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Scientists were saying the same thing just under a year ago...

It makes for good press, though.

[...] a very poorly designed reactor, a shutdown of the insufficient safety systems, and a government that didn't care about its people. None of those conditions exists in US nuclear power plants.

[...] a very poorly designed reactor, a shutdown of the insufficient safety systems, and a government that didn't care about its people. None of those conditions exists in US nuclear power plants.

Well, there are tremendous efforts going on to persuade S. American governments to halt deforestation, as I'm sure you are well aware. The fact is that the 'easy', high return causes of greenhouse emissions are always going to be targeted first.

The U.S is the no.1 global emitter of CO2, producing about 25% (I think - check) of total output, and one of the biggest per -capita outputs (small arab states dependent on desalination for water are bigger per-capita contributers).

Some figure are here.

It is really no wonder that the U.S figures get a lot of attention. As to how much leeway you give developing states, well that's why Kyoto got so much flak - it's end game states that in the long term everyone should be entitled to produce the same amount of carbon - hence China and India get to expand output slightly, while the U.S and Western Europe and Australia get to make swingeing cuts.

In the United States, hydropower has grown steadily, from 56,000 MW in 1970 to over 90,000 MW today. As a portion of the electricity supply, it has fallen to 10 percent, down from 14 percent 20 years ago -- but it still accounts for a greater share than petroleum. In fact, US hydropower plants produce the energy equivalent of 500 million barrels of oil per year.
Source: The Union of Concerned Scientists.

In order for hydro to maintain its current customers, and take on the automobile industry, it will have to triple its power output. Two more Hoover Dams for the left coast. Is there that much water out there?

• global warming
• rigged missile defense tests
• chronically underfunded FDA feedback mechanisms

Well, this has been the US's wet dream for a long time. If we're able to shoot down other people's nukes we get to own the world and all that. Also, this isn't nearly the first time we've failed miserably at it.

We're shouldn't be talking about how much money has been poured into this thing this year, we should be talking about how much has been poured into it since at least the 80s, and probably before that.

On an aside, here at MIT a Professor Postol gave a very convincing lecture a year or two ago on the fraud surrounding the first National Missile Defence test, and the subsequent cover-up of the allegations by MIT's Lincoln Labs and others. Needless to say, he's received a lot of "pressure" from all over the place. More info here.

You seem perfectly capable of looking up your own reference materials.

Here's the clues you need:

biodiesel.org Though they are just a front for the SoyBean farmers association but plenty of resources for you to check out.

Central Intelligence Agency These guys have all sorts of info about agricultural output in USA and other nations.

Wired Magazine Do a search on biodiesel to verify the quotation.

Search Google News for Biodiesel Now click on the little News Alerts icon and subscribe to that search... you'll get all the news on biodiesel that's fit to publish as a current event and learn about how many organizations in US and around world are in fact mongin forward with serious biodiesel plans. Tell you what, there are a whole hell of a lot more actual implementations happening that for any other alternative fuel... happening now.

FYI reality is "socially constructed". Public opinion will wish oilseed crops into existence.. much like it wished electricity infrastructure into existence, wished a global communications system into existence... it's called Supply and Demand.. yeah I know it's just a theory and all but the basic idea is that when enough people want something to happen a Demand is created, which in turn prompts a Supply to come into existence through the efforts of entrepeneurs and business interests who seek to satisfy that Demand.

Technically it is already done. Refining apparatus that is reasonably efficient, and only needs economies of scale to become sufficiently efficient, is in use. New improvements are being researched and tested as we speak..

Energetically biodiesel contains as much or more available energy for combustion than petrol diesel. The plants used for oilseed require minimal energy input from people.. plant and grow.. that's why they love plants like soybeans even though they produce less oil than some alternatives like Castor plants which require more human intervention. On the other hand.. if the price is right the best plant for the job will be planted.

Ecologically... ;-p so you'd prefer the alternative? Which one? You can't take energy out of a system without impacting it. Use solar power and you're cooling off the atmosphere and pulling solar radiation out of the ecology. Use hydro and you're pulling the energy out of the water cycle... screwing with weather patterns by creating new evaporation points, etc. Use tidal power and you mess with ocean currents and tidal changes that maintain coastal ecologies... Hydrogen power has to come from somewhere, it's just a storage medium.. not a source of power.. so think coal, nuclear, etc. Biodiesel looks to have the least impact... carbon is grown, carbon is burned, carbon returns to the ecosystem, carbon is resequesterd through absorption of CO2 by plants... the same plants that are grown for the next generation of fuel.

Heres a great link for info about that from the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Socially it's a slam dunk. Reduced dependence on cartel producers. Environmentally benign compared to current fuels. Renewable resource that provides jobs. It can use the already available infrastructure with zero change and is usable in available vehicles with zero change. Take a look at the initiatives already happening across the nation and the positive reaction coming from every single one.. then look at what's happening in India, Maylasia, and on and on.

Mike-"Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?"

As far a climate science goes Mike has not got a clue, ref: title of post.

Mike-"And make financial investments based on that prediction?"

Investment based on prediction would mean reversing the tried and true US policy of making predictions based on investments. Both sides of the Clinton/Bush thread show that "not one US job" will be sacraficed. (Nothing but a pile of straw there)
The USC are known as a die hard sceptics organisation, here is thier take on climate FUD .

Mike-"Has everybody lost their minds?"

Frederick Seitz certainly has.

You need to read more about the political fud that is driving doubt and just one of the "scientists" paid to spread it.

