George Rebane
Dr Anna Haynes is a True Believer in Anthropogenic Global Warming and its dire consequences for all Mankind. She has taken great exception to my being an AGW skeptic, and has recorded her distress –
• On her personal website NC Focus,
• On her community information website NC Voices,
• During her requested meetings with me,
• During an unexpected walk-in at one of my Rotary luncheons,
• In unsolicited phone calls to our residence during which she has attempted to interrogate me and my wife.
Recently (27mar10) she launched an attack of unfounded allegations on TechTest, a philanthropic merit scholarship project of the non-profit Sierra Environmental Studies Foundation (sesfoundation.org) of which I am a board member and its Director of Research. She alleges that the actual purpose of the test is to gather and indoctrinate the participating young scholars to become climate change skeptics.
She has a longer history of such dealings with my friend and SESF colleague Russ Steele (NC Media Watch). Additionally, her unfathomable labors have also included Messrs Michael McDaniel (SESF) and Martin Light (CABPRO). I will let them tell their own stories.
Tonight Dr Haynes called during dinner to pose yet another question – have I or any of my family been compensated for my skepticism of AGW. As soon as I said ‘no’, she thanked me, hung up, and posted the conversation as a comment here.
This series of intensifying harassments lasting over a year are most disconcerting. My lay assessment is that I am dealing with a disturbed person, and therefore I have not responded to her as a peer. In a recent comment thread I recommended that she seek professional help. I stand by that recommendation, and hope that she would reconsider her continued confrontations until after getting such help.
Ms. Haynes, there isn't a complex answer for that question. "A measure of the kinetic energy of matter" is all that would have been needed to demonstrate a good understanding of what temperature *is*. A discussion of the different types of kinetic energy that might be involved would have demonstrated a deeper understanding but isn't something I was expecting.
Your response along the lines of 'It's what the numbers on a thermometer show' demonstrated something else entirely, was about what I expected from you and indicates the depth of instruction you were offering when you interrupted me that day.
Posted by: Gregory | 09 February 2012 at 09:00 AM