Iowahawk does it again:

Ten Things You Can Do to Save the Planet

My favorite is #3 Crush a Third World economic development movement.

"One of the most pressing threats facing our environment is rising incomes in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Only a generation ago, these proud dark people were happily frolicking in the rain forest, foraging for organic foods amid the wonders of nature. Now, corrupted by wealth, they are demanding environmentally hazardous consumer goods like cars and air conditioning and malaria medicine. You can do your part to stop this dangerous consumer trend by supporting environmentally aware leaders like Robert Mugabe and Fidel Castro to foster an economy of sustainable low-impact ecolabor camps."

I'll get right on that, Al.

Whining seen as effective strategy to prepare for hurricane season:

From Drudge:

SILVER SPRING, MD – Hundreds of concerned citizens and leaders from across the nation will join Hurricane Katrina survivors Wednesday to call for the resignation of the heads of the National Hurricane Center (NHC) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) at the NOAA Headquarters just outside of Washington, D.C. During an 11 a.m. demonstration, advocates will demand that NOAA stop covering up the growing scientific link between severe hurricanes and global warming while insisting on real solutions to the problem of global warming.

The protest comes at the start of the 2006 Hurricane season, which officials at the NHC predict will be “a hectic, above-normal tropical storm season.” Speeches begin at 11 a.m. EDT and protestors will carry dramatic props and photographs of Hurricane Katrina. A 37-hour demonstration will follow, lasting until midnight on June 1st, with picketing during the day and a candlelight vigil by night.

After a record four major hurricanes hit Florida in 2004, the 2005 hurricane season was even more devastating. Of the six most powerful hurricanes ever to hit America in the past 150 years, three occurred within 52 days in 2005. Yet, despite a flurry of peer-reviewed scientific studies linking planetary warming to storms like Katrina, leaders at NOAA and the NHC continue to claim that the recent hurricane devastation is part of a "natural cycle."

WHEN: 11 A.M. EDT, Wednesday, May 31st thru midnight on Thursday, June 1st

WHO: The U.S. Climate Emergency Council, Katrina survivors and concerned citizens from across the nation

WHAT: Press conference and speeches at 11 a.m. followed by a 37-hour protest and vigil to condemn government the cover up of science linking hurricanes and global warming

WHERE: NOAA Headquarters, 1325 East/West Highway, Silver Spring, MD

For more information or to arrange an interview please contact Mike Tidwell at 240-460-5838 or Anne Havemann at 202-997-2466.

Ah yes, Mike Tidwell, the celebrated climate scientist. NOT! Here's a bio:

Mike Tidwell is the author of four previous books, including In the Mountains of Heaven, Amazon Stranger, and The Ponds of Kalambayi. A former National Endowment for the Arts fellow, Tidwell has published his work in National Geographic Traveler, Reader's Digest, Washingtonian, and many other publications. His frequent travel articles for the The Washington Post have earned him four Lowell Thomas Awards, the highest prize in American travel journalism. He lives near Washington, D.C., with his wife, Catherine, and their son, Sasha.

He's a TRAVEL WRITER, for heaven's sake. Here's a sample of his views on global warming and climate change.Notice how dispassionate and reasoned they are.

Here's where Anne Haverman comes from. Apparently she works for Greenpeace, too, who are not exactly known for their use of the scientific method to reach their usually wacky conclusions. She also posts at places like this.

Do these people really think that firing the head of the NHC is going to change ANYTHING about hurricane season? Are there human beings walking around loose that are that delusional? (Well, I know there are, I posted about Amadinejad yesterday) Even if "Global warming" were making hurricanes stronger or more numerous, (and the bulk of the evidence is that it is NOT), why not put your energies into doing things that might actually help, like getting people informed and prepared and not reelecting incompetents like Ray Nagin (oops, too late).Oh, but I forgot, they suffered through Katrina, the worst thing to happen to anyone on the planet, ever. And after all, it's all about them.

Remember this? (Clearer view at NHC here) What trend do these people see again? Or do they ever look at data? (I think I already know the answer to that one)

I watched "The Producers" last night, which I thoroughly enjoyed, then read Ahmadinejad's interview with Der Speigel this morning. The following just seemed to come naturally:

Springtime for Islam (with apologies to Mel Brooks)
(to the tune of "Springtime for Hitler", obviously)

Islamists were having trouble, what a sad, sad story. Needed a new vision to restore their former glory. Where could it be? What could set them free? They looked around, and then they found, their plan for you and me. And now its…..

Springtime for Islam and Shari’a,
Jihad is well on its way.
Revenge on infidels we hate,
Look out, here comes the Caliphate.

Springtime for Islam and Shari’a,
Winter for Christians and Jews
Springtime for Islam and Shari’a
Come on, Moslems, go into your rants…..

Our image has been really evil that’s why we have Al-Jazeera

Don’t be stupid, be a man, come and join the Taliban!

Springtime for Islam and Shari’a
Burqas the fashion once more
Beheadings fill the streets again,
Sinners can lose their feet again.

Springtime for Islam and Shari’a
We have our nukes, bombs, and more

Springtime for Islam and Shari’a means that soon we’ll be going, we’ve got to be going, you know we’ll be going to war!

Yes, it turns out that if you put something off long enough, you won't need to do it after all.

I knew that if I procrastinated long enough, someone else would comment on skill in climate models, and they have, much better than I could. The Climate Science weblog, run by Dr. Roger Pielke’s group at Colorado State, is an excellent discussion on the climate topics of the day by real scientists with facts and no hysteria, even when they disagree with each other. Where else on the Web are you going to get that? (you'll have to scroll way down to get to the skill discussion)

One thing that is very clear and that the IPCC and other various climate commissions (AKA “grant money furnaces”) even admit is that the global models currently being used to influence public policy show very little skill in predicting (or projecting- see Pielke again for a discussion on whether there’s even a difference) regional effects. And yet it is on the REGIONAL scale that any political or social adjustments must be implemented. There is no “one-size-fits-all” global approach to dealing with climate change. Some areas may experience wetter conditions and have to manage floods; some will have to find a way around increasing desertification. Low-lying nations may have to deal with rising sea levels. Some regions will have warmer temperatures and longer growing seasons; some may have to deal with the opposite. Change is the normal state of the physical world. We live on a dynamic planet that goes through its own cycles in the atmosphere and lithosphere without regard to the convenience of the creatures that inhabit it. Those who insist that we have any real control over these are fooling themselves (or running for public office, or trying to get more funding, or any two of these conditions). Dealing with climate change should be like dealing with life in a tectonically active area, i.e. you plan for the worst and get out of nature’s way as much as possible to minimize your losses. It should be even easier, really, because these changes won’t happen as suddenly as an earthquake or tsunami, so the costs can be spread over a longer period of time. But to make realistic and effective plans, you must have reasonable projections as to what may happen, which brings us back to the models again.

