Slashdot Mirror
Surprise Discovery In Earth's Upper Atmosphere
elyons sends word out of UCLA of a completely unexpected discovery in the physics of the Sun-Earth interaction — a previously unknown basic mode of energy transfer from the solar wind to the Earth's magnetosphere. "'It's like something else is heating the atmosphere besides the sun. This discovery is like finding it got hotter when the sun went down,' said Larry Lyons, UCLA professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences. 'We all have thought for our entire careers — I learned it as a graduate student — that this energy transfer rate is primarily controlled by the direction of the interplanetary magnetic field. The closer to southward-pointing the magnetic field is, the stronger the energy transfer rate is, and the stronger the magnetic field is in that direction. [It turns out that] if it is both southward and big, the energy transfer rate is even bigger.'" The researchers have two papers on the discovery coming out in the Journal of Geophysical Research.
Saying "It's like something else is heating the atmosphere besides the sun" when they're talking about the interaction of the solar wind and the magnetosphere is more than a little disingenuous....
In other news, astrophysicists have announced that they now know what all that dark matter is: it's stupidity.
Can you support your premise that all scientists act in concert?
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Okay so when I first saw the title, I read it as "Surprise! Discovery In Earth's Upper Atmosphere" and thought the landing a couple of days ago was a hoax or something.
it was something unexpected (which it was), so nobody was looking in this direction. It would be interesting to find out if this was discovered because of all the hoopla about GW. I am guessing that it is the case. IOW, this would not likely have been found except that ppl are concerned about getting the facts, rather than just trolling.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
"It's like something else is heating the atmosphere besides the sun."
The orbiting teapot must have boiled! ;)
It was a MS virus that all the researchers touched and got infected with. Now, we are in a botnet phase. I mean, hey, nearly all scientist support weird ideas, like the earth not being the center of the universe, and that it is older than 5K year, or that GW is at least strongly influenced by mankind's contribution.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I hope it's not a subspace anomaly left open by a Goa'uld mothership!
> "Heejeong separated the data into when the solar wind was fluctuating a lot and when it
> was fluctuating a little," he added. "When the interplanetary magnetic field fluctuations
> are low, she saw the pattern everyone knows,
That is, the likelihood of "substorms" in Earh's ionoshpere is a function of how "northward"
or "southward" Earth's manetosphere is. More southward, more storms, worse
satellite TV reception.
> but when she analyzed the pattern when the interplanetary magnetic field was
> fluctuating strongly, that pattern completely disappeared. Instead, the strength of the
> flows depended on the strength of the fluctuations.
There's this "interplanetary magnetic field" between the Sun and Earth. The solar wind
is Earthward charged particles from the Sun. These particles interact with the Earth's
magnetisphere. When you have large changes in the solar wind, there are more
substorms, and worse satellite TV reception.
So, pseudo-diff-eq, their contribution is the second term (or maybe I'm missing the point):
substorm likelihood =
southwardness of magnetosphere +
change of solar wind intensity with respect to time
Poor graduate student. So much data...
It's good to see some basic science being done though. More, please!
If I throw money at the democrats will they go away?
Would there be some way to tap the energy from these fluctuations? Instead of solar power arrays in space, could we just have giant blimps floating in the upper atmosphere with large coils in their superstructure to take advantage of magnetic fluctuations? They could then beam that energy down as microwaves to a receiving station.
well, not the teabaggers
I really don't understand why that's supposed to be funny...
I mean, I get why one regularly sees "M$" and "window$" and other equally stupid things on slashdot, but that one I don't get.
I suppose its relevant to point out the polarized views we see spewing out of the US are not interacting with the earths magnetosphere.
solar winds = sun. root cause people.....
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
I was wondering how long it would take the anti-global-warming fringe to latch onto this one and say "Look! This shows scientists don't actually know everything, and therefore it proves that they don't know anything!"
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Why is this being tagged "climate change" with people yammering about global warming? This is a previously unexpected form of energy transfer but would have been occuring since...oh...our planet had a magnetosphere and there is not a single mention in the article concerning climate change or global warming.
Larry: This discovery is like finding it got hotter when the sun went down.
Interviewer: So, the temperature actually goes up when the sun sets?
Larry: Er, no.
