The magic of global warming...

'' Arctic Ice Melt Could Mean More Extreme Winters For U.S. And Europe '' [source]

So now global warming predicts colder winters for half of the planet.
Or: the planet gets warmer AND it gets colder, so if you go out and find any kind of weather, it is still consistent with global warming...
Terrific way to present a scientific theory :D

The first half of this video (from 2007) provides a nice "other side" argument to the Man Made Global Warming.
[video]

The second half is a bit too USA-centric to me and the rhetoric used a bit too politically loaded for my taste.

Cosa VI succede ora, dopo il referendum?

Secondo me i referendum italiani sono cari, populisti, coinvolgono in modo assurdo gli italiani all'estero.

Populisti perche' tanto, anche avendo il quorum e tutto, sono solo abrogativi e cmq sono stati aggirati gia' molte volte in passato: mi pare di ricordare che quando ero in Italia il ministero dell'agricoltura e' stato abrogato 2 o 3 volte tramite referendum, ma e' sempre "risorto" con un altro nome. Ma che incredibile "potere" nelle mani dei cittadini! Ma va.

E secondo me quando uno vive da quasi 10 anni all'estero, che senso ha che voti per elezioni oppure referendum? E poi quanto costa il voto all'estero? Una vera cretinata.



Secondo questo articolo [source], ora che il referendum e' stato vinto, non cambiera' praticamente nulla O_o

"Acqua «privatizzata». L’abrogazione del decreto Ronchi è una vittoria di Pirro per i cosiddetti fautori e sostenitori dell’acqua «pubblica» ... La Comunità europea ha infatti emanato una serie di direttive che prevedono chiaramente l’introduzione del principio della concorrenza (attraverso il meccanismo degli appalti) per i servizi ai cittadini tra cui il servizio idrico (in particolare si vedano le direttive europee 92/50/CEE e 93/38/CEE), che il decreto Ronchi aveva attuato o cercato di attuare.
...
Quali saranno dunque gli effetti reali dell’abrogazione? Semplicemente che continueremo a lasciare inattuata le direttive UE, con la possibilità che l’Europa ci sanzioni, o che – per evitare le sanzioni – creeremo tante società pubbliche, costituite da capitale pubblico (e dunque dal provento delle nostre tasse), alle quali verrà affidato il servizio idrico, con buona pace dell’efficienza e del controllo dei costi."

"Legittimo Impedimento. Questo è il referendum più inutile che sia stato proposto.
...
La legge in questione (la n. 51 del 2010) era già destinata a soccombere per una previsione interna alla legge medesima, sancita al comma 1 dell’art. 2, che stabiliva che la legge avrebbe cessato di essere applicata dopo 18 mesi dalla sua entrata in vigore. E quei 18 mesi scadono proprio a ottobre 2011. Considerando i tempi tecnici per l’operatività abrogativa del referendum, la legge, per effetto della pronuncia referendaria, verrà abrogata appena un paio di settimane prima della sua naturale scadenza."

"Nucleare. Un altro Sì inutile. Abbiamo abolito la possibilità per il Governo di stabilire un piano energetico nazionale per diversificare le fonti di approvvigionamento dell’energia ...
La possibilità di costruire centrali non è stata affatto abrogata, perché la norma relativa era già stata cancellata con il decreto Omnibus."

E tristemente l'articolo conclude cosi':
"Insomma, alla fine chi ha guadagnato da questa bella prova di democrazia? I comitati promotori, che secondo la legge n. 157 del 1999, dalla consultazione positiva (il raggiungimento del quorum), incasseranno un rimborso referendario pari a 0,52 centesimi di euro per ogni firma valida del referendum."

Molto molto interessante, per gli italiani che vivono in Italia, ovviamente :)

What a bad bad article

The article here [source], is (in my opinion) a load of crap. It closes with this sentence:
'' Now that you know the truth, have your opinions changed?''

which is very revealing, since in many human matters there is arguably no truth to be found, but only various opinions, with varying degree of plausibility.

The central point of this very bad article, seems to be that we humans resist to authoritative knowledge, and try to keep close to our own beliefs, even when wrong.
Is that so bad? I think the contrary would be horrible.

I would like to submit that science has been abused in the XX century, and political statements have been made into "scientific truth", time and time again. Skepticism is a virtue.