Right now the climate modeling community, or at least the ones that get all the press, seem to be stuck on global models that emphasize atmospheric CO₂, especially anthropogenic CO₂ as a major climate forcing mechanism. Using their current measures of “skill”, they will only be brought into closer agreement with each other, not necessarily with reality. It’s comparable to the history behind the determination of the charge of an electron as recounted by Richard Feynman in a commencement address at Caltech in 1974 called “Cargo Cult Science”. The speech contains many valuable insights about scientific integrity that should be required reading for all scientists, and especially climate scientists these days. It has been reprinted in the book “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman”. Anyway, and I’m recalling this from memory, between 1908 and 1917 Robert Millikan measured the charge on an electron using an experiment with falling oil drops which turned out to give an incorrect result because of an error in some other value he used in his calculations. The interesting part is that when other physicists started trying to determine this charge, they would get different numbers but would throw out the ones that were too far off from Millikan’s because they figured that something must be wrong with them. The correct charge was finally found and agreed upon, but it took a while due to this herd phenomenon. Climate modeling seems to be falling into the same trap only with more serious consequences all around if policy makers are really going to use the predications made by these models to enact laws and regulations. Bringing all the models in agreement with each other just means they could be equally wrong, not that there’s any additional insight into the climate system. By the time the future rolls around and the predictions can be checked, those responsible for the models and their results will have gone to that big Research Institute in the sky, or at least retired. Another concern I have is HOW these models are brought into agreement. By “tweaking” certain elements until the desired result is achieved? How does this advance our understanding of climate physics again? Why should I believe that they really do represent reality? I really wish someone would tell me.

<----From Drudge 5/26/2006: "Polar bear has become new poster face of Arctic vulnerability..."
Polar bears are so cute. Don't you want to save them? You know it's all our fault they're in trouble. (Actually that's debatable-CC)

From Drudge c. 5/26/65 million B.C.: "Iguanodon new poster face of global cooldown....."

Well, they're not so cute, so who cares if they're extinct? We at Idiots Who Think They Can Stop The Earth From Ever Changing are not sure how climate change and mass extinctions could have happened without humans around to destroy the planet. Maybe it happpened because we weren't there to intervene by making movies and writing books and going on speaking tours in our personal jets.
(Personally I think he (she?) is kind of cute - CC)

They have GOT to be kidding:

It's really discouraging what passes for science these days.

Study: Super-sizing your food takes a hidden toll on your pocketbook

MADISON -- From a soft drink in a mega-size cup to a jumbo order of fries, many fast food restaurants let you upsize your meal for pennies -- seemingly a great value.

But there's a hidden cost to those larger portions, even beyond the health consequences of gaining weight. A team of University of Wisconsin-Madison nutritional scientists has calculated how much money a single bout of overeating can cost over the following year, according to a study to be published in June 2006 in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition.

"When confronted with the overwhelming costs of obesity to society as a whole, people don't always take the statistics personally," says Rachel Close, who completed the study with professor of nutritional science Dale Schoeller as part of her master's thesis. "This is another way to present the costs associated with weight gain, and might help convince people that upsizing a meal is no bargain after all. With obesity projected to rise from the current 30 percent to 40 percent of the American population by 2010, this is an important message."

Schoeller and Close were interested in how additional weight affected the amount of money spent on medical care and a vehicle's gasoline mileage, as well as the cost of the additional caloric energy required to support increased body weight. The pair anchored their study on two key assumptions: that the additional calories from upsizing a fast-food meal would be stored as excess energy -- in other words, that they would lead to weight gain -- and that diners would not compensate for the excess calories during subsequent meals. Close notes that the results of this study apply to overeating regardless of the type of food consumed -- fast-food or a home-cooked meal -- as long as the diner does not compensate for the calories at a later meal.

These are HUGE assumptions,especially the second one, and there is not even an attempt to find out if they are realistic.

After averaging the prices and caloric difference between regular and up-sized french fries and soft drinks at three major fast food chains, Close used studies of body mass index and medical cost, average vehicle mileage and gas prices, and caloric expenditure to calculate how the weight gained from one upsized fast-food meal translates into money out of pocket over the next year.

They found that for the initial 67-cent average cost of upsizing a fast-food meal -- and the subsequent 36-gram weight gain -- the total cost for increased energy needs, gasoline and medical care would be between $4.06 and $7.72 for men and $3.10 and $4.53 for women, depending on their body type.

A 36 gram weight gain? Well, a penny weighs about 3.1 grams, so this is roughly the equivalent of 10 to 11 pennies. So if you have loose change in your car, it's costing you money. I have no idea how this amount of weight gain could possibly translate into increased medical costs. And increased energy needs? What are they? More air conditioning for the fatties carrying an extra 40 grams?

The bottom line: Although upsizing a meal brings you 73 percent more calories for only an additional 17 percent in price, the hidden financial costs drive the price of that meal up between 191 and 123 percent.

Let's do some math, shall we? If we say that the regular size meal costs $4.00 and contains 300 calories, that gives us a cost of about 1.3 cents per calorie. If we supersize the meal according to the above formula, that gives us a cost of $4.68 for 519 calories, or 0.9 cents per calorie. If the "hidden costs" drive the price of the supersized meal up 123% to $10.44, then the cost per calorie goes to 2 cents per calorie. Yes, it's more than the 1.3 cents per calorie for the regular meal, but not THAT much more. And of course, all this assumes that the "hidden costs" are real.

"While there's an immediate savings in upsizing a meal, we've shown that the hidden costs balance that initial savings, and actually surpass it," says Schoeller. "People might choose to change their behavior because of financial consequences, if the health consequences of obesity are not yet a factor in their lives."

Well, I'll go out right now and get all that change out of my car, especially the quarters, they've got to be killing my mileage. Maybe I should also take out the seat belts I don't use, and the maps, and the flashlight, and the spare tire. Who knows how much money I could save on gas? Thanks Dr. Schoeller and Ms. Close!

As soon as I finish grading these finals, I PROMISE to get back to the climate report.

You really should visit Junk Science (linked in the left) today for a roundup of current climate hysteria, some of which was surely brought on by the newly released comedy "An Inconvenient Truth". ALso, did you know that you can change your country's elevation merely by suing the US? No, really, you can!

Yes, part 2, "Skill in the climate forecasting biz" is coming. But you really should read what Patrick Michaels has to say in the Washington Times while I write it.

News flash: global warming is really Ireland's fault!

CCSP Report (Climate Change Science Program)- “Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere: Steps for Understanding and Reconciling Differences"

Sometimes (not often) I really feel sorry for government scientists. The report above is the first in a series of 21, well, let them explain it in their own words:

"This document, the first of the Synthesis and Assessment Products described in the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) Strategic Plan, was prepared in accordance with Section 515 of the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2001 (Public Law 106-554) and the information quality act guidelines issued by the Department of Commerce and NOAA pursuant to Section 515 ). The CCSP Interagency Committee relies on Department of Commerce and NOAA certifications regarding compliance with Section 515 and Department guidelines as the basis for determining that this product conforms with Section 515. For purposes of compliance with Section 515, this CCSP Synthesis and Assessment Product is an “interpreted product” as that term is used in NOAA guidelines and is classified as “highly influential”. This document does not express any regulatory policies of the United States or any of its agencies, or provide recommendations for regulatory action."

Everybody clear on this now? Here is the version for Congress :

"Members of Congress:
We are pleased to transmit to you this report, Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere: Steps for Understanding and Reconciling Differences, the first of a series of Synthesis and Assessment Products produced by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP). This series of 21 reports is aimed at providing current evaluations of climate change science to inform public debate, policy, and operational decisions. These reports are also intended to help inform CCSP’s consideration of future program priorities. CCSP’s guiding vision is to empower the Nation and the global community with the science-based knowledge to manage the risks and opportunities of change in the climate and related environmental systems." etc.

