Lamar Smith, Future Chairman For the House Committee On Science, Space, and Tech 292
An anonymous reader writes "Lamar Smith, a global warming skeptic, will become the new chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology. Someone who disagrees with the vast majority of scientists will be given partial jurisdiction over NASA, EPA, DOE, NSF, NOAA, and the USGS. When will candidates who are actually qualified to represent science or at a minimum show an interest in it be the representatives of science with regard to political decision-making?"
Just vote them in to office (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:3, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the house, where an insignificant little nowhere can get a ton of free crap by just electing the same person for 40 years straight thereby giving him enough seniority to gain influence, chair important committees and bring a ton of pork back to his district.
Vote him out? It's not in the best interests of the few constituents he has. All his negatives are externalities that his constituents don't have to pay.
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:3)
ROTFLMAO!
I lived in Austin from '86 through '94. If the district includes a lot of "downtown", it includes almost no voters.
Apparently in the late seventies/early eighties, Austin did the worst possible kind of "urban renewal", which included ripping down almost *all* housing and buildings for small stores. All that's left are Sixth St., where the clubs are... and office buildings. Except for the Capitol, there's NOTHING ELSE THERE. About 2/3rds of the busses that go downtown weekdays don't run downtown weekends - they stop at malls, or whatever, becuse there's no one there.
mark, naturalized Texan
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:2)
If we were to get the Democrats back in the majority, though, these guys wouldn't be the chairmen.
Re:Just vote them in to office (Score:2)
Indeed, let's all bow in sync and vote single party rule. After all, only one party knows what is best for you, and especially for me. Let's be like California, which has a democrat super majority, as I understand. Only good can come from this; no opposition, only sacred and loving devotion to a single party and its goals, stated and otherwise.
Having opposition views is *so* inconvenient.
To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:5, Informative)
Lamar happens to be the dickbag that keeps trying to push things like SOPA... just keep that in mind.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:5, Funny)
Texas may be slowly warming up to the idea
They may want to move a little faster. They have a lot of coastline.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:2)
Everything moves slowly in the south.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:2)
Thoughts, doubly slow.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:2)
going from a shit nominee to a remotely less shit nominee does not mean that Texas is warming up to logic. They're as anti-logic as they ever have been, with intellectuals remaining a minority.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:3)
going from a shit nominee to a remotely less shit nominee does not mean that Texas is warming up to logic. They're as anti-logic as they ever have been, with intellectuals remaining a minority.
With any luck Texas will make good on their threats and secede, taking him with them.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:2)
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:5, Informative)
Lamar Smith is a Christian Scientist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamar_S._Smith#Personal_life [wikipedia.org]
Christian Scientists believe that sickness and disease are the result of fear, ignorance, or sin, and should be healed through prayer or introspection.
Christian Science is opposed to science and uses the appearance of being a science to give itself extra legitimacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Science [wikipedia.org]
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:3)
Texas may be slowly warming up to the idea
No pun intended, I'm sure.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:4, Informative)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Science [wikipedia.org]
Lamar is also a part of the Christian Science denomination. Read up on what these people think, then get back to me.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:2)
They are both insults to Texas. He also represents that part of Texas where they deem breathing a patent violation.
Re:To Be Fair, He's Replacing Texan Ralph Hall (Score:5, Insightful)
In the link parent provides, Hall responds to the "ScienceInsider" interviewer with the phrase "I'm still waiting for some believable science...". Which is telling. A person tells you that a penny doubled each day for a week is $0.64, And for 2 weeks is $ 81.92, and for a month is $10,737,418.24, and he calls you a bald faced liar because its not believable. After the Challenger disaster, there were two groups of scientists at NASA. One who simply couldn't believe that the foam insulating tiles could impart enough energy to damage the wing of the space shuttle. The logic was that after you hit a Styrofoam cooler lid on the highway it explodes in a shower of beads and your cars is too strong to be bothered. The other group, the "Sliderule Engineers" simply said do the math. At the velocity this ship is traveling, the foam will impart over a ton and a half of force. So they build a mockup, built a model space shuttle wing, and fired a foam block at it with reentry velocity. It nearly tore the wing in half. Science doesn't care what you believe in. God maybe cares. Physics not so much. This is the profound stupidity of putting people in key decision making positions about the future of science in this country who ignore facts that don't mix well with their beliefs or vested interests. Sadly, their ignorance is paid for by American and nonAmericans alike everywhere.
Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Insightful)
If he were merely a skeptic, that's ok; a skeptic is a person who's willing to look at the data and see what they say.
However, far too many of the people who call themselves "skeptics" are in fact not skeptics at all, but global-warming deniers: they don't care what the data is, and aren't really interested in learning. They're not really skeptical, because they already have their conclusion, and are only interested in arguments that support it.
To quote S. Fred Singer, "The deniers are giving us skeptics a bad name."
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:2, Insightful)
If he were merely a skeptic, that's ok; a skeptic is a person who's willing to look at the data and see what they say.
However, far too many of the people who call themselves "skeptics" are in fact not skeptics at all, but global-warming deniers: they don't care what the data is, and aren't really interested in learning.
