Pocket Full of Words

Why, why, why do we need scientific pronouncements from morons? Worse, why in hell does anybody listen to this idiot? The Hollywood illiterati expound on speculative, politicized science they know nothing about, and confuse fact with speculation — “Streisand says to ABC: ‘There could be more droughts, dust bowls. You know, it’s amazing to hear these facts.’ ” [italics mine]

English is a tool. Used well, it precedes a statement like “It’s amazing to hear these facts” with actual facts, not speculation that everyone agrees to pretend is fact. With clear, careful English, statements agree, actions have consequences, there is a connection between parts.

Used by morons, the language breaks; disconnects imply nonexistent relationships between statements that mislead the careless reader into giving garbage pronouncements unearned credence.

There could be dustbowls. Yep. There could be more rains of fish, too, more thirty-foot snow storms, more horses breaking into song and dance in Times Square, and more countries reverting to absolute monarchies, but saying that there could be does not mean there will.

Science is being treated as religion, and that is a frightening thing. Dogma has replaced research, faith has replaced reasonable doubt, and anyone who dares question the Emperor’s lack of clothes is shouted down as a heretic.

We’re using computer models now to predict and suggest possible future weather trends, and some of the results suggested by some of the models are quite alarming. However, these computer models aren’t fed by comprehensive live data, because comprehensive live data doesn’t exist. It has never existed, and while it may someday exist, (if we can gain universal international cooperation to wire the whole planet, from ocean bottom to atmosphere top) it doesn’t exist now. So these models are fed by cherry-picked facts (a random sampling that is not random and cannot be called a sampling), and they’re fed by speculation. They are Streisand’s “could be” — they are not math’s “this is.”

People believe in global warming, though when questioned they cannot offer good science to back up their beliefs. Most arguments devolve into a “they say” litany of “facts” like Streisand’s — the fact that we’ve had bad hurricanes this year is offered as proof that the climate is changing; the fact that glaciers are shrinking (minus the related fact that others are growing) is offered as proof that the whole planet is warming. And these “facts” are linked without any provable causality to human behavior; never mind that the planet’s temperature has never been stable; it has gotten a whole fucking lot warmer than this before humanity came along, as well as a whole fucking lot colder; we are in a high sunspot activity cycle and a natural high temperature cycle; volcanos dump out more emissions every year than all the crap humans dump into the atmosphere; US car emissions and industrial emissions are considerably lower than they were in our coal-burning, steel-manufacturing industrial-base hey-day. (You can go to Pittsburg or East Liverpool or pretty much anywhere along the Ohio River nowadays and your eyes don’t start to bleed. When I was six, this was not the case. The air in the Ohio Valley was yellow then, and it burned when you breathed it, and it was thick enough to cut.), and on, and on.

And if one points out that there’s no provable causality between current weather trends and the theory of human-caused global warming — God, when you dare to demand provable causality before buying into the Global Warmist religion — the Global Warmists assume the attack formation based on what comes down to one’s despicable lack of faith in their religion. We should all believe, because they do, and their faith has led them to the One True Path that will save all of humanity. They can save us from the Hell and damnation of nasty weather, of hurricanes and tornados and droughts (which never, ever happened to anyone before people started driving SUVs), if only we’ll check our brains at the door, have faith … and give them all our money.

Right. Thank you, no thank you. In a thousand years, the Global Warmists will be funny. That’s how long it took for a Monty Python to come along and find humor in the Inquisition. Meanwhile, we’re stuck with the new Dark Age of actress-science, science-faith, and ignorant inquisitioners.

Televangelism ain’t dead, honey. It’s just gone Hollywood.

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