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FrozenGate by Avery

Atlas Shrugged fans

I don't think it too hard to find the truth in science today. It is true that there are those who try to spin versions of truth, but the majority of the scientific community still bears witness to the truth. A fine example of this is the new "opinions" on global warming and its cause. Back in the 1970s it was considered scientific fact that this phenomenon was the result of green house gases being expelled into the atmosphere by human beings. Now, there seems to be two versions of this, but the bulk of the scientific community still believes it is all caused by humans. If you are truly searching for truth, it's still out there, but may conflict with your political ideology. BTW, Astralist sells a 20 watt LPM with data logging for $150.00.
 





BobMc said:
I once watched a show where they took a 6 grade test from back in the early 1900's ( I think it was 6 grade or there about's ) and gave it to present day college students and it was amazing the college student couldn't pass the test.
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Honestly, i'm not entirely sure i could pass that test, though if you could link it in i could at least attempt it ;)

This goes both ways though, although i have a masters degree in chemisry, i'd probably fail the top level highschool chemistry exam if i attempted to take it. Not that my answers would be off by that much, but i could certainly fail to correct for something, or correct for something i'm not supposed to rendering the numerical result off by a bit.

As for the big scaremongery: i'm not really sure how much of that is science and how much is politics. Before global warming was an issue, we had acid rain. This acid rain would destroy plant life, and possibly even buildings (concrete is eroded by acidic water over time).

Somehow the acid rain story disappeared entirely with the news about global warming. As far as i know reductions in SO2 and NOx emissions were made to deal with the acid rain problem, but i've never seen anything in mainstream news about how succesful (or not) those efforts actually were.

As far as 'versions of truth' go: there is some scientific merit behind some of them. If you look at something like global warming and sea level rise you can go for the effects of the worst possible outcome, the median or average, or the lowest possible risk scenario.

And then come the media with the need to report things as shockingly as possible to attract attention. This is what changes the perception of an ocean level rise of 1 meter in 2100 to something like 'potentially' 10 meters by next sunday. What they do is combine the worst possible scenario (all ice melts) with an unrealistic time line to create panic (or, realistically ad revenue).

This does not help anything. Telling the general public to stop burning candles because they'll otherwise be flooded next week is not realistic. Ignoring ocean level rise and failing to increase protection by waterworks is unwise too. Living in a country largely below sea level (at significant cost) could make you more aware of what and what not to believe. Oh, and we've not been flooded yet!
 
The trouble with the media, especially television, is they never report good news or outcomes from subjects like restricting SO4 and NO2 emisions into the air. You would have to research the subject to get a real picture of the effect.
 
Pavlovian conditioned reflex theory
Drop out, tune in, and turn on
BSTEP

Before my time but I can recognise these had an exponential effect on culture.
 
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paul1598419 said:
I don't think it too hard to find the truth in science today. It is true that there are those who try to spin versions of truth, but the majority of the scientific community still bears witness to the truth. ~~~ If you are truly searching for truth, it's still out there, but may conflict with your political ideology. BTW, Astralist sells a 20 watt LPM with data logging for $150.00.
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I sure hope you right about the scientific company. But I'm starting to fear your wrong. :thinking:

I have a 7 watt LPM from Astralist, saw his post for the one with the Ophir head, is that the one your talking about. If so, I've had a few conversations with him about it. It's something I'm considering. But was curious if there were any other options ?

Benm said:
Honestly, i'm not entirely sure i could pass that test, though if you could link it in i could at least attempt it ;)



As for the big scaremongery: i'm not really sure how much of that is science and how much is politics

And then come the media with the need to report things as shockingly as possible to attract attention. (or, realistically ad revenue).

Telling the general public to stop burning candles because they'll otherwise be flooded next week is not realistic.
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It was a few years ago when I saw the program. It was on Glenn Becks channel. Don't know if I could find it. But maybe on YouTube.

I think it's about control and money. I think the media is so dishonest they will do or say anything to get you to believe what they want you to . (They could tell me it's raining outside and I'd get up and look.) I have faith in the media, but it's faith that's says you guys are whacked. Yea guess I'm a little bit jaded. :D But that doesn't mean truth doesn't exist. For the axeum remains " for every question there is an answer, for every up there is a down, for every in there is an out" truth never changes.
 
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@BobMc No, the one Astralist sells is a coated TEC that is rated at 6 watts total and if you are using it to measure higher powers, it will saturate the TEC and give you erroneous readings. The 20 watt version is an uncoated TEC and from reviews by people who have used them, they are accurate to 5%, which ain't bad for $150.00. But, since you already have the 6 watt version, you would only need the uncoated TEC which should be much cheaper.
 
paul1598419 said:
@BobMc No, the one Astralist sells is a coated TEC that is rated at 6 watts total and if you are using it to measure higher powers, it will saturate the TEC and give you erroneous readings. The 20 watt version is an uncoated TEC and from reviews by people who have used them, they are accurate to 5%, which ain't bad for $150.00. But, since you already have the 6 watt version, you would only need the uncoated TEC which should be much cheaper.
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:thanks: I'll send him a pm and ask and see what he says:wave:
 
paul1598419 said:
The trouble with the media, especially television, is they never report good news or outcomes from subjects like restricting SO4 and NO2 emisions into the air. You would have to research the subject to get a real picture of the effect.
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I suppose so. Environmental lobbyists have always alarmed about certain issues, and industry as fixed them if they were real.

