- Belief in unfounded health care claims about solar energy; how so many people believe unproven claims about raw milk and vaccines;
- How the Trump administration is ending the EPA and paying to cancel wind farms;
- Chris Barkley on Trumps 7-step process to answer difficult questions;
- And another reflection on The Last of the Mohicans and its score.
Has humanity reached a saturation point? Has society, and technology, become so complex that the average person cannot understand it and so resorts to simplistic, false, explanations for things because they aren’t able to understand reality?
- Salon, Anna Clark, today: Unfounded health claims are powering a solar backlash
- Subtitle: Solar restrictions popping up across the US “often rooted in misinformation or unfounded fears”
- Comment: Fear of progress, i.e. change. “To some, in Michigan and beyond, this growth feels dangerous. They pressure public officials to stop, stall or otherwise complicate new solar projects with an array of arguments that now go beyond just land use to include public health.
- Scientific American, Helen Pearson & Nature Magazine, yesterday: ‘Staggering’ number of people believe unproven claims about vaccines, raw milk, and more
- Subtitle: Survey results suggest a rise in questioning of scientific evidence
- Comment: And this is because scientific evidence in often, perhaps increasingly, counter-intuitive, and most people prefer simplistic, intuitive alternative answers.
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Thus, simpleton Republicans deny technological advances and investigations into science. More tearing down by this administration of what smarter people before them have built.
- NY Times, today: How the Trump Administration Ended Independent Science at the E.P.A. [gift link]
- Subtitled: The agency’s prestigious research office spent decades doing scientific work insulated from political pressure. Now it’s being dismantled.
- Quote: “For more than a half-century, a prestigious scientific arm of the federal government did groundbreaking research aimed at saving American lives. It studied fertility, asthma, wildfires, drinking water, climate change and myriad other health threats.In just one year, it has been almost completely dismantled.”
- NY Times, today: Trump Administration Will Pay More Energy Firms to Cancel Wind Farms
- Subtitle: In exchange, the companies will invest in oil and gas projects, echoing an earlier deal with the French energy giant TotalEnergies.
- Comment: This is moronic: the oil and gas is polluting the planet, and will eventually run out. Solar and wind power are forever. But Republicans are short-term thinkers.
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I can’t resist posting this, even if the provenance is dicey: Jonathan Seay (who?) via Turning Point USA (really?) via Chris Barkley (a Facebook friend and science fiction fan), on Facebook today. Because it’s what we see all the time. Maybe not every single time, but this is his pattern. This displays *his* cognitive limitations.
Jonathan Seay: “Every single time Trump is asked a question — any question — he runs the exact same 7 steps. In the exact same order. Without exception.
STEP 1 — KILL THE QUESTION
(First thing every time — make the question itself the problem.)
“That’s a stupid question.” / “Fake news.”
STEP 2 — KILL WHO ASKED IT
(Destroy the source so the question has nowhere to stand.)
“Your ratings are terrible. Nobody watches your network.”
STEP 3 — INSERT HIMSELF
(Every topic. Every time. Without fail. It always lands here.)
“Nobody has ever done what I’ve done.”
STEP 4 — SCALE IT TO THE BIGGEST CLAIM POSSIBLE
(Not good. Not great. The greatest. Ever. In history. Every single time.)
“More than any administration — by far.” / “Nobody has ever had crowds like I’ve had — in history, for any country.”
STEP 5 — UNNAMED PEOPLE AGREE
(Faceless. Countless. Unverifiable. Always there.)
“Smart people are saying it. Great people. A lot of people.”
STEP 6 — VAGUE THREAT
(Something bad will happen. Never specified. Always implied.)
“All hell will break out.” / “They know it. Believe me.”
STEP 7 — LOOP BACK TO HIMSELF
(Different words. Same destination. Formula complete.)
“It’s been an amazing period of time. Page after page of accomplishments.”The question was never answered.
The formula just ran.
Go back and watch any clip.
Any year. Any topic. Any reporter.
Count the steps.
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Music/movies: We rented from Amz the movie The Last of the Mohicans last night, in part because Y had never seen it, and in part for me to hear the score in context. ( I don’t think I’ve ever seen the movie again since its original release.) It’s a difficult movie to summarize; there’s a lot of running around (from the opening moments) and it’s something about the French Indian War, with various kinds of tribal alliances, filmed in North Carolina, and the movie’s plot centers on the romance plot. With many dramatic scenes, including some of people falling off cliffs. Still, it’s a thrilling score.
Music. Listening to Philip Glass’s Kepler perhaps for only the second time. Will comment about it later.
