Sorry man. I deal with ruby, php, perl,.net, asp.net and bar none,.net and asp.net are not even close to being as reliable as php or ruby. I would never recommend.net to a client, ever.
This is hugely convincing, I'll bring your valid points to my clients in the future. I think the "bar none" is the big selling point here.
Microsoft has deep pockets and is not shy to use them to support a money pit until it becomes a success (like the xbox). Maybe this phone thing will be a success, but I hope they will come up with something better than Windows CE which, as a developer, was painful to work with.
So saying that a comment is *clueless* is helping to move the conversation forward
When that comment is clueless and I explain why in detail? Yes, that's a valuable comment. A very wrong opinion ceases to misinform people.
You did not "explain" why the comment was clueless, you simply gave your opinion which happens to be different from mine. Putting a label such as "clueless" on an opinion is childish and is a very good way to ensure that the discussion takes a suboptimal direction (like it did).
Are you a woman?
Why the sudden sexism?
Asking if someone is a woman is not sexist. This being said - from your answer I guess you are not a woman, but you have been raised by one.
The simple fact of the matter is that the comment I was responding to was utterly clueless and as an iOS developer I am in a position to say exactly why it was so clueless. Whining about "bias" when you can't give reasons as to why I am wrong does not move the conversation forward in any way.
So saying that a comment is *clueless* is helping to move the conversation forward... because you consider that you are in a position to say it?
Wow, it's rare to see a comment that is this clueless.
An app is an Objective-C equivalent of a website
No, "app" is short for "application". The concept has been around for a long time, it certainly predates the web. Native apps aren't the equivalent of websites. They are fundamentally different things. Apps aren't the shoddy knock-offs of websites you seem to think they are.
In theory, I would agree. In practice, most of the "apps" are features already available on a website. I'm not talking angry birds, but tell me exactly what is "fundamentally" different between the CNN app and the CNN website, or the eBay app and the eBay website, or the Groupon app and the Groupon website (etc.). Nothing.
When Apple first launched the iPhone, they didn't include an SDK for native applications and wanted everybody to use web applications instead. Mobile Safari was a huge leap forward - at the time, most mobile browsers were junk that couldn't render normal websites. It doesn't need "fixing" so that it "works properly" - this is simply delusional. It's been ahead of the pack from day one.
Native iOS applications came about because there was a strong demand for them. Apple didn't push them on anybody, and they certainly didn't do it at the expense of Mobile Safari - they have continued to improve it including adding new features that would ordinarily require native applications (e.g. geolocation). Apple have clearly, inarguably invested in Mobile Safari, and your entire opinion is utterly backwards.
I can't accuse you of being paid by Apple to promote their products, because it is a well-known fact that only Microsoft is doing that (at least on Slashdot). However, I would politely point out that your vision of mobile computing appears to be slightly biased.
Each Monday: 1) Click on Crime Stats 2) Drill-down by city 3) Drill-down by street 4) Sort by count, in descending order 5) Send a black ops team to deal with the top 10 addresses
As an alternative, the data could be plugged in Google maps and the info sent to a UAV.
An app is an Objective-C equivalent of a website, with an additional touch: it gives the opportunity to Apple to fetch a few dollars in the process. It is also hugely convenient for them because they don't have so spend money on fixing their browser so it work properly on their devices. It's "win-win" with Apple being on both side of the dash.
You wrote: "I'm not even sure it would be possible to find records for the last 50 years in that region". See, this is evidence that you're not even living in the same reality as the rest of us. 50 years ago is the early 1960's, not the early Holocene. Your incredulity that records would exist for Chile and Peru in that time period is almost incomprehensible. You seem to be demonstrating the same sort of modern era exceptionalism that sometimes leads small children to wonder if the whole world was colored in black and white before the 1950s.
The early 60s in Peru is not the early 60s in London. This is no "modern era exceptionalism", this is common sense. The country was on the verge of civil war for a large part of the 20th century, yet you expect that they had programs to keep records of weather report since the 19th century. This is unrealistic and again I dare you to find evidence of such program.
There's very little reason to believe that there wouldn't be a record of a snowfall that heavy in, for example, one of the local newspapers in the last 150 years.
Just so you know, "very little reason to believe" still goes in the opinions column, not facts. You really are struggling with that subtle difference, no?
