The melt in history

Climate change skeptics are deploying the old "this [record] Arctic melt is not so unusual when you go back in history" ploy, so Skeptical Science has a long and detailed look at studies that show this is not true. Good job.

Jet stream is on the move

 Measurements of the movement of the jet streams at mid-latitudes, in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, 1979 to 2010

Interesting paper which says the jet streams, and weather systems, have been on the move  for the last 30 years, and the predominant reason appears to be the direct radiative forcing from greenhouse gases.

Stewart on the empty chair

I am not his biggest fan, but Jon Stewart's take on the Eastwood empty chair routine is pretty much exactly what I expected: pretty funny, and insightful about the politics of it too. Here it is:

What a melt

It hasn't bottomed out yet either:

Something to note as a matter of caution, though.  Andy Revkin has taken a very careful approach on this, and reminds us that one paper found that modelling indicates that (suprisingly) intermittent positive trends in Arctic ice are still possible on 2 -20 timescales until the middle of the 21st century.   This must be remembered; as any temporary recovery in the next decade will be claimed by the climate change denialists as proof positive that AGW predictions were wrong.  (Just as they love to falsely claim that the 2011 Australian floods were inconsistent with climate change predictions.)

However, I would have to guess that this "reversal in trend" possibility is looking a bit improbable given the dramatic loss of volume in sea ice.

Modelling sea ice behaviour does seem to be a particularly complicated thing, though.

American Politics

I was rather critical of the lack of qualifications and unrealistic and over-inflated rhetoric of "hope and change" through which Obama got the Democrat nomination and the presidency. And to be honest, so much of American domestic politics is so complicated, with the way their party allegiances in Congress don't work in the same way they do here, that I'm not the most comprehensive reader there is about arcane Washington fights over budgets and legislation. 

So, with that qualification, what's my feelings about the Obama presidency from this point in time?   My general impression is that it has been, more-or-less, competent enough.  Not earth shatteringly brilliant, of course.  I don't think anyone argues that.     Quite a few mistakes and embarrassments, but all Presidents have those.  But not terrible.  Or, if you like, no where near as bad as his lack of qualifications would have indicated was possible.  The general impression is one of a pretty cautious man of reasonable character* who hasn't stuffed things up to a significant degree.  But then again, nor has he been able to take action on certain matters as he should.

My general impression is bolstered by an article in The Economist  which argues that he deserves more credit than he is being given on economic policy.   This feels about right to me.

But of course, a significant part of my feelings about Obama is derived not so much from seeing that he especially deserves credit for leadership and smarts, but from seeing how the Right in the US has run off some ideological cliffs in the last three years, and simply does not appear credible in so many ways now.

Everyone knows I think climate change is important, and really despise the way a handful of unconvinced climate scientist's opinions have been inflated by virtue of the internet into a powerful public and political influence against taking action on CO2.  This quintessentially unscientific enterprise has had its greatest effect on the Right in the US, no doubt because small government and libertarian inclinations are strongest there and these ideologies are always inclined to be hostile to government action of any kind which interfere with how businesses operate.   It's a major embarrassment for those who think the Right is usually the side which is the most pragmatic and accepts evidence as to what works and what doesn't, and is not stuck on ideologically fixated non solutions as the Left can be.

I worry now that readers may think that I put attitude to climate change as my number one priority for assessing politicians.  But, honestly, is it my fault that this does indeed seem to be the bellwether for common sense and reliability in most matters now?  I mean, even if the Tea Party was not effectively forcing Republican candidates to become overtly dismissive of global warming, I  am sure I would still be dismissive of their economic ideas which are, essentially, a triumph of ideology over practicality.

For example, have a look at this article in The Atlantic about Romney's ill formed and "impossible" tax plan.   I don't trust Krugman on absolutely every point, but I find most of what he complains about in the Republicans to be credible and biting.   His recent column on health costs, for example, or his long standing assessment that Paul Ryan has an undeserved reputation for being serious on fiscal policy. 