Interviewer: No? What does happen then?
Larry: Um, well... the temperature goes... down, I guess.
Interviewer: Okay. Thanks for that Larry.
TFA is one of the most confused articles I've seen in a long time.
If Stuart Wolpert had just let the scientists write it, chances are it might be intelligible. As it is it was muddled, convoluted, mis-stated, and just plain wrong on many points.
Never let a journalism student, or worse yet, one who hung around after graduating into the Science buildings.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Whales and flowerpots.
Disappointment is me.
it sounds like the earth has evolved to absorb even rear-facing southward magnetic solar wind. Darwin was right!
I am 20+ yrs annoyed how long various solar questions and basic research have remained unplowed ground, with rather dismissive treatment in the AGW stampede. I note numerous irregularities in the AGW shove similar to deliberate actions that in my personal experience got PhDs (e.g. Cornell, Hopkins, one a nationally known professor) fired for said irregularities.
I also think that the real GA Landis might have some conflict of interest with my statement, such as the InP solar cell patents that might benefit from an AGW hysteria. However I do think that orbital solar is a potential major industry down the road as the major step into the industrialization of space, for 30+ years. Just not down the socialist roads. I
Yeah, I know... and I get why Anderson Cooper would think that's hilarious.
What I don't understand is why your average garden variety left-winger on the internet (where you tend to hear/see it the most)--whether it be slashdot, kos, wherever else--thinks it's so hilarious. I guess what it boils down to for me is, I think it's downright odd how the Democratic party which wholeheartedly embraced liberty, freedom, and the "common man" at its core a generation ago--and still pays lip service to such things--has of late become so dominated by primarily the upper middle classes and the highly educated who are perfectly content to just trust in the government (and ad hom those who don't). I don't understand the scorn for the lower middle class / poor / etc who seem to be at these kind of rallies.
I'll be the first to admit that there are a lot of things I don't understand... but the pure vitriol and loathing of the populist townhall protestors and tax protestors is just ... weird! ... to me.
I don't understand the scorn for the lower middle class / poor / etc who seem to be at these kind of rallies.
I see. You have not been to one of these. It is NOT the lower middle class/poor. I went to one in Denver. Watching ppl drive away in Suburbans is not my idea of lower middle class. Think that there is a real reason why it is pushed by rush?
The idea that this represents the common man would be like having the king of england attend the boston tea party. Basically, the very ppl, neo-cons, that ran up the vast majority of the debt are attending it and trying to point the finger at obama. Now, I am not a fan of Obama's action (though even as a Libertarian, I voted for him to avoid the thought of Palin as a pres), I can say that he was put in a horrible situation. OTH, I have not been impressed by his actions.
But the tea baggers keep pointing their finger at dems while out and out refusing to take responsibility for the nightmare that they got us into. These are the same sets of idiots that voted in W. TWICE.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Reread the post. He was being ironic.
Of course, there is a manner in which scientists do work in concert, and that's in 'consensus'. On this issue, the consensus is pretty clear.
If it's in you sig, it's in your post.
There are constant changes to the model, but nothing HUGE. My understanding from talking to some NOAA scientists that I know, that it would take something totally unknown coming from out of the solar system or from the middle of the earth.
As they pointed out, the simplest item to look at are the glaciers. Overall, they are melting very fast. Some new ones are started, but that is due to increased moisture in the air. That is like the center of Antarctica is growing again, but that is due to increased moisture due to the high melting towards the edge. It use to be melting took place truly on the edge, and now, it is quite far inland.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
... its HAARP
So, basically, since the claim that the "IPPC is the primary sponsor of all AGW research" is a *lie*, can we just ignore everything else you say about this subject?
Please tell us more... Very Interesting....Links please !
Good point, Hummers are not on the road long enough to burn much fuel anyway.
Their point is not transport, it is a status symbol to say to the world "I'm rich and so is my mechanic".
Patriots also buy the things to send the message - "We won the Cold War and here's proof the USA can match the crappiest stuff out of the Communist Bloc".
got PhDs (e.g. Cornell, Hopkins, one a nationally known professor) fired
Given how difficult it is to fire tenured faculty -- and how even if it happens at a state university, to say nothing of the really famous private ones, it makes the national news -- I'm going to have to go with [citation needed] on this one.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Military buffs get the things to show that they too can get the quality you expect from the lowest bidder at a special inflated military price.
hehehe. Sorry. I am really punchy. I have been up working on rebuilding a system for a bit . You may wish to check out that last definition here and re-read what I wrote (or should I re-read your post?).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Then again...
