I know it's cheating but I read the abstract, there survey was not intended to measure literacy.
Quote - "The key objectives of this survey were therefore: to explore how much young people enjoy writing, what type of writing they engage in, how good at writing they think they are, what they think about writing and what the role of technology is in young people's writing." (my emph)
Presumably "some woman" would be charged with falsifying evidence. You and I do not have the ability to accurately judge the claim for ouselves because we are operating in an information vacum. You are ignoring the fact a judge has read the letter and we haven't. Their job is to judge the claims of "some woman", hence the name judge.
If there was any blackmail, there is not any current legal action regarding it.
Well duh, who are the going to charge, 'anonomous of no fixed IP'?
"...blackmail we need to have protections. Not because it causes social harm..."
Actually it IS because it causes social harm. You already have a right to be offended, you do not have the right to demand someone else pay for YOUR sensitivities (thank you Larry Flynt).
No, WP should act ethically as it did in this instance. I don't know about your ethics but mine says that I should not knowingly assist blackmailers and kidnappers.
Unused permits are not a "carbon offset". Think of the atmosphere as a bank, permits are deposits, offsets are withdrawals. Governments print X permits a year which are autioned. When a company makes a deposit into the atmosphere they have to give the permit back to the government (ie it's removed from the market).
A company can also remove carbon from the atmosphere (eg:biochar), the removed carbon can then be converted into a freshly minted permit and sold on the market - This removal of carbon is called a "carbon offset" which then causes total fucking confusion of the terms because when sold on the market there is no difference between it and unused permits.
Reductions in emmission via this scheme come in two ways, the first is the government can reduce the number of permits each year, the second is companies can be formed to create offsets by removing carbon directly from the atmosphere (or some other place in the natural cycle).
Premtive disclaimer: I'm well aware that we are not living in the idealised word described above, and if the atmosphere really did operate like a bank we would all be dead.
"are you even Australian, because if you were, you'd call it a bushfire"
Deliberate, point to one other "bushfire" that has melted windsreens and engine blocks or one where the radiant heat could kill people taking refuge in the middle of a footy field with blankets? I drove through Kilmore on the evening on the Feb fires, I also witnessed ash wednesday and the '68 fires up close. The 15km high smoke plume from the Feb firestorm was more like Mt Pinatobo than a bushfire.
"see the regrowth now"
Because it all has to happen insantaneously or it's not happening at all, right?
"Toxic lakes and dead red gums are a reflection of water management policies"
Agreed, AGW is simply the proverbial straw.
"Melbourne haven't built a new dam in over 20 years"
We haven't been able to get close to filling the ones we have for the last 20yrs. Or are you suggesting we continue mismanaging water by damming the Mitchell and depriving the most fertile valley in the state of water while simultanously turning lakes entrance toxic?
"Tasmania does not lack water"
You have a valid point in that domestic water restrictions were lifted in Feb 2007 for Hobart, however basslink are claiming this is due to their ability to IMPORT power and thus avoid running the hydro turbines.
"Issues with occasional dust storms date back to the first European arrivals"
I wasn't talking about the occasional dust storm. I was talking about the fact that there is a light sprinkling of dust virtualy every morning on my car for the last 10-15yrs. I've lived in Melbourne for nigh on 50yrs, that is neither "normal" or "occasional".
You may also want to check some of your other assumptions with the CSIRO
Green policies are to blame? - under a decade long Howard government? - hehe hoho 'tis to laugh.
"I've seen the GP's story copypasta-ed word for word several times in the last 4-5 threads on global warming."
Imitation is the highest form of flattery, can you point to one of my imitators? I tried a search (with and without the Tasmania typo) but got only my post above. I did post a similar comment in the earlier CRU story but this one is not a c&p of that either. Of course, I'm giving you the benifit of doubt and am assuming you are not a Machevelian astroturfer, rather you read my earlier post and are simply mistaken.
I second your call for more Aussies to chime in with an opinion or an observation.
It's you perogative to make assumptions about my worldview and put your faith in the "fair and balanced" approach espoused in your post, I put mine in science.