I don't have a problem with the proposal that the US economy needs some major tax overhaul, and that spreading the tax base is a good idea, and removing some silly deductions is badly needed.   But it seems that you do not get serious and fair plans being put by the Right anymore - in fact Krugman argues the Republicans are stuck on stupid from way back.   Instead, you get things like Herman Cain with a 999 plan that is so extreme in its effects that even the Wall Street Journal was cool about it.  And you get a fetish about returning to a gold standard (from Cain and sympathetic sounds from Ryan - who, for God's sake, is quoted as saying he finds Ayn Rand influential on the topic.)

It's hard not to conclude that the problem is simply that, while all politicians hate the idea of selling increased taxes to the public,  the part of the Right which is absolutely ideologically committed to the idea that increases in taxes are universally Evil and Bad, and decreases in taxes always and in every circumstance a Good Thing, is currently in control of the Republicans.  Along with this goes the idea that small government is always better government, and (now) that Keynesian spending is always bad.  And gold.  Going back to gold is always good.**

These are, frankly, matters where ideologiy is triumphing over pragmatism, and either ignoring evidence, or interpreting evidence with this predetermined conclusion in mind.   It is no wonder that those who hold these views are nearly always also disbelievers in climate change.

And look at how separated from reality Right wing commentary is becoming.   Large slabs of it in the US, and some of the equivalent wingnuts in Australia, thought that Clint Eastwood's performance at the Republican convention was unalloyed brilliance that was somehow all the more effective for being rambling and looking like it was being "winged" (as indeed it was.)  Ann Althouse:

AND: Here's the whole Eastwood performance. Is it really that hard to get? No, they're merely playing dumb (and humorless), even though they want the other party to be known as "the stupid party."

UPDATE: I just rewatched the performance. It was great! Hilarious... subtle... well-paced.... The haters are totally bullshitting and playing dumb (assuming they are not actually dumb). And what they are trying to do is scare other celebrities: Toe the line or we will destroy you. That crushing repression is the opposite of what the performing arts should be about.

I can handle people saying something like "it wasn't so bad, it played well enough to the crowd" (even though I personally think the fact the crowd found some of the ill considered jokes hilarious made them look pretty stupid).  What I can't get (to the point of doubting people's sanity) is the assessment that it was a brilliant bit of "jazz improvisation" or (to paraphrase someone at Catallaxy) that it was culturally important as giving Americans permission to finally be dismissive of Obama.   The crazed Obama and Gillard hating mind that wrote that knows completely about the rabid wingnut blogs in the States (he links to them frequently), and endorsed Limbaugh slut-calling of Sarah Fluke; yet he thinks the nation was waiting for permission to be crude, rude and ugly towards Obama and anyone who supports him?

As I say, the Right, in large part, has gone stupid;  I'm just sitting here waiting for it to return towards me.


*  I tend to sympathise with most Presidents of either persuasion, although I always felt very cool towards Reagan -  I just never got the "Great Communicator" tag and was not convinced that there was much in the way of natural intellect there.  I have always been persuaded by Christopher Hitchen's take on the man.  But it's arguably the most important job in the world, constantly involving complicated decisions of life and death with  regard to military and foreign affairs in particular.  I don't really see why anyone wants the responsibility and takes it on.

**  The linkage between climate change denialism and a fixation on gold is remarkable. Australia's Jonova and her husband David Evans are gold bugs from way back.

Last week's good health news noted

Chocolate reduces stroke risk for men, research claims

Yes, this is cheering, even if the effect is not huge:

Larsson writes in the latest edition of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology: "High chocolate consumption was associated with a lower risk of stroke."

Men who ate the most chocolate, a weekly average of 63 grams, had a 17% lower risk of stroke compared with men who ate none. The correlation did not seem to differ depending on different types of stroke.

