No Science Zone

[RyanT]

“I like to pay taxes. With them, I buy civilization.”
-Oliver Wendell Holmes

 

[Storker]

My view is the opposite, in that people should manage themselves, and do their own personal internalizing/externalizing, when there are actual consequences for their actions.

So you believe that people will voluntarily cover costs they can push to someone else? Good luck with that.

Do you believe in Santa, too?

 

[diver0008]

So you believe that people will voluntarily cover costs they can push to someone else? Good luck with that.

Do you believe in Santa, too?

I am not sure what you mean by that.

The first part, that is.

 

[Skeptic14]

Scientific consensus is simply the best data we have at the moment. It doesn't matter if we're discussing Earth's age, evolution, the link between smoking and lung cancer, how to best perform a bypass operation or anthropogenic climate change. The best available data are those which the scientific community agrees on.

First, scientific consensus isn't data, at least not empirical data, and if that's the best "data we have so far" than "the science being settled" as is quite often said by some is quite remarkably untrue.

We have very good reasons for knowing earth's age is around 4.6 billion years and we don't need a consensus. Good scientist will point out all the different methods from different fields of science that provide similar conclusions.

The same with evolution, we can look at DNA and see the relation between chimps and humans, the specific chromosomal splices, so once again, no I never hear good scientist using consensus when they are trying to argue evolution, they provide real evidence.

The only two places from my experience watching/reading intellectual debates and topics where consensus is continual used as a supportive rationale is anthropogenic global warming (now climate change) and religious apologist.

As someone else posted, some of you love to try and pigeon hole folks into labels/categories to better bring out the ad hominem so you can dissuade disagreement.

If you choose to follow the advice of a crackpot minority just because 'the oft used "97%" statement is bad... really bad', well, that's of course your prerogative. Which in my opinion is pretty bloody stupid, by the way.

Crackpot... wow, you guys are too much A couple of you so eager to argue with someone that appears to disagree with you haven't apparently taken the tiny amount of time to fully comprehend my point about the 97% quote. It is quite ironic watching you guys question the reliability of "these crackpot minority" that are part of the 97% that you guys use as evidence for your cult. You see how funny that is, or no?

It is your prerogative to continue to use unscientific means of defending your cult/religion masqueraded as science and to attempt to label and pigeon hole anyone that doesn't fully agree with you.

 

[RyanT]

@Skeptic14, as per my previous post, consensus is an important part of science. Science deals in uncertainties and relies on multiple independent tests to arrive at solid conclusions. This is precisely the kind of thing you just talked about in your post. To quote you,

different methods from different fields of science that provide similar conclusions.

So climate science is no different from any other field, including evolutionary biology (which is my field). Scientists from the fields of atmospheric chemistry, physics, geology, meteorology, and oceanography have independently converged on the consensus that anthropogenic carbon production is warming the climate. So although you might not hear someone use the word "consensus" when discussing evolutionary biology, the body of scientific knowledge is in fact, just that.

 

[drrich2]

The purpose of Pigovian taxes is to convert an externality to an internality. By putting a tax on industrial pollution, the government "encourages" the factory to build a wastewater treatment plant instead of just dumping their crap on someone else. If the tax is high enough, building that treatment plant becomes economically favorable, and the customers end up paying what the product really costs instead of dumping some of that cost on someone else.

Also your quote: "Pigou provides numerous illustrations of incidental uncharged disservices. For example, if a contractor builds a factory in the middle of a crowded neighborhood, the factory causes these incidental uncharged disservices: higher congestion, loss of light, and a loss of health for the neighbors. He also references businesses that sell alcohol. The sale of alcohol necessitates higher costs in policemen and prisons, Pigou argues, because of the crime associated with alcohol. In other words, the net private product of alcohol businesses is peculiarly large relative to the net social product of the same business. He suggests that this is why most countries tax alcohol businesses."

Very interesting concept pertinent to the 'what do we do about it' phase. It struck me as 'socialist' for some reason; I think that's because I see 2 ways of seeing society; a moralistically rooted individualistic view - that society is a loose collection of individuals, vs a view of society as a 'group organism' with individuals as a part of that, rather like cells in the body. In practice, let's apply that to some Pigovian situations:

1.) Someone opens a bar in town & does everything legally. He doesn't drive drunk. He doesn't engage in drunk & disorderly acts. Some customers misuse the product and do. Do we 'stick it to' the offenders only, or do we highly tax the product or bar, with the attitude it's a matter of 'group ownership' of access to the product, that the negative effects on the group organism (society) have to be 'owned' by those who use the product, and it's 'right' to make them pay those costs (even though most of them don't do the wrongful acts)?

