The World Has a Third Pole -- and It's Melting Quickly (theguardian.com) 146
An anonymous reader shares a report: Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name. Khawa Karpo is the tallest of the Meili mountain range, piercing the sky at 6,740 metres (22,112ft) above sea level. Local Tibetan communities believe that conquering Khawa Karpo is an act of sacrilege and would cause the deity to abandon his mountain home. Nevertheless, there have been several failed attempts by outsiders -- the best known by an international team of 17, all of whom died in an avalanche during their ascent on 3 January 1991. After much local petitioning, in 2001 Beijing passed a law banning mountaineering there.
However, Khawa Karpo continues to be affronted more insidiously. Over the past two decades, the Mingyong glacier at the foot of the mountain has dramatically receded. Villagers blame disrespectful human behaviour, including an inadequacy of prayer, greater material greed and an increase in pollution from tourism. People have started to avoid eating garlic and onions, burning meat, breaking vows or fighting for fear of unleashing the wrath of the deity. Mingyong is one of the world's fastest shrinking glaciers, but locals cannot believe it will die because their own existence is intertwined with it. Yet its disappearance is almost inevitable.
Khawa Karpo lies at the world's "third pole." This is how glaciologists refer to the Tibetan plateau, home to the vast Hindu Kush-Himalaya ice sheet, because it contains the largest amount of snow and ice after the Arctic and Antarctic -- about 15% of the global total. However, a quarter of its ice has been lost since 1970. This month, in a long-awaited special report on the cryosphere by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), scientists will warn that up to two-thirds of the region's remaining glaciers are on track to disappear by the end of the century. It is expected a third of the ice will be lost in that time even if the internationally agreed target of limiting global warming by 1.5C above pre-industrial levels is adhered to.
However, Khawa Karpo continues to be affronted more insidiously. Over the past two decades, the Mingyong glacier at the foot of the mountain has dramatically receded. Villagers blame disrespectful human behaviour, including an inadequacy of prayer, greater material greed and an increase in pollution from tourism. People have started to avoid eating garlic and onions, burning meat, breaking vows or fighting for fear of unleashing the wrath of the deity. Mingyong is one of the world's fastest shrinking glaciers, but locals cannot believe it will die because their own existence is intertwined with it. Yet its disappearance is almost inevitable.
Khawa Karpo lies at the world's "third pole." This is how glaciologists refer to the Tibetan plateau, home to the vast Hindu Kush-Himalaya ice sheet, because it contains the largest amount of snow and ice after the Arctic and Antarctic -- about 15% of the global total. However, a quarter of its ice has been lost since 1970. This month, in a long-awaited special report on the cryosphere by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), scientists will warn that up to two-thirds of the region's remaining glaciers are on track to disappear by the end of the century. It is expected a third of the ice will be lost in that time even if the internationally agreed target of limiting global warming by 1.5C above pre-industrial levels is adhered to.
An they are right (Score:5, Insightful)
Villagers blame disrespectful human behaviour - greater material greed
They are absolutely right.
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
This is beautiful and poetic mythology.
But I'm not sure it's news for nerds.
(and the statement "glaciologists refer to the Tibetan plateau as the world's "third pole"" should be followed by [citation needed]: who? when?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm a ways into the comments and I have yet to see any reference to Flying Spaghetti Monsters. I have seen the question as to calling a mountain well away from the actual poles a "third pole". Hard to have a pole that is isn't an actual pole f
Re: (Score:3)
It is not a logical fallacy to point out the hypocrisy that shows that someone clearly does not believe their own arguments
It's not a logical fallacy to point out hypocrisy: It's a logical fallacy to say that someone's hypocrisy is detrimental to their argument.
Ie, your logic is broken when you imply his actions mean he doesn't believe his argument. It could simply be that he's a hypocrite: That he does not care.
It is a common logical fallacy, however, to argue "do as I say and not as I do".