Larsson corroborated her findings by conducting a meta-analysis of five other studies, containing a total of 4,260 cases of stroke across Europe and the United States. She found the risk of stroke for individuals in the highest category of chocolate consumption was 19% lower compared with non-chocolate eaters. Every increase in chocolate consumption of 50g per week, reduced the risk of stroke by about 14%, Larsson found.

Also, it's odd that this result from Sweden was not all based on dark chocolate:

  Larsson said: "Interestingly, dark chocolate has previously been associated with heart health benefits, but about 90% of the chocolate intake in Sweden, including what was consumed during our study, is milk chocolate."

Still, they recommend dark chocolate, but obviously in modest quantities.

The other good news was that it appears starving yourself for long life seems not to be worth the effort.  There's a very good article at Slate about the recent monkey study about this, but it explains a lot more about the background to the calorie restriction idea, which goes back to the 1930's.  I also didn't know this:

The history of calorie restriction research is strewn with odd results that have been left unexplained (at best) or outright ignored (at worst). When Steven Austad of the University of Texas–San Antonio tested wild-caught mice, for instance, he found no caloric-restriction-induced increase in lifespan. In another study, researchers created 42 different cross-bred mouse strains and found that in a third of the strains, caloric restriction actually seemed to shorten lifespan. And even Clive McCay, the father of caloric restriction, found weird results: In his 1935 experiment, caloric restriction worked only in the males.

In fact, caloric restriction really seemed to work best in standard laboratory mice. This may be because they are predisposed to eat a lot, gain weight, and reproduce early—and thus are more sensitive to reduced food intake. (Slate’s Daniel Engber has written about how overfed lab mice have distorted scientific research.)

Even better, the article notes this:

 Several studies have shown that excessive leanness—seen often in calorie-restricting humans—can be as risky as obesity. Taken together, these studies suggest that the optimal body-mass index is about 25, which is on the verge of being overweight

Given that I'm only about  2 or 3 kg over BMI 25, I'm somewhat encouraged.

Small brains recognize trouble...larger brains, not so much

BBC Nature - Birds hold 'funerals' for dead

Paul Ryan Is a Climate Change Denialist

More "Bugs R Us": gut, mouth and skin edition

I recently mentioned the article in The Economist which detailed the growing realisation in biology that humans (and all animals I guess) are best viewed as ecosystems, given the incredibly diverse and important role the bacteria that live in and on us play in health and illness.

Since then, there have been a few things about bacteria and health that have come to my attention:

Gut:   Four Corners had a fascinating documentary about the research indicating that at least some types of autism are related to harmful intestinal bacteria.  Unfortunately, the particular strain that they were talking about appears to be very difficult to remove permanently with antibiotics.

Although this idea appears to be catching on only slowly in the medical community, it was hard not to be impressed with the video apparently showing the difference the antibiotic treatment made to the behaviour in the young kid who had been treated for a while a decade or so ago.  (He's now 19 and still suffers autism, but had to stop the antibiotics since they just can't be taken forever.) 

I don't think they mentioned it, but I wondered whether anyone had thought about trying the icky but apparently effective idea of "fecal transplant" as a way of getting rid of the unwanted bacteria in autistic kids.  Googling the topic, I see that indeed this is an area of interest.  The Atlantic had a recent article about people wanting to do "at home" fecal implants (!)  Only with doctor's guidance, I would suggest.

Mouth:   In the Australian forum for wingnuts (and those who like to tell them they are wrong) that starts with the letter "C", I recently noted that I assumed that the differences in mouth bacteria might account (in large part) for why some people just seem to be more susceptible to cavities, despite having relatively low sugar diets and normal dental hygiene.

