Search LBO-Talk Archives

2116 kyoto -- rank: 1000

You misunderstand me. My rhetorical point was that the poster had gone further than saying that Balling and Michaels' science was wrong, he suggested that they had prostituted their scientific credentials and knowlingly lied. Given that neither are subscribers to this list, they have no opportunity to reply to such allegations of misconduct. Similiarly, since Michael DiPaola is not subscribed to this list, it is rather as if I had accused him, not of an error, but a deliberate deceit or crime. W ...

Document Size:	6217
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Dec 13 01:03:57 PST 2000

2117 kyoto -- rank: 1000

In message <E145W8d-00065e-00 at smtp01.mrf.mail.rcn.net>, Liza Featherstone <lfeather32 at erols.com> quoting >Michael DiPaola writes >The more than 2000 scientists who worked on the Assessment reports came from >many disciplines -- including HUNDREDS, I daresay, in meteorology, climate, >physics, etc., etc. It included others for good reason: their assessments >are supposed to predict not only climate but the potential impacts of a >changing climate. Think abou ...

Document Size:	7498
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Dec 12 12:55:54 PST 2000

2118 Global Warming? -- rank: 1000

I think that John's post rather illustrates the problem of the science of global warming. Unlike other scientific enquiries this one is violently distorted by the politicisation of the global climate conferences. Nobody could be in any doubt after the second round of the climate change conference that the debate is not about science, but about the rival claims of the major industrial powers, and that the substance of the issue is capitalist rivalry. Europe wants to restrain US industry, its own ...

Document Size:	12308
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 10 08:21:40 PST 2000

2119 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <F30802balmaHfRGO9DV00013b14 at hotmail.com>, jan carowan <jancarowan at hotmail.com> writes In reply to my comment >was only concerned to show that >>historical materialism has no relation to the philosophical question of >>the objectivity or otherwise of the material world. > >No you were not. To which I can only say, read the post again, whose principal references were to Lenin's Materialism and empirio-criticism and Paul Mattick's Marxism and the N ...

Document Size:	8112
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 10 08:35:04 PST 2000

2120 Queen's Speech, NSPCC, Nice -- rank: 1000

The WEEK ending 10 December 2000 BLAIR DECLARES WAR ON CHILDREN... As reported last WEEK British Prime Minster Tony Blair is gearing up for a war against children. Through his official spokeswoman, Queen Elizabeth II, the self-styled modernizer, set his government firmly against the future, promising to crush the 'yob culture'. Measures include spot crimes for disorderly behavior and to 'raise the age of child curfew schemes from 9 to 15'. Youth worker Stuart Waiton investigated the impact of a ...

Document Size:	8791
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 10 07:39:18 PST 2000

2121 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <F35vsO3Hv13KMgYGS4B0001281e at hotmail.com>, jan carowan <jancarowan at hotmail.com> writes >Mr Heartfield, >You obviously do not understand the first thing about the 75-year-old >new physics. It reduces your observations here about objectivity in >the object itself to heavy handed pronunciamento. Well, forgive me, but I thought the weight of my post was to say that historical materialism was not a species of philosophical materialism and therefore had no rela ...

Document Size:	10499
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 10 01:44:15 PST 2000

2122 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <sa30c719.074 at mail.ci.detroit.mi.us>, Charles Brown <CharlesB at CNCL.ci.detroit.mi.us> writes > >CB: Would you argree with Lenin that materialism is defined by belief in the >existence of objective reality ? > Well, yes, the *doctrine* of materialism is defined by the belief in objective reality. The objective reality itself is indifferent to our belief in it or otherwise. Paul Mattick wrote a good piece on Marxism and the New Physics where he tries to dise ...

Document Size:	5465
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 8 16:16:23 PST 2000

2123 Global Warming? -- rank: 1000

In message <003d01c060dd$9bcfce20$38b30e18 at sprgfld1.mo.home.com>, John Thornton <jthorn16 at home.com> writes > >Try reading the Sept. 1993 'Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society' >review of Robert Balling's work written by Michael MacCracken. He had been >at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for 25 years as a climate modeler. >He was later director of the U.S. Global Change Research Program. >For Patrick Michaels work try the Summary for Policy Ma ...

