Wednesday
Aug212013
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Oodles of noodles
Aug 21, 2013 Energy: gas Greens There's a wonderful article at Kernel Magazine in which Jeremy Wilson meets the fracking protestors:
Have you protested before on energy issues?
Prajna: “Well, no. But I’ve designed a few energy things. I’ve designed an internal combustion engine that only has two moving parts, which is far too efficient to produce, otherwise oil companies would kill me. I’ve had some top engineers working on it. My great uncle designed a perpetual motion machine. But he was busy looking for something that would insulate between magnets in order to produce it. Well actually I’ve had a look at the design since. I looked into buoyancy. I did all the maths on buoyancy.
Reader Comments (64)
My brain hurts!
Sounds like DECC should offer this guy a job. He'd fit right in.
"Prajna" goes on to say:
“Do you know, it would be a wonderful start if they just stopped suppressing free energy and starting encouraging it. But they’re not about that."
Do these people REALLY not know that the government is subsidising renewables like crazy?!
Perpetual motion machines (apart from being impossible) are not green. They may replace CO2, but they will create heat out of nothing, which will exacerbate global warming.
Stuck-Record: Lol.
This is straight out of the fantasy land populated by such characters as Del-boy Trotter, Homer Simpson, Alistair Campbell and Phony Blair!
John Sullivan couldn't have scripted it better.
My internal combustion machine has no moving parts!
Well, the "Occupy Movement" folks had to go somewhere.
His great uncle designed a perpetual motion machine. So it runs in the family.
I think Lewandowsky should do some research into genetic protestation ideation.
Perpetual motion's liike that.
Nice to see the protesters know their subject prior to protesting.
"My internal combustion machine has no moving parts!" --Alan Reed
My internal combustion machine creates moving parts. Of course, they mostly move in parabolas....
Prajna looks exactly like an old neighbour of mine from Paisley. I'm pretty sure it's him. I'll ask around. Last seen on a Devon beach on BBC TV predicting that we would see the 1999 eclipse despite blanket cloud for 700 miles in all directions. He thought he was Jim Morrison.
Possibly the dodgiest guy I've ever known. I heard he was in Devon for personal safety reasons . He was the kind of teenager who would say things like 'brain surgery, that's easy, use a sharp knife and make sure you sterilise it. Easy.'
Weed severely weakens the rational mind. See the music industry for details.
Good grief, that's worse than I thought. What a collection of total nutters. Yet I don't suppose the BBC would let any of them near a camera in case the public found out who the protestors really are.
Funniest thing I've seen for ages! Deserves wider circulation.
Fortunately, it is unlikely that these fruitloops ever get their act together enough to vote.
It is interesting how many of those eco protesters believe in bizarre conspiracy theories. Don't you think it would be interesting if a cognitive psychologist did some sort of study of the intersection between people's opinions on climate catastrophe and belief in bizarre conspiracy theories?
Perhaps we might get Lewandowsky to do some work on it while he's in the UK.
"Weed severely weakens the rational mind. See the music industry for details"
Some of my work is in the music industry (my wife is an independent booking agent) and I would have to say that it is, if anything, worse than most people believe. Pot really does screw you up.
Reading Wilson's piece and looking at the photos, I almost found myself in a sort of nostalgic reverie. I remember these people, or maybe their mums and dads....free concerts in Hyde Park....Portobello Road...the Roundhouse....Windsor Free Festival....
Then I remember, for all their comic other-worldly gormlessness, these people are the enemies of progress and modernity, that they do not inhabit any observable reality, that they are my enemies in a Culture War, determined to impoverish me and my children in the cause of their infantile delusions, and I want to see them all locked up.
Funny thing, age.
And the likes of the BBC likes to pretend that these fruitcakes actually represent a spontaneous middle-class protest on the part of the villagers of Balcombe?
No one outside a lunatic asylum could take these deranged nutcases seriously.
Quite a few Prajts there.
But, is it a spoof article?
Prajna is 57/58 years old and studied accountancy at university. He was alleged to be in Devon thanks to the unwanted attentions of a potential murderer. I last saw him around 1982. He is the main reason I didn't end up like that. He is so toxic I will not acknowledge the existence of his poor parents.