I had likely forgotten that I had read something about this years ago, as the topic does get a brief mention in an article in Scientific American in 2002:

All bacterial biofilms are not alike, however. Although Mutans streptococci and other species have been implicated as primary culprits in causing caries, some people who are infected with these species of bugs don¿t get cavities. Genotypically different strains of the same bugs exhibit varying levels of cariogenicity. Therefore, it¿s not just the quantity of plaque biofilm present, but the specific strain with which one is infected that is important in predicting who might get cavities.

 This is obviously an area of ongoing research, and this abstract of a 2009 Japanese paper indicates the situation is complex:

Recent analyses with ribosomal RNA-based technologies have revealed the diversity of bacterial populations within dental biofilms, and have highlighted their important contributions to oral health and disease. Dental biofilms are exceedingly complex and multispecies ecosystems, where oral bacteria interact cooperatively or competitively with other members. Bacterial interactions that influence dental biofilm communities include various different mechanisms. During the early stage of biofilm formation, it is known that planktonic bacterial cells directly attach to surfaces of the oral cavity or indirectly bind to other bacterial cells that have already colonized. Adherence through co-aggregation may be critical for the temporary retention of bacteria on dental surfaces, and may facilitate eventual bacterial colonization. It is likely that metabolic communication, genetic exchange, production of inhibitory factors (e.g., bacteriocins, hydrogen peroxide, etc.), and quorum-sensing are pivotal regulatory factors that determine the bacterial composition and/or metabolism. Since each bacterium can easily access a neighboring bacterial cell and its metabolites, genetic exchanges and metabolic communication may occur frequently in dental biofilms.

Most interestingly, while Googling this, I also stumble across the ongoing efforts of a Florida company Oragenics to prevent cavities by introducing genetically modified mouth bacteria to out compete the harmful ones:

 Our replacement therapy technology is based on the creation of a genetically altered strain of S. mutans, called SMaRT, which does not produce lactic acid. Our SMaRT strain is engineered to have a selective colonization advantage over native S. mutans strains in that SMaRT produces minute amounts of a lantibiotic that kills off the native strains but leaves the SMaRT strain unharmed. Thus SMaRT Replacement Therapy can permanently replace native lactic acid-producing strains of S. mutans in the oral cavity, thereby potentially providing lifelong protection against the primary cause of tooth decay. The SMaRT strain has been extensively and successfully tested for safety and efficacy in laboratory and animal models.

SMaRT Replacement Therapy is designed to be applied topically to the teeth by a dentist, pediatrician or primary care physician during a routine office visit. A suspension of the SMaRT strain is administered using a cotton-tipped swab during a single five-minute, pain-free treatment. Following treatment, the SMaRT strain should displace the native, decay-causing S. mutans strains over a six to twelve month period and permanently occupy the niche on the tooth surfaces normally occupied by native S. mutans.

Their website goes on to explain that trials have been done on animals (presumably successfully) but FDA requirements for human trials have been tricky:

 After we submitted additional information, the FDA issued a clinical hold letter in June 2007 for the proposed trial with the attenuated strain, citing the need for a plan with respect to serious adverse effects; a plan for the eradication of the attenuated strain in trial subjects’ offspring; and a required pregnancy test for female partners of subjects. We submitted additional protocols in response to the FDA’s concerns. In August 2007, the FDA issued a clinical hold letter with required revisions to the protocol for offspring of subjects. We submitted a response to the clinical hold letter in September 2007, and the FDA removed the clinical hold for our Phase 1 trial in the attenuated strain in October 2007.

We are in the process of commencing a second Phase 1 clinical trial of an attenuated version of our SMaRT Replacement Therapy, which will examine the safety and genetic stability of the SMaRT strain during administration to ten healthy adult male subjects over a two-week period. As a precautionary measure, this trial will use an attenuated version of the SMaRT strain that is dependent on D-alanine, which is a specific amino acid not normally found in the human diet. D-Alanine will be administered though a mouthwash provided to the patient group, and must be administered daily or the attenuated strain will perish in the oral cavity. We expect the second Phase 1 clinical trial of the attenuated strain, including a three-month follow-up examination of subjects, to be concluded in 2011. If the second Phase 1 trial of the attenuated strain is successful and if the FDA lifts the clinical hold on the IND for the non-attenuated version of the SMaRT strain, we anticipate that we would conduct a third Phase 1 trial using the non-attenuated SMaRT strain instead of the attenuated version.