What, and how could that be a logical fallacy, pray tell?
I'm a ways into the comments and I have yet to see any reference to Flying Spaghetti Monsters.
The relevance of that escapes me.
I have seen the question as to calling a mountain well away from the actual poles a "third pole". Hard to have a pole that is isn't an actual pole for anything.
I don't think I'm arguing the silliness of calling the Himalayas a third pole- but regardless, it is used as a metaphor quite co
Re: (Score:2)
It's a logical fallacy to say that someone's hypocrisy is detrimental to their argument.
Nope. It simply shows that the person making argument A does not themselves believe argument A. That is quite detrimental to argument A.
What, and how could that be a logical fallacy, pray tell?
"Do as I say" implies correctness. "Not as I do" implies incorrectness.
The relevance of that escapes me.
It would seem that almost every time a certain mainstream religion is argued here, the standard refutation involves "Flying Spaghetti Monsters". But here, now, a non-mainstream religion makes claims about physical processes and nobody deems it necessary to denigrate that religious belief by pretending th
Re: (Score:2)
Nope. It simply shows that the person making argument A does not themselves believe argument A.
You can't say "Nope" without being a moron here. That's literally the definition of argumentum ad hominem.
You can't possibly be so dim as to believe that a person acting against the better judgement of their belief system means they don't believe it. You can't.. Right?
"Do as I say" implies correctness. "Not as I do" implies incorrectness.
I think this is perhaps the clearest evidence you've provided that you simply don't understand logic at all.
Neither of those things imply anything of the sort.
It would seem that almost every time a certain mainstream religion is argued here, the standard refutation involves "Flying Spaghetti Monsters". But here, now, a non-mainstream religion makes claims about physical processes and nobody deems it necessary to denigrate that religious belief by pretending that FSM is anything serious or even relevant. As you don't find it relevant.
OK? I mean, I think all religiosity is a dimwitted coping mechanism. Theirs includ
Re: (Score:2)
You can't say "Nope" without being a moron here. That's literally the definition of argumentum ad hominem.
Yep. Your insult is the definition of ad hominem. Pointing out that someone is not acting the way they tell others to act is not ad hominem, and knowing from their actions that they do not believe their own words is also not.
Neither of those things imply anything of the sort.
Why would you say "do as I say" unless you thought that what you were saying was true or correct? (You could be deliberately dishonest, of course, and that is a possibility.) You do understand that "imply" does not mean "says explicitly", is means "considering the context of the statem
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. Your insult is the definition of ad hominem.
No, it is not, you ignoramus.
Calling a name is not an ad hominem. Argumentum ad hominem is essentially arguing that their argument is invalid because of some characteristic of them.
Your argument isn't wrong because you're a moron. You're just a moron.
Pointing out that someone is not acting the way they tell others to act is not ad hominem
Correct. Using that as a point in your argument is
and knowing from their actions that they do not believe their own words is also not.
You cannot know that, and even if you did, it's irrelevant. It's still arguing based upon character assassination instead of the merits of the argument. It is fallacious logic, and therefore self evidently inc
Re: (Score:2)
While Tibet is special, they are nevertheless Buddhist.
The biggest or second biggest religion on the planet. Why that is not "mainstream" is beyond me.
Re: (Score:2)
You don't challenge any veracity of the argument, all you show is that the person making the argument is a hypocrite. But that has nothing to do with the veracity of the argument itself.
Re: (Score:2)
It is not a logical fallacy to point out the hypocrisy that shows that someone clearly does not believe their own arguments, or believes that those arguments do not apply to themselves. It is a common logical fallacy, however, to argue "do as I say and not as I do".
Just going to leave this here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Trying to discount someone's arguments because of their perceived actions is a fallacy. Would you accept the argument from a vegan who grows all their own own food, uses a stream and windmill for work power and only ever travels by foot? No? Then you are the hypocrite, and a fallacious one a that.
Here's a tip. Are you arguing against their argument? If not, it's probably a fallacy.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed. It still doesn't detract from the logic of their argument.
Every argument includes both stated and unstated assumptions and logical steps leading from those to the final conclusion. If someone demonstrates that they, themself, do not believe the final conclusion, then it implies that the assumptions must not be valid. Thus any logical conclusions based on those assumptions must be invalid, as well. That detracts from the "logic of their argument".
If you are just trying to claim that an argument that starts with the assumption "assume a spherical cow", e.g., can r
Re: (Score:2)
Every argument includes both stated and unstated assumptions and logical steps leading from those to the final conclusion. If someone demonstrates that they, themself, do not believe the final conclusion, then it implies that the assumptions must not be valid. Thus any logical conclusions based on those assumptions must be invalid, as well. That detracts from the "logic of their argument".
Broken logic. You're assuming you know their beliefs based upon their actions. Do I need to point out the flaw in that argument?
If you are just trying to claim that an argument that starts with the assumption "assume a spherical cow", e.g., can result in a correct, logical outcome, well, IF the assumption is true then the outcome would be true. Since the assumption fails, the outcome also fails.
I'm beginning to believe you have a learning disability.
Here, allow me to put my argument in easier to understand terms not involving spherical cows.
If one says that murder is wrong, and then murders someone. It does not mean that they were wrong, or even that they don't believe their argument.
Your assumption, that murder must not be wrong because he's a murderer and does not be
Re: (Score:2)
Broken logic. You're assuming you know their beliefs based upon their actions.
No. I am seeing their actions and how they relate to their stated beliefs, and observing that they do not coincide. It doesn't matter what the belief is, only that the action belies it. Your hyperbolic example of "murder" makes arguments that I did not, and thus needs no further refutation.
I'm beginning to believe you have a learning disability.
And I can tell from this that you have nothing to add to the discussion but ad hominem. Good bye.
Re: (Score:2)
No. I am seeing their actions and how they relate to their stated beliefs, and observing that they do not coincide.
And trying to apply some kind of meaning to that in the context of a logical debate, when there is none.
It doesn't matter what the belief is, only that the action belies it.
It looks like we're going to have to add the definition of 'belie' to the list of things, along with logical fallacies, that you do not know.
Your hyperbolic example of "murder" makes arguments that I did not, and thus needs no further refutation.
Hyperbole is often the best way to demonstrate faulty logic. I'm unsurprised that you don't understand how it did that.
And I can tell from this that you have nothing to add to the discussion but ad hominem.
You mean the definition of ad hominem, that you still seem to fail to grasp.
Good bye.
Don't drown in that sea of ignorance.
We tried to help.
Re: (Score:2)
What do you mean it's not a distraction? Of course it's a distraction.
detract
verb
1. diminish the worth or value of
Come on now.
Sure, but you can logically conclude that they might not believe their own bullshit.
No, you cannot. You can assume as much. That's not a logical deduction.
History is also full of hypocrites that demonstrated they were using their hypocrisy to enrich themselves.
Ok, you're wasting our time. You think enrichment is somehow a detraction from their argument? Again- that's ad hominem reasoning, and it's fallacious.
I think this discussion is over your head.
Re: (Score:2)
It is an ad hominem fallacy to discount his point because of his hypocrisy.
That really isn't up for debate. I'm not defending him.
Re: (Score:2)
You cannot logically discount his argument by his actions. To claim otherwise is an indisputable indicator of ignorance.
I'm not defending the fact that he's a scumbag hypocritical politician. Only a fool uses *that* a the reason for him being wrong, though.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm pretty sure both are true. Al Gore is wrong about global warming... and he's a scumbag.
Entirely possible. I'm only pointing out that the latter does not imply the former, unless you exercise your right to use broken logic.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They also blamed "Inadequate prayer" as a cause and are actively avoiding eating garlic and onions, burning meat, and fighting as methods to combat this. So, you know, take it with a grain of salt.
