On Saturday, April 12, 2014 2:57:39 PM UTC+1, ghi...@gmail.com wrote: > > > On Thursday, April 10, 2014 2:24:04 AM UTC+1, Brent wrote: >> >> On 4/9/2014 5:50 PM, LizR wrote: >> >> On 9 April 2014 13:14, chris peck <chris_...@hotmail.com> wrote: >> >>> *>> If in some general discussion of climate change someone says (as a >>> convenient shorthand) that "97% of climate scientists agree that AGW is a >>> fact", what is the logical fallacy they are committing? I'd like to know so >>> I can avoid it in future myself.* >>> >>> if you are just pointing out that a consensus exists and nothing more >>> then it isn't a fallacy. This consensus exists. >>> >>> If on the other hand you are pointing out that the consensus exists for >>> some other end, ie as a means of convincing people of the truth of any >>> statement other than '97% of scientist think climate change is occurring', >>> then it is a fallacy. Things are not true because people believe them right? >>> >> >> If scientists are more likely to believe something that is true in their >> field than to believe the contrary (which is false), then it is a simple >> application of Bayesian inference to show that scientists believing X is >> evidence for X. It doesn't mean that their belief *causes* X any more that >> OJ's bloody glove causes him to murder Nichol. But to hold that "97% of >> climate scientists believe burning fossil fuel is causing global warming." >> is *not* evidence for the truth of that statement requires that you also >> believe scientists are more likely to believe what is false than its >> contrary. >> >> Bren >> > > I agree and see no good in the denial camp. But it doesn't look like good > science, or even good ethics, publishing one-sided, cherry picked character > assassination about conspiracy theories. Firstly, there's no reason to > think the people actually responsible for the strategy harbour conspiracy > theories. The directors of tobacco companies and their strategic PR shills > had all long since quit smoking. > > A large component of the political spectrum do feel alienated from science > and that does leave them - and so as find with climate Science - vulnerable > in a way it once was not. And there is a reason for that, that the > institutions of science show no willingness to reflect on at all. For up to > 50 or 60 years, academic institutions, usually in the form of academics > with too much say over who gets posts, have blatently followed corruption > recruitment practiced, packing people in that reflect ONE part of the > political and economic, social and ideological spectrum. Broadly, > conservatives have been pushed and kept out. > > Chickens come home to roost. Look in the mirror time. > I'm trying to improve my typo problem. So that sentence above should have read o "A large component of the political spectrum do feel alienated from science and that does leave them - and so as we now find with AGW - Science itself, vulnerable in a way it once was not. Vulnerable to this kind of manipulation, from admittedly even fouler sources. What would be a good piece of science would be to find out (a) what the impact this internal corrupt practice within science of effectively making political views a criteria for gettingices o ahead. and (a) about the practices deployed to distort the public view. How many people that are found first by the sophisticated denial approach, ever change their mind? And vice verca?
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