Cap'n Bob & the Damsel

Science

A 58 Year Old Inconvenient Truth

A truth inconvenient to Al Gore perhaps. And a truth inconvenient to ozone-obsessed greenbats, as well. Gore, producer of the over-represented global warming hype documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” doesn’t take the time to evaluate actual scientific observations, but rather jumps to the politically inept conclusions found by scientific consensus.

Notice that the conclusion made in the article quoted below by a Swedish scientist in 1948 is still the most likely reason for climate change — to wit: Solar fluctuations.

I found this on NRO’s The Corner:

Global warming, 1948 style [Iain Murray]

A scientist friend discovered an article from 1948 entitled “The Present Climatic Fluctuation.” Written by Professor Hans Ahlmann of the University of Stockholm, it begins:

“The present climatic fluctuation has been discussed since the 1920’s almost exclusively in scientific circles, although it has recently become a subject of more than academic interest…Ordinary people are beginning to realize that something has happened and is happening which is of great interest to themselves. The last dry summer, which transformed large parts of Western Europe into a virtual steppe, increased this interest and also caused anxiety, though this drought cannot be said with any certainty to belong to the present climatic fluctuation.”

Sound familiar? All that is missing is a documentary by [then presidential losing candidate] Thomas E Dewey on the subject. Anyway, Ahlmann documents rapidly rising temperatures, glaciers melting like crazy, atmospheric circulation changes, species shifting, sea level rise, and so on from all around the world. But he concludes:

“If we find in the Antarctic similar evidence of the present climatic fluctuation as has been found in other parts of the world, we shall be justified in concluding that the present fluctuation is a world-wide phenomenon and probably the result of variations in solar activity which, slow as they may be to take effect, are actually resulting in an improvement in the climate of our world.”

How times change!

Stare into this yellow ball for a while and tell me that it has lesser effect than some paltry greenhouse gasses (which amount to less than 1 percent of the entire volume of the atmosphere):

Please read about solar activity and climate in these articles:

Solar X-Flares and Hurricanes
Global Warming – A Hot Topic
Ultimate Global Warming – SPF 2 Million Won’t Be Enough
Solar and Terrestrial Conveyor Belts
Sizzling Solar Snapshot
Scientific Consensus

03 Aug 2006 by Environment Global Warming Science Whacko Politics

Drought, Forest Fires and Global Warming

World Climate Report takes a deliberate and sensible look at the relationship between rising global temperature and frequency of forest fires in the west. Warning to Greenbats — The WCR post contains actual science which may offend and confuse you, and we wouldn’t want your little green brains exploding.


The Fire This Time: More Perspective Needed

Some prominent scientists are becoming increasingly restive about the shrill portrayal of global warming science in popular media. The latest round concerned a paper by A. L. Westerling (Scripps Institute of Oceanography) relating an dramatic increase in western forest fires to regional warming and changes in the onset of snowmelt.

Colorado University’s Roger Pielke Jr., one of the nation’s preeminent scholars about how science and society interact, called it “a useful paper that adds to our knowledge and hopefully will stimulate further research on the integrated effects of climate-society-policy.” But then, he warned that “At the same time I can envisage the paper being used simply as a caricature in the global warming debate—Global Warming Causes Forest Fires!—but that would be a shame because fire policy is more complex than that.”

Well, of course, what he feared would happen, did happen. And the resultant headlines are another sad commentary on how cursory reporting on global warming has become, and how little attention is paid to the facts as they stand. Nowhere, for example, did we read Westerling’s words: “Whether the changes observed in western hydro-climate and wildfire are the result of greenhouse gas-induced global warming or only an unusual natural fluctuation, is presently unclear.”

Why so unclear? In large part, because the science isn’t straightforward, and three decades is a very short period of climate time.


[more]

The article concludes by comparing temperature anomaly with the drought index. Using a “scatter plot” which reveals any correlation between temperature and drought. The plot found nothing to indicate correlation between the two. Nothing to see here, just a random scattering of dots — no lines, no circles, no wavy curves and no correlation.

Of course, Enviroloons and Greenbats will undoubtedly come up with a way to connect the dots.

