Sunday, December 6, 2009

Australian AGW Supporting Scientist - Turned Skeptic...

Now this sort of thing is hitting the mainstream press.  Thank you, ClimateGate!

ClimateGate: Another Scientist Speaks Out...

This time in a letter from Christopher Essex (an applied mathemetician) to Daniel Henniger (a Wall Street Journal columnist).  A snippet that resonated with me:
Science is alive and well in the individual scientists who are not caught up in gaming the system for bigger grants. I call it small science. Many of them are doing very unfashionable things, and are happy to get no recognition for it.

That is where you can find the real scientists. That is where the future will be.

Go read the whole thing.

Copenhagen is All Hot Air?

So sayeth Jonah Goldberg, writing at Real Clear Politics.  I liked this bit:
"Ten countries ruled by nasty people control 80 percent of the planet's oil reserves -- about 1 trillion barrels, currently worth about $40 trillion," writes energy expert Peter Huber in City Journal. "If $40 trillion worth of gold were located where most of the oil is, one could only scoff at any suggestion that we might somehow persuade the nasty people to leave the wealth buried. They can lift most of their oil at a cost well under $10 a barrel. They will drill. They will pump. And they will find buyers. Oil is all they've got."

It's not just the nasty countries. Canada, the Dudley Do-Right of the international community, insists on exploiting its vast and dirty oil reserves in the "tar sands" under Alberta. The intro to an article by British eco-scold George Monbiot declared: "Canada's image lies in tatters. It is now to climate what Japan is to whaling." If Canada, which has long been the UN's Richie Cunningham, won't play ball, does anyone think the Chinese, Indians or Brazilians will?

The “Dudley Do-Right” of the international community.  Heh!

Telling Gordon Brown How the Cow Ate the Cabbage...

These wounded British soldiers are very unhappy with Gordon Brown's leadership, and they're not afraid to let him know.  Well, Gordon, you really wouldn't expect these soldiers to be pushovers, would you?

ClimateGate: More Code Analysis...

Interesting analysis by Robert Greiner, a scientist and programmer, and an AGW agnostic.

Your Sunday Morning Brain Cleanser...

Sarah Palin, Comedienne?

You decide.  I sure laughed, both at her wisecracks and at the slightly modified version of the 12 days of Christmas song...

The Most Influential Tree in the World...

Read all about it here.

Is It Just Me?

Or is the tone of the political cartoons changing?  You decide, after you decide whether to laugh or cry.  Click any thumbnail to enlarge...

Leading Environmental Indicators...

Steven Hayward at Pacific Research is out with the fourteenth Index of Leading Environmental Indicators.  It's a 75 page PDF packed with all sorts of interesting views of our environment, how it's changing, and how it's being reported.

The graph at right is just one randomly chosen example.  This one shows the variations in sea ice coverage in the Antarctic over the past 30 years.  This is the period for which satellite-borne instruments give us reliable coverage data.  If you've been listening to a lot of the AGW hype, what you see on that graph may surprise you...

I recommend taking an evening to peruse this document yourself.  It reminds me a bit of the Skeptical Environmentalist, in a sort of Reader's Digest form...