Saturday, March 04, 2017

CO2: The Garcinia Cambogia Miracle Drug of Climate Science

I came across a blurb today for Garcinia Cambogia. No, Garcinia Cambogia is not some strong, brave woman Hillary Clinton plans to drag out to launch her 2020 presidential run.
Garcinia Cambogia a "miracle weight-loss" pill that MSNBC's Rachel Maddow apparently used to do some load-shedding.
I did a 5-minute google check on it. While individuals rave at what it has done for them, scientists weigh in:
It's mostly pinned on hydroxycitric acid (HCA), a substance found in garcinia cambogia that appears to inhibit an enzyme called citrate lyase and interferes with fatty acid metabolism. 
“HCA does do that—but in a petri dish," says Steven Heymsfield, M.D., the former head of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La. "Converting that to actual weight loss in humans would take 1,000 steps beyond that," he says.
I realized what I had: a near-perfect analogy for CO2 and catastrophic, species-ending, mass migration-causing anthropogenic climate change. Just re-do the words:
It's mostly pinned on carbon dioxide (CO2), a substance found in human energy emissions that inhibits the release of heat through the atmosphere and causes a "greenhouse" effect.
“CO2 does do that—but in a petri dish," says Ima Scientist, PhD and former head of the physics dept at Prestige U. "Converting that to actual temperature gains in earth's complex, chaotic, climate system would take 1,000 steps beyond that," he says.
Now, here's the rub. Why is it that scientists are predisposed towards skepticism towards weight-loss formulas, but are so quick to jump on the AGW belief bandwagon?  Climate is much more complicated, complex, and chaotic than a linear physics lab experiment.

And that's the way the Ball bounces.


"... nothing intellectually compelling or challenging.. bald assertions coupled to superstition... woefully pathetic"