So one of the founders of Greenpeace, an environmentalist wacko organization that does more harm than good in more ways than I could possible scratch with a solid day of typing… and will henceforth be lovingly referred to as GreenBleach, just came out of the proverbial closet in favor of nuclear power. Why? Well… because as it turns out it’s better for the environment. (duh!?)
The GreenBleach founder is Patrick Moore and his entire article is linked here.
Nuclear Engineers have known the environmental superiority of nuclear energy as a large-scale, safe and reliable source of energy for decades. Most reputable scientists and citizens with common sense have also known this for decades. So why are the greens, who are supposed to be so-called “Earth’s defenders”, the biggest opponents of nuclear energy… a curious stance which cutely and ultimately enough hurts the very dirt they worship? Simple. Personal politics.
Nuclear energy, unfortunately, is synonymous with nuclear weapons in ignorant circles (like GreenBleach)… and of course to greens nuke weapons are the phallic tools of greedy white patriarchs seeking to starve all poor children and destroy all planetary animal life. Just using the word nuclear will send many a UC Berkley graduate into an epileptic fit worthy of an Amsterdam rave. Henceforth anything sounding nuclear becomes a Republican plot to make more money, and thus… no matter how much environmental scientific evidence can overwhelmingly support it… out of political fervor most greens will oppose it. But the honest ones are starting to come around.
This phenomenon, by the way, isn’t unique to the environmental issue… you’ll see it everywhere. There are some scientists who, despite the evidence for some intelligent design in nature and the grave problems with a purely naturalistic evolution model, will oppose the idea of design simply because (and they readily admit this) they refuse to face the philosophical and moral dilemma of a designer. In the same vein many oppose intelligent design (ID) not because they believe in evolution, but because evolution fits their worldview better. If you’d prefer to do what you like without the pesky guilt trip then you embrace existentialist claptrap and fight like the devil to keep anything resembling God out of view. This includes opposing ID in schools because they want to keep “Bible-thumpers” from re-writing their school curricula (a noble fear, I must admit).
But alas, I am getting onto a topic for another time. And in reality if there were such a thing as “green conservatives” I would probably be prototypical. So, as a nuclear engineer I applaud any green who decides to put common sense, science, and… *gulp* …the environment before politics. Let us pray for his ostracized soul.
I'm a Christ-follower, compelled by my faith toward reason, which points directly toward conservatism. This world's daily onslaught of lunacy offends my intellect and senses, so this is my venue to blow off steam.
There is such a thing as a ‘green conservative,’ though i’m more of a moderate republican than a conservative. If fact, i thought the world should know that you and I are not alone. Liberals are always accusing Rs of playing politics with public policy (and sometimes they’re right). In this case it is the liberals that need to stop playing the scare tactic game. The ‘Greenpeace Guy’ is a good start.
Wow, thanks for stopping by! There actually is a GreenGOP.org website… how cool is that? I’ll have to check it out.
Bring Wind Power to Kennedy Soun— I mean Nantucket Sound !
Number 1:
While I will agree that nuclear energy, currently from fission, is more friendly to the enviornment than fossil fuel alternatives there still is the serious concern of adequate safe and longterm disposal of spent fuel, etc. Yucca Mountain still seems a long way off and I am still concerned about its longterm stability (10,000 years). Fusion energy offers the hope for cheap, pollution-free energy, but remains technically…challenging. This is not to say I am against nuclear power. I am however quite interested in alternative energy sources. There have been great strides in biomass conversion processes and several European countries have made decent progress to integrating wind-derived energy into the economy.
Number 2:
You did have to bring (so called) intelligent design into the argument. Setting both your and my religious convictions aside (i know from long experience these are irreconcilable), ID does not belong in a science classroom. Science requires testable hypotheses, and postulating a creator behind natural phenomena is inherently untestable a matter of faith. There is also the question of the intelligence behind the design. I’ll refer you to the site honoring the Flying Spaghetti Monster (I’ve been touched by His noodly appendage) for further treatment of the subject: http://www.venganza.org.
And on the subject of evolution, no credible scientist gives ID any credence. Yes, there are things that cannot be quickly and wholly explained. The human eye is a frequent example. I cannot tell you the exact evolutionary steps that happened to bring about this structure, but that does not mean it is therefore designed. I must be content to say “I don’t know, we’re working on it.” Some things may never be known about past evolution. The fossil record is only informative to a point, only a small number of creatures die under the correct conditions in the right place to become fossils for present humans to find. What I can give is this: creatures are composed of funcitonal and strucural proteins. These are coded by RNA which is copied from DNA. DNA is semi-conservatively transmitted in sexually reproductive organisms with an imperfect DNA polymerase, with about one copying error per 100,000 base pairs. This, combined with environemental factors and imperfect DNA repair, as well as chromsomal recombination, lead to genetic heterogeneity. It should be obvious, even with no empiric observation, that genetic differences in the presence of environmental pressures lead to the selection in a population of the genetic determinates which endow a survival advantage. For example, image a group of numbers, 1,2, & 3, segregated into groups of two, so one group might be 1:2, another 3:1, etc. They reproduce by me copying them into another data file, and at that time I take two groups and transpose the numbers. However any group that has two 2′s is copied only 50% of the time. Starting with an equal distribution, a brief number of copy iterations (if pressed i could perhaps calculate the number of generations needed) 2′s would become somewhat rare. Here we see evolution of a group of numbers.
