I take all people who espouse knowledge very seriously. I seldom take what they say at face value. I have often to my profit, told myself that I could analyse, interpret and come to my own conclusions. Where I did so in the past 40 years and more, I found that I could detect errors in the thinking of many people with far more study than me. What I found was that they worked hard, but employed prejudice to prove their instincts. Their theories were basic and formed from their prejudice, their studies flawed and their conclusions irrelevant to a proper analysis of the results. They basically started with cant, did mumbo jumbo, got conflicting results and bs'd the conclusions to fit their views.
When the systems where thought completely thru, logic and basic knowledge often revealed a flaw. When I was 12, many of my colleagues who had intellectual pretensions, proposed the basic prima facie flaws in the reasoning and propaganda of Dow Chemical whose assertions were that DDT was safe, and that Rachel Carson (Silent Spring, 1954) was all wet. We reasoned that the newspaper reports by the scientists probably were paid by Dow, and the reports were probably based on commercial need, and the excessive zeal to find a quick cure for malaria. We could see the drive to find a magic bullet, and the drive to make millions were the factors that led to a misjudgement and that we should distrust our "betters". Our grade eight class was right. We scoffed at our teachers and in one instance laughed out loud when he read the articles of the Dow Chemical scientists. Were we scientists or blessed with the impartiality and cold logic whose inconvenience binds and destroys society's vision of truth by its headlong rush to profit and cure?
A grade eight class looked at the data, the evident prejudice, stepped aside from authoritarian control, and saw the truth. It was no accident, it was simple reasoning, and it was correct. Can you do this? Stop taking mere authority and status as your guide, and think. Even simple contructs and analogs take time. Grade 11 algebraic analysis would baffle and stop 98% of the human race. It is not that deep. Three level problems stop 99.99% of the population.
Think for yourself. Know whom and what to trust. Look for impartiality. Look for supportive reasoning that makes sense. Eschew cant and propaganda and emotionalism. Eschew especially the crowd who acclaim a popular idea. Use logic and think deeply. Accept no false claims that are only supported by declamation. Ask for the studies and examine the statistics. In short become a user of logic, deduction, analysis. Don't wrest til the equations figure to the answer with complete satisfaction. Don't accept bald statements without support. Think for yourself.
Man's contribution to CO2 is 3%. Our present climatic warming, although significant has been repeated many times. CO2 is absorbed by the Ocean in antartic climes. What is the error rate in your temperature and CO2 content figures? What is the data reliability? How long has the data been collected? What are the known causational factors in climate change? How well do we know their levels over geologic time? How accurate are our assumptions? Given the error levels, what variance in data outcome can we expect?
Answer that.
Don't be afraid to be wrong. Chances are, you will be. |
