Gerard Henderson’s Media Watchdog. A really nuanced inside story on the situation in multicultural Sweden, h/t notofan from the Wed forum.
Dan Mitchell. Will Trump drain the swamp? Italy going down.
Agility in Action. At the cutting edge of innovation, a solution to the tomato sauce problem. How to get the last drops out of the bottle. Probably a spinoff from aerospace technology. h/t RWDB
Culture. The descent of the left into tribalism from reasonable social democracy into the hard left. A blast from the past but still sadly relevant. In Defence of Economic Rationalism. Living with bears. Bureaucracy versus the environment.
For nerds. A very perceptive and prescient piece by a CSIRO soil physicist published in 1991 making a number of points that are even more relevant today. Especially, too much use of mathematical models in place of fieldwork. After sketching the ideal of science that he grew up with he wrote.
You may well see this picture as a faded brown snapshot from a distant past that bears no relation to present-day reality. It is, of course, an ideal towards which it is increasingly difficult (and in some degree unrealistic) to aspire. But I do not invoke this ethos of science as an empty exercise. It stays with us as the standard, and deviations from it are a warning of danger. When it ceases to hold the loyalty of the leaders of science the whole scientific exercise is in peril.
This reminds me, as a long time photographer, of many debates that I’ve seen on photography forums where maths teachers and the like bring forth formulas etc regaling what works and what does not. None too surprisingly, you never see any evidence of actual photography to validate their arguments.
I suspect that similar things pervade all manner of professions.
24 february, 2017, michaelsmithnews (video):
That well known champion of lower electricity prices Malcolm Turnbull writes on electricity
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2017/02/that-well-known-champion-of-lower-electricity-prices-malcolm-turnbull-writes-on-electricity.html
Wait. What?
Feb 09, 2010: Turnbull makes the speech Rudd should have
“In December, just a few weeks ago, we had confirmation from three leading scientific organisations—the UK Met Office and, in the United States, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration—that the past decade, the years from 2000 to 2009, was the hottest since record-keeping began …”
NASA Global Temperature Trends: 2008 Annual Summation
“Calendar year 2008 was the coolest year since 2000, according to the Goddard Institute for Space Studies analysis”
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2008/
Check the rest of Turnbull’s parliament speech of 2010 for pricing energy.
3 link limit.
Oops. link: “Believing, as a Liberal, that market forces deliver the most effective solutions…” Turnbull makes the speech Rudd should have
http://www.petermartin.com.au/2010/02/believing-as-liberal-that-market-forces.html
Especially, too much use of mathematical models in place of fieldwork.
Swap out fieldwork with experience and observation and you have what’s wrong with economics and libertarianism
Either Turnbull deliberately lied and misled parliament, or he was poorly informed and advised.
Turnbull should be made to make a note and apology in Hansard and correct his “hottest year evah’ claim.
More on Turnbull’s lie to parliament:
“These dozen climate scientists did not doubt there was an ongoing Pause in 2011”
https://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2011/10/27/candid-comments-from-global-warming-climate-scientists/
Interesting to see that 64 Cats have checked out the Philip article and 58 the Betrayal of liberalism. This is from the statistics of the Rathouse website where these things and many others are located.
A couple more nice bits in the Philip article.
Imagine a 5 year grant nowadays! There is massive pressure to deliver results in a year or two in order to support the next grant application.
Under the sub heading Marxism Persists even if Marx is dead
The inside story by the economist on the situation in Sweden is well worth the read, if not least because real figures are presented, and the guy is quite dispassionate. The summary:
Indeed. If only the bleeding hearts knew a little history.
Wonderful articles linked – about Swedish immigration and on modelling thank you.
John Philips’ observations about the influences of ‘managerialism’ and modelling on science were so clear for a man writing in 1991. As an engineer I see both of these having a pernicious influence. Both are just means to an end, yet practitioners are drawn to treating them as ends in themselves. I don’t see young(er) scientists and engineers able to think and write as clearly as Philips does.
Philips predicted all of the sloppy practice around climate science and the reasons behind it. I wish they showed papers like this to school students and undergrads – but maybe they wouldn’t get it.
The article of the interview with the Iranian Kurd who migrated to Sweden at the age of 9 is fascinating. If a relatively recent immigrant can see the situation so clearly, and articulate it so clearly, why the hell can’t the “leaders” in Sweden, Europe and here in Oz see it? I really do despair for the continuation of our culture.
Touche.
Ditto audio forums – some are prone to ‘paralysis through analysis’, industry Pros always validate.