Wikio Blogs - sciences

[Sciences] Shorter Ace Of Spades HQ (Sadly, No!)

Sadly, No! — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 05:55:36 GMT

Global Warming Hoax is Slowly Coming Apart —Gabriel Malor A person whose credentials I didn’t check 1 has written an opinion column with scientific claims that I can’t understand 2 that totally refutes global warming, like, for real this time. Cool Beans — I Just Found Out I’m Six Foot Tall! —Ace Ha ha! OMG, nice work, Malor! This blockbuster opinion column is true, and so-called “scientists” are fakers who do not understand how science works (der, it must be objective and rely on data ). ‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard . We are aware of all Internet traditions .™ 1 David Evans is a computer programmer who worked as a consultant for the Australian Greenhouse Office. 2 Cf . The Australian has a history of publishing erratic and mutually irreconcilable anti-global-warming editorials.

The Devil's Kitchen : Say can you see... ...
Brutally Honest : "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?" ...

blogs : Sadly, No!,NC Media Watch,Wheat & Weeds,Joust The Facts,Brutally Honest...
(16 posts, last update: 18/07/2008 07:55)

[Sciences] Greenwash guerillas (Greenpeace - Making Waves)

Greenpeace - Making Waves — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:39:29 GMT

Last time I checked coal was definitely still, in the words of top climate scientist James Henson, "the single greatest threat facing our planet." So something was most definitely amiss when UK energy company E.ON, who plan to build the first coal fired power plant in the UK in over 30 years, took it upon themselves to sponsor a climate change conference. Yes, I'm serious. Luckily there are plenty of others also find something very wrong with the equation. A load of Greenwash Guerillas went to tell E.ON just where to go today at the Guardian Climate Change Summit in Central London. The clean up campaign comes just two weeks before a week long Camp for Climate Action will be held on the Kingsnorth site, where the proposed new coal plant is planned. Here's more from one of the Guerilla's posted to the Greenpeace UK site. Continue reading Greenwash guerillas...

Greenpeace UK blogs : Day out with the Greenwash Guerillas ...
Coventry Green Voice : Climate Camp, Kingsnorth -- 3rd to 11th August ...

blogs : Coventry Green Voice,Greenpeace - Making Waves,Greenpeace UK blogs...
(3 posts, last update: 16/07/2008 23:39)

[Sciences] Shock report from the BBC: New exotic fruit to hit UK shops (Catching The Rain)

Catching The Rain — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 19:28:22 GMT

The BBC is reporting that a New exotic fruit [is] to hit UK shops. New? What’s new about the baobab? Africa’s ‘upside down tree’. Well it’s certainly not a new species. It’s certainly not a new use. What appears to define this as ‘new’ is that the EU has [...]

BBC News : This new fruit has three times more vitamin C than oranges ...
Techotic : The baobab, a healthy African fruit to hit UK supermarkets ...

blogs : BBC News,Catching The Rain,Techotic...
(4 posts, last update: 15/07/2008 21:28)

[Sciences] Could Your Windows Power Your House? (Raising Kaine - Front Page)

Raising Kaine - Front Page — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 20:00:00 GMT

