A chat with Kent Lambert
Happy Saturday the 14th, everyone! I was going to post yesterday, but, you know....
I had this titular chat earlier in the week. It was very interesting, and I wish I'd had more time to speak with Mr. Lambert, since we only talked about two topics. I also wish I'd had a tape recorder with me; as is, I'll have to do with paraphrasing him.
I asked him what he thought about global warming. He called it junk science, and said he spoke from being a scientist himself. I pressured him about the hockey stick graph, that graph that shows average global temperature and carbon dioxide levels rising synchronously, and after he mentioned that average global temperature naturally rose periodically, he added, "Don't forget that carbon dioxide is found all over the world, and so we can't say what's causing the rise. Besides, plants use carbon dioxide to breathe, and we don't want to kill the plants."
I stress that this is a paraphrase, and Mr. Lambert probably said something much more sensible. However, I wasn't thinking clearly (as someone with Asperger's Syndrome, I frequently have trouble with conversation), and all I could think of was, "But plants also create carbon dioxide. They store energy by turning CO2 and H2O into sugar and oxygen, then reverse the process to use that energy." So I kept my mouth shut.
It hadn't occurred to me to point out that plants were doing just fine before the Industrial Revolution, which is when the CO2 levels started rising, and average global temperature with them. (It has been pointed out as ironic that the Industrial Revolution also killed a lot of trees. But I digress.)
I changed the topic to taxes. (Right away, you know this cannot be good.) I asked where the sense was in giving tax breaks to the rich. (Sorry. I know grouping many different people under one name is a little simplistic.) After all, since they have more money, can't they afford to have more taken away? He answered with the rhetorical question of "where do you draw the line?" and added that doctors in Sweden, for example, are charged 102% income tax (a figure I haven't been able to verify). I told him I was worried that it sounded a lot like Reaganomics, and he answered (again, this is just a paraphrase): "It is Reaganomics, and Reaganomics works. It's created 30 million jobs in the last 25 years."
I stopped the conversation and let Mr Lambert go at that point, partly because I didn't have enough knowledge to contradict him (or to agree with him, as he pointed out several times). However, I did make a point to ask my mother about it later. She agreed that Reaganomics created many jobs, but she added that a lot of those jobs were low-paying and many people needed to work several jobs to support their families. Now, I still don't know enough to confirm or deny this, but I'll say this much: I'm proud to vote Democrat, because I don't want to be three janitors.
I had this titular chat earlier in the week. It was very interesting, and I wish I'd had more time to speak with Mr. Lambert, since we only talked about two topics. I also wish I'd had a tape recorder with me; as is, I'll have to do with paraphrasing him.
I asked him what he thought about global warming. He called it junk science, and said he spoke from being a scientist himself. I pressured him about the hockey stick graph, that graph that shows average global temperature and carbon dioxide levels rising synchronously, and after he mentioned that average global temperature naturally rose periodically, he added, "Don't forget that carbon dioxide is found all over the world, and so we can't say what's causing the rise. Besides, plants use carbon dioxide to breathe, and we don't want to kill the plants."
I stress that this is a paraphrase, and Mr. Lambert probably said something much more sensible. However, I wasn't thinking clearly (as someone with Asperger's Syndrome, I frequently have trouble with conversation), and all I could think of was, "But plants also create carbon dioxide. They store energy by turning CO2 and H2O into sugar and oxygen, then reverse the process to use that energy." So I kept my mouth shut.
It hadn't occurred to me to point out that plants were doing just fine before the Industrial Revolution, which is when the CO2 levels started rising, and average global temperature with them. (It has been pointed out as ironic that the Industrial Revolution also killed a lot of trees. But I digress.)
I changed the topic to taxes. (Right away, you know this cannot be good.) I asked where the sense was in giving tax breaks to the rich. (Sorry. I know grouping many different people under one name is a little simplistic.) After all, since they have more money, can't they afford to have more taken away? He answered with the rhetorical question of "where do you draw the line?" and added that doctors in Sweden, for example, are charged 102% income tax (a figure I haven't been able to verify). I told him I was worried that it sounded a lot like Reaganomics, and he answered (again, this is just a paraphrase): "It is Reaganomics, and Reaganomics works. It's created 30 million jobs in the last 25 years."
I stopped the conversation and let Mr Lambert go at that point, partly because I didn't have enough knowledge to contradict him (or to agree with him, as he pointed out several times). However, I did make a point to ask my mother about it later. She agreed that Reaganomics created many jobs, but she added that a lot of those jobs were low-paying and many people needed to work several jobs to support their families. Now, I still don't know enough to confirm or deny this, but I'll say this much: I'm proud to vote Democrat, because I don't want to be three janitors.