Category Archives: Science (not-so-real)

Wimp

Posted on by

“I can see my breath!” I complained during walkies Friday morning.

“Wimp,” a passing resident said almost sotto voce.

It was 15°F colder in Southwest Puffin than in North Puffin on Friday.

Some Solar Deniers would have you believe that Global Warming caused this dip in temperature.

I’m an engineer in real life but I also have a 98% useless undergrad degree in Math.

Today is the last day of the 2015 Atlantic Hurricane season. I took my hurricane shutters down last week.

Terminology: A “hurricane” is a tropical cyclone. In the western North Pacific, these storms are called “typhoons” but similar storms in the Indian and South Pacific Oceans are known as “cyclones.”

Hurricane modeling fascinates me. As the season ends in the Tropics, we relied on computer projections that gave our forecasters the results we see as a colored “cone of uncertainty” on the weather maps. Generally speaking, the models can narrow down a north Atlantic tropical cyclone to a path that falls in the … North Atlantic.

Spaghetti Model of Atlantic Hurricane TracksThere are four or five excellent global hurricane forecasting models. Those models solve the equations describing the behavior of the atmosphere over the entire globe. Remember that. These numeric (or “dynamical”) models — called ECMWF, GFDL, GFS, and UKMET — each take hours to run on supercomputers. I was surprised to learn that the U.S. National Weather Service uses the less useful NAM model for only North America and the surrounding waters. There are also statistical models as well as simple trajectory models and hybrid statistical/dynamical models. The National Hurricane Center maintains a list of all of the tropical cyclone track and intensity models.

Here’s one percent of the two percent use that I get from my useless Math degree: I know enough math to know I absolutely could not write the equations for one of these models.

I also know enough math to know the four best hurricane models blither off into uncertainty in a few short days.

“The global warming scam … is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen I have seen.”
–Harold Lewis

The IPCC’s man-made Global Warming model simulations cover the period to the year 2100 and beyond. Not five days. Not 500 days. Not even 5,000 days. The IPCC says their model of man-made Global Warming is fixed out to 31,000 days.

Wow.

We can’t predict whether it will rain on South Puffin today (there’s a 10-20% chance) with any certainty but we can predict the temperature there on November 30, 2100.

Wow.

Global Warming models solve the equations describing the behavior of the atmosphere over the entire globe. Sound familiar?

Let’s consider the hurricane models we count on.

Tropical Storm Kate formed out around the Bahamas on a Monday morning just three weeks ago today, an occurrence unexpected by forecasters in the November of an El Niño year. That pries another nail out of climate models, too.

By Veterans’ Day, Hurricane Kate had become the fourth hurricane of the 2015 Atlantic hurricane season. Kate tracked north away from the Bahamas, passed well north of Bermuda, and pretty much bothered only the fishies.

Strong El Niño events typically bring the Atlantic season to an earlier-than-usual close because the subtropical jet stream gets an increasing boost toward late autumn. Despite that, Kate did become a hurricane but was tamed a couple of days later. Dr. Jeff Masters noted that the “only” Atlantic hurricanes observed since 1950 during El Niño Novembers are Ida (2009), Florence and Gordon (both 1994), the “Perfect Storm” (Grace in 1991 which was actually a Halloween storm), Frances (1986), and Martha (1969).

“Only”? Six seems like a lot of “onlies,” since there were November hurricanes in only three non-El Niño years — 1998, 2001, and 2005. (There was also a Cat 1 hurricane in the Azores in December 1951, plus Alice in the Antilles in December-January, 1952, and Lili in December, 1984. 1951-2 was an El Niño year.) I think there have been 21 el Niño years since 1950.

What have we learned?

  • I’m thinking Dr. Jeff Masters is as good at hurricane reporting as at global warming prediction.
  • If we aren’t good enough at math to predict an atmospheric event as big as a hurricane over a summer, we aren’t good enough at math to predict a 4.3°C temperature change over a century.
  • We don’t know how to terraform a planet.
  • I hate outdoor walkies when the temperature is 4°C.

Maybe the science ain’t as “fixed” as the Far Green would have us believe, hmmm?

Hmmm, indeed. British public schools used to “cane” students for performance as poor as these predicters keep turning in.

 

And that’s the Truth! Pbbbbbbbbt!

Posted on by

Genetically Modified apples that don’t brown are in the news this week. The Arctic Golden and Arctic Granny apples were created by Okanagan Specialty Fruits, a small company in Canada. The USDA approved them for U.S. consumers on Friday.

Moron Holding Sign“The morons say GMO foods cause famine?” an incredulous Rufus said when we saw one on ABC News holding a sign.

Global Warming, measles, and GMO apples give us a good stepping stone to consider facts and truth and moronity.

GLOBAL WARMING
Political Assertion: “Man-made Global warming is making sea level rise.”
Fact: The Isthmus of Panama “recently” formed; that allowed armadillos to migrate from South America into North America by the early Pleistocene.
Fact: The Bering land bridge intermittently connected Asia with North America as sea levels rose and fell under the effect of ice ages; at one point that allowed early humans to migrate from South America into North America.
Truth: The climate does change over time but none of those huge changes had anything to do with humans. Only a moron could believe a politician can fix it with a tax.

