Consensus Science

(Michael Crichton quote:- ".. If it is consensus it is not science.") :- 

"I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you're being had.

"Let's be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world.

"In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it's consensus, it isn't science. If it's science, it isn't consensus. Period."

He's quite right, but I would put it a bit differently.  Science is concerned with getting right answers to questions when the natural world doesn't match with the template of knowledge and understanding we have of it.  It's a work in progress.  If we have a consensus along the way then it effectively dampens the fire, .. puts it out. We might never get there. The 'science' would be short-circuited.  We would put up with a half-answer. 

< read more >


[ See also - Debunking Plate Tectonics - at :-
http://www.platetectonicsbiglie.blogspot.com/ ]

Geologists 'R Us

Geology rules
( .. you bet! .. )

---

Students contemplate a basalt dyke and appear to be expressing manifest disinterest. But I don't think they are. I think they're being very diplomatic.

[This image was taken from the web a while back; can't remember where from.  If anybody objects to me using it I'll remove it, but in view of the subject of these posts it seems to illustrate a nice point (see footnote*)]

Being centre-stage, the subject of this photo is almost certainly the dyke. but I do wonder at the apparent disinterest, .. and why that might be.

It must be the first or second field trip when students get taken to look at a dyke, because like mountains (and valleys) a dyke is one of the simplest, yet most interesting things to contemplate in geology and is instructive for a number of reasons.  We won't cover them all here, .. just to say that when looked at properly (i.e., from the viewpoint of the most incisive question - being, "How the Hell did it get there?"), one look is all it takes to dismiss Plate Tectonics in an instant.  Less incisively perhaps are some others that are more 'circumlocutory' steps along the way to an answer, and are therefore equally valid.

It would have to be the most representative expression of the Principle of Structural Superposition in that it is clearly cutting through, and is therefore later than, the host rock, which in this case looks like granite.  The dyke, which is probably of dolerite (slightly coarser than basalt but of the same composition) is cutting, and therefore younger than, the granite.  So properly speaking we should refer to The Principle of Stratigraphic, Structural, and Magmatic Superposition. This is the triumvirate of Earth processes operating at different scales and different levels in the crust that allows proper time-sequencing of geological events and interpretation of Earth history. The other reasons relate to larger questions of global significance as sketched below.

What seems interesting to me about this picture is why somebody is taking it.  That somebody is probably the group leader, who has decided to take a picture in order to save himself the bother of saying a thousand words about something to do with this particular pit-stop, and which is self-evident.  And maybe something too about the apparent disinterest on show, for that dyke epitomises a fundamental point of logic that the "outsiders" of Plate Tectonics ("without a geological clue") ignore.

So let's consider what it is by asking some of those leading questions.

Did the granite body move sideways to let the dyke in, or did the dyke (being magma) (an incompressible fluid) intrude and forcefully heave the host-rock aside?   Ostensibly the students appear to be looking for an answer.  One at least seems to be convinced it lies underfoot, whilst the others seem to think it lies somewhere off to the side.  [Well, .. at least they're looking at the right side - looking at it my way, that is.]

So, .. pit stop, ..questions, .. thinking, .. photograph.   Here's my take on it (it goes  like this) :-

(Team leader) :-
"Here's a dyke, .. etc., etc., .. with a chilled basaltic margin (both sides) (indicating cooling) (etc.,  etc.)," .. and .. (applying best teaching practice by using leading questions the class can answer themselves, .. "Which was first and which was second, the dyke or the host rock?"

"..Well obviously the granite is first, and the dyke is second".

Then the next question follows :-
"So where did the granite come from?"  To which the answer is, well, .. it's coarse grained, .. it cooled slowly, and there's a great mass of it, so it must have originated at depth and cooled slowly. .. .. 
<  ... >
"So what's the answer?"
"Deep."
"And where did the dyke come from then?"
"Deeper."
"But the dyke is fine-grained and chilled quickly, so where did it crystallise in relation to the granite, and how did it lose its heat?"
"The dyke intruded, .. lost its heat to the granite as it came up, which must have therefore been cooler than the dyke."
"So how did the granite get from being in a hot place to being in a cold place?"
"It must have been uplifted."
"Right? Who thinks that's right? ... How much granite have we got here?"
< .. The whole country .. >
"So how did the whole country get uplifted from a hot place to a cold place?"

