Generational Theory Forum: The Fourth Turning Forum: A message board discussing generations and the Strauss Howe generational theory

(09-25-2019, 02:33 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]Her future looks bleak, but it has nothing to do with global warming, which has been happening for decades already.  Rather, it has to do with her government's willingness to let the elites import cheap labor to prevent her own upward mobility.

No, the climate is the #1 concern of everyone her age … or should be.  The economy is a manmade thing, and can be altered as needed.  The climate is ruled by the laws of physics, and it's getting bad already.  And no, the effect of carbon in the atmosphere is not decades old, at least not as a climate driver.  CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas. so concentrations had to get profound before it mattered.  Now it does, and it only gets worse as the concentrations rise.  We don't need anything like the Eocene Age before it gets horrible.  The last time concentrations got this high, the oceans were 50-80 higher, and most of what is now the high-value coastline was under water.

So you are arguing that CO2 was "weak" in the past 3 decades, but will be "worse" in the next 3 decades. I guess you think the laws of physics are changing?

(09-25-2019, 05:41 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]** 25-Sep-2019 Greta Thunberg

(09-25-2019, 12:38 PM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ] She's looking about 30 years into her future.  That won't be an issue for us, but it certainly will for her and her entire generation.  We Boomers, Xers and even older generations have created a mess, refuse to fix it, and claim we're doing it for them.  She's calling bullshit on that.  

Actually, I doubt that she even knows what she's talking about.  She's a puppet, mouthing the words of her puppetmaster, the climate change activists who couldn't care less about the climate, but who are looking for fat monetary payouts into their climate funds to keep themselves employed and keep African warlords fully supplied with weapons.

John, you may have a strong foreign policy background, but your knowledge of basic science is almost zero. Apparently, Greta is far more versed than you, so simple insults seem more than a little foolish, if you ask me.

If we stop adding more CO2 to the atmosphere starting today, the temperature will continue to rise for the next two centuries. That's the effect of hysteresis. So yes, she has every right to be pissed-off, and not because someone told her to be. The last time the levels got this high, the temperature was about 3.6-5.4 degrees warmer and the seas 50-80 feet higher. Preventing that involves decades of CO2 extraction. Adding more just makes the task more daunting.

When virtually everyone in the know agrees with her, maybe you need to reconsider your POV.

John J. Xenakis Wrote:As for Greta Thunberg, she's proven herself to be able to deliver lines very dramatically, so I would not be surprised at all if she's currently negotiating for a part in a movie or tv situation comedy. 

She's talented in front of an audience, because she's from a theater family and it's in the blood, so to speak. Then again, every successful politician in the last several decades has had to have similar talents, with Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump both being "in the business" before entering politics. It doesn't make her right or wrong, but it does make her dynamic.

(09-26-2019, 10:20 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]So you are arguing that CO2 was "weak" in the past 3 decades, but will be "worse" in the next 3 decades.  I guess you think the laws of physics are changing?

Come on Warren.  You have a science background, so this isn't that hard.  There are many strong drivers of global temperature, including the 11-year solar cycle and the much longer galactic cycle.  Most are just that: cyclic.  Concentrations of greenhouse gases, on the other hand, are driven by other events like volcanic activity and carbon sequestration.  Volcanic activity has driven the climate to the limit many times in the past and the effect can be both acute and dramatic.  Carbon sequestration, or its opposite: burning fossil fuels, is slower.  The effects build up or down over centuries or millennia.

The use of fossil fuels started in earnest with the industrial revolution.  Because the release of the sequestered carbon adds CO2 over time as fossil fuels are burned, the impact finally rises high enough to be noticed in the mix of other drivers. But because it's a linear function, and the concentration continues to rise, the effect eventually begins to dominate … and that's where we are now.

In short, what's more worrisome: A sin(B), where A is large, or Cy, where C is small, but y rises steadily over time? If there is no functionally upper limit to y, Cy can go off the charts.

If it's linear, it has changed the same amount in the past 30 years as it will in the next 30 years. That would be nowhere near bleak or horrible; it would only be slightly more than barely noticeable.

The girl is, as John Xenakis alluded to, a witless millenial tool of boomers with ulterior motives.

(09-26-2019, 02:21 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]If it's linear, it has changed the same amount in the past 30 years as it will in the next 30 years.  That would be nowhere near bleak or horrible; it would only be slightly more than barely noticeable.

Here is a graph that correlates CO2 with global temperature.  Note: the temperature rise is directly related to industrial activity -- driven mostly by population and rising living standards.
Drivers, especially solar, were much stronger until they weren't

Warren Dew Wrote:The girl is, as John Xenakis alluded to, a witless millenial tool of boomers with ulterior motives.

