics: Nives Dolšak and Aseem Prakash. The article was suggesting ways that universities and academics could offset their air travel, though Eric didn't write about that. His focus was on the fact that academics fly across the country and around the world to conferences, to exchange ideas with their colleagues.
Communicating electronically is not that easy
Now I don't know about you, but I've never tried to hold a phone or Skype conversation with more than about 15 people at a time, twenty max I think. I've attended lots of teleconferences and web-based discussions lately, and with almost all of them there have been communications difficulties. Even today one cannot be confident that simple telephony will work for everyone for a couple of hours. Most of the electronic meetings involving 10 to 15 people have suffered with static/hiss, drop-outs, difficulties with web-documents and so forth. To hold a conversation with upwards of 30 people is quite a challenge, let alone gatherings of hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of people.
While it's almost impossible to have a trouble-free meeting hookup, they have their place and can be cost-effective (and carbon-friendly). Such small group phone/electronic discussions are common in academia as they are in business and industry. Not as good as face-to-face but better than nothing at all.
When it comes to larger groups, Reddit AMAs have been one way of bringing experts together to discuss their work with the general public, but it has distinct limitations. Combining video and chat is another way of having people interact. If you've ever tried to follow the chat sessions with live video, especially when the comments scroll by at 1,000 a minute, you'll agree that it's not an ideal way to have an exchange of views between academics.
The authors of the HuffPost article agree. They wrote:
As academics, we recognize that workshops, meetings and conferences are important for producing and disseminating knowledge. Our objective therefore is to reduce the carbon “airprint,” not eliminate travel.
Climate hypocrisy?
The authors pointed out that sometimes it's not exchange of ideas that's the key motivator for academic travel. There is also the status associated with flying a lot (not just frequent flyer recognition, but recognition by their colleagues). This is what Eric Worrall picked up on when he wrote about "professional air miles", whatever that means:
Huffington Post has noticed that many university academics are utter climate hypocrites, that many of them rate their personal importance by how many professional air miles they can accumulate every year.
Only the ignorant...
Eric Worrall himself assumes that learned women and men accept the science of climate change implying that it's only the ignorant and uneducated who don't. He added:
This issue goes beyond feeling outraged at the blatant climate hypocrisy.
Why should any of us take academic warnings about anthropogenic CO2 seriously, when behind closed doors those same academics demonstrate their true level of concern by competing with each other to create the largest possible professional carbon footprint?
How to reduce the impact of air travel
Meeting colleagues to discuss ideas face-to-face is important, from time to time, if these ideas are to progress and make a meaningful difference to the world. The HuffPost authors' suggestions, which Eric didn't mention, include:
- making air travel transparent - recording the distance flown by each person and collectively by each university;
- establishing an internal carbon tax and use it to by carbon offsets to reduce the harm caused by air travel.
These are good suggestions. Offsetting air travel by reducing carbon emissions elsewhere would be an interim measure until air travel becomes climate friendly, which won't happen for quite some time, or until electronic discussions can be made to work better for larger (and smaller) gatherings.
Fake sceptics agree: Educated people don't reject science
Getting back to the assumption by science deniers at WUWT, that there are virtually none of their kind in academic positions, is it any wonder that there are no science-denying published by science deniers, when they don't write them?
This blows apart fake sceptic arguments that there are gatekeepers preventing their work being published. It's not gatekeepers stopping their silliness, it's there are virtually no people of advanced learning who dispute science.
Glad to have that recognised - today at least. Tomorrow they'll have some other excuse at the ready.
Of course, most WUWT-ers don't just want to shut down climate science or stop scientific research on any topic, they won't be happy until there is no university or knowledge-building institution standing anywhere in the world.
Of course, most WUWT-ers don't just want to shut down climate science or stop scientific research on any topic, they won't be happy until there is no university or knowledge-building institution standing anywhere in the world.
