Bucks, Peeps, and Communicable Hysteria

I’m big on using  templates and thinking-models in order to short-cut a lot of mental effort. Being lazy, as I am.

Simply put, you can take a successful product and, by cloning the processes and using existing templates you can skip all kinds of wasted time.

In my “George the Consultant” life, I’m going exactly this with a client right now that’s designing and rolling out a new business.

Thing is, where do you get a template for a new business that’s never existed before?

Simple:  You go template shopping.  We’ll talk more about this is an upcoming Peoplenomics report and how it’s done, but the point is there are templates for everything. Which, in turn, gives us all kinds of “fresh thinking horsepower” to throw at the daily news flow.

Give me the right templates and use the right analogies and even Ure could rule the world.

Take this morning for example:  There are lots of stories being fanned on climate.  For example “Wallace Smith Broecker, the ‘grandfather’ of climate science, leaves a final warning for Earth.”

Also, there was an article on the Weather Underground blog that was also trying to poo-poo the folks who look at the long-term data and see a relationship between post-Ice Age slow warming and the increased number of sunspots on the one hand, and hysterical global alarmism spread by climate charlatans who modify data to “adjust outcomes.”  This WUndeground  article “The Weirdly Quiet Sun May Get Even Quieter (and BTW, Earth Is Still Warming)” nevertheless is useful input reading.  OK, and maybe partisan.

What’s apparent to an old-time, old-school generalist (ahem…) is that we are experiencing one of the core problems of hyper-complexification of life due to wanton connectivity.

To illustrate, in their rush to poo-poo solar cycles, climate panderers point to the Maunder Minimum and proclaim something like “Well, THAT was because of volcanic ash release and not the sunspots…”

Well, except that’s a grand fail due to what?  “In-specialty” thinking.  We need more generalists.

See, if you step outside of the specialty box, and go read a 2011 paper by Marilia Tavares “Influence of Solar Cycles on Earthquakes” you’ll begin to think about the larger and more-linked real-time Reality:

Sunspot declines lead to less heating, or actual crustal shrinkage, and that sets-off quakes and that speeds cooling as ash from volcanos gets global.  Climateers are selling the “single-chain” business model.  Reality is a long-chain affair, however.  Just as is pollution.

We have analogies to this problem in management science:  The problem with “experts.”  Let me illustrate: One person might want to do graphics in a company while another wants to do marketing, but neither has the whole spectrum of skills required to manage a balance sheet or overall throughput, yet.  Specialization builds expert area functionality (subject matter specialists in education) but doesn’t enable one to lead up at the organization-level.

With this in mind, what we have presently are lots of “climate specialists” who seem not to read outside their highly-focused specialty.  They are thus easily led by “logical sounding” but fact-distorting “data adjustments.”

As a result, non-experts are getting roped-in to the fray thanks to two phenomena’s:  The first is “soldier-gathering.”  This is what warring couples do (check with any experienced social worker on this) when divorce is in the air.  They go out and “soldier-gather” from among their friends as they seek support-for and justification-of their pending divorce.

In the same fashion, a few activist climateer’s went out with the objective or “convincing” as many as possible of their “rightness” although to us, any “divorce” is fertile ground for additional conflict. So is climate.

The second phenomenon is how all this propagated into the Political System.  As this morning’s title informs, the Internet is the place of Communicable Hysterias (*OK, and histrionics, too, while we’re at it).

As we recall that Politicians do NOT lead from the front.  They come as a long-delayed reaction to the onset of real problems.  Climate is just one example.  There are others.

Slavery, for example, was a major problem for America on a values-basis as soon as the Nation was founded.  Emancipation didn’t happen until 1865 because politics is slow, especially when there’s actual war over the issues.  Yet even today, political solutions to racial divides are cockeyed, slow, inept, and thoughtless as to longer-term impacts.  See it?

OK, let’s get back to climate:

In fact, usually when there’s this kind of “hard climate change” selling going on, that leads into very bad news for the climateer’s, namely that we did NOT just have the warmest February on record.  It was one of the coldest.