If you'd taken a minute and read my actual post, you'd have noticed that I mentioned that there are important mining interests there. Hence extensive soil analysis. Engineers, including mining engineers, find it very important to know what kind of rainfall and flooding to expect as well as how the rock and soil will react to such conditions. Not to mention that such considerations are important for the location and construction of towns, roads, etc. You specifically said that you would put such information into your museum of "least optimally spent money".
If a mining company is interested to know whether it was snowing in that desert or not 150 years ago and they are willing to fund the soil analysis, then it is their business. If someone is using tax money to do that, then it is my right to challenge the project. I think it is important to spend money on research in many scientific fields, especially in the ones you mention when there evidence that climate is changing. But it's not open bar on my tax money either.
That, from my perspective, is you mocking and dismissing an entire field of study. You can't really escape from that statement. Nor the one where you mocked another poster as a basement-dwelling non-taxpayer for rightfully calling you out on it.
I have to confess that I'm quite curious what discipline _you_ work in where you can look down on fields like geology and meteorology as wastes of money.
You are overly sensitive about your area of expertise, clearly you are not frequently challenged about your stuff. And you underestimate the importance of being able to tell the difference between fact and opinion.
As for me, I work in IT. Day in, day out, I get clients that challenge my diagnostics or suggestions even if I have a much stronger expertise than them. Yet I don't call them idiots or stupid and I don't complain that they are mocking my entire field. I do my best to explain the options, I let them know what is a fact and what is an opinion, but in the end they are the one with the checkbook and sometimes pushing rope is just not worth the aggravation.
Looks like you got all the evidence you need that knowledge of historical rainfall patterns in the geographical area in question has in fact been attained, correlated, and checked.
Huh? Care to document that? So far all that came out of this was a theory of how it could be done, and a general opinion that "people keep records". This is not evidence. This is opinion.
So which is it, you expect answers to your questions, but when you find they exist, this is what you think of them? You can't have it both ways. You pretend the science isn't there, then when it is, you deny it wholesale.
No, I think the science is (probably) there. But the science does not create records or evidence by itself. Work must be done (and funded) to get that kind of results.
Guess which party here is the vapid reality-denying fucktard? (Hint: You)
Do you kiss your mom with that mouth? (ok that was a quote from Fallout but it does apply)
[...] you've made bizarre claims that it's somehow unlikely or even impossible that we'd have any sort of records or evidence of what precipitation has been like in this region. As it happens, I don't have the evidence you demand right in front of me.
It's not bizarre. We are talking about weather reports records for the last 150 years in Peru. I'm not even sure it would be possible to find records for the last 50 years in that region. So I'm not surprised that you could not find evidence to support your claim.
There was snowfall this year that was extraordinarily strange for the region and no-one with extensive knowledge of the region seems to be disputing that. Do you have some sort of problem with that statement?
None. I do not dispute the fact that it was an unusual event. But saying that it did not happen since 150 years is a big stretch when there is no evidence of records or expensive soil analysis (or whatever expert thing) to confirm it
I am not blind to environmental issues. But what I find worrying is the tendency of some environmentalists (not all of them, but many) to come up with cosmetically enhanced statistics to draw more attention to their cause. If someone says: "there was a snowfall in that desert, it is unusual and did not occur since such or such university has been starting to keep records in 1982, and we suspect it did not happen for decades before", it would be accurate but not dramatic enough, so instead they come up with: "it is the first snowfall there in 150 years" but they have no evidence whatsoever to support that statement, just theories. In the end they just look like they are crying wolf and the people that have a vested interest in denying global warming have a field day, like they did with those guys who got their emails hacked in UK.
Stop the FUD and stick to the facts. In the big scheme of things, if it takes a few more years to get results because the mainstream was slower to move, it's still better than getting caught while astroturfing and giving greeners a bad reputation in the general population.
Your childish dismissal of an entire, important, field of study as an example of "the least optimally spent money" is pathetic.
If you take a minute and read my actual post, the dispute was over the fact that if extensive soil analysis would have been performed in that specific area, it would have been very expensive. I don't know how you jump to a conclusion that I am dismissing an "entire field of study".
Given that, do you think that research into what the 100-year flood level is (and into how that level will change due to all the human construction with it's well-engineered drainage systems) is wasted?
