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Koch Brothers pay to show global warming is real
Topic Started: Oct 31 2011, 08:01 PM (4,901 Views)
Chris
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ngc1514
Nov 11 2011, 11:04 AM
Quote:
 
The misconception that knowledge needs authority to be genuine or reliable dates back to antiquity, and it still prevails…It converts the quest for truth into a quest for certainty(a feeling) or for endorsement (a social status). This misconception is called justificationism.

But prevails among who?
In this instance, the arguments Brewster presents, which only typifies the politicization of this issue and others. His argument, if you go back and read it, is one of absolute certainty when science offers no such certainty, a rejection of any skepticism when skepticism is what science is about. His argument carries a facade of science covering scientism.

Think not? Look at his last reply, nothing but arrogant, condescending ad hom: "Nobody in the know is going to pay any attention to you until you roll out something from a real, working climate scientist not in the pay of big energy, but go ahead, keep making a fool of yourself." How did he deal with data his simplistic theory doesn't account for? Same way, he castigates Curry for presenting a view of the data he doesn't like, Curry, a colleague of Muller whom he praises for presenting a view of the data he does like.

Scan back through the thread and you can't help but see it.

Go to this thread to see a repeat performance: Federal Appeals court upholds Healthcare Law.


Who else does such scientism prevail among? Religionists, Creationists, who argue data when it supports their preconceptions and argue the man when it doesn't.

Edited by Chris, Nov 11 2011, 08:29 PM.
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Chris
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telcoman
Nov 11 2011, 03:24 PM
Ad hom, ad hom, ad hom. Whatthe heck is ad hom?
"An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person supporting it."

In short, it's dishonest sophistry.

Here's an example from Brewster: "Nobody in the know is going to pay any attention to you until you roll out something from a real, working climate scientist not in the pay of big energy, but go ahead, keep making a fool of yourself." Unable to address the data, he attacks the person. But like most who engage in ad hom, his attack is made up out of whole cloth. As shown in post #64, the scientist he castigates, Curry, is a colleague of the scientist, Muller, he praises, and those two worked together to produce BEST results, data which if looked at one way Brewster likes because it supports his hypothesis, another way he doesn't because it falsifies it.

I'm surprised, though, telco, that you ask, because you do the same. When your arguments fail, you tend to trot out ad hominem.

Ad hom is generally considered to say just that, the person's argument has failed, it's a flag of surrender. :surrender:
Edited by Chris, Nov 11 2011, 08:44 PM.
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ngc1514
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Chris
Nov 11 2011, 08:27 PM
Who else does such scientism prevail among? Religionists, Creationists, who argue data when it supports their preconceptions and argue the man when it doesn't.

"The misconception that knowledge needs authority to be genuine or reliable dates back to antiquity, and it still prevails…"

So you're saying the argument prevails among people who are not scientists; people who are not qualified to judge the knowledge in any meaningful way?

How, in terms of the knowledge itself, can that be relevant? Who cares what the man on the street has to say about the EPR Paradox? His need for authority is completely irrelevant to both science and how science is done.

To drill down even further, how relevant is what scientists might say about fields of research beyond their own expertise? Good examples of this can be found in the Creationist camp where people like Henry Morris, a Ph.D in hydraulic engineering, speaks meaningfully (supposedly) about the geologic record of the Noachian flood, cosmology and evolution. His books are not directed to his science peers, but only for the non-scientific booboisie (as Mencken called them.)
If Morris was talking about hydraulics, his opinion would carry more weight than when he mumbles about evolution.

Do you agree?
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tomdrobin
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Ad hom it would seem to me is relevant if the person cited as an authority is not an authority or has been corrupted by conflict of interest. Anyone can produce data to support their conclusions, that doesn't mean the data is accurate or relevant.
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Chris
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ngc1514
Nov 11 2011, 09:18 PM
Chris
Nov 11 2011, 08:27 PM
Who else does such scientism prevail among? Religionists, Creationists, who argue data when it supports their preconceptions and argue the man when it doesn't.

"The misconception that knowledge needs authority to be genuine or reliable dates back to antiquity, and it still prevails…"

So you're saying the argument prevails among people who are not scientists; people who are not qualified to judge the knowledge in any meaningful way?

How, in terms of the knowledge itself, can that be relevant? Who cares what the man on the street has to say about the EPR Paradox? His need for authority is completely irrelevant to both science and how science is done.

To drill down even further, how relevant is what scientists might say about fields of research beyond their own expertise? Good examples of this can be found in the Creationist camp where people like Henry Morris, a Ph.D in hydraulic engineering, speaks meaningfully (supposedly) about the geologic record of the Noachian flood, cosmology and evolution. His books are not directed to his science peers, but only for the non-scientific booboisie (as Mencken called them.)
If Morris was talking about hydraulics, his opinion would carry more weight than when he mumbles about evolution.

