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Climate change: Science gets gloomier, crazies get crazier

2009-03-14T12:08:39+10:00

Thanks Miranda Devine for my morning bowl of crazy.

Who knew climate scientists and environmentalists were despots bent on taking over the world and killing hundreds of millions of people? Climate change “sceptics”, that’s who!

Vaclav Klaus, climate change denialist, president of the European Union and the Czech Republic:

“The environmentalists don’t want to change the climate. They want to change us and our behaviour,” he told the Heartland conference. “Their ambition is to control and manipulate us. Therefore, it shouldn’t be surprising they recommend preventing [climate change], not adaptive policies. Adaptation would be a voluntary behaviour.”

Environmentalism had replaced socialism as the totalitarian threat to freedom in the 21st century, he said.

“Environmentalists … do not want to reveal their true plans and ambitions: to stop economic development and return mankind centuries back.”

Threat to freedom! Wow.

Carter described the most powerful speaker [at the conference] as Arthur Robinson, a professor of chemistry and co-founder of the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine. In a wake-up call to Christian groups who have rushed to embrace climate alarmism, Robinson pointed out the world’s poor will bear the brunt of carbon prohibition policies.

He described as “technological genocide” efforts to deny cheap energy, in the form of coal-fired power plants, to the Third World. “Billions of people who live at the lowest level of human existence will suffer greatly from the rationing of energy, and this, in turn, will lead to the death of hundreds of millions.”

Banning the use of DDT for mosquito eradication was the first “example of genocide by the removal of technology, [resulting] in the deaths of 30 to 40 million people and [leaving] half a billion infected with malaria”.

A wake up call to Christian groups from someone who is - surprise! - not a climate scientist eh?

Just as well the poor farmers aren’t dependent on the climate for the livelihood I guess.

Too much crazy? No sir!

He also told to the conference, in excerpts posted on YouTube, “Most arguments about global warming boil down to science versus authority. For much of the public, authority will generally win, since they do not wish to deal with science … Those who are committed to warming alarm as either a vehicle for a post-modern coup d’etat or for illicit profits will obviously try to obfuscate matters.”

A “post-modern coup d’etat”! You couldn’t make this stuff up. Unless you were crazy. Which these guys apparently are.

Why were a bunch of crazies getting together to discuss conspiracy theories?

Well, it turns out that 2000 actual experts were meeting and the news is rather grim (NY Times):

At the opening of yesterday’s session, Lord Nicholas Stern, former chief economist for the World Bank, added his own dose of gloom by saying that his now-famous report on the risks of global warming, written for the British government in 2006, had underestimated them. “The reason is that emissions are growing faster than we thought, the absorption capacity of the planet is less than we thought, the probability of high temperatures is likely higher than we thought, and some of the effects are coming faster than we thought,” he explained

Yup, far from alarmism, the risks have been underestimated.

The Clean Joke Thread

2009-03-07T10:43:15+10:00

Why not post your old corny jokes here?

My wife sent me these, even though most of them were first told to her by me.

1. Two antennas meet on a roof, fall in love and get married. The ceremony wasn’t much, but the reception was excellent.

2. Two hydrogen atoms walk into a bar.
One says, “I’ve lost my electron.”
The other says, “Are you sure?”
The first replies, “Yes, I’m positive…”

3. A jumper cable walks into a bar. The bartender says, “I’ll serve you, but don’t start anything.”

4. Two peanuts walk into a bar, and one was a salted.

5. A sandwich walks into a bar. The bartender says, “Sorry we don’t serve food in here.”

6. A dyslexic man walks into a bra.

7. A man walks into a bar with a slab of asphalt under his arm and says:
“A beer please, and one for the road.”

8. Two cannibals are eating a clown. One says to the other: “Does this taste funny to you?”

9. “Doc, I can’t stop singing ‘The Green, Green Grass of Home.’”
“That sounds like Tom Jones Syndrome.”
“Is it common?”
Doc says “It’s Not Unusual.”

11. An invisible man marries an invisible woman. The kids were nothing to look at either.

12. A man takes his Rottweiler to the vet and says, “My dog’s cross-eyed, is there anything you can do for him?”
“Well,” says the vet, “let’s have a look at him.”
So he picks the dog up and examines his eyes, then checks his teeth.
Finally, he says, “I’m going to have to put him down.”
“What? Because he’s cross-eyed?”
“No, because he’s really heavy.”

