Consumer spending up, but recession still a threat
From Reuters:
WASHINGTON – U.S. consumer spending rose
at its fastest pace in five months in July, backing views the
economy was not falling back into recession, although pending
sales of previously owned homes fell.The Commerce Department said on Monday consumer spending
increased 0.8 percent on strong demand for motor vehicles,
after slipping 0.1 percent in June.Economists had expected spending, which accounts for about
70 percent of U.S. economic activity, to rise 0.5 percent.When adjusted for inflation, spending rose 0.5 percent last
month, the largest gain in 1-1/2 years and the first increase
since April.
While that’s good news, a double-dip recession is still a very real danger. The sovereign-debt crisis in Europe continue to play out, and seems destined to result in at least one and possibly more defaults. The recent brinksmanship in Washington has raised doubts both here and abroad about the sophistication and sense of responsibility among much of our elected leadership. And while corporate profits and corporate cash holdings remain at record highs, that’s dead money taken out of circulation.
As a story in today’s Wall Street Journal puts it:
Economists at JPMorgan, in their weekly reprise of economic developments, blamed the recent global stock selloff on “a sense of policy paralysis in the U.S. and Europe, which has driven home the point that there is no cavalry to ride to the rescue.”
“Fiscal policy has turned restrictive and an additional sharp tightening lies just ahead in the U.S., while monetary authorities have exhausted much of their ammunition,” they said.
Officials on both sides of the Atlantic who orchestrated the response to the global financial crisis insist the world economy would have been worse had they not acted as they did. But it’s clear that the remedies didn’t deliver the recovery for which they hoped.
Some economists, among them Harvard UniversiItty’s Kenneth Rogoff, say today’s painfully slow economic growth is the inevitable result of the massive head winds that follow a recession caused by a banking and financial crisis. Government policies, given already heavy burdens of debt on governments in the U.S., Europe and Japan, can’t overcome the relentless efforts of households and banks to reduce their debt loads.”
It would be fascinating to read how future historians and economists analyze this era and the decisions made by government and business leaders.
– Jay Bookman
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904 comments Add your comment
Bruno
August 29th, 2011
2:53 pm
Most athiests I know respect nature a whoooolllleeee lot more than religious folks. It’s been my experience that the exact opposite of what Bruno wrote to be true.
Oops, back out of your camp, Bosch. IDers aren’t “religious”. Religious people are religious, and I think their lack of respect for nature IS rooted in their narcissistic world view (God made me specially). I also think the term ‘atheistic” is defined in more than one way, but is most often presented as being in opposition to being a full-blown theist. As such, I think you’re lumping too many people under one banner, as Joe mama alluded to. The Wiccans I used to hang out with would likely be technically “atheists”, but I wouldn’t categorize them that way.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
2:53 pm
“If you want a religion that treats nature well, you’ll have to go Native American or Pagan”
Adam,
As a Neo-Pagan Agnostic Christian, I am all with that.
md
August 29th, 2011
2:53 pm
“both”
And how do you know that creationism and evolution are not intertwined?
Paul
August 29th, 2011
2:54 pm
Adam
“Bosch: If you want a religion that treats nature well, you’ll have to go Pagan”
He’s already there. Looking for converts, too. Watch out or he’ll have you dancing naked in the moonlight in a forest clearing.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
2:54 pm
“and I think their lack of respect for nature”
Yeah, dern them Christian farmers. Always tearin up dat land for no reason.
Where do you rat voters come up with this crap?
Adam
August 29th, 2011
2:57 pm
Zap: Are you a scientist?
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
2:58 pm
“I too hold to the concept of “The Force.” I don’t think it incompatible with evolution.”
Dang! I forgot to add “Jedi” to the end of my self-identity religion.
So, make that Neo-Pagan Agnostic Christian Jedi.
AmVet
August 29th, 2011
2:59 pm
Intelligent design (ID) is the proposition that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.” It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God, presented by its advocates as “an evidence-based scientific theory about life’s origins” rather than “a religious-based idea”. It avoids specifying that the hypothesized intelligent designer is God. Its leading proponents are associated with the Discovery Institute, a politically conservative think tank, and believe the designer to be the Christian God.
Intelligent design was developed by a group of American creationists who revised their argument in the creation–evolution controversy to circumvent court rulings such as the United States Supreme Court Edwards v. Aguillard ruling, which barred the teaching of “creation science” in public schools as breaching the separation of church and state. The first significant published use of intelligent design was in Of Pandas and People, a 1989 textbook intended for high-school biology classes. From the mid-1990s, intelligent design proponents were supported by the Discovery Institute, which, together with its Center for Science and Culture, planned and funded the “intelligent design movement”.
