It's complex = we don't know = lets not roll-back the industrial age because of it just yet. Far more important problems for humanity exist. If only they could get 1/2 the attention this non-story gets they'd be solved already.
By the way, the biggest emitters of methane on Earth are Termites. Are you also anti-termite?
If you want to know all about how "peer-review" works in climatology, I suggest you take a look at climateaudit.org. If that doesn't shock you into a healthy skepticism for all climate scientists, I don't know what will.
Here's what is says: "However, the situation in the 20th century is more complicated. There is some evidence that increases in solar heating may have led to some warming early in the 20th century, but direct satellite measurements show no appreciable change in solar heating over the last three decades.".
To be clear about this "debunking", what it is in-fact saying is that there is evidence solar irradiance led to a rise in temperatures early this century. It admits the system is "complicated" - a euphemism for "we don't know". How is it you are so confident?
I think you'll find the fancy theory is that which claims the link between global warming and man-made CO2. At the very least, the case is over-stated as are the implausible chains of inference used to justify the possible consequences.
That wasn't a debunking. It was a rather poor attempt at providing alternate explanations other than the blindingly obvious (the evidence for which is equally lacking). Because the blindingly obvious is not supported by the evidence we have so far accrued it does not mean that the blindingly obvious is in fact wrong. It could equally well mean that we haven't studied the blindingly obvious for long enough or hard enough because we have been too busy spending research grants on the blindingly alarmist.
It's a shame that so much focus is placed on a rise in temperature of a few tenths of a degree along with a whole bunch of unsubstantiated scare stories about consequences, to the exclusion of all of the other problems there are in the world. Deforestation, over-population and over-fishing are probably an order of magnitude worse for the biosphere than a small temperature increase (which may well have more positive benefits than negative in terms of bio-diversity). Perhaps it would be better for Gore to spend his time promoting the spending of an annual 1/4 trillion dollars on those things (even half that amount would fix a whole lot). If you really want to see how sound are the calculations and peer-review processes involved in all of this climate hand-wringing, check out climateaudit.org. You'll be very surprised at what you find.
Hey NBC: I have chosen not to have cable, but want to pay you for Heroes. Guess what my only alternative will be if you pull it from iTunes? Shows that I absolutely love I have no problem spending $ on, because I kind-of appreciate them. For instance, I can't get Sci-fi channel with my freeview (in the UK), so I have to wait until BSG II series airs before buying it on DVD. I think for a weekends entertainment (I'll watch the whole lot through on a single weekend), it's pretty good value for money.
Yep I used Minix at Uni - modified the memory manager to use a different allocation algorithm!
I was going to ask the same question - why did Linux take off the way it did?
1) Maverick Scientist has an Idea.
2) Other scientists deride the Idea.
3) SF Writers use Idea as image of bleak future.
4) Academics debate Idea.
5) Politicians begins to discuss the Idea, but don't understand it.
6) General Public ignores the Idea.
Growth
7) Champion arrives to actively promote and publicize Idea.
8) Scientists form a consensus that agrees with Idea.
9) Academics teach Idea as fact.
10) Fast Adapters change lifestyle, ridicule General Public.
11) Hollywood makes disaster movie, sometimes based on SF novel from 3.
12) General Public makes token lifestyle changes.
13) Politicians use Idea to attack political enemies.
Hysteria
14) Scientific consensus begins ruthlessly crushing dissent.
15) Champion is hailed as Messianic Leader.
16) Academics announce society is doomed.
17) General public accepts Idea.
18) Opponents of Idea are cast as wicked and immoral.
19) Music Industry holds benefit, sometimes using film name from 11.
Critical Mass
20) Dissenting Scientist proposes alternative theory to Idea.
21) Scientific consensus denounces Dissenting Scientist.
22) Messianic Leader begins making ludicrous claims unrelated to Idea.
23) Politicians propose massive social, fiscal, and moral changes to accommodate Idea.
24) Time Magazine puts Maverick Scientist, Messiah, Idea, or all 3 on cover.
Death and Rebirth
25) Dissenting Scientist is proven to be right, nothing happens.
26) Scientists form new consensus, claim they knew all along.
27) Fast Adapters are ridiculed by General Public.
28) Academics continue to teach Idea as "compelling theory".
