A friend asked me how I was going to feel when I discovered that anthropogenic climate change (ACC) was not real, when science was proved wrong. Continue reading The myth of global cooling
|
|||||
|
Everything living depends on ecology. The planet’s hydrologic cycles provide the water that we use for agriculture and industry. Everything you’ve eaten today depended upon soil ecologies, the carbon cycle–driven largely by photosynthesis, insects, and countless other ecosystem processes. Consider, for example, the things made of wood around you right now. Continue reading Ecology and Economics: Betting against science Oceans are acidifying, due to an increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, (for details see this site by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)). We can see this right now from multiple studies. This does not mean that the oceans are actually becoming acidic (which would mean that pH had fallen below 7), but rather that they are becoming less alkaline, moving from a pH of 8.2 to 8.1. Doesn’t sound like much, but it’s huge if you are an ocean dwelling creature. Continue reading Bye, Bye Sponge Bob: Ocean Acidification Alas, the Alaotra grebe has gone extinct. Scientists (including me) have not seen extinctions on this scale since the dinosaurs disappeared at the end of the Cretaceous. It joins a rather heartbreaking list. Here is a list of some bird extinctions since about 1500. Continue reading Goodbye Alaotra grebe, it was nice knowing you BYU’s own Jack Sites has for over thirty years documented the decline of lizards due to climate change. Check out the recent paper he coauthored in Science and the write-up and video at BYU. Another example in the overwhelming landslide of peer reviewed published papers documenting worldwide ecological collapse due to anthropogenic induced planetary . . . → Read More: BYU herpetologist documents declining lizard populations due to climate change I just returned from the MS4 conference. It is the fourth year that a group of philosophers of science have gathered to try to tease apart the implications of computer simulation in science. My interest in computer simulation is in its uses in ecology (see the abstract for my paper if you are interested), but for me, some of the most captivating work of this kind is being done on climate models, in which simulation is used to try to sort out the implications of our warming planet. Philosophers try to pick out what science is doing, it examines its assumptions and attempts to cut the lines of demarcation between what is good and bad science. Science studies the world, philosophers study the science. Sort of like judicial review in laws (don’t take this too far, scientists hardly ever pay attention to what philosophers are saying). Continue reading The models of climate change
My earliest memory of a river is the one behind Bobby Rorey’s house. At the bottom of his large sloping backyard, a brown river rolled slowly through this suburban neighborhood. It was about a stone’s throw across (one of mine mind you) and I do not remember ever swimming in it, although I do remember wading through riffle areas–places where the river turned shallow and ripples danced lightly over buried stones. Along its banks we would play, following paths possibly made by deer, although we did not know that then, or more likely made by adventurous children following the meanders through the neighborhoods and surrounding farmlands. This river seems to be one that appears in my dreams at night at times, and to be honest I’m not sure if some of my memories are not in fact dreams of this place. I remember going down the river further than we had ever gone and watching a giant bull through a fence, but there is a dreamlike quality to the memory that brings into question if it is the memory of an event or the memory of a dream. Continue reading Significance of Rivers It was in fifth grade that I decided to become a scientist. The inspiration came not because I actually new what a scientist did, but through a book. Before I had read this revelatory text, my impression of what scientists did came from the movies. They had four standard attributes that would allow anyone to recognize one at a glance: (1) a muffed and wild hair style, Continue reading My Scientific Hero I thought I would give you a sense of my work in science to give a better context for what I do for a living. Plus since it involves both evolution and climate change it gives me a chance to promote two of my favorite topics and the focus of this blog! So what do I do? I study tsetse flies. Here is a picture:  http://www.dkimages.com/discover/previews/887/20001636.JPG Continue reading Tsetse flies: Why evolution and climate change matter |
|||||
|
Copyright © 2010 The Mormon Organon - All Rights Reserved |
|||||
