Is the ocean broken?

NPR attracts a certain audience whose views would tend to lead in the directions of the poll results you shared. The poll in no way gives an accurate cross-section of America as a whole.

 

You know, in my freshman year at high school, I took earth science. Earth science included weather, climate, plate tectonics, Ice Age effects and oceanography.

My physics courses included information about astro-physics of the Sun, gravity, fluid dynamics, thermo dynamics and magnetism.

My prehistoric history classes included information about prehistoric human migration, ice/ land bridges, the medieval ice age, the lessons of the Cuyahoga River and other industrial/chemical/atomic and human induced disasters.

What specifically about climate change is it 80+% people think should be taught?

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

Congratulations, almost!

How do you plan to use your new degree?

Evolution is a polarizing subject (for some), yet is taught in public schools. What is taught is tailored to the age and abilities of each classroom. AGW would be no different.

 

Greenland's ice sheet has melted to a point of no return, according to new study

 

I don't. My life changed track about two years ago and my wife and I have become serious homesteaders. She has left healthcare and we now do farmer's markets and craft fairs, selling jellies and jams, herb blends, honey from our bees and hand made art themed primarily around our chickens, bees and my interest in sailing and the maritime life.

I got fed up with driving through the Winters of NH, just for one class.

Agreed, however there was a time when the science around Evolution wan't so accepted and that would have made it inappropriate to teach in a primary and secondary setting.

I'm not suggesting the subjects not be addressed at all. I'm only saying these subjects have a place in lessons about the nature of what it means to be human and live in a diverse, free thinking society, not as a hardcoded curricula into itself.

I had an argument with my Physics professor, once, over the idea of the federal government offering funding to private schools, because he did not believe the federal government should fund the teaching of Creationism. My position is that, for subject matter that has gained the status of near universal acceptance, such as Evolution, especially where there is a definate benefit to the forward movement of society, it wouldn't be inappropriate for a government to offer or withhold money on conditions of teaching such material, but it would be hypocritical for it to ban the teaching of material that it found philosophically objectionable. Thus I argued that it would be appropriate for the feds to require the teaching of Evolution, but not appropriate for them to withhold funds for teaching Creationism. He didn't agree was almost violently opposed to the idea that any group should be allowed to teach Creationism.

Establishing a public secondary school curriculum around a subject like Climate Change (Climate Change: the controversial idea that human activity is changing our climate in potentially disastrous ways) would be like requiring students learn computer coding in high school. They do it, but it is not a fundamental skill to base a universal curriculum on.

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

I compared teaching AGW with teaching evolution, but perhaps I should have compared it to teaching sex education in public schools. The reason being that the knowledge of the theory of evolution generally doesn't impact most people's day to day life. However, knowledge of birth control, abortion, family planning, STDs, etc, often does affect us in our day to day life.

The knowledge of the effects of AGW is in between the effects of sex education and evolution. We are already feeling the negative effects of climate change, and those effects will only get worse over time. People and governments will have to make difficult and likely unpopular decisions to reduce those negative effects. If youngsters are brought up knowing about AGW and expecting that society needs to make changes, it will be easier to implement those hard changes.

It's interesting that the opposition to these three tough issues I've mentioned (evolution, sex education, climate change) has come, in large measure, from people's philosophical/religious beliefs, not from scientific disagreements.

 

It it usually the case that philosophy and religion inform scientific opinion.

I know one can reply, "science is not an opinion, it is about facts." but that's what so many before us thought until their "facts" were proven wrong.

The Earth is spherical, but that wasn't alway judged to be a fact. The Earth orbits in an ellipsis around the Sun, but that wan't always considered an apparent fact. The Earth rotates on an axis, but that was not always...

There are a couple of version of a story about Wittgenstein in which he is having a conversation about the Earth rotating on its axis.

One version is that he asks, "why does everyone say it is understandable that people use to believe the Sun went around the Earth?"

He was answered with, "probably because it looks like the Sun is going around the Earth."

To which Wittgenstein asked, "Well, what would it have looked like if it looked like the Earth rotated on its axis?"

The version I like has Wittgenstein and a friend watching the Sun go down at sunset. The friend says, "it is hard to imagine how the ancients believed the Sun orbited around the Earth."

Wittgenstein replied, "I angree, but imagine what it would look like if the Sun did orbit around the Earth."