No. You are now lost in the overblown interpretation of one statement I made and you keep piling up arguments about something I never disputed. It's a little like talking to yourself, but with the added benefit of having me to blame for the rambling part of the dialog.
Your sarcastic disbelief that records could even exist about rainfall in this region comes off, to anyone who thinks about it for even a moment, as ridiculous and ignorant.
Maybe you missed that day in class when they discussed Theory Vs. Practice, but just saying that "people keep records" does not count as proof, especially in a matter such as having detailed weather records in Peru for the last 150 years. So no, I still don't believe such records exist, but I guess it is easier for you to call me ignorant than to bring up actual proof of what you are saying.
"Technical Support" from Apple is like going to church. You get told things like "because that's the way it is" and when you press, you never get the "why" part of it. I learned long ago about the compatibility between Apple and business -- there is none by the standards I have come to expect in the PC world. There is no "next business day, on site, accidental damage" support from Apple. When I learned that, I could never again take them seriously where business was concerned.
Their business model does not target companies because they know that fashion statements have no impact on company buyers, and that's all they have in stock.
How can you know what kind of weather occurred in Peru over the last 150 years?
The fact that this Peruvian desert had no precipitation left it as one of the few places on earth with sodium nitrate prior to WWI. Europeans imported it for fertilizer and explosives. Germany had to devise a way to synthesize nitrate for their war efforts.
So yes, many people historically were aware of the lack of precipitation in that Peruvian desert and what the recorded precipitation was by the locals due to it being an extremely rare event.
You may not get mod points because this whole thread has gone in all kinds of directions but this is actually interesting information.
In both scenarios, the problem is the projection, not the events that happened in that 10-year span.
The problem isn't the projection. Only a complete idiot would make such a statement. THE GLACIERS ARE STILL MELTING.
A word of caution about calling other people idiots or typing stuff in all uppercase: venting and being insulting are secondary emotional payoffs that are not worth it because they can make one look insecure and prevent other people from taking the content seriously.
This being said, please note that there is no dispute about the fact that the glaciers are melting. If you read the title of my post (or yours) you'll see that it is about the projections. I understand your point that they don't matter and I thank your for your positive contribution to the discussion.
If you actually have evidence that someone did all that complex soil and sediment analysis in a specific field in Peru, please provide a link, as I will definitely include that in my museum of the least optimally spent money
Ladies and gentlemen, I present the dumbest motherfucker alive who is somehow capable of using a computer.
Don't worry, the day you move out of your parent's basement and you start to work and pay taxes you will understand.
I give an outline of a scientific argument. You give sneering insults. It is only technobabble to someone with no background in geology. My outline of topics is basic sedimentology. Smaller sedimentary particles take longer to settle than larger particles. Faster water picks up more and larger particles than slower water. Seasonal patterns in sediment deposition give delineation of years. In this way, past precipitation patterns may be inferred. As to rivulets, you should read about how we infer the past existence of liquid water on Mars. Your agressive and content free reply betrays the insecurity of ignorance.
You still haven't provided evidence that what you describe has been performed in that area of Peru. You only rehash your "expert opinion" about what could be possible, and you feel insulted that people don't take your word on it.
Also I would like to point out that in a same post you first complain about me insulting you, then you say that I am insecure and ignorant. I'd love to say something about a kettle and a pot here, but maybe it would be interpreted as another "sneering insult".
Your life expectancy is probably around 80 years. If you get shot tomorrow, it's not the statisticians who are to blame.
If everybody is dying before 80 years, would you then say that there is a problem with the life expectancy projection, or that it is abnormal that people die so young?
You might want to look at this Wikipedia article. It's a timeline of meteorology. Apparently you have some severe misunderstandings about how long human beings have been taking note of the weather.
There is a huge gap between theory and practice. Just like CSI - yes, criminals can be put in jail because of DNA evidence, as long as the crime lab has unlimited funding and an army of field techs that can spend countless hours processing every inch of every area possibly linked to a crime.
Now if you tell me that someone actually created a reliable log (or even just a log) of weather reports for 150 years in a specific area in Peru, then it's wonderful news, but it will take more than a generic Wikipedia link to prove that. Can you even tell me what "high desert" area we are talking about?
Scientists, when they made those projections, were being conservative, just including the factors they were sure of and discounting factors that were not well characterized yet. How much ridicule would you be heaping on them if they had overstated their projections?
