Civilization (Humans)

by Carl, Saturday, November 08, 2008, 16:00 (5651 days ago) @ dhw

Dhw: "... all our transactions are based on faith ... that the expert knows his stuff, and everything will be fine after his/her ministrations. Unfortunately, this dependence has a huge down side. Look at the current banking crisis, the businesses that crash, billion-pound IT systems that don't work, catastrophic invasions..."
I am no Pollyanna when it comes to experts, but you have to realistically evaluate your options. Can I affect the outcome at all? If not, I don't need to arrive at conclusions. Are there conflicting expert opinions? If yes, compare the credentials and possible ulterior motives and biases of the experts. What are the consequences of one choice vs. another? The health of the planet at the possible cost of unneeded reduction of resource consumption and pollution vs. continuing consumption and pollution at the possible cost of the habitability of the planet we leave our descendents is a no-brainer for me. 
David: "You have ignored factual material I presented in my first paragrph to show that there is doubt about the currect global-warming hypotheses. Where did that information come from? Had you seen it before? You have no idea because you are unwillling to look around at material that is available. You simply want to take propagandistic material presented in the news journalism press. ... Any intelligent person can read books on both sides of the debate and come up with some reasonable conclusion not based on so-called faith."
Let me apply the questions I listed above. The only ways I can affect the outcome is in my one vote I cast and conversations I have with people like you to change public opinion. There are experts on both sides of the issue with biases and axes to grind, but it seems to me that the most objective experts favor action. (Both the President and I ignore the popular media). The consequences of deciding global warming is a fact and being wrong is moving from fossil fuels to renewable fuels, but that needs doing anyway. The consequences of deciding against global warming and being wrong is long term damage to the planet of unknown severity.
David: "Scientists follow each other like sheep until they are proven wrong. I've seen this in medicine and described it in another thread."
It may be a majority viewpoint, but science is not a voting process. It is deciding what is as close to factual proof as is possible."
Statements like these always remind me of the stomach ulcer/ H. pylori controversy. It is in three acts. Act I, the medical community ridicules Warren and Marshall for suggesting that ulcers were caused by something as simple as a bacteria. Act II, the medical community investigates the claims. Act III, the medical community treats gastric ulcers with antibiotics to kill H. pylori. The process works. I have faith it will work in the case of global warming.
In regard to the factual material, I need not remind someone of David's scientific training of the danger of looking at anecdotal data in extremely complex systems. One must look at the statistical analysis of all the available data.