29) Politicians raise taxes, just in case.
30) Messiah and Entertainment Industry find new Maverick Scientist.
31) Return to Step 1
You forget that despite what CCP tell you, it's Policy. They have an obvious interest in controlling the course of events in the game (just look at what's happened to the China server). However, the fact the game doesn't naturally balance and needs frequent interventions is one of several fundamental flaws in design, not a problem of individual or group play.
EVE Online would appear to be the perfect example of what happens if Devs appear to be *too* involved in playing the game, yet as any MMO player will attest - forums are filled with people crying about Devs not having "real-World experience of the problems class x is having". Seems like they're damned if they do, damned if they don't.
Except it isn't. People cry about the problems their class have regardless of whether or not the Developers are playing the game. The difference is one of perception. The other guy always looks to have an advantage. The current fashion in Eve is "amarr is teh suck!".
Ultimately this huge controversy, whilst ultimately of little interest to me as an outsider, has given me a fresh outlook and sympathy towards MMORPG developers.
There are two ways developers can play their own game:
(1) With complete transparency, "I AM A DEVELOPER"
(2) With secrecy, "I AM wtfpwndn00b I press all teh sekret buttons"
It's a no-brainer that in the latter case you will get "corruption" because of interactions between guild/corp leaders and the developers (in this case, via MSN). Previous abuses include but are not limited to giving your corporation resources you have given yourself (by virtue of being a developer), tactical information about fleet operations from the enemy (from your l33t developer console), pre-warning about Eve-wide events so your corp/guild can just ride in and win it and of course lets not forget the banning of players who ask pesky questions and expose the above abuses.
But you know, Eve encourages Scamming and things like that. Criminal activity really is the most lauded form of interaction. For the player-base to complain about dev corruption seems to me to set the seal once and for all on this game's reputation as a complete and utter turd.
(Declaring my interest: I played it since beta for 3 years on and off)
One event? I played Crime Online since beta for about 3 years on and off. Meta-gaming is rife. Dev "misconduct" is rife. The player-base has long since moved to the lowest common denominator. I can't think of a place I would least like to spend my evenings hanging out in.
I have to disagree. There are positives and negatives. For example, your commercial channels have produced high quality shows like ER, Friends, The Sopranos, Battlestar Galactica, House etc. etc. The problem the US has is that the proportion of crap is probably greater, but then you have 1,000 channels and we only have a few (that anybody actually watches).
I doubt very much that your models of the mammalian brain will be used to justify expenditure of $250,000,000,000 per year to reduce emissions of non-pollutants from our atmosphere. However, they may be useful in breeding mice with improved powers of recall.
I'm not missing the point. You are putting too much emphasis on models. Models of non-linear chaotic systems that nobody fully understands. Models that are incomplete, make assumptions based on guesswork and that make predictions from past data that do not in any way resemble current measurements. You are using the conclusions of these models to predict future climate even though you know this to be the case. I don't doubt temperature is increasing. I do doubt the causes of this change. I also doubt the value judgements used that state current global climate is "ideal" and that any change is bad. The whole argument is completely ridiculous.
No I'm not. You are basing an entire argument on simple thermodynamic principles that are demonstrable in isolation. But the climate is not a single simple thermodynamic principle in isolation. It is a complex interplay between many simple princples the sum total of which is an extremely complex and unpredictable system. Moreover, the nature of these principles and their emergent behaviour is not well understood.
So what if it is faster today than it was 1,000 years ago? Is it caused by Carbon? Road building? Agriculture? Deforestation? Cows farting? The Sun? Cloud Formation? Microbes? Natural Cycles? All of the above? None of the above? Some of the above? What? Its all guesswork based on inaccurate models that have no verifiable predictive power. How can you justify spending 1/4 trillion dollars per year fiddling with a variable when you have no idea if it's the right one or how it interacts with the other variables? And what about Global Cooling, the Ozone Layer, Asteroid Impact, Y2K, Avian Flu - too many media scares crying wolf and demanding action when the reality as we all know is probably completely benign.
