from the coal-industry-is-persecuted-by-science dept.
The Next Generation Science Standards ( http://www.nextgenscience.org/ ) were intended to provide a set of guidelines that would improve education in public schools. In the process, they seem to have introduced state legislators to the reality that evolution and climate change are widely accepted by the scientific community. That has led to a showdown between legislators and the governor (Kentucky), the rejection of the standards in two states (Oklahoma and Wyoming), and a private lawsuit (Kansas). Now, thanks to West Virginia, we can add another option to the list: modifying the sections that deal with climate change.
The Charleston Gazette ( http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20141228/GZ01/141229489/1419 )has a report on the aftermath of the adoption of the standards by the West Virginia state school board. It turns out that one board member, Wade Linger, made some changes to the sections that dealt with climate change. He apparently objected to a question about the planet's rising temperatures because, "If you have that as a standard, then that presupposes that global temperatures have risen over the past century, and, of course, there’s debate about that.” So, he amended the question to read "rise and fall in global temperatures over the last century"—even though the temperature trend for the last century is clearly upward.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 31 2014, @04:20AM
Why is it that the rightwing are so fearful all the time?
I always wondered.
Saw this the other day....
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/millennial-media/201304/do-racism-conservatism-and-low-iq-go-hand-in-hand [psychologytoday.com]
"Hodson and Busseri (2012) found in a correlational study that lower intelligence in childhood is predictive of greater racism in adulthood, with this effect being mediated (partially explained) through conservative ideology. They also found poor abstract reasoning skills were related to homophobic attitudes which was mediated through authoritarianism and low levels of intergroup contact.
What this study and those before it suggest is not necessarily that all liberals are geniuses and all conservatives are ignorant. Rather, it makes conclusions based off of averages of groups. The idea is that for those who lack a cognitive ability to grasp complexities of our world, strict-right wing ideologies may be more appealing."
Which explains rather nicely why they always fail to see the shades of grey in the world, they just aint smart enough! LOL!
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @12:26PM
LOL AC speaking of psychology as in your psychologytoday link, given that the proles have, by design, absolutely no input in the political or economic process of the country, and no significant control on their personal carbon output other than suicide, a lot of the argument boils down to should the school system as a psychological brainwashing exercise encourage and legally enforce anxiety and guilt in students over something they have no control over and never will have any control over, or not? The net effect on society as a whole is probably best if the issue is ignored, especially as the only scientifically valid solution to the problem resembles a more bloodthirsty version of Pol Pot.
What I'm getting at is ignoring the issue is a healthy middle ground of minimizing suffering across the whole planet. You can inconvenience billions tomorrow as things warm up a little, or mass murder billions today to optimistically prevent things warming up tomorrow. Overall we're better off letting the thermostat go up a bit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 31 2014, @02:16PM
Mass murder?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @05:04PM
Mass murder?
Yeah, depressing isn't it? We didn't stop pre-petrochemical farming because we ran out of oxen and plows... And it only supported less than 2 billion people. We will be VERY optimistic that organic genetically modified post-petrochemical farming could support a full 2 billion people. Yeah good luck with that, but I'm an optimist. Realistically due to contamination / ground water issues / soil erosion only 1 billion is more optimistic. Maybe less, lack of skills, good stuff paved over... Still more than half a bill even pessimistically.
So petrochemical era farming can and does more or less support 7 billion people, more or less stable population in developed world and rapidly growing population in the 3rd world.
So... a transition from petrochemical era farming to post-petrochemical era farming means 7 billion - 2 billion = optimistically 5 billion need to be disappeared as fast as the oil and natgas stop being pumped. Yeah I don't think they're going to go willingly. And we're not shipping all 5 billion off to Mars colonies either.
Still if you want post-petrochemical farming and food distribution, its gotta be done. Or even if you don't want it, wells aren't bottomless.
Not saying I like that, just saying its got to be that way.
There's more problems than just food. Keeping Los Vegas and the western states supplied with drinking water will, eventually, end. Someday the population of Nevada and the like will drop back to pre-1960 levels because thats all the land can support. What'll happen to the people currently there is an open question. Ag is already starting to die out west because the aquifers are pumped out. Replenishment rate of the Ogallala is too low to measure on human scales, but we can pump out about 20% per decade. And we've been doing it for a couple decades. So its done for.
