[OT] - Web pages unstable after conditional comments added
Chris Beall
Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
Last source code change: addition of IE conditional comments. 12 hours
have elapsed since this change.
Structure:
The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
style="display: table">. Each is then individually styled as "display:
table-cell". The two should therefore appear side-by-side, like cells
on the same row of a table. And they did, reliably.
BUT, because IE6 & 7 don't understand 'display: table' conditional
comments were added to, for those browsers only, generate an HTML table
instead of using the table-styled <div>s. That works, producing nearly
the same appearance.
BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable. It
works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not always,
corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
A local copy of the "About" page, saved from FF2 with File -> Save as ->
web page complete, never fails.
Suggestions?
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>
> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
In order for normal good browsers not to see and be affected by typing
in your document, it is usual to make the typing seem to be a comment:
<!-- type away ... -->
In other words, have "<!--" at the beginning and "-->" at the end.
--
dorayme
Chris Beall
them are, but the other half are actually unrecognized HTML tags, which
a browser will ignore (except IE, which will look inside them for its
own special syntax and, depending on the results of the conditional
expression found there, include or exclude the element content).
Information on IE conditional comments is at
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512(VS.85).aspx
and information on what browsers should do with unrecognized tags is at
http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/appendix/notes.html#h-B.1, which says, in
part, "If a user agent encounters an element it does not recognize, it
should try to render the element's content." This is only a
recommendation, but it appears that Firefox works this way, because a
'view source' shows from the color highlighting that FF rejects the
undefined tags, recognizes the content between them as something it will
render, and skips over the comments. So FF understands what it should
do. And gets it right 80-90% of the time.
My first suspicion was some sort of rounding error (varying with every
page load???) that sometimes makes FF think the text doesn't quite fit
and therefore the blocks should stack, but the banner block is display:
table-cell, so that block should NEVER stack with its (also display:
table-cell) sibling, but should either compress by reflowing the text,
or force horizontal scrolling if it can compress no further.
And, of course, if you provide identical input to a computer, you might
reasonably expect identical output, every time, unless you've requested
a randomizing function.
So I'm still mystified.
It is possible that the conditional comments are a red herring. That's
the last change I made, but it's possible some earlier change created
this symptom and it just went unnoticed, as it happens only now and then.
Chris Beall
John Dunlop
> Yes, but these are not really comments. Well, actually, half of the
> them are, but the other half are actually unrecognized HTML tags, which
> a browser will ignore
"[citation needed]"
> (except IE, which will look inside them for its own special syntax and,
> depending on the results of the conditional expression found there,
> include or exclude the element content).
>
> Information on IE conditional comments is at
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512(VS.85).aspx
What Microsoft calls "downlevel-revealed conditional comments" are neither
comments nor tags: <! and [ start a marked section; the rest is garbage.
> And, of course, if you provide identical input to a computer, you might
> reasonably expect identical output, every time, unless you've requested
> a randomizing function.
Garbage in, garbage out.
> So I'm still mystified.
Someone who edited Wikipedia RTFM more closely than Microsoft did.
--
John
Chris Beall
> Chris Beall:
>
>> Yes, but these are not really comments. Well, actually, half of the
>> them are, but the other half are actually unrecognized HTML tags, which
>> a browser will ignore
>
> "[citation needed]"
Um, I provided the citation, for what it's worth (not a lot), but you
seem to have snipped it without notation.
>
>> (except IE, which will look inside them for its own special syntax and,
>> depending on the results of the conditional expression found there,
>> include or exclude the element content).
>>
>> Information on IE conditional comments is at
>> http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537512(VS.85).aspx
>
> What Microsoft calls "downlevel-revealed conditional comments" are neither
> comments nor tags: <! and [ start a marked section; the rest is garbage.
OK, got it. Part of SGML and not recommended within HTML documents
(http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/appendix/notes.html#sgmlfeatures) because
of poor browser support (at the time HTML 4 came out). Clearly not
standard, nor is the contents, but it is what it is.
>
>> And, of course, if you provide identical input to a computer, you might
>> reasonably expect identical output, every time, unless you've requested
>> a randomizing function.
>
> Garbage in, garbage out.
Firefox seems to understand it, unless the parser for the rendering
engine is different from the parser for the View Source function.
>
>> So I'm still mystified.
>
> Someone who edited Wikipedia RTFM more closely than Microsoft did.
>
Indeed. And added some useful tricks to alter the syntax so that it
still works (for IE), yet is syntactically valid for everyone else. So
I changed <![if gt IE 7]> to <!--[if gt IE 7]><!--> etc. And ran the
page through the validator with no errors (I only checked the Home page,
but the code is common to all).
Thanks for that pointer, as following it should eliminate any further
discussion of the irregular syntax of the conditional comments, which
now are valid HTML comments.
And the symptom is still present (though perhaps reduced in frequency; I
haven't kept statistics).
Suggestions?
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > In article <heh41t$iq3$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> >
> >> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
> >>
> >> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
> >
> > In order for normal good browsers not to see and be affected by typing
> > in your document, it is usual to make the typing seem to be a comment:
> >
> > <!-- type away ... -->
> >
> > In other words, have "<!--" at the beginning and "-->" at the end.
> >
> Yes, but these are not really comments.
OK, I rushed, you are using what they call "Downlevel-revealed
Conditional Comments"! My quick thought was simply that since your page
is invalid on your doctype, see <http://validator.w3.org/>, that you
cannot completely rely on it.
I am not seeing the layout changes you are mentioning in my FF 3.5 (Mac).
Might have time for another look later... Bootnic is the man on this one.
--
dorayme
Chris Beall
>
> BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable. It
> works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
> stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not always,
> corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
>
> A local copy of the "About" page, saved from FF2 with File -> Save as ->
> web page complete, never fails.
>
> Suggestions?
>
> Chris Beall
Fails on FF 3.5.5 on Win XP, also FF 2.0.0.20 on Win 98SE.
The best way I've found to induce a failure is to just click down the
navigation list at top left, then reverse direction and work your way up
the list. Failure rate is about 1 in 20.
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
I notice your site now validates.
<http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200511/valid_downlevelrevealed_con
ditional_comments/>
I would be wary of all this heavy use of conditionals and would always
prefer designing so as to minimise the need. I think we have discussed
your site and layout questions previously.
I was slightly amused to read at the MS URL you gave:
"
The following snippet shows a typical downlevel-revealed conditional
comment.
<![if lt IE 8]>
<p>Please upgrade to Internet Explorer version 8.</p>
<![endif]>
"
In a non-IE browser? Talk about MS Confidence! <g>
--
dorayme
John Dunlop
> And the symptom is still present (though perhaps reduced in frequency; I
> haven't kept statistics).
I tried reloading it several times after you validated it, but I didn't
see the symptoms (Firefox 3.5.5 on a Mac).
> Suggestions?
You might try getting rid of the comments altogether and floating the logo
to the left.
--
John
Andy Dingley
> URL:http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
* Don't use conditional comments.
* Don't use display: table; - use <table> instead.
If your content merits using a "grid layout", then the HTML+CSS way to
do this is with a <table> element. If it doesn't warrant a grid, then
hiding this by just using CSS' display: table; is no excuse.
CSS' table properties were added in a well-intentioned but doomed
attempt to use CSS as a presentation language for XML. They were never
intended for HTML use, other than being bound by default to <table>.
As a result, browser support for this is problematic.
In theory, in a fluffy abstract and orthogonal standards-based world,
then any CSS property value could be applied to any element for which
it was permitted, not just those for which it is supported and works
correctly. But that's not the world we have to work in.
It's _sometimes_ (but rarely) worth arguing with a browser. It used to
be an important task, as there was no other way to get things done.
It's less important now as most stuff does simply work as intended.
Where there's a good alternative (using <table>) and there's so little
to gain otherwise, it's just not worth it.
David Stone
John Dunlop <jo...@dunlop.name> wrote:
> Chris Beall:
>
> > And the symptom is still present (though perhaps reduced in frequency; I
> > haven't kept statistics).
>
> I tried reloading it several times after you validated it, but I didn't
> see the symptoms (Firefox 3.5.5 on a Mac).
Same browser/system here, same lack of symptoms - even with dramatic
window resizing between reloads.
> > Suggestions?
>
> You might try getting rid of the comments altogether and floating the logo
> to the left.
I'm wondering if it's something to do with your system,
rather than a specific html/browser issue - have you tried
using a physically different computer?
Has anyone reproduced the problem with a Windows/FF combination?
Chris Beall
> In article <pan.2009.11.25....@john.dunlop.name>,
> John Dunlop <jo...@dunlop.name> wrote:
>
> I'm wondering if it's something to do with your system,
> rather than a specific html/browser issue - have you tried
> using a physically different computer?
Yes. One old system with W98SE and FF2. One newer system with XP and
FF 3.5. Similar failure.
Both systems are served by the same cable modem (Roadrunner).
>
> Has anyone reproduced the problem with a Windows/FF combination?
Good question. Maybe it's something in the water... :-)
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
There are many alternatives to the current design, however all of those
I tried did not meet the requirements I set for myself (which are
already cut back from what I wanted in the first place...sigh).
If the logo is floated left and the banner text is NOT floated, then the
border around the text extends under the logo. The logo hides that
portion of the border, so the user sees a border that is open at its
left end. This also aligns the two blocks at their tops, rather than at
their midpoints.
If both sections are floated, when the window is narrowed the banner
stacks under the logo, then, as the width is further reduced,
compresses. This is the opposite of what I'm trying to achieve: as the
window is reduced, the banner compresses; when it can compress no more,
it stacks under the logo.
The current design works in IE6, IE7, IE8, FF2, FF3, Opera10 and
probably all other current browsers. Except now and then in FF.
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
> On 24 Nov, 17:09, Chris Beall <Chris_Be...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>> URL:http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>
> * Don't use conditional comments.
I would prefer not to. I would prefer to code to standards and not
worry about individual browsers.
>
> * Don't use display: table; - use <table> instead.
I would prefer not to. I like the concept of semantic HTML. There is
no semantic link between the logo and the banner.
>
>
> If your content merits using a "grid layout", then the HTML+CSS way to
> do this is with a <table> element. If it doesn't warrant a grid, then
> hiding this by just using CSS' display: table; is no excuse.
No it is not an excuse. It is a way to prevent audio UAs from
presenting the data as tabular when it clearly is not.
Some day, perhaps, we will have grid positioning
(http://www.w3.org/TR/2007/WD-css3-grid-20070905/), but I'm not holding
my breath.
>
> CSS' table properties were added in a well-intentioned but doomed
> attempt to use CSS as a presentation language for XML. They were never
> intended for HTML use, other than being bound by default to <table>.
> As a result, browser support for this is problematic.
>
> In theory, in a fluffy abstract and orthogonal standards-based world,
Yes, that's the world I'm looking for. Especially the fluffy part. :-)
> then any CSS property value could be applied to any element for which
> it was permitted, not just those for which it is supported and works
> correctly. But that's not the world we have to work in.
>
> It's _sometimes_ (but rarely) worth arguing with a browser.
In this case I think it may be worthwhile. A failure that remains
uncorrected from FF 2.0.0.20 through 3.5 (if that should prove to be the
case), is worth fixing, particularly if it results in other obscure and
intermittent symptoms. I agree that most folks would ignore or
circumvent it and move on.
It used to
> be an important task, as there was no other way to get things done.
> It's less important now as most stuff does simply work as intended.
> Where there's a good alternative (using <table>) and there's so little
> to gain otherwise, it's just not worth it.
I almost skipped the conditional comments, even though the design failed
on IE6, but I felt I couldn't ignore IE7, which had the same deficiency.
Fortunately, no one is paying me for doing this, so I can afford to
pursue my own muse.
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>
> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
>
Can anyone come up with an explanation as to how such an intermittent
failure would occur?
The only one I can come up with is related to the running of parallel
threads in the rendering engine which have data dependencies on one
another. Subtle changes to the arrival times of the various files
coming in from the internet (the HTML, the CSS, and the logo image),
could alter the timing relationship between these parallel paths,
sometimes exposing these data dependencies, ex: Path B assumes an item
of data is valid, but Path A has not yet completed computing that value.
