Hacker News Reader

solarwindon Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

Your argument is ad hominem, a logical fallacy where one attacks the character or motive of the person making an argument rather than the substance of the argument itself.

Furthermore, free speech is a natural human right, to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being, not an Americentrist historical accident.

solarwindon Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

The main thesis of the 1619 project was that the colonists decided to declare their independence from Britain because they wanted to protect the institution of slavery. This is categorically false according to actual historians, and so the NYT had to issue a correction (some 7 months later). None of the leading scholars of the whole period from the Revolution to the Civil War were consulted on the project, yet now it is being taught in some public schools

solarwindon World's Largest Producer of Rubbing Alcohol Can't Manufacturer Hand Sanitizer

The authors of Marginal Revolution are two well-renowned economics professors.

solarwindon Economic Growth Is Incompatible with Biodiversity Conservation

Conflation of "resources" with supply-and-demand. Living near the ocean doesn't use more resources but it's priced higher more because people want to live there bidding up prices. Similarly living in cities cost more because people want to live there (in aggregate).

solarwindon The internet should be a public utility

A few places in the U.S. do already have this system and it works well. The city owns the fiber optic links between your house and a central office, but you get to choose your own ISP (often from dozens of options).

solarwindon The internet should be a public utility

You already know the answer based on the history of repressive regimes that have monopolies on telecom systems.

solarwindon Browser-based climate change simulation

It's not about climate it's about political control. It's a political boogeyman. Left wing politicians have successfully brainwashed a generation to believe they’re gonna die in 12 years unless socialists and communists control our planet and the lives of everyone on it. I was a huge believer in Climate Change as a youth. I wanted to save the environment. Then I caught one lie. Then two. Then three. Then I read the current data. Then I realized they’ve been exaggerating & fear-mongering headlines for decades. No climate apocalyptic predictions with due dates as of today have come true to date.

Nature retracted their very alarmist paper, 10 months after publishing https://retractionwatch.com/category/by-journal/nature-retra...

Whenever there is an extreme weather event, such as a flood or drought, people ask whether that event was caused by global warming. Unfortunately, there is no straightforward answer to this question. Weather is highly variable and extreme weather events have always happened.

I’ve worked with global temperature data, and know that you can produce any shaped global temperature graph you want by picking the right set of stations. There are grossly inadequate amounts of both historical and current data to produce a meaningful long term temperature graph for the earth. Much of the data is fake – by their own admission. https://realclimatescience.com/overwhelming-evidence-of-coll...

Climate scientists openly discussed getting rid of the 1940s warmth in the temperature data without understanding the anomaly. An email unveiled by a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request said: “It would be good to remove at least part of the 1940s blip, but we are still left with why the blip”. http://di2.nu/foia/1254108338.txt

One can download the original and altered data directly from the NOAA. ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ushcn/v2.5 You can see and construct the graphs yourself, first hand, with the data pre-plotted in a Google sheet https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mWanx8ojmOkcazzRhDao... on the “Graphs” tab.

Patrick Moore, Greenpeace co-founder has said: “I can adjust the data to show any trend I like.”

Moore left Greenpeace because he felt they were pushing fear-mongering instead of science and logic. More background on the spat between Mr. Moore and Greenpeace can be found at https://thelibertarianrepublic.com/greenpeace-co-founder-pat...

According to the Toronto Sun, Canada’s Department of the Environment just purged 100 years of data on climate change. Patrick Moore said: “I don’t care why they scrapped the data, that is simply wrong. They could make note of why they don’t trust it but to destroy it is a crime against science and history.” https://twitter.com/EcoSenseNow/status/1174909654297538560 This seems suspicious as no data set should ever be purged, for posterity. This dataset could have simply been deprecated.

Since the NOAA sensors have been unreliable the US has been building a new network higher-quality sensors called the US Climate Reference Network (USCRN) starting in year 2004. The vision of the USCRN program is to maintain a high-quality climate observation network.

It is an error to mis-attribute warming to increased CO2 when many other known causal factors exist. Those other factors are the reason the USCRN was developed, funded, and put in place. The non-CO2 causal factors include increased population density in cities, increased energy use per capita, reduced atmospheric pollution, increased local humidity from human activities (lawn watering, industrial cooling towers), changed site conditions from rural to urban, long-term drought, and wind shadows from buildings in cities. https://sowellslawblog.blogspot.com/2017/03/us-air-temperatu...

