TomS Words of Wisdom

Yes Dad, those are typical La Nina year phenomenon.  However if you dig a little into the subject, one of the sources quoted in your e-mail, the International Arctic Research Center, is actually featuring a link on their home page to NOAA's Arctic Report Card which is reporting: "5° C temperature increases were recorded in autumn", "Near-record minimum summer sea ice extent ", "Fisheries and marine mammals impacted by loss of sea ice", "Observed increase in temperature of surface and deep ocean layers", "Greenland, Records set in both the duration and extent of summer surface melt", "Permafrost temperatures tend to increase, while snow extent tends to decrease".  [Gotta love the power of Google's page rank.]

The commentary you often redistribute about climatology (and a few other subjects) tends to cherry pick facts to support a particular political point of view.  You really need to spend more time understanding the original sources and science rather then relying on ratings driven conservative talk show and newsletter punditry.  This is tragic misuse of science for political propaganda and personal gain.

I have a particular god given gift for taking many diverse facts in a wide range of subjects and forming a very consistent and coherent overall understanding of the "big picture".  The real scientific debate, that did last a decade or more, is over and the conclusions are clear. So I can assure you that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are in fact effecting the global climate and ecosystems.  Any claims to the contrary, without compelling and overwhelming new evidence, are simply false.

Whether these changes will surpass pre-historic levels (they have already passed historic levels) will depend upon three factors: Do enough 'boomers die off soon enough that the western domesticities  can actually reverse their anthropogenic CO2 emissions in time; Does the vast majority of the developing world [China & India] base their economies on burning fossil fuels; and Is there a major dust producing event (large meteoroid impact or supervolcano eruption)?  These are the only relevant unknowns, two of which are really political questions, the other is a cosmic / geologic lottery.  None of them are scientific debate.





Note that the time axis on these two graphs face opposite directions and they are both linked to from the Wikimedia Commons.

This post is copyright by Tom Sayles and is released licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 License.
  Some rights reserved.

Charles Sayles wrote:

Cold Reality

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Friday, October 17, 2008 4:20 PM PT

... <Editorial not quoted here to respect copyrights nor influance page rank.>

A week ago Monday, just after our last vaulting competition of the year, my house-mate / landlord gave me the "My girlfriend is moving in and we want the house to our selves" speech. So I spent several days last week scrambling to find a new place to live. I did the usual things like posting an ad on Craig's list, e-mail friends and family, etc.


As it turns out, the owner of Patterson Creek Farm (where my vaulting club practices) received notice over the preceding weekend that the one bedroom apartment in the loft above the front barn is vacant and that the lease would not be renewed beyond the end of October. The rent, $750 / month, is a little more then I really wanted to spend, but the location pretty much ideal. I'm also a little worried about having noisy [equine] neighbors downstairs.

On the upside I can sleep in another three quarters of hour before vaulting practice on Saturday mornings and it will cut over an hour of the time commitment to workout with Cali (my club's vaulting horse). Also because it's in the loft and because it's well insulated it doesn't cost much to keep warm through the winter and with the skylights that open it should stay cool in the summers. Like the rest of the farm, it's only a few years old. It has Comcast cable service available, including cable modem Internet access. While I was actually looking to rent another room with house-mates, I think that the barn community will fill much the same role in my home life.

It's not finalized yet, as I haven't signed any lease documents, but if all goes according to plan I should be moving on or about the first of November.