People have been very interested in recent reports that highlight studies confirming the theory that an asteroid impact killed off the dinosaurs:
[A]n international team of researchers, using the most precise dating methods currently available, have determined that while the asteroid impact wasn’t the only thing that wiped out the dinosaurs, it was pretty much the deciding event – and it definitely happened simultaneously with the extinction.
“The impact was clearly the final straw that pushed Earth past the tipping point,” said researcher Paul Renne in a press release. “We have shown that these events are synchronous to within a gnat’s eyebrow, and therefore the impact clearly played a major role in extinctions, but it probably wasn’t just the impact.”
And for mammal-evolved lifeforms, this extinction was probably a good thing.
However, was the asteroid strike the result of some Cretaceous era global warming?
A CNN anchor took the occasion of a report about a near-earth asteroid approaching on Feb. 15th to ask if its orbit projection was a result of global warming.
From Brent Baker of NewsBusters:
CNN anchor Deb Feyerick asked Saturday afternoon if an approaching asteroid, which will pass by Earth on February 15, “is an example of, perhaps, global warming?”
Moments earlier, before an ad break, she segued from the Northeast blizzard to a segment with Bill Nye “the science guy,” by pointing to global warming: “Every time we see a storm like this lately, the first question to pop into a lot of people’s minds is whether or not global warming is to blame? I’ll talk to Bill Nye, ‘the science guy,’ about devastating storms and climate change.”
No, the orbit of an asteroid is not influenced by the temperature on the Earth.
I have always felt our nation would be better served if its press members had degrees and/or experience in the fields about which they wrote, especially when it comes to the science and technology so vital to our society. However, until that happens and to assist other CNN journalists, I offer two examples of massive extinction-level-events that were caused by “climate change”:
- Snowball Earth: Between 750 and 580 million years ago, the earth became completed encased in glaciers — oceans included. Speculation is that this icing was caused by a lowering of atmospheric greenhouse gases to near-present levels through tectonically-mediated rock weathering, when the Sun was considerably dimmer than present. This glaciation wiped out the bulk of ancient life, leaving behind two groups of microbes from which all life is now descended. More information can be obtained from the Snowball Earth website (click HERE).
- The Permian Extinction: This is recognized to be the most devastating extinction event, in terms of the death of complex life — 95% of all species were extinguished during this period. It occurred 250 million years ago. It is thought that a massive volcanic event in Siberia (essentially a bulge of molten material, instead of a mere hot spot) lead to a 5 degree C rise in temperatures. This temperature increase triggered the release of methane gas from its oceanic methane-hydrate form, and as methane is a “greenhouse gas”, its substantial enhanced concentration raised temperatures 5 degrees further. The toxic volcanic emissions and heating wiped out land-based lifeforms and the methane release then triggered the marine die-off; then, finally, the additional temperature increase contributed to the extinction of many remaining species.
Interestingly, humans were involved in neither of the above events.
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Science is like truth and photographs these days…it’s been ‘politicized’ and ‘spinned’ until it is not reliable.
See Dan Greenfield’s latest: “The Unverifiable Word” http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-unverifiable-world.html
and Allan Haley’s, “Debasing the Currency of Truth”
http://accurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2009/12/debasing-currency-of-truth.html
When truth, fact and evidence are trumped by politics, a moral and rational chaos, disorientation… mobocracy inevitably result.
Quote from Sultan Greenfield: “The fields of facts are just as bad. Don’t like a study, produce another one. Don’t like these numbers, find some other ones. Everything from polls to credit ratings can be juggled as many times as necessary and while that may not change reality, the only time reality is encountered is when it punches through the paper mache display. And when that happens, everyone just patches it up again.
Global Warming has become a creed without the science, whose enthusiasts keep cooking up numbers to prove what they know is true. Such behavior is hardly unprecedented in science, no matter what the PBS documentaries you watched as a kid may have told you, but it’s the default mode in all fields now. Science has become a religion with ten thousand quarreling prophets threatening to burn each other at the climate change stake.”
