Dave S.

HT to Phil Johnson for giving me the link. As I’ve been saying, Global Warming isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Check this out… Warming Revives Flora and Fauna in Greenland By SARAH LYALL October 28, 2007 The New York Times NARSARSUAQ, Greenland — A strange thing is happening at the edge of Poul Bjerge’s forest, a place so minute and unexpected that it brings to mind the teeny plot of land Woody Allen’s father carries around in the film “Love and Death.” Its four oldest trees — in fact, the four oldest pine trees in Greenland, named Rosenvinge’s trees after the Dutch botanist who planted them in a mad experiment in 1893 — are waking up. After lapsing into stately, Read More ›

This is just too funny to pass up. As a preemptive strike against any commenters who feel a need to say “Aha! ID is all about religion” put a sock in it. I filed this under “Humor”. HT to Jon Wells for giving me the link to this article. Atheism: An Intellectual Revolt or Pelvic Rebellion? By Doug Giles Saturday, October 27, 2007 Atheists would love for everyone to believe that their motive for not believing is an intellectual one. Yes, the atheists ardently suppose that they are wise and the Christians, well, we’re the buckle-shoed buttheads. Yes, darling, the atheists would love all of us to suppose that they cannot believe because they are so astute and rational, and Read More ›

In the ISCID Brainstorms forum Emeritus Professor of Biology John A. Davison challenged my assertion that atmospheric CO2 increases are a good thing for plant growth. He said while it might apply to trees it doesn’t apply to grasses such as rice which don’t yield more grain in an elevated CO2 environment. He then went on to say that only in the laboratory can benefits be observed from elevated CO2 where other potentially limiting factors (sunlight, nutrients, water) aren’t an issue. Sorry John, but that’s just wrong on all counts. Rice grain yields increased 60% in outdoor field tests with elevated CO2. Yield peaked at 28C and then declined 10% for each additional degree. Even the global warming hysterics readily Read More ›

The long and the short of it is that Global Warming alarmists were wrong again. They correctly predicted that the Amazon rain forest would get drier. What they didn’t predict is that it would get greener as it got drier. It seems rainforest growth is limited by sunlight. As it experienced a drought in 2006 the clouds dissipated a little, more sunlight got through, and productivity increased. The details, satellite maps, and whatnot is in the article below.

Global Warming Puzzle: Amazon Rainforest Showed Better Growth During Drought

Accepted global climate models had predicted the Amazon forest would begin to “brown down” after just a month of drought and eventually collapse as the drought progressed. Instead, drought-stricken regions of the Amazon forest grew particularly vigorously during the 2005 drought, according to new research.

“Instead of ‘hunkering down’ during a drought as you might expect, the forest responded positively to drought, at least in the short term,” said study author Scott R. Saleska of The University of Arizona. “It’s a very interesting and surprising response.”

UA co-author Kamel Didan added, “The forest showed signs of being more productive. That’s the big news.”

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The global-warming hucksters Excerpt from Buchanan’s article: Put me down as a disbeliever. Like the panics of bygone eras, this one has the aspect of yet another re-enactment of the Big Con. The huckster arrives in town, tells all the rubes that disaster impends for them and their families, but says there may be one last chance they can be saved – but it will take a lot of money. And the folks should go about collecting it, right now. This, it seems to me, is what the global-warming scare and scam are all about – frightening Americans into transferring sovereignty, power and wealth to a global political elite that claims it alone understands the crisis and it alone can Read More ›

Reprinted by permission from Imprimis, a publication of Hillsdale College.

August 2007

“Global Warming: Man-Made or Natural?”

S. Fred Singer
Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia

S. Fred Singer is professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, a distinguished research professor at George Mason University, and president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project. He performed his undergraduate studies at Ohio State University and earned his Ph.D. in Physics from Princeton University. He was the founding dean of the School of Environmental and Planetary Sciences at the University of Miami, the founding director of the U.S. National Weather Satellite Service, and served for five years as vice chairman of the U.S. National Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere. Dr. Singer has written or edited over a dozen books and monographs, including, most recently, Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years.

The following is adapted from a lecture delivered on the Hillsdale College campus on June 30, 2007, during a seminar entitled “Economics and the Environment,” sponsored by the Charles R. and Kathleen K. Hoogland Center for Teacher Excellence.

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IN THE PAST few years there has been increasing concern about global climate change on the part of the media, politicians, and the public. It has been stimulated by the idea that human activities may influence global climate adversely and that therefore corrective action is required on the part of governments. Recent evidence suggests that this concern is misplaced. Human activities are not influencing the global climate in a perceptible way. Climate will continue to change, as it always has in the past, warming and cooling on different time scales and for different reasons, regardless of human action. I would also argue that—should it occur—a modest warming would be on the whole beneficial.