Your opinion seems to track your dislike of her POV, and little to do with how well she's doing as an advocate. I think she's a bit over-the-top too, but that goes with the territory. If you want to reach the moon, aim for the stars.

At the moment, we're roughly 30 years behind the curve, and there will be serious costs. Someone who is 16 and aware, is not going to be pleased at all.

Your own graph proves my point:  the graph is linear since well before 30 years ago.  It shows a global temperature rise of slightly less than 1F per 30 years.  30 years from now, we can expect a global temperature about 1F higher than now.  Contrary to your characterizations, that would be neither bleak nor horrible, just a bit warmer.

As for the girl, my view of her has much more to do with where she fits in the generational sequence than with any views she might have espoused.  It's not like I had to listen to her for more than 15 seconds to know why she was trotted out by the people really in power. Boomers love using millenials as tools.

*** 27-Sep-19 World View -- The fraud of France's Jacques Chirac in the Iraq war

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• The fraud of France's Jacques Chirac in the Iraq war
  
• Jacques Chirac and Saddam Hussein's Oil-for-Food scam
  

****
**** The fraud of France's Jacques Chirac in the Iraq war
****


Jacques Chirac on March 11, 2007, shortly before stepping down as president. After leaving office, he was found guilty of misuse of public money, breach of trust and illegal conflict of interest (RFI)

Jacques Chirac, who was president of France between 1995 and 2007,
died on Thursday. He had previously served two terms as prime
minister, from 1974-76 and 1986-88, and was mayor of Paris from
1977-1995.

According to the current president, Emmanuel Macron:

<QUOTE>"We are remembering tonight with emotion and
affection his freedom, his personality, the talent he had to
reconcile simplicity and grandeur, proximity and dignity, love of
the motherland and openness to the universal."<END QUOTE>

However, another French politician said anonymously: "People think
Chirac is a decent guy, but not very bright. In fact, he's exactly the
opposite."

In fact, Chirac was extremely controversial as president, although the
thing that he was most praised for was standing up to President George
Bush and refusing to join America and Britain in the 2003 war against
Saddam Hussein in Iraq. According to British journalist Sophie
Pedder:

<QUOTE>"Much to criticise about his time as French president
(twice), prime minister (twice) and Paris mayor. But Jacques
Chirac (1932-2019) was right on Iraq, prescient about
multi-polarity, brave to acknowledge France's responsibility under
Vichy--and an improbable icon of French cool
pic.twitter.com/KHkQE9gHaM"<END QUOTE>

Born in 1932, he was too young to fight in World War II, but later in
life he was praised for acknowledging France's collaboration with the
Nazis during the war, including the deportation of Jews from France to
Nazi concentration camps.

****
**** Jacques Chirac and Saddam Hussein's Oil-for-Food scam
****

As I recently described, the 2003 Iraq war occurred as the result of
panic in the West over weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), 58 years
after nuking of Japan in 1945 at the end of World War II. (See
discussion of 58-Year Hypothesis in "2-Sep-19 World View -- Israel-Hezbollah-Lebanon border clash fizzles quickly, no repeat of 2006 war"
)

Saddam Hussein had used chemical weapons against the Kurds and the
Iranians in 1988 at the end of the Iran/Iraq war, and had continued
developing chemical weapons during the 1990s. Saddam refused UN WMD
inspections under President Bill Clinton, and his response was to
order bombing campaigns on military targets in Iraq.

However, military action did not go farther than that until 2003, 58
years after the nuking of Japan, as the age cohort of people who were
children in 1945 suddenly became anxious that the WMDs would be used
again, causing a general panic. (58-Year Hypothesis) Saddam was
resolutely opposing UN inspections, and many people read this as a
sign of guilt.

Most countries were convinced that Saddam was still developing WMDs,
and many endorsed the British and American plan for a ground war in
Iraq. The two major exceptions were Russia and France. In the case
of Russia, it was thought that the reason was that the Russians still
hoped to collect the $10 billion that Iraq owed to Russia, mainly for
illegal arms deals.

Jacques Chirac was president of France at the time, and he announced
that he would veto any UN Security Council resolution authorizing the
military action. That's why so much of the mainstream media is
heaping praise on Chirac.

Chirac insisted that his opposition to the Iraq war was principled,
but an investigation revealed that Chirac and his family and some of
his ministers were deeply implicated in a lucrative scam to divert
millions of dollars of profits of the UN's oil-for-food program into
their own private coffers.

So, in my opinion, Chirac does not deserve one bit of adulation he's
been receiving these last two days. He opposed the Iraq war, because
he didn't care how many people Saddam killed with WMDs, but he wanted
to keep the fraudulent millions pouring into his coffers.