You can see here the students beginning to shuffle a bit at this point.  This is not what was expected from a simple dyke in a simple granite. Anyway, it was supposed to be about the dyke, not the granite.

"And what about the dyke?  Where did it come from, what was it feeding? And where is all of that 'feeded-stuff'  now?  And if the granite cooled at depth and got uplifted so we can stand on it, what happened to what was on top of *it*?  Erosion?  Who said 'erosion'? Did someone say erosion?  And how did *that* erosion, relate to the dyke's erosion that we see now - and what it (the dyke) was feeding?  And how do we think this uplift happened exactly, if it applies to the whole country, and the dykes (and that little sill over there - out of the picture) are not folded?  And what do you think uplift means for the 'sideways' aspect of this intrusion shown by the separation of the walls of the dyke?  Did this 'sideways behaviour crumple anything?  And where did the *granite* come from in relation to the basalt, if it was at depth long enough to cool down and be coarse grained? .. And if the basalt was below the granite in the first place, why did it come up?  Why didn't it just stay down there and likewise be coarse-grained?  And since it did come up, why did it come up in such skittery bits as this dyke, instead of in a big country-wide mass like the granite.  Fracture?  Who said fracture?   How deep was it, and how laterally extensive might it have been? Can we map it and find out?  What was the spatial and temporal relationship of the respective melts?  And which do you think was under the greater pressure to come up? "  Why did the granite 'come up' on the scale of the whole country while the basalt is just coming up what is essentially a hairline fracture - or less?

This is the bit where the students begin to look right and left, and realise that what he's going to say next is ...

" And let me have your thoughts by Monday."

Fig.2.  Filaments of NW-striking dolerite dykes intrude a diapiric granite pluton.  (Pilbara region, Western Australia.)  [GoogleEarth Location :-   -22.822591°, 117.341177°]

[*Footnote :- The point here being (apart from the obvious one of erosion) the importance of fracturing as indicative of scale of crustal penetration, and the likely importance of incremental upwards movement as a means of creating sideways space rather than (as Plate Tectonics has it) ~3,000km of (sideways) movement such as are said to build the Himalayas and, further away, deform the Russian Peninsula ["far-field tectonics"].

Truly, we live on a flat ('sideways') Earth according to Plate Tectonics.  This, I think, could well be what is occupying the collective minds of the students in the picture, which is why they're shuffling and contemplating their boots.  But how are they going to weasel such cleverness into their class exercise on which they'll be judged at the end of term?  It's all very well for the group leader to be asking suchlike questions implying 'up', but they know perfectly well that 'im indoors, .. their professor, waxes lyrical about sideways Plate Tectonics being the best thing since sliced bread and deserving a Nobel prize, with five centimetres of dyke three thousand kilometres away heaving up the Himalayas and all..  The students are no doubt wondering why three thousand sideways kilometres are needed at all if just a few centimeters of on-the-spot 'up' will do the job anyway.  Or even better if the global distribution of dykes in general are the issue, just lithospheric stretching - as the crust adjusts to outwards movement from the centre - like Earth expansion says?  Why the need for all the sideways hyperactivity?

Let's hope that's what they're doing anyway (contemplating).  We need a whole new crop of geologists apparently.  Otherwise another generation is (well and truly) screwed., and screwed up.

Geology.  It's all a question of scale. Observation / Logic /'Science'. And not getting carried away by anthropomorphic-homo/eccentric fantasy and speculation (/'models'). ["India came running full speed at Asia and boom, they collided," - said.]  Communicating to the public on the level of three-year-olds is one thing, but precisely what is being communicated is another.  A mindset is a mindset.  And the mind of Plate Tectonics is set in a both naive and zombie-like cast.  (And a few other adjectives as well, i.m.o.,  when it comes to questions relating to the biggest 'dyke' intrusions of all - those  (as Plate Tectonics would have it) constituting the sheeted dykes of the ocean floors.)  

