Slashdot Mirror

The previous issue (Feb 12) has some good summaries of global warming, particularly addressing a number of "tipping point" dangers - problems that will be much more difficult or impossible to fix once a threshold had been passed. See http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg185248 64.300 for a teaser. You'll have to get the magazine for the full article. However a brief summary runs as follows:

Ocean conveyor belt shuts down=much colder climate for Western Europe.

Greenland's ice cap melts=higher sea levels (7 meters) over a long period (1000-3000 years). However, the problem is that a tipping point could be reached with only a 2.7 degree C rise - this means the meltdown would begin but not necessarily reverse even if temperatures subsequently dropped.

Methane released from undersea sediments (methyl hydrates)->accelerated warming because this is a greenhouse gas. The estimate is that there is something like 5 trillion (10^12) tonnes of methane under the ocean in this form.

Oceans become more acid because of dissolved CO2. This could disrupt CO2 sequestration by interfering with sea organisms like corals and shellfish.

Rate of CO2 buildup may increase because, after a little warming, organic material will decay more rapidly. The short-term effect of more CO2 is faster plant growth, hence more absorption. However, this trend can reverse at some temperature as decay speeds up.

Not anymore: Burp vaccine cuts greenhouse gas emissions.

Even the Bush White House has said over six months ago that humans are responsible for global warming. Unfortunately, there are many people who will refuse to let your overwhelming evidence influence their dogma...

But we do know that there is a small amount of commerce of material between Mars and Earth without the use of space probes. Well, a billion tons has moved from Mars to Earth (see here). It's much harder for stuff to move the other way but it's not completely implausible. (It would require quite a kick of energy from somewhere, not just to get it out of the earth's gravity well, but also to push it out from the Sun. But it could get that by looping around other planets - eg. Venus. The journey might take many tens of thousands of years. But it's not impossible.)

According to http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7014 the scientists have not only detected methane, but also formaldehyde, which was measured at levels of 130 parts per billion. From the article:

He thinks that the gas is being produced by the oxidation of methane and estimates that 2.5 million tonnes of methane per year are needed to produce it. "I believe that until it is demonstrated that non-biological processes can produce this, possibly the only way to produce so much methane is life," he says. "My conclusion is there must be life in the soil of Mars."

Bruce

Article on the science behind climate change, what's certain and what's not, who's convinced and who's sceptical, .

Climate change: Menace or myth?

One prominent sceptic, meteorologist Richard Lindzen of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has made an interesting case that warming may dry out the upper levels of the innermost atmospheric layer, the troposphere, and less water means a weaker greenhouse effect. Lindzen, who is one of the few sceptics with a research track record that most climate scientists respect, says this drying effect could negate all the positive feedbacks and bring the warming effect of a doubling of CO2 levels back to 1 C. While there is little data to back up his idea, some studies suggest that these outer reaches are not as warm as IPCC models predict (see "Areas of contention). This could be a mere wrinkle in the models or something more important. But if catastrophists have an Achilles' heel, this could be it. Where does this leave us? Actually, with a surprising degree of consensus about the basic science of global warming - at least among scientists. As science historian Naomi Oreskes of the University of California, San Diego, wrote in Science late last year (vol 306, p 1686): "Politicians, economists, journalists and others may have the impression of confusion, disagreement or discord among climate scientists, but that impression is incorrect."

There is a scientific consensus, and it doesn't agree with you.

It's already being done for music files by simply using zip compression. See here. http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn3602

Why don't they just bz2 or zip compress it to determine the content type :).

There's an article in New Scientist which reports that Dutch military suppliers have finally solved the problem of using colour-mapping to convert the monochrome images of nightvision systems into colour. Previous attempts to use fake colour mappings had been a failure due to the creation of "psychadelic experiences". Some images of the new system

There's an article in New Scientist which reports that Dutch military suppliers have finally solved the problem of using colour-mapping to convert the monochrome images of nightvision systems into colour. Previous attempts to use fake colour mappings had been a failure due to the creation of "psychadelic experiences". Some images of the new system

too late - there's already new strains running around...

Multi-drug-resistant HIV strain raises alarm

The coincidence that an engineered HIV against cancer comes around just when another HIV mutation appears on the wild... Where is my tinfoil hat?