Hi,
From my observations of these lunatics, I thought Prajna was one of the more rational ones. Compared to Caroline Lucas ----- he is an Einstein!
P
"My internal combustion machine has no moving parts!" --Alan Reed
My internal combustion machine creates moving parts. Of course, they mostly move in parabolas....
--Commenterjorgekafkazar
--
My internal combustion machine BORROWS moving parts from a parallel universe, so I am actually building up moving part credits here, if anyone wants to buy them - special offer, BOGOF, offer ends tomorrow
Prajna appears to be a classic case of I.Q. loss from smoking cannabis.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19372456
It's not called "dope" for nothing:-)
Regan: “I think when the power of love overcomes the love of power, then we shall find peace. You might want to look that up on the internet to make sure I got it right. I think it’s Gandhi.”
LOL...Don't have to look it up...Jimi Hendrix...Gandhi...What's the difference?
Oh well, we have the iron sun guy on this side of the fence.
Read it. Looked at the photos.
wow, just...wow.
...
I mean...what...how do they...really?...wow.
"Prajna is 57/58 years old and studied accountancy at university. He was alleged to be in Devon thanks to the unwanted attentions of a potential murderer. I last saw him around 1982. He is the main reason I didn't end up like that. He is so toxic I will not acknowledge the existence of his poor parents."
Aug 21, 2013 at 5:11 PM eSmiff
Pure magic smiffy. Are you sure you're not Lee Child? That's one hell of a tale you can tell (and I believe you - ie: I am not taking the p*ss).
What a crazy wackjob! These people really don't know anything.
This dude did hear the sound of the bell, but doesn't know where the clapper hangs. ;-)
Doubting Rich: "Perhaps we might get Lewandowsky to do some work on it while he's in the UK."
Lewandowsky probably thinks a perpetual motion machine is possible. I think physically it uses a special form of "back radiation".
Ignoring the protestors themselves what is wrong with the principle of the Occupy movement? CEO and executive/director pay looks to me like theft from the masses to me and nothing to do with free market forces.
That is the problem, there's nothing wrong with the principle but scratch the surface and it's just another vehicle for the Usual Suspects. In the same way many CAGW sceptics have a long standing interest in "green" and alternative technologies and are annoyed that the field has been hijacked by the watermelons who know little or nothing about it and are just misusing it for political ends.
http://www.kernelmag.com/features/report/4630/balcombe-fracking-protest-in-pictures/
1st picture, it's that bloke from "Shameless"!
Aug 21, 2013 at 9:24 PM | NW
The interesting comparison is to what you have protested against to know where your real convictions lie. You seem to say here you are against the principle of the Occupy movement still.
I wonder if any of these people interviewed are Caroline Lucas' friends? Hope so....
MikeC: I think you will find the "Power of Love" was made famous by Frankie Goes to Hollywood in the 1980's.
Turning Tide
I was talking to a couple of friends - green-tinged Guardian reading Labour Party activists - yesterday, both with PhDs. One said: “Why doesn’t the government stop subsidising fracking and subsidise wind power instead? We don’t want any more nasty carbon”. They’d view this Balcombe lot as fruitcakes too; so would Lucas. If it was only the druids we had to counter we might have a chance.The lights are on but there's no one home.
Foghorn Leghorn
Rob Burton:
You are evidently not very familiar with the realities of the free market. Rig it how you like, it will always assert itself. Crooks may briefly prosper. As certainly, they will be found out. Genuine enterprise as surely succeeds, with, in its wake, benefits for a surprisingly large number.
Whatever its imperfections, it remains the only viable method of human economic activity.
"What a crazy wackjob! These people really don't know anything."
Aug 21, 2013 at 7:39 PM | Wijnand
Oh the irony. The phrase 'crazy whackjob' would aptly describe a high percentage of the people who post here, who tend to believe in ridiculous conspiracy theories, deny basic science which can be demonstrated in any laboratory, or believe themselves to know more about climate science than virtually all the experts in the field, despite never having published anything, or indeed having any evidence at all for their daft claims.
People looking for evidence for the recent papers co-authored by Stephen Lewandowsky, need look no further than those who comment here.
