multi-media

A very frequent whinge from climate change denialists is that the big bad environmental industrial complex is suppressing any dissent from the pre-approved party line. This is never accompanied by any actual evidence beyond an occasional anecdote. One such anecdote emerged last June in what was trumpeted as the EPA supressing one of its own internal documents assessing the state of climate science and refuting the IPCC party line. Have a look at one of Peter Sinclair's excellent Climate Crock of the Week videos below and see just how, yet again, the story falls to pieces with the most…
Offered in the spirit of off topic friday funnies: Have a good weekend!
Lots of FUD about climate models get thrown around in the Climate Wars, but what is it they are really doing anyway? The contrarians would have us believe they just take in a bunch of contrived parameters and spit out the worst case possible scenario for global average temperature increase. But the truth is the kinds of models the IPCC report on are very complex and nuanced. Since I'm no expert and pictures are worth thousands of words, I would like to offer a few beautiful video realizations of GCM output. The first is from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) CCSM climate…
Just like those national debt clocks showing you dollar by dollar how high it is, this site has a "Carbon Counter" showing how many metric tons of carbon have been released into the atmosphere. As I post this, we are at 3,642,255,344,781. No wait, now its 3,642,255,367,521...no, it's 3,642,255,381,988...well, you get the picture! They have some other interesting resources there as well.
Now this is worth checking out! (for the incurious, it is a bit of fantastic photography of various insects) The mosquito larvae are my favorite so far.
Giant Razor Clawed Crabs pose no threat, experts say At least I thought it was funny.
Homer style, that is! (h/t to The Intersection)
I know this video is for real because since I first saw it several years ago it has been erased from YouTube at the request of the Japanese television company that produced it. Being real does not stop it from also being surreal to the extreme! See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.
It's time to take a deep look at the world's oceans, from Straightgoods: Google is adding the world's oceans to its extensive Earth mapping. In a phone conversation with David Suzuki Foundation staff, John Hanke, director of Google Earth and Maps, admitted, "We had really overlooked two thirds of the planet." Partly because of prodding from oceanographer Sylvia Earle, the company has embarked on a massive project as part of Google Earth 5.0 to map the oceans using sonar imaging, high-resolution and 3-D photography, video and a variety of other techniques and content. As some of you might have…
Lifted from a comment by Gavin at RC.
I must confess, not looking at the numbers or anything, I have always mentally dismissed the impact of air travel on humanity's carbon footprint. But looking at the very cool video below my impression is a bit different! Notice how the day-night terminator moves through the scene: Anyone know where I could find a down-loadable, high resolution version of that? [UPDATE] Thanks to Patrick in the comments: "Hi-Quality Versions available here, right at the Source: http://radar.zhaw.ch/"
I found this YouTube clip via Crooks and Liars of James Hansen on Democracy Now. It also contains some highlights of other Democracy Now interviews, including one of Science Blogs' own Chris Mooney. He talks about the political muzzling he has experience under both parties during his time at NASA. (But don't the denialists tell us of collusion between scaremongering politicians and money grubbing scientists? Funny how the denialists tell us of collusion between scaremongering politicians and money grubbing scientists and yet the reality is NASA's earth sciences budget being cut and…
Via last Thursday's APOD, I came to this site where I downloaded an excellent, high-res video about some recent research out of Germany. Over the last 16 years, a team of astronomers have taken images of a tiny patch of sky that is the very center of the milky way. By doing this they have been able to analyze the motion of 28 stars that are orbiting a supermassive blackhole that is the center of our galaxy. I highly recommend the full video (232MB .m4v) but here is a small taste of the phenomenon from youtube: One of the star's orbits is only 16 years long, and it gets as close to the…
This is too hilarious for words, seven lumps of coal wearing scarves and toques singing Christmas carols about "clean coal" and energy independence! There are six to chose from, I didn't get far but my favorite is transcribed below: Frosty the Coalman, is a jolly happy soul, He's abundant here in America and he helps our economy roll. Frosty the Coalman's getting cleaner every dayHe's affordable and adorable and helps workers keep their pay.There must have been some magic in clean coal technology,For when they looked for pollutants there were nearly none to see.Oh, Frosty the Coalman, is a…
Offered without comment:
Okay, so this clip is a bit long (~10 minutes) and it is mostly Fox Noise, but it is really fascinating to watch this one guy, Peter Schiff, being dead on in his economic predictions and advice over and over and over again, and even more interesting to watch the the boobleheads laugh at him and wisely wag their fingers. They even talk about what a bargain buy and how solid Meryl Lynch is, about one year ago! But like New Orleans and Katrina, "no one" saw this mess coming....
So it took me a long time to finally watch the last segment, but I did find this documentary from PBS to be very engaging and very informative. Maybe not so encouraging though... FWIW, In It for the Gold agrees you should go watch it. The synopsis is here: Melting glaciers, rising sea levels, fires, floods and droughts. On the eve of a historic election, award-winning producer and correspondent Martin Smith investigates how the world's largest corporations and governments are responding to Earth's looming environmental disaster.
You all should check out some beautiful photographs of bacterial cultures Seed Magazine has in one of its "portfolios". There are many other great sets there too, of all kinds of things.
A Few Things Ill Considered is just as happy as the next vile, hate-spewing, far left smear machine that Barack Obama actually won the recent US Presidential election, but I have to say I am so ready to be really disappointed! Call me a cynic, but we've had progress waved under our noses before, only to have it snatched away by spineless, self-serving Democratic congress people and the harsh reality that the real power structures in the US are not all elected officials. Nevertheless, when it comes to tackling climate change, the signs are really hopeful, even if the challenge is enormous. I…
I received via unsolicited email a link to a website with an rather interesting video presentation about the recycling process. So, if you've ever wondered just what happens to all that stuff you spend your time seperating out from the trach and depositing in the recycle bins, have a look at this: RecycleBank.