A word on Stalin, Galileo, and all that

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. A word on Stalin, Galileo, and all that. Intl. J. Inact., 2:83

Yesterday, Greenfyre wrote a blog entry in which he compared the US Chamber of Commerce’s call for a mock trial of global warming to, well, Soviet Lysenkoism. I commented that this is probably a bad idea, because we ourselves don’t like it when, say, climate inactivist Christopher Monckton compares scientists to war criminals.

Another use of a cultural icon. What do you think of it?

Greenfyre replied,

Hmmm … it’s a complicated issue for sure, and not one to be solved in comment forum.

Want to blog back and forth on the question? not a debate or argument, but rather meditations that seek to explore the issue fully (or as fully as we can), and see where that takes us? Not just Stalin, but charged icons, good and bad.

So let the dialogue begin. (-: I guess the main reason I don’t like comparisons to Stalin or Lysenkoism is the same reason Mike Godwin doesn’t like comparisons to █████ ██████ — such comparisons tend to be overused, and overblown. Similarly for comparisons to Galileo, Einstein, the US Founding Fathers, genocidal dictators (e.g. Radovan Karadžić), Kim Jong-il, and so on. What counts as “overblown”? Generally, the more analogizing you have to do, the more overblown I’ll think it is. To give an example, if a person literally wants to euthanize all political dissidents, then a comparison to Stalin might be apt in my view; but if he just wants to reduce their influence, then no.

On a related note: George Orwell’s essay Politics and the English Language also discusses worn-out metaphors and meaningless words in general.

Climate science is not going to settle this

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. Climate science is not going to settle this. Intl. J. Inact., 2:69–70

Tom DeWeese claims that global warming mitigation is a malign Marxist plot, and that anyone who protests against “social injustice” is really a secret Marxist: [✍]

Social justice is a major premise of Sustainable Development. Another word for social justice, by the way, is Socialism. Karl Marx was the first to coin the phrase “social justice.”

Uh… hmm. Also, at the top of the essay, there’s an editor’s note which among other things offers up Definitive Proof of the Phantom Soviet Empire Behind the Worldwide Marxist-Warmist Conspiracy:

One elected official said I had exposed too much — as he walked out on my presentation.

In other words, our editor didn’t know who the bloke was, but somehow was able to tell that he was an “elected official”.

Then again, DeWeese didn’t really have to rely on pop cryptography and vague rumours to make his case, because in China, some people are trying to promote climate regulation by calling it Marxist (!). [✍] To make things even more confusing, there are also Chinese who claim that the solution to global warming isn’t Marxism, but… Confucianism. [✍]

Oh well. Capitalism, Marxism, Confucianism, whatever. Can’t we just make do with the science? I guess this is why I hate politics.

Bet: bad. Debate: good. Thus said Galileo.

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. Bet: bad. Debate: good. Thus said Galileo. Intl. J. Inact., 2:55

Debate: good. Blogger Milo Yiannopoulos reports on a debate between global warming activist Joe Romm, and global warming ‘skeptic’ Marc Morano. He thinks Morano obviously won because already likes Morano, and Noel Sheppard, who also likes Morano, also thinks Morano won. Objectivity! [cached: 1, 2]

Also, Greenfyre has reported on how global warming ‘skeptics’ Václav Klaus and Bjørn Lomborg are trying to get Al Gore to debate them.

Bet: bad. Meanwhile, Brian Schmidt reports that chemistry professor Mark Campbell, after chastising “Chicken Littles” for spreading fear of global warming, refuses to take a bet with Schmidt on future global temperatures even when the bet is in his favour. Schmidt also has a list of bets he’s proposed with global warming doubters — most of them not taken up. [cached: 1, 2]

I’m sure there’s a good reason why climate ‘skeptics’ prefer debates to bets, right?

We are going to be suppressed by the mainstream media

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. We are going to be suppressed by the mainstream media. Intl. J. Inact., 2:33–34

The poll to predict the take-home message of the upcoming ‘”2009 International Conference on Climate Change” is still running! Right now, the hottest predictions are “Fire James Hansen!” followed closely by “Japanese now dispute global warming!”

However, here’s a press release from the Heartland Institute web site which suggests that the conference’s centre of attention may turn out to be…

Nominations for ‘conference’ take-home message are now open!

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. Nominations for ‘conference’ take-home message are now open! Intl. J. Inact., 2:28–29

Yes, it’s less than 2 weeks before the Heartland Institute’s “2009 International Conference on Climate Change”, during which a few talking heads will prattle on and on about how this ‘global warming crisis’ thing is really a huge hoax perpetrated by crypto-Marxists to implement totalitarian rule or something, and 1,000+ people who can’t care less about the whole global warming ‘debate’ will be there just to enjoy the free catered food while pretending to listen to the speakers. DeSmogBlog has informed us that they’ll be going. :)

Now, if last year’s any guide, the ‘conference’ proper will be pretty boring, and the fun stuff will come in the form of media stunts and what not that occur outside of the presentations. Indeed, during last year’s gathering the right-wing blogosphere made a lot of noise over weatherman John Coleman’s appearance on the media, and the take-home message of the ‘conference’ practically became this:

JOHN COLEMAN IS GOING TO SUE AL GORE!!!!!!

