Sceptics conclude Earth has warmedFollow

FTFY

To be fair I'd be surprised if anyone here had a really good understanding of climate-modeling; much less enough knowledge to critically analyze those models and tease out what may or may not be working properly.

Either you believe they're on the right track or not; that the consensus' percentages and probabilities are in-line with reality, that the models are accurate, etc. etc. I'd like to say "prove them wrong" but I don't think anyone here does any simulations of their own anyway. I wouldn't necessarily take it well if someone outside the field tried to tell me how to do Proteomics, much less science in general.

I suppose as much as I'd like to go along with the scientists and trust them here (they are skilled professionals in their fields, and pretty darn intelligent people by the way) if some was to push back, really, I couldn't say I fully understand how they came to their conclusions. We all have to take their word for things in the end, and either you can make that jump in faith or you can't.

Same could be said about any field that requires training or expertise I suppose.

ramble ramble ramble...

Edited, Oct 27th 2011 7:35pm by someproteinguy

No, it doesn't. Because one is proposing a course of action (with sizable financial cost), while the other isn't.

If someone insists that a dimensional rift will open up any day now and Dinosaurs will spill out swarming the earth and causing mass harm, the burden is on them to prove that I need to start spending massive amounts of money preparing for a dino-apocalypse. I don't need to prove that they're wrong to argue that we shouldn't spend that money on those preparations. I need only show that they haven't proven that they are right.

Arguing that I haven't proven them wrong is silly, isn't it? I also haven't proven that the rapture wont happen tomorrow. But I don't have to in order to continue to go about living my normal life. Others need to prove to me that I need to do something different.


I can come up with more examples to illustrate why you're wrong if you still need them.

Edited, Oct 28th 2011 3:02pm by gbaji

And in our system of government, those people then have to convince the taxpayers who will have to pay for it to support whatever actions they propose. Which does mean that I, as a taxpayer and a voter, can absolutely look at the arguments being used and say that they are not sufficient proof to justify the costs being asked.

And, since we live in a society with free speech, I'm free to argue that other people shouldn't blindly accept the arguments being used as sufficient justification for the costs of the proposed actions either. And the counter argument "But you didn't prove their wrong", isn't relevant. I don't have to. I only have to show that they haven't proved they are right.



Sure. They need to convince enough other people that they are right. Do you see how I don't have to prove I'm right, but only to show to those "other people" that they have not yet proven that they are? I'm not the one trying to talk people into spending billions of dollars and accepting significantly higher energy bills to stop something from happening. They are. And they kinda have to first convince people that the thing they want to stop will actually happen and *then* convince people that their proposed actions will have an effect.


Good luck with that!

Edited, Oct 28th 2011 4:38pm by gbaji

Damnit, if GFY makes a comeback because of this thread i'm going to be annoyed.

I heard the raptors were coming, but so far I've been let down.

He was born, he is risen, he shall come again.