The new USCRN data has shown no significant warming trend in the USA in 12 years: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/11/08/the-uscrn-revisited/

The USCRN data is rarely mentioned in NOAA’s monthly and annual “State of the Climate” reports to the U.S. public, instead buried in the depths of the NCDC website, one can get access to the data and have it plotted.

The United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) doesn’t do original research but reports on others’ research, which they call Assessment Reports. There have been 5 thus far.

A scientist working with the IPCC said the IPCC is above Freedom of Information Acts: “One way to cover yourself and all those working in AR5 [Assessment Report 5] would be to delete all emails at the end of the process. … Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get – and has to be well hidden.”

“I’ve discussed this with the main funder (U.S. Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2011/11/23/climateg...

Scientists with NOAA view global warming as a political cause rather than a balanced scientific inquiry and much of the science is weak and dependent on deliberate manipulation of facts and data. https://observer.com/2017/02/noaa-fake-global-warming-data-p...

The IPCC report relies upon six long-term surface temperature datasets to come up with the 0.2°C per decade rate of increase. The report does not cite the two global temperature datasets derived from satellites: the University of Alabama in Huntsville reports that global average temperatures are rising at a rate of 0.13°C per decade, and Remote Sensing Systems reports the rate of increase at 0.18°C per decade. At the UAH rate of warming, the 1.5°C threshold would not be exceeded until around 2070. https://reason.com/2018/10/11/how-big-of-a-deal-is-half-of-a...

The myth of an almost-unanimous climate-change consensus is pervasive. It’s often said that 97% of scientists agree with the anthropogenic climate-change thesis. However, a 2012 poll of American Meteorological Society members also reported a diversity of opinion. 11% attributed the phenomenon to human activity and natural causes in about equal measure, while 23% said enough is not yet known to make any determination.

Source: https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/10/climate-change-no-its...

The UN has been making the same claim that we only have twelve years to save the planet from global warming, for the past 30 years.

The 12-year deadline is a talking point for politicians. However the IPCC said there is not some “magic global mean temperature or total emissions that separate 'fine' from 'catastrophic’”

Source: https://www.axios.com/climate-change-scientists-comment-ocas... , https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/15/children-strike-school-cl...

Someone at Reason read the UN/IPCC report, said there is no doomsday in it. https://reason.com/2018/10/11/how-big-of-a-deal-is-half-of-a...

No climate apocalyptic predictions have come true to date, despite 50 years of such predictions.

https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-failed-eco-pocalyp...

solarwindon Browser-based climate change simulation

Goes both ways. The alarmists using "carbon" as a synonym for carbon dioxide is a form of propaganda. https://www.cfact.org/2019/04/25/carbon-is-not-a-synonym-for...

solarwindon Climate talks break up with no agreement on carbon trading

Carbon is not a synonym for carbon dioxide. https://www.cfact.org/2019/04/25/carbon-is-not-a-synonym-for...

solarwindon SUVs second biggest cause of emissions rise, figures reveal

I can't take anyone seriously who says "carbon" when he means carbon dioxide.

solarwindon Climate change has turned permafrost into a carbon emitter

Carbon is not a synonym for carbon dioxide.

solarwindon Dealing with China Isn’t Worth the Moral Cost

There was a photograph of a protester holding a sign saying "We need the second amendment": https://www.breitbart.com/asia/2019/07/29/hong-kong-proteste...

solarwindon Dealing with China Isn’t Worth the Moral Cost

The New York Times must have a policy that it will not publish an article if it doesn't have at least a couple snarky digs at "capitalism" and Trump, no matter how tangential to the subject matter.

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

The USCRN is a new network of 143 stations that wasn't fully completed in 2008 (started in 2001 with data becoming available 2004). The data prior to 2004 is from the historical sensor network (USHCN).

The whole reason the USCRN was built was because of the problems with the historical network. The USCRN was designed to get more reliable measurements.

The aforementioned spreadsheet illustrates the problems with the USHCN data.

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

Though I do agree with the sentiment that disproving bullshit is more work than writing it, the linked Google Sheet is a literal import of the raw and modified data sets freely downloadable from the NOAA ftp site.

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

Also, the 12-year deadline is a talking point for politicians. However the IPCC said there is not some “magic global mean temperature or total emissions that separate 'fine' from 'catastrophic’” [1]

1. https://www.axios.com/climate-change-scientists-comment-ocas...