I live in Melbourne Australia and it is happening to the whole fucking continent not just Sydney. No matter what is "causing" Australia to dry up while the poles are melting, we can not afford to let the climate debate get deliberately derailed by people like Fred and his finacial backers. The best minds on the planet give us a "heads up" and the self styled "leader of the free world" sticks it's head in the sand, it is pathetic.

It did not take long. These people are spending up big on climate FUD. One notable among the names associated with the FUD is Frederick Seitz who was responsible for $45M in tabacoo research. Another A/C...wonders if A/C's are paid to be stupid?

I had never heard of OSIM and I have been interested in climate science for a long time. I have heard of "The Union of Concerned Scientists" many times and they seem like an independent group of sceptics on just about anything. They claim that OISM is a front and a fraud (my summary), they also have a roundup of some other "prominent sceptic organisations". I spent 2 minutes to google OISM climate funding and select one link from the 251 (mostly negative) articles. I went a bit further ( google "Arthur B. Robinson" fund ) another couple of minutes I find that "Frederick Seitz" (see below) was heavily involved in the tabacoo industries fraudulent junk-science(surprise,surprise).

You YELL A SUBJECT LINE but offer nothing more than a bunch of signatures obtained by deception. Then accuse the aurthors of fixing the results to obtain a fudiciary benifit. You really have to ask yourself why you have swolled the political crap to the point where you are yelling, posting fradulent petitions and sigining of your post with a character assination. Or maybe you are a paid A/C activist, since it is hard to imagine someone who can so easily be duped.

Relevant section on OISM from this link follows...

The Marshall Institute co-sponsored with the OISM a deceptive campaign -- known as the Petition Project -- to undermine and discredit the scientific authority of the IPCC and to oppose the Kyoto Protocol. Early in the spring of 1998, thousands of scientists around the country received a mass mailing urging them to sign a petition calling on the government to reject the Kyoto Protocol. The petition was accompanied by other pieces including an article formatted to mimic the journal of the National Academy of Sciences. Subsequent research revealed that the article had not been peer-reviewed, nor published, nor even accepted for publication in that journal and the Academy released a strong statement disclaiming any connection to this effort and reaffirming the reality of climate change. The Petition resurfaced in 2001.

Spin: There is no scientific basis for claims about global warming. IPCC is a hoax. Kyoto is flawed.

Funding: Petition was funded by private sources.

Affiliated Individuals:Arthur B. Robinson, Sallie L. Baliunas, Frederick Seitz

Yeah, if by "persecuted" you mean repeatedly debunked and asked not to spread his pseudoscience. Poor little baby. He is not a scientists, he is a statistician, and a pretty poor one at that.

Here is what some real scientists are saying about Lomborg.

No. It allows the efficient to continue producing efficiently while pushing the inefficient to produce more value for the amount of pollution they create.

Let me put this in perspective. The U.S. has an $11 trillion economy and produces 1,446,777 kilotons of CO2. China has a $6.449 trillion economy and produces 917,997 kilotons of CO2. So the U.S. produces 1.58 times as much CO2 but our economy is 1.71 times larger. From a pollution perspective we're doing more economic activity with relatively less pollution.

So who needs to adjust their habits? The U.S.? Buzzzz. Wrong answer. Currently China and the U.S. together produce 2,364,774 kilotons of CO2 per year with total economic activity of $17.449 trillion. Let's say you arbitrarily say that we need to reduce our emissions by 10% from 1,446,777 to 1,302,099. Let's just say that means our economy will drop 10% to $9.9 trillion. Let's say that that lost $1.1 trillion goes to China so their economy increases by 17% to $7.549 trillion and that that means a 17% increase in their economy means a 17% increase in their emissions to 1,074,056 kilotons per year.

The result? The total economic activity of China and the U.S. hasn't changed but now CO2 output has increased from 2,364,774 kilotons to 2,376,155 kilotons and jobs have been lost in the United States as economic activity moved to China. And that's not even realistic--in reality there would also be a loss of economic activity because the movement to China wouldn't be 100% efficient. So you will have lower worldwide economic activity and higher pollution.

No, punishing the United States isn't the answer. There are two possible solutions that will help the environment: 1) Move more production to the United States where we are better at producing goods at a lower rate of CO2 production. This would generate more employment in the U.S. and lower employment in China but it would lower total CO2 production. 2) Improve the efficiency of China's economy so it can produce more goods with the same or lower CO2 production. If China were as efficienct as the U.S. they would be able to generate the same amount of economic activity and produce less CO2.

I personally think the solution is making inefficient countries more efficient so they pollute less. But any way you analyze it it makes no sense to have a treaty like Kyoto that actually discourages activity in the countries that produce the least pollution for a unit of economic activity and encourage it in those countries that pollute more per unit of economic activity.

No. It allows the efficient to continue producing efficiently while pushing the inefficient to produce more value for the amount of pollution they create.

Let me put this in perspective. The U.S. has an $11 trillion economy and produces 1,446,777 kilotons of CO2. China has a $6.449 trillion economy and produces 917,997 kilotons of CO2. So the U.S. produces 1.58 times as much CO2 but our economy is 1.71 times larger. From a pollution perspective we're doing more economic activity with relatively less pollution.