Could your windows some day power your house with clean, free solar energy? It sounds like science fiction, but according to this new development by MIT , it actually could be coming very soon: A new type of solar panel that allows light to pass through it like a pane of glass has been invented by scientists who said that it is 10 times more powerful than conventional methods of producing energy from sunlight. The discovery raises the prospect of using ordinary domestic windows to generate electricity with minimum structural alterations , although scientists have not yet worked out how much it would cost to convert a domestic home to a solar-powered generator. [...] Scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston said that the "solar concentrator" is made from a film of organic molecules that can be coated on to glass window panes or other surfaces exposed to sunlight . This allows light to pass straight through the window even though it is being used to generate power. It also means that the expensive solar cells need only be placed around the edges of the collecting area, so that there is little need to track the movements of the Sun for generating maximum power, as well as reducing overall costs. Now, imagine a city filled with high rises covered in power-generating windows? Imagine buildings that require no electricity from the grid, even buildings that produce a surplus of power that can be fed BACK to the grid? Imagine cities that are completely self sufficient in energy and emit no greenhouse gases? Now, imagine how much quicker all this could happen if the government stopped standing in the way and aggressively promoted technologies like these, or at least set a price on carbon (either directly or indirectly) and then let the market work its magic? Finally, imagine if we'd stop wasting our time talking about Stupid Stuff That Won't Accomplish Anything ® like oil drilling off our coasts (or even dumber ideas like tapping the Strategic Petroleum reserve or a "gas tax holiday") and started spending our time productively on real solutions to our energy and environmental problems? Sure, Dominion might not be happy, 'tis a pity. But aside from poor old Dominion, wouldn't you enjoy having your house being self-sufficient and not getting an electric bill every month? Hmmmm.

The Independent : New windows double as solar panels ...
The Zen Of Steve : New windows double as solar panels ...

blogs : The Zen Of Steve,Raising Kaine - Front Page,Crooks and Liars,Left Turn with Cecily Friday,The Independent...
(7 posts, last update: 11/07/2008 22:00)

[Sciences] Clean Air Causes Global Warming, Global Warming Causes Smog (NewsBusters)

NewsBusters — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 05:15:55 GMT

In today's "People Can Prove Whatever They Want If They Really Try Hard Enough" moment, Swiss scientists claimed early this week that efforts to clean the air over Europe the past three decades are responsible for at least half of that continent's 1°C rise in temperatures since 1980. In an interesting chicken and the egg conundrum, scientists in America claimed Thursday that global warming causes smog. So, cleaning the air causes global warming -- which ends up leading to higher levels of smog? Let's start with the Swiss study reported by NewScientist Wednesday (emphasis added, photo courtesy Reuters): GOODBYE air pollution and smoky chimneys, hello brighter days. That's been the trend in Europe for the past three decades - but unfortunately cleaning up the skies has allowed more of the sun's rays to pierce the atmosphere, contributing to at least half the warming that has occurred . Since 1980, average air temperatures in Europe have risen 1 °C: much more than expected from greenhouse-gas warming alone. Christian Ruckstuhl of the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Switzerland and colleagues took aerosol concentrations from six locations in northern Europe, measured between 1986 and 2005, and compared them with solar-radiation measurements over the same period. Aerosol concentrations dropped by up to 60 per cent over the 29-year period, while solar radiation rose by around 1 watt per square metre ( Geophysical Research Letters , DOI: 10.1029/2008GL034228 ). " The decrease in aerosols probably accounts for at least half of the warming over Europe in the last 30 years ," says Rolf Philipona, a co-author of the study at MeteoSwiss, Switzerland's national weather service. See? That's what you get for trying to clean the air! However, readers shouldn't be too concerned, for the following report from Reuters Friday makes it clear that global warming will increase smog (emphasis added): U.S. environmental regulators quietly published a draft study on Thursday that linked global warming to higher levels of smog that could harm human health , a report green groups said stood in contrast to the Bush Administration's slow movement on climate change. The draft report published by the Environmental Protection Agency in the Federal Register said, " Climate change has the potential to produce significant increases in near-surface (ozone) concentrations in many areas of the U.S ." It said parts of the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast and lower Midwest show some increases in ozone in study simulations, and the seasons in which ozone is a problem could last longer as a result of higher temperatures . Confused? Well, this should add to that condition, for in 1987, the developed nations of the world entered into a treaty called the Montreal Protocol. This was designed to reduce and eventually eliminate the production and release of a number of substances thought at the time to be depleting ozone. Wouldn't it be fascinating if such efforts lead to cleaner air around the world which ended up warming the planet, and that additional warmth is now breaking down the very ozone we thought we could save? Even more hysterical was the August 2007 United Nations findin g that "the biggest emissions-cutting projects under the Kyoto Protocol on global warming have directly contributed to an increase in the production of gases that destroy the ozone layer ." Lest we not forget the September 2007 study that debunked the consensus concerning exactly " how ozone holes are formed and how that relates to climate change ." In the end, doesn't all this simply prove that it's not nice to fool Mother Nature ?