2.) Each year in the U.S., there are many instances of speeding, highway fatalities & other auto-related havoc. Is that the fault/liability of Ford, Chevy, Honda, Toyota, etc...

3.) Zoning ordinances are intended to prevent placing factories in neighborhoods where they'll be problematic, without penalizing anybody deliberately.

4.) From what presumed 'state of normal' do you judge that a business has somehow damaged the social organism? Some seem to think we ought to set the bar at a society where no one is fat, drinks soda or eats fried food or uses table salt, everyone works out and nobody smokes. Then we shaft anybody who's fat, sedentary, drinks soda, etc... We blame McDonalds for making people fat; shall we go farther and put a $100 tax apiece on forks & spoons? $5 Per Can for Coke or Pepsi?

It's not even that simple. When more legalized gambling was proposed in Kentucky, a supporting argument was that it would generate high revenues and thus high tax revenues. The counterpoint was that money didn't magically appear out of nowhere; most money going into gambling would've otherwise entered the local economy in other ways, still been taxed, and without some of the perceived negatives of the gambling.

Pigovian solutions tend to be government-imposed. This is a good point:

So you believe that people will voluntarily cover costs they can push to someone else? Good luck with that.

On the other hand, this is the same government system that spends hugely more than it takes in annually, commits us to an ever-expanding vast & unpayable debt and borrowed so heavily against the very important Social Security program in the U.S. that this program that ought to be in good shape is often cited as being in dire jeopardy. The manner in which the states basically robbed the tobacco companies some years back, which some considered justified, then misappropriated most of the money for other uses is another example. Put another way, many believe government tends to be corrupt and incompetent, and to make matters worse over time.

I'm not making a blanket statement the Pigovian approach is wrong across the board. I am saying that, at least from an individualistic perspective, that mentality is potentially dangerous and applying it should be very much case-by-case with intense scrutiny. Make sure any tax money off selling 'carbon credits' is used to plant a tree, etc..., and any bureaucracy managing it is lean & efficient.

Richard.

 

[Skeptic14]

@Skeptic14, as per my previous post, consensus is an important part of science. Science deals in uncertainties and relies on multiple independent tests to arrive at solid conclusions. This is precisely the kind of thing you just talked about in your post. To quote you,

So climate science is no different from any other field, including evolutionary biology (which is my field). Scientists from the fields of atmospheric chemistry, physics, geology, meteorology, and oceanography have independently converged on the consensus that anthropogenic carbon production is warming the climate. So although you might not hear someone use the word "consensus" when discussing evolutionary biology, the body of scientific knowledge is in fact, just that.

There is a big difference between polling the opinions of scientist to gather a consensus and having multiple experiments, multitudes of data points and multiple methodologies coming to the same conclusion. And I agree, I'm sure there is a consensus among scientist on most current theories, but that isn't a way to enter technical discourse on the topic and it isn't scientific and I hardly see it come up when discussing other fields like it does with AGW.

I would agree that parts of climate science are real science, my gripe is the parts of it where it is becoming cult-like due to ideological agendas.

 

[RyanT]

There is a big difference between polling the opinions of scientist to gather a consensus and having multiple experiments, multitudes of data points and multiple methodologies coming to the same conclusion.

Yes, so back to my original challenge. Read the studies and then explain why those studies are flawed. You say that you agree that "parts" of science climate are real. Please tell me which parts are not real.

 

[diver0008]

Yes, so back to my original challenge. Read the studies and then explain why those studies are flawed. You say that you agree that "parts" of science climate are real. Please tell me which parts are not real.

Not me. I am no climatologist. Studies, graphs, charts...who has the time, and not my specialty. Not to mention that the data may be flawed or skewed. Wouldn't be the first time.

The intriguing part of all this is all the fervor and hype. As if next week the seas are all going to rise, the forests will turn to deserts, and we're doomed, so pay up.

I just don't buy it.

Maybe the climate is changing. I don't see it. Maybe it will change for the better. Who knows. Maybe, if it is changing, human activity has something to do with it. How much effect and what it holds for the future, I don't know, and I doubt that anyone really does. And honestly, I don't care. There are far more pressing issues threatening humanity; terrorism, nuclear proliferation, overpopulation...

Why this climate stuff gets so much hype is wierd.

Why "deniers" are so vilified is strange.

Heretics.

Blasphemers.

Something else is going on.

 

[RyanT]

@Murky Waters, of course you don't have to buy it. The same scientific method that has brought you computers, medicine, and engineering has also elucidated the problem of climate change. So pick and choose as you will, the science is available for you to read.