Constant Conservative

Brilliant movie director reads from horrendous script:

James Cameron, director of the eco-tinged smash film Avatar, on Sunday called global warming skeptics “swine” at a renewable energy conference in Aspen, Colo., according to a news report.

“I think they’re swine,” he said at the American Renewable Energy Day Summit, the Aspen Times reported.

On a related note, we had BLTs for supper: we were all out of mutton.

John at Power Line is concerned about moose. Actually, he’s concerned about people who are concerned about the Minnesota moose. After reading an article which claims local global warming is hurting the moose population, he does a bit of thinking out loud:

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency says mean temperatures have increased in the state by a whopping one-half of one degree Fahrenheit in the last 50 years. Those moose must be sensitive creatures.

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Here’s what puzzles me, though: isn’t global warming supposed to be–you know–global? That being the case, why are moose populations “burgeoning” in Massachusetts, returning to Wisconsin, “growing” in Michigan, moving into Connecticut, where historically they did not live, “booming” in Oregon, “resurging” in Vermont, “increasing” in Washington, “growing exponentially” in New York, “significantly increas[ing]“ in Colorado, and “growing” in Utah?

Even here in South Dakota (where we do not officially have moose) we’ve had several visitors from Minnesota. Perhaps that’s the real problem with Minnesota’s herd, they are moving over to the warmer South Dakota prairies without leaving forwarding addresses.

Willis Eschenbach does another excellent job of explaining a difficult matter with regard to climate. After noting that he often hears people say something along the lines of “well, simple physics tells us that more CO2 equals warming” he dives in:

Unfortunately, while the physics is simple, the climate is far from simple. It is one of the more complex systems that we have ever studied. The climate is a tera-watt scale planetary sized heat engine. It is driven by both terrestrial and extra-terrestrial forcings, a number of which are unknown, and many of which are poorly understood and/or difficult to measure. It is inherently chaotic and turbulent, two conditions for which we have few mathematical tools.

The climate is comprised of five major subsystems — atmosphere, ocean, cryosphere, lithosphere, and biosphere. All of these subsystems are imperfectly understood. Each of these subsystems has its own known and unknown internal and external forcings, feedbacks, resonances, and cyclical variations. In addition, each subsystem affects all of the other subsystems through a variety of known and unknown forcings and feedbacks.

Then there is the problem of scale. Climate has crucially important processes at physical scales from the molecular to the planetary, and at temporal scales from milliseconds to millennia.

As a result of this almost unimaginable complexity, simple physics is simply inadequate to predict the effect of a change in one of the hundreds and hundreds of things that affect the climate.

Then he introduces a couple of thoughtful experiments to help explain why he is saying that the systems’ interplay is simply too difficult to guess correctly. Please, go read it all–you’ll be glad you did.

One need not be a hard-core global warming skeptic to question whether we should alter the way we live in response to predictions based on findings that cannot be checked because the raw data was intentionally destroyed by the outfit that made the findings.

So says Paul of PowerLine. Well put, sir. Well put.

On the issue of global warming this morning, we have this:

So the 1079 emails and 72 documents seem indeed evidence of a scandal involving most of the most prominent scientists pushing the man-made warming theory – a scandal that is one of the greatest in modern science. I’ve been adding some of the most astonishing in updates below – emails suggesting conspiracy, collusion in exaggerating warming data, possibly illegal destruction of embarrassing information, organised resistance to disclosure, manipulation of data, private admissions of flaws in their public claims and much more. If it is as it now seems, never again will “peer review” be used to shout down sceptics.

Someone left a lot of information in a not well-secured place and this is the result. This seems all but certain to seriously heat things up in the days before the Copenhagen meeting to address climate change.

Go and read and see what you think.

On the subject of global warming as caused by human beings, much has been written. I’ve no doubt that much more remains to be written. However, one of the best pieces I’ve read in some time may be found at PowerLine. An couple excerpts follow:

[Physicist and mathematician Frank Tipler says, in part] I no longer trust “scientists” to report observations correctly. I think the data is adjusted to confirm, as far as possible, AGW. We’ve seen many recent cases where the data was cooked in climate studies. In one case, Hanson and company claimed that October 2008 was the warmest October on record. Watts looked at the data, and discovered that Hanson and company had used September’s temperatures for Russia rather than October’s. I’m not surprised to learn that September is hotter than October in the Northern hemisphere.

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This is why I am astounded that people who should know better, like Newt Gingrich, advocate increased government funding for scientific research. We had better science, and a more rapid advance of science, in the early part of the 20th century when there was no centralized government funding for science. Einstein discovered relativity on his own time, while he was employed as a patent clerk. Where are the Einsteins of today? They would never be able to get a university job…

Science is an economic good like everything else, and it is very bad for production of high quality goods for the government to control the means of production. Why can’t Newt Gingrich understand this? Milton Friedman understood it, and advocated cutting off government funding for science.

Such a simple statement, but so spot on: “We had better science and a more rapid advance of science, in the early part of the 20th century when there was no centralized government funding for science.”

I do not agree within anyone on everything (in fact, I don’t even entirely agree with the me from 5 or 10 years ago) but I find more to like with regards to Milton Friedman the more I read. What chance, however, do you think that such a proposal would have today? Hold on, I think I can see a snowball . . . . Sorry, I believe it just melted. Must be global warming.

For the recently closed weather poll, which asked “What will the next 10 years bring, in terms of weather?” (which not many of you participated in between opening presents and stuffing yourselves on turkey) we have the following results:

• 12.5% said “Global warming”
• 0.0% said “Global cooling”
• 87.5% said “Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter”
• 0.0% said “Forget the next 10 years. I’d just like to be warm again.”

Apparently, humor does not mix well with cranberry sauce and sweet gherkins. Thank you.

New poll in the sidebar. Enjoy.

I’m a regular reader of PowerLine, the blog written by three intelligent lawyers who came to national attention when they and their readers took Dan Rather to task for supporting a story which was terribly short on facts and long on supposition in reference to George W. Bush’s time in the Texas National Guard.

But that is not the only story that they have done good research and writing on. For a recent example of their continuing excellence in communication, I bring you the following:

No doubt the TerraPass system would make sense if I understood it, but for now I think the import is clear: if you are a Power Line reader, you have received absolution! Turn up your thermostat. Take your snowmobile for a spin. Trade in your Prius for a Navigator. Rent a private plane to go skydiving. And, in general, party like it’s 1999. You’re entitled!

Head on over there to see what they are talking about and then get your own blessing before the carbon-based sinning continues.

For those of you who are preparing for this weekend’s possibly brutal weather here in South Dakota and environs, don’t worry. It will quickly be gone–and what’s more, the polar ice cap itself will disappear in the next 5 years. Straight from the horse’s mouth, here is the video which proves it (note for my German readers, the voice-over translation is much clearer than the original speech):