6 ms·

Australian Env Scientist – Gagged and grief-stricken, but not without hope

28 points by jay_kyburz 3y ago

000ooo000 3y ago
Anyone know how to disable this 'Odyssey' format on abc.net.au, without a userscript or similar? Prior to loading finishing, the article appears to be there on the page in the standard format.
- logifail 3y ago
  Firefox with NoScript works. That way the entire page loads in less than half a second, too.
  - zizee 3y ago
    Firefox's reader view also does the trick.
lynx23 3y ago
Very emotional language. Picturesque victims. A gagged female scientist, who wouldn't dislike that. Who dares to impose hierarchies on female scientists.
- _3u10 3y ago
  It's almost as if almost all public servants in all governments are required not to be political publicly and is written into their contracts.
  - jbu 3y ago
    Why is reporting scientific findings considered political?
    - loup-vaillant 3y ago
      Probably because many of those increasingly read like "if we don’t stop this soon we’re all gonna die". The direr the reported consequences of human activities get, the more we think "this scientist is telling me how to live my life". It’s like playing Russian roulette, and having all the fun ruined by some eagle eyed gun expert pointing out that actually, there’s a bullet in that gun. The risk comes from the bullet, but we’re still tempted to be annoyed at the expert instead.
    - _3u10 3y ago
      Because it’s going to quickly go from we observed this which is a finding to we project that the world is going to end unless we do X which is not a scientific finding but rather one of a multitude of opinions on the future which is why climate models are averaged because there is no consensus and even if there was science doesn’t work on consensus. You can tell by the dramatic article that this is why the government doesn’t let people like her give its opinions because her opinion diverges from that of the government.
      - lynx23 3y ago
        Besides, Humans != TheWorld. This planet is going to spin even if we--arguably the biggest issue this planet ever had--are gone. There is this old joke. Two planets meet and have a chat. "So, how are you?" "Well, not good." "Why?" "I have homosapien!" "Don't worry, this will pass." So, no worries, the world is not going to end. And if humans manage to ruin their living conditions so badly that we end up dying out, evolution has just made another important step. After all, it is not like we deserve to survive.
  - bananapub 3y ago
    > It's almost as if almost all public servants in all governments are required not to be political publicly and is written into their contracts. I'm framing this, it's a perfect example of the endemic "dumb HN take". 1. asserting some personal desire as a rule 2. asserting it across the entire world 3. ignoring the actual details of the actual thing being discussed (climate change is surely not political in the same way that gravity isn't) 4. having no empathy at all for the actual topic or interest in it 5. despite all of the above, for some reason deciding to post a comment instead of saying nothing
  - totetsu 3y ago
    There is case history in this area in Australia. "High court rules public servants can be sacked for political social media posts" https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/07/high-court-rules-public-servants-can-be-sacked-for-political-social-media-posts https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/07/high-... And here is the APS professional standards manual. https://www.dfat.gov.au/about-us/publications/corporate/ethics-integrity-and-professional-standards-policy-manual/chapter-3-values-and-codes-of-conduct https://www.dfat.gov.au/about-us/publications/corporate/ethi...
- gameoverhumans 3y ago
  This take made me cringe. The only one putting emphasis on the fact that this scientist who has visited Antarctica 20 times in their life happens to be female, is you.
  - pineaux 3y ago
    This
- defrost 3y ago
  You overlooked the other male scientists in the article that spoke out on the same issues?
robertlagrant 3y ago
Is this article written in a different timeline? Climate has been constantly talked about for 20+ years in my one.
- gameoverhumans 3y ago
  is it really so hard to imagine that perhaps the climate issues that have been "constantly talked about for 20+ years" have been heavily moderated/filtered/co-opted by financial/political interests? The current party line is "holy shit we gotta do something soon or 2100 is gonna be bad, ya'll!". Thing is, essentially nobody today will be alive by 2100. Humans are not very good at thinking in these kinds of timescales. Corporations are hilariously bad at thinking beyond the next quarterly financial report. So if it turns out that we're witnessing irreversible and catastophic changes to important natural systems that many of us will witness first-hand in our own lives, don't you think it's entirely plausible that the people in charge don't want us to learn the full scope of how bad things got under their watch? That the people profiting from this carnage don't want the majority to act in a way that impacts their profits?
  - justinclift 3y ago
    > Humans are not very good at thinking in these kinds of timescales. That doesn't really resonate with me, as there are plenty of people who do stuff for the betterment of their kids, grand kids, and so on.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
- bananapub 3y ago
  ? it's specifically about Australia, where the government has largely been climate-denalists for two decades, including sabotaging government research projects: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/16/csiro-abruptly-scraps-globally-recognised-climate-forecast-program https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/16/csiro...
aaron695 3y ago
[dead]
renewiltord 3y ago
Australia is a resource economy. They’re not going to threaten their mines. Beautiful photos though.
nonrandomstring 3y ago
> Bergstrom likens scientists to soothsayers, carrying the burden of being able to see the future, "It plays a heavy toll on your psyche. It's hard to take because we know what's coming down the track." Cassandra complex is a real and horrible state of mind. It affects anyone who has to compartmentalise, or chooses to for whatever reason. I've seen it eat up more than a few people, and it definitely affects me too. My father was in the airforce and went to the South Pacific on nuke tests. He often had the thousand yard stare and "didn't want to talk" about there "being no future". Another member of our family is a climate scientist who did some particularly disturbing research. He has the same look sometimes. He says there's no point telling people - "just live your lives". For me being in cybersecurity is watching a "slow motion suicide by apathy". The unfolding, preventable catastrophe haunts me. But deep down we do want to tell people because even if you can't "change the world" it's hard to live and interact with people you love every day, knowing what you know. Most of the time the Casandra problem is that either nobody believes you, or nobody cares. Bergstrom's problem is that others want to actively prevent her from speaking, which I imagine is worse. Those with power really worry that we "scare the children". I even find myself saying it to fellow hackers when we are giving talks, because the effect of telling the plain truth is not action, but hopelessness, and I don't want to put that on people.
- fodkodrasz 3y ago
  But was the world burned by nuclear holocaust, or did the Y2K melt down the nuclear powerplants causing a global Chernobyl disaster? Did the ozone layer disappear and did the acid rains kill all forests? Extrapolating from a short period to a distant catastrophe can poison your life, while usually when a problem gets bad enough, then widespread consensus forms against it and appropriate resources are allocated. * Regarding IT security: I surely wouldn't be sleepless over IT security, given my money is reasonably safe and insured. Hackers won't destroy the water supply or nuclear reactors, even if they might be able to, or at most cause some incidents before steps are taken. Terrorists have vast possibilities already, we shouldn't be so arrogant to think that IT is so special that it is especially susceptible to causing some global catastrophe. One can already buy a hacksaw and tear down power lines, no need to hack a powerplant. One can poison water reservoirs, etc. No need for Hollywood drama, where special single points of failure are protected by (lone) heroes, protecting us from the lone maniacs. Our society is vulnerable and fragile, since at least 50 years ago, and it is not being attacked because nobody really wants to attack it. I'm more concerned about the gradual decline of privacy caused by the fear-mongering situations like outlined above. (If you meant this than I misunderstood you, sry.) * - Or we die. We die someday anyway.
barrysteve 3y ago
Knowledge isn't enough. People will ostracize anything. The culture won. The West is a cultural project, and anybody taking knowledge seriously, will be laughed off the planet.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

