Science Related Memetic Disorder:for example, someone tells you that
Science Related Memetic Disorder (SRMD) is a memetic disease which susceptible persons can both catch and transmit. SRMD appears to be a naturally-occurring memetic disorder which spreads via fringe science books and half-baked online rantings. A susceptible person - usually an engineer or scientist whose theories have been snubbed by his professional peers - who reads one of these rants can catch SRMD. Once a person has been infected with the SRMD meme complex, he or she will begin to constuct a scientific theory and will go to any length to prove it and to show everyone who disregarded his work that his theory is correct. Persons infected with SRMD, who are colloquially called "mad scientists," will often engage in illegal or hazardous actions to further their goals.
"people and their activities affect the global environment."
if you believe it, you just caught SRMD.
3 comments:
The whole Global Warming thing is so full of conflicting information. Too bad we can't get a clearer picture about what is really going on in the world without all the emotion, presupposition, and "disorders" of which you speak!
Enjoying your blog, Elliot!
The earth IS getting warmer.
This is demonstrably true.
For example, just last month Greenland farmers brought in the first barley crop....in 800 years.
So we're nearly as warm as we were before the little ice age so the current conditions are...ummm...
INFIDEL!!! JIHAD!!!! JIHAD!!!!YOUR STATEMENT IS DOUBLE-PLUS UNGOOD!
Our activities do affect the global environment. They just don't affect it on sufficient scale to credibly explain the warming we're experiencing. Demonstrably though, you can examine the myriad of changes mankind has produced on the local scale and show impact elsewhere in the globe (see dams, irrigation, deforestation, transplanting alien flora/fauna, etc).
So saying that we have no effect on the global environment is disingenuous in my opinion. I would consider it better to claim that we do not have a sufficient impact on global warming/cooling, as that effect is far outside our purview as a species (short of touching off a nuclear war).
Post a Comment