How do you stop the huge modern population of the upper midwest from freezing to death without petrochemicals, oh thats easy, you don't. Going back to pioneer era wood heat means about 99 in 100 have to move away. Even high tech insulation and solar still means 9 in 10 need to move away. To where? Not Vegas, not if they want drinking water. And who's going to make high tech insulation and high tech solar panels if everyone's a refugee and factories have no energy and none of the consumers have any money? Nobody, thats who. So it'll be the 99 in 100 have to move away not 9 in 10.
If you think well depletion rates are magically going to be similar to or slower than natural death rates you have another thing coming. Whats Eagle Ford's typical horizontal well production decline, like 70% over the first 3 years? There's only one way to drop the human population that fast, and it isn't pretty.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday December 31 2014, @03:52PM
Not much input, through regular channels, yes. We need to be more creative. Everyone admits we still have the right to assemble. I think the police need frequent reminding of who they really work for and who their real bosses are: us. There've been just too many confrontations between people and police, with the police behaving as if their bosses are shadowy power brokers, some twisted principle of law and order, or no one and nothing at all. For instance, why did police line up against the Occupy Wall Street protesters, why didn't they join them? Why weren't the police busy getting control of the fraud by arresting the people responsible, seizing their persons, offices, physical properties and other assets? The 2 groups should have been on the same side. The average policeman was just as screwed by the housing bubble burst, massive financial fraud, and economic collapse as everyone else. Instead both accepted roles that put them in opposition. The protesters saw police as mere brainwashed tools of the elite, while the police accepted the narrative of the protesters just being a bunch of rabble rousing, disorganized delinquents.
It's similar with Climate Change. We do have the power to solve this problem. Do we have the will? Lot harder with all the negativity and denial. First they said it wasn't happening. Then they said it wasn't our fault, as if that absolves us from any need to do anything about it. Now they, and you, are saying that fixing the problem will cause too much suffering, like by destroying the economy. Nothing could be further from the truth! That "destroy the economy" talk is only fear amplified by the propaganda of the entrenched industries who have everything to lose because they're the biggest part of the problem. Coal mining is big in West Virginia, so of course they would fight this.
Doing something, right or wrong, always stimulates the economy. It's doing nothing that makes economies stagnate. There are a lot of things to be done to deal with Climate Change. Switching from coal to wind, water, and solar power will take a lot of work. Changing our vehicles to electric, or something else away from oil burning, is lots more work. Maybe we should build sea walls, atmospheric carbon scrubbing facilities (or just plant more trees), or start relocating to higher ground. Whatever we do, it will be a lot of jobs.
Don't you want more jobs for everyone? Then support actions on Climate Change! If you're against doing anything, then the question should be asked, Why Do You Hate America?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @05:22PM
Everyone admits we still have the right to assemble. I think the police need frequent reminding of who they really work for and who their real bosses are: us.
Well, clearly you don't live in the USA. Thats cool.
There are a lot of things to be done to deal with Climate Change.
Yeah but none of them do anything scientifically or engineering significant. Being politically active or successful doesn't necessarily imply any scientific relevance. If we all really cared and tried really hard and rushed the barricades we might get bipartisan senate support for a law reducing the force of gravity, maybe by as much as 5% per year. That would really stimulate the aerospace industry, not to mention making bridges and buildings safer in earthquakes. It won't actually change anything of course, not in the real world.
Also the climate changes. Dramatically. Where I'm sitting there was a 2 mile ice shelf 10K or so ago and within the next 10K or so it'll be back. Its pure hubris to think we can or should freeze the climate or its wrong that it changes. It MIGHT be within our control over the next hundred or thousand years, but outside that horizon the earth is going to do whatever it pleases far outside our range of control. Where's my tax breaks for ice age prevention? The next ice age is going to cause a lot more economic destruction and kill a lot more people than a mere couple cm of ocean height or a degree or two in the air and there is nothing to be done about it.
We do have the power to solve this problem.