Chirac was formally charged in 2007 after he left office as president,
losing immunity from prosecution. In 2011, he was found guilty of
misuse of public money, breach of trust and illegal conflict of
interest while he was mayor of Paris, and given a two-year suspended
jail sentence.

Sources:

• Iraq / Ex-French President Chirac, who stood up to US, dies at 86 (ABCNews/AP, 26-Sep-2018)
  
• Press review Jacques Chirac (RFI-fr, 26-Sep-2019)
  
• Former French president Jacques Chirac dies aged 86 (RFI-fr, 26-Sep-2019)
  
• Iraq / Oil for Food / The Chirac Doctrine (MiddleEastForum(Fall,2005):
  
• Iraq / France / Jacques Chirac / The sordid truth about the oil-for-food scandal (Telegraph, 10-Oct-2004)
  
• Iraq / Oil for Food / Jacques Chirac / Lawmaker Wants French to Answer Bribe Charges (FoxNews, 14-Jan-2015)
  
• Oil for food II: several French companies sentenced to light sentences (LeMonde, translation, 15-Feb-2019)

Related Articles:

• Israel-Hezbollah-Lebanon border clash fizzles quickly, no repeat of 2006 war (02-Sep-2019)
  
  
• Fourteen companies in France on trial over Iraq war oil-for-food corruption (22-Nov-2018)
  
  
• Generational Dynamics historical analysis of the violence in Iraq (18-Jun-2014)
  
  
• The Iraq war may be related to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (17-Feb-2008)
  
  
• How Israel panicked in pursuing the summer Lebanon war with Hezbollah (23-Dec-2006)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, France, Jacques Chirac,
Iraq, Saddam Hussein, Oil-For-Food, Russia

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John J. Xenakis
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(09-25-2019, 02:33 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]Her future looks bleak, but it has nothing to do with global warming, which has been happening for decades already.  Rather, it has to do with her government's willingness to let the elites import cheap labor to prevent her own upward mobility.

I notice patterns of global warming. It's late September here in Michigan and it still feels like summer. There has been no autumn chill yet... and it used to be around in half the days of late September.  September is still summer here. Even the leaves seem to be changing colors later. 

It might be nice to enjoy summer-like weather a little earlier and later, but I did see the expression "Michigan will be like Oklahoma if global warming goes as it seems headed". OK, Arkansas is worse because it is more humid...

If you want to know what is creating economic distress for the working class, then contemplate the consequences of a world without scarcity (except in things that can be monopolized). Karl Marx had it right when he said that the proletariat has nothing to sell but its labor... and a century and a half later that is true. The industrial proletariat fares well when people are buying innovative new manufactured goods. But when the technological marvels get cheap, so does the pay.

Upward mobility has practically disappeared for most Americans due to the diminishing presence of small business, the rise of bureaucratic elites in large (especially vertically-integrated) firms, and tax cuts that foster a profits-first economy. Figure that the leadership elite now in most executive positions got the MBA degree, or "Master of Brutal Administration".

Now, as for global warming:



       It looks like an exponential growth rate more than like a linear increase. 1.5C may not seem like much, but it is enough to shift some grain belts and extend the range of tropical diseases.

** 27-Sep-2019 World View: Climate science

(09-26-2019, 10:35 AM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]> John, you may have a strong foreign policy background, but your
> knowledge of basic science is almost zero. Apparently, Greta is
> far more versed than you, so simple insults seem more than a
> little foolish, if you ask me.

> If we stop adding more CO2 to the atmosphere starting today, the
> temperature will continue to rise for the next two
> centuries. That's the effect of hysteresis. So yes, she has every
> right to be pissed-off, and not because someone told her to
> be. The last time the levels got this high, the temperature was
> about 3.6-5.4 degrees warmer and the seas 50-80 feet
> higher. Preventing that involves decades of CO2 extraction. Adding
> more just makes the task more daunting.

> When virtually everyone in the know agrees with her, maybe you
> need to reconsider your POV.

So here are some things that I know:

• Anyone whose strongest argument is that 14 year old teenage girl
  aspiring actress knows more about science than I do is completely full
  of crap and knows that he's completely full of crap. Furthermore, if
  you ever watched anything but the crazy nutcases on CNN and MSNBC,
  you would know that there are a lot of people "in the know" who don't
  agree with the teenage girl.
  
  
• Anyone who denies the climate change religion is shunned by the
  mainstream media, or is called a racist or misogynist or white
  supremist.
  