From the WUWT comments
Here are some of the comments under Eric's misleading article:
Bitter&twisted seems to think climate scientists are the only people who work in universities. There are no other scientists, and no academics in law, the humanities, engineering, philosophy, social sciences, economics or other fields. She wrote:
April 1, 2018 at 1:29 am
Why does this egregious hypocrisy of climate “scientists” come as no surprise?
Ronald P Ginzler takes the argument to the extreme, invoking a logical fallacy as deniers do, ignoring what the authors wrote and the suggestions they made:
April 1, 2018 at 4:41 pm
“First, transparency.” (Quote from the article.) The authors, who are UOW professors, then neglect to reveal how many air miles they have sinned in the past year. Travel is evil, we should all be on foot or on bicycles. No, wait, bicycles are made in factories, which are also evil. Welcome to the new Dark Ages.
I don't believe Willis Eschenbach. Many people who understand the problem have taken steps to reduce their carbon footprint yet Willis continues to disinform his readers. If he admitted this, as he surely should, he'd just shift the goalposts because that's what science deniers do.
April 1, 2018 at 1:30 amPop Piasa implies he didn't even read the article Eric quoted from, and just wanted to point out that he'd never get a job in academia (using the logic of WUWT deniers):
I’ll start believing that CO2 might be a problem when the people who claim it’s a problem start acting like it’s a problem …
w.
April 1, 2018 at 12:17 pm
I’ll start reading the Huff Post when they realize CO2 is not the primary driver of global temps.
Louis thinks that only "liberal elites" are clever enough to advance to academic positions. Conservative elites need not apply:
April 1, 2018 at 1:38 am
These liberal elites get so upset when we are unwilling to change our lifestyle to fight climate change, yet here they are bragging about who among them has the biggest carbon footprint. If they really believed their own hype about catastrophic climate change, wouldn’t they want to set an example for everyone else?
There were the usual "but algore is fat" comments, although tempered by a couple of people who pointed out Gore uses carbon offsets. Ed Zuiderwijk started it:
April 1, 2018 at 1:55 am
How many air miles have Al Gore and his Flying Circus accumulated over the past decade?
Tom in Florida added the "is fat" part:
April 1, 2018 at 7:06 am
He’d be better off if he was calorie neutral.
Michael Jankowski was one of the people who mentioned carbon offsets. (Sophocles was the other.)
April 1, 2018 at 7:40 am
At one time he had the company of a board he sat-on pay for carbon credits to offset his travels, so he pretended jet-setting across the globe was being done responsibly.
WUWT should avoid any claim its readers are intelligent. Not with people such as tom0mason expressing unintelligible "thoughts" like this:
April 1, 2018 at 2:09 am
If only someone invented some kind of televisual method of meeting but I can’t imagine that would happen in these ‘professorial colleagues’ lifetimes — not while all the BIG BUCKS keep rolling in!
And like this one, from Moderately Cross of East Anglia, who clearly never went to university or met a harried academic:
April 1, 2018 at 2:33 am
Right and don’t forget all those people involved looking after these hypocrites to ensure they are waited on hand and foot and fed – in fact the very people whose lives these academics are happy to screw up. Weapons grade stupidity and hypocrisy hardly begins to describe these academics.
I find it curious that deniers assume that academics don't talk with each other between conferences and face-to-face meetings. Many of them do use tools such as web-meetings, the telephone, email and Skype (or other mixed web and phone). Russ Wood wrote about Zoom, implying such facilities are not used in academia. Web-assisted conferencing is fine - not terrific, but it works okay - for small groups of people on a good internet connection. It's not so good for anyone on a far-flung research site (or a farm). Nor does it suit extensive discussions involving more than about 10 people. Web-based sessions can certainly work with bigger audiences; however, they are not as good as face-to-face when lengthy one-on-one discussions involving larger groups are important.
April 1, 2018 at 4:12 am
There are EXCELLENT televisual meeting programs – my wife uses one to give Webinars on her professional speciality. The particular one she uses is ‘Zoom’, but there are many others.
Ah! But then the ‘climate experts’ wouldn’t be able to spend a week in a nice resort at someone else’s expense! (Probably the taxpayers’).