"The fact that this story is posted under Politics says a lot about what's wrong with the global warming 'debate' IMO"
The is no serious scientific debate about the primary cause of the warming, what should be done about that (if anything) is political. This deplorable and obvious beat-up is nothing more than dirty politics from those who desperately want to do keep building Easter Island statues in the form of a coal fired smokestacks.
The desal plants (powered by coal) are an adaptation. The buying back of irrigation allocations ia also an Adaptation. A more important question is can the rest of the biosphere adapt to (geologically) very rapid changes such these and ocean acidification from CO2. If our agriculture folds altogether then food imports would be an adaptation. Would we be able to import food while the rest of the world is also "adapting"? - I don't know.
IMHO a more sensible and in the long run much cheaper adaptation would be to phase out coal fired generators but I don't see that happening any time soon.
I never said it does but we are talking about half a continent here and we are seeing exactly what was been predicted by the much maligned climate models. Similar models at NASA predict a total loss of summer Artic sea ice in the next decade accompanied by dust bowl conditions in the midwest.
BTW: Climate != weather, climate is the long term statistics of weather and is fundementally different since it is not sensitive to initial conditions (ie: not chaotic).
Slashdot Mirror
I know it's cheating but I read the abstract, there survey was not intended to measure literacy.
Quote - "The key objectives of this survey were therefore: to explore how much young people enjoy writing, what type of writing they engage in, how good at writing they think they are, what they think about writing and what the role of technology is in young people's writing." (my emph)
"Tell me about it.. a self-selecting group of people grade themselves? How on earth is that scientific?"
Happens all the time, it's called peer review.
+5 insightfull? - I would like to think the mods were refering to the title of your post but somehow I doubt it.
"And what if it isn't blackmail?"
Presumably "some woman" would be charged with falsifying evidence. You and I do not have the ability to accurately judge the claim for ouselves because we are operating in an information vacum. You are ignoring the fact a judge has read the letter and we haven't. Their job is to judge the claims of "some woman", hence the name judge.
If there was any blackmail, there is not any current legal action regarding it.
Well duh, who are the going to charge, 'anonomous of no fixed IP'?
"...blackmail we need to have protections. Not because it causes social harm..."
Actually it IS because it causes social harm. You already have a right to be offended, you do not have the right to demand someone else pay for YOUR sensitivities (thank you Larry Flynt).
Yeah right, because exposing a blackmailer is the same as working for the ministry of truth.
"Wikipedia should refuse to comply."
No, WP should act ethically as it did in this instance. I don't know about your ethics but mine says that I should not knowingly assist blackmailers and kidnappers.
Unused permits are not a "carbon offset". Think of the atmosphere as a bank, permits are deposits, offsets are withdrawals. Governments print X permits a year which are autioned. When a company makes a deposit into the atmosphere they have to give the permit back to the government (ie it's removed from the market).
A company can also remove carbon from the atmosphere (eg:biochar), the removed carbon can then be converted into a freshly minted permit and sold on the market - This removal of carbon is called a "carbon offset" which then causes total fucking confusion of the terms because when sold on the market there is no difference between it and unused permits.
Reductions in emmission via this scheme come in two ways, the first is the government can reduce the number of permits each year, the second is companies can be formed to create offsets by removing carbon directly from the atmosphere (or some other place in the natural cycle).
Premtive disclaimer: I'm well aware that we are not living in the idealised word described above, and if the atmosphere really did operate like a bank we would all be dead.
Not sure where I read it but I heard he was seen carrying a roll of yellow cable into building seven...
Slashdot IS international news and posts like yours are the reason I keep coming back. Well done.
I'd be pissed if it was in my home and I wasn't invited.
I hear they have tunneled their way back in after studying reruns of the graet escape.
"but I feel a little sad that intelligent life appears to be heading towards the status of being an oxymoron"
Drake had a good question if a somewhat glib equation. Where is ET?
Perhaps there is some law of biology that says; when a criiter gains the technology to wipe out their own species they waste little time in doing so.
