The meme below shows a guy at his laptop, grinning like he just cracked the Da Vinci Code:
“Honey, come look! I’ve found some information all the world’s top scientists and doctors missed.”
If you only saw it recently, you might think it’s just a generic joke about overconfident amateurs. A little jab at the guy who reads three articles and suddenly thinks he’s running the NIH.
That’s not how it was used.
That meme didn’t go viral in some neutral, pre-political vacuum. It exploded during Covid—right when governments, public health officials, and their media auxiliaries were issuing sweeping, life-altering directives with absolute certainty and very little tolerance for dissent.
And the meme wasn’t there to encourage humility.
It was there to enforce it—selectively.
It was a rhetorical cudgel. A way to say: sit down, shut up, the experts have spoken. Don’t ask questions. Don’t notice contradictions. Don’t point out when the “settled science” changes every three weeks. Just comply.
Because the people in charge, we were told, had this handled.
Except they didn’t.
Lockdowns were sold as short-term measures, then dragged on. School closures were defended long after evidence showed the damage. Mask guidance flipped, then flipped again. The lab-leak hypothesis went from unspeakable to plausible. Data that didn’t fit the narrative was ignored, downplayed, or memory-holed.
And through all of it, the tone from institutions remained remarkably consistent: confidence bordering on arrogance, paired with a hair-trigger instinct to delegitimize critics.
That’s the environment where the meme thrived.
It wasn’t about correcting bad reasoning. It was about protecting authority.
So when someone pointed out inconsistencies, the response wasn’t, “Let’s examine that.” It was, “Oh look, another laptop genius who thinks he knows more than the experts.”
Fast forward a few years, and that same image lands very differently.
Because now there’s a story—completely real, documented, and frankly a little inconvenient—about a man with a laptop who actually did find something worth paying attention to.
Paul Conyngham is a technology entrepreneur in Australia. His dog, Rosie, is diagnosed with aggressive mast cell cancer. Surgery and chemotherapy buy time but don’t solve the problem. The situation is the kind that usually ends the same way: limited options, managed decline.
Instead of accepting that trajectory, Conyngham turns to the tools he knows best—data analysis and artificial intelligence.
Not in a casual way. He goes straight to the deep end.
As The Australian reports, “Mr Conyngham used a chatbot to brainstorm possible cures for Rosie’s cancer — then harnessed artificial intelligence to process gigabytes of genetic data to create the blueprint for an mRNA vaccine.”
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/tech-boss-uses-ai-and-chatgpt-to-create-cancer-vaccine-for-his-dying-dog/news-story/292a21bcbe93efa17810bfcfcdfadbf7
That’s the part where, under the old rules, the meme gets deployed.
Some credentialed authority figure is supposed to roll their eyes, maybe chuckle, and remind everyone that real science is done by real experts in real institutions—not by some guy with a chatbot and a sick dog.
Except this time, the guy doesn’t stop.
Conyngham isn’t a veterinarian, but he’s not clueless either. He has “17 years of experience in machine learning and data analysis,” which turns out to be directly relevant to modern biology, whether the gatekeepers like it or not.
He contacts researchers at the University of New South Wales and asks for genomic sequencing of Rosie’s tumor. Their initial reaction is exactly what you’d expect from a system that’s been trained to filter out outsiders:
“We often get oddball queries…”
There’s the reflex. Dismiss first, evaluate later—if at all.
But here’s where the script goes off the rails.
Conyngham gets the sequencing done. Then he analyzes it himself, with AI assistance. He compares healthy DNA to tumor DNA, identifies mutations, and starts mapping those mutations to potential treatment targets.
He even explains the process in terms simple enough that you don’t need a PhD to follow:
“It’s like having the original engine of your car and then a version of the engine 300,000km down the road — you can compare them and see where there’s damage.”
That’s not anti-science. That’s applied reasoning.
And the researchers notice.