Scenario 1: 2001 - scientist says that glaciers will melt in 100 years 2011 - scientist says that glaciers will melt much faster than 100 years
Scenario 2: 2001 - scientist says that glaciers will melt in 10 years 2011 - scientist says that glaciers will melt much slower than 10 years
In both scenarios, the problem is the projection, not the events that happened in that 10-year span.
Why being so dramatic? It is a very sad state of affairs that it is now politically incorrect to mention that an alarmist statement is nothing else but an alarmist statement.
And as usual the Chuch of Global Warming is very active on Slashdot and keeps modding down comments that are not fanatically pro-IPCC.
How can you know what kind of weather occurred in Peru over the last 150 years? Did someone find Mayan engravings? Or there is this very old guy that can swear that this never happened since he was born? Or maybe it was a Union soldier that got lost and decided to start a weather journal?
Ok, I have some homework for you. Go home and read your textbook on Sedimentology, focussing specifically on lake sediments caused by runoff. Read about how the flows of rivers can be read by drilling sediment cores out of lake beds. Then find your textbook on Glaciology, and read about how cores of ice drilled from long term ice deposits can be used to track snowfall. While you are at it, you can read about how rainfall events leave specific signatures in sand and dirt, including rivulets and specific patterns in the distribution of different sizes of sedimentary particles. I suspect snowfall events could also be inferred with similar observations.
You would be amazed at what geologists and geographers can find out simply by using observation and logic.
If you actually have evidence that someone did all that complex soil and sediment analysis in a specific field in Peru, please provide a link, as I will definitely include that in my museum of the least optimally spent money. What about other regions in Peru? Or Bolivia? Or Thailand? Unless the scientists have a very impressive algorithm allowing them to pinpoint locations where something never happened so they can raise flags if that thing actually happens.
Nah, your post sounds like the biggest dump of techno-babble I witnessed since many years ago when I read an article about the capabilities of the data-mining software available at the NSA, that allegedly could allow them to predict the next terrorist attack by running a neural network analysis on the log files from download.com (or something).
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry man. I deal with ruby, php, perl, .net, asp.net and bar none, .net and asp.net are not even close to being as reliable as php or ruby. I would never recommend .net to a client, ever.
This is hugely convincing, I'll bring your valid points to my clients in the future. I think the "bar none" is the big selling point here.
Microsoft has deep pockets and is not shy to use them to support a money pit until it becomes a success (like the xbox). Maybe this phone thing will be a success, but I hope they will come up with something better than Windows CE which, as a developer, was painful to work with.
When that comment is clueless and I explain why in detail? Yes, that's a valuable comment. A very wrong opinion ceases to misinform people.
You did not "explain" why the comment was clueless, you simply gave your opinion which happens to be different from mine. Putting a label such as "clueless" on an opinion is childish and is a very good way to ensure that the discussion takes a suboptimal direction (like it did).
Why the sudden sexism?
Asking if someone is a woman is not sexist. This being said - from your answer I guess you are not a woman, but you have been raised by one.
The simple fact of the matter is that the comment I was responding to was utterly clueless and as an iOS developer I am in a position to say exactly why it was so clueless. Whining about "bias" when you can't give reasons as to why I am wrong does not move the conversation forward in any way.
So saying that a comment is *clueless* is helping to move the conversation forward... because you consider that you are in a position to say it?
Are you a woman?
Wow, it's rare to see a comment that is this clueless.
No, "app" is short for "application". The concept has been around for a long time, it certainly predates the web. Native apps aren't the equivalent of websites. They are fundamentally different things. Apps aren't the shoddy knock-offs of websites you seem to think they are.
In theory, I would agree. In practice, most of the "apps" are features already available on a website. I'm not talking angry birds, but tell me exactly what is "fundamentally" different between the CNN app and the CNN website, or the eBay app and the eBay website, or the Groupon app and the Groupon website (etc.). Nothing.
When Apple first launched the iPhone, they didn't include an SDK for native applications and wanted everybody to use web applications instead. Mobile Safari was a huge leap forward - at the time, most mobile browsers were junk that couldn't render normal websites. It doesn't need "fixing" so that it "works properly" - this is simply delusional. It's been ahead of the pack from day one.
