Global warming FREEZE......

[Chad L. Magee]

Ok I'll say it.   Chad, you are definitely smarter than a 5th grader.      
I actually enjoy reading your post.  Very rational thought process.   One can almost mistake you for a college professor.    Almost.......

Thanks, I try to advocate scientific thinking processes in my lectures as much as I can.  Sometimes it works, other times not so much...

[Chad L. Magee]

It is extremely frustrating that medical knowledge and scientific knowledge change with time.  This is unfortunately a consequence of the underlying process of following evidence, formulating hypotheses, and testing them.  In the end, it is the probability that something will be valid that decides.  Those who topple a paradigm get recognized.  This process is also why I don't think a scientific conspiracy would last that long.  People can be wrong, and strength of personality and ability to argue can enter into science, but in general, it works.


My reading of the cooling arguments is that they are a blip on a longer term trend. The 60's and 70' arguments about ice ages were old ones, based on inferences about the record of ice ages that when traced to the present would put us in a climate state with ice sheets growing across parts of Europe and Canada.  

Coffee?  I think I need some more.

If you go back in history to the ancient Greeks, Aristotle and Democritus argued over what made up matter.  Aristotle believed that you could cut into something in half time and time again without ever reaching a point that could not be cut in half and still be matter.  Democritus did not believe that concept but thought that "atmos" (translated to atoms) existed as the smallest unique points of matter.  At that stage, atoms could not be broken down without losing the concept of matter as they thought of it as.  Guess who won out on that argument?  Aristotle, because of his power of influence got the win on this one.  The concept of atoms was not really explored for nearly two thousand years later because of that result.  Yet, he is still considered a great philosopher aside from this fact.  It shows how much an opinion can change how something is thought of in science (and other areas) for a very long time.  That effect can be dangerous in the wrong hands...

For those who want to know more on the history of atoms (it goes into much more detail):

http://www.nobeliefs.com/atom.htm

[XH29N0G]

Sure strong arguments can sway thinking, but if there is a test that is well thought out, it can and should topple the prevailing wisdom. 

I don't know if there was a test that could have been done or was done at that time to demonstrate the discrete nature of matter.   But if there was ...  shame on those who did not heed it.

Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd: - Pope

[Chad L. Magee]

Sure strong arguments can sway thinking, but if there is a test that is well thought out, it can and should topple the prevailing wisdom. 

I don't know if there was a test that could have been done or was done at that time to demonstrate the discrete nature of matter.   But if there was ...  shame on those who did not heed it.

Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd: - Pope

No, there was nothing that they could have done with what was available at that time to experimentally prove atoms without very large errors.  Remember that atoms are much smaller than can be seen with the naked eye or even a high power microscope (not counting an electron microscope which can go to atomic levels, but is not actually "seeing" the atoms but the forces given off by the atoms).  Even in the middle ages, the best analytical techniques available to scientists at that time was the flame test (to see the colors involved), with the taste test being second.  (Note: Many alchemists back then had taste testers that had very short lives.  Some alchemists did the taste testing themselves and succumbed to the things that they tested.  That is kinda like my sister's cooking in a way, but you don't die from it.)  Even now with all of the best equipment money can buy (like at CERN), we cannot absolutely prove many of the parts of quantum mechanics (such as string theory) without having some amount of error involved.  If someone can get to a real working theory of everything that can be tested true, then the above could possibly change...