Posts Made By: Robert Pasken

I guess you would have an answer to the question how much pollution does mexico contribute to the overall total western hemisphere pollution. Care to hazard a guess?

Lee Spain said:

It might be about time to upgrade some of our home technology or provide some upgrades to family for Christmas. We've been pondering the merits of MP3 players and Ipods.

If you get an Apple iPod are you limited to buying music on Apple's iTune site? Can you rip copies of your own CDs? Can you load mp3 files from other sites onto an iPod? Does the Microsoft Zune have similar restrictions?

Can you use iPod accessories with other MP3 players?

Super Luddite Bonus Question: Which is cooler, an iPod or a Playstation 2? Why would I ever want a Playstation 2 when Playstation 1 games are available for about $5.00 each?

Your answers are appreciated. I'm about ready to give up and become Amish . . .

iTunes software which comes with the iPod allows you to rip your own music from CD's. It also allows you to download podcasts, audiobooks as well as mp3 files of any sort. The other players don't have much support for other than music. The iPod also has support under Solaris/Aix/Linux, in addition to MacOSX and Windows. None of the other players have support for other than Windows. I can easily upload songs from my Sun workstation on to my iPod.

As far as I am concerned the intuitive controls on the iPod make it a winner compared to others, particularly the Zune. I find it difficult to use other mp3 players, they are just hard to use. I could figure out how to use the iPod in a few minutes, on the other hand I trouble getting the Zune to play the songs I wanted.

On a side note, I NEVER steal music. I only listen to music I purchased OR music that is clearly marked as freely redistributable. In the case of the Zune even if the music is DRM-free, when you copy the track on to a Zune, the Zune ADDS DRM making the music impossible to play any where but on that Zune. I am annoyed that any mp3 file with content I CREATED gets Microsoft's DRM attached to it.

Michael Tencza said:

Before I buy, I'd like to know what the consensus is for filters useful for viewing Mars. I am using a Megrez II 80mm FD (f/6.9).

I noticed that Orion is selling one as well as the original one by Televue. I also would like to know as well.

Linton Rohr said:

"Suggesting one of these as a reason to doubt global warming puts you in the same category as those who claim that the destruction of the World Trade centers was not an act of terrorism, but a desperate act on the part of the Bush administration."

Wow. You're entitled to your opinion on the global warming debate,
but that kind of BS is entirely uncalled for.
Linton

Just as every single piece of "evidence" the 9/11 truth movement has presented has been shown to be knowingly falsified, the global warming myths have been shown to be deliberate falsifications. Why would you knowingly deliberately edit and misuse someone else's scientific results in testimony before congress as Pat Michaels did in 1998 unless your agenda was to discredit those who actually were working to understand the problem. Why do the global warming skeptics spend more time on speaking tours funded by the oil/gas industry than they do conducting research?

Don't shoot the messenger because reality does fit your preconceived notion

David Hakenewerth said:

We don't need a top ten list because the number 1 myth is that we as a species can do anything to stop the process. We might slow it or alter it's effects, but humanity is on a ride that will not stop. We can't change mans need/desire to exploit the worlds resources.

Not to worry anyway, nature and evolution will do a much better job at solving this problem than we ever could.

Come to think of it can someone give me some examples of any large social/environmental issue that we've eliminated. Poverty? Crime? Human Rights? I can't readily think of any. Someone restore my hope.

Dave H.

The Montreal Protocol? The world decide to remove halogenated hydrocarbons {CFC's) to prevent the destruction of Ozone Layer. Lo and behold with world cooperation the amount of CFC's in the atmosphere have declined dramatically and stratospheric ozone has stabilized. There are variations in the amount of stratospheric ozone,but the rate of change is now positive rather than negative. As with CO2 businesses predicted the end of the world if CFC's were banned of course instead of a decline in business, there was an increase as people replaced equipment and replaced refrigerants.

Mark Norby said:

Here's what I know: There has been a warming trend in global temps over the last 150yrs or so. This rise seems to be a rebound from the "Little Ice Age". It's been demonstrated that since 1940 or so, industry started to produce considerably more CO2, released into the atmosphere.However, most of the increase in temps came before 1940. Here's my last link, for now. It pretty well demonstrates how and why I believe as I do. The summary is also provided on this page, should you not care to read the entire paper: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

Once again a politically oriented website that has an axe to grind. The reality is

Neftel, A., E. Moor, H. Oeschger, and B. Stauffer. 1985. Evidence from polar ice cores for the increase in atmospheric CO2 in the past two centuries. Nature 315:45-47.

