Chevy Bolt concept - 200 mile range, $30,000

[Corporate666]

Generally in the EU:...

Any borrower picking that arrangement over a secured car loan deserves to be ripped off. Bank lobbying must be extremely powerful there.

How is it any different than in the USA?

I've never seen non-recourse car loans here, so if you finance a car and don't pay, and it is repossessed and sold, you are still on the hook for the deficiency balance which can be collected against your assets and income, including your home, your bank accounts, your paycheck and more.  And the lender can press the issue with a notice to show cause, which can ultimately lead to Sheriffs confiscating property for auction to satisfy the deficiency.

[Rick Law]

...
Bottom line is, like many other "sciences", they just want your money.

That is why I would not trust anything said by the environmental groups unless and until government, tax, and government funding is taken out of the picture.

Rick

Science by its very nature is a public endeavor. It has always been publicly funded.  See the 5 principles you cited - they all depend on public and open sharing of knowledge.  While some science is funded by private companies - by its nature it is usually not shared openly and the financial incentives create huge conflicts of interests.  Trust me I deal with this on a daily basis. Drug and medical device company funded research is fraught with this problem.

How would you propose science be funded?

In my view, public funds is appropriate only for theoretical research, not in applied science and absolutely not appropriate in manufacturing and installation.  It is no longer science  by the time it gets to manufacturing let alone installation.

Electricity, AC current, the transistor were all invented in the private sector.  It did not impeded our ability to use transistors, or to leverage electricity the moment it was invented.  Competitors soon enough figure out how to do it themselves, and then how to do it better.
 
What does impeded progress is with public funds it generally removed competition - it is government's nature to spread the pork where it is most politically advantageous.  Particularly bad is when public funding cross national boundaries.  We removed competition not nationally but internationally.

When nations compete, progress will be made.  When companies compete, progress will be made.  These "international this, international that" is a huge impediment to progress:

Had there not been a space race between nations, human likely would not have set foot on the moon.  Instead, nations took up the challenge.  America did it first and did so in less than 10 years.

Environmental Science and Global warming failed all 5 criteria.  When was the last time the   data was critically discussed?  etc. etc.  I am not saying it won't pass.  I am saying it has not yet pass.

Thus, Environmental Science is not one I would call science.  It totally lack the vigor required by science be it in collected data or proposed hypothesis or peers verification.  Consequently, "Environmental Science" like "creation science" and many other "sciences" are on a par in substance.   

OK so you're just a climate change denial nutter.   Dismissing a whole field of science because it disagrees with your political views betrays your motives.

Apparently you don't understand what environmental science is. It is a field of Chemists, Physicists, Biologists, Geologists and Geographers doing research in their fields as it applies to the environment. Do you not consider those sciences?

You should read my post again.  It has nothing to do with who participated and in what field they are.  It has to do with this (global warming) field's lack of vigor in data collection and analysis.

Chemist (or Physicist, or whatever) needs government grant, I get it, I understand.  But their participation in something doesn't make it science or not science unless they applied their normal vigor to this field.

It is the vigor of the method.  How was data collected?  How was it analyzed.  What were the criticism and short comings of the method/data/proposals and how was it handled.  None of those were done.  The global warming data has not been critically judged and debated.  It has been reviewed by "friendly forces" only.  That is not vigor.  We need to allow and support scientist to play devil's  advocate, support to the same degree we allow and support the "friendly" side.  The devil's advocate must exist to shake a theory down - when a theory can withstand the shaking, that is when the data gains integrity and that is when it get polished and groom to be a theory with firm footing.

Thanks for merely calling me a "nutter".  We actually have politicians proposing that there should be punishment for non-believers of global warming.  Well, "nutter" is a far cry better than labeling non-believers as "heretics" as Roman Catholic Church (and other religion) has done so in history.

[Corporate666]

You should read my post again.  It has nothing to do with who participated and in what field they are.  It has to do with this (global warming) field's lack of vigor in data collection and analysis.

