Remain lucky? You've got to be kidding. The Earth has never been lucky. Giant space rocks have been hitting the Earth on a regular basis since it came into existence. What makes you think that will somehow magically change? Have we run out of asteroids already? The chance that the Earth will never again be hit by a large extraterrestrial body is so infinitesimal, that for all practical purposes it is zero.

So yes, it is inevitable that another giant space rock is going to fall out of the sky at some point.

What do you mean by "considerable"? Would 1% of one year's worth of the world's economic output in the 1600s be "considerable" in your mind? Does 1% meet your definition of "massive amounts of resources"?

Today, Gross World Product is currently around 75 trillion dollars per year. Let's say the cost to build and test an asteroid defense system is two billion dollars over ten years, or two hundred million dollars per year. Two hundred million dollars is what, 0.0002857% of yearly GWP? Have I got that right? Someone better check my math on that.

Assuming my math is correct, do you really think 0.0002857% of the world's economy for ten years would be so damaging that it would cause hardship for...well, anyone?

You have a strange definition of coward".

Just because someone is in a military role that doesn't expose them to enemy fire doesn't make that person a coward. By your definition, every military force on earth has a large proportion of cowards in their service.

Ah, an optimist. Nothing wrong with hoping for the best, but it's foolish not to plan for the worst.

The survival of humanity is not the same as the survival of human civilization. Doing nothing may not cause human extinction, but it will certainly expose our civilization to great risk. And in this case, being prepared for the worst is a relatively low cost proposition when compared to the cost of re-building civilization from scratch.

What makes you think that our current rockets aren't big enough, and what makes you think we're not currently building bigger ones?

In any event, you seem to think we're currently taking at least *one* reasonable precaution (scanning the sky). How many more precautions do we have to take before you'll no longer consider asteroid strikes to be "Yet Another Irrational Fear"? When we reach your magic number, would you then consider it appropriate to devote public money to the effort?

I do try to avoid politically charged discussions, although I am sucked into them every once in a while. : )

I certainly won't disagree with you on that point.

Cheers!

Sigh.

First, I was simply providing an example in support of Namarrgon's admonition to review source documents rather than strictly relying on popular media sources.

Second, I used the Cook abstract because it contained a citation YOU ASKED FOR.

Third, how anyone can claim with a straight face that this sentence: "I'm so very glad you pointed this out, because it perfectly illustrates why you should be reading, at a minimum, the paper's abstract:" represents an endorsement of the paper's conclusions is beyond me.

Perhaps your little break from this discussion wasn't long enough, because you're still not thinking very clearly.

LOL, please quote what I said in support of Cook's paper.

so...yes..you're taking a break? That's probably a good idea.

Is this supposed to be a reply to my post? I'm not defending any paper, I've not called anyone a "denier", and I don't care about someone's paper that wasn't accepted.

What I am doing is calling into question the claims of the author of the Forbes piece you cited.

I'm also challenging your apparent contempt for peer review. If there's a better way to get good science, you haven't identified it.

I'm also calling you out on your insinuation that scientific misconduct/fraud/sloppiness/whatever is rampant in climate science.

Finally, I'm supporting poster Namarrgon's advise on citing source documents whenever possible - instead of citing sources that have such a low signal to noise ratio, it's difficult to get to the underlying science.

What your incoherent ramblings above have to do with anything I've said is beyond me. Maybe you should take a break for a while.

I'm so very glad you pointed this out, because it perfectly illustrates why you should be reading, at a minimum, the paper's abstract:

Thereby demonstrating the folly of relying on opinion pieces written by lawyers masquerading as scientists to support your arguments.

See above.

It comes as no surprise that you don't know what constitutes an ad hominem attack.

You either didn't read the Forbes article you linked to, or you didn't comprehend it.

The article's author, James Taylor, claims that the survey conducted by the paper's researchers didn't ask the right question:

Taylor does also claim that the papers composing the data of phase I of the study were misclassified - but he relies solely on the analysis of "investigative journalists" at the crank site Popular Technology to support his position. Further, both Taylor and Popular Technology conveniently ignore the fact that phase II of the study had the authors of the papers self-classify.

As an aside, pointing to an opinion piece on Forbes written by James Taylor, a lawyer at the Heartland Institute, hardly lends weight to ANY argument. Mr. Taylor claims to be a "scientist by training" because "I successfully completed Ivy League atmospheric science courses". His employer, Heartland Institute, has likened climate scientists to Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, murderer Charles Manson and Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.

NOBODY said the peer review process is perfect. But as GP correctly states, it's the best we've got. You seem to think that just because some academic fraud exists, that it's therefore having a substantial impact on climate science. That's a pretty extraordinary claim...got anything to back it up?

That's not what GP was saying. Jesus. Namarrgon is saying that before YOU or some other guy on the internet starts pontificating about this or that scientific research, YOU should at least read the abstract of said research. But since you're happy to rely on opinion pieces and pop science articles that are chock full of hyperbole and distortion, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that Namarrgon's wise advice is falling on deaf ears. At least in your case.

According to who? You? On what credible data do you base that extraordinary claim? Another James Taylor opinion piece in Forbes?

That's debatable. In any case, the fact remains that the big banks WERE bailed out, and everyday homeowners were left hung out to dry.

PopeRatzo's observation that banks/homeowners could have been bailed out together for the same amount (or less) than bailing out the banks alone has merit.

Your resentments aside, you seem to absolve the banks of their responsibility in the mortgage fiasco and lay the blame on those that took out loans they couldn't afford. Thing is, it used to be that no matter how stupid the lendee was, a bank loan officer would deny a loan if there wasn't convincing evidence that the lendee could meet the obligations of the loan. For some reason, banks didn't do that anymore. Why do you think that happened?

Which was the basis for my question. Who measures IQ anymore?

I guess my question would be *when* were you in the third grade? If it was last year, then I guess "they" are still administering IQ tests.