Princeton physicist Freeman Dyson has been roundly criticized for insisting global warming is not an urgent problem, with many climate scientists dismissing him as woefully ill-informed. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, Dyson explains his iconoclastic views and why he believes they have stirred such controversy.
On March 3, The New York Times Magazine created a major flap in the climate-change community by running a cover story on the theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson that focused largely on his views of human-induced global warming.
Basically, he doesn't buy it. The climate models used to forecast what will happen as we continue to pump CO2 into the atmosphere are unreliable, Dyson claims, and so, therefore, are the projections. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, his first since the Times article appeared, Dyson contends that since carbon dioxide is good for plants, a warmer planet could be a very good thing. And if CO2 does get to be a problem, Dyson believes we can just do some genetic engineering to create a new species of super-tree that can suck up the excess.
Earth Changes
Joseph Romm, George Soros's bulldog at the alarmist climate fantasyland web blog called Climate Progress has a post (h/t Climate Depot) "NOAA puts out "El Nino Watch, so record temperatures are coming and this will be the hottest decade on record".
Based on the coming El Nino he hints at upcoming disappointment for climate realists with respect to arctic ice and warmer global temperatures for 2009 and for the decade. Of course he used the bogus NOAA temperatures which have taken the lead in being the most contaminated and exaggerated through station dropout globally, no adjustment for urbanization, a purposeful adjustment up of sea surface temperature warming (compare UNISYS with NOAA satellite), and bad siting (Anthony Watts has identified only 10% of the 948 United States stations meet government's own standards for siting).
The result is nonsense press releases every month like a year ago in June when NOAA proclaimed it to be the 8th warmest June in 129 years with an anomaly of +0.5C, while the satellites that don't have these surface errors found it to be the 9th coldest in its 30 years of record keeping with an anomaly of -0.11C. This last month University of Alabama MSU global satellite data had an anomaly of just 0.043C. You can count on NOAA, which has become another Mother Goose to tell a different story when they announce the May global numbers with their bogus assessment. Romm who revels in fairy tales, will surely announce the NOAA results.
Based on the coming El Nino he hints at upcoming disappointment for climate realists with respect to arctic ice and warmer global temperatures for 2009 and for the decade. Of course he used the bogus NOAA temperatures which have taken the lead in being the most contaminated and exaggerated through station dropout globally, no adjustment for urbanization, a purposeful adjustment up of sea surface temperature warming (compare UNISYS with NOAA satellite), and bad siting (Anthony Watts has identified only 10% of the 948 United States stations meet government's own standards for siting).
The result is nonsense press releases every month like a year ago in June when NOAA proclaimed it to be the 8th warmest June in 129 years with an anomaly of +0.5C, while the satellites that don't have these surface errors found it to be the 9th coldest in its 30 years of record keeping with an anomaly of -0.11C. This last month University of Alabama MSU global satellite data had an anomaly of just 0.043C. You can count on NOAA, which has become another Mother Goose to tell a different story when they announce the May global numbers with their bogus assessment. Romm who revels in fairy tales, will surely announce the NOAA results.
© unknown
© Oscar van der Velde
"With my new zoom lens I can now magnify the sky above thunderstorms to get very detailed images of sprites," says van der Velde. "This amazing 'carrot sprite' occurred near the coast of southern France about 250 km away from me."
"Sprites are a true space weather phenomenon," he adds. "They develop in mid-air around 80 km altitude, growing in both directions, first down, then up. This happens when a fierce lightning bolt draws lots of charge from a cloud near Earth's surface. Electric fields [shoot] to the top of Earth's atmosphere--and the result is a sprite. The entire process takes about 20 milliseconds."
© US Geological Survey
Date-Time:
Monday, June 08, 2009 at 05:13:16 UTC
Sunday, June 07, 2009 at 11:13:16 PM at epicenter
Location:
15.930°N, 86.952°W
Depth:
10 km (6.2 miles) set by location program
Distances:
30 km (20 miles) NW of La Ceiba, Honduras
125 km (80 miles) ENE of San Pedro Sula, Honduras
205 km (130 miles) N of TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras
1290 km (800 miles) SW of Miami, Florida
Climate Progress has a weblog by Joseph Romm titled "Breaking: NOAA puts out "El Nino Watch," so record temperatures are coming and this will be the hottest decade on record".