  
• There are many scientists and web sites that deny the climate
  change religion. Here's one that presents plenty of evidence that
  climate change claims are wrong:
  
  (https://realclimatescience.com/)
  
  I particularly like the article entitled "Another Wildly Fraudulent
  Data Set From NOAA":
  
  (https://realclimatescience.com/2019/09/a...from-noaa/)
  
  
  
• Even if you assume that climate scientists have always been
  correct about the past, it turns out they've almost always been
  wrong about predicting the future. Here are a couple of sites
  to look at:
  
  (https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-year...redictions)
  
  (http://www.aei.org/publication/18-specta...is-year-3/)
  
  These are subjects that MUST NOT be uttered. It's forbidden to
  mention these things in the mainstream media, and it may even be
  punishable by death by people from the loony left.
  
  
• Climate scientists assume a static, unchanging world, with one and
  only one thing changing in the next century, carbon emissions.
  Climate scientists run scared when you talk about a dynamic world.
  
  
• Particular issue that makes climate scientists run scared: The
  certainty of one or two world wars in this century, plus massive
  regional nuclear and ground wars, killing hundreds of millions or
  billions of people when combined with disease, famine and suicide.
  The population reduction will substantially reduce carbon emissions.
  
  
• Another issue that makes climate scientists run scared: The
  Singularity, nanotechnology, biotechnology, and other technological
  advances that drive so-called scientists crazy.
  
  
• Another issue that makes climate scientists run scared: Showing
  how their predictions have been consistently disastrously wrong, which
  means that it's the climate activists are the true "climate
  deniers."

And so, I do believe that I know more about science that the 14 year
old teenage girl aspiring actress. However, I doubt very much that
you do.

AGW is not religion. Religion and science operate in different ways, even if someone like the cleric-theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) tries to reconcile them (God did it -- but He did it through physical and mathematical laws).

Science can be a good tool for deciding what is moral. It is scientific knowledge that lead is a hazard to mental development and good behavior, so science can get the lead out of paint.

It is not the science behind AGW that creates the judgment on behalf of AGW. People have moral values that say that economic, political, and military chaos resulting from changes in climatic conditions can draw certain conclusions about AGW and the desirability of reducing its bad effects. Or -- science cannot show that driving Jews into a gas chamber to be exposed to the fumes of hydrogen cyanide is wrong. Science can tell us what fumes of hydrogen cyanide do to people, and it is up to us to determine that exposing innocent people to the fumes of hydrogen is wrong because... well, murder is objectionable in the extreme.

The models overwhelmingly go one way. The risk of climate change inundating lowlands and shifting places out of cultivation is simply too high for my taste. I do not want any martial apocalypse, especially one in which hundreds of millions stand to be killed. If we choose to cause millions of Bangladeshis to die because we are unwilling to reduce our use of fossil fuels, then we are little better than those Nazis who drove innocent people into shooting pits and gas chambers.

John -- Without replying line-by-line, let's agree that your sources and mine are very different. Your climate sources are, to be frank, a bunch of hacks funded by the fossil fuel industry (yes, I did my research). It's impossible to respond to their nonsense, because it's a lot easier to create than rebut -- a feature Trump uses every day and every way. Your argument that we shouldn't listen to a 16 (not 14) year old has more merit. I would never cite her as an expert source or even a spokesperson for an expert source. She's an activist, who happens to be more right than wrong. Her role, like that of any activist, is to rabble-rouse. That she's' doing extremely well. Since using logic and empirical data haven't worked, maybe a little emotion and a touching narrative might be in order.

** 27-Sep-2019 World View: Get ready to burn

(09-27-2019, 02:10 PM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]> John -- Without replying line-by-line, let's agree that your
> sources and mine are very different. Your climate sources are, to
> be frank, a bunch of hacks funded by the fossil fuel industry
> (yes, I did my research). It's impossible to respond to their
> nonsense, because it's a lot easier to create than rebut -- a
> feature Trump uses every day and every way. Your argument that we
> shouldn't listen to a 16 (not 14) year old has more merit. I
> would never cite her as an expert source or even a spokesperson
> for an expert source. She's an activist, who happens to be more
> right than wrong. Her role, like that of any activist, is to
> rabble-rouse. That she's' doing extremely well. Since using logic
> and empirical data haven't worked, maybe a little emotion and a
> touching narrative might be in order.

So your sources are phony left-wing ideological hacks who present
evidence selectively and make phony, delusional predictions of a
dystopian future in order get funding for their governments or
themselves. And like every other activist, you completely ignored the
two points about war and technology, both of which destroy the climate
activists' arguments.

This whole thing is a joke and a hoax anyway. Nobody is reducing
carbon emissions except the United States, and China is aggressively
pursuing new coal-fired power plants. Even if everything you say were
right, it would make no difference in carbon emissions. So if you
really believe all the crap that you're referencing, then just lean
back and enjoy your last 11 years on earth, because nothing is going
to stop you from turning into a charred piece of flesh.

