Harold 'Hal' Lewis of the University of California at Santa Barbara

There have been a number of prominent scientists (including at least on Nobel prize scientist) who have made similar announcements over the last 40 or so years (mostly in the last 5 years that I am aware of).  This has not had any effect, except as beacons of light to those rare [scientists, amateurs] struggling [alone, in tiny groups] against the problem.  Many people's [careers, lives] have been destroyed by scientists, but who cares?  When do we hear about that?

I agree strongly with much what he says, and that reflects what many others have said for a long time.  MOST of those pointing this out are non-scientists, but falsely-placed confidence (especially by [government, academic] scientists, ignores the "gifted" amateurs, then eventually a few of them steal their concepts and claim them as their own (as with much of the fixes to scientific concepts themselves).  Some of Lewis's statement I like :

• The giants no longer walk the earth, and the money flood has become the raison d’être of much physics research, the vital sustenance of much more, and it provides the support for untold numbers of professional jobs.
  
• Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.)
• but the then President immediately launched a hostile investigation of where we got the e-mail addresses
• Lewis provides concrete descriptions of specific events and what people did (many other "skeptics" have done that for a very long time)
  

From my "multiple conflicting hypothesis" practice, I don't throw out mainstream [science, commentary], but nor do I throw out alternate viewpoints.

There are, however, key differences in my "multiple conflicting hypothesis" viewpoint from what Lewis states.  That's why

• Lewis :  "...   Some have held that the physicists of today are not as smart as they used to be, but I don’t think that is an issue.  ..."
• Here he misses out key points :
  
• they are no smarter than they used to be, in spite of their powerful [tools, equipment, eduction, work experience].  One could argue that scientists of the past had to be far better at thinking to get the results they obtained with just a pen, pencil, and tiny or non-existent budgets.
  
• there are far more [strong, creative revolutionary] thinkers in the general population outside of science than within it.  If they are [interested, motivated] to spend the time going into the details of the [math, science], then they beat essentially all [government, academic] scientists at their own game.  Of course, there are [strong, creative revolutionary] thinkers in [government, academic] science, but the one in [10,000, million] rules apply to them just as for the general population in spite of their training and experience.
• [strong, creative revolutionary] thinking is not a reliable property of any one person - it is issue-specific for some reason
• "...   but I don’t think that is an issue.   ..."  -  Nuts to that, it's the BASIS of the issue!!
  
• Lewis : "...   I think it is the money, exactly what Eisenhower <...the Eisenhower warning is frequently quoted...> warned about a half-century ago. There are indeed trillions of dollars involved, to say nothing of the fame and glory (and frequent trips to exotic islands) that go with being a member of the club.   ..."
• I guess that this is a KEY factor, but not the basic problem, and that it is vastly exaggerated.  I see this as a perennial weakness of Western [philosophy, thinking] that impedes progress in many areas, not just science.
• NOTE :   While Eisenhower's phrase "military-industrial complex" is a universal truth, the socialist "government-academia complex" is unknown, and is vastly more dangerous.
  
• Lewis :  "...   I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.   ..."
• NONSENSE -  A vast number of scientists (probably a very strong majority?) have probably read at least part of the ClimateGate information.  It cannot have any effect on scientists (people) who simply reject it out of hand, and that is the over-whelming majority of them.   This speaks volumes about how they actually think :  as intellectual robots.
• My expression "strong thinker" is limited to the cognitive part, while moral issues are something I don't address.  It's funny though, I guess that what we perceive as [moral, ethical] depends on the parts of our thinking that over-ride this judgment and subsequent actions.  My personal example is he subconscious delay in payment, and delay in changing stupid spending, when my finances get tight.  It isn't a "conscious thing", so much as an automatic behaviour.  I think that evolutionary social behaviour actually favours "pre-empted" morality, as it's easier to survive that way in society.
  
• As I've stated before, to me the basic issue is the catastrophic failure of [rational, rational, logical] thinking by essentially ALL scientists in essentially ALL areas of science.
  