Clubs and Gambling

2011-08-21T00:55:59+10:00

Why are clubs and their patrons so opposed to the proposed mandatory pre-comitments for gambling?

If the clubs are really being funded by problem gamblers, to the extent that clubs would be non-viable without the ‘contribution’ of these people who can least afford it, then I hope they would want to change that.

Putting up signs advocating responsible gambling etc. is not going to be enough. Optional pre-comitment doesn’t impress me either. I think that would mostly miss the target.

Would mandatory pre-comitment deter casual gamblers? It applies to bets over $1 (I needed to look that up). Perhaps a lot of people are just unaware how much they’re really spending on their little flutter.

I think pre-comitment is a good idea. Setting oneself limits is something responsible people will do anyway. This would formalise it for the sake of those with problems.

We’ve got used to wearing seat-belts, random breath-testing, removal of tobacco advertising for sports and other tobacco sanctions,... and accommodated all those. If the clubs are as valuable to the community as they say, surely they could get over this.

Here is an article about the current politics of this.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/wilkies-poker-face-has-labor-staring-at-defeat-20110819-1j26l.html

latest news column

2011-11-24T05:09:01+10:00

The ‘latest news’ column has not been updated since November 17. What is happening. I thought it was an automatic feed.

David Hicks, Mohammed, & Terrorism

2011-08-30T08:11:51+10:00

David Hicks is in the news. Was he a terrorist?

My question is “was Mohammed a terrorist, and do his teachings inspire terrorists?”

This website True history of Islam which offers this:

Just a cursory look at Muhammad’s Qur’an (Koran) should be enough to warn you to keep your distance from Islam:
In it you will see “unbridled raw evil”, such as statements like these:
- Truly, god loves those who fight
- Fight and slay the pagans wherever you find them, and seize them,
beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem.
- Chop off their hands and chop off their fingertips
- When you meet the unbelievers, chop off their heads
- Fight and slay those who don’t convert wherever you find
them
- Believers, take neither Jew nor Christians for your friends
- Those who follow Muhammad are ruthless to unbelievers
- Those who reject Islam are “the vilest of creatures” and thus deserve
no mercy
- Fight them until Islam reigns supreme (throughout the world)

There are more than 100 verses in the Qur’an (Koran) advocating the use of violence to spread Islam. There are exactly 123 verses in the Qur’an about killing and fighting.
The word “Islam” has been falsely proclaimed by Muslims to mean peace. The word Islam, actually means “submission” to the Muslim god of intolerance and hatred. It comes from the root Arabic word “taslim”. In Arabic, the word for peace is only “solh”.

and this one Was Mohammed a terrorist? says:

Was Muhammad a terrorist? Of course he was. You’ve seen the information quoted exclusively from Islamic source materials. And there are many more crimes committed by Muhammad that could be detailed. To keep this article brief I only listed five. Yes Muhammad was a terrorist, and yes, terrorism is allowed in Islam. And yes, Fundamentalist Muslims are in a state of war with all those who reject Islam and terrorism is a legitimate weapon for their use.

I would hope that western mass media point out these facts in order to help both Muslims and non-Muslims look at the person who inspires such great following in the world. I would also hope that the message of Jesus Christ and the gospel should also be spelled out more clearly to the world.

Jesus is the only person with the message of hope and salvation, and a person like Mohammed is only counteracting this message with his lies which only lead to the despair we see so many Muslims (like David Hicks) living, as they live lives in slavery to the wrong message.

New EMU Cd out at TWIST

2010-09-15T14:50:36+10:00

I dunno about you all but I have loved the last three EMU congregational CDs I’ve bought (We Are His People, Let All Creation Sing, Come Hear The Angels) and I have particularly loved the higher production values. I am stoked to hear they have a new CD out.

Who else is excited? I haven’t heard the Little Rooms CD yet. Is it any good?

Scientific American: Peak oil soon

2009-10-10T09:13:24+10:00

There’s a new consensus… yet still our governments and businesses plan wider highways and more enormous airports. WAKE UP AUSTRALIA!

Why the ‘peak oil’ debate is irrelevant

* 17:20 08 October 2009 by Shanta Barley

The debate over exactly when we will reach “peak oil” is irrelevant. No matter what new oil fields we discover, global oil production will start declining in 2030 at the very latest.