I'm an agnostic. I don't know if or how much global warming is occurring; and given the hyper-partisan rhetoric, name-calling, and various logical fallacies coming from both sides I don't think I'll know for a very long time.
The term you use, "denier", is a perfect example and is in fact a Godwin. The term was well known for Holocaust denier and once it became appropriately stained people started using it to label skeptics of their pet ideas when they didn't want to have to actually convince anyone.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm an agnostic. I don't know if or how much global warming is occurring; and given the hyper-partisan rhetoric, name-calling, and various logical fallacies coming from both sides I don't think I'll know for a very long time.
So skip the partisans and see what qualified people have to say: scientists.
The term you use, "denier", is a perfect example and is in fact a Godwin. The term was well known for Holocaust denier and once it became appropriately stained people started using it to label skeptics of their pet ideas when they didn't want to have to actually convince anyone.
Bullshit. If someone denies a well established fact, they're a denier. The only common bond they have with people who deny other well established facts is that they reject facts established by mountains of evidence.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm an agnostic. I don't know if or how much global warming is occurring; and given the hyper-partisan rhetoric, name-calling, and various logical fallacies coming from both sides I don't think I'll know for a very long time.
So skip the partisans and see what qualified people have to say: scientists.
The problem is, I'm not a climate scientist or even a weather scientist. Nor do I work in a field closely related to them. Frankly I'm unqualified to survey the literature myself. Normally for something like this I would listen to what knowledgeable people say who have read the literature, but in this case knowledgeable people are divided. So my next approach would be to consider who is making the various arguments, what their tone is, whether they seem to be trying to honestly convince me, etc. However in this case both sides are pretty full of people who I don't trust for various reasons. Some because they have backing from corporations that stand to lose money if GW is addressed. Some because they have their own money sources if GW is addressed. Many because they've resorted to name-calling and insults instead of reasoned arguments. Case in point...
The term you use, "denier", is a perfect example and is in fact a Godwin. The term was well known for Holocaust denier and once it became appropriately stained people started using it to label skeptics of their pet ideas when they didn't want to have to actually convince anyone.
Bullshit. If someone denies a well established fact, they're a denier. The only common bond they have with people who deny other well established facts is that they reject facts established by mountains of evidence.
So basically you're saying that what you believe to be true is a "well established fact" which frees you up to call anyone who disagrees with you a "denier" which, as I noted before, first gained notoriety as a term describing holocaust deniers. So is it true then that anyone who disagrees with you is the moral equivalent of a holocaust denier.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Interesting)
...but in this case knowledgeable people are divided.
Well, knowledgeable people are divided on every topic. The question is divided how? If it's 50-50 or even 60-40, I can see some ambiguity. If it's 95-5 or thereabouts (which actually seems to be the case) then it's much less so.
And maybe it's just me, but my mind doesn't go to "holocaust denier" when the term "denier" comes up. I've been hearing the term with regard to global warming for some time, and your post is the first time I've ever seen anybody try to draw that connection, and it certainly wouldn't have occured to *me*.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Informative)
" but in this case knowledgeable people are divided"
NO! they are not. It's is a fake controversy manufactured for rating and the illusion of debate. Nothing more.
The experts in the field have consensus.
"So basically you're saying that what you believe to be true is a "well established fact" "
no. AGW is a well established fact.
As the poster stated: Anyone who opposed something that has a well established facts is a denier. The ONLY exception is if you bring forth a different testable idea. At which point you see if the data fits and have actual scientific debate.
You may have never heard the term 'denier' before the holocaust denier issue, but it has been used for other things for at least 30 years that I personally know of.
A denier is someone who denies facts. YOU are the one that tried to connect to the holocaust. There is a logical fallacy there, you might want to look it up.
If you want real world examples look at China. AGW harm there growth more then anyone on the country, and they say it's real. Look at the predictions, there only fault is that they are turning out to be too conservative.
But you don't understand the literature, so you refuse to believe the community they is experts in the field.
That makes no sense. I'ts like not understanding set theory so you refuse to accept that Cartesian product is real, and the Georg cantor was on the doll of big Maths.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:3)
The problem is, I'm not a climate scientist or even a weather scientist. Nor do I work in a field closely related to them. Frankly I'm unqualified to survey the literature myself. Normally for something like this I would listen to what knowledgeable people say who have read the literature, but in this case knowledgeable people are divided.
You can't know everything, so IMO the sensible thing to do is to defer to the experts. If I wanted to know about star formation, I'd defer to an astronomer, or better yet an astrophysicist, but wouldn't care a fig what a newscaster or successful CEO thinks.
Regarding "divided", for a while the American Association of Petroleum Geologists was the only professional society that rejected global warming, and even they caved in in 2007.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change#Statements_by_organizations [wikipedia.org] for more.
Many because they've resorted to name-calling and insults instead of reasoned arguments. Case in point...
For better or worse, most people only have limited tolerance for fools.
So basically you're saying that what you believe to be true is a "well established fact" which frees you up to call anyone who disagrees with you a "denier" which, as I noted before, first gained notoriety as a term describing holocaust deniers. So is it true then that anyone who disagrees with you is the moral equivalent of a holocaust denier.