One of them admits:
“Paul was relentless… he had analysed the data and found mutations of interest and then used AlphaFold to find the proteins that were mutated, and then identified potential targets and matched them to drugs.”
At this point, the meme is looking a little shaky.
Because the “guy at the laptop” is now doing work that—while not a substitute for institutional science—is clearly adjacent to it. Close enough that actual scientists are taking him seriously.
Then comes the next institutional checkpoint.
They try to access an existing immunotherapy drug. The pharmaceutical company declines. Procedures, policies, liability—pick your bureaucratic poison.
So Conyngham does something that doesn’t fit neatly into the credentialed hierarchy.
He pivots.
mRNA vaccines.
Yes, the same technology that was treated during Covid as both sacred and beyond discussion depending on the week.
The article explains, “mRNA — short for messenger ribonucleic acid — is a molecule that instructs a cell to produce disease-fighting proteins.”
Using the mutation data, Conyngham designs a personalized mRNA sequence targeting Rosie’s cancer. He runs algorithms, builds a model, and hands it off to researchers who can manufacture the vaccine.
And here’s the line that should make every institutional ego just a little uncomfortable:
“He ran an algorithm to inform the design of the mRNA and sent it to us… It’s democratising the whole process.”
Democratising.
That’s the word that explains why the meme existed in the first place.
Because democratization threatens gatekeeping.
For decades, institutions didn’t just do science—they controlled access to it. They decided which questions were legitimate, which hypotheses were acceptable, and who was qualified to ask either.
Credentials became a proxy for correctness.
And during Covid, that mindset hardened into something closer to orthodoxy. Questioning official positions wasn’t treated as part of the scientific process. It was treated as deviance.
Now along comes artificial intelligence and quietly wrecks that model.
AI doesn’t care where you went to school. It doesn’t check your publication history before helping you analyze genomic data. It doesn’t enforce consensus.
It just processes information.
Which means the gap between “credentialed insider” and “capable outsider” is shrinking.
Back to Rosie.
The vaccine is produced. Regulatory hurdles are cleared. A veterinarian administers the treatment.
And then the part that really scrambles the narrative:
“Rosie’s cancer was really, really advanced but one tumour has shrunk quite a lot — probably halved.”
The dog improves. Energy returns. She’s running around again.
No, this isn’t a peer-reviewed clinical trial. It’s not definitive proof of anything. That’s not the point.
The point is that the initial idea—the direction, the approach, the willingness to try something unconventional—did not come from the institutions that are so quick to assert authority.
It came from the guy the meme was designed to mock.
That doesn’t mean institutions are useless. Far from it. They built the underlying science. They provided the infrastructure. They made the vaccine.
But somewhere along the way, parts of the system started confusing expertise with infallibility.
And infallibility is poison to science.
Because once you believe you can’t be wrong, you stop asking the kinds of questions that lead to being right.
We’ve seen that pattern play out repeatedly.
During Covid, where certainty routinely outran evidence.
The climate arena has been running this same playbook for years, just with better branding and bigger budgets. Model outputs—often presented with impressive graphics and decimal-point precision—are treated less as exploratory tools and more as authoritative forecasts. When those projections fail to materialize on schedule, the response is rarely to step back and reassess the underlying assumptions. Instead, timelines shift, variables are reweighted, and the public is told the models were “misinterpreted,” not mistaken.
There’s also a noticeable pattern in how uncertainty is handled. In normal scientific practice, uncertainty is front and center—it’s quantified, debated, and used to guide further inquiry. In the climate space, uncertainty tends to be selectively emphasized or quietly sidelined depending on whether it strengthens the policy case being advanced. Error bars shrink when urgency is needed and expand when predictions miss the mark. That’s the communication strategy.
And just like during Covid, dissent doesn’t get treated as part of the process. It gets treated as obstruction. Researchers who question model sensitivity, data adjustments, or attribution claims often find themselves pushed to the margins—not necessarily refuted, just excluded. The conversation narrows, the consensus hardens, and the public is told the debate is over, even as key questions remain unresolved.
