Shout-out to the hard core greenies
Respect from the pond for our green cousins in the UK. A troop of 1500 environmental campaigners have been risking arrest and protesting outside Heathrow for the last week in opposition to the airport’s expansion plan, which would lead to an extra 250,000 flights a year and who-knows-how-much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. They even had a children’s march which the police greeted with - riot gear.
The whole camp was set up with running water, sanitation, hot food twice a day, renewable power, wireless internet and even a cinema. Check out this video which wanders around the camp and explores all its self sufficient systems. The week also saw related demonstrations across the country, this frog’s favourite being a carbon offset company’s invasion by protestors dressed as red herrings. I love an aquatic theme.
But I think NZ’s got the number on them - the Save Happy Valley occupation is coming up to 18 months. Boomshanka!
August 22nd, 2007 at 8:06 pm
1934
Need I say any more?
August 22nd, 2007 at 8:44 pm
‘Twas rather warm back then. Bit cooler now
Meanwhile, London needs more landing space. ‘Tis a bore circling round the stack waiting to land.
Uses up fuel, too.
August 22nd, 2007 at 9:09 pm
I thought you right wingers were supposed to be sensible about their investments. You want to build a massively expensive white elephant on the cusp of Peak Oil?
By the time the third runway is ready, flying will be getting prohibitively expensive for the average person and flights into Heathrow will be getting less.
August 22nd, 2007 at 9:15 pm
sorry, I don’t follow, are you saying you think it was warmer in 1934 but it is cooler than that now? That’s not what the data says, e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png
August 22nd, 2007 at 9:25 pm
hey frog, great stuff, more articles like this from around the world to give us hope! As always with Monbiot it’s a great article. All his recent ones have been on top form, really hard hitting.
especially his recent Green consumerism will not save the biosphere articles “Selling Ecocide” (I like the cartoon on that copy of it) and Eco-junk.
August 23rd, 2007 at 12:23 am
Stuey, This is the graph enmess was gloating about:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/Fig.D_lrg.gif
Need enmess say more? Not really, NASA has already said all that needs to be said: ( http://www.realclimate.org/ )
“Indeed in the 2001 paper describing the GISTEMP methodology (which was prior to this particularly error being introduced), it says:
The U.S. annual (January-December) mean temperature is slightly warmer in 1934 than in 1998 in the GISS analysis (Plate 6). This contrasts with the USHCN data, which has 1998 as the warmest year in the century. In both cases the difference between 1934 and 1998 mean temperatures is a few hundredths of a degree. The main reason that 1998 is relatively cooler in the GISS analysis is its larger adjustment for urban warming. In comparing temperatures of years separated by 60 or 70 years the uncertainties in various adjustments (urban warming, station history adjustments, etc.) lead to an uncertainty of at least 0.1°C. Thus it is not possible to declare a record U.S. temperature with confidence until a result is obtained that exceeds the temperature of 1934 by more than 0.1°C.
More importantly for climate purposes, the longer term US averages have not changed rank. 2002-2006 (at 0.66 ºC) is still warmer than 1930-1934 (0.63 ºC - the largest value in the early part of the century) (though both are below 1998-2002 at 0.79 ºC). “
August 23rd, 2007 at 10:02 am
Thanks for those articles, Stuey. Very timely. Perhaps the Greens will stop going on about hybrid cars now?
August 23rd, 2007 at 1:16 pm
Kevyn, that image link doesn’t go anywhere, but even so, that 1934 issue is a US average temperature issue. The graph I pointed to is a global one.
I’m sure there are other individual countries that have past years that were warmer than recent years - it’s called natural variability.
Of course there are going to be regions that buck the global trends, just as there are individual years that buck the overall trend. That’s why we have global averages and 5 and 10 year means.
The realclimate post on this subject points out that the change in the relative ranking of 1934 and 1998 is within the margin of error: “none of these differences are statistically significant. ” i.e. it is a complete non-issue - we couldn’t say with statistical certainty that 1998 was warmer than 1934 in the US before the change and after the change to the data we can’t say with statistical certainty that 1934 was warmer than 1998 in the US. It’s too close to call.
But, anyway this is for that country only. When you look at the world as a whole, it is not too close to call. The world is getting warmer.
August 23rd, 2007 at 1:33 pm
Hey Sam, I hope so too, but where and when have the Greens gone on about hybrid cars?
