“I moved from San Francisco to the LA area about a month ago so am experiencing the fires from a little closer vicinity. The local news
told us that the areas on fire last burnt about 1929! The brush is 20ft high in many places! After a week of burning they finally pulled
in the larger drop aircraft including the DC-10.” Vernon.
Defining the Scientific Sceptics (Part 10): Karl Popper
The genuine rationalist does not think that he or anyone else is in possession of the truth; nor does he think that mere criticism as such helps us achieve new ideas. But he does think that, in the sphere of ideas, only critical discussion can help us sort the wheat from the chaff. He is well aware that acceptance or rejection of an idea is never a purely rational matter; but he thinks that only critical discussion can give us the maturity to see an idea from more and more sides and to make a correct judgement of it.
–Karl Popper, All Life is Problem Solving, 1999
via Benny Pieser
Record Warm Sea Surface Temperatures
SCIENTISTS at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Prediction Center (CPC) recently announced that the average global sea surface temperatures in July was 62.6 degrees F making it hotter than the previous record of 1998 and the hottest since record-keeping began in 1880.
The record average is from satellite based measurements and was initially disputed by some sceptics including climate scientists Roy Spencer, University of Alabama, Huntsville. Dr Spencer initially attributed the error to a data processing blunder at NOAA, but has since conceded the blunder in the calculations was his. [Read more…] about Record Warm Sea Surface Temperatures
Other People’s Free Speech: Donna Laframboise
DONNA Laframboise believes that when activists insist their cause is more important than other people’s free speech, we all need to worry.
www.DeSoggyBog.com
California Bushfires
Los Angeles: The so-called Station Fire more than doubled in size as it burned out of control for a sixth day, charring 105,000 acres (42,500 hectares), up from 42,000 acres (17,000 hectares) late on Sunday, and sending up towering plumes of smoke that fouled the air for miles (km) around. Read more here.
Global Cooling has Begun: Bob Foster
BIG things are happening Sun-wise. The longer Solar Cycle 24 is delayed, the weaker should it be. Thus, it is more likely day by day – while Cycle 24 remains in deferral – that we are entering the next Little Ice Age cold period (Landscheidt Minimum1).
In 2004, NASA predicted an extra-powerful Cycle 24 starting in 2006, far stronger than modest Cycle 23 – thus supplementing IPCC’s projected people-driven warming. As you might expect, there are very few people outside the ‘mainstream’ consensus policed by Royal Society, IPCC, NASA – and propagated by the great journals Science and Nature – with the expertise to challenge NASA on this esoteric topic. But happily, there are some.
The collective angular momentum of the giant outer planets drives the Sun’s highly-irregular orbit about the centre-of-mass of the solar system (as Newton knew); and the timing (albeit, not yet the magnitude) of consequential solar variability can therefore be predicted. By “variability” I don’t mean in total solar irradiance; because TSI varies only by fractions of a percent. I am referring to the outflow of magnetised plasma from the Sun – which can vary by orders of magnitude at timings from quotidian to millennial. [Read more…] about Global Cooling has Begun: Bob Foster
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.