Am I the only person in the world who is puzzled by the incredible over-exposure Sacha Baron Cohen's comedy attracts? For God's sake, even Christopher Hitchens devotes a column to him in Slate (although admittedly for the worthy point of correcting lefties who take the Borat movie as some sort of genuine indictment of American culture.)
I have just never found him all that funny.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Humour time
Now for some light relief. Scott Adams continues to amuse me over at the Dilbert blog.
For example, talking about the recent US elections:
I read that President Bush’s approval rating is less than 1 in 3. Nancy Pelosi, the incoming majority leader for the opposition party is in the same range. In other words, two-thirds of the citizens of the United States believe our leadership could improve if Bush drove his Segway into the majority leader and then over a cliff, assuming Cheney saw it happen and died of a heart attack.
And from his post about intelligence:
After college, I got my first job as a bank teller in the San Francisco financial district. My typical customers were titans of industry. They seemed pretty smart. I wondered how smart I was compared to them. Sure, I earned excellent grades in my tiny high school and small college, but how would I stack up in the real world? Was I smart enough to become a titan of industry?
For example, talking about the recent US elections:
I read that President Bush’s approval rating is less than 1 in 3. Nancy Pelosi, the incoming majority leader for the opposition party is in the same range. In other words, two-thirds of the citizens of the United States believe our leadership could improve if Bush drove his Segway into the majority leader and then over a cliff, assuming Cheney saw it happen and died of a heart attack.
And from his post about intelligence:
After college, I got my first job as a bank teller in the San Francisco financial district. My typical customers were titans of industry. They seemed pretty smart. I wondered how smart I was compared to them. Sure, I earned excellent grades in my tiny high school and small college, but how would I stack up in the real world? Was I smart enough to become a titan of industry?
I decided to take an I.Q. test administered by Mensa, the organization of geniuses. If you score in the top 2% of people who take that same test, you get to call yourself a “genius” and optionally join the group. I squeaked in and immediately joined so I could hang out with the other geniuses and do genius things. I even volunteered to host some meetings at my apartment.
Then, the horror.
It turns out that the people who join Mensa and attend meetings are, on average, not successful titans of industry. They are instead – and I say this with great affection – huge losers. I was making $735 per month and I was like frickin’ Goldfinger in this crowd. We had a guy who was some sort of poet who hoped to one day start “writing some of them down.” We had people who were literally too smart to hold a job. The rest of the group dressed too much like street people to ever get past security for a job interview. And everyone was always available for meetings on weekend nights.
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Now I'm a believer
I’m officially ceasing my sitting on the fence about greenhouse gases, but want to make a few things clear.
It is right to worry about greenhouse gases, and to worry quite a lot. For me, the most convincing reason for this is actually not directly the issue of global warming, which still carries uncertainty about its likely extent and its full consequences, but rather ocean acidification.
The recent Scientific American article I posted about here gives good reason to worry about the global situation if CO2 levels ever reach 1000 ppm. (Short explanation: if oceans or seas become sufficiently lacking in oxygen and warm enough, hydrogen sulphide producing bacteria might make enough gas to cause enormous deadly gas bubbles that could wipe out life on nearby land.) The problem is, as noted in my recent post here, the world could get up to 700 ppm by the end of this century, and despite what the Scientific American article says, it would seem it need not take another century beyond that to crack 1,000ppm.
Going back and looking at other articles on ocean acidification, it seems to me that the environmental effects of that are relatively easy to test and accurately predict. (It doesn’t take much to set up a large tank and change the Ph and see what it does to plankton or coral shells.)
As plankton plays a significant role as a CO2 sink in the deep oceans, surface acidification to an extent that would cause a decrease in plankton would also seem to be a major worry for accelerating the rate of increase of atmospheric CO2.
The other issue that gives me concern is that letting CO2 levels get close to 1000 ppm may make it extremely easy for some uncontrollable event to lead to a sudden disastrous global increase. (For example, a supervolcano system suddenly springing to life, or an asteroid hit or two. If I understand it correctly, anything that kicks up a lot of dust would initially cool the earth, but the greater greenhouse gases would eventually kick in.)
That’s my reasoning for deciding that there is not much point in nitpicking over the arguments about how much hotter increased CO2 levels may make the world. Seriously bad effects on the oceans seem certain with sufficiently high CO2 levels anyway.
Of course, Phillip Adams and his ilk are in full gloating “told you so” mode about the fact that politicians on the the Right are starting to sound more serious about the issue. (It seems to me that Adams is wanting to take far more credit for early recognition of the issue than his published columns indicate he deserves.) My impression is that ocean acidification issue has really only started attracting a lot of attention in the last couple of years anyway.
Also, to be clear about my position, there are several things related to global warming of which I remain either dismissive or at least very sceptical:
1. the Kyoto Treaty;
2. wind power;
3. Carbon offset schemes which involve growing trees, especially if they are in areas where bushfires are a distinct possibility. (It is my suspicion that many companies promoting carbon offset schemes are selling snake oil when it comes to their long term effect.)
4. Environmentalists and politicians who claim Pacific Islands are already disappearing from increasing sea levels caused by global warming. (In another 30 years or so, maybe. But hey, just how viable is any 2 metre high island nation built in the middle of the ocean anyway.)
