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The man behind the sphere, Freeman Dyson, is dead at 96:
Freeman Dyson, a physicist whose interests often took him to the edge of science fiction, has died at the age of 96. Dyson is probably best known for his idea of eponymous spheres that would allow civilizations to capture all the energy radiating off a star. But his contributions ranged from fundamental physics to the practicalities of using nuclear weapons for war and peace. And he remained intellectually active into his 90s, although he wandered into the wrong side of science when it came to climate change.
Degrees? Who needs 'em?
It's difficult to find anything that summarizes a career so broad, but a sense of his intellectual energy comes from his educational history. Dyson was a graduate student in physics when he managed to unify two competing ideas about quantum electrodynamics, placing an entire field on a solid theoretical foundation. Rather than writing that up as his thesis, he simply moved on to other interests. He didn't get a doctorate until the honorary ones started arriving later in his career. His contributions were considered so important that he kept getting faculty jobs regardless.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @05:10AM (7 children)
Smart dude right? But his thoughts on climate change are irrelevant? Maybe he saw something the dogma beaters did not.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @05:28AM (4 children)
If he did he'd have explained it clearly, the way he explained physics to his students.
No, he simply subjectively wasn't convinced. If he had a good argument against climate change, or had meaningful insight backed up with data, he'd have shared it. He liked to share information (see: teaching, publishing but not seeking degrees, etc). So he wasn't convinced. Given 10x studies with 95% CI, one should expect 1 in (.05)^10 "good" scientists to doubt the result, ie about 0.1%. So he was in that 0.1% - and he himself would have said that what matters is the argument not who argues it.
And he'd have been pissed at "Dyson says so, so it must be" just as he'd be pissed if Dyson were replaced with the name of a climate scientist who claims anthropogenic climate change is real.
In other words, yes, "his thoughts on climate change are irrelevant" insomuch as it is expected that some good scientists will have such thoughts, and insomuch as he never developed any results based on data. And he'd have been among the first to say that his thoughts, without data, were of no consequence.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @05:32AM
PS - see https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2008/06/12/the-question-of-global-warming/?pagination=false [nybooks.com] for Dyson's thoughts. They're not wrong per se; they're just insubstantiable. We don't have genetically modified orgs that do what he suggests, for example.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday February 29 2020, @06:22PM (2 children)
Seriously, we get this same crap ever time someone knowledgeable has a contrary opinion on the subject of climate change. Where else do you get convenient delivery of studies when the results of the studies are needed for political purposes (like the flawed "hockey stick" paper which purports to show that climate hasn't be as warm as it was in the year 1999 for thousands of years)? Argument from obfuscation (here's 700 pages which somewhere proves the issues you have doubts about)? Institutionalized propaganda like "climate change" for global warming, and "climate denier" for anyone who doesn't drink the kool aid? Textbook confirmation and observation bias (extreme weather and blaming everything on climate change)? And money - tens of billions of dollars in funding with another order of magnitude more for climate change-dependent projects (on the same order of magnitude as fossil fuel profits, let us note)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:58AM (1 child)
More likely, he heard shitty arguments like that one (discounting someone's argument through mere assertion)
What? That's not "assertion", that's demonstrating that we should expect persons with his conclusions, among intellectually honest and capable persons. Where did I assert that he's wrong? I did assert that he doesn't have a proof - and then in the PS followup, I linked to his subjectively argued explanation of why he wasn't convinced of anthropogenic climate change. You know, the primary data?
To reiterate: what he published was his insightful but subjective opinions, and not novel data or analysis with a clear proof.
Good for you for picking on climate arguments which are flawed. But you've clearly got "a side" which you're defending here, and not being an honest and fair participant in the discussion.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday March 01 2020, @02:43PM
How much again does it cost to accumulate primary data? There is a profound dishonesty here where one side is allowed to carry an argument just because they received considerable funding to collect some data (not, let us note some evidence). The whole point of presenting research and its data in papers and such is so that people who aren't primary data collectors can evaluate the research for themselves. You can choose to ignore those evaluations, but that's not scientifically relevant.
And so do you clearly. I don't consider that "not being an honest and fair participant in the discussion" at all. To remain somehow purely unbiased forever is to ignore reality. What I consider dishonest and unfair is using imaginary and unrealistic standards of science to prejudge criticism of climate research.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Bot on Saturday February 29 2020, @07:30AM (1 child)
> But his thoughts on climate change are irrelevant?
Yes they are. Leave speculation on models to kids and scientists. Climate change is about carbon quotes and laws and taxes which can topple corps as big as auto makers. The future financial landscape depend on it. So let the grownups work.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 29 2020, @04:20PM
You nailed it. The models are not 'there'. They change with the weather (hehe). But the important part is it is now about money. Not helping us.
Biggest change in years for 'climate change' the price of NG went below the price of coal. Adding taxes and derivatives will distort the market. Around 2010 when prices of oil were hitting 150 a barrel. That nearly 60% of the market was just in speculation. Not in real goods traded. Once the money guys wrung out what they could from that market the whole thing collapsed like the ponzi scheme it was. One whole country thought they could build a socialist empire upon it. That did not work either.
Is there some sort of 'change' happening. You bet. Is it anything like the models. Not really. They can not really tell me the global model 3 days out. Yet somehow magically they can nail the weather 30 years from now? Pull the other one.
So let the grownups work.
Having worked now with some of these 'grownups'. They are not anything close. It is bro's all the way down. They will suck your wallet dry and drive off in their fancy 100k car.