This would make reproducing the problem difficult, especially with a
local copy that eliminates the transmission latencies.
Any other ideas on nailing this down?
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> John Dunlop wrote:
> > Chris Beall:
> >
> >> And the symptom is still present (though perhaps reduced in frequency; I
> >> haven't kept statistics).
> >
> > I tried reloading it several times after you validated it, but I didn't
> > see the symptoms (Firefox 3.5.5 on a Mac).
> >
> >> Suggestions?
> >
> > You might try getting rid of the comments altogether and floating the logo
> > to the left.
> >
>
> There are many alternatives to the current design, however all of those
> I tried did not meet the requirements I set for myself (which are
> already cut back from what I wanted in the first place...sigh).
>
Consider a few of these requirements to help the users:
* If the images are not there, especially the logo, the better
alternative is not to bother the user with that it is a logo ("ULA
logo") but simply to announce "Ulster Literacy Association". This is the
text *alt*ternative. Also it is the better thing to do on your pages
because it is the only announcement visible (sans scrolling) about your
site in some situations.
* Better not to foist the home page that looks like the below URLs on
some of your users by insisting on the huge fixed footer that grows.
<http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/ulsterlit1.png>
<http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/ulsterlit2.png>
* If all the CSS is turned off, before the least real thing is known
about the site, there is the invitation to come to your house. "meet the
people who make it all work!" Make what work? Best to know something
about someone before accepting such an invitation. One can get into
tricky situations otherwise. <g> I mention these things because you show
an interest in some of your remarks in semantics and accessibility.
> If the logo is floated left and the banner text is NOT floated, then the
> border around the text extends under the logo. The logo hides that
> portion of the border, so the user sees a border that is open at its
> left end. This also aligns the two blocks at their tops, rather than at
> their midpoints.
>
> If both sections are floated, when the window is narrowed the banner
> stacks under the logo, then, as the width is further reduced,
> compresses. This is the opposite of what I'm trying to achieve: as the
> window is reduced, the banner compresses; when it can compress no more,
> it stacks under the logo.
>
Consider simplifying altogether. If you must have the announcement in
the header, consider something along the lines of
<div class="header">
<a href="index.html"><img class="logo" src="ULALogo.gif" alt="Ulster
Literacy Association" title="Home" height="120" width="192"></a>
<p class="importantAnnouncementSomehowDeservingToBeInTheHeader">
Come to our Holiday Open House and see our new offices at 480 Aaron
Court on December 15th from 1:00 p.m. until 4:00 p.m. We're in
Willowbrook Park, off the access road to the Hannaford end of Kingston
Plaza. See our new offices, nibble snacks, meet the people who make it
all work!
</p>
</div>
<ul class="nav">
<li class="current">Home</li>
<li><a href="challenge.html">The challenge</a></li
<li><a href="teach.html">...</a></li>
</ul>
with
.header {min-width: 600px;}
.logo {float: left;border: 0;}
.importantAnnouncementSomehowDeservingToBeInTheHeader {margin-left:
200px; margin-right: 30px; border: 2px solid; padding: 5px;}
.nav {clear: left;}
> The current design works in IE6, IE7, IE8, FF2, FF3, Opera10 and
> probably all other current browsers. Except now and then in FF.
>
> Chris Beall
--
dorayme
Chris Beall
> In article <hejhur$qv5$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>>>
>> There are many alternatives to the current design, however all of those
>> I tried did not meet the requirements I set for myself (which are
>> already cut back from what I wanted in the first place...sigh).
>>
>
> Consider a few of these requirements to help the users:
>
> * If the images are not there, especially the logo, the better
> alternative is not to bother the user with that it is a logo ("ULA
> logo") but simply to announce "Ulster Literacy Association". This is the
> text *alt*ternative. Also it is the better thing to do on your pages
> because it is the only announcement visible (sans scrolling) about your
> site in some situations.
Good point. Done.
>
> * Better not to foist the home page that looks like the below URLs on
> some of your users by insisting on the huge fixed footer that grows.
>
> <http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/ulsterlit1.png>
> <http://dorayme.890m.com/justPics/ulsterlit2.png>
I've stolen your pics to use as examples at the political meeting where
this will be decided. I also expect to have a live demo so I can show
people why this was a Bad Idea (as I think we all agreed over at
alt.html.critique).
>
> * If all the CSS is turned off, before the least real thing is known
> about the site, there is the invitation to come to your house. "meet the
> people who make it all work!" Make what work? Best to know something
> about someone before accepting such an invitation. One can get into
> tricky situations otherwise. <g> I mention these things because you show
> an interest in some of your remarks in semantics and accessibility.
Did you miss the part about "nibble snacks"? Where are your
priorities?! :-)
The location of the banner was a specific client request. The content
on the home page will change (changeable by the client...) and they seem
to want it so as to provide a current news bulletin. I haven't looked
specifically at accessibility yet; perhaps an invisible link to main
content at the very top. What's the current bible on accessibility
design? [I don't think the client is very hot about this, so whatever I
do will be for my own benefit.]
OK, I tried this. Looks pretty good, although it misses one of my (not
previously conveyed here) criteria, which is that the image and banner
should be vertically centered on one another. Also, the text border
always extends to the right margin, even if the text is shorter than one
line. (My ideal solution would CENTER the text and its border within
the available space in such a case, but I haven't achieved that and it
probably won't happen often.)
I would leave the min-width off, or set it in em units to the width of
the longest expected word, but since the content is dynamically
client-provided I'd probably just leave it off. This causes a
content-overflows-border issue at extreme narrow widths, but I can't get
excited about that.
(snip)
Thanks for contributing.
See another post for the current status of the original problem.
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>
> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
>
> Last source code change: addition of IE conditional comments. 12 hours
> have elapsed since this change.
>
> Structure:
> The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
> style="display: table">. Each is then individually styled as "display:
> table-cell". The two should therefore appear side-by-side, like cells
> on the same row of a table.
<snip red-herring about conditional comments)
>
> BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable. It
> works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
> stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not always,
> corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
>
> A local copy of the "About" page, saved from FF2 with File -> Save as ->
> web page complete, never fails.
Reduced demo at http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/learntest.html
Click the only link, then alternate back and forth between the two
pages. Failure rate varies dramatically, from every 4th page load to 1
in 20 or so.
I am continuing to try to reduce the test case. Note that there is a
position: fixed footer on these pages, but it now contains only an empty
<div>, so all you can see of it is a 5px top border against the bottom
of the window.
I'm on Windows. Mac users haven't been able to reproduce the problem.
Can anyone else see the symptom?
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> Chris Beall wrote:
> > URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
> >
> > Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
> >
...
> > Structure:
> > The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
> > style="display: table">.
Just by the way, I recall once in some thread I offered as some sort of
solution to some problem:
<http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/verticalCentringTableCSS.html>
I mention this only out of interest in that I had no 'display: table' on
the parent. Perhaps someone might like to comment on the need for it and
when...
Plus, you might try this omission and see if your phenomenon still
occurs!
> Each is then individually styled as "display:
> > table-cell". The two should therefore appear side-by-side, like cells
> > on the same row of a table.
>
...
> > BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable. It
> > works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
> > stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not always,
> > corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
> >
...
>
> Reduced demo at http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/learntest.html
> Click the only link, then alternate back and forth between the two
> pages. Failure rate varies dramatically, from every 4th page load to 1
> in 20 or so.
As I have mentioned and as you mention, no 'effect' on Mac (I did test
your above URL, 1,523,437 times, I have a method of becoming robotic but
I cannot reveal it)
But I am reminded of a possible bug in FF. When the browser window is
reduced, the horizontal scroll bar fails to come up and the banner is
simply cut off (the text does not wrap where it clearly can and the
right side of the bordered box is presumably somewhere over there --->
in logical space, sort of counterfactually, sort of quiverlingly
potentially...
--
dorayme
David Stone
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
Well, it could be in the 'tubes' if its only YOUR Win/FF combinations
that exhibit the problem. Unless, of course, you have some sort of
exotic plug-in or extension in all your copies of FF that is actually
the cause? From a "having had to debug odd intermittent application
failures before' perspective, this looks very much like a memory leak
in _something_, but the fact that it occurs in both older and newer
versions of FF makes me wonder about other effects. If no-one else
can duplicate the problem on a Windows box, and temporarily removing
all plug-ins/extensions doesn't fix things, it might be worth poking
into your cable modem logs? Or take a trip to the nearest library
or internet cafe and see if you can reproduce the problem yourself?
By the way, one design thing: if the window is narrowed dramatically
(as it would be on a cell-phone, for example), the logo drops down
as the text beside wraps into a taller and taller vertical space.
Eventually, the logo disappears completely, as would any alt text
associated with it.
Someone had suggested floating the logo instead: this would solve
this effect, which looks very odd. Either that, or find some other
way to 'pin' the img to the top-left corner! I'd also consider
scaling the image to take up less room, as it doesn't really need
to be that big, but that's a personal preference.
Andy Dingley
> I would prefer not to. I like the concept of semantic HTML.
Semantics still take third place to making the rendering work (1st)
and acessibility (2nd). We'd like to do semantics, we don't yet get
the luxury of being able to do it everywhere. In particular, the
semantics of a banner are relatively unimportant anyway.
> There is no semantic link between the logo and the banner.
Agreed. This implies there's no justification for grid-formatting
them. They're two box-like elements that need to sit alongside each
other. So use float instead (and for anything float, read
brainjar.com).
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > In article <hejhur$qv5$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
...
>
> The location of the banner was a specific client request. The content
> on the home page will change (changeable by the client...) and they seem
> to want it so as to provide a current news bulletin. I haven't looked
> specifically at accessibility yet; perhaps an invisible link to main
> content at the very top.
You could, I suppose, but I would see to getting the H1 heading higher
on the home page at least and unmistakably there almost for anyone...
Best to be plain and simple. People want to know what the site and page
is about *quickly*. I am not saying yours is so bad in this regard, most
folk would be happy but our job is to try to make nearly everyone
relatively happy.
It is a very difficult moral and technical question. On the morality and
something nicely vague about the calculus, I would at least recommend
reading J.S Mill on Utilitarianism.
> What's the current bible on accessibility
> design? [I don't think the client is very hot about this, so whatever I
> do will be for my own benefit.]
>
Perhaps have a look at
<http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/>
> > Consider simplifying altogether. If you must have the announcement in
> > the header, consider something along the lines of
> >
> > <div class="header">
> > <a href="index.html"><img class="logo" ...
> >
> > with
> >
> > .header {min-width: 600px;}
...
...
>
> OK, I tried this. Looks pretty good, although it misses one of my (not
> previously conveyed here) criteria, which is that the image and banner
> should be vertically centered on one another. Also, the text border
> always extends to the right margin, even if the text is shorter than one
> line. (My ideal solution would CENTER the text and its border within
> the available space in such a case, but I haven't achieved that and it
> probably won't happen often.)
>
There is this business of vertical alignment, I was aware of it! But imo
at least, better to have something solid without having to jump through
hoops to satisfy different browsers and it is not as if *nothing* can be
done to approach the sort of alignment you want for a lot of the viewing
public.
Possibly something along these lines might do? Requires you to prepare a
good sized logo and then em the dimensions (browser down sizing is
usually more acceptable than up sizing):
<http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/bealeStripped.html>
--
dorayme
dorayme
<3896f442-520f-4d3c...@f16g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
Andy Dingley <din...@codesmiths.com> wrote:
>...(and for anything float, read
> brainjar.com).
If you want great technical insight at the risk of falling into the
greyest sleep, sure. But be careful, I have conducted many tests on this
and more people have died in their sleep than from reading the more
exciting and crazy and far less complete and far more rambling
<http://netweaver.com.au/floatHouse/>
Does brainjar have access to an HTML camera? No, it does not. But
dorayme got hold of one. Does brainjar go on and on about what is not?
No, but dorayme does from the very earliest pages. Earthlings love what
does not exist. They love magic tricks, things hidden, and all sorts of
spooky stuff. Does brainjar have the equivalent of Lewis Carrol's cat's
smile sans the cat? No, but dorayme has borders to nothing much at all,
and quite thick ones too. Does brainjar pay anyone for reading their
pages? No, but dorayme has sent out thousands of cheques to countless
numbers of people for even glancing at its pages.