So, this first report is an attempt to reconcile discrepancies between climate model results and observed data, of which there are many. It actually doesn't get very far, though it does make some recommendations for future work, like all reports designed to seek assurance of future funding. I'll get into the details of the actual results tomorrow. For now, I will elaborate on why I feel sympathy for the plight of the scientists involved (aside from the govspeak they are required to write)

Before this report was officially released, it was submitted to some sort of peer review. I'm not sure whether the participants were chosen or volunteered, but their comments could be predicted from their affiliations. Earth Defense was all bent out of shape because the report didn't stress the "overwhelming scientific consensus that human activity is affecting the climate system". Ditto for the Climate Institute. From the other side, Roger Pielke doggedly tried to nail them down on what he felt were deliberate evasions about the ability of the climate models to accurately reproduce the known state of the atmosphere for the past 20 years and also what he viewed as a tendency to blame the data instead of the models for the observed differences.

Being an apostate from the Church of the Holy Model for some years, I have more of an affinity for the second view, but I am certainly not going to rule out data problems. I know there are great difficulties in obtaining good data sets, correcting for changes in instrumentation over the years, diurnal solar effects, the scarcity of global radiosonde data, etc. One of the conclusions of this report is that these things should be dealt with in a timely and accurate fashion, as well they should. BUT shouldn't the models themselves be subjected to tougher scrutiny as well? One of the stated purposes of this series of reports is to "inform public debate, policy, and operational decisions" (see above), and also to "address .......questions that are obviously of great importance to policy makers with state of the art climate models and with our current best estimates of historical changes in external climate forcing." (emphasis theirs, p. 148 of the comments) If the best estimates are all derived from the current models, then........ well, let's pick it up tomorrow with a discussion of "skill" in the climate forecasting biz.

Nag, nag, nag,

Global warming is all your fault again!

From the Washington Post:

Ask most home builders these days what they sell, and they will say a lifestyle. In most cases, that means a house on the outer fringes of suburbia with a yard for the kids and a garden for the folks. The house has plenty of room to pursue hobbies, entertain friends, bond with the family and get away from it all in a spacious master suite.

But is that lifestyle sustainable for the long haul? That is, in meeting our needs, are we compromising the needs of future generations? The needs of our children and our children's children?

Yes.

There is an even more critical reason to rethink the suburban lifestyle: the energy it consumes. More than 40 percent of the planet-warming greenhouse gases that we collectively produce every day are directly or indirectly tied to our buildings. Half these buildings are houses.

So what is a sustainable lifestyle for the long haul? Almonte, Ontario, energy expert William H. Kemp said: "A sustainable lifestyle uses less energy, less land and fewer resources. It's living in an apartment in a city like New York or Boston and using public transit or walking to work, school and shopping areas."

Etc., etc.

Actually, there are good arguments to be made for building communities that do not depend so heavily on cars and none of them have to do with global warming. This article does make a few of them. But, how many people can really afford to live in an apartment in New York or Boston? Even down here in the South, a one bedroom loft in the nearby Big City costs more than twice what my planet-killing three-bedroom suburban house does. Plus the public transportation system doesn't really go anywhere useful unless you live in a housing project. And we won't even start on the public schools. What are people with children supposed to do?

Another point that is danced around but never addressed is the reason more suburban houses are being built to begin with. There must be people buying them, mustn't there? Where are they coming from? Actual birth rates in the US are just below replacement levels, so it's not like there's another baby boom. It's true that more Americans are moving from small towns and rural areas to large cities and suburbs, so that would account for some of the increase, but then why are the sustainability people worried about using up farmland for housing? I would think there would be more of that available as the country and small town folk move to the city. Hmmmm, it must be something that is a very sensitive issue, something that would damage their liberal/environmentalist creds if they spoke of it in a negative way.

Can you tell the Compassionate Crank what the answer is?

Wierd doings in the UK:

From The Telegraph:

A judge who must decide whether a retired businesswoman accused of running a campaign of "pure evil" against an idyllic rural community should be given an anti-social behaviour order has adjourned the case.

Jeanne Wilding is accused of being "at war" with at least 15 individuals or organisations.

Deputy District Judge Sandra Keen is expected to give her ruling in the hearing at Calderdale Magistrates' Court in Halifax, West Yorkshire, where the local council is applying for an anti-social behaviour order against her.

The case centres around a long-running saga in Bottomley, near Todmorden, West Yorkshire, which involves more than 250 alleged incidents in under 16 months.

James Ward, for Calderdale Council, told the court that Ms Wilding was running a "rampaging campaign of hatred and pure evil" as she turned her idyllic countryside community into a "hamlet of horrors".

The judge was told Ms Wilding's acts of anti-social behaviour included loudly playing a choral work "about rape, pillage and the trashing of villages", causing extensive damage to vehicles, beaming floodlights into her neighbour's home, and tipping oil over her neighbour's drive at night.

She also deposited rubbish, dog faeces, glass and nails on the road, obstructing other homes and communal spaces, Mr Ward said.

An interim Asbo currently bans her pointing her surveillance cameras into her neighbours' homes, obstructing a communal area between the houses and dumping rubbish, including animal corpses, as well as contacting neighbours.

You know, the Brits used to know how to deal with people like this: (go ahead, click on it!)

Another couple of busy days. You really should visit ecoEnquirer . Take the poll!

We're all gonna die!

From Christian Aid:

Climate change is now threatening development goals for billions of the world’s poorest people – with a clear danger that recent gains in reducing poverty will be thrown into reverse in coming decades.

A staggering 182 million people in sub-Saharan Africa alone could die of disease directly attributable to climate change by the end of the century. Many millions more throughout the world face death and devastation due to climate-induced floods, famine, drought and conflict.

That is the sombre message of 'The climate of poverty: facts, fears and hope', a new report from Christian Aid, which calls on the UK government to lead rich countries in taking urgent action to curb global warming.

But the report also offers the vision of a different future – a revolution in development thinking that could see poor regions using renewable energy to power a new, and clean, era of prosperity.

etc. etc.You know, Christian Aid, the home of the world's most elite climate scientists.

From The Guardian:

Record amounts of the Arctic ocean failed to freeze during the recent winter, new figures show, spelling disaster for wildlife and strengthening concerns that the region is locked into a destructive cycle of irreversible climate change.

Satellite measurements show the area covered by Arctic winter sea ice reached an all-time low in March, down some 300,000 square kilometres on last year -an area bigger than the UK.

Scientists say the decline highlights an alarming new trend, with recovery of the ice in winter no longer sufficient to compensate for increased melting in the summer. If the cycle continues, the Arctic ocean could lose all of its ice much earlier than expected, possibly by 2030.

Article continues

---

---

Walt Meier, a researcher at the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado, which collected the figures, said: "It's a pretty stark drop. In the winter the ice tends to be pretty stable, so the last three years, with this steady decline, really stick out."

Experts are worried because a long-term slow decline of ice around the north pole seems to have sharply accelerated since 2003, raising fears that the region may have passed one of the "tipping points" in global warming. In this scenario, warmer weather melts ice and drives temperatures higher because the dark water beneath absorbs more of the sun's radiation. This could make global warming quickly run out of control.

Dr Meier said there was "a good chance" the Arctic tipping point has been reached. "People have tried to think of ways we could get back to where we were. We keep going further and further into the hole, and it's getting harder and harder to get out of it."

The Arctic is rapidly becoming the clearest demonstration of the effects of mankind's impact on the global climate. The temperature is rising twice as fast as the rest of the planet and the region is expected to warm by a further 4C-7C by 2100. The summer and winter ice levels are the lowest since satellite monitoring began in 1979, and almost certainly the lowest since local people began keeping records around 1900. The pace of decline since 2003, if continued, would see the Arctic totally ice-free in summer within 30 years - though few scientists would stake their reputations on a long-term trend drawn from only three years.

