Michael Crichton Speech #4

[Entropy56]

The point of this speech is that left wing liberal Democrats cause more harm than good.

[imbrd]

Can anyone understand the idea of Wuwei? or also known as Wei Wu Wei? its a very nice & not only interesting way of life but also the only method of keeping sanity in life when faced w/ or without crisis. Everyone really should look this concept up & study it some but more importantly practice it deeply

[anonypoet]

As for the "everything is going to be fine" idea, it's not lazy. No one's advocating that, because an issue (any) needs no tending to, we should do nothing. Rather, the time and resources being put forth unnecessarily could be used elsewhere to better use.

Case in point: local/state governments spend about $7.2 billion combined to subsidize plastic recycling, which offers no benefit to the environment and some cases harms it. Couldn't that money be put towards restoring natural ecosystems

[anonypoet]

which act as carbon sinks and remove toxins from the environment, research, building more clean power plants, research in areas outside the realm of ecology (medical, etc.) or pretty much any other use which would utilize that money to greater effect?

[polymath7]

B-I.

"...it's not lazy..."

This wasn't my primary point at all.

You have widely misread me, anonypoet, and have not the excuse that my prose is anywhere near as opaque and formless as your own.

My central point was that arguments of this sort are not to be admitted into the discussion, and even if they were he accusation of apocalyptic paranoia is wide open to the recriminative accusation of Pollyannic denial.

But such arguments are ENTIRELY worthless.

If the proposition ...

[polymath7]

B-II

...under discussion -as indeed it appears to be- is, "Should I, as a member of the lay public, concur that anthropogenic global warming has been empirically demonstrated and could have catastrophic consequences if ignored or inadequately responded to" then the statements of journalists and politicians -and airport novelists- are to be flatly disregarded.

They are not climatologists and have absolutely nothing whatever to contribute to this topic.

To use the statements ...

[polymath7]

B-III.

..of journalists and politicians in an attempt to discredit a scientific proposition -as Crichton incontrovertibly is trying to do- is for someone, for someone of his relative scientific literacy- and act of deliberate demagoguery.

If you seek to defend him, you are simply talking out of your hat and will, I promise you, be summarily exposed and defeated.

Finally, at no point did I imply that a cost-benefit analysis is unreasonable (have you been listening to Bjorn Lumborg? (cont.)

[polymath7]

B-IV.

The whole point is that such an analysis tilts immensely lob-sidedly against cost. Illustration:

if I decide that the prospective fruits of a thousand dollar wager are insufficient to persuade me that it is a good idea to play a single round of Russian roulette, this is surely nothing if not a cost benefit analysis.

Now, if you'd like to discuss such an analysis as regards global warming, I will be happy to do so.

[polymath7]

Click on "See All Comments" and all will be visible.

[scythekain]

I completely agree, we need more people debunking what should be obvious... mankind is not causing catastrophic global warming.

[JFoun321]

no, but we are contributing to the problem...

[huhokay]

what problem?

[arseneau2]

Instead of telling all of this stuff in a boring voice in a conference room, Michael Crichton should get on T.V to tell this stuff. I don't mean CNN. Nobody would hear him. I mean The Tonight Show or the Daily Show so that somebody would actually hear him.

[DaleTales]

I would too. But does the media want people to not be afriad? No. Fear sells. Fear is an emotion of urgency and need. People who feel secure aren't aren't very good consumers.

[polymath7]

One could just as easily argue that Chrichton's thesis is a shameless and inexceedibally cynical appeal to the lazy-minded and child-like desire to believe that everything is going to be fine.

If you're going to argue a scientific proposition with such transparent ad hominems rather than actual data, and are actually prepared to disbelieve one side on grounds of emotional incentive, which scenario is really the more plausible?

[anonypoet]

He's not arguing against the scientific merit of global warming (nor pretending to), but rather illustrating that, as with issues in the past, it's being sensationalized because sensationalized things sell. This hurts those on both sides of the issue--unrealistic claims that favor one's argument harm said argument just as much as claims against.

[anonypoet]

The above statement, of course, is hyperbolic. And the "you" utilizes a logical fallacy. But the "you" represents the general public, which is not generally praised for its reasoning ability.

[polymath7]

I.

Nor is pretending to?

I simply don't share this perception.

I am glad you chose to say "illustrating" rather than "demonstrating", for in order to do the latter he would have to have contrasted the articles he is quoting with a representative sampling of statements from professional climatologists. No such antithesis is remotely demonstrated and indeed is left altogether unattempted.

And (from Crichton's position) for good reason.

It is a truism to any scientifically literate person...

[polymath7]

II.

...that by and large mainstream media coverage has not exaggerated the claims of professional climatologists and has in fact done the obverse.

In the statement of mine to which you allude the "you" is intended as an impersonal pronoun and the statement contains neither the mildest hyperbole nor any logical fallacy that I am able to discover.

Would you care to expatiate?

[anonypoet]

I think one of my comments didn't get put up, the allusion was meant as a qualifier to the (apparently nonexistent) comment. Will put up now.

[polymath7]

Crichton and Gore? Rather than a politician and an author of airport novels, why not a couple of actual climatologists?