Politicians the world over, however, can have rather a poor grasp of the relationship between evidence and democracy. If I were to dedicate my time to documenting every instance of this in Australia, my server would probably collapse under the weight of the miniature black holes thus created. But Dr Dennis Jensen, Australian Federal Member for Tangney, has managed to be a little bit more offensive than usual for his rank (while still managing to maintain the level of mediocrity unique to Australian politics).

Dr Jensen is sponsoring a petition opposing the proposed Emissions Trading Scheme, set to be introduced by the Federal Government in 2010. Now, I’d like to state that I’m no supporter of the Labor government’s emissions trading scheme either. If compromise was represented by a straight line between two desirable outcomes, our government have managed to travel away from it orthogonally.

No one is with you on this, Kevin. No one.

In short, I politely disagree. But Dr Jensen’s petition… well, the petition addresses the following:

• We live on a dynamic planet; natural climate change occurs all the time.
• As a nation we need appropriate infrastructure and planning to protect against climate change including long-term warming or cooling and severe weather related events such as cyclones, droughts and bushfires.
• Global temperature increased slightly in the late 20th century and has been decreasing since 1998. Neither the warming nor the cooling is of an unusual rate or magnitude.
• Cutting carbon dioxide emissions in Australia will result in no measurable change in future climate. Australia contributes less than 1.5% of global emissions.
• The introduction of a Carbon Trading Scheme represents a major economic intervention that will drive Australian industries and jobs overseas.

Now, some of that poll is fairly inoffensive. Actually, it isn’t, but what I mean specifically is that every clause up there that isn’t emphasised might well be a matter for public and parliamentary debate. Say, forty years ago. Those highlighted sections, though? They’re a little disturbing.

I don’t really want to launch into a debate about climate change. That’s not what scares me about this. They way I thought it worked, though, was that if we are suspicious of certain pieces of evidence or the conclusions drawn from it, we can dispute it with some other evidence or logical argument. That’s called science. Dr Jensen, amazingly, has found a shortcut that completely removes the need for scientific debate: if he gets enough signatures on a petition, the evidence disappears. Presto!

Does Dr Jensen think a criminal trial should be conducted this way? Should forensic evidence be countered by a few hundred signatures from people who know nothing about the crime in question? If it’s about numbers, I’m pretty sure that there are more supporters of teaching Creationism in public school than there Tangney citizens, no matter which way they vote.

But Jensen’s disregard for science and reason is not the most frightening aspect of this. There is another, far more disturbing possibility here, out beyond political opportunism and clinical insanity — a possibility that nonetheless might deserve some attention.

What if he’s right?

What if Dr Dennis Jensen, the man himself, has the power to enact a material change on the universe through the power of opinion polls? What if, simply by gathering a number of signatures on a piece of paper, he can actually change the laws of nature? He clearly thinks he can, and he has a much better suit than I do (it doesn’t have a utility belt, though, so some points to me).

In the interests of being truly scientific (pending a magic petition, of course), I propose we test this. There are a variety of laws and conclusions that we live our life by that I think are dangerous, offensive and even downright silly. If Dr Jensen has the power to change the evolution of the Earth’s climate through a petition, surely the following suggestions are not beyond his abilities.

• I would quite like to be able to fly. I know I’m not the only one. And there are so many problems and mortal dangers caused by gravity that my case is already pretty much made for me. You should have no problems here, Dr Jensen — the nature of gravity is still hotly disputed by the world’s most eminent physicists, so there’s plenty of room for a wedge.
• The sky. It’s blue. It’s always been blue, it always will be blue, even when there are clouds I know it’s the same damn colour underneath. Make it purple, Dennis. Just to see what happens. The kids will love it, and you should be able to get enough signatures again to change it back if it looks awful. Come on. You know you want to.
• Cancer. This might require a lot of signatures (I’m not quite sure how your petition power scales), but I will personally walk from Perth to Canberra with as many petitions as there are remorseful Tangney voters.
• It has long been my personal ambition to destroy the Sun. You might just be the Member of Parliament for the job. Call me.

If we’re all wrong about environmental policies being a good idea then I’ll take that on the chin, along with aaaaaall the people who are paid to actually know what they’re talking about. But the idea that we can replace science with a petition… well, it’s a bit ridiculous. It makes me a little uncomfortable, in fact. It’s basically how a theocracy works, except without the sparkle.

I will make the concession, though, that if it turns out we can’t change the laws of nature through an opinion poll, we don’t have to return to an evidence-based debate straight away. There’s always gladitorial combat.

Think about it.

Not these ones.

Yes. Yes it can.

The science theatre can be a dangerous place. Between the tens of millions of volts leaping out of a Tesla coil, the hand-bleaching acetone and the neurotic theatre coordinator, theatre demonstrators have more than enough to worry about before they even leave their house in the morning (except for that last part). Science is a perilous enough activity without adding the general (ie. uneducated, unwashed, untagged, etc…) public to the beaker. Compounding matters by adding an audience is just asking for trouble.

