The American Politics thread

[sledger]

Originally Posted by Redbacks

Reflexivity_(social_theory)

Kind of sounds like the above. George Soros, Billionaire and PhD student under Popper used it to guide his trading strategy.

Yeah, a quick read of that makes it seem like there are more than a few similarities tbh, quite a bit that overlaps in any case. Though systems theory tends to deal with a wider range of spheres than those that can be considered social systems. I wouldn't suggest you read the wiki page on it though, last time I checked it was full of confusing rhetoric which didn't actually explain anything, just gave a vague description of what the theory entailed.

[Cevno]

Originally Posted by Flem274*

Find me a scientific reference for point one and prove it isn't black and white.

I believe it is caused by man, so arguing for the other side would be playing kind of devil's advocate. I can give you some links but no point as then i can't go and defend them.

In any case even if it is the case with 1, 2 and 3 are still to be settled and thus the issue is still a evolving one in policy terms.

[Flem274*]

You said it wasn't black and white. I'm not asking you to defend the other side, I'm asking you to provide references to scientific articles proving it isn't black and white.

[silentstriker]

Originally Posted by Flem274*

You said it wasn't black and white. I'm not asking you to defend the other side, I'm asking you to provide references to scientific articles proving it isn't black and white.

Good luck trying to find a viable hypothesis and a magical process by which 9 billion tons of emissions have no effect whatsoever.

"See we burn them and then....err...they go away like into....errr...Rick Perry 2012!!!"

[Cevno]

Originally Posted by Flem274*

You said it wasn't black and white. I'm not asking you to defend the other side, I'm asking you to provide references to scientific articles proving it isn't black and white.

I think Spark already posted one before.There is that whole argument which says that the temperature was rising throughout the ages in any case and with population growing it had to rise more etc..

There was a Whole NOAA report saying that Antartica had stopped to warm more in 2007/8, also parts of some IPCC reports, some parts of flip flops and lies caught in some earlier reports with facts still emerging etc.....

I don't certainly believe them as with more carbon emissions increased they have to go somewhere, so i can't argue for that side and neither i have the expertise to go into the scientific details or what some scientist are saying on that side(or whether they are industry sponsored or not).In any case settled in public policy terms means that when everyone is convinced.
.
Point 2 and 3 are more important AFAIC. Hasn't a recent report by the IPCC(?) sister organisation said that it would become irreversible after 5 years or something?

[Flem274*]

Originally Posted by silentstriker

Good luck trying to find a viable hypothesis and a magical process by which 9 billion tons of emissions have no effect whatsoever.

"See we burn them and then....err...they go away like into....errr...Rick Perry 2012!!!"

exactly

[Fusion]

Originally Posted by silentstriker

Good luck trying to find a viable hypothesis and a magical process by which 9 billion tons of emissions have no effect whatsoever.

"See we burn them and then....err...they go away like into....errr...Rick Perry 2012!!!"

[Spark]

Originally Posted by Cevno

I think Spark already posted one before.There is that whole argument which says that the temperature was rising throughout the ages in any case and with population growing it had to rise more etc..

That wasn't an argument. That was a case-in-point example of a logical fallacy on the part of those who draw little overlapping blue lines wherever they can that happent go down for brief times.

[Cevno]

Originally Posted by Spark

That wasn't an argument. That was a case-in-point example of a logical fallacy on the part of those who draw little overlapping blue lines wherever they can that happent go down for brief times.

I know what you meant and i would mostly agree with you. But that is one argument often presented by people and even scientists on the other side. And both sides have a tendency to exaggerate the truth and turn facts into what suits them best.

[silentstriker]

Originally Posted by Cevno

I know what you meant and i would mostly agree with you. But that is one argument often presented by people and even scientists on the other side.

Which scientists are these and what % of the total do they constitute?

Reminds me of this: Weathering Fights - Science: What's It Up To? - The Daily Show with Jon Stewart - 10/26/11 - Video Clip | Comedy Central

Unfortunately this is the mainstream platform of the republican party.

[Sanz]

While Herman Cain is simply ignorant, Ron Paul's views are flat out dangerous for a civil society.

On Health Care :- Tea Party Fanatics Cheer 'Let Him Die' - YouTube
I watched the debate live and I don't think I have heard a more hypocritical response to health care debate.

On Abortion - Ron Paul on Abortion and Stem Cell Research - YouTube

Abortion is an act of violence ? Really ? And I don't understand this Federal Vs. State Govt. right, so it is okay if the state government allows abortion but not if Federal Govt. does ? To me it is just passing the buck to the states. He continues to justify his stance by citing extreme examples.

Education :- Ron Paul: 'Education Isn't A Right' - YouTube

Education isn't a right, Really ?? May not be a constitutional right (which is a a joke anyway). So you want to protect the right of the unborn but do not want to have anything to make sure that he.she gets an equal opportunity to get educated.

Civil Rights Act :- Enuff has already been said about this.

[Spark]

I have a great deal of respect the Ayn Rand philosophical school of libertarianism, but only as a philosophy. What a lot of people have done with that philosophy - Ron Paul included and in many ways at the heart and centre - is truly despicable.

Libertarianism was originally supposed to be about limited government intervention with a social conscience.

A lot of people seem to have forgotten the second bit.

[silentstriker]

Ah Ayn Rand - summarized succinctly by Roger Ebert as: "I’m on board; pull up the lifeline."

Atlas Shrugged was such a chore.

On a side note which is unrelated since I'm sure there isn't anyone here who takes Glenn Beck seriously but it was hilarious to see him go on and on about Rand until someone pointed out that she was an atheist and wasn't exactly a fan of religion in general. Pretty funny moment.

[shankar]

Originally Posted by Redbacks

Scientific knowledge is based on conjectural leaps and a theory takes what is known and places it in the unknown (not the otherway around as Aristotle put it) because you simply can never exhausively test any theory. All swans are white is never verified because every single person observes it to be so, but is certainly falisified once one counter example is found, such as a black swan in WA is discovered.

While Science doesn't proceed by constantly adding to a set of proven 'facts', it doesn't proceed, as you say above, by falsifying theories either. No fact can disprove a theory because one can always take recourse to some auxiliary hypothesis which can save the theory. For example the perihelion precession wasn't as predicted by Newtonian effects. Yet this fact didn't falsify Newtonian mechanics. Several ad-hoc hypotheses were proposed to explain the 'anamoly' until Einstein's general relativity. So theories can neither be proved nor disproved by any set of 'facts'. One can however distinguish between progressive and degenerating research programmes as shown by Lakatos.

[silentstriker]

Well that's only sort of true. While a single fact will not disprove a theory that is able to make many many predictions, it depends on the type of fact. The reason ad-hoc explanations were offered because Newtonian mechanics still explained a hell of a lot, and more importantly, there was no other theory that explained everything Newton's did plus the new fact. That latter is key. A discovery of a new process or a fact does not invalidate the facts which are explained by the previous theory - that theory is still sufficient to explain all the facts it previously did, and unless someone can do a better job of explaining those facts, it makes no sense to abandon a theory that yields useful results.

As an example, it would be like as soon as a single fact was found that contradicted Newtonian mechanics, you would stop engineering buildings or machines that relied on calculations derived from Newtonian mechanics....that approach wouldn't really make any sense.

However, and this is both field and theory dependent, it is possible for a single fact to disprove a hypothesis depending on how central to the theory it is.