Just not onion or garlic salt, right?
Loss was inevitable anyway, it's the rate (Score:1)
Although a bit sad that a way of living they have been used to will be changing, this is true for countless societies across time. These glaciers may be going away faster than they would have otherwise without a warming trend, but they would have been gone eventually. The people that live there will have to figure out how to deal with that, either now or later.
Re: (Score:1)
Seems like the Quaternary Ice Age is ending, and we're on track for a Warm Earth. Not all change is bad: I believe that transition is what prevented the glaciers from returning 10k years ago, giving humans the breathing room to create civilization (10k years of stable climate is seen no where else in the million or so years of detailed data available from ice cores).
People will complain that humans are accelerating the process, and I'm sure we are, but having civilization seems like a good trade-off there.
Re: (Score:2)
That an interglacial period happened does not imply that the end of the Ice Age will be beneficial or good, or that our civilization can even exist in that state.
Re: (Score:2)
No doubt.
Alas, unless humans intend to engineer the climate of the planet as long as we occupy it (and perhaps longer, if we choose to use it as a nature preserve of one form or another), then it's pretty much inevitable that we're going to have to deal with climate change, since the planet and sun don't intend to do us the courtesy of restricting
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
We wouldn't be around to talk about the issue if it weren't for the quite anomalous 10,000 years of stability of the climate. That stability is clearly a good thing. As far as I can tell, the end of the ice age is the only credible explanation, and if so that's also clearly a good thing, whatever may come.
The idea that a Warm Earth is somehow less able to support civilization than an Ice Age is laughable. Argue that the transition will be rough, if you must (seems reasonable to me). But humans solve har
Re: (Score:2)
The idea that a Warm Earth is somehow less able to support civilization than an Ice Age is laughable.
Says you?
That a world is lush with life does not mean the world is amenable to large scale arability for the crops we need to survive at population levels we call "civilization"
Will mankind persist? of course. I'm not arguing it's going to destroy us.
I don't think you really understand the temperatures this planet hits during non-Ice Age periods.
Look them up, and get back to me. I await your proposals for maintaining reasonable populations with 100 degree oceans.
Frankly, I find your rather poorly-thoug
Re: (Score:2)
That a world is lush with life does not mean the world is amenable to large scale arability for the crops we need to survive at population levels we call "civilization"
We know a Warm Earth supports very rapid and health plant growth - enough to support 40-ton herbivores.
Do you seriously imagine that we somehow won't be able to adapt food crops? Something mankind has done for many centuries? If we need to do it in more of a hurry than before, well, we have new tools for that. But it seems like we'll have centuries.
Now, if you want to claim that "the location of arable land will move, likely across national borders, causing conflict", then maybe so. Modern markets are r
Re: (Score:2)
We know a Warm Earth supports very rapid and health plant growth - enough to support 40-ton herbivores.
We do. We also know it leads to daytime temperatures north of 130F in formerly temperate environments.
Jungles and rainforests are not crops.
Do you seriously imagine that we somehow won't be able to adapt food crops?
I have no difficulty imagining that.
Something mankind has done for many centuries?
Oh? Have they? List your examples of large, ancient, advanced cultures from the Amazon region, or the Congo.
That climate is not well suited to the kind of farming it requires to sustain our civilization.
Is it possible we can work around it? Sure. Is it a sure bet? No. It's not. It's hubris to say so.
I don't think it's a coincidenc
Re: (Score:2)
All that matters is that we can grow sufficient calories per acre. Growing enough protein per acre would be convenient, as meat is more expensive, but not required. Even in the quite unlikely circumstance that we can't engineer corn to thrive in any given climate (given centuries of trying), there will just be something new to work with. The amount of farmland the US uses to feed itself is just tiny - there's tons of room for less dense, less optimized crops.
