Al Gore v. Half Sigma

Al Gore scored 519 on the Chemistry Achievement Test. (Washington Post). Half Sigma scored 770 on that test.

Gore also had a D+ average in his two "Natural Sciences" classes (which seem pretty bogus to me, kind of like "rocks for jocks"). Half Sigma has Bs or B+s in two semesters of Chemistry and two semesters of Physics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (before he transferred to an Ivy League undergraduate school).

What does this mean? It means Half Sigma is more qualified to talk about gases in the atmosphere than Al Gore. Someone should give me a Nobel Prize.

(I have to confess that the physics of energy waves was the most complicated thing I ever studied and I don't understand the stuff--but apparently 99% of the "scientific consensus" doesn't understand it either. "Climatologists" aren't physicists, they're modelers. But on much simpler topics, such as epidemiology and statistics which I do understand, I see the scientific consensus on stuff like cholesterol or the hereditability of IQ is completely wrong, so I have strong doubts that a politically correct consensus would be correct on something a lot more complicated.)

Comments

[Russ]

What's the scientific consensus on cholesterol? Why's it wrong?

[JewishAtheist]

Al Gore is a popularizer, not a scientist. It's disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

"Al Gore is a popularizer, not a scientist. It's disingenuous to pretend otherwise."

I wonder who is doing all the pretending?

[GanjaButter]

Hey, where is the Ron Paul gold standard blurb that was listed in the Google blog search? I'm curious as to why you think his idea of a backed currency would be doomed for failure. Throughout history don't most currencies start out backed by something tangible until the leaders take the rug out from under the civilization causing said currency to collapse? Isn't that kind of how the cycle goes? My college education on financial stuff ended after a community college Business Math course but my independent studies of history have led me to think that no currency has ever lasted and they usually fall prey to the changing-out of what backs it. Credit goes wild then the currency fails. Am I way off on that?

As for Al Gore and gases, I sometimes wonder if he isn't just an usher for the government to have more control over our lives. I agree that people need to be aware of what they do and the consequences it has on the Earth, but beceause of Al Gore now a lot of people are jumping on the global warming phenomenon and some nefarious elements stand to profit tremendously through regulation and taxation of those emissions.

Don't forget the immense satisfaction liberals derive from believing they are right.

[David Alexander]

Half Sigma has Bs or B+s in two semesters of Chemistry and two semesters of Physics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (before he transferred to an Ivy League undergraduate school).

That sentence alone explains everything about you.

[DML]

Once again leaning on those meaningless numbers as a crutch? What is it about nerds and meaningless numbers from years past? I think it's our version of the middle-aged guy who talks about his days as a running back for the local high school team.

"I think it's our version of the middle-aged guy who talks about his days as a running back for the local high school team."

Hey, I was great back then!

[Ned]

Al Gore has rather unimpressive SAT and chemistry achievement scores and, as far as I can see, has no graduate training in any science at all. Yet he's an "expert" on global warming. What nonsense! For a different perspective:

The really big lie about man-made global warming is that almost all scientists accept it. More than 4,000 scientists from 106 countries, including 72 Nobel prize winners, signed the Heidelberg Appeal (1992), calling for a rational scientific approach to environmental problems. Many senior scientists have also supported The Statement by Atmospheric Scientists on Greenhouse Warming (1992), The Leipzig Declaration (1997) and finally the Oregon Petition (1998) which received the signatures of over 19,000 scientists.

http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/ten_facts_about_global_warming.htm

[IQ]

This further comfirms HS belief of little use of IQ in money and power.

[Gannon]

In money and power...
social skills are the key.
About cholesterol, although the healthy range limits are probably way too strict
there is a clear correlation between very high cholestero and heart attacks.

Gore is an fucking idiot:

http://jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/040698/opi_Monedit2.html

[AllanF]

"there is a clear correlation between very high cholestero and heart attacks"

Indeed. And there is a clear correlation between atmospheric CO2 and mean global temp (well, since about 1500 or so, please don't look further back or the data begin to conflict).