--
dorayme
Andy Dingley
> > What's the current bible on accessibility
> > design? [I don't think the client is very hot about this, so whatever I
> > do will be for my own benefit.]
>
> Perhaps have a look at
>
> <http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/>
Please, no! The W3C / WCAG are the last people to ask for practical
accessibility guidance from.
Try the Joe Clark book (free online copy). Looking a little old now,
but still the best around.
dorayme
<037085a4-ac8f-4de7...@z41g2000yqz.googlegroups.com>,
Andy Dingley <din...@codesmiths.com> wrote:
I never associate bibles with practicality, but rather something to read
and get a serious feeling from. But you are probably right.
--
dorayme
David Stone
dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
I'm still waiting for mine - I take it it's in the mail? ;)
dorayme
David Stone <no.e...@domain.invalid> wrote:
> > ... Does brainjar pay anyone for reading their
> > pages? No, but dorayme has sent out thousands of cheques to countless
> > numbers of people for even glancing at its pages.
>
> I'm still waiting for mine - I take it it's in the mail? ;)
Ah... in that case please send money back... choose a more secure route
like stuffing envelope with cash or direct bank transfer ...
<http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/jokes/beingAndNothingness.html>
<g>
--
dorayme
Josiah Jenkins
<dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>In article <no.email-3F3F79...@news1.chem.utoronto.ca>,
> David Stone <no.e...@domain.invalid> wrote:
>
>> > ... Does brainjar pay anyone for reading their
>> > pages? No, but dorayme has sent out thousands of cheques to countless
>> > numbers of people for even glancing at its pages.
>>
>> I'm still waiting for mine - I take it it's in the mail? ;)
>
>Ah... in that case please send money back... choose a more secure route
>like stuffing envelope with cash or direct bank transfer ...
If I provide my banking details, will you send me some too ?
>
><http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/jokes/beingAndNothingness.html>
dorayme
Josiah Jenkins <josiah-jenkins@somewhere_else.invalid> wrote:
> If I provide my banking details, will you send me some too ?
> >
Yes, please send credit card details, all passwords etc... You won't be
disappointed by the new mean clean look of your accounts.
--
dorayme
Chris Beall
> In article <hekuv6$485$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>> Chris Beall wrote:
>>> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>>>
>>> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
>>>
> ...
>>> Structure:
>>> The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
>>> style="display: table">.
>
> Just by the way, I recall once in some thread I offered as some sort of
> solution to some problem:
>
> <http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/verticalCentringTableCSS.html>
>
> I mention this only out of interest in that I had no 'display: table' on
> the parent. Perhaps someone might like to comment on the need for it and
> when...
I will comment. It should not be necessary, per
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/tables.html#anonymous-boxes rules 1 and 2.
Making it explicit, however, provides documentation of what was
intended, so I'll leave it unchanged.
> Plus, you might try this omission and see if your phenomenon still
> occurs!
A worthwhile experiment. I tried. Nothing changes.
>> Each is then individually styled as "display:
>>> table-cell". The two should therefore appear side-by-side, like cells
>>> on the same row of a table.
> ...
>>> BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable. It
>>> works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
>>> stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not always,
>>> corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
>>>
> ...
>> Reduced demo at http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/learntest.html
>> Click the only link, then alternate back and forth between the two
>> pages. Failure rate varies dramatically, from every 4th page load to 1
>> in 20 or so.
>
> As I have mentioned and as you mention, no 'effect' on Mac (I did test
> your above URL, 1,523,437 times, I have a method of becoming robotic but
> I cannot reveal it)
>
> But I am reminded of a possible bug in FF. When the browser window is
> reduced, the horizontal scroll bar fails to come up and the banner is
> simply cut off (the text does not wrap where it clearly can and the
> right side of the bordered box is presumably somewhere over there --->
> in logical space, sort of counterfactually, sort of quiverlingly
> potentially...
>
Hmm, "quiverlingly potentially" eh? Sounds like a dime novel (which, ue
to inflation, would now be about 5 USD).
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
> Chris Beall wrote:
>> URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>>
>> Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
>>
>> Last source code change: addition of IE conditional comments. 12
>> hours have elapsed since this change.
>>
>> Structure:
>> The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
>> style="display: table">. Each is then individually styled as
>> "display: table-cell". The two should therefore appear side-by-side,
>> like cells on the same row of a table.
>
> <snip red-herring about conditional comments)
>
>>
>> BUT, on FF2 and 3, the side-by-side appearance has become unstable.
>> It works often, but now and then a page is displayed with the banner
>> stacked below the logo. Refreshing the page usually, though not
>> always, corrects this. I can detect no pattern to these failures.
>>
>> A local copy of the "About" page, saved from FF2 with File -> Save as
>> -> web page complete, never fails.
>
> Reduced demo at http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/learntest.html
I've tweaked the demo some. It now fails about 80% of the time on W98SE
+ FF2, less often on Win XP + FF 3.5. To induce failures, the sequence
TAB - ENTER - TAB - ENTER has proven most effective, increasing in speed
until the banner slips under the logo.
Oddly, doing any of the following to this test case reduces the failure
rate to zero or very nearly so:
- Delete the lengthy area of commented-out code below the header.
(Yes, all this does is change comments to nothingness).
- Delete the comments introducing the (not present in the demo) use of
conditional comments and explaining them.
- Delete the links to alternate stylesheets. Note that these are
already commented out...
- Remove all the links to stylesheets and bring the relevant style
onto the page in a <style> section.
All of these changes do not alter the logic of the HTML or CSS. What
they do alter is the TIMING. I believe this supports my hypothesis that
a design error in a multi-threaded implementation has been exposed by
these conditions.
Anyone out there on a Windows system that can run through this test demo
and detect a failure? The older and slower the system, the better chance
you will have.
Chris Beall
dorayme
Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
...
> > But I am reminded of a possible bug in FF. When the browser window is
> > reduced, the horizontal scroll bar fails to come up and the banner is
> > simply cut off (the text does not wrap where it clearly can and the
> > right side of the bordered box is presumably somewhere over there --->
> > in logical space, sort of counterfactually, sort of quiverlingly
> > potentially ...
> >
> Hmm, "quiverlingly potentially" eh? Sounds like a dime novel (which, due
> to inflation, would now be about 5 USD).
>
As much as that? I was planning for a mass market with smaller returns
that still would see me on a beach, no sweat, in The Carribeans ...
--
dorayme
Chris Beall
Perhaps you could do it as a 99 cent download...
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
tried the large left margin to get the paragraph border out from under
the logo. I've marked that for consideration.
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
For others following this thread, the book is (today) at
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
I'll do that. I find the CSS recommendation to be a bit foggy at times;
seeing someone else's interpretation may help.
And I need the sleep anyway. :-)
Chris Beall
Chris Beall
The HTML camera alone is worth the price of admission!
Chris Beall
Ben C
> On 24 Nov, 17:09, Chris Beall <Chris_Be...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>> URL:http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/�(all pages)
>
>
>
>
> do this is with a <table> element. If it doesn't warrant a grid, then
> hiding this by just using CSS' display: table; is no excuse.
>
> attempt to use CSS as a presentation language for XML. They were never
> intended for HTML use, other than being bound by default to <table>.
> As a result, browser support for this is problematic.
I'm not sure that's _why_ browser support for it is problematic. It's
only older versions of IE they don't work in, but nothing much worked in
older versions of IE, and most of what didn't work had nothing to do
with XML.
> In theory, in a fluffy abstract and orthogonal standards-based world,
> then any CSS property value could be applied to any element for which
> it was permitted, not just those for which it is supported and works
> correctly. But that's not the world we have to work in.
Using display: table-cell on a DIV or something is a good way to do
vertical centering.
Ben C
> In article <hekuv6$485$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>> Chris Beall wrote:
>> > URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
>> >
>> > Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
>> >
> ...
>> > Structure:
>> > The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
>> > style="display: table">.
>
> Just by the way, I recall once in some thread I offered as some sort of
> solution to some problem:
>
><http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/verticalCentringTableCSS.html>
>
> I mention this only out of interest in that I had no 'display: table' on
> the parent. Perhaps someone might like to comment on the need for it and
> when...
You only need a display: table parent if you want to style the table.
Otherwise you get one automatically-- it's an "anonymous table box". You
also get an anonymous table row.
Put two table-cells next to each other and they will go in the same row.
You will need to start setting table-row if you want more than one row.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-26, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <hekuv6$485$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > Chris Beall <Chris...@prodigy.net> wrote:
> >
> >> Chris Beall wrote:
> >> > URL: http://ulsterliteracy.org/sandbox/ (all pages)
> >> >
> >> > Symptom: Layout changes intermittently as pages are reloaded.
> >> >
> > ...
> >> > Structure:
> >> > The logo and bordered-banner are within an envelope <div
> >> > style="display: table">.
> >
> > Just by the way, I recall once in some thread I offered as some sort of
> > solution to some problem:
> >
> ><http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/verticalCentringTableCSS.html>
> >
> > I mention this only out of interest in that I had no 'display: table' on
> > the parent. Perhaps someone might like to comment on the need for it and
> > when...
>
> You only need a display: table parent if you want to style the table.
> Otherwise you get one automatically-- it's an "anonymous table box". You
> also get an anonymous table row.
>
OK, are you meaning styling that is particularly exclusive to table
elements? In the above URL, notice I styled the parent div with a dotted
border without display tabling it. But if I had wanted to put borders
around the "cells" but did not want the double border between the two,
then display: table along with border-collapse: collapse on the parent
would be one way to go. But read on.
As it happen, simply putting 'border-collapse: collapse;' or
'border-spacing: 5px;' on the parent *without* display: table, has the
same effect in my browsers as *with*. In the specs border-collapse and
border-spacing are said to apply only to tables (see 17.6) but perhaps
browsers apply it to anonymous table boxes too as an act of charity?
What styles would not work on an anonymous table box without explicit
display tabling? I should experiment harder. But since you are here, I
am lazy. <g>
Do you realise, Ben, we can say anything we like in this thread because
someone went to mark it as OT? JK can say absolutely nothing against it,
nothing! You don't really think the yanks blew up their own towers? <g>
> Put two table-cells next to each other and they will go in the same row.
> You will need to start setting table-row if you want more than one row.
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhh2fpf....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>> > Just by the way, I recall once in some thread I offered as some sort of
>> > solution to some problem:
>> >
>> ><http://dorayme.netweaver.com.au/verticalCentringTableCSS.html>
>> >
>> > I mention this only out of interest in that I had no 'display: table' on
>> > the parent. Perhaps someone might like to comment on the need for it and
>> > when...
>>
>> You only need a display: table parent if you want to style the table.
>> Otherwise you get one automatically-- it's an "anonymous table box". You
>> also get an anonymous table row.
>>
>
> OK, are you meaning styling that is particularly exclusive to table
> elements?
Yes.
> In the above URL, notice I styled the parent div with a dotted
> border without display tabling it.
You were styling the div. Hiding inside the div is the anonymous table,
and inside that, the anonymous table row. But you can't style these
anonymous boxes-- they're too cowardly and have forged email addresses
so there is no way to get hold of them, although they can still inherit
things as you found (read on).
> But if I had wanted to put borders around the "cells" but did not want
> the double border between the two, then display: table along with
> border-collapse: collapse on the parent would be one way to go. But
> read on.
>
> As it happen, simply putting 'border-collapse: collapse;' or
> 'border-spacing: 5px;' on the parent *without* display: table, has the
> same effect in my browsers as *with*. In the specs border-collapse and
> border-spacing are said to apply only to tables (see 17.6) but perhaps
> browsers apply it to anonymous table boxes too as an act of charity?
Border-collapse and border-spacing are both inherited properties, so the
anonymous table box inherits them from its respectable parent (the div).
> What styles would not work on an anonymous table box without explicit
> display tabling?
They can only inherit stuff.