People don't farm jungles/rainforests because
Re: (Score:2)
People don't farm jungles/rainforests because the plows will keep hitting trees (did you really ask that?) But vast swaths of former jungle/rainforest were cleared and farmed. It's what all the Greens whined about before they latched onto global warning.
You mistake the implication. Farming in jungle/rainforest areas is *massively* unproductive. It can be done, but generally, it barely supports the local population.
Cash crops, ie, crops native to that area- coffee, etc, do great. Bananas are one too. Perhaps we can live off of bananas.
You seem to be reading scare-literature about what a warm earth will be like. It's not that much warmer at the equator, but temperatures are nearly the same at the poles. (Not that land area near the equator is all that important given the current distribution of continents).
That's just false. It is that much hotter at the equator.
Is the spread narrowed? Yes. Instead of today's 100 degree spread between the equator and the poles, you have something more akin to a 50 degree spread. Since the pole
Re: (Score:2)
Clearly feeling terrified of the future makes you happy. Enjoy. My descendants will meanwhile enjoy a bright and happy future, in the stars.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
While the "cave men" settled the icy regions, or the edges of the icy regions, they mostly lived in nice savannas and/or forests.
The idea that a Warm Earth is somehow less able to support civilization than an Ice Age is laughable.
If you mean less habitable as in harder to live in, you are right, but the land we can live in will be much smaller, and the arable land even less. Unless a mystery changes some deserts into a habitable/arable zone.
Re:Loss was inevitable anyway, it's the rate (Score:5, Interesting)
Although a bit sad that a way of living they have been used to will be changing, this is true for countless societies across time. These glaciers may be going away faster than they would have otherwise without a warming trend, but they would have been gone eventually. The people that live there will have to figure out how to deal with that, either now or later.
That's true, but gradual change is always easier than sudden change. All societies adapt over time, so it's possible that at a more "normal" melting rate they could adapt, while at a faster melting rate they collapse or villages that have existed for hundreds or thousands of years disappear.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Can modern society survive, while that small village cannot? My guess would be yes. So it's not quite the "ZOMG! INSTANT CHANGE KILLS!" kind of thing we need to worry about. We may need to change over the next few centuries - considering how much society and cities have changed over the last 200, which much lower technological capabilities, I'm not sure I see the dire death for all that is oft-predicted...
On my part, the concern isn't so much society as a whole surviving. It's the anthropological loss that is inevitable with climate change over the long term. Isolated villages destroyed or abandoned. Islands inhabited for thousands of years disappearing under the water. Cultures, artifacts, traditions, and languages lost forever. While losing these things doesn't affect how we live our lives (except of course for the people that will have to relocate), we do lose a bit of our shared history.
Re: (Score:2)
When the Mongol hordes sweep across Eastern Europe and sack the cities, don't come crying to me. This was true for countless societies across time a
Re: (Score:2)
The only constant thing in life is, CHANGE.
Get used to it....nothing ever stays the same.
Your heart's beating around the clock
Time tickin' away, it doesn't stop
Evolution is takin' place
The world is spinnin' and changin' everyday
Anything you think of with a name
There isn't anything in life that ever stays the same
Everything changes, changes
Things are changin' constantly
Everything changes, changes
It's evolutionary
Everything changes, changes
Changin' all the time
Playin' with your mind
Modified or rearranged
Everything has got to change
You take a chance, you roll the dice
You risk it all, it's just a p
Re:Loss was inevitable anyway, it's the rate (Score:5, Insightful)
rapid change == mass extinctions (Score:2)
you dipshit
One of these things is not like the others (Score:2)
inadequacy of prayer, greater material greed and an increase in pollution from tourism
I'll take "increase in pollution" for $100, Alex.
Subject (Score:2)
Curious, where does the watershed go from these glaciers?
Aren't India, and that region in general, facing a huge water crisis?