This is an interesting and very bold forecast of record temperatures by Joe Romm, and, if this does occurs, it would substantially support his claims on the dominance of human-caused global warming. Only time will tell, of course, if this warming will occur. However, unfortunately, he still does not understand that i) the appropriate metric to monitor global warming involves heat in Joules, most which occurs in the oceans (e.g. see), and ii) that the accumulation Joules in the upper ocean has not occurred since 2003 (e.g. see and see).
This is an interesting and very bold forecast of record temperatures by Joe Romm, and, if this does occurs, it would substantially support his claims on the dominance of human-caused global warming. Only time will tell, of course, if this warming will occur. However, unfortunately, he still does not understand that i) the appropriate metric to monitor global warming involves heat in Joules, most which occurs in the oceans (e.g. see), and ii) that the accumulation Joules in the upper ocean has not occurred since 2003 (e.g. see and see).
© Gavin Schmidt and Joshua Wolfe
Like that of all reservoirs in the American West, the water level of Lake Powell has fluctuated since the day it was dammed.
Like that of all reservoirs in the American West, the water level of Lake Powell has fluctuated since the day it was dammed.
What follows is an open letter to the Salon writer Peter Dizikes, who recently published an article about a new book by NASA scientist Gavin Schmidt on climate change.
Dear Mr. Dizikes:
I recently read your overview of Gavin Schmidt's new book as well as your interview with him on Salon.
I was surprised to see that you consider the effects of manmade global warming to be "oddly invisible." Having studied the subject for a couple of years now, while performing my own research, it has been my observation that newspapers, magazines, and television news sources show images of supposed manmade climate change on a daily basis. Such images include: floods, polar bears, glacial calving, etc. If anything, images of global warming might be said to saturate western media.
As with so many other products generated by the AGW industry, Schmidt's book Climate Change: Picturing the Science is part of an ongoing effort to frighten the credulous. Its messages include: weather will kill you; our moment on Earth is unique; and climate did not used to change.
© John Prescott/SWNS
A tornado comes close to touching the ground near Bude, Cornwall
A tornado comes close to touching the ground near Bude, Cornwall
The twister - a thick tunnel of cloud caused by spiralling wind - was seen near Bude in Cornwall over the weekend.
The tornado, defined as a "violently rotating column of air" are usually found in America but Britian has about 33 a year.
Derek Prescott, 58, who witnessed the latest storm, said: "Its spout formed and started spiralling down towards us. It was exciting."
Tornadoes usually occur with thunderstorms. They usually form where warm moist air meets dry hot air.
Property damage was reported on Sunday in Greece following an undersea earthquake at mid-day that measured 4.2 on the open-ended Richter scale.
Seismologists at the Athens Observatory put the epicentre of the quake, which struck at noon (0900 GMT), at a point 150 kilometres (95 miles) west of Athens in the Corinthian Gulf, off the city of Aigio.
Seismologists at the Athens Observatory put the epicentre of the quake, which struck at noon (0900 GMT), at a point 150 kilometres (95 miles) west of Athens in the Corinthian Gulf, off the city of Aigio.
© Reuters / Shaun Best
Canadian wheat grows in a field near Teulon, Manitiba, July 26, 2006.
Canadian wheat grows in a field near Teulon, Manitiba, July 26, 2006.
Winnipeg, Manitoba - Cool weather has pushed growth of Western Canada's wheat and barley crop at least 10 days behind schedule, the Canadian Wheat Board said on Monday.
"You're pushing development into a period with better likelihood of getting a (pre-harvest) frost," said Bruce Burnett, director of weather and market analysis for the Canadian Wheat Board. "It's not particularly what we need at this moment. It's just too cool."
There's little relief in forecasts for the Prairie region. Southern Manitoba, parts of which are still seeding, will have cool, wet weather through Wednesday, according to Environment Canada. Daily low temperatures of just above freezing are also forecast for much of Saskatchewan and Alberta.
The Wheat Board, which has a government-granted marketing monopoly on Western Canada's wheat and barley, releases its planting and production estimates on Thursday.
© Ken Prior
But despite their stunning and frequent appearances, the formations have yet to be officially recognised with a name.
They have been seen all over Britain in different forms - from Snowdonia to the Scottish Highlands -and in other parts of the world such as New Zealand, but usually break up without producing a storm.