No, we're calling anyone who disagrees with what the overwhelming majority of qualified scientists say is a well established fact deniers, just as we would for anyone who denies the expanding universe, the atomic theory of matter, the geocentric solar system, etc.
And cut the crap on holocaust denailism. I have a dictionary from 1972 that has an entry for "denier", no mention of holocaust or Nazis. You're the one who's godwining the thread.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Insightful)
People keep trying to isolate climate scientists, like there's this little fraternity of 20 guys all sitting at a pub in Scotland trying to figure out what they can pull over the worlds eyes. Here's the problem. The climate impacts things. Lots of things. Things all over the place. So when a scientist at NASA who's an expert on what keeps low earth satellites up in space tells you that there is less drag on satellites today, because the upper atmosphere is colder, the compliment to global warming in the lower atmosphere, he's being a climate scientist. And when the biologist tells you that temperatures in ocean water in the tropics is killing off coral around the world she's become a climate scientist. An when the agricultural botanist tells fruit farmers that they have to change up their fertilization straightedges because spring comes 4 weeks earlier than it did 20 years ago he's become a climate scientist. So when you say climate scientist today you in fact are talking about a body of scientists whose disciplines cover hundreds of difference scientific fields including meteorology, biology and botany, oceanography, paleontology, astrophysics, geology and chemistry. This doesn't even begin to talk about the huge subdivision of these sciences, and the tens of thousands of researchers involved. This issue has been investigated, validate and corroborated from so many different angles it is now one of the better understood processes on the planet today.
Here's the crazy part. Remove the billions of dollars worth of FUD and noise being generated by the guys who just want to keep burning carbon, who pretty much own the world as we know it today, guys who really don't appreciate anyone telling them its time to change up, and you'll find a consensus among respected scientific sources that is pretty much comparable to the certainty reserved for evolution, a round earth and relativity. The only real controversy is that people want what people want when they want it, and this is damn inconvenient.
If you want to know why the scientists are emphatic, and angry, and loud about this, imagine being in a passenger in a car being driven at high velocity towards a cliff while the driver is busy inspecting the condition of the visor. You might get a wee bit emphatic in suggesting he just drive instead. If he continued to ignore the approaching precipice you might even get a little testy. Our government is owned and operated on the behalf of men with power. Consider this in the same category as "9 or of 10 doctors smoke XXX Brand Cigarettes." anyone who thinks the entire scientific community is falsifying research to raise more research money must therefore assume all science it just made up, pulled out of some learned man's behind like to perverse magic trick to pay for puttering around laboratories. That would be lawyers and marketing men whispering in your ears. Stop listening to the lawyers and marketing men.
Re:which scientists (Score:4, Informative)
The ones writing scientific articles in the peer-reviewed scientific journals.
You know, the ones who have spent 10 years post-secondary science education studying the details of the physics and chemistry of the atmosphere and oceans to the level of accepted PhD thesis, then gone on to do say 5-years post-doctoral research in a relevant specialty, then conducted accepted peer-reviewed research in these fields for years or decades.
Those ones. Especially the ones that have no funding associations with the fossil fuel industry.
If you seriously have no clue as to how to evaluate the credibility of sources of information, you're in a deep morass of ignorant hurt.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:3, Insightful)
"and various logical fallacies coming from both sides I don't think I'll know for a very long time. "
or you could, you know, read the the actually climatologist are saying.
Scientifically there is no debate. AGW is real. So you can stick you head in the sand becasue pundits blather about nonsense, but that's cowardly and short sighted.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:4, Insightful)
Bollocks, "denier" is perfectly apt for someone who refuses to look at facts that they disagree with.
A sceptic will say, "What evidence do you have that you had breakfast this morning".
A denier will say, "I don't believe you had breakfast this morning" stick their fingers in their ears and shout "LA LA LA LA I CANT HEAR YOU".
You are right that denier is a term of ridicule, but these people bring the ridicule on themselves. If we didn't call them "deniers" they'd still be ridiculed all the same.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:2)
> far too many of the people who call themselves "skeptics" are in fact not skeptics at all
Sadly yes. :-/ The correct term is Pseudo-Skeptic or Irrational Rationalists.
i.e. see Sofka's excellent "Myths of Skepticism" whitepaper.
http://homepages.rpi.edu/~sofkam/papers/skeptik.html [rpi.edu]
or Wu's very interesting essay which despite it being on a different topic altogether lays out the problems of pseudoskeptics.
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Introduction.htm [debunkingskeptics.com]
Great quote BTW !
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:5, Informative)
The irony is that there is no convincing evidence that the global climate is actually warming.- Fred Singer
"The atmospheric temperature record between 1978 and 2000 (both from satellites and, independently, from radiosondes) doesn't show a warming. Neither does the ocean." - Fred Singer
Yeah Fred Singer isn't a skeptic he's a denier and one of the worst ones at that.