This argument is insane. I live in East Anglia (United Kingdom). 10,000 years ago it stretched right across to Europe. The north sea didn't exist. Mammoth roamed where the channel is today. Sea level has risen 300 feet since then and you are concerned about a rise of 1 or 2 meters over 100 years? Let me ask you a question: would you prefer global temperatures increased or decreased? They sure as hell aren't going to remain the same and you have no idea whether or not the current climate and temperatures are optimal for supporting anything, from Orange tree frogs to Mum and Dad. Your whole argument is predicated on the fact that we can actually keep global climate as it is today. I'm in dispair at the irrationality of the whole ridiculous argument.
I've bought season 1 and 2 box sets for myself and also my nephew for xmas (past) because I don't get sci-fi channel here. That's a good £200 from one customer alone. Waiting for season 3 DVD in the UK (out in September I believe).
My love of it has absolutely nothing to do with seeing Tricia Helfer naked either....
Please don't continue the dumbness. Water vapour also produces things called Clouds. Clouds are one of the most important factors driving our climate. It isn't as simple as saying "x is 10 times more potent a greenhouse gas than y". The plain fact is scientists don't know nearly enough about all of this to be driving policy makers. Not even a tiny amount of useful reliable data exists with which to make all of the shrieking predictions of gloom and doom the media are full of today. I read yesterday that palaeontologists have found a hippo fossil in the Antarctic FCOL. I mean please, was it a Woolly Hippo? Climate is variable. 10,000 years ago the North Sea didn't exist!
IMHO this climate change thing is all completely insane. Reducing pollution is good in itself though but the problem is Carbon isn't a pollutant.
The problem here is not that Microsoft can't come up with a decent competitor to the iPod (eventually), its just that having the apple brand on your player is so much cooler than having Microsoft. An iPod is an accessory first and an mp3 player second. The Zune will never be cool as long as its got the MS logo on it. Its only ever going to be bought by clueless grandparents as gifts for grandchildren at birthdays and christmas.
Precisely. If you value reason and logic, then reason with the fact that all climate "models" have the following in common, (1) they use insufficient data given the complexity of the thing they are trying to model, (2) they lack the required understanding of the components used to construct the model in the first place and (3) they make assumptions based on guesswork.
They are all completely and utterly useless at making predictions due to their primitive assumptions. For example, we don't know much about cloud formation yet. How on earth can you model and make climate predictions if you don't understand this fundemantal and basic mechanism? I'm not going to even mention solar activity because if you don't even understand cloud formation, which is fatal to the average doomsday prediction, it surely doesn't make a huge difference if you add in the effects on climate of all of the other things we know very little about.
This whole debate is insane.
Slashdot Mirror
It's complex = we don't know = lets not roll-back the industrial age because of it just yet. Far more important problems for humanity exist. If only they could get 1/2 the attention this non-story gets they'd be solved already. By the way, the biggest emitters of methane on Earth are Termites. Are you also anti-termite?
If you want to know all about how "peer-review" works in climatology, I suggest you take a look at climateaudit.org. If that doesn't shock you into a healthy skepticism for all climate scientists, I don't know what will.
Here's what is says: "However, the situation in the 20th century is more complicated. There is some evidence that increases in solar heating may have led to some warming early in the 20th century, but direct satellite measurements show no appreciable change in solar heating over the last three decades.". To be clear about this "debunking", what it is in-fact saying is that there is evidence solar irradiance led to a rise in temperatures early this century. It admits the system is "complicated" - a euphemism for "we don't know". How is it you are so confident?
I think you'll find the fancy theory is that which claims the link between global warming and man-made CO2. At the very least, the case is over-stated as are the implausible chains of inference used to justify the possible consequences.
That wasn't a debunking. It was a rather poor attempt at providing alternate explanations other than the blindingly obvious (the evidence for which is equally lacking). Because the blindingly obvious is not supported by the evidence we have so far accrued it does not mean that the blindingly obvious is in fact wrong. It could equally well mean that we haven't studied the blindingly obvious for long enough or hard enough because we have been too busy spending research grants on the blindingly alarmist.