This IS Slashdot, so it is quite understandable that many might first think of a Hummer instead of a hummer, despite all those references OP made to "wives" and "girlfriends".
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
PhDs were from those schools, not those schools' faculty.
Prof was fired as an outside consultant and consulting company with a payroll of about a dozen with a cushy contract, about $3m/yr in today's scrip, by a Fortune 50 company, not as a professor. And it was an unpublicized matter that neither wanted out in public.
The prof would have jeopardized future funding, grants and donations where he was actively seeking about $50m in today's scrip, and had been lead to expect a good chunk of it if he could deliver technically and politically. The contracting F50 company and manager would have been further embarrassed over various failure issues.
We all know which side of the argument is trying to force no end of regulations, beliefs and laws on the other.
So it seems a bit of a idiotic question : you can do whatever you want, as far as I'm concerned. The reverse, as is plain to see, is not true.
Why can't YOU leave the rest of us alone ? I'm fucking tempted to move to China these days. One is actually more free there, and the people are actually more tolerant of differing viewpoints, that's how "liberals" have changed America. Heh, perhaps I'll take the middle road and see about Singapore or thereabouts.
Oh and needless to say, the IPCC sponsorship thing is true. And if you count IPCC + it's members you will find that you've accounted for over 80% of all climate research, it's that bad.
Ok, now I know a bit more US slang.
The last mixup was "pasties" which are a sort of english folded pie and a cover for nipples in places bizzare enough to have strip shows where nipples must be hidden. Seems pointless, and I got a good laugh out of being called naive by some guy that was paying money to not see nipples.
hehehehe. Yeah, I love the differences in slang. Way too funny. My wife is UK-borne Indian and sometimes interesting to hear what she has to say about the language.
/.ers assume that everybody is American.
Normally, I try to assume that somebody is from another country before assuming the worse about them. It pays off more often than not. What is odd is how many
BTW, I am not certain, but I think that pasties are pretty much gone, except for waitresses. It was something from the 50's, in 'respectable' places like Las Vegas. To be honest, I would not be surprised if I am wrong. I could see places in the bible belt requiring them.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I was wondering how long it would take the anti-global-warming fringe to latch
I thought that we were all against global warming (even Al Gore)?
I don't know how many times I'm going to have to repeat this, but the Mann et. al. 1999 reconstruction was accurate and has been independently confirmed by many researchers. Those links contain many references to peer-reviewed research papers that you can read to learn about paleoclimatology temperature reconstructions.
Interesting, first poster says:
Lots of money flowed to W and the neo-cons and now they are gone ...
So, when you throw money/whatever at a problem, it goes away.
This was pretty funny, and not surprisingly, was modded so... then the followup posts this comment:
If I throw money at the democrats will they go away?
For some reason - that was modded troll? I found the second one as equally amusing, and fail to see how the second was any more trollish than the first - particularly when the first even referred to tea-party protesters as "tea-baggers"
To me, the most interesting point of this discovery is that it should improve our understanding of shortwave radio propagation.
It has always frustrated me that the same space program that is producing the data needed to understand the physics needed to make accurate, day-to-day predictions of ionospheric propagation -- a hundred-year-old mystery -- is also the same space program that replaced commercial HF communication with satellites, greatly reducing the economic value of such predictions (and, therefore, the science funding to make them). So now that we have the ability, we no longer have the desire . . . unless one is an amateur radio operator, and it's harder to think of an entity lower on the economic value chain than that.
The most difficult path for shortwave links is one that passes near the magnetic poles, like the path from Southeast Asia to the US East Coast that passes over the north magnetic pole. Energy from the solar wind couples into the Earth's magnetic field; in particular, charged particles are directed parallel to the field. This is great for propagation over most of the planet; however, near the poles the magnetic field becomes vertical and these particles are directed perpendicular to the ground, where they form a ring of radio wave attenuation and refraction in the upper atmosphere that closes this path for many days out of a given month. To open this path there has to be minimal energy coupling from the solar wind, and there is very little understanding of when this will occur. Even the best propagation prediction software (e.g., VOACAP and Proplab Pro) is based on statistics, giving one the probability of a given path being open.
