Scientific Consensus and YouTube (Mykel Board's February 2021 Blog)

 

Scientific Consensus

 (Mykel Board's February 2021 Blog)

 YOU'RE STILL WRONG.. 

MYKEL'S JAN. 2021 BLOG

OR

Scientific Consensus

by Mykel Board

It’s Last Week Tonight with bespectacled British comedian, John Oliver. I don’t get HBO, but I can watch on YouTube. I do.

Oliver sits behind a desk. As he talks about Climate Change® the upper left corner of the screen flashes pictures of fires, melting polar caps and the obligatory polar bear stranded on an ice-floe. Then the comedian complains about network coverage of the phenomenon.

“It’s always one-on-one,” says Oliver, “the moderator in the middle, Bill Nye, the science guy, on one side, and some schmuck on the other side.”

Oliver claims this presents an unfair picture of climate science. He says that 97% of climate scientists agree that global warming is human-made-- far from the 50-50 implied by only one guy on each side.

To make the presentation more fair, Oliver brings in two people who agree with the schmuck… and 97 people who agree with the science guy.

The audience laughs.

Now, before we go on, I want to make my own position clear on this.

1. Climate change is real. Just watching weather reports over the last 10 years should prove that. It’s something every Eskimo who sees his igloo slowly melt knows instinctively.

2. With the exception of the Eskimo who never leaves his refrigerator in Point Barrow…

No educated people deny that the climate is changing. They don’t think climate change is “a hoax.” The climate has always been changing. There is only denial on the cause of the change. Oliver’s 3% believes that cause is not humans. Climate change killed the dinosaurs for fuck’s sake. Was that because of the gasoline engine?

3. I believe things are more complicated, and while there is natural climate change… and it’s probably happening… humans are responsible for making it much more destructive and faster-acting.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

I’m at the podiatrist’s. My passion for long walks.. and my love of army boots and cop shoes has injured my left foot. The doctor is putting a cast on the foot. He talks to me through a black mask over his mouth and nose. I talk to him through a blue one.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “Would you mind removing your mask? My hearing is lousy and I can’t understand what you’re saying.”

He takes off his mask. I see that he’s smiling.

“I’m happy you don’t care about that mask stuff,” he says. “I know the government and the medical establishment don’t want people to feel helpless in the midst of this pandemic.”

“I prefer to call it a plague,” I tell him.

He laughs… and continues, “If people feel there’s nothing they can do, they’ll panic. You’ve got to give them something to hold on to. Some way they can believe they have control over this pandem… er… plague.”

I laugh. “You got it!” I say.

On facebook, I connect to a video of a doctor lecturing about how useless masks are… and how they might, in fact, spread the disease. She gives the example of going out to eat, taking off the mask, setting it on the table next to the food, possibly contaminating fingers, the table, the dishes, etc…

Soon after I post the video on facebook, come the answers:

“Yeah, Mykel, you found a doctor who doesn’t believe in masks... one in a hundred. Leave it to you.”

“One in a hundred? Who do you think you are?” I don’t ask. “John Oliver with the Science Guy?”

Now before we go on, I want to make my position clear:

1. COVID-19 is real. I know several people who have had it, and the father of one of my best friends has died from it.

2. I don’t think most people who are against mask-wearing think COVID is “a hoax.” The virus is real and a killer. But they believe mask wearing… especially the paper things and kerchiefs you see on the street… are not effective against it. They are a palliative… and may actually spread the disease. (Watch the video)

3. I believe things are more complicated. In many ways, the virus is nature’s way of keeping house. Cleaning out humankind… the most destructive force on earth. We can mitigate the effect, but we should not over-react. 

Lockdowns kill people, depriving them of income, doctor visits, and the security of not being isolated. Lockdowns drive people nuts, impoverish the nation, instill a fear of other humans as deadly. They spread a philosophy of “Don’t Wait... Separate.” Social Distancing is anti-social. 