Native iOS applications came about because there was a strong demand for them. Apple didn't push them on anybody, and they certainly didn't do it at the expense of Mobile Safari - they have continued to improve it including adding new features that would ordinarily require native applications (e.g. geolocation). Apple have clearly, inarguably invested in Mobile Safari, and your entire opinion is utterly backwards.
I can't accuse you of being paid by Apple to promote their products, because it is a well-known fact that only Microsoft is doing that (at least on Slashdot). However, I would politely point out that your vision of mobile computing appears to be slightly biased.
The drill-down on that dashboard will be awesome.
Each Monday:
1) Click on Crime Stats
2) Drill-down by city
3) Drill-down by street
4) Sort by count, in descending order
5) Send a black ops team to deal with the top 10 addresses
As an alternative, the data could be plugged in Google maps and the info sent to a UAV.
An app is an Objective-C equivalent of a website, with an additional touch: it gives the opportunity to Apple to fetch a few dollars in the process. It is also hugely convenient for them because they don't have so spend money on fixing their browser so it work properly on their devices. It's "win-win" with Apple being on both side of the dash.
You wrote: "I'm not even sure it would be possible to find records for the last 50 years in that region". See, this is evidence that you're not even living in the same reality as the rest of us. 50 years ago is the early 1960's, not the early Holocene. Your incredulity that records would exist for Chile and Peru in that time period is almost incomprehensible. You seem to be demonstrating the same sort of modern era exceptionalism that sometimes leads small children to wonder if the whole world was colored in black and white before the 1950s.
The early 60s in Peru is not the early 60s in London. This is no "modern era exceptionalism", this is common sense. The country was on the verge of civil war for a large part of the 20th century, yet you expect that they had programs to keep records of weather report since the 19th century. This is unrealistic and again I dare you to find evidence of such program.
There's very little reason to believe that there wouldn't be a record of a snowfall that heavy in, for example, one of the local newspapers in the last 150 years.
Just so you know, "very little reason to believe" still goes in the opinions column, not facts. You really are struggling with that subtle difference, no?
If you'd taken a minute and read my actual post, you'd have noticed that I mentioned that there are important mining interests there. Hence extensive soil analysis. Engineers, including mining engineers, find it very important to know what kind of rainfall and flooding to expect as well as how the rock and soil will react to such conditions. Not to mention that such considerations are important for the location and construction of towns, roads, etc. You specifically said that you would put such information into your museum of "least optimally spent money".
If a mining company is interested to know whether it was snowing in that desert or not 150 years ago and they are willing to fund the soil analysis, then it is their business. If someone is using tax money to do that, then it is my right to challenge the project. I think it is important to spend money on research in many scientific fields, especially in the ones you mention when there evidence that climate is changing. But it's not open bar on my tax money either.
That, from my perspective, is you mocking and dismissing an entire field of study. You can't really escape from that statement. Nor the one where you mocked another poster as a basement-dwelling non-taxpayer for rightfully calling you out on it.
I have to confess that I'm quite curious what discipline _you_ work in where you can look down on fields like geology and meteorology as wastes of money.
You are overly sensitive about your area of expertise, clearly you are not frequently challenged about your stuff. And you underestimate the importance of being able to tell the difference between fact and opinion.
As for me, I work in IT. Day in, day out, I get clients that challenge my diagnostics or suggestions even if I have a much stronger expertise than them. Yet I don't call them idiots or stupid and I don't complain that they are mocking my entire field. I do my best to explain the options, I let them know what is a fact and what is an opinion, but in the end they are the one with the checkbook and sometimes pushing rope is just not worth the aggravation.
Looks like you got all the evidence you need that knowledge of historical rainfall patterns in the geographical area in question has in fact been attained, correlated, and checked.
Huh? Care to document that? So far all that came out of this was a theory of how it could be done, and a general opinion that "people keep records". This is not evidence. This is opinion.
So which is it, you expect answers to your questions, but when you find they exist, this is what you think of them? You can't have it both ways. You pretend the science isn't there, then when it is, you deny it wholesale.
No, I think the science is (probably) there. But the science does not create records or evidence by itself. Work must be done (and funded) to get that kind of results.
Guess which party here is the vapid reality-denying fucktard? (Hint: You)
Do you kiss your mom with that mouth?
