I met him years ago on an Astronomy trip, and what a huge personality he was, yet so approachable! The perfect spokesman for science.

If you are getting paid by the Climate Denying Propaganda Pimps, Inc. (R - Fox), you need to sit down and have a long talk with yourself.

I'll stand by my post.

and Fox entertainment actually puts on some good stuff. You have to differentiate that from its "news" arm.

Also, I believe Cosmos was produced in conjunction with National Geographic and a few other respectable entities.

But Fox Entertainment is a huge company.

And yes, Fox broadcasts Simpsons, Family Guy, and lot of other content that probably pisses off conservatives. Hell, they broadcast House, MD!

Thanks for the response.

That the realization that FOX isn't News, is that the media on television and radio, and print to a lesser extent, is an artificial construct. Its intention is to give that impression, that we have one side, and the other. All the while, it mostly ignores the TPP, promote war without end, never speaks of corporate domination of our politicians with the use of campaign finance, and if someone does stray from those issues, they're generally fired pretty quickly, like Cenk, or Dylan Ratigan who frequently hit on how bought our politicians were, and pointed out the false right/left paradigm.

You can't have people on your fake left, that point out it is a fake left, can you?

I'd love to hear you try to explain that nutism.

"according to reports,' since I watch almost zero TV, the Fox entertainment 'division' is not controlled by Fox Newsless.
So it actually does have some worthwhile programming,, a few mentioned in this thread.
I prefer to watch the snow out my window, and right now it is snowing like hell ! :&gt

Fox is a huge company with many divisions.

Roger Ailes works in only one of them, the News one.

Such as Stewart, Colbert & Maddow. If they are going to use the platform to inform people the truth, then have at it.
If it's just for a pay stub and to regurgitate some sponsor approved scripted lines, to hell with them. We can no longer afford to play nice with corporations anymore.
I am tired of watching the trees die, of the streams and lakes drying up, of the suffering and death of wildlife. It is falling apart.

He taking these people's money, and then telling them they are idiots. He's not soft soaping them one bit. He's taking their dirty money, and doing something clean with it. And Fox damn well vetted every minute of this before they allowed in on their network, so it's not like this is a surprise to them.

was a real glorious shocker to me, to say the least.
That stuff about the Catholic Church. ! And Bruno 'ascending' like Jesus? whoee... how did that ever get left in there....?

Yes, Bruno said that there may well be multiple worlds in the universe. But that isn't what got him executed for heresy. He also denied the divinity of Christ, the Trinity, the efficacy of the sacraments, the Virgin Birth and so on. It's like a man who robs a bank at gunpoint, shoots someone dead, takes a hostage and runs a red light while making his getaway. The APB is not going to say, "Man wanted for running a red light."

Incidentally, Nicholas of Cusa advanced the same sort of multiple worlds hypothesis some years previously. Nicholas became a bishop, and later a cardinal, and died peacefully in his bed.

but did not know about Nicholas of Cusa. Thanks for the info. I'll go check him out.

This is a very good case of when "WE" make statements, accusations, etc. 'we' must be very careful lest they come back to bite us.

Harry Reid is a good example, I believe. He is really showing some gumption these days, and I am glad, but he's gotta be very careful exactly what he says and how.

I'm sure somebody will be along to give you a thirteen part series on astral traveling to the planet Nubiru using crystals and positive thoughts any minute now.

but scientific materialism is an offense to the cosmos, as is the wholesale denigration and condemnation of what you and others refer to pejoratively as "woo."

There are not two equal sides to scientific issues

True fact.

has cowed the media into giving equal weight to lies and facts. And therein lies the problem. There was a time when lies were ridiculed and deconstructed. Now they're just accepted as a differing viewpoint.

Relevant cartoon I recently came across: [center][img][/img][/center]

Third rail topics, all. See what I mean?

Understanding science: science is the opposite of sloppiness.

Climate change is not an issue that's "too close to call".

... only over solutions.

Credulous viewers accept what they are spoonfed even when evidence is weak or non-existent.

Credible presenters acquire credibility by peer review or by having their reputations pumped up by the hosts or by being given equal time with truly credible presenters and panelists.

I think credibility would be something of a stretch for a lot of media figures, these days.

Framing every issue as a question (e. g. "Is Climate Change Real?&quot means that all the media has to do is find two spokespeople. One says Yes. The other says No. Both take turns spouting talking points in a "debate." Easy peasy, and it requires not the slightest bit of effort.

Presenting facts and actually attempting to educate the viewer would require that the media put in the mental exertion necessary to actually know what the hell they're talking about. That's just too much to ask these days, I suppose.

there will be plenty of other countries to take over. We no longer have an exclusive lead over science or technology, and if the country doesn't pull its head out of its ass, we as a country will be left behind

For some issues, like health care or economic inequality, there may be dozens of well thought out "sides". For others, like the existence of the Holocaust, there's only one.