Driive : Improved air quality contributing to global warming? ...
Stop the ACLU : Which is it? Global warming caused by more smog or by less smog? ...

blogs : Stop the ACLU,The Sundries Shack,American Pundit,PrairiePundit,Thaindian News...
(18 posts, last update: 13/07/2008 07:15)

[Sciences] Effects of Bovine 'Burps' on Global Warming Covered With Straight Face (NewsBusters)

NewsBusters — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 13:58:07 GMT

It looks just like the type of story that would appear in The Onion but the funniest thing about this Reuters story about the effects of cow "burps" on global warming is that it was covered with a completely straight face. According to this story, methane released by cow "burps," not humans, might be the culprit in causing the rise in greenhouse gases. A scientific study on this phenomenom is being undertaken via cow "burp" collection: Argentine scientists are taking a novel approach to studying global warming -- strapping plastic tanks to the backs of cows to collect their burps. Researchers say the slow digestive system of cows makes them a producer of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that gets far less public attention than carbon dioxide in efforts to fight global warming. Scientists around the world are studying the amount of methane in cow burps and Argentine researchers say they have come up with a unique way. Attaching a red plastic tank to a cow's back and connecting it through a tube to the animal's stomach, scientists say they can trap bovine burps and analyze them. "When we got the first results, we were surprised. Thirty percent of Argentina's (total greenhouse) emissions could be generated by cows," said Guillermo Berra, a researcher at the National Institute of Agricultural Technology. Uh-oh! Don't those cows know they are in violation of EPA standards? Perhaps special filters need to be attached to the posteriors of all cows to prevent their "burps" from adding to the greenhouse effect in the atmosphere. The story continues on the dire threat of cow "burps" to the environment in all seriousness: Berra said the researchers "never thought" a cow weighing 550 kg (1,210 lb) could produce 800 to 1,000 liters (28 to 35 cubic feet) of emissions each day. At least 10 cows are being studied, Berra said, including some in a corral whose burps are collected in yellow balloons hanging from the roof. Greenhouse gases are widely blamed for causing global warming. Methane, researchers say, is 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide in trapping heat in the atmosphere and can be found in animal waste, landfills, coal mines and leaking natural gas pipes. Quick! Someone notify Al Gore about the inconvenient truth that "burping" cows, not humans, are the real culprits in global warming. Fortunately, the article shows a way that our planet could be saved from cow "burp" pollution: Scientists are working to develop new diets for cows that could make it easier for them to digest food, moving them away from grains to plants like alfalfa and clover. The Reuters straight face on the subject of the polluting effect of cow "burps" is also maintained in their video on this topic. The only humorous hint offered by the Reuters reporter is her mention that this cow "burp" problem is a "stinky situation." Although Reuters was careful not to be too blunt in their descriptions, the U.K. Telegraph did not shy away from being a bit less delicate in their headline for the same story : "Cow farts collected in plastic tank for global warming study."

The Telegraph : Cow farts collected in plastic tank for global warming study ...
Neatorama : Collecting Cow Farts ...

blogs : ScienceNewsBlog.com,Alertnet,Snooze Button Dreams,Patrick Joubert Conlon,Nothing To Do With Arbroath...
(24 posts, last update: 11/07/2008 15:58)

[Sciences] Global Warming Hacks Collect Cow Farts (Moonbattery)

Moonbattery — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:10:00 GMT

There is one positive aspect to the global warming farce: it continually provides comic relief. In Argentina, scientists paid to prop up the hoax rather than conduct meaningful investigations are now strapping plastic tanks to the backs of cows to...