Chemist (or Physicist, or whatever) needs government grant, I get it, I understand.  But their participation in something doesn't make it science or not science unless they applied their normal vigor to this field.

It is the vigor of the method.  How was data collected?  How was it analyzed.  What were the criticism and short comings of the method/data/proposals and how was it handled.  None of those were done.  The global warming data has not been critically judged and debated.  It has been reviewed by "friendly forces" only.  That is not vigor.  We need to allow and support scientist to play devil's  advocate, support to the same degree we allow and support the "friendly" side.  The devil's advocate must exist to shake a theory down - when a theory can withstand the shaking, that is when the data gains integrity and that is when it get polished and groom to be a theory with firm footing.

I have no dog in this fight but I just read the above and what you say is patently false.

Science lives and dies based on peer review.  There are no authorities in science whose opinions are taken as fact, and the best way to gain critical acclaim as a scientist is to go against "the herd" and be right.  It happens all the time -  many scientists who are considered great had ideas that were considered stupid/whacky at first.  But truth quickly prevails in science.

Also, the claims that there is are conspiracies in science to keep funding flowing are simply without any merit. 

People with inherent biases never admit them, they will attack that which goes against their preconceived ideas and support that which agrees with it, without any thought to the accuracy or legitimacy of what they are supporting or attacking.  When someone clings to an idea that's been debunked, it's almost always due to that staunch refusal to allow their own preconceived ideas to be challenged.

I would urge you to do unbiased review on the science of global warming.  It really is a fact and is indisputable, in a scientific context.  There is some debate about the cause of it, but clinging to the conspiracy/money-grants/no-peer-review stuff is as incorrect as the 6000 year old earth folks.

[mtdoc]

...
That's not to say that like any human endeavor, the potential for biases is not there - but science by it's nature averages any individual biases out through the process of repeatability, peer review, open discourse, etc until eventually consensus is reached, or not.

In an ideal world yes, and in some disciplines of science more than others, but in politically hot areas such as climate research and forecast the politics intermixed with science, scientists becomes activists and are emotionally invested in the outcome, skeptics are intimidated and ridiculed, and being in sync with the prevailing dogma improves one's chances of getting published and receiving grants.

Sorry but science doesn't work that way. It just doesn't. Of course scientists are human. They are fallible and some even corruptible. But the truth is that in most cases a scientist has much more to gain by going against the consensus - assuming they can prove their claims - than by going with it.

I really see no point in rehashing the AGW issue but since it's the example you use lets look at it.  Lots of climatologists have set out to show there is no relationship between burning fossil fuels and global warming. They have failed. Many scientists who started out skeptics became believers once they actually looked at the data.

Whether discussing climate change or the link between fossil fuels and human health, It's not like these are a new areas of research where a few isolated, influential scientists might hold disproportionate sway.  These issues both have decades of research by thousands of scientists from across the globe and across the political spectrum who have looked at these issues and come to the same conclusions - despite in many cases trying to disprove the consensus. 

What's more likely?  - that thousands of scientists from across the globe, some politically on the right, some on the left (but most probably moderate) are colluding to reach the same conclusions (for what motive?) or that a politically motivated (and partly fossil fuel industry funded) media campaign continually tries to sow doubt among its faithful (and vocal) disciples.?

I saw recently on youtube an episode of the Andrew Bolt show (can't find it now) where a scientist said something very interesting, 'only retired (climate) scientists express skepticism' because they do not depend on the system anymore. You can find many references for intimidation among scientists, here is an arbitrary example

http://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/18395-intolerance-global-warming-fanatics-intimidate-swedish-scientist

You're not going to convince anyone by citing stories from blatantly right wing political media sites. But even if true it's a weak argument - because some scientist somewhere felt intimidated by some colleague then it must be that all the thousands are being intimidated..Yeah right.


And why is it that the only science that is accused of being systemically biased is that which challenges a group of blatantly partisan political and mega-corporate interests?

The weakest link in science are the humans ;-)

Not sure what the point is with that statement. Humans are imperfect, yes. Science is the best system we have of smoothing out those imperfections in our attempt to better understand the physical world.  Do you have a better idea on how to do it?  Religion?