It's a shame that so much focus is placed on a rise in temperature of a few tenths of a degree along with a whole bunch of unsubstantiated scare stories about consequences, to the exclusion of all of the other problems there are in the world. Deforestation, over-population and over-fishing are probably an order of magnitude worse for the biosphere than a small temperature increase (which may well have more positive benefits than negative in terms of bio-diversity). Perhaps it would be better for Gore to spend his time promoting the spending of an annual 1/4 trillion dollars on those things (even half that amount would fix a whole lot). If you really want to see how sound are the calculations and peer-review processes involved in all of this climate hand-wringing, check out climateaudit.org. You'll be very surprised at what you find.
Yep I used Minix at Uni - modified the memory manager to use a different allocation algorithm! I was going to ask the same question - why did Linux take off the way it did?
The Life Cycle of Junk Science
Genesis
1) Maverick Scientist has an Idea.
2) Other scientists deride the Idea.
3) SF Writers use Idea as image of bleak future.
4) Academics debate Idea.
5) Politicians begins to discuss the Idea, but don't understand it.
6) General Public ignores the Idea.
Growth
7) Champion arrives to actively promote and publicize Idea.
8) Scientists form a consensus that agrees with Idea.
9) Academics teach Idea as fact.
10) Fast Adapters change lifestyle, ridicule General Public.
11) Hollywood makes disaster movie, sometimes based on SF novel from 3.
12) General Public makes token lifestyle changes.
13) Politicians use Idea to attack political enemies.
Hysteria
14) Scientific consensus begins ruthlessly crushing dissent.
15) Champion is hailed as Messianic Leader.
16) Academics announce society is doomed.
17) General public accepts Idea.
18) Opponents of Idea are cast as wicked and immoral.
19) Music Industry holds benefit, sometimes using film name from 11.
Critical Mass
20) Dissenting Scientist proposes alternative theory to Idea.
21) Scientific consensus denounces Dissenting Scientist.
22) Messianic Leader begins making ludicrous claims unrelated to Idea.
23) Politicians propose massive social, fiscal, and moral changes to accommodate Idea.
24) Time Magazine puts Maverick Scientist, Messiah, Idea, or all 3 on cover.
Death and Rebirth
25) Dissenting Scientist is proven to be right, nothing happens.
26) Scientists form new consensus, claim they knew all along.
27) Fast Adapters are ridiculed by General Public.
28) Academics continue to teach Idea as "compelling theory".
29) Politicians raise taxes, just in case.
30) Messiah and Entertainment Industry find new Maverick Scientist.
31) Return to Step 1
You forget that despite what CCP tell you, it's Policy. They have an obvious interest in controlling the course of events in the game (just look at what's happened to the China server). However, the fact the game doesn't naturally balance and needs frequent interventions is one of several fundamental flaws in design, not a problem of individual or group play.
(1) With complete transparency, "I AM A DEVELOPER"
(2) With secrecy, "I AM wtfpwndn00b I press all teh sekret buttons"
It's a no-brainer that in the latter case you will get "corruption" because of interactions between guild/corp leaders and the developers (in this case, via MSN). Previous abuses include but are not limited to giving your corporation resources you have given yourself (by virtue of being a developer), tactical information about fleet operations from the enemy (from your l33t developer console), pre-warning about Eve-wide events so your corp/guild can just ride in and win it and of course lets not forget the banning of players who ask pesky questions and expose the above abuses.
But you know, Eve encourages Scamming and things like that. Criminal activity really is the most lauded form of interaction. For the player-base to complain about dev corruption seems to me to set the seal once and for all on this game's reputation as a complete and utter turd.
(Declaring my interest: I played it since beta for 3 years on and off)
One event? I played Crime Online since beta for about 3 years on and off. Meta-gaming is rife. Dev "misconduct" is rife. The player-base has long since moved to the lowest common denominator. I can't think of a place I would least like to spend my evenings hanging out in.
I have to disagree. There are positives and negatives. For example, your commercial channels have produced high quality shows like ER, Friends, The Sopranos, Battlestar Galactica, House etc. etc. The problem the US has is that the proportion of crap is probably greater, but then you have 1,000 channels and we only have a few (that anybody actually watches).
I doubt very much that your models of the mammalian brain will be used to justify expenditure of $250,000,000,000 per year to reduce emissions of non-pollutants from our atmosphere. However, they may be useful in breeding mice with improved powers of recall.