The attempt to portray him as some sort of reasonable doubter is a PR move, initiated by himself, and nothing more.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/singer-criticises-deniers.html [skepticalscience.com]
He's been so dramatically wrong on so many issues where the evidence was incontrovertible and always in the favor of the industry that was paying him, it's hard to conclude that he's a just liar for hire. He's been called out for stating falsehoods so frequently, displayed so little remorse or contrition when caught and about things of such great consequence - the life and death of millions of people- that it's hard not to conclude that he's a textbook sociopath.
http://www.desmogblog.com/s-fred-singer [desmogblog.com]
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=S._Fred_Singer [sourcewatch.org]
The list of scientific facts that Fred Singer has denied over the years doesn't paint a pretty picture. He's denied CFCs were responsible for the hole in the ozone, something he termed the "ozone scare".
He's denied that second hand smoke causes the spectrum of diseases second hand smoke does indeed cause.
He's denied that acid rain was a problem or what caused by industry emissions.
He's denied human caused climate change.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2008/01/20/202297/unstoppable-disinformation-every-15-minutes-from-fred-singer/ [thinkprogress.org]
http://climateinsight.wordpress.com/editorial/merchant-of-doubt-s-fred-singer/ [wordpress.com]
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=S._Fred_Singer [sourcewatch.org]
and so on ad naseum...
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:2)
There's another category which is at odds with the environmentalist movement, which is where I sit. Yeah, we've got global warming. Is it important? I'd say no.
We can't predict when cold or warm cycles will happen with any good degree of accuracy. However they do come. What we do know for sure is that the continents will eventually drift to become Pangaea Ultima. In such a configuration, there can't be any polar ice caps, and the globe will be much hotter than it is now.
The earth was in such a configuration before in age of Pangaea, and life did quite well then. We had monstrous macro scale life, namely dinosaurs and very large dragonflies, and the earth was the greenest it has ever been. This is what the eco movement describes as a doomsday scenario for all macro-scale life, yet the fossil evidence tells us otherwise.
Many species will die, the rest will adapt, and new ones will show up. As for us...we've been pretty good at adapting so far. We've survived through periods much warmer than now, periods much colder than now, and we witnessed other species go extinct in time immemorial, such as the wooly mammoth. Due to the homeostatic nature of all life, we don't like change. But that doesn't really matter, it will happen anyways.
The only things we need to be careful of is making sure we don't contaminate the soil and cause any more species to go extinct than will otherwise happen. Things like cap and trade won't address that at all, carbon dioxide is not a pollutant, and water has a much greater impact on the greenhouse effect than any other gasses, (something like 33%) not to mention its atmospheric ppm is much higher than all others.
Also related to this, mildly off topic, and I'll probably get modded troll for saying this, but recycling paper is incredibly stupid. Paper isn't going to cause us to run out of trees any more than eating food is going to make us run out of carrots or tomatoes. For quite some time now, paper has been made from selectively bred trees that are grown on farms for the express purpose of making that and other fibrous materials. These trees grow very few branches and have some other properties ideal for paper that wild trees can't match. These trees are literally considered an agricultural product, and are ripe for harvest every 8 years.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/oregonwild/2086083298/ [flickr.com]
Recycled paper is a waste of resources and is ultimately pointless. Unlike metals, paper becomes less useful each time you recycle it, not to mention it is expensive. People only recycle paper or buy recycled paper because it makes them feel good, other than that it has no practical purpose.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:3)
Can't you see the insanity of going off on a tangent about others substituting the term climate change for global warming in reply to a poster using the term global warming? The person doing the substitution is you ... and predominantly people like you ... personally I believe it has become more common after surfacestations imploded and outright denialism of warming became a bit too silly.
Re:Skeptic is ok... (Score:3)
Once again: no, they didn't change global warming to climate change. Both terms came into use at about the same time (http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/climate_by_any_other_name.html ). Global warming just refers the warming of the surface of the earth while climate change refers to all the changes that are occurring due to the changing climate. As such global warming is, and always has been, a subset of the current climate change. It's interesting that you feel the need to make up this story about "scammers" changing the name. If the case against climate change/global warming is so strong, why do you need to make up things like this?
Get off my tech blog (Score:3)
If you're too stupid to get that there can still be SIGNAL of anthropegenic global warming in the NOISE of random CLIMATE VARIATION, you don't belong on slashdot. Go argue on a reality TV show fan site or something. J@sus!
Re:Get off my tech blog (Score:2)
should read: anthropogenic
When (Score:2)
When will candidates who are actually qualified to represent science or at a minimum show an interest in it be the representatives of science with regard to political decision-making?
When a majority starts using their brains to vote. Which means, probably never.
Re:When (Score:2)
Democracy isn't a particularly good method for coming to facts, especially when you find yourself realizing that your own personal interest is not served by acceptance of that fact.
Re:When (Score:2)
Re:When (Score:2)
They do. But people can only make decision on the data they have.
That is why media manipulation is a problem. GIGO.
You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:2, Interesting)
The candidate (Lamar Smith) is not there to represent science, so he doesn't really need to be qualified for that. He's not there to represent NASA, EPA, DOE, NSF, NOAA, and the USGS. He's there to represent the people who elected him, and more broadly all of the people of the US. Just playing devil's advocate here. Not everyone in the US agrees with all things science.