Reductio ad absurdum: "Serve your children broken glass in their oatmeal? See the debate between experts at 11:00!"

There is no such thing as "settled science"! For example, consider these three scientific "facts":

1. The Earth is at the center of the solar system. All heavenly bodies, including the Sun, orbit the Earth.

2. The heavier an object is, the faster it will fall under the influence of gravity.

3. All motion, including the motion of light, is relative.

Each of these theories was fully supported by almost every scientist of its time. Each theory was backed by evidence, and was considered "settled science".

Yet Copernicus disproved the first, Galileo the second, and Einstein the third. All three would have been considered "flatlanders" by their communities.

Copernicus had to write in secret to avoid persecution. Galileo actually was persecuted. And Einstein was snubbed; he never got a Nobel Prize for Relativity because his theory was so unconventional.

So is that what we want science to be like in the 21st century? Do we really want to silence unpopular scientific views?

The key is to NEVER shut down scientific debate, but to somehow shape the debate so that legitimate voices can be always heard. I'm not interested in Rush Limbaugh's theory of global warming. But I'd be very interested in what a PhD in geology would have to say, even if that PhD is a climate change denier.

Einstein did not get a Nobel Prize for his Special Relativity paper of 1905. He got if for another paper he wrote in 1905, on the Photoelectric Effect. That paper confirmed Max Planck's Quantum Theory, which Planck came up with to explain Black Body Radiation. I shall not explain either the Photoelectric Effect or Black Body Radiation, except to say that they are two essentially unrelated phenomena, both explained by the Quantum Theory. Indeed, Einstein wrote two further papers that year, one on Brownian Motion and the second on Mass-Energy Equivalence (e=mc**2); any one of these papers was worthy of a Nobel Prize. Einstein's theories were greeted with enthusiasm by most of the scientific community when they came out, so he was a "flatlander" of no sort.

Galileo was prosecuted by the Papal Inquisition because he pissed off Pope Urban VIII, essentially by calling Urban an idiot in print. The formal charge was heresy, the actual charge was lèse-majesté. Remember that, under English law at the time, "referring to the Sovereign offensively in public writing" was a capital offense, so Galileo can be said to have gotten off easy with just house arrest.

The central issue here not one of history. It is whether or not it is acceptable to permanently shut down scientific debate. I am very disturbed that so many people find it acceptable.

As far as Einstein goes, as I noted before, he should have won the Nobel Prize for his work on Special Relativity. There are two theories as to why he did not. One, it's because his work was so unconventional. Two, it's because Einstein was himself unconventional (Jewish, and not a noted scientist when it was published). The truth is probably some combination of the two.

Nevertheless, my point holds. Einstein in 1905 was an outsider, and his views were outside those of accepted science. Fortunately for Einstein, Planck was an early supporter.

As to Galileo, you are certainly correct. His beef was with the Church. But that does not matter. For whatever reason, he was a rebel, and had to be silenced.

And you need not explain either the Photoelectric Effect or Black Body Radiation, to me anyway. I have taught both topics at the college level.

was from an essentially prescientific time. Early science, with strong resistance from religion, discovered that the Sun is the center of the solar system. Early science also discovered that heavier objects don't fall faster, ignoring air resistance. Those were early achievements of science.

Copernicus and Galileo were persecuted by the church, not science.

Science isn't done in the media. Science requires the scientific process. The overwhelming consensus among scientists, using the scientific method, is that man-caused climate change is real. Any other explanation for why the Earth's climate is changing should be accomplished through the scientific method.

Survey finds 97% of climate science papers agree warming is man-made:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2013/may/16/climate-change-scienceofclimatechange

Based on our abstract ratings, we found that just over 4,000 papers took a position on the cause of global warming, 97.1% of which endorsed human-caused global warming. In the scientist self-ratings, nearly 1,400 papers were rated as taking a position, 97.2% of which endorsed human-caused global warming. Many papers captured in our literature search simply investigated an issue related to climate change without taking a position on its cause.

Our survey found that the consensus has grown slowly over time, and reached about 98% as of 2011. Our results are also consistent with several previous surveys finding a 97% consensus amongst climate experts on the human cause of global warming.

...However, vested interests have long realized this and engaged in a campaign to misinform the public about the scientific consensus. For example, a memo from communications strategist Frank Luntz leaked in 2002 advised Republicans,

"Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly. Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate"

As I posted earlier, I believe that legitimate scientific debate should be spirited, and ongoing. Never silenced. That doesn't mean that science should be paralyzed. Once a consensus has been reached, science needs to move forward, based on that consensus.

But minority views must still be heard.

But Luntz is not making that argument. He is just trying to paralyze the entire process. His approach is not my approach, and I reject his thinking completely.

are the real 'Flat Earthers'. The extremely destructive A(CO2)GW paradigm is coming to an end. Good for science and humanity!