Do you agree?
That part of the point, that non-scientists or scientists outside their expertise should pretend to be experts. All that accomplishes is the politicization of science, from Henry Morris to Al Gore who, though their mysticisms differ, their emotionalismm is the same. I think though, too, Deutsch goes further to include even scientists in the field of expertise pretending science is certain and absolute, when it's not. Einstein, who knew he'd improved upon Newton, was humble enough to predict another would improve upon his work. If biologists held Darwin as the authority evolutionary theory would never have advanced through the modern synthesis to the extended synthesis it now grapples with (see some of the work by Pigliucci).

Science shouldn't be politicized, and worse, that politicization personalized. It doesn't advance knowledge at all, but undermines it.
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Chris
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tomdrobin
Nov 12 2011, 12:46 AM
Ad hom it would seem to me is relevant if the person cited as an authority is not an authority or has been corrupted by conflict of interest. Anyone can produce data to support their conclusions, that doesn't mean the data is accurate or relevant.
Again, the scientist Brewster ad homed is a colleague of the one he praised (another form of ad hom). The difference was not in which was an expert, but how each viewed the same data, one from a distance, one close up.
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ngc1514
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Chris
Nov 12 2011, 09:58 AM
That part of the point, that non-scientists or scientists outside their expertise should pretend to be experts.
Good, we apparently agree. Now, how do you decide who is correct when scientists look at data that is within their expertise and disagree with the conclusions drawn from that data? In astronomy you have the case of Halton Arp claiming that the apparent recessional velocity of quasars (in particular Markarian 205) is not cosmological (the redshift does not provide a measurement of the distance in opposition to Hubble's constant) and says that a "bridge" exists between Markarian 205 and the galaxy NGC 4319. He also claimed statistical analysis of quasar redshift were quantized. The rest of the astronomical world says the bridge does not exist, the quasar is about 10 times further away than the galaxy and the red shift provides an accurate measurement of the quasar's distance.

For those who might be interested, you can see images of the galaxy/quasar pair and make up your own mind here: Link

Who is correct? Do you go with the "rogue" or with the general consensus? Or, as a layman, should you withhold judgement?


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retired
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ngc1514
Nov 12 2011, 11:06 AM
Chris
Nov 12 2011, 09:58 AM
That part of the point, that non-scientists or scientists outside their expertise should pretend to be experts.
Good, we apparently agree. Now, how do you decide who is correct when scientists look at data that is within their expertise and disagree with the conclusions drawn from that data? In astronomy you have the case of Halton Arp claiming that the apparent recessional velocity of quasars (in particular Markarian 205) is not cosmological (the redshift does not provide a measurement of the distance in opposition to Hubble's constant) and says that a "bridge" exists between Markarian 205 and the galaxy NGC 4319. He also claimed statistical analysis of quasar redshift were quantized. The rest of the astronomical world says the bridge does not exist, the quasar is about 10 times further away than the galaxy and the red shift provides an accurate measurement of the quasar's distance.

For those who might be interested, you can see images of the galaxy/quasar pair and make up your own mind here: Link

Who is correct? Do you go with the "rogue" or with the general consensus? Or, as a layman, should you withhold judgement?


:smile:
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Brewster
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I have a small bone to pick with you, Eric:

Halton Arp may be a "rogue", but at least he's a "rogue" with good credentials in the field, and actually does research. He may be wrong, he may be right, but at least his work is founded in rational scientific inquiry.

In no way analogous to Chris's Judith Curry.
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Chris
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ngc1514
Nov 12 2011, 11:06 AM
Chris
Nov 12 2011, 09:58 AM
That part of the point, that non-scientists or scientists outside their expertise should pretend to be experts.
Good, we apparently agree. Now, how do you decide who is correct when scientists look at data that is within their expertise and disagree with the conclusions drawn from that data? In astronomy you have the case of Halton Arp claiming that the apparent recessional velocity of quasars (in particular Markarian 205) is not cosmological (the redshift does not provide a measurement of the distance in opposition to Hubble's constant) and says that a "bridge" exists between Markarian 205 and the galaxy NGC 4319. He also claimed statistical analysis of quasar redshift were quantized. The rest of the astronomical world says the bridge does not exist, the quasar is about 10 times further away than the galaxy and the red shift provides an accurate measurement of the quasar's distance.

For those who might be interested, you can see images of the galaxy/quasar pair and make up your own mind here: Link

Who is correct? Do you go with the "rogue" or with the general consensus? Or, as a layman, should you withhold judgement?


Withhold judgment, and go with neither, but open up to learning more. Science is by its very nature tentative, incomplete and probabilistic. Not familiar enough with your example to even hazard a judgment there. But in the case of global warming, as I reported in post #64, most scientists have withheld judgment on the matter taking a wait and see attitude that 13 to 15 years on no rise in warming is not significant enough, though 17 might be, against a recently reported dramatic rise in CO2 levels. As you said early on in this thread climate is far too complex to be understood yet as an oversimplified human caused CO2 is the cause of recent warming.
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