Super Shabbos Weather
How awesome was the weather on the East Coast today? Literally felt like it was May. Nothing like a mid-winter day of blue skies, bright sunshine and 70-degree temperatures to banish any symptoms of SAD. It was almost like taking a one-day vacation to warmer climes - without having to pack anyone up.
Global warming or not, I truly enjoyed.
Global warming or not, I truly enjoyed.
posted by orthomom at 9:19 PM
20 Comments:
Not to mention the pretty mild summer we just had. I almost got a tan today
I was hoping for a tan too, but I think the angle of the sun just doesn't cut it in January.
Oh, it was gorgeous today...
[For the economic-minded, oil dropped like mad thanks to the mild winter, too, this week. The impression is that it simply can't be a winter that will need lots of heating, etc., and that means there's a nice surplus this year. Gas might dip under $2...!]
"For the economic-minded, oil dropped like mad thanks to the mild winter, too, this week. The impression is that it simply can't be a winter that will need lots of heating, etc., and that means there's a nice surplus this year. Gas might dip under $2...!]"
Terrific! And maybe we will be able to guzzle gas to our heart's content releasing tons of extra hat trapping carbon into the atmosphere!! And soon enough NYC will be underwater! I hope you love swimming!
Thank God for Global Warming!
'Cause when NYC goes under water, maybe we can get more Jews to revitalize the tiny-and-dying Jewish communities in Upstate New York and everywhere else that's so-called "out of town".
I broke out a straw hat and took a Shabbos walk across the George Washington Bridge. It was crazy.
it's not so warm over here.
Global Warming? Did I just mention the mild summer we had? You buy into that liberal ala Al Gore bogus science?
"Gas might dip under $2"
And that means more demand for Saudi oil and more export of their Wahabi ideology. Not good.
'You buy into that liberal ala Al Gore bogus science?'
It is not bogus. It is now the scientific consensus. It is, of course, inconvenient for those whose ideology rejects empirical evidence.
I should add that a single record warm winter day is not strong evidence for global warming. To the contrary, it is 125 years of good records from around the world. And that 125 year time series of increasing temperatures closely correlate with the increasing human use of fossil fuels.
Yes, correlation is not proof. But do you really want to do the experiment to find out? Real estate in much of Manhattan and Brooklyn would be under water if the experiment's results turn out other than the way you want -- not to mention the homes of millions in Louisiana and Bangladesh. The conservative approach would be do take preventive action before it is too late.
It turns out that I made my first trip even to Lawrence yesterday, for a wedding at Beth Shalom. I'm sorry I didn't see the rabbi, whom HaShem blessed with a new grandson this past Shabat. It was nice that the couple had decided to have their wedding in a beautiful beit knesset rather than in a wedding hall. My wife and I had had ours in a beautiful beit knesset -- in February, in Pittsburgh, to 55 degree temperatures!
'And soon enough NYC will be underwater!'
Here in Riverdale, we are on high ground and will likely be spared the malbul. You are all welcome for Shabat.
Proof of global warmimg. Denver is under 10 feet of snow. This is a cyclical evenet. Winter and summers tend to swing from extreme s to moderate. Why have we missed the record high so many times in the past few weeks of balmy weather?? Because it has been this warm in January before. Its happens in natute once and a while. In fact, I reacll tree huggers who are global warming lunitics 5 years ago warned of colder winters and warmer summers. We are having a warmer winter and had a colder summer. It nature not a long term warming.
I'd like to hear the facts from a real scientist with real credentials.
"I'd like to hear the facts from a real scientist with real credentials."
I'm a real scientist (Associate Professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine) with real credentials (PhD in Biostatistics from Johns Hopkins).
The facts are as I stated. I've seen the data. What is in dispute is how much of the increase is due to human activity and how much is due to natural fluctuation: There have been warm periods before, in particular, the early middle ages (at least as far as we can tell from qualitative reports; worldwide temperature records begin in about 1880.). More and more scientists are coming to the conclusion that human activity is primarily responsible, in part because of the strong correlations I mentioned above. A minority is still demanding a stronger level of proof before accepting that conclusion. (At this point the minority is still considered respectable, unlike the people who dispute evolution or say that HIV does not cause AIDS. Those folks are considered crackpots engaged in junk science.)