"What on earth does the GP post have to do with scientific illiteracy?....[snip]...refusing to expose their data for review
Absence of critical thinking == scientific illiteracy.
Apparently the English Channel was formed in the same manner.
Coward is the correct tag in this instance.
"are you even Australian, because if you were, you'd call it a bushfire"
Deliberate, point to one other "bushfire" that has melted windsreens and engine blocks or one where the radiant heat could kill people taking refuge in the middle of a footy field with blankets? I drove through Kilmore on the evening on the Feb fires, I also witnessed ash wednesday and the '68 fires up close. The 15km high smoke plume from the Feb firestorm was more like Mt Pinatobo than a bushfire.
"see the regrowth now"
Because it all has to happen insantaneously or it's not happening at all, right?
"Toxic lakes and dead red gums are a reflection of water management policies"
Agreed, AGW is simply the proverbial straw.
"Melbourne haven't built a new dam in over 20 years"
We haven't been able to get close to filling the ones we have for the last 20yrs. Or are you suggesting we continue mismanaging water by damming the Mitchell and depriving the most fertile valley in the state of water while simultanously turning lakes entrance toxic?
"Tasmania does not lack water"
You have a valid point in that domestic water restrictions were lifted in Feb 2007 for Hobart, however basslink are claiming this is due to their ability to IMPORT power and thus avoid running the hydro turbines.
"Issues with occasional dust storms date back to the first European arrivals"
I wasn't talking about the occasional dust storm. I was talking about the fact that there is a light sprinkling of dust virtualy every morning on my car for the last 10-15yrs. I've lived in Melbourne for nigh on 50yrs, that is neither "normal" or "occasional".
You may also want to check some of your other assumptions with the CSIRO
Green policies are to blame? - under a decade long Howard government? - hehe hoho 'tis to laugh.
Wet and dry: More heat = more turbulance = 'crazy' weather.
"Every bit of data has to be re-validated."
Why?
"...they have a responsibility to be somber, formal, and utterly proper at all times."
Even when privacy is assumed?
"I have a Ph.D. for non-linear modeling in an industrial process."
Do you know of any credible FEA models from the "skeptics"? I've been waiting for well over a decade to see one.
"I've seen the GP's story copypasta-ed word for word several times in the last 4-5 threads on global warming."
Imitation is the highest form of flattery, can you point to one of my imitators? I tried a search (with and without the Tasmania typo) but got only my post above. I did post a similar comment in the earlier CRU story but this one is not a c&p of that either. Of course, I'm giving you the benifit of doubt and am assuming you are not a Machevelian astroturfer, rather you read my earlier post and are simply mistaken.
I second your call for more Aussies to chime in with an opinion or an observation.
If Sagan's book was compulsory reading for high school students there would be less carnage.
Thanks for the link. Please forgive my generalization, I'm a Victorain troglodite.
It's you perogative to make assumptions about my worldview and put your faith in the "fair and balanced" approach espoused in your post, I put mine in science.
"The fact that this story is posted under Politics says a lot about what's wrong with the global warming 'debate' IMO"
The is no serious scientific debate about the primary cause of the warming, what should be done about that (if anything) is political. This deplorable and obvious beat-up is nothing more than dirty politics from those who desperately want to do keep building Easter Island statues in the form of a coal fired smokestacks.
The desal plants (powered by coal) are an adaptation. The buying back of irrigation allocations ia also an Adaptation. A more important question is can the rest of the biosphere adapt to (geologically) very rapid changes such these and ocean acidification from CO2. If our agriculture folds altogether then food imports would be an adaptation. Would we be able to import food while the rest of the world is also "adapting"? - I don't know.
IMHO a more sensible and in the long run much cheaper adaptation would be to phase out coal fired generators but I don't see that happening any time soon.
I never said it does but we are talking about half a continent here and we are seeing exactly what was been predicted by the much maligned climate models. Similar models at NASA predict a total loss of summer Artic sea ice in the next decade accompanied by dust bowl conditions in the midwest.
BTW: Climate != weather, climate is the long term statistics of weather and is fundementally different since it is not sensitive to initial conditions (ie: not chaotic).