3 ms·

Jo Nova is anti-vax, anti-govt, libertarian, climate-skeptical, etc. Totally on form for her to be bagging the ABC, one of her favourite targets. Interesting

Jo Nova is anti-vax, anti-govt, libertarian, climate-skeptical, etc. Totally on form for her to be bagging the ABC, one of her favourite targets. Interesting reading sometimes, but also read the sources. Her interpretations can be wild. Thankfully, she usually cites the sources.

kybernetyk 2y ago
>anti-govt, libertarian oh god, no
defrost 2y ago
Meh, corporate shill masquerading as a "science presenter" is closer to the mark. Nova is happy enough to sing the praises of the Australian Liberal | National coalition when it comes to climate (or lack thereof) policy. They (husband and wife) jumped on fossil fuel funded think tank money some decades back and make bank as "voices of reason" casting FUD on the waters and rehashing the greatest hits of How to Lie with Statistics in new(ish) and innovative ways, mostly her anti-climate science stuff is straight up misdirect which both herself and husband are qualified to know is incorrect.
- marcus_holmes 2y ago
  I get the "corporate shill" angle, but I'm not so convinced by it. It's entirely possible to be both convinced of a cause's rightness and also funded by other people who think the cause is right. I don't agree with her take on any of it, but I'm also glad that someone is out there saying it (while citing their sources, obviously). We need this. We may not like it, but we need it. <prepares to be downvoted to oblivion> ;)
  - ggm 2y ago
    Why do we need it?
    - defrost 2y ago
      Peak counter argument .. as weak as it is.
    - marcus_holmes 2y ago
      We always need heretics. People willing to say the unsayable, and contradict the consensus. If everyone follows dogma, we get more dogma. Everything becomes dogmatic. We end up with Lysenkoism and science stops working. Tolerance for other points of view is good. You never know, they might be right. Plate tectonics was prompted by someone saying "isn't it weird that Africa looks like it fits into South America?" and was ridiculed for it. This is not uncommon in science. I know the climate science community has been under attach by the fossil fuel lobby using scientific doubt as a lever to create real problems. But that doesn't mean we should abandon doubt in science. It is necessary to doubt scientists, make them prove their case. Scepticism is a cornerstone of the scientific principle. No-one gets to say "I am a professional scientist, therefore what I say is true" because then that stops being science and starts being religion. Yes it's painful, even harmful, when a muppet on Facebook with zero knowledge is contradicting someone who spent years or even decades studying a subject, but that's better than going the other way; where no-one is allowed to contradict the official truth. Having someone like Jo Nova screaming weird shit at the fringes of society is good for science.
  - defrost 2y ago
    I was referring to the Nova blog posts that attack climate science; eg. one's that make a big deal about small outliers as though those invalidate large means, etc. Nova posts on climate get bandied about in online heated climate discussions a lot and there are sites that take each of these (and other such articles) apart piece by piece and rebut them on their arguments. Theses posts don't make the case that they claim to and people with a BSc (like "Nova") should be aware of just how weak their own argumentss are particularly when presented time and time again with dot points on the problems. After literal decades of this it's difficult to believe that Nova is still acting in good faith, convinced that everybody in the climate sciences is wrong and she alone is a light of truth in the wilderness. Other blog posts on other topics vary, this linked one is a bit OTT about a take down of AI generated research papers - as others have pointed out there are better articles reporting the same thing, and I agree that such papers are a problem. This will no doubt be forever future folded into a narative about the failures of "Big Science" that's hardly applicable save by adjacency. > I don't agree with her take on any of it, but I'm also glad that someone is out there saying it. I certainly wouldn't suppress it, and frankly if Jo Nova et al are the best "science" voices the anti-climate crowd can muster it only serves to strengthen the case for AGW.

kybernetyk 2y ago

>anti-govt, libertarian oh god, no

defrost 2y ago

Meh, corporate shill masquerading as a "science presenter" is closer to the mark. Nova is happy enough to sing the praises of the Australian Liberal | National coalition when it comes to climate (or lack thereof) policy. They (husband and wife) jumped on fossil fuel funded think tank money some decades back and make bank as "voices of reason" casting FUD on the waters and rehashing the greatest hits of How to Lie with Statistics in new(ish) and innovative ways, mostly her anti-climate science stuff is straight up misdirect which both herself and husband are qualified to know is incorrect.

marcus_holmes 2y ago
I get the "corporate shill" angle, but I'm not so convinced by it. It's entirely possible to be both convinced of a cause's rightness and also funded by other people who think the cause is right. I don't agree with her take on any of it, but I'm also glad that someone is out there saying it (while citing their sources, obviously). We need this. We may not like it, but we need it. <prepares to be downvoted to oblivion> ;)
- ggm 2y ago
  Why do we need it?
  - defrost 2y ago
    Peak counter argument .. as weak as it is.
  - marcus_holmes 2y ago
    We always need heretics. People willing to say the unsayable, and contradict the consensus. If everyone follows dogma, we get more dogma. Everything becomes dogmatic. We end up with Lysenkoism and science stops working. Tolerance for other points of view is good. You never know, they might be right. Plate tectonics was prompted by someone saying "isn't it weird that Africa looks like it fits into South America?" and was ridiculed for it. This is not uncommon in science. I know the climate science community has been under attach by the fossil fuel lobby using scientific doubt as a lever to create real problems. But that doesn't mean we should abandon doubt in science. It is necessary to doubt scientists, make them prove their case. Scepticism is a cornerstone of the scientific principle. No-one gets to say "I am a professional scientist, therefore what I say is true" because then that stops being science and starts being religion. Yes it's painful, even harmful, when a muppet on Facebook with zero knowledge is contradicting someone who spent years or even decades studying a subject, but that's better than going the other way; where no-one is allowed to contradict the official truth. Having someone like Jo Nova screaming weird shit at the fringes of society is good for science.
- defrost 2y ago
  I was referring to the Nova blog posts that attack climate science; eg. one's that make a big deal about small outliers as though those invalidate large means, etc. Nova posts on climate get bandied about in online heated climate discussions a lot and there are sites that take each of these (and other such articles) apart piece by piece and rebut them on their arguments. Theses posts don't make the case that they claim to and people with a BSc (like "Nova") should be aware of just how weak their own argumentss are particularly when presented time and time again with dot points on the problems. After literal decades of this it's difficult to believe that Nova is still acting in good faith, convinced that everybody in the climate sciences is wrong and she alone is a light of truth in the wilderness. Other blog posts on other topics vary, this linked one is a bit OTT about a take down of AI generated research papers - as others have pointed out there are better articles reporting the same thing, and I agree that such papers are a problem. This will no doubt be forever future folded into a narative about the failures of "Big Science" that's hardly applicable save by adjacency. > I don't agree with her take on any of it, but I'm also glad that someone is out there saying it. I certainly wouldn't suppress it, and frankly if Jo Nova et al are the best "science" voices the anti-climate crowd can muster it only serves to strengthen the case for AGW.