28 points by jay_kyburz 3y ago

Anyone know how to disable this 'Odyssey' format on abc.net.au, without a userscript or similar? Prior to loading finishing, the article appears to be there on the page in the standard format.

logifail 3y ago
Firefox with NoScript works. That way the entire page loads in less than half a second, too.
- zizee 3y ago
  Firefox's reader view also does the trick.

lynx23 3y ago

Very emotional language. Picturesque victims. A gagged female scientist, who wouldn't dislike that. Who dares to impose hierarchies on female scientists.

_3u10 3y ago
It's almost as if almost all public servants in all governments are required not to be political publicly and is written into their contracts.
- jbu 3y ago
  Why is reporting scientific findings considered political?
  - loup-vaillant 3y ago
    Probably because many of those increasingly read like "if we don’t stop this soon we’re all gonna die". The direr the reported consequences of human activities get, the more we think "this scientist is telling me how to live my life". It’s like playing Russian roulette, and having all the fun ruined by some eagle eyed gun expert pointing out that actually, there’s a bullet in that gun. The risk comes from the bullet, but we’re still tempted to be annoyed at the expert instead.
  - _3u10 3y ago
    Because it’s going to quickly go from we observed this which is a finding to we project that the world is going to end unless we do X which is not a scientific finding but rather one of a multitude of opinions on the future which is why climate models are averaged because there is no consensus and even if there was science doesn’t work on consensus. You can tell by the dramatic article that this is why the government doesn’t let people like her give its opinions because her opinion diverges from that of the government.
    - lynx23 3y ago
      Besides, Humans != TheWorld. This planet is going to spin even if we--arguably the biggest issue this planet ever had--are gone. There is this old joke. Two planets meet and have a chat. "So, how are you?" "Well, not good." "Why?" "I have homosapien!" "Don't worry, this will pass." So, no worries, the world is not going to end. And if humans manage to ruin their living conditions so badly that we end up dying out, evolution has just made another important step. After all, it is not like we deserve to survive.
- bananapub 3y ago
  > It's almost as if almost all public servants in all governments are required not to be political publicly and is written into their contracts. I'm framing this, it's a perfect example of the endemic "dumb HN take". 1. asserting some personal desire as a rule 2. asserting it across the entire world 3. ignoring the actual details of the actual thing being discussed (climate change is surely not political in the same way that gravity isn't) 4. having no empathy at all for the actual topic or interest in it 5. despite all of the above, for some reason deciding to post a comment instead of saying nothing
- totetsu 3y ago
  There is case history in this area in Australia. "High court rules public servants can be sacked for political social media posts" https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/07/high-court-rules-public-servants-can-be-sacked-for-political-social-media-posts https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/07/high-... And here is the APS professional standards manual. https://www.dfat.gov.au/about-us/publications/corporate/ethics-integrity-and-professional-standards-policy-manual/chapter-3-values-and-codes-of-conduct https://www.dfat.gov.au/about-us/publications/corporate/ethi...
gameoverhumans 3y ago
This take made me cringe. The only one putting emphasis on the fact that this scientist who has visited Antarctica 20 times in their life happens to be female, is you.
- pineaux 3y ago
  This
defrost 3y ago
You overlooked the other male scientists in the article that spoke out on the same issues?

