Cosmos - With Neil deGrasse Tyson

[Greylock Crescent]

the statement itself is not political, but the only way to convince people to act to address climate change is through political activism. Because politics is the art of convincing people to work toward a goal, to contribute their resources and energies toward it under someone's leadership. Those of us who believe that action is necessary can only make a difference by being politically engaged, by participating in the conversation and winning people to our cause.

I know it's a mighty fine distinction, but that sounds more like education than politics to me.

The problem is with the ends, not the means.

Curious ... I'd say the problem is more with the means, than the end (as in, the ends do not justify the means). Ultimately, everyone wants to be prosperous and healthy and be able to leave as much as they can to their offspring. But how we go about achieving our prosperity, is the vital difference between accepting that climate change is real and must be ameliorated, or denying it.

To wit:

But why do we need activism to con people into acting on climate change, when IPCC lead authors predict that within the lifetime of our newborns, we'll go from an average temperature of 289 degrees Kelvin to a scorching 289.37 degrees Kelvin? Thus we must revamp our entire society, raise energy prices so high that poor people can't afford food, sit back and watch corn riots in Mexico City, and make sure Africans don't have reliable electricity for another hundred years. It is a cause that is both stupid and evil.

Hyperbolic (and continued unsourced) statements such as this are why it's vital to focus on the means of improving our energy footprint, rather than the ends.

Shoo.

 

[gturner]

My source is the recent papers putting the TCR at 1.3 C, very slightly lower than earlier estimates, and one of which was by multiple IPCC lead authors. You just deny science in favor of your apocalyptic death cult and its wacko beliefs that make Scientology seem sane. You could've seized on any random variable, such as average wind speed (which has been dropping) or water vapor (which has been dropping), or the number of lightning strikes, or the number of shark attacks. You've grabbed on to a particularly stupid number as your cause, because warmer is better and you have to argue against all reality to pretend it's not so.

Almost everyone goes on vacation by flying about 10 or 15 C closer to the equator, where it's warmer, except for the people who already live there, who mostly just drink beer, fish, and enjoy a life that's not spent chopping firewood to get through the winter. As we warm up by a fraction of a degree, or even a whole degree, a few people will actually notice the longer growing season and increased vegetable yields.

I would only worry if temperature were going the other way (which they possibly will till about 2200 AD based on recent papers on solar data), because during the Little Ice Age, when temperatures were slightly less, North America and China experienced centuries long mega-droughts, and crop yields plummeted and millions of people starved to death, even in Europe.

Getting colder would be a real reason to rethink how we've laid out our infrastructure and farming, and how we should cope with a climate that shifts our crop lands hundreds of miles to the South, eliminating or severely curtailing northern areas. In contrast, there is no equatorial line of foodlessness. The problem at the equator is that plants grow so well that you have to spend your day in hand to hand combat with all the weeds, as if you were in a hydroponic greenhouse from hell.

So from this blindingly obvious state of affairs, where the tropics are called "lush" and the Arctic is called "desolate", and the massive geologic record where all the really hot periods were called "climate optimums", a bunch of self-hating, guilt-ridden scientific morons has proposed a reality where the Earth coincidentally reached an absolute climate optimum (from the northern Siberia to Nigeria) sometime between the Bee Gee's and the Duran Duran epoch. My working theory is that Andy Gibb screwed with their heads, because nothing in their thinking is remotely rational.

The temperature versus latitude from the tropics to the Arctic circle is about 1C per 90 miles and is very close to linear, in both hemispheres. Are you really terrified of moving 90 or 180 miles to the South, and if so, do you make out your will and testament before every vacation to Disneyland because you're traveling to a climate that NGT and the alarmists tell you is unable to support any life, much less human life?

Do you really believe all that nonsense?

 

[Awesome Possum]

You'd argue that water isn't wet in its liquid form if you were clever enough to write a wall of text for it.

 

[AgentCoop]

Do you really believe all that nonsense?

I could ask you the same question.