It is clear that the genesis (get it?!) of ID is based on Christian opposition to Darwin, Big Bang and the other non-teleological theories and sciences that attempt to explain the universe, etc.
oldguy
August 29th, 2011
2:59 pm
For all you Darwin/”fat”Albert Gore fans:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fI8834iCgo
Granny Godzilla
August 29th, 2011
3:00 pm
Zap
Thanks Stud Muffin
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:00 pm
Creation and evolution have much in common. They both end in tion. They are both English words. They both have greater than seven letters.
Thulsa Doom
August 29th, 2011
3:01 pm
Bosch,
Nope. Just your opinion. I freely admit that there are plenty of things I don’t know-particularly on the origins of the universe. But there are a few things that I absolutely know. And one of them, unlike you going back to last week’s debate, is that a dollar spent by the private sector is more efficient than a dollar spent by the federal government.
Secondly, if you will notice on here there are liberals who portend their ideas as fact instead of something we think we know but aren’t really sure of. For example Adam thinks that CO2 is the main reason that the earth is in a gradual warming trend. This is something that we think may be true but it is not a proven fact as Adam mistakenly believes it to be.
Likewise Doggone @ 2:38 seems to posit the idea of evolution and her idea that we cannot observe evolution. I disagree because we have this thing called the fossil record and in my opinion- not fact, the evidence of the fossil record does not prove evolution. But yet liberals on here seem to posit both evolution and man made global warming as fact when they are anything but.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:01 pm
Bruno,
Well, isn’t THAT rich, Mr. Bruno — YOU lecturing on making broad brush assumptions and grouping people.
Anywho, my point was that in my experience athiests, at least the ones I know, do respect nature, in my opinion, more so than theists, because they tend to look at it through math and science — things that are tangible instead of brushing it aside as being created by some dude in the sky.
Paul
August 29th, 2011
3:02 pm
Bosch
You’ve moved up from Padawan! Congratulations! I knew you’d do it?
prior thread, 8:43. You’ll likely find it interesting.
AmVet
August 29th, 2011
3:02 pm
Darwin fans?
150 years on and nothing has countermanded or replaced it and the deniers still think its a club or something.
Incredible…
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:03 pm
Just Another Anonymous One @ 3p
jm
August 29th, 2011
3:03 pm
I no longer believe in evolution.
The Republican and Democratic parties are both proof its just a hoax. I mean “theory”. Whatever.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:03 pm
“is that a dollar spent by the private sector is more efficient than a dollar spent by the federal government”
Nope Doom, that’s STILL just your opinion.
The only FACTS in the world are that you were born and will one day die. Other than that, it’s really just the way we all interpret things.
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:03 pm
Science is settled. There is no more to learn. The theory of man causing climate change is a closed topic.
(Brought to you by the same people who so wisely predicted the new ice age would be upon the earth by the year 2001 and Miami would be under water by 2010. )
Joe Mama
August 29th, 2011
3:04 pm
Bruno — “The Wiccans I used to hang out with would likely be technically “atheists”, but I wouldn’t categorize them that way.”
Agreed. I’ve generally found Wiccans, Buddhists and Jews (???) the most accepting/tolerant of atheists. Folks in non-theist religions seem to be a bit more understanding of atheists — possibly because we’re just a different species of non-theist.
I have no idea why Jewish folks would be more accepting of atheists. Perhaps I’ve just been fortunate with the ones I’ve met.
Dusty
August 29th, 2011
3:04 pm
Well, my brakes have been repaired by Goodyear’s intelligent design but my tires are still in evolution. Seems they are soon to become fossils that will crack and crumble. But a devine human being then declared to me that four new tires would save my day.
At this revelation, I tenderly backed away from the price tag and smiled sweetly in great study. Thank you, thank you, I said, I appreciate your safety worries about little blowouts but I must consider all revenues (and other tire dealers.)
As they tenderly stroked my credit card, I pulled it back to safety. So I ride on good brakes. And tomorrow yes… tomorrow, I shall venture into the jungle of tire dealers. Pray for my safe return!! (and my credit card too.) Thank you.
Bruno
August 29th, 2011
3:04 pm
Want to put it in a comparative religion, philosophy or other class? That’s an option. But in a science class, where the scientific method cannot be used to examine it? I think that’s where the problem is.
Possibly just my opinion, Paul, but I don’t think that the scientific method should stand in isolation as you are proposing, which has pretty much been the modus operandi of public education for the past 50 or more years. The scientific method comes with a rich philosophical background, with some great thinkers honing it along the way:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_scientific_method
Even today, however, the interplay between inductive thinking, which is the ultimate source of hypotheses, and deductive reasoning, which drives experimentation, is not close to being understood. In other words, the scientific method itself is outside of the scope of the scientific method. Why limit our scope of understanding so severely??