So I guess we can expect there to be a similar take-home message for this year’s ‘conference’. But what will it be? Here are a few possibilities I came up with after, well, storming my brain a bit:

We are really, really suing Al Gore really, and here is a silly graph

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. We are really, really suing Al Gore really, and here is a silly graph. Intl. J. Inact., 2:14–16

The inactivist New Zealand Climate ‘Science’ Coalition just made a grand announcement, with lots of pomp and fanfare, about the upcoming lawsuit against Al Gore or something. In Viscount Christopher Monckton’s own words:

There are now serious discussions afoot to lodge complaints against Gore to the federal financial and legal authorities, in that he fraudulently talks up the imagined “climate crisis” in the hope that he and his “green” investment corporation can profit by the baseless alarm that his falsehoods generate.

There are “serious discussions”… “now”? I wonder if this means that the “discussions” in the last 10 months or so about suing Al Gore were, in fact, not “serious”? (That sounds about right, since I can see no trace of the “notable attorneys” discussing this supposed case who Coleman claimed exist. In the meantime, you can sign the “Sue Us” Petition to get them to sue Al Gore for real.)

Also, here’s another gem from Monckton’s missive:

Al Gore is the Jim Crow of Liberal Fascism

cite as: F. Bi. 2009. Al Gore is the Jim Crow of Liberal Fascism. Intl. J. Inact., 2:8

Well, the weather here’s insane, and while this doesn’t prove or disprove global warming, it probably does explain why I’m feeling somewhat irritated at the moment.

But that aside. The International Climate ‘Science’ Coalition is now touting a new ‘children’s climate science book’ (in the upper right corner of its web site) titled We’re Not Scared Anymore Mr. Gore.

This ‘children’s book’ is a collection of many of the usual inactivist canards, logical fallacies, and insinuations of wrongdoing. Personally, I think the best part of the book is the very first graphic, which tries to suggest that Al Gore owns a private jet. Read the whole thing, as they say. :)

Web 2.0 is fat?

cite as: F. Bi. 2008. Web 2.0 is fat? Intl. J. Inact., 1:190–192

Well, Al Gore thinks that this “Web 2.0” thing can help stop global warming, restore democracy, and bring balance to the cosmos. Now, if you’ve been reading this blog you’ll know that I like the idea of stopping global warming. Alas, things aren’t that simple. For one thing, some “Web 2.0” techniques such as AJAX and Adobe Flash like to guzzle lots of CPU power, which means more CO₂ emissions and thus more global warming.¹

A bigger problem is that “Web 2.0” and the “New Media” — well, the kinds of stuff normally associated with these buzzwords — don’t really give me a good way to do what I want. I’ve been thinking, “hmm, how can I make it easier for myself (and others) to maintain the think-tank diagram?” I figure that what I’d really like is

• a more automated way to collect the information we’ve been collecting — domain name to IP mappings, IP to domain name mappings (canonical name lookups at least), hyperlinks between sites, etc.;
• a proper database system to maintain this information; and
• a way to allow people who aren’t me to add to this information, and to easily process the updated information into a pretty little diagram.

And here’s the rub: no combination of Facebook, YouTube, WikiWikiWeb, Movable Type, etc. will be enough to achieve this.^{2, 3} What will achieve this, well, is some good old programming gruntwork. That is, unless some of you have better ideas… :)

Footnotes

1. Except for those who have moved to 100% alternative energy sources, or who harness these techniques to avoid even greater power consumption elsewhere.
2. And come to think of it, the RealClimate wiki may suffer from a similar problem. It’s supposed to be a collection of links to debunkings of inactivist nonsense, indexed by topic, by myth, by author, and by media outlet — probably a tailor-made database structure will be more suited for this than a wiki.
3. “But Frank,” one may say, “Web 2.0 isn’t just a hodgepodge of technologies; it’s a philosophy, it’s a mindset, it’s a way of life! And what you’re trying to achieve is perfectly within the spirit of Web 2.0! Don’t criticize Web 2.0; improve on it!” No.

Al Gore’s adipose and the global warming conspiracy

cite as: F. Bi. 2008. Al Gore’s adipose and the global warming conspiracy. Intl. J. Inact., 1:187

The Truth about global warming, like all other The Truths, has been summarily ignored by the mainstream media.

You are in a little twisting maze of think-tanks, all different

cite as: F. Bi. 2008. You are in a little twisting maze of think-tanks, all different. Intl. J. Inact., 1:179–180

From an essay regarding Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth, on the web site of the State Policy Network, written by Deborah Thornton of the “Public Interest Institute” (limitedgovernment.org):

An English High Court ruling states there are “so many demonstrable errors in An Inconvenient Truth that it can not be shown [in England] unless students are also taught its errors and the opposing views.”

Um, the above quote looks authoritative, but I can’t find it in the text of the High Court ruling… and besides the court only found 9 errors, and stated that AIT “is substantially founded upon scientific research and fact”. But Thornton goes on to say:

We must demonstrate the difference between propaganda and fact.

Yeah, right. The lady doth protest too much methinks…

More interestingly, the web address of the “Public Interest Institute” turns out to be another nexus of think-tanks.