For example the Greens Climate Change Policy doesn’t mention the transportation sector at all, only the energy, agriculture and forestry sector.
The Peak Oil toolbox suggests promoting all sorts of new and used fuel-efficient cars not just new hybrids, and also suggests promoting public transport, cycling and walking rather than personal transport.
Doing a search for hybrid on the greens site reveals that most of the mentions of hybrid on the main site are about buses or even ships not cars.
It turns out that most of the mentions of hybrid within all the greens sites is actually on this blog. If frog, or the commenters on this blog are going on about hybrids, that does not mean that the Green Party is going on about hybrids.
August 23rd, 2007 at 2:05 pm
stuey, You and I know the true significance of 1934. But the likes of enmess and his straw-grasping compatriots have embraced 1934 as the Holy Grail. Hence my comment that he indeed needed to say more.
August 23rd, 2007 at 3:02 pm
Fair enough Stuey, I was actually thinking of Jeanette promoting new cars in the Real Bottom Line, though actually ‘hybrid’ didn’t come into it:
“Green Party Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons said at the launch she gets around 4.8 litres per 100 km in open road conditions and around 5.2 in congested city driving in her new 1300 Jazz. “This is the most painless step we can take to prepare for the end of cheap oil, as we rethink our overuse of transport fuel, and make the transition to biofuels to address both oil scarcity and climate changeâ€? she said.”
I’ll still take a second-hand bike as the best solution for those congested city streets.
August 23rd, 2007 at 4:05 pm
Bikes are OK Sam, but the wisdom that comes with age comes with the frailties of aging, and I’d like to keep Jeanette around a few more years, and for that matter I have become a lot less keen about subjecting my body to the raw conditions that make wind generation so viable around here
respectfully
BJ
August 23rd, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Actually, the Happy Valley occupation reached 18 months in July - in 5 days time, it’ll be 19 months - by far the longest environmental occupation in Aotearoa’s history.
August 23rd, 2007 at 5:55 pm
good post fwwog, i see the banner mentioned peer reviewing of scientific results, i am feeling in a good mood, and some of my redneck friends say you could get an award soon, embarrassed,
August 24th, 2007 at 10:11 am
Sam
I too have a second hand bike (and live near the top of the hill, whilst in a pissing contest!-) but quite close to the centre of town.
But Jeanette lives up the Kauranga valley.
I have heard her make the point that while she could have afforded a hybrid, it is only the wealthy who can. The modern small cars mean while spin out fuel longer, giving us all more time to adjust, and are more affordable.
Also I think hybrid cars are unproven technology. They use novel technology for the transmission of power to the wheels. The small cars like the Jazz use incremental improvements in technology.
cheers
W
August 24th, 2007 at 10:36 am
The Happy Valley occupation are largely a bunch of ignorant, lazy idealists. Basically, they have been wasting their time for 19 months whilst drawing down the dole or some such parasitic scheme. Their ignorance about the issues surrounding the actual operation they are opposing is astounding: the coal is not, as has been stated by the group, sent to India or China to be merely burned, but is rather high quality low impurity metallurgical coal which forms an essential part of the steel making process. (Developing countries use low grade brown coal to fire power stations, and it would be uneconomic to use valuable bituminous coal to do this) While thoughtful arguments can be put forward against the explosion of inefficient, pollutive industry, it is important for people to realise that the green revolution can not be brought about without industry: indeed great advances will be made with green revolutions in industry. It is sad that rugged natural beauty on the west coast is being eroded by the industrial age, but if Save Happy Valley wanted to make a concerted stand against the significant problems of this mining project, they should have boned up on the facts. As it turns out, it is going ahead anyway, which does give me a sense of sadness, but I won’t be siding with the Save Happy Valley morons. In another sense, we are blessed, because the Save Happy Valley coalition are so tied up with their occupation that they won’t be able to sully other environmental stands with their ignorance.
