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gregladen | January 29, 2015I've recently written about the Serengeti Strategy, a coin termed by climate scientist Michael Mann to describe the anti-science strategy of personal attacks against individual scientists in an attempt to discredit valid scientific research one might find inconvenient. Science Careers (from Science Magazine) has a new item called "Science under the microscope" looking at bad faith criticism of science and scientist. Some of this comes from within science itself, where the term "torpedo" is sometimes used. Rival scientists do take shots at each other in the peer review or grant review…
gregladen | January 28, 2015What happened to the Blizzard of 2015? Well, it happened. Despite breathless complaining about how the forecasters got it all wrong, they didn't. As the storm was predicted, there should have been close to about two feet of snow in the New York City metropolitan area, but as it turns out, there was between 8 and 12 inches. That means that New York City experienced a typical winter month's worth of snow in one day. Also, most snow that falls on The City falls a few inches at a time and melts more or less instantly, as few cities can match New York in its heat island effect. So, 8-12 inches…
jrosenhouse | January 27, 2015We're only six episodes into The Nightly Show, the program Comedy Central put on to replace Colbert, but I'm about ready to write it off. Larry Wilmore, the show's host, was pretty funny as a correspondent for The Daily Show, so I was optimistic. But it was not to be. The basic format is this: In the first segment Wilmore does a monologue on some issue of note. In the second segment there is a discussion of the issue with four guests. In the third, the panel is asked blunt questions, and is then judged on whether or not they are keeping it real.
The trouble is that the panelists, each…
jdupuis | January 27, 2015On May 20th, 2013 I published my most popular post ever. It was The Canadian War on Science: A long, unexaggerated, devastating chronological indictment. In it, I chronicled at some considerable length the various anti-science measures by the current Canadian Conservative government. The chronological aspect was particularly interesting as you could see the ramping up since the 2011 election where the Conservatives won a majority government after two consecutive minority Conservative governments. The post is my most popular by an of magnitude, with around 10 times more page views that the…
gregladen | January 27, 2015The Blizzard continues. The center of the low pressure system moved to the northeast more than expected, so the maximum snowfall amounts have also moved deeper into New England, and it the storm may end up dropping the largest amounts Downeast, in Maine, rather than around New York and southern New England. Nonetheless maximum snow totals are heading for 20 inches in many areas west of Boston.
Here, I wanted to alert you to a recent study that talks about "Changes in US East Coast Cyclone Dynamics with Climate Change," which has this abstract:
Previous studies investigating the impacts of…
esiegel | January 27, 2015If you want to know where you are on Earth, you use a GPS, you use other terrestrial landmarks to help determine your location, or you use some well-known objects in the sky.
Image credit: still by Fraser Gunn, additions by Ethan Siegel.
This will get you latitude easily, but how about longitude? While there are some tricky things you can do to help yourself out, one of the most commonly used techniques for centuries -- surprisingly -- was using the moons of another world: Jupiter!
Image credit: Robert J. Modic, over a mere 10-minute timespan! Image was processed down from 3.2 MB to a…
jrosenhouse | January 25, 2015Do you prefer math problems to chess problems? Well then today's your lucky day! For today is the day that Problem Of the Week returns! Our theme this semester is: Geometry. Euclidean geometry to be exact.
There will be ten problems during the term. The first five are meant to be relatively simple, while the second five will be more challenging. So have a look, see what you can make of it, and feel free to leave your solutions in the comments.
jrosenhouse | January 25, 2015This week we shall continue our look at helpmates. The problem below was composed by Zivko Janevski in 2011. It calls for helpmate in two, with three solutions:
Before diving in, let's review how helpmates work. In defiance of normal chess logic, white and black will be cooperating to contrive a position in which black is checkmated. The convention is that black moves first, so that, from the diagram, we are looking for a sequence of the form: Black moves, White moves, Black moves, White gives mate. Even though black and white are cooperating, normal chess rules apply. It is fine for…
jrosenhouse | January 21, 2015I'm not in the mood for heavy blogging just now, so how about we discuss something light and frivolous. Like the meaning of life.
Back in July, I wrote this:
Answers about our origins have no implications at all for questions of meaning and value. Arising through blind, uncaring forces in no way implies that life is not awesomely precious, and being made in the image of a transcendent designer in no way implies that it is.
That seems entirely obvious to me, but I routinely hear religious people deny it. They say that if there is no God, then life has no meaning. The only way this claim…
gregladen | January 21, 2015Gas prices have fallen to nearly half (or more depending on your starting point) in recent months. Therefore, according to Jevons Paradox, which does indeed appear to exist sans apostrophe, use of gas should have gone up.
It did, but only by 1%.