The irony is that climate systems are among the most complex, nonlinear systems we attempt to model. Oceans, clouds, solar variation, land use, feedback loops—these are not variables you plug neatly into a spreadsheet and solve. Yet the confidence with which long-term projections are presented would suggest otherwise. It’s a level of certainty that would make engineers nervous in far simpler systems, but in this case it’s packaged as settled understanding.
And once again, the same institutional reflex appears: protect the model, protect the message, and treat skepticism as a problem to be managed rather than a signal worth examining.
In any number of fields where dissent is treated less as a tool and more as a threat.
The damage isn’t abstract.
Public trust declines. Not because people suddenly reject science, but because they watch institutions behave in ways that don’t look like science—closing ranks, enforcing consensus, and treating criticism as illegitimate.
That’s how you get from “trust the experts” to “maybe I’ll check this myself.”
And now, with AI, “checking it yourself” is no longer a joke.
It’s a starting point.
The meme was supposed to freeze that instinct in place—to make people hesitate before questioning authority. To remind them that they weren’t qualified, that they didn’t belong in the conversation.
But tools change incentives.
When a person with the right background and the right software can meaningfully engage with complex problems, the old lines start to blur.
The guy at the laptop isn’t automatically right.
But he’s no longer automatically wrong either.
And that’s the part the meme was never designed to handle.
Guess what, the reason why climate scientists believe water vapor was a positive feedback, is because they have not learned how to do regressions. Simple example here from Chung et al 2010..
Actually, it’s YOU that haven’t learned. Positive feedback is readily determined from the physics of the problem. As you would been taught in sixth grade. But never absorbed.
Physics isn’t taught in sixth grade.
Clearly, it was in Wazza’s skool for ‘special’ kids.
I wasn’t introduced to feedback until engineering school (with the exception of feedback at rock concerts).
Water vapor “feedback” is presumed because higher air temperature supposedly increases evaporation. But as shown by NOAA data, tropospheric and stratospheric humidity has been decreasing in recent decades but for the surface where it is a bit higher, but not much. What physics explains that? None I can think of.
You have never studied energy systems or control theory.
The use of “feedback” in the climate conversations usus a common/social language context derived definition. It was chosen because it sounds sciencey but the word has hijacked and redefined to mislead.
Graphing, curve fitting and comparing data is a form of correlation.
(Correlation is not cause.)^10
The so-called experts didn’t discover that climate largely repeats after 3,560 years. How embarrassing for them; it’s been hiding in plain view for 25 years.
A 3560-Year Jovian Solar and Climate Cycle
DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.27244.01925
Water vapor originates the albedo which cools the earth.
You cannot remove the GHE and keep the 30% albedo.
Just flat wrong.
Which? Bond Albedo or Geometric Albedo?
FYI, the reflectivity of a surface is easily calculated from electromagnetic fields and waves.
mu (μ, permeability) and epsilon (ε, permittivity) are involved.
Who the flip was recording data at the beginning of this “3560-Year … Cycle”?
2026-3560 = 1534BC
In biblical terms, escaped Egyptian slaves were just marching around Jericho.
Reconstructed from ice cores. The Minoan Warm period was 1600–1200 BC.
Your graphic seems to show more that doesn’t match than does.
The paper explains the regions that appear inverted (green). It’s also explained in the video.
Actually, it’s the history of science from Bruno to Carnot to Wegner …..
Phlogiston, luminiferous ether, antiseptic surgery, Martian canals – and many others all consensus that turned up wrong.
Martian canals were never “consensus”. While somewhat sensationalized in the press from the reports of Percival Lowell and Giovanni Schiaparelli, canal like features were not seen by most serious Mars observers.
GHE has never had consensus.
In 1906 Arrhenius walked back his 1896 paper for overlooking water vapor. “Oops, my bad, Never mind.” And his contemporaries thought he was full of beans.
Since you have stepped up, explain how/why my 3 points are wrong.