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6932 Another article which might be useful since their site is slashdotted now...

> The article has some interesting plots; look it up if you get a chance.

Here are two of the plots showing the unexpected reversals in trends for CO2 and CH4. (The one on the left expects methane to more or less track solar radiation, and certainly not to make a u-turn like it does.)

Unfortunately, I can't find an on-line version of the summary plot for temperature vs. expected temperature over the past 10K years, so you may still find it worth reading the magazine article.

Not everyone agrees with Ruddiman, of course. Here is a discussion thread at RealClimate, revealing a range of views about his proposals.

Yes, and here's a link to an article in the British magazine, New Scientist, which has one picture. Small article with a pic. (the sever may not be in britain though)

A model that assumes stock market traders have zero intelligence has been found to mimic the behaviour of the London Stock Exchange very closely.

I at least agree with the "don't boil them" statement.

But you're wrong about solar. The US's built-up area (roofs, roads and such) already covers as much ground as Ohio. My estimate is that about 500 quads (quadrillion BTU) of solar energy falls on this area each year. If you can convert even 7% of this to electricity (35 quads/year), you'll have more electricity than the United States uses each year, plus enough energy to replace everything that goes to the wheels of all our vehicles.

The problem has been primarily cost, secondarily storage. But if the Europeans can bring the one-micron-thick silicon cells to market at 1 Euro/watt, solar PV will be cheaper than fossil-fired fuel during daytime hours across a large swath of the USA. It will be much cheaper than energy generated from oil. In 2015, will you be driving home on energy that fell on your workplace's roof that day? Don't discount the possibility - the technology is all here, and a relatively small shift in cost will start the stampede.

You are right. Check out this article

In laboratory tests, the Cell chip reached a top "clock speed" of 4GHz, which means it can perform more than four billion calculations per second. By comparison, the fastest Intel Pentium chip is currently capable of 3.8GHz.

This difference in basic speed is not large but Richard Doherty, director of the computer industry analysts Envisioneering, in San Francisco, says Cell's modular architecture will give it a more substantial edge for many applications.

"At first blush I think it's safe to say that it will be 10 to 20 times faster than the fastest graphics cards and processors," Doherty told New Scientist. "We think it is going to revolutionise computer science for entertainment and business."

Quote: "There are shipping companies now planning on using new routes which are being opened up by melting sea ice."

There are people planning to play Duke Nukem Forever, too.

Any shipping company that would get an advantage by using such new routs would have to be bonkers not to make plans for such a contingency. Just as bonkers as they would have to be to bank the whole business on such routs being commercially viable in the near future.

Perhaps you should read the article

So yeah, it seems that Mars had an atmosphere in the past, and it slowly (i.e. over millions of years) leaked away. What they mention in some of the better articles on this story is that they studied flouride-based gases, some of which are 10,000 times as effective as CO2. A relatively small production of those over many years would probably be able to sustain the atmosphere.

As seems to be increasingly the case, I already submitted (rejected) variants of this story twice over the past week. I've pasted one of those variants below, which has links to sources far more information than the freakin' Guardian:

Greenhouse gases could breathe life into Mars

MSNBC, New Scientist and PhysOrg report on research by Margarita Marinova and others on using synthetic greenhouse gases to warm the Martian atmosphere and create the conditions for life to thrive. The study focused on fluorine-based gases (dubbed "super-greenhouse gases"), which would be non-toxic, nearly 10,000 times as effective at capturing heat as CO2, and could be made from Martian resources. The research concluded that adding 300 parts per million of these gases would lead to a feedback effect by unfreezing CO2 and water on the surface. According to Marinova, 'Since warming Mars effectively reverts it to its past, more habitable state, this would give any possibly dormant life on Mars the chance to be revived and develop further.' The feasibility and consequences of such terraforming have been debated in the past.

Also, note that contrary to the accepted submission's title, NASA hasn't done any sort of proposal of actually doing this. This is simply cool research exploring a very interesting "What-if".

Where the hell are we supposed to get that much of ANY gas?

From the article in the New Scientist: "The study found four fluorine-based gases that could be made of elements abundant on the Martian surface."

