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Climate Scientists Ask For Help Fighting Somali Pirates
thebchuckster writes "Scientists are seeking the help of the Australian and US navies to repel Somali pirates who are threatening one of the world's key climate monitoring programs. They hope to deploy about 20 robotic instruments in a no-go area north of Mauritius. The instruments, which record ocean heat and salinity patterns, are programmed to submerge and eventually resurface to upload their data to satellites."
Why doesn't the govt give Somalis money for acting morally? If we have to print money to reward virtue, isn't it a good thing and won't society benefit more than if we spend money on punishment, which ends up creating endless cycles of violence and repression?
But global warming is caused by a lack of pirates!
sounds like a challenge.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster#Pirates_and_global_warming
Everyone knows that pirates have an inverse effect on global temperature! If there are pirates in the area, then the data will be skewed. No wonder those scientists want those pirates gone.
Que the Pastafarian jokes in 3..2..1..
Scientists want to study the correlation between pirates and global warming.
It makes sense now.
How big are these things and how long does it take to deploy them? Can't they just drop them from an aircraft like a sonar buoy? If the things can't take an airdropping perhaps a flying boat is an option?
Despite the fact they threaten climate monitoring equipment, anyone else go straight to "the lack of pirates is the reason for global warming argument". haha
House the probes in old WW2 mines - armed of course...
Then just give the big shipping boats GPS coordinates, and let the pirates "find" them if they wish.
Seems to solve multiple problems as the pirates find more and more of them...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Ah ha, so there _is_ a correlation between pirates and global warming!
I know this guy, he goes by Capt. Jack Sparrow. He'd be happy to help, I'm sure. I heard he is out of work now a days.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Seriously, throw an active sonar pinger on it, before it surfaces to send radio data, have it do a few active pings and make sure no one else is around before surfacing, sending the data, and re-submerging.
You'd probably want to put a little effort into having multiple sensor units pinging at the same time to make it hard for them (the pirates without a lot of tech) to triangulate based on the pulse source.
You're talking a 5 pound sonar module and a few lines of code, a few thousand dollars, far far less that putting a bunch of fully crewed ships burning fuel and food in the area. Hell, do they not already have sonar modules on them for sensing water speed and temp at depth, or looking for thermoclines?
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
The real issue is in how the global security is executed. When these pirates are caught, it is up to the country of the vessel's home port to pay for extradition and prosecution. You may be surprised but in the majotrity of cases, the pirates are arrested and then days later released as the government of the vessels home country decides not to extradite as they don't want the expense of shipping tham, then housing them in prison. A solution? Well, go back to how we used to deal with pirates. Tried by a captain on ship and walk the plank into the water 300 miles off shore. Done. Problem solved.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Sorry but the oceans are already gone, they won't take the acidity and heat. All this research won't convince anybody. Better fight the oil and coal companies, but they be protectud by thems criminal bankers.
"Oooh, a Somali pirate! I'm scared now! Oh sure, the scientists will pay whatever you ask them! Here, take my leg! Please! So I can be a peg leg like you! Let's see what your Mom has to say about that!"
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
They just need help to get there, deploy them, and leave.
Scientists are seeking the help of the Australian and US navies to repel Somali pirates who are threatening one of the world's key climate monitoring programs. ... The instruments, ... are programmed to submerge
Not seeing the problem here. Make them big, really F-ing big, like mil-surp naval submarine big. Wrap with flypaper. Any pirate who wants to touch a submerging sub covered with flypaper is welcome to try it. In fact I double dog dare them, just like kids licking a flagpole in the winter...
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Pirates don't care about socialism. They vaguely care about globalism inasmuch as it affects the number/type of ships that go by. Mainly they just want to get rich, like 90% of the rest of the world.
The point is, the scientists need to drop the sensors into the pirate infested waters, and no commercial ship dares to go there. So they are hoping a military ship will take them to drop the sensors. Hope it works out.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
US and other naval warships patrol the area. All you have to do is ask to tag along behind one and drop the sensors.
