“Inside every adult lurks a graduation speaker dying to get out, some world-weary pundit eager to pontificate on life to young people who’d rather be Rollerblading. Most of us, alas, will never be invited to sow our words of wisdom among an audience of caps and gowns, but there’s no reason we can’t entertain ourselves by composing a Guide to Life for Graduates.” …
These are the opening lines of a newspaper column from the Chicago Tribune. It is very short, but I cannot reprint it in total due to copyright, only a snippet as fair use. Read the whole thing here.
It is weird, just weird. The piece, which reads like a poem and comes off a little like Rudyard Kipling’s If
“If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you…”
It was supposedly written by a Tribune columnist named Mary Schmich. I don’t believe that. Why? It is just instinctual … for one thing, she would have been 43 in 1997 when the piece came out, and it sounds much older and wizened than someone that age can produce.
For another, it went viral, but NOT as a Mary Schmich piece. Instead, we were told that it was an MIT commencement speech given by Kurt Vonnegut. He finally issued a public statement saying it was not him, as miffed as any of us about how it came to be. How could that happen?
Finally, the line “Wear sunscreen” is odd and prescient. That is what is so weird about the entire affair, from fake authorship to use of the Internet to make it go viral to the use of Vonnegut to sunscreen as the opening and closing lines. The global warming hoax was well underway at that time, the original sweat-soaked summer hearings taking place in 1988.
The warming trend we underwent lasted from 1978 to 1995, and is now long over. Consequently, warming is now called “climate change. It is a nice catchall phrase. Climate change can be blamed for every weather event, hot or cold, and even wars and psychosis. It is highly sophisticated and immensely powerful agitation propaganda.
The people behind it mean business, but business having nothing to do with weather (the planet is doing quite well). It is money, for sure, carbon trading schemes and all of that, but also extreme dishonesty from scientists, deliberate hysteria, and in the end, command and control – how we live, what we drive and and what kind of house we live in. We will pay more to heat and cool those houses, as solar power doesn’t get it done, and windmills are more a metaphor than a reliable source of energy.
Fossil fuels have been a boon for mankind, bringing us easier and better lives and more wealth. Some suspect that the nuclear power industry is behind the climate change hoax, wanting to undo the coal industry. That has legs, but at the same time the whole of the climate change hoax is too big, too powerful to be just that. It is an insidious body of propaganda, a massive lying campaign, with the public faces like James Hansen, Al Gore and Michael Mann mere stooges, sock puppets. It could be racist at its core, preventing development of Africa, keeping those nasty brown and black people down.
What is the ultimate end? I cannot know. All I know is that we can ignore the weather warnings. The planet is OK.
- The oceans are rising only imperceptibly, as they have been for centuries.
- In a richer CO2 environment, we have more moisture.
- Forest fires have been diminishing in size and number for decades.
- There is a slight warming trend, only boosted a minuscule amount by CO2. It’s been going on since the bottom of the Little Ice Age, 400 years ago, and through centuries when we were not burning fossil fuels as we are now.
- Because of CO2, the planet is greening, and vegetation, as measured by satellites, is encroaching on dry areas, such as the Southern Sahara.
- The Amazon Basin is thriving, as is the Great Barrier Reef.
- Droughts are at record lows.
- Arctic ice oscillates, grows and shrinks, and will continue to do so. Greenland ice appears to be shrinking, but not enough that it can be farmed as it was by Vikings during the Medieval Warm Period. Wouldn’t it be nice …
- Ice in the Antarctic is growing, not shrinking.
- Maybe half if the world’s glaciers are shrinking, the other half growing. They never hold still.
- Polar bear numbers are at record highs in terms of recorded populations, triple what they were in 1960, more than 30,000 compared to 5-10,000 then.
- There is no measurable trend in strength of storms, nothing but statistical noise, natural variations, indicating a flat line.
- It is the same with planet’s skin temperature, with repeated warnings of “warmest year on record” based on numbers so slight as to be within the margin of error. High temperatures have not changed, but lows have increased. This is not a big deal.
- Every computer model used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been shown not only to be wrong, but wildly so. (That is, except one … the Russian scientists seem to have a handle on this affair.)
The above is said to be a prediction of how “climate change” is going to affect areas of the country. Droughts and floods, forest fires, crazy bad storms … it comes from some kind of front group called “Grist,” probably well and secretly-funded. It is meant to scare people, to appear on Facebook and other social media as grist for the mill.
It is propaganda, to be mild in my choice of words. Not one thing about it will come true. It is scaremongering at its worst. I am surprised they didn’t put the monster from Ghostbusters in it too.
