Armored from head to toe with the “invincibility of ignorance” the “momentum of the misinformed” is overwhelming because the informed are so colossally outnumbered.—Paraphrased from a quote from the American Council on Science and Health
"A new scientific McCarthyism is alive and well in America today." --ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan
The idea behind giving professors lifetime tenure is that this will enable them to speak out freely. But it would be hard to name any other occupation with a more cowardly record than academics, who have been giving in to politically correct campus bullies ever since the 1960s.—Thomas Sowell
“…..the vast majority of journalists are not that hot on history, especially where it’s in conflict with their political prejudices.” Gerard Jackson
Furthermore, if America was culturally rational, a snake oil salesman like Al Gore would be publicly mocked, horsewhipped or sued into oblivion as an utter fraud for his massive global warming scam perpetuated against the American people. However, these are perilous and perverse times we live in today where good is considered evil and evil touted as good, virtuous and laudatory; ---- Ellis Washington.
The precautionary principle, popular in Europe, is the idea that no new thing should be permitted until it has been proved harmless. Sounds good, except as Ron Bailey of Reason writes, it basically means, "Don't ever do anything for the first time." John Stossel
Paul Watson, founder of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, says that you are a virus infecting planet Earth: “Curing a body of cancer requires radical and invasive therapy, and therefore, curing the biosphere of the human virus will also require a radical and invasive approach.” How radical? Watson thinks that the parasitical human population should be reduced to less than a billion, and those chosen to survive should inhabit colonies of twenty thousand or less, with uninterrupted wild areas separating them. They will all be vegans or vegetarians, of course, and reproduction will be limited to those who are responsible enough, in Watson's judgement, to handle parenthood…JAWA REPORT
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.… [T]hose who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” C. S. Lewis
The Holy Grail for most scientists is not truth but research grants. Jon Ray
Back in Venezuela, Gabaldón reviewed his problem. Half of his countrymen suffered from malaria at one time or another. It broke the spirit as well as the body. "People with malaria just don't care," says Gabaldón. "They don't even care if you treat them." As a Rockefeller Foundation fellow in protozoology, Gabaldón had learned that the chronic malarial "lose even the desire to procreate." Gabaldón decided to go all out for DDT. "Men in Green"
There is an "ascetic instinct" (or perhaps a "survivalist instinct") in many people that causes them to delight in going without material comforts. Monasteries and nunneries were once full of such people -- with the Byzantine stylites perhaps the most striking example. Many Greenies (other than Al Gore and his Hollywood pals) have that instinct too but in the absence of strong orthodox religious commitments they have to convince themselves that the world NEEDS them to live in an ascetic way. So their personal emotional needs lead them to press on us all a delusional belief that the planet needs "saving". -Jon Ray.
What alternatives do you offer? What hard evidence do you have? How much will it cost? Thomas Sowell
“It is a very human tendency to blame someone for the vagaries of the weather. A run of bad summers in the 1950s was blamed on nuclear bomb tests, the rains during the First World War were blamed on artillery going off on the Western Front and two centuries ago it was the battles of the Napoleonic Wars that were blamed for upsetting nature. And now it's global warming”…………Paul Simons, The Times, July 23, 2007
“If you make a deal with the devil you are the junior partner.” Armey’s Axiom
Would it be considered “piling on” to remind Congress that last year’s hurricane season predictions — that is, a 95 percent chance of a very active season — turned out to be a total bust? If hurricane experts armed with supercomputers can’t predict a regional storm season six months into the future, why would anyone think that they can project global climate trends for the next 100 years?”......Steve Milloy
Simply put: There is no climate policy that could curb greenhouse gases enough to slow global warming to any appreciable degree without ruining the global economy…..Max Borders
Malaria was actually a natural population control, and DDT has caused a massive population explosion in some places where it has eradicated malaria. More fundamentally, why should humans get priority over other forms of life? . . . I don't see any respect for mosquitoes in these posts."…. Jeff Hoffman, environmental attorney, wrote on grist.org
There are many other advantages that the activists have that allow them to get their point of view into the media, often to the exclusion of any contrary perspective. To put it bluntly, even in countries with high levels of education, there is too often a high degree of scientific illiteracy. Given various trends in academia such as postmodernism (which may now be ebbing), being highly educated can still entail a condition of extreme scientific illiteracy or what Thorstein Veblen called "trained incapacity." All these give the skillful activist speaker the opportunity to appear to score points against a scientist in a debate. By Thomas R. DeGregori
….scientific uncertainty, which so often occupies a central place in environmental controversies, can be understood not as a lack of scientific understanding but as the lack of coherence among competing scientific understandings."….. Roger Pielke Jr.
