the top 25 censored media stories of 2003-2004

Poststructural Pub
21

:astonished: I’m winning friends and influencing people every day, but I never have read that book, no. :laughing: I never saw the need for it, but if you wish to send me a copy, I would be glad to read it for you…but reedmaking might take precedence over that.

I am just stirring up the pot a little while I do some boring file transfers and can’t sleep.

I am getting lots of hugs (and back scratches too), but no matter how many you give away, you get one right back..

There is a lot of pressure on our legislature to cause them to listen to some groups more than others, so I take political departments (except the ones actually in the constution and not read into it) statements with a whole shaker of salt.

I had rather pay attention to the actual research scientists, not just meterologists/climatologist types, but all fields (archeology is a very important one), very few of which think that man is more powerful than God/Nature/Giea/Shiva/ and ignore the actual heat producer of our solar system itsself, the nearest star, the Sun and the effects of natural events not involving men at all than to all the U.S. government, United Nations, European Union, etc publications you care to point at.

If you want to point to the start of global warming, I hav even seen some scientists point to the change from hunter/gather to the farmer/animal or the agricultural revolution era as being the ir-reversable point of global warming. I disbelieve this as well.

From all the information I can gather, I have concluded that the sun and nature has more effect because it is much cooler now than it was in the dark ages, but mankind has exploded across the earth since that time.

How would you explain the huge difference between the long history of observation and a few recent years of recent measurements with some new high tech toys?

22

Caj wrote:
“Science is not qualitative, it is quantitative”

Some other points to keep in mind:
*Publication in a scientific journal does NOT equal FACT. The purpose of publication is to state a hypothesis and findings, and to have this hypothesis peer reviewed, and the findings duplicated by others.
*There is no such thing as ZERO in science. There is “none detected”, “below levels of quantitation”, “none found”, etc. - but no zero. With advances in detection methods, what was being detected at ppm (part per million) levels 25 years ago is being detected at sub-ppt (part per trillion) levels today.
*A study is only as good as the work put into it. One set of data points does NOT prove a hypothesis. “Wrong” answers are just as important as “right” answers. Statistics can be skewed to give whatever result you want them to.

I could go on - but I think you get my point. The “public”, politicians and others are woefully ignorant on the scientific principals, and policy based on poor science is scary (and sometimes deadly).

Missy

23

I don’t understand this statement in light of your previous comments. The legislature at this time is Republican controlled, which means oil company controlled. Their “pressure” is coming from oil companies. If anything, the current legislature would be more apt to agree with you.

Susan

24

This is a blanket statement. Personally, I think there may be a certain amount of truth there, considering the number of political contributions (it may even partially account for why so very many oil company jobs have moved from Oklahoma to Texas in recent years), though one could as easily say the Democrats are controlled by their big contributors. Anyway, what I’m asking for is proof, from reputable (or disinterested) sources, that a Republican majority means that oil companies are in control.

25

Absolutely.

I’m reputable! :wink: (and it was indeed a blanket statement)

Susan

26

Well, if only. I posit that some folks understand perfectly that science offers no absolute proof, and exploit that to discredit it.

For example, a politician can always shrug that “more studies need to be done, because we still don’t know for sure if XYZ causes PDQ.” This is a common trick to exploit the fact that real science involves nonzero, if ever-shrinking, uncertainties.

Also, we know that people with agendas knowingly exploit the way science is done to generate false controversy. We have competing theories for the mechanism behind evolution — punctuated equilibria, versus gradual selection, etc — always the exact details are being refined in any theory. Creationists exploit this by painting a false picture of scientists who still don’t agree over evolution.

This is like two people trying to figure out the make and model of a car that just rear-ended them and drove off—and a third person arguing that since they can’t agree, maybe there wasn’t a car at all.

Caj