So who needs to adjust their habits? The U.S.? Buzzzz. Wrong answer. Currently China and the U.S. together produce 2,364,774 kilotons of CO2 per year with total economic activity of $17.449 trillion. Let's say you arbitrarily say that we need to reduce our emissions by 10% from 1,446,777 to 1,302,099. Let's just say that means our economy will drop 10% to $9.9 trillion. Let's say that that lost $1.1 trillion goes to China so their economy increases by 17% to $7.549 trillion and that that means a 17% increase in their economy means a 17% increase in their emissions to 1,074,056 kilotons per year.

The result? The total economic activity of China and the U.S. hasn't changed but now CO2 output has increased from 2,364,774 kilotons to 2,376,155 kilotons and jobs have been lost in the United States as economic activity moved to China. And that's not even realistic--in reality there would also be a loss of economic activity because the movement to China wouldn't be 100% efficient. So you will have lower worldwide economic activity and higher pollution.

No, punishing the United States isn't the answer. There are two possible solutions that will help the environment: 1) Move more production to the United States where we are better at producing goods at a lower rate of CO2 production. This would generate more employment in the U.S. and lower employment in China but it would lower total CO2 production. 2) Improve the efficiency of China's economy so it can produce more goods with the same or lower CO2 production. If China were as efficienct as the U.S. they would be able to generate the same amount of economic activity and produce less CO2.

I personally think the solution is making inefficient countries more efficient so they pollute less. But any way you analyze it it makes no sense to have a treaty like Kyoto that actually discourages activity in the countries that produce the least pollution for a unit of economic activity and encourage it in those countries that pollute more per unit of economic activity.

How about the Union of Concerned Scientists including many Nobel Laureates and Phd's in environmental sciences?

Or the Bush administration itself which accepted it is likely the case in 2002?

The general scientific position is that it exists. The potential consequences of doing nothing seem to suggest its prudent to take action.

By the way, since the USSR is the only other signatory of that treaty, and they are no longer around, does that mean it is still valid?

"The Outer Space Treaty of 1967, signed by more than 90 countries including the United States, bans ..."

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_security/space_weapon s/index.cfm?pageID=1150

And Russia seems to have inherited the rest of the old treaties. (ABM and such). No point in grasping at straws to justify breaking treaties, just go ahead and tell everynone the truth, mr. Palpatine ;)

on space weapons and why they might not be a good idea see the union of concerned scientist's page on space weapons.

on space weapons and why they might not be a good idea see the union of concerned scientist's page on space weapons.

Also worrying even now about people that could lose his job and vote is better than worry about dead people (by hurricanes and similars enhanced by climate changes) that dont matter because they dont vote anymore.

Hopely Bush is still alive (and whoever he cares about) the day of the end of the world as we know it, would hate that he fuck the world and don't lives to suffer for what he helped to cause.

According to UCS, nuclear is down to 21% of our energy production and falling as old plants get retired. Russia used to have a pretty active nuclear program as well, but they've had a few problems.

Meanwhile coal is doing 54%. If the Clean Air Act had not been watered down, we would have much cleaner air.

Some of the posts on this thread disturb me. They imply that people aren't taking intelligent design (ID) seriously enough as a threat to science. The posts say that maybe ID is compatible with science after all: maybe it only applies to speciation; or maybe a god started things off at a certain point, and evolution took over from there; or if you interpret "day" to be some indeterminate length of time, maybe you can make the bible's creation story match facts (hint: you can't -- the creation story has plants appearing before the sun, for example).

The point is not whether it's possible to somehow reconcile ID with fact if you try hard enough. The point is that ID is being presented as a science, when it is clearly nothing of the sort. Are there unanswered questions in evolution? Of course. But saying "god did it" answers a small mystery with an enormous, or even completely unknowable one (god). It explains nothing, and encourages intellectual laziness. If we accepted "science" like this, we'd all still think thunder was the sound the gods make when they're angry.

I don't care if people choose to believe in god or ID based on faith; that's their right. What terrifies me is when it is presented as science -- especially in our schools. There is absolutely no doubt about it: if it weren't for the fact that ID puts a pseudo-scientific face on a certain demonstrably false and contradictory "holy" book, and the fact that proponents of that book fund ID well, it would have long since been thrown out as crackpot nonsense. Instead, it is being accepted by some school districts as science. Teaching ID as science undermines our entire theory of knowledge.

So discoveries like this possible explanation for the eye are important! They can potentially narrow the gaps in our scientific knowledge, which is the only attack against "god of the gaps" arguments like ID (the fact that ID is almost impossible to completely falsify is another big "tell" that it is not scientific).

p.s. [political rant]
Defending science is especially important with Bush in the white house. This is a man who says the "jury is still out" on evolution. This is an administration that approves a National Park Service booklet saying that the Grand Canyon was caused by Noah's flood. This is an administration with the worst environmental and scientific record in recent memory.
[/political rant]

- obviously doesn't like me
- has murdered thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands
- has had desires for WMD his entire life
- flaunts UN inspections
- is Islamic
- waves a gun in the air berating western countries
- pretends he has what he doesn't for show purposes
- you name it, he did it

The ozone and global warming should be separated. Lightning will not patch the ozone hole, because surface ozone (lightning) is separate from the upper-level ozone protecting us from UV radiation. Surface ozone is actually a pollutant.

Increased vegetation is really thought to play a role in mitigating global warming. But the effect is not strong enough and not fast enough. Recent studies (summer 2004) also raise the possibility that increased CO2 will increase CO2 emissions from arctic beat bogs and from forests as well, due to the changes in microbe fauna in the soil.

More info on beat bogs and on carbon loss from forests. (More or less random links to the news articles that appeared everywhere.)

