Mark J. Heinicke – Page 18 – Forecast: partly sunny with a chance of cataclysms

Holy Coal

Who would have known that fossil fuels are a special gift to humanity from the Divine?

Fred Palmer, that’s who. The Heartland Institute’s ~~holy warrior~~ senior fellow has revealed his elegant chain of reasoning: “Because it’s easy to get to, it’s here and more people live better and longer for it,” therefore “fossil fuels [are] part of a divine plan.”.

This is a guy who says that global warming science is “sophistry. It’s an agenda driven by lawyers who make their own facts. . . . ”

I ought to note here that if you are a Deist—which is the most minimal religious belief this side of atheism—of course all Creation is divine by definition. No argument here. But that’s not the sense in which Palmer makes claims about fossil fuels. He means to elevate fossil fuels above other objects of Creation, special gifts to humankind. Which seems to me a bit dismissive of stuff like oxygen (without which, incidentally, coal, oil, and gas would not burn; oh, but oxygen is used by other animals, so it’s not so special).

Continue reading “Holy Coal”

Stop Pruitt, Zinke

If you’re reading this you’re probably a Democrat, and Senate Democrats are very likely to vote against the Scott Pruitt (EPA) and Ryan Zinke (Interior) nominees, but if you can give them a nudge to prevail upon their Republican colleagues to stop these enemies of environmental regulation, it might help.

I understand both of these characters are now out of committee and going to the Senate floor. Not sure when, maybe today.

“Due to the high volume of calls,” it’s difficult to get through to a senator’s phone at all today, much less speak to a staff member. But you can comment online. Find your senators’ websites by searching on their names. Use the official sites not something pushed on you by Wow or Yahoo.

Thanks!

Mark

Coping in the Data Ocean

Our Oceanic Data Environment and the Paradox of Choice

What is it like to be a bat? is the title of a paper by Thomas Nagel in the Philosophical Review in October 1974 that is widely quoted and discussed among philosophers. But you don’t have to be a philosopher to see that the question goes straight to the mystery of consciousness. Is the consciousness of a bat anything like ours? What about a wolverine, a gecko, a sea urchin?

How does an animal’s environment shape its consciousness? You’d expect that the consciousness of a wandering albatross, who spends months at a time on the wing without ever touching land, has to be wildly different from that of a mole who spends most of its time underground in the space of half an acre.

For more on wandering albatross flight, see this will blow your mind

It’s all very well to imagine yourself a wandering albatross. It sounds like a glorious life, untethered by our bonds to mere stationary places and to people who do not soar thousands of miles at a stretch.

But, what is it like to be a fish?

Continue reading “Coping in the Data Ocean”

Now for Pushback: “Indivisible”

Resistance is not Futile: Coordinated Nationwide Action Getting Traction

Just in case you are not aware of a coordinated national group gathering momentum to resist Trump & Co., check out the link at the end of this post. This group is for real and you can join: local chapters are springing up in places with potential for critical mass.

The emphasis for Indivisible is on pressuring your national-level legislators to. . . well, there are too many issues to enumerate here, but the priority at the moment is trying to save the ACA. For example, here in the Charlottesville area some of our members plan to meet at our (Republican) Congressman’s office Tuesday to make the case against repeal.

Continue reading “Now for Pushback: “Indivisible””

Another Disrupter: Prince Charles

British officials are all in a sweat about Prince Charles possibly confronting Trump over Climate Change when the latter visits UK. White House is telling UK that Prince Charles raising the issue would be “counterproductive.”

Counterproductive!?! Isn’t Climate Change counterproductive enough already without trying to sweep it under the diplomatic rug?

See http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/trump-and-charles-in-climate-row-d2qwb7962

Giving up on Natural: Do We Need Intelligent (Human) Design?

A ‘State of Nature’ Has Been Lost Forever

[Source for this essay is a Washington Post article by Chris Mooney and Brady Dennis in June 2016: see here.]

“‘Let’s get back to that natural environment with humans out of the picture. . .’—that’s a chimera, a false hope. . . it’s too late for that,” declares Melinda Zeder. co-author of a paper published last year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The paper, stuffed with anthropological, paleoecological and archaeological evidence, establishes that humans have been modifying the natural environment for many tens of thousands of years. Well, we knew that. . . and we’ve also been exposed to this line of thinking, if not for tens of thousands of years, for long enough to have drummed into our heads the idea that returning significant portions of the Earth to Nature is a doomed hope.

Continue reading “Giving up on Natural: Do We Need Intelligent (Human) Design?”

Trump Speaks, Many Cringe

This country is rubble and needs to be rebuilt

During Trump’s inauguration address, I was reminded of his observation, many months ago, that “the generals are rubble.” Essentially, our whole country is rubble needing to be rebuilt, was the message he sent today, with a litany of bad stuff and the newly minted term “American Carnage.”

The strangest part of the speech was when he said that the education system has caused our children to be “deprived of all knowledge.” Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos is set to reverse this situation by informing us that public education is a fraud, which is the one piece of knowledge that will get driven into our empty heads.

So, from rubble and absence of knowledge, shall we rise?

That’s not such a good bet, considering how he just excoriated a lot of the people who will be working for him.

Trump Nominees’ Climate Playbook

Fossil Fuel Advancement Playbook Employs the “Climate Change is Real” Admission

In the current week of Senate hearings for Trump’s nominations to head the EPA, the Department of Interior, and the Department of Energy, we have heard variations on a seemingly surprising theme, to wit: Climate Change is real and human activity has something to do with it. Surprising coming from them anyway—Scott Pruitt (EPA), Ryan Zinke (Interior), and Rick Perry (Energy)—all of whom had not so long ago belonged to the Climate Change Denial faction of the Republican Party.

The three are following the same playbook, a series of moves that lead us from the concern that fossil fuels might be messing up our climate, to the conclusion that fossil fuels are the remedy for the potential ills of climate change. Something along the lines of fighting fire with fire, a kind of global homeopathy. Here’s the play:

(1) Admit Climate Change science is not a hoax,

(2) Acknowledge Climate Change may actually be occurring.

(3) Acknowledge, that human activity might contribute in some way to Climate Change.

(4) Question whether the change is happening as quickly as most climate scientists fear.

(5) Question whether, even if it is happening quickly, is it all that dire.

– here between (5) and (6) is the move from hypotheses into policy –

(6) (a) if it is not dire, then other priorities such as economic development with fossil fuels should take precedence over costly efforts to minimize emissions; or (b) if it is dire, then we should move forward on adaptation, for which we will need the economic development made possible by fossil fuels.

Continue reading “Trump Nominees’ Climate Playbook”

Best Read on Trump Appeal in The Guardian

Tom McCarthy writes an insightful article on Trump’s appeal to the working class in The Guardian here. (BTW, Those who do not subscribe to The Guardian may find themselves blocked if they have read too many articles in a given month.)

McCarthy writes with great deftness but without showing off. I especially like his metaphor, that Trump’s victory felt to many people “as if a trapdoor in history had clumsily sprung open and the country fallen through.”

His piece speaks for itself, but there’s one note that I’ve heard rung not only in Northampton County, PA, but elsewhere in the U.S.: that the expression ‘Merry Christmas’ had, while recently under a cloud, had made a welcome comeback. Despite the number of times Obama said ‘Merry Christmas’ (MSNBC played a collage of about ten instances of Obama wishing ‘Merry Christmas’ in various settings), during the last few decades a sense of shame had gotten attached to the expression among Christians who have felt themselves under siege. People got used to saying ‘Happy Holidays,’ but all along have been feeling a loss as well as resentment against the ‘Political Correctness’ that had taken the away the merriment.