tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6727975.post6260192849772237025..comments2024-03-25T16:30:58.213+13:00Comments on GREENIE WATCH: JRhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00829082699850674281noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6727975.post-9213876269313131322008-04-18T12:50:00.000+12:002008-04-18T12:50:00.000+12:00A very good analogy of truly stupid "skepticism" a...A very good analogy of truly stupid "skepticism" and "denial"in fact akin to Holocaust denial (of pictures of piles of bodies and piles of shoes and glasses etc., ovens, mass graves, personal reports and wrist tattoos, a history of the phrase "The Jewish Problem" that was akin to our modern day "Drug Problem" etc. etc. etc.) those who claimed that AIDs was not caused by the rapidly mutating and very devilish HIV virus. It's devilish not just because it mutates like crazy, but also it makes its home in the immune system itself!<BR/><BR/>This included Kerry Mullis, Nobelist for his invention of the ("Jurassic Park") polymerase chain reaction (PCR) that amplifies trace amounts of DNA into huge amounts. These DENIERS actually invoked in most stupid fashion Koch's Postulates: that to prove a disease is caused by a given vector one must incubate it, then use it to re-infect an animal (in this case somewhat unethical despite an actual abundance of human volunteers), but at the time, HIV couldn't be grown in a Petri dish SINCE IT INFECTS NOT BLOOD AGAR MEDIUM, but living IMMUNE SYSTEM CELLS that don't take kindly to living in Petri dishes.<BR/><BR/>Mullis is also a Global Warming skeptic, but ALSO a skeptic of the well-known mechanism of catalytic ozone depletion by halogen (chlorine) radicals, so basically he's skeptical about EVERYTHING, except...I kid you not...ASTROLOGY. The "thin razor's edge between genius and insanity" has never had a better textbook example, but then, skepticism of his lone maverick type is healthy for science, and PCR has already saved many lives, directly and indirectly. It SHOULD have been invented many years earlier, for no new methods were involved, just a combination of standard ones.<BR/><BR/>The DENIALIST THEORY was that "gay lifestyle" was the real cause, in the same way that although a bacteria "causes" ulcers, not everybody with traces of the bacteria in their stomach gets an ulcer, but that a combination of stress *and* the bacteria are usually necessary. That the inventor of this theory took a HUGE DOSE of the bacteria and then got an ulcer was proof only of the bacteria's ROLE in ulcer formation. That AIDS has become more of a black than a gay disease in the USA doesn't support the "gay lifestyle" theory either (besides 30% of black adult men from NYC being in jail, 40% also have HIV).<BR/><BR/>However, I have not heard ANY "HIV causes AIDs" deniers WILLING TO INJECT THEMSELVES WITH THE BLOOD OF FULL BLOWN AIDS PATIENTS.<BR/><BR/>Have you?<BR/><BR/>What I *have* heard of, many times over, is how in random hospitals, accidental needle pricks have given nurses HIV, or how tainted blood given to physically injured hospital patients gave them AIDS, or how anti-HIV drugs work by specifically known mechanisms that target enzymes needed by the HIV virus to reproduce, etc. etc. etc.<BR/><BR/>The HIV "deniers" really did consciously ignore such utterly blunt EARLY and DEFINITIVE evidence, so really were "deniers." I remember reading their highly emotional (verging on hysterical) criticisms in which such factual evidence was simply IGNORED.<BR/><BR/>But WHAT blunt evidence are "Anthropogenic Global Warming Deniers" denying? Where's a simple cause–and–effect chart I am even ALLOWED to "deny"?! The hockey stick?! To point out that it was a case of "lying with statistics" (http://www.amazon.com/How-Lie-Statistics-Darrell-Huff/dp/039309426X/ref=ed_oe_p) is an understatement, not a "denial."<BR/><BR/>"Denial" assumes a mindset of CONSPIRACY theory, like those who deny that it was a plane that hit the Pentagon, even though there are pictures of the PAINTED AIRLINE LOGO on large pieces of sheet metal strewn across the grassy knoll (I mean lawn) next to the crash hole. If you want to turn most of a plane to dust, which building OTHER than the Pentagon might you fly it into? Ah, a Pyramid! Or maybe the containment dome of a nuclear reactor. The "pilots" that hit the Pentagon *knew* it was a useless target, so their original plans were to hit the much more fragile Capitol Building, which they couldn't see out the window in time.<BR/><BR/>The question arises though, is Global Warming skepticism really a case of truly crazy people who support and maintain a bonafide conspiracy theory and form a close knit cult-like community? Holocaust denial is obviously so, and thus worthy of curt dismissal, to deny the deniers, so to speak.