This discovery should add to our understanding of how and when these paths will open. Until then, we have to survive on "Space Weather" web sites like these, and turn on a radio to see for ourselves what the day brings.
(Those interested in an accessible introduction to HF propagation can check out K9LA's propagation site.)
really? The pubs had control of congress from 94-2000, while the dems had control of the presendcy; The pubs had TOTAL control of dc from 2000-2006. pubs had WH from 2006-2008, while neither party control congress during that time (dems controlled house, but the pubs had a slight edge on the senate).
So, where did it get us?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms It MASSIVELY shot up when pubs had total control. It does not appear to matter which congress has it, but which president has it. For example, reagan and W never saw a deficit that they did not love. OTH, CLINTON (a dem) fought against the neo-con deficit and turned it around. So do the dem controlled congress of the 60's/70's, who paid off most of WWII debt.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
*sigh* the "reconstruction was accurate" is a cute, but misleading, statement.
"Consensus" is that the conclusion of the paper was correct, that temperatures have risen in the last 1300 years (which has a great deal of historical precendent : all interglacial periods were periods of slow warming).
BUT the graph, the dataset used *and* the methodology were indeed flawed. But yes, the conclusion stood. The corrected graph is a hell of a lot less steep though. The point being is that the IPCC did not see fit to use the corrected graph, once it was published. And we're not talking 5 days after publication, but a full 1.5 years.
Google Wegman report. But yes, the end conclusion, that there is *some* warming (that started somewhere around WWI) is present, stands.
Obviously you didn't bother to read anything in those links. As I've said, many studies have examined the PCA centering issues, and found no significant differences when using different methodologies. I'm baffled as to why you find it necessary to tell me to google the Wegman Report, when I discussed it at length in the first link of my previous comment. It's perfectly normal for laymen to be confused about these issues (they ARE complicated). But it's ludicrous to suggest that the scientific community as a whole is somehow unaware of these issues or engaged in a massive conspiracy to suppress them.
Nevermind. I don't feel like repeating myself ad nauseum. It's not possible to reason someone out of a position that he didn't reason himself into in the first place.
Have you missed the fact that people all across the nation are angry with both republicans and democrats? More than one republican who assumed that he could just get in front of this movement has been booed off the stage.
Politicians are the problem. The republican/democrat distinction is just a distraction. Both sides want to take away your freedoms and your money - they just pay lip service to different ideals when they do it.
That damn unshielded reactor just keeps causing us problems - damn it, damn it to hell. But seriously, this kind of reminds me of the Tacoma Narrows bridge failure. Second order forces thought to be inconsequential end up causing a dramatic change in behavior. Also, the vitriol of many comments is amazing. Probably sounds just like the Church when discussing a certain Italian.
Conservative, mod down for violating
...is a flame war centred around the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
Can one of our atheist friends here on Slashdot outline to us, where this discovery stands in relation to the Second Law? Have we finally arrived at the moment we've all been breathlessly waiting for; the Second Law's violation?
I'm seriously hoping so; I've waited for years now for the ability to have a magnetic motor next to the power supply in my desktop, and run it without plugging it into the wall. That would seriously be awesome. ;)
Does it run Linux?
{{.sig}}
Your unspoken assumption (that the poor and lower class are somehow politically "pure") and revolution must come from the bottom up is ridiculous outmoded 20th century fringe left thinking.
Every western liberal movement in history has been driven by the upper and upper middle classes. Do you people actually think Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson were just "middle class" regular Joes? From the Lords in the middle ages who conspired against their king to give us the Magna Carta to the idle over educated wealthy children of Merchants in the 1700-1800s who didn't like the establishment and so decided to use their wealth and connections to agitate and stage liberal revolutions over throwing their respective kings.
Every great western movement against governments has been driven by the well to do who have the time, means and connections to sit around and ponder over throwing the king in the first place.
We have ample opportunity to see what happens when the poor and lower class overthrow their governments and take control by the way. Every third world country and half of Eastern Europe and South America through the 19th and 20th century answered that question.