In my younger years I had a pessimistic outlook. Even as my life got better, I always feared disaster to be right around the corner. But even though small disasters happened, always seeming bigger than they were, things got better for me. I see in people that fear, that something bad is going to happen to us, that things cannot be this good. It is as if pessimism is the natural condition, and our leaders merely feed it. These days my outlook is more beholden to chance, that things can turn worse or better, but that I’ll be OK.
As I drive around the foothills of Colorado this spring, I am overwhelmed by how lush and green it is. Weather patterns have an effect, for sure, but also more CO2 in the atmosphere. That’s a good thing.
Where did the “Wear Sunscreen” piece come from? Who wrote it? Why was it attributed to Vonnegut? Answers to those questions might unveil some of the dirty rotten scoundrels behind the climate change hoax. However, it is a very well-written piece, full of good advice except … don’t be worried about sunscreen, and be careful not to trip over defunct windmills and solar panels in the coming good years.
No doubt some will think only in terms of problems, and we do have them. Humans do cause ill effects, such as deforestation exceeding regrowth, and pollution as seen in Beijing (not caused by CO2 by the way). These are indeed serious problems, but humans are adaptable, and we can solve these problems. First, we need to forget about climate change as anything more than a bad dream, a propaganda campaign. In terms of deforestation, it helps to remember that without fossil fuels, our forests would quickly disappear as people turn to wood for energy.
Piece of Mindful 
It was played heavily on pop music channels in 1999.
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I saw that – did not listen to it however. Never knew it existed. What was I doing in 1999? Oh yeah – chasing my girlfriend/now wife.
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I find the pop music recording explains the cadence of the written piece that you question. I had only ever heard the musical recorded version of this writing, and it seems to me that the words were written for the song, not that the song was construed around a mass media CT article. The pop music version got it out to the masses, the awaited millennial class of ‘99.
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I don’t advocate the use of sunscreen as it prevents natural vitamin D from being made in our bodies
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3356951/
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/vitamin-d-from-sun
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I’m more than happy to state in plain terms that I do not believe in ‘anthropogenic global warming’ and, what’s more, I believe ‘climate change’ is a HOAX. Period. End of story.
I took up the practice of sungazing about 18 months or so ago. I highly recommend it. The sun is our friend, not our foe. Which would explain why are told the opposite.
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I am glad someone agrees. At its worst, when they do the extreme scaremongering, it is easily seen as an agitprop program. That means they want something big, and they want it now.
Jon, as always, I don’t know why your comments go to moderation, as there are no roadblocks in place. I will look into that some time when I have time.
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https://missoulian.com/opinion/columnists/a-rising-climate-challenge-to-political-elites/article_2ceb3802-b60f-51a2-a31b-a2995300cf4f.html
How’s this for an all-hands-on-deck, “something big,” is coming signal?
Relates back to an earlier article: http://www.wrongkindofgreen.org/2019/01/17/the-manufacturing-of-greta-thunberg-for-consent-the-political-economy-of-the-non-profit-industrial-complex/
“What’s infuriating about manipulations by Non Profit Industrial Complex is that they harvest good will of the people, especially young people. They target those who were not given skills and knowledge to truly think for themselves by institutions which are designed to serve the ruling class. Capitalism operates systematically and structurally like a cage to raise domesticated animals. Those organizations and their projects which operate under false slogans of humanity in order to prop up the hierarchy of money and violence are fast becoming some of the most crucial elements of the invisible cage of corporatism, colonialism and militarism.” — Hiroyuki Hamada, artist
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Sungazing? Looking directly at the sun for long periods? Put aside “science”, doesn’t that violate common sense experience…? It can be blinding just driving down city streets that run east/west at certain times.
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Regarding sungazing, I am not trying to advise others to do it for themselves if they don’t feel inclined to it already. Only those who are interested in trying new things are ever likely to even consider the seemingly-crazy idea that looking towards the sun might be beneficial.
If you look towards the sun and it hurts your eyes, of course you will avert them. What happens as the sun moves closer to the horizon (i.e. twilight?) The sun’s power seems to decrease, and one may realise that no pain or discomfort is felt when looking towards the sun.
That is my experience, anyway. But I also like to stretch and exercise in the sun (also early or later in the day, not when the sun is too powerful). I am by modern standards a strange man. Not only do I not fear the sun, but I try to derive energy from it! How bizarre…
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Question on the hoax- what percent roughly of the sci guys truly believe it, and what percent knowingly lie?