<BR/><BR/>[I am ignoring the HIV as God's Wrath rants of the conspiratorial Religious Right television celebrities, of which 90% have defrocked themselves already in (often gay) sex scandals, my favorite being Pastor Ted who ran Richard Dawkins off his property a few months before his gay prostitute habit was exposed, screaming his lungs off that Dawkins for implying that his "flock" were "animals" (!!!).]<BR/><BR/>But Global Warming skepticism (GWS) isn't like that, especially since it has been a grass-roots, mainly Net phenomenon of mostly non-climatologist scientists and science buffs, over time looking up publications and slowly looking for problems, but mainly pointing out MAIN STREAM MEDIA BIAS, which has been the fad of the blogophere for a decade now. Suddenly the MEDIA itself is being muchracked, otherwise known as having ITSELF racked over the coals.<BR/><BR/>But GWS is qualitatively, philosophically different from the very good analogy of "HIV denial" as it is described on Wikipedia:<BR/>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDS_reappraisal<BR/><BR/>"Several prominent scientists once associated with AIDS reappraisal have since changed their views and accepted the idea that HIV plays a role in causing AIDS, in response to an accumulation of newer studies and data. Robert Root-Bernstein, author of 'Rethinking AIDS: The Tragic Cost of Premature Consensus' and formerly a critic of the HIV/AIDS paradigm, has since distanced himself from the AIDS dissident movement, saying: "The denialists make claims that are clearly inconsistent with existing studies. When I check the existing studies, I don’t agree with the interpretation of the data, or, worse, I can’t find the studies [at all]."<BR/><BR/>To add a nail to the coffin, literally, I further quote from the Wikipedia article, a sadly humorous fact:<BR/>"The magazine 'Continuumg', run by HIV-positive dissidents, shut down when its editors all died of AIDS-related causes."<BR/><BR/>***<BR/><BR/>This allows me to create a new theory, that of CONTROVERSY ENTHUSIAST TYPES:<BR/><BR/>Type A ("Asshole"): Offers up normal, usually early, skepticism of a new hypothesis. Though often stupid, this is extremely healthy for science, since it forces much more strong evidence to be published. And (!), often, A's end up being correct after all!<BR/><BR/>Type B for ("Bastard"): Unfortunately normal, early and late, mostly just ignores a new hypothesis, based on simple old age inflexibility of scientists (pictures of atoms in crystals are not really pictures of atoms, claimed one of my alcoholic physics professors). These are lazy people. They soon die, being replaced by a new generation of scientists (or "man will never fly" engineers). They really do deny evidence, and thus really are "deniers." Today, many aging nutritionists fall into this category. But so do many Emeritus professors who actually don't care about getting tenure or funding any more, so actually have the balls to be extremely skeptical of new theories, just out of habit, having seen so many fads come and go already, meaning when they *do* speak up, they can, in coherent moments, act as A's.<BR/><BR/>Type C ("Crazy"): They simply lack the aptitude and/or training that is as vigorous as Navy Seal training, namely, HARD-NOSED SKEPTICISM at such an extremely unnatural level that most mortal men or women have NO IDEA is so intense at the highest levels of real science. Often their entire self-image, ego and self-esteem are wrapped up in the POLITICS of a scientific theory. Instead of debating skeptics, they demonize them, and to be fair, given their actual lack of understanding of how scientific debate can be very heated in general without causing wars or murders, especially given the fact that most scientists entered science due to disgust with such "earthly" affairs, they are prone to take great offense towards skeptics of a theory, and truly cannot understand a typical skeptic's motivation except as being something BAD and thus worthy of fighting, even organizing against to literally fight.<BR/><BR/>Global Warming skeptics are mostly A's, whereas most (but not all) Global Warming activists are C's. The most B's do is sign petitions.<BR/><BR/>Another term for C's is the American slang term for the genitals of a female.<BR/><BR/>***<BR/><BR/>John, sorry for hijacking your comments section as a surrogate blog, but comments sections are now the norm, so a new species is appearing, online, of which I admit to being: a blogrenter. I had a blog once or twice back when there were no blogs, but just "online journals". My personality (INTP = "Architect" vs. yours of which I assume is ENTP = "Mastermind") is too obsessive and perfectionistic to be tied to a single blog, and especially punishing would it be were that blog my own.<BR/><BR/>-=DrNikFromNYC=-Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com