JohnB

My apologies to all. While I was writing I was running both Imperial and Metric in my head. I meant to say 250 pound. (And regardless of Wiki, they do get that big.) Looking at the ideas in order. Just linking our Capital cities and using a direct line, minimum distance. Brisbane - Sydney : 456 miles Syney - Melbourne : 450 miles Melbourne - Adelaide : 410 miles Adelaide - Perth : 1,520 miles If we include the rest of Queenslands east coast to make it a "National" rail link. Brisbane to Cairns : 886 miles (If you want to go to the tip, add another 460 miles) Total : 3,722 miles (I haven't included Darwin, so you can pick the option that suits you; Brisbane - Darwin : 1,760 miles Adelaide - Darwin : 1,635 miles Perth - Darwin : 1,648 miles So closing the loop Perth-Darwin-Cairns adds around another 3,000 miles.) Nearly 4,000 miles of pheremone emitters to be serviced regularly and a measly 20 million people to pay for it. It's not worth it, there are better things to spend money on. Not to mention that the greenies would kick and scream about interfering with the "natural" movement patterns of the roos. In total that would probably be about right. IIRC, the worry was more that the front would be steel plate and the rest aluminium. Personally I don't see how this would be a problem. Different moments of inertia between loco and carraiges? I just don't know. A cow catcher is fine for deflecting animals that stay on the ground. A cow catcher covering the entire front of the train was a different matter. TBH, when this was being discussed years ago that was my first thought too. (I still don't know why it wouldn't work) The bottom line is that the idea was found to be both impractical and uneconomic. While we do have high(er) speed trains, they generally don't go over 100 mph. Speaking from personal experience, I have seen the engine of one of the old steel Toyota Landcruisers pushed clean into the passenger compartment by roo impact at 60 mph. What they would do to a train at 180 mph isn't worth thinking about. We don't put things like this on the front of sedans for fun. When considering rail transport, there are three main factors, distance, population and dangers. We have the same area as the US with 1/15 th the population to pay for the lines. We also have large, solid wild animals that are not stopped by a standard fence like cattle are. If I were to drive due west, in 780 miles I would get to the South Australian border, roughly the width of Texas. But if I were to drive north for the same distance as it is from Mexico to Canada, I would still be in Queensland. And in all this vast area, we have less then 3 million people to try to pay for transport infrastructure. With 15 times our population and States that you can p*ss across, you guys can't do it for Amtrack. (I'll add that is quite surreal to be driving in an area that is as flat as a board all the way to the horizon in all directions and see the sign "Road subject to flooding indicators show depth" and realising the indicators are 14 feet high.)

The idea of high speed trains was pushed for a while in Oz. Until someone asked "What happens when a train at 300 kph hits a 250 kilo kangaroo?" Short of armouring the train, the result would be disaster. The idea died.

I've been curious enough about their claims to put myself on their mailing list. So far a lot of noise, but no proven results.

npts, you still aren't thinking straight. Start your company and then get a thousand or so people to join it. Then declare "problems" and ask for a bail out. That's how to do business with .gov

swansont, thanks for the reply. As I understand the system it has three basic steps. 1) Original article is published. 2) "Comment on" original article is published. 3) "Reply to Comment on" is published. It is also my understanding that in general the original authors are sent a copy of the "Comment on" so that they can prepare a reply and both the comment and reply are published together. Publishing a "Comment on" as a new article is a political machination directly intended to circimvent the "Right of Reply" of the original authors. (An intent stated in the emails) It is therefore an attempt to circumvent the system. I also note that the Addendum to Douglass et al was "lost" for 4 months and when resent to the editor it was immediately sent to Santer et al. Is this normal proceedure? The Addendum explained why RAOBCORE V 1.2 was used rather than the later versions. (A central argument of the Santer paper) I also note that RC use this as an argument as well, without mentioning the Addendum that is in their possession. Such action can only be called "false and misleading" in my book. (AFAIK, the Addendum has not yet been published by the journal.) One of the main arguments for having "faith" in the scientific method is that it has accepted proceedures that make it "self correcting". If you allow the process to become corrupted, then the argument no longer holds. It doesn't matter who was right, Douglass or Santer, let both sides publish in the normal way and let the readers decide. It was the attempt to deny the right of reply that was wrong to me. I don't know if the US has it, but down here in a court case hiding evidence, collusion on arguments, improper divulgence of information, etc bring you up on charges of "Attempting to pervert the course of Justice". I see "Attempting to pervert the due process of science" as only slightly less heinous. Maybe the world outside academia works differently, but if an editor/publisher was passing one companies information to that company's competitors, there would be a Securities Commission investigation and prima facie on the emails that show improper collusion, there would be jail time involved for all concerned. That business should have a higher ethical standard than science is just wrong.