[mtdoc]

BTW- once again - a prime example of a renowned scientist who was a climate change skeptic who became convinced once he actually looked at the data.  And ironically some of the funding of his failed attempt to disprove AGW came from Charles Koch . So much for biases or funding dictating scientific results

[mtdoc]

Electricity, AC current, the transistor were all invented in the private sector.  It did not impeded our ability to use transistors, or to leverage electricity the moment it was invented.  Competitors soon enough figure out how to do it themselves, and then how to do it better.
 

As far as I know Electricity and AC current were not invented but discovered. Big difference. And no, Galvani and Volta were not "in the private sector".    Granted, Tesla was working privately when he developed applications for AC current but this became public quickly only because of the immediate need to compete with Edison's DC applications.

As far as developing the transistor - the basic science research that allowed its development was publicly funded I believe. No one is arguing that commercial application of basic science into products should not be done by private industry. 

Based on your post, I'm not sure you understand the difference between scientific research and applied science.

You can't seriously be arguing that the vast body of scientific knowledge has not been primarily publicly funded, are you?

[zapta]

Not sure what the point is with that statement. Humans are imperfect, yes. Science is the best system we have of smoothing out those imperfections in our attempt to better understand the physical world.  Do you have a better idea on how to do it?  Religion?

For a starter, understanding the limitations of science, especially when it is politicized and scientists become activists with emotional investment in the outcome. One example is the consistent gap between the global warming forecasts and reality.

[mtdoc]

Not sure what the point is with that statement. Humans are imperfect, yes. Science is the best system we have of smoothing out those imperfections in our attempt to better understand the physical world.  Do you have a better idea on how to do it?  Religion?

For a starter, understanding the limitations of science, especially when it is politicized and scientists become activists with emotional investment in the outcome.

  So, basically ignore all of the above and just repeat the same old unsubstantiated claim. ok. got it.

One example is the consistent gap between the global warming forecasts and reality.

  References? 

Predictions about the exact degree (but not direction) of future temperature changes are imprecise and no one would claim otherwise - there are too many variables.   But this has nothing to do with the facts of AGW.   

You might as well argue that because I cannot predict exactly how much the temperature of the heatsink attached to a power mosfet will rise at a specific point in time in a variable external environment then the fact that it's rise is due to current passing through it is false and how hot it gets has nothing to do with the amount of current.

[dannyf]

The car makes my quality of life better.

Not mention that it allows to travel in comfort and style, , and to claim proudly that you paid 32Kgbp for a car worth half of that.

It's an excellent deal.

For Nissan, yes.

[dannyf]

You can't seriously be arguing that the vast body of scientific knowledge has not been primarily publicly funded, are you?

You can't seriously be arguing that the vast body of scientific knowledge has been primarily publicly funded, are you?

[dannyf]

But their participation in something doesn't make it science or not science unless they applied their normal vigor to this field.

That's an important point that some people here failed to comprehend.

That's not to mention how useful such research may be. Our universities are overloaded people who are more interested in getting grants than teaching young people. It is really a fleecing of taxpayers and young kids.

[tom66]

All reasonable discourse was lost about 10 pages ago. You can't argue with someone whose mind is made up already. Their belief is based on ideology rather than facts or evidence. This exists on BOTH sides of the argument.

If sufficient evidence was presented that showed that climate scientists were involved in a major conspiracy to cover up cooling or minimal change (& not a silly CRU email) then I'd change my mind. And I'm sure many other reasonable minds would.

[mtdoc]

I'd hoped to avoid it but yes, it seems that we've headed down the same pointless path. Wash, rinse, repeat, facts and logic be damned. Yes, it does get boring. I agree to disagree.

[zapta]

I'd hoped to avoid it but yes, it seems that we've headed down the same pointless path. Wash, rinse, repeat, facts and logic be damned. Yes, it does get boring. I agree to disagree.

+1.

It looks exactly the same from here.  ;-)

[dr.diesel]

Who needs electric cars: