It’s always been a pointless scam, and it’s becoming ever more clear. As Glenn has noted, all the sorting and binning is mostly a religious ritual.
Category Archives: Science And Society
Climate Change
It has (finally) run its course:
A good indicator of why climate change as an issue is over can be found early in the text of the Paris Agreement. The “nonbinding” pact declares that climate action must include concern for “gender equality, empowerment of women, and intergenerational equity” as well as “the importance for some of the concept of ‘climate justice.’ ” Another is Sarah Myhre’s address at the most recent meeting of the American Geophysical Union, in which she proclaimed that climate change cannot fully be addressed without also grappling with the misogyny and social injustice that have perpetuated the problem for decades.
The descent of climate change into the abyss of social-justice identity politics represents the last gasp of a cause that has lost its vitality. Climate alarm is like a car alarm—a blaring noise people are tuning out.
On the other hand, next month will be the sixth anniversary of the blog post that Michael Mann is suing me for. It’s been almost a year and a half since we requested an en banc rehearing of our appeal in the case to the DC court of appeals, with no response.
How To Know If You Can Have A Conversation About Climate
Yes, all of these are a sign that the belief is religious, not scientific or rational.
Asimov And O’Neill
The Space Studies Institute has resurrected a old television discussion of the prospects for space colonies.
It’s interesting to note that when this occurred, we didn’t know how much hydrogen was available on the moon and in the rest of the solar system.
Reversing Aging
The latest, and it looks promising. Humans aren’t rodents, but no reason in principle we shouldn’t be able to do similar things.
[Tuesday-evening update]
Intermittent fasting seems to help. I’ve been doing this as part of my weekday routine for a while. I go all day without eating until dinner time, other than coffee in the morning, but it’s mostly out of convenience rather than for health reasons. I’m glad to hear it might be good for me.
[Bumped]
The Latest Safety Insanity
OK, so I read this, and the steam that shot out of my ears took the fresh paint off the wall of the kitchen on both sides of the room:
His committee recommended that NASA and the other ISS partners should plan for ways to operate the station with a reduced crew if commercial crew vehicles aren’t ready to enter service by the fall of 2019.
“Given these schedule risks, we recommend the partnership pursue plans to protect for a minimum crew capability to ensure ISS viability during the flight development phase,” he said. “NASA’s biggest priority is maintaining the U.S. presence on the ISS in case the commercial crew launch dates slip.”
One option he mentioned at the meeting is “providing training to Russian crewmembers on the USOS critical systems.” That training, he said, would be provided to cosmonauts scheduled to fly to the station on Soyuz missions in September 2019 and March 2020.
So, let me get this straight: In order to avoid any risk of loss of crew (and there is no way to do that), we are going to not only make ourselves more dependent on the Russians, but further reduce, if not eliminate any actual utility we’re going to get out of a facility in which we’ve invested over a hundred billion dollars and, as a bonus, put that facility at risk.
All because “safety is the highest priority.”
This is insane.
The Jaguar
…is made for the age of humans. A nice nature piece from Nadia Drake.
And though this is a leopard, not a jaguar, it’s interesting.
It's always seemed pretty clear to me that my cats knew what a mirror was, and didn't treat it like another cat. But maybe the leopard is figuring it out. https://t.co/8z4UnokOs6
— Rand Simberg (@Rand_Simberg) May 10, 2018
Rejuvenation
This seems like a very promising approach. First dogs, then use the revenue to do clinical trials on humans. I’m holding up pretty well for my age, but I’d really like to set the clock back.
[Update a few minutes later, after reading]
I’d note that one of the “diseases of aging” listed is diabetes. I think it’s pretty clear at this point that this is mostly a problem of poor diet, based on decades of criminally terrible nutrition recommendations, and can largely be reversed by simply going keto. In fact, they’ve found that it can even be an effective treatment for Type 1 (and it was, prior to the development of insulin).
[Thursday-morning update]
New at Analog: Can we reverse aging?
[Via Gary Hudson]
[Bumped]
Fasting
It may aid in the regeneration of stem cells. I do this almost every day. Not quite 24 hours, but I often don’t eat from when I go to bed until dinner the next evening. Other than morning coffee, which I don’t think would count, given its utter lack of nutrients.
The Big Mac Diet
This is quite a record.
The unhealthiest thing about a Big Mac is the bun. This story doesn't say what else he ate: https://t.co/zFggBxH6rm
If he skipped the fries and soft drinks, a Big Mac diet per se wouldn't be that big a problem.
— Rand Simberg (@Rand_Simberg) May 6, 2018