Monday, January 25, 2016
And you thought the Freemasons were bad
Australian politics is pretty boring at the moment: Malcolm Turnbull would easily win the election if only he could continue doing nothing before it has to be called. Just like the Queensland Premiership, where Annastacia Palaszczuk maintains popularity by simply keeping a pretty low profile, the non-scary leaders who get to follow those who do scare the public have a pretty easy run for quite a while.
Of course, there is the bizarre spectacle of Kevin Rudd thinking he would be good for the United Nations - but surely that is more of a matter of entertainment than a serious possibility. Why would Julie Bishop say the government would even consider it, though? (Kevin doesn't look all that well to me in recent photos I've noticed, too, although they might be old file ones I suppose.)
So without politics to worry about at the moment, I wandered over to Arts & Letters Daily, to read a scathing review of book about Augustine. It's lengthy, but this episode is noteworthy for its insight into ancient rumour mill:
Of course, there is the bizarre spectacle of Kevin Rudd thinking he would be good for the United Nations - but surely that is more of a matter of entertainment than a serious possibility. Why would Julie Bishop say the government would even consider it, though? (Kevin doesn't look all that well to me in recent photos I've noticed, too, although they might be old file ones I suppose.)
So without politics to worry about at the moment, I wandered over to Arts & Letters Daily, to read a scathing review of book about Augustine. It's lengthy, but this episode is noteworthy for its insight into ancient rumour mill:
The story begins when Augustine, as a Manichee, may have heard (must have heard according Lane Fox) an anti-Manichaean slander that the cult’s Elect, at their secret meals, had sex on top of flour spread on the floor. Their joint juices were spilled on the flour, and the male like some unknown Onan spilled his seed upon the ground, making the flour a carrier of the particles of light from the Elect, as the members of the Manichee sect were called. Bread was then made of the flour for the Elect to consume. Like most attacks of bigotry, this slur was illogical. What good would it do for the Elect to recycle light out into bread and then back into the source of the light in the first place? There is no way to know how widely this crude attack was known to people, much less to know how many credited its nonsense.Erk.
Saturday, January 23, 2016
Down the black hole to a new universe
An abstract on arXiv:
We investigate the effect of a black hole as a nucleation cite of a false vacuum bubble based on the Euclidean actions of relevant configurations. As a result we find a wormhole-like configuration may be spontaneously nucleated once the black hole mass falls below a critical value of order of the Hubble parameter corresponding to the false vacuum energy density. As the space beyond the wormhole throat can expand exponentially, this may be interpreted as creation of another inflationary universe in the final stage of the black hole evaporation.I'm pretty sure I saw another paper making the same argument on arXiv last month, but I forgot to note it. (I think Sabine H saw it too.) Should try to find it...
Friday, January 22, 2016
Maybe this will help...
OK, if you don't understand, listen to this.
(It appears Nesmith has required all YouTube's of Elephant Parts to be taken down from YouTube, which is fair enough I guess.)
How good a debater is Cruz? (A short, funny Colbert piece)
Surely even Republicans would find this funny:
And while you are on the Colbert channel, you may as well look at this clip just to see how extraordinarily similar Colin Hanks talks, looks, and acts like his father Tom. As many people say in comments after, it's almost spooky.
And while you are on the Colbert channel, you may as well look at this clip just to see how extraordinarily similar Colin Hanks talks, looks, and acts like his father Tom. As many people say in comments after, it's almost spooky.
Ross Douthat confesses
My Sarah Palin Romance - The New York Times
It was, however, a very brief romance.
And look, if one looks back at this very blog (no, I'm not going to help you find it), one will see that I too thought that her very first appearance on the national stage showed an impressive and natural confidence that might work well. But then, as Douthat says, she had to talk national policy to the media, and it all fell apart.
So I actually have a bit of sympathy here for Ross. But I still don't think he knows the way forward for the Republicans. No one on the Right has a proper grip on what has happened to the American Right, if you ask me.
It was, however, a very brief romance.
And look, if one looks back at this very blog (no, I'm not going to help you find it), one will see that I too thought that her very first appearance on the national stage showed an impressive and natural confidence that might work well. But then, as Douthat says, she had to talk national policy to the media, and it all fell apart.
So I actually have a bit of sympathy here for Ross. But I still don't think he knows the way forward for the Republicans. No one on the Right has a proper grip on what has happened to the American Right, if you ask me.
Don't worry, Catallaxy, we already know you don't "do" science
That’s a silly number | Catallaxy Files
Being ideologically dedicated to as tiny a government as possible because - well, just because! - the economists of Catallaxy don't like the idea of government funding science. Which is consistent with the blog being deeply devoted to climate change denial.
The blog would be better served by just not discussing science at all. Crank economics is enough of a burden, let alone taking on crank science.