You should also be aware of some not so reliable information sources.

The ozone hole does not cause global warming. Global warming is caused by an increase in ozone gases in the atmosphere: it keeps the heat here, preventing sun energy from re-radiating out into space. The ozone hole may though be, funnily enough, caused by global warming here

The problem with ozone depletion is that the ozone shields us from high-energy cancer causing light. here

You are incorrect.

The 1967 Outer Space Treaty only restricts the use or deployment of WEAPONS of MASS DESTRUCTION (more info here ) in space. Conventional warfare is not restricted. What has kept everyone from weaponizing space is:

a) It is expensive
b) Soldiers, Ports, Airstrips and Radar stations are not found there
c) The first nation to do it will be universally despised
d) It is expensive

Now however there are enough 'assets' in space that the US is beginning to fret that a space Pearl Harbour is a distinct possibility because of the military's (over) reliance on GPS and other satellite-based communication. Therefore the costs, both economic and political, are becoming less important to military thinkers.

Just because something weighs against choosing Bush does not make it Bush bashing, does not make it partisan, and most of all does not make it false.

Restoring Scientific Integrity is not Bush bashing. (The link says 60 signers on Feb 18, it soon included 48 Nobel laureates and thousands of other scientists.) It is from over 7 months ago. It is not about the election and it does not call for Bush to be replaced! I have yet to hear anyone claim there is a single thing false or unjustified. It's objection is:

"Although scientific input to the government is rarely the only factor in public policy decisions, this input should always be weighed from an objective and impartial perspective to avoid perilous consequences. Indeed, this principle has long been adhered to by presidents and administrations of both parties in forming and implementing policies. The administration of George W. Bush has, however, disregarded this principle."

It then cites many specific examples of problems.

It calls for the current government to:

return to the ethic and code of conduct which once fostered independent and objective scientific input into policy formation; and

Advocate legislative, regulatory and administrative reforms that would ensure the acquisition and dissemination of independent and objective scientific analysis and advice.

Over half a year ago it effectively called on Bush to fix a specific problem within his administration. It is unfortunate that Bush failed to do so.

Sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling "Bush bashing! Bush bashing!" makes YOU partisan and biased.

Even they can be partisan. I'm sure there are just as many who support Bush.

It is doubtless that some of the signatories do or did support Bush. It is also doubtless that some of the people from this non-partisan group have joined the partisan 527 committee to defeat Bush exactly because Bush failed to stop his administration from misrepresenting and suppressing scientific results and meddling in the production of independant and objective scientific analysis and advice.

You may certainly find Nobel laureates who support Bush, but I defy you to find Nobel laureates who reject this Restoring Scientific Integrity paper. It happens to weigh against Bush (if you value independant and objective science anyway). If you like Bush, well tough luck. Everyone has flaws and this is one of Bush's flaws. He runs an administration with little or no respect for independant objective science. Deciding other factors outweigh scientific advice is a fact of life, but currupting the scientific process itself is unacceptable.

You can decide to support Bush for other reasons, but dismissing this Bush bashing is a copout. Maybe you find Bush good on abortion or good on terrorism, but Bush runs an administration that is bad on science.

-

I for one do not welcome our American overlords, any time soon.

Are you saying science is a substitute for religion, or those who practice religion should be dismissed as scientists?

By one count there are some 700 scientists with respectable academic credentials(out of a total of 480,000 U.S. earth and life scientists) who give credence to creation-science, the general theory that complex life forms did not evolve but appeared "abruptly."
- Newsweek, June 29, 1987, pg. 23

President Bush's actions in expanding the funding of NSF, NASA and many other agencies suggest that he is pro-science.

Would you have said the same thing about Jimmy Carter who was also devoutly Christian? How about Albert Einstein who was a practicing Jew, or Donald Knuth who is a devout Lutheran.

It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.
-- Albert Einstein

While this is true in the absolute sense, in any sort of practical sense the Bush administration has a horrible record for distorting science.

I don't recall anything a severe as this condemnation happening under any prior administrations.

I would say that the record is bad enough that they shoud be kicked out.

In its 2001 Nuclear Posture Review the Defense Department envisaged nuclear options for a wider range of circumstances than ever before, and called for the development of new nuclear weapon types and heightened readiness of the Nevada test site.

Here is a very very short list of American charities that do work that impacts the world. I'm only listing a few to give you a few links. You can find a gazillion others.

http://www.pedaids.org/

http://www.cancerresearch.org/

http://www.children.org/home.asp?sid=98BD1FD2-E8B7 -42F2-B0A7-BC88E745D831

http://www.conservation.org/xp/CIWEB/home

http://www.afsc.org/

http://www.accion.org/default.asp

http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php? content_id=49986

You can get a nice list of the top ranked (in terms of money raised being used wisely) charities online

According to American Association of Fundraising Counsel" Americans gave $241 Billion to charity in 2003.

<sarcasm>

That's only ~$1000 per person in the US, which probably does seem a bit niggardly to other countries who like to envision the United States Citizens as fat bloated and heartless. Look at it this way: The average income for a family of 4 in the US is $40k. Giving $4000 for that family is just down right cheap.

</sarcasm>

Certainly if you look at the charts you'll see that Americans did indeed give the Lions share on internal charity, because charity does in fact begin at home, but the amounts spent on international charities, plus the amounts spent for medical research that will eventually benefit the world are hardly insignificant. Donations to save the environment benefit everyone, as does charitable giving in many scientific and medical areas of research.