> I should experiment harder. But since you are here, I am lazy. <g>
>
> Do you realise, Ben, we can say anything we like in this thread because
> someone went to mark it as OT? JK can say absolutely nothing against it,
> nothing!
I have been enjoying the excellent biscuits, distinguished company, and
Stockholm syndrome of his killfile for a few weeks now, so have a
new-found sense of freedom anyway. People are still talking about you in
here by the way, mostly good.
> You don't really think the yanks blew up their own towers? <g>
Well, I don't know for sure, but it seems quite likely. Have you ever
tried to demolish a building? It's quite difficult to make it telescope
down neatly like that. You have to place the charges carefully and time
them just right.
While we're at it, I don't believe in global warming either. Never have.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-28, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> > But if I had wanted to put borders around the "cells" but did not want
> > the double border between the two, then display: table along with
> > border-collapse: collapse on the parent would be one way to go. But
> > read on.
> >
> > As it happen, simply putting 'border-collapse: collapse;' or
> > 'border-spacing: 5px;' on the parent *without* display: table, has the
> > same effect in my browsers as *with*. In the specs border-collapse and
> > border-spacing are said to apply only to tables (see 17.6) but perhaps
> > browsers apply it to anonymous table boxes too as an act of charity?
>
> Border-collapse and border-spacing are both inherited properties, so the
> anonymous table box inherits them from its respectable parent (the div).
>
> > What styles would not work on an anonymous table box without explicit
> > display tabling?
>
> They can only inherit stuff.
>
...
Yes, I'm fairly sure I get your meaning about inheritance here with
anonymous elements but I was making the point that 17.6 seems to *rule
out* styling border-collapse on an element that is not an HTML table
element or one that is not at least styled as display: table. So I am
still a bit puzzled. Is this a case of browser error correction or
strictly incorrect implementation of CSS? To put it simply, see 17.6 in
the CSS 2.1 specs and ask yourself how correct it could then be to style
a div (at the point at which it does not yet know it contains cunning
anonymous table boxes) with border-collapse or border-spacing.
> >
> > Do you realise, Ben, we can say anything we like in this thread because
> > someone went to mark it as OT? JK can say absolutely nothing against it,
> > nothing!
>
> I have been enjoying the excellent biscuits, distinguished company, and
> Stockholm syndrome of his killfile for a few weeks now, so have a
> new-found sense of freedom anyway. People are still talking about you in
> here by the way, mostly good.
>
I doubt you are actually in there *seriously*, your crime was simply not
as severe as mine. Yours was based on a misunderstanding caused by a
typo of his (in a context where a certain challenging style made this
more likely even for you, the most gentlemanly of all usenet users of
all time except where Albert the Validator is concerned, and even then
you are not all that ungentlemanly).
Look, it's complicated but I still have some sources in there that
inform me you are not *really* a prisoner but in fact a grudgingly
respected guest. It is a bit like anonymous login, I was official, you
are not. I hope he served you those little Finnish tarts with the cherry
on top. I loved those. I have mentioned the croissants many times. When
I revealed a few secrets to him about how forged my email address
*really* was, he had his maid bring me CRANBERRIES WITH TIANUCHKA-SAUCE:
<http://www.dlc.fi/~marian1/gourmet/13_2.htm>
> > You don't really think the yanks blew up their own towers? <g>
>
> Well, I don't know for sure, but it seems quite likely. Have you ever
> tried to demolish a building? It's quite difficult to make it telescope
> down neatly like that. You have to place the charges carefully and time
> them just right.
>
I have never tried to demolish a building like the tower ones, no, so
cannot say with certainty. But I did read and see quite a lot about it.
It is the Pentagon story that seems to me to have the most holes. But in
general I am very boring, I believe the main public account. And the
reason I do is that it is *a more likely one* than the alternative.
> While we're at it, I don't believe in global warming either. Never have.
This has recently split a major political party in Australia and the
crises is on heat right now. Read any oz newspaper. I do believe,
boringly again.
--
dorayme
Ben C
It just says border-collapse only _applies_ to tables and inline-tables.
But any element can carry the gene as it were, and it will be expressed
in any descendents it has that it does apply to (i.e. those that are
tables or inline-tables).
The computed value is what descendents inherit, and it says there,
"Computed value: as specified".
> Is this a case of browser error correction or strictly incorrect
> implementation of CSS? To put it simply, see 17.6 in the CSS 2.1 specs
> and ask yourself how correct it could then be to style a div (at the
> point at which it does not yet know it contains cunning anonymous
> table boxes) with border-collapse or border-spacing.
It's all quite correct. The div does have border-collapse set on it, it
just has no effect on the rendering of that div. But you should be able
to read the value out with Javascript to see it's there.
9.2.2 confirms that anonymous boxes inherit inheritable properties, and
1.4.2.3 confirms that all elements _have_ all properties, even when they
don't apply.
They have them in the sense they can be read by DOM, and inherited.
Firebug also shows them.
Provided the HTML is valid, everything is correct. CSS puts no
restrictions at all on what you can nest inside what. You can bung a
table-cell into an inline box just like that and it will sort it all out
by making anonymous boxes for you. This isn't error correction, it's
just how CSS works, and is completely defined.
But do that kind of thing in the HTML (i.e. put a TD in a SPAN), and the
browser will error-correct it but in an _undefined_ way, before it gets
as far as CSS. CSS will then be applied to the patched-up
error-corrected DOM tree. I believe this is a sufficiently good mental
model of HTML error correction in the sane browsers.
[...]
>> > You don't really think the yanks blew up their own towers? <g>
>>
>> Well, I don't know for sure, but it seems quite likely. Have you ever
>> tried to demolish a building? It's quite difficult to make it telescope
>> down neatly like that. You have to place the charges carefully and time
>> them just right.
>>
> I have never tried to demolish a building like the tower ones, no, so
> cannot say with certainty.
I don't think just crashing a plane into the top few floors would have
the desired effect.
> But I did read and see quite a lot about it. It is the Pentagon story
> that seems to me to have the most holes. But in general I am very
> boring, I believe the main public account. And the reason I do is that
> it is *a more likely one* than the alternative.
There are various alternatives ranging from they let it happen to they
actually planned it. But to me the strangest thing in need of
explanation is just what physically happened. That theory about fuel
falling down and burning out the steel supports or whatever they said
sounds awfully contrived.
>> While we're at it, I don't believe in global warming either. Never have.
>
> This has recently split a major political party in Australia and the
> crises is on heat right now. Read any oz newspaper. I do believe,
> boringly again.
I came to a skeptical position just by reading the pro-warming websites
and thinking, "is that all you've got?", not by presuming or relying on
the argument that anyone was actually cheating.
It has been fairly widely known for a few years that Michael Mann is a
fraud, but what I didn't know, until I saw the leaked emails which
started the latest crisis, was how centrally involved he still is in it
all, and that he's not the only one.
Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
(and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-29, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> >
> > ... 17.6 seems to *rule
> > out* styling border-collapse on an element that is not an HTML table
> > element or one that is not at least styled as display: table. So I am
> > still a bit puzzled.
>
> It just says border-collapse only _applies_ to tables and inline-tables.
> But any element can carry the gene as it were, and it will be expressed
> in any descendents it has that it does apply to (i.e. those that are
> tables or inline-tables).
>
So border-collapse does not literally "apply to" anything but a table
element (as contrasted, say, with list-style, which applies to elements
with 'display: list-item' or text-decoration which applies to 'all
elements' ...). But when it *really does* apply, what do you see (as a
user) different when there is the border-collapse compared to when there
is not? Compare:
<table style="border-collapse"></table>
with
<table style="bugger-all"></table>
Nothing, it seems. You get the collapse only if there are borders to
collapse and you get these only if there are cells with borders in the
table element. I am starting to like the mysterious nature of "applies"
already. <g>
I like your gene model a lot. I was sort of looking forward to writing
*a very annoying piece* on a model of spooky backwards causation over
the Xmas break, the idea being that the property of (say)
border-collapse *does* apply because the springing into existence of
child table cells or any elements with display table-cell *causes* the
parent (be it a table or any element like a div) to suddenly *but
earlier* (ha!) literally acquire table status. Even in this annoying
model, there is no real contradiction with the idea that inheritance is
at work. The borders on the children still collapse due to inheritance,
the gene doing its causal work. I am just extending it to act backwards
as well - not to backwardly collapse anything but to confer tablehood on
things like divs that were not assigned display: table. This all happens
*very quickly* and the tests you mention below, DOM and Javascript, are
all way after the action, perhaps a CSS camera (which is in development
for me) will be able to detect it in a more visually friendly way?
Remember, JK does say that inheritance is one of the least understood
concepts, so I think it would be a nice Xmas present for me to send him
a leather bound version of a long babbling attempt to show how simple it
all is, providing one imports some barely fathomable notions.
...
> [...]
> >> > You don't really think the yanks blew up their own towers? <g>
> >>
> >> Well, I don't know for sure, but it seems quite likely. Have you ever
> >> tried to demolish a building? It's quite difficult to make it telescope
> >> down neatly like that. You have to place the charges carefully and time
> >> them just right.
> >>
> > I have never tried to demolish a building like the tower ones, no, so
> > cannot say with certainty.
>
> I don't think just crashing a plane into the top few floors would have
> the desired effect.
> > But I did read and see quite a lot about it. It is the Pentagon story
> > that seems to me to have the most holes. But in general I am very
> > boring, I believe the main public account. And the reason I do is that
> > it is *a more likely one* than the alternative.
>
> There are various alternatives ranging from they let it happen to they
> actually planned it. But to me the strangest thing in need of
> explanation is just what physically happened. That theory about fuel
> falling down and burning out the steel supports or whatever they said
> sounds awfully contrived.
>
Imagine what needs to be hypothesised for these alternatives to be true.
One of the biggest difficulties is that a lot of people would have to
have been involved or known about it. There have been no credible
whistleblowers emerge. I have never had the impression that big
governments or big organizations are ever that good! The order of
magnitude of the operation is very great indeed and it is unlikely to be
govt orchestrated. Puzzles, not knowing the answer to things in one
explanation, is not a good rational reason to embrace even wilder
explanations. But, to be fair to you, I do not know what you might be
thinking in detail as alternative.
> >> While we're at it, I don't believe in global warming either. Never have.
> >
> > This has recently split a major political party in Australia and the
> > crises is on heat right now. Read any oz newspaper. I do believe,
> > boringly again.
>
> I came to a skeptical position just by reading the pro-warming websites
> and thinking, "is that all you've got?", not by presuming or relying on
> the argument that anyone was actually cheating.
>
> It has been fairly widely known for a few years that Michael Mann is a
> fraud, but what I didn't know, until I saw the leaked emails which
> started the latest crisis, was how centrally involved he still is in it
> all, and that he's not the only one.
>
> Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
> (and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
OK I will. I download it now for reading later.
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhh4i98....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-11-29, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> ...
>> >
>> > ... 17.6 seems to *rule
>> > out* styling border-collapse on an element that is not an HTML table
>> > element or one that is not at least styled as display: table. So I am
>> > still a bit puzzled.
>>
>> It just says border-collapse only _applies_ to tables and inline-tables.
>> But any element can carry the gene as it were, and it will be expressed
>> in any descendents it has that it does apply to (i.e. those that are
>> tables or inline-tables).
>>
>
> So border-collapse does not literally "apply to" anything but a table
> element (as contrasted, say, with list-style, which applies to elements
> with 'display: list-item' or text-decoration which applies to 'all
> elements' ...).
It applies to anything with display: table or display: inline-table
(does't have to be a TABLE-- you can set display: table on LI if you
want).
> But when it *really does* apply, what do you see (as a
> user) different when there is the border-collapse compared to when there
> is not? Compare:
>
><table style="border-collapse"></table>
>
> with
>
><table style="bugger-all"></table>
>
> Nothing, it seems. You get the collapse only if there are borders to
> collapse and you get these only if there are cells with borders in the
> table element.
Yes, you do also have to have borders.
> I am starting to like the mysterious nature of "applies"
> already. <g>
>
> I like your gene model a lot. I was sort of looking forward to writing
> *a very annoying piece* on a model of spooky backwards causation over
> the Xmas break, the idea being that the property of (say)
> border-collapse *does* apply because the springing into existence of
> child table cells or any elements with display table-cell *causes* the
> parent (be it a table or any element like a div) to suddenly *but
> earlier* (ha!) literally acquire table status.
