I support your intent of countering the “intelligent” design “theorists” and their stealth efforts to bring in Creationism into the classroom (and kick out science). However, what’s this business of pirates vs. global surface temperature. Sure, you make a point that there’s a difference between correlation and causation. Perhaps you’re trying to point out that the true cause of GW may not be man-made green-house gas emissions. Well, the scientists have studied this problem and have come to the conclusion that it is. Please don’t give with one hand and take with the other. You support the scientists in Darwinian evolution and on the other hand don’t in GW science.
I suggest you remove your references to pirates and global surface temperature (your curve does look compelling though).
Regards,
Alan
[A response: No deal, Alan. I tend to agree with the Global Warming hypothesis, and I certainly think it makes sense to err in that direction whether or not you agree with it - I'm all for conservation and green technologies. But, there is an almost religious type of dogma surrounding the Global Warming issue that makes me uncomfortable. Global warming is probably happening, but that is a world apart from saying it is Truth that must be supported. I'm against dogma and a priori reasoning, not any specific beliefs. -bobby]
@ Eric – why on earth does the human species deserve to survive as long as possible? Yes, we’ve achieved some reasonably ok things historically – I wouldn’t be an archaeologist if I didn’t believe that – but we’re about the most destructive species there is and quite frankly if it’s a choice between humanity dying out themselves or killing off 90% of other species, I’m all for giving something else a chance to make a better job of things, and the more people who make a conscious decision not to have kids because there are too many people already the better. To quote Bill Hicks – we’re a virus with shoes.
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Um, sorry all – think the New Year hangover only just hit when I got up this morning (stopped at about 6am on the second so not unreasonably I guess) and I apologise if anyone thought my previous comment was unacceptably harsh or grouchy. I stand by the sentiment but would maybe have preferred to word it better ordinarily. Happy New Year anyway.
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I may be a heretic to your little “church” here, but I must call into question the entire pirate graph altogether. Piracy is actually a considerably large and growing problem in shipping channels worldwide—particularly in the Middle East and Africa.
http://archive.gulfnews.com/articles/07/12/31/10178403.html
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Thank you Cho for showing me that it doesn’t take a Fundi to totally misinterpret satire and take it way to seriously.
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Sofa King
Jan 4th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
I may be a heretic to your little “church” here, but I must call into question the entire pirate graph altogether. Piracy is actually a considerably large and growing problem in shipping channels worldwide—particularly in the Middle East and Africa.
*
They are not REAL pirates! They are just thieves on water. WE are real pirates (and wenches) and keep the true faith alive. Always important to remember :)
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Dont be sexist- wenches are pirates too.
In fact, without them, we wouldn’t have any pirates.
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Hi Jenny. It’s not at all a matter if we deserve it or not. The goal for us a a specie is simply to survive and keep the specie going. As an archaeologist I’m sure you are familiar with this basic principle of life. Therefore I believe we should handle the earth with care, and avoid killing those 90% of other species (which we need in order to survive + it’s a moral issue).
Do you really mean that it is OK for the human race to go extinct? No offence, but I hope you don’t get childrens then, as it would contribute to the survival of our species.
btw: The population in my country are quite stable
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I, too, have a problem with your pirates and global warming conjunction. As the (retired) CIA pirate analyst I assure you that the number of pirates has not declined over time, but has increased. Of course modern pirates do not operate in quite the same way as ancient ones, but are practitioners of the AK-47 and Zodiac boat more than cutlass or sailing ship. They board and rob ships more often than stealing the complete ship, although that has happened recently as well.
Modern pirates operate in the tropics more often than not, thus preserving the link between temperature and piracy, but correlated opposite to that in the graphic. Most modern pirates can be found in the Malacca Strait, off Somalia, in the Red Sea, and off Nigeria and other coastal areas of West Africa. The Caribbean remains a haven for pirates, especially those who target pleasure craft (yachts) rather than commercial shipping.
My research would indicate a positive correlation between piracy and global temperature as well as a positive correlation between pirates and icebergs.
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No offence taken, Eric – I hope I don’t get kids either. And, yes, I really do mean it’s ok for the human race to go extinct. Besides which, whether or not I or anyone else thinks it’s ok, it’s almost inevitable that one day it will happen, given the fact that something like over 90% of all species that ever lived are now extinct. Generally I’m pretty happy with the thought that it’s going to happen one day. It has to be a really bad day for me to want it to happen immediately!
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@Jennyanydots Jan 7th, 2008 at 2:02 pm: “No offence taken, Eric – I hope I don’t get kids either. And, yes, I really do mean it’s ok for the human race to go extinct. Besides which, whether or not I or anyone else thinks it’s ok, it’s almost inevitable that one day it will happen, given the fact that something like over 90% of all species that ever lived are now extinct. Generally I’m pretty happy with the thought that it’s going to happen one day. It has to be a really bad day for me to want it to happen immediately!”
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The state we humans put the planet in, makes it a very tough decision to have children, when you see at what pace everything degradates. As a kid, looking at the time line fixed to the wall of the second grade class, I wondered about events in history becoming more and moredense when approaching our era. I didn’t know of the word “exponential” back then. The degradation of the planet follows a similar curve, and the belief in the unlimited powers of science and technology during the 19th century kinda orientated people in the wrong direction, when you look at it now… Maybe it won’t be too late before the people in power not only look at the power of our technology, but actually DO something with it before it is too late.
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@Jennyanydots
Evolve or die! That’s my motto. I don’t mind the human race becoming extinct, nothing in this world stays the same. As I’ve said before there where forests in the Antarctic when dinosaurs walked the earth and when bugs ruled the earth (can’t remember the period, but it was on the BBC’s wonderful ‘walking with monsters’) there was 30% more oxygen in the atmosphere, which would make even the most weedy human able to run a marathon in record time.