CFC's and ozone deplation: proved to be true, emissions where regulated strictly and the ozone seems to be slowly replenishing. Downside: the gas used in spraycans is now highly flammable (butane/propane mix, same you use for a camping stove). Also less efficient air condintioners and such.

SOx, NOx and acid rain: emissions were restricted but there seems limited results on what catastrophe has been prevented. Scrubbing these gasses from exhaust is expensive, but feasible, and probably a good thing for smog reduction as well.


But then came the impossible one from environmental groups: CO2, with a side note that nuclear power is somehow very bad too. This is one of the points where Atlas may shrug: it's impossible to fix on the short term.

Any non-nuclear -reliable- power source will emit CO2, period.

Things like solar panels are nice, but few people realize they will not even produce 10% of their rated power when it's even slightly overcast, and don't produce any power when heavily overcast or at night.

Wind turbines have a similar problem: they produce power at a given wind speed, but very little or none when there is too little or too much wind (in strong winds they need to be vaned away to prevent catastrphic damage).

This would all be okay if we could store electrical power to need the worlds needs for a couple of weeks, but at the moment we cannot. So we build our solar panels and windmills, backed up by very low efficiency open-ended gas turbines to compensate. I'll shrug at that approach.
 
It is no fiction that CO2 emissions have added to the oceans' acidification. This can be seen on the reefs in sallow waters off Australia and the Caribbean. It has also been shown to cause the destruction of developing shell fish that are at the bottom of the food chain and so may lead to the destruction of species that feed on them and those that feed on the latter. Yes, there is little stomach for building new nuclear power plants, but that doesn't make the science wrong about CO2 emissions.
 
I don't think these is any doubt that CO2 levels have rising quite a bit after industrialisaton, nor that industrialisation is the cause of that rise.

The question is what if anything to do about this. If you turn to industry, one solution would be to replace fossil fuel with nuclear wherever possible, mainly in electricity generation. Couple with electric cars that could give some savings. Sadly environmental groups dismiss a nuclear solution beforehand, even though waste management and safe plant construction and opertion have been demonstrated in many countries over a long period of time.

This could not prevent all emissions but it could certainly help quite a bit.

There are things that simply cannot run on nuclear generators nor on electricity such as airplanes and long-haul trucks. However, there are things that could but do not for various reasons. One of them is cargo ships, that continue to run on (rather dirty) heavy oil resulting in emissions of CO2, but also sulfur oxides.

Nuclear powered ships have been well demonstrated to work, including things like aircraft carriers, submarines and ice breakers. There is no scientific reason that this cannot be done with large cargo vessels.
 
I believe part of the distaste has been in reaction to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor meltdowns in 2011. As late as this year there have been radiation levels in reactor #2 of 650 sieverts/hr. Remember that these are reactors designed by General Electric. This seems to be an ongoing problem and though it was preceded by an earthquake, there are many reactors in areas where there are tectonic faults and are potentially an earthquake waiting to happen.
 
Allow me to butt in here-

I've never read Atlas Shrugged in its entirety, but I have read/heard large portions of the book, to the point where I think I understand the main storyline and the concepts portrayed. Libertarianism is not a left/right issue as has already been pointed out. I've been down some of the internet's darkest rabbit holes, and can assure you that the extreme right hates Rand just as much as the extreme left. Libertarianism is its whole own thing; it can be left or right flavored.

Now, as to not completely derail your current discussion:

I firmly believe that phasing out nuclear is one of the worst choices we could make for the future. The current nuclear arsenal is composed primarily of generation II and II+ reactors, with relatively few gen III reactors in operation. Gen II/II+ reactors are outdated and in many cases, unsafe (relative to newer technology, gen II reactors are still ridiculously safe though). Gen III reactors and more promisingly gen IV concepts (such as the LFTR, gen IV fast reactors, etc.) have the capability to provide clean, cheap energy without most of the risks prevalent with current reactors.

The possibility of helium-based and other closed-cycle turbines also means that reactors could be built underground, reducing the risk of nuclear proliferation.

The problem is, nuclear is just too big and scary of a pill for the public to swallow. Accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima come to mind at the first mention of the words "nuclear power" despite the fact the nuclear power has one of, if not the lowest death rate per trillion kW/h. Nevertheless, with the public unease about nuclear and the solar/hydro/wind agenda being pushed so adamantly, we will likely see a near complete abandonment of nuclear in the future in favor of a much longer, more expensive renewable route.
 
dden4012, to embed videos, you only need to include the last bit of the url, in this case "VQlbiQj_49o". If you add the entire link between the
 
RedCowboy said:
Global warming caused by man is not a proven fact, it is still highly contested.

The Earth has a natural Ice age cycle of warming, melting, reflecting and then freezing, about every 100k years.
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"Multiple lines of scientific evidence show that the climate system is warming. Many of the observed changes since the 1950s are unprecedented in the instrumental temperature record which extends back to the mid 19th century, and in paleoclimate proxy records over a thousand years.
In 2014 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report concluded 'it is highly likely that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century.'"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming

Also search Global warming (disambiguation)

Edit: there were problems with the link earlier, but that has been fixed.
 
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