Someone at Reason read the UN/IPCC report, said there is no doomsday in it: https://reason.com/2018/10/11/how-big-of-a-deal-is-half-of-a...

There's also a lot of questionable stuff.

The NOAA data adjustments and climate scientists openly discussing getting rid of the 1940s warmth: https://realclimatescience.com/61-fake-data/ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T86IIKK9FRg

Lack of warming trend in the raw data: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mWanx8ojmOkcazzRhDao...

The new USCRN data showing no significant warming trend in the USA in 12 years: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/11/08/the-uscrn-revisited/

The Canadian data purge: https://twitter.com/EcoSenseNow/status/1174909654297538560

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

So newspapers, which are not primary sources, and have a long history of parroting climate alarmism predictions that have never come true: https://twitter.com/robbystarbuck/status/1175075616699355139

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

False. All of the sources in the blog are cited; you obviously didn't look carefully enough before arriving at your conclusion.

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

What about the NOAA data adjustments and climate scientists openly discussing getting rid of the 1940s warmth: https://realclimatescience.com/61-fake-data/ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T86IIKK9FRg

And lack of warming trend in the raw data: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mWanx8ojmOkcazzRhDao...

And the new USCRN data showing no significant warming trend in the USA in 12 years: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/11/08/the-uscrn-revisited/

And the Canadian data purge: https://twitter.com/EcoSenseNow/status/1174909654297538560

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

What are your primary sources for these statements, or are you just parroting what you've heard? Have you looked at any of the raw data?

solarwindon How climate change is melting, drying and flooding Earth – in pictures

What sources do you have for this, or is this just your opinion?

solarwindon Employer health plans are getting pricier and skimpier

This. Spreading the cost of something that's getting increasingly more expensive across the populace doesn't solve the fundamental factors that are causing that thing to become more expensive in the first place. It also removes the incentives to fix the underlying issues.

solarwindon Why media layoffs keep happening

This. I used to think "fake news" was far-right baloney, but I've come to lose all faith in the journalistic integrity of the New York Times and WaPo. This recent piece for the NYT was a bizarrely flattering story about an anti-gay, anti-Semitic hate group is a good example. They have a narrative to push and will push it with any available facts and information.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/23/us/black-hebrew-israelite...

solarwindon Sweden's cashless society is no longer a utopia

If you are a Canadian citizen who ever used a credit/debit card at a cannabis dispensary (or if you even just invested or worked for a Canadian dispensary), you are now permanently barred from entering the United States. A cashless society is a totalitarian society.

solarwindon Anti-Tax Fervor Closed Their Libraries. Now Residents Are Trying to Go It Alone

According to this it is a non-profit corporation open to the public. A corporation is just a legal structure around ownership interest. The corporate shareholder structure allowed the shareholders to collectively share their books in the library which they provided to the public. Nothing about being exclusive to the rich.

Income is a continuum. Schooling (not to be confused with education) at its essence is just a room with a teacher, pupils and study materials. It can be realistically attained by nearly all income levels but the extreme lowest.

solarwindon Anti-Tax Fervor Closed Their Libraries. Now Residents Are Trying to Go It Alone

I'm not sure if most people know that the first libraries in America were privately funded subscription services, established by Benjamin Franklin. The first American lending library (Library Company of Philadelphia) was set up in 1731, where it operated for literally over 100 years as a private institution, and exists to this day as a nonprofit. The first taxpayer-funded public library was established 102 years later, in 1833 (New Hampshire Town Library). The optional market good served its clientele better than the non-optional public service for over 100 years.

From the Revolutionary War to 1800, when the national government was in Philadelphia, the Library Company also served as the Library of Congress. Until the 1850s it was the largest public library in America. All of the books the Library Company acquired year by year over more than two and a half centuries are still on its shelves, along with many others added since it was transformed into a research library in the 1950s. In the 21st century, the Library Company serves as a resource for a variety of readers, from high school students to senior scholars, from novelists to film producers, and anyone else with an interest in our collections.

https://librarycompany.org/about-lcp/

solarwindon Signal’s Moxie Marlinspike calls out Telegram founder Pavel Durov

https://medium.freecodecamp.org/why-i-asked-my-friends-to-st...

This article explains a lot better than I can some of the security tradeoffs with Whatsapp, particularly in regard to metadata and data collection.

Also, the worst UX? IMO Signal looks and feels much better and less cluttered than WhatsApp, Wire and Hangouts. Only Telegram has a superior UX (and a really nice QT native desktop app), IMO.