Experts at the US Naval Postgraduate School in California think the situation could be even worse. They are about to publish the results of computer simulations that show the current rate of melting, combined with increased access for warmer Pacific water, could make the summertime Arctic ice-free within a decade. Dr Meier said: "For 800,000 to a million years, at least some of the Arctic has been covered by ice throughout the year. That's an indication that, if we are heading for an ice-free Arctic, it's a really dramatic change and something that is unprecedented almost within the entire record of human species."

The winter ice has declined all around the region - bad news for polar bears, which spend summer on land before returning to the ice in spring to catch food.

In geologic terms, the "entire record of the human species" really isn't that long. There have been periods with NO arctic ice in the planet's history. In fact, the last one occurred when the dinosaurs were thriving, so one would think that such periods are good for living things.

From The Independent:

Global warming is to blame for the rising numbers of Britons suffering from hay fever, in the first direct impact of climate change on human health in this country.

The pollen from trees and grasses that produces allergic reactions in millions of people is steadily increasing with rising temperatures, according to the UK's leading pollen specialist.

Pollen seasons are lengthening, and the pollen itself is provoking a more powerful reaction - a situation already being reflected in rising GP consultation rates for hay fever, according to Professor Jean Emberlin, director of the National Pollen and Aerobiology Research Unit.

Hitherto, the direct effects of climate change on everyday life have seemed a long way off. But for the estimated 13 million Britons who annually suffer the misery of runny noses and watering eyes, they have already arrived, as pollen counts head steadily upwards - and more and more people are being affected.

"We are seriously concerned that rising pollen loads are starting to affect a substantial number of people who have never had hay fever before," said Muriel Simmonds, chief executive of Allergy UK (formerly the British Allergy Foundation). "That is coming over loud and clear."

You can read the whole thing, if you dare. More plants and a longer growing season are bad for humans. I guess I'm just not smart enough to figure this one out.

For some reason the British press have appointed themselves climate alarmists to the world. I don't know, maybe this is an attempt to compensate for the lost empire by trying to have an influence, any influence, on international affairs. But it really doesn't help your image when you sound as hysterical over climate change as Laurie David et al.

Hurricane season draws near and so do the kooks:

From the Miami Herald:

Hurricanes can be frozen, nuked or blown away with really, really big fans. If we build a tall wall, they'll hit it and bounce right back over the ocean. Wait, barges that pump up cool ocean water -- that will kill 'em.

Actually, no. They won't. Not even close. None of it.

Hurricane myths are flourishing, experts said Thursday, another consequence of the recent swarm of catastrophic storms that struck Florida and other areas -- often after days of sky-high stress and suspense.

''You can see them coming sometimes a week in advance,'' said scientist Chris Landsea, who helped conduct a hurricane-myth workshop at the Governor's Hurricane Conference in Fort Lauderdale. 'So the natural question is, `What can we do to get rid of them?' ''

Here, as a public service, is the answer:

Nothing.

Not even a nuclear bomb?

''A nuclear bomb is just a hiccup to a hurricane,'' said Landsea, the National Hurricane Center's science and operations officer. ``And then you have a radioactive hurricane. Not good.''

And yet the ideas keep flooding in.

''It can get pretty exasperating, getting these same questions all the time,'' said Steve Letro, the National Weather Service's chief forecaster in Jacksonville.

On Tuesday, during a visit to Sun City, south of Tampa, President Bush was told by a man in the crowd about a way to destroy hurricanes using ``the coldest thing in the universe.''

Bush: ``To control hurricanes?''

Man: ``Right.''

Bush: ``Where were you last year?''

A day earlier, faxes arrived at the hurricane center, in Miami Beach city offices and at The Miami Herald promoting a plan to employ 25 barges -- ``with two pumps and four pipeing [sic] systems each vessel.''

The proponent said this would bring up from the depths enough cool water to kill a hurricane deader than dead.

Nah, not really, Landsea said.

It's all a matter of scale. Hurricanes are fantastically enormous, immensely powerful phenomena. One measure of that: Every second, a hurricane generates as much energy as every power plant on Earth combined.

Pumping up cool water? ''You would need 3,000 pipes,'' Landsea said. And in the right place at the right time in advance. ``Just not feasible.''

Towing icebergs and placing them in the hurricane's path? ``You would need all the ships in the world.''

Seeding hurricane clouds with silver iodide so the storm rains itself out over the ocean? That was actually tried in the 1960s. Didn't work. ``The pellets just went splash in the ocean.''

Building giant walls or mile-high fans along the coast? ``Let's not even talk about that.''

Read the whole thing:

1.) Isn't Landsea a great name for a hurricane expert?

2.) Every year there are calls to "do something" about hurricanes. I imagine that this year it will be even worse than usual because of Katrina and Rita. And politicians love to appear to be "doing something", hence all the calls to implement the Kyoto protocols and other such foolishness to combat "global warming". Whether anything can or even should be done is not usually a concern.

Here's a satellite shot of Hurricane Frances, Sept. 5, 2004, as it crosses the Florida Peninsula:

Notice the sheer size of this storm. At this point it was probably a category 3, though it had been a 4 as it traveled through the Caribbean. Now, what exactly do people think can or should be done about this? Well, some of that was in the article above and none of it would make much of a difference (except the "nuke the hurricane" suggestion, which would make things worse). This is the Earth system doing what it does, in this case moving heat and moisture around the hydrosphere/atmosphere in the most efficient way. When the lithosphere redistributes heat, we get earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis. It's just the way the planet works, and we members of the biosphere have to adjust as best we can. In fact, those of us who brag about having large brains should be able to realize the need for this and adjust our behaviour accordingly. But we like living on the beaches and barrier islands. We think that just because we build a city on a coastal swamp or a major faultline that manages to stay relatively untouched for a couple hundred years that it is somehow entitled to remain there forever. We really don't learn from experience, do we?

From Reuters, who never met an American they did like:

Another compare and contrast

Alarmed by the relentless rise of anti-Americanism around the world, a business-backed group is trying to change the behavior that spawned an enduring stereotype of Americans abroad -- loud, arrogant, ill-dressed, ill-mannered and lacking respect for other cultures.

For many years, much of the rest of the world distinguished between the United States and the American people. Americans tended to get better ratings than their country and its policies. But recent surveys show that favorable perceptions of Americans have been shrinking while views on the world's only superpower grow increasingly hostile.

Enter Business for Diplomatic Action Inc. (BDA), a non-profit organization founded by advertising executive Keith Reinhard after a worldwide survey of attitudes toward Americans convinced him that "our collective personality is one of the root causes of anti-Americanism."

"We are seen as loud, arrogant and completely self-absorbed," said Reinhard, chairman emeritus of the advertising agency DDB Worldwide. "People see in us the ultimate arrogance -- assuming that everybody wants to be like us."

This month, San Francisco-based BDA -- whose board includes executives from Exxon and McDonald's -- began distributing a "World Citizen's Guide" to corporate travelers. Its 16 points are a mirror image of the behavioral patterns that earned Americans a boorish reputation in the first place. Here's a sampler from the guide.

*** Think as big as you like but talk and act smaller. In many countries, any form of boasting is considered rude. Talking about wealth, power or status -- corporate or personal -- can create resentment.

*** Speak lower and slower. In conversation, match your voice level and tonality to the environment and other people. A loud voice is often perceived as bragging. A fast talker can be seen as aggressive and threatening

***Listen at least as much as you talk. By all means, talk about America and your life in the country. But also ask people you're visiting about themselves and their way of life. Listen, and show your interest in how they compare their experiences to yours.

BDA's campaign follows several unsuccessful attempts by the government to "sell America," including a branding effort led by a high-powered advertising executive, Charlotte Beers. Under her leadership, the State Department's Office for Public Diplomacy produced a series of videos about Muslims thriving in the United States.