August 24th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
The country with 40% of the world’s measurement stations that are the least corrupted by the Urban Heat Island effect shows no increase in temperatures in over 70 years and Kevyn has the gall to claim I am clutching at straws
You people are even more pathetic than Pete Hodgson
For those with an open mind, this is the blog of the guy who discovered the “error”
http://climateaudit.org/
August 25th, 2007 at 3:47 am
enmess,
The 1930’s had 5 years with a temperature anomoly greater than .5 degrees C, and 5 years where it was less than .25
The ten years ending 2006 had 8 years greater than .5 and 2 years less than .25
The highest 5 year mean in the 1930s was .65, in the last 10 years it was .8
The mean for the entire 1930s was .5, the mean for the last ten years was .75
The 3 year mean centered on 1934 of .633 has been beaten or equalled 3 times since then, 1954 .717, 1991 .633, 1999 .893
A six order polynomial trend analysis reveals the following low and high points: 1902 -.25, 1941 .3, 1972 -.1, 2002 .6
Apart from 1934 being .01 degree warmer than 1998 there is no statistical support for your contention that the USA shows no increase in temperatures in over 70 years.
August 25th, 2007 at 7:27 am
enmess
Just in case you didn’t notice, the rest of the f’ing planet shows an unmistakable signal as well, particularly the oceans which, given the thermal capacity of water is quite an impressive achievement. Most of us here entertain all manner of thoughts, including the possibility of error.
However, it is the nature of the scientific process to weed out the errors… and that is happening… and what is left is retreating polar ice-caps, warming oceans, shifting rainfall patterns and disease vectors.
We aren’t impressed by your single minded rejection of the hypothesis that our own CO2 emissions cause this. You have yet to prove any part of that hypothesis faulty, which is what is required. You have yet to provide any viable alternative hypothesis which explains the existing data. Just what mechanism warmed the oceans over the past 100 years? You have asserted in essence, that the warming isn’t happening. Yet, if it isn’t warmer how come the ice is melting? Note that that didn’t happen in 1934. The variation was too short lived.
Basically you are living in a fantasy land born of an ideological fixation, a hatred of anything that smacks of or supports the need for government and restrictions on the freedom to abuse the resources of the planet. This leads you to reject the work of climate scientists from every corner of the planet in favor of whatever half-complete theory is in vogue in the denialist press this week.
Consider the atmosphere as part of the commons which supports our little tribe of humans. Hmmm… better check here… are you familiar at all with the “tragedy of the commons” ? It is a rather famous essay in philosophy relating to the problem of unpriced but limited resources. I leave it to you to either know of it or to look it up.
Basically the atmosphere is part of the global “commons” and the phrase “free as air” is a complete falsehood. Using up the atmosphere has a price. The bill gets presented some 30 to 50 years after the use.
Nobody currently even pays a price for making it unusable by others much less for the long term damage being done… and economics 101 tells you that if some resource is free, not only will it be used in preference to other costed resources it will be used no matter how inefficient it is, in preference to costed resources.
I support the idea that the commons must be costed, the price of its use must be assessed and paid. This affects your freedom and more importantly if affects the freedom of the businesses that pay for the opinions of the Wall Street Journal and the denialist press. It changes the business model. They don’t want to change.
Closed minds… yes there are minds that are welded shut on Wall Street. Everything is fine there. They’re the smartest guys in the room. They can do anything… or can they? Did you notice what the markets are doing lately? Did you notice how suddenly their scam has been caught out? The fact that they gave up mark to market and adopted mark-to-make-believe pricing models has been exposed and suddenly financial deals that exceed the gross world product are being shown to have about as much value as that proverbial deed to the Brooklyn bridge.
Lets trust THEIR judgment about what is happening instead of the climate scientists?
Find someplace else to spread your disinformation.
BJ
August 25th, 2007 at 11:32 am
You guys just don’t get it do you?
The guy from NASA who basically invented global warming has been caught with his pants down from a humble blogger.
Just keep parroting the line we have to trust climate scientists like you trust government to be right 100% of the time (and an agency of the evil AmeriKKKan government to boot)
Anyway, the US temperature stations maybe a proxy but it a damn good one
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:GHCN_Temperature_Stations.png.
If you can’t see that how can you think political polls are of any use at all, you probably think the Greens are the most popular party in the country at the moment.
The point is since then GLOBAL temperatures may have risen .1 or .2 since then (or fallen) but it sure as hell hasn’t risen .7 degrees since 1900
August 25th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Enmess…
YOU are the one who doesn’t get it.
The gross effects on the planet are happening all around us and you are completely ignoring them to focus on a difference of less than the margin of error in a noisy set of records.