So, there are some of my figures. If I may turn the tables, you said :The hike in interest rates in the 1980s, caused indirectly by Star Wars expenditure, raised these repayment rates to crippling levels. Would you return the courtesy and post some documentation/facts/figures to back up that statement? I know that the "Star Wars defense was proposed in 1983, and that $60 Billion had been spent on Star Wars in the last 20 years. Yet, if Americans gave away 241 Billion in 1 year, I can't see how 60 billion over 20 years would have caused a hike in interest rates.

I also agree that debts can be crippling, which is why now there are policies established such as the Enterprise for the Americas Initiative (run by USAID) call for forgiving foreign debt (at least in South and Cetral America) in return for children's welfare reform. The Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative also makes sure that countries are able to survive their debt. I would very much like to see Iraq be forgiven the debts that their Dictator amassed in their name, but it seems Iraq's creditors will have their pound of flesh.

You can bet that the bill will be footed from here, and we

>Base MSRP is $19,855, for manual transmission.
>Since no one in the US drives manual (except me
>it seems), I suspect $21,000 to start for most
>people.

Ford's web site - http://fordvehicles.com/escapehybrid/home/index.as p?bhcp=1 says $26,970 for front wheel drive, $28,595 for four-wheel drive. Where did you get your numbers from?

It would be nice to see the government provide more tax credits to encourage use of these vehicles (less pollution, encourage new technology development, less gas use leading to less reliance on middle east oil, etc), but the existing credits are set to expire soon. Meanwhile Bush wants to drill in Alaska for a minimal oil supply, but that's another story...

I don't see any evidence of censorship, even in the PDF report. The reports were still published, albeit without the administration's blessings.

To summarize this page, the EPA's Report on the Environment in 2003 was released without a section on the climate or any mention of global warming -- because White House officials (this site does not name them) allegedly wanted to change that to an extent that would misrepresent the scientific consensus, by including discredited research and . Also, the White House (yes, directly) allegedly blocked reprinting of a brochure listing ways for farmers to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.

They distort this conclusion to represent that Texas has higher pregnancy rates that most other states. Of course, they really mean that Texas has higher rates among secually active couples.

No, actually, that means what it says. They might be lying, but that should be easy to demonstrate. This is a source the UCS used: (Scroll past the quotes to "Texas' Recent Record") http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/publications/fact sheet/fsbush.htm

Quote:
* Texas' teen pregnancy rate is 113 per 1,000 teen females aged 15 to 19. Only Nevada, California, Arizona, and Florida have higher teen pregnancy rates.
* Texas has the second worst teen birth rate among 15- to 19-year-old females, ranking 49th out of 50 states. Only Mississippi has a higher teen birth rate.

(I suppose that means Texas has a low rate of abortions and miscarriages? That's something good.)

A very simple google search for ["teen pregnancy rates" texas] seems to confirm these statistics.

In other words, if you teach abstinence, and they have sex anyways, they are more likely to get pregnant.

Um. Well, that makes sense to me. And they will. Really. It may surprise you to learn this, but teenagers are both rebellious AND horny. (A shocker, I know.)

Really, I'm not trying to push a radical gay whale-saving communist agenda on you, but you ought to at least read the site instead of briefly skimming it before you accuse them of spin-doctoring and shoddy research. And I personally don't imagine that it would be much different under a different administration. This one is probably more extreme, but the same shit goes on in any bureaucracy.

We already know a lot of eggheads don't like our cowboy president.

Why, what a subpontibian thing to say :-)

See that great big yellow sidebar on the right side of all the ucsusa pages, with "Reports", "Cases", and "Activism" headings? It takes up nearly half of each page. The "Cases" section, as you might surmise from the name, contains links to specific pieces of evidence.

The page linked to in the /. summary contains a "Related Links" box with a link to a 351k PDF. (The text is "Read the new report".)

Here's the link, in case you still can't find it:
http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/report.cfm?publ icationID=877

Here is the full report, published in February:
http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/report.cfm?publ icationID=730

See that great big yellow sidebar on the right side of all the ucsusa pages, with "Reports", "Cases", and "Activism" headings? It takes up nearly half of each page. The "Cases" section, as you might surmise from the name, contains links to specific pieces of evidence.

The page linked to in the /. summary contains a "Related Links" box with a link to a 351k PDF. (The text is "Read the new report".)

Here's the link, in case you still can't find it:
http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/report.cfm?publ icationID=877

Here is the full report, published in February:
http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/report.cfm?publ icationID=730

Now maybe a private company can develop it for 2% of the cost and we'll have cheap, environmentally benign power.

Or, now maybe we can continue to be dependent on (mostly foreign) oil, established oil companies with little incentive to develop newer and ultimately cheaper energy sources, and politicians who make sure NASA doesn't undermine those vested interests.

"NASA officials cited a policy shift toward the International Space Station and the space shuttle program."

Now, I know the Shuttle has been so tremendously successful, and the International Space Station isn't just the leftovers of the lasts gasps of the old Soviet Manned Space Flight Program, both have been so well funded since the "policy shift" three years ago in 2001 -- so, if you're going to be intellectually honest, you have to ask yourself, "what occasioned this policy shift?"

I'm not just trying to be annoyingly partisan here; I'm trying to make the point that even when it comes to science, politics takes over, and when politics takes over, you have to follow the money.

In other words, 6% of the contiguous US land area would have to be covered with windmill farms.