Re:You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't disagree with facts. You can be ignorant of them, but you can't disagree as they are not matters of opinion. Sometimes there are not two sides, the earth is round, the sun is the center of the solar system, the earth is billions of years old.
At least he is replacing the "lies from the pit of hell" moron.
Re:You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:2)
I disagree :)
In fact, it's right in the definition: to dissent in opinion (from another person) or dispute (about an idea, fact, etc.)
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/disagree [thefreedictionary.com]
Now.. that doesn't make their positions any less wrong.
Re:You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:3)
Re:You're confused about who he's representing. (Score:4, Insightful)
The candidate (Lamar Smith) is not there to represent science, so he doesn't really need to be qualified for that. He's not there to represent NASA, EPA, DOE, NSF, NOAA, and the USGS. He's there to represent the people who elected him, and more broadly all of the people of the US. Just playing devil's advocate here. Not everyone in the US agrees with all things science.
"The people" elected him to represent their district. A political machine made him chair of the committee.
Scientists need to be careful to avoid bias (Score:3, Insightful)
People like this are the reason that scientists need to be very careful to present their data in an unbiased fashion. The temptation to show "simple" or "clear" data that supports something they are sure is true needs to be resisted. Any evidence that the scientists are in any way biasing their data can be used politically to discredit the entire field.
Re:Scientists need to be careful to avoid bias (Score:2)
one year where winter snowfall doesn't melt
So this would happen Randomly, with no cause, just 'because'?
You're talking about Massive climactic variance on a huge scale, which would have be caused by something. A volcanic eruption, massive earthquake that changed geology on a huge scale, massive meteor impact, etc. The Earth has a lot of feedback loops that keep things in stasis over certain time periods as long as certain conditions are met. We're messing with those conditions and thus are almost certain to kick in feedback loops that are hostile to our continued gentle existence
please define (Score:3)
Define "vast majority of scientists"
If you want someone who understands science better, then someone like Roscoe Bartlett should not have been voted out of office, given the fact that he holds a PhD is physiology and is a former NASA engineer. Stop voting for politicians, vote for people with real world experience and technical knowledge. Get rid of the lawyers and elect doctors and scientists.
Re:please define (Score:3)
Lawyers deciding scientific matters doesn't make much sense, but neither does doctors deciding matters of war and peace or scientists deciding matters of budgeting. That's one of the major problems in politics: Anyone actually trying to serve their country well (I know, pipe dream, but bear with me) has to make decisions about subjects they know absolutely nothing about.
Here's what you actually need: People who are smart enough to listen to expert advice about what they don't know, and discerning enough to tell the difference between a real expert and a fake expert. Having a general background in a wide variety of subjects also helps in determining which expert is lying.
Also, there are currently 16 doctors, 8 other health care professionals, 9 farmers, 5 engineers, 6 scientists, and 5 accountants, who haven't done things all that differently from everyone else in Congress. Also worth noting is that there are 201 business executives and 94 educators as well as 225 lawyers.
Re:please define (Score:2)
So how does him(her) knowing a bit about the law and some litigation mean (s)he knows any more than other people about science and technology?
FTFY, to include 50% of Congress
Some scientists make policy (Score:2)
> When will candidates who are actually qualified to represent science ... be the representatives of science with regard to political decision-making?
You know that Steven Chu [wikipedia.org] is secretary of energy, right? And that the department of energy has a Basic Energy Sciences division which gets a lot of federal science money?
And wasn't there a slashdot story about a physicist-turned-congressman lately?
I mean, yes, I'd like it if it happened more often, and I'm not defending Lamar Smith's qualifications, but it's childish and petty to pretend that it _never_ happens.
My apologies. (Score:5, Interesting)
To all of Slashdot's out-of-US readers: On behalf of the United States of America, I apologize for this event. I do not live in Smith's Congressional district; nor would I have dare voted that anti-freedom, anti-technology SOPA author and professional monster [wikipedia.org] to Congress (let alone this apparently influential committee position) if I did.
Smith has left great bruises on the certainty of a free internet and will now leave a great and lasting scar on Science and the Useful Arts. He will not endanger the science of "climate change" or "global warming", he will endanger knowledge itself.
Re:My apologies. (Score:5, Funny)
What the fuck qualifies you to speak on behalf of the Uniyed States?
Because he can spell?
Re:My apologies. (Score:2)
Makes you weep for his pour home schooled children.
Re:My apologies. (Score:2)
He went on a super-secret-squirrel mission to save the world from an evil mastermind plotting to blow up the moon with a laser beam.
From his office chair. In his parent's basement. Drinking Mountain Dew and eating Cheetos.
Re:My apologies. (Score:2)
His brain?
When? (Score:2)
"When will candidates who are actually qualified to represent science or at a minimum show an interest in it be the representatives of science with regard to political decision-making?"
When more scientists step up and become congresscritters of course. Until then....
Re:When? (Score:2)
Well, they'd have to win election too...