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I would, however, prefer to evolve. Like X-men or something.
Maybe we should return to eugenics. Not the Nazi version, which was frankly shit, as it only concerned it self with turning people into physical perfect homosexual stereotypes. But the real deal! Then some people would be band from breeding. Like Young Earth Creationists and members of the NRA.
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@John
“Dutchie, everything I have heard regarding global warming, from scientists, media, al gore, etc. directly referenced the hole in the ozone layer, and citing global warming and emissions as directly related to the hole, in many causes having caused it. From what I gather, this hole is the focal point of the fight global warming campaigns.”
You are so full of shit and clearly don’t listen to anything nor can you be bothered to read anything or even use Google you clown.
The Ozone has nothing to do with global warming! The ozone stops radiation, it has nothing to do with global warming.
I don’t mind ignorance in these matters, but your statement above shows you have not paid attention but are still trying to pass off a half arsed opinion. How would a meteor affect the Ozone unless it contained large amounts of CFCs or another gas which destroys Ozone?
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@Eric Threepwood
Yes I am serious. Evolve or die, that’s the way it has always been. The human body has been shown to be imperfect, and in fact is very poorly made for how we live. This indicates that we are still evolving and are yet to reach a stable state in the environment we are currently in. If we continue to evolve we will not be humans anymore, we will be something else. There fore the human race would die out. Not in a bang but as a slow farting sound.
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@Pacman- If you had read my post you would have seen that events have transpired that have cures more rapid climate change.
And why does another species have to step up to the plate? Plenty of things will survive us and with out us something else can rise to power through the never ending war of survival that is life.
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I think the GW thing is just a continuation of the attitude shown towards “intelligent design”- i.e. science provides a logical and sensible explanation for how we came to being.
In the same way, science provides a logical explanation for the reasons behind global warming.
In both cases however, people refuse to believe the logical and go for the illogical and unproven-
instead of evolution, it was an invisible almighty guy in the sky (parodied by the spaghetti monster) and
instead of human activity causing global warming, it’s just a random phenomena (parodied by the reduction in pirates)
Both parodies are ridiculous to emphasise the logical explanation.
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It’s misleading to suggest that scientists have unanimously agreed that GW is the result of human activity, or even of greenhouse gases. Quite a lot of geophysicists think that it’s another spike of heat in the natural progression of the cycle of Ice Ages. Hell, some Christian scientists even think that God’s causing it (although how they can call themselves scientists, I don’t understand). The diminishing of piratical activity isn’t that stupid. In fact, it’s sorta scientific – you take two pieces of evidence, compare them, note any correlation, and make a conclusion based on the data. So… if that’s unscientific, how did the other scientists come up with their more scientific theories?
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The difference between the science of global warming and the pirate correlation is huge. Scientists point to specific pathways and causal mechanisms (many of which can be backed up, albeit on a smaller scale, through laboratory experiments) through which human activity, or natural phenomena, affect the global climate. It is not a simple correlation. Pirate related global warming, however, provides no such causal explanations – pirates are just human beings, and beyond the effects of accelerated ship-building, cigar-smoking, and burning of other ships, there is no reason to believe that they have any exceptional impact on the environment. There is no way you could really prove it was the number of pirates per se, or eye patches, or peg legs, etc. because you have nothing but a correlation. The reason global warming is better than, say, a lot of nutrition science, is that many of the particular physical processes that would contribute to it can be demonstrated through controlled experiments. To the extent that the science relies on computer modeling and more inferential approaches, it is on shakier ground than, say, organic chemistry, but you can’t compare it with pirates.
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Hi Jenny! Someday the people near me will die. I don’t like it, but it is inevitable, so I accept it. In the same way as I accept that most probably our specie will go extinct some day (unless we’re going Star Trek). I guess we just have to agree to disagree on this one.
Pluto: I wasn’t really asking if you were serious, but who cares. I think hat we will still identify ourselves as humans, no matter how much we evolve. As long as we have the collective memory we have now, civilization and technology and all, we will still identify ourselves as humans.
Another thing is how much we are evolving. Most people goes through life relatively untouched by selective pressure (at least in the western world. It can be debated in development countries, but so far our technology seems to evolve much faster than we do). Of course lots of things can happen in the geological timescale, my guess however, would be that any major evolutionary changes of humans would be resistance to some bacteria and viruses.
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Just because I like the theory of evolution, doesn’t mean I have to believe in the standard GW theory. That’s like saying if I vote for Ron Paul, I have to be republican (I’m a democrat)
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Boy some people just don’t get it do they?
Do you think the post from ‘the scientes’ is real?
Some of the comments in the hate mail section are just halarious.
That section is probably the best argument AGAINST evolution; I mean, how can some of these people survive? Survi al of the fittest….please.
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Dude! I thought scientists were supposed to be cool! Rocking With Hawking is my favorite shirt on ThinkGeek!
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For a scientist, you don’t use your head much do you?
Pirates cause global warming. Its a completely off the wall crazy ass made up silly piece of bullshit. It is ment to reflect the breing to light the off the wall crazy ass made up silly pieces of bullshit that EVERY religion is made up of.
You see, Bobby was very smart. He wanted to end ID in the schools, not add yet another wacky ass religion to science class. So just in case Florida and Kansas would actually start teaching FSMism, he told them to do it in complete pirate regalia so at least then they would look fucking stupid doing it.
It should be aganist the law not to perform a mercy killing on anyone so fucking stupid and brainwashed that they would want to do society such a disservice as teaching ID or religion in the classroom.
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Pirates don’t use items that produce greenhouse gassses. Thus, our theory is correct.
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My fellow on Facebook shared this link and I’m not dissapointed at all that I came here.
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