Re: NANFA-- Gloom, Dispair & Agony on me

Rich Butts (richbutts44_at_yahoo.com)
Sat, 11 May 2002 01:23:50 -0700 (PDT)

Moontanman_at_aol.com wrote: In a message dated 5/10/02 8:36:10 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
markotnes_at_email.msn.com writes:

<< Anyway, I still recommend the book. If you don't want to buy it for fear
of
financing an ideological opponent, then just go check out Andrew Sullivan's
web sight, follow a few links and you can get Scientific American's rebuttal
along with Lomborg's counter arguments.
>>

While I haven't read the book you are referring to I agree that critiquing
someone's book without reading it is somewhat hasty at least. Just as many
people assumed the book I recommended (The Deep Hot Biosphere) was invalid
because I remarked that what we know as fossil fuels may indeed not be fossil
fuels if the author is correct. Some people immediately assumed the book was
by someone who believed that oil and gas were not limited resources or
something in that regard. One thing I have noted in recent months is that
more and more researchers are beginning to wonder if indeed we might be
headed toward another ice age instead of global warming due to some before
now unnoticed effects of melting polar caps on ocean circulation that may
cause an extreme negative feed back when the planet gets too warm. So even
the greenhouse effect may not indeed be what we all expect. It all boils down
to information, The more information we have the more accurate any
predictions will be but assuming that preliminary evidence is valid without
continuing to gather new and question old data can lead to making the wrong
conclusions and decisions. If you look at the track record of science you
will quickly see that what the experts say is possible and impossible changes
regularly. Scientists do seem to be more reluctant to say that something is
impossible in recent years due to past assumptions proving to be more
flexible that at first thought. Of course this doesn't mean science can't
find the answers it just means that science is a fluid process and the dogma
of one generation becomes the blunders of another. Never forget that asking
questions always brings more questions than answers and the way data is
interpreted can be as important as the data it's self.

Moon

TVGM
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/"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily
/ reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes
/ Association"
/ This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes Association
/ nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word
/ subscribe, unsubscribe, or help in the body (not subject) of an email to
/ nanfa-request_at_aquaria.net. For a digest version, send the command to
/ nanfa-digest-request_at_aquaria.net instead.
/ For more information about NANFA, visit our web page, http://www.nanfa.org