Comments by "PM" (@pm71241) on "Liberalism, Authoritarianism, & Trump (Pt. 2) | Deirdre McCloskey | ACADEMIA | Rubin Report" video.

  1. Highland Chicken. ... that depends very much upon where in the world you use those words and which specific meaning you put into them. I'm European. I'm a classical liberal. The closest word that describes the specific direction in english is "geo-libertarian" (in other words I'm a supporter of a Land-Value-Tax based on the arguments of Thomas Paine and Henry George")... already there's the word "libertarian" ... but I'm very much opposed to anarcho-capitalism (which have also been "on the show" and IMHO is just a utopian idiocy as communism) ... but these guys also calls them selves "libertarian". So you have to be more specific - which kind of libertarian and liberal are you talking about?
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  2. Andrew Mcmillan: No, it's not a "terrible thing" to do ... it's just utterly naive. ... given a topic complex enough and a person interviewed without any honest interest in objectivity you are just feeding into Brandolinis law. All experience shows that there's enough gullible people out there to amplify nonsense if it's not challenged.
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  3. Highland Chicken. Again... 100% with you on that. Dave set out to be (quote) "dedicated to applying reason to the big questions of the day." But that goal seems to have drowned in discussing the SJW crowd nonsense ... and since those most vocal about how silly the SJW nonsense is is generally on the right (like Crowder) he has in the process had a whole lot of people on who are very much NOT dedicated to applying reason, but obviously ideological biased when it suits them (like Crowder). And the idea that if you just let them spout their nonsense long enough they will "hang them selves" even if they are not challenged is just utterly naive and TOTALLY fails the stated goal. PS: I'm NOT claiming that Deidre here is like Crowder. Not at all... she seem reasonable.
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  4. E Samuels Bernie Sanders? Tulsi Gabbard?
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  5. +Nocturane Nahh... it just sound like you don't know what "scientific proof" actually is. Here's a short guide. - written for creationists, but the level of their misunderstanding is the same as climate science deniers: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/sciproof.html Read it - then come back.
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  6. Argh.. I actually liked Deidre throughout the first part and a bit into the second. Sad to see her criticize others for lack of objectivity when she obviously lack objectivity in her criticism. The thing is that Matt Ridley does actually have investments in the coal industry. AND regardless of whether environmental regulations can be clumsy (they probably can and might very well be)... Matt Ridley IS demonstrably a climate science denier capable of spouting the most idiotic nonsense about the science ... So it's perfectly warranted to take anything this guys says about environmental subjects with a very large grain of salt. ... and that's a part of the story here Deidre !. I listen to people complaining about objectivity when they are capable of applying it them selves. PS: In Deirdres defense, I haven't been able to find statements from her that indicate that she doesn't her self take science serious, so she might just have overlooked Matt Ridleys track record of total lack of credibility here.
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  7. Eric Duprey This all starts with not being a science denier. Matt Ridley is a science denier. If you accept the science and still have reasonable arguments for further investments in fossil fuels I'll happily listen... However first of all: No one who have claimed to accept the science (like Alex Epstein) have actually done that, but only tried to con people into think they did... secondly... I have a very hard time seeing how anyone accepting the science would think continued exploitation of fossil fuels is a good idea. ... and I couldn't care less about Al Gore. He's not a climate scientist.
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  8. Stuart> Well ... that might very well be. It doesn't really change the fact of climate science. There is such a thing as "inertia". We have far from seen the full effect of the CO2 we have emitted and we also cannot stop momentarily tomorrow. So effectively we have already locked our selves into consequences which might very well make you argument totally redundant. One cannot simply make such simply inferences as you try to. It's like saying that "antibiotics has saved many lives there for the more antibiotics we use the better" - totally ignoring large parts of the problem as it is stated.
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  9. Stuart> Oh come on .... What am I supposed to do with vague accusations like that? You don't even attempt do address my argument wrt. inertia. My example with antibiotics was not an encouragement for you to go off and a tangent of calling solar and wind for "herbal medicines" without any actually argument what so ever. It was a hope that you would listen and realize that just as my example with antibiotics didn't address the actual problem biologist and doctors say there is with resistance YOU didn't address the actual problem described by climatology when you just stated that coal had helped people in the past. ... you simply ignored the science and the problem at hand and effectively said "let's talk about something else". ... You put up a Red Herring (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_herring) Now - I said I would listen to anyone not denying the science. I didn't say I would pretend any distraction not relevant to the issue or simply blatantly ignoring what the issue is about was brilliant. Sure, getting cheap energy from fossil fuels has done a lot for humanity historically ... But just merely stating that doesn't even attempt to address the problems we are facing in the future. I'm sure you can do better - if you set out to have an honest interest in "applying reasons to the big questions of the day" ... as was the Rubin Reports stated goal.
