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Fiber Optics In Antarctica Will Monitor Ice Sheet Melting

sciencehabit writes: Earth is rapidly being wired with fiber-optic cables — inexpensive, flexible strands of silicon dioxide that have revolutionized telecommunications. They've already crisscrossed the planet's oceans, linking every continent but one: Antarctica. Now, fiber optics has arrived at the continent, but to measure ice sheet temperatures rather than carry telecommunication signals. A team of scientists using an innovative fiber-optic cable–based technology has measured temperature changes within and below the ice over 14 months. This technology, they say, offers a powerful new tool to observe and quantify melting at the base of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.

92 comments

  1. need more by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    bandwidth

    1. Re:need more by davester666 · · Score: 1

      move to Antarctica!

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
  2. WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Nyder · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Nice, here I live in Seattle, just off of downtown, can't get fiber optics, but hey, whatever. fuckers.

    --
    Be seeing you...
    1. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Teresita · · Score: 2, Insightful

      There's a record 7.6 million square miles of ice pack in Antarctica this year, but no, we need to measure it melting.

    2. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Why would that matter? We already have 18 years of no warming and the AWGers deny that, along with every other of their claims being wrong.

    3. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Teresita · · Score: 1

      That's great, you don't even know that the extent of the icepack this year is as stated, 7.6 million square miles, something you can find on Google News, but you require a formak data set, in Latex format no doubt.

    4. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by chmod+a+x+mojo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Nope, I require science, something you don't seem to have a firm grasp of as of yet. Try taking a few classes, looking at and actually understanding the massive amounts of data available, and after that coming back in a year or three when you actually have a chance at understanding the difference between long and short term trends.

      But, if you actually have data proving climate change wrong, for the love of $DIETY publish it in a peer reviewed journal, you will become famous... I won't hold my breath though.

      --
      To err is human; effective mayhem requires the root password!
    5. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by flaming+error · · Score: 2, Informative

      This is +4 informative? Seriously?

      For those who can't be bothered to read the summary, this is not about FO communications. Some guys are using the properties of fiber optics and light to figure out the temperature along a length of cable they dropped down a bore shaft to the ocean.

    6. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by paul.hatchman · · Score: 3, Informative

      Perhaps you could use your obviously epic google skills to look up the Western Antarctic Ice Sheet. You know the one the article is actually talking about? The one that is shrinking and unstable and could cause sea levels to rise by 1.2 metres? I think that's worth at least keeping an eye on. Don't you?

    7. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      gobbly gook what?

    8. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Marking a funny post as funny doesn't get the poster any "points" so many times funny posts get marked informative. That or the average /. moderator is a total idiot.
      I'll let you decide what is more likely.

    9. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jeremy+Erwin · · Score: 1

      formak data set, in Latex format

      That sounds like word salad. Why would anybody format a data set using a typesetting language? netCDF is far more common for this sort of thing.

    10. Re: WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      No
      http://www.skepticalscience.com/no-warming-in-16-years.htm

    11. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Teresita · · Score: 1

      Is that the one that's shrinking due to geothermal effects? Perhaps if we ban plastic bags in grocery stores, the magma god will be appeased.

    12. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by dbIII · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Maybe, but that's just a guess isn't it? Perhaps it's a good idea to let scientists take a look at it to understand what is going on instead of attempting to trump reality by some sort of political fiat. Even if some declare the climate has never changed since Genesis there's still a great deal of value for global weather forecasting in monitoring conditions in Antarctica - it's half the reason Scott etc went there a century ago after all.
      King Canute's lesson to his court over how political will cannot command nature is very apt. You can shout from the rooftops that nothing is happening but there is some reason why last month was the hottest September in more than a century. Putting on a blindfold is not going to help.

    13. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Ichijo · · Score: 2

      political will cannot command nature

      That's obviously false, as evidenced by the fact that the sun rises earlier when daylight saving time is in effect. If that isn't political will commanding nature, then what is? (In fact, they had to end the trial early in Arizona way back in WWII when they discovered the extra hour of sunlight was scorching the grass.)

      --
      Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
    14. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      Is that the one that's shrinking due to geothermal effects?

      Is it melting due to geothermal effects? Can you point us to a peer reviewed article which details these effects?

      You understand how your assertions are your responsibility to prove - right?

    15. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      We already have 18 years of no warming

      The last 6 months were the warmest on record for the NOAA and the GISTEMP data sets, so I think that the hiatus may have finished.

      Throughout that time there was warming, it's just that the oceans and cryosphere have seen more warming than the global mean surface temperature.

      along with every other of their claims being wrong.

      CO2 is a greenhouse gas?

      Sea level is rising?

    16. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      Perhaps it's a good idea to let scientists take a look at it to understand what is going on instead of attempting to trump reality by some sort of political fiat.

      Indeed. Whether you are worried about climate change or think many scientists are clueless fearmongers, you should still favor this. Anything that collects data and improves our understanding is a good thing.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    17. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1, Troll

      The last 6 months were the warmest on record for the NOAA and the GISTEMP data sets, so I think that the hiatus may have finished.

      NOAA ignores its own satellite records (which it previously claimed were more accurate than surface temperature measurements) to make that claim.

      And it's just like them to do so. They choose whichever dataset that supports their pre-formed conclusions. The satellite record has shown a slight but real cooling trend for a decade and a half, and a year that has actually been one of the COOLEST on record. Not the coldest ever, but right down there in the bottom 10.

      Also, sea level is not rising. That is to say, it isn't rising any faster today than it has for the last couple of hundred years. About 1-1.5 mm per year, on average.

      The amount of fudging that NOAA and its NCDC have to accomplish to make this year actually look warm, much less a record, is nothing short of incredible. I mean that word literally: in-credible.

    18. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 0, Troll

      If you don't believe, try looking HERE, and HERE.

      I have quite a collection of official government raw data that show a very different truth than what NOAA claims.

      Hell, even the majority of climate scientists admit that it hasn't really warmed for 16 years or more now. Their last best hope for explaining why their CO2-warming climate models didn't correspond with reality was that the "missing heat" was hiding in the deep ocean.

      Alas, THIS PAIR OF PAPERS shows rather solidly that there isn't any "missing heat" being stored in the deep oceans.

      Too bad, so sad. Which is sarcasm, of course. People should be celebrating (and some are). But too many are so caught up in their ties to research grants or their "CO2 religion" to admit they're looking more foolish by the day.

    19. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      That's okay. Since you can't be bothered to google it yourself, I'll help GP a bit and show you one.

    20. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 2

      NOAA ignores its own satellite records (which it previously claimed were more accurate than surface temperature measurements) to make that claim.

      Land based measurements are much more directly related to temperature, than satellites, and don't have the problems of interpreting the MSU readings as temperature, orbital drift, the fact that there have been fewer than three instruments in orbit for much of the time making calibration guesswork, and correcting for what the satellite orbits are passing over.