This uniquely western middle class self hatred must stop.
Exactly. Appealing to populist demand is fucking insanely stupid. Shit, why not put Paris Hilton in the VP office at least we know there will be something good to watch, duh doy dee duh doy dee duh.
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
At one time scientific consensus was that washing your hands before operating was unnecessary and the man who suggested otherwise was turned into a pariah.
And that "Miasma" was the cause of tuberculosis despite hard evidence to the contrary.
Consensus means absolutely nothing if you are being rational about the matter.
really? The pubs had control of congress from 94-2000, while the dems had control of the presendcy; The pubs had TOTAL control of dc from 2000-2006. pubs had WH from 2006-2008, while neither party control congress during that time (dems controlled house, but the pubs had a slight edge on the senate).
So, where did it get us?
Um... a budget surplus?
First, stop considering who is in the WH. They only make suggestions to the congress. Congress is in control of spending. Sure, the Prez can veto a budget, but then the government shuts down and the Prez gets the blame because ignorant people don't understand that congress controls the government.
OTH, CLINTON (a dem) fought against the neo-con deficit and turned it around.
Bullshit. Read the above statement. CONGRESS CONTROLS THE BUDGET! Clinton tried to veto it and Newt shut the government down. Clinton had to give in and not get all the liberal, hippie, tree hugging BS he wanted.
The pubs had TOTAL control of dc from 2000-2006. pubs had WH from 2006-2008, while neither party control congress during that time (dems controlled house, but the pubs had a slight edge on the senate).
The Republicans barely had control... it was so close in fact that when a single Republican changed party, it changed control. (Jeffords sound familiar)! Matter of fact, when Jeffords jumped to become and an independent, it gave control of the Senate back to the Democrats. Republicans gained control of the Senate in 2003 but lost the control again in 2005. So that's just TWO years that Repubicans held the Senate. Those two years by the way broke records in regards to government tax receipts because the economy was so good. Although I agree that spending was out of control... That happens when the control is so close. You can't get anything passed without paying everyone off.
At one time scientific consensus was that washing your hands before operating was unnecessary . . .
To be fair, that consensus was held before science was applied to the proposition of washing your hands before surgery.
By your rationale, I would assume you do not know how to read or write, as once upon a time in the not-too-distant past, you couldn't speak, frequently shit your pants, and crawled around all day eating debris off the floor.
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
Simply calling a group "fringe" does not make it so. Fringe relative to whom? Mainstream society is overwhelmingly skeptical, so if anything the pro global warming hug fests that one sees on echo chambers like this are the true fringe.
Whether you like it or not.
Just calling it how I see it btw.
"It does not appear to matter which congress has it, but which president has it."
uh huh
"the dem controlled congress of the 60's/70's, who paid off most of WWII debt"
Make up yer damn mind already.
You Parisians would be amusing if you weren't so sad. The two party system is one of the greatest evils ever pushed upon mankind.
So the democrats have total control now, so why am I constantly hearing shrill screaming from "the left" about the evil republicans stopping the magical quarter billion person national health care and *never* hearing about the same type of "evil" democrats who are the *real people stopping it*.
If the democrats wanted it they could just vote for it. How does the average "left" wing supporters head not implode from the cognitive dissonance on display at the moment?
Anyway isn't attributing deficits to the President disengenous given the fact that it's the congress that manages the money...
WindBourne I've been on this site for many years and you are most definately *not* a Libertarian, you are a Social Democrat through and through.
Stop talking out of your bum it cheapens us all.
Republican President & Republican Congress: deficits soar
Republican President & Democratic Congress: deficits increase, but not as much
Democratic President and Democratic Congress: again, deficits increase but not as much as the first pairing, but taxes increase even more
Democratic President and Republican Congress: we get surplusses
The last nine years seem to reinforce the pattern. It seems that when the government is divided between the two parties, and for some reason a Democrat is in the Oval Office, we're better off economically. Seems like a good reason to give Congress back to the Republicans in '10 and give them and Obama a chance to work things out through '16.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Can you support your premise that all scientists act in concert?
There's some bias in this direction when funding is centralized. I'm sure somebody can provide a concrete example, but as heresay, I've been told that a scientist simply can't get funded for certain areas of investigation.