(ok that was a quote from Fallout but it does apply)
[...] you've made bizarre claims that it's somehow unlikely or even impossible that we'd have any sort of records or evidence of what precipitation has been like in this region. As it happens, I don't have the evidence you demand right in front of me.
It's not bizarre. We are talking about weather reports records for the last 150 years in Peru. I'm not even sure it would be possible to find records for the last 50 years in that region. So I'm not surprised that you could not find evidence to support your claim.
There was snowfall this year that was extraordinarily strange for the region and no-one with extensive knowledge of the region seems to be disputing that. Do you have some sort of problem with that statement?
None. I do not dispute the fact that it was an unusual event. But saying that it did not happen since 150 years is a big stretch when there is no evidence of records or expensive soil analysis (or whatever expert thing) to confirm it
I am not blind to environmental issues. But what I find worrying is the tendency of some environmentalists (not all of them, but many) to come up with cosmetically enhanced statistics to draw more attention to their cause. If someone says: "there was a snowfall in that desert, it is unusual and did not occur since such or such university has been starting to keep records in 1982, and we suspect it did not happen for decades before", it would be accurate but not dramatic enough, so instead they come up with: "it is the first snowfall there in 150 years" but they have no evidence whatsoever to support that statement, just theories. In the end they just look like they are crying wolf and the people that have a vested interest in denying global warming have a field day, like they did with those guys who got their emails hacked in UK.
Stop the FUD and stick to the facts. In the big scheme of things, if it takes a few more years to get results because the mainstream was slower to move, it's still better than getting caught while astroturfing and giving greeners a bad reputation in the general population.
Your childish dismissal of an entire, important, field of study as an example of "the least optimally spent money" is pathetic.
If you take a minute and read my actual post, the dispute was over the fact that if extensive soil analysis would have been performed in that specific area, it would have been very expensive. I don't know how you jump to a conclusion that I am dismissing an "entire field of study".
Given that, do you think that research into what the 100-year flood level is (and into how that level will change due to all the human construction with it's well-engineered drainage systems) is wasted?
No. You are now lost in the overblown interpretation of one statement I made and you keep piling up arguments about something I never disputed. It's a little like talking to yourself, but with the added benefit of having me to blame for the rambling part of the dialog.
Your sarcastic disbelief that records could even exist about rainfall in this region comes off, to anyone who thinks about it for even a moment, as ridiculous and ignorant.
Maybe you missed that day in class when they discussed Theory Vs. Practice, but just saying that "people keep records" does not count as proof, especially in a matter such as having detailed weather records in Peru for the last 150 years. So no, I still don't believe such records exist, but I guess it is easier for you to call me ignorant than to bring up actual proof of what you are saying.
Opera... seriously?
"Technical Support" from Apple is like going to church. You get told things like "because that's the way it is" and when you press, you never get the "why" part of it. I learned long ago about the compatibility between Apple and business -- there is none by the standards I have come to expect in the PC world. There is no "next business day, on site, accidental damage" support from Apple. When I learned that, I could never again take them seriously where business was concerned.
Their business model does not target companies because they know that fashion statements have no impact on company buyers, and that's all they have in stock.
How can you know what kind of weather occurred in Peru over the last 150 years?
The fact that this Peruvian desert had no precipitation left it as one of the few places on earth with sodium nitrate prior to WWI. Europeans imported it for fertilizer and explosives. Germany had to devise a way to synthesize nitrate for their war efforts.
So yes, many people historically were aware of the lack of precipitation in that Peruvian desert and what the recorded precipitation was by the locals due to it being an extremely rare event.
You may not get mod points because this whole thread has gone in all kinds of directions but this is actually interesting information.
In both scenarios, the problem is the projection, not the events that happened in that 10-year span.
The problem isn't the projection. Only a complete idiot would make such a statement. THE GLACIERS ARE STILL MELTING.
A word of caution about calling other people idiots or typing stuff in all uppercase: venting and being insulting are secondary emotional payoffs that are not worth it because they can make one look insecure and prevent other people from taking the content seriously.
This being said, please note that there is no dispute about the fact that the glaciers are melting. If you read the title of my post (or yours) you'll see that it is about the projections. I understand your point that they don't matter and I thank your for your positive contribution to the discussion.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present the dumbest motherfucker alive who is somehow capable of using a computer.
