Sorry I haven't been blogging much lately. I've been busy with some things and some friends, all of which have to come before my little exercise in self-indulgence here. I'm currently at work on my latest Analog Alternate View column. This time out I'll be discussing Global Warming (which is not happening, dammit!) and how poor scientific methodology of the most elementary kind has led to apocalyptic pronouncements of doom. I'll also explain how other scientists, who do know how to fashion a solid experiment, have let the doom and gloom crowd get away with their bullshit for so long.
I mean really--if we're to be asked to pay higher taxes to stave off global warming, we'd damn well better make sure there really is a problem. We hear all the time about the collapsing ice shelf in the Antarctic. How many of you know that the overall extent of ice cover in the Antarctic has been increasing? Only one area in Antarctica is showing any kind of increase in temperature; the rest is holding steady or cooling a bit. Antarctica is a big place--it would be very odd indeed if at any arbitrary point in time, parts of it weren't warming a bit as compared to the rest.
And I just came upon the photo at the top. Here's the caption for the photo: Skate (SSN-578), surfaced at the North Pole, 17 March 1959. Notice the open water? Recall the current hoopla that the ice cap is melting, like this has never, ever happened before? It's nonsense. 50 years ago, it looked just like this. Ice moves around at the north pole. Cyclical current and wind patterns cause it to melt more some years than others. Currently, the polar ice has fully recovered to its typical historical extent--indeed, it refroze at near record rates. You can find out a great deal more about what is really happening with the climate at this site: http://wattsupwiththat.com/ This is one of my favorites, run by a meteorologist.
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Bottom line: Doomsday has been cancelled.
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