(09-27-2019, 09:25 AM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]** 27-Sep-2019 World View: Climate science

(09-26-2019, 10:35 AM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]>   John, you may have a strong foreign policy background, but your
>   knowledge of basic science is almost zero. Apparently, Greta is
>   far more versed than you, so simple insults seem more than a
>   little foolish, if you ask me.

>   If we stop adding more CO2 to the atmosphere starting today, the
>   temperature will continue to rise for the next two
>   centuries. That's the effect of hysteresis. So yes, she has every
>   right to be pissed-off, and not because someone told her to
>   be. The last time the levels got this high, the temperature was
>   about 3.6-5.4 degrees warmer and the seas 50-80 feet
>   higher. Preventing that involves decades of CO2 extraction. Adding
>   more just makes the task more daunting.

>   When virtually everyone in the know agrees with her, maybe you
>   need to reconsider your POV.

So here are some things that I know:

• Anyone whose strongest argument is that 14 year old teenage girl
  aspiring actress knows more about science than I do is completely full
  of crap and knows that he's completely full of crap.  Furthermore, if
  you ever watched anything but the crazy nutcases on CNN and MSNBC,
  you would know that there are a lot of people "in the know" who don't
  agree with the teenage girl.
  
  
• Anyone who denies the climate change religion is shunned by the
  mainstream media, or is called a racist or misogynist or white
  supremist.
  
  
• There are many scientists and web sites that deny the climate
  change religion.  Here's one that presents plenty of evidence that
  climate change claims are wrong:
  
  (https://realclimatescience.com/)
  
  I particularly like the article entitled "Another Wildly Fraudulent
  Data Set From NOAA":
  
  (https://realclimatescience.com/2019/09/a...from-noaa/)
  
  
  
• Even if you assume that climate scientists have always been
  correct about the past, it turns out they've almost always been
  wrong about predicting the future.  Here are a couple of sites
  to look at:
  
  (https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-year...redictions)
  
  (http://www.aei.org/publication/18-specta...is-year-3/)
  
  These are subjects that MUST NOT be uttered.  It's forbidden to
  mention these things in the mainstream media, and it may even be
  punishable by death by people from the loony left.
  
  
• Climate scientists assume a static, unchanging world, with one and
  only one thing changing in the next century, carbon emissions.
  Climate scientists run scared when you talk about a dynamic world.
  
  
• Particular issue that makes climate scientists run scared: The
  certainty of one or two world wars in this century, plus massive
  regional nuclear and ground wars, killing hundreds of millions or
  billions of people when combined with disease, famine and suicide.
  The population reduction will substantially reduce carbon emissions.
  
  
• Another issue that makes climate scientists run scared: The
  Singularity, nanotechnology, biotechnology, and other technological
  advances that drive so-called scientists crazy.
  
  
• Another issue that makes climate scientists run scared: Showing
  how their predictions have been consistently disastrously wrong, which
  means that it's the climate activists are the true "climate
  deniers."
  

And so, I do believe that I know more about science that the 14 year
old teenage girl aspiring actress.  However, I doubt very much that
you do.

1. It is rare that a child in her mid-teens knows more about science than does the President and that such is abundantly clear -- but along comes the Great Ignoramus to be President of the United States.  Donald Trump is proudly wrong about many things, including science. Maybe Obama didn't show himself a fool -- but wise people know their limitations.

It is wisest to be within the scientific mainstream if one is not a scientist. To expound pretentiously about scientific matters while being ill-trained in the relevant science is to show oneself as a crank. Donald Trump is a crank. 

2. Climate change is not a religion. If anything I would ask what religion says about climate change. Mainstream religions recognize the hazards and have decided that the right course of action is to counter the menace of climate change. If you want to discuss religion and climate change, then maybe one can discuss what the Pope says of it in his encyclical Laudate si:

  http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/e...to-si.html

Pope Francis is not a scientist, but he has competent scientists to advise him. Except on reproductive rights, the Pope is about as mainstream as anyone can be. 

I am more concerned about the personality cult that has formed around President Trump as a quasi-religion. 

3. Just as there ares scientist who deny global warming and that there are historians who deny the Holocaust... pseudoscience and pseudohistory are not valid alternatives to honest, carefully-honed intellectual efforts.  The denials of global warming are dated and they come from people who sold out to the petroleum industry before it started to recognize that climate change is a problem. 

The energy companies are diversifying their energy sources.

