The U.S. and Syria - by Dia
faetal on 18/9/2013 at 15:39
Also, with the "politicians would become scientists" idea - I'm not sure that would be quite true, since they'd need to go get PhDs, which takes 3 years of degree plus 3 years doing PhD minimum, so I can't see there being a sudden influx. The point of a technocracy is that there are no politicians per se, you just have your researchers (scientists, economists, engineers, historians, archaeologists - depending on the problem) who are tasked to find solutions to problems raised by the civilians. The outcomes of the research are turned into policy by some kind of executive department - something like civil servants.
It's obviously not perfect and has many weak points for the elite to target for corruption, the point is that if it relies on complete publishing of all data - corruption will be easy to spot and talk about. At the moment, we're pretty much "yeah, the guy in the suit with the nice hair whose sound bites I like, that's who I want to fuck me over for the next x years".
Gryzemuis on 18/9/2013 at 16:16
Let's take the example of climate change. Scientific data says that the climate has been changing over the last 15 (or 50) years. Good. But that doesn't help much.
- 15 Years is not enough time to know for sure. Insufficient data. 50 Years is too short too. There have been changes to climate (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period) in the past too.
- But let's assume the world is really warming up. How do we know this is because of humans ? The only real scientific proof would be if we could redo the experiment. This time without humans. Undoable experiment. We only can make assumptions and do extrapolation.
- Let's assume the world is really warming up, and it is completely to blame on human behaviour. Could we actually stop this development ? Could we roll it back ? What needs to be done ? Nobody knows. And we can't try it out in a controlled experiment.
- Suppose we can roll it back. What measurements are worthwile for the cause ? And which bad habits are we allowed to keep ? Can we keep flying to Spain for our Holidays ? Science is not gonna give us answers on what is vital, and what can be scrapped. It's all subjective.
Are you telling me you can only be a real scientist when you have a PhD ? Is this maybe a biased view, because you are getting one ? Imho getting a PhD says mostly something about someone's stamina.
In my country (NL) there is currently a big debate about (cutting) spending. It's obvious that if the goverment spends more money, more money will flow and that will boost the economy. But where does that money come from ? If you tax the population more, less money will be spent. If you borrow money, that'll have an impact later on. So even though the basic observation (cutting spending is bad for economy) is correct, that doesn't mean it is obvious what needs to be done. Economic science is not the answer here.
I don't think the answer is to change the way the government makes decisions. Marx didn't make proposals how to change the distric voting system. If you want to improve democracy, you need to break the power of forces that are working against democracy. And imho that are the establishment, the wealthy, the multinationals, large corporations and the military-industrial complex. No matter how you try to improve the democratic system, those powers will defend their position. Neuter their political power and influence, and then maybe democracy can bring what it is supposed to bring.
faetal on 18/9/2013 at 17:52
Quote Posted by LittleFlower
Let's take the example of climate change. Scientific data says that the climate has been changing over the last 15 (or 50) years. Good. But that doesn't help much.
- 15 Years is not enough time to know for sure. Insufficient data. 50 Years is too short too. There have been changes to climate (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period) in the past too.
- But let's assume the world is really warming up. How do we know this is because of humans ? The only real scientific proof would be if we could redo the experiment. This time without humans. Undoable experiment. We only can make assumptions and do extrapolation.
- Let's assume the world is really warming up, and it is completely to blame on human behaviour. Could we actually stop this development ? Could we roll it back ? What needs to be done ? Nobody knows. And we can't try it out in a controlled experiment.
- Suppose we can roll it back. What measurements are worthwile for the cause ? And which bad habits are we allowed to keep ? Can we keep flying to Spain for our Holidays ? Science is not gonna give us answers on what is vital, and what can be scrapped. It's all subjective.
