~ knowledgeporn

These days, as I may have previously mentioned, I cannot imagine getting into bed of a night (or an afternoon) without my ipod and the growing store of utterly fascinating wisdom contained within. Constantly, I am discovering new podcasts by brilliant commentators and thinkers. Constantly, I am driven to my books or to the net to research things I’ve never heard of before. The universe is an utterly fascinating place, if you are interested in it, if you are in your manic phase and not weighed down by the leaden disinterest of depression.

I’ve added new list of links to the Sails of Oblivion sidebar. It includes all my current favourites like Reasonable Doubts (anyone conflicted about religion should listen to this – the mental agility of these guys is sometimes breathtaking), Skeptoid (The slow pitiless torture and execution of urban myths, alternative health nostrums, historical shibboleths and general wrong-headedness by the infuriating Brian Dunning), and Skeptics’ Guide to The Universe (the predominant sceptical podcast which, besides being rather entertaining, updates the progress of scepticism-related issues and advises on critical thinking).

I realised yesterday, when the new episode of The History of Rome appeared in my pod, that I’d been looking forward to it at least as much as the latest True Blood. There’s something about ancient Rome that does it for me. Simple as that.

And similarly with The Bible. Having been brought up a strict Catholic, The Bible was first presented to me as immutable, flawless and sacred. Consequently, in these latter days, I love seeing it picked apart and revealed as the imperfect work of fallible human minds. The related history and mythology is also captivating, as is the language - and in these regards, The Bible Geek is uber-knowledgeable, a talking concordance.

Sometimes, I wonder if anyone else is having the same experience as me. My delight in this newfound voluptuary of knowledge is a solitary vice, yet the net is a social phenomenon. There should be other lazy brains out there being driven to thought …

As regards the New Scepticism (or ‘Freethought’ as it is often described in the US) this really seems to be the case. There is a bone fide movement fomenting over there, spawned in the dark years of the Bush administration - when science found itself beholden to the madnesses of the extreme Christian right - and then set free to prosper with the rise of Obama. The nation’s freethinkers have organised themselves and are raising a loud, clear, measured voice against the powerful kooks that plague that country, be they conspiracy theorists, the anti-vaccination lobby or young Earth creationists.

Predictably the effects are spilling over into our fair land - despite our tendency to apathy and our lack of hugely influential maniacs against which to fight. Sceptic and atheist groups in Australia are feeding off the clamour in the US and consequently finding their feet. New web presences of a sceptical bent are always appearing, often produced by students. The Skeptics In The Pub phenomenon is catching on. And, excitingly, Melbourne is hosting The Global Atheist Convention in 2010. Its rubric is ‘The Rise of Atheism’. Let’s hope there's truth in that title.

As a young teenager, shortly after I lost my faith, I looked forward to many things: flying cars, the colonisation of Mars, and a world free of religion. Naively, I believed that by the turn of the century humanity would have developed sufficient intelligence to abandon such childish comforts as faith in an afterlife and a caring omnipotent god.

Naturally, as the years passed, my hopes were dashed. I had to recalibrate my opinions regarding humanity.

But now, I wonder, I just wonder, whether we might be seeing the glimmerings of a new Enlightenment.

~ a sceptic of the skeptoid

I listen to Brian Dunning’s Skeptoid podcast every week, but sometimes he drives me crazy. The episode entitled ‘SUV phobia’ is a good example

To quote:

“Let's spend some time on the trendy fad of looking for villains to blame for global warming. My flavour of the week is SUV's, those evil gas guzzling, ozone destroying, unethical, politically incorrect, Nazi family soccer wagons. Only let's not do it the trendy way, let's look at the issue sceptically.”

He argues articulately that the SUV is a style of car rather than a mechanical category - and fair enough. He berates city councils for banning this ‘style’ of car rather than specifying fuel-inefficient or over-large cars - and fair enough. He lets us know that ‘the majority’ of SUVs are neither bigger nor less fuel-efficient than the average car - and, if this is true, fair enough. What’s more, the SUV ‘style’ obeys modern emission laws, so is generally cleaner than many older cars.

But isn’t he missing the point somewhat?

It is only recently that the American term ‘SUV’ has begun to replace the Australian descriptor ‘Four Wheel Drive’ and half way through the podcast I began to wonder exactly what kind of car Dunning was referring to. Was there a definition discontinuity? Certainly, there seem to be a great many of the small SUV types on the road, but these are not the ‘villains’ fuelling the issue.

Hummer 2s, Range Rovers and Canyoneros (whatever) are heavy vehicles - there are no two ways about it. To move their considerable mass, a larger engine and more fuel is required. What people are complaining about is the use of such vehicles in situations and environments in which they are unnecessary and in which their fuel use is therefore excessive. People also complain about of the ability given their owners, who may lack a certain sensitivity, to access areas of the planet which require just this sensitivity to survive. And this aside from the clumsiness in the parking lot, the dangers these vehicles create as an obstacle to clear vision on the roads ,and their poor ‘crash compatibility’ with normal sedans.

Face it. They’re jet-skis.

It is natural for thoughtful, caring people to recoil against what appears to be a flagrant waste of resources and a font of unnecessary pollution. Therefore, inevitably, the large ‘SUV’ has become a symbol of excess, an icon for just the kind of behaviour that is threatening our world. If city councils have banned them, then huzzah! They are underscoring a basic human moral. They are helping remind the populace that it is gross and offensive to shit where you live.

If, as Dunning argues, there is a by-catch of small, low polluting cars, then that can surely be addressed, though it is, I would contend, a secondary issue. That the military Humvee [H1] and the Hummer 2 do not share a single component is indeed ‘another example of why you should be sceptical of marketing labels’ but it should not divert attention from the barbaric nature of the vehicle itself. I have seen an H2 and there is no way anyone is going to convince me it is a city-appropriate, fuel-efficient, planet-friendly vehicle. Even its advertising slogan ‘Get Lost’ seems to admit this, having a sub-text aimed at those who would criticise the unashamedly boorish artifact.


The angle Brian Dunning takes on the SUV issue is certainly sceptical. Logical too. But I would draw the line at humanist. I have noticed this kind of thing on other occasions too, as I tread the vasty deeps of the sceptisphere. The new sceptics can sometimes get so enthusiastic with their critical analysis that they discard the human element. Even Richard Dawkins is sometimes a culprit.

Certainly, as Dunning says, container ships produce carbon emissions equivalent to 300,00 cars and are not subject to emission laws, but there are many more cars than container ships.* And without the billions of stuff-hungry people those ships would be mothballed. And there’s the rub. A simple confusion over categorisation should not stop or discourage us reducing excess in our daily lives. Like many, I hold strongly to the credo ‘think globally, act locally’.

* Are there 300,000 cars for each container ship in the world? I would guess there are a lot more. But it’s only a guess, and I’m flirting with sceptics here.