That's not quite true, of course. But the idiots in the North Carolina legislature are trying to outlaw the use of climate data to estimate the rise of the level of the sea over the next 90 years. Because they don't agree with the current scientific consensus about climate change and the effects that it will have on sea levels.
So if scientists are projecting a rise in sea level of one meter, or 39 inches, by 2100, North Carolina will, by law, only consider and plan for maybe a rise of eight inches.
Because politicians are better able to make sense of scientific data than scientists.[1] The last time this sort of drama played out, the tobacco industry obfuscated the scientific data on the effects of smoking, the "conservatives" bought into that and public health efforts were set back by decades.
This time, the stakes are higher. Substitute the coal and petroleum industries for the tobacco industry and the same dynamic is at play.
Legend has it that a thousand years ago, King Canute demonstrated that the sea paid no heed to royal commands. If only the legislators in North Carolina were that intelligent.
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[1] Especially when those politicians are taking "campaign contributions" from the coal industry and from the Koch brothers.
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4 comments:
Plant the idiots at the low tide mark and let them tell us if the sea level is rising.
What next? They pass a law saying pi is exactly 3.0 and outlaw any books that have more words than pictures?! How smrt of them!
If I knew that the earth's climate wasn't really changing, I could make a fortune selling flood insurance to people who thought it was.
It seems like this would force the NC insurance commissioner to require linear risk extrapolations. Let's see how that works out.
Ain't nuthin' in the constitution prohibiting people from being nincompoops. Idiocy and ignorance are as American as apple pie.
Yours very crankily,
The New York Crank
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