DDP Newsletter, January 2013, Volume XXXI, No. 1
It is difficult for the Met to predict precipitation in the UK because it can’t tell what the jet stream is going to do. It is impossible to make reliable predictions on the economic or political front because of the vagaries of human behavior. Yet fundamental laws will not be defied with impunity. First, let’s attempt to identify key questions. Continue reading
DDP Newsletter, November 2012, Volume XXX, No. 6
For more than a decade, scientists and engineers at Stony Brook University in New York had argued for building storm-surge barriers in New York. When a 4.2-meter-high wall of salt water hit the city on Oct 29, all their predictions came true (Nature 11/8/12). Continue reading
DDP Newsletter, September 2012, Volume XXX, No. 5
The Green religion constantly issues apocalyptic prophecies and proclaims dogma. Ice will melt, seas will rise, green is clean, and their policies will lead to health, prosperity, and the salvation of the Planet as well as humanity.
But without a Memory Hole, these false prophets cannot prevail. Continue reading
DDP Newsletter, July 2012, Volume XXX, No. 4
Reporting on the Rio +20 conference, Lord Christopher Monckton writes: “The walls of the conference center were festooned with disturbing images, many painted by children under the rubric, ‘children teaching their parents.’
“In one painting, a child painted the sun, dressed as a doctor taking the temperature of the earth. The diagnosis: ‘I’m sure you have humans!’” Continue reading
DDP Newsletter, May 2012, Volume XXX, No. 3
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may cite numbers of human lives theoretically saved by its regulations, but the Green agenda is clearly the protection of Nature or the Planet. The effect of a technology on the environment may not even be the issue. The fact that it promotes prosperity may be the Greens’ main objection to it. Continue reading
DDP Newsletter March 2012, Volume XXX, No. 2.
Like clean water and clean air, a low incidence of infectious disease is a very good thing. But removing smaller and smaller traces of pollution, or the last cases of measles, becomes increasingly difficult and costly. Zealotry is a problem in and of itself. And at some point, efforts become counterproductive. “Clean” technology such as wind turbines may lead to more net pollution. What if more vaccines produce more net sickness? Continue reading
DDP Newsletter January 2012, Volume XXX, No. 1.
After the UN climate conference in Durban, South Africa, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) issued a report on the “gigatonne gap” between current emission reduction pledges and the actual emission reductions needed to maintain a good chance of keeping global warming to two degrees Celsius, as estimated by IPCC models. Continue reading
DDP Newsletter November 2011, Volume XXIX, No. 6.
Public health officials are concerned that more parents are requesting exemptions from childhood vaccines. In some states, as many as 1 in 20 public school kindergartners have skipped one or more of the required immunizations (AP 11/29/11). Continue reading
DDP Newsletter September 2011, Volume XXIX, No. 5.
The official faith of America is in Science. This idol is an erroneous construct of what the scientific quest for truth really is. When officials say that “the Science has spoken,” these days they generally mean that white-coated priests are interpreting the oracular conclusions derived from a mathematical model or a computer program. Continue reading
DDP Newsletter July 2011, Volume XXIX, No. 4.
Suppose that we had a readily available, affordable, broad-spectrum, extensively researched, well-tolerated modality that could treat serious disease and also prevent future problems such as cancer, at very low risk, by stimulating the body’s own defenses? Should we want to have these facilities in shopping malls and pharmacies, as vaccines are now? Continue reading