>
> Even in this annoying model, there is no real contradiction with the
> idea that inheritance is at work.
>
> The borders on the children still collapse due to inheritance,
> the gene doing its causal work. I am just extending it to act backwards
> as well - not to backwardly collapse anything but to confer tablehood on
> things like divs that were not assigned display: table. This all happens
> *very quickly* and the tests you mention below, DOM and Javascript, are
> all way after the action, perhaps a CSS camera (which is in development
> for me) will be able to detect it in a more visually friendly way?
>
> Remember, JK does say that inheritance is one of the least understood
> concepts, so I think it would be a nice Xmas present for me to send him
> a leather bound version of a long babbling attempt to show how simple it
> all is, providing one imports some barely fathomable notions.
Well, good luck with your annoying model. I think it certainly has
potential... to be annoying :) But attempts at reverse Occam's razor can
be instructive.
You make a good point. I don't have a detailed theory of how they got
there, just that it looked a lot like there were explosives in the
towers.
If I've learned anything from Sherlock Holmes, it's that you have to
start with the facts, and can't overlook some apparently minor detail
that you know to be true because it doesn't fit the simpler face-value
explanation.
[...]
>> I came to a skeptical position just by reading the pro-warming websites
>> and thinking, "is that all you've got?", not by presuming or relying on
>> the argument that anyone was actually cheating.
>>
>> It has been fairly widely known for a few years that Michael Mann is a
>> fraud, but what I didn't know, until I saw the leaked emails which
>> started the latest crisis, was how centrally involved he still is in it
>> all, and that he's not the only one.
>>
>> Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
>> (and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
>
> OK I will. I download it now for reading later.
It's an interesting paper and quite readable, whatever you think about
global warming. The technique it explains is from the advanced course in
how to lie with statistics.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-30, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhh4i98....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2009-11-29, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> > Puzzles, not knowing the answer to things in one explanation, is not a
> > good rational reason to embrace even wilder explanations. But, to be
> > fair to you, I do not know what you might be thinking in detail as
> > alternative.
>
> You make a good point. I don't have a detailed theory of how they got
> there, just that it looked a lot like there were explosives in the
> towers.
>
> If I've learned anything from Sherlock Holmes, it's that you have to
> start with the facts, and can't overlook some apparently minor detail
> that you know to be true because it doesn't fit the simpler face-value
> explanation.
>
We have to start with the facts we have because there is nothing else we
can do. But we are fairly quickly to the stage where we are then
*guided* by theories. It is the theories that set the agenda of what
further facts to gather. You might not pick this up from Holmes, he was
a natural investigator, but beware of his philosophy of investigation.
We can, we do, and we must overlook minor details that we have no
explanation for, otherwise we would unreasonably delay coming to
decisions and this is a very dangerous thing to do because the lion will
have struck and eaten us.
Science always carries niggling questions but is not put *on hold* by
them. Sherlock Holmes's allegations about the facts works only in
idealised situations. In the real super complicated world, the puzzles
and anomalies are simply carried, and sometimes explained by much later
evidence and theories.
On all that I have seen, I cannot believe it was a giant conspiracy by
the American Government, nor largely one. I am open to the idea that
internal American forces might have taken advantage of the situation
afterwards and covered a few things up but I really don't know.
--
dorayme
Ben C
But not if the minor details actually make the theory wrong. It's like
trying to decipher a difficult Latin sentence-- sometimes you can have
what seems like a very good intuitive idea of what it must mean, but if
that depends on something you know is wrong, like making a noun in the
genitive the subject, then it can't be right and you have to throw it
out.
> Science always carries niggling questions but is not put *on hold* by
> them. Sherlock Holmes's allegations about the facts works only in
> idealised situations. In the real super complicated world, the puzzles
> and anomalies are simply carried, and sometimes explained by much later
> evidence and theories.
It is possible that buildings can collapse like that without explosives.
But I don't think it's ever been known to happen before.
Really one would have to build a replica, or at least a scale model, and
try it in order to put the matter to rest.
> On all that I have seen, I cannot believe it was a giant conspiracy by
> the American Government, nor largely one. I am open to the idea that
> internal American forces might have taken advantage of the situation
> afterwards and covered a few things up but I really don't know.
I'm speculating completely here, but a group of conspirators connected
to only one or two members of the government seems easier to imagine.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-30, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhh7c3f....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2009-11-30, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> > We can, we do, and we must overlook minor details that we have no
> > explanation for, otherwise we would unreasonably delay coming to
> > decisions and this is a very dangerous thing to do because the lion will
> > have struck and eaten us.
>
> But not if the minor details actually make the theory wrong. It's like
> trying to decipher a difficult Latin sentence-- sometimes you can have
> what seems like a very good intuitive idea of what it must mean, but if
> that depends on something you know is wrong, like making a noun in the
> genitive the subject, then it can't be right and you have to throw it
> out.
>
You cannot in good conscience believe a theory where you *know*
something contradicts it. But these are not the anomalies that I am
saying science justly ignores or must 'carry'. Buildings falling down
surprisingly straight, especially ones that are rather unusually built,
are crashed into by huge fuel-laden planes at high speed is not a fact
known to contradict the general idea that a bunch of truly evil young
men on a terrorist mission ... as per the received opinion of most of us.
> > Science always carries niggling questions but is not put *on hold* by
> > them. Sherlock Holmes's allegations about the facts works only in
> > idealised situations. In the real super complicated world, the puzzles
> > and anomalies are simply carried, and sometimes explained by much later
> > evidence and theories.
>
> It is possible that buildings can collapse like that without explosives.
> But I don't think it's ever been known to happen before.
>
> Really one would have to build a replica, or at least a scale model, and
> try it in order to put the matter to rest.
>
Perhaps, but if there was no other way to test this, and if it is too
impractical to do this, I am saying it is not unreasonable to carry this
possible doubt, to ignore it in the light of greater theory.
> > On all that I have seen, I cannot believe it was a giant conspiracy by
> > the American Government, nor largely one. I am open to the idea that
> > internal American forces might have taken advantage of the situation
> > afterwards and covered a few things up but I really don't know.
>
> I'm speculating completely here, but a group of conspirators connected
> to only one or two members of the government seems easier to imagine.
But the operation was so spectacular and coordinated and successful that
it would have required the cooperation of more than 2 people (your least
case is one govt member (guess who comes to mind, ... someone beginning
with C ... and I don't mean to be crude) and one outside operator (Clark
Kent?).
Now, the more there are, the greater the incredible lack of whistle
blowers ... But there would need to be a lot of people doing a whole lot
of cooperating to carry off such a huge operation so successfully. If
you want anomalies, lift the rock of the conspiracy theories, there are
teeming ones to rival any of the difficulties to the publicly accepted
story.
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhh8cqh....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> You cannot in good conscience believe a theory where you *know*
> something contradicts it. But these are not the anomalies that I am
> saying science justly ignores or must 'carry'. Buildings falling down
> surprisingly straight, especially ones that are rather unusually
> built, are crashed into by huge fuel-laden planes at high speed is not
> a fact known to contradict the general idea that a bunch of truly evil
> young men on a terrorist mission ... as per the received opinion of
> most of us.
There were truly evil young men on a terrorist mission I'm sure.
But if there were also explosives rigged up inside the building, then it
just implies that there might have been some more equally evil people on
the inside.
>> > Science always carries niggling questions but is not put *on hold* by
>> > them. Sherlock Holmes's allegations about the facts works only in
>> > idealised situations. In the real super complicated world, the puzzles
>> > and anomalies are simply carried, and sometimes explained by much later
>> > evidence and theories.
>>
>> It is possible that buildings can collapse like that without explosives.
>> But I don't think it's ever been known to happen before.
>>
>> Really one would have to build a replica, or at least a scale model, and
>> try it in order to put the matter to rest.
>>
>
> Perhaps, but if there was no other way to test this, and if it is too
> impractical to do this, I am saying it is not unreasonable to carry this
> possible doubt, to ignore it in the light of greater theory.
No, not unreasonable, you are right.
>> > On all that I have seen, I cannot believe it was a giant conspiracy by
>> > the American Government, nor largely one. I am open to the idea that
>> > internal American forces might have taken advantage of the situation
>> > afterwards and covered a few things up but I really don't know.
>>
>> I'm speculating completely here, but a group of conspirators connected
>> to only one or two members of the government seems easier to imagine.
>
> But the operation was so spectacular and coordinated and successful that
> it would have required the cooperation of more than 2 people (your least
> case is one govt member (guess who comes to mind, ... someone beginning
> with C ... and I don't mean to be crude)
I should think it was Cheney. He seems like a nasty piece of work.
> and one outside operator (Clark Kent?).
Well I think Bin Laden and his gang may as well have organized the plane
crashes pretty much as per the official story.
All you need on top of that is someone to put the bombs inside the
buildings as well. It's not that much extra organization.
Have you seen a film called "Man on Wire" about that French clown chap
who snuck in there so that he could tightrope walk between the two
towers? (If not I recommend it).
> Now, the more there are, the greater the incredible lack of whistle
> blowers ... But there would need to be a lot of people doing a whole
> lot of cooperating to carry off such a huge operation so successfully.
> If you want anomalies, lift the rock of the conspiracy theories, there
> are teeming ones to rival any of the difficulties to the publicly
> accepted story.
The conspiracy theories are mostly rather silly, it's true, but that
doesn't change the facts.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-30, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhh8cqh....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> [...]
> > You cannot in good conscience believe a theory where you *know*
> > something contradicts it. But these are not the anomalies that I am
> > saying science justly ignores or must 'carry'. Buildings falling down
> > surprisingly straight, especially ones that are rather unusually
> > built, are crashed into by huge fuel-laden planes at high speed is not
> > a fact known to contradict the general idea that a bunch of truly evil
> > young men on a terrorist mission ... as per the received opinion of
> > most of us.
>
> There were truly evil young men on a terrorist mission I'm sure.
>
> But if there were also explosives rigged up inside the building, then it
> just implies that there might have been some more equally evil people on
> the inside.
>
who happened to know that the planes were about to ...? who also? who
also...? Your 'just implies' suggests a cosy limit of an extra fact or
two! The trouble is the explosive (pardon the pun) nature of this extra
fact in terms of the consequences generated (none of which, btw, have
been confirmed, no whistleblowers, not much concrete in the way of all
the people who would likely have seen them operating, in ways that
should be striking bells now, coming forward and so on. Mostly these
things leak out and people put things together... It has been 9 years of
peace time conditions and a free press and loads of money incentives.
...
> Well I think Bin Laden and his gang may as well have organized the plane
> crashes pretty much as per the official story.
>
> All you need on top of that is someone to put the bombs inside the
> buildings as well. It's not that much extra organization.
>
But that is not quite true. You need that they knew the foreign
terrorists were about to strike and lots of other coordinating stuff.
Unless you are proposing a coincidence, which I am sure you are not.
Questions alone are not enough for me in this...
--
dorayme
David Stone
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-11-30, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhh8cqh....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> [...]
> > You cannot in good conscience believe a theory where you *know*
> > something contradicts it. But these are not the anomalies that I am
> > saying science justly ignores or must 'carry'. Buildings falling down
> > surprisingly straight, especially ones that are rather unusually
> > built, are crashed into by huge fuel-laden planes at high speed is not
> > a fact known to contradict the general idea that a bunch of truly evil
> > young men on a terrorist mission ... as per the received opinion of
> > most of us.
>
> There were truly evil young men on a terrorist mission I'm sure.
>
> But if there were also explosives rigged up inside the building, then it
> just implies that there might have been some more equally evil people on
> the inside.
You know, initially I thought you were trying to be funny, so I wasn't
going to jump in here at all. However...
In the words of Sherman T. Potter, "You ain't using your head, son".
To pancake a building requires a demolition crew to drill into the
concrete around all pillars and the walls of the central core
(elevator shafts) and stairwells, placing shaped charges. You can't
do that in a building like the WTC without at least some occupants
literally hearing about it, and you couldn't do it quickly in the
middle of the night without a large number of crew members.