robertlagrant 3y ago

Is this article written in a different timeline? Climate has been constantly talked about for 20+ years in my one.

gameoverhumans 3y ago
is it really so hard to imagine that perhaps the climate issues that have been "constantly talked about for 20+ years" have been heavily moderated/filtered/co-opted by financial/political interests? The current party line is "holy shit we gotta do something soon or 2100 is gonna be bad, ya'll!". Thing is, essentially nobody today will be alive by 2100. Humans are not very good at thinking in these kinds of timescales. Corporations are hilariously bad at thinking beyond the next quarterly financial report. So if it turns out that we're witnessing irreversible and catastophic changes to important natural systems that many of us will witness first-hand in our own lives, don't you think it's entirely plausible that the people in charge don't want us to learn the full scope of how bad things got under their watch? That the people profiting from this carnage don't want the majority to act in a way that impacts their profits?
- justinclift 3y ago
  > Humans are not very good at thinking in these kinds of timescales. That doesn't really resonate with me, as there are plenty of people who do stuff for the betterment of their kids, grand kids, and so on.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
bananapub 3y ago
? it's specifically about Australia, where the government has largely been climate-denalists for two decades, including sabotaging government research projects: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/16/csiro-abruptly-scraps-globally-recognised-climate-forecast-program https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/16/csiro...

aaron695 3y ago

[dead]

renewiltord 3y ago

Australia is a resource economy. They’re not going to threaten their mines. Beautiful photos though.

nonrandomstring 3y ago

> Bergstrom likens scientists to soothsayers, carrying the burden of being able to see the future, "It plays a heavy toll on your psyche. It's hard to take because we know what's coming down the track." Cassandra complex is a real and horrible state of mind. It affects anyone who has to compartmentalise, or chooses to for whatever reason. I've seen it eat up more than a few people, and it definitely affects me too. My father was in the airforce and went to the South Pacific on nuke tests. He often had the thousand yard stare and "didn't want to talk" about there "being no future". Another member of our family is a climate scientist who did some particularly disturbing research. He has the same look sometimes. He says there's no point telling people - "just live your lives". For me being in cybersecurity is watching a "slow motion suicide by apathy". The unfolding, preventable catastrophe haunts me. But deep down we do want to tell people because even if you can't "change the world" it's hard to live and interact with people you love every day, knowing what you know. Most of the time the Casandra problem is that either nobody believes you, or nobody cares. Bergstrom's problem is that others want to actively prevent her from speaking, which I imagine is worse. Those with power really worry that we "scare the children". I even find myself saying it to fellow hackers when we are giving talks, because the effect of telling the plain truth is not action, but hopelessness, and I don't want to put that on people.

fodkodrasz 3y ago
But was the world burned by nuclear holocaust, or did the Y2K melt down the nuclear powerplants causing a global Chernobyl disaster? Did the ozone layer disappear and did the acid rains kill all forests? Extrapolating from a short period to a distant catastrophe can poison your life, while usually when a problem gets bad enough, then widespread consensus forms against it and appropriate resources are allocated. * Regarding IT security: I surely wouldn't be sleepless over IT security, given my money is reasonably safe and insured. Hackers won't destroy the water supply or nuclear reactors, even if they might be able to, or at most cause some incidents before steps are taken. Terrorists have vast possibilities already, we shouldn't be so arrogant to think that IT is so special that it is especially susceptible to causing some global catastrophe. One can already buy a hacksaw and tear down power lines, no need to hack a powerplant. One can poison water reservoirs, etc. No need for Hollywood drama, where special single points of failure are protected by (lone) heroes, protecting us from the lone maniacs. Our society is vulnerable and fragile, since at least 50 years ago, and it is not being attacked because nobody really wants to attack it. I'm more concerned about the gradual decline of privacy caused by the fear-mongering situations like outlined above. (If you meant this than I misunderstood you, sry.) * - Or we die. We die someday anyway.

barrysteve 3y ago

Knowledge isn't enough. People will ostracize anything. The culture won. The West is a cultural project, and anybody taking knowledge seriously, will be laughed off the planet.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]