That is about all I know regarding this as my own research is in other areas. But I think that is a fair description of the current state of knowledge. And
the question of what to do about this is not primarily a scientific issue but a public policy issue. And my joke about the malbul was just that -- a joke.
I would add that I have no problem with the scientists who take the minority position. I have a problem with the non-scientists who promote the minority opinion as if it is the only one. And much of the right wing talking heads do exactly that -- including in the blogosphere.
The Bush administration itself has admitted that warming temperatures at northern latitudes are threatening the polar bears:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-12-27-polar-bears_x.htm
I don't know if scientists have figured out why the largest recent temperature rises have been in the arctic. But those rises have been very substantial.
Charlie Hall said...,
"it is 125 years of good records from around the world."
With all due respect to the scientific community, I find it unlikely that accurate weather records are kept throughout the world even today, never mind for the last 125 years. Are you suggesting that the entire world make decisions costing hundreds of billions of dollars based on records kept in a little notebook by some farmer in Kansas before we had electric lights? Or the notes a tribal leader carved in a tree in the darkest regions of Africa before the first Europeans arrived?
"And that 125 year time series of increasing temperatures closely correlate with the increasing human use of fossil fuels."
It also corresponds with the beginnings of indoor plumbing and major league baseball and the end of slavery in the US. (If you even believe these accurate records exist.) Perhaps it was letting those darned black folks vote that's really causing it? Coincidence? I think not.
On a more serious note, the Minister of Liberal Propaganda at Hewlett High School decreed today "freshman wellness day". For their indoctrination the entire grade was forced to watch the above mentioned "Al Gore Film".
"I have a problem with the non-scientists who promote the minority opinion as if it is the only one."
How about the non-scientists who promote the MAJORITY opinion as if it is the only one? Got a problem with that? Say, Al Gore for example? The LEFT-wing talking heads do exactly that--including in the blogosphere
Or the administrators of my kid's school? Does THEIR one sided curriculum upset you? How about dropping them a line and asking if they would have a non-scientist representative of the 'minority' opinion stop by and use up a couple of more hours of valuable classroom time. Maybe the president of Exxon?
Well, gotta go. I have to get that boat finished, just in case.... ;-)
'Or the notes a tribal leader carved in a tree in the darkest regions of Africa before the first Europeans arrived?'
Check your history. Europeans had reached just about all of Africa and Australia by the early 1880s.
Continuous instrumental records for most of the world exist from a few decades earlier:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumental_temperature_record
I deliberately mentioned an 1880 start because the was the approximate date at which Europeans had completed their conquest of the last two continents.
Would you like to retract your accusation of massive fraud directed toward the scientific community?
'It also corresponds with the beginnings of indoor plumbing and major league baseball and the end of slavery in the US.'
And none of those events meet the additional requirements for the explanation of scientific phenomena:
http://www.sunmed.org/caus.html
'Got a problem with that?'
Would you have had a problem with your school promoting an anti-smoking campaign while the tobacco industry was still publicly disputing the overwhelming evidence about the health effects of smoking?
Would you have had a problem with your school pointing out the evils of communist totalitarianism despite the presence of another opinion, held by the Communist Party USA?
Would you have a problem with your local Jewish day school teaching the concept that the Torah is written by God, despite the existence of another opinion led by some academic bible scholars and most of the much larger Conservative movement?
And I would hope that you would not have a problem with teaching the essential equality of all so-called races despite the existence of a few crackpots who still subscribe to Nazi ideology.
Academic freedom is not relativist and not absolute. I do not have the right to knowlingly teach falsehood. Truth actually exists; it is not some artificial manmade construct. That is a basic principle of Judaism as well as of science. (This is a Jewish blog and you should respect our position here.) There are indeed opinions that do not deserve to be taught.
See if you're enjoying it in a few more years, when it's 80+ in the winter, the ice caps are melting, tsunamis are racing across the planet, Manhattan is underwater, ffresh water is a commodity and skin cancer is the new plague.
Keep enjoying that SUV.
Fresh water is a commidity, skin cancer is a plague, nature is out of control, and its been happening for 150 years since the industrial revolution.
I know, lets go back to burning coal, riding in horse and buggy, farm for our selves.
More admission by the Bush administration:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/10/science/10climate.html
Post a Comment
<< Home