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  10. Stuart> Yes... "accusations".... you started by referencing some personal exchange between Judith Curry and unnamed other scientists... I fail to see what the argument is, what the relevance is and why I should pretend such vague insinuations constitutes and argument. > "I would consider it so obvious that we don't even need an "actual" argument that green energy is too useless to consider" That might be your opinion... and given the proper arguments you could in principle be right. ... but you didn't provide arguments and it still just another Red Herring attempting to avoid addressing the actual issue. (and btw. totally ignoring the point I made with the antibiotics analogy) > "I already know what the green position is; it's practically a thoughtcrime to go against it." Ahh.. so you you 1) labled me with prejudice as "green", 2)said you didn't need to listen and 3) invented a fantasy victim role to pretend the reason people didn't just agree with you was because of discrimination. Come on Stuart... that's not how an adult conversation works. > "Okay, tell me what you think the "science" and "problem" specifically are and I'll speak to it." The science tells us what happens when the CO2 level is raised on earth. It's substantiated by overwhelming evidence that the the global average temperature will rise - most in higher latitudes. This will have a lot of consequences which we can see play out in the geological record - easiest to understand is probably that polar ice caps will melt and sea levels rise. That in it self is however one of the least worrying problems. Ultimately we will risk inducing oceanic anoxia. ... Science tells us in no uncertain terms that the extra CO2 causing the temperature rise is from our burning of fossil fuels and the temperature rise so far has matched the predictions of physics. ... honestly... I don't know why I'm spending time listing all this for you. Since you obvious have so strong opinions about this, I would expect you had already read at least the IPCC publications. > "But it's not like science tells us X and I'm denying X." No.. and if you listened to what I wrote I didn't accuse you of that either. What I said was that you were (quote) "blatantly ignoring X" .... instead you went of on a conspiracy theory trajectory with vague accusations of unnamed scientists - which I really can't see any point in trying to address. It's just noise. > "It's more like: the media and the climate establishment tell us X, and I'm denying that the climate establishment is really science - and that even that which is really science is misrepresented and distorted by the media." I really don't care what you think of the media. I don't get my information about science from the "media". > "I think you're massively underestimating how much fossil fuel is doing for us, or how irreplaceable is really is." No I'm not. I'm just not ignoring the fact that continuing down this track has a very high risk of having so serious consequences that such bold claims as flat out declaring fossil fules "irreplaceable" without even having tried is just pure idiocy. Btw... I live in a country which has already replaced 45% of its energy consumption with wind and solar. ... so maybe "irreplaceable" sounds better than it is true. > "You're like a socialist that found one flaw in capitalism and then thinks that means we need to turn over the entire system." When one runs out of arguments, one can always resort to name calling - right? Socialism and Capitalism are political ideologies. Knowledge about our climate system however is physics ... and nature doesn't really care what your political ideology is. You cannot argue with physics. CO2 is a green house gas and it traps heat in the atmosphere. In fact, it traps heat at a rate of 1.5-4.5 K / doubling of CO2 concentration. (it's a probability distribution) That leaves a non-trivial long tail of high risk scenario where we will seriously wreck the world for our civilization. Any sensible risk analysis would hedge against those scenarios ... That's just plain economic sense. ... anything else would be stupid. Not doing it because you have decided that the messenger is "socialist" is just utterly stupid.
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  11. Andrew Mcmillan> "I've been under the impression that Dave expects his audience to check and double check out the veracity of any statements made." Any viewer should practice source criticism. But 1) That doesn't mean that you cannot provide your viewers a better starting point for knowing what to check by challenging controversial statements, and 2) It should be obvious from many of the comments here that many of the viewers DO NOT fact check nonsense propagated by their favorite bullshit artist but is only cheering them along. (Crowder being a good example).
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  12. Andrew Mcmillan> You don't have to be confrontational. You only have to play devils advocate and ask polite questions exposing the irrationality, non-objective bias or double standards (or whatever is the problem). So for instance when people try to argue that because something was good in the past (like fossil fuels) then it must also be good in the future (which is an obvious fallacy to anyone knowing the topic) - ask if they really mean that... don't just let them get away with the nonsense. Wrt #2 ... no he can't "solve" it ... but if he really mean that this is a place where people whit a critical mind should meet and be exposed to other ideas and (quote) "apply reason to the big questions" then he should let the critical thinking begin already in the interview and not count on people deep inside a confirmation bubble starts applying reason them selves. Just a simple question, like "It that really the case?" ... "what's your evidence for that?" ... or "How do you reconcile this with XYZ?" ... Also ... btw... if you can "derail" a discussion by asking "what's your evidence for that? " ... THEN the guest has truely hung himself.
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  13. rwatertree> that's basic economics. Yes. ... however. economy does have to be a little more than "basic". Only thinking in "basic" economics one would think that people would not spend their entire awake hours working for a wage for which they can't maintain a life. ... that would of course be obviously unsustainable in terms of survival. Yet - empirical evidence shows people actually end up doing that. So ... for the economic theories to be anything worth they have to explain why that is. - not just being "basic"
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  14. +Nocturane No ... consensus emerges as a consequence of the cumulative weight of the total evidence. Science doesn't advance by consensus, but policy makers bloody well take the scientific consensus seriously.
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