There were however some very minor re-arrangements in the various rankings (see data). Specifically, where 1998 (1.24 ºC anomaly compared to 1951-1980) had previously just beaten out 1934 (1.23 ºC) for the top US year, it now just misses: 1934 1.25ºC vs. 1998 1.23ºC. None of these differences are statistically significant. I
Or is the retreat of sea ice in the arctic and antarctic and the warming of the ocean in the past 100 years somehow not counting ? Perhaps you have a theory that attributes that to an urban heat island ? Let me say that again. Warming Of The Ocean…. made of water, with a huge thermal capacity. Physics 101.
http://scrippsnews.ucsd.edu/Releases/?releaseID=666
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science/Fingerprints.html
I call your attention to the graphic in the middle of this showing the warming signal in the ocean profile.
As for McIntyre… you are just blowing smoke if you call him a humble blogger. McIntyre is a well respected critic with a degree in pure maths and a strong understanding of the uses and potential problems in statistics underlying the science. Further to that, if you READ his blog you may notice that HE does not claim that his work disproves global warming. His work is largely to make sure the data used is appropriate and accurate.
The folks at NASA thanked him for pointing out the problem with the changes they had applied… and they have corrected them, possibly inappropriately in my judgment, but that remains to be seen.
Maybe you will thank us for correcting your misconceptions. Unfortunately I hold out little hope of that. You came here to tell us we are wrong and have been told that you are. People are seldom thankful to be relieved of a misconception in that manner.
BJ
August 25th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
enmess, Your “humble blogger” has several scientific papers to his credit.
Global warming was “invented” by a Swedish scientist in the 1890s. NASA was “invented” in the 1960s.
There is an extremely thorough investigation of the evolution of the various strands of climate change science and the many alternative theories and postulates put forward over the years.
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/
August 25th, 2007 at 5:04 pm
What do you mean my humble blogger is a scientist? I thought there was a scientific consesus. Next you’ll be telling me there is a tiny minority (30-40%) of climate scientist who don’t buy into the consensus. And that tiny minority of climate scientist must be silenced. Hey while where at it, why don’t we silence an even more miniscule minority - Labour voters. Or lets go even further like the Clark government is trying to do and silence the majority.
Ok, so now it’s Oceanic Warming not Global Warming, well if that becomes a common viewpoint, I’ll start investigating again with a clean slate but seeing as your the only person saying that I won’t waste my time.
Global Warming was recogized for what it was up until the late 80’s (a theory and given what we knew then quite a plausible one) until James Hansen started the politicized process.
Anyway don’t argue with me, you guys are better off argue your point with these guys
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBCRStksqL0
You can win US$100,000 and buy a solar panel or something
Tell you what I’ll chuck in another $10 grand if you win
I’d like to see if any of the Warmists would be prepared to put the money where the mouths are
August 25th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Emmess
I knew you weren’t serious when you started this, and it is clear you are simply trolling. McIntyre is a pure maths major with a mining engineering background, and he is well respected. If you read him carefully EXPLICITLY does not claim there is no such thing as global warming. It would be a shame if you didn’t take that point to heart.
How many climate scientists don’t buy the consensus? I know of most of the objections and can count the principle backers of them without taking off my shoes. Most clearly I have to take seriously the list shown here
http://illconsidered.blogspot.com/2006/02/there-is-no-consensus.html
…and the people I worked with at NASA.
Where do you get 30 to 40 percent? Some online poll that anyone can sign up to?
It is GLOBAL warming Emmess, the oceans (let me see now) “cover 4/5ths of a planet made for man… who has no gills” - Ambrose Bierce
The point however, is that a lot of heat went into warming the ocean… and the warming effects are indeed global or did you notice what is happening at the poles? You concentrate on such little things while the planet runs away on you.
As for Junkscience… it is home to just that of course, but the rules of the contest are pretty restrictive….
# All entries must represent the original work of an entrant that has been produced specifically for the UGWC.
Which realistically rules out ALL scientists because they all work for someone else and almost all the science ever done. I was wondering why they felt so safe in issuing the challenge and of course it is right there in the rules.
Basically real science cannot be presented.
You are wasting MY time emmess, you are not presenting any new information, any correct information or any new hypothesis. You aren’t pointing at anything useful. You haven’t even established clearly what you claim. Is it that global warming isn’t happening at all, that it is a natural variation or that it is due to something other than humans? Choose something please, make it clear and state your case. You aren’t doing much but dancing around so far.