      I would be very surprised if NOAA every claimed that satellite derived near-surface temperatures were more accurate than met stations. Do you have a link to one of the places that they make this claim? (Or did you just make it up yourself, and hope that people would believe you?)

      And in what way did they ignore their own satellite records?

      The satellite record has shown a slight but real cooling trend for a decade and a half, and a year that has actually been one of the COOLEST on record.

      Okay, again you're going to need to provide a source. I know of two groups interpreting satellite data. There's a couple of skeptics at UHA, and their satellite temperatures show this over the last 15 years. As you can see, it shows a warming trend.

      The other is by a private company called Remote Sensing Systems. Their data looks like this. A very slight cooling, that I cannot believe would be "real cooling trend", if by real you mean statistically significant.
      (The fact that the difference in warming trends spans the difference in the warming trends of the land-based measurements is indicative that the satellite temperatures are in fact, less accurate than land based ones.)

      Also, sea level is not rising. That is to say, it isn't rising any faster today than it has for the last couple of hundred years.

      If the sea is rising, then it is warming. Sea level rise is caused by thermal expansion and by melting land ice. Both require energy in.

      But your claim that it is not accelerating does not have any consensus from the scientific community. Most people would say that it is accelerating. For instance: There is considerable variability in the rate of rise during the twentieth century but there has been a statistically significant acceleration since 1880 and 1900 of 0.009 ± 0.003 mm year2 and 0.009 ± 0.004 mm year2, respectively. - Church and White (2011)

      The amount of fudging that NOAA and its NCDC have to accomplish to make this year actually look warm, much less a record, is nothing short of incredible. I mean that word literally: in-credible.

      Given your questionable points above, I also question this conclusion. What is the basis of your claim of "fudging". Are you one of these conspiracy theorists who claim that the vast majority of scientists advance their careers by producing papers that claim results that aren't reproducible? Because that is literally in-credible.

    21. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      If you don't believe, try looking HERE [wordpress.com], and HERE [wordpress.com].

      You think if I read some anti-science blogs I would find that science is all wrong, and that the real truth can only be found in blogs that say that the scientists are all lying?

      Do you think that would help?

      What kind of luddite world are you posting from?

      I have quite a collection of official government raw data that show a very different truth than what NOAA claims.

      I suspect that this is bullshit.

      The luddite blogs you linked to only discussed the USA for a reason: There is a time of observation bias that is in one direction in that data set. For the global data set the adjustments average nearly zero.

      NOAA's claim (verified by GISTemp), is that the last 6 months are the warmest ever globally.

      Hell, even the majority of climate scientists admit that it hasn't really warmed for 16 years or more now.

      Really. Citation please.

      Their last best hope for explaining why their CO2-warming climate models didn't correspond with reality was that the "missing heat" was hiding in the deep ocean.

      That would explain sea level rising unabated, wouldn't it?

      What's the luddite explanation for that? Alas, THIS PAIR [nature.com] OF PAPERS [nature.com] shows rather solidly that there isn't any "missing heat" being stored in the deep oceans.

      I see you don't read your own links very well. From the abstract of the first paper:
      These adjustments yield large increases (2.2–7.1 × 1022 J 35 yr1) to current global upper-ocean heat content change estimates, and have important implications for sea level, the planetary energy budget and climate sensitivity assessments.

      The second paper also confirms warming, explicitly in the abstract.
      The net warming of the ocean implies an energy imbalance for the Earth of 0.64 ± 0.44 W m2 from 2005 to 2013.

      That estimate agrees with the 0.9 W/m-1 that is calculated from energy imbalance, which shows the opposite of what you claim. The warming of the oceans is consistent with accepted values of global warming.

      Too bad, so sad. Which is sarcasm, of course. People should be celebrating (and some are). But too many are so caught up in their ties to research grants or their "CO2 religion" to admit they're looking more foolish by the day.

      Pro tip: Try to get one of my facts right before calling the scientific community "foolish".

      There is probably another reason people aren't celebrating.

    22. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      That's okay. Since you can't be bothered to google it yourself, I'll help GP a bit and show you one.

      I think you may have linked to the wrong paper.

      The one you linked to doesn't have the word "geothermal" in it, and the science daily write up about the paper didn't mention this either.

    23. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by dave420 · · Score: 1

      Climate is not usually measured in periods of less than 30 years, so either you haven't got a clue, or are trying to create a reality which simply doesn't exist. You do this every time, though, so it's not surprising. You frequently get confused between sea ice and ice on the land, and use the extent of the sea ice as some sort of argument that the land ice is doing fine, when in fact the opposite is usually the case.

      Please grow up.

    24. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      Is that the one that's shrinking due to geothermal effects?

      I suspect not primarily, but it is contributing. The source I saw was 100-200mW per square metre from geothermal effects. The average warming due to the enhanced greenhouse effect is about 900mW per square metre.

      Of course glaciers tend to have high albedo, so the total effect might be closer. On the other hand Antarctica has low absolute humidity, so the CO2 greenhouse effect is stronger there (since there is a large overlap between CO2 and H2O absorbance), and the ice-albedo effect is also very strong there. (Since the ice is white, and the rock and ocean both dark).

    25. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by dave420 · · Score: 1

      The actual paper (which cites the one you linked to) says geothermal activity is responsible for part of the melting, not all of it. I'm getting used to you either lying or being confused by abstracts. It explains your ridiculous position which flies in the face of evidence.

    26. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      That's okay. Since you can't be bothered to google it yourself,

      That's right.

      I'll help GP a bit and show you one. [pnas.org]

      Did you link to the right article? The article you linked makes no mention of geothermal effects being responsible for the shrinking of the west antarctic ice sheet.

      I guess you weren't as helpful as you initially hoped?

    27. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The record breaking cold of this July, the coldest July on record for the south pole, had temperatures as low as -135.4. That explains the largest amount of sea ice Antarctica experienced this winter ever since they kept track of it with satellites in the 1970s. Amidst record breaking cold, it is therefore impossible for the globe to be "hotter than its ever been before." The only way to detect the climate is to measure daily temperatures and there simply is no other way to do so. It is also ridiculous to state that the weather will do whatever and then proclaim the climate is simply not connected to weather. For example, if I said "I just got back from Panama and we had a lot of snow there" you should be able to flatly state no, you didnt. And if I said I got back from the North Pole where it was 80 degrees you should say the same thing.
       
        Actual scientific observation should trump a wrong forecast no matter how badly your brain is washed.

    28. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Here is satellite vs land. Which one shows the hiatus? They look about the same to me. It also looks like the trend over the last half of the satellite record is greater than the trend in the first half. So what are you talking about?

    29. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Truth_Quark just said the 18 years of no warming has ended because of the last 6 months.

      So is it 30 years or 6 months? It appears it needs to be 30 years if you disagree with it and only 6 months if you agree with it. THAT is why everyone thinks people like you are not to be trusted, you constantly change your story and lie about it.

      Just yesterday I saw a story where Halloween will be canceled because of too many polar bears, yes the same bears that Al Gore told us would be extinct by now because of global warming. Its almost as if when you make a claim the world makes sure it doesn't come true.