All rather complicated, but it sounds as if we might be hearing soon about whether it works in humans, or not.

Skin:  There was also news this week that the adult red faced skin condition rosacea may be caused by the bacteria that live in the face mites that quietly live in the pores of many faces.   (My January 2011 post which featured a photo of them and had the catchy title "The bugs, they're all over me!" remains one of the more commonly Googled way that people arrive at this blog.) 

This would seem to provide a good explanation as to why rosacea usually responds to antibiotics, as  it seems no one had previously quite understood why.  It was known that people with rosacea usually had higher numbers of face mites than other people, and sometimes success has been had with trying to kill the mites directly.

The last bizarre part of this biological story is that face mites apparently don't have an anus (see, I avoided trying to work out the plural for "anus") so the gut bacteria in them don't get out until the mite dies.  But when they do, they cause an immune reaction that causes inflammation and redness.


Truly, it seems that bacteria rule.

And finally:   you know what my mind always wanders to when reading about these topics?   George Lucas and his bizarre sounding introduction of "midi-chlorians" as being behind The Force:

Without the midi-chlorians, life could not exist, and we would have no knowledge of the Force. They continually speak to us, telling us the will of the Force. When you learn to quiet your mind, you'll hear them speaking to you."

―Qui-Gon Jinn, to Anakin Skywalker

Obviously (and confirmed by Lucas) based on mitochondria, this seemed a really weird way to give a materialistic explanation for The Force.   But, the more I read about the importance of bacteria, the more I worry that Lucas might be the accidental Einstein of biology.

Selfishness re-considered

Physicists suggest selfishness can pay 

Frank Tipler thinks that games theory explains why selfishness doesn't pay, and that therefore the future  Omega Point that is God naturally doesn't like it.

I didn't realise that so much thought continues to go into games theory, but this article notes how there has been recent controversy over whether previous conclusions about how to best play the prisoner's dilemma  still hold up. 

This is hard to summarise, but it's interesting to note that Freeman Dyson is one of the guys putting thought into this.  I think the conclusion is that it still seems safe to assume, in an evolutionary context, that co-operation is best.

Lucky for Frank, then...

How did that slip through?

Activation of old carbon by erosion of coastal and subsea permafrost in Arctic Siberia : Nature : Nature Publishing Group

I noticed this article via a mention on The Australian's website this morning.  Yes, that's right, The Australian.  What's going on?  The regular science editor on holiday?  

Anyhow, while it is basically an estimate of how much carbon (and CO2) could be coming from defrosting Siberian permafrost, the figures are quite large sounding:

Thawing of Arctic permafrost could release significant amounts of carbon into the atmosphere in this century³. Ancient Ice Complex deposits outcropping along the ~7,000-kilometre-long coastline of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS)^{4, 5}, and associated shallow subsea permafrost^{6, 7}, are two large pools of permafrost carbon⁸, yet their vulnerabilities towards thawing and decomposition are largely unknown^{9, 10, 11}. Recent Arctic warming is stronger than has been predicted by several degrees, and is particularly pronounced over the coastal ESAS region^{12, 13}. There is thus a pressing need to improve our understanding of the links between permafrost carbon and climate in this relatively inaccessible region. Here we show that extensive release of carbon from these Ice Complex deposits dominates (57 ± 2 per cent) the sedimentary carbon budget of the ESAS, the world’s largest continental shelf, overwhelming the marine and topsoil terrestrial components. Inverse modelling of the dual-carbon isotope composition of organic carbon accumulating in ESAS surface sediments, using Monte Carlo simulations to account for uncertainties, suggests that 44 ± 10 teragrams of old carbon is activated annually from Ice Complex permafrost, an order of magnitude more than has been suggested by previous studies¹⁴. We estimate that about two-thirds (66 ± 16 per cent) of this old carbon escapes to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, with the remainder being re-buried in shelf sediments.