BJ
August 25th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
kevyn, bj etc, leave this deluded paranoiac alone, they seem addicted to blog flaming, maybe it is one of those regeneration by fire species? If we ignore it, maybe they will curl up and die, surrounded by the cess of their junk science?
August 25th, 2007 at 6:40 pm
Ahuahu
I would, but this is a green blog and like a tagger’s marks on a fence, these misstatements need to be clearly rejected (painted over) so that he does not get to feel proud of his “accomplishment”. Also it is necessary to keep other casual visitors from getting the wrong idea.
I would LOVE to ignore him… but we let him in and we let him post… we don’t have ignore-this-fool buttons here on the blog and we can’t rate his posts.
respectfully
BJ
August 25th, 2007 at 7:09 pm
do you know what bj..?
i reckon i’d be ‘buttoned’..real quick..
eh..?
there’d be a long green queue..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
August 25th, 2007 at 9:13 pm
http://dvsun3.gkss.de/BERICHTE/GKSS_Berichte_2007/GKSS_2007_11.pdf
Again if you call this a consensus, by that logic you all will be supporting a National Party controlled One Party State
August 25th, 2007 at 9:24 pm
I reckon the more people know about a subject, the less likely they are to call themselves an expert. In contrast, some people believe that the selective reading of a few suspect web sites makes them experts. Oh well, I guess that is human nature.
I’m not an expert on climate change … but I do wonder if we have seen similar arguments to this throughout history? For example, I wonder if people on Rapanui were concerned about all the coconut trees being cut down to move the statues as they were built? I wonder if some people believed more trees would always magically grow (much as some people believe technology will magically get us out of all our current problems)? We’ll never know what arguments were going on (if any) about saving the trees on Rapanui, but we do know that all the trees were cut down. Is this how human societies work in general? Are we doomed to see the very worst climate change scenarios eventuate, because human society is too conservative, and has too much inertia to make the necessary changes to avert a climate catastrophe?
August 26th, 2007 at 12:12 am
Kindly take in the more complete picture Emmess, include Oreskes work and the lists of concurring organizations. I can understand that you discount my own circle of acquaintances back at the lab and their 100% consensus, but did you notice all the details of what von Storch was actually reporting?
Given that REAL scientists always regard their own hypotheses with suspicion I am not surprised at the results Von Storch obtains, particularly given his methodology in 2003 and the fact that he is attempting to ask scientists about certainty…. yet YOU really need to get down and dirty in the appendices of his paper to get the answers to the question of consensus about the opinions of scientists about global warming. I refer specifically to figure 24 of page B24 of the paper you refer to, and again on page B27. It is true that Von Storch himself does not highlight these results in his study, and the methodology contained flaws that prevented it from being accepted by Science, but in fairness to Von Storch He’s trying hard to get real answers as a good scientist must. and he DOES include the actual questions and the breakdowns of the answers.
Which I read and understood.
The numbers from Von Storch don’t support your 40% contention Emmess.. They’d be hard pressed to support a 10% contention… which in science is as near a lock as you ever get anyway. The critical issue is not what they think of the predictive accuracy of the models, but what they think will happen. They are very uniform in their agreement that bad things are on their way.
Where you get 40% is in the question of whether they know just HOW bad.
Now… go back and fetch some other fragment of information taken out of context, tortured and distorted to support your contention that this/that or the-other is fatal to the hypothesis of anthropogenic global warming. I know you will. The fact that you are wrong may eventually sink in… though I have never seen it happen. Easterbrook had his moment, which is a big feather for his cap, but I don’t think you’re anywhere near as honest with yourself as he or von Storch.
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 12:28 am
Phil
I admit that you’ve given me some times when I’ve wished to have that button… but I don’t regard you as a uniformly bad influence and my experience with the thing is that it isn’t something I use very much at all. Nor do people get shut out permanently. Generally it’s a temporary thing, and as it keeps me from adding flame to the flame it tends to be self correcting.
I’ve got one guy shut out now on a climate related board and he’s been ignored for about a week so far. Others have responded to him but I’ve read all I care to read. It is almost invariably the party line from one of a couple of sources of junk science and I just don’t need the constant aggravation. There are other follks who could answer emmess,
I reckon you’re right though. You have the tact of a sledgehammer so there probably would be a queue
Even when you’re right.
respectfully
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 12:59 am
Ahuahu, yep, enmess is definitely wedded to an extreme view. And he seems to confuse a debate with a game of tennis, psuedo McEnroe style.