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:04 pm
This is something that we think may be true but it is not a proven fact as Adam mistakenly believes it to be.
I’ll put Thulsa on the list of people who is behind on the questions that science has answered….
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:05 pm
“Zap: Are you a scientist?”
Nope, and I never claim to know what science says or doesn’t say about a subject when said subject is a theory backed by a loser politician who flies around the world on a private 747.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:05 pm
“Thanks Stud Muffin”
No problem, hotness.
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:05 pm
GLL: Science is settled. There is no more to learn. The theory of man causing climate change is a closed topic.
Speaking of mischaracterizations and hyperbole….
Let’s close the patent office!
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:06 pm
And Doom,
In regards to Adam and Doggone (and everyone else here) — it is pretty much a given to me that everything we express is an opinion — it’s just that there are many here like Doggone and Adam, who can, and most often do, explain where and how they formulated theirs. And if they don’t in a particular post, if asked, will provide it for you.
jm
August 29th, 2011
3:06 pm
“Why limit our scope of understanding so severely??”
Why broaden our minds? We live in America. Where the liberals and conservatives know the absolute truth and everyone else is an idiot. Evolution is over.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:06 pm
Paul,
ON IT!!
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:06 pm
Zap: when said subject is a theory backed by a loser politician who flies around the world on a private 747.
Yeah because he totally came up with the idea all by himself
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:07 pm
“150 years on and nothing has countermanded or replaced it and the deniers still think its a club or something.”
Yet again, Vet claims to be a scientists. Darwin accepted Christ on his death bed. At least that’s what stories have claimed so it must be true.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:07 pm
Brought to you by the same people who so wisely predicted the new ice age would be upon the earth by the year 2001 and Miami would be under water by 2010. )
I have not read that paper. Was it in Sports Illustrated, Swimsuit Edition or what.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:07 pm
“Yeah because he totally came up with the idea all by himself”
Never said he did, cupcake.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:09 pm
Darwin accepted Christ on his death bed. At least that’s what stories have claimed so it must be true.
That was to ensure a proper burial and subsequent good treatment of his survivors by the church. Much like today, if you are not a member in good standing with the appropriate church, life can be hell.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:09 pm
Alright rats, I gotta go do some real work. Have fun calling each other names about subjects in which you have no idea how they work. Can’t wait to read Vet’s rants. What will he call us next?
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:09 pm
NEVER QUESTION ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENTISTS!!
“[By] 1995, the greenhouse effect would be desolating the heartlands of North America and Eurasia with horrific drought, causing crop failures and food riots…[By 1996] The Platte River of Nebraska would be dry, while a continent-wide black blizzard of prairie topsoil will stop traffic on interstates, strip paint from houses and shut down computers.” Michael Oppenheimer, published in “Dead Heat,” St. Martin’s Press, 1990.
“Arctic specialist Bernt Balchen says a general warming trend over the North Pole is melting the polar ice cap and may produce an ice-free Arctic Ocean by the year 2000.” Christian Science Monitor, June 8, 1972.
“Using computer models, researchers concluded that global warming would raise average annual temperatures nationwide two degrees by 2010.” Associated Press, May 15, 1989.
“By 1985, air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half.” Life magazine, January 1970.
“If present trends continue, the world will be … eleven degrees colder by the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us in an ice age.” Kenneth E.F. Watt, in “Earth Day,” 1970.
“By the year 2000 the United Kingdom will be simply a small group of impoverished islands, inhabited by some 70 million hungry people … If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.” Ehrlich, Speech at British Institute For Biology, September 1971.
“In ten years all important animal life in the sea will be extinct. Large areas of coastline will have to be evacuated because of the stench of dead fish.” Ehrlich, speech during Earth Day, 1970
But laughing at them is completely appropriate.
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:10 pm
Dusty: In other words, the scientific method itself is outside of the scope of the scientific method.
Circular logic… ugh. You’re going in circles and making stuff up. The scientific method is a sound method, designed to observe, test, predict. It does that. To attempt to explain it away as some sort of faith or something is really, really lame.
Joe Mama
August 29th, 2011
3:11 pm
Dusty — “Well, my brakes have been repaired by Goodyear’s intelligent design”
It couldn’t have possibly been intelligent design. At Goodyear Intelligent Design auto shops, they come to your house unannounced in the middle of the night, make the repair without you being aware of it, and then they randomly hit one of your credit cards for the amount due. If you try to take your car to one of their shops, they’re always closed. If you manage to find one open, there’s no window for you to watch the work being done. Then they try to pass someone else’s car off as yours.
Bruno
August 29th, 2011
3:11 pm
It is clear that the genesis (get it?!) of ID is based on Christian opposition to Darwin, Big Bang and the other non-teleological theories and sciences that attempt to explain the universe, etc.