12 Jul 2006 by Environment Global Warming Science Whacko Politics

Monkey Business

Just think about this when you decide whether or not to have that one last beer before driving home from the 4th of July picnic this year . . .

From University of Washington News:

‘Ape-earances’ can be deceiving for many under the influence of alcohol

It’s pretty difficult to overlook the proverbial 800-pound gorilla, or even an average-size person dressed in a gorilla suit.

But a new study indicates that people who were given a simple visual task while mildly intoxicated were twice as likely to have missed seeing the person in a gorilla suit than were people who were not under the influence of alcohol.

The study, appearing in the current issue of the Journal of Applied Cognitive Psychology, is the first to show visual errors caused by “inattentional blindness” are more likely to occur under the influence of alcohol. This phenomenon occurs when important, but unexpected, objects appear in the visual field but are not detected when people are focused on another task, according to Seema Clifasefi, a postdoctoral psychology researcher at the University of Washington.

[more]

UPDATE: Damsel tells me that she read that drivers using Cell Phones are also subject to “inattentional blindness” just the same as drivers under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

02 Jul 2006 by Culture Science

Space Rock Lunar Impact Video

Not having an atmosphere to ward off small meteoroids, the Moon’s surface is under constant bombardment by space rocks. NASA scientists are now collecting data about impactors on the Moon with an eye on problems they may cause future Lunar explorers.

NASA – A Meteoroid Hits the Moon

June 13, 2006: There’s a new crater on the Moon. It’s about 14 meters wide, 3 meters deep and precisely one month, eleven days old.

NASA astronomers watched it form: “On May 2, 2006, a meteoroid hit the Moon’s Sea of Clouds (Mare Nubium) with 17 billion joules of kinetic energy—that’s about the same as 4 tons of TNT,” says Bill Cooke, the head of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office in Huntsville, AL. “The impact created a bright fireball which we video-recorded using a 10-inch telescope.”

Right: A meteoroid hits the Moon.
[Click here or on the image to see the video]

Lunar impacts have been seen before–“stuff hits the Moon all the time,” notes Cooke–but this is the best-ever recording of an explosion in progress.

[Read more]

Image courtesy NASA.

Hat tip to Dr. Tony Phillips of SpaceWeather.com

14 Jun 2006 by Astronomy Environment Science Space Rocks

Screwy “Second Moon” Leaving Earth

Few of us know that planet Earth has been host to a “second moon” for the past seven years. And now, this fickle little rock is going to move along. An Earth-orbit-crossing Space Rock got a little too close to the gravitational influence of our planet and has been screwing around for the past few years — but not for long.

NASA – Corkscrew Asteroids

June 9, 2006: News flash: Earth has a “second moon.” Asteroid 2003 YN107 is looping around our planet once a year. Measuring only 20 meters across, the asteroid is too small to see with the unaided eye—but it is there.

This news, believe it or not, is seven years old.

“2003 YN107 arrived in 1999,” says Paul Chodas of NASA’s Near Earth Object Program at JPL, “and it’s been corkscrewing around Earth ever since.” Because the asteroid is so small and poses no threat, it has attracted little public attention. But Chodas and other experts have been monitoring it. “It’s a very curious object,” he says.

Right: The typical corkscrew path of an Earth Coorbital Asteroid.

[more]

10 Jun 2006 by Astronomy Science Space Rocks

The “O” Zone

“Ozone” was President George H.W. Bush’s pet name for Al Gore during the campaign in ’92. At that time, Gore’s weirdo environmental views were already well-known, but, that’s beside the point of this article.

What do we know about ozone?

To better understand that question, we must discuss oxygen. Earth’s atmosphere is composed of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen and 1% “other gasses” which include water vapor, carbon dioxide and ozone. Included in the latter 1% is the dreaded “greenhouse gasses” you hear about. Less than one percent of the atmosphere is causing all that “trouble” — hmmmm. I digress — Back to oxygen . . .

Right: The Antarctic ozone hole (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech)
Continue reading…

31 May 2006 by Environment Global Warming Science

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