4. Climate science is static only to the extent that the knowledge is well established. So it was for relativity a few decades ago. One can configure the climate for a time in which Australia and Antarctica were still connected and India had not yet slammed into central Asia. A hint: glaciers did not exist even at the South Pole until Australia separated from Antarctica... when Australia was about 20 degrees south of where it is now, and the powerful currents did not then separate Antarctica from warmth penetrating from middle latitudes and when cold air from the most southerly parts of Antarctica could spread into the middle latitudes and mitigate. The rise of the Himalayas thrust a huge volume of silicate rick into the atmosphere where intense rainstorms full of carbon dioxide could cause a reaction that turns darker silicate rocks into near-white carbonate rocks that reflect heat better. The Earth chilled, and Antarctica lost all characteristics of temperate climate. 

5. I can hardly imagine anything that could make a particularly dangerous time around 2100 (that is about when the next Crisis Era will occur if one takes the eighty-year cycle of the Saeculum seriously... than climate change that guts the world food supply at the very time in which people are getting intolerant, governments become increasingly dictatorial, extremist causes flourish, and nationalism reaches its peak. If World War III should be the focus of this Saecular crisis and World War IV the focus of the next Saecular crisis, then I can hardly imagine anything that makes the Crisis of 2100 so ominous than the consequences of global warming. 

I have just given you a focus of danger for the next Crisis Era with the potential for wars far worse than those that we can imagine or even experience now. 
 
There is no technological fix out of food shortages, and food shortages can topple governments. The more serious unmet needs that people have in a Crisis Era, the more severe the Crisis will be! I cannot imagine anything more likely than destructive climate change to make your Generational Dynamics particularly ominous around 2100!

6. So far one of the greatest contributors to the nastiness of this time is the disappearance of scarcity of manufactured goods. Even the poor in the industrialized world must often decide what they are to give away or discard so that they can replace an obsolete technology with another. OK, the old console TV is an obvious object to discard when one gets one of the new flat-screen TV's that even ten years ago did far more than the best console TVs did, and with lesser input of material. (A hint: you can easily carry a 32" flat-screen TV about, but you had to rely upon someone delivering a 25"-screen console TV to your home. You could not simply put it in your car and take it home with you because it was too d@mn heavy!

People are less likely to load up with cheap stuff that either ends up as clutter or goes quickly to the landfill. They now know what is going on, and most people have the stuff that they need. To get people buying more of the cr@p at "Big Box-Mart" we will need a population explosion that makes young adults 'hungry' for such cr@p. 

I can make a prediction about interior design circa 2035: even if society is generally prosperous, contents will seem comparatively austere as they did in the 1950's. We are no longer in an age of scarcity of material goods; indeed, we are in a scrape because what Marx said about the proletariat in the mid-19th century (workers have nothing to sell but their toil) remains true. When manufacturing becomes a far-lesser share of the economy, the proletariat finds its ability to prosper by selling its toil far more futile than it used to be.         

6. Although highly-advanced technology in nanotechnology and biotechnology offer miracles, and the singularity is scary... just think how thinking machines could turn a hungry, alienated proletariat against the elites of the time. I have my idea of what stops the Singularity -- that there are people who enjoy thinking and creating and are not going to devolve those delights to unfeeling machines. If you wonder how I see the future of technology, then I see it resembling a titration curve:

                                                                                     

(sodium hydroxide added to hydrochloric acid) -- note that the 'progress' in making the solution less acidic is slow until  the relevant amounts of hydrogen and hydroxide ions get close to each other, and close to the point of equivalence the pH rises rapidly as more hydroxide ions enter the solution and neutralize the hydrogen ions. Not long after the solution is neutral, adding more sodium hydroxide rapidly leads to dominance until the pH reaches a certain point -- and then the addition of more sodium hydroxide can no longer  cause the pH to rise much. 

That is how I see technology. We are limited in our intellectual ability and our talents for management of material objects (and such consequences as images and sensations) to get more out of new technologies beyond a certain point. The rewards for technological innovation will by then decline sharply OK, I do not have a time scale, and I do not know when diminishing returns start becoming obvious for increases in technology. I can't even say that we are not close by a few years from such a point, or that we have even passed the zone of maximal slope.  

OK, so we have gone as far as we probably can in the creation of entertainment. How many channels of cable TV do you need?

8. The acid test of the real or imagined dangers of AGW lies in the future -- but we cannot impose social models upon unwilling people. It would be unconscionable to bring back slavery, Nazism, or Stalinism  to establish definitively how horrible they are. It will be unconscionable to 'give' parts of the world 35F wet-bulb temperatures as which people cannot cool off by perspiration, to let the seas inundate huge tracts of rich farmland, or to turn areas that currently have excellent farming into deserts or near-deserts. Climate is an obvious barrier to growing certain crops in some places (cotton grows well around western Tennessee, but not in central Illinois), but even if a climate typical of the American wheat and potato belts (Dfb as in the eastern Dakotas) appears in southwestern Alaska, the soil nutrients might not be ready. A hot-summer Mediterranean climate (Csa, as in the northern Central Valley of California or in southwestern inland Oregon) might appeal to some in Michigan (Hooray! Put away the snowplows!) until one reasons that Michigan does not have the deep high mountain valleys to serve as reservoirs for irrigation. 

