Tuesday, July 18, 2017

Dadaist Science | The Weekly Standard

Dadaist Science | The Weekly Standard:
"Earlier this month Stephen Hawking declared: “We are close to the tipping point where global warming becomes irreversible. 
Trump’s action [withdrawing from the Paris climate accord] could push the Earth over the brink, to become like Venus, with a temperature of two hundred and fifty degrees [Celsius], and raining sulphuric acid.”
Let’s unpack this a bit, using actual science.
Image result for al gore hysteriaThe proportion of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere is currently about 400 parts per million (ppm).
The Cambrian explosion—when most animal lineages first appeared—occurred a little more than 500 million years ago when, according to all estimates, carbon dioxide levels were several times higher than today.
The atmosphere of Venus is 965,000 ppm carbon dioxide, enveloped in clouds of sulfuric acid.
And Venus itself is almost 26 million miles closer to the sun than Earth.
So Hawking’s claim that the earth is on the “brink” of becoming like Venus is preposterous.
...What is really disturbing, though, is that Hawking has flagrantly given up on even the pretense of engaging with actual science. 
He speaks entirely from authority: 
I am a scientist.
Adopt this political policy that I favor or suffer fire and sulfuric acid.
Image result for dadaismThe threatened punishment for noncompliance substitutes sulfuric acid for the regular sulfur (brimstone) that features in old-fashioned religion.
As far as the justification for the claim, there is no important difference between this and a religious statement that is supposed to be believed simply because it issues forth from a high priest.
***
The philosophy of Dadaism was that something is art if an artist says it is. 
In 1917 the Dadaist Marcel Duchamp famously proclaimed a urinal to be art.
The original urinal was thrown in the trash after being exhibited, but Duchamp later commissioned several replicas, one of which sold for $1,185,000 in 2002.
We can leave the merits of Dadaist art to the art critics.
It is clear, however, that applying the Dadaist philosophy to science is a big mistake because it means rejecting the commitments that made science successful in the first place..."

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