FLASH TO POLAND 1514: There’s Nicolaus Copernicus up on roof of the student dorms. Looking through a telescope… making notes… checking and double-checking.

He sketches the sun… its path through the sky… the stars… the way they move. Then checks and double-checks.

“It must be,” he thinks… in Polish. “I’ve done the research. I’ve confirmed it… tested it. It must be. The earth revolves around the sun… not the other way around. It’s the only explanation.”

For weeks, young Nic checks and double checks his figures. He tells a few close friends. Most pooh-pooh his theory… call him a nut. A few agree to go with him, to check their own telescopes… to check their own figures... and see if they match. They do.

FLASH AHEAD TO 1633, Italy: The Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei, has heard about the Copernican theory and bought his own telescope to check it out. Amazingly, it checks out. He can see with his own eyes and his own figures that it is the earth moving in an orbit… not the sun.

Galileo is not as shy as Copernicus was. He broadcasts his finding. Italy is stunned. His fellow astronomers gather to condemn the man… call him a conspiracy nut… a follower of the mythical PeeAnon.

“But it moves,” Galileo famously says, talking about the earth traveling around the sun.

The Polish nation turns to TuTube to watch La Scorsa Settimana Stasera where Johanus Oliverus talks about astronomy. He talks about the earth-centric deniers… and how the SCIENCE says that earth is the center of the solar system.

On one side of the host is Galileo, on the other side is The Pope. Johanus introduces each side, then explains (in Italian)… that in order to make an accurate representation of scientific consensus, he will bring in two astronomers of the sun-is-central Galileo school… and 6483 followers of earth-is-central Papal school. And the debate begins. Galileo loses.

Get it? Science isn’t politics. It’s not a democracy. That a majority of scientists believe something, doesn’t make it true. Science is always going back on itself. There are a few dissenters and either they disappear, or get a bigger following… then there are more dissenters. Isaac Newton, then Albert Einstein, then Max Planck… All right in their theories... until a few dissenters show they’re not.

To quote a great dissenter: “John Oliver… YOU’RE WRONG!”

=============================
I want to write a little about the Capitol protests. I’m writing a few days before the inauguration, and state capitals (and capitols) are on high alert.

I’m disgusted by the whole thing, but not surprised. A fratboy protest, complete with costumes and facepaint, is called “an insurrection.” Four people die…so it’s a DEADLY insurrection. One protester is shot by the cops. One cop is hit in the head by a flying fire extinguisher. Three protesters die from their own excessive stupidity... wall climbing, balcony jumping… like that.

An effigy noose is “evidence” that the protesters planned to hang the vice president and the speaker of the house. Despite the rope’s non-useability as a hanging device.

Insurrectionists do not wear Viking hats... unless they're real Vikings. They enter firing. They’re soldiers, not jocks…. But Congress takes its revenge. In the name of healing®, they impeach the president ten days before he leaves office anyway. In 50 years, this’ll be a Netflix comedy. It’s already a very sick real-life one.

Time has passed. It’s now 8:10 on the day of the inauguration. Looks like I was mistaken. Here’s the apology I post on facebook:

“I want to apologize for my earlier skepticism. I just didn't see the coordinated rebel attack on every state capitol, the violence in the streets, the machine gun fire in Washington. I was making fun of this whole "armed revolution all over the country" bit. I thought it was incredibly stupid panic, by a population over-reacting to little more than a fratboy party gone wrong... but these massive attacks have proved that I was mistaken.”

See you in hell,

Mykel Board

ENDNOTES: [You can contact me on facebook or by email at mykelboard@gmail.com. Through the post office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything new is available. Send me an email with SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Back blogs and columns are at https://mykelsblog.blogspot.com]

–> Go vegan and smoke dept: Research done in India seems to show that vegetarians and smokers are less susceptible to the disease than others. When that was reported in the US… vegetarians went on an I-TOLD-YOU-SO rampage. You can see the carnage… er… vegage... all over facebook and twitter. But smoking? Few people will dare believe that smoking can lower your risk. But it moves,” say the few brave doctors.

