Category Archives: Technology and Society

History, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

#SciTech2016

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I’ve been at the SciTech2016 conference in San Diego (drove down from LA this morning ahead of most of the rain). Posting will probably remain light until tomorrow afternoon or Thursday, when I get back to the office.

I should say, though, that Bill Anders was very politically incorrect in the plenary session this morning. He was basically singing from my hymnal, about the obsession with safety, and Apollo not being about space, and he had unkind words to say about Orion, with a poor young woman from the program sitting on the dais with him (it was pretty funny when Ann Sulkosky and another Lockmart guy came up to him afterwards to gently remonstrate with him). It was particularly hilarious, because they’re the primary sponsor of the conference; there was a big Lockmart logo above them.

I introduced myself, and gave him a copy of the book. He said he’d read it (future tense), and I hope he does. It’s nice to run into an Apollo astronaut who’s thinking in 21st-century terms. He said Elon was on his poop list (he used a different word) because he was one of the few Apollo guys who had stood up for him against Cunningham and Cernan, but Elon had stood him up for lunch. I don’t think Apollo astronauts are used to being stood up for lunch.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

“Expert Climate Economists”

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Are apparently morons:

When asked at what date climate change will have a net negative impact on the global economy, the median survey response was 2025. In the recent past, climate change likely had a net positive impact on the global economy, due primarily to the effect of carbon fertilization on crops and other plant life. However, even contrarian economists agree, when accounting for the vulnerability of poorer countries to climate impacts, global warming has been hurting the global economy since about 1980.

The NYU survey asked when the economic benefits we experienced up to 1980 would be completely wiped out; 41% of respondents said that’s already happened. Another 25% answered that it would happen within a decade, and 26% said we’d see net negative economic impacts by 2050. If we continue with business-as-usual pollution and warming, on average the experts predicted a GDP loss of about 10% by the end of the century, and that there would be a 20% chance of a “catastrophic” loss of one-quarter of global GDP.

There is no scientific evidence to believe any of this.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

The Science Is Settled

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I don’t believe that science is done by “consensus,” but if you are sufficiently unfamiliar with how science works that you do, the consensus seems to be that CAGW is a crock:

Only 36 percent of geoscientists and engineers believe that humans are creating a global warming crisis, according to a survey reported in the peer-reviewed Organization Studies. By contrast, a strong majority of the 1,077 respondents believe that nature is the primary cause of recent global warming and/or that future global warming will not be a very serious problem.

It’s also worth noting that the BS 97% number is not about CAGW.

Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Technology and Society

Star Wars

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…and the age of the fake nerd.

I suppose that’s still better than taking pride in your ignorance of math, as some do. As I noted on Twitter yesterday, it’s OK to like Star Wars, as long as you don’t delude yourself that it’s science fiction.

[Wednesday-morning update]

Star Wars TFA has a perfection problem. Note (FWIW) that Megan is married to SF film critic Peter Suderman.

[Bumped]

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

The Space Mess In Russia

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Bob Zimmerman has some thoughts:

Overall, Rogozin’s comments suggest that there is a great deal of confusion within Putin’s government on what to do in space. On one hand he says they want to do it cheaper. On the other he says they want to build a very expensive rocket. Then with his third hand he adds that they still plan to go to the Moon, but also took out his fourth hand to note that their goal is not the Moon or Mars, but doing things cheaper.

I’m encouraged that they want to copy us in our folly of building a giant rocket. It will hold them back just as it does us.