So, we are not impressed with Jevons paradox.
gregladen | January 20, 2015I watched the State of the Union Address, and it was great. Not nearly enough on climate change, but otherwise it was great. I did not watch the response. I heard it was not great.
But then Clara Jeffery of Mother Jones asked on twitter if they, the responses, are ever great. So I went and looked through a few old ones and I found one that YOU MUST NOT MISS. Watch the whole thing including the credits and the bit with Brokaw at the end. Pay special attention to the hair.
So, without further delay, the Democratic Response to Reagan's 1985 State of the Union Address, a veritable Variety…
egrossman | January 19, 2015If you’re in the market for a paint remover and head to your local hardware store, most of the products you’re likely to find will contain methylene chloride. These products’ containers promise “professional results” – that they remove paint “in 10 minutes” – and that they are “specially formulated for antiques and fine furniture.” One called “Dad’s Easy Spray,” suggests it can be used to remove paint from fabrics and rugs. Also available are adhesive removers and “prepaint” products that contain methylene chloride. Some of these come in aerosol dispensers.
These products all carry hazard…
gregladen | January 19, 2015Matt Ridley has written an opinion piece for The Times (not the New York Times, the other one) which is a response to his critics, specifically, to those who openly disagree with him about climate change. Ridley’s commentary is jaw dropping, and for most of you, those who are not of Royal Blood and highly privileged, it is more than a little squirm-inducing. But, putting that aside, Ridley makes a number of assertions, two of which (*) I’d like to address. Other problems with Ridley's approach have been addressed here, by Dana Nuccitelli.
Spoiler alert, he is wrong on both counts.
First, to…
pgleick | January 19, 2015By Peter Gleick (Pacific Institute) and Carl Ganter (Circle of Blue)
1. The California Drought Becomes an Emergency
California’s multi-year drought grew dire enough in 2014 to prompt Governor Jerry Brown to declare a drought emergency in January. By the end of the year, California had experienced the driest and hottest 36 months in its 119-year instrumental record. Some researchers described the drought as 1) the worst in over 1200 years and 2) evidence of rising temperatures globally as climate changes accelerate. As of mid-January, the drought is continuing.
As the California and western…
jrosenhouse | January 17, 2015This series has featured quite a few direct mates, selfmates and endgame studies. There are, however, other problem genres to consider. One of these neglected genres is the helpmate. So, over the next few weeks, I'd like to show you a few of them.
This week's example is a simple, but, I think, elegant example of how helpmates work. It was composed by me, and it was published all the way back in the April 1989 issue of Chess Life magazine. The problem calls for helpmate in two, with the added stipulation that there are two solutions:
Now, as the name suggests, in a helpmate, white…
gregladen | January 17, 2015Did you ever notice that you can smell rain? Usually, you smell it better after the rain, but if you are a highly trained naturalist, or Aragorn son of Arathorn, Elessar, the Elfstone, Dúnadain, the heir of Isildur Elendil's son of Gondor, or something, you can smell it before it rains. During the rain you are usually inside smelling other things.
It is called Petrichor. That word comes from ancient Greek for rock (obviously) and God Blood. That makes sense because with all the gods up in the sky, a certain amount of God Blood would fall to the earth when it rains.
Anyway, I came across…
jrosenhouse | January 16, 2015Anyone surprised to read this?
A bestselling Christian book that claims to detail a boy's trip to heaven and his return to Earth is being pulled from stores after one of its co-authors admitted he made the whole thing up.
The 2010 memoir, The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven, was written by Alex Malarkey and his father, Kevin Malarkey, a Christian therapist in Ohio.
In 2004, when Alex was 6, the two were badly injured in an automobile accident. Alex ended up in a coma for two months, and the book claims to tell the story of his trips to heaven during that time.
Malarkey described a heaven…
jrosenhouse | January 15, 2015Pope Francis engages in some yes-buttery with regard to the Charlie Hebdo murders:
Pope Francis said Thursday there are limits to freedom of expression, especially when it insults or ridicules someone's faith.
Francis spoke about the Paris terror attacks while en route to the Philippines, defending free speech as not only a fundamental human right but a duty to speak one's mind for the sake of the common good.
But he said there were limits.
By way of example, he referred to Alberto Gasparri, who organizes papal trips and was standing by his side aboard the papal plane.
“If my good friend Dr…
jrosenhouse | January 13, 2015I don't have much to add to what I have already said about the Charlie Hebdo killings. However, having had some time to think about things a little more, and to read what other people have said, I do feel inclined to change my mind about one aspect of this.
First, Charlie Hebdo put out a new issue today. Here is the cover image, which I think is brilliant:
The caption translates to “All Is Forgiven.”
In my original post I was rather dismissive of the artistic value of the Muhammad cartoons. I now think I was too hasty. I hadn't fully appreciated the context in which some of the…