Bring on da stakes ; fire up da BBQ !!
Federick – dumb as a sack of rocks. Doesn’t anyone at CNN (or the rest of the msm. ) have a shred of integrity left ? The only way to stop these leftist idiots is for normal people to refuse to appear on their shows and for everyone at home, who isn’t a committed leftist, not to tune in. What good accrues to Bill Nye to appear on camera with this mental midget who only cares about furthering the leftist agenda? Starve the beast and it will die !
I couldn’t agree more. I’ve wondered for years why someone would even appear on these networks which employ such dimwits as this woman.
The Liberal’s revisionism of history will someday involve humans in these catastrophic events: A People’s History of a Massive Volcanic Event in Siberia caused by Retroactive Human-Based Anticipated Global Warming and Confirmed by Talking Points of the Liberal Media and a finger in the Air.
Why is the left so ignorant of science? What do they have against science? What are they afraid of? Why do we on the right allow the left to paint us as ignorant and superstitious if we embrace creationism?
There is no resolution to the question of the origins of the universe. Currently, scientists have theories that explain everything but where all the hydrogen came from. To explain that requires faith, whether that faith is in a Creator or in the ability of matter to appear from nothing. The origins of our universe predate human observation and we can never go back and witness or duplicate the event.
Climate change (which has occurred as long as we’ve had climate), economics, and human behavior are all observable and can be studied real-time. Yet, we have those on the left, opposed to scientific study, who claim that the government can spend more than it collects indefinitely. Joe Biden claims we have to borrow money to get out of debt. The left ignores the science of the past 50 years that clearly displays the failure of their social agenda to eradicate poverty. No study shows Head Start to be effective, yet we continue to pour money down that hole.
No amount of gun control can stop mentally unstable people from inflicting harm on others. Gun-free zones have the opposite effect intended.
And conservatives are the ones who ignore science.
Right.
I thought Nye did a good job of using a superfluous comment about meteors and meteorology to avoid embarrassing the anchor.
Of course the only other response would have been to stare at her, in slack-jawed amazement for about 5 seconds, and then start his response with “Deb, you ignorant slut….”
I suggest that when researchers start using a “gnat’s eyebrow” as a unit of measurement, science has become the equivalent of a TV reality show.
Given the 33,000 year uncertainty of the exact date, and its proportion to the 66 million years elapsed since then, the fraction 0.0005 can’t be described any better than with the metaphor of a gnat’s eyebrow.
It’s disingenuous to assert that it’s a measurement being discussed.
Liberal Propagandists, speaking to assumed low information viewers, have no interest in actual science.
Theirs is the ‘science’ of wealth redistribution propaganda which they defend by smearing high information dissidents.
This has been going on for many generations though cable news has greatly enhanced their propaganda power.
They realize they are also subject to media attacks by use of factual information or counter-propaganda.
That is why you see them trot out so called experts in the field to nullify and discredit opponents.
This is why you see their creation of Fact Check organizations and efforts such as ‘Attack Watch.’
If fully engaged by counter-propaganda and facts, the end game would result in a tie… much like the game of tic-tac-toe.
With regards to the war on gun owners, hitting Liberals non-stop as political enemies of the US Constitution, thus the foundation of this country, they have no counter except to feebly deny it as they act to shred the US Constitution.
This is why Obama posed for a picture with a shot gun.
This is why Pelosi went on air yesterday to claim she was not against the First [sic] Amendment right to bear arms.
This is a vulnerability which they recognize as a political Achilles heel, a vulnerability of truth which I exploit daily against them.
We have to be as powerful or more powerful in the use of their propaganda tactics as applied to their targeted low information majority of the country.
You forgot to mention one of the oldest and most well-known climate change events, Genesis 7-8.
“…an example of, perhaps, global warming?”
Um…no. An example of, perhaps, Global Dumbing? Absolutely!