MEASLES
Political Assertion: “Vaccinations cause bad shit.”
Fact: The United States eliminated measles in 2000 thanks to vaccination levels over 90% of the school-age population. China and Mexico have almost no measles infections thanks to vaccination levels over 90% of the school-age population.
Fact: Measles cases in the United States are at their highest level since 2000.
Truth: Most current infections occur in unvaccinated people, most of whom declined the injections for religious, philosophical or political reasons. Only a moron could believe that the political science of climate change is so vastly right but the real science of disease prevention is so vastly wrong.

GENETICALLY MODIFIED FOODS
Political Assertion: “GMO foods cause famine.”
Fact: Genetically modified wheat doubled yields in Mexico, India, and Pakistan and have saved over a billion people from starvation.
Fact: Modern corn (maize) began with a huge leap in genetic modification about 10,000 years ago when farmers in Mexico domesticated maize by choosing seeds because they came from taller plants or tasted better or were easier to grind. This selective breeding or artificial selection led directly to the corn we enjoy today. Modern genetic tools reduce the labor force needed to produce enough food for us and reduce the need for evil pesticides.
Truth: Politicians make stuff up. Morons believe them.

TRUTHS
• The solar deniers cult simply ignore the inconvenient truths that their computer models are flawed, that Michael Mann’s flawed hockey stick graph was never real science, and even that solar activity has some small teeny-tiny relationship to temperature here.

Whether climate change is man made or not has become a religious argument with the faith-based politicians who believe with all their hearts and none of their brains using the story to make money and that magic will keep their feet dry and their crops growing. The facts paint a different story.

The climate is always changing. The wise human will prepare for the change while the moron rails against the thermometer.

• The liberal left and the conservative right have joined forces under the anti-vaxer’s tinfoil hat of political science disease prevention.

Whether vaccine is good or bad has become a religious argument with the faith-based anti-vaxers political cult who believe with all their hearts and none of their brains that magic will keep them safe. The facts paint a different story.

Vaccination can prevent the once common diseases that ravaged us — polio, measles, diphtheria, whooping cough, rubella, mumps, tetanus, rotavirus and the flu. The wise human will protect him or herself while the moron rails against the needle.

• ABC  News also noted in the GMO story that 80% of the corn we eat is genetically modified. ABC News was dead wrong. 100% of the corn we eat is genetically modified.

Whether genetic mods are good or bad has become a religious argument with the faith-based politicians who believe with all their hearts and none of their brains trying ban all change and that magic will keep them fed. The facts paint a different story.

Foods evolve whether we do it in the field or the lab. The wise human will measure the impact of the change while the moron rails against the science.

So. Facts and truth and moronity.
The wise human observes a problem, gathers facts, has an idea, tests the idea, and draws a conclusion. The wise human tests that conclusion against any new data.
The moron hears a perfect idea on the Interwebs, finds a fact that confirms the idea, concludes it was a great idea and never ever needs changing, and then rails against the science that contradicts him or her.

And that’s the Truth!

 

Far Green Screws Consumers and Environment. Again

Posted on by

New York City has banned yet another common product. First it was the trans fats when the City worried about gangs greasing up the subway tracks. Then the red Solo™ cup of soda. Next it was selfies with kittens.

Now, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has announced that the largest city in the U.S. will ban polystyrene foam, effective July 1. No more packing peanuts. No more takeout coffee cups. No more Rigid Foam insulation.
Coffee Cup on the Beach
Actually I’m good with losing packing peanuts. They are such a PITA to store in my barn.

And I don’t drink coffee.

More than 75 cities and counties in California have banned polystyrene food and beverage containers and more. Brookline, Massachusetts, did the same in 2013. And now NYC.

Did the U.S. suddenly suffer a cranio-rectal inversion? Did the science-denying State of California suddenly end up on the East Coast?

There is, as usual, pretty good (read “scientific”) evidence that plastic is better than paper. It seems that science is anathema to the Far Green.

Let’s spend a minute with the real science instead of the political science.

Study after study has compared “styrofoam” cups side by each with paper cups to find that

• Polystyrene is derived from petroleum and natural-gas. It takes 4,748 gallons of water to make 10,000 Polystyrene cups. The 5.4 million BTUs needed to make 10,000 16-ounce polystyrene cups is about the same as burning 450 pounds of coal. Most important, it takes gallons of water.

• In addition to the renewable twenty million trees, most paper cups are coated with polyethylene, derived from petroleum and natural-gas. It takes 8,095 gallons of water to make 10,000 LDPE-coated paper cups with sleeves. The 6.5 million BTUs needed for 10,000 polyethylene-coated paper cups is equivalent to 542 pounds of coal. (The “greener” polylactide-coated paper cups require even more water and energy.)

Huh.