Have you read a systematic review on climate science? Because most of what you say above isn't accurate. We have various forms of data (ice cores, isotope analysis in fossils, analysis of tree rings and many more) which give consistent historical data pertaining to effects we know are caused by climate and little else. These show that cycles of warming and cooling indeed have happened historically, but never at the rate we are seeing now. We know that the closest rate of climate change to what we are seeing is when sheet basalt activity in the northern hemisphere caused 5 degrees of warming over around 200,000 years, which is believed to have led to the release of methane clathrates in the sea, which caused further warming of 5 degrees, which in turn obliterated around 90% of all life on earth. This event was called the Permian mass extinction. Since we have commenced industrial activity, we have seen an increased of between 0.8 - 1.2 degrees (which despite sounding small, is actually pretty significant in terms of a change in global average) in a little under 200 years, with the rate of change speeding up the later we get. This
rate of change is unprecedented in all of earth's measurable history. We need to find a way to limit this if we wish to avoid massively increasing the risk of another mass extinction, but there are other factors too which are difficult to pick up if you don't have scientific training, e.g.:
1) Evolution works by adapting to change - species which do not adapt well to change tend to die out favouring those which do. If you increase the rate of that change, more species die and more opportunistic or hardy species take over. What this means is that the proportions of biomass will change over time as the conditions become less hospitable, because evolution is too slow to allow speciation to provide the necessary adaptation. Bear in mind, there is no guarantee how edible or nutritious to humans these hardy species will be. Fancy a bowl of grass? Also, what happens when either insects or the specific plants they pollinate fall out of synch? Plant flowering and insect life cycle are closely tied to ambient temperature, humidity etc.. if that changes too rapidly, there's no guarantee that their cycles will shift at the same rate or by the same amount, so you potentially get lots of biomass loss that way too. It doesn't take a lot.
2) Positive feedback mechanisms. Once these kick in, the amount of effort we put in to limit emissions may not help. Positive feedback mechanisms which are already a problem:
a) Loss of ice albedo - ice reflects sunlight away from earth, preventing its absorption and conversion to heat. Increase in temperature means less ice coverage = lower albedo = faster warming = less ice etc...
b) Thawing of tundra permafrost = methane release = warming etc...
c) pH decrease of water by additional absorption of CO2 by the air = dissolving of coccolithophore shells = release of more CO2 from the sequestered carbonate = more warming etc...
These are three of many.
That's from my non-climate science standpoint - imagine how much more explanation can be given by someone who studies the science daily and for years?
Quote:
Are you telling me you can only be a real scientist when you have a PhD ? Is this maybe a biased view, because you are getting one ? Imho getting a PhD says mostly something about someone's stamina.
No, but having a PhD does guarantee the aptitude past a certain threshold. While it's perfectly possible for someone without one to be just as good as someone with, it's a statistical likelihood that someone with is going to know their subject past a certain point. Hey, why have qualifications for anything? Are you happy to be operated on by this guy who never went to medical school? Unless you've done a PhD - try not to comment on what it "says mostly", it's pretty insulting to hear that the 4 years of hard work and detailed analysis I've just put myself through was "grunt work" or whatever it is you think doesn't require expertise. Also, not sure why you think I'd say that a PhD should be required just because I'm doing one - I have no vested interest here since I'm talking about a completely hypothetical form of government. All a PhD is supposed to do is give someone the training they need to go out and independently investigate their field.
Quote:
In my country (NL) there is currently a big debate about (cutting) spending. It's obvious that if the goverment spends more money, more money will flow and that will boost the economy. But where does that money come from ? If you tax the population more, less money will be spent. If you borrow money, that'll have an impact later on. So even though the basic observation (cutting spending is bad for economy) is correct, that doesn't mean it is obvious what needs to be done. Economic science is not the answer here.
You don't know that economic science isn't the answer because you're having a lay debate about what's to be done. Where do you think the money came from to bail out banks? Ironically, it came by borrowing money from the banks being bailed out, which they then earn interest from. The way stimulus works is by borrowing to kick start the economy, then using the results of the faster economy to generate a surplus and pay back the debts.