Totally amazing about how the life cycle of that big fiery ball of gas (no, not Congress!) up in the sky seems to be wholly ignored as having much of any bearing upon our humble little dirtball swirling through space. Consider also that it’s only within the last year or so that we’ve actually been able to get a near-live 360-view of the sun courtesy of solar survey satellites versus our previous one-sided view.
Once one of these all-knowing weenies can definitively conclude what the “correct” and “optimal” temperature should be all around the planet (taking into account the previous epochs of widely-ranging temperature extremes), then let’s come together and discuss things — even setting aside, for the moment, exactly how much all-mighty humankind can change it to any significant degree (all pun intended).
“Interestingly, humans were involved in neither of the above events.” – that’s what YOU think! BuWaHaHaHa!!!
🙂
(sorry, I couldn’t resist)
I’d love to be a news anchor, but I don’t know how to become uneducated enough to qualify.
“I have always felt our nation would be better served if its press members had degrees and/or experience in the fields about which they wrote…”
Have to disagree with this. Journalism—and therefore the nation—was much better off when it was primarily a last-resort profession for people with no other skills than knowing where the period goes in a sentence.
It’s been the semi professionalization of journalism (see: J-schools) that have made “journalists” believe they’re members of an elite class whose views are better than the average Joe’s. They’ve lost their skepticism toward power.
By contrast, take a look at the 23-year-old Ernest Hemingway’s profile of the newly installed Mussolini, in the Toronto Star, at a time when the world was cooing over the incipient dictator.
It’s been the semi professionalization of journalism (see: J-schools) that have made “journalists” believe they’re members of an elite class whose views are better than the average Joe’s.
Their ability to bulldoze public opinion to achieve their own personal political nirvana figures far more highly in their self-assumed ‘elite’ status.
In one person you have a simultaneous argument against both intelligent design and natural selection.
[…] Dear Readers: As always, look for my political posts on Legal Insurrection — and a little later this morning, a post about Pope Benedict’s resignation will be up. Until then, a little science: CNN anchorwoman gets a failing mark in climate science […]
The practice of cherry picking science to support one’s politics has been going on since the beginning of science and politics, and neither conservatives nor liberals can point an innocent finger at the other. It has long been a standard human political practice to use others’ ignorance against them, which is what happens when a pol co-opts science to their agenda. They do the exact same thing with law, history, arts, etc. – if they believe their audience won’t realize the lie, they lie.
Don’t blame science. Blame those who corrupt it for political gain. Some bright scientist invented the wheel, which led to the axle, and some other bright scientist put a bucket on top and the wheelbarrow was born. If some amoral degenerate uses the wheelbarrow to haul bodies from the gas chambers, it isn’t the fault of those scientists. If some laudable person uses it to haul food to the hungry, the science garners no praise either. The good and evil of science is in its applications, conducted by humans, to whom the blame or credit accrues.
“I have always felt our nation would be better served if its press members had degrees and/or experience in the fields about which they wrote, especially when it comes to the science and technology so vital to our society.”
Logical fallacy. Would you rather all those people with degrees pushing these global warming theories on us be there nightly on the boob tube to help better brainwash the masses?
It was a cute mental fart. Laugh about it and enjoy.
Judges call in objective expert witnesses to explain fields they don’t know, and professional journalists are supposed to do the same (with ‘objective’ being as important as ‘expert’). When journalists deign to use experts at all, they are chosen specifically because they are reliably subjective, in favor of the journalists’ prejudices.
Yes, they may do so, Henry, but that does not mean such expert witnesses are always entirely objective any more or less so than anyone can claim that all judges are entirely objective. The court itself may appoint such an expert witness upon recommendation by either the prosecutor or the defense counsel to avoid the jury associating such a witness with the side that called him.
IMHO, the biggest problem with expert witnesses is that the court cannot appoint anyone who refuses consent to testify. That in itself raises a question as to the objectivity of those witnesses who do choose to testify for a multitude of reasons.
Again, it’s a logical fallacy of appeal to authority. Anybody want Obama giving us our weekly Constitutional authority lesson? He’s got the credentials, doesn’t he? …or so we’re told.