Highly Educated, Very Intelligent, and Under Smart

By Rich Kozlovich 

Over the years I've discovered I.Q. is highly overrated. Einstein was alleged to have a 160 IQ but he never took an IQ test, so that's pure speculation, and I think highly under speculated. 

My now passed friend Dr. Jay Lehr was at Princeton while Einstein was there and he said Einstein agreed to give a series of lectures, it was either five or seven lectures, I think it was seven, and during the first couple of lectures you couldn't beg, steal, or borrow a seat in that lecture hall it was so packed.

Jay said at the end of that series there were a lot of empty seats.  I was surprised and asked why.  He said Einstein was lecturing to some of the smartest people in the world, and they didn't have a clue what he was talking about.  Can you imagine what that did to their egos?  And they didn't dare say Einstein didn't know what he was talking about since it was a world wide view he was the smartest man in the world.  

When it came to physics, he was brilliant, but the trouble with these brilliant minds is they seem to think they can opine all all subjects with equal brilliance.  They can't.  Einstein thought socialism a was a good thing. It's not, it's a failure and it's evil, and the green movement is part of that.  Einstein is alleged to have said if all the honey bees died we'd only have four years go live.  Well, he was a great physicist, but he was a lousy entomologist.   One of the things I've discovered about these brilliant minds is like everyone else, they're limited to what they know, and what they can do.

Years ago I remember everyone talking about Stephen Hawking being the smartest man in the world, also with an IQ of 160, which isn't all that high in his field, an IQ he shared with Jane Mansfield.  She had a 165 IQ.   At any rate since everyone was so enthused about his brilliance, I thought I ought to see what he thinks about things.   While he was considered a brilliant physicist, and I won't argue that point, because I was just like those scientists at Princeton, I didn't have a clue what he was talking about.  At least until he deviated from all that theoretical physics into social issues.  

Social issues are all about history, logic, and provable facts, and guess what, as he deviated outside his realm of expertise I realized he was dumb as dirt, merely mouthing the consensus memes from academia, because culture is king.   It seems to me Hawking was like a lot of over educated, highly intelligent, but under smart people who need to stay in their little world rather than pushing themselves into the public spot light making "pronouncements" about things they really don't understand.   

His realm is mathematical speculation, much of it unprovable.  My realm is history, logic, facts, and reality.  From my point of view - outside his area of expertise - I didn't think he was all that bright.  On May 4, 2017, Alex Berezow  stated:

There's no doubt that Stephen Hawking is one of the most brilliant scientists to have ever lived.  There's also no doubt that he enjoys giving his opinion on topics of which he knows absolutely nothing.......  He voiced opinions on climate change, asteroid strikes, epidemics, and overpopulation, and he was wrong on each count. 

Jay Lehr was a great defender of actual science and a magnificent foe to junk science.  He told me the White House called him to say the President decided to take his advice to abandon the Paris Climate treaty.   Here was the slide show he showed the President.

Stephen Hawking totally abandoned science on this issue.  When asked what he thought of the President's decision to abandoning the Paris Climate Accord he pontificated:

“We are close to the tipping point where global warming becomes irreversible.” .....“Trump’s action could push the earth over the brink to become like Venus, with a temperature of over 250 degrees and raining sulfuric acid,” ..... “Climate change is one of the great dangers we face,”.......“and it’s one we can prevent, if we act now.”......“By denying the evidence for climate change, and pulling out of the Paris Climate Agreement, Donald Trump will cause avoidable environmental damage to our beautiful planet, endangering the natural world for us and our children,......”

What nonsense!  The Earth's climate has always been in a state of change.  Climate change is all natural, it's cyclical, and mankind has nothing to do with it.  There's no irreversible tipping point. Each and every prediction, mostly based on computer models designed to give the answers the warmists want, and outright lies to scare humanity for political purposes, have come and gone, or are failing.  As for the Earth becoming like Venus, John J. Ray of Greenie Watch noted:

He wants more government control so is prepared to speak nonsense to facilitate it. He knows as well as I do that the high Venusian surface temperature is an adiabatic effect -- a function of the great weight (hence pressure) exerted by the huge Venusian atmosphere. The earth has no such atmosphere so anything similar on earth cannot occur......

