"passed Trump associates' communications with Russians on to US counterparts"

See that part you missed?

You think they were passing unmasked Trump communications to Obama for legitimate reasons? That's quite an assumption. Regardless, I thought it was denied that the British passed ANY Trump communications to Obama administration. Did they pass it to the NSA or directly to the Whitehouse? Lots and lots of questions.

But the pattern is consistent - first deny that anything happened at all. Then admit something DID happen but it wasn't improper. The next stage isn't pretty (and we're almost there) since it appears Obama admin used the intel community against political opponents. That's something police state authoritarian dictators do. And if Obama can do it... so can Trump. If only Republicans are upset about this and nothing gets fixed... good luck next election!!

Utterly ridiculous you say?

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/04...

I agree.

Where we would probably disagree: how pervasive is mental illness?

Most Muslims in North Africa, the Middle East and Afghanistan would be considered 'extreme' by North American standards.

It is unfortunate that the PC crowd has managed to divide Muslims into two simplistic categories: the tiny minority of violent crazies and the vast majority of peace loving, liberal, progressive, democratic, tolerant Muslims.

That is pure fantasy. For example, only 22 percent of Muslims in Afghanistan believe honor killings are never acceptable, according to Pew research.

http://www.pewforum.org/2013/0...

I found the creationist tack amusing. From everything I've read about evolution you would think the 'random genetic variation' thing would be a slam dunk. Now here's Spencer saying that's not the case. Is it true? I don't know since I've never looked into it. (It's not high up on my list of interests...)

But simply being open to Spencer's claim, being willing to listen and hear it out, makes me a creationist. Apparently because of the threat to science there is no room for debate. Sound familiar?

He did say that you follow him around...

Don't worry I'm vaccinated! You won't catch anything from talking to me! :P

Luckily most everyone vaccinates so the few people who choose not to vaccinate pose very little risk. Currently you are much more likely to get a nasty reaction from a vaccine than catch polio for example. In fact, where I live the chances of catching polio and suffering a dangerous complication are vanishingly small. So no, anti-vaxxers do not "threaten the health of every individual they come in contact with".

Maybe tone down the hysterical rhetoric??

Hi, thanks for the tip. It's interesting to see how far people will go to push their views on others!

If you approve of this sort of thing today you probably would have been among those who approved of forced sterilizations in the past. Compulsory sterilization was the law where I live up until 45 years ago. Because fuck "parental rights".

Vaccines can cause brain damage in some cases. It's rare, but it happens. The risks of not vaccinating are very low. You are more likely to suffer moderate to severe reactions from a vaccine.

yeah exactly. and if the mob happens to feel that sterilization is essential to a healthy population if your child does not have genetic markers for high intelligence... fuck parental rights! You are potentially dumbing down our whole civilization by refusing compassionate sterilization for your children!

That puts us all at risk!!

The bit of video I saw showed Dr Spencer arguing against genetic randomness. Maybe he believes the only other possibility is Intelligent Design? I don't know. I haven't looked into it.

And I would absolutely not be surprised IF there was contradictory evidence to "genetic randomness" that is simply ignored or dismissed out of hand. Because that's how people behave, and how you are behaving when you ignore and dismiss all the evidence that shows Cooks paper is complete garbage, regardless of whether his results happen to be consistent with other papers. Integrity of method is more important than producing "correct" results.

But I know nothing about competing genetic randomness theories, so my lack of surprise has nothing to do with the actual science, in case you misunderstood. (I haven't looked into it.) But I won't be surprised if that doesn't stop you from trying to paint me as a "neo-creationist" or whatever. Because that's how people behave.

As to the graph I posted by Spencer, what if it's accurate? What then?? Will you become a creationist?

https://climateaudit.org/2016/...

You are trying to lump me in with "intelligent design" people which is funny. Here's what I actually said: "I haven't looked into it."

Nice attempt at a smear though. As a left-leaning Canadian I'm aghast at how pushy and nasty the left has become. Apparently everybody must all believe the "correct" views or else it's fair game to attack, gang-up on and smear. It's disgusting. And extremely short-sighted.

Certainly not "scientific".

Nice find! He is talking about the random component to evolutionary theory? The first result I see on google asserts that genetic variation is random. He is saying it doesn't add up when you look at it statistically? That scientists have simply assumed it's random and now it's deeply ingrained dogma? (Because what else could it be but random?)

I haven't looked into it. But I wouldn't be surprised if there is contradictory evidence that is simply ignored or dismissed because it challenges orthodox views. Scientists are human beings after all.

Why do you seem to think that survey is a good way to estimate the scientific consensus

Interesting that you are so quick to dismiss contradictory evidence. The AMS survey is evidence that does not support the notion of a vast scientific consensus. And it is better than Cooks work since it does not depend on activist raters who break anonymity and blindness.

In Cooks paper, social sciences papers such as a public survey looking at "Informed and uninformed public opinions on CO2 capture and storage" were considered climate science literature that endorsed consensus.

Knowing the above I'm not sure how anyone can defend that paper. Maybe they are so happy with the results they don't care how they got them? Is that how science is supposed to work?

I also already explained that their question wasn't "worthless".

It is worthless for determining what is relevant in this debate: whether there is a consensus that most warming is human caused and whether it is potentially dangerous.

OK, 3146 scientists were surveyed. To get their 97% figure they only used 77 of those respondents. We both understand that. So would you consider it dishonest if someone were to use the Doran study to assert that 97% of all scientists agree that warming is primarily human and dangerous?

how did they get past review in the first place?

You do realize that Tol's paper passed peer review also? You must therefore believe that there's 'a big conspiracy among the authors, the reviewers, the publishers, and more'. ?

I note that you dodged the question about breaking anonymity.

I would happy to pass along peer reviewed scientific studies studying peer review.

As to your other comments, since when are social scientists (who are included in Cook's 97% figure) climatologists? Since when are public surveys considered climate science literature? AMS members are a lot closer to 'climatologists' than many of the scientists he includes in Cook's 'consensus' paper.

---

On another note, you got me thinking about the integrity of the people on the review board who approved Cook's paper.

"Tonight, I’m surprised to find that Gleick, who stole documents under a false identity, and then likely forged a fake memo sent to MSM outlets is apparently still on the editorial review board of the Institute of Physics (IOP), Environmental Research Letters (ERL) which published the now discredited Cook et al. 97% consensus paper." - https://wattsupwiththat.com/20...

Maybe they believe climate change is SO important that they're willing to be dishonest? Gleick was willing to be dishonest. At least we can agree on that, right?

I never would have believed this if we couldn't somehow explain it. I do understand that this early explanation may turn out to be wrong, but I'm sure it will be updated as we learn more. Thank you!