Check out HotWhopper Chat ! - internet’s serious climate chat room

My previous post is pretty bleak.  But, I’m a healthy human and hope does spring eternal even when marching into the valley of destruction.  That’s why I was excited when Sou of HotWhopper blog fame invited me to join HotWhopper Chat before it went public and to help with getting it rolling and iron out any glitches.

I’m enthusiastic about this promising discussion forum.  It’s not a place for childish contrarian arguments about the validity of climate science.  After all, the science is pretty well established.  As any constructive honest debate will make plenty clear to anyone who engages in it with good faith.  Don’t believe me? Try it!  

Or check out the folks who collect all the studies for our general edification SkepticalScience.com.

Here’s a summary: 

http://www.SkepticalScience.com/argument.php

... global warming and climate change myths, sorted by recent popularity vs what science says. Click the response for a more detailed description. You can also view them sorted by taxonomy, or by popularity,

Instead HotWhopper Chat is a serious place for serious people who are concerned about what we are doing to our climate, you know, our Earth’s life support system. 

People who want a safe space for constructive discussion about climate issues and public communication issues among like minded individuals.  It’ll also be a great place to help us network and hopefully develop a sense of community among people who are concerned with climate science and communication. 

There are many of us out here, now we have a new interesting place to get together and discuss such things among friends.  Drop on by for a visit.

Visit:

https://chat.hotwhopper.com

By Sou | September 12, 2016

We’ve launched! A big thank you to everyone who helped in the early stages. A warm welcome to everyone who visits. 

AGW awareness, but is it too little, too few, and too late?

Over at Hotwhopper there was a story: Dissenting view on Climate Change Action - No longer silent, but is it too little, too few, and too late?

http://blog.hotwhopper.com/2016/09/dissenting-view-on-climate-change.html#comment-form  | September 6, 2016

Basically it was the story of two members of Australia's Climate Change Authority who have published a minority dissenting report to their Authority’s, Special Report from the CCA: Special Review of Australia’s climate goals and policies. It’s interesting and worth reading.  

Though as I was finishing the article I was thinking, okay that was all about the “no longer silent” but nothing about the “too little, too few, and too late?”  I was curious because being a long time witness to the profound changes that have been occurring on this Earth and in particular the increasing tempo of eco-system breakdowns and extremely destructive weather events these past few years and the awareness that we have only worse to expect, I find myself confronting the specter of despair and hopelessness more often.

A commenter to Sou’s article stepped up to fill the breach with a sobering answer to the title’s question: “too little, too few, and too late?”  It's a painful well written assessment.  I feel compelled to share it because it contains many thoughts I've been trying to corral myself.   

The following isn't for general consumption, this comment is restricted for the serious student of our planet. The ones who appreciate our Earth and her systems and who understand what this AGW is about.  If you are one of those, you know the horror of realizing what we are doing to ourselves and our younger generations, not to mention this fantastical planet we inherited.  Dealing with that awareness is going to become an increasing personal spiritual challenge.  This essay gives voice to that horror.  I found it somehow comforting (or was that refreshing?) in it's brutal honestly.

_______________________________________________

Anonymous | September 6, 2016 at 4:16 AM | commented at Hotwhopper.com

It's going to become very obvious that the posturing everyone is doing on both side of the fence is irrelevant in the end. If the goal was to waste time and money, both sides have accomplished this. But there are no "sides" in reality, it's just us ignorant humans and the millions of other life forms trying to live on this planet.

Government, business and industry are often thought of as the problem to climate change inaction, but it goes much deeper then this. Our civilization is the problem, right down to the individual (you and me). It is intractable and immutable as long as it exists.

Everything will be done to protect civilization and our so-called "way of life". Nothing will be done to change any of this. Every individual is responsible. Every scientist, every doctor, every mother, every father, every sister, every brother. Both by virtue of our very existence, and by our silence and by our individual obligation to a habitable future.

GOP's 2016 Platform wishful thinking over substance.

I wrote the following for the September issue of the Four Corners Free Press, it's a sequel to last month's "Calling out Trump's Rev. Burns and GOP absolutism." Since I retain the copyrights, I can share it here, and I invite anyone, if you want to, copy and use any of it.  

Another privilege I retain is that I can keep on editing and since most of serious writing is rewriting and editing, this isn't exactly the same essay that appears in the FCFP.  (You know what they say: The project is never finished, you just meet deadlines!)