    30. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What if it's growing? It might be nice to know that the beach-front property I'm thinking of buying will be a mile from the sea in 20 years...

    31. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Eunuchswear · · Score: 1

      The other is by a private company called Remote Sensing Systems. Their data looks like this. A very slight cooling, that I cannot believe would be "real cooling trend", if by real you mean statistically significant.

      And of course that famous AGW alarmist Dr Roy Spencer is on records as thinking that there is something wrong with the RSS dataset.

      --
      Watch this Heartland Institute video
    32. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Alas, THIS PAIR OF PAPERS shows rather solidly that there isn't any "missing heat" being stored in the deep oceans.

      Nice half-truth. You ignored that these articles (particularly the first one) do show that energy is being stored in the upper oceans.

    33. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Shatrat · · Score: 1

      They are using technology developed for fiber optic communications. I expect the fiber they are using is standard single-mode G.652 fiber, and the device they are using to measure http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B... is an OTDR, which we use in telecom to measure fiber quality and locate defects/breaks.

      --
      09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
    34. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      NOAA do NOT ignore their own satellite records.

      They never claimed it was more accurate (how could a model of how a thick volume of radiating gas being spotted miles away, turned into a temperature profile with that model and then interpreted into a surface temperature be more accurate than a thermometer you can damn well calibrate thermally?), they claimed it had far more coverage and that it agreed with the surface records that the world was warming.

      HOW THE FUCK can you make such asinine claims?

      The deniers chop and change which satellite record they want to take to "prove" cooling. None of them do. RSS is the coolest at the moment and shows +0.07C per decade warming (about half the IPCC average, but the error bars on the RSS over that period overlap the IPCC mean). But that will change as each satellite has a MODEL not a MEASURE of temperatures from irradiance figures.

    35. Re: WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh man, you're a genius for betting against the odds! If you end up being wrong, surely you could just displace all the water with your enormous balls.

    36. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Amidst record breaking cold, it is therefore impossible for the globe to be "hotter than its ever been before."

      Or at least it would be if that were true...

      last September was the hottest of them all, out of 135 Septembers going back to 1880.The same was true for August 2014. And June of 2014. And May of 2014. What that means is that for each of these months, the combined average global land and ocean surface temperature has never been higher, at least since we started recording these temperatures back in the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/10/21/temperatures-have-been-above-average-for-355-straight-months/

      If you're under 30 years old, you've never experienced a (globally) colder than average month.

    37. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      You think if I read some anti-science blogs I would find that science is all wrong, and that the real truth can only be found in blogs that say that the scientists are all lying?

      What makes you think "Steve Goddard's" blog is "anti-science"? Because it doesn't conform to your world-view? That's name-calling, not an argument.

      Goddard examines raw data records and compares against the "adjusted" data. This is what allowed him (and others) to show the massive amount of manipulation that is done to data that comes out of NCDC, and GISS in particular. GISS has been widely criticized for questionable manipulation of its data sets, and in fact not long ago it was found (by who? your "anti-science" Steve Goddard that NCDC was improperly "infilling" as much as 40% of its data in some cases from temperature stations that were offline or did not even exist.

      Not only that, NCDC publicly admitted that infilling was a problem, that they had known about it (for some unspecified time), and that they "intended to fix it" at some unspecified time in the future. Nobody knows how long they had known about it or when they intend to fix it.

      Obviously, nobody needs to "fix" something that is working properly.

      Granted, Goddard got some things wrong in the beginning, but lately he's been getting a lot more right, as even GISS has admitted.

      Further, your sources are not all "independent", since most of them incestuously rely on the same questionable data sets. It doesn't have to be "a conspiracy" or "lying", if they all work with the same questionable data. This is a valid point that people have been making for well over a decade.

      So don't sit there and tell me what your vaunted sources say, until you address the data they are all using. There are KNOWN serious problems with it. Not just minor problems; big ones.

      I suspect that this is bullshit.

      You suspect incorrectly. My "collection" consists of web links to official data, of course, it's not all right here on my hard drive. But I do have it. Don't expect me to post it all here on Slashdot. Regardless, your "suspicions" are irrelevant.

      I see you don't read your own links very well. From the abstract of the first paper: These adjustments yield large increases (2.2â"7.1 Ã-- 1022 J 35 yr1) to current global upper-ocean heat content change estimates, and have important implications for sea level, the planetary energy budget and climate sensitivity assessments.

      I see you didn't read my comment very well, AND have poor analysis skills. First, the conclusion is drawn from the second paper, which references the first. Second, the Argo array has been measuring the upper-level sea temperatures since 2005. THOSE temperatures are no surprise and have already been accounted for.

      Deep ocean warming was the last gasp attempt to show that the CO2-based warming models were sound, by discovering the "missing heat" that they predict. There is none. Therefore the CO2-based warming models are unsound.

      You can try to obfuscate this fact all you like, but it really doesn't get much simpler than that.

      Hell, even the majority of climate scientists admit that it hasn't really warmed for 16 years or more now.

      Really. Citation please.

      Seriously? Do you know absolutely nothing about the subject you are discussing, and pretending to refute me on?

      Even the latest IPCC AR report, which is of course based largely

    38. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      The actual paper (which cites the one you linked to) says geothermal activity is responsible for part of the melting, not all of it. I'm getting used to you either lying or being confused by abstracts. It explains your ridiculous position which flies in the face of evidence.

      Pardon me... do you see anywhere here where I claimed it was responsible for "all" the melting?

      Attributing words to me that I didn't write is the only lie here. Why did you do that?

    39. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      Looks like you're right. I must have gotten my links mixed up. Thank you to those who pointed this out.

      Anyway, here is a link to one paper. It isn't the only one.

    40. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1
      But again, this says that geothermal activity might contribute to mobility of the glacier, not that geothermal activity has increased over the last 100 years and is thus the cause of the west antarcitc ice shelf melting: per the GP's assertion: Is that the one that's shrinking due to geothermal effects?. The assertion you claimed was supported by scientific papers: I'll help GP a bit and show you [ a paper detailing geothermal activity as the cause of the observed melting of the west antarctic ice shelf ].

      Is there a paper that meets the criteria - or were you planning to keep posting articles on glacial mobility?

    41. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      Pardon me... do you see anywhere here where I claimed it was responsible for "all" the melting?

      So what is the cause of the rest of the melting?

    42. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He is a blogger who believes there is a global conspiracy to suppress the truth about the global temperature record. He apparently must believe that skeptics Spencer and Christy are in on the conspiracy since their satellite temperature reconstruction corroborates the surface station record. If you're getting your information from a blog that accuses scientists of fraud on a regular basis then you may be on the fringe of the internet and should not be surprised if people don't take you seriously.

    43. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      What makes you think "Steve Goddard's" blog is "anti-science"?

      Because he's got no scientific research background, and he spreads the standard anti-science agenda, for the standard George C Marshall Institute-funded culprits. If someone has a scientific point, and isn't a charlatan, they usually publish in the scholarly literature so that the scientific community can vet what they write. Going straight to the public with ideas that aren't in the literature is a sign of anti-science.