Cooler not warmer.
GHE graphics are trash.
Surface cannot radiate “extra” energy as BB.
Many valid points.
Cooler not warmer: situationally dependent. I am not convinced that, as a generalization, it is valid and applicable (universally).
Surface cannot radiate “extra” energy as BB: Partially correct. It does need to include thermal energy releases and transport latencies (EM at c, thermal, on average, 1/2 speed of sound) as well as thermal conductance of energy into the planet.
In my engineering thermal management designs, BB does radiate EM with thermal energy input. Materials sciences has measured the effect. The designs must achieve equilibrium and since most operate in vacuum, only EM radiation cools. Satellites do not operate in an atmosphere with sufficient molecular density to remove excess thermal energy.
No GHE = no GHG = no water vapor = no clouds, ice, snow, oceans or 30% albedo & naked Earth gets baked by 250 F solar wind = hotter
Esoteric handwavium.
BB requires all energy to leave by radiation. Much of the energy leaving Earth surface does so by the kinetic processes so no BB.
Energy leaving the earth energy systems can only be by EM radiation. Space has no atmosphere and thermal energy needs an atmosphere. This is not addressing use of BB calculations on the surface.
There is no greenhouse effect. Therefore there is no such thing as a greenhouse gas unless one is specifically talking about an environmental control system called a greenhouse.
BB does not do as they say. BB is actually an equilibrium state (no atmosphere in the ideal model and no mass for the radiating surface) in which the surface temperature rises due to influx of energy until the radiated EM energy out matches energy in.
If there is no water on the planet, of course it would be different, much akin to the moon.
It may be we are debating semantics. Not clear, but your phraseology raises questions.
GHE graphics are trash. I would use a stronger term.
Surface cannot radiate “extra” energy as BB. The issue here is your definition of “extra.” If your intention is to invoke Kirchhoff’s Law, then I agree.
In those bogus GHE graphics, BB requires all energy to leave by EM radiation. There is thermal energy transfer from the surface to the atmosphere via latent heat and convection. That is true. That is a “feature” of a bogus energy imbalance graphic, but not the most egregious flaw. It is indeed that those bogus graphics use EM radiation as if it is independent of thermal energy flows, meaning “extra” energy.
And yes, H2O has a dominant effect on Earth’s energy systems.
I do not comprehend why you need to insult with the expression “Esoteric handwavium” especially given I agreed with most of your comment.
Obviously I should cease to discuss with you.
“In 1906 Arrhenius walked back his 1896 paper for overlooking water vapor.
This is what Svante Arrhenius said in 1906 (English translation from Världarnas utveckling) ……
Worlds in the making; the evolution of the universe
by Arrhenius, Svante, 1859-1927; Borns, H. tr
Publication date 1908Topics
“Fourier and Pouillet now thought that the atmosphere of our earth should be endowed with properties resembling those of glass, as regards permeabihty of heat. Tyndall later proved this assumption to be correct. The chief invisible constitutents of the air which participate in this effect are water vapor, which is always found in a certain quantity in the air, and carbonic acid, also ozone and hydrocarbons. These latter occur in such small quantities that no allowance has been made for them so far in the calculations. Of late, however, we have been suppliefl with very careful observations on the permeability to heat of carbonic acid and of water vapor. With the help of these data I have calculated that if the atmosphere were deprived of all its carbonic acid — of which it contains only 0.03 per cent, by volume — the temperature of the earth’s surface would fall by about 21°. This lowering of the temperature would diminish the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, and would cause a further almost equally strong fall of temperature. The examples, so far as they go, demonstrate that com paratively unimportant variations in the composition of the air have a very great influence. If the quantity of carbonic acid in the air should sink to one-half its present percentage, the temperature would fall by about 4°; a diminution to one-quarter would reduce the temperature by 8°. On the other hand, any doubUng of the percentage of carbon dioxide in the air would raise the temperature of the earth^s surface by 4°; and if the carbon dioxide were increased fourfold, the temperature would rise by 8°. Further, a diminution of the carbonic acid percentage would accentuate the temperature differences between the different portions of the earth, while an increase in this percentage would tend to equalize the temperature.”