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Atlanta is becoming increasingly distressed over a drought that has reached “exceptional” level threatening to leave more than 3 million city residents without tap water if the drought persists more than a few more months. What happened to the increasingly frequent and severe Atlantic hurricanes that so-called “global warming” was supposed to produce? There’s nothing but the proverbial sound of crickets chirping in the southeast where there should be at least a few howling hurricanes or remnants thereof dumping torrential rain on the region. Meanwhile, on the western side of the Gulf coast, Texas has had an unprecedented amount of rainfall even absent hurricane activity. Lake Travis, a 20,000 acre flood control reservoir near me, has been near or into Read More ›

Distinguished Professor Emeritus Botkin of the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, gives a balanced view of the enviromental impact of global warming titled “Global Warming Delusions” in today’s Wall Street Journal and a rather unflattering comment about scientists resorting to deceit to panic a public into supporting a political agenda. Global Warming Delusions By DANIEL B. BOTKIN October 17, 2007; Page A19 Global warming doesn’t matter except to the extent that it will affect life — ours and that of all living things on Earth. And contrary to the latest news, the evidence that global warming will have serious effects on life is thin. Most evidence suggests the contrary. Case in Read More ›

Says Emeritus Professor Gray:

Imagine that. One of the world’s foremost atmospheric scientists saying that scientists are afraid to say what they believe because of the personal financial consequences of going against the popular, fashionable, politically correct “scientific consensus”. Sound familiar? Atmospheric scientists are the newest victims, joining scientists who openly question evolutionary dogma, in the war against open scientific inquiry. I fear science may be a long time recovering from these shameful political agenda driven displays. It’s a good thing engineers don’t try to base technological innovation on hare-brained just-so stories like these that escape from academia to the main stream media.

William M. “Bill” Gray

(b. 1931), Ph.D., is a pioneer in the science of forecasting hurricanes. In 1952 he got a BS degree in Geography from George Washington University, in 1959 he got a MS in Meteorology from the University of Chicago, where he went on to get a PhD in Geophysical Sciences in 1964.

Gray pioneered the concept of “seasonal” hurricane forecasting — predicting months in advance the severity of the coming hurricane season. Gray’s prognostications, issued since 1983, are used by insurance companies to calculate premiums. [1]

Gray is Emeritus Professor of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University (CSU), and head of the Tropical Meteorology Project at CSU’s Department of Atmospheric Sciences. Gray is noted for his forecasts of Atlantic hurricane season activity.

Professor Gray served as a weather forecaster for the United States Air Force, and as a research assistant in the University of Chicago Department of Meteorology. He joined Colorado State University in 1961. He has been advisor of over 70 Ph. D. and M. Sc. students. His team has been issuing seasonal hurricane forecasts since 1984.

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Ben Stein to battle Darwin in major film Actor-commentator stars in ‘Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed’ Ben Stein, the lovable, monotone teacher from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “The Wonder Years” is back in the classroom in a major motion picture release slated for February 2008. But this time, the actor will be on the big screen asking one of life’s biggest questions: “Were we designed, or are we simply the end result of an ancient mud puddle struck by lightning?” That’s right. Evolution – and the explosive debate over its virtual monopoly on America’s public school classrooms – is the focus of the film “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.” In the movie, Stein, who is also a lawyer, economist, former presidential Read More ›

RC Motorcycles Technical Discussion

The dangers of creationism in education Report Committee on Culture, Science and Education Rapporteur: Mr Guy LENGAGNE, France, Socialist Group Summary The theory of evolution is being attacked by religious fundamentalists who call for creationist theories to be taught in European schools alongside or even in place of it. From a scientific view point there is absolutely no doubt that evolution is a central theory for our understanding of the Universe and of life on Earth. Creationism in any of its forms, such as “intelligent design”, is not based on facts, does not use any scientific reasoning and its contents are pathetically inadequate for science classes. The Assembly calls on education authorities in member States to promote scientific knowledge and Read More ›

Challenge to Scientific Consensus on Global Warming: Analysis Finds Hundreds of Scientists Have Published Evidence Countering Man-Made Global Warming Fears Posted : Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:58:42 GMT Author : Hudson Institute Category : PressRelease WASHINGTON, Sept. 12 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A new analysis of peer-reviewed literature reveals that more than 500 scientists have published evidence refuting at least one element of current man-made global warming scares. More than 300 of the scientists found evidence that 1) a natural moderate 1,500-year climate cycle has produced more than a dozen global warmings similar to ours since the last Ice Age and/or that 2) our Modern Warming is linked strongly to variations in the sun’s irradiance. “This data and the list of scientists Read More ›

1: Cell Cycle. 2007 Jun;6(15):1873-7. Epub 2007 Jun 6. Links Universal genome in the origin of metazoa: thoughts about evolution. Sherman M. Department of Biochemistry; Boston University Medical School, 715 Albany St., Boston, Massachusetts 02118, USA. sherma1@bu.edu Recent advances in paleontology, genome analysis, genetics and embryology raise a number of questions about the origin of Animal Kingdom. These questions include:(1) seemingly simultaneous appearance of diverse Metazoan phyla in Cambrian period, (2) similarities of genomes among Metazoan phyla of diverse complexity, (3) seemingly excessive complexity of genomes of lower taxons and (4) similar genetic switches of functionally similar but non-homologous developmental programs. Here I propose an experimentally testable hypothesis of Universal Genome that addresses these questions. According to this model, (a) Read More ›

Edward Rubin again finds hard evidence supporting a front loaded evolution. Front loading is a design engineering term generally used to describe design elements inserted for possible use in the future (contingency) as opposed to immediate use. The mechanism of random mutation and natural selection is incapable of contingency planning. RM+NS can build based on experience but can’t build based on an abstract future. It is reactive not proactive. The front loading hypothesis in essence says the complex specified information necessary to construct the more complex machinery of life has been around since life appeared on the earth but much of it was preserved for expression in the far distant future. Natural selection cannot preserve unexpressed information for long against Read More ›