–> Meanwhile dept: The trusty New York Post reports that two Chinese boys died while (and likely FROM) wearing masks while doing strenuous exercises. In their case, heavy running. The masks restricted their breathing. How many kids are going to suffer brain damage from their parents trying to protect them?
According to The Post report about the Chinese deaths,

The death certificate listed the cause as sudden cardiac arrest, but no autopsy was performed.

The boy’s father said he believes that the mask his son was required to wear to school played a role in his death.

See you in hell… again,

MB

LINK TRADE DEPARTMENT:

I read that the search engines like lots of links... and it's also nice to support my friends and enemies in their blogs. So facebook me or email me if you have a blog, webpage or something else to connect to. I add you. You add me.

Here's a start:

Here’s Richard Goldberg: goldberg.wordpress.com

Poetry and humor fans will like Justin Martin in The Latency

And my friend Mike R has a nice site with recipe hits from the past! (He cooked for me once... great stuff.) Check out Yesterday's Recipes.

Rock-writer and historian extraordinaire, Jim Testa, has continued his great zine online. Jersey Beat is still going!

And here's one by a member of ANTI-SEEN... a tour diary of sorts.

Andy Shelton has an interesting blog here.

Savage Hippie is a guy who has been YouTubing for a long time. Our opinions largely overlap... but he complains that I'm a Communist. I'm not! I'm a communist.

Chris Stecher publishes a zine called PRECIS. You can see the back issue links there... and he promises a new issue soon.

George Fertakis has a very nice graphics-heavy blog... with music and books featured prominently. If there’s no link here (I can’t find it temporarily), then Google… er… Duckduckgo him for information.

And my long-term pal Sid Yiddish contributes with his Mishegas Master Blog.

And connect to TRUST Zine, a long-running German punk zine… that STILL PRINTS!!! Yeah, they have a website too… of course! It’s here.

Here are a couple video links.

This from Jon Cox https://squelchchamber1.bandcamp.com/album/down-so-low

And this one from my very long-time friend Roger Armstrong.

Jim Testa moved his long running zine, Jersey Beat, to the blogosphere awhile back. You can read it here. Jim also recommended a kind of unique album… in a style you don’t see to much of these days… or any days. Neo-Hassidic Rock Opera. You can stream the album here.

Kyle Nonneman is in prison in Portland. At least he can’t be kidnapped by the secret police… I think. I post his blog for him, he can’t do it from the klink. Lots of stuff about noise metal… and some very weird politics that will either fascinate or repulse you… or both.

Oh yeah, then there’s me. I have a blog of stuff I’ve written mostly from last century. You might enjoy it. Then again, you might not. It’s here.

I have a very occasional blog about how rich people are just like us… same needs, same desires, you know. You can read it here.

Let me know if you have a blog… or a print zine… or a YouTube and want to be added to the list. You show me yours… you’ve already seen mine. god@mykelboard.com

LIBERTARIANS ARE LIKE BIKE-RIDERS: aka YOU'RE STILL WRONG Post MRR Columns: Number 4

YOU'RE STILL WRONG

POST MRR COLUMNS

(or Why Libertarians are Like Bike Riders)

by Mykel Board

He fell asleep murmuring, "Sanity is not statistical," with the feeling that this remark contained in it a profound wisdom. --George Orwell

When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. --H.G. Wells

Nothing is more patent, indeed, than the fact that charity merely converts the unfit - who, in the course of nature, would soon die out and so cease to encumber the earth - into parasites - who live on indefinitely, a nuisance and a burden --H.L. Menkin

Here's to you oh left and right, you brutal double pack of slime. Basically you're not too bright. New ideas are a crime. --Mykel Board

I type this lying naked on a bed in the air-conditioned guest room of my host here in Trinidad. My laptop is propped on one knee. It's freezing in here. I have the guest AC turned to 60 degrees. This freeze lets me cover myself with a heavy blanket, though outside it's over 90^o. The blanket is the only way to keep off the mosquitoes.