In a similar vein, James Bull, implies "all sorts of industries" only use phone or web to meet, and never meet face to face or hold industry conferences.
April 1, 2018 at 10:11 am
A friend of mine runs just such a company used by many to hold meetings and presentations for all sorts of industries world wide. But of course the elite have to have it better than the likes of us.
James Bull
Oh. This is a beautiful example of conspiratorial denier-speak from nicholas william tesdorf. It's a language all of its own:
April 1, 2018 at 2:20 am
When the Puffington Host notices hypocrisy, the hypocrisy is of truly monumental proportions, especially if it occurs amongst its own anointed ones. The main support of CO2 Global Warming Alarmism is held firmly in place by the Group Dynamic rewarding true belief and systematically punishing criticism or analysis of the hollow shell of CO2 Global Warming Alarmism, which would harm the acolyte’s benefits.
There's more, from mikewaite, this time with Stalin thrown into the mix. He's deep into "education is evil and academics are Satan" one occasionally finds among the under-educated (e.g. certain US-style "home-schooled") deniers at WUWT:
April 1, 2018 at 4:23 am
Simon Montefiore in his book the “The Young Stalin” mentions that by “Dictatorship of the Proletariat” Lenin meant exactly that :” OF the proletariat “, not ” BY the proletariat”. In similar vein , in his recent book about the communist spies in Britain (Philby , Burgess , Fuchs etc) Richard Davenport-hines talks that the early sympathisers of Soviet Russia admired the communist system because it encouraged working people to stay in their ordained roles and not try to “ape” the bourgeoisie by attempting to improve their status.
Clearly the global warming advocates are following a well worn path.
There are a lot more "thoughts" in the same vein. I didn't see any comment that hinted that a fake sceptic could ever get work as an academic. I know some have managed it. I think deniers are, oddly enough, trying to maintain some consistency (ha!) with their line that all academics are "liberal leftists, Satanists, Stalinists, commies, fascists, watermelons, libtards..." who accept the science that made our lives what it is today. (Instead of academia being made up of dim deniers who think that physics is a hoax, the earth is flat, and gravity isn't real.)
Nice try Sou, but no banana. Openly competing to see who can accumulate the most air miles suggests nobody expected to be called out for their carbon sins, that such conversations were completely normal and acceptable amongst their peers.
ReplyDeleteIf academics felt any sense of urgency about avoiding air travel, academics would put up with the inconvenience of teleconferencing, and would make an effort to fix any deficiencies to improve their teleconferencing experiences.
For example, if the world was in the grip of a deadly pandemic with long symptom free infectious period and a high R number, you wouldn't catch an academic within ten miles of an airport. Teleconferencing would be the preferred means of holding large meetings.
Clearly the climate issue is a lot less urgent in the minds of University of Washington academics than their pride and sense of personal prestige. Remember the people laughing and boasting about their extreme air club memberships are mostly the same people who submitted 136 million miles of air travel claims in 2014
I do think everybody has a duty to minimise their carbon footprint.
ReplyDeleteBut, unlike the fanboys at WUWT, I don't think rape is OK because UN peacekeepers do it.
Eric, you have no decency, do you. If you read the article properly, and mine, and not been a dishonest chap by inclination or a "climate hoax" conspiracy theorist, you would not have misrepresented either.
ReplyDeleteWhat are your views on the suggestions made by the authors? You made no mention of those.
Do you really think that people concerned about climate change don't "walk the walk"? (Or is it just that you project all your character flaws onto everyone else?)
What is your opinion about this tweet from one of the world's leading oceanographers/climatologists?
Stefan Rahmstorf @rahmstorf
Good points. I pride myself on not having any frequent flyer status, I don’t fly enough. You can be influential as a scientist without that! Good publications are more important than going to conferences.
