Tag Archives: bullshit

Racism in NZ Politics

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Posted by JJ on March 23, 2010 – 9:26 pm
Filed under Random Grumps & Raves, The Demise of Democracy and Freedom
Tagged as , , , , , , ,

Democracy is not working for Maori, according to the New Zealand Minister of Maori Affairs, Pita Sharples.  He says Maori will not be fairly represented in the Auckland super city.

New Zealand has separate Maori seats in parliament, which is something Sharples wants for the super city, and he now says democracy is failing Maori.  “There is a democratic process but it’s not working for Maori, they are outside of that system,” Sharples says.  He says the principle of one person one vote will not give Maori representation.

“Unless we find some ways for them to be more involved, that is user friendly to their culture, then we have to do something else and I believe seats for Maori is the answer,” Sharples says.

The principle of one person one vote gives every individual equal representation.  Not every racial group – every person, regardless of ethnic origin.  European countries have comparatively recently become democracies.  European societies evolved from a tribal system, in which everything belonged to the chief, the tribes were constantly at war, and no common man had individual representation.  The societies developed into feudal systems, in which everything belonged to the king or duke and his lords and knights, the kingdoms and fiefdoms were constantly at war, and no common man had individual representation.  Finally (and with much struggle) European societies became democracies.  Pre-European Maori society and culture was tribal, and the tribes were constantly at war.  Now New Zealand is a nation, not a collection of tribes or fiefdoms, and it is a democracy.  That democracy brings individual representation to all.

Maori culture, having declined for too long, is undergoing a renaissance within our democracy, and is flourishing.  So what’s this about democracy not being user friendly to Maori culture?  What does that mean, Pita?  Are you implying that Maori who, like you, have been through the NZ education system, are inherently incapable of understanding the political system, inherently incapable of benefiting from the representation they now have?  Isn’t it time to acknowledge that all can achieve and make their mark according to their abilities?  That all Maori people can aspire to academic distinction, or to become a Minister of the Crown?

But if you are right about democracy not suiting particular races, then let’s try it your way.  Let’s have a racist organisation.  Let’s have, say, separate seats for New Zealanders of European descent, and for New Zealanders of Chinese descent, and of Samoan, Tongan, ad nauseum descent.  Let’s have a racially divided proportional representation, with the interests of each racial group stridently represented by each bloc.  And decided by majority vote.

No?  You bet, no!  It would pit ethnic group against ethnic group, leading to hatred and conflict instead of acceptance and harmony.  Let’s have simple democracy instead.  It may not be ideal, but it’s the best we can hope for.

Like you, Pita, I have Maori and European ancestors.

References:

Pita Sharples on Democracy:  http://tvnz.co.nz/politics-news/sharples-says-democracy-not-working-maori-3428048

CO2 Domes and Charlatans

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Posted by JJ on March 19, 2010 – 9:39 am
Filed under Global Warming
Tagged as , , , , , ,

“Any scientist who can’t explain to an eight-year old what he is doing is a charlatan.” – Dr Felix Hoenikker, nuclear scientist.

“Write it down, then ask yourself ‘Would it make sense to my Grandmother’?” – Ken Dixon expounding his “Grandmother Test”.

A Stanford University study has concluded that domes of increased carbon dioxide concentrations – discovered to form above cities more than a decade ago – cause local temperature increases that in turn increase the amounts of local air pollutants, raising concentrations of health-damaging ground-level ozone, as well as particles in urban air.  The overall conclusion is that CO2 domes in US cities are responsible for an increase in premature mortality of 50 to 100 deaths per year in California , and even more,  300 to 1,000 more premature deaths in the contiguous 48 states.

How is this established?  By data-evaluated numerical computer modeling of CO2 feedbacks and health impacts for the contiguous 48 states, for California and for the Los Angeles area, to determine the increase in the death rate from air pollution for all three regions compared to what the rate would be if no local carbon dioxide were being emitted (See Appendix below).

That’s it – no hard data.  Nothing testable.  They built a complex model predicting heating impacts, made assumptions about the health consequences of that heating, and then made recommendations about carbon taxes based on the model’s estimates.  So CO2 causes the urban heat islands (UHI)!  Not concentrations of people and services and central heating and power and motor vehicles and concrete and stone, but CO2!  Come on – cities are hotter than the countryside simply because they are cities.