I'm not missing the point. You are putting too much emphasis on models. Models of non-linear chaotic systems that nobody fully understands. Models that are incomplete, make assumptions based on guesswork and that make predictions from past data that do not in any way resemble current measurements. You are using the conclusions of these models to predict future climate even though you know this to be the case. I don't doubt temperature is increasing. I do doubt the causes of this change. I also doubt the value judgements used that state current global climate is "ideal" and that any change is bad. The whole argument is completely ridiculous.
No I'm not. You are basing an entire argument on simple thermodynamic principles that are demonstrable in isolation. But the climate is not a single simple thermodynamic principle in isolation. It is a complex interplay between many simple princples the sum total of which is an extremely complex and unpredictable system. Moreover, the nature of these principles and their emergent behaviour is not well understood.
So what if it is faster today than it was 1,000 years ago? Is it caused by Carbon? Road building? Agriculture? Deforestation? Cows farting? The Sun? Cloud Formation? Microbes? Natural Cycles? All of the above? None of the above? Some of the above? What? Its all guesswork based on inaccurate models that have no verifiable predictive power. How can you justify spending 1/4 trillion dollars per year fiddling with a variable when you have no idea if it's the right one or how it interacts with the other variables? And what about Global Cooling, the Ozone Layer, Asteroid Impact, Y2K, Avian Flu - too many media scares crying wolf and demanding action when the reality as we all know is probably completely benign.
This argument is insane. I live in East Anglia (United Kingdom). 10,000 years ago it stretched right across to Europe. The north sea didn't exist. Mammoth roamed where the channel is today. Sea level has risen 300 feet since then and you are concerned about a rise of 1 or 2 meters over 100 years? Let me ask you a question: would you prefer global temperatures increased or decreased? They sure as hell aren't going to remain the same and you have no idea whether or not the current climate and temperatures are optimal for supporting anything, from Orange tree frogs to Mum and Dad. Your whole argument is predicated on the fact that we can actually keep global climate as it is today. I'm in dispair at the irrationality of the whole ridiculous argument.
I've bought season 1 and 2 box sets for myself and also my nephew for xmas (past) because I don't get sci-fi channel here. That's a good £200 from one customer alone. Waiting for season 3 DVD in the UK (out in September I believe). My love of it has absolutely nothing to do with seeing Tricia Helfer naked either....
Please don't continue the dumbness. Water vapour also produces things called Clouds. Clouds are one of the most important factors driving our climate. It isn't as simple as saying "x is 10 times more potent a greenhouse gas than y". The plain fact is scientists don't know nearly enough about all of this to be driving policy makers. Not even a tiny amount of useful reliable data exists with which to make all of the shrieking predictions of gloom and doom the media are full of today. I read yesterday that palaeontologists have found a hippo fossil in the Antarctic FCOL. I mean please, was it a Woolly Hippo? Climate is variable. 10,000 years ago the North Sea didn't exist! IMHO this climate change thing is all completely insane. Reducing pollution is good in itself though but the problem is Carbon isn't a pollutant.
The problem here is not that Microsoft can't come up with a decent competitor to the iPod (eventually), its just that having the apple brand on your player is so much cooler than having Microsoft. An iPod is an accessory first and an mp3 player second. The Zune will never be cool as long as its got the MS logo on it. Its only ever going to be bought by clueless grandparents as gifts for grandchildren at birthdays and christmas.
Precisely. If you value reason and logic, then reason with the fact that all climate "models" have the following in common, (1) they use insufficient data given the complexity of the thing they are trying to model, (2) they lack the required understanding of the components used to construct the model in the first place and (3) they make assumptions based on guesswork. They are all completely and utterly useless at making predictions due to their primitive assumptions. For example, we don't know much about cloud formation yet. How on earth can you model and make climate predictions if you don't understand this fundemantal and basic mechanism? I'm not going to even mention solar activity because if you don't even understand cloud formation, which is fatal to the average doomsday prediction, it surely doesn't make a huge difference if you add in the effects on climate of all of the other things we know very little about. This whole debate is insane.
Yes and likewise,
A is true,
B is true,
Therefore B causes A
where A = "global warming" and B = "carbon emissions".
Can you spot the flaw in this logic?
.....I for one welcome our future peptide resistant bacterial overlords.....
It most probably isn't. Our survival is based on our adaptability.