The goal of the environmental movement is to get out the truth and they don’t care how many lies they have to tell to do it.…(Me, and I think I plagiarized it.)
Dr. Elwell: Do you deny that at that time, your patients were under the impression that you were a butcher, and not a doctor?
Dr. Praetorius: Do you prefer the impression given to their patients by so many of our colleagues that they are doctors, and not butchers? From the movie, People Will Talk
"Ours is an ecological perspective that views Earth as a community and recognizes such apparent enemies as 'disease' (e.g., malaria) and 'pests' (e.g., mosquitoes) not as manifestations of evil to be overcome but rather as vital and necessary components of a complex and vibrant biosphere." ……Earth First founder Dave Foreman
As for the "science" you read about in the mainstream media these days, the rule of thumb is caveat emptor: buyer beware….Alan Caruba
The global warming contingent loves to don the Mantle of Science as the reason to curb greenhouse gas emissions. But its backup argument is: It's OK if we're wrong, because we mean well…… If the alarmists are right, the whole world will have to change and it will be onerous. If the global warming alarmists are wrong, much of the sacrifices they demand will have been for nothing.…Debra J. Saunders
Global warming 'is good and is not our fault'….Jon Ray
One of the big pieces of the psychobabble industry is the promotion of "self esteem" at the expense of self control and personal responsibility. But, contrary to popular myth, self esteem is not the holy grail of psychological health. In fact, it is not necessarily even good for you, and most bullies, tyrants and other dysfunctional people fairly ooze self esteem...Pat Santy AKA Dr. Sanity.
Environmental alarmism should be taken for what it is-a natural tendency of some portion of the public to latch onto the worst, and most unlikely, potential outcome. Alarmism should not be used as the basis for policy. Where a real problem exists, solutions should be based on reality, not hysteria." .....Dr. Amy Leigh Kaleita
“It cannot be stated often enough that our universities generally are run by fools who are breeding a generation of fools. There are, of course, many exceptions, but these exceptions have little impact on the deconstruction of civilization and the breeding of anti-intellectuals taking place at our universities”….Dennis Prager.
A peace prize for people fomenting conflict between the developed and developing world, inciting class conflict between the have and have nots? For causing food shortages (and likely greater conflict) through panicked conversion of food crops to biofuels to avoid a phantom menace? And the 'science' part? That has degenerated to the point where computer-generated gibberish is confused with real data. What a sad state...Steve Milloy
Substantially greater investments in infrastructure -- roads, electrical power, water resources --underlie all other efforts in rural and agricultural development. Unless infrastructure is improved, there is little hope for real progress in reversing the alarming food insecurity trends or in making agriculture an engine of economic growth…. Norman Borlaug
It is now a proven fact that eating food - any kind of food - will kill you. No one who has eaten food in the past is alive today, and everyone currently eating food will die. Therefore, those noble people who seek to save us from eating every kind of food that the earth provides should be hailed and saluted for their efforts to keep us alive..….Alan Caruba
An industry can survive those who are foolish and careless. It can survive the overly ambitious, but it cannot survive those who attack an industry and what it stands for from within. The activists are more to be desired because they present themselves as the enemy at the gate. Although they may use deceit and cunning they are known because they carry their banner openly. No matter how formidable they may be they cannot be as serious a threat as those who wear the garments, speak the language and share the customs of those within an organization while secretly working that which is harmful They rot the heart of an industry, undermine the pillars of support and infect the industry with their treason to the point that those who see clearly and understand what is really going on are left standing alone. That industry will no longer be able to resist those who would destroy it. Can any crime be feared more? Paraphrased from a quote by Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC)
“The environmental movement in fact stands out as the true Flat Earth Society, constantly looking to build fences to save us others, the mindless masses, from falling off the edge.” Jon Ray
Traditional wisdom is the slow accumulation of "what has worked" in a given society. Conventional wisdom may be nothing more than the philosophical flavor of the day. Traditional wisdom is a valuable legacy that can only be lost or discarded for conventional wisdom at considerable peril.……Paraphrased comments of Jon Ray, Thomas Sowell and Me.
What weird critters watermelons are………Junkscience
Further, we are not impressed either by the "players" who are swearing that, no, no THIS time the sky is REALLY falling, nor by their tactics. Their longstanding ideology -- anti-Americanism, socialism, communism and the like fosters no great confidence in their latest hysteria either……. Evan Sayet explaining to the Brits why Americans aren’t in love with Kyoto and the climate change crowed.
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