The New Scientist also has an article on the subject.

The wheel has already been patented here in Australia

The article can be read here

The article can be read here

This reminds me of a concern that surfaced in the immediate wake of 9/11: that the bad guys were shunning traditional net-based communication (e-mail, forum/newsgroup postings, etc.) and might be using codes or signals embedded in images in common places (eBay, for example).

I seem to recall a distributed screen-saver type app that was being used to crunch through millions of hosted images. Not much to find online about this, but there are articles like this one at NewScientist.com suggesting that the effort was a washout. here are some more stats from a study that came up dry, but there always this reference to "first stenographic image in the wild" as reported by ABC back when.

Dark Matter isn't the only theory about why astronomical data doesn't fit theory. Another theory is called MOND, MOdified Newtonion Dynamics, and it postulates Newtons gravety theory might break down at astronomical distances (instead of inverse square it might be something else) A modified version of Newtons gravety creation have been created to fit the astronomical data, but there is no explanation about why the force of gravity should change over vast distances. There was an article in New Scientist magazine a few weeks back about how the guys behind the MOND theory think that there may be two types of gravity, and it might explain the discrepency in the location of the Pioneer probes.

Doesn't compare to the star-nosed mole, who strikes me as two notes cooler by the fact it overclocks its own brain:

"The pace of the star-nosed mole's feeding is so fast that it is approaching the maximum speed at which its nervous system can process information."

More revelations worthy of a New Yorker article just make me yawn. And, more evidence of my, um, correct opinion is corroborated here, in Black Table's "believe the hype?" review.

Forward suggests that research needs to be carried out into materials that release gases when heated so they can be used to drive the sail. If he read the issue of New Scientist that contains this story he'd find another story that deals with precisely this issue. It turns out that The Terrorists have been doing this research for him.

Yeah, numbers would be nice to know, for example, how big the sail would need to be. I sure hope this picture isn't supposed to be to scale.

One person who is a quadriplegic recently (this past year) had a chip implanted. He can now control things by thinking about it.

Here are some other articles from a google and some things I have marked...

• Electric dreams
• Brain chip offers hope for paralyzed
• A company with a potential product
• Clubbers choose chip implants to jump queues
• A collectino of references to articles on Neural interfaces
• A display in thin air.
• Some people who do not see some things as good.

I know google is banned, but according to a New Scienctist article, elgoog, the "backwards" google mirror, is not. I'm pretty sure you can access the caches through that, but the site is slow. And I don't think it can handle all of China trying to access it, though it's supposed to be quite popular.
Death to censorship.

Have you bought any new Beastie Boys CDs lately...?

What climate prediction model?

"The scientists behind the project, called climateprediction.net, say it shows there's no such thing as a safe level of carbon dioxide."

This project was a massive attempt to determine what kind of an effect an increase in atmospheric CO2 would have. Were they only projecting increased heat absorption and retention due to CO2? The article doesn't say, but it seems likely. And that is no climate prediction model!

As Spy_Handler mentions, there have been hotter periods in historical time, when CO2 and other greenhouse gasses were not factors (as far as I have been able to find out). The sun is more than likely the culprit in those past times, and is more than likely the culprit in our times as well.

As reported by New Scientist (in Nov 2003, so it's not news):

"The Sun is more active now than it has been for a millennium. The realisation, which comes from a reconstruction of sunspots stretching back 1150 years..."

Read the complete article here

So, if we truly are contending with a global warming trend, it seems likely that it isn't because of increasing CO2, but because of a larger heat input. So what are we going to do, launch ice cubes at the sun? That's ridiculous, of course, so we're better off enforcing Kyoto. It won't make a bit of difference, but it will definitely make us feel more virtuous.

Ooooo....this reminds me of a Dateline show that I saw, where the father was trying to teach his daughter about patents. Anyways, in the end, the daughter patented the playground "swings."

No, it was swinging sideways on a swing. (Covered on Slashdot, even. Sheesh, you must be new.)

Also seen here, here, and here.

