#2 The Conspiracy - Dissecting Dr Lindzen's intrinsic obtuseness

#2  "government created monopoly" and further conspiracy ideation

{slight editing 3/13/15 noon}

 This is the second part (link to first one) of my review of an interview by Alex Epstein with Professor Richard Lindzen.  I've taken the time and trouble to transcribe much of it in order to focus on Lindzen's bizarre version of reality and to juxtapose it against history and the known science.  

In this installment we consider the possibility that 'alarmists' aren't all in on a grand conspiracy to take away your freedoms and that they are alarmed for good reasons.

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Power Hour: Questioning Climate Science with Dr. Richard Lindzen October 22, 2012 | Alex Epstein

Richard Lindzen joins Alex Epstein to talk about perspectives on climate change:

• Questions about climate
• “Balance” in nature
• The goals of environmentalists

1:45  Alex:  Whenever I read one of his (R.L.) papers I get almost emotional just by the level of clarity and diligence and utter lack of any kind of appeal to authority. ...

3:05  Lindzen: What bothers me about this issue is the intrinsic obtuseness of the questions. ...

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5:00  Alex:  ... how science has become much more institutionalized, as you describe it reminded me of a government created monopoly.

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Government created monopoly on climate science?  And he seriously believes it.  Can't leave the conspiracy ideation alone.  

… Here are the six characteristics associated with conspiracist ideation:(https://wickershamsconscience.wordpress.com/2014/04/18/wonkery-conspiracy-ideation-and-science/) 

• The folks behind any conspiracy are always nefarious. There aren’t any conspiracies for good purposes, only bad purposes.

• The person claiming there is a conspiracy typically considers herself, at least tacitly, to be the brave antagonist of the nefarious intentions of the conspiracy; that is, the victim is also a potential hero.

• The conspiracy theorist refuses to believe anything that does not fit into the conspiracy theory. Thus, nothing is at it seems, and all evidence points to hidden agendas or some other meaning that only the conspiracy theorist understands.

• Nothing happens by accident. Small random events are woven into a conspiracy narrative and reinterpreted as indisputable evidence for the theory.

• The underlying lack of trust and exaggerated suspicion contribute to a cognitive pattern whereby specific hypotheses may be abandoned when they become unsustainable, but those corrections do not impinge on the overall abstraction that ‘something must be wrong’ and the ‘official’ account must be based on deception. Princess Diana was murdered and Princess Diana faked her own death.

• Contrary evidence is often interpreted as evidence for a conspiracy. This ideation relies on the notion that, the stronger the evidence against a conspiracy, the more the conspirators must want people to believe their version of events (“self-sealing reasoning”).

Also see: http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2013/02/26/what-happens-when-you-study-conspiracy-theories-the-conspiracy-theorists-make-up-conspiracy-theories-about-you/

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What Alex ignores is that these developments (see the end of this post for a list of major Environmental Acts of the twentieth century) were driven by accumulating knowledge at the insistence of an informed electorate.  

It was demanded by "We The People" with US Reps. grudgingly bowing to the people's will.  Aren't we a democracy?

Timeline: The Modern Environmental Movement

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/timeline/earthdays/

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As for Alex's loathed 'climate science' bureaucracy, come on, get real. it's no different than what's happened within every other human endeavor over this past half century - that's the price of unrestrained population growth and breakneck progress.  

#1-Dissecting Dr Lindzen's intrinsic obtuseness - The Question

#1  "The Real Questions" according to Dr. Lindzen

My previous review was of the last two and half minutes of an interview by Alex Epstein with Dr. Lindzen.  Now that I've been introduced to the whole thing and had a chance to listen to it, it seems like all of it deserves some scrutiny.  So I've taken the time and trouble to transcribe much of it.

My intention is to review Lindzen's words and juxtapose his version of science with the real thing.  I'm going to break this up into smaller sections.  This one covering "the real questions" according to Richard Lindzen. 

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Power Hour: Questioning Climate Science with Dr. Richard Lindzen October 22, 2012 | Alex Epstein
Richard Lindzen joins Alex Epstein to talk about perspectives on climate change:

• Questions about climate
• “Balance” in nature
• The goals of environmentalists

1:45  Alex:  Whenever I read one of his papers I get almost emotional just by the level of clarity and diligence and utter lack of any kind of appeal to authority.
I remember he was on this show last time, despite all his credentials the number one thing he encouraged was for people to do the research, look into things themselves. ... and I really consider that a very good indication for the quality of scientist and the quality of person someone is. ...  
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3:05  Lindzen: What bothers me about this issue is the intrinsic obtuseness of the questions.  For instance in these public consensus statements and so on, it's always is there agreement that CO2 plays a roll, or climate changes and so on.  These are things which in fact everyone agrees on.
Those are not the questions in dispute.
And yet it's presented as though if there's agreement that climate has changed, ahh, we should do something about it.

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This is superficial silliness.  The issue has nothing to do with "climate has changed" - the consensus statements are about our manmade emissions of greenhouse gases significantly altering our atmosphere.  
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Why we need to talk about the scientific consensus on climate change

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/nov/20/why-we-need-to-talk-about-scientific-consensus-on-climate-change

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The agreements acknowledge the obvious: If we warm up our Earth's global heat and moisture distribution engine it will create more intense weather and disrupt natural systems that have been tens of thousands of years in the making.  This will lead to increasing problems for humanity and everything else.

As our climate changes, the risk of injury, illness, and death from the resulting heat waves, wildfires, intense storms, and floods rises. 

http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-effects/health.html 

Scientists and economists are beginning to grapple with the serious economic and environmental consequences if we fail to reduce global carbon emissions quickly and deeply. The most expensive thing we can do is nothing. 

http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-effects/economy.html

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Lindzen: The real questions are, you know change is normal, it always occurs, is there anything unusual,