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> Since when did science become about predicting what will happen in the future? Since evidence based policy making became a thing. We use it for deciding when

> Since when did science become about predicting what will happen in the future? Since evidence based policy making became a thing. We use it for deciding when to plant crops, deciding what medical treatments should be broadly implemented, deciding what water treatment methods are acceptable...it's fairly popular. > That concept is completely antithetical to what science is at the core (i.e. making repeatable observations to establish fact). Either what you have established holds repeatably and you are predicting the future, or it doesn't hold repeatably and it's not, by your definition, science. You may be confusing repeatable experiments with repeatable observations, though. > I understand that observed trends tend to indicate future direction but this push, rooted in FUD, to make consensus of the scientific community equivalent to absolute fact At this point the observations are enough where it's an absolute fact. The only question is how much, how fast. That's what the computer modeling is trying to get a handle on. Plus, your argument is equivalent to playing Russian roulette and claiming that the presence of a bullet somewhere in the gun is not an established fact. That's true. You don't know if it might be loaded. But do you really want to find out?

johnmorrison 7y ago
> You don't know if it might be loaded. But do you really want to find out? This is a really great analogy. Pumping more and more GHG into the atmosphere is the stupidest experiment ever. Like poking a sleeping lion harder and harder.
- macinjosh 7y ago
  The analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened and we don't currently have the knowledge or capability to truly know what will happen with the climate. And please don't tell me that doing something just in case we're right is better than doing nothing. There is a great cost to enacting the climate policies that have been proposed, both human and financial.
macinjosh 7y ago
> Since evidence based policy making became a thing. We use it for deciding when to plant crops, deciding what medical treatments should be broadly implemented, deciding what water treatment methods are acceptable...it's fairly popular. Thanks for the smug talking down to. :) However your comparison here is ridiculous. We can easily measure crop out comes, water treatment outcomes, and medical outcomes because in the past actual experiments were done that showed what worked and didn't in that situation. The climate on the other hand is completely different. We don't have a second one to use as a control. The scale is too large to fully factor in all inputs and outputs. It is just not the same at all as the things you mention. > Plus, your argument is equivalent to playing Russian roulette and claiming that the presence of a bullet somewhere in the gun is not an established fact. I am not the type to choose security over giving up the personal freedoms and rights of myself and my fellow humans just in case someone's computer model turns out to be accurate. In any case, your analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened and we don't currently have the knowledge or capability to truly required to truly know what will happen with the climate.
- madhadron 7y ago
  > Thanks for the smug talking down to. :) Absolutely. There's a lot of people who don't understand how science works outside of a parochial impression from physics, and if I can't get some pleasure from dealing with it, then why bother? > We don't have a second one to use as a control. Like all observational sciences, basically. > In any case, your analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. All analogies can be strained out of usefulness. > You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened We already did. We're fifty years in and seeing the effects.

johnmorrison 7y ago

> You don't know if it might be loaded. But do you really want to find out? This is a really great analogy. Pumping more and more GHG into the atmosphere is the stupidest experiment ever. Like poking a sleeping lion harder and harder.

macinjosh 7y ago
The analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened and we don't currently have the knowledge or capability to truly know what will happen with the climate. And please don't tell me that doing something just in case we're right is better than doing nothing. There is a great cost to enacting the climate policies that have been proposed, both human and financial.

macinjosh 7y ago

> Since evidence based policy making became a thing. We use it for deciding when to plant crops, deciding what medical treatments should be broadly implemented, deciding what water treatment methods are acceptable...it's fairly popular. Thanks for the smug talking down to. :) However your comparison here is ridiculous. We can easily measure crop out comes, water treatment outcomes, and medical outcomes because in the past actual experiments were done that showed what worked and didn't in that situation. The climate on the other hand is completely different. We don't have a second one to use as a control. The scale is too large to fully factor in all inputs and outputs. It is just not the same at all as the things you mention. > Plus, your argument is equivalent to playing Russian roulette and claiming that the presence of a bullet somewhere in the gun is not an established fact. I am not the type to choose security over giving up the personal freedoms and rights of myself and my fellow humans just in case someone's computer model turns out to be accurate. In any case, your analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened and we don't currently have the knowledge or capability to truly required to truly know what will happen with the climate.

madhadron 7y ago
> Thanks for the smug talking down to. :) Absolutely. There's a lot of people who don't understand how science works outside of a parochial impression from physics, and if I can't get some pleasure from dealing with it, then why bother? > We don't have a second one to use as a control. Like all observational sciences, basically. > In any case, your analogy is actually very poor. You can check and be 100% sure if a gun is loaded. All analogies can be strained out of usefulness. > You can't check what will happen to the climate in 50 years because it hasn't happened We already did. We're fifty years in and seeing the effects.