Re:When? (Score:2)
The Committee on Science, Space and Technology has about as much to do with science as the Book of Genesis does with explaining the origin of the universe. It's a POLITICAL committee.. it is motivated by cash. Period. Just like all other committees. Democrats/Republicans/"Independents"... they're all cash hungry. That's it. I wish it were better, but it isn't. The one or two representatives and senators who understand the Internet and aren't in the back pockets of the *AAs are not connected enough to get on a committee...
Will the world return to flat earth belief and a desire to return to the moon for the cheese? No. Will scientists be burned at the stake? No. It's the HOUSE committee... there's still a SENATE committee... and well, the other guys who have that chamber aren't that much better.... but the planet will not implode and we won't be demon hunting in New Jersey because Lamar Smith railroaded a law through that claims all able bodied individuals must go on witch-hunts twice a year or be fined $500.
Re:When? (Score:2)
Rush Holt says hi.
Apparently.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Finally! (Score:2)
This appointment leads to a new invention (Score:2)
"Global Warming" is both science and politics (Score:3, Insightful)
The real reason for pushback against the global warmist 'consensus' is that it is frankly both scientific and political. It starts with observations of global climate, and ends up with the undeniable and unquestionable conclusion that First-World governments must do whatever it takes to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions in their countries. The entire chain of reasoning from observation to required government policy has been so sanctified that any one who questions or doubts even the tiniest aspect of it is labeled a "denier", implying that they are just as bad or worse than those who deny the Holucaust.
It's very puzzling that scientist's predictions of how an imperfectly-understood chaotic system will behave in the future, and recommendations for one particular policy approach to dealing with it, have achieved the inerrant status of Holy Writ, so that those who question any aspect of it must be burned at the stake.
Re:"Global Warming" is both science and politics (Score:3)
Re:"Global Warming" is both science and politics (Score:2)
Several reasons.
Climate modeling is exceptionally difficult - it is a nonlinear,not well understood system with hysteresis, that does not allow for controlled experiments. The system contains a lot of low frequency noise which makes statistical analysis of past data unreliable. The studies are complex and difficult, trying to condense the assumptions and results into a form where even a well educated non-expert can understand them is difficult.
The results of the models are not simple: they do not predict "global warming", they predict widespread climate change that varies by region, though the overall average may be warming, that isn't the most important part.
Even if you knew the resulting climate change, the effect on society are not easy to model, and are highly variable. Trying to decide what resources should be spent to avoid climate change is difficult even if you knew with absolute certainty what its effects ere.
The results have a very large economic impact - trillions of dollars may be directed from some industries to others based on these predictions. Lots of people have a financial motivation to push one answer or the other.
Science is not done by surveying scientists and taking a vote. The only people in a position to judge the work are those who are directly involved in climate modeling. (I could easily sell a non-expert in my field on a technology that isn't really viable).
The only other scientific field with similar problems is medical research, and it also has very serious problems.
Re:That's illiteracy, not politics (Score:2)
As far as I know, the World Bank people have claimed warming will damage some economies. I have no idea what politics they have advocated, if any. I haven't kept up with that.
My point is that AFAIK nobody is calling the World Bank people "global warming deniers." Actually my real point is that the World Bank can advocate ANY political position, and still nobody is going to call them deniers.
The World Bank could say
and no matter how crazy the idea is, they won't be called deniers for their policies. It's only if they say "the tables of measurements are fake, despite how many differing measurements there are -- it's all a diabolical conspiracy, the greatest in human history!" that they'll get labeled as deniers.
Some people (read the comment I was replying to!) have claimed that they'll be called deniers based on their politics. I don't believe that. If I'm wrong (and yes, I could be) it will be because some moron yells "denier" without knowing what that word means.
I don't care about that (Score:2)
It would be good to have a skeptic, someone who won't just dive in with spending trillions and curtailing rights every time someone brings up the climate change bogeyman.
What I am worried about is this guy is in the pocket of the entertainment industry. He wanted to strengthen the DMCA's provision on anti-circumvention software, and this is THE guy who introduced SOPA.
Re:I don't care about that (Score:2)
He's not a true skeptic. If he was he wouldn't be a Christian Scientist.
Confusion (Score:2)
Lamar "SOPA" Smith? Fuuuuuuuuu..........!!!! (Score:2)
That's crazy! This is the worst possible person for the job in the whole fucking world! This guy isn't a global warming skeptic, he's an outright, card-carrying denier.
The same Lamar Smith of SOPA/PIPA fame? (Score:2)
Is that the same lamar smith?
He's not a skeptic (Score:2)
The word "skeptic" implies some rational basis for doubt,
He's a denier.
The next frontier (Score:2)
I can see the NSF starting to issue CFPs for researchers to find Noah's Ark. What nobody realizes is that it's in the same warehouse as the Ark of the Covenant.
II see stupid people... (Score:3)
To all of you, who say great, got a man in a position to ignore Global Warming, I have to ask you. Do you think that's all NASA, EPA, DOE, NSF, NOAA, and the USGS do? Have you even the faintest, vaguest idea how important the work of these organizations are to our day to day life, not to mention the critical future of our nation competing with other nations on maintain some miniscule hint of technological leadership in the rest of this century. Have you any idea what kind of damage a Luddite at the helm of our scientific organization can do you our economic viability or the development of our youth as scientists and engineers in a future which is going to DEMAND technological aptitude.