I type knowing that I'll soon be called to visit a humingbird sanctuary and have tea with my host's mom and mom's friend. It's an odd luxury of long-term travel. You're always involved in new situations, new experiences, adventures... but you also have more time. Just nothing to do except lie naked on a bed with your computer.

Unfortunately, in the ubiquitous internet age, too much time goes to xvideos.com, and facebook. And worse (better), I found a facebook group of Jim Goad fans that's been so engrossing, I can hardly tear myself away to write this.

For those who don't know: Jim Goad is the man behind ANSWER ME! one of the best, most disgusting, zines in history. He also wrote THE REDNECK MANIFESTO and what may be the best prison memoir ever: SHIT MAGNET.

Jim is a smart misanthropic libertarian. His fans, as you'd expect, are also misanthropic libertarians... some of them smart. Before me, his page was a mutual stroke fest. Like a PETA site, where everyone shares horror stories about turtle abuse, Jim's site was where everyone shared horror stories about the evils of gypsies, the excesses of feminism, and the creeping dangers of big government, immigrants and welfare recipients,

For me it's a strange mix. I LOVE immigrants, admire welfare recipients, am not really concerned about gypsies, and feel much the same as these guys about feminism. What draws me into the conversation here is the LEVEL of the discussion. There's a lot of humor, a touch of know-it-all-ism, some stridency, and with the exception of one asshole (soon blocked), there is no name-calling or hysteria. Often, there is actual THOUGHT that goes into posts. That's not something you usually associate with an internet discussion.

Of course, I'm the bad guy... the intruder. BUT, they put up with me. They er... ANSWER ME (usually) and give me a window into the way some people think. Probably my proudest moment is when someone writes:

I've never before heard ANYONE, liberal or conservative, say they want their tax money to support some lazy asshole who simply refuses to work.

That's right buckaroos, I am not like ANYONE, liberal or conservative.

That's what I want to talk about... it's a topic I return to a lot. Words. Liberal or conservative. And how if you're LIBERAL you've gotta support laws against hate speech and if you're CONSERVATIVE you've gotta believe the world is 3000 years old and created by G-d in 7 days. I showed them (and they showed me), that's just WRONG.

Each side accuses the other of some wildness, something against logic... against basic fundamentals that everybody knows. (Clue... as soon as you hear EVERYBODY KNOWS, what follows will be wrong.)

The libertarians complain about PARASITES. They talk about SOCIAL LEECHES who live off of the work of others. They say everybody knows that people should stand on their own two feet. It's obvious. WHY is it obvious?

First, and clearest to anyone who is NOT a libertarian, there are plenty of people who DON'T HAVE TWO FEET TO STAND ON! Old people, sick people, cripples, babies, parents who struggle with feet that can't even walk yet. It is NOT obvious how these people can stand on their own two feet, let alone why they should.

Yet, there is some sort of quasi-religious mantra: do it yourself, that's good. Help is bad. Taking charity is bad. Why?

If no one else is there and you HAVE to do it yourself... okay, you have to. But because it may be a necessity, doesn't mean it's a virtue.

One word these guys throw around is parasite. They usually use it for people who receive money from the government... like old people... but mostly a vast network of mostly colored people who just are “too lazy to work.”

Their idea of PARASITE is strange. They define it as some one who lives off the work of others. Or that's what they say. But let's see if that's right:

I work an hour for $20. Of that, $2 goes to Jasmine, on welfare. Because I worked for that $2, rather than Jasmine, that means that Jasmine is a parasite. Right?

Wrong!

I work an hour and make $40 for Big Joe, my boss. That means my boss is living off of my work... work he didn't do. He gets $20 of my money. Jasmine gets $2. Who is the parasite?

But, because the word is used so many times in the context of WELFARE RECIPIENTS, people can't think of any other way to see them. Liberals or conservatives... Both say, MORE JOBS! MORE WORK! Both are wrong. Both make MORE PARASITES. BIGGER PARASITES!