No extra cost, no big deal.
The Nation's article on CIA black sites? I may have been in a bubble, but I don't recall many articles mentioning Somalia until The Nation ran their article about the US Torture camps in Somalia.
Now I see article, after article, about how there is a humanitarian crisis in that country is caused by people the US want to torture/murder and now an article about how climate change research is being hampered by evil people in the area. It all seems a little much.
I really want to stay away from tinfoil hat material but, when a story about torture camps run by the US gov seems to be ignored and then humanization problems seems to appear at the same time, I can't help but wonder if a counter information campaign, like what the hack on HBGary help to expose may be responsible.
Ah, be PROUD of your stupidity! Why not?
They're taking the ships not the buoys. The buoys are expendable, they drift till they die. They can be scuttled if needed. The ones we use are capable of being air dropped.
Keep on trolling for the oil industry, there's a good lad. They need real-world observations because they have two things you don't have - intellectual curiosity and honesty.
http://www.wikipedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/M2_Browning
Why make things difficult?
That's kind of the whole point. They need to place them in specific locations, so they're asking to tag along behind one after it goes where they need it to.
Science is a great endeavor, but when hundreds of millions can't eat, something is wrong and it has nothing to do with global warming.
It is called global-ISM and it has to be eliminated. If it is not stopped with its policies of artificial scarcity of oil, and natural resources to jack up prices for the super wealthy and destroy everyone else through the ruthless MBA programs that teach it is OK to use slave labor to produce things, we are going to have a third world war.
The amount of destruction has to be seen to be believed from these policies. Whole cities in the USA look like they have been bombed out like Dresden in Germany in WW II. Michigan, California, Ohio...the number of states look awful..almost third world like.
What this amounts to is too much is owned by too few. You can't even grow your own food in many states in the US because Monsanto is on every local county board paying people off to arrest and fine people who threaten any revenue stream from the local grocery store.
They don't want people able to feed themselves.
You know most of these pirates simply want to have food medical care and a way to support their families. People who have food, and a means to support themselves and their families are usually very enthusiastic about science and learning.
I think if I was in their position I would probably do the same thing....only I would be much more, creative about it and sink every ship I get my hands on. They could make huge changes in world order if they were to do that.
That way you could steal any of the commodities on the vessel then sink it and get out before anyone gets there. You also then have a much higher rate of survival.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
You just create dependence doing that.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
What we know about climate change. Of course, he who doesn't listen cannot hear.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
It doesn't matter to you whether scientists collect data or not. You will just assume you know better -- right? The beliefs come first, and then the "evidence" is lawyered by your "super" intelligence. There is indeed an inverse relationship between someone's competence, and their own belief in their competence.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
any pirates who would attack scientific intstruments are committing property crime. the death penalty seems a little harsh.
as for the pirates that attack people, well, somalia doesn't really have a government to speak of.
and if you think you can 'solve the problem' by intimidating a few of them, you might want to read about what motivates them in the first place. i.e. there is a massive drought in the region right now, millions of people are starving... as i write this.
if i were in their shoes, and you asked me if i wanted to be a pirate, and maybe eat, i dont know what i would say. you see, i've never been starving to death and watched my whole family die.
in my humble opinion, instead of starting a nother never ending 'war on piracy', we could instead try to stop the corruption and malfeasance that prevent the somalis from engaging in ordinary business activity. i.e. start enforcing international laws regarding the fisheries off of their coasts.
(same AC as GP) Everyone knows the "bury the researchers in millions of bogus, frivolous FOIA requests" is simply a tactic of the oil-industry shills - about as intellectually honest as "teach the controversy" from the anti-evolution tards - or, more to the point, about the same as the tobacco industry's decades of stonewalling that no evidence existed for a link between smoking and cancer.
The submersibles have already been programmed with the data they will transmit...
Name me one Presidential candidate recently who hasn't exaggerated to make a point. Maybe Ron Paul but I doubt it.
It's damn near impossible to find an "anti-AGW" statement that has not been proven false or at least ridiculously exaggerated.