And not just "way out whacky" stuff, but things that go against the grain. Chugging-vials-of-h.pylori kinds of experiments, for instance. Sometimes the consensus is wrong, yet it's expensive to find that out.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Google for "tesla energy transfer atmosphere" or "tesla atmosphere energy" (he said he knew how to collect energy from the atmosphere, and how to transfer it through it.... of course noone listenede, noone believed, and noone wanted to sponsor it.... and of course: "if there are no wires, where are you going to put the elecitrc counters?")
fist link i found and there are more
i read your email
The LMC/"poor" are politically illiterate and are too busy surviving to attend rallies.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Simply calling a group "fringe" does not make it so.
Well, of course. I call it fringe science because it is fringe science, not the other way around.
Talk to some atmospheric scientists-- real atmostpheric scientists, people who actually do measurements, and computer models, and physics. Not to the people who say "we don't believe the measurements, and making more measurements won't help, we won't believe them no matter how many there are. We don't believe the computer models, and making better computer models won't help, we don't believe any computer models, no matter how good. We don't believe the physics, either, because we're just skeptical, period."
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
But it's ludicrous to suggest that the scientific community as a whole is somehow unaware of these issues or engaged in a massive conspiracy to suppress them.
Then why Nature's soft-pedaling of the correction to Mann? McKitrick and McIntyre detail their experience of trying to deal with Nature to get a correction here. Interesting reading.
And the referees throwing up their hands and saying "this is too complicated for us to evaluate in 2 weeks" shows a weakness in the process.
It's like a woman, the more you try to understand, the more crazy and disappointed you will be in the end.
You have people here who think down modding means "I don't agree with your post" and that agreement is never subject to reality.
I'm thinking the problem is, there are no viable 3rd Party alternatives. All we see are the different sides of the same coin, and no matter what we choose, we have to compromise something and 'accept the lesser evil'. The problem is, the lesser evil is still evil no matter how you slice it. And of course, no current Party fits all my wants.
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
You can't despise both sides of the isle, that's against the rules!
We all know which side of the argument is trying to force no end of regulations, beliefs and laws on the other.
Very insightful-- in that this summarizes the thought process of the anti-global warming crew: We don't like the political implications, therefore, the science must be wrong.
Do you see that this argument is a non sequiter?
The universe is the way it is. Your dislike of political implications does not change the science. Carbon dioxide in that atmosphere does what it does, and whether you like or dislike the politial implications does not change its effect on global warming.
The anti global warming fringe, however, isn't actually interested in the science-- they already have their political beliefs, and this has given them their beliefs about science.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Your observation is the result of democrats attempting to play the underdog card. A few posts up someone even attempts to misconstrue the number of seats held by the republicans from 2000 to 2006 without even bothering to check just because this point was hit so hard with him.
The problem is, the people are against most of the health care reforms. I know at least 5 people who claimed to of been life long democrats until the dems started calling them republicans for being against the current health care bills in congress. They are claiming they will vote party line republican from now on because of it. There are a lot of problems in the legislation on the hill, we have seen how the sloppy rushing through congress has failed in the past and Nancy Pelosi's no debate vote without enough time to even read let alone understand the bill and amendments added to the house bill before forcing a party line vote has infuriated plenty of people who would have been supportive if we just took our time and did it right. With representatives mocking people wanting to be thorough and saying you would need two days and two lawyers just to understand the bills, it's painfully clear that they do not care what is happening as long as they can place their name to it.
A lot of people who used to blame republicans for everything are waking up and realizing it's not better under democrats. This first became obvious with the TARP legislation in which the loudest speaker against companies using bailout money to pay bonuses turned out to be the same one who put the wording into the law that makes it legal. When the dems can't even remember what they did, or attempt to ignore it instead of fixing it, or are the reasons the mess exists in the first place (I'm looking at you Ted Kennedy), eventually people will look at it and wake up.