We did, we burned what was burnable, mostly. Mexico is pretty near done being an exporter, UK is a net importer now, Texas wells are mostly empty, once its gone its gone. If the wells in TX were full like in 1914, then we could argue about changing the future. I guess my point is we're like 90% done burning what our species is gonna burn. Its not like we're just starting burning petrochemicals, its more like we're almost done. Which makes social engineering to fool with whats left kinda pointless. Maybe in 30 years we can hash out climate regulations to regulate oil production in Illinois. Oh wait, its already all pumped out, so stop wasting time trying to regulate it. Like a big political farce about proposing regulation of the horse and buggy industry in about 1920, a little late to the party. Or proposing massive government controls of the 8-track player industry in 1980. Or the LP vinyl record industry in about 1990. Too late man, look forward not back. Social engineer the future not the distant past.
Maybe we should build sea walls, atmospheric carbon scrubbing facilities (or just plant more trees), or start relocating to higher ground.
That I can agree with. Not just trees, but groundcover in general to reduce soil erosion. Climate is gonna change no matter what, so best prep for it. Nuclear power plant on tsunami beach, maybe not great idea. Building a city in the desert is pretty idiotic. The kind of stuff that just makes sense.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:31PM
Where I'm sitting there was a 2 mile ice shelf 10K or so ago and within the next 10K or so it'll be back. Its pure hubris to think we can or should freeze the climate or its wrong that it changes. It MIGHT be within our control over the next hundred or thousand years, but outside that horizon the earth is going to do whatever it pleases far outside our range of control.
To the contrary, the longer the time frame the more power you can exert over the natural world. In millions of years, you can move stars. In billions of years you can move galaxies.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:55PM
Because the only "solution" allowed to be talked about on the national stage is a big scam [youtube.com] designed to pull a reverse robin hood [nakedcapitalism.com] for the few at the top of the pyramid [forbes.com] and all because a few rich scumbags (that live in McMansions and drive SUV fleets no less) figured out how to snatch the mike away from those that actually wanted to make the world a better place, in essence becoming the Al Sharptons of the AGW movement?
What we need is some sensible solutions, investment into using algae biodiesel to recycle carbon that would have been released into fuel, a "people's car/truck/suv" that uses a diesel/electric hybrid platform with simple body swaps to drop the price low enough that even the working poor (who are the reason why the USA has such piss poor average gas mileage) can afford to switch, painting roofs and the endless miles of parking lots white to reflect instead of absorb heat, heck I could go on all day with simple sensible things that would really add up and make a difference...but then the hucksters couldn't make crazy bank while giving their buddies credit indulgences to insure the status quo stays just the way it is with those at the top not having to compete, so that isn't gonna happen.
Now watch how quickly I get attacked by those that worship at the AGW altar. They have been fooled by the snake oil salesmen into thinking "ZOMFG we have to do something!" without being allowed to stop and think "will this something actually WORK, or has it already been set up with enough loopholes and offshore exemptions that it will do nothing but enrich those at the top of the pyramid?". Because when you look at who is actually writing the "rules" cap and trade is supposed to function under? You have about as much chance of affecting AGW with cap and trade as you do of winning a pile of money playing 3 card monty with a street hustler. Those that can move will be given tax breaks to send their carbon belching factories to the third world, those that can't move but have friends at the top will be given indulgences, it'll only be the poor and rapidly dying middle class that will have to "tighten their belts" and the entire time all that will be done to "solve" AGW will be nothing but sleight of hand.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Wednesday December 31 2014, @07:56PM
You are right -- voters have absolutely no impact on politics because the "two" political parties are totally owned and besides, they agree on much, MUCH, more than they disagree on. Secondly, recycling a few tin cans and driving a prius isn't going to stop global warming and there is very little an individual can do of any great impact -- except this: choose to be childfree. I have. I could burn diesel in my backyard by the tanker-full, 24/7 for the rest of my life, and ultimately, my contribution to the future carbon footprint will be less than a person who chooses to have a sprog. Considering the number of humans and the rapid population explosion of them, choosing to be a parent is about the most selfish and self-serving act a person can do. The world doesn't need your offspring, it's got plenty to spare.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday December 31 2014, @04:11PM
Not sure where the rightwing bit came from? I guess because all five states mentioned are majority republican? That is out of context in this situation because three of those states mentioned helped to write NGSS and two completely rejected it. West Virgina is mentioned specifically because after adopting the standards they changed them. Just to put this more in perspective, from a national standard (common core) there is no mention of human caused global warming. Kentucky helped write and adopted human caused global warming as science while Democratic states like Florida, Virgina, Pennsylvania, and others have not. So we can safely leave political parties out of this one.