      Goddard examines raw data records and compares against the "adjusted" data.

      Then he's focussing on the USA data, because the global data's adjustment is about 0. The cause of the bias in the adjustments to the USA data is a general shift in the time of observation across the country. It's warmer and 2pm than it is at 10am. So you have to adjust if you want to compare temperatures at 10am with ones at 2pm.

      Steve Goddard that NCDC was improperly "infilling" as much as 40% of its data in some cases from temperature stations that were offline or did not even exist

      If he's doesn't understand all the adjustments, he should ask the NCDC about them, they're the experts. It is quite normal for a station to be removed for purposes of estimating the trend of a grid, if it shows signs of being anomalous. Such as a step change that didn't occur at surrounding stations, or a trend that is too different from that of surrounding stations.

      Different temperature data sets have different policies on infilling where there is no data in the grid. GISTemp interpolates from the trend in adjacent grids, or the nearest grid that does have data. HadCRU calculates the temperature based on grids that they have data for. I don't know NCDC's policy, but "infilling" is one of the things that is done.

      Not only that, NCDC publicly admitted that infilling was a problem, that they had known about it (for some unspecified time), and that they "intended to fix it" at some unspecified time in the future. Nobody knows how long they had known about it or when they intend to fix it.

      They said the temperatures are "as intended", and there was no problem. They were intending to add a flag to the final data to show which temperature stations were interpolated because of anomalous trends or step changes.

      Obviously, nobody needs to "fix" something that is working properly.

      The presence or absence of a flag on the data to show its provenance does not mean it is not working properly.

      Granted, Goddard got some things wrong in the beginning, but lately he's been getting a lot more right, as even GISS has admitted.

      Have they. Do you have a link to this admission?

      Further, your sources are not all "independent", since most of them incestuously rely on the same questionable data sets.

      There are two links. One to the CSIRO sea level rise data and one to the energy imbalance data. They don't rely on the same data, and they're not about the same thing.

      So don't sit there and tell me what your vaunted sources say, until you address the data they are all using. There are KNOWN serious problems with it. Not just minor problems; big ones

      That's not a big problem, nor a problem. Trends for stations are interpolated if the station's trend is clearly anomalous. This happens both up and down, and the net effect is almost exactly zero on the global trend.

      Cherry picking one that has been adjusted up, and making a big song and dance ignores the fact that that is not representative of the adjustments, and frankly, that the adjustments are quite correct to make.

      My "collection" consists of web links to official data, of c

    44. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by khayman80 · · Score: 1

      Granted, Goddard got some things wrong in the beginning, but lately he's been getting a lot more right, as even GISS has admitted. [Jane Q. Public]

      Have they. Do you have a link to this admission? [Truth_Quark]

      Do you really want to ask for that link? Watch what happened the last time someone asked Jane/Lonny Eachus for that link:

      GISS ADMITTED GODDARD WAS RIGHT. YOU DIDN’T KNOW. YOU’RE IGNORANT OF THE FACTS. LEARN THEM. MEANTIME, GO AWAY. [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

      Try Google, dumbshit. Unless you don’t know how. It took me all of 20 seconds. ... Why? Why should I do this for you? Would you like me to wash your balls too? Answer: no. ... The fact I WON’T wash your balls for you is not evidence that they don’t exist. The fact that YOU won’t, IS. ... Correct. To all outside observers, so far, your balls don’t exist. Why don’t you prove that they do? show us. ... Should we just ASSUME it? Or, like you, should we require that you SHOW US? ... To make an even better analogy: there is a picture of them that has been posted online by your girlfriend. ... BUT we don’t believe you really have any. Should we ask you to prove they’re yours? Every time we discuss it? [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

      Sorry, dude. You aren’t going to get me to wash your balls. The rest of us are looking at pictures of your girlfriend. wondering when you’re going to say “I won’t hang them out again just for you. Look it up.” [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

      Are you REALLY that fucking stupid? [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

      I’ve insulted you because you deserve it. Arguments were made. Your inability to absorb them is not evidence. [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

      I guarantee something: that doesn’t make ME an asshole. I’ll leave it up to others what it does mean. [Lonny Eachus, 2014-08-30]

    45. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      Try Google, dumbshit. Unless you don’t know how. It took me all of 20 seconds.

      Hmmm. Doesn't inspire confidence does it?

      Since GISS's is the Goddard Institute of Space Studies, googling "GISS" and "Goddard" gets a lot of hits. GISS and "Steve Goddard" gets a whole stack of denier blogs.

      I'm going to call this Myth Busted on the 20 seconds claim alone.

    46. Re: WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by thejuggler · · Score: 1

      No http://www.skepticalscience.co...

      Sorry but that article claims the heat is going into the ocean. However, NASA says NO it's not. http://science.nasa.gov/scienc... Again real science trumps.

    47. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      Ah, the muckraker troll rears his head again.

      Would you all like to see his dumbass failure at trying to school me in thermodynamics? All you have to do is follow his comments back a ways. A long ways... because he kept making the same nonsense arguments, over, and over, and over again, even after he had been shown how wrong they were.

      I will invite everyone to my complete writeup (which, unlike his comments, won't take others out of context or distort their statements... I promise a true accounting). This will take quite a while since he was actually trolling about this for over two years, in various forums.

    48. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      I'm going to call this Myth Busted on the 20 seconds claim alone.

      You call it wrong. If all you did was Google "GISS" and "Goddard", that's a pretty obvious fail. You look pretty silly basing any call on that.

      You know, it's funny how "khayman80", and people like you, who write in ways that are remarkably similar, tend to pop up at the same time in the same places. And in particular, much like the comments by "khayman80", all of "your" comments seem to be about global warming (aka "climate change").

      Hmmmm.... I think I smell yet another sockpuppet. Does anybody know how long "Truth_Quark" has been around Slashdot?

    49. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      So what is the cause of the rest of the melting?

      Why the hell are you asking me? I simply pointed to a paper about volcanic activity under the Western ice sheet. Did you see me anywhere here claiming I was an expert about it?

      My suggestion would be to go find someone who is loudly proclaiming their vast knowledge of the subject... then ask someone else, and you are probably more likely to get the truth.

      But I specifically deny expertise about the Western ice sheet. Maybe I'll go learn about it.

    50. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      The assertion you claimed was supported by scientific papers: I'll help GP a bit and show you [ a paper detailing geothermal activity as the cause of the observed melting of the west antarctic ice shelf ].

      That is very far from what I actually stated. GP claimed not to have seen any papers about geothermal activity. I supplied one. End of story. I did not claim it was any kind of proof of what anybody else said.

      Don't try to put words in my mouth, unless you want to make an instant enemy. That's not ethical.

    51. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      You call it wrong.

      Prove it.
      If you can find it in 20 seconds, you could have settled it to much better satisfaction by providing the link.
      I'm also going to call this myth busted on failure on your part to find it as well as failure on my part to find it.

