Programming isn't terribly complex.
Awesome that you think so! Now, program some realtime flight surface control software for a fly-by-wire jet and sleep well knowing that your program will never, ever, kill anyone... (Or, substitute any other safety critical software you can think of - and theres a lot!)
"Programming" (by which I really mean software engineering) is one of the most complex activities in existence...
Renewables are fine providing you include a continent wide grid and some local storage to even out weather fluctuations. Specifically the grid is old tech and (except for NIMBY's) very easy to implement.
That is actually completely incorrect, given that there will "10 year", "100 year" or "1000 year" weather events that lead to power outages, mass inconvenience, and people dying.
That's all aside from the fact that we're nowhere close to a "continent wide grid" in the first place.
these days we have in every sense superior renewables.
You're delusional. Wind and solar both have a huge problem with consistent supply. Wind also requires huge swathes of land, and if you want to put it in the ocean it faces severe challenges - salt corrosion and storms.
Power shortages due to over reliance on renewable technologies are inevitable - unless nuclear is in the mix in a big way.
Wind maximum capacity is pretty meaningless, I believe the average production is around 1/3 of rated.
Nuclear is a far superior power source, given it's low land use, lack of environmental impact (eyesores, noise, bird/bat kills for wind) and constant output. Nuclear plants should be built out to completely replace coal, at a minimum.
ISIS is essentially an Al-Queda in Iraq splinter that set up shop on its own.
Yes, except it "set up shop" due to failures in the 0bama foreign policy.
The last "I" stands for Iraq. They wouldn't exist today without that mess having happened.
No, the last "I" stands for "In". ISIS stands for "Islamic State In Syria". President 0 favors ISIL, "Islamic State In the Levant".
They wouldn't exist today without that mess having happened.
They wouldn't exist today if the current administration hadn't thrown away all the blood and treasure expended on Iraq by cutting and running. Regardless of his dislike for the war, he should have acted in the best interests of both America and Iraq.
The most important thing influencing policy in these datasets are the trends. Both major satellite datasets show much less of a warming trend from the mid-90's until now than the recently "adjusted" surface datasets. No doubt this is a strong El Niño, we'll see if it can beat the massive average temperature spike in 1998. It's not close so far.
It'll be interesting to see how things play out over the coming decades...
That's amazing! Especially, given the complete lack of correlation with the satellite datasets:
The satellite datasets directly integrate temperature over almost the entire globe, with no interpolation and no revisionist "adjustments". They use laboratory grade instruments, and are frequently calibrated against balloon soundings. And no, there is nothing magic as far as detecting temperature trends gained by measuring at ground level only.
It's beyond ironic that NASA is trumpeting ground-based measurements while ignoring better data gathered from space.
And the first satelite was launched when?
Ohhh certainly not in the late 1800's.
Certainly. However, since the last adjustments, the surface datasets of record have been diverging from the satellite measurements:
The Diverging Surface Thermometer and Satellite Temperature Records
The Diverging Surface Thermometer and Satellite Temperature Records Again
Interesting that this is taking place going into another big climate conference complete with demands for "climate justice", and also while we're on the eve of a solar Grand Minimum...
A quote from that last linked article:
Scientists at the Climate and Environmental Physics and Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of Berne in Switzerland have recently backed up theories that support the sun's importance in determining the climate on Earth. A paper published last year by the American Meteorological Society contradicts claims by IPCC scientists that the sun couldn't be responsible for major shifts in climate. Judith Curry, chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, rejected IPCC assertions that solar variations don't matter. Among the many studies and authorities she cited was the National Research Council's recent report "The Effects of Solar Variability on Earth's Climate".
Other researchers and organisations are also predicting global cooling - the Russian Academy of Science, the Astronomical Institute of the Slovak Academy of Scientists, the Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism Russia, Victor Manuel Velesco Herrera at the National University of Mexico, the Bulgarian Institute of Astronomy, Dr Tim Patterson at Carleton University in Canada, Drs Lin Zhen at Nanjing University in China, just to name a few.
You'd better take a long look at my post below regarding satellite measurements. The recent trumpeting of warmest this and that is highly suspect - including the "2014 is the warmest year on record" claim.
It's enough to make you think there's a hidden agenda or something...
That's amazing! Especially, given the complete lack of correlation with the satellite datasets:
The satellite datasets directly integrate temperature over almost the entire globe, with no interpolation and no revisionist "adjustments". They use laboratory grade instruments, and are frequently calibrated against balloon soundings. And no, there is nothing magic as far as detecting temperature trends gained by measuring at ground level only.
It's beyond ironic that NASA is trumpeting ground-based measurements while ignoring better data gathered from space.
The win-win scenario is vastly increased investment into nuclear electric generation. Nuclear is already the safest form of baseline power generation, and is 100% carbon free. Next-gen technologies offer the possibility of less than 5 per KWH electricity, and no possibility of meltdowns. The world needs plentiful, non-stop power going forward. The ONLY carbon-free way of achieving that is nuclear power, and this can be done with no sacrifice, and no penalty to the poor via increased energy prices.