To remember what we can make science say for us, check out this discussion about eugenetics
that refers to materials from after the first world war. At that time, they had quite a different "truth" about these topics than the one we have today.

DNS-Filtering Legislation (USA)

''Internet-security researchers are saying Senate antipiracy legislation that would dramatically increase the government's legal power to disrupt and shutter websites dedicated to infringing activity “raises serious technical and security concerns.”'' [source]

We live in the coldest period of the last 10.000 years

"We live in the coldest period of the last 10.000 years" , says
glasiologist, Jørgen Peder Steffensen who take us back in time to the Grenland icecores and reveals the secrets from the past. [video circa 4 minutes]

''Svensmark's Theory.
Danish Professor Henrik Svensmark explaining the link between cosmic rays the solar magnetic field and cloud cover influencing climate on Earth.'' [video circa 6 minutes]

Global warming?

''The Disappearing Science of Global Warming'' [source]

Great article. Summary:
there are 3 major agencies that collect temperature data from all around the planet, and they all cheat, one way or another.

So, apart that proving that global warming is our fault is difficult, how should one prove that the globe is really warming up?
And keep in mind that this is not about short term weather, but "climate", which is:
"Climate (from Ancient Greek klima, meaning inclination) is commonly defined as the weather averaged over a long period of time.[2] The standard averaging period is 30 years" [source]
and that makes it impossible for any person (no matter how expert) to assess this theory at an individual experience level.

Mixed news

''4D cityscape'' [source]
''First Glimpse at Studio Ghibli's Karigurashi No Arrietty (The Borrowers)'' [movie trailer]
''RPG like Diablo'' [source]
''World's Smallest Battery Created'' [source]
''POOP, NOT THE PILL, CAUSES ESTROGEN POLLUTION'' [source]
''The Geminid meteor shower, which peaks this year on Dec. 13th and 14th, is the most intense meteor shower of the year. It lasts for days, is rich in fireballs, and can be seen from almost any point on Earth.'' [source]
''AMELIA EARHART'S FINGER BONE RECOVERED?'' [source]
''Project Scheduling Tools for Google Spreadsheets'' [video]
''Project Euler'' [source]

Deforestation and global warming

''Deforestation 'not so important for climate change'.
... ecologists reported that carbon emissions from the destruction of tropical forests are probably only half previous estimates.
...
Four years ago, the UN's Intergovernmental panel on Climate Change estimated that deforestation was responsible for up to 20 per cent of CO2 emissions. A more recent study by Richard Houghton of Woods Hole Research Center in Falmouth, Massachusetts, revised that down to 15 per cent for the period 2000 to 2005.
...
But now ecologists at Winrock International, a respected US consultancy based in Arlington, Virginia, whose work was funded by the World Bank and the Norwegian government, says a more detailed analysis puts the figure for 2000 to 2005 at around 8 per cent, with a possible range between 5 and 12 per cent.
'' [source]

Mixed news

''BEAUTIFUL UNIVERSE: TOWARDS RECONSTRUCTING PHYSICS FROM NEW FIRST PRINCIPLES'' [source]
Terrific series from BBC [source]
''Strange Martian Spirals Explained'' [source]
'' Big Lunar Eclipse'' [source]
''Students Record Spellbinding Video of Disintegrating Spacecraft'' [source]

''STOPPING DESERTIFICATION IN AFRICA WITH A 'GREAT GREEN WALL''' [source]

''OnLive killed the game console star?'' [source]
''Microsoft confirms, kills Courier in one fell swoop'' [source]
''An LED That Mimics an Old Standby'' [source]
''Nine iPhone Alternatives'' [source]
''Engadget app updated for Android and webOS'' [source]

''Studio Ghibli Taking Their Time On DS Game'' [source]

What a sad BBC documentary about Global Warming.

I just watched this documentary in 3 parts:
(BBC) Earth The Climate Wars (video)

And I could barely finish watching the first episode, without feeling deeply disappointed. I was hoping to find some intelligent discussion about how do we know that global warming is happening, and how do we know it is caused by our CO2 emissions. Both things were clearly central in the documentary's plot.

Personally I don't believe in anthropogenic global warming (AGW) and I am more or less convinced that there is a warming trend.
I would have loved to see an honest discussion among the different factions and presenting pros and cons of the various possible positions on AGW. I don't mind learning some new facts that show I was ignorant or simply biased, so if the show was about concluding that AGW is true, at least the should provide some good explanations.