      If all you did was Google "GISS" and "Goddard", that's a pretty obvious fail.

      From the post to which you are replying:
      GISS and "Steve Goddard" gets a whole stack of denier blogs.

      You know, it's funny how "khayman80", and people like you, who write in ways that are remarkably similar, tend to pop up at the same time in the same places. And in particular, much like the comments by "khayman80", all of "your" comments seem to be about global warming (aka "climate change").

      It's certainly one of my interests.

      Hmmmm.... I think I smell yet another sockpuppet. Does anybody know how long "Truth_Quark" has been around Slashdot?

      The Userids are sequential, n00b.

    52. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      That is very far from what I actually stated. GP claimed not to have seen any papers about geothermal activity.

      The GP said this: Is that the [west antarctic ice shelf] that's shrinking due to geothermal effects?

      I asked for proof of this alleged causation, in the usual form of a scientific paper detailing the causation.

      You, for some reason, butted in and said: I'll help GP a bit and show you one.

      There is no logical explanation for this, except that you claiming the associated papers were proof of causation. Further i later explicitly described your attempts as an attempt to demonstrate causation:

      Did you link to the right article? The article you linked makes no mention of geothermal effects being responsible for the shrinking of the west antarctic ice sheet.

      I didn't see anybody claiming that there were no papers pertaining to geothermal activity. You must think we all share your self professed ignorance.

      Don't try to put words in my mouth, unless you want to make an instant enemy. That's not ethical.

      I'll put YOUR words into your mouth anytime it pleases me to do so.

    53. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think I smell yet another sockpuppet

      This is my favorite of Jane's neuroses. Jane would prefer to think that everyone who disagrees with him are pawns of some maniacal puppet master.rather than grapple with the fact that he holds a fringe position.

    54. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1
      No. I was responding specifically to this question of yours:

      Can you point us to a peer reviewed article which details these effects?

      I pointed you to a peer-reviewed article that details warming due to geothermal effects. I provided a reasonable reply to the question. If that good enough for your taste, too bad.

      I asked for proof of this alleged causation, in the usual form of a scientific paper detailing the causation.

      You asked the question I quoted above, verbatim. That was the question I was responding to.

      You, for some reason, butted in and said: I'll help GP a bit and show you one.

      I "butted in" because I am sick and fucking tired of people who can't spend 2 minutes on Google and look something up, and incessantly demand somebody else do it for them.

      There is no logical explanation for this, except that you claiming the associated papers were proof of causation.

      Then you have a pretty weird idea of what constitutes logic.

      I didn't see anybody claiming that there were no papers pertaining to geothermal activity.

      I refer you again to the question I quoted above. If I misunderstood your question, perhaps you should have stated it more clearly.

      You must think we all share your self professed ignorance.

      I professed no ignorance; I merely disclaimed expertise. This seems to be another attempt to put words in my mouth. Your "logic" failed you again.

      I'll put YOUR words into your mouth anytime it pleases me to do so.

      Then why don't you try actually doing so, rather than the distorted versions you did print? You have misunderstood my clear statements at least twice, and insinuated that I stated things in this exchange that I did not in fact state.

      You can probably do better, if you simply try to stick to what other people actually wrote, instead of trying to put your own "spin" or interpretation on it.

    55. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      I was responding specifically to this question of yours: Can you point us to a peer reviewed article which details these effects?

      You mean my question about the causal effects of the melting ice shelf. Unless you are claiming to know better than I what I meant?

      I pointed you to a peer-reviewed article that details warming due to geothermal effects. I provided a reasonable reply to the question. If that good enough for your taste, too bad.

      You admit you posted some irrelevant cites. We are still waiting for a relevant cite btw.

      I "butted in" because I am sick and fuc -

      Nope. Don't care.

      I refer you again to the question I quoted above. If I misunderstood your question, perhaps you should have stated it more clearly.

      Entry criteria is a basic grasp of english comprehension. Your failure is not my problem.

      You must think we all share your self professed ignorance.

      I professed no ignorance;

      So you DO know what is causing the west antarctic ice shelf to melt? What is this cause?

      I'll put YOUR words into your mouth anytime it pleases me to do so.

      Then why don't you try actually doing so, rather than the distorted versions you did print?

      You deny saying : I'll help GP a bit and show you?

    56. Re:WTF, the antarctic gets FO before me? by KeensMustard · · Score: 1

      But I specifically deny expertise about the Western ice sheet. Maybe I'll go learn about it.

      I suggest you do.

  3. Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Every scientist says it's irreversible. So what's the point if we're doomed regardless?

    1. Re:Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      whats good enough for a common sense person, not good enough for a liberal.

  4. Selfish by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    All I have to do is read they're laying fiber optic in such a remote place. Can't even feed the world's starving children

    1. Re:Selfish by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We tried feeding fibre optics to starving children but it turns out they have no nutritional value. (The fibre optics, not the children. Actually, the children too.)

  5. Gramling Says What? by nicoleb_x · · Score: 2

    TFA by Carolyn Gramling is a real piece of work. It makes scary claims and then links to articles that make no such claims. I guess that is what staff editors do for us.

  6. This is not science by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They're starting with an assumption then trying to prove it.

    1. Re: This is not science by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So in your world testing a hypothesis isn't science?

    2. Re:This is not science by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      They're starting with an assumption then trying to prove it.

      What assumption are they starting with?

      They're measuring the temperature of the ice. Making good measurements is science.

    3. Re: This is not science by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Informative

      So in your world testing a hypothesis isn't science?

      Strictly speaking, testing a hypothesis is the opposite, it's trying to prove the hypothesis false. The more you fail at disproving, the more likely it is to be correct.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  7. Re:Sounds silly by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

    Fiber optics in Antarctica sounds extravagant and silly,

    You realize that it's not being used for telecommunication, right? It's being used to measure the temperature of the ice.

  8. Now this pisses me off by dargaud · · Score: 2

    Over a decade ago I submitted a project to carry data in Antarctica by a 1500km fiber for a large project. It was shut down by the Americans because according to the Antarctic Treaty you cannot leave anything in Antarctica permanently. Now the US has this project (how are they gonna get it out of the Ice ?), Ice Cube (which has thousands of detectors under km of ice) and others...

    --
    Non-Linux Penguins ?
    1. Re:Now this pisses me off by Neil+Boekend · · Score: 1

      That's because that will be there for permanent - 1 day.

      --
      Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
    2. Re:Now this pisses me off by Truth_Quark · · Score: 1

      Over a decade ago I submitted a project to carry data in Antarctica by a 1500km fiber for a large project. It was shut down by the Americans because according to the Antarctic Treaty you cannot leave anything in Antarctica permanently.

      I think that they pull it back up when they're done, as they did last year:
      Although Tyler’s team pulled its instruments out of the borehole in January 2013, the mooring that held the cable in place remains frozen into the ice shelf, he says—and the team hopes they can get back to it for a longer term monitoring project.

