Science on Reasonable Conclusions

Apocalypse Mirage

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Apocalypse, Apocalypse,
I love ya, Apocalypse,
you’re always a day away…
(w/ apologies to Annie)

[last updated June 27, 2021 6:31 AM (MDT)]

Having been born into a fundamentalist Christian household, I am intimately familiar with the apocalyptic mindset. From the beginning, the end of the world has always been nigh. The writers of the so-called ‘gospels’ put apocalypse in Jesus’ mouth frequently. He told his disciples of a time, supposedly before they would die, that the entire temple in Jerusalem would be a pile of rubble. By the time the writer of ‘Revelations’ was finished, Jesus returns and the entire earth would be destroyed and a ‘new heaven and earth’ would be created, along with a 1,000 year reign with Jesus as literal king. After this, Satan would, for unknown reasons, be released from hell and the final war to end all wars would be fought. After this, actual heaven.

Consensus as Religion

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Regardless the accuracy of the often stated ‘97%’ scientific consensus on climate change, I think it is safe to say that most climate scientists believe that anthropogenic CO2 is warming the earth faster than it would otherwise warm. The general public is more divided. A core of conservatives disagree on whether or not the earth is even warming at all, but most skeptics merely disagree on either the anthropogenic cause or the degree of the influence. Most all skeptics disagree on the severity of the future impact and political solutions.

Coral Reefs

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Coral reefs regularly go through bleaching episodes, generally tied to ENSO events. For years each one of these bleaching events have been tied to climate change. The reefs have been predicted to die off permanently for decades now.

One recent study that went so far as to project how climate change would separately disable reef fish to the point where they would basically be sitting ducks for predators and be gone quite soon has now failed a replication test and an independent investigation has been launched. One of the authors, Oona Lönnstedt, was first found guilty of misconduct (fabricating tests/data) on a separate paper re: micro-plastic damage in young fish in Dec. 2017 at Uupsala Univ. in Sweden.

COVID-19

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Update: April 17, 2022

I’ve done a lot of reading, maybe TOO MUCH reading, over the last month. Some of it was pure conspiracy theory rabbit holes, but a lot was good old thought-provoking stuff. Here is today’s ‘mind-blown’ quote:

“As long as the majority of infections are among the healthy, the more dangerous variants circulating among some of the bedridden will be outnumbered and will become evolutionary dead ends. But when public health officials intentionally restricted spread among the young, strong, and healthy members of society by imposing lockdowns, they created a set of evolutionary conditions that risked shifting the competitive evolutionary advantage from the least dangerous variants to more dangerous variants. By locking us all up, they risked making the virus more dangerous over time. Evolution doesn’t sit around to wait for you while you develop a vaccine.”

Disappearing Birds

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A recent example of ‘speculative extinction’ is the recent study/publicity campaign regarding North American bird population.

Original Paper

3 Billion Birds

Clarification and thoughts from Brian McGill’s Dynamic Ecology blog:

“they estimate the total number of individuals of each species found in North America (excluding Mexico) from an extrapolation from data covering a fraction of a percent of the US.”

“Wouldn’t we be much better off to say: a few species have declined drastically, a few have increased drastically many haven’t changed that much? This is a general pattern, not just in these birds.”

Insect Armaggedon

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Threat Headlines

The global ecosystem is rapidly collapsing… insect biomass plummets 75% in one generation… scientists warn of “decimation”… humanity may not survive much longer

Warning of ‘ecological Armageddon’ after dramatic plunge in insect numbers

Source

More than 75 percent decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

Worldwide decline of the entomofauna: A review of its drivers

Claims

“Over 40% of insect species are threatened with extinction.” - entomofauna paper

Losing My Faith in Science

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

“It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.”

Drug Companies & Doctors: A Story of Corruption - Marcia Angell

[last updated June 27, 2021 6:31 AM (MDT)]

Monarch Butterflies

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Are Monarch Butterflies Going Extinct?

Things to expand on

Population Estimates
WWF Mexico Weird Control of Reserve Areas
No unapproved researchers allowed
Our trip to Cerro Pelon reserve in early 2020

“Collaboration with WWF-Mexico is key, however; due to an agreement with the Mexican government, only the organization and employees of Mexico’s Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve are allowed to measure these monarch colonies.”

We need a better way to measure monarch populations

Sea Levels

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Depending on which coast you look at, the longest-running tide gauges all show the same story - 2-3mm/year or 11 inches per century of sea level rise. This doesn’t change even when you take rising and falling ground levels into account, or GPS being added to the tide gauge station for verification. Accuracy checks and balances don’t change the numbers. The seas have been slowly, inexorably rising ever since we began checking, but there is no evidence of any acceleration of any kind. There is no signal that CO2 has had any effect on sea levels.

Speculative Extinctions

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

[last updated October 26, 2021 6:26 AM (CDT)]

Seeds of Doubt

The first seeds of doubt in my mind re: the ‘consensus’ view on climate change came about in a rather roundabout way. First, I was reading about yet another dire astronomical number of extinctions that were already under way both now and in the near future (caused, at least in part, by climate change). But this time something snapped and I just couldn’t believe the numbers. So many numbers were being thrown out on a regular basis, and yet no actual newly-extinct species were being named. I dug in.

Temperatures

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

This is perhaps too large a topic for one blog post. I have just finished reading dozens of articles on this topic. Even after correcting for possible motive/bias issues, and after weeding out ad hominems, I am left with the following conclusions:

The temperature dataset from 1850-1906 or so covers less than 50% of the globe.

The Southern hemisphere data coverage reached 50% only in 1950.

Source: https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/station_data_v3/

The Replication Crisis

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

This one goes beyond just climate.

It would seem that this would be more of a problem with the ‘soft’ sciences - psychology, etc., where research often depends on more subjective measurements such as whether someone feels better. But even when hard numbers are involved, the misapplication of statistics and biased interpretation can significantly shift things. Below are a series of links both explaining the larger picture and providing examples in medicine, clinical research, economics, sports and hydrology.