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vitsli October 5 2013, 19:48:43 UTC
Tears of biodiesel advocates are not forgotten.

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telemann October 5 2013, 20:03:11 UTC
Q: Did you hear the one about the aluminium recycling plant?
A: It smelt!

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vitsli October 5 2013, 20:25:50 UTC
Tears of global cooling advocates are not forgotten either.

Keep trying ;)

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telemann October 5 2013, 20:51:06 UTC
Q: What did the environmentalist get when he sat down for too long on an iceberg?
A: Polaroids!

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gunslnger October 5 2013, 20:15:51 UTC
There has been some indications conservative think tanks and lobbying firms have used professional "trolls"

It always has to be a right-wing conspiracy, doesn't it?

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telemann October 5 2013, 20:19:49 UTC
So out of 1300 words, and that's your take-away?

Oy vey.

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enders_shadow October 5 2013, 20:45:58 UTC
Was there a better snippit for him to snipe at? Well then, you have your answer.

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fizzyland October 5 2013, 21:19:57 UTC
I think this clearly demonstrates that Popular Science made the right move.

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notmrgarrison October 5 2013, 20:54:45 UTC
historic mean

How far back does the "historic mean" go?

And your graph is funny. The red line goes back to 1950. They've been using this model since 1950? Or did they come up with it much more recently, using data that includes the 1950's, 1960's, 1970's, ..., but the line is drawn back to the 50's to make it look like it's been predicting things correctly for half a century.

And do you have a graph for Antarctic ice (you know, that stuff that's been increasing lately)

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mindstalk October 5 2013, 21:03:57 UTC
Artarctic sea ice, that is. http://www.livescience.com/39720-antarctica-ice-record-highs-2013.html

"The record sea ice doesn't contradict global warming. Because Antarctic sea ice encircles a frozen continent, the factors controlling its growth are complex, and include winds, warming air temperatures and even the ozone hole. Wind plays a greater role the size of the ice pack than air temperature or ocean currents, according to a study published in the Nov. 11, 2012, issue of the journal Nature Geoscience."

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notmrgarrison October 5 2013, 21:12:49 UTC
Do you have a graph for it? Did they predict it? Does more sea ice in the Antarctic somehow not affect sea levels?

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mindstalk October 5 2013, 21:32:00 UTC
Sea ice doesn't have much effect on sea levels, no. It wouldn't have any effect except for salinity changes. Ice is already floating in the water, when it melts the part sticking out just fills the volume left by the part beneath shrinking.

I'm sure you can search for your own graphs if you're so obsessed with this trivial question.

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telemann October 5 2013, 21:50:04 UTC
Thank's for that link. I really appreciate it!

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sandwichwarrior October 5 2013, 22:46:19 UTC
Comments sections can be bad for science. That's why, here at PopularScience.com, we're shutting them off...we are as committed to fostering lively, intellectual debate as we are to spreading the word of science far and wide. The problem is when trolls and spambots overwhelm the former, diminishing our ability to do the latter. But even a fractious minority wields enough power to skew a reader's perception of a story, recent research suggests.

A politically motivated, decades-long war on expertise has eroded the popular consensus on a wide variety of scientifically validated topics. Everything, from evolution to the origins of climate change, is mistakenly up for grabs again. Scientific certainty is just another thing for two people to "debate" on television. And because comments sections tend to be a grotesque reflection of the media culture surrounding them, the cynical work of undermining bedrock scientific doctrine is now being done beneath our own stories, within a website devoted to championing science.These are the words of a ( ... )

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sandwichwarrior October 5 2013, 23:01:16 UTC
.we are as committed to fostering lively, intellectual debate...

But there is a "but". This is the rhetorical equivalent to the old "I'm not racist but..."

spreading the word of science far and wide.

Science is not a word to be spread. It is a specific approach to problem solving which her words both before and after seem to contradict. What was the actual ratio of trolls and spam to sincere debate? Does she even know? This pre-suposes that there is even such a thing as a scientific Gospel in the first place.

Long story short, i've see more open minds in Church.

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