Daily Mail : Reducing cow burping 'is key to tackling climate change' ...
Badger Blog Alliance : Sure. Blame the cows. ...

blogs : ENN: Top Stories,Alertnet,Daily Mail,YID With LID,Prophecy Fellowship Forums...
(8 posts, last update: 10/07/2008 02:10)

[Sciences] Bunch of morons get together to pretend they can control 6 billion+ people (Woking Libertarian)

Woking Libertarian — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:53:00 GMT

Brussels Broadcasting Corporation World leaders say they will aim to set a global target of cutting carbon emissions by at least 50% by 2050 in an effort to tackle global warming. It strengthens last year's G8 pledge to "seriously consider" the cuts. The world is run by clowns. How this pathetic bunch of fevered egos think they have any real say in the matter, I don't know. I take it they mean human emissions (just a few % compared to natural ones). With the population rising and more of the developing world becoming devoloped, they have around nil chance of cuting co2 "emissions" at all, never mind by 50%. What might save these dingbats, is some people think the world will run out of oil and gas by then. That might help them to their target. Not really in their control though and not really going to make much difference in the grand scheme of things anyway. With the planet still at record levels of co2, you would think they would be trying to find ways to increase it. Especially as co2 is vital for all life to survive and we are due another ice age soonish too.

BBC News : G8 agrees tough action on climate ...
The Brooks Blog : The G8 aims to halve greenhouse gas emissions ...

blogs : OTB News,News Scotsman,Green Bloggers Digest,People Daily,Democratic Underground...
(94 posts, last update: 08/07/2008 12:53)

[Sciences] Solving the food crisis? (Greenpeace - Making Waves)

Greenpeace - Making Waves — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 15:18:14 GMT

If you look at the G8 agenda, most of it is about food. There is a working lunch, a working dinner, another working lunch. And then there is the photo call. And then - that's it. How appropriate then, that they have been talking about the global food crisis while munching away at their Japanese specialities. Sadly, what they have been saying has not made much sense. Bush, Berlusconi and others have been pushing for genetically engineered food as the solution to the food crisis. They have all pretended the liberalizing trade will lower food prices, which it will not. All it will do is drive poor farmers, especially in the developing world off their land. There has been some talk about how unsustainable biofuels are part of the problem - but no decision to, say, stop clearing land for biofuels. To add insult to injury, there is a lot of really overpackaged food all over the media centre. Another way to solve the food crisis? One overpackaged water melon piece at a time? These summits do sure make your head spin! You keep calm, though, and find out here why biodiversity and ecological farming is the real solution to the food crisis.

BBC News : Food inflation blamed on biofuels ...
BBC News : US and EU urged to cut biofuels ...

blogs : Focalplane Blog,BBC News,The Greenpeace weblog,Greenpeace - Making Waves,The Coffee House...
(9 posts, last update: 08/07/2008 17:18)

[Sciences] Indecent Earth? (Another Green World)

Another Green World — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 22:36:17 GMT

showing humanity in the form of a man indecently exposing himself to a pristine universe. Yes I have been judging a cartoon competition again.

The Independent : No words necessary: The cartoonists tackle climate change ...
poldraw : And the Ken Sprague “Earthworks 2008″ winner is… ...

blogs : Another Green World,The Independent,One for the road...,poldraw,Grains of Sand...
(5 posts, last update: 05/07/2008 00:36)

[Sciences] Green Lifeline (Monbiot.com)

Monbiot.com — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 07:09:12 GMT

A radical new idea could save the world’s ecosystems. But what will it do to the economy?