Re:Subject (Score:4, Informative)
The glacier is here:
https://tools.wmflabs.org/geoh... [wmflabs.org]
It is on the opposite side of the Himalayas from the eastern tip of India. And even then, the Brahmaputra empties through Bangladesh.
Re: (Score:2)
Curious, where does the watershed go from these glaciers? Aren't India, and that region in general, facing a huge water crisis?
India is 1.3 million square miles. Parts of it can be facing a drought, and other parts not.
But in this case, though, the mountain range in question is in Yunnan [wikipedia.org], and drains to China, not India.
Re: (Score:2)
But in this case, though, the mountain range in question is in Yunnan [wikipedia.org], and drains to China, not India.
The headwaters of the Mekong River are also in the Meili Mountains, and the Brahmaputra River begins just over the ridgeline in eastern Tibet.
About 10 years ago I went to Lijiang [wikipedia.org] with my spouse, and we took a side trip into the Meili Mountains. We stayed at a bed-and-breakfast at the base of a glacier at 17,000 feet. The mountains around us towered another mile higher, at 22,000 feet.
"Third pole" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Click Bait. At least once all the ice completely melts our descendants won't have to hear complaints about it anymore.
Save CoyboyNeal!!!!
Re: (Score:2)
That's what I came here to say but you already said it. Guess they know how to get us to read the article ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Yet it was a brilliant use of metaphor that went completely over your head because you insisted upon focusing upon geographic location rather than the amount of ice involved.
And I wish readers were more literary, but alas, wishes are not horses.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Khawa Karpo lies at the world's "third pole." This is how glaciologists refer to the Tibetan plateau
Odd. I've worked with glaciologists for 25 years and never heard of this silly term.
Re: (Score:2)
Appears to be more a failure of your knowledge [google.com] than something foreign to glaciologists.
NASA has heard of it [nasa.gov]. So what's your excuse?
Re: (Score:2)
because you insisted upon focusing upon geographic location rather than the amount of ice involved.
And you missed the detail that poles are not defined by how much ice is in a place. The North Pole would be the North Pole (and will be at some point) when there is no ice there at all.
Poles also have nothing to do with geographics. They are the place(s) where there is a null in some value. Such as, the North Pole is the place where there is a null in translational movement of the surface. (It is all rotational.) The North Magnetic Pole is the place where there is a null in the horizontal magnetic field.
Re: (Score:2)
Quick, tell NASA they've failed in scientific thought [nasa.gov]. I'm sure that they'll get right on that, along with Nature and all the other Journals [google.com] that have published on the topic.
Re: (Score:2)
Quick, tell NASA they've failed in scientific thought.
Your link has NASA reporting what the location has been nicknamed, not that it actually is a pole, nor even that NASA created the nickname.
You do know what "nickname" means? It's a tacit admission that it isn't really what the name implies.
Re: (Score:2)
You do know what a metaphor means? It's literally "a figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable."
Thank you for your concession of defeat.
Re: (Score:3)
No-one thought the Earth had a third axis of rotation. But this is a metaphor that undermines the credibility of the person using it, so using it is not effective at its goal. That makes it a bad metaphor.
Re: (Score:3)
Calling the Himalayas "the third pole" because there's ice there is like calling your dog your "second wife" because they're both bitches.
Metaphors operate on primary traits, not secondary.
This ought to be interesting (Score:3)
Wow, I hope climate change is real, otherwise their explanation:
Villagers blame disrespectful human behaviour, including an inadequacy of prayer, greater material greed and an increase in pollution from tourism.
...might make sense.
Maybe we need to appease Khawa Karpo instead of focusing on carbon emissions or Jesus. Regardless, we should teach both sides of the debate.
The science is still out (Score:5, Funny)
debate? (Score:2)
What "debate" are you referring to, exactly?
Re: (Score:2)
What "debate" are you referring to, exactly?