That’s the conclusion of the most comprehensive report to date on global oil production, published on 7 October by the UK Energy Research Centre.

The report, which reviewed over 500 research studies, suggests that global oil production could peak any time from right now to as late as 2030.

“Either way, our research shows that the difference between even the most pessimistic and optimistic claims is just 15 to 20 years,” says Steve Sorrell, the report’s lead author, who is based at Sussex University in the UK.

This is a problem, says Sorrell, because 20 years isn’t long enough for governments to prepare well-thought-out policies that would tackle the economic chaos likely to occur when oil production begins to decline. Research in 2005 by the US Department of Energy suggests that policies to reduce the demand for oil while developing large-scale alternatives will take at least two decades to bear fruit, he says.

New for old

Global production of oil is declining at a rate of 4 per cent per year in existing oil fields and we have very little to replace it with, says Sorrell: “If we want to maintain global oil production at today’s level we would need to discover the equivalent of a new Saudi Arabia every 3 years.”

Yet discoveries of new oil fields are in decline. Even the “giant” Tiber field recently found by BP in the Gulf of Mexico “will only serve to delay peak oil by a matter of days”, he says.

“Of the 70,000 oil fields on Earth, just 100 giant fields account for 50 per cent of the oil we use,” says Sorrell. “Most of these giant fields are quite old and past their peak of production, and we’re not going to find many new ones.”

The International Energy Agency’s latest estimate is that that oil production will not peak until after 2030, but that “is conservative to say the least”, Sorrell warns.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17943-why-the-peak-oil-debate-is-irrelevant.html

The hypocrisy of atheist billboards

2009-11-20T01:32:05+10:00

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/atheist-ad-campaign-moves-to-billboards/story-e6freuz9-1225799952050

“Please don’t label me, let me grow up and choose for myself.”

Atheists always seem to embrace the “don’t force your beliefs on others” philosophy, yet these ads (or at least this one in particular) seem to be “forcing” their beliefs on others (in this case, parents), don’t they? Weird.

If only the supporters of this campaign were just as “protective” of the unborn as they apparently are with children.

I personally would like to see a billboard that says:

“Please don’t kill me, let me grow up and choose for myself.”

;-)

Inspirational quotes

2010-01-01T14:58:35+10:00

Who is this baby ?

Who is this baby ?

In chemistry, He turned water to wine.
In biology, He was born without the normal conception.

In physics, He disproved the law of gravity when He ascended into heaven.
In economics, He disapproved the law of diminishing return by feeding 5,000 men with two fishes and 5 loaves of bread.

In medicine, He cured the sick and the blind without administering a single dose of drugs.
In history, He is the beginning and the end.

In government, He said that he shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Prince of Peace.
In religion, He said no one comes to the Father except through him; So. Who is He ? He is Jesus ! The greatest man in history.

Jesus had no servants, yet they called Him Master.
He had no degree, yet they called Him Teacher.
He had no medicines, yet they called Him Healer.
He had no army, yet kings feared Him.
He won no military battles, yet He conquered the world.
He committed no crime, yet they crucified Him.
He was buried in a tomb, yet He lives today.

Christian Persecution in the Middle East

2011-01-10T09:23:27+10:00

I find the treatment of Christians in Lebanon deplorable. It’s also amazing ( but not incredible ) that our mainstream media haven’t reported it :

Your report (’‘Christian lambs left to the slaughter’‘, January 8-9) attributes the decline of Christian communities in the Middle East to Western nations’ interference in the region, but in my view it tip-toed around entrenched religious, cultural and other local factors.

In the north-south civil war in the Sudan, some 2 million people were killed, mostly Christians and animists. What did this have to do with Iraq or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

In Lebanon, which gained independence in 1943 as a country with a solid Christian majority, Christians continue to flee and now constitute an estimated 35 to 39 per cent of the population. The primary forces driving the exodus have been local.

To stop Christians leaving, Lebanon’s Labour Minister, Boutros Harb, proposed a bill on December 30 that would prohibit Christians from selling their property to non-Christians for a period of 15 years, nullify any such transaction retroactively and set a prison term of 10 to 15 years for offenders.

The only country in the Middle East in which Christian communities are growing in number is Israel.

Peter Wertheim Council of Australian Jewry, Sydney

SMH letters