For those who say "why does a thawing Arctic ice cap matter?", there's part of your answer.

Sick

Yes, no doubt about it, I have finally succumbed to (what I assume is) this season's flu.

At least an illness like this makes one better appreciate how good "normal" feels. I used to feel that way about hangovers too, but as they get worse as you get older, it does seem a waste of the next day for something that can be avoided.

Some random observations:

*  I like the way you can customize Google news now;

* Who can really admire Apple when they seek to enforce some ridiculous patents.

* I hate websites that scroll sideways. The Global Mail will fail for this reason alone.

Goodnight...

Potty mouth Luther

Horrible Histories recently featured a sketch about Luther and his toilet issues, noting (amongst other things) that he used to write to his friends describing recent bowel movements.

Although I knew that he had spent a lot of time sitting on the toilet, I wasn't quite aware of how much he referred to poop and scatological matters generally in his writings and sermons, so I went looking for more information.

And here's what I found:  a pretty interesting research paper from 2008 that looks at the question of why Luther engaged in scatological expressions so much.   This has, apparently been the subject of much academic attention over the years, and the paper summarises the various schools of thought, before concluding that, in the context of German culture at the time, throwing literary "shit" at his enemies gave him the desirable air of virile masculinity.

It would seem that Germans have always had a scatological bent - I'm sure someone has had a go at explaining that, but I'll go looking for that another day.   This part notes the way poop was used in disputes at the time:

 Ain't history grand?

(As an aside, this description of Luther's eyes is of interest:

Seems a good lead for a science fiction story based on his being a robot; but I guess all of the sitting on the toilet suggests a design fault.)

Reading about this reminds me that the other great nation with an unusual degree of interest in poo is Japan.  I'm sure there must be lots of material on the net about this, but here's  a short-ish but useful essay on the topic.

I may well have noted this unusual connection before:  why do two nations so far apart have this in common?   Like the esoteric stories of Jesus travelling to India (or Japan), was there a prophet of digestive  health who travelled from Germany to Japan in the first millennium AD, proselytising the importance of having well formed poo, but who remains mysteriously unrecorded in history?

Just a thought for someone's future research endeavour.

Calling the aliens

Backreaction: How to beat a cosmic speeding ticket

Well, this is very hard to follow in the details for a non physicist, but Sabine Hossenfelder has a go at explaining her new paper looking at (what I take to be) speculative physics that may allow faster than light communication.

I want to note it here just in case she's right.

Possum returns

The possum under the balcony has been away for quite a while, but she's started turning up again - with youngster in tow.    (The photo could be clearer, but you get the idea.)

No big surprise

BBC News - Young cannabis smokers run risk of lower IQ, report claims

The findings come from a study of around 1,000 people in New Zealand.
An international team found those who started using cannabis below the age of 18 - while their brains were still developing - suffered a drop in IQ.

A UK expert said the research might explain why people who use the drug often seem to under-achieve.
For more than 20 years researchers have followed the lives of a group of people from Dunedin in New Zealand.

They assessed them as children - before any of them had started using cannabis - and then re-interviewed them repeatedly, up to the age of 38.

Having taken into account other factors such as alcohol or tobacco dependency or other drug use, as well the number of years spent in education, they found that those who persistently used cannabis - smoking it at least four times a week year after year through their teens, 20s and, in some cases, their 30s - suffered a decline in their IQ.

Natural variability is not always your friend

Given that we now have now officially got an extraordinarily low Arctic ice extent (with a couple of more week's melt to come), the climate change "skeptics" are casting around for reasons as to why it doesn't mean all that much.