5. Politicians who resist nuclear power on principle.
6. Dismissal of the sun’s role as being possibly significant for temperatures over the next century.
7. Believing that the current Australian drought is necessarily related to global warming.
8. Arguing that current short bouts of surprising cooler weather are a sign that global warming is not true, and that greenhouse gases are not worth worrying about. (Sorry Tim Blair, they are funny, but I think no serious climate scientist is concerned about them disproving the theory.)
9. “The Day after Tomorrow” scenarios to do with the sudden “switching off” of the Atlantic ocean conveyor current. (Real Climate recently chided The Guardian for getting reporting of recent research on this completely wrong.)
10. The more excitable predictions about the number of birds, frogs, spiders, polar bears etc likely to be lost as a result of global warming.
The fact that Rupert Murdoch and me have suddenly reached the same conclusion is, of course, simply a sign that great minds think alike. He's a sharp old codger, isn't he?
It is right to worry about greenhouse gases, and to worry quite a lot. For me, the most convincing reason for this is actually not directly the issue of global warming, which still carries uncertainty about its likely extent and its full consequences, but rather ocean acidification.
The recent Scientific American article I posted about here gives good reason to worry about the global situation if CO2 levels ever reach 1000 ppm. (Short explanation: if oceans or seas become sufficiently lacking in oxygen and warm enough, hydrogen sulphide producing bacteria might make enough gas to cause enormous deadly gas bubbles that could wipe out life on nearby land.) The problem is, as noted in my recent post here, the world could get up to 700 ppm by the end of this century, and despite what the Scientific American article says, it would seem it need not take another century beyond that to crack 1,000ppm.
Going back and looking at other articles on ocean acidification, it seems to me that the environmental effects of that are relatively easy to test and accurately predict. (It doesn’t take much to set up a large tank and change the Ph and see what it does to plankton or coral shells.)
As plankton plays a significant role as a CO2 sink in the deep oceans, surface acidification to an extent that would cause a decrease in plankton would also seem to be a major worry for accelerating the rate of increase of atmospheric CO2.
The other issue that gives me concern is that letting CO2 levels get close to 1000 ppm may make it extremely easy for some uncontrollable event to lead to a sudden disastrous global increase. (For example, a supervolcano system suddenly springing to life, or an asteroid hit or two. If I understand it correctly, anything that kicks up a lot of dust would initially cool the earth, but the greater greenhouse gases would eventually kick in.)
That’s my reasoning for deciding that there is not much point in nitpicking over the arguments about how much hotter increased CO2 levels may make the world. Seriously bad effects on the oceans seem certain with sufficiently high CO2 levels anyway.
Of course, Phillip Adams and his ilk are in full gloating “told you so” mode about the fact that politicians on the the Right are starting to sound more serious about the issue. (It seems to me that Adams is wanting to take far more credit for early recognition of the issue than his published columns indicate he deserves.) My impression is that ocean acidification issue has really only started attracting a lot of attention in the last couple of years anyway.
Also, to be clear about my position, there are several things related to global warming of which I remain either dismissive or at least very sceptical:
1. the Kyoto Treaty;
2. wind power;
3. Carbon offset schemes which involve growing trees, especially if they are in areas where bushfires are a distinct possibility. (It is my suspicion that many companies promoting carbon offset schemes are selling snake oil when it comes to their long term effect.)
4. Environmentalists and politicians who claim Pacific Islands are already disappearing from increasing sea levels caused by global warming. (In another 30 years or so, maybe. But hey, just how viable is any 2 metre high island nation built in the middle of the ocean anyway.)
5. Politicians who resist nuclear power on principle.
6. Dismissal of the sun’s role as being possibly significant for temperatures over the next century.
7. Believing that the current Australian drought is necessarily related to global warming.
8. Arguing that current short bouts of surprising cooler weather are a sign that global warming is not true, and that greenhouse gases are not worth worrying about. (Sorry Tim Blair, they are funny, but I think no serious climate scientist is concerned about them disproving the theory.)
9. “The Day after Tomorrow” scenarios to do with the sudden “switching off” of the Atlantic ocean conveyor current. (Real Climate recently chided The Guardian for getting reporting of recent research on this completely wrong.)
10. The more excitable predictions about the number of birds, frogs, spiders, polar bears etc likely to be lost as a result of global warming.
The fact that Rupert Murdoch and me have suddenly reached the same conclusion is, of course, simply a sign that great minds think alike. He's a sharp old codger, isn't he?
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Planning for the year 12,000 and beyond
This article, from a publication of the National Academy of Sciences in the US, talks about the fairly silly sounding lengths that the US is forced to go to in its planning for the safe storage of spent nuclear fuel. The Yucca Mountain waste depository is forced by the EPA to met certain standards of exposure in 10,000 years time! And the report even suggested that there was no reason to stick to a nominal period, and "recommended that assessment be performed out to the time of peak risk to a maximally exposed individual, which may be several hundred thousand years in the future." !!
I would like to think that humans will still be around in recognizable form in 10,000 years time, but isn't there a fair chance they will be half robot hybrids who would like to sip on a radioactive spritzer instead of a vodka cocktail? Also, even if the entire planet is one big nuclear waste dump, won't there be somewhere else to live by then?
I would like to think that humans will still be around in recognizable form in 10,000 years time, but isn't there a fair chance they will be half robot hybrids who would like to sip on a radioactive spritzer instead of a vodka cocktail? Also, even if the entire planet is one big nuclear waste dump, won't there be somewhere else to live by then?
CO2 on the up and up
Recently I have had a few posts about CO2 levels, and how bad the situation looked for anyone interested in seeing that atmospheric concentrations level out.
Here's a story from Nature that confirms this. (As News@Nature articles tend not to be accessible for long, here's a New Scientist version, but it is not as good.)
From the Nature story:
Global carbon emissions are now growing by 3.2% a year, according to results presented at an Earth science conference in Beijing on 9 November. That's four times higher than the average annual growth of 0.8% from 1990-99.
"We are not on any of the stabilization paths," says Michael Raupach, a carbon-cycle scientist with Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Canberra, who presented the Global Carbon Project results. ...
"What's really striking is the rate of growth in places like China," says Raupach. According to Chinese figures, China currently contributes some 16% to global emissions, but accounts for 40% of the growth in world emissions.
China's vice premier Hui Liangyu yesterday told the meeting that China, like all countries, suffers from severe weather events that are in part a result of global warming. "The Chinese government attaches great important to global environmental change and actively copes with the related problems," he wrote in a letter to the meeting delegates.
China plans to reduce the amount of its 'energy intensity', defined as the emissions per person per unit of GDP, by 20% by 2010, although it has no official emissions targets.
Sea-level rise is also at the upper end of IPCC projections, adds John Church, who works at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research in Hobart, Tasmania. Analyses published in 2006 have shown that sea level is currently rising at 1.5-2 mm per year, which is in the upper half of the IPCC value of 1-2 mm per year. The rate of the rise is accelerating.
This is expected to lead to an 88 cm rise in sea level by 2100. "We have to start acting soon — it's urgent," says Church. Raupach's results, he says, are "really striking". ...
Here's a story from Nature that confirms this. (As News@Nature articles tend not to be accessible for long, here's a New Scientist version, but it is not as good.)
From the Nature story:
Global carbon emissions are now growing by 3.2% a year, according to results presented at an Earth science conference in Beijing on 9 November. That's four times higher than the average annual growth of 0.8% from 1990-99.
"We are not on any of the stabilization paths," says Michael Raupach, a carbon-cycle scientist with Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Canberra, who presented the Global Carbon Project results. ...
"What's really striking is the rate of growth in places like China," says Raupach. According to Chinese figures, China currently contributes some 16% to global emissions, but accounts for 40% of the growth in world emissions.
China's vice premier Hui Liangyu yesterday told the meeting that China, like all countries, suffers from severe weather events that are in part a result of global warming. "The Chinese government attaches great important to global environmental change and actively copes with the related problems," he wrote in a letter to the meeting delegates.
China plans to reduce the amount of its 'energy intensity', defined as the emissions per person per unit of GDP, by 20% by 2010, although it has no official emissions targets.
Sea-level rise is also at the upper end of IPCC projections, adds John Church, who works at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research in Hobart, Tasmania. Analyses published in 2006 have shown that sea level is currently rising at 1.5-2 mm per year, which is in the upper half of the IPCC value of 1-2 mm per year. The rate of the rise is accelerating.
This is expected to lead to an 88 cm rise in sea level by 2100. "We have to start acting soon — it's urgent," says Church. Raupach's results, he says, are "really striking". ...
Armstrong and the Prophet, again
"Muhammad: a prophet for our time" is the second Karen Armstrong biographical book on the founder of Islam. (Does she actually like wearing big "kick me" signs taped on her back?) It's been out for a couple of months but seems to have attracted little in the way of reviews.
This weekend, a review in The Tablet starts off seemingly well, but it doesn't last:
In her elegantly composed and absorbingly narrated story of Muhammad's life and achievements, Karen Armstrong aims at doing just this and even more. She sees Muhammad not only as "a moral exemplar" but also as no less than "Prophet [and not only a prophet] for our time". Her account is based partly on a straightforward and uncritical reading of the work of Muhammad's earliest biographers, taking the Qur'an as her main source of information.
....Armstrong arrives at what seems a contrived interpretation of Muhammad's life: "Muhammad literally sweated with the effort to bring peace to war-torn Arabia, and we need people who are prepared to do this today. His life is a tireless campaign against greed, injustice, and arrogance ... he wore himself out in the effort to evolve an entirely new solution."
For Armstrong, the violent phase in the career of Muhammad must not be taken as its climax: Muhammad "eventually abjured warfare and adopted a non-violent policy". This statement is bizarre and corresponds to no Muslim account. It is highly questionable also in the light of all the bloodshed during the early history of Islam, starting with the Medinan period of Muhammad's career. Is it really historically convincing to claim that the battles of Muhammad and his immediate successors "had no religious significance"? Or that the first four caliphs, the "rightly guided ones", "in expanding the Arab Islamic empire by diplomatic and military means", were "responding to a political opportunity ... rather than a Qur'anic imperative"? The Qur'an clearly indicates that Muhammad's first great victory, at Badr, was to be understood as an act of divine intervention, vindicating Muhammad in his struggle against the enemies.