They were meant to show that the Muslim world had a mistaken image of the United States, but several Arab governments refused to air the videos, branding them propaganda.

Etc. etc. Now let's look at apparently acceptable ways of interacting with the natives in a country to which you have emigrated or are acting in a diplomatic capacity:

From KLRT in Little Rock, Ark. :

Controversy over building a proposed Islamic community in Little Rock and many residents are not pleased. The planning commission unanimously approved the project which includes a mosque, a school and more than 20 homes. This stamp of approval is just the first step in a long process that will include much opposition. Several members of the community and members of the planning commission expressed their concerns. Their biggest concern, they are fearful this planned Islamic community will exclude other religions. Little Rock resident... Tim Lawson, says, "I'm opposed to any type of segregation and I believe this is what's going to happen.

From Virginia Tech:

About 60 faculty members from a Saudi Arabian university are taking courses on Virginia Tech's campus this summer. But the program's setup is a bit different than a typical Tech class.

Men and women from King Abdulaziz University are taking identical faculty development courses at Tech, but meet in gender-specific classes. Tech officials said administrators from the Saudi university separated the sexes to mirror classroom settings at their home institution, which operates separate campuses for men and women.

And in North Carolina:

.......just-graduated student named Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, 22, and an Iranian immigrant, drove a sport utility vehicle into a crowded pedestrian zone. He struck nine people but, fortunately, none were severely injured.

Until his would-be murderous rampage, Mr. Taheri-azar, a philosophy and psychology major, had a seemingly normal existence and promising future. In high school, he had been student council president and a member of the National Honor Society. The Los Angeles Times writes that a number of UNC students found him "a serious student, shy but friendly." One fellow student, Brian Copeland, "was impressed with his knowledge of classical Western thought," adding, "He was kind and gentle, rather than aggressive and violent." The university chancellor, James Moeser, called him a good student, if "totally a loner, introverted and into himself."

In fact, no one who knew him said a bad word about him, which is important, for it signals that he is not some low-life, not homicidal, not psychotic, but a conscientious student and amiable person. Which raises the obvious question: Why would a regular person try to kill a random assortment of students? Mr. Taheri-azar's post-arrest remarks offer some clues.

• He told the 911 dispatcher that he wanted to "punish the government of the United States for their actions around the world."
• He explained to a detective that "people all over the world are being killed in war and now it is the people in the United States' turn to be killed."
• He said he acted to "avenge the deaths of Muslims around the world."
• He portrayed his actions as "an eye for an eye."
• A police affidavit notes that "Taheri-azar repeatedly said that the United States government had been killing his people across the sea and that he decided to attack."
• He told a judge, "I'm thankful you're here to give me this trial and to learn more about the will of Allah."

And then there's this:

• n 1982, a Miami judge issued a warrant to search Prince Turki Bin Abdul Aziz's 24^th-floor penthouse to determine if he was holding an Egyptian woman, Nadia Lutefi Mustafa, against her will. Mr. Turki and his French bodyguards prevented a search from taking place, then won retroactive diplomatic immunity to forestall any legal unpleasantness.

• In 1988, the Saudi defense attaché in Washington, Colonel Abdulrahman S. Al-Banyan, employed a Thai domestic worker, Mariam Roungprach, until she escaped his house by crawling out a window. She later said that she had been imprisoned there, did not get enough food, and was not paid. Interestingly, her work contract specified that she could not leave the house or make telephone calls without her employer's permission.

• In 1991, Prince Saad Bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud and his wife, Princess Noora, lived on two floors of the Ritz-Carlton in Houston. Two of their servants, Josephine Alicog of the Philippines and Sriyani Marian Fernando of Sri Lanka, filed a lawsuit against the prince, alleging they were held for five months against their will, "by means of unlawful threats, intimidation and physical force." They say they were only partially paid, were denied medical treatment, and suffered mental and physical abuse.

• In March 2005, a wife of Saudi Prince Mohamed Bin Turki Alsaud, Hana Al Jader, 39, was arrested at her home near Boston on charges of forced labor, domestic servitude, falsifying records, visa fraud, and harboring aliens. Ms. Al Jader stands accused of forcing two Indonesian women to work for her by making them believe "that if they did not perform such labor, they would suffer serious harm." If convicted, Ms. Al Jader faces up to 140 years in jail and $2.5 million in fines.

Do I need to go into the recent antics of the so-called "immigrants" from Mexico? Of course, they do have some of the natives on their side:

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) -- This famously liberal city is serving notice that illegal aliens are welcome, even while Congress is considering tough new penalties. Police won't harass you. Education and health care are available.
Here's the hitch: You probably can't afford to live here.
In 1985, when Cambridge first declared itself a "sanctuary city," rent control kept apartments affordable.
Today, however, Cambridge no longer has rent control; cheap apartments were turned into luxury condominiums, and the city -- home of Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology -- is among the most expensive places to live in the United States. The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is $1,400 a month.
So, while the city renews its open-arms declaration -- as other U.S. cities are doing -- it's not exactly a magnet for new immigrants, particularly illegal ones.

Read more here. It's pretty typical of these folks to make such meaningless gestures, especially when there's no possibility that they will face any consequences. Sort of like all those CA mayors who declared their towns "nuclear free " and "dolphin safe" zones.

A rambling blog today, I know. But idiocy knows no bounds these days. The next post is about somebody who's actually doing something useful and intelligent, sort of an antidote to the rest of the news.

From the Belleville News-Democrat

ILLINOIS STYLE: UI researcher makes crude oil from pig manure

DAVE ORRICK

(Arlington Heights) Daily Herald

HAMPSHIRE, Ill. - Can the other white meat's manure make black gold?

They say you can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, but University of Illinois researchers are working some interesting magic at the other end of the animal.

"We are the first to actually do this," professor Yuanhui Zhang says proudly of his team's ability to turn swine manure into crude oil. He's a bio-environmental engineer at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who has led the 10-year research project that recently announced a breakthrough in porcine petroleum.

That neat trick may sound crude.

But it also sounds good to a pork industry swamped with oceans of swine manure, and it sounds like the national anthem to those looking to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil.

A typical pig produces about 6 gallons of waste a day.

For a hog farmer like Pat Dumoulin of Hampshire, who has about 1,200 sows, that's enough stinky and potentially hazardous fumes that he has a pair of 500,000-gallon tanks to properly store the stuff.

Like most farmers, much of the manure from Dumoulin's hogs winds up as fertilizer.

"Most of the farmers in our area are open to taking the hog manure," says Dumoulin, whose farm has been in his family for more than 50 years. "Sometimes it's done for no cost, sometimes they pay us a fee to spread it on their fields."

Either way, scientists have agreed for years that the chemical and capital potential of pig manure, like almost all organic waste, could have other uses.

Zhang's breakthrough wasn't that he and fellow researchers had become excrement alchemists; in about 1998, he figured out how to convert some of a pig's byproduct to an energy source. Turning garbage into natural gas, cow manure into fuel for power plants, and even fast-food grease into auto fuel are other examples of recent advances in the sub-field of icky-but-renewable energy.

Zhang's big breakthrough is that he's designed a more efficient process: a continuous reactor. Instead of converting hog waste one batch at a time, Zhang's lab, which is funded in part by the Illinois Pork Producers Association, has developed a method to feed waste continuously into a reactor, which is essentially an industrial-strength pressurized oven. And, Zhang boasts, "We don't even need pre-drying."