I believe this is meant to be a tongue-in-cheek reference to the debate about teaching evolution in schools: https://www.npr.org/templates/... [npr.org]
Everything about this article is stupid (Score:3)
Calling the Himalayas a pole, entertaining ideas of religious nuttery is the cause for glacial retreat, saying "global warming" instead of "climate change".
Next, Slashdot will run a story blaming hurricanes on the gays.
Re: (Score:3)
Next, Slashdot will run a story blaming hurricanes on the gays.
People have started to avoid eating garlic and onions, burning meat, breaking vows or fighting for fear of unleashing the wrath of the deity.
Forget the gays . . . it's obviously the garlic and onion eaters and meat burners.
Burning meat? Can someone explain to me what is the point of that? A local specialty, like blackened fish?
Re: (Score:2)
Burning meat? Can someone explain to me what is the point of that? A local specialty, like blackened fish?
Little-known fact: When the Acadians were forced to flee Canada - while most fled to the area we now know as Louisiana, a small band moved to Tibet.
LIES! (Score:2, Interesting)
>Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name.
That is untrue. It did not happen. Stating it as fact is a lie.
This bugged me too. (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
Well, any adult with better than primary education would immediately read that as a retelling of a legend. There are enough clues there, including the opening words "Many moons ago". Setting cultural context for a story is nothing new in journalism. If anyone took the passage seriously, I think the problem is with the reader, not the article.
Re:LIES! (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, any adult with better than primary education would immediately read that as a retelling of a legend. There are enough clues there, including the opening words "Many moons ago". Setting cultural context for a story is nothing new in journalism. If anyone took the passage seriously, I think the problem is with the reader, not the article.
Not in a news story purporting to impart facts. Perhaps giving context would make it true "In Tibetian mythology...". but as written it reveals sloppy writing.
Re: (Score:3)
A news story is not stereo instructions. A certain amount of the reader's intelligence is assumed. As soon as they mention "gods" and "demons", a reasonable person will understand that this is mythology without being told explicitly so.
Re: (Score:2)
A certain amount of the reader's intelligence is assumed.
Judging by the vocabulary in common use in "news" articles today, that "certain amount" corresponds to an IQ of 75.
As soon as they mention "gods" and "demons", a reasonable person will understand that this is mythology without being told explicitly so.
Reasonable people are in short supply. My own family believes in gods and demons. You just have to give them the "right" names. It's embarrassing.
Re: (Score:2)
>Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name.
That is untrue. It did not happen. Stating it as fact is a lie.
Perhaps the statement about the Second Buddha should have been presented as a belief, as its truth is challenging to prove. However, it's ironic that the bold proclamation that the original statement is a lie is itself not provable and must ultimately rest upon the supposed obviousness of the proclamation or upon less rigorous forms of purported proofs.
Re: (Score:2)
>Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name.
That is untrue. It did not happen. Stating it as fact is a lie.
Perhaps the statement about the Second Buddha should have been presented as a belief, as its truth is challenging to prove. However, it's ironic that the bold proclamation that the original statement is a lie is itself not provable and must ultimately rest upon the supposed obviousness of the proclamation or upon less rigorous forms of purported proofs.
I disagree. To state something as being true when you know you don't know is a lie. The writer of TFA is surely fully aware that they had no evidence that any such transformation took place and plenty of good reasons to think it cannot be true. So in stating it to be what happened, they were lying.
Re: (Score:2)
>Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name.
That is untrue. It did not happen. Stating it as fact is a lie.
Perhaps the statement about the Second Buddha should have been presented as a belief, as its truth is challenging to prove. However, it's ironic that the bold proclamation that the original statement is a lie is itself not provable and must ultimately rest upon the supposed obviousness of the proclamation or upon less rigorous forms of purported proofs.
I disagree. To state something as being true when you know you don't know is a lie. The writer of TFA is surely fully aware that they had no evidence that any such transformation took place and plenty of good reasons to think it cannot be true. So in stating it to be what happened, they were lying.