You could be right. My preferred option would be to let the markets pick the winners and losers. The key is to apply a revenue neutral carbon tax that ensures that any fees collected are spent in reducing income tax and sales tax. That way we are taxing behaviours that we want to discourage, and lowering taxes on things we ought to be encouraging.
The problem is that such a scheme is still regressive, at least here in the US. The poor pay no income tax, and there is usually no sales tax on food and other necessities. A carbon tax would raise the cost of energy, and if applied to gasoline and diesel, would increase the cost of goods pretty much across the board. Also, plenty of poor people would be hurt by higher gasoline prices.
If there were fewer artificial barriers to nuclear (including somehow educating the public regarding the actual instead of perceived risks) it would quickly become one of the least expensive options - cheaper than coal or gas.
One of the more practical approaches to next-gen, molten salt nuclear is being developed at ThorCon.
over 50 organizations including the Royal Society, American Chemical Society, American Institute of Physics, American Physical Society, Australian Institute of Physics, European Physical Society, etc, etc, etc.
Dissenting:
NONE
It's worth pointing out that there is significant dissent within the American Physical Society, with several prominent scientists leaving the organization over its unreserved endorsement of CAGW (catastrophic anthropogenic global warming, as opposed to the meaningless catch-all "climate change").
The real issue, which is obscured by all the noise around full-fledged denial (which isn't rational) is whether or not AGW represents a substantial threat to our future, among the wide array of issues facing humans. There is a good deal of evidence showing that the AGW models are overestimating warming. The world will wean itself off fossil fuels as solar, nuclear and other technologies fall in price, regardless of AGW concerns. The real question is whether we need to spend massive quantities of money and cripple first-world economies in the short term, or not.
The win-win scenario is vastly increased investment into nuclear electric generation. Nuclear is already the safest form of baseline power generation, and is 100% carbon free. Next-gen technologies offer the possibility of less than 5 per KWH electricity, and no possibility of meltdowns. The world needs plentiful, non-stop power going forward. The ONLY carbon-free way of achieving that is nuclear power, and this can be done with no sacrifice, and no penalty to the poor via increased energy prices.
The difference is that Linux and Mac GUIs get choppy under the slightest load, while Windows says smooth like butter in every situation. Some people have even installed Windows on their Macs and they are getting more graphics performance from the same hardware.
You're conflating a couple of different things. Windows general-purpose multitasking is terrible compared to Linux/MacOS (at least based on Win7 experiences).
On the other hand, Microsoft has had a laser focus on Windows gaming, with the obvious tie-in to Xbox gaming. This has resulted in very fast graphics drivers for Windows.
Linux seems to be doing well lately, with some Steam games getting higher frame rates on Linux than on Windows. Linux may end up being the best of all possible worlds (well out of three worlds anyhow) given its lean design, performance and stability. Perhaps eventually it'll see more proprietary software ports like Solidworks and ProEngineer.
You appear to be getting some things confused.
The surface of the planet is warming up. We have models based on currently understood science that seem to give reasonable projections, at least so far. We can make some predictions as to what's likely to happen. That's the science.
The surface of the planet has been warming up for centuries, since the Little Ice Age. For the vast majority of that time, it had nothing to do with CO2. One of the major criticism of climate alarmism is that natural variability is massively downplayed.
The models don't appear to be giving "reasonable projections" at the moment. Remember the hiatus, which has been acknowledged by the IPCC. Those "predictions" won't be worth much until the models better correspond to reality, and have been validated in some meaningful way. They are far from first principles models.
What we should do is a political matter that should be informed by science. Whether or not we build more nuclear power plants (which I'm strongly in favor of) is a political matter that should be informed by science. Unfortunately, there's a lot of politicians and environmentalists that have their own strong (and often subsidized) opinions that take no account of the science, or positively deny it.
I don't have much of a quibble with that, except that what we should do should also be informed by desirable outcomes in general. For instance, LED light bulbs are clearly a win, as they save money while presenting no discernible downside except higher initial investment.
I'm glad to see you support nuclear power, keep it up!
There's other things we can do to cut the amount of carbon dioxide entering the air that aren't going to hit poor people disproportionately. I understand the argument that we're not sure enough of what's happening to do anything drastic, and the argument that we want to keep up economic and technological growth so we can do something when we're more certain of what to do, but I would like to see the science at least accepted.
The basic science is accepted by virtually everyone - CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas. The science that attempts to inform policy includes other controversial facets such as water vapor amplification. If the expected peak concentration of CO2 (550-600 PPM) will not cause problematic heating, there is no need for expensive, drastic action. Whether CO2 related warming will be problematic is still absolutely in dispute. Recent estimates for climate sensitivity to CO2 have been trending downwards.
Did you know that for the price of a 280-Z you can buy two Z-80's? -- P.J. Plauger