But, correlation is not causation! And the remedies so-called experts suggest in each of these cases is nothing more than modern day witch-doctoring.

[Steve H]

It's idiotic to criticize Gore for getting mediocre grades 40 years ago.

You can measure a person's raw ability by the high-water mark of their success; their lowest grade is a measure of how much they're failing to live up to their potential.

When I graduated high school I was among the 50 most brilliant students in Canada; in my third undergraduate year, when my mother died and I broke up with my girlfriend, I barely scraped through a couple of my classes. I don't consider those low marks to mean I'm a dummy, though.

[Half Sigma]

There is no doubt that Al Gore is EXTREMELY talented at getting leftist-liberals to worship his holiness. But does that mean he understands physics, chemistry, and climate science? Or is he just parroting stuff he doesn't understand except at the most basic levels?

[michael vassar]

Half Sigma: Does it seem plausible to you, or possibly near certain, that Gore has gained specific expertise on global warming since college? Would you claim that you were better qualified to pontificate on medical policy than a specialist in the field who had a 134 IQ, comparable SATs, a MD, and a bad chemistry achievement score?

It's really pretty clear to me that chemistry has much more to do with medicine than with global warming. The basic logic of global warming is pretty trivial. Do you think that a greenhouse with many panes will not work better than one with a single pane? I don't. Absorption bands are probably fractally distributed so that above some low threshold exponential increases in CO2 produce linear (or more likely 1/4th power measured in degrees K, but that's linear for our purposes) increases in temperature.

As for IQ and cholesterol, isn't what you really mean not that the scientific consensus is wrong, but rather that the popular media mis-reports the scientific consensus among those scientists who have specifically studied the subject?

[Lancaster]

You global warming skeptics should mind your manners. The day is not far off when the name of Al Gore will be uttered in the same breath as other great men of science, such as Ptolemy and Lamarck. Give the man his due.

[david]

Why is everyone concerned with Al Gore's IQ? What is Bush's IQ?

Does a Nobel Prize winner have to take an IQ test now?

[miles]

What ticks me off about AL is that he got his money from Occidental Petroleum, has worked for legislation that would allow mining on and near his properties around Carthage Tennessee, yet you never hear of the guy backing geo-thermal, wind, ocean waves, or solar energy.

These are the things we should be pushing to provide electricity for plug-in hybrid cars so that most people wont even have to use any gas at all most workdays unless they drive over fifty miles. Especially solar........there should be panels on every roof, and a small windmill atop every telephone poll. We ought to do it just to fuck with the world oil prices. I cant figure why Al isn't on THIS bandwagon of a countermeasure that would actually help.

[David Alexander]

We ought to do it just to fuck with the world oil prices.

If you wanted to fuck with world oil prices, then we should be using coal liquefaction to sell fuel on the global market below OPEC's price. I'd estimate that $25/bbl would be enough to fuck OPEC over...

[Gil]

'correlation doesn't mean casuation'

Is it me or are people using that line to end a discussion, period? After all, don't many Buddhists believe that everything we perceive to be imagined? If correlation never means casuation then no one could be charged with a crime as you couldn't attach the evidence to the person in question because it could always be a great coincidence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation

[SFG]

In money and power...
social skills are the key.
No kidding. Responsible for an ocean of bitterness on my part. Don't forget choosing your parents carefully, though. Bush is a personable guy but he'd never have gotten past used car salesman of the month if his daddy wasn't President.

Once again leaning on those meaningless numbers as a crutch? What is it about nerds and meaningless numbers from years past? I think it's our version of the middle-aged guy who talks about his days as a running back for the local high school team.
Essentially correct. I still remember my SAT score. Pretty close to 1600, too. Fat lot of good it did me. It's too fucking late now. By the time I get the social skills I need and make up for all those miserable years of high school and college (and what came after), it'll be too damn late to allow for anything more than minor social mobility.