Moonstruck

( ..Loony tunes? ..)


Readers of this blog will know that it is a documentation of support for an expanding Earth, a 'catch-up diary' of sorts that grew out of my time as a geologist over a period of some forty years.

Now, I can't claim employment for all of that time.  Far from it.  And not that the employment I was lucky enough to secure would lend a whole lot of gravitas to the proposed motion tabled anyway since the rote machinations of  industry do not take too kindly to geological pontificating about the origins of rocks.   That belongs in a different department.   Exploration is about yakka, rocks 'n socks, 'n boots, .. heat and dust, flies and isolation, .. or mozzies, ice and snow and freezing, .. sampling soils and rocks and testing them for anomalies and drilling them, then more drilling, and then (if you're lucky - 'cos that could mean you might have a job next year), digging.  And increasingly as a concession to propriety (because traditionally we're a bunch of rednecks who don't give a fig about health *or* safety and think having women on the job is just a great idea), about a whole lot of regulation by beaurocrats whose mission in life is to dictate and control everything and issue death certificates before the fact, and to generally remind everybody that a certain person is alive and well and going among us with a lot of let and not a lot of hindrance. .. (And I don't mean Elvis.)

But I can claim that if there was any question of pontificating, or navel-gazing on questions of geological import, then it was mostly done at night, ..under the stars, .. gazing at the naked cool beauty of the huntress Diana as she strode the night sky looking like she owned the place.  And why shouldn't she after all because she'd been doing it for about four billion years and by the looks of those battle scars paid her dues too. 

Draw breath, .. and see as she strings her bow and asks the unvoiced question, "Who are you, .. born of the Hadean hell I suffered, to win my right to stride this starry sky looking like I own the bloody place?  .. And what will become of you?  Look at me!!  And hear the silent scream of your oblivion as I pierce you., for we are one, you and I, and your destiny faces me as I face you."

Shit!  You'd think she'd just shut up for a fucken minute while you think about that.  And stop pointing that thing.  Her child?  What Hadean hell?  What's she talking about?  And what was all that about blood?  Was it true?  Was I?  Would I? .. follow undone from that 'hell'(?) to that starry night? Ashes-to-ashes, dust and all that?  Jeez, ..  The only Hades I know of is the fiery heat of every summer in this place, ..doing this job, ..that's for sure.  Forty-eight in the shade and rising.  What sort of Hades did she know about, .. what agony did she suffer that made her turn her scarred face to her conqueror, and four billion years later lay her toy aside, reach for her accoutrements of war,  and take aim?  Why me?

Hang on, .. was *that* what she was on about? ..  about suffering to make life easy for us?  - all that banded iron formation we were looking at earlier before pulling up for the day - rythmic accumulations of iron dust spewed from the cauldron of creation, .. settling every day, every month, every year in those primal seas.  Gaseous clouds of iron and silica?  Was that how she got those scars, .. Hadeas Corpus from impacts to the core? .. the Earth dragging its envelope of millenial cosmic dust - global-scale ignimbrites - right from the core?  So cosmic it enveloped the Earth for hundreds of millions of years and settled with every turn of the Earth, with every cycle of the seasons, with every advancing year.  Spinning through that dust cloud for zillions of years.  Wonder who will make the splash with that one :-  "Hey, look everybody, what I just guessed about the origins of the Earth-Moon system, banded irons as the terrestrial expression of lunar impacts.  And now let's see if we can turn it around and make a story people will buy."