BTW - you haven't addressed one of the core conclusions I got from your article and the responses. Do you seriously think that there are no fake sceptics in academia? What about Willie Soon? What about Judith Curry? What about Roy Spencer and John Christy, Ross McKittrick, Peter Rudd, and the other handful of prominent deniers? Is there only a handful because science deniers can't hack the pace, or is it because they are waging a war against knowledge? They can neither beat it nor join it.
By the way, it's weird that Eric thinks that academics don't use teleconferencing - and telling that he doesn't mention web-conferencing. He's probably not stepped into a university in decades (or maybe not since the phone was invented), if ever.
ReplyDeleteYou can hear the experience of another scientist who grounded himself because of climate change. (I haven't yet.)
ReplyDeletehttps://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/eastermonday/audio/2018638696/why-scientist-shaun-hendy-has-grounded-himself
What are your views on the suggestions made by the authors? You made no mention of those.
ReplyDeleteSou you are still missing the point.
If climate was an urgent issue there would be no need for academics to police each other's actions. In the example I gave of a pandemic, the risk of dying would police the actions of most people tempted to travel. Academics who ignore the contribution their air travel allegedly makes to dangerous climate change are demonstrating that they just don't care - the issue is not personally urgent enough for them to change their behaviour..
As for the occasional academic who takes a stand on air travel, I respect their integrity. But if the description of University of Washington provided by the authors is accurate, principled conscientious objectors to the academic air travel culture seem more the exception than the norm. 136 million air miles in one year, 23,811 tons of CO2 equivalent in one year.
Do you really think suggestions that academics should police each other more vigorously in the future will somehow compensate for for their utter lack of concern about their own carbon footprints? Punishing academics who transgress is just forcing them to keep up appearances - it has no bearing on their true personal level of concern, which going by their flagrant academic air travel culture is pretty close to zero.
Unless you compare the travel of academics with people working in other sectors, you've not made any point at all.
ReplyDeleteSure, air travel can be curtailed, or at least offset (with carbon offsets). However, you've still not responded to the main point of the article, which is the suggestion for how to manage air travel without curtailing the development of new knowledge.
Oh, I get your argument, Eric. I see it on denier blogs all the time. The extension of your argument is that unless working career scientists move into a cave and stop all aspects of modern life, including no travel to dangerous remote places where they carry out research, stop cooking, stop working on their super-computers, stop traveling to work or to conferences where ideas are exchanged, stop informing the public about the dangers ahead, then climate change can't be real. Stupid plus!
It's part of the "clever" argument of deniers to stop funding research, thinking that if scientists stop working then global warming will stop.
In reality, you (like Ronald P Ginzler above) just want to play "gotcha". You don't "believe in" science or climate science and will spend hours each day deriding it, much like the idiot lads who self-consciously hover at the back of the class sniggering at the teacher (and the clever kids up front).
By the way, for anyone interested, there are about 23 climate experts at UWA, out of a staff complement of approximately 25,000. Eric thinks climate science is a hoax because some of these 25,000 people fly in aeroplanes.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.washington.edu/news/uw-climate-change-experts/
https://www.quora.com/How-many-employees-are-there-at-the-University-of-Washington
If the HuffPo had written an article that climate scientists fly less than other academics, WUWT would have made a scandal out of these activist scientists.
ReplyDeleteEric Worrall is a clear political hack.
Clearly all climate scientists should be issued with a bicycle and a canoe (or kayak depending on taste) for all travel. Semaphore telegraph can replace wasteful electrical communication system. There is nothing like a good goose quill pen and some parchment or vellum as a communication mode.
ReplyDeleteThe scientists can raise their own geeese and parchment/ vellum sources, thus further reducing their carbon footprint.
I somehow suspect the WUWT readers would not feel this is sufficient.
Sorry I was feeling a bit sarcastic thes morning.
What's become clear to me over years of reading climate change deniers (skeptics, contrarians, denialists, pick a label) is that few of them have scientific backgrounds, understand how scientific research is conducted, are familiar with universities, or have been to technical conferences of any kind. At this point, remote networking and conference tools do not scale up to the needs of large groups, and while they can be extremely useful to keep in regular contact with a small working group, they don't replace in-person interactions.