Did  you know that?  I didn't know that, but Hawking had to know that, so, not only is he wrong, it's clear he must have deliberately lied, and now I find he might not have been the brightest pebble in the brook when it comes to physics either.  It's being claimed mathematicians have proven Hawking was wrong about the most extreme black holes.   

I would happily explain it to you, but I don't have a clue what they're talking about either, and apparently neither did Stephen Hawking.  Highly educated, very intelligent, and under smart!

•  Have I Ever Told You About Preconceptual Science?

The motto of science is supposed to be "de omnibus dubitandum", everything is to be questioned!  Unless it impacts grant money.  Truth is no longer the golden calf of science, it's grant money.  All these Lysenkoian scientists who have jumped onto the grant money band wagon promoting the fraud of anthropogenic climate change have made scientific integrity an oxymoron.  Hawking was no better, as anthropogenic climate change is a massive fraud, and there was so much evidence of that right from the very beginning, he had to know that.  But culture is king, and academia is a viper's pit of scientific corruption.

• 18 spectacularly wrong apocalyptic predictions made around the time of the first Earth Day in 1970, expect more this year

The Human Side of Pennsylvania’s Capitulation to Woke Environmentalism

by Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris | Jun 8, 2022 | Climate, Energy, Lifestyle, Politics @ America Out Loud

(Editor's Note:  My Friend Jay Lehr has passed.  This is a blast from the past, and a demonstration of Jay work with his long time partner in this battle against the junk science over global warming and energy production, Tom Harris. His like won't pass this way again soon.  RK)

There is a disconnect between the elites in government, business, labor, and academia and common citizens in America. Many of the elite “have never worked an honest day in their lives,” as old-school folks might say. They do not understand what it takes to earn a living, run a business, or feed a family by the sweat of their brow. And some of those with beginnings in the “real world” — say, union officials — find themselves corrupted by money and power when they achieve positions of leadership.

President Joe Biden went to law school and became a politician. Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania inherited a successful business and lived off its wealth. We have young people major in political science, then become legislative staffers until there is an opportunity to run for office. They have no idea what goes on in the world of profit and loss, hiring and firing. They have no appreciation of what it takes to produce food and energy or make steel, cars, or widgets of any kind.

In the climate arena, we have people falling for climate scares and willing to risk impoverishing an entire civilization to finance windmills and solar panels that cannot possibly sustain a modern society. And it’s not just government. It’s big business, big labor, and practically all of academia. This state of affairs has had a terrible negative impact, particularly on the state of Pennsylvania.

Visible from western Pennsylvania’s Allegheny Mountain ridges are coal-fired power plants — and their plumes of water vapor — that have been integral to much of the regional economy for 50 years. Three plants east of Pittsburgh directly employ 550 people and support an estimated 8,100 jobs, according to Power PA Jobs Alliance, a coalition of labor and industry groups. Now, two of these power plants — the generating stations of Conemaugh on the Indiana-Westmoreland county border and Keystone in eastern Armstrong County—are slated to close by 2028.

The owners blame costs from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) wastewater rule. The regulation is expected to lead to at least 26 plants in 14 states to stop using coal, according to news reports. Another factor in Pennsylvania is Gov. Tom Wolf’s unilateral decision to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI).

“These plants have sunk billions of dollars into environmental projects,” said Ken Umholtz, a Conemaugh employee commenting on the EPA’s concern about water quality. “We no sooner finish one thing, and it’s something else.”

Though the Conemaugh plant recycles most of its water, Umholtz said, “Environmentalists. . . plan to regulate us out of business, but they are not going to have electricity because there is nothing to replace us. 

After eight regional refineries closed and others downsized, workers at a Philadelphia refinery hope the government won’t kill their jobs too. The modernization of the Trainer Refinery south of Philadelphia is initially obscured by aged brick buildings and hulking equipment. With closer examination, however, emerge brightly painted pipes, scores of gleaming white tanks, and towering construction cranes that hint of ongoing upgrades.

With a growing post-pandemic economy and strong energy prices, prospects are bright save for threats of a controversial carbon tax scheme by the governor and federal regulations. Federal rules have contributed to the closure of seven independent refineries on the East Coast since 2009, leaving only Trainer and three others remaining. And one of those — owned by PBF Energy in New Jersey — closed half its refining units and laid off 250 employees last summer. 