9. Climate change has happened in the past, but when it was not gradual (it takes about 75 years for the world to go from slightly glaciated to being in a full Ice Age) it did not work well.  At one point the Sahara hardly existed

 

in contrast to what we have today:



I strongly discourage anyone from playing 'climate roulette' with global warming.

** 27-Sep-2019 World View: Trump considers blocking all US investments in China

The Trump administration is discussing a major escalation in the
US-China trade war, whose purpose is to curtail or end US investments
in China. China's economy is already suffering because of the
existing trade sanctions, and preventing US investments would cause
severe new disruptions.

Among the options being considered are these:

• Delisting Chinese companies from U.S. stock exchanges
  
  
• Limiting Americans’ exposure to the Chinese market through
  government pension funds

It's not clear whether there's a legal way for the administration to
require the delisting of Chinese companies from US stock exchanges,
but if successful it would put harsh new limits on Chinese access to
American dollars.

For example, the MSCI World Index is a broad global equity index that
represents large and mid-cap equity performance across 23 developed
markets countries. According to msci.com, it covers approximately 85%
of the free float-adjusted market capitalization in each country and
MSCI world index does not offer exposure to emerging markets.

Hundreds of Chinese businesses have been added into the MSCI Inc.’s
indexes since last year, in order to increase the volume of American
investments in China. Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio and
others in Congress have become alarmed by this, and have been
advocating for stronger investment restraints and greater scrutiny for
Chinese companies in stock indexes and U.S. pension funds.

Trump's nominal strategy is to force China to stop intellectual
property theft and forced technology transfers. But as I've written
in the past, the larger picture is that Trump's strategy is to disrupt
critical places in China's economy in order to stop or slow its
headlong rush to launch a war with Japan, Taiwan and the United
States.

*** 23-Sep-2019 World View: Trump's strategy with China

http://gdxforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?...804#p47804

Escalating the trade sanctions will certainly succeed in disrupting
China's economy further. The intent is to stop or slow its headlong
rush to launch a war with Japan, Taiwan and the United States, but
when sanctions were imposed on Japan in 1941, Japan responded by
bombing Pearl Harbor.

---- Sources:

-- Trump considers delisting Chinese firms from U.S. markets: sources
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-t...SKBN1WC1VP
(Reuters, 27-Sep-2019)

-- White House deliberates block on all US investments in China
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/27/white-ho...china.html
(CNBC, 27-Sep-2019)

-- China trade talks are set to resume on Oct. 10
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/26/china-tr...ct-10.html
(CNBC, 26-Sep-2019)

-- U.S. Stocks Hit 3-Week Low as Trade Tensions Rise: Markets Wrap
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/...rkets-wrap
(Bloomberg, 27-Sep-2019)

-- White House Weighs Limits on U.S. Portfolio Flows Into China
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/...a-k12ahk4g
(Bloomberg, 27-Sep-2019)

My degree is in economics... and on the assumption that people who believe in nothing other than themselves, their indulgence, their power, and sex -- the Chinese leadership believes in practically nothing... the big motivator is gain. The Chinese government will start cracking down as harshly on the theft of intellectual property when intellectual property becomes a significant part of the Chinese economy -- especially for exports. The Chinese leadership isn't pushing its ideology except on places that are somehow Chinese. Taiwan still claims to be the Republic of China.

OK, I would love to see democracy appear in China. The people certainly deserve it, and the economy is developed enough that people are able to do some of their own thinking. Democracy is far safer -- until demagogues appear. (I guess you can figure what I think of Donald Judas Iscariot Trump)... but how well people government depends largely upon their ability to operate above the level of bare literacy that well serves modern tyrants like Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Duvalier (either one), Assad (either one), Mugabe, and Satan Hussein.

It is arguable that a huge chunk of American export revenue comes from the sale or lease of intellectual property. I could make the case that the biggest exporters in America include such entities as Time-Warner, Disney, etc. As exports from China, it is arguable that most of the exports are to Overseas Chinese... contrast Japan and South Korea, both of which make huge incomes off intellectual property.

(09-27-2019, 06:53 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]** 27-Sep-2019 World View: Get ready to burn

So your sources are phony left-wing ideological hacks who present evidence selectively and make phony, delusional predictions of a dystopian future in order get funding for their governments or themselves.  And like every other activist, you completely ignored the two points about war and technology, both of which destroy the climate activists' arguments.