ReplyDeleteAs for the contrarians, yes, there are a minor number of engineers and scientists among the ranks, some with up to graduate level education and even a statistically trivial number of professors (almost all opining about matters well outside their own areas of expertise), but for the most part these are angry, isolated individuals shouting about a world that is entirely foreign to them.
Like many conspiracy theorists, they seem in dire need of real-life friends and/or productive hobbies. Unfortunately the Internet has been no friend to them.
I know Kevin Anderson has made some pointed comments about the need for him and his fellow climate scientists to set a better example than they have been. I was going to cite a video of his but I found this 2016 article and it seemed to be right on point regarding the writer, a climate scientist, making the effort to cease flying and embrace a more environmentally friendly way of life. I wonder what the likes of Mr Worrall makes of it given his previous comments - http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/life-after-oil/how-far-can-we-get-without-flying-20160211
ReplyDeleteKnowledge acquisition in action
ReplyDeleteClimategate Email 3980.txt
Phil Jones:
As I've booked the flights on frequent flyer miles, I'm wondering if I can convince myself (my grant) that I can justify the hotel ...
Michael Mann:
looking forward to seeing you in Tahiti, we can enjoy some nice tropical drinks w/ umbrellas in them.where are you planning on staying by the way? I haven't decided yet. The cheap options sound way to spartan to me, but the nicer options are so expensive!
ROFL, Eric is still quoting stuff stolen by Putin's hackers.
ReplyDeleteHey Eric, that "source" you are using also tells us that we Brits carried out the nerve agent attack here on our own soil. Do you believe that?
ReplyDeleteThe so-called 'Climategate' emails are what, ten years old now? Their veracity aside, is that the best you can do Mr Worrall? You were claiming, I believe, that recent technology makes air travel to conferences unnecessary? Are you now claiming that this technology was available a decade ago?
ReplyDeleteBest Regards
Kevin
All this wuht nonsense reminds me of the headline in the Roman Times, at the time of Jesus' walking on water at the Sea of Galilee
ReplyDeleteEXCLUSIVE Son of God can't swim
Tadaaa
The individual "carbon footprint" canard can be ignored as the red herring that it is. Everybody is guilty of carbon contributions, even sitting here typing on this keyboard has a measurable impact upon my own carbon footprint.
ReplyDeleteGetting sucked into these really stupid debates over really stupid arguments is a waste of life. The "hypocrisy" is still full-retard on the climate denialists who will seek any argument, including stupid arguments to pretend that climate science is wrong. Don't sink to their level of idiocy.
I stopped driving for 13 years - and it didn't make a whit of difference. It did not change anybody's attitude towards me, or my carbon contributions, or the science-based arguments about climate change. Worrall is seeking to lay false accountability upon everyone - but himself. He's just another moron trying to find some wiggle room for his anti-science, climate denial bullshit. Ignore him.
Climate change deniers would not miss an opportunity for a Tu quoque claim. The fact that such a claim is fallacious is obvious.
ReplyDeleteI would not have to steal email to know that top scientists have to travel a lot because many want to hear their advice. Nor would I need such criminal acts to know that for the maximum a civil servant is allowed to spend it is sometimes hard to get a decent place to stay the night.
ReplyDeleteWhile you can find a few dozen bloggers in a medium sized city or region and it is easy to find a few dozen conspiracy theorists in a small region, there are only a few dozen people in the entire world that have sufficient expertise to help me in my research.
I am happy that most of my colleagues are in Europe and that we have good public transport. America could start building up their crumbling infrastructure that civil engineers give a grade of D. But the same demographics that populates WUWT are not speaking up that their president is breaking his campaign promises again and does nothing on that front. A decent rail network would reduce the need for flights a lot.
OMG - Eric discovered that two people went to Tahiti ten years ago. And they flew in an aeroplane instead of rowing a boat. That *proves* climate change is a hoax.