_________________________________________________________

July 19th Ben Adler at grist.org reported on the GOP Platform’s environmental goals, he compiled a list of eleven highlights. Republican’s call for:

Cancelation of the Clean Power Plan - Abolish the EPA as we know it. - (barring that) - “Forbid the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide” - Stop environmental regulatory agencies from settling lawsuits out of court - Revoke the ability of the president to designate national monuments - “Oppose any carbon tax” - Kill what minimal federal fracking regulations exist - Expedite export terminals for liquefied natural gas - Turn federal lands over to states. - Halt funding for the U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change (IPCC) - Build the Keystone XL pipeline and more like it.

To begin with, what’s up with the GOP’s seething hostility towards our government? If not our current government, what else? Regional power struggles? The problem with our government is the outside power-brokers who are only concerned with their own immediate self-interest. State governments are easier to own by ruthless interests, so where would that leave We The People’s interests when it comes to divvying up the last of our unmolested landscapes?

Watts Up With YouTube Search Engine?

I've long been bothered by the proliferation of climate science contrarian videos on YouTube.  There's something obscene about it, but what can be done?

  

Then, this evening I noticed something that seems over the top.  I was searching for an old greenman3610 video and went to YouTube's search engine and typed in “Delingpole climate contrarian - greenman3610” and this is the search result I got.

Rather than taking me to Greenman3610 videos, YouTube, Google, someone else, rerouted me to a slew of Heartland Institute's dirty tricks videos. 

Try it to see what happens on your computer, share your results if you want.

I wonder if anyone can explain how that works and why YouTube or Google does, or allows, such rerouting?

Exploring Conservative Think Tanks - index to Dunlap, Jacques (2013) project

I have a bit of over-attention syndrome, for example in researching some NC20 Burton related leads, I came across Dunlap and Jacques 2013.  A study where they investigate the connection between climate science denying books and Conservative Think Tanks.  I’ve skimmed it before, but this time it seemed more relevant and I noticed it had a CC license, allowing reprinting with attribution, Considering sometimes I get sick of dealing with professional liars and need some diversion into serious science, this seemed like a refreshing project.

So I wound up with an eight part series to add to my collection of substantive information sources that help describe the workings of the economically motived faith-based attack on science America has been subjected to for far too long.

This is the index to the series.  

Sections 3, 4, 5, 6 include links to a great deal of supporting information.  For chapter 8, I looked up and included links to their extensive reference sources.  Thank you Professors Riley Dunlap and Peter Jacques for all your efforts.

Happy learning. 

The American Behavioral Scientist

Climate Change Denial Books and 

Conservative Think Tanks

Exploring the Connection 

Riley E. Dunlap and Peter J. Jacques

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3787818/

Copyright © 2013 SAGE PublicationsThis is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Am Behav Sci. 2013 Jun; 57(6): 699–731.

doi:  10.1177/0002764213477096

Okay mineguy, lets debate Jim Steele and his LandscapesandCycles conviction

{edited to fix formatting issues  8/2/16}
I received a dismissive, yet challenging, comment from a "mineguy," he claims he can "take down" my arguments with ease.  

Okay Mineguy, I'm game.  Bet you can't! 

I invite you to choose from any of my Jim Steele Critiques (I include the list after my response to your revealing comment.).  Then in a rational constructive manner, point out my errors and produce some evidence to support your opinion - I'd be happy to learn from you, if you can produce some rational defensible evidence. 

Here let me give you an example of how it's done:

 At 3:44PM, August 28, 2016, mineguy's comments: 

A brief read indicates this WUWTW site is another of the group-think anthropogenic true believers who are incredibly organized to dispute, disparage, and ‘take down’ any sane and objective contrary argument against that line of propaganda. 

Find it at "LandscapesAndCycles"

“Group think” -  What’s that even mean in this context?  

You could just as easily complain that, me trusting that men landed and walked on the moon is the result of group think.  

What's wrong with group think based on facts?

#8 Dunlap, Jacques - History of Climate Science Denial, Notes and References (with links)

This is the eighth and final installment of Dunlap, Jacques' (2013) study of the history of our dysfunctional public climate science education dialogue.  They focus on the influence of "conservative think tanks (CTTs) on the output of "skeptical" climate science book publications.  

This installment is a copy of their Notes and Reference sections. I have added links to the references. 

With these sources you can learn about how out and out lying became the mainstay of the Republican climate science contrarian PR strategy. 

Given that the study has a CCA License I decided to Repost their interesting effort over here.  It makes worthy addition to my collection.  I thank Riley Dunlap and Peter Jacques for the opportunity to Repost their impressive work.

#8 Notes and References

_________________________________________________________

The American Behavioral Scientist

Climate Change Denial Books and 

Conservative Think Tanks

Exploring the Connection 

Riley E. Dunlap and Peter J. Jacques

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3787818/