Does bug me losing about the global warming thing. Sure Sigma's probably wrong, but it takes me way more free time than I have to dig up a rebuttal to every one of his arguments. I mean, I could spend the weekend doing it, but this particular weekend I need for other things. (work-related) And by the time I get the free time off, he'll have moved on to something else. So...I just have to declare defeat. Won't be the first time.

[johnny five]

Wait wait wait. Haven't all SAT scores (and subject test scores - everything but the PSAT), always, always, been multiples of ten? How do you get a "519" (or other scores reported here that leave remainders on division by 10)?

[Spungen]

The general public respects diligent-but-average privileged people more than it does brilliant underachievers with bad attitudes.

[Spungen]

P.S. Your experience bolsters my theory that transfer students who graduate from prestigious schools suffer a penalty compared to those who started there freshman year. Although most of my sample comprises people who transferred from community colleges.

[Half Sigma]

There was no transfer student penalty. Penn had an an excellent transfer student orientation and did a fabulous job of integrating transfer students into campus life.

[Spungen]

So I guess there's nothing to blame but the attitude for your not being a billionaire i-banker by now ...:)

[Dan Morgan]

I actually heard a reporter today on NPR refer to Gore as a scientist. Pretty funny.

[David Alexander]

Although most of my sample comprises people who transferred from community colleges.

The problem with going from a community college to a very selective college is that you miss out on the first two years of bonding experiences that the student body have, and it's exacerbated by the fact that community college students are proles who borrow their way into such schools while the rest of the student body is composed of the upper middle class. In effect, you'll never fit in, spend years being resentful, and fail to make the networking connections needed to succeed in tandem with the degree. It's pretty much why I've chosen to stay out of private college for now.*

So I guess there's nothing to blame but the attitude for your not being a billionaire i-banker by now

As I stated earlier, HS's choice of physics and chemistry as his initial majors implies that he's a nerd of some sort, and the stereotypical personality of a high IQ nerd pretty much assures that the best HS can do is tax law. Otherwise, per his description of the UPenn transfer program, HS should have made plenty of contacts at his time at UPenn, and those contacts would have allowed him to wiggle his way into high paying position with some prestige and access to women.

*Maybe I'll take a chance and apply for the Columbia's School of General Studies, attend at night, and hide from everybody else.

[SFG]

If he were younger and more into math, I guess he could go for one of those jobs in derivatives.

[Spungen]

DA, stop bagging on tax law. It's hard to find a good tax lawyer. And stop assuming HS has no "access to women," it leads to readers according him underdog sympathy that he probably doesn't deserve when he writes those chauvenistic posts of his.

[SFG]

Yeah, most of the woman shortage whining is done by Peter, who's married.

[David Alexander]

DA, stop bagging on tax law. It's hard to find a good tax lawyer.

Considering that I'm too stupid to do tax law, I probably should cease his decision to enter tax law as a reason to humiliate him.

Admittedly, there's a part of me that believes that HS could have done better given his UPenn undergrad education. On paper, HS should have been a millionaire now happily living in a WASPy suburb with stay at home, yet highly educated Ivy League wife and possibly one young infant. It's not that his current lifestyle is that of a pauper, but certainly one would expect somebody with his high IQ and skills to do much better. In regards to his access to females, I've presumed that if HS had access to women, he'd write about it more often, and he'd refrain from making posts about females being more irrational than men. It's the same reasoning behind why I think HS isn't rich from many of his quasi-populist posts.

Since this is the same man who lied about his sex at a previous blog, maybe we shouldn't take much stock in what he says about himself. As I've stated earlier, for all we know, HS could be a closeted liberal middle class male with wife in kids in the 'burbs.

[Spungen]

No, I believe he is what he says he is -- single and living in Hell's Kitchen. And he's disclosed a lot about his financial situation, all of which makes sense. I'm just saying, we shouldn't assume someone is involuntarily single, or has no options, just because he's single. Especially when he's indicated that he finds the opposite sex rather annoying, in general. I think that is the case with many older (35+) bachelors.

