Model Science Predicts More Model Scientists!

News Flash!

Today, at Ivory Castle Western California, Scientists have discovered that the use of models in science has advanced not only the course and rapidity of human discovery and the acceleration of more grant velocity of funding, but in fact also has lead to the creation of more model scientists! Thanks to recent advances in the use of computers for all sorts of investigations where actual field work is onerous, the process lengthy and difficult, and the effort involved greatly exceeds the value of any potential discovery, there has been a great reduction in the need for such wasted effort; as the models eliminate all such needs. Now, thanks to the new iResearch Assistant program from Apple Computer: Scientists are 87.4% more productive at turning publications into further grant requests and with a 56.3% greater success rate, recent model runs report. Furthermore, in an unexpected additional discovery, the use of the model to predict its own adoption rate has confirmed that there is now a 86.9% increase in Model Scientists in the next 2 decades.

This startling discovery, found after 4 hours of exhausting model operation, is all the more astounding given that we just last month demonstrated that 75.1% of all current publications were already the result of computer models. (It is unclear at this time how we can have 86.9% increase when we already have 75.1%; however, we are certain that after additional funding is secured, further model simulations will answer this vexing question. The fate of Science itself hangs in the balance, so we are hopeful that an expedited request will be favorably received.)

One thing is clear: There will be a very large increase in the use of iReasearch Assistant in the coming years, despited the reported availability of iResearcher Pro in an early release form in Paris. We have in planning a month long expedition to Paris, centered about this approaching spring, to asses this recent development. A paper on those results will be presented in the fall, once appropriate model configuration achieved such that it can determine the consensus truth, and so as to produce a suitable paper. It may be that the use of this new iResearcher Pro model software is what was predicted in our last run of iResearch Assistant. Only extensive field work in the streets of Paris, especially at night, will enable us to determine for certain. (Due to this, we will be unavailable prior to noon most days.)

At the present time, we can only surmise how these developments will impact patterns of research, investigation, and field work. But we are certain that, with adequate funding, the frontiers of human understanding can be pushed ever forward. The model of Human Understanding 2.3 release has given a 97.5% confidence interval in the composite of the last 9 runs.

In conclusion, the clear understanding today is that the present use of Model Science predicts much more Model Scientist in future years, due to the greatly enhanced productivity of papers per unit of understanding gained (in some cases, asymptotically approaching infinity!) and the great increase in grants and funding per unit of actual human labor required. The labor savings alone assures that in the not too distant future, almost all science will be done with models and providing much higher levels of truthiness.

Genesis

I was looking at this map of present disease outbreaks:

http://outbreaks.globalincidentmap.com/home.php

And noticed a disease I’d never heard of before: Schmallenberg

Doing a quick search on the name, up pops a BBC article about this “new disease”… Seems that it’s a disease of sheep and may be spread by ‘midges’. It is named for the town in Germany where it was first discovered.

Now, last I looked, Germany could be fairly cold. Sometimes even colder than The UK. Yet the article was talking about how this disease was spreading to the UK due to warming caused by, you guessed it, “Climate Change”… Reading further, the article says they don’t really know how it is spread, but that programming a model of midges with projections of temperature rises can yield an alarming rise in personal research importance….

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17223445

Climate change is raising the risk of diseases such as Schmallenberg in the UK and northern Europe, say scientists.

Schmallenberg virus affects sheep and cattle, and is probably carried by midges. It was identified in Germany last year, and in the UK in January.

Until 1990, Europe’s midge-borne viral diseases were found only in Spain and Portugal; but two have emerged within the last six years in northern Europe.

Experts say the path of Schmallenberg is currently impossible to predict.

Schmallenberg virus – named after the German town where it was first identified – causes fever and diarrhoea in adult animals, but they recover.

However, infection during a critical stage of pregnancy leads to lambs and calves being born with deformation of limbs, spine or brain. Many are stillborn.

Currently it has been found on 83 farms in the UK, mainly in the southeast.

Unpredictable future

The next few months will almost certainly see the birth of more affected lambs and calves resulting from infections their mothers picked up last year, as farms progressively further north go through the calving season.

But after that, it could “burn itself out” or become a regular threat – or anywhere in between, according to leading scientists speaking at a briefing in London.

“There are these two scenarios,” said Matthew Baylis from the Institute of Infection and Global Health at Liverpool University.

“The key question is whether the virus will be picked up by the vector (midges) from the calves and lambs that will be born later in the spring, after the midge season starts.”

If that happens, he said, more cows and sheep will be infected, with problems emerging next year when they give birth.

But the path is very hard to predict as so little is known about a virus that was only identified a few months ago.

“There is the possibility it will simply die out, but I think that would be too good to be true,” said Peter Mertens from the Institute for Animal Health in Surrey.

“There’s a lot of virus about, and I think it’s quite likely it won’t simply go away in one year.

“Is Culicoides (the midge) the only means of spread, or is there something else on a local level – fecal-oral spread, or aerosol (airborne) spread?

“We don’t know.”

So a new virus shows up in Germany. They have no clue how it is actually spread. They don’t know for sure what the vector might be. They admit to not knowing at all how it might play out.

One part of the puzzle that scientists have put together is the influence of climate change on the risks of midge-borne viral diseases.

A higher temperature means an increase in the number of midges, and that they feed more often. It also allows the virus to develop faster.

Using weather and climate models as well as information on the biology of viruses and midges, Prof Baylis’s research group showed that recent climatic change in northern Europe has significantly increased the risk of viral midge-borne diseases.

“Temperature changes in Europe which to most of us have felt relatively small have in our model led to a large increase in the risk of viral midge-borne diseases,” he said.

The modelling results, he said, reflected what has actually happened across the continent.

“Culicoides infections were first detected in Europe in the 1920s, but only in Spain and Portugal and on the eastern borders, around Turkey,” he said.

“Then in 1998 we saw cases in Italy. Bluetongue then emerged in northern Europe in 2006/7, and now we have Schmallenberg.”

The modelling suggests other similar diseases should be expected in future, said Prof Mertens, adding: “The doors are open.”

Yet Another publication of the form “Given these conclusions what assumptions can we draw?”

So they start from the assumptions that heat will give more disease, then run models that predict more heat, and golly, The Computer Says there will be more disease.

This is just such crap. Fantasy masquerading as science.

How about doing some field work to find the actual vectors and demonstrate the virus in them? How about looking at the midge populations MEASURED over time? Perhaps some historical work to show past midge infestations? (Any records from the MWP or the Roman Optimum?) Perhaps even looking at the midge range in other continents to see if they have historically had greater cold tolerance than expected? Or if housing animals in heated barns has let the midge survive in modern farms? Or how about this; check to see if there is a foreign midge introduced into Europe. Or doing some contagion tests with midge free sheep to see if the ASSUMPTION of midge as vector is even warranted? You know, actual Science…

Doing a web search on ‘midge cold tolerance’ turned up a slew of papers about the Antarctic Midge, so at a first blush it looks to me like there is little problem with midges living in cold places.

There are so many interesting and useful bits of Science that could have been done, or at least proposed. There are two genuine mysteries here to be explored (what is this disease, and its limits, its evolutionary history? what is actually happening with disease vectors on European sheep farms?) yet it’s all tossed out with a wave of the Computer Model and the Global Warming Scare Story.

I would like to think of some more suitable term, but I can’t. Only one word shouts at me. They are: Idiots. Publishing propaganda and pretending it has meaning.

Subscribe to feed