 

[Trekker4747]

Almost everyone goes on vacation by flying about 10 or 15 C closer to the equator, where it's warmer, except for the people who already live there, who mostly just drink beer, fish, and enjoy a life that's not spent chopping firewood to get through the winter. As we warm up by a fraction of a degree, or even a whole degree, a few people will actually notice the longer growing season and increased vegetable yields.

A fraction of a degree or even 1 degree is the difference between freezing and above freezing. Which is the difference between ice and water. Which is the difference between a sea level at "x" and a sea level at "x+y."

It's also able to mess up ocean currents, air currents, and countless other things. But hey, the humans on the planet can cope with a minor raise in temperature, so, pffft.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

Do you really believe all that nonsense?

If you're referring to the content of your posts, then no ... no I do not believe it at all.

 

[Yanks]

Here we go. Because I say the sky isn't falling, somehow that's construed into I want dirty air and water, and I'm sure I hate polar bears and I want to see all little girls get swept away (see Al Gores tripe movie). I've clearly stated that when solar/alge/wind techology becomes affordable it will "win the war". But, as this administrations track record CLEARLY proves, that just doesn't happen because someone wants it to.

Sure maybe the technology for alternative energy isn't quite there yet, but if it wasn't for the government consistently pushing the car companies to reduce emissions and improve their technology, it's likely our cars would be much less clean and efficient than they are now.

As incompetent as our government can often be (and I don't deny it can be very incompetent), one thing it can do well is use it's considerable power and wealth-- which is much greater than any corporation's-- to invest in ideas and push people to innovate much faster than they would otherwise be able to.

So I'm not seeing the harm in our government wanting to invest in clean energy and improve the quality of our air and our children's future. It's bizarre to me that that's somehow considered a "bad" thing now, or a goal worthy of ridicule by many on the right.

I don't see harm in the government wanting to invest. They just need to be smart about it.

30+ companies "invested in" have gone bankrupt. That's just throwing the taxpayer dollars down the drain.

I'd more support the government hiring the "smart" and put the resources necessary to develope these "green technologies" for the masses, then help the start up companies.

Their approach is just ass backwards if you ask me.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

30+ companies "invested in" have gone bankrupt. That's just throwing the taxpayer dollars down the drain.

I'd more support the government hiring the "smart" and put the resources necessary to develope these "green technologies" for the masses, then help the start up companies.

Their approach is just ass backwards if you ask me.

Your first part doesn't match with the rest.

Most companies fail, no matter how they are funded. That's a fact. Plenty of research also dead-ends, too. It can't be helped. This is why you fund lots of things, in the hopes you'll get a winner or two out of the bunch. It's not a waste--every failure is a learning experience. If the government knew which companies would succeed and which wouldn't, it'd be an easy choice, but they don't.

 

[Christopher]

I know it's a mighty fine distinction, but that sounds more like education than politics to me.

Those are not incompatible things. Responsible politics requires education. You're still buying into the myth that "politics" only means "dirty tricks that my opponents do." As I've said, that in itself is a political stance, so it's a hypocritical pretense. Politics can be a positive tool if it's wielded responsibly for positive ends. You can't change the world for the better without convincing people to support policies that do so.

The problem is with the ends, not the means.

Curious ... I'd say the problem is more with the means, than the end (as in, the ends do not justify the means). Ultimately, everyone wants to be prosperous and healthy and be able to leave as much as they can to their offspring. But how we go about achieving our prosperity, is the vital difference between accepting that climate change is real and must be ameliorated, or denying it.

I'm not talking about prosperity. I'm talking about the human endeavor known as politics, which, as Wikipedia defines it, is "the practice and theory of influencing other people on a civic or individual level. More narrowly, it refers to achieving and exercising positions of governance — organized control over a human community, particularly a state." It's not enough to accept that climate change is real -- we have to act on that knowledge, formulate policies and pass laws and mobilize resources on a national scale. Only government can do that, and persuading people to elect and support a government that can do that requires using political activism. Cosmos is a work of political activism, and it's one we desperately need, because we're being inundated by anti-intellectual right-wing activism and it's high time that those of us who value education and science and sanity push back against that flood and make our voices part of the conversation.