While at least 23-people were killed in Alabama and across the South in a tragic outbreak of thunderstorms and tornados overnight, we can rest assured that some charlatan will immediately, and hysterically, linking this to “climate change.”

Again, we advise adjusting your “Reality Filter” to remove the BS – in which case it’s a just a quiet Monday as these days go.

More useful is the NY Times piece Friday (in case you missed it) as they reveal some of “How the Weather Gets Weaponized in Climate Change Messaging.”

As a result (of soldier-gathering and political pandering) we are bored (or sickened) by the childishness of climate “news.”

Although even the DrudgeReport had to see the tip of the “charlatan iceberg” in their “Gas-guzzling car rides expose Ocasio-Cortez amid Green Deal pledge…” link this morning.

What you didn’t hear enough of was the subject in the Billings Gazette Friday “Good riddance February: 2nd coldest ever, and 3rd snowiest.”  Or, in Rapid City where it was the third coldest February ever and sixth snowiest.  Or, in Seattle where it was the coldest February in 30 years.

We get it:  It’s a bitch to sell climate change when in the “sunny southland” of California “For the first time ever, temperature in LA remains below 70 degrees for all of February.”

Sunspots are out – and you can see it in the solar cycle progression data released this morning:

When it comes to climate, think in terms of hysteria and trust your own “lying eyes.”  The data (uncorrected for political windage, at least) doesn’t lie.

And we’re not the only ones calling for the “showdown with hysteria in 2020″as the data comes in.  Genuinely scientifically-minded people have seen this coming for more than a year.

Economic News Void

Unfortunately, this week starts at a painfully sluggish rate.,  Some housing data in a couple of hours.

Other than that?  Gold was getting its ass kicked (-$10.40) Bitcoins were down in the $3,700 range.  Which means digital tulip crops survived the winter..

And the Dow futures were +95, which means bulls took the money from bears who went short over the weekend.  I wasn’t one of them.

Moron the ‘morrow...time to chase down some chickens and pigs for breakfast..

20 thoughts on “Bucks, Peeps, and Communicable Hysteria”

  1. Yo G – not only did the digital tulips survive the winter..they be THRIVING.

    Coming to a left coast house of representatives near and dear U – a new Bill being proposed – Marijuana Businesses will be able to pay their Taxes in Stable Coin!

    Where the hells the value in Stable Coin one might ask..value indeed.

  2. I am curious George what these hucksters are going to do when AI which makes it decisions based on raw data starts to debunk their BS? Could this be the end of AI? I mean seriously how dare we put real facts into the argument

    • The “computer” is as nearly flawless an instrument as has ever been devised. You put data in, you get resultants out. If you put the SAME data in, you always get the same result, data dump, or computational solution.

      Howsomesoever, when I was a wee lad, we had an acronym: GIGO.

      GIGO is: “Garbage in, garbage out,” meaning, if someone taints or colors the data, or the program running the data, or the system (or translator, or interpreter, or compiler, or assembler) processing the data, or the program that’s either drawing conclusions from, or dumping the data, you get results which are not relevant, and conclusions which are not based in true, relevant fact.

      THIS “data or programming sabotage” is the basis of ALL computer error. The “computer,” as nearly perfect a machine as it is, is only as “perfect” as the program coders and the data entry allow it to be.

      “AI” can not, and will probably never be able to correct for a person or persons who deliberately fudge entry data or inject erroneous or malicious code into the computer’s operating system or programming code. It WILL eventually be able to tell its operator when a dataset is insufficient on which to base a conclusion, It MAY eventually be better-able to screen outliers than a human data-interpreter, but neither human nor AI is going to be able to compensate for, or probably even identify a deliberate attempt to cook the input data…

    • Jeff… probably the same thing when we finally start to debunk the MSM news..we are nothing more than a biological computer bank..

      It frustrates me.. that the crap they spread is so much and from so many directions that it takes me a while to finally figure out that all of it is crap.. the BS is so deep and spread so far.
      I wonder if that isn’t how they gain control over world leaders..give them BS data and news stories to back their point of view .. touch their heart strings..then have points of power within their own govt and industry to give them the power needed to turn the great ships of time and countries to do their bidding’s.. I actually quit paying attention to the news..

