gregladen | July 22, 2013It has been said that global warming has stopped over the last several years. Some say it has not been happening for 17 years, some say for ten years, some say for 12 years. Let's test these hypotheses
Hypothesis: June, the most recent month with full data, was an average year, not a warm year.
Now that July is nearly over, we can look back at the data for June and see how warm or cool June was.
According to data from NOAA and NASA, summarized here,
June was one of the hottest such months on record globally...The month extended the unbroken string of warmer-than-average months to 340,…
gregladen | July 21, 2013Michael Mann initiated a defamation lawsuit agains t the National Review and the Competitive Enterprise Institute some time ago, and it has been trudging along int he courts. Two very important decisions came down in the Washington DC Superior Court in Professor Mann's favor. I'm not going to try to describe this to you because there are others who know much more about these things than I do, but I encourage you to read Climate Science Watch's summary and update here: DC Court affirms Michael Mann's right to proceed in defamation lawsuit against National Review and CEI
It is interesting to…
gregladen | July 21, 2013From Paul Douglas:
Just like we read left to right, most weather systems move left to right (West to East). Right now however, the weather pattern is out of whack, moving East to West, creating a monster tropical heatwave for a big chunk of the U.S. WeatherNation Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas has more on the rare retrograde weather pattern and why it's important to take the heat seriously, but not lose your sense of humor.
gregladen | July 21, 2013From The World Bank.
Within a few decades rising world temperatures will create food shortages in Sub-Saharan Africa and leave some parts of Asia flooded while other areas will not have enough drinking water. World Bank President Jim Yong Kim says the world must mitigate climate change as he reveals key findings of Turn Down the Heat: Climate Extremes, Regional Impacts, and Case for Resilience, a scientific report on the expected rise of global temperatures by 2 degrees by 2040.
gregladen | July 21, 2013It seems to me that the science of epidemiology is a lot like being in shoe sales in a country on the pacific rim. You never know when the other shoe is going to drop, but you know it will. Our species (humans) is numerous, contiguous, and dense (in more ways than one). This means that a highly virulent pathogen could spread across the globe and kill a gazillion people before we could do anything to stop it. Yet, such a thing has not happened in modern times, meaning, since the widespread and easy flux of population provided by the airline industry at several scales of space.
At the…
gregladen | July 20, 2013This was one of the many great panels at FtBConscience, this panel hosted by Miri of Brute Reason and organized by Biodork.
A panel of reproductive rights activists come together to discuss access to abortion in current events , clinic escorting and some common religious and non-religious arguments against abortion. Our panel consists of clinic escorts - including one panelist who volunteered before FACE laws went into effect (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances), health care professionals, an author and several bloggers who write about reproductive rights. Our panelists hail from…
gregladen | July 20, 2013Climate Scientist John Abraham and I just finished a session of FtBConscience on Climate Change and during that session we promised to provide some useful links. We also used some graphics during the session. Below are the links and the graphics!
First, here is the video of the session:
Climate Change Science Twitter List
I created a twitter list of people (or organizations) that tweet about current climate change science. If you check this list at any given moment you’ll know the latest climate science news. If you have a suggestion as to who should be added to this list, send me a tweet!…
gregladen | July 19, 2013Reproductive Success (RS) is defined in many ways in different places by different people, but one of the most common definitions is simply the number of offspring an individual produces. This definition is further modified in most cases to mean only those individuals that will be fertile, i.e., capable of producing further offspring. RS is important in understanding Natural Selection (NS). In the simplest model, a heritable feature that increases RS will be selected for over time in a population because individuals with higher RS will contribute more offspring to future generations and this…
gregladen | July 18, 2013The latest Skeptically Speaking is "War on Science"
This week we’re looking at threats to science and critical thinking, and how you can sort fact from fiction. York University science librarian John Dupuis joins us to discuss what he calls the Canadian government’s War on Science. And Chris MacDonald director of the Jim Pattison Ethical Leadership Program at Ryerson University, joins us to talk about his textbook The Power of Critical Thinking, which can help you navigate the hyperbole and misinformation that happens when the media looks at science news.
Listen here.