Calling all conservatives stupid (literally dumb, not just derogatory name calling) is missing the point completely. Conservatives wouldn't be where they are today if they were all dumb. If they can get poor/lowIQ people to vote for them so they can reduce capital gains taxes on themselves then that is damn smart. Painting them all as dumb is failing to see the world as shades of gray : )
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Wednesday December 31 2014, @04:28PM
Why is it that the rightwing are so fearful all the time?
Compared to who? The other side of the "climate change" debate are a bunch of chicken littles.
My view on this is that humans have to have a certain level of legitimate fear in their lives or they start making up things to fear. Kind of like immune systems.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @05:34PM
Fear is an effective way to control people. If they don't make it up organically, their leaders will create the fear to control them.
There's a terrorist hiding behind every tree stump because they hate our freedumbs so we need to give up our freedumbs to fight them so they'll lose because we're the land of freedumb. The commies are going to take over SE Asia (and if they did, I should care exactly why?). The Russians are going to march down the streets of Paris unless we post a huge standing army in western germany. The Japanese will own the entire world economy (gotta be old to remember this one). The cubans are going to invade florida unless we invade cuba first. That dude in Panama was our best buddy but now that he isn't he's just a filthy drug dealer. That dude in Iraq is our second best ally until our ministry of truth rewrites it to we're at war with eastasia and have always been at war with eastasia.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:24PM
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:55PM
Can't disagree that it might be ancient, but I suspect over time that more bad stuff has been done with "I've got a plan that'll fix everything" than "Beware of the dude who has a plan that'll fix everything"
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Wednesday December 31 2014, @07:06PM
Don't forget how big of a "threat" NK is, what with their 50 year old Soviet hand me downs, or Iran whose "new super duper high tech fighter" is nothing but a reskin of the 1959 F5s we sold the Shah [wikipedia.org] and then of course there is ISIS, a group so scummy even other terrorist supporting countries are trying to destroy...yeah not really shaking in my boots from any of the above, but we gotta have an excuse for that defense budget right out of the cold war, don't we?
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday December 31 2014, @07:13PM
Why is it that the rightwing are so fearful all the time?
Because they know they are losing.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 31 2014, @04:28AM
Climate change isn't an issue that would be a showcase for the democratic system of government. In fact, the Chinese leadership seems to have a better grasp of the consequences of not taking vigorous action, than the Americans do, at least in terms of the policy decisions made by the latter.
Sometimes, enlightened despotism can be an effective way of getting some of the right things done. Now, I'm not saying the Chinese are doing enough, because they aren't, but at least they acknowledge the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 31 2014, @08:24AM
I'd say it has nothing to do with the political system. Look at every other democratic country in the world - climate change is a fact, the details are left to scientists while politicians debate about how to best react to it.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @12:17PM
AC has accurately summarized the politics of the topic.
Google for USA carbon emissions and China carbon emissions and China is going up in a semi-exponential curve, steadily increasing its rate of growth, whereas the USA is slowly, steadily declining over the decades, per capita. However for political reasons, China is the "winner!" because they acknowledge. Oh so proud of them. Of course the USA is the only one actually lowering (admittedly mostly due to economic decline, but still...)
(Score: 2) by pe1rxq on Wednesday December 31 2014, @12:47PM
China's level might still be growing, but it is still way less than that of the US. The US could halve its emissions and China would still be the winner on a per capita base.
They are acknowledging it and are taking measures to stop the growth. With the rate the US numbers are declining it won't be hard for the Chinese to have lower numbers pretty much indefinetly.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday December 31 2014, @01:08PM
The US could halve its emissions and China would still be the winner on a per capita base.
Your numbers are out of date. That's the problem with exponential growth. In 2010 it was something like 17 and dropping about one percent per year since roughly the 70s, vs 6 in 2010 and doubling every decade since the 80s. So a realistic estimate for 2015 would be 16.8-ish vs 9-ish so no, as of recently China is no longer half of the USA.
The crossover point will be in the next decade, at which point the USA will still be getting slammed politically for declining yet not kissing enough butt, and China will still be getting a free pass for doubling every decade but more importantly as long as they continue to kiss some butt they'll be media darlings.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday December 31 2014, @04:33PM
They are acknowledging it and are taking measures to stop the growth.