This is where we get to the bicycle riders. I've written about them before. If there is a more annoying group of self-righteous humorless Bozos, I can't think of one. They ride like they own the streets. Get out of the way, I'm environmentally correct. Defer to me, you gas-guzzling polluters of Mother Earth.

They care even less about pedestrians than car drivers... pedestrians who pollute less than they do. After all, how much energy was used to make that fuckin' bicycle? How much petroleum goes into that grease you put on the chains?

I've heard bike-riders yell at walking people standing in the bike lane? Get out of my way. I'll run you down. You're in the bike lane! Follow the rules! But Traffic lights? They're for cars! I'm saving the earth, so fuck your traffic lights.

GET A BIKE! PEDAL WITH YOUR OWN TWO FEET. You're just like those libertarians.

Er... aren't you forgetting something? Some people don't have two feet to pedal with. Some people are old, crippled, have more kids than'll fit on a bike. People carry furniture, groceries for a brood. Who are you to judge the car driver? And who are you to judge the pedestrian whose day you just ruined with your self-righteousness? Bicycles do not make you a good person.

CHANGE THE SUBJECT: And what do you learn in school? What is evidence? When I told the Goad-folks that Giuliani, declared war on the poor... they wanted statistics, reports.

I said I SAW street bums harassed. Cab drivers, food venders, street artists all the worst-paid, lowest members of society bullied by cops, forced to leave Manhattan during Giuliani's regime. But it wasn't enough. I saw them. That makes it anecdotal evidence. These guys want numbers, reports from respected places. I respond with a How 'bout Fox News crack. They said something about MSNBC... the topic is lost. But it keeps coming up in different forms.

It happens all the time: BOTH SIDES throw out numbers, statistics. A MILLION FRAUDULANT votes screams the right as they try to pass a poll tax in the guise of VOTER ID.

A MILLION WOMEN WILL BE RAPED IN THE NEXT 12 MONTHS scream the feminists, explaining that something has to be done about violence against women... as if it were any different than violence against anyone else.

Numbers fling from one side to the other like shit into the audience at a GG Allin show. 87% of the numbers are just made up. The rest are from studies, which almost always give the stats to prove whatever they started out wanting to prove. Just google your topic and find a report that gives the stats you want. It's easy.

The climate change deniers quote numbers to show the supporting scientists don't really believe in global warming and climate change. The other side quotes numbers to show that during the past 20 years the average temperature blah blah blah.

Wake up and smell the wreckage. Look at the glaciers disappearing in Greenland. Look at the first LAKE ever in Antarctica. Look at the rubble of the Philippines hit by the largest storm in history... and Superstorm Sandy in New York just the year before. Look at the real world, NOT statistics.

Stats? Reports? They're bullshit. The anecdotal evidence they tell you to ignore? THAT'S THE REAL STUFF! Anecdotal is what happens to people.

First there's the howling of wind. WHOOOO WHOOO WHOOO Then the beating of rain like a drummer against the tin roof of your hovel. Then harder. Then the roof shakes... pulls off fragments. Roof pieces blow razer sharp... cutting your hands... your arms... you try to protect yourself. Water is shooting at you now... like tiny pellets from a shotgun. There's no longer a roof to protect you. The walls shake from the wind. A piece of adobe falls, PLOW! On top of your head. You feel the blood stream down your face. Then another blow. And another... the wall falls on you... crushing you.. burying, filling your mouth with clay and dust. You inhale it. It burns in your lungs. You feel like you're going to explode... then you die.

THAT'S anecdotal evidence. And that's what's real.

Show me the paper on how Hugo Chavez built up Venezuela. Show me the stats on the improvement of the lives of poor people. Bullshit! I was there. People are miserable. They live in fear, of crime, of the government. At night, people break open the garbage bags to eat out of them. I've seen it! Don't give me statistics. Give me truth.