Don't worry, the day you move out of your parent's basement and you start to work and pay taxes you will understand.
I give an outline of a scientific argument. You give sneering insults. It is only technobabble to someone with no background in geology. My outline of topics is basic sedimentology. Smaller sedimentary particles take longer to settle than larger particles. Faster water picks up more and larger particles than slower water. Seasonal patterns in sediment deposition give delineation of years. In this way, past precipitation patterns may be inferred. As to rivulets, you should read about how we infer the past existence of liquid water on Mars. Your agressive and content free reply betrays the insecurity of ignorance.
You still haven't provided evidence that what you describe has been performed in that area of Peru. You only rehash your "expert opinion" about what could be possible, and you feel insulted that people don't take your word on it.
Also I would like to point out that in a same post you first complain about me insulting you, then you say that I am insecure and ignorant. I'd love to say something about a kettle and a pot here, but maybe it would be interpreted as another "sneering insult".
You are right and the IPCC is right. Also, we were never at war with Eurasia.
Your life expectancy is probably around 80 years. If you get shot tomorrow, it's not the statisticians who are to blame.
If everybody is dying before 80 years, would you then say that there is a problem with the life expectancy projection, or that it is abnormal that people die so young?
You might want to look at this Wikipedia article. It's a timeline of meteorology. Apparently you have some severe misunderstandings about how long human beings have been taking note of the weather.
There is a huge gap between theory and practice. Just like CSI - yes, criminals can be put in jail because of DNA evidence, as long as the crime lab has unlimited funding and an army of field techs that can spend countless hours processing every inch of every area possibly linked to a crime.
Now if you tell me that someone actually created a reliable log (or even just a log) of weather reports for 150 years in a specific area in Peru, then it's wonderful news, but it will take more than a generic Wikipedia link to prove that. Can you even tell me what "high desert" area we are talking about?
> You managed to show absolute ignorance in only 4 important areas
You win, since you only show ignorance about one thing: sarcasm.
> and that "Union soldiers" were combatants in the American Civil War several thousand miles away
See above comment.
Scientists, when they made those projections, were being conservative, just including the factors they were sure of and discounting factors that were not well characterized yet. How much ridicule would you be heaping on them if they had overstated their projections?
Scenario 1:
2001 - scientist says that glaciers will melt in 100 years
2011 - scientist says that glaciers will melt much faster than 100 years
Scenario 2:
2001 - scientist says that glaciers will melt in 10 years
2011 - scientist says that glaciers will melt much slower than 10 years
In both scenarios, the problem is the projection, not the events that happened in that 10-year span.
Why being so dramatic? It is a very sad state of affairs that it is now politically incorrect to mention that an alarmist statement is nothing else but an alarmist statement.
And as usual the Chuch of Global Warming is very active on Slashdot and keeps modding down comments that are not fanatically pro-IPCC.
How can you know what kind of weather occurred in Peru over the last 150 years? Did someone find Mayan engravings? Or there is this very old guy that can swear that this never happened since he was born? Or maybe it was a Union soldier that got lost and decided to start a weather journal?
Ok, I have some homework for you. Go home and read your textbook on Sedimentology, focussing specifically on lake sediments caused by runoff. Read about how the flows of rivers can be read by drilling sediment cores out of lake beds. Then find your textbook on Glaciology, and read about how cores of ice drilled from long term ice deposits can be used to track snowfall. While you are at it, you can read about how rainfall events leave specific signatures in sand and dirt, including rivulets and specific patterns in the distribution of different sizes of sedimentary particles. I suspect snowfall events could also be inferred with similar observations.
You would be amazed at what geologists and geographers can find out simply by using observation and logic.
If you actually have evidence that someone did all that complex soil and sediment analysis in a specific field in Peru, please provide a link, as I will definitely include that in my museum of the least optimally spent money. What about other regions in Peru? Or Bolivia? Or Thailand? Unless the scientists have a very impressive algorithm allowing them to pinpoint locations where something never happened so they can raise flags if that thing actually happens.
Nah, your post sounds like the biggest dump of techno-babble I witnessed since many years ago when I read an article about the capabilities of the data-mining software available at the NSA, that allegedly could allow them to predict the next terrorist attack by running a neural network analysis on the log files from download.com (or something).