My view is that China makes these few token efforts in order to encourage the developed world to continue its acts of economic suicide. This is the fast track to becoming the next superpower. They'll stop paying lip service, when there's nothing more to gain from it.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by curunir_wolf on Wednesday December 31 2014, @01:41PM
Folks, do not send your kids to public schools. My son got out 5 years ago barely managing to escape with any critical thinking skills at all, and it's gotten even worse since then.
They eventually gave up trying to lecture him (or explain to me) that factual errors he found in the curriculum should be discussed privately, because it was "disrespectful" for him to correct the instructor in front of the class. They never quite gave up insisting that I approve and sign off on every little thing even though he turned 18 in his senior year. Luckily the clerk in the office recognized him as an adult. Frankly, he was more of an adult than most of those public school administrators for most of his high school years.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 1) by Anonoob on Wednesday December 31 2014, @02:19PM
Seems that finding factual errors to the point they complain to you about it, is quite a healthy critical thinking skills base. Unless their plan is adversarial development of such skills, their approach would probably not reinforce its enhancement.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:15PM
Highly relevant song: What Did You Learn in School Today? [youtube.com], written by Tom Paxson, performed here by Pete Seeger.
I know that when I was in school, during the Gulf War, our teachers required students to make yellow ribbons and care packages for soldiers. I and my pacifist parents made a bit of a fuss about that.
As far as the issue in West Virginia, it's obvious: Politicians in WV know that King Coal rules the state, and act accordingly.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday December 31 2014, @06:06PM
Seems school boards is populated by the less intelligent monkeys..
A lot of schooling seems to be about shaping mindless drones than to cultivate sharp intellect.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Natales on Wednesday December 31 2014, @07:39PM
The whole process around school boards is insane. As someone raised in a different country and now living in the US, it's beyond me how local people with no qualifications whatsoever can actually run, get elected and literally mandate and change what future generations get to learn. To make things worst, it's a well known fact that very few people voted in the last midterm elections where tons of school boards were in the ballot, and now we complain when some of these wackos are making changes like that...
One big issue is that it's very hard to do proper research on local candidates, their thinking and their point of views. This time I spend 4 hours digging online until I could make up my mind, but it took me a long time just to find the right sources.
As a registered Independent, I wrote down my voting "methodology" here [ramirosalas.com] for whatever is worth, but to stay on point, these types of problems are of our own making. IMHO, school boards should have only a non-binding advisory role representing the feelings of the community, but with no veto power over peer-reviewed norms based on academic consensus. But how can that ever happen with the current system? I have no idea...
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday December 31 2014, @08:19PM
I'm a liberal and so my POV is supposed to be similar to yours. In fact, it is the opposite. This not because school boards do a great job, it is because the Feds could do way worse and then there is nothing you can do it about. Examples: don't like being at war for over a decade? Leave the country (but still pay your taxes). Don't like mass surveillance of everything? Tough shit. Don't like the massive prison/industrial complex? watch your step, you could end up there. Aren't to happy about privatizing profits and socializing losses? Whatever, open your wallet. Seriously, is there a single positive thing the Feds have done in the last few decades? Probably, but these things would be on the scale of "Jeffry Dahmer was nice to puppies" -- so we should love and respect him despite the cannibalism?
The reason I, as a liberal, support increased local power, not just in schools, but in everything (*) -- is because when you have one monolithic fucked up government, you have nowhere to go. But when you have a bunch of localized fucked up governments intermixed with localized OK governments, you have options, and having options is better than being totally screwed.
(*) I'd support a constitutional amendment allowing the unilateral secession of states. The civil war determined that secession requires bilateral agreement between a state and the feds, but that could be changed with a simple amendment.
(Score: 1) by Natales on Thursday January 01 2015, @03:04AM
I respect your POV. The thing is that I'm not advocating for a central government to fulfill that role, but rather a peer-reviewed, consensus meritorcracy. That is intrinsically non-partisan. I see this as a technical matter, not something that should be politicized... In any case, the status quo as it is now leaves too many doors open for the Koch brothers of the world to buy all the elections they want at the school board level and quietly shape the thinking (or lack thereof) of the country in the long term... something has to change...
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday January 01 2015, @08:02AM
Call me cynical, but I can't envision any future in which a reality based meritocracy would ever prevail at the national level.