Adam–Though the motivation of the original framers of ID may have been to circumvent anti-Creationist laws, in the process they came up with a theory which should stand on its own merit. To not discuss on its own merits reveals an incredible bias on your part, IMO.
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:11 pm
Bosch: And if they don’t in a particular post, if asked, will provide it for you.
You mean as opposed to “I’m not going to do your research for you!”?
AmVet
August 29th, 2011
3:12 pm
As I said earlier, repackaged creationism.
Although arguments for intelligent design are formulated in secular terms and intentionally avoid positing the identity of the designer, the majority of principal intelligent design advocates are publicly religious Christians who have stated that in their view the designer proposed in intelligent design is the Christian conception of God. Stuart Burgess, Phillip E. Johnson, William Dembski, and Stephen C. Meyer are evangelical Protestants, and Michael Behe is a Roman Catholic, while Jonathan Wells is a member of the Unification Church. Phillip E. Johnson has stated that cultivating ambiguity by employing secular language in arguments that are carefully crafted to avoid overtones of theistic creationism is a necessary first step for ultimately reintroducing the Christian concept of God as the designer. Johnson explicitly calls for intelligent design proponents to obfuscate their religious motivations so as to avoid having intelligent design identified “as just another way of packaging the Christian evangelical message”. Johnson emphasizes that “the first thing that has to be done is to get the Bible out of the discussion”; “after we have separated materialist prejudice from scientific fact [...] only then can ‘biblical issues’ be discussed”.
Fine. Discuss them outside of the science classroom…
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:12 pm
Paul,
I actually did read that, but I’ve been busy and didn’t have time to write the comment it deserved.
I sit on an Interfaith “committee” or whatever you wanna call it in my little town — we do some fun things and piss off alot of people because we sponsor things that make people ponder, and sometimes they don’t like to ponder, but we enjoy that.
It’s always fascinated me when people get all bent out of shape to listen to people of other faiths, beliefs, etc. As Bishop Spong said once (and I paraphrase), “if little old insignificant me can create such animosity in you and if that shakes or even makes you question the foundation of your faith, then YOUR faith isn’t that strong.”
In other words, if you are truly faithful in what you believe, it should really never get you all upset to hear someone else express another belief.
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:13 pm
Zap: It doesn’t matter who backs what as long as the theory is sound (which it is). Like I said before, it only becomes political as soon as someone suggests doing something about it. Which, apparently, is just too much change for people who fear change.
Granny Godzilla
August 29th, 2011
3:13 pm
Zap
Groovy, macho man
Midori
August 29th, 2011
3:14 pm
anybody know where I can get a good deal on tires this weekend?
Joe Mama
August 29th, 2011
3:14 pm
Zap — “Yet again, Vet claims to be a scientists. Darwin accepted Christ on his death bed. At least that’s what stories have claimed so it must be true.”
And even the creationists themselves say there’s nothing to that tale.
http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/03/31/darwins-deathbed-conversion-legend
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:14 pm
SCIENCE IS ALWAYS RIGHT!!! DO NOT QUESTION SCIENCE!!! ANYTHING TO THE CONTRARY IS DANGEROUS!!!!!
YOU MUST OBEY!!!!!!
At the first Earth Day celebration, in 1969, environmentalist Nigel Calder warned, “The threat of a new ice age must now stand alongside nuclear war as a likely source of wholesale death and misery for mankind.”
C.C. Wallen of the World Meteorological Organization said, “The cooling since 1940 has been large enough and consistent enough that it will not soon be reversed.”
In 1968, Professor Paul Ehrlich, Vice President Gore’s hero and mentor, predicted there would be a major food shortage in the U.S. and “in the 1970s … hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death.” Ehrlich forecasted that 65 million Americans would die of starvation between 1980 and 1989, and by 1999 the U.S. population would have declined to 22.6 million. Ehrlich’s predictions about England were gloomier: “If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.”
In 1972, a report was written for the Club of Rome warning the world would run out of gold by 1981, mercury and silver by 1985, tin by 1987 and petroleum, copper, lead and natural gas by 1992. Gordon Taylor, in his 1970 book “The Doomsday Book,” said Americans were using 50 percent of the world’s resources and “by 2000 they [Americans] will, if permitted, be using all of them.” In 1975, the Environmental Fund took out full-page ads warning, “The World as we know it will likely be ruined by the year 2000.”
Harvard University biologist George Wald in 1970 warned, “… civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” That was the same year that Sen. Gaylord Nelson warned, in Look Magazine, that by 1995 “… somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.”
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:14 pm
“You mean as opposed to “I’m not going to do your research for you!”?”
Exactly! I mean, if I can type here on the blog, THAT means, MY google is NOT BROKE!!