And, I just finished…
gregladen | July 18, 2013This is funny:
Just so you know, he was not fishing for "bluegills" This is a bluegill:
A nice bluegill
Bluegills live in fresh water and are like "sunfish" and "pumpkinseeds" and "crappies" etc. all of which are in the bass family.
Bluefish live in the ocean and roam along littoral regions in large schools. This is what large bluefish look like:
Of course, when one is fishing for bluefish, there is always the possibility of catching the fish that eats them, such as striped bass. Like this:
The striped bass is not in the "bass family" referred to above. Striped Bass are Moronidae,…
gregladen | July 18, 2013John Abraham, of St. Thomas University, and I have a running conversation about climate change ... the science, communication about the science, the politics, etc. ... and we are going to package this conversation in a one hour session at FTBConscience, an on line conference, Saturday Morning at 9:00, July 20th.
Details are here.
Join us as we discuss the latest news and events related to climate change, such as what is happening in the Arctic, deep in the Oceans, with the Jet Stream and weather extremes, some recent research on glacial melting and sea level rise, and so on.
And, we'll…
gregladen | July 18, 2013I'll be joining a panel of amazing people, organized by my friend Brianne Bilyeu, to talk about reproductive rights, on Saturday. I expect my contribution to be relatively minimal and I'll be listening with great interest to ...
A panel of reproductive rights activists come together to discuss access to abortion in current events , clinic escorting and some common religious and non-religious arguments against abortion. Our panel consists of clinic escorts - including one panelist who volunteered before FACE laws went into effect (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances), health care…
gregladen | July 17, 2013There is now a video and a transcript of the Evolutionary Psychology Panel at CONvergence 2013. Many of you, when you watch this, will become enraged at things said by the panelists. Rumors of what was said had already been spread around on the internet and as I understand it Jerry Coyne and Stephen Pinker have already become enraged. Or maybe the loved it. I'm not sure.
If you want me to respond to any of your enraged rage regarding anything that was said, or for that matter, if you have anything at all ... negative, positive, informative, whatever ... to contribute to the conversation…
gregladen | July 16, 2013No. Here's a handy graphic for you to enjoy and share, courtesy of Climate Nexus.
Also, you might want to ask the question: What has global warming done since 1998?
That question is addressed HERE, where this handy graphic is available showing the importance of ocean warming:
So, has global warming stopped? No, I'm afraid not.
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Other posts of interest:
How to get rid of spiders in your house
Why is your poop green?
How many cells are there in the human body?
Is there really a plot hole in Harry Potter Goblet of Fire?
How long is a human generation?
Is blog ever really blue?
How to…
gregladen | July 15, 2013Neither, obviously. But whatever facts you may have been using to deliberate may have been wrong:
In the end, Trayvon is the one that was executed for his crimes by George. Different George, though.
gregladen | July 14, 2013Elaine Morgan, who has done a many thing in her life and is also the chief proponent of the more recent version of the Aquatic Ape Theory, has died at the age of 92.
Dr Morgan only retired at the start of this year from writing a weekly column for the Western Mail after suffering ill health in 2012.
The coal miner's daughter, who lived in Mountain Ash, Rhondda Cynon Taf, passed away on Friday morning, three weeks after suffering a stroke.
Her daughter-in-law Kim Morgan said: "She was an incredible woman and so inspirational to so many people."
...
Her book The Descent of Woman became an…
gregladen | July 14, 2013First, I want to say this to George Zimmerman and his lawyer. Stop whining. You are the one who chose to kill someone, and did so, then got away with it. It is not you who lost or who has had your life torn apart or taken away or anything like that. So stop being the damn victim. No one is going to hunt you down and kill you. That's you, George. That's you who hunts down and kills people. Other people, generally, don't do that. No one is going to hunt you down and kill you or in any other way bother you. Having said that, it is true that much of the part of humanity that is aware of your…
gregladen | July 12, 2013July 9, 2013 - In this speech on the Senate floor, Senator Whitehouse talked about what's at stake in the climate change debate using a series of rhetorical questions. He concluded that "many of the answers carry stakes so high, that they plead for prudent and rational choices. The down side is so deep, that the balance has to be towards precaution, if we are indeed a rational species."