Other anti-Armstrong reviews:
From a University of London academic Efraim Karsh (this was noted in LGF in September):
Ms. Armstrong goes out of her way to whitewash Muhammad's extermination of the Jewish presence in Medina, especially the beheading of the entire 600 to 800 male population of the Qurayzah tribe. "[T]he Qurayzah were not killed on religious or racial ground," she claims, adding that "Muhammad had no ideological quarrel with the Jewish people." This is of course a travesty of the truth. Muhammad might have had no ideological quarrel with "the Jewish people," but he was seething with anger at the Medina Jews, who had not only spurned his attempts to woo them into his incipient religion (for example, by adopting a number of religious Jewish practices and rituals) but had also become his fiercest critics. Reflecting this outrage, both the Qur'an and later biographical traditions of the prophet abound with negative depictions of Jews. In these works they are portrayed as a deceitful, evil, and treacherous people who in their insatiable urge for domination would readily betray an ally and swindle a non-Jew.
And from the Boston Globe:
Readers will find her style stilted: At her best, she makes use of her intellectual skills to explore the tension between the personal and the historical, presenting Muhammad as an average individual doubting his choices, a visionary testing the limitations of his epoch; at her worst, she's didactic, frequently making sermonizing comments about thinking critically about jihad that are a mere rhetorical device. For Armstrong isn't a savvy, inquisitive thinker: She tells rather than shows, assumes rather than explains.
This weekend, a review in The Tablet starts off seemingly well, but it doesn't last:
In her elegantly composed and absorbingly narrated story of Muhammad's life and achievements, Karen Armstrong aims at doing just this and even more. She sees Muhammad not only as "a moral exemplar" but also as no less than "Prophet [and not only a prophet] for our time". Her account is based partly on a straightforward and uncritical reading of the work of Muhammad's earliest biographers, taking the Qur'an as her main source of information.
....Armstrong arrives at what seems a contrived interpretation of Muhammad's life: "Muhammad literally sweated with the effort to bring peace to war-torn Arabia, and we need people who are prepared to do this today. His life is a tireless campaign against greed, injustice, and arrogance ... he wore himself out in the effort to evolve an entirely new solution."
For Armstrong, the violent phase in the career of Muhammad must not be taken as its climax: Muhammad "eventually abjured warfare and adopted a non-violent policy". This statement is bizarre and corresponds to no Muslim account. It is highly questionable also in the light of all the bloodshed during the early history of Islam, starting with the Medinan period of Muhammad's career. Is it really historically convincing to claim that the battles of Muhammad and his immediate successors "had no religious significance"? Or that the first four caliphs, the "rightly guided ones", "in expanding the Arab Islamic empire by diplomatic and military means", were "responding to a political opportunity ... rather than a Qur'anic imperative"? The Qur'an clearly indicates that Muhammad's first great victory, at Badr, was to be understood as an act of divine intervention, vindicating Muhammad in his struggle against the enemies.
Other anti-Armstrong reviews:
From a University of London academic Efraim Karsh (this was noted in LGF in September):
Ms. Armstrong goes out of her way to whitewash Muhammad's extermination of the Jewish presence in Medina, especially the beheading of the entire 600 to 800 male population of the Qurayzah tribe. "[T]he Qurayzah were not killed on religious or racial ground," she claims, adding that "Muhammad had no ideological quarrel with the Jewish people." This is of course a travesty of the truth. Muhammad might have had no ideological quarrel with "the Jewish people," but he was seething with anger at the Medina Jews, who had not only spurned his attempts to woo them into his incipient religion (for example, by adopting a number of religious Jewish practices and rituals) but had also become his fiercest critics. Reflecting this outrage, both the Qur'an and later biographical traditions of the prophet abound with negative depictions of Jews. In these works they are portrayed as a deceitful, evil, and treacherous people who in their insatiable urge for domination would readily betray an ally and swindle a non-Jew.
And from the Boston Globe:
Readers will find her style stilted: At her best, she makes use of her intellectual skills to explore the tension between the personal and the historical, presenting Muhammad as an average individual doubting his choices, a visionary testing the limitations of his epoch; at her worst, she's didactic, frequently making sermonizing comments about thinking critically about jihad that are a mere rhetorical device. For Armstrong isn't a savvy, inquisitive thinker: She tells rather than shows, assumes rather than explains.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Vague cause for optimism
While not arguing with Israel's right to take steps to stop the never ending random rocket attacks on its territory, shouldn't they be reconsidering the use of shelling (with its inherent risk of error) as an appropriate method? Sure, missile attacks from helicopters and drones kill passersby too, but their explosive force is usually must more limited than a shell coming through the roof of a house (or hitting a beach.)
That said, I continue to wonder why the Palestinians think their rocket attacks are worthwhile when they are (in comparison) causing few deaths but, as a terror tactic, make it impossible for any Israeli government to say to its citizens that they should just ignore it.