Wrapping charges around the outside pillars would be (a) stupidly
obvious and (b) unlikely to have the desired effect.
As for why the building collapsed the way it did, I believe you'll
find that this has been well-studied and thoroughly modelled.
It took a combination of (a) a fully-fuelled airliner crashing
into the building and shearing through at least part of the core
(b) a massive fireball from the exploding fuel (c) an intense
inferno resulting from the remaining fuel and flammable building
contents, whipped up by the updraft from the now open elevator
shafts in the core. The resulting temperature would be enough to
weaken the remaining steel supports, to the point where the mass of
the floors above simply collapses at least one floor. After that,
gravity takes over and the rest is very sad history.
Of course, the folks over at PBS, and the engineers they interviewed
about this, could all be part of a massive coverup. If you believe
that, I have some prime Florida real estate to sell you...
dorayme
David Stone <no.e...@domain.invalid> wrote:
> As for why the building collapsed the way it did, I believe you'll
> find that this has been well-studied and thoroughly modelled.
> It took a combination of (a) a fully-fuelled airliner crashing
> into the building and shearing through at least part of the core
> (b) a massive fireball from the exploding fuel (c) an intense
> inferno resulting from the remaining fuel and flammable building
> contents, whipped up by the updraft from the now open elevator
> shafts in the core.
Interesting questions were raised about the third tower (not hit in the
above way) and even on this I found the conspiracy story unconvincing.
<http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2008/s2355522.htm>
But the Pentagon hit is more puzzling and the official replies leave one
wanting to hear more and better.
--
dorayme
David Stone
dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
_Anything_ concerning the Pentagon is puzzling from where I sit!
Q: Where's the Pentagon?
A: I didn't even know it was missing!
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
Yes, it was interesting and I am now trying to find out what other
scientists who have no special career biases (to do with being
associated with government funded climate bodies or government studies
with not quite open and clear agendas). Easier said than done.
Normally, if one does not have expertise in a particularly expert field,
one waits to see what consensus emerges, checking only that the whole
processes of open peer review is not being corrupted by money and career
and other pressures. Pardon me if I take some time over this.
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhh7c3f....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> >> Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
>> >> (and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
>> >
>> > OK I will. I download it now for reading later.
>>
>> It's an interesting paper and quite readable, whatever you think about
>> global warming. The technique it explains is from the advanced course in
>> how to lie with statistics.
>
> Yes, it was interesting and I am now trying to find out what other
> scientists who have no special career biases (to do with being
> associated with government funded climate bodies or government studies
> with not quite open and clear agendas). Easier said than done.
There's always some bias. Having two opposingly biased sides is often
the best you can hope for.
Sustained thuggery for too long can remove the opposition. Remember that
chap we helped lay out his website complaining to Ofcom about Channel
4's documentary "The Great Global Warming Swindle"?
If you watch that documentary, among the skeptics are a former editor of
New Scientist, at least one former IPCC contributor (who had trouble
getting the IPCC to remove his name from things), and a former
co-founder of Greenpeace. A lot of formers.
(How can you be a former co-founder of Greenpeace? See Wikipedia: "He is
sometimes referred to as a co-founder of Greenpeace, including at times
by the organization itself[1], though this is disputed by the current
Greenpeace organization and those it acknowledges as founders.")
Even the former director of the Hadley CRU was a GW skeptic.
> Normally, if one does not have expertise in a particularly expert field,
> one waits to see what consensus emerges, checking only that the whole
> processes of open peer review is not being corrupted by money and career
> and other pressures.
Although apart from things like theoretical physics, most science is
reasonably easy to understand, so it is worth looking at the actual case
being made. You can also look for bias and bogosity in the usual way
which doesn't require scientific expertise.
In the case of global warming, you have to ask, what evidence do they
actually have that hasn't come out of a computer model, and what exactly
went into that model.
This from New Scientist's "debunking skeptic myths" page is particularly
priceless:
"Given the complexity of our climate system, most scientists agree
that models are the best way of making sense of that complexity. For
all their failings, models are the best guide to the future that we
have. Finally, the claim is sometimes made that if computer models
were any good, people would be using them to predict the stock
market. Well, they are!
A lot of trading in the financial markets is already carried out by
computers. Many base their decisions on fairly simple algorithms
designed to exploit tiny profit margins, but others rely on more
sophisticated long-term models.
Major financial institutions are investing huge amounts in automated
trading systems, the proportion of trading carried out by computers
is growing rapidly and a few individuals have made a fortune from
them. The smart money is being bet on computer models."
This is dated 2007 :)
> Pardon me if I take some time over this.
Of course and I'm not trying to convince you of anything, and it's
off-topic anyway. This, from a current IPCC contributor, is also
interesting:
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-05, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhh7c3f....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> >
> >> >> Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
> >> >> (and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
> >> >
> >> > OK I will. I download it now for reading later.
> >>
> >> It's an interesting paper and quite readable, whatever you think about
> >> global warming. The technique it explains is from the advanced course in
> >> how to lie with statistics.
> >
> > Yes, it was interesting and I am now trying to find out what other
> > scientists who have no *special* career biases (to do with being
> > associated with government funded climate bodies or government studies
> > with not quite open and clear agendas) think. Easier said than done.
>
> There's always some bias. Having two opposingly biased sides is often
> the best you can hope for.
>
True, but some biases are worse than other ones. We *had* an official
Chief Scientist (advises govt and is supposed to be particularly
authoratitive) here a while back who rarely said a trustworthy or
believable thing.
> Sustained thuggery for too long can remove the opposition.
>
It can remove them voicing things in public. There is a lot of this sort
of thing.
> > Normally, if one does not have expertise in a particularly expert field,
> > one waits to see what consensus emerges, checking only that the whole
> > processes of open peer review is not being corrupted by money and career
> > and other pressures.
>
> Although apart from things like theoretical physics, most science is
> reasonably easy to understand, so it is worth looking at the actual case
> being made. You can also look for bias and bogosity in the usual way
> which doesn't require scientific expertise.
>
> In the case of global warming, you have to ask, what evidence do they
> actually have that hasn't come out of a computer model, and what exactly
> went into that model.
>
Yes, no argument on this. But it is a tall order!
Basically, you are saying that the majority of the peer review published
scientists on this subject are being led up the garden path by a few
central furphies and myths and unexamined propositions, that there are
some things like the hockey that has brainwashed them.
And that one must carefully examine:
"To gain an understanding of the level of scientific consensus on
climate change, a recent study examined every article on climate change
published in peer-reviewed scientific journals over a 10-year period. Of
the 928 articles on climate change the authors found, not one of them
disagreed with the consensus position that climate change is happening
or is human-induced.
"These findings contrast dramatically with the popular media's reporting
on climate change. One recent study analyzed coverage of climate change
in four influential American newspapers (New York Times, Washington
Post, LA Times, and Wall Street Journal) over a 14-year period. It found
that more than half of the articles discussing climate change gave equal
weight to the scientifically discredited views of the skeptics."
(David Suzuki).
And, the implication is - possibly - if all these scientists (if DS is
correct) could be given independent guarantees that whatever they say
will not affect their income or position (something like tenure being
guaranteed), they would change their tune and their voices would line up
much more with the popular press voices.
At the moment, I don't believe this. But you have got me a bit
interested.
> This from New Scientist's "debunking skeptic myths" page is particularly
> priceless:
>
> "Given the complexity of our climate system, most scientists agree
> that models are the best way of making sense of that complexity. For
> all their failings, models are the best guide to the future that we
> have. Finally, the claim is sometimes made that if computer models
> were any good, people would be using them to predict the stock
> market. Well, they are!
>
> A lot of trading in the financial markets is already carried out by
> computers. Many base their decisions on fairly simple algorithms
> designed to exploit tiny profit margins, but others rely on more
> sophisticated long-term models.
>
> Major financial institutions are investing huge amounts in automated
> trading systems, the proportion of trading carried out by computers
> is growing rapidly and a few individuals have made a fortune from
> them. The smart money is being bet on computer models."
>
> This is dated 2007 :)
>
We might need to be careful here, there is a clause "for all their
failings" that might allow usefulness and some rational foundation for
cautious prediction.
> > Pardon me if I take some time over this.
>
> Of course and I'm not trying to convince you of anything,
> and it's
> off-topic anyway.
Yeah, well, that is always such a huge factor for me! I tremble in fear
as I type on these things. <g>
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhhlgku....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-12-05, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>> > In article <slrnhh7c3f....@bowser.marioworld>,
>> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>> >
>> >> >> Read http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/McKitrick-hockeystick.pdf
>> >> >> (and see realclimate.org for counter-arguments).
>> >> >
>> >> > OK I will. I download it now for reading later.
>> >>
>> >> It's an interesting paper and quite readable, whatever you think about
>> >> global warming. The technique it explains is from the advanced course in
>> >> how to lie with statistics.
>> >
>> > Yes, it was interesting and I am now trying to find out what other
>> > scientists who have no *special* career biases (to do with being
>> > associated with government funded climate bodies or government studies
>> > with not quite open and clear agendas) think. Easier said than done.
>>
>> There's always some bias. Having two opposingly biased sides is often
>> the best you can hope for.
>>
>
> True, but some biases are worse than other ones. We *had* an official
> Chief Scientist (advises govt and is supposed to be particularly
> authoratitive) here a while back who rarely said a trustworthy or
> believable thing.
I tend to start with the assumption that nobody associated with the
government _ever_ says a trustworthy or believable thing.
Recently here though there has been some logic of the black is white and
white is black kind.
>> Sustained thuggery for too long can remove the opposition.
>>
>
> It can remove them voicing things in public. There is a lot of this sort
> of thing.
>
>> > Normally, if one does not have expertise in a particularly expert field,
>> > one waits to see what consensus emerges, checking only that the whole
>> > processes of open peer review is not being corrupted by money and career
>> > and other pressures.
>>
>> Although apart from things like theoretical physics, most science is
>> reasonably easy to understand, so it is worth looking at the actual case
>> being made. You can also look for bias and bogosity in the usual way
>> which doesn't require scientific expertise.
>>
>> In the case of global warming, you have to ask, what evidence do they
>> actually have that hasn't come out of a computer model, and what exactly
>> went into that model.
>>
>
> Yes, no argument on this. But it is a tall order!
>
> Basically, you are saying that the majority of the peer review published
> scientists on this subject are being led up the garden path by a few
> central furphies and myths and unexamined propositions, that there are
> some things like the hockey that has brainwashed them.
I don't get the impression many of them have tried to actually
replicated the central tenets from scratch.
The IPCC only quote four global temperature series. One is from the
Hadley CRU (whom I don't trust), one is from NASA GISS (who are part of
the same clique), and the other two are satellite data, which basically
say it hasn't been warming by anything like as much (at least not until
the data are "corrected" and "adjusted" by the usual suspects...).
> And that one must carefully examine:
>
> "To gain an understanding of the level of scientific consensus on
> climate change, a recent study examined every article on climate change
> published in peer-reviewed scientific journals over a 10-year period. Of
> the 928 articles on climate change the authors found, not one of them
> disagreed with the consensus position that climate change is happening
> or is human-induced.
>
> "These findings contrast dramatically with the popular media's reporting
> on climate change. One recent study analyzed coverage of climate change
> in four influential American newspapers (New York Times, Washington
> Post, LA Times, and Wall Street Journal) over a 14-year period. It found
> that more than half of the articles discussing climate change gave equal
> weight to the scientifically discredited views of the skeptics."
>
> (David Suzuki).
To me, that just sets off all the bogosity detectors. Nobody with a
decent case ever used the appeal to consensus (which is basically the
flypaper argument-- all those flies stuck to the flypaper can't be
wrong, let's join them). And the clear implication is that he's
uncomfortable with what those American newspapers are publishing and
would like to shut them up!
None of the papers disagreed with the tenets. It doesn't mean they were
actually challenging them either. These are "articles on climate
change", I expect mostly discussions of this or that consequence or
related effect. I doubt they are 928 independent attempts to verify the
theory.
