The new "The end is near" nonsense comes from a Canadian article. Quote:
"Combining the 20 years of accumulated data from 10 different satellites -- including Canada's RADARSAT-1 mission -- and ensuring that the data was all applied over the same geographic area, using the same time spans, and using the same models for surface melting of glaciers and for the rise of land-mass due to glacial melting (known as post-glacial rebound), the team found that the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctic have been losing mass at an accelerated rate since the early '90s."
I'm not sure how they square that with the fact that we have not seen increasing planetary temperatures in seventeen of those twenty years. But notice the "models" for surface melting; I was under the impression they were actually supposed to be measuring ice mass itself.
Well, it turns out to be more complicated than that. See, satellites pass over the same places at the same time every day. Also, how do you tell how much ice is over a spot? How do you tell how dense it is? Satellite coverage is far from complete for the whole Arctic or Antarctic, and so models have to be employed and extrapolations made. If ice is seen as disappearing in one spot it is assumed to be disappearing in spots that the satellites aren't getting a good look at. So models have to be used to make that extrapolation. It's part of why the National Snow and Ice Data Center accidentally "lost" Arctic ice -- about 193,000 square miles of it -- when they changed methods a few years back. This was a result of "sensory drift" and algorithmic problems.
If, in fact, the melt was as severe as greedy folks wanting more money say - wouldn't the ocean levels be rising?
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report from 2001:
"No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected."
And in 2007 the IPCC reported:
"Global average sea level rose at an average rate of 1.8 [1.3 to 2.3] mm per year over 1961 to 2003. The rate was faster over 1993 to 2003: about 3.1 [2.4 to 3.8] mm per year. Whether the faster rate for 1993 to 2003 reflects decadal variability or an increase in the longer-term trend is unclear."
The Artic Ice caps have been melting a bit ever since the last ice age ended BTW - and we the oceans have been rising - a few millimeters a year - ever since.
Remember folks, nobody ever got rich by telling you that we really don't know exactly what is going on. You can only get rich by saying if you don't send boatloads of money today, all hope is lost. Speaking of that, all hope is lost unless you send me money right now.
You're right, this would increase electrical consumption and increase pollution at the same time.
A hybrid car has a bigger carbon footprint than a large SUV. You are lucky that you don't live a third world country where the batteries are reprocessed, the pollution created by these operations is appalling.
The only "renewable" power source is nuclear, and environmentalists have just about killed that. The reactors we run now are all from the 1970's and are aging badly.
The reality is that the market will decide what happens no matter how many billions of dollars the government wastes on feel good research programs and propaganda. This is what has always happened, every singe time, no exceptions.
An economy that doesn't grow has a birth rate equivalent to the death rate. We're getting there in the U.S., but the third world continues to breed at alarming rates. It's a nice thought, though, that we could all get there someday.
In 1903 the electric car with a lead acid battery had a range of about 30 miles. At that time the war between electric and gas was more real than it is now. Here are are over 100 years later and we have the Nissan Leaf electric car with a range of 50 miles. This represents an increase in efficiency of.36% per year.
You can't legislate chemistry, or physics. This is as stupid as the "mandate" that the 2015 CAFE standards represent.
Now ignorant fools with no knowledge of engineering will blather on about the progress in computers, or advances made during world wars, or other such nonsense.
There is no correlation. The chemistry that makes a battery hasn't changed much in the last million years.
This is simply another excuse to bribe people who then give you money to get elected. All the high minded talk about the government setting lofty goals and inspiring us all is complete baloney, and if you buy into this nonsense I have some great investment deals for you, I promise I'll get you a one million percent return while saving the planet, saving the whales, reducing CO2, and making a car that gets 1 thousand miles per gallon on ordinary cooking oil. Send me money today, or the ice caps will melt, the oceans will rise, the skies will burn, and the end will come much sooner than you think.
I was hoping for an intelligent discussion about the I.T. technologies used by the two campaigns, and instead I find the same old waste of time war of words going on where liberals insult conservatives in the most hateful of ways, calling them names, and conservatives shout back with alleged facts and no references.
Is it not possible for anyone to move beyond this?
Seems to me the "great uniter" we elected in 2008 has divided all of us against ourselves in an irreconcilable way. It didn't take much to do this.
In states where the Unions have not bribed the politicians to give them the right to force people to join and pay dues you are absolutely correct.
How can anyone can support a system where you are forced to join an organization whether you support their values or not, and then forced to pay dues that are used to bribe politicians who's views you may not agree with?
The latest trend is forced unionization of workers who do not get a say as to whether they join or not. This happened in Michigan last year to home health care workers.
The opinions of people who have not dealt with private or public sector unions personally, who have this glorious utopian ideal of the people's collective power being represented by the benevolent, helpful union, who is allied with them to fight the evil greedy corporate masters... Are living in a fantasy world.
In reality, the unions turn out to be just as greedy, just as corrupt, and just as evil as the evil corporations they are supposed to be protecting you from.
That's because they are run by humans, just like corporations.