PA-based Monroe Energy, which owns the Trainer Refinery, annually spends tens of millions of dollars on improvements to keep abreast of government regulations and customer needs. A few years ago, it invested nearly $200 million installing equipment to make low-sulfur gasoline. Currently, the company is building high-efficiency electrical substations, as well as water-cooling units that enable millions of gallons of water to be reused, dramatically reducing dependence on Delaware River water.

Monroe employs approximately 500 people and hires at any one time up to 1,400 members of the Philadelphia Building Trades for maintenance projects that can last for months. Because of their work, Trainer produces daily more than 8 million gallons of fuel, mainly for transportation and heating.  

Despite this, the overall decline of regional production capacity has left the East Coast vulnerable to supply interruptions and more dependent than ever on imported fuels.

Wolf’s proposal to institute a tax on electricity generators that use fossil fuels through the RGGI is intended to encourage the replacement of fuels like coal and natural gas with more expensive wind and solar energy.

In comments to regulators, Monroe noted its extensive use of electricity and cited data showing that the cost of power was 38 percent less in non-RGGI states. Despite spending hundreds of millions of dollars on environmentally beneficial investments, with plans for more, Monroe fears “that enacting a program like RGGI will increase costs to such an extent that we may be unable to move forward with some of these projects.” 

Both RGGI and the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) requiring ethanol in all gasoline have drawn widespread criticism from labor and industry groups and from politicians of both major parties. While Pennsylvania and New Jersey governors are supportive of RGGI, both have written the EPA with concerns about the issue of RFS credits.

Yet more than 50 organizations representing millions of people have written in support of RFS reform. Even the National Wildlife Federation opposes the RFS because increased ethanol use has led to croplands infringing on natural habitats. Trade organizations of the dairy industry and bakeries have objected to RFS’s pressures on corn prices and supplies.

The negative consequences of both RFS and RGGI — including job losses and diminished fuel security — seem obvious to nearly everybody. Yet the employees at Trainer are still waiting for relief from Washington while also hoping to avoid the economic wreckage proposed by the governor and the absurdity of bureaucrats trying to improve the climate.

“We hope people will side with us and allow us to keep doing our jobs,” says Trainer employee Ron Pierce. A retired Marine sergeant, Pierce started as a unit operator and now leads the facility’s emergency-response teams and acts as refinery fire chief. Yet all that is in jeopardy now due to woke environmentalists and their cowardly and uninformed political supporters. It must be stopped!

Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris

Dr. Jay Lehr is a Senior Policy Analyst with the International Climate Science Coalition and former Science Director of The Heartland Institute. He is an internationally renowned scientist, author, and speaker who has testified before Congress on dozens of occasions on environmental issues and consulted with nearly every agency of the national government and many foreign countries. After graduating from Princeton University at the age of 20 with a degree in Geological Engineering, he received the nation’s first Ph.D. in Groundwater Hydrology from the University of Arizona. He later became executive director of the National Association of Groundwater Scientists and Engineers.

Tom Harris is Executive Director of the Ottawa, Canada-based International Climate Science Coalition, and a policy advisor to The Heartland Institute. He has 40 years experience as a mechanical engineer/project manager, science and technology communications professional, technical trainer, and S&T advisor to a former Opposition Senior Environment Critic in Canada’s Parliament.

Here's to My Friend Jay Lehr

By Rich Kozlovich

In my younger years I loved reading Reader's Digest, and one of the features they had there was called, My Most Unforgettable Character.  In the course of your life you will come across such people, and my friend Jay Lehr was one of my "most unforgettable characters".  My friend Jay Lehr has passed, and since Jay lived just outside of Columbus, Ohio I went to his "celebration of life", and it was packed.  While I always knew Jay was amazingly optimistic, and he was always encouraging to others, until the speakers told their experience with Jay, I never realized just how true that was.

 

Jay and I were so much alike in philosophy I had often said we were twins born ten years apart, but I realize now that when comparing my life with Jay's, it's like comparing a pair of Nike tennis shoes with an old worn out pair of loafers in a closet.   