Chemically, pig dung isn't as different from oil as one might think. In Zhang's reactor, a process known as thermochemical conversion partially breaks down hydrocarbon molecules that make up most of the excrement, and voila: porky petrol.

Similar but not identical to the black gold it took Mother Nature eons to brew, Zhang's fuel behaves like diesel.

Now the plan is to move from the lab to a full-sized pilot reactor on a farm somewhere Downstate. Zhang predicts the process could get 3.6 gallons of crude oil a day out of each pig. Illinois brings some 7.2 million hogs to market each year and the nationwide industry is about 100-million hogs strong.

Theoretically, the resulting millions of barrels of crude a day could make a significant dent in America's dependence on nonrenewable, and often imported, oil.

But converting the nations automobile fleet to hog-oline isn't what Zhang or the hog industry is thinking about right now. No research has been done into how many current commercial vehicles could run on the fuel.

Let the swine jokes begin.

It's the sun, stupid

From CO2 Science

Two Millennia of Japanese Temperature Fluctuations

Reference
Kitagawa, H. and Matsumoto, E. 1995. Climatic implications of δ¹³C variations in a Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) during the last two millennia. Geophysical Research Letters 22: 2155-2158.

What was done
The authors analyzed δ¹³C variations of Japanese cedars growing on Yakushima Island, southern Japan (30°20'N, 130°30'E), in an effort to reconstruct a high-resolution proxy temperature record over the past two thousand years. In addition, they applied spectral analysis to the δ¹³C time series in an effort to learn if any significant periodicities were present in the record.

What was learned
Significant decadal to centennial-scale variability was noted throughout the record, with temperatures fluctuating by about 5°C across the series. Most notable among the fluctuations were multi-century warm and cold epochs. Between AD 700-1200, for example, there was about a 1°C rise in average temperature (pre-1850 average), which the authors state "appears to be related to the 'Medieval Warm Period'." In contrast, temperatures were about 2°C below the long-term pre-1850 average during the multi-century Little Ice Age that occurred between AD 1580 and 1700. Kitagawa and Matsumoto also report finding significant temperature periodicities of 187, 89, 70, 55 and 44 years. Noting that the 187-year cycle closely corresponds to the well-known Suess cycle of solar activity and that the 89-year cycle compares well with the Gleissberg solar cycle, they conclude that their findings provide further support for a sun-climate relationship.

What it means
The results of this study add to the growing body of evidence that the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age were global phenomena. What is more, they indicate there is nothing unprecedented about Current Warm Period temperatures in this region, which according to the data presented in the authors' Figure 3, remain about a degree Celsius lower than the peak warmth of the Medieval Warm Period.

Reviewed 10 May 2006

Wow! They didn't use a computer model to simulate the MWP! They actually went and LOOKED AT SOME DATA! Science in action!

What were they thinking, part 2 - What the hell were they thinking????

From Dailybulletin.com

While Minuteman civilian patrols are keeping an eye out for illegal border crossers, the U.S. Border Patrol is keeping an eye out for Minutemen -- and telling the Mexican government where they are.

According to three documents on the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations Web site, the U.S. Border Patrol is to notify the Mexican government as to the location of Minutemen and other civilian border patrol groups when they participate in apprehending illegal immigrants -- and if and when violence is used against border crossers.

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman confirmed the notification process, describing it as a standard procedure meant to reassure the Mexican government that migrants' rights (!!!!!?????) are being observed.

"It's not a secret where the Minuteman volunteers are going to be," Mario Martinez said Monday.

"This ... simply makes two basic statements -- that we will not allow any lawlessness of any type, and that if an alien is encountered by a Minuteman or arrested by the Minuteman, then we will allow that government to interview the person."

No, they'll just allow people to come over the border illegally.

Minuteman members were not so sanguine about the arrangement, however, saying that reporting their location to Mexican officials nullifies their effectiveness along the border and could endanger their lives.

"Now we know why it seemed like Mexican officials knew where we were all the time," said Chris Simcox, founder of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps. "It's unbelievable that our own government agency is sending intelligence to another country. They are sending intelligence to a nation where corruption runs rampant, and that could be getting into the hands of criminal cartels.

"They just basically endangered the lives of American people."

Officials with the Mexican consulate in Washington, D.C., could not be reached for comment Monday.

Unbelievable. Read the whole thing.

It's hard to believe this is all about ice cream:

From The Times:

FOR 60 years the tinny jingle of Greensleeves that announced the arrival of the ice-cream van has been an indelible memory of childhood, but that sound may soon be removed from suburban streets. Health lobbyists have decided that ice-creams are too much of a danger to children’s health.

Sound familiar? The madness is everywhere.

MPs and health officials are planning a series of measures across the country that are already forcing Mr Whippy and his helpers into meltdown.

I don't know, maybe it's the name. Would you trust someone named "Mr. Whippy" around your kids?

Under an amendment to the Education and Inspection Bill to be put forward this week, local authorities will be given new powers to stop ice-cream vans from operating near school gates. The move comes as operators claim that they are already being forced out of business by an over-zealous health lobby.

Local authorities have in recent weeks banned ice-cream vans from using pay-and-display parking spaces and set up “ice-cream-free”exclusion zones around busy shopping streets. Newham council, in east London, informed vendors last month that it would fine van owners up to £80 if they used pay-and-display bays. Greenwich council, in southeast London, has banned the vans from its streets altogether, while in Scotland, West Dunbartonshire council has introduced an exclusion zone around schools for vans.

Mark Gossage, the director of Ice Cream Alliance that represented 20,000 van owners in the 1960s and now has 700 members, said that many of his members can no longer make a living. “Many schools have already stopped arrangements for vans to sell to pupils,” he said. “They are wiping us out.”

There are about 5,000 ice-cream vans in Britain. In times gone by they would have parked at the side of most roads; but times have changed. The amendment would grant local authorities the power to ban ice-cream vans from parking near schools.

One dietitian told The Times that a ban on ice-cream vans near schools would be a draconian policy that may drive children to buy even less healthy foods at nearby shops.

Catherine Collins, the chief dietitian at St George’s Hospital, Tooting, south London, said: “This is the kind of blanket ban that gives the health lobby a bad name. A healthy diet can factor in a sugary treat such as an ice-cream. It is the frequency of that treat that is an issue. Most choices from an ice-cream van would provide fewer calories and fat compared to a free choice from a newsagent.”

Horse-drawn vans selling flavoured ices were first seen on cobbled streets in the 19th century. Motorised vans followed in the 1950s, selling hard, scooped or soft ice-cream.

By the 1980s the business had become so lucrative that gangs fought over the right to sell to certain streets. In 1984 a row between Glasgow-based gangs led to the murder of six members of the Doyle family, who had run the Marchetti ice-cream company. The sector has since declined because of the availability of ice-creams from shops and garages. The few vendors left said last week they would be out of business if the amendment was passed.

Gang wars! Over ice cream routes! Well, I guess the crime rate will go down in Glasgow. Unless the powerful tofu and broccoli families become involved at the schools.

John Barrowclough, whose Iced Treats van stops outside schools around Wolverhampton, said he had been forced to sell one of his two vans because of a clampdown.

“We sell a lot of ice-creams near schools,” he said. “Of course no one wants to see fat kids, but most children have an ice-cream once a week, not every day.”

Sefer Huseyin, whose family have run Five Star Catering ice-cream vans in Camberwell, southeast London, since the 1960s, said that his vans had been banned from schools. “Telling vendors they are not allowed near schools is the wrong message,” he said. “They have been going there for years and their livelihood is being taken away from them.”

Plus, do the Brits really want more unemployed Muslims with actual grievances against the system hanging around?