> And, the implication is - possibly - if all these scientists (if DS is
> correct) could be given independent guarantees that whatever they say
> will not affect their income or position (something like tenure being
> guaranteed), they would change their tune and their voices would line up
> much more with the popular press voices.
I don't think it works quite like that. But if equal funding were
available to people with a contrary position, you would find probably
464 such articles and 464 about side-effects of the way solar radiation
influences climate, that didn't question that assumption that the sun is
the most significant driver of climate.
> At the moment, I don't believe this. But you have got me a bit
> interested.
>
>> This from New Scientist's "debunking skeptic myths" page is particularly
>> priceless:
>>
>> "Given the complexity of our climate system, most scientists agree
>> that models are the best way of making sense of that complexity. For
>> all their failings, models are the best guide to the future that we
>> have. Finally, the claim is sometimes made that if computer models
>> were any good, people would be using them to predict the stock
>> market. Well, they are!
>>
>> A lot of trading in the financial markets is already carried out by
>> computers. Many base their decisions on fairly simple algorithms
>> designed to exploit tiny profit margins, but others rely on more
>> sophisticated long-term models.
>>
>> Major financial institutions are investing huge amounts in automated
>> trading systems, the proportion of trading carried out by computers
>> is growing rapidly and a few individuals have made a fortune from
>> them. The smart money is being bet on computer models."
>>
>> This is dated 2007 :)
>>
>
> We might need to be careful here, there is a clause "for all their
> failings" that might allow usefulness and some rational foundation for
> cautious prediction.
Of course the idea is not to throw out all modelling. But it brings some
new things to watch out for, in particular opacity, because it's often
very hard to tell exactly what's in the model because it's so
complicated. Financial models suffered from this problem.
There are subtle differences between a model and glorified
curve-fitting. The former should predict fairly well, the latter
probably very badly.
If you're a modeller and your model fails to predict the past correctly,
you should examine the model, and if you're lucky, find and correct an
error or assumption which makes it work better.
But if you just _tweak_ it so it hindcasts better, i.e. change it "just
so it works" without a proper rational basis for the change, then you're
cheating, and are actually undermining its power to predict the future.
But the distinction between these activities isn't always easy to make.
Chris F.A. Johnson
...
> I tend to start with the assumption that nobody associated with the
> government _ever_ says a trustworthy or believable thing.
My assumption is the opposite: I would trust anything said by any
democratially elected government before I'd trust anything said by
a for-profit company.
--
Chris F.A. Johnson <http://cfajohnson.com>
===================================================================
Author:
Shell Scripting Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach (2005, Apress)
Pro Bash Programming: Scripting the GNU/Linux Shell (2009, Apress)
dorayme
"Chris F.A. Johnson" <cfajo...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2009-12-06, Ben C wrote:
> ...
> > I tend to start with the assumption that nobody associated with the
> > government _ever_ says a trustworthy or believable thing.
>
> My assumption is the opposite: I would trust anything said by any
> democratially elected government before I'd trust anything said by
> a for-profit company.
Except that is not the very opposite!
--
dorayme
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-05, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> >
> > Basically, you are saying that the majority of the peer review published
> > scientists on this subject are being led up the garden path by a few
> > central furphies and myths and unexamined propositions, that there are
> > some things like the hockey that has brainwashed them.
>
> I don't get the impression many of them have tried to actually
> replicated the central tenets from scratch.
>
Nor have the vast majority of scientists, at *any time after Darwin* who
more or less believed in Darwin's theory of natural selection much
reconstructed the whole basis for the theory from scratch. Few went
around the world collecting data on ships, closely questioning breeders,
taking particular interest in beetles... It is rather a process of
seeing if there is any other interpretation that does better at
explaining whatever evidence is available (and gathered at great effort
by many people and organizations over a fair period of time)
It is messy and complicated and until I see more evidence that the
faults with the original hockey were like some big Monty Python foot
stomping on all the scientists, I remain an anonymous cowardly believer
with a possible forged from field that the climate is warming and humans
are making a significant contribution to it.
> If you're a modeller and your model fails to predict the past correctly,
> you should examine the model, and if you're lucky, find and correct an
> error or assumption which makes it work better.
>
> But if you just _tweak_ it so it hindcasts better, i.e. change it "just
> so it works" without a proper rational basis for the change, then you're
> cheating, and are actually undermining its power to predict the future.
>
> But the distinction between these activities isn't always easy to make.
Fair enough. But it is not a given that most scientists are doing this
in regard to climate change.
In reading responses to McKitric, and I mean whole panels and
committees, I do not get the impression they are ignoring their
responsibilities and whitewashing the human influenced climate change
theory.
But you may have read more extensively and I will keep an eye out on the
issue.
--
dorayme
Ben C
I think the principle behind Chris F.A. Johnson's point is fairly sound,
but there are confounding factors, in particular that power corrupts
more than profit.
Ben C
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-12-05, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> ...
>> >
>> > Basically, you are saying that the majority of the peer review published
>> > scientists on this subject are being led up the garden path by a few
>> > central furphies and myths and unexamined propositions, that there are
>> > some things like the hockey that has brainwashed them.
>>
>> I don't get the impression many of them have tried to actually
>> replicated the central tenets from scratch.
>>
>
> Nor have the vast majority of scientists, at *any time after Darwin* who
> more or less believed in Darwin's theory of natural selection much
> reconstructed the whole basis for the theory from scratch. Few went
> around the world collecting data on ships, closely questioning breeders,
> taking particular interest in beetles... It is rather a process of
> seeing if there is any other interpretation that does better at
> explaining whatever evidence is available (and gathered at great effort
> by many people and organizations over a fair period of time)
Darwin presented an enormous amount of actual evidence for his theory,
which was accessible just from what he presented.
The "evidence" for AGW is not straightforward evidence that you can just
look at. The conclusions they make about the future cannot be made
without complicated computer models. Even the conclusions about the past
aren't made without fairly sophisticated (and suspect) statistical
processing of the data.
> It is messy and complicated and until I see more evidence that the
> faults with the original hockey were like some big Monty Python foot
> stomping on all the scientists, I remain an anonymous cowardly
> believer with a possible forged from field that the climate is warming
> and humans are making a significant contribution to it.
I think it _is_ rather like a big Monty Python foot. There are two main
points they're making: that recent warming has been unprecedented and
anomalous, and that future warming will be even greater if we don't cut
CO2.
The hockey stick was meant to demonstrate the first point (and the
second is mainly just extrapolation from the first). After the original
hockey stick was demolished their efforts concentrated on reproducing the
same basic shape from different data so that they could save their
story.
But this was the same bunch of people! It is not wise to trust someone
who's been shown to be a fraud once to reform himself just like that. It
wasn't obvious (to me, until recently) they were the same bunch of
people until I saw the emails between the discredited Mann and the
pnambic Phil Jones and others of the Hadley CRU. The Hadley CRU were
supposed to be our boys, completely independent of Mann.
There are many more details about what they got up to and how they put
the hockey stick back, and McIntyre has continued to keep a very close
eye on them.
Although they did their best not to give him any of their data or
details of how they arrived at their conclusions, he was able to get
some of it (they published in the Royal Society, and one of their
conditions of publication is that you make data available on request) in
which he found a more recent hockey stick was the result of
cherry-picking a handful of trees in Siberia that had shown a 20th
century growth spurt, rather like Mann's bristlecone pines, in spite of
most Siberian tree records showing the opposite.
He has also more recently explained what Phil Jones meant by "Mike
[Mann]'s Nature 'trick' to hide the decline"-- my understanding is it's
not just a matter of replacing tree-ring data since 1960 with
thermometer records (which they did because the tree rings went down)
but doing the replacement _before_ some kind of statistical smoothing,
in other words, to use the thermometer record to distort the tree-ring
history _before 1960_, again to flatten it and make a hockey stick.
Of course everything McIntyre does is hotly disputed by the Mann
clique... You can make your own mind up, but at least be aware that
there is considerable controversy, in spite of their attempts to
suppress it or to fob it off as the work of "flat-earthers" or oil
company shills.
The thermometer record since 1960 _has_ gone up, but the point of these
graphs is to demonstrate that recent warming is unprecedented and
anomalous, in particular, to hide the fact that it has been both much
hotter and much colder than now during the last 2000 years with no help
from human CO2.
It has been warming since about 1800, which is why the glaciers are
retreating and the ice sheets melting. But there's nothing unusual about
it. They will probably come back again in a few years-- one can't say
for sure-- but one can be reasonably sure that cutting CO2 emissions
will not make a blind bit of difference to the process.
The satellite and radio balloon temperature records of UAH (which I
posted a link to before) do not show any anomalous warming. They also
show that warming is less in the troposhere than at the surface, which
shows that any recent warming there has been is not caused by greenhouse
gases.
Now the usual suspects have published a lot in which they "show" that
the satellite data does agree with all their hockey-sticks after all,
but only after they've "recalibrated" and "adjusted" it. Christy and
Spencer at UAH, who actually make those measurements, do not agree with
their conclusions.
For a more balanced picture you have to subtract Mann, Jones, Santer,
Briffa, Schmidt, et al. (there are 50 or 70 or so in the clique, and
leaked emails show abundant evidence of their collusion and activism)
from the "consensus" and see what is left.
>> If you're a modeller and your model fails to predict the past correctly,
>> you should examine the model, and if you're lucky, find and correct an
>> error or assumption which makes it work better.
>>
>> But if you just _tweak_ it so it hindcasts better, i.e. change it "just
>> so it works" without a proper rational basis for the change, then you're
>> cheating, and are actually undermining its power to predict the future.
>>
>> But the distinction between these activities isn't always easy to make.
>
> Fair enough. But it is not a given that most scientists are doing this
> in regard to climate change.
>
> In reading responses to McKitric, and I mean whole panels and
> committees, I do not get the impression they are ignoring their
> responsibilities and whitewashing the human influenced climate change
> theory.
No, both Wegman and North did a good job, although I've seen North
credited with the fact that Mann got to keep his job. He's actually on
Mann's side, but also respects McIntyre and upheld his findings (Mann
was hoping for a whitewash from North).
> But you may have read more extensively and I will keep an eye out on the
> issue.
I don't know that much about it, but it's all out there.
Wegman's report (on the original McIntyre hockey-stick demolition) has a
whole lot of stuff in it about the tightness of the IPCC clique, and the
dubiousness of the way they peer-review each other, and this has been
known for some time. But the emails make all that that much clearer and
less ambiguous.
It's also clear from the emails the influence they have on "independent"
news sources like the BBC. It's interesting to read the discussion they
had about Paul Hudson's controversial blog entry.
Paul Hudson wrote a BBC blog entry saying it hasn't got warmer for the
last 10 years, their models didn't predict it, and what was going on. It
was a fairly balanced article, although he's generally considered
pro-warming.
You can read it here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulhudson/2009/10/whatever-happened-to-global-wa.shtml
Anyway, although many of the climate researchers in the emails thought
he made some interesting points, Mann wrote this:
"extremely disappointing to see something like this appear on BBC.
its particularly odd, since climate is usually Richard Black's beat
at BBC (and he does a great job). from what I can tell, this guy
was formerly a weather person at the Met Office.
We may do something about this on RealClimate, but meanwhile it
might be appropriate for the Met Office to have a say about this, I
might ask Richard Black what's up here?"
Mann is supposed to be an academic in Pennsylvania. What the hell
business is it of his what the BBC print or the Met Office say?
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
I am not aware of this principle, and less that it is sound. Given that
govts tend to be bigger and richer enterprises than business, tend to be
enmeshed with them, and that money itself is power, I reckon anyone
would have a hard time arguing such a principle.
I have no over arching tendencies to assume from the start anything
about the trustworthiness of either business or governmental
pronouncements and feel particularly depressed about this because my
stance is so boring. <g>
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhhpctu....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-12-06, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>> > In article <7o2ni4F...@mid.individual.net>,
>> > "Chris F.A. Johnson" <cfajo...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> On 2009-12-06, Ben C wrote:
>> >> ...
>> >> > I tend to start with the assumption that nobody associated with the
>> >> > government _ever_ says a trustworthy or believable thing.
