Saturday, October 17, 2020
Non-explaining arrogance isn't new
The non-explaining Expert is more common now but NOT new. Here's a beautiful example from the pivotal year of 1906.
The SF earthquake was followed quickly by a highly unusual spell of rain, which made even more trouble for the miserable people who were temporarily sheltering in parks and plazas.
From American Inventor p199 of PDF.
As a consequence of these unusual conditions, Prof. O. A. Leuschner, the astronomer in charge of the observatory at the University of California, received many requests for information upon the subject of the connection between earthquakes and the weather. To all these requests he made the short and simple answer: "Earthquakes are never influenced by the weather, nor do they affect weather conditions in any way." A curious fact about the rainstorm was that the wind accompanying it came from the north, whereas storms in California almost invariably are brought on by a strong southeasterly or southwesterly wind. One of the amateur weather observers at Berkeley, the seat of the University of California, says that during a period of many years he has never known heavy rain associated with a northerly wind. Prof Leuschner, however, while not undertaking to explain the phenomenon and admitting that our knowledge of earthquakes is slight, declares that "wind and rain and other weather phenomena cannot possibly be considered as under the influence of seismic phenomena."Note the arrogant dismissive tone of Leuschner, who was flatass wrong. The fast pressure change in a storm CAN trigger a quake that's ready to rumble, and the huge electrical discharges produced by quakes CAN trigger or move storms. Both facts were already known in 1906. Geologists are still declaring that earthquakes can't possibly be related to anything. The job of an expert is to connect things that are disconnected, and disconnect things that are connected. Break all facts, obliterate all logic. Note also the healthy skeptical attitude of the American Inventor writers. ¶ 1:16 AM