  9. Re:Sounds silly by smooth+wombat · · Score: 1

    but it is the left's investment in ongoing hysteria.

    Sort of like the right's hysteria over Ebola. Less than 5K deaths on the entire planet and they panic, completely ignoring the 50K+ deaths from flu or the 30K+ roadway deaths which occur in this country every year.

    --
    We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
  10. Irrelevant by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    The area of the ice is irrelevant. It affects albedo, but that is insufficient to cancel out the influence of contaminants like excessive CO2. What we care about is the mass of the ice, and we covered here fairly recently how that has decreased sufficiently to measure gravitationally.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  11. Jane's makin' stuff up. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It looks like the RSS team agrees: "A similar, but stronger case can be made using surface temperature datasets, which I consider to be more reliable than satellite datasets." - http://www.remss.com/blog/recent-slowing-rise-global-temperatures

    The RSS satellite temperature reconstruction is the minority report. The UAH satellite temperature reconstruction agrees largely with the surface station datasets. The contrarians want to hang their hat on the minority report. Strange that.

  12. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    ... Would you all like to see his dumbass failure at trying to school me in thermodynamics? All you have to do is follow his comments back a ways. A long ways... because he kept making the same nonsense arguments, over, and over, and over again, even after he had been shown how wrong they were. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-22]

    Jane keeps insisting that this Sky Dragon Slayer equation describes electrical heating power:

    My energy conservation equation is this: electrical power in = (epsilon * sigma) * T^4 * area = radiant power out [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-08]

    Once again, that violates conservation of energy. Draw a boundary around the heat source:
    power in = electrical heating power + radiative power in from the chamber walls
    power out = radiative power out from the heat source

    Jane's equation wrongly cancels "radiative power in" with a nonexistent term.

    The BASIS of “greenhouse warming” -- back radiation -- has been SCIENTIFICALLY shown to be a load of hogwash. [Lonny Eachus, 2014-10-14]

    No, Jane/Lonny Eachus's Slayer nonsense has been scientifically shown to violate conservation of energy. Unless, of course, Jane/Lonny can finally write down an energy conservation equation before wrongly "cancelling" terms?

    It's fascinating that Jane/Lonny Eachus keeps insisting that mainstream physics is a hogwash dumbass failure. Jane/Lonny just needs to inform "dumbasses" like Prof. Brown, Dr. Joel Shore, physicists in the National Academies of Science, the American Institute of Physics, the American Physical Society, the Australian Institute of Physics, the European Physical Society, etc.

    Jane/Lonny's Sky Dragon Slayer nonsense is so ridiculous that even prominent climate contrarians are rational enough to back away from the Slayers:

    • Dr. Fred Singer finds it "surprising that this simplistic argument is used by physicists, and even by professors who teach thermodynamics. One can show them data of downwelling infrared radiation from CO2, water vapor, and clouds, which clearly impinge on the surface. But their minds are closed to any such evidence." The comments prove his point.
    • Dr. Roy Spencer "clearly demonstrates that IR absorbing gases (greenhouse gases) reduce the Earth's ability to cool to outer space. No amount of obfuscation or strawman arguments in the comments section, below, will be able to get around this fact."
    • Anthony Watts banned one of the original authors because of his nutty comments and later called the argument
    1. Re:Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      Jane keeps insisting that this Sky Dragon Slayer equation describes electrical heating power:

      In a particular, very specific context, which you have not bothered to explain here.

      No, Jane/Lonny Eachus's Slayer nonsense has been scientifically shown to violate conservation of energy.

      No, it hasn't. It has been "khayman80 shown to violate something... I'm not sure what. But you "scientifically" show squat... you didn't even use the appropriate equations for the context of the problem under discussion.

      I repeat: your use of a heat transfer equation, rather than a radiant power equation, to calculate the radiant power output of the hottest object in an isolated vacuum environment is just laughable. Your own "power in = power out" claim shows it to be wrong. It contradicts your own calculations, which I showed to be wrong 3 different ways. Hell, you even got some simple math wrong.

      Your repeated, out-of context claims notwithstanding.

      I repeat: I will be publishing this for all to see. Your repeated protests are only going to make you look that much more foolish... or dishonest. I'll let the readers decide on that one.

    2. Re:Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      Once again, Jane confuses "radiant power output" with "electrical heating power".

      I haven't "confused" anything. I understand perfectly well how you think your own erroneous "solution" to the problem worked... or more accurately, didn't work.

      I am very definitely not the party here who is confused.

      Or maybe Jane could listen to Prof. Brian Cox. Jane/Lonny Eachus likes Prof. Brian Cox and is very bothered by the fact that Prof. Cox agrees with mainstream physics.

      No, once again you've put words in my mouth that I never actually stated. Why have you kept doing that? Are you allergic to simply telling the truth?

      The experiment we were discussing was Spencer's radiation experiment. Not "global warming". You keep trying to apply my arguments about Spencer's challenge to the broader issue of global warming, aka "climate change", and it's not valid to do so. I have not argued with you about that in many months, and I do not intend to argue further with you about that... because you do not argue honestly. That isn't an idle comment; I have pages and pages of proof.

      If you want to ask him about what amounts to a pretty straightforward textbook radiation problem, go right ahead. But I already know the answer -- which, in fact, I got from textbooks on the subject -- so I don't have to bet. You go ahead, if you want to.

      The only reason I agreed to work through the Spencer experiment with you was because I already knew you were wrong, and wanted the chance to show that to everybody, unequivocally. Well, I got that chance. And as soon as I get it written up (which as I have stated before will take a while), I fully intend to show everybody. You asked me if I really was willing to publish the results, no matter the outcome. Well, now that in fact it didn't go well for you, sour grapes isn't going to get you anywhere.

      I have no other business with you, or arguments with you. If you try to argue with me I will not respond, except (possibly) to show others where you err and misquote me. And maybe not even then.

    3. Re:Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1
      (Note: once again, I am not writing this for your benefit, because we've been over all this before. This is for other readers.)

      Once again, how bizarre. The whole reason Slayers deny that an enclosed source warms is because that implies greenhouse gases can't warm the surface:

      I stipulated before we got into that discussion that we were discussing ONLY Spencer's experiment, nothing else. You agreed to that condition. And now, you're violating it by extrapolating my comments to a completely different context. Which is no surprise to me at all. And it is equally of no interest to me, except where you distort my meaning by using my words out of context.

      In other words: bok bok bok BOKKKKK. That's what I thought. Jane/Lonny Eachus is chicken.

      Hahahaha. I have already stated my reasons, so let's be clear: I already know the answer to the problem, and that answer is supported by multiple textooks and experts in the field. So please explain to me what possible motivation I might have to bother, much less bet, Prof. Cox about it?

      As I wrote earlier, if you feel you would like to make such a bet, go ahead. If I had been "afraid" of what you would find, I would not have encouraged you to do so. I just have zero reason to do it myself.