But no -we gotta blame CO2.  Carbon taxes are depending on it.

Pity the scientists didn’t try explaining it to their grandmothers.  Or failing that, to an eight-year-old.  They might have realised just how ludicrous their “study” really is.

References:

pdf of the Stanford study:  http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/CO2loc0709EST.pdf

WUWT Post on the story:  http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/16/stanford-urban-co2-domes-mean-more-death/

Appendix:

This is what they claim to have real-world modelled to a standard of certainty sufficient to predict the urban death-rate due to CO2:

Example CO2 feedbacks treated include those to heating  rates, thus temperatures, which affected

  • (a) local temperature and pressure gradients, stability, wind speeds, and gas/particle transport
  • (b) water evaporation rates
  • (c) the relative humidity and particle swelling
  • (d) temperature-dependent natural emissions, air chemistry, and particle microphysics.
  • (e) photosynthesis and respiration rates
  • (f) dissolution and evaporation rates of CO2 into the ocean
  • (g) weathering rates
  • (h) ocean pH and chemical composition
  • (i) sea spray pH and composition
  • (j) and rainwater pH and composition. Changes in sea spray composition, in turn, affected sea spray radiative properties, thus heating rates.

Potsdam Institute – Professional Advocates

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Posted by JJ on March 17, 2010 – 8:16 am
Filed under Global Warming
Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, a group composed of natural and social science researchers, announced a study that “shows” that a solar minimum will not slow global warming.  The study is an attempt at a pre-emptive strike.  The sun goes into a cooler period and bingo – they rush to add to the endless repetitions of predictions of doom.  It’s what they do, and why they exist – to advocate for global warming.

The entire study depends on the assumption that the IPCC climate models are comprehensive and correct in their predictions of twenty-first century climate change.  These models include only the possible causes they know about and are capable of modelling, with all of their weightings of climate forcing tuned to enable reasonable hind-casting, applied to a warming world.  When the models approximately predict the global temperature (they are very approximate, and then only while the earth is warming) the climate change scientists conclude that they have proved their estimate of the climate forcing due to man-made CO2, and that their forecasts of temperature rises to come in the twenty-first century must therefore be correct.  They call this modelling technique “optimal detection”.  That is the technique that Ptolemy used in his geocentric model of the universe, which made very accurate predictions of the motions of the moon, planets and stars.  It took more than a thousand years for later scientists to discover the truth,  That is understandable – the relative predictive accuracy of Ptolemy’s model left little reason to suppose that it might be wrong.  So until Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler, astronomers fully accepted the geocentric model.

Similarly, the Potsdam people take AGW and the IPCC-sponsored models as fact.  The very notion that the earth cools and warms in cycles, and that in inter-glacial periods like the present, there are mini-cycles of warm periods between little ice-ages, is dismissed as unscientific wishful thinking.  It is nothing of the kind.  It’s simple observation.  And within the last two thousand years, we have written history to draw upon.  Written history that documents the Roman Warming and the Medieval Warm Period.  The IPCC claim that the recent warming is unprecedented is false.  So are the models.

There has been a fifteen-year hiatus in the warming, against the model predictions.  Even Phil Jones of the CRU agrees that there has been no statistically significant warming since 1995.  And in spite of the present warmth, all indications are that the PDO is now turning negative, and that in five-to-ten years the AMO will also turn negative.  The earth is in for 20 – 30 years of cooling, while CO2 continues to rise, fed by the economic growth in China and India.  The IPCC models did not predict the flat temperature since 1995, and they do not predict the forthcoming cooling.

Greenhouse gases did not cause the twentieth-century warming, or the earlier MWP and still earlier Roman warming.  When cooling sets in, it will not be because greenhouse gases are reduced, or because we are saved by a quiescent sun.  It will be a result of the natural cycles.

Reference:

Discovery News Article    http://news.discovery.com/space/the-sun-cant-save-us-from-global-warming.html

Potsdam Press Release:   http://www.pik-potsdam.de/news/press-releases/weakening-sun-would-hardly-slow-global-warming