[Boiler]

Round here there is a proposal to build a very large solar farm on nearly 2,200 acres of farmland that's adjacent to the East Coast Main Line (hence the unimaginative name) and unsurprisingly, it has stirred up a lot of opposition in the adjacent villages - most of which are nice and reassuringly expensive places to live.

For: https://www.mallardpasssolar.co.uk/
Against: https://www.mallardpassactiongroup.com/news/

I'm sure a nuclear plant would occupy less than 2175 acres.

[kreuzberger]

Well, rivers.

The Rhein is quoted, quite rightly, in the international press for its historically low levels and that it is barely navigable. The Elbe hasn't had quite the same levels of publicity but, twixt Berlin and Leipzig on Saturday, it was looking pretty anemic.

So, the Mighty Danube must also be reduced to a dribble, right? Erm, no. Yes the levels are a little lower but the differences from earlier somes are not exactly notable. And that includes the new races which cut through Regensburg to prevent flooding. You would expect them to be the first to run dry. Quite evidently, the Danube is an exception while the country is witnessing quite extreme circumstances.

The potential for ecologic balance is evident but, in Germany, the economic considerations even in the short-term are, well, arse-clenchingly scary. The railways are maxed out and the Autobahn network is structured for people rather than stuff except for East-West cross-continental movements. It is clear that we can rapidly lose the momentum of the export sector and that will cut deeply in to the labour market.

Bleak. (Not in the British sense of the word, obvs.)

[kreuzberger]

Heard it all before. Violently nasty weather, a few dead, pretty much normal for places in foreign climes.

Having not seen the footage of what has been happening in Pakistan this weekend, it was virtually impossible to understand what this biblical flooding event is wreaking on those poor souls.

What little footage there is, is now coming to light and the situation is truly horrific. The dead are currently being listed in the hundreds but that is a story which will unfold on a massive and almost unimaginable scale. That is not a clever-clever prediction, rather simply what happens when the waters subside. As James O'Brien would say, it's just counting.

We clutched our pearls when faced with the reality of this being 30 to 50 years down the road. No one officially confirmed that we can expect this on Friday. Now, today, tomorrow.

But here we are, seeing what we have never seen before - (except on those occasions we studiously ignore.)

[Yug]

These arseholes know exactly what they're doing. The serious underlying question is "Why?"

The climate science denial echo-chamber has been loud and proud this week with claims a new “international study” has found no evidence of a climate emergency in records of extreme weather.

So impressed was the Australian with the work that it ran uncritical coverage on page one and page two.

Using algorithm-friendly headlines such as “Report finds ‘no evidence’ of a climate emergency”, Sky News Australia has amassed more than 400,000 views on YouTube across two segments on the story.

Yet a closer look at the publication, which appeared nine months ago in the European Physical Journal Plus – a journal not known for climate studies – reveals something very different.

The authors – three Italian physicists and an agricultural meteorologist – did little original work, but instead reviewed selected papers from other scientists. This was an article, not a study.

Climate scientists told Temperature Check the work was selective and had misinterpreted the results of some studies, while leaving others out...

It was highlighted last week in online outlets known for publishing stories promoting climate denial. One UK-based climate sceptic group, the Global Warming Policy Foundation, included the article in its Net Zero Watch newsletter.

The report in the Australian, from the environment editor, Graham Lloyd, described the article as a “long-term analysis of heat, drought, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes and ecosystem productivity” which had found “no clear positive trend of extreme events”.

Dr Greg Holland, an emeritus senior scientist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, has coordinated several reviews of extreme weather.


He told Temperature Check the journal article “appears to have taken the predefined view that there has been no change – and then selected evidence to show this”...

https://amp.theguardian.com/environment ... ard-enough


I really can't understand why some people would take clear evidence of impending disaster and twist it to 'prove' there's nothing to worry about .

[Bones McCoy]

There's good money in shilling for billionaires.

As long as you consider your principles, reputation and integrity as disposables.

[Andy McDandy]

Because they learned all this clever dick shit in debating society and think it translates to reality. And to a degree, it does.

Rhetorical questions work. Anything sounds dodgy when put in quote marks. Almost nobody has a 100% consistent and ideologically pure track record. Poor and thick people resent rich and smart people, particularly if you can present the rich/smart as "not that special". Make someone look iffy and you've won, because they're on the other side and they've lost.