      If Jane/Lonny Eachus were a real skeptic, he'd at least consider the possibility that Jane's "radiant power output" equation doesn't describe "electrical heating power". Jane's textbooks don't say to use a "radiant power output" equation to describe "electrical heating power".

      If I were a "real skeptic", I would have researched the real answer to this problem. But wait... I actually did! Unlike you, who found some equation for "electrical heating power" which applies to a space that is air-filled and subject to conduction and convection, I looked up the actual power equations for a vacuum-filled space with only radiant heat transfer.

      And Prof. Cox isn't alone, not by any stretch of the imagination. For instance, Grant Petty is a professor of atmospheric science and wrote A First Course in Atmospheric Radiation. He wrote a letter:

      Spencer's experiment is not "atmospheric radiation". It involves a vacuum.

      The rest of your comment is similar irrelevant straw-man fluff, attempting to support your fallacy.

    4. Re:Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      No, I found a principle called "conservation of energy" which states that power in = power out through a boundary where nothing inside is changing.

      I am familiar with the principle and I made use of it in my calculations.

      If you want me to ask him instead, then I'll send him this tweet:

      @ProfBrianCox, an electrically heated plate is in a vacuum chamber with cooler walls. Does heating power depend on the wall temperature?

      Hahaha. You slay me. (Pun intended.) First, you asked me to make him a BET, but you're not willing to do it yourself? Second, you honestly expect a tweet to describe the actual conditions of the experiment? It took us something like 2 days to even agree on that, with hundreds of lines of messages back and forth.

      I do not take such things very seriously. Either send him an honest and full description of the problem (and I would want to see it to make sure you were being honest, because you haven't always been), or shut up about it. I am tired of your games.

    5. Re:Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1

      Once again, I never asked you to make him a bet. I'm betting you $100 that Prof. Cox agrees that "electrical heating power" depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature.

      Well, pardon me for not reading it carefully. But that's because you've conducted yourself in a way that is impossible to take seriously.

      It's bizarre that Jane now insists that this disagreement requires hundreds of lines. Just yesterday, Jane said:

      I have the pages and pages of exchanges we had over agreeing on the initial conditions of the experiment. Denying that won't make them disappear.

      ... If you want to ask him about what amounts to a pretty straightforward textbook radiation problem, go right ahead. But I already know the answer -- which, in fact, I got from textbooks on the subject -- so I don't have to bet. You go ahead, if you want to

      It *IS* a pretty straightforward radiation problem. I didn't claim it was complex, I stated that it took a while to be sure we were agreeing on what the initial conditions are.

      Once again you display your talent for distorting another person's meaning. The fact that describing the problem would take much more than a simple tweet does not mean -- or even imply -- that it is a particularly difficult problem. It isn't, despite your strenuous attempts to make it so.

      @ProfBrianCox, an electrically heated plate is in a vacuum chamber with cooler walls. Does heating power depend on the wall temperature?

      Yes, it is a simple yes or no question. But it doesn't sufficiently describe the problem. For just one example, you haven't mentioned that the walls are being actively cooled. You aren't explaining that the input power to the heater is fixed. You haven't mentioned the geometry or the dimensions of the objects we discussed... on and on and on.

      The fact that your proposed tweet is a simple yes-or-no question is irrelevant. It's not the same question.

      Jane, my answer is "yes". What's yours? What answer do you think mainstream physicists would give to this simple yes/no question?

      Since that wasn't the question I was answering, again this is irrelevant. Far too much is left out. You're really good at these straw-man arguments, but that doesn't make them anything more than straw-man arguments.

      And you consistently neglect the fact that it was MY solution to the problem that was quite literally represented the textbook, "mainstream" physics. Not the "khayman80" theory about how it should work.

      I repeat: why don't you pick up a textbook and find out for yourself?

  13. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    ... I repeat: your use of a heat transfer equation, rather than a radiant power equation, to calculate the radiant power output of the hottest object in an isolated vacuum environment is just laughable. Your own "power in = power out" claim shows it to be wrong. It contradicts your own calculations, which I showed to be wrong 3 different ways. Hell, you even got some simple math wrong. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-23]

    Once again, Jane confuses "radiant power output" with "electrical heating power". Since "electrical heating power" is zero if the chamber walls are at the same temperature as the source, Jane is simply wrong to use a "radiant power output" equation to describe "electrical heating power". As I just explained, mainstream physicists and even most climate contrarians agree that "electrical heating power" has to account for the chamber wall temperature.

    If Jane tried just once to write down an energy conservation equation for a boundary around the source without wrongly "cancelling" terms, he'd realize that this Slayer nonsense is wrong.

    Or maybe Jane could listen to Prof. Brian Cox. Jane/Lonny Eachus likes Prof. Brian Cox and is very bothered by the fact that Prof. Cox agrees with mainstream physics. Jane/Lonny urges Prof. Cox to take time from his obviously busy schedule to review the actual state of the science on this extremely important subject.

    Jane/Lonny seems to think that physicists just need to be told the glorious Sky Dragon Slayer "truth" and then they'll happily abandon conservation of energy. Maybe Jane/Lonny Eachus could convince physicists like Prof. Cox by finally writing down an energy conservation equation for a boundary around the source without wrongly "cancelling" terms? Or maybe Jane/Lonny could just ask Prof. Cox if the required electrical heating power depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature?

    I bet Jane/Lonny Eachus $100 that Prof. Cox answers "yes" to the previous question. Is Jane/Lonny Eachus chicken?

  14. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    ... The experiment we were discussing was Spencer's radiation experiment. Not "global warming". You keep trying to apply my arguments about Spencer's challenge to the broader issue of global warming, aka "climate change", and it's not valid to do so. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-25]

    Once again, how bizarre. The whole reason Slayers deny that an enclosed source warms is because that implies greenhouse gases can't warm the surface:

    .. the CO2-warming model rely on the concept of "back radiation", which physicists (not climate scientists) have proved to be impossible. I'm happy to leave actual climate science to climate scientists. But when THEIR models rely on a fundamental misunderstanding of physics, I'll take the physicists' word for it, thank you very much. .. [Jane Q. Public, 2012-07-05]

    ... The only reason I agreed to work through the Spencer experiment with you was because I already knew you were wrong, and wanted the chance to show that to everybody, unequivocally. Well, I got that chance. And as soon as I get it written up (which as I have stated before will take a while), I fully intend to show everybody. You asked me if I really was willing to publish the results, no matter the outcome. Well, now that in fact it didn't go well for you, sour grapes isn't going to get you anywhere. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-25]

    If Jane is so sure that his Sky Dragon Slayer nonsense is correct, why can't he write down a simple energy conservation equation around the heated source without wrongly "cancelling" terms? Ironically, this is the very first equation needed to understand Spencer's experiment. And Jane can't even get the first equation right. Prof. Cox is right: this isn't even degree-level physics.

    Jane, if you tried just once to write down an energy conservation equation for a boundary around the source without wrongly "cancelling" terms, you'd realize all this Slayer nonsense is wrong.