Petit, J.R., J. Jouzel, D. Raynaud, N.I. Barkov, J.-M. Barnola, I. Basile, M. Benders, J. Chappellaz, M. Davis, G. Delayque, M. Delmotte, V.M. Kotlyakov, M. Legrand, V.Y. Lipenkov, C. Lorius, L. Pépin, C. Ritz, E. Saltzman, and M. Stievenard. 1999. Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica. Nature 399: 429-436.

To summarize the large increases in CO2 began in the late 40's and early 50's. The temperature increases were the largest over the same period. A summary figure is attached

I owned a Tinsely 8" cassegrain that I bought when the St Louis Science center auctioned off old equipment. Bob Cox bought a pair of these scopes for the Science Center when the McDonnell Planetarium was built. When I tested the primary it was a very under-corrected parabola. I spent a lot of time on the phone with Bob about the scope and he told me that was the way it should be as the scope was a Dall-Kirkham rather than a classical Cassegrain.

From the title of this forum "Global Warming or Not" Almost all of my posts have been trying to fight the disinformation whether intentional or not that global warming doesn't exist.

What you propose is something far more meaningful, not whether global warming exists, observations shows that it is occurring, but what should the response of society as whole be to what is happening. Unfortunately that falls outside the realm of science and into politics.

Having been a atmospheric scientist for over 30 years, I have watched the demonization of all scientists for very short-term political and economic gain by a very few. Simply reporting facts results in Ad Hominmem attacks. Wait till you speak in public about science issues and have you answering machine and email flooded with ocherstrated personal attacks.

A formal challenge to any results from that polling place should be made. I had to challenge the board of elections in the last presidential election, when my paper ballot was grabbed out of my hand while I was waiting for a booth to open. The claim was that the polling place had closed and no more voting was allowed. I claimed that since I had entered, had my credentials checked and a ballot in hand before the polling place closed that I should be allowed to vote and have my vote counted.

You are correct when you speak of the complexity of the system, but the existence of global warming doesn't depend models. Observations are the primary driving force. Observations document the existence of global warming. How to attribute the effects of man are where models come into play. I described the process in an earlier post. To summarize: I create a model that recreates the observed features as closely as possible documenting where the model results differ from reality (this is the control case and the error bars). I then add/subtract driving forces and compare these results against earlier model runs, noting how the results change. I have my students conduct this simple experiment. Using a simple climate model, I ask them to input data from 1950 and run the model forward 50 years. They then compute the difference between year 2000 observations and year 2000 from the model creating the control case and the error bars. I then have them run the model again with CO2 increasing until the CO2 has doubled in the model year 2000. They once again compare this run against the control run of the model and against observations. The last step is to run the model with decreasing CO2 until in 2000 it is half of the 1950 value. They again compare the results against previous runs and observations. The experiment documents the effects of CO2 on the earth's climate. Since they are using a simple model the error bars are large, but the doubling/halving CO2 concentrations is still clear in the results

The current generation climate models, which do a very good job at duplicating observations, do not have to reproduce exactly observed conditions, what they have to do is document where and how it differs. When I make a change to the model I use a control run to determine what effect each change has. The figure attached is an example. The curious thing is that these model runs, created in 1988, assumed a major volcanic eruption in 1997 (note the dip in temperatures), Mount Pinatubo erupted in late 1991 early 1992 and the observational data picked it up. The model is able to describe the effects of volcanic eruptions assuming the year of the eruption is correct. This also points out the minimal effect major volcanic eruptions have on the climate as temperatures recovered in a few years. The three scenarios in the graph are: a) exponential increases in CO2, b) linear increases in CO2 and c) linear increase until 2000 when CO2 was held constant. The model does not reproduce observations exactly, but the parting of the lines in 1990 indicate what rate of increase is most realistic.

I would love to debate/teach the science of global warming, but like you I also get irritated when outright fabrications and distortions of the science is spewed. It is one thing if you do not understand and are willing to learn, but completely another when you understand and with malice of forethought distort.