I see from this BBC report that at least some Palestinians seem to share this view:
That said, I continue to wonder why the Palestinians think their rocket attacks are worthwhile when they are (in comparison) causing few deaths but, as a terror tactic, make it impossible for any Israeli government to say to its citizens that they should just ignore it.
I see from this BBC report that at least some Palestinians seem to share this view:
An old man called Muhammad Hussein broke down as he talked of the deaths of his sister and other relatives.
"They were all killed - pieces!" he shouted as he wept. "Thrown in pieces. I saw them! I put them in a sack! Eighteen people - they were killed."
But he said there should be no retaliatory suicide bombings.
"I don't like it," he said. "I myself don't like it. I am more than 70 years old. I want to live in peace!"
A much younger man called Nasser Hamad agreed.
"Palestinians should think carefully," he said.
"Palestinians should go to the peace process. We should not stop negotiating with the Israelis because they are pressuring us to lose our control and do unjustified actions against them."
He described suicide bombings as an ineffective tool.
They are talking about suicide bombings, but I presume that they would not agree with the rocket attacks either. It's a start, although I imagine it is a little hard for grass roots peace movements to get going within Gaza.The yearning Tracee
Tracee Hutchison's column in The Age today is easy to ridicule in part:
Maybe for those who pay attention to the political opinions of an overly sensitive, arty musician who was far too successful far too early for the good of his own mental health. (Well, you go read the transcript of the Enough Rope interview he gave. It made me feel very uncomfortable watching it.)
Talking about Midnight Oil, Hutchison writes:
In truth, there are probably more bands making political statements in their lyrics now than there were when the Oils were in their prime. It's just that the Oils were an extraordinary rock'n'roll band first and foremost and their powerfully persuasive lyrics came wrapped in wonderful melodies, so their message reached more people than most.
I may be a musical ignoramus, but I am very surprised at the suggestion that Midnight Oil were big on melody.
But I shouldn't be too tough on this Hutchison column, because she does express cynicism about the relevance of things like this:
Quite true. But Hutchison's only source of inspiration in politics today? :
Activist-turned-Greens leader Bob Brown aside, the absence of inspired political leadership in Australia has never been starker. And the need to give people something to believe has never been more crucial. As a twentysomething, Peter Garrett sang about not wanting to be the One. Maybe so. But we need more Garretts, Browns and Stott Despojas engaged in the political process and we need them being heard.
I don't know. It seems to me a large part of the problem is this: teenagers, as a general rule, have always thought they know more than their hopeless parents who are running the world. Nowadays, psychological teenage-hood often extends into the early 30's, and so the class of disaffected "youth" had accordingly increased. (And, if they are all convinced of coming global catastrophe, they will probably have fewer children and avoid the life lessons that child rearing often entails.)
There are issues with how Western youth and society as a whole now chose to find meaning in life. But just complaining that oldies don't listen to and don't know how to lead the disaffected youth is not exactly a helpful contribution.
A COUPLE of weeks ago, Silverchair's lead singer Daniel Johns made a bold political statement with a spray can at the annual ARIA awards. Having paid homage to ARIA Hall of Fame inductees Midnight Oil with a powerful rendition of the Oils' 1981 anthem I Don't Wanna Be the One, 27-year-old Johns spray-painted "PG 4 PM" on a strategically placed piece of plasterboard.
It was a fascinating moment.Maybe for those who pay attention to the political opinions of an overly sensitive, arty musician who was far too successful far too early for the good of his own mental health. (Well, you go read the transcript of the Enough Rope interview he gave. It made me feel very uncomfortable watching it.)
Talking about Midnight Oil, Hutchison writes:
In truth, there are probably more bands making political statements in their lyrics now than there were when the Oils were in their prime. It's just that the Oils were an extraordinary rock'n'roll band first and foremost and their powerfully persuasive lyrics came wrapped in wonderful melodies, so their message reached more people than most.
I may be a musical ignoramus, but I am very surprised at the suggestion that Midnight Oil were big on melody.
But I shouldn't be too tough on this Hutchison column, because she does express cynicism about the relevance of things like this:
Now, more than ever, young, and not so young, people are looking for something, someone, to show them the way.
How else can you explain U2 lead singer Bono's ability to persuade 50,000 fans at U2's Brisbane concert to send a text message to the Make Poverty History organisation while pointing their mobile phones at the moon?
Exactly how 50,000 texts to the ether helps anyone but the shareholders of the phone companies is a mystery...Quite true. But Hutchison's only source of inspiration in politics today? :
Activist-turned-Greens leader Bob Brown aside, the absence of inspired political leadership in Australia has never been starker. And the need to give people something to believe has never been more crucial. As a twentysomething, Peter Garrett sang about not wanting to be the One. Maybe so. But we need more Garretts, Browns and Stott Despojas engaged in the political process and we need them being heard.
I don't know. It seems to me a large part of the problem is this: teenagers, as a general rule, have always thought they know more than their hopeless parents who are running the world. Nowadays, psychological teenage-hood often extends into the early 30's, and so the class of disaffected "youth" had accordingly increased. (And, if they are all convinced of coming global catastrophe, they will probably have fewer children and avoid the life lessons that child rearing often entails.)