I cannot prove most facts that I believe to be true, nor do I understand most facts that I assume to be true. By the standard of stating "something as being true when you know you don't know," most of what I say is a lie, including most principles of science, history, etc.
Lies can only be attributed to an inherent level of untruth in a statement, unrelated to the intent of the speaker, or to a characteristic of the intent of the speaker, unrelated to the inherent truth of the statement. I don't know the s
Re: (Score:2)
called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name.
That is untrue. It did not happen. Stating it as fact is a lie.
Indeed, the fact of the matter is he actually is the mountain, not residing there.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Prove it.
By definition, the holiness of a malevolent mountain demon is less than the holiest protective warrior god.
By violation of the principle of preservation of holiness, no malevolent mountain demon can be transformed into a holiest anything.
holiest protective warrior gods are in the set of holiest protective anythings.
Q.E.D.
Re: (Score:2)
They don't need to climb it. The serial port is at the bottom, under a rock. The aliens aren't that dumb.
Don't offend mountain gods. (Score:2)
"Nevertheless, there have been several failed attempts by outsiders -- the best known by an international team of 17, all of whom died in an avalanche during their ascent on 3 January 1991."
Kwaha Karpo doesn't fuck around.
TL;DR: Deliberately misleading headline! (Score:1)
It is an icy place. That does not make it a pole
Tibet Villagers are Evangelicals! (Score:2)
https://cbsaustin.com/news/loc... [cbsaustin.com]
So the Hetrodyne Boys were right (Score:2)
There IS a West Pole!
So, will there be a race to it?
"Don't tell me you fear the experiment."
"No, I fear the result!"
Greenland weeps... (Score:2)
This is how glaciologists refer to the Tibetan plateau, home to the vast Hindu Kush-Himalaya ice sheet, because it contains the largest amount of snow and ice after the Arctic and Antarctic
It's second behind Antarctica [wikipedia.org].
I hear there's also a third magnetic pole. (Score:2)
I heard the world also has a second south magnetic pole. And it's man-made. Story goes like this:
Back during the late-middle of the 20th century, there was a lot of speculation that magnetic monopoles might be real. Also rare (massing something like 137 times the mass of a proton and thus rarely produced short o big-bang conditions).
If a few of these were wandering around, it was thought, some might get stuck in exposed magnetite outcroppings. So some physicists made an extractor - a pulsed electromagne
Except we're supposed ENTER one currently! (Score:2)
Climate does NOT change by such an EXREME amount in such a crazy short time! These things take thousands of years! Not freaking decades; are you insane?
To me, you are like an *active* holocaust denier. Active because you actively participate in it *while* denying it.
Except you don't *murder* people. You mass-murder *entire freaking species!*
Your are a mass-murderer!
And that is how you will be treated bef
Re: (Score:2)
Wow... some real idiots on Slashdot, apparently! Modding my statement of fact as a "Troll" post? LOL....
And arguing that the big chunks of ice left behind on the planet aren't just remnants from a previous ice age and subject to melting is equivalent to both denying the holocaust AND participating in it actively? You are just absolutely off your rocker!
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
The missing component is magic. Proton didn't have a west pole, but Phaze did.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Being our earth is a perfectly uniform topographically flat sphere, orbiting the sun in a perfect circle, with no axis wobble, we don't need loci of cold air to give us a temperate gradient between the limited arability equatorial regions in some hypothetical squashed topographically rough sphere that wobbles with an elliptical orbit.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
But to deny that it's a question is insanity.
The problems introduced by a large amount of warming are absolutely existential crises for civilization in its current form without very drastic measures.
Re: (Score:3)
Again, that life may thrive more does not mean our civilization will. Civilization is new for us, and it didn't arise until the Holocene. We had a quarter of a million years to figure out before then, and we didn't.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that those temperatures aren't well suited to farming food supplies for large populations.