One of the more credible attempts at this appears to come from Judith Curry, who points us to a recent paper arguing that the enhanced warming in the Arctic from 1965 to 2000 was mainly due to a natural variability:

There seems to be a large multidecadal variability in the complex ocean–atmosphere system that can superimpose itself atop the global warming signal. It seems to be identifiable with a few large-scale patterns in the temperature fields; when phases of the pressure modes match up one with another they can enhance the rate of warming, especially on the large, wintertime continents. It is not yet known whether cooling periods can happen as well in this scheme. Nor do we know exactly the origin of the multidecadal long-term variability that has been identified. It could be related to anthropogenic causes, or it could just be part of the natural system’s internal variability.

But - as the summary notes before this conclusion:

What causes the two primary decadal empirical pressure patterns to ramp up their amplitudes and line up their phases in such a way as to encourage lots of warm air polewards onto the big continents during the study period and not at other times? Wallace et al. do not address this issue but list several contenders.

One possibility is that the anthropogenic factors are actually inducing this change in circulation, perhaps even through stratospheric connections as mentioned earlier. They seem to lean toward unforced natural variability at the decadal scales.

So:   even if you accept that the radiative forcing alone is not doing this (and I would presume that the fact that the IPCC did not predict an Arctic ice melt this fast indicates this may be right)  it remains quite possible that anthropogenic changes to circulation patterns are altering what appears to be natural variability to make it worse.

Besides which, even if there are no anthropogenic reasons affecting the circulation change, doesn't the whole exercise mean that even modest AGW is a problem when it gets a multi-decade boost from natural variability?

I mean, you see this failed excuse making re solar influences too:  sure, a quieter sun could make parts of the Northern Hemisphere cooler for a couple of decades, and that could be partially offset by AGW, but none of that helps when the sun goes back to normal.   What could be a mere bit of breathing space for just one area of the world would be no reason to not be working to dramatically reduce CO2 for when a short term cooling effect wears off.

Also - the particular problem with loss of Arctic sea ice - even if it is largely happening at the moment due to natural variability - is the feedback potential that it gives to AGW.   This might be a particularly unlucky coincidence that gives the AGW effects on the polar region a boost up to a level that it's not going to drop back from anytime soon. 

The "do-nothing" climate skeptics are interested in the short term only.  They do not take seriously the long term interests of the residents of the planet.

UPDATE:   In any case, here's a 2012 paper which appears to contradict the claim that natural variability has had much role to play in the recent Arctic ice loss.

Given the lack of evidence of substantial polar ice loss in other warm Earth periods, it seems to me to not make much sense that natural variability (uninfluenced by humans) is the substantial cause.

Tax in the US

Paul Ryan tax cuts: American fiscal conservatives who ignore the debt are gambling. - Slate Magazine

This article looks at the current Republican obsession with reducing taxes.   I can certainly understand how widening the tax base would make sense, as would reforming the tax system to reduce deductions; but the rush to first of all move in and reduce taxes in a way that the rich simply don't need at this point in time makes me think the party is simply stuck in a stupid ideological mode.  As it says:

In most countries, to be “fiscally conservative” means to worry a great deal about the budget deficit and debt levels—and to push these issues to the top of the policy agenda. In many eurozone countries today, “fiscal conservatives” are a powerful group, insisting on the need to boost government revenue while bringing spending under control. In Great Britain, too, leading Conservatives have recently proved willing to raise taxes and attempted to limit future spending.

The United States is very different in this respect. Leading politicians who choose to call themselves “fiscal conservatives”— such as Paul Ryan, now the Republican Party’s presumptive vice-presidential —care more about cutting taxes, regardless of the effect on the federal deficit and total outstanding debt. Why do U.S. fiscal conservatives care so little about government debt, relative to their counterparts in other countries?