My sources are those controversial ones, like NOAA, NASA and the IPCC. I know you consider practicing scientists hacks, but there it is. As far as war is concerned, if we build our lives around living through the next major war, we'll stagnate and die. No thanks! Technology, on the other hand, tends to be beneficial and problematic, as it always has. The Luddites had a point, just not a very compelling one. In no way does any of the technology you listed have any direct impact on climate, unless it's created and focused on making things better.

John X Wrote:This whole thing is a joke and a hoax anyway.  Nobody is reducing carbon emissions except the United States, and China is aggressively
pursuing new coal-fired power plants.  Even if everything you say were right, it would make no difference in carbon emissions.  So if you really believe all the crap that you're referencing, then just lean back and enjoy your last 11 years on earth, because nothing is going to stop you from turning into a charred piece of flesh.

Citing China is a joke. If any country is buying into renewable energy and electric cars, its China. Maybe you need to read some literature outside your limited domain. Try reading Automobile magazine, for one of many examples outside the realm of politics. They have no axe to grind, but they know that, within the transport sphere, the US is headed to oblivion pursuing old tech, when China and most of Europe are heading full sail into the future. China plans to dominate solar (they're the leaders a the moment), battery technology (they have the most lithium deposits, so it's a natural for them) and advanced computing, among many other future technologies. They aren't Russia and certainly not the Soviets. Pretending they are is the huge risk of the 21st century.

** 28-Sep-2019 Burn baby

(09-28-2019, 08:11 AM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]> Citing China is a joke. If any country is buying into renewable
> energy and electric cars, its China.

Building windmills and electric cars does not reduce carbon emissions,
while a massive buildup of coal-fired electric plants massively
increases carbon emissions.

Your beloved Communist tyranny in China is going to kill you.

Start counting down 11 years. Burn, baby, burn!

** 28-Sep-2019 Hacks

(09-28-2019, 08:11 AM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]> My sources are those controversial ones, like NOAA, NASA and the
> IPCC. I know you consider practicing scientists hacks, but there
> it is.

You're the one who used the word "hack." Scientists at NOAA, NASA and
the IPCC are heavily conflicted, because their jobs depend on the
climate change narrative, and because they'll be fired or sidelined if
they have the audacity to challenge the narrative. They don't dare to
tell the truth as they see it. The organizations will lose all their
funding if they dare to challenge the narrative. That's pretty much
the definition of what a "hack" is. I don't know how anyone can be
more of a hack than the so-called scientists at NOAA, NASA and the
IPCC. They almost define the word "hack."

Just look at the "green new deal," which is typical of the hacked crap
put out by these so-called scientists. The whole thing is a joke.

As I said, if you really believe the crap that these hacks are putting
out, then you've got 11 years left. Relax and enjoy it. Burn, baby,
burn!

(09-28-2019, 09:17 AM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]** 28-Sep-2019 Hacks

(09-28-2019, 08:11 AM)David Horn Wrote: [ -> ]My sources are those controversial ones, like NOAA, NASA and the IPCC. I know you consider practicing scientists hacks, but there it is.

You're the one who used the word "hack."  Scientists at NOAA, NASA and the IPCC are heavily conflicted, because their jobs depend on the climate change narrative, and because they'll be fired or sidelined if they have the audacity to challenge the narrative.  They don't dare to tell the truth as they see it.  The organizations will lose all their funding if they dare to challenge the narrative.  That's pretty much the definition of what a "hack" is.  I don't know how anyone can be more of a hack than the so-called scientists at NOAA, NASA and the IPCC.  They almost define the word "hack."

When the earliest AGW papers were presented, they were seen as dangerous to the established order, and research funding was, if anything, hard to come by.  Even then, NASA had some skin in the game, so that agency took the early lead.  But let's not pretend that this was the arrival of ever-flowing research funds.  Republicans, and their funders in the fossil fuel industry, have fought this idea tooth and nail from day one.  So tell me, how is pitching an idea that has no short term upside and plenty of short term downside, good for science funding -- unless it's the funding to debunk the real science.  That's gotten funding galore for decades, though the total buy-in by industry seems to be cracking -- finally!

John X Wrote:Just look at the "green new deal," which is typical of the hacked crap put out by these so-called scientists.  The whole thing is a joke.

As I said, if you really believe the crap that these hacks are putting out, then you've got 11 years left.  Relax and enjoy it.  Burn, baby, burn!

If you don't believe it, the timeline is the same.  The only difference, all the evidence supports AGW, so sitting around playing Nero may not threaten your life.  Do you have children?  Grandchildren?

And btw, the GND is the next economic driver.  The Luddites hated the weaving machines, but the machines won by making quality fabrics cheap.  The GND will do the same for energy and transportation.  The market is already noticing and joining the fray.