 [ Added 20130616 :-  "..the whole point of the equivalence of mass and energy is that it’s every bit as valid to call the interaction energy “mass” as it is to call individual particles “mass.” And, in fact, 99% of the mass associated with everyday objects comes from exactly the same source as the energy released in nuclear reactions.  http://scienceblogs.com/principles/2011/01/27/energy-from-mass-mass-from-ene/  ]

Seems pretty obvious does it not, when you think of the different rates of iron and silica dust settling in the primal seas - globally.  And the ages virtually correlate with the lunar impacts, give or take a bit of homo(ex)centricity, ..  Makes you wonder, does it not, .. .. about origin, .. and again about science and how it's done, .. about guessing on multiple working stories, or standing back and taking things in the context of the time-sliced bigger picture.  Algal blooms and iron dissolved in sea-water indeed. You can take all this global warming stuff a bit far, in the punt for funds.  There's nothing like keep being wrong as a reason for keep (not) trying to be right!

No guns, no battleships, no knives, forks, spoons, or weapons of war, and especially not the wherewithall to make anything (much) at all, but for the tribulations of that doxie with the bow and the arrow and the certain aim... looking after us.  But for that scarred face where would 'civilisation' be? And think of the cost if modernity had to be contrived from alternative sources..  More likely we'd still be in the bronze age.

[ Image reproduced with thanks 
to  Kevin Radthorne
www.KevinRadthorne.com ]








Some Kookie. Doesn't look like a bout of Hadeas Corpus to me..
Unerring of aim and right on target whatever the intention.
and scar or no scars, .. a bit of all right.
Not sure about the convolution though, ..
Distraction? (So you don't get the message till it hits you?)
Probably.
( "Bows and flows of angel hair"..)

Bet it's right though, .. about the Moon and the origin of the Banded Iron Formations.  I've come across nothing to contradict it in the decades since it occurred to me.  Everything's still up the smushy garden path of consensus waffle. How does it help exploration?  This way, which is to say, .. by looking at context.

( Crikey! .. I see they're asking nearly forty dollars.) (Jeez!) (Crims!)  (Why not support your local global protest instead and with the help of the internet and the New Deal in World Insemination we'll sink this rust bucket, ..despite its best efforts to drown us in garbage.)

[ See also - Debunking Plate Tectonics - at :-
http://www.platetectonicsbiglie.blogspot.com/ ]

Magical Mystery Tour

Through the Looking Glass

("Starry night with Tardis")

by Alice





You know how when you get a flyer through the door selling something, ..and there's bullet points, and you want to see what it is they're actually saying, .. how you have to skip to the bottom line to see what it's all about .. and then you wonder why they made you wade through all the crap to get there and why didn't they just put it right up the top and say it - like, .. "The Earth is getting bigger". Maybe in bold if they want to catch your attention. And just leave it at that. Why do they have to hype it up when there's nothing in it but the obvious? Why don't they just start off with the bottom line then go, blonk - blonk - blonk with the facts and just leave it to you? Why do they have to turn it upside down and make such a meal of it into the bargain?
Well, it's true is it not? And what's more, the difference in the way you read it is exactly that between the S.M. ( sado-masochistic) Scientific (/hypothetical) Method way of doing science and the unscientific (no-probs) Natural Philosophical , observational way of doing it - like here.

In the scientific method (as Feynman says), with a few facts and an apparent correlation you make a guess about what it means, and then see if you can back it up with support. And if there's a 'Hey Presto' in it you think you can sell, then you turn it all around and make it look like a respectable conclusion that follows from those blonks. It's a kind of short-cut way of trying to look at things, one that elevates thinking over looking, and makes you look clever.

For example, you might pick up a grain of sand and say, "Ah-hah, this is a beach," and set about trying to prove it according to rules about beaches. So you see if it is round, and of a certain size, .. at which point you decide you might need a bit more data, so, you go, and you look, and see if you can find another one and you do and so hey, .. now you have *two* grains of sand, .. and they're both just exactly round, .. and so on. (Pretty smart, huh?) Then with a straight face you can say with confidence, "This is a beach", and hope everybody will buy one. Doesn't matter about the water. That's different and can be dealt with later, .. this is about science, sand and beaches, right? (Reductive.) ["Elemental, my dear Watson."]

