Update on 10:10 - Sony and Kyocera have pulled the plug - O2 are still supporting them

Another scary climate change prediction:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/3165129/Nightmare-postcards-from-the-future-vision-of-life-after-a-rise-in-sea-levels.html

Latimer,

Your link only got audio for me, but

http://otherbloggersstuff.blogspot.com/2010/10/splattergate-downfall.html

works O.K. for me.

I admit to a sick and warped sense of humour, so I enjoyed this take, as well as the original "no pressure" clip.

In this domain, you've either got to laugh at everything or learn to lighten up a bit.

One or two of you with sick and warped senses of humour like me may find this response to 'No Pressure' very funny. The others will probably be dreadfully offended. Be warned

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/5291308/10_10_no_pressure_downfall/

To Andrew as the author of the GWPF report on the UK enquiries re Climategate : how is it that no enquiry made any investigation around the "Harry read me" files ?
It looks like you did not mention this aspect in your report

At the risk of going into psychobabble, these are my thoughts on where the makers of the "No Pressure" video were coming from.

Those people who are very activist and alarmist on the CAGW issue are obviously very concerned, and disturbed, about the presence of disagreement - because it causes doubt, both in their minds and of others, and so reducing the motivation for action. Hence the expression "merchants of doubt" - they see sceptics as people who are intentionally diluting the certainty needed to have the necessary motivation for action. To even consider that those spreading "doubt" might be sincere, let alone have a point, would be counter-productive since it would just increase their own doubt.

A consequence of this kind of thinking is that the doubters/sceptics must be thought of as being a minority - a minority that is either deliberately misleading the others ("merchants of doubt") or simply unmotivated - lazy, selfish, stupid, not caring, etc. But even the presence of this minority is already enough to dull the motivation of others.

So I think that what the filmakers were thinking went something like thiis: do not let the minority demotivate you, pretend they don't exist, get them out of your mind . The image of destroying them with a button was a supposedly funny way of conveying this message.

What they didn't even consider, apparently not for a second, was that (1) some people, far more than they thought, would identify with the people being blown up - probably because they themselves are not very good in empathy; (2) that even that message is authoritarian - ignoring people whose ideas annoy or "demotivate" you is the first step before sending them to lunatic asylums, etc.

Either way it's deranged, but I think my analysis may explain how they could have possibly thought it was a good video.

Bishop

The first part of an interesting essay posted as a newsletter a couple of days ago at

http://www.scientific-alliance.org/

(I have broken it down into paragraphs, as the original is totally daunting.)

'Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.
Arguably the two biggest issues facing the world's population today are the threat of food insecurity and the possible negative implications of climate change. The first is an undeniable reality. Today's population of 6.8bn is estimated to plateau at around 9bn by mid-century. Just keeping pace means increasing harvests by about one-third. But as people in emerging economies become more prosperous they eat more meat and, as animal protein is less efficient to produce than plant protein, the general view is that total food production must increase by 70% or more. Since there is little good quality new farmland available and a proportion of existing arable land is degraded year by year, this much higher productivity must come from essentially the same land area. This is a very real challenge.

The impacts of climate change, on the other hand, are for now just projections from computer models. They may be right, they may be wrong, but the fact is they are based on the supposed dominance of a single factor: the known warming effect of increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, amplified by positive feedback effects. Deep cuts in CO2 emissions worldwide are prescribed as the only way to avoid a future catastrophe. We have one quite clear and imminent problem (food security) and one credible but unproven hypothesis which could conceivably wreak havoc later in the century (anthropogenic global warming), both vying for attention and resources. Those worried about the second issue have almost inevitably oversold their case to bring the threat to the highest priority level, to pressure politicians to take action on something far beyond their normal time horizons.

[As an aside, many readers will have seen that the Royal Society this week published a new guide to the science of climate change following internal criticism of their rather strident effort of 2007 to rebut claims made in 'The Great Global Warming Swindle'. Although the change of tone and the acceptance of uncertainties has been welcomed by many sceptics and agnostics, the Royal Society did itself no favours by putting Sir John Pethica, chair of the sub-group which produced the report, up for interview on the BBC Today programme. By refusing to acknowledge that 'the science' could be at all uncertain, he reinforced the impression that mainstream science is led by people with closed minds.]'

Trade Minister Craig Emerson says he is concerned that some countries may use the issue of climate change as an excuse to put up trade barriers.

British climate change economist Nicholas Stern says countries that do not put a price on carbon risk being shut out of world markets.

But Dr Emerson has told Sky News that the Federal Government will not put up with old European trade barriers being veiled by a "green cloak".

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/03/3028307.htm?section=justin

Beaverbrook, I'm not sure it's lack of reaction, I'd suggest it's a determination not to allow reaction by those whould would control the message.

Didn't the last government enact laws against incitement to violence and terrorism?
If this had been a video made by fundemental muslems then the papers and politicians would have been all over it. instead it's a small error in judgement by a group of believers so it's no big deal.

Personally I think everyone has the right to free speech and thought and the video is just an expression of that. What beguiles me most is the lack of reaction by the MSM to this against the condemnation of other area's of self expression by groups who do not fit the ideals required by those who influence the media and politics of this country.