Think about Henry Higgins. He wasn't cut out to live with a woman, but still managed to lead a full life.

[Peter]

Yeah, most of the woman shortage whining is done by Peter, who's married.

I may have popularized use of the term, but the concept certainly isn't mine. There's no way in creation I was the first person to notice the fact that nightclubs have no male alternatives to "ladies nights" or that online dating sites have far too many men chasing far too few women.

Also, the concept of de facto polygamy, with women ignoring ordinary men while holding out for Alphas, is hardly unique to me. Consider, for example, this line from Roissy, one of the true geniuses in the dating and relationships field:

the distribution of men by their attractiveness to women follows an uneven continuum where at the extremes a small percentage of alphas monopolize an immense number of quality women and a much larger blob of omegas struggle to rut with warpigs

I can only wish that I could have put it so well.

[Tom]

I wonder what Gore Vidal thought when he heard this.

[David Alexander]

the distribution of men by their attractiveness to women follows an uneven continuum where at the extremes a small percentage of alphas monopolize an immense number of quality women and a much larger blob of omegas struggle to rut with warpigs

Nobody cares, there is no woman shortage, there are simply ugly loser bitter men who think they deserve hot women.

[Spungen]

there are simply ugly loser bitter men who think they deserve hot women.

Now David, there are also many decent, single, overly insecure or unlucky men, just as there are women. They just aren't the ones who call women warpigs.

the distribution of men by their attractiveness to women follows an uneven continuum where at the extremes a small percentage of alphas monopolize an immense number of quality women and a much larger blob of omegas struggle to rut with warpigs

I can only wish that I could have put it so well.

I bet local female bloggers like Megan, Capella, Before Sunrise and Biting Blonde Wit would be saddened to see what that 50-year-old fellow who hangs around trying to give them romantic advice really thinks about women.

[Spungen]

In regards to his access to females, I've presumed that if HS had access to women, he'd write about it more often

I assume the opposite. As HS himself has said (in effect) in relation to Libertarian Girl, people busy actually having sex aren't going to waste much time writing about it. More importantly, HS seems to have more class than to ridicule his intimate contacts on the Internet. He usually resists our attempts to goad him into discussing his personal life.

And despite his political issues, he doesn't seem as personallhy disdainful of women as the guys with no hope usually are.

And to bring this thread back on track, he's at least as attractive as Al Gore.

[David Alexander]

Now David, there are also many decent, single, overly insecure or unlucky men, just as there are women. They just aren't the ones who call women warpigs.

But those people aren't complaining about a woman shortage, and quite frankly, it's just the inefficiencies of the market in terms of the meeting partners that's the source of their poor luck. For most of them, things may work out, and there may be a few who may stay unlucky, but this subset is not out there on the internet acting like a bunch of losers.

My previous comments wasn't meant for men like myself who are honest about our problems and are willing to live with the consequences. They're meant for the losers who act as if they're guaranteed a woman and continually pout about it claiming that a cabal of men have stolen all of the women. These men are blind to the idea that women are simply uninterested in them because they're pathetic, and unless they change, they're simply going to have to get used to the idea of being alone.

[Spungen]

They're meant for the losers who act as if they're guaranteed a woman and continually pout about it claiming that a cabal of men have stolen all of the women.

Yeah, those guys hate it when I say my husband loves science fiction and computer stuff, doesn't watch football, and plays golf, and is in decent shape, and makes a lot more money than they do, and scored at least moderately well with attractive women in his pre-marriage years, and is a libertarian (small l, no gold standard), and thinks guys who whine about alpha males and female standards are ridiculous. Makes their heads explode.

Back on topic, on second thought I'll stick my neck out and say Half is cuter than Gore.

[David Alexander]

He usually resists our attempts to goad him into discussing his personal life.

As I've said, I suspect he's hiding stuff. Lying about sex on the internet is a big thing, and given the time and effort he put into faking being a female, I wouldn't be surprised if he was lying about his current persona as well.