The No-Probs method is different. In this one you get in your tardis and zoom out and look at everything else *but* the sand, .. and once you've got the framework right and everything in its rightful domino-place then Bob's-your-Uncle. You can zoom in on the sand and check out the boulders and the other flotsam lying around if you like. No guessing needed. In fact you might not even bother that much (about 'beach') because a beach is a beach. Seen one you've seen 'em all. Go a bit further and you might find something quite interesting - like a whale, .. lying on top of a grain of sand. And what do we do about that then, .. (on the beach)? .. Well, we get in the tardis again and ... .. .

See what I mean? No guessing, .. no 'science' (of the guessing /hypothesising /theorising sort) needed, .. Just finding that things just are in their natural rightful order, when you look at them the right way, .. which is in context. And how do you do context right?

Well, ... you just go forth, .. get in the Tardis .. and, ... look through the glass.

Easy. You don't have to molecate everything to be scientific. Alice's No-Probs Tardis is just fine. In fact it's where science begins. Or should begin -with the contemplated life and the considered observation. All sorts of problems arise if the 'molecules' are not in the right order. And that's where the tardis comes in handy, .. it gets you right up there (with Cazaly, a round of leather and a jar of vegemite). Everything just falls into place - right, bright and shiny, .. and speaking for itself.

So, .. all aboard?
=>  *(basketables) rm/genesis.html

(Who said the Earth was flat) (like a plate)  .. ?
=>  *one plate or several nonsense/plate.html =>  *House of collapsing cards nonsense/cards

(next)
[Yeah, .. but so what? ]====================



[ See also - Debunking Plate Tectonics - at :-
http://www.platetectonicsbiglie.blogspot.com/ ]

Putting Trolling in Perspective.

( or, .. What do you do when you perceive science to be failing? ..)


The question of trolling has arisen again on Rationalskeptics Discussion Forum.

[  Quoting Theropod:- 

" ... Jesus fucking Christ on a stick, can't you read? What part of "if they haven't published" can't you grasp? Now, having made that really fucking clear, how the hell is anyone supposed to know of these "authorities" unless they have published in reputable journals?

"I know for a fact there are several professional scientists that participate on a regular basis here on ratskep. [ .. I have enough professional qualifications in earth sciences to see through this EE smoke and mirrors.. ] That professional training allows me to adjudicate these citations as sorely lacking in direct support of an EE.

"My opinion is based on the historical facts of this thread. I've been here since day one.  The topic was started to specifically troll this forum.

"In case you haven't noticed I have no desire, or intent, to be helpful in regards to this topic on any level. It's ALL bullshit, and the whole intent of this thread was, and is, to troll this forum. I've already listed my concerns with your "facts". I really don't give a rats ass if the EE folks have their feeling hurt, or if I piss them all off. This EE crap isn't about the science. It's about what folks will believe even in the face of overwhelming evidence telling them they're notion is totally fucking nuts. Exactly like creationism in that regard isn't it? I am not a humanitarian, or even a very nice man. As far as I'm concerned these folks came into my house and shit right in the middle of my living room floor. I'm really supposed to now be helpful to any aspect of this insanity? I don't think so. Even defending this tripe in a passing manner deserves scorn AFAIC." ]

This point, about the forum being assailed by "nuts" obsessing about Earth expansion, has been raised from the beginning.  Under no circumstances could S.Athearn, the subject of the above abusive attack be accused of trolling, and neither could the original poster of the thread.  Below is the original post by 'Brainman',  a cognitive scientist interested in the emotional response of people to views that contradict their own beliefs, and how consensus ('Groupthink') therefore arises - the Groupthink in this case being the monolithic belief of Plate tectonics. :

['Brainman' :-   Expanding earth. Do the continents wind back to a sphere
#1  Post by Brain man » Jun 14, 2010 12:27 pm

"Most people are familiar with neal adams interesting animations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PQSrsy9xg70
My interest is actually psychological regarding this. I am training in neuropsychology and am interested in the mechanism behind the reaction of disbelief itself. I am presuming there will be not be many here in favour of expanding earth hypothesis.

The point is, can this thread force readers to answer the primary question of the thread first. i.e. Can the poll question itself actually be answered with a yes or no ? EDIT. The question is "Do the continents "look" as if they wind back to a sphere ?"