Some years back, 07 maybe, I met a recent climate science graduate.. Some level of postgrad I forget.. And he conceded that the system was too complex for us to really pretend mastery. But he was just sold that, still, clearly our industry was bad for the environment, so might as well be on board with global warming. As a way to advance his intuitive or political stance against excessive industrial activity.
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All of the money say study climate change. If you don’t, you might as well be driving truck.
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To answer my own question… My guess is the top guys consciously manage the hoax. But they rely on groupthink and indoctrination (plus employment carrot and stick) to bring in the rank and file scientists.
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global warming is certainly a hoax…I don’t know about “sungazing” but being in the sun is the only way for our bodies to make Vitamin D
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https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/vitamin-d-from-sun#time-of-day
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Darcy, seeing as you’re into psilly experimental rigs andwhatnot; here’s one of my favorites. It’s wild bill libby’s Anticoincidence chamber. This is how he measured the carbon isotope c14. Wild bill was a veteran of the manhattan project. His ole lady was too of course. Her name was leona woods. She worked with fermi and szilard at the ci cago pile…
The agw hoax is the nuke hoax. Isotopes are chemically identical so you need special machines like wild bill’s to separate and measure said isotopes. The only difference betwixt chemically identical isotopes is the number of neutrons. Here’s a picture of the man credited with inventing the neutron hanging with Leslie groves and Richard tolman…
https://siarchives.si.edu/collections/siris_arc_384503
…Sir James Chadwick was the biggest of big wigs during the manhattan project of course. Don’t tell my little buddy though he has to believe in isotopes cause wild bill’s c14 not only gave us the agw hustle it also “revolutionized” geology of course.
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Oops, I almost wild bill’s “curve of knowns”. You’ll get a kick out that as well…
To test the technique, Libby’s group applied the anti-coincidence counter to samples whose ages were already known. Among the first objects tested were samples of redwood and fir trees, the age of which were known by counting their annual growth rings. They also sampled artifacts from museums such as a piece of timber from Egyptian pharaoh Senusret III’s funerary boat, an object whose age was known by the record of its owner’s death.
In 1949, Libby and Arnold published their findings in the journal Science, introducing the “Curve of Knowns.” This graph compared the known age of artifacts with the estimated age as determined by the radiocarbon dating method. It showed all of Libby’s results lying within a narrow statistical range of the known ages, thus proving the success of radiocarbon dating.
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So it was proven? I don’t see where you point out any problems with their claims.
Not sure the connection from isotopes to agw either?
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I’m a agw denier because I don’t believe in isotopes.
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A close relative of mine died of metastatic melanoma. I don’t believe in agw, but I do believe that too much of a good thing can kill you. Moderation in all things…
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Timr, I’m not sure where I should start. Do you believe in nukes?
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SMJ, I’m a nuke skeptic but I don’t consider myself very well versed in all the arguments or claims of either side.
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My bad. That’s cool. Darcy and my little buddy Gaia have a bit of a one-sided history. Sometimes I can come off as an arrogant prick. I don’t believe in isotopes and c14 is an isotope of course. C14 is the official proof for agw. The story starts with rutherford. Keep an open mind check out his coat of arms. Hermes trismesgutus is the charge on the Dexter side of his eschutcheon. All the shite I just typed will make sense to you one day unless you have a dog in the fight.
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Okay gotcha, so C14 is an isotope. Now I see the connection, thanks. Guess I need a better grounding in nuclear science etc.
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“Ernest Rutherford (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937) was a New Zealand-born British physicist who was known as the father of nuclear physics. Rutherford decoded the natural mechanisms behind the crowning objective of alchemy which is the transmutation of elements. He shaped our model of the atom through his discoveries that atoms have nuclei (in an experiment in which particles were deflected off gold foils), which contained the Proton (while splitting the Nitrogen atom) and the Neutron (which was discovered under his leadership at the Cavendish Lab, Cambridge University).
When he was appointed as Lord Rutherford, he designed his coat of arms with a kiwi bird (being a New Zealander) as well as a Maori flanking the left (facing away from the emblem). His motto, plucked from a poem by the Roman poet Lucretius, translates into “To seek the first principles of things”. And on the right, he placed an image of Hermes Trismegistus.”
http://flameating.blogspot.com/2014/06/ernest-rutherfords-coat-of-arms.html
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Are you implying that his work was esoteric mumbo jumbo? Not really “scientific”? Or a blend of science and mysticism maybe?
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Modern ‘science’ is for consumption for the general population. It defects attention from the esoteric/unknown. Makes manipulation & control much easier when unwashed masses are w a y behind in the physical & spiritual realms. GOOGLE this : us6506148 b2 a blend of 1984 & hands on technology….or scare tactic Tom Foolery?
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