Phil, you aint that bad. Most of the time your responses are thoughtful and adress the points raised in the debate. You’re only infuriating some of the time, that just means you’re as human as the rest of us.
bj, IMHO you’re trying to be scientific with a robot. Robot’s never question their programming and their programming limits their ability to verify their data.
August 26th, 2007 at 1:04 am
BJ, I think you are cherry picking just a little by choosing that question.
To what degree do you think climate change will have detrimental effects for some societies?
To be honest I cannot find the source of the survey which had the results of 57% support the theory of anthropogenic climate change and 30% not supporting it (66% to 34% extrapolated out)
But the closest question there would be:-
Figure 30. Climate change is mostly the result of anthropogenic causes.
1/2/3 : 9+24+20 = 53
5/6/7 : 8+11+10 = 29
This is almost the exactly same -a 65%/35% split
And that’s generous because I would normally consider 4 a don’t know as not supporting a premise.
August 26th, 2007 at 1:11 am
Kevyn, once again if less than 35% is extreme, then you must agree Labour voters are a tiny minority and they must be silenced. Not to mentioned what should happen to you Greenies (what is 5-6% in that case?).
August 26th, 2007 at 2:38 am
enmess, I am well aware of the range of uncertainties in climate science and the broad range of interpretations that can be considered valid within the context of those uncertainties subject to the usual limitations to any definitive estimation of the balance of probabilities, etc, etc.
The views you have expressed thus far are two or three standard deviations from the mean, hence technically extreme, as are those of the Greens politically. Nobody has suggested you be silenced. Merely that you be ignored. After all this is a Green blog. I would expect a similar response if I espoused communist assumptions on a Libertarian blog.
IMHO 35% is a minority, 5% is a small minority, 0.05% is a tiny minority.
August 26th, 2007 at 3:02 am
PS, my politics are capitalist anarchist, I am a retired systems analyst and I have never voted for the Greens and never will since they aren’t capitalist anarchists. I reserve my more extreme veiws to other more appropriate blogs. In my experience well reasoned arguments will be debated on this blog, often vigorously. Automatic gainsaying and argumentum ad hominem are frowned upon as is the case on most blogs.
August 26th, 2007 at 6:48 am
emmess
You’ve made a point of claiming it isn’t happening, so now you choose a question that assumes that it is and asks about the cause.
Certainty about the cause is quite significantly lower than certainty about whether something is happening and the effects of it happening, as it should be. Causation is almost always a vexed issue in climate science.
These organizations agree with my assessment.
# NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS)
# National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
# National Academy of Sciences (NAS)
# State of the Canadian Cryosphere (SOCC)
# Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
# Royal Society of the United Kingdom (RS)
# American Geophysical Union (AGU)
# National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
# American Meteorological Society (AMS)
# Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society
* Academia Brasiliera de Ciências (Bazil)
* Royal Society of Canada
* Chinese Academy of Sciences
* Academié des Sciences (France)
* Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina (Germany)
* Indian National Science Academy
* Accademia dei Lincei (Italy)
* Science Council of Japan
* Russian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Society (United Kingdom)
* National Academy of Sciences (United States of America)
* Australian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and the Arts
* Caribbean Academy of Sciences
* Indonesian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Irish Academy
* Academy of Sciences Malaysia
* Academy Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand
* Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Which organizations agree with your assessment?
Hell’s Bells man, even Exxon-Mobil has quit the game. Did you understand Oreske’s work? Easterbrook’s “defection”?
Even so, I am not that interested in the opinion poll aspect of this. Consensus as indicated in the IPCC reports is pretty unusual in Science. Consensus as indicated by Von Storch
#28 We can say for certain that Climate Change is a process already underway
12% against
83% for
- using your methodology.
#31 We can say for certain that, without change in human behaviour, global warming will definitely occur some time in the future.
13% against
78% for
We can go on about this single study all day and not touch the IPCC reports or the listed organizations who put their reputations behind the “consensus” and not trouble ourselves with Oreske’s sifting of papers.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/31/AR2007 013101808.html
or her analysis of the misuse of “proof”
http://historyweb.ucsd.edu/oreskes/Papers/science%20and%20policy%20.pd f
None of which however, contributes a jot to our understanding of your ill-considered skepticism. Where’s your hypothesis Emmess. How do YOU explain what is happening? How come the CO2 is rising and the ice caps are melting ,,, etc?
