By BJ Bjornson
Nate Silver has caused a bit of a buzz today by challenging the mainly conservative bloggers who seem to enjoy claiming how cool or cold it has been in their neighbourhood, or occasionally somewhere else, and then extrapolate their local conditions to claim that the global climate isn't really getting warmer.
His challenge was no doubt prompted by the fact that for the post that caught his attention at Power Line, the actual temperatures for the month haven't actually been below average as much as above average, and certainly not out of the ordinary overall, making Hinderaker's claim of a 1816-style "Year Without a Summer" even more ridiculous than it already was.
Of course, the whole thing has absolutely nothing to do with Climate Change. The only way the betting on local weather patterns might actually result in something useful were if Silver somehow managed to find takers for his bet accross the entire globe, including places where there are no people actually living. Climate, after all, is a lot bigger than your local weather forecast.
Still, as Silver says, this is more about shaming the folks who push these kinds of stories, (and let's be fair on this one, the tendency for those on the other side of the debate to overuse local hot periods to push their favoured line is just as rampant in some quarters), rather than providing any proof one way or the other. Still, if one accepts the scientific evidence that the globe is warming, odds are good that on average you'd come out ahead on such a challenge.
The real question is whether or not any of the denailists who choose to ignore the mountains of scientific evidence believe their own propoganda enough to take Nate up on the challenge.
Somehow I doubt it, and I also doubt they'll feel any shame about continuing to push their line against Climate Change sans actual evidence.
Yes, it's called Global Climate Change for a reason. Here in the wet gray Pacific Northwest we are having a bit of a cool down today -
ReplyDeleteit's only going to be about 5 or six degrees above average down from 10 or 15. (average is 80) Tommorow it will one again be 15 + and that is to continue until we are 20+ drgrees above by the weekend.
Sometimes I feel like fighting ignorance is like peeing in the ocean.
ReplyDeleteJust before sitting down here at the keyboard I was watching TV. Surfing channels I watched a little of a CNN program featuring that Republican chart showing the complexity of the House version of the health plan. The gasbags were laughing and making inane remarks as they interviewed some Republican who had little to add in the way of content. I couldn't stand it so I kept surfing.
I finally came to a movie in progress, The Man Who Became King. This heart-wrenching documentary tells of a Sudanese refugee in Canada surprised to learn that he had become the designated king of his tribe back in Sudan. The film details first his patient, eventually successful efforts, to have his family join him in Canada, then his hard decision to leave them behind, returning to Africa to fulfill his obligations as leader of their tribe.
The film covers four years that followed, and by the end of the film (2007) he had yet to be reunited with his wife and children in Canada. The film focuses on how hard it was for him to persuade tribal elders and the rest of the tribe to embrace changes. His accomplishments during that time were the building of a school, clinic and airstrip which was eventually used to bring much-needed food and medicine to the village to stem the progress of a cholera outbreak.
The parallels between this man's challenge and that of another man we know with African roots is striking. We find it unbelievable that ignorant tribal people cannot understand why they need to have a school or clinic. Or work together to clear an airstrip for small planes. We cannot believe it when the narrator says that if you tell them the plane was made by humans they will not believe it. They believe it was made by God.
And yet we know that for some reason the snow is melting on mountains all over the world. Glaciers are becoming smaller and the polar ice caps both North and South are also getting smaller. Polar bears are going extinct before our eyes and grizzlies are moving into habitats now green that were once frozen tundra.
Despite this evidence climate-change deniers are not embarrassed to flaunt their ignorance. In the face of abundant evidence that the health care system left untouched will soon sink America's economic boat in a way that will make the financial crisis look like a walk in the park. And when even her critics look at clear evidence that a nominee for the Supreme Court documenting her adherence to the rule of law over decades in the courtroom, stands in vivid contrast to her personal feelings, they still blink, shaking their heads in disbelief, and use words like "dissonanc," trying to make sense of their own blind ignorance. (I recall my own disbelief the first time I heard a Negro on television speaking standard English. The image didn't compute. I said to my mother "Come, look at this!" Ignorance may be universal but thank God it's not incurable.)
I wanna scream at the TV "What are you gonna believe? The facts you see before you or the prejudiced ignorance of your stupid mindset?" And when it comes to the health care debate and climate change I have the same impulse. Where do they get these people?
(/rant)
Thanks for listening.
I had to get that out. Back now to our regular programming.