I met one of Jay's academic friends there who said Jay told him he wanted to "live" as long as he was alive, and he did.  Jay was 85 when he decided to finally stop jumping out of airplanes for fun.

Jay wrote for America out Loud, did podcasts for them and appeared on Malcolm's radio show, and Malcolm felt Jay was an important part of their success, so he said so in this interview. Here is the interview (all of which is great to hear): 

Here's Tom Harris' article about him, where he notes:

At Jay’s “celebration of life” on January 16, the meeting venue in Delaware, Ohio, was packed with people. Everyone who spoke described his energy, enthusiasm, generosity, and goodness. Jay would have loved it…the happiness, friendship, celebrating, jokes, and all the stories. While I and many, many people will certainly miss Dr. Jay Lehr, he would not want us to be mournful. Jay lived an incredible life, and we are all blessed to have known a real-world Superman.

Read the whole piece, it's worth reading about the life of one of "my most unforgettable characters".  I will miss him.

My Friend Jay Lehr Has Passed

 By Rich Kozlovich

For some years I had the privilege to knowing and working with Jay Lehr, one of the founders of EPA who said they haven't done anything worthwhile since 1980 and need to be dismantled.  He's now passed, and I am truly saddened, he was a warm, humorous, gracious and generous man, and I always thought a humble man who had a major impact in the fight for truth, and wanting to continue to do so as long as he lived.  And he did.  His passion for life was really quite remarkable! Below is the obituary.

 

Jay H. Lehr September 11, 1936  -  January 10, 2023

Jay Lehr, 86, of Ostrander, Ohio passed away Tuesday, January 10, 2023 at Grady Memorial Hospital. Born September 11, 1936 in Bayonne, New Jersey, he was the son of the late Martin Moses and Rebecca (Dreznick) Lehr. On July 7, 1991, he married Janet Kingery at the Wyman Woods Park and they shared 31 wonderful years together.

Jay was a professor of Hydrogeology at The Ohio State University in the 1960’s and adjunct for many more years. He spent 25 years as the Executive Director of the National Ground Water Association. He then spent 25 years as Senior Scientist for The Heartland Institute. Most recently, Jay was Senior Scientist for the International Climate Science Coalition. Jay was passionate about educating others on the science behind the fallacy of man-made climate change.

Jay was known as the “Father of Western Lacrosse”. He was assistant lacrosse coach at The Ohio State University in the ‘60s. He loved playing club lacrosse, hockey and men’s hardball. He founded the Columbus Metros semi-pro football team. He was an avid skydiver, 10-time Ironman finisher, and multiple marathon finisher. Jay loved watching all sports on tv, splitting firewood and taking care of his chickens and dogs.

Jay was a proud Princeton alum (class of ’57). He was known throughout the Princeton community for his participation in the Princeton Parade, where he walked the parade route on his hands for 20 years, then completed the route annually on his unicycle for another 20 years. He was also known for his love of skydiving, having completed 1481 successful jumps, always with exact precision of hitting his target,“Earth”.

Jay was the most optimistic and energetic person you will ever meet. He always inspired others to reach their highest potential. He adored his wife, Janet and cherished doing everything together, from traveling to biking to watching Hallmark movies. Everyday was Christmas Eve to Jay. In addition to his wife, Janet, he is survived by his daughters, Leslie (John Truby) Lehr and Tracy (Mike) de Martino; stepchildren, Tonia (Richard) Birt and Tom (Colleen) Kingery; grandchildren, Juliette, Caty Joy, Marie Claire, Josilynn, Spencer, Emily, Abigail, and Landon.

In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by his sisters, Edith Amsterdam and Rachel Lehr.

Dear friends, please join us to celebrate the life of our beloved Dr. Jay H. Lehr on Monday, January 16, 2023 at Gather, 53 N. Sandusky Street Delaware Ohio from 4-7.  If you would like to share a memory, please contact Janet at JanetandJay1991@yahoo.com (subject line: remarks) so that we can plan accordingly.  We hope to start sharing these memories with everyone around 5:30. Memorial contributions may be made in Jay’s name at Landonacure.org.

For parking information visit https://www.mainstreetdelaware.com/parking-map/