More inconvenient facts waiting to be tortured.
Someplace deep in your world view there is a flaw. It is entirely possible that by the time you recognize it you will already have dug the graves of your children’s children.
Your comments fill a much needed gap.
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 7:16 am
Ah yes… Here is the one I was looking for…
http://tinyurl.com/349pk9
respectfully
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 10:16 am
bj said..
“..Even when you’re right…”
(um..!..isn’t that always..?..)
phil(whoar.co.nz)
August 26th, 2007 at 10:37 am
bj said..
“.. You have the tact of a sledgehammer so there probably would be a queue..”
you don’t reckon the urgencies of the times require a shedding of the tact/politeness facades..?
by all means be civil..but do call a spade a spade..eh..?
and a pile of stinking dog-do..a pile of stinking dog-do..eh..?
and the ’sledgehammers’ of my words are nothing compared to the real/physical sledgehammers coming our way..eh..?
and lotsa people don’t yet seem to be aware of that..
btw..did you see the ‘uncertainties’ in the american financial systems are expected to peak in the last third of 2008..?
around about the time of what is shaping up to be a very interesting election..
(’interesting’..in the chinese proverbial sense..)
and just puling back to the even bigger picture..
what chilled me to the bones..was a newsletter i linked to the other day..from an accepted ‘guru’ of such things..
who was unequivacal that the sh*t is about to come down..and to continue coming down for quite the forseeable future..
and the one message he was trying to get through was..
don’t trust banks..!..any banks..!..
he said the only recommendation he could give re banks..
..was that they were ok to hire a safe deposit box in..to put into what you have drawn out of your accounts..
apart from that..
his advice was to grab what is yours..and to head for the hills..
(safety deposit box key tucked away somewhere safe..
cos’ it’s gonna rain..for a very long time..
and when it stops..we will be living in a different world..
eh..?
(not very ‘tactful of him there..eh..?..
why..!..he’s just trying/going to scare all those horses (us)..that our ‘masters’ are going “sshhh…sshhh1..there there..!..everything will be ok..!” to..eh..?)
cos’ when that ‘confidence-facade’ cracks/is broken..
it will all go very runny..very quickly..
(and hey..!..we haven’t even factored in the upcoming environmental meltdowns..eh..?
this is just the economics-thread..of the whole unravelling..whoar..!..).
phil(whoar.co.nz)
August 26th, 2007 at 12:59 pm
BJ
I has been proven the American NASA GISS data was incorrect.
There are well known problems with Urban Heat Island effect in developing countries such as Russia,China, Brazil
The ball is in your court to prove that the European (+Japanese/Canadian/Australian/New Zealand if you like) data is that much better.
August 26th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
Phil
Send me your e-mail address. I would like to invite you to visit “the motley fool” (which makes it free to you). I recommend the METAR board (Macro Economic Trends And Risks). Not the only place I frequent but a rich source of economics knowledge and information.
Never mind the guru, and I think I know which article you’re talking about… just be sure you’re well out of the market or holding short positions by 10 September. THIS year. The cracks in the structure at the top hint of an avalanche to come. For you are right not to trust banks. We may be less vulnerable than some, but we are not as safe as we could be. The Central Banks and the major banks and bankers have had a free ride for a long time.
http://www.kitco.com/ind/Rubino/aug202007.html
bjchip AT computer DOT org
respectfully
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
No Emmess, you have proven no such absurdity. The NASA GISS data SET was restructured in 2000 and it required adjustments in the software that interprets it. This reduced the variability of the data and WITHIN the margin of error brought warm years of the early thirties into the top 10 warmest list. What you’ve proven is that the process of science works…. not that the GISS data is garbage.
Perhaps you will send your memo to the Polar Ice Caps and explain to them that it is all a mistake and they can stop melting.
Or have you no ability to check ANY factoid against reality?
BJ
August 26th, 2007 at 2:58 pm
Does the WTO have the kahones to stop the US from responding in the same way it did in 1930? A repeat of the Smoot-Hawley tariff act might not be as catastrophic now that we have the Euro. We might not see a deep recession plunged into a full blown depression as happened in 1930 but I wouldn’t bank on it.
