Taking Action

I was catching up on my blog reading this morning and two posts caught my eye.  First, John Cole at Balloon Juice posted about an encounter with a bunch of elderly Fox News watchers.  When one of them made a ridiculous claim John called him on it: 

Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore, and when he said “You can’t even pray anymore. Christians get stopped from praying, but Muslims get to pray,” I lost it.

“When was the last time someone stopped you from praying,” I asked.

He seemed startled- “Me, never. But they…”

I cut him off- “And when was the last time anyone stopped anyone you know from praying?”

“Well, I don’t personally know of anyone…”

“So who exactly is stopping people from praying?”

I’m not sure it changed anyone’s mind, but I think it’s good to call out BS when you see it.  Ignoring the crazy talk just allows it to continue to spread.  I work with some very conservative people with pretty radical ideas.  I challenge them on it whenever I can.  If nothing else, it forces them to defend their beliefs.

The second post was from Hement, the “Friendly Atheist.”  It’s similar to the Balloon Juice post, but focuses on religion.  Why shouldn’t we argue with religious people and force them to defend their beliefs?   Again, letting ridiculous claims go unchallenged is dangerous.  Hemant uses the example of child vaccinations.  Of course we have to speak out against the anti-vaccination crowd, because their beliefs are irrational and dangerous.  Why shouldn’t we also speak out against irrational religious beliefs?  Religion is used to justify discrimination against women and gays.  It also provides cover for charismatic leaders who claim that they are “doing God’s will.”   If Sarah Palin truly believes that she is doing God’s work, then any crazy thing she says or does is justified.   Read Jon Krakauer’s  “Under the Banner of Heaven” for great examples what can happen when religious fervor goes unchecked.

Anyhow, read both posts.  They are well worth your time.

How to handle a global warming denier

Ron Johnson, a Republican candidate for Senate from Wisconsin, has made some crazy claims about global warming.  He recently blamed it on sunspots, even though the sun has in an extended period of low sunspot activity.   Russ Feingold and the Wisconsin Democratic party released a video making fun of Johnson’s statements.  Take a look:

 

 

I think this is the right response when dealing with someone who denies science and logic. Reason doesn’t work, so we may as well use mockery to expose the craziness.

Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the tip.

“Benevolent Catholic Dictatorship”

 

That’s what this guy says we need.  Oh – and only good Catholics get to vote.  This is a great example of Poe’s Law.  This almost has to be a parody, but I can’t really tell.

Now that we know they want replace our government with a Catholic version of Sharia Law, should we ban construction of new Catholic churches?

Thanks to PZ for the tip.

Language Sensitivity

Rebecca at Skepchick is auctioning her magical powers to induce whatever bodily enlacement the winning bidder desires.  Proceeds will fund her trip to DraconCon in September.  I think it’s a great idea, and suitably snarky for Rebecca.   But here’s the rub:  her initial Ebay listing had the word “shit” in it, so they yanked it.  They are perfectly fine with a listing that’s selling obvious hocus-pocus, but a little 4-letter word is too much.  Where does this sensitivity to words come from?  I don’t know, but I like George Carlin’s classic take on it:

What Global Warming Looks Like

 

 

Dr. James Hansen has posted a brief paper on current weather patterns. Much of the earth is experiencing warmer than normal weather, and there have been extreme floods in some areas, and fires in other regions.  Hansen asks whether these patterns could be the result of global warming.  While it’s not possible to definitively link near-term weather to long-term climate patterns, the current trends are consistent with patterns predicted by climate models.  From the paper:

“What we can say is that global warming has an effect on the probability and intensity of extreme events. This is true for precipitation as well as temperature, because the amount of water vapor that the air carries is a strong function of temperature. So the frequency of extremely heavy rain and floods increases as global warming increases. But at times and places of drought, global warming can increase the extremity of temperature and associated events such as forest fires.”

Fortunately there is an emerging La Nina, which should have a cooling effect during 2nd half of 2010. 

Thanks to Daily Kos for the tip

Climate Denial Croc of the Week

If you haven’t discovered Peter Sinclair’s excellent video series, check it out.  This 2-part episode does a great job of explaining how the deniers distort the temperature data to support their claim that the earth isn’t heating, and is actually cooling.

Greenland Continues to Lose Ice

This can’t be good (from Science Daily): 

Greenland Glacier Calves Island Four Times the Size of Manhattan

“In the early morning hours of August 5, 2010, an ice island four times the size of Manhattan was born in northern Greenland," said Andreas Muenchow, associate professor of physical ocean science and engineering at the University of Delaware's College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment.

I haven’t been following the conservative denial machine in the past few days, but I wonder if the time is changing in light of the recent NOAA report and this news about Greenland.  Are they going from “It’s not happening” to “It’s part of natural cycles”?