Instead, sadly, the presenter simply connects things that have nothing to do with each other, and is a fan of AGW, and introduces few alternative views and when he does they immediately are dismissed as stupid. Sad way of arguing for your favorite theory :(
An example: after discussing how we know that the climate has changed in rapid ways in the past (1) and that CO2 is a green-house gas (2), the presented jumps to the conclusion than humans are causing climate change. But 1 and 2 are not connected, actually if the climate is capable of changing a lot even without human intervention, there is even more need to be sure that this time it is our fault.

Why is it important to know if AGW is true or not?
The way I see it: suppose that we starve some people to death and kill some more for lack of electricity in hospitals, in the effort to reduce CO2 emissions.
What happens for instance if we have a wrong model of the situation, and after all the efforts we discover that high C02 levels are better for the climate of the next 50 years?

Moreover, the documentary present the history of the idea of global warming in such a linear and flat way, that they can easily point out and name the main bad guys in the story.
And to me, finding a single bad person that is responsible for a global-scale phenomenon is normally very very difficult and makes the discussion sound childish to the extreme.

I also dislike the tone of the documentary: the entire discussion is carried on using the past tens. Clearly the presenter things that the climate wars are over, and that now justice has triumphed :(

As an AGW non-believer , I actually sat and watched the whole documentary with Gore, which I also find too political and Gore-centered to be of any interest.
Why, if the man has a good point, does he not explain it as simple as possible? Instead the political left-wing tones are so evident, that it is not possible to separate what Gore says from a liberal view of history. Again: an example of sad rhetorical decision. I can disagree with an argument but understand and sympathize for an honest speaker. But Gore's documentary was simply political propaganda and self-promotion.

Here are some more opinions on the BBC documentary: link.

"The Day Eugenics Died"

''The Day Eugenics Died

posted by Ronald Ladouceur on 2009.07.03'' [source]

''I was not taught much of the history eugenics in school, but I somehow absorbed that it was an “old” idea, one that had been thoroughly discredited once the horrors of the Nazis were exposed.

So it came as a bit of a surprise to find that many American high school and college biology textbooks continued to discuss eugenics as if it were a non-controversial idea well into the rock-and-roll era. In fact, the most popular textbook published in 1960, Moon, Otto and Towle’s Modern Biology, referred to eugenics “a young science,” (648) and suggested its methods would surely begin to see application once a few more properly studied human generations had passed.''

A very interesting discussion on eugenetics and how it was finally abandoned.


It is my belief that we must honestly and openly confront past ideas, to learn from the past. A kind of meme vaccination.

Global warming VS global cooling

30 Years of Global Cooling Are Coming, Leading Scientist Says
''Latif, a professor at the Leibniz Institute at Germany's Kiel University and an author of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, believes the lengthy cold weather is merely a pause -- a 30-years-long blip -- in the larger cycle of global warming, which postulates that temperatures will rise rapidly over the coming years. '' [source]

So what do we really know about the climate? O_o

Give me a break!

One way or another we are screwed :(

"Record cold winter may increase ozone hole over North Europe" [source]
"European scientists confirmed that Arctic high atmosphere is reaching the lowest ever temperatures this winter, warning that destruction of the protective ozone layer is substantially increased under very cold conditions."
Furthermore:
"“The Arctic has experienced an extremely harsh winter. The first signs of ozone loss have now been observed, and large ozone losses are expected to occur if the cold conditions persist”, says European Commissioner for Science and Research Janez Potonik."

Ps But the ozone hole was it not over south pole?
Pps Funny how global warming can co-exist with "extremely harsh winter" :>

Did we fix it? (from BBC)

Climate change dominates the agenda now, but what happened to the environmental causes of the 1970s, 80s and 90s - have these all been resolved now?
[source]

The "Hockey Stick" controversy

A quasi-global instrumental temperature record exists from approximately 1850. However, to construct a millennial-scale record, proxies for temperature are required. Consequently, there are issues concerning the accuracy with which these proxies reflect actual temperature change, their geographical coverage, and the statistical methods used to combine them. [source]

... The hockey stick controversy has to a large extent been focused on Mann and on the MBH98 reconstruction on which he was the lead author. ...
... In 2003, Stephen McIntyre and Ross McKitrick published "Corrections to the Mann et al. (1998) Proxy Data Base and Northern Hemisphere Average Temperature Series" in the journal Energy and Environment 14(6) 751-772, raising concerns about their ability to reproduce the results of MBH. ...