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:14 pm
That GLL sure posted all my favorite sources for the latest in climate science.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:15 pm
“anybody know where I can get a good deal on tires this weekend?”
Damn Midori! I was just behind a dude with about 500 new ones on the bed of his pick up truck. It was defying logic and gravity as to how those things were staying on his truck — if I’d know, I’d have run him off the road and grabbed you some!!
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:16 pm
Bruno: in the process they came up with a theory which should stand on its own merit. To not discuss on its own merits reveals an incredible bias on your part, IMO.
Intelligent Design has already been discredited as anything scientific. Supposing a creator – excuse me a “designer,” – means that you are introducing an unprovable and untestable element into the process, and that MAKES it non-scientific. It isn’t a scientific theory. It does nto belong in a science classroom.
And as I have said before, you’re more than welcome to include that in a class of comparative religion alongside all the other creation myths known to man, if you like.
AmVet
August 29th, 2011
3:16 pm
B, you misattributed my quote to Adam.
I doubled-down on it with my 3:12.
The strategy of deliberately disguising the religious intent of intelligent design has been described by William Dembski in The Design Inference. In this work Dembski lists a god or an “alien life force” as two possible options for the identity of the designer; however, in his book Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science and Theology, Dembski states that “Christ is indispensable to any scientific theory, even if its practitioners don’t have a clue about him. The pragmatics of a scientific theory can, to be sure, be pursued without recourse to Christ. But the conceptual soundness of the theory can in the end only be located in Christ.” Dembski also stated, “ID is part of God’s general revelation [...] Not only does intelligent design rid us of this ideology (materialism), which suffocates the human spirit, but, in my personal experience, I’ve found that it opens the path for people to come to Christ”. Both Johnson and Dembski cite the Bible’s Gospel of John as the foundation of intelligent design.
Barbara Forrest contends such statements reveal that leading proponents see intelligent design as essentially religious in nature, not merely a scientific concept that has implications with which their personal religious beliefs happen to coincide. She writes that the leading proponents of intelligent design are closely allied with the ultra-conservative Christian Reconstructionism movement. She lists connections of (current and former) Discovery Institute Fellows Phillip Johnson, Charles Thaxton, Michael Behe, Richard Weikart, Jonathan Wells and Francis Beckwith to leading Christian Reconstructionist organizations, and the extent of the funding provided the Institute by Howard Ahmanson Jr., a leading figure in the Reconstructionist movement.
Perhaps you can direct me to the scientific postulates, hypotheses and theorems that this is all based on?
(Hell, I might even adequately understand some of them!)
Granny Godzilla
August 29th, 2011
3:16 pm
Bosch
I love me some Shelby….
Keep Up the Good Fight!
August 29th, 2011
3:16 pm
Great GLL…thanks for citing evidence from the 1970 and more. Of course, thankfully we enacted the Clear Air Act some 40 years ago and modified the dates for those events and predictions. Now if you want to use them as “evidence” you should really state all of the assumptions and caveats in those claims and then demonstrate that there have been no interveniening events.
We’ll be here where you return with your support.
Kamchak
August 29th, 2011
3:17 pm
Midori
I always go to Kauffman Tires.
I trust their service, and if I have to pay more for the tires — so be it.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:17 pm
“Which, apparently, is just too much change for people who fear change.”
No one fears Owl Gore.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:18 pm
“That was to ensure a proper burial and subsequent good treatment of his survivors by the church. Much like today, if you are not a member in good standing with the appropriate church, life can be hell.”
That is SOOOO true! I’ve known three folks in the past couple years to die and be cremated and there really is no where “legal” to dispose of their ashes.
Paul
August 29th, 2011
3:18 pm
Bruno
“Possibly just my opinion, Paul, but I don’t think that the scientific method should stand in isolation as you are proposing,”
Seems reasonable that for a subject to be taught in science class, it should meet the requirements of science. Want to examine the idea outside science? As I said, that could be considered.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:18 pm
“And even the creationists themselves say there’s nothing to that tale.”
Sarcasm went right over your head.
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:19 pm
LISTEN TO THE BIBLE POUNDER TURNED ENVIRONMENTAL SAGE!!!
TO GORE BE THE GLORY!!!!
Sea Levels: Mr. Gore predicted in An Inconvenient Truth that sea levels would rise by 20 feet by 2100. Well, if that is going to happen, the sea level better get on with it. The sea level rise over the last 18 years is 1.8 inches. In the 20th century the total increase in sea level was 8 inches. Over the past 10,000 years, the average increase in sea level per century has been 4 feet as glaciers from the last ice age have melted.
Ice Free Arctic Ocean: In 2009 Mr. Gore claimed that there was a 75% chance that the Arctic Ocean would be ice free by 2014. He cited climatologist Dr. Wieslav Maslowski as his source. Dr. Maslowski promptly rejected this, stating he had no idea how Gore had arrived at his prediction.