It's simply disingenuous to pretend that what Tyson, Druyan, and Soter are doing here is politically neutral. Politics in and of itself is not the problem -- dishonest politics is the problem. So the important thing is to be honest -- with ourselves as well as with everyone else. This show is a political statement, but it's a political statement grounded in education and truth rather than obfuscation and propaganda.

To wit:

Like I said, the problem isn't politics, it's dishonest politics. Just because the opposition has embraced big-lie propaganda as its favored approach to politics, that doesn't mean they get to define what politics is for all time. They're corrupting the political process, and someone needs to reclaim it and redeem it. Political activism can be a force for good. That's what Carl Sagan's generation believed.

 

[Forbin]

The show only ever invokes religion in a derisive manner so I'm not sure how one could draw the conclusion that it's not anti-religion. It very obviously is.

I don't think it's anti-religion, but it IS against allowing religious fables to overpower actual science. Those are the points being made.

 

[Yanks]

30+ companies "invested in" have gone bankrupt. That's just throwing the taxpayer dollars down the drain.

I'd more support the government hiring the "smart" and put the resources necessary to develop these "green technologies" for the masses, then help the start up companies.

Their approach is just ass backwards if you ask me.

Your first part doesn't match with the rest.

Most companies fail, no matter how they are funded. That's a fact. Plenty of research also dead-ends, too. It can't be helped. This is why you fund lots of things, in the hopes you'll get a winner or two out of the bunch. It's not a waste--every failure is a learning experience. If the government knew which companies would succeed and which wouldn't, it'd be an easy choice, but they don't.

Don't agree. I know most companies fail. So I don't think it's prudent or smart to just throw money at a problem in a bunch of companies (especially just to repay for campaign contributions). Then they all go bankrupt (inside 2 years), then they file for backruptcy... all wasted tax dollars. the ole' double wahammy...

Perfect the technology first. The money invested in research is spent much more wisely. When it's ready for the market, there will be folks chomping at the bit to get it out there.

 

[gturner]

Almost everyone goes on vacation by flying about 10 or 15 C closer to the equator, where it's warmer, except for the people who already live there, who mostly just drink beer, fish, and enjoy a life that's not spent chopping firewood to get through the winter. As we warm up by a fraction of a degree, or even a whole degree, a few people will actually notice the longer growing season and increased vegetable yields.

A fraction of a degree or even 1 degree is the difference between freezing and above freezing. Which is the difference between ice and water. Which is the difference between a sea level at "x" and a sea level at "x+y."

It's also able to mess up ocean currents, air currents, and countless other things. But hey, the humans on the planet can cope with a minor raise in temperature, so, pffft.

And that just moves the freezing line by about an hour's drive on a planet that's almost 8000 miles in diameter, and the freezing line was already in rapid motion from the seasons. Everywhere else it means the difference between -39F and -38F, or between 77 F and 78 F. Most US states already experience temperature swings of about 140 degrees F, and if it becomes a degree warmer, even climate scientists will have trouble measuring the difference, because they can't even agree on what the temperature was two within two or so degrees.

This March many US states saw their historic average temperature records adjusted downwards by about 2 F just from rethinking how to compute the old averages. Was anyone here even aware of the huge shift, one that's larger than the change that has you terrified enough to abandon technology? Did you go out and protest? Did you set your car on fire and swear "no more!" because your climate has just shifted more from your grandparent's time than what has you so agitated, and this happened as the result of a software change instead of the evil Koch brothers?

 

[Squiggy]

Facts are all it takes for me, not politics and idealism.

And yet you're the one who keeps bringing up politics.

Sad it's in this show, I agree.

Do you not read your own posts?

 

[Yanks]

And yet you're the one who keeps bringing up politics.

Sad it's in this show, I agree.

Do you not read your own posts?

Yes, I use contractions...

 

[Squiggy]

Over half your posts are political.

 

[Yanks]

Over half your posts are political.