So he amended his temperature projection of 1896 from 5-6C to 4C and did not “walk back” his theory, but he did amend his view, acknowledging that in the lower atmosphere, water vapour absorption was very strong. However, he argued that in the dry, cold upper atmosphere, CO2 changes still played a significant role and changed the calculation to take better account of water vapour, as well as changed his prediction on the speed of warming, thinking it would happen much slower and be beneficial to future generations.
Angstrom on atmospheric absorption shows Arrhenius was wrong in less than a year.
https://journals.ametsoc.org/configurable/content/journals$002fmwre$002f29$002f6$002f1520-0493_1901_29_268a_kaoaa_2_0_co_2.xml?t:ac=journals%24002fmwre%24002f29%24002f6%24002f1520-0493_1901_29_268a_kaoaa_2_0_co_2.xml
“Honey, come look! I’ve found some information all the world’s top scientists and doctors missed.”
And asking the question: WUWT April 2014
The climate sensitivity of CO2 is about 1.2C° per doubling in the atmosphere
The climate sensitivity of CH4 is about (___)C° per doubling in the atmosphere
Can anyone fill in the blank?
While it did get some decent response here at WUWT, the Global Warming Potential numbers for Methane and other lesser greenhouse gases, as the late Sir John Houghton came up with, are still repeated as if they really mean something. No, methane is not 82.5 times more powerful than CO2 at trapping heat. And nitrous oxide isn’t 273 times more powerful than CO2 either. Nor is Sulfur hexafluoride 23,000 times more powerful. A Google (News) search on “Methane times” continues to come up with the ridiculous GWP numbers.
And various government regulations are requiring that Bovaer be fed to livestock to reduce methane emissions. I’m not dreaming, this is really going on.
All the world’s top climate scientists and reporters are ignoring this. At least that’s what it looks like to me.
And what are the effects on humans who have eaten beef from cattle fed bovaer?
All the long term studies of the effects on humans fed meat from cattle fed bovaer tell us what? Ohh? There aren’t any long term studies you say???
Population growth and healthy children.
Can anyone fill in the blank?
0.00
By the time it doubles in about 275 years, several sources including Google’s AI, says it’s about 0.3K. By 2100 simple arithmetic says about 0.08K. Claiming less than a tenth of a degree by then should be a reasonable talking point in any debate.
“climate sensitivity” or “equilibrium climate sensitivity”
The same reference dates used in the claims about CO2’s Climate Sensitivity. My point over the years bringing methane up in the discussion has always been that we are never told how much warming in degrees or Kelvins how much global warming is projected to occur due to increasing methane in the air. And the poohbahs in the media and ranks of bureaucrats and other policy makers never ask.
“Experts” are human they can be wrong or bought off to promote government propaganda.
Or just performing for “the cause”.
Too many “experts” have assume roles as influencers, leaving science behind.
It’s the press.
Likewise, Bret Weinstein proposed in his early thesis (rejected by Nature), that laboratory mice provided by Jackson Labs were predisposed to specific cancers. By exposing these mice to certain chemical agents, the mice were in effect ‘treated’ with chemotherapy for undiagnosed cancers, and experienced a longer life span.
Bret goes on to surmise the recent paper finding mice exposed to 1.9GHz radiation lived longer than the control group for the same reason.
The highly inbred mice are the problem. Studies exposing mice to dangerous chemicals and dangerous radiation are curing the mice from the genetic diseases caused by the ill-advised breeding program.
Somehow the experts can’t see how these highly inbred mice are the problem.
The process of becoming an expert is too learn more and more about less and less until you eventually know everything about nothing at all.
The problem with today’s experts is that they are experts at arguing their point of view, not at critical thinking.
I have been a member of WUWT for years why can I never read the members only articles?