There are issues with how Western youth and society as a whole now chose to find meaning in life. But just complaining that oldies don't listen to and don't know how to lead the disaffected youth is not exactly a helpful contribution.
Friday, November 10, 2006
Bush and a carbon tax?
While it seems to be based on pretty slim evidence, Timothy Noah in Slate speculates that maybe Bush will become a carbon tax convert. It would be some surprise...
The baby flap
I haven't posted anything about Japan for a while, but this article in the Japan Times caught my eye:
KUMAMOTO (Kyodo) A hospital here plans to create a drop box where parents can anonymously leave unwanted babies, hospital officials said Thursday.
It's a peculiar idea in some respects; and I find it odd that giving up a baby this way doesn't cause all sort of problems for the mother in explaining to neighbours and relatives what happened to the baby.
Further down in the article, the depressing figure of the number of abortions in Japan is mentioned:
According to the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, in fiscal 2004, the number of abortions in the prefecture stood at 5,619, while the nationwide figure came to 301,673. No figures were available on abandoned babies in Japan, which is struggling to find ways to stem a falling birthrate.
Just how big a difference to the population problem in Japan would a reduction in abortions mean? According to the BBC in August 2006:
Almost 550,000 births were registered in the six months from January to June, up by more than 11,600 from the same period last year.
So, that means (if this increase holds up), about 1,100,000 births a year. The number of deaths in 2005: about 1,077,000. (More people died in 2005 than were born.)
The point is, if they are going to insist on very low migration as a source of population growth, then halving the current abortion rate would stop the population slide by a substantial number.
UPDATE: by coincidence, I see that there is a recent Japundit post about the birth rate, and the strange attitude of Japanese to immigration.
KUMAMOTO (Kyodo) A hospital here plans to create a drop box where parents can anonymously leave unwanted babies, hospital officials said Thursday.
Jikei Hospital said it will begin the work to create the drop box as soon as it obtains permission from local public health authorities. The hospital wants to set it up by the end of the year.
Drop boxes for abandoned babies have been introduced in Germany, where they are known as a "babyklappe" (baby flap) or "babyfenster" (baby window) in German. In Italy, they are called "culle per la vita" (cradle for life).
A Jikei Hospital official visited Germany, where they are usually set up at hospitals or social centers, in 2004.
Jikei Hospital said its baby drop box, called "konotori no yurikago" (cradle of storks), will be a boxlike chamber similar to an incubator, accessible from outside the hospital by opening a window. When a baby is dropped off, an alarm will alert nurses.
I had heard of this idea before, but did not know it was already well established in Europe.It's a peculiar idea in some respects; and I find it odd that giving up a baby this way doesn't cause all sort of problems for the mother in explaining to neighbours and relatives what happened to the baby.
Further down in the article, the depressing figure of the number of abortions in Japan is mentioned:
According to the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, in fiscal 2004, the number of abortions in the prefecture stood at 5,619, while the nationwide figure came to 301,673. No figures were available on abandoned babies in Japan, which is struggling to find ways to stem a falling birthrate.
Just how big a difference to the population problem in Japan would a reduction in abortions mean? According to the BBC in August 2006:
Almost 550,000 births were registered in the six months from January to June, up by more than 11,600 from the same period last year.
So, that means (if this increase holds up), about 1,100,000 births a year. The number of deaths in 2005: about 1,077,000. (More people died in 2005 than were born.)
The point is, if they are going to insist on very low migration as a source of population growth, then halving the current abortion rate would stop the population slide by a substantial number.
UPDATE: by coincidence, I see that there is a recent Japundit post about the birth rate, and the strange attitude of Japanese to immigration.
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Good news/bad news on greenhouse gases
Good news on the greenhouse gas front is rare to find (and not exactly over-reported.) But it turns out that atmospheric levels of methane, an important greenhouse gas due to it having a larger effect than CO2, has stopped increasing. From American Scientist:
As usual with their site, they don't believe in over-simplifying their explanations for easy understanding, but the figures suggested, although appearing fairly "back of the envelope" look pretty bad:
This is a bit of a guessing game, but 2°C has been proposed as a reasonable danger limit. This would be decidedly warmer than the Earth has been in millions of years, and warm enough to eventually raise sea level by tens of meters. A warming of 2° C could be accomplished by raising CO2 to 450 ppm and waiting a century or so, assuming a climate sensitivity of 3 °C for doubling CO2, a typical value from models and diagnosed from paleo-data. Of the 450 ppm, 170 ppm would be from fossil fuels (given an original natural pCO2 of 280 ppm). 170 ppm equals 340 Gton C, which divided by the peak airborne fraction of 60% yields a total emission slug of about 570 Gton C.
These figures are not good. However, the argument goes on in the comments section about whether Kyoto is a help or hinderance. Post number 105 comes up with some fairly imaginative ideas about reducing CO2 with self replicating robots and such like, and ends on this note, which neatly summarises conservative's concerns about Kyoto:
..many of the problems associated with CO2 is best solved with wealth. Indeed technology induced wealth solves both CO2-related problems AND all other sorts of nasty problems unrelated to CO2 such as poverty, disease, hunger, misery and disasters. By insisting on strangling economic growth, not only are you robbing the world of the best way to cope with climate change -- technology -- but also robbing the poor of the world the opportunity to cope with just about anything.