Document Size:	8191
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Dec 9 01:22:35 PST 2000

2124 Science -- rank: 1000

Justin's approach takes as its starting point the mutual alienation of man from man. The question for him is why does he believe what scientists say, not what is the source of the knowledge. Why we believe scientists is a secondary question of psychology. What is the source of scientific knowledge is what is at issue. The source of scientific knowledge is its object, nature. In message <F234CE7DH9kwy15jfXX0000a0b8 at hotmail.com>, Justin Schwartz <jkschw at hotmail.com> writes >&g ...

Document Size:	5818
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 22:20:08 PST 2000

2125 Global Warming -- rank: 1000

In message <002b01c0604b$fcf1e9a0$38b30e18 at sprgfld1.mo.home.com>, John Thornton <jthorn16 at home.com> writes >I was under the impression that both these gentlemen (Balling & Michaels) >had had their criticisms thrashed soundly by the IPCC, Dr. Bert Bolin, and >even by another 'climate change' skeptic Richard Lindzen of MIT. Your impression is wrong. >I have read >some of the IPCC's papers and have read Ballings and Michaels charges >against them. I have read ...

Document Size:	5938
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 22:11:03 PST 2000

2126 Global Warming -- rank: 1000

Sceptics on anthropic global warming include Patrick Michaels, professor of environmental science at U of Virginia, climatologist to State of V. and Robert Billings, Director of the Office of Climatology and Prof of Geog. at Arizona State U. The greater part of the nine hundred scientists who signed the Kyoto declaration were not climatologists, nor even in related fields. -- James Heartfield

Document Size:	4828
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 15:14:17 PST 2000

2127 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <F259D3JkUwWpSWerOc000009eb6 at hotmail.com>, Justin Schwartz <jkschw at hotmail.com> writes >Of course this is absolutely wrong. Science is decided by consensus. The >consensus may be wrong, but what makes something scientifically respectable >is that the scientists agree on it. --jks No you are absolutely wrong. Scientific facts are decided by material. Scientific consensus merely recognises that. The earth was not flat when scientists thought it was, it was rou ...

Document Size:	5099
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 14:55:17 PST 2000

2128 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <F248XWzRPTNZStgLzhV00007289 at hotmail.com>, Carl Remick <carlremick at hotmail.com> writes >>Science is not decided by consensus >>-- >>James Heartfield > >Interesting discovery, JH. You might want to alert all those scientists >clamoring to get findings published in peer-reviewed journals that they're >wasting their time. Peer review is an institutional check. Scientists involved in it understand that the warrant of scientific findings com ...

Document Size:	5123
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 11:38:28 PST 2000

2129 Disarming the Struggle AgaiAIDS: Anti-Science Obscurantism, Conpsiracy Theor -- rank: 1000

I don't think that anyone ever suggested that AIDS is insignificant. But the consensus is strained by the fact that the pattern of infection does not follow the assertion that we are all equally at risk. In Africa, AIDS diagnoses are indeed questionable, because the methodology is flawed. Many writers have suggested that deaths attributed to AIDS in Africa are from other diseases. In message <20001207173345.48360.qmail at web10805.mail.yahoo.com>, Leo Casey <leoecasey at yahoo.com> w ...

Document Size:	9160
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 11:41:18 PST 2000

2130 Science -- rank: 1000

In message <p0433010bb6543f7441fe@[216.254.77.128]>, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> writes >Actually I thought the consensus among scientists on both AIDS and >global warming was pretty strong. There aren't that many dissenters, >are there? The 'consensus' on anthropic global warming was achieved through political fiat, most of the scientists signing the Kyoto declaration, not being experts in climate. Science is not decided by consensus. As Einstein said when a book w ...

Document Size:	4955
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Dec 7 09:57:06 PST 2000