There was an interesting article published recently in the New Scientist magazine in the UK (http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18524 814.900 - unfortunately only a preview). which talks about a lot of work going on about hyperglots (people who are able to speak 6 languages or more) and about the facility for language being stronger in some people than in others. The facility didn't appear to be age dependent either. I still think there's something in what you say, though.

I think that reducing things simply to one variable like the age question can be counter-productive sometimes, especially in human and social science. It's difficult to resist the temptation sometimes, but I happen to think that people are so fantastically unpredictable that the predictive power of many theories is severely limited in the real world.

Prodigies like Mozart or Yehudi Menuhin are examples of those who take a mallet to most age-centred learning theories, albeit in a highly specialised way.

I supposes it's a bit like quantum mechanics or statistical mechanics (like Boltzman's work); you can't predict the behaviour of an individual child or person, but you might hope to estimate behaviour over a larger, macroscopic sample. I'm not sure what this average behaviour would really be useful for in a human system, but there you go.

The inventors said that one was one of the toughest problems they tackled. They've arranged the coils so that most of the power is within a centimeter, or so, of the surface. Beyond that, the field rapidly drops off to background levels. More here.

Check this out...

Speed of Light broken with basic lab kit

I have more, if you're interested...

Here are links to free copies of the bite mark, maggot and fingerprint articles referenced by the grandparent post.

Here are links to free copies of the bite mark, maggot and fingerprint articles referenced by the grandparent post.

Here are links to free copies of the bite mark, maggot and fingerprint articles referenced by the grandparent post.

A few people have suggested launching something very similar to HST, with the new instrumentation that was supposed to go up in servicing mission 4. One such proposal is the "Hubble Origins Probe"; they had a poster at the last American Astronomical Society meeting, the abstract of which you can read here.

That abstract begins, "A no-new-technology HST-class observatory with COS and WFC3 as its core instruments ..." (COS and WF3 are the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph and new Wide-Field Camera, respectively.)

There's also a brief article about this at New Scientist.

I'm not crazy about this idea, for a bunch of reasons, but it is under active investigation.

New Scientist coverage 22nd Jan
17 th Jan New Scientsit better article

I am convinced if thier search went back to 2000/2001 they had this story back then (about scents that attract mosquitos)

mosquitos are actively being eradicated by technology, developments to ecnourage bats to 'cave' closer to mosquito hotspots, 100watt sound speakers that bust open the guts of larvea under water and my personal favourite, a well aimed pillow in the middle of the night.

bastards.

New Scientist coverage 22nd Jan
17 th Jan New Scientsit better article

I am convinced if thier search went back to 2000/2001 they had this story back then (about scents that attract mosquitos)

mosquitos are actively being eradicated by technology, developments to ecnourage bats to 'cave' closer to mosquito hotspots, 100watt sound speakers that bust open the guts of larvea under water and my personal favourite, a well aimed pillow in the middle of the night.

bastards.

David Southwood (the ESA head of science) was the one who said so - he said "That's scientists trying to screw the system. We don't have redundant systems to get more data down, we have redundant systems for redundancy." http://www.newscientist.com/channel/space/mg185248 33.700

The point is that very little consistency checking goes on. For example forensic evidence is used to convict someone. Then the fact that they were convicted is used as evidence to support the accuracy of the forensic evidence without external validation. This is a very common theme. And it's interesting to listen to forensic experts speaking. Some are incredibly sure of themselves and seem to be unaware of the existence of statistical variation. That maggot story is a prime example. Maggots aren't an entirely stupid way to date the death of a corpse. But it's all about chance - like how many flies just happen to be in a particular area at any one time. But courts sem to be particularly poor at dealing with probabilistic information. (And there are numerous publications on that subject.)

The point is that very little consistency checking goes on. For example forensic evidence is used to convict someone. Then the fact that they were convicted is used as evidence to support the accuracy of the forensic evidence without external validation. This is a very common theme. And it's interesting to listen to forensic experts speaking. Some are incredibly sure of themselves and seem to be unaware of the existence of statistical variation. That maggot story is a prime example. Maggots aren't an entirely stupid way to date the death of a corpse. But it's all about chance - like how many flies just happen to be in a particular area at any one time. But courts sem to be particularly poor at dealing with probabilistic information. (And there are numerous publications on that subject.)