Facts are not something I associate with climatedepot.
How ironic, the reason they are forced into piracy to live is because europe has been dumping their chemical and radioactive waste off their coast... which is pretty much where 100% of their food source resides.
More than 30 nations are involved in the multi-million pound Argo project, in which 3,000 robotic instruments provide data on the heat and saltiness of the world's oceans. The information is of great value to scientists who are able to forecast weather patterns and advise farmers of the likelihood of rainfall and floods.
Well what have done those 30 nations when overfishing and nuclear waste dumping was done in somalian coasts for decades, taking advance from the absence of somalia costguard? That is not a major enviromental isue, or what? What is the scientific advise to somalia people they face right now a _major_ drought crisis? Justice for all...
"You know most of these pirates simply want to have food medical care and a way to support their families. People who have food, and a means to support themselves and their families are usually very enthusiastic about science and learning."
Sure. Unless they're black.
Also, they can sing such timeless classics of Aussie "culture" such as 'Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport' and 'The Jolly Swagman' (or whatever the fuck they're actually called), which will have the pirates cutting their own throats in no time.
A DEEEEN GO STOLE MOY BAI BE!
Not just pay them not to attack, but pay them to go and place the bouys for you. Why? Because it gives them money from a non-piracy endeavour, their primary intention being financial gain. It's money they would have otherwise sought through ransom etc, and ulimtately keeps good people out of harms way. Would they hold the bouys to ransom? Well maybe, but you could make sure they are expendable, after all it's the data you want.
Or just get a Navy vessel to drop off the gear. Get in some target practice on anything that approaches. Only way to be sure.
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
Pay for a vastly expensive mission of friendship and understanding that carries vast amount of cash and bling with the aim of getting a MoU with the pirates and a mutually agreeable but non-binding protocol where they get to pillage etc as much as they want, but they should try and avoid enlarging their carbon footprint or damaging etc the sensors that are so critical. Repeat this every six months and everyone's happy.
Two problems solved.
(Three if the sharks have lasers.)
It's the U.S., who created this civil war.
No, it's the media. No it's...
Maybe it's just base tribalism rearing its ugly head. Oops, did I just blame the Somalis for being responsible for their own behavior? How very callous and imperialistic of me. Root causes, root causes: smart Western people will dig it out.
The article discusses many of the benefits of what those guys are asking for, but none of the costs.
Asshats like you are the problem today. i wish there was a law to kill stupidity.
So you would like a law to silence people whose ideas you find offensive?
Wow, talk about loving big huge government. Where do you nutcases come from?
You need to look into things a bit more deeply than you apparently do. Please give me a quote from Phil Jones where he admits manipulating data for other than valid scientific reasons. Does one mistake (Himalayan glaciers) in the IPCC AR4 report invalidate the thousands of other points in the report? That's like getting a F on a final exam because you missed one question out of 100. The IPCC had nothing to do with the climate refugees statement. That was a think tank associated with the UN. And I believe their statement was "up to 50 million climate refugees". Did they put a minimum value on it? The sulfur in coal does cause a cooling effect as SO2 in the atmosphere but it doesn't last nearly as long as the CO2 does so in the long run coal burning unequivocally causes warming.
Please show me the science that shows increasing the levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere does not cause a warming effect. If you can give me some good science showing that then I'll join you. Until then you're just someone who puts economics and politics over reality.
And you probably love directv
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Getting all pissy when someone points out how clueless and reactionary your murder fantasy is.
It was nice of you to end your last post by saying, "i wish there was a law to kill stupidity." It lets everyone know what a wretched little maggot you are.