I'm the poster of the article because this is from my dad's lab at UCLA. While I must profess great ignorance about much of what he does and this piece of research in particular, he has been telling me about this work for a while. Basically, he is a weather scientist, but instead of studying weather patterns that directly affect earth's surface (e.g. rain storms and tornadoes), he studies the weather in earth's upper atmosphere, and specifically in the magnetosphere where earth's atmosphere interacts with the solar wind. His primary focus is to understand the dynamics and triggers of weather storms there, called magnetospheric substorms -- which, besides from causing some havoc with satellites and communications, also cause the aurora, or northern lights. While this has nothing to do with global warming, it is quite interesting as his group discovered that there is a much larger influx of energy into the magnetosphere than was previously thought. For all those here with space/physics/weather/atmosphere interests, I thought it would be of interest. As previously noted, this is solid basic research that furthers our understanding of how our planet works at the interface with space.
It doesn't show a weakness in the process, it shows that computation power isn't infinite. Redoing all the calculations without the benefit of PCA requires use of a large cluster for a long time. This was done (in point 5) and shows that any PCA errors were negligible. Scientists aren't evil monsters engaged in a massive conspiracy. Really. We're ordinary people, just like you.
Oops. I should have said point 5 in part 2. Sorry for any confusion that typo caused.
Yes, this! ^ Parent should NOT have been modded down - get a grip people, stop being morons with your mod points.
People want to tax everyone, and pour that tax money into mostly useless "carbon credit" schemes. If and when those carbon credits include the reforestation of the continents, I'll sit up and take notice. Almost every other scheme that I've seen is just harebrained chicanery, designed to move money from MY wallet to some politician's best buddy's wallet.
This is why I can't accept much of the effort being shown to combat this global warming.
The efforts I DO support include, reducing emissions, finding cleaner energy sources, general conservation (reducing waste), stricter laws on hazardous waste - common sense things.
Meanwhile, I despise the alarmists for their efforts to rob people. Carbon credits my ass.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
I'm on the fence between something like GOOOH or just switching to random lotteries instead of elections.
Congratulations, you won the internet!
I'm constantly, cynically impressed by how few people even mention that fact. It's almost as if the entire environmentalist community doesn't want anyone to know that the natural world has global-scale mechanisms in place to balance things out. What are they afraid of?
The difference between spam and poop is that you don't have to dig through septic tanks looking for real food. -- Me
Thanks for the link (in Point 5, Part II). I also read in point 8 that "If you use the MM05 convention and include all the significant PCs, you get the same answer. If you don't use any PCA at all, you get the same answer. If you use a completely different methodology (i.e. Rutherford et al, 2005), you get basically the same answer."
It is asserted that if you use random, trendless data, you also get the same answer. See the graph near mid-page at http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/trc.archive.html.
Do you have any comment on the link I gave regarding the Nature correction?
The IPCC does *not* fund most climate research, what you are saying is false...
It's like saying the International Astronomical Union "funds" astronomy research... it doesn't, it's an assembly of scientists working around a subject.
The IPCC is an International Panel of Climate Researchers, they take the results of climate research and turn it into general reports on the state of the science.
The funding into Climate Research is provided by countries and other organisations such as the EU.
The IPCC is the result of that research funding, not the cause...
And from your rather idiotic outburst, it's also quite clear that you do not believe reality should influence your political convictions and launch into a tirade which has *nothing* to do with my simple statement that what you claimed is untrue.
There's a lot of money available for destroying the Global Warming consensus regardless.
Play Command HQ online
If even a handful of Republicans were serious about health care reform, the handful of asshole Democrats (and ex-Democrats) who are holding things up wouldn't matter.
But the Republicans have made the mostly correct political calculation that if there is no bill, or if it's a bad bill, it's all over for the Democrats. They also know voting for a good deal won't help them politically. Republican party discipline is so good that no health care bill will get a single Republican vote no matter what.
That sets up a game of chicken between your average Democrat who wants to improve healthcare and get re-elected, and your asshole Democrat who doesn't give a shit about healthcare, he just doesn't want to face TV ads saying "Big Government Liberal" next year.
Play Command HQ online
I can't get that graph to load (but my net connection has been flaky lately so it could be my fault.) At any rate, it sounds like a claim that MM have made: that sending "red noise" into the MBH98 program results in a hockeystick. The main problem is that the extracted trend explains very little variance relative to the trend extracted from real data. Here's a 4-part primer on PCA to help people understand the basics.