Transition Culture : The Art of Wishful Thinking or Why The World Cup Finals Won’t Get Us Out of This ...
Grains of Sand : Kyoto2 ...

blogs : The Guardian,Grains of Sand,Transition Culture,Monbiot.com...
(4 posts, last update: 03/07/2008 09:09)

[Sciences] Ray of Light on Global Warming Opinion- Or Is It? (Skipper)

Skipper — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 10:06:00 GMT

I was dismayed a week or so back to see an Ipsos Mori poll which showed the majority of British people did not think global warming was the result of human activity. Like so many liberals I constantly find it hard to believe others do not see the world as I do but a recent poll suggests a more hopeful diagnosis: 52% favour the government tackling environmenatal problems while 44% thought the priority should be economic problems. This suggests the message that global warming is the most acute problem facing the world has finally penetrated and that more selfish concerns have been seen to be secondary. Well, it would be nice to conclude that but other parts of the poll suggest opinion is confused and contradictory. While 65% support the introduction of green taxes but only 30% think they should be introduced now, irrespective of the economy. This suggests many people are paying lip service to such necessary measures but withdrawing support when it seems they might actually be implemented. Similarily, 19% say they would buy and 'environmentally expensive alternative' but 58% say they would go for a 'cheaper alternative'. So we are not that far from being back to the gloomy position from which we started. Maybe the message about global warming has reached the mainstream but there is no evidence yet to suggest that the full implications of what is needed to counter cardon emissions has either been understood by most people or accepted.

The Appalling Strangeness : The Environment and The Voters ...
The Green Room : *Climate more urgent than economy, say voters ...

blogs : The Green Room,Skipper,The Appalling Strangeness,The Cedar Lounge Revolution,The Coffee House...
(6 posts, last update: 03/07/2008 12:06)

[Sciences] Marks (Crooked Timber)

Crooked Timber — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:56:24 GMT

The eternal trench warfare between teachers and students over exams and other forms of assessment has long been a popular topic here at CT (unsurprisingly, viewed mostly from the teacher’s side of the barbed wire). Having been on both sides at different times, I’m an observer of the process these days, since my research fellowship doesn’t [...]

Philosophy, et cetera : Philosophers' Carnival #72 ...
The Space of Reasons : The 72nd Philosopher's Carnival ...

blogs : Philosophy, et cetera,The Space of Reasons,Crooked Timber,Brood Philosophy...
(4 posts, last update: 02/07/2008 22:56)

[Sciences] Whither the Elves? (RT)

RT — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 06:01:54 GMT

According to a somewhat startling report in The Independent today, “for the first time in human history, ice is on course to disappear entirely from the North Pole this year.” Of course this has nothing whatsoever to do with anthropogenic global warming. Nope, nothing to see here, move along… Perhaps Kate has a picture of a badly situated temperature gauge or some fabulous graph illustrating how small a fraction of a million is, or… look, over there — a shiny rock!

Think Progress : ThinkFast: June 27, 2008 ...
Daily Kos : And Ice... Water? ...

blogs : Self-Portrait as,World Prout Assembly,World Hum,THE STEEL DEAL,all-encompassingly...
(40 posts, last update: 29/06/2008 08:01)

[Sciences] CCTV cameras 'taught to listen' (The anger of a Quiet Man)

The anger of a Quiet Man — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 09:11:15 GMT

They really are pushing their luck in trying to get people to accept being spied upon . CCTV cameras which use artificial intelligence software are being developed to "hear" sounds like windows smashing, researchers have revealed. University of Portsmouth scientists are working on adapting the software so it can also react to crowd noise. Crimes would be captured on camera faster and response times improved.The news comes after the BBC learned councils in southern England routinely used powers brought in to fight terrorism and crime to spy on people.Figures obtained by BBC South showed the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) was used more than 750 times by the councils in 2007/08. So they are also training them to recognise crowd noise so that when the inevitable revolution starts over their heavy handed authoritarianism they can get a good headstart. Every day I think I've heard the worst from these numpties in power and every day they come up with more and more ways to surprise me. The incredible thing is that somehow or other they have managed to con enough people into thinking that it's OK to be spied upon! The sooner this lot goes the better, not that I have much confidence in who will replace them.

BBC News : CCTV cameras 'taught to listen' ...
Nermal's Life : Civil liberties in the UK ...

blogs : The anger of a Quiet Man,BBC News,Nermal's Life...
(3 posts, last update: 26/06/2008 11:11)