Tuesday 23 December 2014

Foundations

 There are lots of things in mainstream thought, viewpoint and activity, that seemingly just "are". If you were to ask anyone about those subjects, they would just respond like it was a truth carved in stone. They've never questioned whether it's true or not. That's almost understandable because everyone's parroting it with the same level of conviction.

The funny thing is when they're explored, many of these have stories have weak or questionable foundations. This is especially true of the scare stories. Take for example, the oft quoted "the average Briton is caught on CCTV x times per day." All sorts of people love that phrase. Turns out, its roots lie in a piece of fiction about a theoretical character and slowly it drifted into mainstream thought via an academic paper. Similarly, the Y2K bug which had industry and government running around in a blind panic, creating a lot of well paid IT consultants was a lot less scary and likely than the activity and spend indicated. What makes his story worse and relevant to this post is that when it first began its journey into into hype, the disaster being alluded to was unlikely and the people who started it knew that.

There's another story already out there and has people running around panicking. More importantly, a lot of people have made a lot of money off this and continue to do so whilst it remains a sacred cow. We all know it as global warming. One of its foundations is the subject of ocean acidification. That general idea is that the sea is turning into one giant, life ending vat of acid that will burn everything in it alive. The warmists love to trot it out as fact without question.

However, it looks this foundation is having some of its foundation science questioned. I suspect, judging by the way the strong hint he was given to desist from his research, the discoverer may be on to something. As they say, if you're taking flak, you're getting close to the target.

I'll let Watts Up with That take up the story

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/12/23/touchy-feely-science-one-chart-suggests-theres-a-phraud-in-omitting-ocean-acidification-data-in-congressional-testimony/