I'm don't claim to be an expert, but that's what it sounds like. Here's a reference within the paper itself that references the 6% figure again:

The amount of windy land available for power class 4 and above is approximately 460,000 square kilometers, or about 6% of the total land area in the contiguous United States. The potential average power from areas with class 4 and higher, which are suitable for development with advanced wind turbine technology, is estimated at 500,000 MW.

(The sizing assumptions fromt he study: 50-m hub height, 10 D x 5 D spacing, 25% efficiency, and 25% power losses.)

Another interesting figure:

Figure 4 shows the contribution that the wind energy of each state could make to meet the total electrical needs of the nation, assuming a moderate land exclusion scenario. North Dakota alone has enough potential energy from windy areas of class 4 and higher to supply 36% of the total 1990 electricity consumption of the 48 contiguous states.

How much does each windmill cost? (I don't know.) How much would a million of them cost?

The AWEA document includes basic information on cost. One of the charts tables shows a 1.65mW rated 71m diameter turbine to cost $1.3M in 2000. They give a capital cost estimate of building a class 4 50MW wind farm at about $1M/MW, with an annual power production (assuming 35% capacity factor) of 150M kWh.

Here's a 2001 study of Comparative Cost Of Wind And Other Energy Sources [PDF]. Citing a table from the California Energy Commission's 1996 Energy Technology Status Report (CEC calculations do not include subsidies or environmental costs), Wind is about even w/ coal (4.0-6.0c/kWh) and *much* cheaper than nuclear (not sure why the CEC's number differs so much from those floated by the Uranium Information Centre). Once externalities [PDF] are figured in of course, wind power is much cheaper than coal.

What would be the effect of taking that much energy out of wind patterns? Would rainfall in the region be affected? Regional temperatures? Flowering plant pollination rates?

I agree, the most common environmental problems seem to those affecting birds and aesthetic, etc. While I don't think that larger climactic changes are a significant concern at the scales we're talking about, it would be nice to see some numbers/empirical research. I haven't, however seen any such portential issues cited it anywhere, from the ANL's Wind EIS's concerns, the UCS, or any of the various reports I've read (I've done searching on Google and Citeseer), which you might expect to see if there were problems. What I have seen shows local net-positive effects in wildlife from reduced emissions in states implementing large-scale wind power. It might be worth doing more research on how Denmark is doing (they're at over 10%+ of their power being generated vy windmills, and aiming for 40-50% by 2030).

I haven't done enough research to actually nail down the numbers of whether it would be able to completely replace coal, but from the research I've done, wind power is actually something that is pretty close to viable in the US (unlike solar) and certainly very viable in other countries.

Of course getting rid of burning coal is great, but our oil consumption problem is really a totally different can of worms (w/ about 45% of the 20.0MMBD last year being gasoline).

In other words, 6% of the contiguous US land area would have to be covered with windmill farms.

I'm don't claim to be an expert, but that's what it sounds like. Here's a reference within the paper itself that references the 6% figure again:

The amount of windy land available for power class 4 and above is approximately 460,000 square kilometers, or about 6% of the total land area in the contiguous United States. The potential average power from areas with class 4 and higher, which are suitable for development with advanced wind turbine technology, is estimated at 500,000 MW.

(The sizing assumptions fromt he study: 50-m hub height, 10 D x 5 D spacing, 25% efficiency, and 25% power losses.)

Another interesting figure:

Figure 4 shows the contribution that the wind energy of each state could make to meet the total electrical needs of the nation, assuming a moderate land exclusion scenario. North Dakota alone has enough potential energy from windy areas of class 4 and higher to supply 36% of the total 1990 electricity consumption of the 48 contiguous states.

How much does each windmill cost? (I don't know.) How much would a million of them cost?

The AWEA document includes basic information on cost. One of the charts tables shows a 1.65mW rated 71m diameter turbine to cost $1.3M in 2000. They give a capital cost estimate of building a class 4 50MW wind farm at about $1M/MW, with an annual power production (assuming 35% capacity factor) of 150M kWh.

Here's a 2001 study of Comparative Cost Of Wind And Other Energy Sources [PDF]. Citing a table from the California Energy Commission's 1996 Energy Technology Status Report (CEC calculations do not include subsidies or environmental costs), Wind is about even w/ coal (4.0-6.0c/kWh) and *much* cheaper than nuclear (not sure why the CEC's number differs so much from those floated by the Uranium Information Centre). Once externalities [PDF] are figured in of course, wind power is much cheaper than coal.

What would be the effect of taking that much energy out of wind patterns? Would rainfall in the region be affected? Regional temperatures? Flowering plant pollination rates?

I agree, the most common environmental problems seem to those affecting birds and aesthetic, etc. While I don't think that larger climactic changes are a significant concern at the scales we're talking about, it would be nice to see some numbers/empirical research. I haven't, however seen any such portential issues cited it anywhere, from the ANL's Wind EIS's concerns, the UCS, or any of the various reports I've read (I've done searching on Google and Citeseer), which you might expect to see if there were problems. What I have seen shows local net-positive effects in wildlife from reduced emissions in states implementing large-scale wind power. It might be worth doing more research on how Denmark is doing (they're at over 10%+ of their power being generated vy windmills, and aiming for 40-50% by 2030).

I haven't done enough research to actually nail down the numbers of whether it would be able to completely replace coal, but from the research I've done, wind power is actually something that is pretty close to viable in the US (unlike solar) and certainly very viable in other countries.