And to bring this thread back on track, he's at least as attractive as Al Gore.

So he has high IQ and he may be handsome. It seems that his talents are being wasted here on the blog instead of making millions in the real world, or seducing beautiful Ivy League women.

[Spungen]

David, your cruel words wound my tender heart.

I don't think LG was some masterpiece of deception. Lots of people were suspicious right away. If he were going to lie again he'd lie about stuff that made him more popular, like saying he gets casual sex with hot chicks by using manipulative behavior that any mean dork can learn. How far-fetched is it that a fringe political blogger is a 30+ male libertarian programmer who likes video games and went to law school?

Plus his law license is online if you're really curious.

[Spungen]

P.S. It's not like I said better than Obama or Edwards, so don't get all jealous now. ;)

[David Alexander]

David, your cruel words wound my tender heart.

I believe that I'm taking out the stresses of my daily life on the blogs now...

How far-fetched is it that a fringe political blogger is a 30+ male libertarian programmer who likes video games and went to law school?

One can't describe HS as a libertarian (see the gold standard comments), and he's certainly of a higher class and intellect than the "angry white males" of the media. He's definitely not a left-winger or liberal, but his aversion to the rich keeps him out of the right wing camp. He may border being on racist with some of the IQ posts, but I'm trying to figure out his noted interest in black women. Quite frankly, in my drunken moments, I believe HS reeks of a right-wing populist.

Plus his law license is online if you're really curious.

I looked it up, and I was unable to find it.

[~trumwill]

Now David, there are also many decent, single, overly insecure or unlucky men, just as there are women. They just aren't the ones who call women warpigs.

Yeah, I think that you nail it here. It's the biliousness that is to blame for most of their troubles. I honestly don't know any guy around my age (28-32ish) that either isn't in a relationship or hasn't had the opportunity for one that doesn't have significant baggage of one sort or another. The same is true for women

loves science fiction

An interest in geeky things really isn't as indicative of social failure as a lot of people believe. The problem is when their interest in these things makes conversations with people uninterested in these things difficult. This is a much bigger problem when it comes to geeky interests than when it comes to more conventional interests.

I believe HS reeks of a right-wing populist.

By New York standards maybe, but right-wing populist types in the south and west are much scarier (they even make some of their conservative allies nervous). I think there's a special category for people like HS... I'd call it embittered libertarianism. I know a number of people that are libertarian by default, but in cases where they (not always incorrectly!) see themselves as being screwed, they split from the ideological timber.

[Peter]

One can't describe HS as a libertarian (see the gold standard comments), and he's certainly of a higher class and intellect than the "angry white males" of the media. He's definitely not a left-winger or liberal, but his aversion to the rich keeps him out of the right wing camp. He may border being on racist with some of the IQ posts, but I'm trying to figure out his noted interest in black women. Quite frankly, in my drunken moments, I believe HS reeks of a right-wing populist.

I continue to harbor suspicions that Half Sigma is not a "he" but a "they." It's hard to say exactly why, or to point out examples, but some of the postings over the past year or so seem like they've been made by at least two different people. That might account for some of the seeming contradictions, for instance the interest in black women. I could be entirely wrong, but this is my impression.

--

An interest in geeky things really isn't as indicative of social failure as a lot of people believe. The problem is when their interest in these things makes conversations with people uninterested in these things difficult. This is a much bigger problem when it comes to geeky interests than when it comes to more conventional interests.

Your last sentence nails it. Men who are obsessed with conventional guy-type interests, especially sports, don't seem to pay any social price no matter how all-consuming their obsession might be. Women have little trouble accepting total sports nuts even though most women aren't as interested in sports. Trouble arises only when men are consumed with things that (1) don't appeal much to women and (2) aren't seen as fully masculine, for instance sci-fi, D&D, Trek, RPG's, and so on.

Lastly, as for the comment about my offering romantic advice to women, the fact remains that I've long since "retired" from doing so.