I haven't read the Stern report, or many of the articles criticising it yet, so I can't comment helpfully yet. But the main point of this post is just how bad the figures look for how hard it will be to keep that much carbon out of the atmophere.
This happy development wasn't entirely unanticipated, given that the rate of increase has been slowing for at least a quarter-century. Yet the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has predicated many of its conclusions on scenarios in which methane concentrations would continue growing for decades to come. Thus the recent stabilization of methane levels is something that some scientists are trying very hard to explain.
Edward J. Dlugokencky, an atmospheric chemist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has tracked atmospheric methane for many years. He says that "even as the reduction was happening, people doing emission scenarios weren't accounting for it." Dlugokencky maintains that the evolution of methane levels in the atmosphere mostly just reflects the attainment of a chemical equilibrium, such that methane production is balanced by its destruction. In sum, he says, atmospheric methane "looks like a system approaching steady state."
But now for the bad news. Over at Real Climate, there is a recent post about how much additional CO2 in the atmosphere might be "safe".As usual with their site, they don't believe in over-simplifying their explanations for easy understanding, but the figures suggested, although appearing fairly "back of the envelope" look pretty bad:
This is a bit of a guessing game, but 2°C has been proposed as a reasonable danger limit. This would be decidedly warmer than the Earth has been in millions of years, and warm enough to eventually raise sea level by tens of meters. A warming of 2° C could be accomplished by raising CO2 to 450 ppm and waiting a century or so, assuming a climate sensitivity of 3 °C for doubling CO2, a typical value from models and diagnosed from paleo-data. Of the 450 ppm, 170 ppm would be from fossil fuels (given an original natural pCO2 of 280 ppm). 170 ppm equals 340 Gton C, which divided by the peak airborne fraction of 60% yields a total emission slug of about 570 Gton C.
How much is 570 Gton C? We have already released about 300 Gton C, and the business-as-usual scenario projects 1600 Gton C total release by the year 2100. Avoiding dangerous climate change requires very deep cuts in CO2 emissions in the long term, something like 85% of business-as-usual averaged over the coming century. Put it this way and it sounds impossible. Another way to look at it, which doesn't seem quite as intractable, is to say that the 200 Gton C that can still be "safely" emitted is roughly equivalent to the remaining traditional reserves of oil and natural gas. We could burn those until they're gone, but declare an immediate moratorium on coal, and that would be OK, according to our defined danger limit of 2°C. A third perspective is that if we could limit emissions to 5 Gton C per year starting now, we could continue doing that for 250/5 = 50 years.
According to a chart that was part of my last post on CO2, the atmospheric level of CO2, on a "business as usual" basis, would be reached by about 2040. (We're already at about 380ppm.)These figures are not good. However, the argument goes on in the comments section about whether Kyoto is a help or hinderance. Post number 105 comes up with some fairly imaginative ideas about reducing CO2 with self replicating robots and such like, and ends on this note, which neatly summarises conservative's concerns about Kyoto:
..many of the problems associated with CO2 is best solved with wealth. Indeed technology induced wealth solves both CO2-related problems AND all other sorts of nasty problems unrelated to CO2 such as poverty, disease, hunger, misery and disasters. By insisting on strangling economic growth, not only are you robbing the world of the best way to cope with climate change -- technology -- but also robbing the poor of the world the opportunity to cope with just about anything.
I haven't read the Stern report, or many of the articles criticising it yet, so I can't comment helpfully yet. But the main point of this post is just how bad the figures look for how hard it will be to keep that much carbon out of the atmophere.
Uncommon medical advice
I like stories about doctors who have gone mad, assuming no harm is done in the process:
A doctor at a family planning clinic told a patient that she needed an exorcism because there was something sinister moving around inside her stomach, a medical tribunal was told yesterday.
A doctor at a family planning clinic told a patient that she needed an exorcism because there was something sinister moving around inside her stomach, a medical tribunal was told yesterday.
Joyce Pratt, 44, allegedly told the patient, who was seeking contraceptive advice, that she might be possessed by an evil spirit and needed religious rather than medical help.
She gave the woman crosses and trinkets to ward off black magic, allegedly told her that her mother was a witch, that she and her husband were trying to kill her, and suggested that she visit a Roman Catholic priest at Westminster Cathedral in London.During the consultation at the Westside Contraceptive Clinic in Central London the doctor was said to have told the patient that she had black magic powers that could help to alleviate the problem.
I am sure Queensland Health could find a place for her in any event.On the US elections
Complicated system, this having a separate executive from the legislature.
As far as Iraq is concerned, it's hard to see how a Democrat controlled house is going to help come up any time soon with a concrete change of plan in Iraq. The Guardian helpfully points out that important Democrat figures are all over the place:
....suggestions that Democrats have the answers on Iraq appear sadly misplaced. In the first place, they lack decisive power. Mr Bush remains arbiter-in-chief of America's foreign and security policy. More to the point, they have no coherent, collective view - and are scared of being accused of betraying frontline troops.