The average 16-ounce polystyrene cup uses a third less energy, produces half the solid waste by volume, releases a third less of the so-called greenhouse gases, and uses 40-percent less water than does the “green” 16-ounce paper cup with a sleeve.

[Editor’s note: the next wars will be fought over water.]

I know! I know! We’ll ban the plastic cup because it’s bad and promote the paper cup because it’s so much better for the environment.

We haven’t even gotten to life cycles.

Polystyrene is easy peasy to grind up and put through the process again and again and again so that marvelous, mailable cooler your steaks came in could have a new life as a high dollar coffee cup if the Far Green weren’t determined to cut down our forests.

Do you really want to save the environment? Carry your own mug. Don’t litter on my beach. Learn science.

 

We Only Have 500 Days Left, Part III

Posted on by

Want to know why I distrust our liberal friends?

They drive how science goes wrong.

I started this three-part series with the simple question, “If you distrust what the Administration told you about the military, why do you trust what they say about global warming?”

Yes, I chose two hot button issues across the political spectrum. It’s always more interesting than yattering in a corner about National Safe Digging Month versus potholes

Sheeple Image Found at alt-market.comThe responses follow a predictable pattern:

“Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and the latest IPCC AR say it is so.”
“in Europe, where environmental awareness is far higher, everyone takes human caused global warming seriously.”
“There is 97% agreement on human caused global warming.”
“Man-Made Climate Change Deniers are the authentic environmental wackos.”
“BS, Dick.”

Trust but Verify
That “simple idea underpins science” but Ronald Reagan gave it a bad name among our Liberal friends who say “the science is settled.”

“Trust but do not verify” follows every “complete agreement,” the Liberal signal that people have not thought through their pet issue, are mistaken about their pet issue, don’t want to hear contradictions about their pet issue, and go ballistic if I ask them to rethink it.

See the summary of responses above.

Let’s look at the 97% agreement on human caused global warming and the IPCC.

John Cook published a paper in Skeptical Science that claims he and others reviewed nearly 12,000 abstracts of studies published in the peer-reviewed climate literature. They found that “97 percent of the papers” that expressed a position on anthropogenic global warming “endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming.”

Our liberal friends latched onto that one, you betcha.

Unfortunately, Mr. Cook, um, cooked the books.

It turns out he was not alone.

The Economist reports that “modern scientists are doing too much trusting and not enough verifying — to the detriment of the whole of science, and of humanity” — and they are doing it in fields from biotechnology and rust to, yes, “global warming.”

  • “Too many of the findings that fill the academic ether are the result of shoddy experiments or poor analysis.”
  • “Researchers at … Amgen found they could reproduce just six of 53 ‘landmark’ studies in cancer research.”
  • “‘Negative results’ now account for only 14% of published papers, down from 30% in 1990.”

Papers from PNAS and IPCC fill most of the categories the Economist lists. Unfortunately, I do not expect my Liberal friends to accept the Economist [La la la la la la la la la la la] as a source, though. After all the Economist said of Liberal darling Paul Krugman, “the most striking thing about his writing these days is not its economic rigour but its political partisanship.”

And finally, for those who pray at the institutionalized ignorance altar to Al Gore, there may be a scientific consensus on global warming after all. Only 36 percent of geoscientists and engineers believe that humans have created global warming, although I suspect 100 percent of them believe humans have created the crisis itself. Of course, this finding was in the peer-reviewed Organization Studies, so it must be suspect, yes?

There is good news: The Economist also reports, “The most enlightened journals are already becoming less averse to humdrum papers. Some government funding agencies, including America’s National Institutes of Health, which dish out $30 billion on research each year, are working out how best to encourage replication.” [Emphasis added]

That small trend is a good start, but I don’t see it taking hold anywhere in the human-caused global warming industry and I don’t see it taking hold in the media or populace that supports and pays for said human-caused global warming industry.

 

We Only Have 500 Days Left, Part II

Posted on by

Want to know why I distrust our liberal friends?

The NYTimes reports that the National Climate Assessment study was prepared by a “large scientific panel overseen by the government and received final approval…” The White House released the report May 6.

The White House “wants to maximize its impact to drum up a sense of urgency among Americans about climate change — and thus to build political support for a contentious new climate change regulation that President Obama plans to issue in June.”

Mr. Obama wants to drum up urgency about climate change and build political support for [his] new climate change regulation.

Mr. Obama didn’t introduce it with a Rose Garden speech, though, because that would (a) give him only one shot at marketing it and (b) would give the people who understand the actual science yet another major opportunity to demonstrate how political this is. Instead, Mr. Obama “spent Tuesday giving interviews to local and national weather broadcasters on climate change and extreme weather.”

Don’t want to take my word for it? Read what climatologist Roy Spencer has to say. Before becoming a Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Dr. Spencer was a Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Climate Confusion is his popular book on global warming.

For the record, there are still 975 days until Inauguration Day, January 20, 2017, so there is little doubt among our liberal friends that LAX will be underwater before the next President takes office.