Who are these wonderful benevolent people who toil for the greater good? Where do we find them? There are a few, sure, but they are in the minority.
If you want to educate yourself about how Unions in America really operate, there's a great book out called "Shadowbosses" - look it up on Amazon. Not a conspiracy book at all, just a fact based analysis of where the money goes and how it is used.
The two budgets submitted by the Obama Administration resulted in a vote of ____________?
The excuse for not having a budget the two years the Democrats controlled both houses is ________________?
And the budget proposals passed in the house, with Bipartisan support, that the Senate refused to bring to the floor are the fault of Harry Reid, Republican? No doubt.
The Republicans are driving us off a cliff at 70 miles per hour. The Democrats are driving us off the cliff at 100 mph. Either way we're going off a cliff.
In the waning days of the election, Obama announced his Economic plan in a glossy brochure. Guess what the main point was:
"Reduce rates across the board, while closing tax deductions for high income earners"
This is the Romney plan - that they ridiculed. Guess where it started? Simpson-Bowles, the debt commission that Obama formed - and ignored.
Are you going to declare I made all this up too?
ROFL
You're ignoring the cold hard reality that the Obama administration has not passed a budget, at all, the entire time they have been in power. The Democrats have simply spent, spent, and spent while TALKING about all the great things they believe.
Yes, we are still running off the 2008 budget revenue assumptions. The 2008 budget was based on 2008 revenue projections. Guess what's happened since 2008? Revenue has gone down. That's one of the big reasons the deficit is so large.
Until the Democrats actually pass a budget, all talk by all Democrats about fiscal matters is complete and utter BS.
"You cut spending as much as you can,"
Under the current Administration, that would be zero. By not passing a budget, spending is at 2008 levels despite a huge drop in revenue. This has never happened before - no President has ignored this responsibility, ever.
Your argument is based on speeches, not facts. And that is the problem. Saying you care about the deficit - and rejecting the ideas of your own deficit reduction committee - means you don't care about the deficit. Duh.
Unemployment is lower than when Obama took office by one tenth of a percent. Wow,
The voter ID laws are DESIGNED to weed out Obama's constituents.
Oh please I am so tired of this rhetoric. It is absurd as the notion that we don't need ID because there is no fraud.
Using this logic, showing ID to buy cigarettes is an attack on the Tobacco Companies, showing ID to drink is an attack on the liquor industry, and showing an ID to fly is an attack on airlines.
Simple logic says that it is the people who are cheating who don't want ID.
Slashdot Mirror
Al Gore being a perfect example of this, of course. Man Bear Pig is real, I tell you, I've seen it.
The new "The end is near" nonsense comes from a Canadian article. Quote:
"Combining the 20 years of accumulated data from 10 different satellites -- including Canada's RADARSAT-1 mission -- and ensuring that the data was all applied over the same geographic area, using the same time spans, and using the same models for surface melting of glaciers and for the rise of land-mass due to glacial melting (known as post-glacial rebound), the team found that the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctic have been losing mass at an accelerated rate since the early '90s."
I'm not sure how they square that with the fact that we have not seen increasing planetary temperatures in seventeen of those twenty years. But notice the "models" for surface melting; I was under the impression they were actually supposed to be measuring ice mass itself.
Well, it turns out to be more complicated than that. See, satellites pass over the same places at the same time every day. Also, how do you tell how much ice is over a spot? How do you tell how dense it is? Satellite coverage is far from complete for the whole Arctic or Antarctic, and so models have to be employed and extrapolations made. If ice is seen as disappearing in one spot it is assumed to be disappearing in spots that the satellites aren't getting a good look at. So models have to be used to make that extrapolation. It's part of why the National Snow and Ice Data Center accidentally "lost" Arctic ice -- about 193,000 square miles of it -- when they changed methods a few years back. This was a result of "sensory drift" and algorithmic problems.
If, in fact, the melt was as severe as greedy folks wanting more money say - wouldn't the ocean levels be rising?
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report from 2001:
"No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected."
And in 2007 the IPCC reported:
"Global average sea level rose at an average rate of 1.8 [1.3 to 2.3] mm per year over 1961 to 2003. The rate was faster over 1993 to 2003: about 3.1 [2.4 to 3.8] mm per year. Whether the faster rate for 1993 to 2003 reflects decadal variability or an increase in the longer-term trend is unclear."
The Artic Ice caps have been melting a bit ever since the last ice age ended BTW - and we the oceans have been rising - a few millimeters a year - ever since.
Remember folks, nobody ever got rich by telling you that we really don't know exactly what is going on. You can only get rich by saying if you don't send boatloads of money today, all hope is lost. Speaking of that, all hope is lost unless you send me money right now.
You're right, this would increase electrical consumption and increase pollution at the same time. A hybrid car has a bigger carbon footprint than a large SUV. You are lucky that you don't live a third world country where the batteries are reprocessed, the pollution created by these operations is appalling.
The only "renewable" power source is nuclear, and environmentalists have just about killed that. The reactors we run now are all from the 1970's and are aging badly.