You don't have to win; you just need to fuck the other guy up so he can't. Then you win by default.

[MisterMuncher]

I've found asking for a preliminary debate about why debate is only used by people without the capacity for empiricism tends to run off a fair amount of Debate Is The Only Way To Decide folks

[Oboogie]

6am, pitch dark and the car informs me that it's 17°C, that's a July early morning temperature, it's going to be November on Tuesday.

[Youngian]

Hartley Brewer’s climate change hoax schtick not going down well

[Yug]

How To Win Friends and Influence People (2nd edition)

Just Stop Oil considers slashing famous artworks as it threatens to 'escalate' protests

https://news.sky.com/story/amp/just-sto ... s-12757133

Just Stop Oil demonstrators are considering slashing famous works of art as they threaten to "escalate" their protests.

Like a bunch of overgrown toddlers, in a fit of anger at not immediately getting their way, they smash mummy's favourite vase, and sit among the wreckage whining "Look what you made me dooo".

The message they have is very very important, but shit like this only serves to deflect attention away from the message and onto the messengers.

The controversial climate activists have also issued a call to England captain Harry Kane to wear an armband carrying their message at the World Cup in Qatar.

Which would result in Kane being sent off the pitch for wearing non-approved kit, and Kane himself and the English FA being fined by FIFA. The Just Stop Oil message would be lost in the ensuing media shitstorm.

Alex De Koning, a spokesman for Just Stop Oil, said it was "insane" that "more people are outraged" about the activists targeting artwork than the devastating floods in Pakistan, which displaced millions of people.

The 24-year-old - who describes himself as a "climate scientist"* - told Sky News that the protest group may follow in the footsteps of suffragettes who "violently slashed paintings in order to get their messages across".

*and everyone else describes as an overgrown fucking toddler with no concept of how the world actually works.

Mr De Koning said targeting famous art had "marked an escalation" in Just Stop Oil's action and warned it will "continue to escalate unless the government meets our demand" to stop future gas and oil projects.

I can only assume that these people honestly believe that the best way to make the powerful do what they want them to is to really really really piss off those same powerful. Have they thought this through?

"Because there was no damage (to the Van Gogh painting), there was a lot of support that actually came out as well as a lot of controversy."

Yes. Because there was no damage. Actually slashing a n old Masterpiece with a knife is not quite the same thing as chucking paint or soup over the protective glass in front of the painting.


I can't help wondering how many Just Stop Oil members are/were also members of Momentum? There's the same stiff-necked 'we're right and everyone else is wrong' attitude. The same childish belief that the world's problems really are black and white. The same pig-headed refusal to even try to understand the way the world really is.

Are they aware that when their protests are reported on TV an in the papers, the focus is on them and their actions, the disruption they're causing, not on the message they're trying to get across.

Acting like a bunch of overgrown toddlers isn't going to win many people over to their cause. A bunch of immature twats who are actually making things worse by acting like immature twats.

Whatever happened to grown up protest?


Afterthought:

I've just realised this post is all about them and their actions, not about their message. A prime, inadvertent, example of what I'm talking about.

Afterafterthought:

To clarify and sum up, I am totally behind their cause. My issue is with their actions. This is a global disaster, and they're making it so easy for the MSM to make the story all about them rather than the issue they're attempting to highlight. It's totally counter-productive.

[Yug]

Addendum to my above

When the 14 year-old Greta Thunberg first came on the scene she exhibited a far higher level of maturity than all of these so-called adults in Just Stop Oil.

I wonder what her private thoughts about them are?

[mattomac]

Yup I really like what Greta does and to be fair her and her cohort have done reasonably well, more governments are paying more attention to it.

This lot I want to support them but some of their targets make no sense to most people, it’s really crap campaigning.

[Yug]

Nice to see our government is still serious about saving the planet...

The UK government is refusing to release the carbon emission figures behind its transport decarbonisation plan, which campaigners say could make proposed road schemes financially unviable.

The Department for Transport (DfT) is blocking academics from seeing the figures, which include data on how much car use would have to be reduced in order to reach net zero commitments.