So this thread is primarily about psychology. You can post on how the video itself made you feel. Conflicted, angry etc.

I would also like to make these following points to introduce that the topic has an educated, reasoning and respectable proponent. The point of this thread is not to debate the geology though. These points are just stated to offset the damage having an artist proposing the subject has done. It should be remembered though that in spite of his background Neal Adams claims that the plates were not shrunk or altered in the 3d modeller. The ins-and-outs of geology is a different subject from this and should be started on the earth sciences section.]

...from which it is quite clear that the intention of the post is exactly as it says -  nothing to do with the for-or-against geological  arguments of Earth expansion but simply to test emotional reaction to that video.  It's difficult to see how it can be read otherwise.

Neverthless apart from the few respondents who did answer within the guidelines but noted that a response would obviously be tempered by initial belief and the scientific merit of the video, by far the majority appeared to consider their intelligence confronted and scientific acumen abused, and Brainman was shortly banned for being a "troll" for exactly the reason Brainman specifically stated, and what Theropod says in somewhat more colourful vernacular :- "This EE crap isn't about the science. It's about what folks will believe even in the face of overwhelming evidence telling them they're notion is totally fucking nuts".

Evidently the fine point of Mr Adam's video (and Brainman's intention in posting the question) escapes the Theropod - that the italicised "nuts" in question are in fact those believing in Plate Tectonics - and how might it feel to be labelled a nut, even just on the basis of a space/time-traveller's cursory glimpse of an enlarging, rotating Earth such as that video illustrates.

Today Plate Tectonics is standard teaching in schools colleges, universites, and even kindergartens. as well as used in top-level media presentations to the public.  And there is even the view that it is deserving of a Nobel prize.

But what do you do when you perceive it to be simply wrong in critical aspects and think it appropriate to say so?  Do you present your hopeful case to what you see as the arbiters of scientific respectability in the expectation they have a duty to listen?  .. maybe even too in the expectation (if reason and logic is applied) that there might possibly be some capitulation to your illuminated insight?  Well, .. if you're naive you might, but you certainly won't get any marks for pointing out to the scientific community at large that the Earth is round and rotating, and that the consequences of this is something everybody's been missing all along.  Theropod has a point.  It *is* something like dumping right in the middle of the living-room.  No matter how much you might try to persuade and say, "No, .. but look, .. seriously, .. it's all good, and it goes so much better with your furniture than the junk you have strewn around."  You could even add that every living room should have a pile of it right up to the ceiling, ... and (getting really bolshie) add further  .. "So what's wrong with *you* then?" 

Even on a sliding scale from wheedling to belligerent, somehow I don't think that cuts it.  Some other strategem is called for.  But what?  What do you do when even  'peaceful proselytising' elicits the antagonistic odium and abuse that has been the history of Rationalskeptic's response since day 1 - and some other forums as well, and (though somewhat better dressed) the scientific literature too.   Everybody likes to arrange their living room the way that suits them - because there are friends that turn up from time to time who like a cozy corner to relax in where they don't have to consider their place in the world.  Living is a social enterprise after all, and it helps if everybody is like me.

Well, there are two things you can do.  The first is simply putting it out there for whoever is inclined to look at it - passive proselytising /gentle persuasion for those who may be persuaded, but in the full knowledge that there will be hecklers at the rear who will take every opportunity they can to shout you down and try to make a fool of you.

And the other thing you can do is recognise therefore what it is you're up against and 'fight fire with fire', .. stir-'em-up and dump some reflective 'troll-shit' in the living room and leave them to the consequences when it hits the fan, and the public, seeing finally that their tax dollars are being consumed on a gravytrain ("in the dining car of free lunch"), insists on a better deal.

(Mirror mirror on the wall..)

"Many people here are home-schooling because our education system has them come out dumber than they went in."  J.T - USA.

"Children have this habit of thinking for themselves, and the point of education is to cure them of this habit." ~ Bertrand Russell.

[ See also - Debunking Plate Tectonics - at :-
http://www.platetectonicsbiglie.blogspot.com/ ]