• The money thing certainly sways this, but CANNOT possibly explain why almost all scientists [strongly, sincerely] believe in their scientific "religion" in spite of over-whelming evidence to the contrary, and in spite of their proclaimed [thinking, behaviours].  This is completely confirmed when you know the scientists well and can judge for yourself the basis of their thinking and behaviour. 
  
• Modern education does next to nothing to reduce the problem, and I suspect that this has been a big issue going throughout ancient civilisation and probably before then.
• This is a failure of Cognition at the simplest level, and it is telling us something very important that we don't want to hear, and cannot fix.
• While I say at least one aspect of "turbic thinking"  (screamingly [dishonest, dysfunctional, delinquent, hypocritical, back-stabbing, cowardly, parasitic]) is invariably present, and that the factors are correlated, it is the "stupidity" issue that underlies much of it and strengthens the other factors.  I sense that this is universal to all of us, and that is an impossible lesson for us to learn (it's probably not good for personal [career advancement, achievement, success] to believe in this).
  
• Another major factor is the very strong Western belief that "the intent to do good" is always a good thing.  There are many historical quotes that the opposite is often the case, starting with "... the road to hell is paved with good intentions   ...".  I think that this is also a major driver of many hideous things.  There seems to be a constant flood of Don Quixotes who work hard to fix the world, instead unleashing the worst atrocities.  (socialism is a perfect example, climate science a puny and unimportant one).
• well-intentioned stupidity is not necessarily the best answer
• Cognitively-limited thinking with complex systems has virtually no chance of understanding or resolving them.  We are ALL cognitively limited!
  
• Beware of the successor to the dragon -  If, for example, the "CO2 is the primary driver of climate since 1850" theme is eventually over-thrown as the mainstream scientific consensus (religion),  many will proclaim victory, and that the problem has been solved.  But that will be nonsense, as this kind of problem is thriving universally, and new problems of the same type surface constantly. 
  

Individuals that think like me are very rare, but there are some.  Most write about a theme like "science as a religion".  However, quite possibly we are the crazy ones.


[ssh, sftp] server -  By the way - do you happen to be running an [ssh, sftp] server for your business?  (see below my signature block).  Perhaps you don't deal in highly classified information with your consulting now, but if you do, be careful - encryption can be very important!  (even if it is a pain in the butt)


Bill Howell
Volunteer firefighter, Member of Hussar Lion's Club & Sundowners
1-587-707-2027     www.BillHowell.ca
P.O. Box 299, Hussar, Alberta, T0J1S0

Mr. Bill Howell
1-587-707-2027     www.BillHowell.ca
P.O. Box 299, Hussar, Alberta, T0J1S0
member - International Neural Network Society (INNS), IEEE Computational Intelligence Society (IEEE-CIS),
IJCNN2019 Budapest, Authors' Guide, Sponsors & Exhibits Chair, https://www.ijcnn.org/organizing-committee
WCCI2020 Glasgow, Publicity Chair mass emails, http://wcci2020.org/
Retired: Science Research Manager (SE-REM-01) at Natural Resources Canada, CanmetMINING, Ottawa


*************************
[ssh, sftp] server need

I need to provide access from 01May to 01Sep2019; to a 1 Gbyte encrypted file; to 700-1000 attendees of a scientific conference www.ijcnn.org.  Attendees must have individual [userename, passwords] which I can generate and provide to both the attendees and the [SFTP, SSH] system.  They should be allowed 3 attempts to access in one session, and are limited to one successful download, with 3 attempts to download in case of failed downloads.  Attendees are from around the world (eg China is ~1/4 to 1/3 of attendees)

I had an ssh server for ~2.5 years, but at 75$/month I gave it up when the projects I was working on ended.  That's still an option, but only IF the conference pays.


-------- Forwarded Message --------

Subject:	Top Scientist Resigns: 'Global Warming is a $Trillions Scam — It has Corrupted Many Scientists' | Humans Are Free
Date:	Tue, 7 May 2019 03:19:59 +0000
From:	anonymous <>
To:	Bill Howell <>
CC:	anonymous2 <>

An interesting read.
http://humansarefree.com/2016/04/top-scientist-resigns-global-warming-is.html


Sent from my iPhone