However, the amendment is supported by some health campaigners. Chris Waterman, the executive director of the Confederation of Education and Children’s Services Managers, said ice-cream vans should be restricted. “There are millions going into healthy food in schools, yet kids are rushing to spend their money on food from mobile vans,” he said.

Well, it is their money. Or, more likely, their parents' money. But we really can't have people just spending their own money as they want, can we?

Finally, the Anglican church is certain about something.

Faith demands action on climate change, Archbishop says 29/03/06
Dr Rowan Williams,spiritual head of the world’s 77 million Anglicans, has called on the UK government and other government’s around the world to take practical steps to get people to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Speaking in an interview with the BBC in London this week, the Archbishop of Canterbury said that both faith and human values demand consolidated action to address the climate change situation, not least because of the terrible impact it is having, and will continue to have, on the world’s poorest people.

The Archbishop said that there was no escaping the fact that ordinary people had a moral responsibility to change lifestyles. But he stressed that this was not a matter of simply ‘lecturing’. It was something pressed upon us by the facts of the situation.

The consequences if we did not address C02 emissions, Dr Williams warned, would be the deaths of billions of people worldwide from the effects of extreme climate change.

He said the biblical narrative made it clear that God would hold people accountable when they had been warned they were going down the wrong path.

Snort! (sound of beverage being sprayed out nose) Given what's been going on in the Anglican church for the past forty years or so, he's now going to get religion? About climate change????

And the Archbishop also said that US President George W Bush's stance of refusing to cut emissions because it might compromise American jobs was not compatible with a Christian point of view.

"I think if we look at the language of the Bible we very often come across situations where people are judged for not responding to warnings," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"I think what the Bible and the Christian tradition suggest is that those who have that challenge put before them, and not only that challenge but the evidence for it, and don't respond, bear a very heavy responsibility before God."

There's more about how it's all the U.S.'s fault that Kyoto isn't working, and in fact the UK can't seem to get its own emissions down to target levels. (Not that it would matter much if it did, see Junk Science for more detail). Read the rest if you must.

The really funny thing about all this is the Archbishop's earlier statements about not wanting to be the "comic vicar to the nation" by commenting on things to which he could not make a contribution, like, I don't know, moral issues -

from The Guardian

Dr Rowan Williams was talking eloquently about society's expectations of the Church of England and said words to the effect that society was missing the point in expecting the church to be in the business of moral leadership. At this the man from the Daily Mail practically fell off his chair. He recovered sufficiently to offer a spirited rejoinder. Surely moral leadership was the whole point of the church? An archbishop who didn't believe in moral leadership was worse than useless. Or words to that effect………………………….

I invited him to elaborate on the remark which had so astonished the man from the Daily Mail. Was he really so averse to the idea that the Archbishop of Canterbury should offer moral leadership? "Leadership is, to me, a very, very murky and complicated concept," he begins, sitting in an armchair in his Lambeth Palace office, his minder a watchful presence across the room.

"I think the question I always find myself asking of myself is, 'Will a pronouncement here or a statement there actually move things on, or is it something that makes me feel better and other people feel better, but doesn't necessarily contribute very much?'"……………………..

He accepts that his scholastic background brings with it both pluses and minuses.

"The downside of it is, I guess, that academic habits die hard, and the urge to qualify and complicate dies hard. I don't congratulate myself on that - that's just one of those things that makes it a bit more difficult sometimes."

Could he understand why a doctrine of habitual reticence should make the Daily Mail man come close to implosion? "Hmmm, yes, I can. I think there is a bit of a myth, if you like, that Religious Leaders - 'capital R capital L' - are, by their nature, people who make public pronouncements on morals." Williams parodies this position as, "Why doesn't the archbishop condemn X, Y, Z? Because that's what archbishops do, you know, they condemn things. They make statements, usually negative, condemnatory statements." It's part of what he terms being "comic vicar to the nation".

Negative, condemnatory statements like the ones he made about the U.S. not playing along with Kyoto? Maybe he's really aiming for "comic vicar to the Western world". Or has he received a direct revelation from God that He is really more concerned about atmospheric CO2 than people's morals?

How can this be? There aren't any human beings there.

From the Seattle Times:

Jupiter's Great Red Spot suddenly has a sibling, an enormous new spot that some planetary scientists think could be evidence of climate change sweeping the gaseous planet.

The new spot is roughly half the size of the Great Red Spot. Both are caused by violent storms churning the upper atmosphere of the solar system's largest planet.

Amateur and professional astronomers have been observing the new spot for the past few weeks. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration on Thursday released pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, showing both red spots.

"Planets with atmospheres are dynamic and changing," said Ray Villard of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. "So it's nice to have Hubble out there to record these atmospheric changes over time."

As on the other planets known as gas giants — Saturn, Uranus and Neptune — there is no solid surface below the red spots on Jupiter. As a result, the storms can be long-lasting, constantly replenishing themselves from below.

The Great Red Spot dates at least to the 17th century, when the first telescopes revealed it to observers on Earth. It is large enough to contain two or three planets the size of Earth. The storm rises as high as five miles above the surrounding cloud level.

The new red spot began as three white ovals, which are cooler, upper-level storms, according to Amy Simon-Miller of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. One of the three was first spotted in 1939; the other two date to 1915.

In 1998, two of them merged, and in 2000 the third joined them to form a large white oval the size of Earth.

"Last year, some amateur astronomers reported the white oval was getting brownish," Simon-Miller said. Then early this year, it turned red, shocking professional astronomers.

"That's very unusual," Simon-Miller said.

Some astronomers believe the most likely explanation for the color change is that the storm is dredging up material from deep in Jupiter's atmosphere, which turns red after reacting chemically with ultraviolet light from the sun.

Observing climate change on another planet would be a major scientific event, astronomers said. They cautioned that it's too soon to know if it is occurring on Jupiter, or whether it can tell scientists anything about climate change on Earth.

Maybe it was those Voyager probes that somehow contaminated the Jovian atmosphere with anthropogenic emissions. I mean, a planet's atmosphere can't change naturally, can it?

Hooray for the Kiwis part 2


Greenpeace tries to discredit the Climate Science Coalition

Then the CSC dismantles their arguments piece by piece.


Some highlights: (Greenpeace in italics)

1. “The newly formed group of 'climate scientists' is about politics and big business, not science.”

As explained on our website*, the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition (NZCSC) is committed to providing New Zealanders with balanced scientific opinions that reflect the truth about climate change and expose the exaggerated claims that have been made about human-caused global warming.

The Coalition is led by scientists, and makes its appraisals using evidence-based science.

From its published comments on many issues, not just climate change, it is clear that Greenpeace does not base its views on science, but rather strives to achieve its environmental agenda through political ends.

4. "It is a well known strategy by vested interests to cast doubt on the climate science. But the debate is over. The scientific majority agrees - climate change is happening and it is caused by human activities. What we are seeing in the formation of the Climate Science Coalition is the death throes of the climate change sceptic."

The first sentence is irrelevant innuendo, and also contains a false assertion: unlike Greenpeace, the NZSCS always aims to highlight the scientific facts and their sensible interpretation.

The second sentence is manifestly false. Greenpeace illustrates Orwellian 'double think' when it makes this statement and then disparages 'skeptics'. It can't have it both ways.

The third sentence is vacuous in that the climate has always changed and always will; it is also false in that not even the IPCC claims that climate change is solely caused by human activity.
Finally, the fourth sentence is political rhetoric divorced from reality.

7. "Exxon-Mobil, the biggest oil company in the world, has spent more than NZD$18.8 million funding groups and climate sceptics to challenge the science of climate change."