It is therefore in the interests of science theatre demonstrators everywhere that I have compiled this list. While a full course in crowd control is well beyond the scope of someone who once tried to strangle their own lab partner with a spectroscope, this outline should serve as a reasonable starting point for large-scale behavioural modifcation tactics.

I hope that this guide comes in handy at some point (possibly as evidence submitted to a pre-trial hearing, but you never know). I would have made an equipment list, but it was too short to even qualify as, let alone warrant being, a list.

No, not a nominal and ineffective ploy to garner votes from a population whose chances at such a test would be dubious at best — we’re above that. The test will look at Australian values. At morality. At political ideals. Where traditional entry requirements just examine the mind and body of a potential citizen, this test will examine their heart. And possibly wallet. But mainly heart.

Now, at first I was skeptical. Yes, me. Cynical, even. I just didn’t see the value in what I thought was just a spurious exercise in off-season political campaigning. I failed to see the logic in attempting to combat issues that arise long after the application for and approval of citizenship by making said application slightly longer. But then I realised that, instead of whingeing and bitterness, this country would benefit far more from my involvement than my detraction.

So I decided to write my own test. I carefully chose questions that would test for and reflect our own values and national character, while maintaining a sensible degree of objectivity. I think that I have successfully formed a test that will evaluate the person while minimising bias.

So please, read my test — my contribution to how our population and even culture will be influenced by newcomers to this country of ours — and tell me what you think.

The Australian Citizenship Test (v2.0)

Please answer all of the following questions to the best of your knowledge, ability and financial situation.

Personal Details

Name:

Country of origin:

Real country of origin, not the one you moved to for two months before applying because it was politically favourable:

Religion:

(‘Yes’ or ‘no’ will suffice.)

[ ] Tick here if you are a terrorist
(This is for the purposes of statistics and will not affect your application.)

Section One: Social Values and Political Principles

1. Tick any of the following terms you find offensive:

   1. Towelhead

   2. Wog

   3. Economy

   4. Tasmanian

2. Which one of the following problems does alcohol induced violence not solve:

   1. Minor disagreements

   2. Domestic abuse

   3. Basic arithmetic

   4. Criminal sentencing

3. In forty words or less, prove that you are not Lebanese.

    

    

    

    

Section Two: Language Competency

1. Complete the following sentence:

   The war in Iraq was motivated by legitimate suspicion of possession of weapons of mass destr              .

2. The word ‘secular’ means:

   1. Outdated, outmoded or obsolete

   2. Blasphemous or deliberately offensive

   3. Unable to compete despite apparent advantages

   4. Sexually dysfunctional and unattractive

   (Tick one.)

3. Translate the following Nyoongah expression:

   Allewah boolyaduk, baal nooniny barminy.

   1. I have access to all the educational resources I need!

   2. Why yes, I’d be much happier in the hands of a stranger chosen by bureaucrats than with my actual parents!

   3. Voting can be quite tough when there are so many representatives you identify with.

   4. We should have made the Dutch more welcome.

Section Three: Skills, Education and Training

Please list any qualifications you have obtained, in order of monetary value:

Indicate the minimum hourly wage for which you would work:

(This question legally binding.)

End of Test

Please sign and date your test, and ensure all additional papers are securely attached. When stapling cash, ensure that you do not obscure the serial numbers on the notes. Thank you for your cooperation.

[Tessa K]: positivism is the view that physical theories should only relate experimentally measurable — or even directly observable — quantities. For example, before the existence of atoms or molecules were verified, molecular theories of thermodynamics are not positivist.

Einstien worked in an environment very much influenced by positivists (like Mach), and you’ll note that his theories are very much oriented around observables (Heisenberg also).

POST-positivism comes after. With the advent of large, collaborative scientific endeavours (such as the Manhattan Project, Hollywood films and ridiculing P.T. Barnum until he made a lot of money), it was necessary to compile authoritative lists of things that could be measured. However, the question of whether the list itself could be experimentally verified to exist caused a great deal of consternation amongst the scientific community, leading to such famous quarrels as Russell’s paradox, the EPR paradox and Feynmann’s infamous “I know you are but what am I?” paradox.

Consequently, the list was split into four parts, each given to four little known physicists who died horrible deaths soon after. It is said that whoever finds and assembles the four parts will see the truth in whatever topic haunts them, shortly before dying a horrible death — making it a perfect present for that kid in the back seat who has just asked “are we there yet?” for the hundredth damn time.

What was the question?

Vendor: Cheers, mate. How’re you today?
Me: Yeah, not bad…
Vendor: Yeah, you’ve got that look — “not great, but I’m not gonna complain to the homeless guy…”

…And one of the students who completely neglected to calculate the Young’s modulus had a 6 word aim: “To find Young’s modulus of wire”

On 15/03/2006, at 3:31 PM, I wrote:
Perhaps they are protesting the attribution of the stretching of the wire to some simplistic physical principle. There are many details of wire-stretching that cannot be explained by current materials science, which indicates that the stretching is guided in some way — past and even present — by a more complex intelligence.

Maybe they feel that the idea of “Intelligent Deformation” should be given equal shrift in science education, rather than simply being dismissed as religiously motivated propaganda for another theory that, really, can’t explain the universe completely either.