    ... maybe Jane/Lonny could just ask Prof. Cox if the required electrical heating power depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature? I bet Jane/Lonny Eachus $100 that Prof. Cox answers "yes" to the previous question. Is Jane/Lonny Eachus chicken?

    ... If you want to ask him about what amounts to a pretty straightforward textbook radiation problem, go right ahead. But I already know the answer -- which, in fact, I got from textbooks on the subject -- so I don't have to bet. You go ahead, if you want to. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-]

    In other words: bok bok bok BOKKKKK. That's what I thought. Jane/Lonny Eachus is chicken.

    If Jane/Lonny Eachus were a real skeptic, he'd at least consider the possibility that Jane's "radiant power output" equation doesn't describe "electrical heating power". Jane's textbooks don't say to use a "radiant power output" equation to describe "electrical heating power".

    That's why Jane is too chicken to ask Prof. Cox if electrical heating power depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature. Because Jane's afraid that Prof. Cox will say yes. If not, why did Prof. Cox say all these things?

    Remember,

  15. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    ... If I were a "real skeptic", I would have researched the real answer to this problem. But wait... I actually did! Unlike you, who found some equation for "electrical heating power" which applies to a space that is air-filled and subject to conduction and convection, I looked up the actual power equations for a vacuum-filled space with only radiant heat transfer. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-26]

    No, I found a principle called "conservation of energy" which states that power in = power out through a boundary where nothing inside is changing.

    This is a very fundamental physics principle.

    In contrast, Jane found a "radiant power out" equation, and wrongly assumed that "electrical heating power = radiant power out" without even trying to write down an energy conservation equation without wrongly "cancelling" terms.

    If Jane tried to write down that energy conservation equation just once, he'd realize that "radiant power out" isn't equal to "electrical heating power".

    ... maybe Jane/Lonny could just ask Prof. Cox if the required electrical heating power depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature? I bet Jane/Lonny Eachus $100 that Prof. Cox answers "yes" to the previous question. Is Jane/Lonny Eachus chicken?

    ... I already know the answer to the problem, and that answer is supported by multiple textooks and experts in the field. So please explain to me what possible motivation I might have to bother, much less bet, Prof. Cox about it? ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-26]

    I didn't suggest that you bet Prof. Cox. I'm betting you $100 that Prof. Cox agrees that "electrical heating power" depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature.

    Jane's only possible motivation to bother would be if Jane has a single shred of skepticism and curiosity, and if Jane has any respect for Prof. Cox.

    The reason I suggested Jane ask Prof. Cox is because Jane simply dismisses any physicist who disagrees with him. I've repeatedly failed to convince Jane that he might want to write down an energy conservation equation to determine "electrical heating power". But Jane might listen if a physicist he respects tells him that electrical heating power depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature.

    ... If I had been "afraid" of what you would find, I would not have encouraged you to do so. I just have zero reason to do it myself. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-26]

    If you want me to ask him instead, then I'll send him this tweet:

    @ProfBrianCox, an electrically heated plate is in a vacuum chamber with cooler walls.
    Does heating power depend on the wall temperature?

    Jane, it's okay if you don't want to bet money. But I'll only ask Prof. Cox that question if you promise not to start calling him a dumbshit dumbass fucking moron idiot if he says yes. That hasn't been very educational.

    I'll ask Prof. Cox that question, but only if Jane promises that if Prof. Cox says "yes", Jane will at least try to write down an energy conservation equation without wrongly "cancelling" terms to determine "electrical heating power".

    Deal?

  16. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    If you want me to ask him instead, then I'll send him this tweet:

    @ProfBrianCox, an electrically heated plate is in a vacuum chamber with cooler walls.
    Does heating power depend on the wall temperature?

    Hahaha. You slay me. (Pun intended.) First, you asked me to make him a BET, but you're not willing to do it yourself? Second, you honestly expect a tweet to describe the actual conditions of the experiment? It took us something like 2 days to even agree on that, with hundreds of lines of messages back and forth.

    I do not take such things very seriously. Either send him an honest and full description of the problem (and I would want to see it to make sure you were being honest, because you haven't always been), or shut up about it. I am tired of your games. [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-26]

    Once again, I never asked you to make him a bet. I'm betting you $100 that Prof. Cox agrees that "electrical heating power" depends on the cooler vacuum chamber wall temperature.

    It's bizarre that Jane now insists that this disagreement requires hundreds of lines. Just yesterday, Jane said:

    ... If you want to ask him about what amounts to a pretty straightforward textbook radiation problem, go right ahead. But I already know the answer -- which, in fact, I got from textbooks on the subject -- so I don't have to bet. You go ahead, if you want to. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-25]

    This is a pretty straightforward textbook radiation problem. Jane, this is a simple yes/no question:

    @ProfBrianCox, an electrically heated plate is in a vacuum chamber with cooler walls.
    Does heating power depend on the wall temperature?

    Jane, my answer is "yes". What's yours? What answer do you think mainstream physicists would give to this simple yes/no question?

  17. Jane/Lonny Eachus goes Sky Dragon Slayer by khayman80 · · Score: 1

    ... Yes, it is a simple yes or no question. But it doesn't sufficiently describe the problem. For just one example, you haven't mentioned that the walls are being actively cooled. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-27]

    That's because it doesn't matter whether the walls are actively cooled. Their temperature affects electrical heating power regardless.

    ... You aren't explaining that the input power to the heater is fixed. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-27]

    It doesn't matter if electrical heating power is constant. Even if the source temperature is held constant rather than electrical heating power, the electrical heating power still depends on the cooler chamber wall temperature.

    ... You haven't mentioned the geometry or the dimensions of the objects we discussed... on and on and on. The fact that your proposed tweet is a simple yes-or-no question is irrelevant. It's not the same question. ... [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-27]

    The dimensions and geometry also don't matter. Regardless of size or shape, electrical heating power still depends on the cooler chamber wall temperature. And that's exactly what Jane denies:

    My energy conservation equation is this: electrical power in = (epsilon * sigma) * T^4 * area = radiant power out [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-08]

    Jane got the very first equation wrong, because Jane refuses to write down an energy conservation equation for a boundary around the source without wrongly "cancelling" terms. If he tried to do this just once, he'd realize that electrical heating power depends on the cooler chamber wall temperature.

    ... And you consistently neglect the fact that it was MY solution to the problem that was quite literally represented the textbook, "mainstream" physics. Not the "khayman80" theory about how it should work. I repeat: why don't you pick up a textbook and find out for yourself? [Jane Q. Public, 2014-10-27]

    Again, I'm trying to point out that you and the other Slayers misunderstood your textbooks. Electrical heating power depends on the cooler chamber wall temperature. "Radiant power output" doesn't. Sky Dragon Slayers have confused two completely different fundamental concepts.

    Jane, if you're so sure that electrical heating power doesn't depend on the cooler chamber wall temperature... why not just ask Prof. Cox if it does?

    It's pretty clear that you're just scared he'll say "yes", which would mean that your entire calculation is wrong, from the very first equation.