Dan Kennedy: Scientific Illiterate, Global Warming Hysteric

If you want to know how the press decided that a “scientific consensus” exists around global warming, you only have to take a look at Dan Kennedy, a professor of journalism at Northeastern University.

Kennedy is a full fledged global warming hysteric. Of course, the reason for this is that he is an all around extreme left loon. The global warming hysteria is only his current excuse for increasing everybody's taxes and regulating every business on earth. Once the current hysteria fades away, Kennedy will find another one, and that one will also require increasing everybody's taxes and regulating every business on earth.

Kennedy has never read a primary scientific source paper in his life. I know this because I challenged him to read about scientists who are skeptical of global warming. I even helped him out by explaining to him how to conduct a Google search or a Wikipedia search to discover these scientists.  Apparently, he'd never considered this.  Perhaps his browser doesn't support this functionality.  Kennedy refused to even read the views of these scientists.  Instead, he ran directly to The New York Times, a rabid partisan in the global warming debate, and then denounced scientists who opposed his theory to be “tools of the oil companies.”  Apparently, producing oil and gas is evil.

I'll decipher the “scientific consensus” for you. Reporters like Kennedy read only the popular press, and they read only their leftist ideological comrades. Kennedy and his comrades have decreed that scientists who are skeptical of his theories are evil “tools of the oil companies.” The only real scientists, according to Kennedy, are the ones who agree with him.

Kennedy is a scientific illiterate. His degree is in a literary discipline.  He's never worked in a scientific field.

I am a competent computer programmer, with the ability to write high level applications in C++, Visual Basic, Javascript and Actionscript, among other languages. I've worked for a pharmaceutical company programming applications for use in the clinical trials process. In addition, I'm about half way through an LPN certification program, so I have a good understanding of anatomy, physiology and pharmacology. In short, I know a hell of lot more about scientific methodology than Dan Kennedy.  And I'm very skeptical about global warming.  Humans exhale CO2.  Plants inspire CO2 in order to grow.

The great “scientific consensus” was created by extreme leftist reporters, like Kennedy, working for papers across America. They decreed that the only “legitimate” scientists were those who agreed with them.

Incidently, Kennedy's column today in the U.K. Guardian was provoked by comments that I made in his blog. Kennedy wrote a column a couple of weeks ago in which he said that conservatives were stupid and unscientific. His proof? They are skeptical of global warming. So, I pointed him to this post in Anne Althouse's blog about Al Gore. Althouse is a law professor at the University of Wisconsin.

In true leftist lunatic fashion, Kennedy responds to Althouse's post by declaring that she “smeared” Gore, thus martyring the poor guy. Of course, Kennedy has assumed the Althouse is a political enemy. I've been reading Althouse for a couple of years. She doesn't have a fixed position on global warming.

“If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem,” was the slogan of the old commies at SDS. Kennedy is a true leftist loon in this tradition.

So much for that "scientific consensus." It was invented by loony leftists like Dan Kennedy. And they are all scientific illiterates.

Comments

[Pwthornton]

Here are some of the people pushing climate change hysteria: NASA, MIT, NOAA, etc, etc, etc.

You know, basically educated scientists who look at actual data That's what you do, right?

I bet they are a bunch of scientific illiterates, leftists, wacko, elitists. Am I right?

Us real 'Muricans, we don't need no stinking data. When I walked outside today it was cold. This must point to global colding.

[Shouting Thomas]

Well, I wasn't talking about about NASA. I was talking about Dan Kennedy, who is a scientific illiterate.

Unfortunately, the entire range of institutions you've mentioned have all been tainted by the actions of the IPCC.

To be a skeptic is the proper role of anyone interested in the sciences. Reproducible evidence is what counts.

When you're advocating taxing every individual and regulating every business on earth, you bear a very high burden of proof.

Thanks for dropping by.

[Michael Pahre]

You wrote the words "primary scientific source paper."

I'm a research scientist who has published more than 100 scientific papers. I have never, ever heard anybody use that term that you accuse Kennedy of not understanding.

I Googled the term "primary scientific source paper" (using quotes) and find only one hit: your blog. The term doesn't exist.

Since you have invented a term, would you please define it? And apologize to Kennedy for accusing him of not understanding a term that doesn't exist?

[Shouting Thomas]

The meaning of the term of is clear.

It means to actually read the work of a scientist, rather than to read characterizations of his work in the popular press.

You've managed, as you intended to, to avoid the crux of what I said. Political discussions of these sorts quickly devolve into macho battles of men demanding that other men cry "uncle," which is what you are doing.

I challenged Kennedy to actually read the work of a scientist who is a global warming skeptic. He refused and, instead, read a summary article about skeptical scientists in the New York Times.

The Times apparently denounced that scientist as a "tool of the oil industry." On that basis, Kennedy refused to even read material that that scientist had written.

Would you like to respond to what I actually said? Kennedy believes there is a "scientific consensus" because he refuses to actually read the work of scientists who do not share his political opinions.

This is worth talking about. Your macho posturing is a bore. If you want to play bullying games, as you apparently do, you can fuck off.

This is akin to somebody denouncing one of the papers you'd written, based solely on a review he'd read in the popular press, and refusing to read the paper itself.

And, as Dan Kennedy says, you may just be a complete impostor. More likely you're one of his students that he is indoctrinating in his class. Wouldn't surprise me at all.

[Dan Maloney]

Give 'em 'ell, Thomas!

[Jeremy Smith]

I don't think you being a nurse and a computer geek is any qualification to dispute global warming. Yes it's real! Yes it's a scientific consensus! I am a graduate student of ecology. You sir are scientifically illiterate!

[Shouting Thomas]

I've lived through several dozen environmental apocalypses during my 63 years on this earth. Many of them have contradicted earlier apocalypses.

Several decades ago, it was global cooling that was the impending disaster.

Oddly, the people pushing these apocalyptic scenarios always favor governmental control of the entire economy. Environmental apocalypses are always the reason they cite for shutting down free markets.

I long since have learned to discount the Chicken Littles as having a secondary agenda that has nothing to do with the environment.

[Jeremy Smith]

What is the agenda of the scientific community?
If you are right than maybe we should stop regulating vehicle emissions. Have you ever been to Beijing China?

[Shouting Thomas]

I haven't been to China, but I have spent considerable time in SE Asia and the Philippines, where air pollution is a serious problem.

The agenda of much of the scientific community is to continue to get grants and funding. The money in the environmental arena is all on the side of more regulation, because it is governmental agencies that control grants and funding. Governmental agencies have a natural predisposition to more regulation because that creates bureaucratic jobs.

Wealth creation is what leads people to demand clean air and water. The U.S. and Western Europe are wealthy societies, so they have moved on to demanding a higher quality of living. Poor societies are too driven by the desire to provide for basic necessities to do that. Give China and the Philippines some time and you'll see the demand for a clean environment emerge.

I remain unconvinced that CO2 is a pollutant in the same manner as leaded gasoline. If you are demanding an end to free market economies and the shutdown of whole industries like the coal industry, the burden of proof on you is sky high.