A geologist in the state-run oil business loses her job because she signs a petition saying that Chavez should honor the constitution. That is not a statistic! It's my host in the country. Those are MY ANECDOTES.

Statistics aren't real. Numbers don't mean shit. Tell me what happens. Put me there. Show me. THAT'S real. The anecdotal evidence they told you to avoid in Social Studies is the ONLY evidence. The rest is just playing with numbers.

OK, buckaroos, that's it for this month. No travel adventures, though there've been many. No punk rock reports. Though there's plenty to report. For more on that stuff check the travel blog... and wait until next month.

ENDNOTES: [You can email me (god@mykelboard.com) or connect to my facebook page.

Postal contact: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003

If you'd like to read my travel blog, you can do it at mykelsdiary.blogspot.com.

If you like my writing in general, you can be notified when anything new is available. Just join the MYKEL'S READERS Yahoo group readmboard-subscribe@yahoogroups.com]

-->Reclaiming dept: Taki Magazine reports that over 100 tattoo shops worldwide offered free swastika tattoos in an effort to “reclaim” the symbol from the Nazis. People who chose to receive the tattoos were required to sign a waiver stating that they did not intend to “use it as a pro-Nazi symbol.” Jewish reporting on the event has been mixed.

-->More than one holocaust dept: The same Taki Magazine had an article by Jim Goad about something called Holodomor. This relatively unknown event took place in the former Soviet Union in the 1940s. Apparently, more than 7,000,000 Ukrainians were starved to death by Stalin and his crowd. Why was this ignored? Maybe because Stalin was our ally in WWII.

In any case, genocide is NOT the property of one group, or one period in history. We need to take note of this, make amends where possible, and then move on.

-->Truth is no excuse dept: The NSA (government agency that reads your email, spies on the German Prime Minister, and copies your internet friends), is suing a novelty store LibertyManiacs.com, for printing t-shirts about them. My favorite: NSA, the only government agency that actually listens.

-->Speaking of the NSA department: Social Reader reports that those guys have broken into a link to Yahoo and Google data centers. This enables them to get EVERYTHING that goes through those servers anywhere in the world. Yeah, I have a gmail account and a picassa picture site, but when I want to do any kind of research. It's duckduckgo.com for me.

-->Things we already knew dept:

• DO PSYCHOPATHS MAKE GOOD CEOs? asks Fortune Magazine. According to a recent book, The Wisdom of Psychopaths, the answer is yes! The characteristics of a psychopath: inability to empathize, ruthlessness, single-minded focus, murderous competitive nature, fit perfectly with what's needed to run a corporation.
• CNN REPORTS: People with lots of facebook friends are more likely to be narcissists. Do we need to do a study to find out this stuff? What's next? NEW STUDY FINDS THAT THOSE WHO SPEND THE MOST TIME ON FACEBOOK GET LAID THE LEAST?

-->How to get gun control dept: Long-term readers of this column know that I oppose gun control. Violence has nothing to do with guns or video games or Hollywood. Violence is a reflection of the culture. American culture solves its problems by killing people. A culture that values flags more than life, is gonna be violent.

That said, if the anti-gun crew REALLY wanted to pass anti-gun legislation, there'd be an easy way to do it. Have BLACK militias, armed, trained in the Montana mountains, toting guns to church. You'd see anti-gun laws pump up like penises at a porn show. It's happened already. In fact, the NRA SUPPORTED anti-gun legislation when the Black Panthers were active. (The details are here.) Can you guess why? Hint: it's in the name of the group and NOT the word PANTHERS.

-->Keep up the pressure dept: I'm happy to report that reader pressure on MRR is making them invent new excuses for my firing. The latest? I “refused to answer criticism in the letters column.” It's a lie, of course. I said that I'd agree to answer such letters anywhere. I only wanted the right to mention that I'd prefer it if the letter writer got the last word. That's an offer that still holds.

Keep the pressure on. You can send your protests to mrr@maximumrocknroll.com. Please do!