ReplyDeleteImagine if they were climate migrants from the UK and flew to sunny (and stormy, flood-prone) Queensland. That would have the hoax signed, sealed and delivered.
>>I am happy that most of my colleagues are in Europe and that we have good public transport.
ReplyDeleteDriving from Australia to Europe (or North America, or anywhere else) is not possible. Our cross-nation public transport stinks, too. That's why the Melbourne-Sydney route is one of the busiest air routes in the world. The train service is woeful - old-style third world "comfort", slow and unreliable.
Our nationwide communications lie somewhere between fair and appalling, which is why I complained about teleconferences and web meetings being difficult at best.
And don't get me started on our support for climate science - or lack of, or action to reduce carbon emissions...
Plus in science the convenient teleconference times for Europe and America (afternoon in Europe), which makes up the bulk of the researchers, is rather unfortunate for Australia (and East Asia).
ReplyDeleteA friend of mine was an R&D engineer for the old Digital Equipment computer company. He told me that Digital had the largest private "airforce" in the U.S., because the company founder felt it was that important to have face to face meetings. This included fixed wing and helicopter aircraft.
ReplyDeleteHey Eric: in this latest news report your Russian pals are repeatedly accused of being in denial. Doesn't that mean - according to climate change denier logic - the nasty western media are linking them to the holocaust?
ReplyDeleteDriving from Australia to Europe (or North America, or anywhere else) is not possible.
ReplyDeleteTisk tisk, a decent sail boat should get you to within railway distance of Paris in about 6 months with minimal carbon expenditures. I am sure that is how Eric travels.
On a more serious note, I understand Kevin Anderson's point but I think he should also consider if a judicious uses of flying might be a good idea. If one is a climate scientist one should try to stay at the cutting edge of the field and from what I read, and old confernence attendence (in another disipline) I suspect direct personal contact with other researchers results in a synergistic effect.
Also, from a cynical point of view, unless enough people emulate him that the airlines cut back by a flight, his reduction in carbon production is purely notional.
Richard Mercer:
ReplyDelete"A friend of mine was an R&D engineer for the old Digital Equipment computer company. He told me that Digital had the largest private "airforce" in the U.S., because the company founder felt it was that important to have face to face meetings. This included fixed wing and helicopter aircraft."
That DEC helicopter shuttle from Logan Airport (Boston) to Maynard, MA (DEC HQ) sure saved me a ton of hassle back in the day ...
I'm pretty sure that if leftist academics, Al Gore, and ministers attending climate negotiations were to all stop flying in airplanes, the airline industry would collapse from lack of passengers.
ReplyDeleteI figured this out by reading climate deniers. Whenever they fret about airplanes contributing to global warming, it is because of the above-named populations.
Sounds an aweful lot like an apologia pro vita sua to me.
ReplyDeleteIn case you missed it. This from the chief dimwit at WUWT endorsing censorship of a scientific report.
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/wattsupwiththat/status/981167663027183618?s=21
Let's do the math. How many miles a year does a frequent flyer climate scientist rack up on his account? 10,000? 20,000? Let's say 20,000.
ReplyDeleteAviation is responsible for 2% to possibly 5% of annual emissions. About 50 billion miles are flown every year. 20,000 miles is 0.0000004 of 50 billion miles, or (please check my math) 0.00004% of that total. But that includes every single person on all those flights. There are 3 to 4 billion people taking air flights every year.
So, that climate scientist, if he flies to 4 conferences a year is therefore a passenger about eight to ten times that year. That frequent-flying climate scientist is responsible for (3.5) X (10) = 35 billionths of the 0.00004% of total air miles flown.
And that resulting fraction needs to be multiplied by 1/50 or 1/20 to come up with the total carbon footprint those 20,000 miles of air travel he is responsible for. I can't even do the math - the numbers require scientific notation they are so small and I am hopeless at it.
But can we agree? This is a really really small number in the grand scheme of things. A number that does not justify being called a hypocrite. A number that has a gigantic ROI considering how important is the work of a climate scientist.