Full canvas to the Royals, we'll make the Horn by Midnight.

They're right. This is the "silly season"

So, out of curiousity, how many journal editors do you feel you can "lean on"? Are you suggesting that it's alright for certain persons to circumvent the usual process of scientific debate because they think they're right? I'll freely admit that there is a difference in perception here. I'm not from science, I'm from business. I hold science to a higher standard than I do my business competitors and I'm deeply disappointed when a science fails to meet even those standards. A business that followed the data retention standards that are accepted by some for climate science would find it's CEO in jail or facing heavy fines. It is even more disappointing when a science itself does not keep to it's much espoused principles. How many times have we told people that replicability is the basis of good science? How many times have we told people in pseudoscience to produce data? How many calls to "Show us the maths" have there been? My point is that CRU fails to meet any of these requirements. To the extent of persons there actively obstructing attempts to get the data. Sorry for the rant, but it really bugs me that some aspects of climate science have such low standards that it couldn't get itself out of the "pseudoscience" forum here. It shouldn't be that way.

Sorry, my mistake.

@iNow Sorry, I don't see the connection here. Is it okay for Santer etc to do it because someone else has? My point was that the emails were not "taken out of context" at all. They demonstrate a concerted willingness to circumvent the usual peer review process. I find this serious. It's the intent that counts. On tree rings. Could you confirm I've got your thinking right? 1. Tree rings match to temps well for more than half of the calibration period. 2. Post 1960, an unknown influence caused them to diverge from the temp record. 3. These unknown factors might have influenced the earlier record. 4. When tree rings reconstructions are compared to other proxy reconstructions they roughly agree. Conclusion: Since the reconstructions roughly agree, it is reasonable to say that the unknown factors (post 1960) are not active in earlier times. Is that roughly it? To add. Actually it's the "team" that are shown to be constantly violating protocols.

We pagans don't discriminate, he can come to the party too.

Cool. I've been following DR. Spencer work on cloud variability forcing/feedback and find it interesting. The pdf of his presentation to the fall AGU meeting is here. The work is interesting and his simple model does explain satellite data, something which the more complex models don't seem to do. I don't know if his comments that all IPCC models use clouds as a positive feedback is correct. Do you have any idea on this claim? Didn't you say that you had done some work in this area? I'd like your opinion.

You might like to read this article at American Thinker. It shows the sequence of emails concerning 2 papers, one from Douglass and Christy and one from Santer et al (the Santer 17). Taken out of context, my arse. The emails clearly state that the intent was to avoid Douglass et al having the "last word", regardless of usual process. The actions of the IJC editor also shown to be far less than ethical. (But since one of "the team" was on the board, possibly understandable.) How many published authors here think they have the ability to "lean on" the Editor of a journal like the IJC? BTW, have you watched the MIT debate? Interesting.