If you take the Ptolemaic System and compare it to the Copernican System; in its basic form, the planets move, with their relation to Earth, in the same way. Anchor the Sun in the Ptolemaic System while allowing Earth and the rest of the planets to move relative to the Sun , and they move in elliptical orbits.

Philosophy/religion has a great deal to do with how we approach the evidence of the Universe all around us. It is likely to always be thus. Those who claim to be people of science and therefore un-influenced by factors other than facts are not seeing the whole truth, because there is no way to take in only facts, unfiltered by the opinion or belief in others and move through this world. We have to accept, on flimsy anecdotes, analogies, statistical guesswork and simply a decision to include one-self as a member in a given community, and act as though they know the facts.

The fact is, we can't know the facts without going out there and talking the measurements, constructing and testing the models for ourselves. It is unreasonable to say to another group of people, you must agree with these "facts" or else.

There is so much to say about the subject of objectivity versus subjectivity and the rights of expectations of "popular" versus "unpopular" science. It has nothing to do with scientific facts and everything to do with the freedom to choose ignorance over enlightenment.

When we realize that there is no "Knowing" of facts, how can we insist that those who are not in a position to know what we know, must accept our opinion of facts as truth?

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

Yet to have a smoothly functioning society we (that is, those in power) tell people all the time, if not what to believe, then what to do.

We tell people they can't send their kids to school unless they are vaccinated.

We tell agribusiness which pesticides they can use, and how much pesticide residue can be on the harvested produce.

We tell power plant operators how much emissions they can emit and automobile manufacturers what their fleet m.p.g. must be.

etc, etc, etc

While all these rules or laws are made by politicians, science informs much of the information-gathering process. And the reason science is often used, rather than other forms of information-gathering (dice, religious maxims, astrology, etc), is that, in spite of all of its flaws and limitations, it's the best technique we have for determining empirical "facts" (relatively) free of human bias.

Personally, I have no problem encouraging our government to use the information being supplied by climate science to "force" unpleasant decisions upon us, provided that it can be shown that the short-term pain results in long-term gain -- just as the government has made similar decisions regarding the issues I mentioned above.

 

Death Valley hits 130 degrees, thought to be highest temperature on Earth in over a century

Temperatures in Death Valley skyrocketed to a blistering 130 degrees on Sunday — possibly the highest mercury reading on Earth since 1913.

If the National Weather Service’s recording is correct, it would also be among the top-three highest temperatures to have ever been measured in Death Valley, as well as the highest temperature ever seen there during the month of August.

Death Valley holds the record for the highest temperature ever recorded on the planet: 134 degrees in 1913, according to Guinness World Records. That reading has been disputed, however.

 

Well, specifics relating to AGW and climate change.

Curriculums abound on the internet, here's one from Boston with a plan for elementary, middle and high schools...

Climate Lessons — climate curriculum https://www.climatecurriculum.com/climate-lessons-1

So, in the rundown of your personal history, what's the point? What does what you were taught have to do with what you weren't taught?

 

This whole screed is absurdity. How do you even function in life? How do you venture outside without taking the measurements and constructing and testing the models for yourself?

"It has nothing to do with scientific facts and everything to do with the freedom to choose ignorance over enlightenment." And this works for you?

 

NPR is pretty radical, no? Lol I suppose you might be right, it takes intelligence to assimilate facts. It's highly probable more Americans get their facts from Jerry Springer or the Enquirer than NPR.

Let me guess, your go to is Fox News.

https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/themountaineer.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/5/c6/5c6f14b0-f8cc-11e9-98d7-2f650f879c4c/5db5b47c47b97.image.jpg?resize=1200,909

 

This goes along with the complete dispersion of plastics in the ocean and throughout the worldwide food chain, they have developed a method of determining plastics in the human bodies tissues and organs. Since micro and nano plastics offer an ideal vehicle for chemical toxins and disease, this might become a regular part of medical science.

Microplastic particles now discoverable in human organs
New technique expected to enable scientists to find accumulated microplastics in humans
Microplastic particles now discoverable in human organs https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/17/microplastic-particles-discovered-in-human-organs

 

My goto is talk radio. The chart you posted has lefties in the neutral column so is not credible, probably compiled by leftists.

 

Another one bites the dust. No idea if this was intentional or what. On it's way to the ocean...