And you BOZOs applaud? Apparently Nero fiddling while ROME burned wasn't such a bizarre thing after all.
Smith is easy to underestimate (Score:3)
Oh, come on, (Score:3)
Q: When will candidates who are actually qualified to represent science or at a minimum show an interest in it be the representatives of science with regard to political decision-making?"
A: when hell freezes over
The US is a nation of dopes. We get the government we deserve, the one we are dumb enough to vote for.
Re:No big suprize. (Score:3)
He's a politician. He'll sabotage whatever he's paid most to sabotage. It's not unique to Lamar (who is a jackoff in his own right)... it's how politicians work. Make no bones about it, even if he was a proponent of sending all the Oil companies into space and using nothing but solar power, he'll STILL go to the highest bidder.
In other words.. this is MOTS... regardless of party... Anyone who's been awake for the last 4 years can realize now that there isn't a two party system anymore in the US.
Re:I can see it now (Score:2, Informative)
No, the Mexican government would have prevented this. In Mexico the lower house, the Chamber of Deputies, elects 3/5th of its members by district and 2/5th by proportional representation. Proportional representation puts a wrench in the gerrymandering machine. By contrast, in the US we would have to have a 5% greater Democratic vote than Republican vote [princeton.edu] just to get parity in the House due to a phenomenal level of gerrymandering (which the Supreme Court says is perfectly legal even outside of the census as long as there is no obvious attempt to define districts to disenfranchise people based on race). Unfortunately, the people only voted for Democrats by 0.5% more than Republicans, resulting in the Republicans having 33 more seats than the Democrats.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, Mesopotamian creation myths showed a flat Earth. So what? They were operating with a very different belief system than modern empiricism, or even post Pythagorean logic. Is that what you want to make decisions with? Divine inspiration from Enki?
That's the only way you are going to get to the idea of a flat Earth.
FACT: Anyone who can do basic geometry can prove the Earth is not flat. Pythagoras knew it 2500 years ago.
Likewise with global warming. It's a FACT that the Earth is getting warmer. Sea levels all over the world are going up. There is no possible explanation for it other than the average temperature is increasing unless you believe some magic sky daddy is creating water to trick us.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trends_in_global_average_absolute_sea_level,_1870-2008_(US_EPA).png [wikipedia.org]
Now the data for anthropogenic global warming is slightly less compelling, but none the less it is compelling. If you don't want to accept it, fine. But I betcha that you are going to look like a complete boob some time in the future.
Sorry, but conspiracy theories are complete horseshit. It's EXACTLY the same logical fallacy that led Republicans to believe they were going to win the election (left wing media controls the polls and they are manipulating the results).
Let me guess. You thought Romney was going to win, didn't you?
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:2)
Actually the data supporting anthropogenic global warming is very compelling.
All other ideas of what is causing this trend to happen on top of normal cycles have not been supported by the data.
We know how much energy comes from the sun, we know the earths rotation and wobble determine cooling into or out of an ice age.
The outer most atmosphere is not warming. Only the atmospheres close to the earth. So it's not external.
Not. External.
He looks like a boob now. Pile of flesh with no brains.
Re:Vast Majority? roxy (Score:2)
> why is even one cent of tax money going to rebuilding cities that are under the current sea level
Oh I agree you completely. This money is being wasted in a bipartisan way.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:5, Insightful)
"If a scientist, or a vast majority of scientists, say something is true, it is considered heresy to even dare to question it.".
Heresy is an interesting concept. Maybe I've not been around the right people, but the only people I've seen to cry heresy are the anti-global-warming folks. Most of the pro folks tend to quote facts and studies, while the anti folks say things like "I've seen that weather changes, so therefore, though I've never studied it I am pretty sure that all of the people who *have* studied it are wrong." Now to me that sounds an awful lot like Copernicus being accused of heresy because he tried to use evidence to convince people of something they knew nothing about but desperately wanted to be wrong.
You should question scientists. That is good. That is science. But if you walk up to someone who has spent their life studying something and accuse them of being wrong with no facts to back you up, you are not questioning. You are denying. And that's why nobody takes you seriously. It's not an question of heresy and orthodoxy, it's a question of making up your mind without going through that tedious fact-collecting step.
They laughed at Einstein. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. And you, sir, are no Einstein.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:2)
> WOW! Apparently I struck a nerve.
Yes you did. Especially when you started out with the talking point that at some time in the past the majority of people believed in ideas that are generally considered to be false, and then sprinkled your comments with conspiracy theories and claims that things like global warming were not happening.
I've seen the one on flat Earth stated as "once all scientists believed the earth was flat". Well poppycock of course. One of the first results of analytic thinking led to the proof that the Earth is round. Long before the philosophical underpinnings of what we call science today were developed.
This shows such profound problems with your thought process and understanding of history and the evolution of philosophy that I was horrified.
> I am just saying that I have not seen compelling, non-biased evidence that man-induced, or anthropogenic if you like big words, causes are the reason for this current warming trend.
Well, you also claimed data for global warming was unclear. That is just not so.