Happy Solstice to all. (We burned our Yule log 6 months ago.)

blackhole, you can't argue with that sort of idiot and it is a waste of time trying. I'm familiar with Parker 2005. There are later papers that refute the extremely low value for the UHI and if your opponent had any valid points he might have referenced them. His complaint is political rather than scientific and should be understood on that level. The point you should consider is that his political complaint is quite valid. A recent Telegraph article lists many of Dr. Pachauris commercial connections. There is often much made of "big oil" funding sceptics (I've never got a cent, so if the cheques are rolling, send me one:D) yet very little concern about funding the other way. This bothers me. The head of the IPCC is also head of an organisation that is funded by TATA, his policy recommendations as head of the IPCC will make TATA an awful lot of money. Are we sceptics the only ones who can say "conflict of interest"? The simple fact is that any complaint that sceptics were "getting paid" is now invalid re the IPCC because it is quite obvious that the IPCC is also "getting paid". (Certainly the IPCC Chairman is, but as the linked article points out, we can't find out exactly how well.) The above doesn't change any of the scientific arguments, but it does cast a very big shadow over any policy or political statements that the IPCC puts out. Exxon/Mobol may have funded sceptic think tanks etc to the tune of some $60 million (or however much) over the last 10 years, but that is nothing compared to the 1.5B Euros or so that TATA expects in the next 5. In politics, follow the money.

I have to challenge this. It was shown in this thread http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?t=39659 that not only do a number of Universal systems provide better health outcomes than the US system, they do so for far less money than you are currently spending. (Shamelessly quoting myself) Nationmaster has some figures for spending per capita as of 2002. US: 4,271 Denmark: 2,785 Sweden: 2,145 Austria: 2,121 Australia: 1,714 United Kingdom: 1,675 As to "Unconstitutionality". How anybody could possibly argue that reasonably priced access to healthcare for all citizens would not "Promote the general welfare" of those citizens is absolutely beyond me.

So where has the energy gone? The models certainly don't answer that question. You would also have to agree that if there is no way to measure the internal changes in the energy budget then there is also no way to check whether the models accurately reflect those changes? A model might get the right answer, but is it for the right reasons? It would seem that at least internally, there is no way to check. bascule. If it seemed like I was having a go at Trenberth, I didn't mean to give that notion. My reading of the email is that a researcher was complaining of a lack of measurment data, without which his science was put in a bad position for checking assumptions. A very valid complaint. A question for you both. Since most current models do not show where the energy has gone, if there was one that did, would it not be worth careful consideration?

Interesting paper. It says "submitted", do you know if it was accepted? (Not nit picking, I was just wondering) I'll have to give it a really good read. A few of points come to mind. 1) The paper is referring to the Arctic SST anomaly, when the warming was worldwide. (Look at the GISS graphs.) How does this explain the warmth of the 1930-1940 period in the US? 2) What do you make of Figure 3A? It shows sea ice declining from 1950- 1985 and then rising again? If correct, then the post 2000 reductions have yet to get as low as the 1960s. This doesn't seem right to me. Thoughts? 3) The mechanism outlined is interesting and does agree with comments made about the record 2007 sea ice loss. (As in that unusual wind patterns were the cause.) 4) The paper notes. (Emphasis mine.) Which is one of my concerns re the infallibility of models. It's nice to know that it's not just me. Blackhole. There are extremists on both sides of the debate. On the "sceptic" side there are those like you've encountered, on the "alarmist" side there are those who believe sea level will rise 100 ft by 2100. The trick is to not lump everybody together. In a similar way, just because someone believes in a higher power does not mean that they are a creationist, yet they are often treated as such. BTW, who is "this guy" you speak of?

Guys, I'm really, really sorry. I thought for a while you had a chance. It makes me think that "Big Oil" and "Big Coal" who are supposedly obstructing the AGW thing are mere beginners when compared to the "Health Insurance" lobby in the US. Right now would be a good time for "the people" to be asking very hard questions of their Senators. Edit to add. Anyone who is active in the Democrat party should be particularly upset over all this. It's handing the next election to the Republicans who can run with the slogan "Even when they control the Upper House, the Lower House and the Presidency, the Democrats can't do squat!" I would add that such activities as practiced by Congressman Billy Tauzin would lead to a full scale investigation down here, with probable charges. We have prosecuted before and had Ministerial decisions overturned (with the Minister convicted). Joining a lobby automatically means that any decision regarding that lobbies industry is investigated.