Bye Bye Polar Bears: Mr. Gore claimed in An Inconvenient Truth that polar bears would become endangered due to melting glaciers and ice bergs in the Arctic. Even the Obama administration was recently forced to admit that polar bears aren’t endangered. Reports on the ground in Alaska and Canada indicate an increase in polar bear populations.
Melting glaciers-Gore claimed in An Inconvenient Truth that glaciers were melting as a result of global warming. Unfortunately for Mr. Gore, many studies indicate that many glaciers are growing not shrinking, The UN last year had to admit that the prediction of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by 2035 due to global warming was not based on scientific research as claimed, but based upon speculation contained in a non-peer reviewed magazine article from 1999.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:19 pm
Mrs. G.,
Yes, he is neat. I got to meet him once briefly, and he is all that.
Bruno
August 29th, 2011
3:21 pm
The scientific method is a sound method, designed to observe, test, predict. It does that. To attempt to explain it away as some sort of faith or something is really, really lame.
Last attempt at getting some original thought out of you, Adam. The scientific method is, at its essence, a creative process. The source of our hypotheses about the world can’t come from any type of deductive reasoning, but instead relies on inductive reasoning. Do you understand the difference between the two?? To deny the existence of, or prohibit discussion of the inductive part of the Scientific Method reveals a deep lack of understanding on your part. Can you possibly see past the false dichotomy of Science/Faith for a moment and ponder the fact that the Scientific Method is simply one more human-created tool to understand our world, one of many other tools??
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:21 pm
Keep Up
I just want to thank you and your giant brain for figuring out that it was the Republicans that caused the earth Quake on the 23rd of August this year.
From all of the people on earth: Thanks.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:22 pm
Melting glaciers-Gore claimed in An Inconvenient Truth that glaciers were melting as a result of global warming.
You mean higher temperatures can actually melt ice! Do you have any proof of that!
Paul
August 29th, 2011
3:22 pm
Bosch
“we do some fun things and piss off alot of people because we sponsor things that make people ponder, and sometimes they don’t like to ponder, but we enjoy that. ”
Sounds like my kind of committee!
Bishop Sprong sounds like a neat kind of guy. As to his comment, I’m regularly amazed at the number of people with control issues who get all bent out of shape by other people doing stuff that doesn’t affect them in the least. Like people who see a car coming fast so they change lanes to block it. Same with people who say “I believe such and such.” That’s nice. Why get bent out of shape over it?
Unless they wanna institute Sharia Law in the Supreme Court, that is…..
Hi Midori!!!
Dusty may have a used set -
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:23 pm
How many global scammer believers on this blog have a degree in any of the science fields? Reading all of these “facts” makes me curious as to how many people have a scientific background.
Joe Mama
August 29th, 2011
3:23 pm
Zap — “Sarcasm went right over your head.”
Shrug. There’s nothing so perfect about you and your posts that you can’t be misunderstood or misinterpreted.
Am I supposed to call you “tough guy” or something now?
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:23 pm
GLL: You’re no longer participating in the argument, you’re just spouting the straw man argument that people who understand science and evolution are trying to stop you from speaking.
Speak all you want. Be wrong all you want. But you don’t get to insert religious ideas into a classroom because you have a belief that contradicts it. If you aren’t trying to do that, Great! You can continue to hold on to the idea that evolution is false if you like. As for climate change, yes, continue to believe as you like. I would appreciate it if you didn’t use it as another excuse to rape the earth. Thanks.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:24 pm
“Perhaps you can direct me to the scientific postulates, hypotheses and theorems that this is all based on?”
Perhaps Vet will enlighten all of us as to what kind of scientist he is. Nah, he’ll just keep bobbing and weaving, duck and diving, all while throwing out childish insults.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:24 pm
I just want to thank you and your giant brain for figuring out that it was the Republicans that caused the earth Quake on the 23rd of August this year.
I have not seen any fracking evidence from drillers to confirm that humans had no contribution and given that the epicenter was smack dab in the middle of that Republican stronghold of Virginia… need I say more.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:25 pm
Hey Paul! I just had an idea! As part of our Community Interfaith programming, and since I’M a Jedi now, and well, you obviously are one, do you think you could visit and we could do a light saber demo? The kids would love it. Hell, the adults would too! I’d probably have to get a fireman to standby — but he’d probably do it for free just to see the awesomeness of the demo.
And afterwards we could do a Power Point on “The Force and It’s Many Wonders”
Whadda ya think?
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:25 pm
Bruno: I agree with all that. But that doesn’t mean you can explain away the tool. In fact it gives a very good reasoned argument for why it should remain as a very important tool.