Quote:
I don't think the answer is to change the way the government makes decisions. Marx didn't make proposals how to change the distric voting system. If you want to improve democracy, you need to break the power of forces that are working against democracy. And imho that are the establishment, the wealthy, the multinationals, large corporations and the military-industrial complex. No matter how you try to improve the democratic system, those powers will defend their position. Neuter their political power and influence, and then maybe democracy can bring what it is supposed to bring.
How do you break that power? Most people don't even know it is there. Also, most don't care enough to do anything. Even in the US where poverty is on a par with a lot of third world countries due to their extremely corrupt politics and economical system, the most people do is blame people on benefit, or immigrants, or taxes for their situation. All the while super rich people with no fear of accountability continue to extract the nation's wealth and send it to tax havens. I do not have much hope in evolution of politics. At this stage, any change would need to be orthogonal to be effective. This is nothing to do with me considering myself or other academics "elite" in any way, I just genuinely think that governance in response to data, refined by consensus of an expert community would actually lead to results which benefit more people more of the time. It's not about scientists having their day, it's about current politics ignoring realistic cause and effect in favour of attractive lies to drive agendas.
Vivian on 19/9/2013 at 08:33
Quote Posted by LittleFlower
Are you telling me you can only be a real scientist when you have a PhD ? Is this maybe a biased view, because you are getting one ? Imho getting a PhD says mostly something about someone's stamina.
I'm a professional scientist, and I can tell you in no uncertain terms that you cannot be a 'real' scientist unless you have a PhD. It's the minimal professional qualification.
Also anyone who thinks there isn't any evidence for anthropogenic climate change has either not read any of the research on the matter or is choosing to ignore it. Saying things like 'but no-one knows!' is bloody ignorant. Scientists rarely 'know' anything, but the hypothesis of rapid, human-caused climate change has got a startling amount of evidence in it's support. Go read some stuff.
SubJeff on 19/9/2013 at 08:51
Quote Posted by Vivian
I'm a professional scientist, and I can tell you in no uncertain terms that you cannot be a 'real' scientist unless you have a PhD. It's the minimal professional qualification.
That's not true at all, is it? There are plenty of researchers who don't have PhDs.
faetal on 19/9/2013 at 08:58
It's the minimum guaranteed qualification. Without the PhD, the quality of the researcher is too variable. With a a PhD, the ability to research independently is a guarantee (though no system is perfect so some duffers probably scrape through).
John Wayne Gacy was a pretty good amateur anaesthetist.
Vivian on 19/9/2013 at 09:13
Quote Posted by NuEffect
That's not true at all, is it? There are plenty of researchers who don't have PhDs.
Mate, how do you get a job in research without a PhD? Maybe it's different in other fields, but they call research positions 'postdocs' for a reason. Seriously, it's a requirement.
SubJeff on 19/9/2013 at 09:16
That's a post-doc research post. I don't have a PhD (only an MSc) and my first ever paper was submitted (and considered but not accepted) to Nature. Yeah, if you want to really climb the research ladder its far, far better to have a PhD but to say that you can't be a scientist without one is misleading.
Vivian on 19/9/2013 at 09:20
It's totally not. People working on MSc and PhD programs are students, people assisting in scientific research who aren't students or hold a PhD are techs. And no offence, I'm sure it's a fine paper, but submitting something doesn't mean anything. Also, where you the sole author? Or was your advisor on there as well? And what qualification did they hold?
SubJeff on 19/9/2013 at 09:38
No I wasn't the sole author. The head of department was and yes he had a PhD. The only reason I mention that it got submitted to Nature is that the findings were deemed interesting enough, that my non-PhD scientific research was good enough for Nature. It was rejected on the grounds that the same strain of knockout mice had been featured earlier that year, but I wasn't bothered then and I'm not now.
What I'm saying is that it's perfectly possible for someone to have a BSc or an MSc and still be doing scientific research. Does this make them not a scientist? If they are involved in experimental design, data collection and processing, in writing up the papers? I know there are lab techs (we had them) who just "do" stuff but they don't get their names on papers, do they?