So, um, where has the energy gone? This is the point. The GCMs don't show it. For example (and just as a suggestion). The recent hiatus could be due to increased temps and WV forming more clouds and reflecting more incoming radiation. I think that this is what Trenberth was saying. If such a negative feedback existed and was messing up the budget, we have no way of detecting it. AFAIK such a negative feedback is not included in the workings of models (from my readings, there seem to be very few negative feedbacks considered at all) so better detection would be of great value in improving those models. (If such a feedback existed of course, but better detection would be a plus in it's own right.) A bit hard to do when we get averaged output from ensemble runs, wouldn't you say? That's what Douglass tried (although it was a poor paper) and was roundly castigated for looking at the "mean" rather than the "spread".

Blackhole, AFAIK, nobody disputes the world has warmed. Nobody in their right mind would dispute that this in general has been a good thing. (If it hadn't warmed over the last 100 years we would still be in the "Little Ice Age" and I presume that nobody would consider this "good".) The debate is not so much "Has the Earth warmed?" but rather "Has the Earth warmed unusually?" and if so, "How much is attributable to man?" Number 1 is why paleoclimate reconstructions come in for such a hammering, as they are the only method we have to compare modern climate changes with those in the past. Without such comparisons, how can say what is or is not "unusual"? Temp rise from 1900-1940 is generally thought to have been "natural", yet is on a par with the 1970-2000 period. Was 1900-1940 "unusual" as well? Number 2 deals with attribution. How big is the "A" in "AGW"? This is another area where debate occurs.

Right, now I'm depressed. I'm too old for the "sexting" thing and I never got any of those polaroids that people mentioned. I've had a deprived life!

I've read the revised paper and I must admit I'm not so sure that the situation is any better. Figure 2 of the UCAR paper shows the energy budget, something I think we've all seen before in one form or another. Put bluntly, isn't he arguing that due to a lack of data we can't actually confirm the transfers within the system? More to the point, we can't measure the transfers in the budget at all. If we could, we would be able to see which one(s) had changed and therefore know where the energy had gone? So we have 341W/m-2 coming in and 341 W/m-2 going out (in a balanced system) but no way measuring what is actually happening inside the system. We can't measure or prove a single value in the internal workings of the budget. If this is the case then he's right, it is a travesty. While it doesn't impact the GW debate that much, it does show where some money should be spent. I also note that he mentions Dr. Spencers idea that a 1% change in cloud cover can roughly account for recent warming.

A world government? Oh goody. Being democratic this would of course mean that India and China would control roughly 1/3 of the votes. I take it you don't see a problem with this outcome? iNow. I see what you're getting at in post #130. I hadn't thought of it in that way and will have to consider the implications. (And possibly my position on this.) As an aside, you are aware that Dr. Mann has stated that no reputable climate scientist would graft the instrumental record onto a proxy reconstruction? Regarding DeepClimates allegations I would suggest that DC is incorrect. SteveM (I believe rightly) inferred that the discussion was Briffas decline in the late 20th C. Simply because the reply email from Michael Mann says so. http://eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=136&filename=938018124.txt That the reply to the earlier emails speaks of the Briffa decline would surely imply that it was indeed the topic of discussion. So DC hasn't caught SteveM lying at all. There is one question that hasn't been asked in all this. (Or at least I haven't seen it asked) Keith Briffa says in one email; http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=138&filename=938031546.txt I'd really, really like to know who or where this "pressure" was coming from. It comes across that rather than dispassionate science, someone wanted a predetermined picture presented. I also note that having d/loaded the full FOI2009 file there are a number of documents that that back up (to a degree) Wegmans concern about co-authors reviewing each others papers. While such occurrences are not neccessarily pernicious, they do undermine the concept of "independent" review and would perhaps tend to encourage "groupthink".

I keep an old machine that boots 98SE/XP just to play one of the older ones. "European Air War" with all the user mods is still an awesome game to play. Flyable planes is now around 300 types and user campaigns are from all over the planet. Spanish Civil War, Malta, New Guinea, Russia. There's something about the game that gives it an amazing immersive quality. (And it's hard to describe the feeling of going up with your Squadron of Hurricanes intercepting 100+ bogies. The sky is just full of planes and tracer everywhere.)