Joe the Plutocrat
August 29th, 2011
3:25 pm
you folks still batting the Intelligent Design vs. Evolution shuttlecock (that was cool; I said c*ck) to and fro’? here’s the bottom line; the very concept of intelligence is human or the product of the homosapien brain. this is like gay people and homophobes fighting over who gets to have the word “mariage”. here’s my take; creationism (lower case c) should be studied and investigated, but there is not need to recognize it as “science” or as a manifestation of some Creator (upper case C).
stands for decibels
August 29th, 2011
3:26 pm
Is there anyone posting here who actually believes that the scientific community had coalesced around the concept of a cooling planet, with anything even approaching the unanimity or the length of time that climatologists have come to accept global warming, and man’s contribution to same?
Anyone?
Ok, since I know the answer to this, I gotta ask–GLL, who do you think you’re impressing with that crap you’re regurgitating @ 3.14?
I’m not saying you’ll go blind from all that mental masturbation or anything, but it can’t be especially good for you.
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:26 pm
Just Another Anonymous One
Stop trying so hard. I think it is important to take a look at the “proven science” of the past to put a little perspective on the nonsense we are being handed today.
It’a all about the money. Be a scientist working on projects that disprove the man-made climate change theory and see how many grants you get.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
August 29th, 2011
3:26 pm
Yes, GLL, I do expect that you suffer the ability to determine sarcasm. Your candidate Bachmann claims to have told a joke too. I expect that you believe her.
Of course, you deflect from the gist of my post with your silly false claims. But that just shows the weakness of your position.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:26 pm
“with control issues who get all bent out of shape by other people doing stuff that doesn’t affect them in the least”
Good point Paul — never really thought of it that way, but that’s going in my brain for later use……now.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:26 pm
Arrrrgh! The scientific method was a creation!!!!!!
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:27 pm
Zap: How many global scammer believers on this blog have a degree in any of the science fields?
Uh… I do (raises hand). Not that that necessarily means anything, as you attempt to imply.
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:27 pm
“Am I supposed to call you “tough guy” or something now?”
No, just call me Zap.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:27 pm
Paul,
Like the gays getting married and all? Yeah, and that affects your marriage how exactly??????
Zap Rowsdower
August 29th, 2011
3:27 pm
“Uh… I do (raises hand).”
Cool, what do you do?
Good little liberal
August 29th, 2011
3:28 pm
Just Another Anonymous One
The Giant brained Keep Up said that mother nature was trying to get the Republican’s attention for trying to cut the budget of the USGS, by shaking us a little.
People from his planet know these kinds of things.
AmVet
August 29th, 2011
3:28 pm
Slightly dated (2002) but even then the basic premis was extremely dubious:
ID parallels but is not identical to creation science, the view that there is scientific evidence to support the Genesis account of the creation of the earth and of life.
ID and creation science share the belief that the mainstream scientific discipline of evolution is largely incorrect. Both involve an intervening deity, but ID is more vague about what happened and when.
Indeed, ID proponents are tactically silent on an alternative to common descent. Teachers exhorted to teach ID, then, are left with little to teach other than “evolution didn’t happen.”
A search of scientific databases, such as PubMed or SciSearch, reveals that scholars have not applied the concept of irreducible complexity or the design inference in researching scientific problems.
ID has been called an “argument from ignorance,” as it relies upon a lack of knowledge for its conclusion: Lacking a natural explanation, we assume intelligent cause.
Most scientists would reply that unexplained is not unexplainable, and that “we don’t know yet” is a more appropriate response than invoking a cause outside of science.
http://ncse.com/creationism/general/intelligent-design-not-accepted-by-most-scientists
md
August 29th, 2011
3:29 pm
“This is what I mean by you not getting the science part. Science tests for this by using PAST evidence and PRESENT evidence and testing for results based on all that.
Really? I mean, REALLY? This cannot POSSIBLY be that hard to understand!”
Yes, Adam, you do seem to be having a hard time grasping that science is only what we think we know…………………..once upon a time, science said the earth was flat………..you can try to get it from there…………
Dusty
August 29th, 2011
3:29 pm
ADAM @ 3:10 What? I said that? Where? We must have some ghost writers here unless I am overcome with gas fumes aquired via auto repair.
Scientists, as researchers,make things simple. They observe what they see. Repeat how they got results. Observe again. Do this hundreds of times. Then study the results and see if some one else can get the same results or disprove it.
That’s to find the first miniminute fact of discovery. It goes slowly. We are blessed with the results of what some spent their entire lives discoverering just to make one step forward. If you want to knock what they do, go spend your own life for one step forward.
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:29 pm
Be a scientist working on projects that disprove the man-made climate change theory and see how many grants you get.