  3. “Give me the right templates and use the right analogies and even Ure could rule the world.”

    For heaven sakes George…Ure in for a nightmare if you run for president. Don’t under any circumstances do any business with anyone from Russia if you do decide to run.
    Just turning on the news the past couple of years has been a non stop nauseating experience alone..
    The last thing I think I could have heard” DJT drank a black Russian drink.. Once maybe two of them”
    How much proof does a person need for Christ’s sake..
    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Xhp3rdl-sx0

  4. Hmmm…climate change / prejudice

    Hmm.. I have always believed in climate change..its a natural cycle. I’ve always suspected as mankind proliferate their actions alone will have an affect. ( don’t be slapping fart bags on cows to be shot into space..that’s just stupid along with the idiotic mirror flinging idea..but hey he has a piece of paper hanging on the wall as a credential..I would have to see it to see if it says Charmin or Scott but beck it pays the bills and he makes more than me so who am i) for me the thought is simple build green don’t blacktop and concrete everything..but i absolutely hate the term global warming.. God that just reeks of the wrong mental image.

    Slavery.. And racial discrimination. I thank god I had color blind parents. They taught us kids that there are idiots in all sizes races and religions. But considering being abused by others. Lets think about the Indians as one. In the past they were murdered abused had their land stolen and forced to live in inhumane places. Had small pox sent to them in the hopes to annihilate them. Lets take the chineese, japaneese, etc.etc. back a few years the kkk was targeting Catholics.. Yet we are only directed at one aspect of discrimination. All which was way before me. Like one of my favorite actors said.. (Morgan Freeman) want it to stop..quit bringing it up. Its in the past. The only reason its still thought about is because of the constant hype.
    He to reminds me of my father..
    Yesterday SF’s issues came up. A horrible situation for such a beautiful city. Years ago I asked someone from south Africa what all the crap I was reading was about since south Africa is an extremely beautiful country modern and well laid out. Her comment was this. That’s what you see. The people she said are classified they live in their area and aren’t allowed to learn. She said the school she went to had armed guards in it to make sure the teachers didn’t teach something out of their class. If they did the soldiers were suppose to eliminate that from getting out. To me this made sense. Shortly after that a young girl made history by wanting to get an education. To stop her someone brutally tried to kill her..the reason she was a woman and women were not allowed to get an education.
    So literally there are those that live in an areas where the issues in the community are not seen or even considered.
    The same for myself. I knew a really good man that lived in a dumpster I couldn’t fathom it nor could I survive it. But I know it exists

  5. Is this the beginning off the market correction I have been anticipating, anticipating, & anticipating. Since I believe AI & the IofT is the future, I realigned my portfolio last year in half chip stocks & half cash to take advantage of a substantial correction & then planned to hold until URE INDEX 30,000. With our gov’t in such a mess, it seemed reasonable that the market would take a big hit. So far, I believe it is prudent to hold to the current plan, & maybe be a little more diligent watching the market. I will have to leave PT on his own. Now in my 70’s, it all doesn’t seem that important & fishing season has begun & golf is close.

  6. Whether or not you believe in Climate Change, the issue is that it’s not something we can actually see on a day to day basis. We are trying to sell a long term effect, if there is one, on a sound bite world. We can’t see, feel or smell Climate Change…so it will always be hard to fathom and accept…but we do have sensory perceptions on another issue…And that’s pollution.

    I was born in the 50’s and grew up in the 60’s and 70’s. I distinctly remember the “Keep America Beautiful” campaign of those times. Highway and road littering became a huge issue as the intrastate highway system combined with disposable packaging became ubiquitous nationwide. Unfortunately, Keep America Beautiful was well-funded by the packaging industry to put the blame of littering on individuals rather than the businesses that were actually producing the packaging that turned into litter in the first place. But it did help clean up our roads, parks and communities. Why? Because garbage is something tangible.