Greenpeace seems here, and in other places, to be obsessed with big business. What Exxon-Mobil may or may not have spent encouraging scientific investigation is known only to Exxon-Mobil, and is anyway a matter of which they would rightly be proud, not ashamed.

NZCSC numbers amongst its members persons who are alleged (by Greenpeace members, amongst others) to have received funding from Exxon-Mobil. The allegations are utterly without foundation.

If Greenpeace wants to contribute sensibly to the public discussion on climate science, it needs to reorient itself away from politics and innuendo, and start acknowledging the primacy of the science of the issue.

9. "Why would anyone cast doubt on the largest body of scientific effort ever assembled on planet - the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) a collaboration of over 1,500 climate experts from around the world that 17 national academies of science have endorsed as the pre-emininent authority on climate science on the planet?"

Science is about observation, experiment and theory, not consensus. This statement is rhetoric, and weak rhetoric at that.
NZCSC stands for less rhetoric and more science. (IT'S ABOUT TIME! -CC)

10. "Why would anyone argue against 11 national science academies who issued a joint statement to the G8 Summit that acknowledged G8 nations have been responsible for much of the past greenhouse gas emissions? Or recent participants at Wellington's Climate Change and Governance conference who all agree climate change is real and happening."

No-one disputes that climate change is real and happening, that burning fossil fuels adds CO2 to the atmosphere, nor that G8 nations have contributed their share of emissions. In contrast, there is no agreement at all as to the portion of climate change that is human-caused, the likely magnitude of any temperature change that may follow from continuing human emissions, nor whether it is necessary to take remedial action.

Neither science academies, nor the IPCC, nor the recent Wellington conference has a monopoly on science wisdom about climate change. Indeed, some of the utterances of persons associated with these bodies conflict so dramatically with science reality, and with the views of independent expert scientists, that one is forced to conclude that these bodies are now operating to a significant degree in the political realm. Like Greenpeace.

You really should read the whole thing.

I've got a busy day today. Check out All Things Beautiful . It's simply the most unique blog I've seen.

Even MANAGEMENT PROFESSORS Get It !


From the National Post

Judged by their Climate Manifesto, the Climate 90 signers are not scientists. That is the unavoidable conclusion of the Climate Manifesto's language.

The issues in this climate debate are simple and rather clear. The disagreement is not about rising temperatures but whether the rise can be attributed to human activity. None of the Manifesto's four points claim to solidly back their conclusion. Their approach isn't scientific at all.

1. The two groups agree on the first point: "There is increasingly unambiguous evidence of changing climate in Canada and around the world."

2. The second point has nothing to do with "science": It is a forecast. Moreover, the point does not say how the forecast is linked to "human activity" or which human activity brings it about. Since all climate scientists know that the Earth's climate has gone through periods of warming and cooling that had nothing to do human activity, and since we are now within the range of that variability, this forecast must be taken with grain of salt.

3. Advances in climate science since the 2001 IPCC Assessment have provided more evidence supporting the need for action and development of a strategy for adaptation to projected changes." What does this statement mean, if anything? It reads like bureaucratic political blah-blah. "More evidence" does not mean "convincing evidence." And even skeptical scientists have not opposed people adapting to the warming temperature.

4. Their last, very prudently articulated fourth point suggests a lack of evidence -- it only asks for more taxpayer money to finance research. This point is fine; researchers are entitled to be lobbyists, though perhaps they should register as such." Canada," it says, "needs a national climate change strategy." First, red flags should pop in one's mind when people invoke nationalism and patriotism when talking about science. If one is talking about "global climate change," what can Canadian taxpayers, with just 33 million people scattered on an immense surface, do to have any effect? Then the signers ask for "continued investment in research, [to] understand what is happening, to refine projections of changes induced by anthropogenic release of greenhouse gases."

Does this sound as if there is strong evidence of human activity causing global warming? Not really. Which is fine, that's why there is disagreement in this field of science. This isn't the major issue.

But here we come to the most troubling part of the entire manifesto, and one wonders how 90 scientists could endorse it. The principle of scientific research is NOT to confirm, and analyze opportunities and threats but to try and reject a hypothesis. Scientific research is about finding deviations, because deviations disprove rules. Science is not about going with the herd and confirming what some have found but to try and reject it. After all, the saying in science is "Even if one million people believe in an idea, it can be a very dumb idea."

The government may decide to fund further climate research but it should do so with strings attached, and finance proposals that state explicitly how they will try to reject findings rather than confirm them, let alone politicize the subject or speculate about threats. (Of course, fear mongering is easy, can find political support, and bring in money for "research" that very conveniently subsidizes pleasurable conferences in -- where else? -- warm climates. This principle should hold true for researchers on either side of this or any other scientific debate.

It is about time that taxpayers stop funding activists and lobbyists who masquerade as scientists. The government would give a strong signal by applying a scientific "Accountability Act" by putting the 90 who signed this "manifesto" on the watch list.

Reuven Brenner lectures at McGill University's Desautels Faculty of Management.

From AP News My Way:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's foreign minister was quoted on Tuesday as saying that Russia and China had officially informed Tehran they would not support sanctions or military action over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

U.N. ambassadors from the United States, Britain and France are expected to introduce a resolution this week to legally oblige Iran to comply with U.N. Security Council demands it halt all uranium enrichment work.

When asked how far Russia and China, veto-wielding permanent members of the council, would support Washington, Manouchehr Mottaki told the Kayhan newspaper:

"The thing these two countries have officially told us and expressed in diplomatic negotiations is their opposition to sanctions and military attacks."

"At the current juncture, I personally believe no sanctions or anything like that will be on the agenda of the Security Council," he said in the interview.

Western diplomats say China and Russia will probably back a U.N. resolution demanding a halt to Iran's fuel work, but are not yet ready to back moves toward sanctions.

Iran has been hauled before the U.N. Security Council after failing to convince the international community that its nuclear power station program is not a front for building an atom bomb.

China and Russia both have big energy interests in Iran, the world's fourth biggest oil exporter. In 2005, more than 11 percent of China's crude imports came from Iran. Russia's LUKOIL is exploring the Anaran oilfield in western Iran.

China is also planning a multi-billion-dollar deal to buy Iranian Liquefied Natural Gas when it comes onstream in return for an upstream stake in a huge southern Iranian oilfield.

Russia has been helping Iran build its first nuclear power station at the southern port of Bushehr, a $1 billion project, and Tehran has said it is keen for foreign firms, particularly Russian, to play a role in building more reactors.

However, both China and Russia also have strong trade ties with the United States and European Union whose positions on Iran are becoming increasingly united.

Then there's this:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran will target Israel first if the United States does anything "evil", a senior commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards said on Tuesday.

The United States says it wants Iran's nuclear standoff with the West solved diplomatically but has refused to rule out military action.

"We have announced that wherever America does something evil, the first place that we target will be Israel," Revolutionary Guards Rear Admiral Mohammad-Ebrahim Dehqani was quoted as saying by Iran's student news agency ISNA.

The Islamic Republic has never recognized Israel and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for the Jewish state to be "wiped off the map."

Dehqani said naval wargames held in the Gulf last month "carried the warning to those countries that threaten Iran, including America and the Zionist regime".

Experts said the wargames, in which Iran said it had tested new missiles and torpedoes, were a thinly veiled threat that it could disrupt vital Gulf oil shipping lanes if it was attacked.

I think we need a new definition of diplomacy for the 21st century. How about this: Diplomacy - the art of postponing the inevitable until millions , instead of thousands, must die.