I'm assuming you mean in this thread?

Probably about right, but there is politics in COSMOS and it's presentation so...

There also is probably a good portion that indicated or discuss how bad a narrarator NdT is too...

Your point?

 

[AgentCoop]

His point is that you keep complaining about the politics you perceive in the show (where you presumably don't think they belong), yet you yourself keep bringing up Al Gore and Obama's administration, neither of which is all that relevant to Cosmos.

But you knew that was the point already.

 

[davejames]

It's also able to mess up ocean currents, air currents, and countless other things. But hey, the humans on the planet can cope with a minor raise in temperature, so, pffft.

Yeah we've already seen more extreme weather, a big change in rainfall patterns, and more frequent heat waves etc just with the very slight increase in temperature we've had so far.

Do people really think those things aren't going to get even worse as the temperature goes higher and higher like it's predicted to do?

To reduce it down to the analogy of taking a vacation in the tropics is beyond simplistic. The increase in heat will likely have far more wide-ranging impacts on the planet than simply making it a tiny bit warmer at the beach.

 

[Yanks]

His point is that you keep complaining about the politics you perceive in the show (where you presumably don't think they belong), yet you yourself keep bringing up Al Gore and Obama's administration, neither of which is all that relevant to Cosmos.

But you knew that was the point already.

No, I keep rebutting those that imply it is not present. Of course I site examples of movies that "stretch the truth" to satisfy political agenda.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

I know it's a mighty fine distinction, but that sounds more like education than politics to me.

Those are not incompatible things. Responsible politics requires education. You're still buying into the myth that "politics" only means "dirty tricks that my opponents do." As I've said, that in itself is a political stance, so it's a hypocritical pretense. Politics can be a positive tool if it's wielded responsibly for positive ends. You can't change the world for the better without convincing people to support policies that do so.

This is true. But there's a difference between education and politicking. Teaching a person about climate change and what needs to happen to prevent it is different than advocating specific “policies” to bring about that change. If you want to play the definition game, Merriam Webster has it as, "activities that relate to influencing the actions and policies of a government or getting and keeping power in a government." This supports my assertion and, in fact, is much more in line to the usage of the word today. But regardless of whether or not the usage of the word should continue to shift in this direction, the practical, pragmatic fact is: It has. And I don’t see any way to put the toothpaste back into the tube. As such, applying its broader-based definition to scientific recommendations will result in far too many people perceiving those recommendations in a biased, almost pejorative light.

As for Cosmos, unless I’ve missed something, there hasn't been anything (yet) from the series that speaks to specific acts of governance. The show hasn't advocated any specific governmental policies or courses of action to take. This is where Cosmos (at least so far) differs from Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth which, by way of its explicit criticisms of Bush (for example), made the film political, rather than purely scientific and educational.

Cosmos, on the other hand, has provided information and the scientific conclusions about what the data means. In terms of the future, it has only stated general and scientifically valid courses of action (reduce greenhouse gas emissions). It hasn’t suggested how those recommendations are to be carried out – it’s recommendations are directed to everyone, including both the public and private sectors. The politics happens when we (including you and I) start taking those recommendations and start advocating for specific policies (such as government funding of solar research or personal investments in green technology companies, and so on).

Or to be more specific:

It's not enough to accept that climate change is real -- we have to act on that knowledge, formulate policies and pass laws and mobilize resources on a national scale. Only government can do that, and persuading people to elect and support a government that can do that requires using political activism. Cosmos is a work of political activism,

Who is Cosmos advocating to be elected? What form of government is it supporting? Because (by your own usage of the term) the fact that it’s not doing any of those things, demonstrates that it is not political activism. I suppose you could say it’s environmental activism. Maybe social activism? But not political.

Perfect the technology first. The money invested in research is spent much more wisely. When it's ready for the market, there will be folks chomping at the bit to get it out there.

And just who is going to perfect the technology? A market already too reliant on fossil fuel power? One that would have to sacrifice short term economic benefits?

These things don't simply happen without a push.