Being ideologically dedicated to as tiny a government as possible because - well, just because! - the economists of Catallaxy don't like the idea of government funding science. Which is consistent with the blog being deeply devoted to climate change denial.
The blog would be better served by just not discussing science at all. Crank economics is enough of a burden, let alone taking on crank science.
Trend change discussed
Changes | Open Mind
Tamino notes that, for most climate change indicators, it's not yet clear whether the trend rates are changing (that is, accelerating.) But, of course, the actual current trends are worrying enough.
Tamino notes that, for most climate change indicators, it's not yet clear whether the trend rates are changing (that is, accelerating.) But, of course, the actual current trends are worrying enough.
Furry empathy, re-visited
Consoling Voles Hint at Animal Empathy - The Atlantic
I like research into niceness, but I see that people were doubting that rats saving other rats were displaying empathy. But perhaps this study into prairie voles makes a stronger case. (I'm still generous in my interpretation of the rat study, too.)
I like research into niceness, but I see that people were doubting that rats saving other rats were displaying empathy. But perhaps this study into prairie voles makes a stronger case. (I'm still generous in my interpretation of the rat study, too.)
Thursday, January 21, 2016
They have their standards
Once again (and there are a million other examples), I am bemused by the Catallaxy outrage at how leftists "hate" (someone said something mean about the late Bob Carter, and Sinclair Davidson thinks its worth noting), while over at another thread a "leftist" ABC journalist is called (for no apparent reason relevant that I can see) a "$20 a trick hooker", and no one else in the thread bats an eyelid.
(Incidentally, that Riccardo Bosi is one of the nuttiest of any commenter on the Australian blogosphere. Here's his follow up to the "hookers" comment:
(Incidentally, that Riccardo Bosi is one of the nuttiest of any commenter on the Australian blogosphere. Here's his follow up to the "hookers" comment:
There’s a very good reason why I went public with my name, and I’m just getting warmed up. The hookers at the ABC are just one group who will eventually be taking a long walk off a short pier.He's ex-Army, rabidly Christian and anti-abortion, hates Islam with a passion, and has said he's going to be undertaking some speaking tour of Australia to convince everyone of God knows what.)
More about the geologist to the "lay person"
I see a common theme that runs through the many Bob Carter condolence comments made at climate change denying sites such as Catallaxy and Jonova is that many felt he was great at explaining clearly to the non scientist "lay person" why AGW was a nonsense.
Just as anti-vaxxers should realise that the fact that the mere handful of anti-vax doctors always seem to be talking to groups of "lay people" instead of other doctors might be a clue as to the real quality of their advocacy, those who refuse to believe in AGW are oblivious to their own gullibility.
Yesterday, in Alan Moran's post at Catallaxy, for example, he linked to a video of a recent (little noticed) talk Carter was giving at Paris last year on behalf of the Heartland Institute. (It's the 5th video down.)
I started watching it, and was surprised to hear him claim within the first few minutes that it was "irrelevant" climatically as to whether there has been a 16 or 18 year "pause" in the warming. You have to look at climate change on the longer scale of 30 years (he says that the last 150 years only has 5 climate data points.)
Well, that's interesting, because here's what he was saying in The Age a mere 5 years ago at the height of the argument about an Australian carbon tax:
The appeal to, and deliberate confusion of , the "lay person" is not something we have much sympathy for when it comes to anti-vaxers. The only reason people might be less harsh towards climate change deniers and advocates to the gullible like Carter is probably because with climate change there is not such an easy present day attribution to death, as there is with a baby who dies of whooping cough, for example.
But long term, the problems Carter was trying to deliver to humanity on ideological grounds were, of course, worse. (Even if you want to argue that stopping all vaccinations might kill just as many people as climate change, the realisation of a mistake with that policy would be quickly reversible. Carter and his ilk always skipped over the fact that their advocacy for delay makes the problem - if they are wrong - essentially irreversible.)
Just as anti-vaxxers should realise that the fact that the mere handful of anti-vax doctors always seem to be talking to groups of "lay people" instead of other doctors might be a clue as to the real quality of their advocacy, those who refuse to believe in AGW are oblivious to their own gullibility.
Yesterday, in Alan Moran's post at Catallaxy, for example, he linked to a video of a recent (little noticed) talk Carter was giving at Paris last year on behalf of the Heartland Institute. (It's the 5th video down.)
I started watching it, and was surprised to hear him claim within the first few minutes that it was "irrelevant" climatically as to whether there has been a 16 or 18 year "pause" in the warming. You have to look at climate change on the longer scale of 30 years (he says that the last 150 years only has 5 climate data points.)