Compelling unbiased evidence for AGW is published in science journals on a frequent basis. Do you have a subscription to Science or Nature? If not try going to a library.
> Are you saying left wing media controls the polls or are you saying that is what Republicans think?
I am saying that polls were biased was a common theory among Republicans, used to deny reality. There were even polls on the topic showing 7 out of 10 Republicans believed this. Members of the Tea Party gave this response some 94% of the time.
It is exactly the sort of thinking that leads to the theory that climate scientists are biased, which is used to deny reality.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:2)
". I am just saying that I have not seen compelling, non-biased evidence that man-induced"
Then you aren't looking.
Let me sum up:
Every external source does not hold up to the data.
So it's internal reason the world is warming up. Normal cycle are from external sources. i.e. the earth position relative to the sun.
The outer atmosphere isn't changing. gain, we would expect a change there is the source was external.
". "If a scientist, or a vast majority of scientists, say something is true, it is considered heresy to even dare to question it.""
More accurately:
"Vast majority of scientist who expertise is in the field being discussed come to consensus, then it is ignorant to question it with out supporting data or evidence of your position."
history is full of times when consensus changed when new data became available.
.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:2)
I am not denying that we are having more severe weather, higher watermarks on the coast, etc. I am just saying that the evidence I've seen has not really shown to me that it is only man's fault.
Why does it have to be only man's fault? There are so few things in the world that have only a single cause. Isn't the fact that man is apparently contributing to it, enough?
It's true the Earth has experienced many things in the past, including warm periods, ice ages, and mass extinctions. In fact, for most of the Earth's lifetime, it has gotten along fine without humans. Now, I don't expect global warming will make humans extinct, as a group we're pretty adaptable (if you don't care what happens to any particular individuals). But if it's enough, it could, there have been widespread extinction events before. Homo sap has been here for what, 100K years +- 50% (on the long side for critters with the right anatomy, on the short side for behavior), there's no guarantee we will be here for another 100K, or even 10K. Nature doesn't care, any more than it did about dodos or passenger pigeons, we can be replaced.
But even if global warming doesn't mean extinction, flooding, heat, changing weather patterns, changing disease patterns, changing rainfall can mean the deaths of many individuals. We're much more likely to make things worse by not changing our behavior, than we are by changing it to reduce our contribution to warming.
Re:Vast Majority? (Score:2)
Re:Wasted Space! (Score:2)
Why is it that all the Republicans on the House Committee of Science, Space and Technology; Deny Science {Evolution,Global Warming, etc.}, don't understand Technology {The Internet is a "series of tubes"} and are just a waste of Space?!?
Politics. They deny global warming because their $$$ sponsors expect them to, and they deny evolution because the people who vote in their districts expect them to.
Re:What makes you qualified to say he's unqualifie (Score:3)
You have a religious interpretation of a scientific issue. Science doesn't matter how he "feels" or what he "believes". They are orthogonal.
All that matters is what he plans to do. I think he's planning to do the right thing, with right thing defined as causing the least overall human suffering.
I really don't care which sky god told him to do it, or what jumbled up mystery bounces around inside his head. Just continue to do the right thing and I'm happy.
It would be "nice" if he was in the community of the rational, but I'll take "doin the right thing" over that any day as a pragmatic outlook.
Re:What makes you qualified to say he's unqualifie (Score:2)
IS religion believes that god won't let anything jn happen to the world, so Global Warming isn't real.
Soon to be: Global warming is gods plan.
Re:What makes you qualified to say he's unqualifie (Score:2)
I keep trying to tell various AGW fanatics that, but it never penetrates. Maybe seeing it come from somebody they can consider to be on "their side" will make them believe it. Not, of course, that it matters if they believe it or not.
Re:What makes you qualified to say he's unqualifie (Score:2)
No science is ever "provable." [stephenjaygould.org] Or can be.
And if he were skeptical, that wouldn't be a problem. But he seems to have made up his mind--not from looking at the scientific evidence, but based on economic interests. Mitigation would cost his owners money, so it can't be true. That's not skepticism.
Re:He does show an interest in it. (Score:3)
Right.
This is why he was elected. Well that and gerrymandering, but this is the job his constituents (the republican party and Fox news) chose him to do. To oppose these 'false elitist scientists' or however you want to phrase it.
In 2010 'Merican voters handed gerrymandering majorities to Republicans, this is what they did with it. We're complaining because this is what he publicly stood for before coming into office. That's what he believes, that's what he was elected to do. For all of the many faults of republicans the Tea Party has made them actually stand for the things they say they stand for. They might be ignorant fools, but at least they aren't liars (or at least not lying about the policies they are going to vote for). I guess thats supposed to be an improvement.
Re:Congress does not represent a mythical group (Score:2)
what happens is eventually said country becomes third world, relatively - not because of its communist leadership by a muslim, but because of its 'i want to screw my sister some more more after we read the bible' behavior, and they get taken over by a country who has 9 out of 10 of its politicians that are scientists (hint, they are a country that 'we borrow all our money from', in a move paralleling how banks owned the dumb in this country for so long, haha time for a taste of your own medicine).