    That campaign yielded to the recycling campaigns of the 80’s and 90’s which was embraced because it created a worldwide $40 billion recycling industry. Again, plastics, and metals clogging up our waterways, landfills, etc. is visible and creates an emotional reaction. And, recycling in of itself became a shape shifting entity that has now morphed into city wide political action against plastic straws, utensils, plastic grocery bags and much more. Today, recycling and the elimination of disposable items is as routine as having a cup of coffee in the morning.

    Then there is air pollution. The real issue of her day. Can we position pollution and turn the messaging into a visible and sensory issue like litter and plastics? I think so.

    We can see pollution in our own air. In 2018, following the Camp Fire disaster in Northern California, the winds shifted and caused Bay Area skies to darken. Our air quality was touted as worse than Beijing, China. What really stood out to me and many of my friends and colleagues wasn’t our own air quality at that time…it was the fact that Beijing has to suffer though this everyday…all because of human caused pollution and the lack of environmental oversight on their production of goods and services. Many other Chinese and Indian cities have just as poor air quality.

    In the Central Valley of California, 1 in 6 children in the San Joaquin Valley have asthma. While some officials blame indoor air quality as the main cause, the American Lung Association blames the outdoor air quality in the Central Valley as the main culprit. Either way, over 550,000 people in the San Joaquin Valley have asthma. That’s a number that not only affects our health, but the cost of healthcare and our pocketbooks as well.

    Cities all over the country have poor air quality indexes. According to the American Lung Associations State of the Air report, California has the top 5 worst cities in air quality. But after that, many of the cities are in Red or Purple States. Houston, Dallas, Las Vegas. Tulsa, Denver, Oklahoma City, St Louis, Pittsburgh, Kansas City and Cincinnati to name a few are in the top 25. This is pollution you can see, smell, and feel from a health standpoint. And while climate change is still a theory in peoples minds…pollution is a real entity like garbage.

    More important from messaging standpoint, pollution is analogous to many relatable issues. Let’s take a heart attack. For those that insist on touting Climate change… that is the heart attack…Pollution is the junk food and vices that cause it. Clean energy is the heart healthy diets we implement to combat the heart problems. When you put issues of importance into perspectives like this…it makes it so much easier for people to understand and adopt.

    In addition, Climate change by itself means absolutely nothing to many in America, because of talking points surrounding the fear of economic burdens it may cause on corporations that may be affected by it. Again, let’s put it in perspective… A heart attack is a potentially mortal byproduct of a careless lifestyle. But, it’s eating a healthy diet that we message. Entire industries have been created as a result of those fears. The fear of a heart attack has spawned many industries from health clubs, yoga centers, to health food to vitamin supplements etc. It’s even caused many junk food companies such as Nabisco, Nestle and General Mills to re-posiition and expand their product lines as well…which creates jobs.

    Likewise, controlling pollution has spawned many industries as well and could help create many more if we all could make it a daily routine like recycling. According to a report by the 2017 U.S. Department of Energy and Employment report as reported by NRDC.org, clean electricity jobs are outstripping the number of paychecks provided by the fossil fuel industry by at least five to one. When you add in those people that put in part time hours installing or working in part for energy efficiency, the number balloons to 14 times the number of paychecks produced.

    From a government standpoint, politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and others are missing the boat by focusing solely on climate change as well. The right has already stamped AOC as a radical. And, it will get worse unless the messaging changes to be something we can ALL embrace.

    That focus should be on job creation, healthy lifestyles, education and opportunity. The mantra for the Democratic Party for instance should be…”What if we can create more jobs with better pay while enjoying more beautiful skies, better air quality, cleaner water, healthier bodies and the possibility of a better life, would you all be in? Let’s talk about the facts!”

    This is where the American public can learn about the real facts surrounding the new jobs that have been and can be created that are more stable and much safer to human health than being a coal miner or an oil roughneck, as an example. This also attacks the (ongoing) campaign talking points of Trump and his misleading promises to the coal and fossil fuel industry.

    All of the above is like the AMA saying” What if I told you you have a better chance of living longer, feeling better, looking younger if you eat better and exercise regularly, would you be all in?” They don’t talk about the Heart Attack…they talk about the benefits surrounding a healthier lifestyle.