Well, that's interesting, because here's what he was saying in The Age a mere 5 years ago at the height of the argument about an Australian carbon tax:
Fact 1. A mild warming of about 0.5 degrees Celsius (well within previous natural temperature variations) occurred between 1979 and 1998, and has been followed by slight global cooling over the past 10 years. Ergo, dangerous global warming is not occurring.Seems strangely like he is encouraging his readers in 2011 to believe that the "pause" is indeed climatically significant, but apparently it's not unless you look at the 30 year period. Which, a few days after his death, looks like this:
Fact 2. Between 2001 and 2010 global average temperature decreased by 0.05 degrees, over the same time that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels increased by 5 per cent. Ergo, carbon dioxide emissions are not driving dangerous warming.
The appeal to, and deliberate confusion of , the "lay person" is not something we have much sympathy for when it comes to anti-vaxers. The only reason people might be less harsh towards climate change deniers and advocates to the gullible like Carter is probably because with climate change there is not such an easy present day attribution to death, as there is with a baby who dies of whooping cough, for example.
But long term, the problems Carter was trying to deliver to humanity on ideological grounds were, of course, worse. (Even if you want to argue that stopping all vaccinations might kill just as many people as climate change, the realisation of a mistake with that policy would be quickly reversible. Carter and his ilk always skipped over the fact that their advocacy for delay makes the problem - if they are wrong - essentially irreversible.)
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
The irony meter will never recover
Anthony Watts writes this at WUWT about the sudden death of one of the two Australian geologist global warming star "skeptics", Bob Carter:
Anthony Watts, whose blog is the home for the wilfully and gullibly ignorant of the United States, bemoaning the "cult of ignorance" in his country. Wow.
Regardless of his personal qualities (of which we pretty routinely give the recently deceased the benefit of any doubt), if people cannot work out that Carter was intellectually leading them up the garden path with misdirection and science-y sounding argument about climate that actually did not bear even moderate scrutiny, then they're too silly to continue arguing with.
And that's probably why Watts sounds sort of depressed these days - actual climate scientists are (rightly) more than ever just ignoring his beloved "work" of spreading disinformation. Even he is started to get that it has been for nought.
Regardless of his personal qualities (of which we pretty routinely give the recently deceased the benefit of any doubt), if people cannot work out that Carter was intellectually leading them up the garden path with misdirection and science-y sounding argument about climate that actually did not bear even moderate scrutiny, then they're too silly to continue arguing with.
And that's probably why Watts sounds sort of depressed these days - actual climate scientists are (rightly) more than ever just ignoring his beloved "work" of spreading disinformation. Even he is started to get that it has been for nought.
A bit of insight into the ways Americans think about slavery
I used to lead tours at a plantation. You won’t believe the questions I got about slavery. - Vox
It's a good essay, and sheds some light on the change in thinking that I think has become much more prevalent in the US since the rise of the ideological, "evidence, what evidence?" American Right over the last decade or so.
It's a good essay, and sheds some light on the change in thinking that I think has become much more prevalent in the US since the rise of the ideological, "evidence, what evidence?" American Right over the last decade or so.
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Good for the astronomers
Star wars: Lights set to be dimmed in NSW country towns to allow for space research | DailyTelegraph
I see it's only a proposed plan at the moment, but good to see that the politicians are taking seriously the need to limit light pollution around the Siding Spring Observatory outside Coonabarabran. (Which is where the photo that graces the top of this blog was taken from.)
I see it's only a proposed plan at the moment, but good to see that the politicians are taking seriously the need to limit light pollution around the Siding Spring Observatory outside Coonabarabran. (Which is where the photo that graces the top of this blog was taken from.)
Physics mysteries, continued
Tiny black holes could trigger collapse of universe—except that they don't | Science | AAAS
I missed this story from August last year. How slack of me.
Seems that a paper last year argued that mini black holes in theory could cause the collapse of the universe's vacuum state (thereby ending the universe), but for some reason, they don't. (And we know that because it should have happened long ago, if it could.)
Interesting...
I missed this story from August last year. How slack of me.
Seems that a paper last year argued that mini black holes in theory could cause the collapse of the universe's vacuum state (thereby ending the universe), but for some reason, they don't. (And we know that because it should have happened long ago, if it could.)
Interesting...
Easier said than done
Let's Measure Consciousness! Max Tegmark
Max Tegmark likes big ideas, and here he's suggesting that he's come up with a (possible) way of testing for consciousness.
You ought to follow the link in the article to his paper on arXiv: even by the standards of what you routinely find there, it's absolutely chock full of maths.
Max Tegmark likes big ideas, and here he's suggesting that he's come up with a (possible) way of testing for consciousness.
You ought to follow the link in the article to his paper on arXiv: even by the standards of what you routinely find there, it's absolutely chock full of maths.
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