OT - Lights going out in three years

[Andrew Gabriel]

The 50 years worth is current operating mines, and those easily reopend.

[Jo Stein]

I completely agree with you. He is so ignorant that one of the basic law of science is unknown to him. When someone goes against consensus or common sense, we can be pretty sure that we witness a crank in action.

In earlier days we had to watch with more care, as it could be a genius in action; someone like Swante Arrhenius or Milutin Milankovi?. Not any more, as science is now more complete.

**Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments, Justin Kruger and David Dunning, Cornell University, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, vol 77, no 6, p 1121-1134 (1999)

[Tim Streater]

Which basic law is that, then?

Like Galileo or Einstein, you mean? The notion that a consensus about something in science, in and of itself makes the consensus correct, is nonsense.

How do you know this? Answer: you don't.

[harry]

You need to know the difference between a hypothesis, a theory and a law. A law is set in concrete. The rest of them are open to debate.

[Tim Streater]

Not so much debate, but a hypothesis and a theory can both be disproved by new evidence being found. You start with a hypothesis, an idea of how something might work. You then look for evidence to support or disprove the hypothesis.

If you find evidence to support it, then depending on how strong the evidence is, it might be advanced to become a theory; that's where the consensus comes in.

But that doesn't make it *true*. Evidence may be found at any time to disprove even a theory. Relativity and Quantum Theory, f'rinstance, are believed to be good models as they work very well, but they leave significant questions unanswered, so neither can be regarded as the last word, whatever Mr Stein may like to imply.

[Huge]

Which is why the mining people were working on robotic mines where hardly anyone has to go underground.

[Huge]

Ahh, bless. Is there nothing that 'harry' cannot get completely wrong?

[Jo Stein]

It is a law that is so basic that none has cared to write it down. When you go against consensus there are only two possible explanations.

1. You are a genius
2. You are a crank As there are far more cranks than geniuses, we can with great confidence rule out number one.

Science is very much like mapping the world. After we found that the earth is round also you have confidence in that consensus. We can also have high confidence that the number of continents is 5.

I do not now have time for a long answer, and think that Isaac Asimov has written something that explains why there is an end to science:

[The Natural Philosopher]

Noe of them are set in concrete. A law is simply a hypothesis that's stood the test of time. A theory is just a more complete hypothesis.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Science has zero truth content. It just works, that's all.

Truth is always relative to a metaphysical ontology: Never absolute.

[The Natural Philosopher]

[The Natural Philosopher]

Typical warmist illogic. I am in fact a genius, so f*ck off.

We have never found that.

also you have confidence in that consensus. We can also

Oh dear. Jo stein reveals himself to know nothing about logic philosophy or science or the difference between definition, deduction and induction.

How sad.

Try a few people like Turing, Godel, Penrose. It ain't over yet.

[Dave Liquorice]

Cheap, Quality, Speed - pick any two.

[Mark]

So you're in favour of the current system?

[Mark]

Admit it. You've been reading the Daily Mail again.

[The Other Mike]

...and driven through by Cecil 'trouser snake' Parkinson and John Wakeham, the latter going on for a cushy number as a director at Enron, who built and ran one of the first 'dash for gas' power stations in the UK.

[harry]

There are huge quantities of coal in North/South America, Australia and Asia that can be open cast mined very cheaply. But we need an independent energy source. Re sulphur, our coal is low.

[harry]

Clearly you don't know the difference,

seem to be exceptionally thick if you don't understand this.

[harry]

But you have lost all money, or so you have said. How can a genius be so poor?

[Lieutenant Scott]

Bullshit. Have they never heard of supply and demand? Put the price up= , people will use less.

And we're linked to Europe anyway, so the question should be will Europe= have enough energy.