Of course getting rid of burning coal is great, but our oil consumption problem is really a totally different can of worms (w/ about 45% of the 20.0MMBD last year being gasoline).

To the people who are linking global warming to this film, nice fucking meme work. If you are not a believer in global warming, you are devious and clever, I salute you. If you do belive in global warming, you just made an own goal. Well done, idiot! Now we are going to see lots of people who belive that by disproving this sci-fi movie, they are disproving global warming.

With regards to Lomborg: In my opinion, he is a fraud and a self promoting piece of shit.

Some relevant links for those who are too lazy to Google:
Debunking Pseudo-Scholarship: Things a journalist should know about The Skeptical Environmentalist

UCS examines The Skeptical Environmentalist by Bjørn Lomborg

A great quote from one of the articles, "Nine things journalists should know about the Sceptical Environmentalist":

In assessing the validity of Lomborg's work, journalists should proceed with caution. Here are some points to keep in mind:

1. Pseudo-scholarship.

The Skeptical Environmentalist contains nearly 3,000 footnotes, implying careful research.

In fact these footnotes reveal numerous instances of highly selective quotation and often inaccurate sourcing that distort, directly contradict the original author or otherwise fail to provide support for Lomborg's claims.[3]
2. Confusing the issue.

The subtitle to Lomborg's book is "Measuring the Real State of the World," a lead-in to the author's premise that the state of the world is improving, not deteriorating as environmentalists claim.

In support, Lomborg presents evidence that humans are living longer and healthier lives, with rising levels of income and growing amounts of leisure time worldwide, and he dismisses evidence of global environmental degradation.

But the environmental issue facing society is not whether we are increasing our material wellbeing -- we are -- but whether we are prospering in ways that damage the natural environment.

Lomborg's book equates -- and confuses -- these two fundamentally different issues.
3. Statistical fallacies.

Lomborg furthers this confusion by mistaking association for causation, an unlikely error in a statistician.

Throughout the book, he attributes environmental improvements to increases in standard of living rather than to improved scientific understanding research or to firm environmental policy.

It was scientific research on ozone depletion that led to phasing out CFCs, stricter air pollution regulations that improved air quality in industrial countries, and the introduction of SO2 emissions trading that reduced the causes of acid rain in the United States.

Good science and political will, as well as wealth, led to these environmental improvements.

But Professor Lomborg asserts that, in heavily polluted developing countries, rising incomes will automatically lead to similar environmental improvements, and he implies that additional research or environmental policy efforts are therefore not needed.
4. The oceans.

Lomborg claims that "marine productivity has almost doubled since 1970"[4] -- a surprising statement given the well-documented declines of many commercial fish stocks.

What Lomborg actually means appears later in the book as a figure depicting an increase in total fish catch, plus production from fish farms.[5] Capture of wild fish from the sea has increased by 20 percent, not 100 percent since 1970.

And what humans are taking from the oceans and what the oceans are producing are of course fundamentally different matters.

Lomborg's equating of the two exemplifies how his book is fundamentally misleading.

By focusing on total production, Lomborg's graph conceals that stocks of cod, haddock, hake, flounder, swordfish, sardines, halibut, Atlantic Ocean perch, and many others have crashed.
5. The forests.

Lo

The Abrupt Climate Change FAQ from the Union of Concerned Scientists, has a lot to say on the subject and the movie:

Can what happens in The Day After Tomorrow happen in real life?

No. The dramatic, virtually instantaneous and widespread cooling envisioned in the film is fiction. But like all good science fiction, the film is premised on several important scientific facts. We know with great certainty that the Earth is already warming, largely because as we burn fossil fuels and clear forests we are releasing carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere. This warming is expected to continue in the coming decades, accompanied by changes in rainfall patterns and rising sea levels. The possibility of an abrupt shift in the climate system is only one feature of a changing climate that is expected to become more erratic, with extreme weather events like droughts, torrential rainfall, and extreme heat becoming more common. We can slow down global warming and reduce the likelihood of future abrupt climate changes by reducing our emissions of heat-trapping gases.

The other interesting thing it mentions is that Abrupt Climage Change refers to changes that happen over years to decades as opposed to climate change that is happening now over decades and centuries. Make no mistake, we have changed our climate more in the last hundred years than in the previous thousand years.

Could this be a sign of where Apple stands in the stem-cell debate?

Personally I think Bush is an idiot, and it's know he twists science to support his moronic points of views, and no one else's. He probably believes in the creationists. Join the to fight to bring back USA's status as the leading nation in science, and vote against Bush!

If you actually read the link in my post you would have seen it's not just the editors of SciAm that are upset. Here: RTFA

Ah, so you're being the straight guy, eh?

Bush is in office, so it's now mandatory that the Earth was created by God 6,000 years ago. Abortion is only done by and for terrorists. Stem cell research is all but banned. Condoms are removed from government medical sites. The Food Pyramid has candy on it. The Clean Air Act has been harpooned. Lead paint and mercury are now good for you.

There's plenty more here: Restoring Scientific Integrity

"[T]he campaign of fear now being waged against genetic modification is based largely on fantasy and a complete lack of respect for science and logic." Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore.

I hardly think that the co-founder of Greenpeace is someone to take advice from on Genetic modification. I would trust the Union of concerned Scientists ,

The Union of Concerned Scientists today released a groundbreaking pilot study that found genetically engineered DNA is contaminating traditional seeds of three major U.S. crops. Seed contamination, if left unchecked, could disrupt agricultural trade, unfairly burden the organic industry, and allow hazardous materials into the food supply.