I read some of it, and their complaints sound very similar to what other scientists go through when trying to get their research published. Peer-review is often an unpleasant process because it's based on confrontation, but this is true for everyone. In this particular case, I think Nature was right to reject their article based on the mountain of evidence against their claims.
"Anyway isn't attributing deficits to the President disengenous given the fact that it's the congress that manages the money..."
As if anyone in Congress gets blamed for anything. My congressmen brings home the bacon! Sure he's been in office over 20 years, and gets over 60% of the popular vote thanks to all those wonderful corporate sponsored commercials; but I know he's still looking out for my best interests.
Common Sense
Um, no. I had been voting Libertarian for MANY ELECTIONS (including Rob Paul). I have simply opposed you neo-cons. There are FAR too many neo-cons that try to claim that they are Libertarian and then try to control the party. Sadly, these days, it is working. That thought that we had Barr, a true fucking neo-con, as a candidate made my skin crawl. Now, do I support all elements? Nope. But then again, neither do you, or other wanna-be's.
So, in your word, go back to your party. You bring illogical and irrational thoughts to my party.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The page you refer to does not seem to answer the complaint raised in the random, trendless data simulations. It talks mostly about the data used for a "training period." That was something I had not heard either side discuss before. There is one or two sentences at the end of the page you cite which talks about the random data, but just acknowledges its existence and concludes with a dismissive "who has the patience?"
I'm not a climate scientist or or any other kind of scientist, so I'll admit maybe I just don't "grok" it, but the page you referenced in answer to my Monte Carlo query seems almost off-topic. You've been kind in your responses, so maybe you can indulge a non-scientist just a bit more.
a pokemon maybe?
Slashdot ya no es que lo era!
I'm referring to this quote: "I've now done some stuff with random series rather than the MBH proxy series. This has the advantage of allowing you to create as many proxies as you like. I'll hive that off to a separate page: here. What that appears to demonstrate is that M&M are right about one thing: it often does lead to a 'hockey stick' shape in random data. But the problem is that the variance-explained of the PC1 done this way is tiny: the first eigenvalue is about 0.03. Whereas when you run it on real data the first eigenvalue is about 0.55 (back to 1000) or 0.38 (back to 1400). Which means the two problems are very different."
In the other link, the eigenvalues are supposed to be accessible via a link, but I can't get figure 1 to display. Again, don't know if this is just me. Regardless, they're saying much the same thing. The eigenvalues of the MM fit to red noise aren't statistically significant.
But the real point is that the same answer emerges from more straight-forward analyses that don't rely on PCA at all (which avoids all these issues). In fact, as I've mentioned in my article, multiple independent analyses have been performed, all of which agree that the hockeystick shape is accurate.
The next couple of elections could be interesting. People voted for the Democrats because they were tired of the Republicans. Now they are pissed off at the Democrats, so they won't make that mistake again. Not enough time has passed for them to forget why they are pissed at the Republicans, so who are they going to vote for? If a third party plays its cards right, they could find themselves as a major contender. Of course, since the current system favors two parties, it would be at the expense of one of the two major parties - almost certainly the Republicans as they are becoming more and more irrelevant every day. Maybe it's time to bring back the Whigs?
"The idea that this represents the common man would be like having the king of england attend the boston tea party."
They represent the people who are paying the bills. The fact that you don't believe they are the "common man" is telling. The finger should be pointed at everyone who spent and wants to spend massively and take yet more money from the producers.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
In case you missed it, the 2008 Presidential election was considered to be a populist victory.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html ...shows how U.S. department of energy misleads the cause.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101102724 ...shows how the null hypothesis (read: human-made CO2 concentration is significant enough to change global climite) was protected via sabotage.
Common sense might tell you that seafloor spreading and the geothermal activity account for more of an increase in ocean and ground temperatures than air temperature can possible account for. Can't link you to any common sense so you'll have to discover that on your own.
multiple independent analyses have been performed, all of which agree that the hockeystick shape is accurate.
and the point is, obviously, that it is clear why : even random data, without temperature rise, is accurately represented by the hockeystick graph.
That's the big "oops".
Yes, but with an eigenvalue >10x smaller than the principal component from the real data. Thus the red noise fit isn't statistically significant, but the real data fit's is. That's the point of the Monte Carlo analysis done by Mann et. al. which was mentioned in the first link I gave.