Of course you all deny that you're not overpopulated by nutters, and of course also all deny that you're deniers...
Prajna: 'I did all the maths on buoyancy.'
Nurse: 'Arise Sir Prajna, FRS'
I vote for a Druid priestess at the foot of every windmill so that we can finally reduce bird fatalities to zero.
Prajna has the same alma mater as Andrew Neil and Will Hutton (Guardian), Paisley Grammar and was the school tennis champion in 1971/72. He was the school weed and acid champion in the same year. Wrong kind of buoyancy.
Snotrocket
The alleged potential murderer was someone who decided not to go to the police. Do you think there is book deal on the horizon if I fill in the (very) sordid details ?
Turning Tide (Aug 21, 2013 at 2:37 PM) observes:
"Prajna" goes on to say:
“Do you know, it would be a wonderful start if they just stopped suppressing free energy and starting encouraging it. But they’re not about that."
////////////////////////////////////////////
This is one of the greaat misunderstandings.
No energy is free.
Wind and solar are no more free to us than is coal, oil and gas, or indeed any resource that presently exists.
The issue is simply one of the costs involved in the harvesting of the resource and the costs of turning it into something that we desire.
So in the case of energy from coal, the costs are the costs of extraction from the ground, the costs of building a power generator, the costs of transporting the coal to the generator to the power plant, and the costs involved in burning the coal at that plant and disposing of the waste.
In the case of wind, it is the costs of building the turbines, transporting these to site, erecting them (including the costs involved in producing and transporting the cement required for their base), building infrastructure to remote places (ie., the windfarm), coupling it to the grid, the costs of building back uop generation (eg., a natural gas power generator and the costs of running that in standby mode) and the costs involved in building stand by generators (if necessary) for balancing the grid (eg., standby diesel generators and the costs of running those).
People mistakenly believe that renewables are free. As noted above, they are not and unfortunately the costs involved in extracting energy from them is far more than the costs involved in extracting energy from more conventional means (coal and gas) and that is why the government has to subsidise them (with the subsidy being paid by the tax payer and by the consumer).
Far from being free, renewables are uneconomic and are driving the nation towards fuel poverty. The MSM needs to correct this misunderstanding and set out the facts about renewables and their real costs. Hopefully that report which DECC appear to want to suppress will see the light of day and will set the record straight.
....CEO and executive/director pay looks to me like theft from the masses to me and nothing to do with free market forces.
Aug 21, 2013 at 8:45 PM | Rob Burton
////////////////////////////
Excessive executive/director pay is 'theft' primarily from the share holders of the company, and not those who purchase goods or services from the company.
In the case of excessive executive/director pay of a state owned company (or organisation in cluding governmental and quasi governmental bodies) then this is 'theft' primarily from higher rate tax payers not in receipt of tax credits. Any tax payer who is a basic rate tax payer and/or receives tax credits also bears some part of the 'theft;' but is of course shielded from the full effects of this by the higher rate tax payers not in receipt of tax credits.
That Prajit guy looks like he's ready for the Royal Society where he and Lewandowsky can join forces for the future of, uh, science.
MikeC, thinkingscientist
You piqued my curiosity, and according to my search of the internet that particular quote about love and power is attributed to Gladstone.
richard verney
Good summaries in your last two posts, particularly the free energy one.
Rob Burton, I'm not against the principle, but the so called "Occupy Movement" is just the anti capitalist loonies under yet another name and I do not support them.
In other words I am against the fat cats but would rather have them in power than the occupy people or whatever they are calling themselves this week.
Re: 'free energy', that particular nutter wasn't referring to renewables as being free, but rather to the considerably more unrealistic ideas of the 'over-unity' community. He also mentioned an uncle who had designed a perpetual motion machine that only needed 'a way of shielding magnets' for it to work. This is a very common theme amongst over-unity nutters, who generally believe that magnets are magic and/or a potential source of limitless energy ('a magnet can hold itself up on my fridge for ever, wtf??!!').
It's an entertaining/disturbing field to look in to, full of proper science 'deniers' - you could start here:
www.youtube.com/results?search_query=overunity+magnet+generator