I was going to make the simple observation that the underlying premise of Worral's argument of the nonsignificance of human-caused global warming is completely invalidated by the logical fallacy in which he has engaged, and ask him if he has the nous to understand which fallacy it is. The only problem is that Frank Rosser beat me to it, and laid it down for all to see.
ReplyDeleteThe point remains though that Worral has never once raised any point of fact that counters the seriousness and urgency of the climate change problem. He's selling smoke, pure and simple.
Eric has done a "Brave Sir Robin", as is his habit.
ReplyDeleteThis talking point has been floating around for years, usually brought up by the more dimwitted among the already intellectually challenged denier flock. For them to regurgitate it now and give it a bit more emphasis just shows how desperate they must be.
ReplyDelete_ Dang, we don't have any science to fight the alarmists with. Hey, Eric can you bring me your "bag-of-stupid" and see what we can dredge up.
_ No problem Anthony; that's my favourite bag. I carry it with me everywhere.
_ You know, Eric. The alarmists think they're smart but we're even smarter. Eric, I'm so smart I just made up a word _ "smartererer".
_ Does it mean smarter than smart?
_ I knew you were intelligent, Eric. Not many people would have guessed that.
_ To come up with that...YOU'RE the genius. Can I kiss you?
_ Shssss...not here Eric. For goodness sake, not in public.
Ok. Where was I. You got me flustered with the kissing business. Ah, yes, how smart we are. See, what we do is, we don't need to pore over scientific papers; look at evidence, facts, measurements etc. We let the alarmists do all the hard work and then watch how they behave. You've got to be cunning like a fox; take short cuts. To preserve brain cells, you have to do as little thinking as possible.
_ Wow. I think we're meant for each other, Anthony. Can I hug you.
_ Not here (pushes him away)
_ Sorry Anthony. In your presence I can't contain myself. But I know what you're saying is true because that's what I've done instinctively all my life. If I think more than five minutes my brain gets tired, so I try not to do too much.
_ We skip the unnecessary work and just watch how they behave and we'll know for sure if there's something to worry about with this "Knowbull Warming". Look Eric, I invented another word _ "knowbull". Hahahahahaha. It's so funny this one. I'd better stop. My brain is getting tired already from inventing these words.
(Eric is rolling on the floor laughing). Alright, alright, that's enough Eric.
All these things they're telling us are bad, that's all bunkum. They're all scientific hoaxes. I know smoking is safe because a doctor I knew used to smoke... and drink too. What about speeding. They say speeding is dangerous...what a load of crap. Cops speed all the time. If speeding was dangerous there wouldn't be a cop alive; and all racing car drivers would be dead too. You see Eric, what all those so-called smart people have missed is that nobody has ever died from speeding unless they've hit something _ another car, a tree etc. So speeding, in itself, is not dangerous. You just have to avoid hitting something. And of course Knowbull Warming. You see, Eric, if alarmist science was so sound they'd be alarmed and not one of them would be doing any carbon-emitting activity. The fact that they are means that the science is bs. The logic is irrefutable. I know it's so because every time I run that argument past an alarmist, they shake their heads. That's another irrefutable observation of mine. If an alarmist shakes his head it means he has no answer to my foolproof logic.
_ Gee, Anthony. I get so excited listening to you.
_ Oh, for goodness sake, Eric. Is that an erection? Quick, go and hide behind that tree before someone notices.
Meanwhile, somewhere in the woods of red-state Texas, a lone climate scientist is trying to set an example. He is writing a scientific paper by the light of a candle. Poor man; he only got back from sailing to Europe _ a six month return journey _ and he didn't even make it to that scientific conference he was so looking forward to. Missed it by a week because the winds weren't favourable on the way there.
And now deniers have scrawled graffiti on his window _ "Hypocrite scum! That candle is emitting CO2!"
There may be another motive for running stories on the extravagances of climate scientists. Heartland employees are busy concocting stories in defence of one very naughty boy who really has been extravagant at the taxpayer's expense.
ReplyDelete