While the two have appeared together at some social functions, their relationship has been marked by mutual disdain.
"He is an incompetent leader. In fact, he is not a leader," she said in a 2004 interview. "He's a person who has no judgment, no experience and no knowledge of the subjects that he has to decide on." Bush, for his part, has painted Pelosi has a tax-loving Democrat, although during the midterm campaign he left the mud-slinging to party operatives who depicted her in political adverts as a stereotypical San Francisco liberal.
I have not paid attention to the nature of the Republican attacks, but I see that some say Fox News spent a lot of time on her.
Interesting times ahead.
As far as Iraq is concerned, it's hard to see how a Democrat controlled house is going to help come up any time soon with a concrete change of plan in Iraq. The Guardian helpfully points out that important Democrat figures are all over the place:
....suggestions that Democrats have the answers on Iraq appear sadly misplaced. In the first place, they lack decisive power. Mr Bush remains arbiter-in-chief of America's foreign and security policy. More to the point, they have no coherent, collective view - and are scared of being accused of betraying frontline troops.
Hillary Clinton, the 2008 presidential hopeful, opposes an Iraq withdrawal timetable. John Kerry, beaten by Mr Bush in 2004, wants a firm deadline. John Murtha, who will control the House committee that appropriates cash for the Iraq war, has demanded an immediate pullout. Joe Biden, the senior Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee, is advocating a tripartite division of Iraq. And there are many other points of view. All that unifies them is criticism of Mr Bush's performance.
The paper also points out how new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has previously spoken of the President:While the two have appeared together at some social functions, their relationship has been marked by mutual disdain.
"He is an incompetent leader. In fact, he is not a leader," she said in a 2004 interview. "He's a person who has no judgment, no experience and no knowledge of the subjects that he has to decide on." Bush, for his part, has painted Pelosi has a tax-loving Democrat, although during the midterm campaign he left the mud-slinging to party operatives who depicted her in political adverts as a stereotypical San Francisco liberal.
I have not paid attention to the nature of the Republican attacks, but I see that some say Fox News spent a lot of time on her.
Interesting times ahead.
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
A realistic military option with Iran?
This article makes a very plausible argument for a type of military option for dealing with Iran if the need arises.
(My idea of using electromagnetic pulse weapons does not get a mention, but maybe someone in the Pentagon reads my blog. Or perhaps I have to type in the words "Praise Allah, here are the plans for nuclear weapon" to be sure that will happen.)
(My idea of using electromagnetic pulse weapons does not get a mention, but maybe someone in the Pentagon reads my blog. Or perhaps I have to type in the words "Praise Allah, here are the plans for nuclear weapon" to be sure that will happen.)
An interesting take on Stern report
This short article from TCS daily argues that cost of fighting global warming, as suggested in the recent Stern report, is much higher than it first appears. (Roughly $400 billion annually.) The writer suggests that if this is the sort of money involved, then maybe some global engineering solution (of the mirrors in space variety, for example) is not so out of the question after all.
Speaking of which, here's another suggestion for such a solution:
Angel and colleagues propose launching a constellation of trillions of small free-flying spacecraft a million miles above Earth into an orbit aligned with the Sun, called the L-1 orbit. The spacecraft would form a long, cylindrical cloud with a diameter about half that of Earth, and about 10 times longer.
According to Angel and colleagues, the sunshade could be deployed by a total 20 electromagnetic launchers launching a stack of 1 million flyers every 5 minutes for 10 years.
Oh. Suddenly sounds less than plausible. Do it from the moon instead would seem a much better bet!
This idea also made me wonder whether anyone has suggested nanotechnology as a possible shielding solution. I quite liked Michael Crichton's novel "Prey", about swarms of nano gnats that start eating people. Of course, that such devices will ever exist seems farfetched, but if something like them could be made on an industrial scale, and launched to live high in the atmosphere, could the swarm form a controllable high altitude dusty sunshade? Just thinking outside of the circle, folks...
Speaking of which, here's another suggestion for such a solution:
Angel and colleagues propose launching a constellation of trillions of small free-flying spacecraft a million miles above Earth into an orbit aligned with the Sun, called the L-1 orbit. The spacecraft would form a long, cylindrical cloud with a diameter about half that of Earth, and about 10 times longer.
Some 10 per cent of the sunlight passing through the 97,000 kilometre length of the cloud - pointing lengthwise between the Earth and the Sun - would be diverted away from our planet. The effect would be to uniformly reduce sunlight by about 2 per cent over the entire planet, enough to balance the heating caused by a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
But the trick is how to get them there:According to Angel and colleagues, the sunshade could be deployed by a total 20 electromagnetic launchers launching a stack of 1 million flyers every 5 minutes for 10 years.
Oh. Suddenly sounds less than plausible. Do it from the moon instead would seem a much better bet!
This idea also made me wonder whether anyone has suggested nanotechnology as a possible shielding solution. I quite liked Michael Crichton's novel "Prey", about swarms of nano gnats that start eating people. Of course, that such devices will ever exist seems farfetched, but if something like them could be made on an industrial scale, and launched to live high in the atmosphere, could the swarm form a controllable high altitude dusty sunshade? Just thinking outside of the circle, folks...
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