Campaigners say meeting these legally binding targets will be possible only with a drastic reduction in motor traffic, which could make many new road projects financially unviable...


...Prof Greg Marsden, of the University of Leeds, said the figures showed the sector breaching carbon targets and not meeting its own carbon reduction plans. He has submitted a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) demanding the figures be released.

The projection shows car use will increase or remain stable. It says: “In the high economy scenario, car trips increase over time. In contrast, in the low economy scenario, car trips remain relatively stable until the 2040s, from which point they begin to decrease.”

However, scientists say a shift to electric vehicles alone is not enough and car use needs to be drastically reduced in order to meet net zero targets, with some reports showing that a reduction of at least 20% is needed by 2030. None of the projections from the DfT show this.

Marsden said: “The key question is: why is it OK to release information about scenarios which are not government policy, but not to release information about scenarios which are?”

The ICO agreed with Marsden, ruling: “The commissioner considers that there is a very strong public interest in publication of data that will assist the public in understanding policy decisions – especially those designed to be as far-reaching and long-lasting as the transport decarbonisation strategy. Disclosure will help the public to understand where the government’s proposals are too ambitious, not ambitious enough or about right.”


However, the DfT has appealed against the ruling, further delaying the publication of the figures.

The department claimed it does not have to submit its workings on the decarbonisation plan as it is a “live policy”, arguing: “It is submitted these should not be disclosed because they are, in effect, the foundation of future policies in the making and are therefore to be considered live policies. ..

https://amp.theguardian.com/environment ... ks-release

Such information should not be disclosed because this may lead to an inhibiting effect on discussing and developing those ideas.”...

Bollocks. Publishing the figures will actually spark discussion. Though it may well lead to an inhibiting effect on developing those ideas, simply because what the government have come up with for their friends in Big Oil and the motor industry is detrimental to the health of the people and of the planet . The only reason the government have for not wanting to publish the figures is that it's a crock of shit and they know it.

[Spoonman]

Speaking of Ms Thunberg - **Mic Drop!**

[davidjay]

What is it about this harmless young girl that outrages so many powerful white men?

[Yug]

I had to Google Andrew Tate as I'd never heard of him before. He is stereotypical of what I despise about so many Americans - the abject failure to develop intellectually and emotionally beyond the age of 14. If it weren't already polluted enough, I'd tell the cunt to get in the sea.

[AOB]

I had to Google Andrew Tate as I'd never heard of him before. He is stereotypical of what I despise about so many Americans - the abject failure to develop intellectually and emotionally beyond the age of 14. If it weren't already polluted enough, I'd tell the cunt to get in the sea.

On a related note, I recently went down an internet rabbit hole, only on mainstream news sites, about the Incel culture. Involuntary Celibacy is what it's short for. In a nutshell, it's a load of inadequates who gather on internet forums spewing violent hatred of women, because they can't get a girlfriend. Inconsistent with their view of women is that they want one. Their numbers are quite high, the US seems to be the epicentre, and a few have since committed murder. Tate is a hero of theirs. Any article you read on the subject is depressing, but not hard to find if you google the word.

[Andy McDandy]

Yeah, what we used to call sad bastards.

[Watchman]

Tate acts like a cunt - Tate can’t get a girlfriend - Tate is my hero - I can’t get a girlfriend - I follow Tate on social media…..go figure you gullible twat

[Youngian]

I had to Google Andrew Tate as I'd never heard of him before. He is stereotypical of what I despise about so many Americans - the abject failure to develop intellectually and emotionally beyond the age of 14. If it weren't already polluted enough, I'd tell the cunt to get in the sea.

On a related note, I recently went down an internet rabbit hole, only on mainstream news sites, about the Incel culture. Involuntary Celibacy is what it's short for. In a nutshell, it's a load of inadequates who gather on internet forums spewing violent hatred of women, because they can't get a girlfriend. Inconsistent with their view of women is that they want one. Their numbers are quite high, the US seems to be the epicentre, and a few have since committed murder. Tate is a hero of theirs. Any article you read on the subject is depressing, but not hard to find if you google the word.

Are these gig economy males feeling emasculated as they’re not in a secure financial position to be a catch? Or Joe the plumber who earns bundles but the prom Queen is now much smarter than he is and went off with the nerdy guy?