Is this concept to difficult to understand? Pirate takes boat by force using guns- kill Pirate- feed to shark... What the hell is the discussion?: Seriously? WTF Pirate= death walk the plank, get hanged, shot in the head, who gives a rats ass. Rob a bank with a gun and jail for life. Why are these fucking bleeding heart liberals actually having a retort to this? saying things like well Food, they ar starving... too fucking bad. You put a gun to my head and steal my boat, your a criminal and you fucking die. NUF SAID.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Ive had enough. pirates = taking a boat by force with lethal weapons. I don't give a fucking rats ass what your argument is. they need to be executed. would you like a home invasion robbery? WTF is wrong with you people ? Shoot them. Done. feed them to the sharks. give a good deterrant. Tree huggers protected by the US laws need not apply.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Doesn't the CSIRO have anything better to do in wintertime than this?
After all, they are paid by the Government, that's tax payers money.
So they come up with ... THIS SHIT?
Some heads need off.
--//
Is this some Teabagger Newspeak I don't grok?
I wonder if there are any roving spy blimps that could be tasked to spend some time tracking all boats in the area around somalia. Its a big ocean but if you can watch the coast , catch them leaving and track it might work?
The information could be used to warn others where the pirates are or for the more hawkish amoung us allow nations who have had enough to intercept them.
Mine the entire coast of Somalia. Pay the "government" in lost fishing returns until they can independently and effectively patrol their own border or are willing to persecute the pirates via prison or death.
At least the pirates are honest about their profit motivation. Maybe, the climate "scientists" should offer to cut the pirates in on the scam!
An honest comment gets modded down... Slashdot... the home of censorship!!
SlashUSSRdot.
Seriously, throw an active sonar pinger on it, before it surfaces to send radio data, have it do a few active pings and make sure no one else is around before surfacing, sending the data, and re-submerging.
You'd probably want to put a little effort into having multiple sensor units pinging at the same time to make it hard for them (the pirates without a lot of tech) to triangulate based on the pulse source.
You're talking a 5 pound sonar module and a few lines of code, a few thousand dollars, far far less that putting a bunch of fully crewed ships burning fuel and food in the area. Hell, do they not already have sonar modules on them for sensing water speed and temp at depth, or looking for thermoclines?
The issue is NOT about collecting the devices afterwards - it's about the ships going in to plant the devices in the first place. You are addressing the wrong problem. Don't tell me you didn't RTFA?
The fisheries off the coast of Somalia were destroyed by years of European countries dumping toxic waste and over fishing off the coast. What the fuck else are they supposed to do?
Support the Somali volunteer coast guard
Someone at Slashdot clearly has an agenda and it ISN'T the free flow of information. Clearly censorship is being actively enforced here at Slash_Any_Opposing_Views_dot
I dono... climate scientists are starting to join the ranks of lawyers, politicians and insurances agents. Is there a "tipoff a somali" option somewhere?
(and of course I'm kidding, if you really don't have a sense of humor)
Now that the USA is winding down ops in Iraq and Afghanistan there'll be available drone operators who'll need to keep their skills sharp. What better use for Global Hawk and Predator drones and a few Hellfire missiles? Instead of blowing up wedding parties and funerals they could be doing something useful and take out Somali pirates. The unmanned drone optics are more than adequate quality to easily avoid mis-identifying their targets.
Climate scientists have moved beyond whether CO2 in the atmosphere causes warming. You can read the signature of CO2 capturing radiant energy in the spectrum of the planet. I have read the IPCC AR4 Working Group I Summary for Policy Makers. What's your point? You don't like the way they're simplifying the uncertainty for non-scientists? If they can't be virtually certain about something but only consider it very likely we can ignore the risk? Science doesn't work in absolutes (except zero).
The WG1 report is all about the science and doesn't get into danger, it's Working Group II where that part comes in. That's where they examine the probable effects of global warming.
Pirates are a real problem and they must be elinimated with all cost. The international community of countries should pool together all their resources and firepowers to get rid of pirates. Pirates causes delays in shipping goods to desired country and in many cases huge loss of money.
They asked the UN for help in stopping the dumping of toxic waste in their waters, they asked the UN for help in stopping Asian fishing vessels from emptying their sea of the food Somalia has always used to sustain itself.
Guess what the answer was since Somalia has nothing anybody wants. That is right, get stuffed.