I think that the Union of Concerned Scientists are much better informed on genetic modification than the head of Greenpeace.

On the subject of nuclear energy, there are less nuclear reserves available on the planet than fossil fuels. If the planet relied on Nuclear Energy for all electricity, estimates are that we would run out in about 80 years. See Energy at the Crossroads : Global Perspectives and Uncertainties"

"In truth, what the environmental community has become is a money machine"

What is the relevence of this quote? Does money somehow make enviromental action less important, less relevant or less beneficial? This quote has nothing to do with enviromental progress . . . it is a comment that may be true, but it does not in any way comment on the value of enviromental activism on the environment.

DDT is toxic and malaria is bad . . . but malaria is preventable by other means. DDT gets into the ecosystem and is nearly impossible to remove. Should you like to spray your backyard with DDT, I refer you to a less politically charged and more factual reference. An MSDS for DDT which I quote:

A serious environmental hazard due to bioaccumulation and transport up the food chain. Concentrations in animals near the top of the food chain (such as predatory birds) may become high enough in areas in which DDT has been heavily used, to have devastating effects upon reproductive ability. Degrades extremely slowly in the environment and is removed very slowly from animal tissue.

The most humorous part of your post is that you cite a doxilogically open set of quotes which undermines your argument . . . you use quotes from former and current activists/activist groups to support you postulate (in particular the cofounder of Greenpeace), then you attack activists with other quotes (The Alfred Runte quote). This appears to be a mishmash of quotes pulled out of the net through the "misuse" of internet tools like Google. Either activists have credibility or not, but you can't have it both ways and expect to make a credible point.

URL in parent has an extra space in it. Correct URL is:
The Science of Global Warming

I am a little skeptical of your estimate of the generating capacity. Peak power demand for a modest city is about 2 kW per person, so a power plant would have to generate 500 megawatts to supply a city of 250,000. Each unit at Three Mile Island had a capacity of about 800 megawatts. Are you saying that each power plant on the Enterprise is more than half the size of Three Mile Island?

Also, with all your confidence in Navy machinists' mates, I wonder how all those well-trained ex-Navy personnel allowed so much corrosion to attack the reactor vessel head at the Davis-Besse plant. According to the NRC, it was because they were not adequately trained, supervised, or audited.

Techno-determinism will only buy you so much, here, dude.

Doesn't exist. Monsanto terminated the project.

Only after public outcry from "anti-science" folks such as myself and the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Why would a plant generate herbicide?

We've been making roundup-ready soybeans for years. Just hose the field down and everything else dies. The next step (still under development) is plants that automatically kill their adjacent weeds. Seem like a bad idea to me, but that's not stopping people from doing it.

Resistance to antibiotics

This was a little non-linear on my part, so I will try to explain: part of the modification process involves conferring antibiotic resistance into the things being spliced together. We shotgun a bunch of genetic material together, and then we make it so that the ones we want to make are resistant to antibiotics. Then we kill off (using antibiotics) every cell in which the modification didn't take. Leaving behind things with the properties we want, and some antibiotic resistance. Which at a gut level is bad for plants - and in many very real ways is bad for animals.

Will peanuts? ...

Ah, but you see, GM foods pollinate with non-GM foods quite easily. There are known cases of fields becoming "contaminated" by their adjacent GM crops. It's not the GM corn I'm worried about, it's the effects of having my neighbor's GM corn next to my regular corn.

Lots of plants generate their own poisons

True. But they evolved to do that. Us tinkering to raise the yield of that herbi- or pesti- cide by an order of magnitude or two could have devastating effects in the long term. We don't know.

I guess it all comes down to the fact that we don't know. I'm of the opinion that the way we've been dealing with GM so far has been haphazard, barely scientific, and downright dangerous. Approval is granted to companies that do their own studies showing that the crops they want are safe to plant under certain guidelines. This approval is then rubberstamped and the crops are sent to farmers who plant them like traditional crops, thus making a risky situation worse. We DON'T KNOW what the effects of this will be. We have conducted no long term studies, and too many of the short term studies are funded by people who require a specific result.

So I think that we should stop plunging headlong into this situation, and move a lot more cautiously. Golden rice and the like has the potential to get rid of hunger - but other things have the potential to cause famine around the world. But whenever someone says "tread cautiously" they get tarred with an anti-science brush, which is an unfair characterization. The truth is that we don't know, and are going forward with it anyway.

Agreed: "The Bush administration and the Republican majority in Congress have used the tragedy of 9/11 to spread fear among Americans, and are using that fear to gain control of all three branches of government - legislative, executive and judicial. If we don't stop allowing the right-wing factions in this country to consolidate their power by taking away our freedoms one by one we won't have a country worth saving."

The U.S. government is rapidly becoming more corrupt. Here are just a few examples, which were posted before to another story:

Killing people and destroying their property:
N.Y. Times editorial
"... Americans paid Ahmad Chalabi to gull them into a war that is costing them a billion a week and a precious human cost."

Lying about scientific facts:
"The Bush administration has deliberately and systematically distorted scientific fact in the service of policy goals..."
N.Y. Times
The Guardian
Wired News
Union of Concerned Scientists

The present terrorism against the U.S. people is partly the result of the U.S. government's secret violence:
About a year ago, I hastily put together a short, incomplete history that shows what has happened: History surrounding the U.S. war with Iraq: Four short stories.

If you don't like it, vote accordingly.