 The article goes on to talk about the history of the idea, and ends on this note:

Ryan and other Republicans undoubtedly want to cut the size of the federal government, and they have articulated plans to do this over several decades. But, in the near term, what they promise is primarily tax cuts: Their entire practical program is frontloaded in that direction. The calculation is that this will prove politically popular (probably true) while making it easier to implement spending cuts down the road (less obvious). The vulnerability caused by higher public debt over the next few decades is simply ignored.

For example, Ryan supported George W. Bush’s spending spree. He also supports maintaining defense spending at or near its current level—resisting the cuts that were put in place under the Budget Control Act of 2011.

The assumption here—unstated and highly questionable—is that the U.S. will be able to sell an unlimited amount of government debt at low interest rates for the foreseeable future. There is no other country in the world where fiscal conservatives would want to be associated with such a high-stakes gamble.

The battle of the cutes

Trouble at Kangaroo Island - Nature - Environment - The Independent

I seem to have missed this, if it was in the Australian media:  

Kangaroo Island, south of Adelaide, is one of Australia's most popular tourism destinations, thanks to its profusion of native wildlife, which includes koalas, kangaroos and the world's smallest penguin species.

But lately there have been dark goings-on in the animal kingdom: the New Zealand fur seals have been devouring the fairy penguins.

Penguin numbers have dropped by half on the island, according to some locals, who want the seals to be sterilised, relocated or even culled. Now they have come up with a new suggestion: shoot them with beanbag rounds – a method more commonly used to control riots – if they approach penguin colonies.

Personal taste

Not all of these David Mitchell soapbox rants are so good, and as with nearly every single modern comedian except for Jerry Seinfeld, he's starting to swear a bit too much, but I quite liked this one:

                
                   
                   
                   
Some of the comments following this at The Guardian are pretty funny too.   Bacon is always a good subject for humour.

Speaking of swearing comedians, I saw Tony Martin's second book of autobiographical stories (A Nest of Occasionals) going for $5 in some remainder-ish bookshop, and have finished reading it.  He really is a talented and funny writer, even though he swears too much.  I particularly liked the last story, about a trip back to New Zealand to learn about his grandparents.   (Young Tony had a quite unsettled, and unsettling, childhood.  In fact, one gets the impression from an earlier chapter - about all of the medical probes he has had over the years -  that he may still suffer from the lingering stress of his childhood.)

I see from Martin's fairly extensive Wikipedia entry that he's now divorced.  His last TV venture was also not so good.  As far as I know his falling out with Mick Molloy has not yet ended in a Jerry Lewis/Dean Martin style televised reconciliation.   Maybe he needs a hug.

The universe and all that

There was a university press release that got a lot of publicity recently, about "quantum graphity" - rather a bad name by whoever came up with it, I thought.

Anyhow, ars technica has a cynical look at the PR exercise, and as I expected, there is probably less to this than it seems.

Of more interest, I think, is this story about measurements indicating that spacetime is pretty 'smooth':

Some theories of quantum gravity say that the universe is not smooth but foamy—made of fundamental units called Planck lengths that are less than a trillionth of a trillionth the diameter of a hydrogen atom. Planck lengths are so small that there's no way to detect them, except via photons like those that make up gamma-ray bursts. Here's why.

The wavelengths of these photons are some of the shortest distances known to science—so short they should interact with the even smaller Planck length. And if they interact, the photons should be dispersed—scattered—on their trek through Planck length–pixilated spacetime.

 In particular, they should disperse in different ways if their wavelengths differ, just as a ping pong ball and a softball might take alternate paths down a gravely hillside.

 You wouldn't notice the scattering over short distances, but across billions of light years, the Planck lengths should disperse the light. And three photons from the same gamma-ray burst should not have crashed through the Fermi telescope at the same moment.

 But they did, and that calls into question just how foamy spacetime really is. "We have shown that the universe is smooth across the Planck mass," Nemiroff said. "That means that there's no choppiness that's detectible. It's a really cool discovery. We're very excited."