The world is not as simple as you think it is.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Then just give the big shipping boats GPS coordinates, and let the pirates "find" them if they wish.
And what do the private yachts do, just go ker-splat so the oil can get through?
The only reason any of this is a problem is that certain governments have outlawed self-defense on the high sees. Having several 50mm guns on the deck would be all that is necessary and sufficient to get rid of the entire Somali pirate problem. When pulling into port, the harbormaster can ensure that the guns have the requisite safeties on them - he can use his locks if it really matters.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
In the 17th. century piracy was a major problem for international commerce. Solution: Shoot pirates on sight. ...
Today piracy is a major problem to international commerce. Solution:
I am still amazed that the international community does not act appropriate and hunt these people. Go for the "mother ships" they are large, slow and easily identifiable. Find a fishing ship with no fishing gear and loads of guns, and sink the ship! Use a deck gun or even a rocket... Warn them in advance over the radio
"Dear pirates, we will sink your ship in aprox. 30sec. if you want to live, jump over board, you might prefer to use a life boat or at least a life west. Mind the sharks"
Boom!
The problem would be solved in quite a short time... Recruitment would be alot harder... Actually making money from the business would be harder...
I think the issue is with taking a boat out there to install these things, not the worry that pirates will try and steal the things themselves.
It makes me laugh when I hear neo-cons say "government isn't the solution, it IS the problem"
To someone lost in the middle of the desert lack of water is a problem. To a drowning person excess of water is a problem. Why is it so hard to understand that most western countries are drowning in a massive excess of government?
It makes me laugh when the same people who believe governmental health care is the solution to all problems complain so hard about TSA pat-downs.
They have done exactly that
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-07-14/scientists-call-in-the-navy/2795700?section=world
asking the Royal Australian Navy to take nine of our floats up into that area on the next rotation to the gulf.
interesting concept. i have never heard of a 'preventative death penalty' before.
only preventative wars.
It occurs to me that Somalia would be a utopian paradise for "free market" types of people. Do you think taxes should be ultra-low? Do you want "small government" because you think government always screws things up? Want unfettered access to all varieties of weapons? Believe that two private individuals should be able to enter into *any* contract whatsoever?
Somalia is the place for you! (Link actually jokes about Darfur and Minnesota.)
Only people who want big government supported by high taxes should stay in HELLHOLES like the completely backward United States of America.
It's very hard to spot a small surface craft with sonar. They just get lost in the clutter when there's any kind of significant waves running. Even the big-budget navies don't always get it right; there have been several cases of innocent surface craft getting accidentally rammed and sunk by surfacing submarines.
Like the rest of their global warming data.
I think it's got naught to do with the teabaggers. It's entirely possible to be a treehugger and a teabagger.
why not pull a hostile takeover on the somali pirates and make a real enterprise out of it? startup costs are not prohibitive assuming you can find some willing participants to join you in the endeavor. insurance and legal costs are minimal. the world is awash in small arms and un/underemployed. there is a lot of profit there for someone.
It's up to the Climate "Scientists" (i use that term very loosely) to prove that CO2 causes dangerous warming.
Venus.
For that matter, high school physics classes do the experiment all the time, measuring heat retained with a concentration of X-percent of CO2 and heat retained by Y-percent concentration. It ain't rocket science, it's just basic physics that have been well-established for over a century.
Oh, that's right, physics works differently in the labs of petro-conglomerates, so there's nothing to worry about.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
Well, if you don't understand how uncertainty is quantified in science then I would say you don't know what real science is. It's a key concept in science.
How can you make a prediction when it's impossible to know ahead of time how much CO2 will be added to the atmosphere or what the Sun is going to do in its cycles and a number of other things? Instead you create various scenarios for reasonable possibilities and base your expectations on those.
If you find 100 other errors like the Himalayan Glacier typo in the IPCC AR4 then maybe I'll start wondering about it. In a report with literally thousands of predictions from hundreds of authors 4 or 5 mistakes isn't enough to take it down.