[K]

The "Woman Shortage" was not popularized by Peter, but by a Wall Street Journal article analyzing the consequences of declining birth rates in the 1970's (see google groups). While I suspect there is some truth to it, it has a very strong New York flavor, given that it sees men in their 40's as prime marriage candidates while the national average is 27.

I do feel the birth dearth affects both genders somewhat due to what I might call "reduced peer density." In other words, growing up as the only kid on your block affects your social development, and it's not like the Baby Boomers who could go to Coney Island and be surrounded by tons of people their own age. Then you go to a small college in a male-dominated major and find several of your classmates are "nontraditional students." Then you graduate into a very gray workplace (I heard some statistic that NASA had more workers over 60 than under 30). It does not ruin your chances, just shaves a few points off the odds.

Regarding bitter men, it's easy to rearrange cause and effect. Men who fall in with sweet, pretty girls at the biologically and psychosocially appropriate stage in life are unlikely to become bitter. A decade and a half of rejection and frustration is what causes bitterness.

But, actually (to Spungen), I have been shocked at the misogyny spouted by many married men when in all-male gatherings. Perhaps it's largely a male-bonding pose, but single men don't have a monopoly on bitterness.

And (again to Spungen), your husband would not make *my* head explode. Perhaps it's because I subscribe to a more mild strain of the theory.

And, in the end, perhaps that's what's most discouraging, as I sit on the cusp of 30: for all my supposed "potential," I have a relatively low-paying, low-prestige job (and therefore have to devote my time to making a living, not being interesting), do not have the resources or talent to get into something better, and don't really have a special personality to overcome it (one of the girls I liked married a guy who got a masters' in Creative Writing...not high-paying, but definitely compatible with feminine interests, unlike cold, hard math-y engineering or something). In other words, the guys who are successful with women generally do outrank me in pretty much every criteria. It's not that they're high schoolers stupidly chasing the dumb jock in the IROC while I sit at home practicing the SAT, and they'll be sorry they didn't pick a quiet smart guy like me. No, I see the romantically successful guys as generally having better jobs, better personalities, and better looks than me. And with all that going for them, they are much less insecure, because they have nothing to be insecure about.

So I know why I'm a beta, and know that some of it has to do not just with experiences in my background (isolated homeschooling during the teen years is a bad idea), but also I habe ADHD, an incurable brain disorder. This would be less of a problem if I were a hell-raisin' guitar player / record store worker, but I'm kind of nerdy and have been trying to live in the religious and high-IQ world.

So (kind of like DA), I've pretty much come to accept my place in the world: But that doesn't mean I don't hate it. And I have a hard time making a lifetime commitment to a similarly boring woman who is also 150 pounds overweight or something when I see guys around me with attractive and interesting wives and girlfriends.

[Peter]

The "Woman Shortage" was not popularized by Peter, but by a Wall Street Journal article analyzing the consequences of declining birth rates in the 1970's (see google groups). While I suspect there is some truth to it, it has a very strong New York flavor, given that it sees men in their 40's as prime marriage candidates while the national average is 27.

Here is a link to that article. It's almost six years old, but I don't see why it shouldn't still be accurate.

[Spungen]

But, actually (to Spungen), I have been shocked at the misogyny spouted by many married men when in all-male gatherings. Perhaps it's largely a male-bonding pose, but single men don't have a monopoly on bitterness.

I've made similar observations. They tend to be older men who are still resentful about their lack of sexual popularity in youth. In their married years, their angry feelings have curdled and festered, perhaps exacerbated by marriage difficulties. As the years wear on, their views toward young people are increasingly those of outsiders looking in. From TV, from the Internet, from the little they know of young people around them, they get the idea that if only they had known then what they (think they) know now, they could have had the upper hand. They also get the idea that there's a lot more sex available nowadays and feel they were unjustly left out of it.

Trumwill had a good post the other day about how married men *think* more women are attracted to them after they're married, but really it's probably because women find them safer to talk to. But some guys think something's changed, either with marriage or with age, and that they'd now be a lot more sexually desirable.