    I could go on for pages about research on embodied cognition and how positioning pollution as the catalyst could enhance global participation…But for now…I would like to start a new conversation that we ALL can agree upon that is inclusive and not…divisive….for the betterment of our future and the future of our children.

    • I agree…

      …but as I said before, GCC is not a problem, therefore, it has no “solution.” “Creating a solution” [for GCC] is a blank check with multi-trillion dollar backing, no need to ever expend energy or perform work, and no need to EVER show a quantifiable or qualified “improvement.”

      “Pollution” IS a problem, one which requires both money and effort to rectify. However, given money and effort, “improvement” would be readily noticed by anyone who looks for it.

      A religion is any belief system which requires “faith” — a belief in something which can not be empirically proven. This is what differentiates “religion” from “proven fact.” Can a religion be factual? Absolutely! Can it be fraudulent or fake? Also absolutely.

      GCC is a religion. It requires faith to believe anything extraordinary is happening WRT Earth’s climate, and conceit to believe Mankind is a significant contributor. Both the above are disprovable by any competent geologist whose math education passed elementary calculus, yet data, computation, and even common sense are ignored and vilified by the GCC crowd, because they run counter their faith and attack their egocentric conceit.

      Pollution is not a religion. It is quantifiable, observable, and fixable. However, unless we can find a way to make “pollution” as “sexy” as GCC, neither the nutjobs nor the greedsters will ever take it seriously, unless it threatens themselves or their lifestyles with imminent demise…

      • G.C.C. is a natural cycle..

        “Mankind is a significant contributor.”

        Mankind may not be the main contributed in the process.. But we and our actions are contributors.

        http://blog.phantomforest.com/2016/09/how-many-trees-are-needed-to-produce-enough-oxygen-for-one-person/

        Figure seven trees per human ( not counting animals etc) and seven billion plus and growing.
        Mix in some greed and a little clear cutting.
        A few yards of asphalt and concrete.
        The natural cycle has nothing left to do but speed up a bit. Instead of every fifty thousand years it now becomes ten thousand year cycle.
        Where constructing smarter would most definitely slow the natural process down.
        That is in my opinion an individual choice and the decisions made by a communities planning and zoning committee

        Unfortunately I think people are going to attemp to make huge profits riding on the fears of the people to market their GCC views and pass useless laws so they can gain.

      • So, if you’re going the “tree route,” why do you think the Gorical of Al, and all its GCC followers, are advocating we asphyxiate the trees by eliminating that which they “breathe…?”

      • Nope..not asphyxiate…we are doing that naturally on our expanding footprint on the planet.

        All that does is provide the path for the marketing of G.C.C. and supplies the credibility to push their sales.

        As a great man has said often..

        It’s all a business plan..

        Now if you gander at this same question of AI and plant asphyxiation…growth etc. Our carpenter ant ways also affects plant growth and the weather . but then that is a complete different set of debates..and Climate Change is still going to be a natural cycle.
        Things that could have been done should have been done years before I was born.
        I think we as a species can and could slow it down .but it would mean a whole different approach to community planning.

    • “Keep America Beautiful”

      When I was a kid.. A neighbor had a carnival. Every year before he would start touring. He would set up the carnival. Everything test out the rides and shows . the bear wrestler would practice everything. The owners grandkids would get to ride for the town kids. Our job was to walk the ditches pick up as many grocerybags of trash. In exchange we got a days pass to everything.

      Another member of our community was once a cartoonist for Walt. But then that’s another story..
      Junk food.. Eggs wholesome flour oil milk ..fiber for good digestive health.
      No

      • No don’t give up on any of those junk foods just because someone says they are bad for you.. at our age who in the heck cares anyway..I say Eat the cookies.. eat the cake..

  7. Hi, George,

    Someone please tell Mark from San Francisco that a heart attack is not always a “potentially mortal byproduct of a careless lifestyle”. He is so pompous. Heart attacks also come to people who have the genetic background for them, from their parents and grandparents.

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