The claim
"... a rapid warming during the 20th century that culminates in anomalous late 20th century warmth ... " [source and source]


Problems replicating the results:
The M&M Project: Replication Analysis of the Mann et al. Hockey Stick [source]
... If the flawed bristlecone pine series are removed, the hockey stick disappears regardless of how the PCs are calculated and regardless of how many are included. The hockey stick shape is not global, it is a local phenomenon associated with eccentric proxies. Mann discovered this long ago and never reported it. ... [source]


Below are the findings and conclusions of the 2 third-parties that were asked to asses the validity of the original claim: The Wegman Panel and the National Academy of Sciences.

Some findings [source]:
Findings
In general, we found MBH98 and MBH99 to be somewhat obscure and incomplete and the criticisms of MM03/05a/05b to be valid and compelling. We also comment that they were attempting to draw attention to the discrepancies in MBH98 and MBH99, and not to do paleoclimatic temperature reconstruction. Normally, one would try to select a calibration dataset that is representative of the entire dataset. The 1902-1995 data is not fully appropriate for calibration and leads to a misuse in principal component analysis. However, the reasons for setting 1902-1995 as the calibration point presented in the narrative of MBH98 sounds reasonable, and the error may be easily overlooked by someone not trained in statistical methodology. We note that there is no evidence that Dr. Mann or any of the other authors in paleoclimatology studies have had significant interactions with mainstream statisticians.

Moreover [source]:
... they found that the full amplitude of century-to-century variations were underestimated to an increasing degree as the noise level was increased. Thus, the reconstruction of century-long trends has substantial uncertainty when it is based on data that exhibit year-to-year variability.
...
Some of these criticisms are more relevant than others, but taken together, they are an important aspect of a more general finding of this committee, which is that uncertainties of the published reconstructions have been underestimated.

In conclusion
As a good friend of mine said a few days ago about this controversy, it is never a good idea to mix science and politics ;)

What would you do... to fix the climate?

Try out this game [source], based on scientific model (CCC-Dice).

Also check out directly at the source: this accessible paper "Perspective on Climate Change" by Lomborg explains the CCC point of view.

A more technical article, here, explains how the CCC model works and how its conclusion is that technology can fix the climate.

Critics to the model can be found here.

A stupid question...

Fact1: the population of the World is in bed for the swine-flu, that is killing us all (source and source)
Fact2: there is a huge meeting at Copenhagen that attracts people from all over the world (source)

How comes Copenhagen is not a city under quarantine?
... or perhaps media were exaggerating a bit the swine flu? (see here)

There are 2 clima top meetings in Copenhagen!

''According to this press release (in danish) the danish peoples party which supports the ruling government in Denmark will arrange an alternative climate conferance in Copenhagen at the same time as the Official climate meeting.'' [source]

Climate Challenge (English) [source]

And to be fair, here is a negative opinion about the "alternative clima conference" [source]

And the prostitutes union of Copenhagen has a special offer for the participants to the clima conference: check it out.

Der er 2 kilmatopmøder!

''Det mener professor Henrik Svensmark fra DTU Space, én af Danmarks førende solforskere, der i går deltog i den klimakonference på Christiansborg, som Aarhus Universitet havde arrangeret sammen med Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten. Ifølge Henrik Svensmark er Solens aktivitet lige nu på det laveste niveau i mindst 100 år, muligvis 200 år.'' [source]

''Henrik Svensmark - Galactic Cosmic Rays causes climate change'' [video in English]

''Når det store klimatopmøde begynder i København til december, vil det blive ledsaget af en alternativ klimakonference ...
På konferencen vil forskere som danskerne Henrik Svensmark og Bjarne Andresen komme med det, Dansk Folkepartis medlem af Europa-parlamentet, Morten Messerschmidt, kalder ”alternative forklaringer” på klimaforandringer.'' [source]

''Selv om hovedparten af verdens klimaeksperter er enige om, at der er en global opvarmning, og at det er os mennesker, der er skyld i den, forsøger enkelte skeptikere at sætte spørgsmålstegn ved, om det nu også er den fulde sandhed.'' [source]