August 26th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
bj..
puremedianz@hotmail.com
phil(whoar.co.nz)
August 26th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Do you think the timing of the “revelations” regarding the dangers of Chinse goods alongside the recent high powered U.S. trade delegation to China protesting at the unfair trade advantage that the Chinese have?
http://english.people.com.cn/200612/16/eng20061216_333220.html
I think its priceless that the Yanks are protesting at the trade imbalance as the primary beneficiaries of that imbalance are a) U.S. enterprises who have outsourced their production there, and b) U.S. consumers who have benefited from the super low prices due to the lax or nonexistant labour and environmental laws. When the Chinese do actually propose labour protection, guess who is the first to complain? Yep the heads of U.S. corporations. Their perspective is best summed up by this quote.
“And, according to their own English translation, they also gave the Darwinian advice, “that the fittest survives is the basic principle of all creatures.â€?
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3017/fights_over_chinese_labor_ref orm/
August 26th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
I meant
Do you think the timing of the “revelations� regarding the dangers of Chinse goods alongside the recent high powered U.S. trade delegation to China protesting at the unfair trade advantage that the Chinese have is coincidental?
August 26th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
You know the financial markets are in deep doo doo when the New Zealand Herald incorporates an article from The Independent.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10459208
August 30th, 2007 at 3:41 pm
Another article to demonstrate how fked the world economy is going to be in the not too distant future.
http://www.kitco.com/ind/Daughty/jul202007.html
August 30th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
Got a spooky one for you Sleepy
http://www.fnarena.com/index2.cfm?type=dsp_newsitem&n=B03AAE1A-17A4-11 30-F5A895FE45EDE2AA
respectfully
BJ
August 30th, 2007 at 8:29 pm
Yep the current financial crisis does have rather scary parallels with the market “correction” in the 1920-21 depression, which directly led to the Great Depression thanks to the Fed’s attempts to stimulate the economy, alongside the Feds attempts to assist the British to return to the gold standard after World War I.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression#Debt
Personally I think that it won’t take 8 years for the next Great Depression to happen. Already people are distrustful the our financial institutions after the seventh collapse of a finacial compony in 15 months.
Even banks don’t trust each other enough to lend to each other without the government/reserve bank being the intermediary.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4174017a13.html
September 8th, 2007 at 12:54 am
Sleepy, Here is a simple (and somewhat simplistic) theory of how banks amplify or create the boom and bust economic cycles.
economy doing well => people get paid more
people get paid more => people save more for a rainy day
people save more for a rainy day => banks pay more interest on savings
banks pay more interest on savings => banks have to lend more money
banks have to lend more money => have to find more enitities to lend to
have to find more enitities to lend to => have to lend to riskier entities
have to lend to riskier entities => bad loans increase
bad loans increase => have to increase interest rates all lending
increase interest rates on all lending => businesses reduce investments
businesses reduce investments => economy slows down
economy slows down => people get paid less
people get paid less => people withdraw rainy day savings
people withdraw rainy day savings => banks begin repossessing instead of refinancing
banks begin repossessing instead of refinancing => sharemarket collapses
sharemarket collapses => economy collapses
economy collapses => banks declare bankruptcy
banks declare bankruptcy = > bad debts written off
bad debts written off => economy revives
September 8th, 2007 at 3:29 pm
Your argument is sound Kevyn, but you seem to be unaware of the concept of fractional reserve banking. You’re assuming a case of a bank being required to have 100% reserves, rather than the current less than 10% reserves requirment and also doesn’t take into account moral hazard on the part of bank loan officers, investment fund managers, and asset speculators who want to get as much “performance bonuses”, commission, and profits as possible in full awareness that the negative consequences of their actions are socialised and their interests are protected by government regulations. (Federal Deposit Insurance, bailouts etc)
“In essence, it states that for every $100 of loans, a bank should have at least $8 of capital, of which at least $4 must be permanent equity. Because loans secured over residential property were seen to be less risky than other loans, they only had to have 50% as much capital. Loans to banks from OECD countries were seen to be less risky still, so they only had to have 20% as much capital, and loans to governments denominated in their local currency 0%. There were several other categories and treatment for off-balance-sheet exposures.”
http://www.rbnz.govt.nz/speeches/0104984.html