Let me know if you need some contacts at Exxon, the Heritage Foundation, Massey Energy… there are plenty of people willing to pay but no matter how much they pay, they cannot magically change that which is observed. It is what it is.
JohnnyReb
August 29th, 2011
3:30 pm
You guys are boring. Here’s the red neck, hick, chauvinist, conservative, bigotted, terrorist saying for the day.
Julie Banderas is not an illegal immigrant. And, if those that are looked like her, there wouldn’t be a problem!
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:30 pm
Zap: Cool, what do you do?
Wow who saw that one coming? I work for big oil, if you must know.
jm
August 29th, 2011
3:30 pm
“anybody know where I can get a good deal on tires this weekend?”
The governments giving them away. Just ask Obama, he has the answer.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:31 pm
stands @ 3:26
Just damn. I’m out of screen AND monitor cleaner. I gotta go make me a new batch now.
Thulsa Doom
August 29th, 2011
3:31 pm
Bosch,
For the man that thinks that a dollar spent by the govt is as efficient as a dollar spent by the private sector. I won’t get into macroeconomic examples to illustrate why states where the govt controls every dollar such as the Soviet Union or North Korea are abysmal failures relative to economies where the private sector spends most of the dollars such as Hong Kong or Singapore. Suffice it to say that the evidence is so self-evident that even you can understand the obvious.
Instead I’ll just leave you with a nice, easy to read essay on why a dollar spent in the private sector is far more efficient than a dollar spent by the govt. Its an easy read and hopefully you’ll learn something instead of clinging to stubbornness.
http://www.bobmcteer.com/essays/primer.html
Just Another Anonymous One
August 29th, 2011
3:31 pm
md wishes to live a past life. Perhaps as a 3-D person in a 2-D world or vice versa.
Joe Mama
August 29th, 2011
3:32 pm
Bruno — “The source of our hypotheses about the world can’t come from any type of deductive reasoning, but instead relies on inductive reasoning. Do you understand the difference between the two??”
I do.
While hypotheses may come from inductive reasoning, my understanding is that deductive reasoning has to pick up where inductive reasoning ends. I’m sure you’re familiar with Hume’s notion of skeptical inquiry.
“To deny the existence of, or prohibit discussion of the inductive part of the Scientific Method reveals a deep lack of understanding on your part.”
Inductive reasoning’s great for coming up with ideas and concepts that bear testing, examination and discussion. But IMO you seem to be minimizing the value of *those* parts of the Scientific Method in order to inflate the value of another.
“Can you possibly see past the false dichotomy of Science/Faith for a moment and ponder the fact that the Scientific Method is simply one more human-created tool to understand our world, one of many other tools??”
I wouldn’t say that induction is a tool *to understand* our world; I’d term it a single tool among many, and one that realizes its greatest utility when used in concert with other tools.
jm
August 29th, 2011
3:32 pm
Zap is getalife when he wakes up the wrong side of the bed
Adam
August 29th, 2011
3:32 pm
md: you do seem to be having a hard time grasping that science is only what we think we know
Right…. here’s the problem. You seem to think science is something that can be reasoned out of existence just by saying that somewhere along the line you have to rely on something that isn’t proven to your own personal satisfaction. Too bad that’s not how science actually works.
Paul
August 29th, 2011
3:32 pm
Bosch
I think that’s a great idea! Haven’t seen one of those since a Florida State halftime show.
Think of all the acolytes we’ll pick up. And their soccer moms…..
The Same Old Cliches
August 29th, 2011
3:33 pm
“I’m out of screen AND monitor cleaner.”
Bruno
August 29th, 2011
3:34 pm
Seems reasonable that for a subject to be taught in science class, it should meet the requirements of science. Want to examine the idea outside science? As I said, that could be considered.
Paul, Amvet, Adam and any others who think that the Scientific Method itself shouldn’t be examined in Science class: Are you guys for real?? To pretend that the SM stands on its own, and isn’t a branch of philosophy, is truly astounding to me. Please give me some valid reasons as to why the underpinnings of Science, i.e. the SM, should not only be discussed, but actively criticized. To not do so smacks of an intellectual totalitarianism which is worse than any religiously imposed dogma.
Also–Please point to me even one prediction that Darwinian Evolution has made that has come true that can’t be explained in some other way?? It all comes down to randomness vs. purposefulness. You can argue all day for a purposeless, random Universe, but I see no evidence of that, let alone proof.
Bosch
August 29th, 2011
3:35 pm
Doom,
“I won’t get into macroeconomic examples to illustrate why states where the govt controls every dollar such as the Soviet Union or North Korea are abysmal failures relative to economies where the private sector spends most of the dollars such as Hong Kong or Singapore.”
You can get into that all you want, go for it, but it will still be your opinion.