While there are situations where the evolution of certain traits has not entirely been worked out, the general theory that the traits of organisms arise from evolution is not in doubt. There is no controversy over this in biology. That said, the origin of life is a different question, and again I must simply say and be content with, “I don’t know”. However once there is an imperfectly self-repllcating system, in the presence of selective pressure evolution is assured.
ID belongs in the classrooms of philosphy and religion, not science. If I let evolution into a biology classroom, shouldn’t i also force the theory that that the odd thermal properties of supercoooled He are due to sub-quantum-sized gnomes carrying baskets of heat from one molecule to the next? Leave science to the scientists and religion to the priests.
The book Origins of Life by Fuz Rana (a micro-biologist) goes into insane detail as to the troubles with purely naturalistic DNA mutations producing evolved speciation… not the least of which is the eye example you brought up. As long as there has to be retardedly ridiculous amounts of fantastic coincidental crap mutations happening simultaneously (sorta) for a successful positive new trait to aid in natural selective survival of that specimen… I will bite my thumb at thee.
I have heard of the flying spaghetti monster, and I find him to be a much more feasible and believable culinary entity than prebiotic soup delivered by anyone’s guess.
ID and evolution should probably both be taught. Arguing who the designer is can be saved for religion class, but testing the validity of design is the same forensic ballet that evolution is, as macroevolution cannot be tested any more than we can go back to find out how the hell an infinitesimal speck the size of a Plank cube, possessing near infinite mass, could appear out of nowhere to crash our empty vacuum party. Either way we can run the numbers to figure out the chances a populated Earth could occur naturally in a couple billion years… but the numbers don’t look good.
- A quick serach shows me that Dr. Rana is a chemist by training but i’ll not quibble.
- There are THOUSANDS of instances where morphologic, biochemical, and genetic analyses have produced data supporting the theory of evolution. There are some where the data is ambiguous, even potentilally contradictary. That does not mean that we must jump to a supranatural explanation. It means more research needs to be done. I would also go as far as saying that i have witnessed evolution. I have taken a random sample of bacteria, cultured them on an agar plate, and subjected them to antibiotic challenge. I find that subsequent generations (the doubling time of bacteria being measured in minutes to hours) all express antibiotic resistance genes not ubiquitously expressed in the original population. My little sample of bacteria evolved. Granted this is a small population change, but what can you expect in a brief experiment. Stretch this worldwide over billions of years and nearly anything is possible.
- But let me get to the most salient point: Science is all about testable hypotheses regarding natural phenomena. Once any creator is introduced with ideas of design, there is no longer anything testable,. There is no way to disprove the null hypothesis, whether we are talking about creation by god or invisible construction by goblins. Anything invoking god is not science, it is faith. I am not here to argue faith, just to say that faith does not belong in a science classroom.
- I would also like to again, this time explicitly, separate the questions regarding the origin of life and the subsequent evolution. There is virtually no data reguarding how life started on Earth, with little testable theory, and this also does not belong in a science classroom. It should be simply left “We don’t know”.
Alternative Energy in Ireland
The Irish are currently pursuing energy independence and the further development of their robust economy through the implementation of research and development into alternative energy sources. At the time of this writing, nearly 90% of Ireland’s energy needs are met through importation—the highest level of foreign product dependence in the nation’s entire history. This is a very precarious situation to be in, and the need for developing alternative energy sources in Ireland is sharply perceived. Ireland also seeks to conserve and rejuvenate its naturally beautiful environment and to clean up its atmosphere through the implementation of alternative energy supplies. The European Union has mandated a reduction in sulphuric and nitric oxide emissions for all member nations. Green energy is needed to meet these objectives. Hydroelectric power has been utilized in Ireland in some areas since the 1930s and has been very effective; however, more of it needs to be installed. Ireland also needs to harness the wave power of the Atlantic Ocean, which on its west coast is a potential energy supply that the nation has in great store.
Ireland actually has the potential to become an energy exporter, rather than a nation so heavily dependent on energy importation. This energy potential resides in Ireland’s substantial wind, ocean wave, and biomass-producing alternative energy potentials. Ireland could become a supplier of ocean wave-produced electricity and biomass-fueled energy to continental Europe and, as they say, “make a killing”. At the present time, Ireland is most closely focused on reaching the point where it can produce 15% of the nation’s electricity through wind farms, which the government has set as a national objective to be reached by 2010. But universities, research institutes, and government personnel in Ireland have been saying that the development of ocean wave energy technology would be a true driving force for the nation’s economy and one which would greatly help to make Ireland energy independent. A test site for developing wave ocean energy has been established in Ireland, less than two miles off the coast of An Spideal in County Galway Bay. This experimental ocean wave harnessing site is known as “Wavebob”. The most energetic waves in the world are located off the West coast of Ireland, says Ireland’s Marine Institute CEO Dr. Peter Heffernan. The technology to harness the power of the ocean is only just emerging and Ireland has the chance to become a market leader in this sector. David Taylor, CEO of the Sustainable Energy Initiative,or SEI, tells us that SEI is committed to innovation in the renewable energy sector. Wave energy is a promising new renewable energy resource which could one day make a significant contribution to Ireland’s electricity generation mix thereby further reducing our reliance on fossil fuels.
Padraig Walshe, the president of the Irish Farmers Association, tells us that with the closure of the sugar beet industry, an increasing amount of Irish land resources will become available for alternative uses, including bioenergy production. Today, renewable energy sources meet only 2% of Ireland’s total energy consumption. From a farming perspective, growing energy crops will only have a viable future if they provide an economic return on investment and labour, and if the prospect of this return is secure into the future. Currently the return from energy crops is marginal and is hampering the development of the industry. Biomass energies need to be further researched by Ireland.