The reality is that the market will decide what happens no matter how many billions of dollars the government wastes on feel good research programs and propaganda. This is what has always happened, every singe time, no exceptions.
An economy that doesn't grow has a birth rate equivalent to the death rate. We're getting there in the U.S., but the third world continues to breed at alarming rates. It's a nice thought, though, that we could all get there someday.
In 1903 the electric car with a lead acid battery had a range of about 30 miles. At that time the war between electric and gas was more real than it is now. Here are are over 100 years later and we have the Nissan Leaf electric car with a range of 50 miles. This represents an increase in efficiency of .36% per year.
You can't legislate chemistry, or physics. This is as stupid as the "mandate" that the 2015 CAFE standards represent.
Now ignorant fools with no knowledge of engineering will blather on about the progress in computers, or advances made during world wars, or other such nonsense.
There is no correlation. The chemistry that makes a battery hasn't changed much in the last million years.
This is simply another excuse to bribe people who then give you money to get elected. All the high minded talk about the government setting lofty goals and inspiring us all is complete baloney, and if you buy into this nonsense I have some great investment deals for you, I promise I'll get you a one million percent return while saving the planet, saving the whales, reducing CO2, and making a car that gets 1 thousand miles per gallon on ordinary cooking oil. Send me money today, or the ice caps will melt, the oceans will rise, the skies will burn, and the end will come much sooner than you think.
I was hoping for an intelligent discussion about the I.T. technologies used by the two campaigns, and instead I find the same old waste of time war of words going on where liberals insult conservatives in the most hateful of ways, calling them names, and conservatives shout back with alleged facts and no references. Is it not possible for anyone to move beyond this? Seems to me the "great uniter" we elected in 2008 has divided all of us against ourselves in an irreconcilable way. It didn't take much to do this.
In states where the Unions have not bribed the politicians to give them the right to force people to join and pay dues you are absolutely correct. How can anyone can support a system where you are forced to join an organization whether you support their values or not, and then forced to pay dues that are used to bribe politicians who's views you may not agree with? The latest trend is forced unionization of workers who do not get a say as to whether they join or not. This happened in Michigan last year to home health care workers.
The opinions of people who have not dealt with private or public sector unions personally, who have this glorious utopian ideal of the people's collective power being represented by the benevolent, helpful union, who is allied with them to fight the evil greedy corporate masters... Are living in a fantasy world. In reality, the unions turn out to be just as greedy, just as corrupt, and just as evil as the evil corporations they are supposed to be protecting you from. That's because they are run by humans, just like corporations. Who are these wonderful benevolent people who toil for the greater good? Where do we find them? There are a few, sure, but they are in the minority. If you want to educate yourself about how Unions in America really operate, there's a great book out called "Shadowbosses" - look it up on Amazon. Not a conspiracy book at all, just a fact based analysis of where the money goes and how it is used.
The two budgets submitted by the Obama Administration resulted in a vote of ____________? The excuse for not having a budget the two years the Democrats controlled both houses is ________________? And the budget proposals passed in the house, with Bipartisan support, that the Senate refused to bring to the floor are the fault of Harry Reid, Republican? No doubt. The Republicans are driving us off a cliff at 70 miles per hour. The Democrats are driving us off the cliff at 100 mph. Either way we're going off a cliff. In the waning days of the election, Obama announced his Economic plan in a glossy brochure. Guess what the main point was: "Reduce rates across the board, while closing tax deductions for high income earners" This is the Romney plan - that they ridiculed. Guess where it started? Simpson-Bowles, the debt commission that Obama formed - and ignored. Are you going to declare I made all this up too? ROFL
You're ignoring the cold hard reality that the Obama administration has not passed a budget, at all, the entire time they have been in power. The Democrats have simply spent, spent, and spent while TALKING about all the great things they believe. Yes, we are still running off the 2008 budget revenue assumptions. The 2008 budget was based on 2008 revenue projections. Guess what's happened since 2008? Revenue has gone down. That's one of the big reasons the deficit is so large. Until the Democrats actually pass a budget, all talk by all Democrats about fiscal matters is complete and utter BS.
"You cut spending as much as you can," Under the current Administration, that would be zero. By not passing a budget, spending is at 2008 levels despite a huge drop in revenue. This has never happened before - no President has ignored this responsibility, ever. Your argument is based on speeches, not facts. And that is the problem. Saying you care about the deficit - and rejecting the ideas of your own deficit reduction committee - means you don't care about the deficit. Duh. Unemployment is lower than when Obama took office by one tenth of a percent. Wow,
The voter ID laws are DESIGNED to weed out Obama's constituents. Oh please I am so tired of this rhetoric. It is absurd as the notion that we don't need ID because there is no fraud. Using this logic, showing ID to buy cigarettes is an attack on the Tobacco Companies, showing ID to drink is an attack on the liquor industry, and showing an ID to fly is an attack on airlines. Simple logic says that it is the people who are cheating who don't want ID.