>> >>
>> >> My assumption is the opposite: I would trust anything said by any
>> >> democratially elected government before I'd trust anything said by
>> >> a for-profit company.
>> >
>> > Except that is not the very opposite!
>>
>> I think the principle behind Chris F.A. Johnson's point is fairly sound,
>> but there are confounding factors, in particular that power corrupts
>> more than profit.
>
> I am not aware of this principle, and less that it is sound.
Do not be deceived by its pithiness. It is not the _bons mots_ of a
famous guru but just something I made up on the spot :)
> Given that govts tend to be bigger and richer enterprises than
> business, tend to be enmeshed with them, and that money itself is
> power, I reckon anyone would have a hard time arguing such a
> principle.
Good points, although it's also true that people in big business _can_
make a lot of money just by running a good business. The whole point of
paying them a lot is in the hope that they will work for you and only
for you.
> I have no over arching tendencies to assume from the start anything
> about the trustworthiness of either business or governmental
> pronouncements and feel particularly depressed about this because my
> stance is so boring. <g>
You're probably right. There are actually a few politicians who come
across as perfectly decent people.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
...
> >> I think the principle behind Chris F.A. Johnson's point is fairly sound,
> >> but there are confounding factors, in particular that power corrupts
> >> more than profit.
> >
> > I am not aware of this principle, and less that it is sound.
>
> Do not be deceived by its pithiness. It is not the _bons mots_ of a
> famous guru but just something I made up on the spot :)
>
Don't worry! It was my way of pretending deep thought on fundamentals.
<g>
> > Given that govts tend to be bigger and richer enterprises than
> > business, tend to be enmeshed with them, and that money itself is
> > power, I reckon anyone would have a hard time arguing such a
> > principle.
>
> Good points, although it's also true that people in big business _can_
> make a lot of money just by running a good business. The whole point of
> paying them a lot is in the hope that they will work for you and only
> for you.
>
Perhaps there is some truth in saying that it is easier to run *some*
businesses honestly than to run any government anywhere honestly. But
this may be an unfair comparison and, even if it is fair, I do sometimes
wonder! If businesses were really honest (think of their bullshit
advertizing and all the millions of sly things they say and don't say,
how they pressure others and givt agencies etc), I wonder how well they
would do.
> > I have no over arching tendencies to assume from the start anything
> > about the trustworthiness of either business or governmental
> > pronouncements and feel particularly depressed about this because my
> > stance is so boring. <g>
>
> You're probably right. There are actually a few politicians who come
> across as perfectly decent people.
You can also make judgements about the relative honesty and integrity of
whole systems, I have more confidence in the governing bodies in
Australia than i imagine I would have in Russian ones...
I attended a council meeting with other kite flyers to protest against
proposed bans on kite flying and witnessed the council going too far in
its honesty activities! Before each interminable issue (before our issue
came up) there would be almost unbearable explanations by various
members of possible conflicts of interest. They would say even things
like they owned a cat but did not feel this prevented them from voting
on some issue concerning cats... I forget the absurd lengths they went
to be honest or seem so... I sat there thinking all this honest and
transparency could actually act to glug up the whole damn system!)
--
dorayme
Ben C
> You can also make judgements about the relative honesty and integrity
> of whole systems, I have more confidence in the governing bodies in
> Australia than i imagine I would have in Russian ones...
>
> I attended a council meeting with other kite flyers to protest against
> proposed bans on kite flying and witnessed the council going too far in
> its honesty activities!
Why would anyone want to ban kite flying?!
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-07, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> [...]
> >
> > I attended a council meeting with other kite flyers to protest against
> > proposed bans on kite flying
>
> Why would anyone want to ban kite flying?!
It was on the beaches and certain other areas. They were worried about
injuries to people. I don't myself fly on beaches, preferring lonelier
high places over the sea, but went to support friends. Instead of some
nuanced idea that inhibited foolish people flying kites, especially the
fast multi-line ones from operating on crowded beaches, they simply
found it easier to slap a wholesale ban on. Those people highly affected
were responsible flyers who would not operate on crowded beaches in any
case, who enjoy using near deserted ones, especially in winter ...
It is perfectly possible for the beach inspectors to be given discretion
but the council were worried about the legalities.
Basically Australia is becoming a nanny state with nanny governments
both local and larger. I even saw a sign sprout up near a completely
obviously dangerous high cliff edge warning not to go too near the edge.
The less the public is trusted, the more the courts award damages
against governing bodies for personal injuries due to risky behaviour,
the more the governing bodies guard themselves by producing more and
more responses, the more infantile the nation becomes. The citizens are
then guaranteed never to grow up and take personal responsibility and do
a bit of their own danger assessments.
--
dorayme
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-06, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhhn4hr....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2009-12-05, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > ...
> >> >
> >> > Basically, you are saying that the majority of the peer review published
> >> > scientists on this subject are being led up the garden path by a few
> >> > central furphies and myths and unexamined propositions, that there are
> >> > some things like the hockey that has brainwashed them.
> >>
> >> I don't get the impression many of them have tried to actually
> >> replicated the central tenets from scratch.
> >>
> >
> > Nor have the vast majority of scientists, at *any time after Darwin* who
> > more or less believed in Darwin's theory of natural selection much
> > reconstructed the whole basis for the theory from scratch. Few went
> > around the world collecting data on ships, closely questioning breeders,
> > taking particular interest in beetles... It is rather a process of
> > seeing if there is any other interpretation that does better at
> > explaining whatever evidence is available (and gathered at great effort
> > by many people and organizations over a fair period of time)
>
> Darwin presented an enormous amount of actual evidence for his theory,
> which was accessible just from what he presented.
>
Not exactly accessible "just from what he presented". People might have
to go to a lot of trouble to check what Darwin and Wallace had been
observing in detail over many years.
> The "evidence" for AGW is not straightforward evidence that you can just
> look at. The conclusions they make about the future cannot be made
> without complicated computer models. Even the conclusions about the past
> aren't made without fairly sophisticated (and suspect) statistical
> processing of the data.
>
Maybe you suspect this but I am confident that soon enough the
scientists themselves will sort weaknesses out. They will be not be
defeated by temporary distortions and the truth will out. I doubt you or
I can do anything about it. I am sending a small team to watch various
principles in this matter, tap phones, intercept emails, listen in to
confessions with their priests etc but in the end, I wait with
confidence. There will be many more highly competent scientists with
relevant skills who will speak out if they find that in fact humans are
not contributing much to warming or there was no particular warming
trend to be alarmed about.
> > It is messy and complicated and until I see more evidence that the
> > faults with the original hockey were like some big Monty Python foot
> > stomping on all the scientists, I remain an anonymous cowardly
> > believer with a possible forged from field that the climate is warming
> > and humans are making a significant contribution to it.
>
> I think it _is_ rather like a big Monty Python foot. There are two main
> points they're making: that recent warming has been unprecedented and
> anomalous, and that future warming will be even greater if we don't cut
> CO2.
>
> The hockey stick was meant to demonstrate the first point (and the
> second is mainly just extrapolation from the first). After the original
> hockey stick was demolished their efforts concentrated on reproducing the
> same basic shape from different data so that they could save their
> story.
>
> But this was the same bunch of people! It is not wise to trust someone
> who's been shown to be a fraud once to reform himself just like that.
Let us wait and see if there was any real fraud going on. The evidence
is not in on this one and things are happening as I type...
...
>
> It has been warming since about 1800, which is why the glaciers are
> retreating and the ice sheets melting. But there's nothing unusual about
> it. They will probably come back again in a few years-- one can't say
> for sure-- but one can be reasonably sure that cutting CO2 emissions
> will not make a blind bit of difference to the process.
>
I have had the feeling that it is probably too late anyway and I simply
find it hard to believe that China and India and other developing
countries will do what might be needed, let alone the countries that
have contributed most to the effect (if you are wrong, that is). It is
near impossible for modern earthlings not to foul their nests. They have
grown too greedy clever and powerful and the age of unnatural selection
is upon them. Doom is probably nigh. But it may be delayed by putting a
price on Carbon to make people think of alternative ways that have a
lesser effect on this nest.
To end on a cheerier note: Even if you are right, the false theories
might be doing the world a favour...
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhhpgbg....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>> The "evidence" for AGW is not straightforward evidence that you can just
>> look at. The conclusions they make about the future cannot be made
>> without complicated computer models. Even the conclusions about the past
>> aren't made without fairly sophisticated (and suspect) statistical
>> processing of the data.
>>
> Maybe you suspect this but I am confident that soon enough the
> scientists themselves will sort weaknesses out. They will be not be
> defeated by temporary distortions and the truth will out.
Eventually you would have thought so. It also depends what the weather
does. The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come
true.
But then they just tweak the models, and hey presto, they correctly
"predict" the past again and, look, the sudden rise in temperatures is
just around the corner.
It's a little bit like when Jesus didn't come back. Eventually you end
up with a post-disappointment eschatology.
[...]
>> But this was the same bunch of people! It is not wise to trust someone
>> who's been shown to be a fraud once to reform himself just like that.
>
> Let us wait and see if there was any real fraud going on. The evidence
> is not in on this one and things are happening as I type...
It seems very likely to me that MBH98 (the original hockey stick) was a
fraud. The main thing the emails show is the continued activity of that
same clique of people and which pies their fingers are in. It is only
rational to subtract their contribution from the "consensus", and then
ask what remains.
They also show evidence of sloppiness, extreme bias, and clues of
further fraud. You're right, the evidence is not all in on that yet, but
that they are under suspicion is enough to consider their work tainted.
After all there are supposed to be all these tens of thousands of
scientists who say the same thing anyway...
For a lot of reasons I think the most reliable temperature record we
have is the satellite record from UAH which goes back to about 1978, and
it appears to falsify the models.
In any case the argument from models is circular-- they're built
on the assumption that the climate is extremely sensitive to CO2 in the
first place.
I've seen no actual evidence produced for that assumption. But there is
some evidence that points against it.
>> It has been warming since about 1800, which is why the glaciers are
>> retreating and the ice sheets melting. But there's nothing unusual about
>> it. They will probably come back again in a few years-- one can't say
>> for sure-- but one can be reasonably sure that cutting CO2 emissions
>> will not make a blind bit of difference to the process.
>>
>
> I have had the feeling that it is probably too late anyway and I simply
> find it hard to believe that China and India and other developing
> countries will do what might be needed, let alone the countries that
> have contributed most to the effect (if you are wrong, that is).
I think that's right. In any case, temperatures are rising and it's
prudent to keep an eye on sea-levels and make sure your dykes are high
enough etc.
The Aztecs convinced themselves climate change was their fault and the
consensus was that more human sacrifices would make it go away. It's
possible their energies might have been better directed elsewhere.
> It is near impossible for modern earthlings not to foul their nests.
> They have grown too greedy clever and powerful and the age of
> unnatural selection is upon them. Doom is probably nigh. But it may be
> delayed by putting a price on Carbon to make people think of
> alternative ways that have a lesser effect on this nest.
Yes but it might make it worse. Of course pollution is bad, but CO2
is (IMO) probably harmless, and certainly more harmless than plutonium.
And it seems unfair not to let developing countries burn their coal so
they can have electricity.
This is all politics though, which I don't know the anwsers to or have
strong views on. But I do feel strongly that one should not acquiesce in
bad science just because one might be in favour of the political
consequences.
> To end on a cheerier note: Even if you are right, the false theories
> might be doing the world a favour...
As with everything there will be winners and losers.
Scott Bryce
> The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come true.
20 years before that scientists were saying that our use of fossil fuels
would cause another ice age by the year 2000. That hasn't happened either.
I remember seeing films that showed how man's technology would resemble
that of the middle ages by the year 2000 because of our use of fossil
fuels. That hasn't happened either. Instead, our politicians are
proposing changes in energy policy that will send our technology back to
that of the middle ages, and they are using those old false predictions
as the basis for making those new policies. Something is wrong with that
picture.
Ben C
> Ben C wrote:
>> The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come true.
>
> 20 years before that scientists were saying that our use of fossil fuels
> would cause another ice age by the year 2000. That hasn't happened either.
I knew about the ice age scare of the 70s, but how were fossil fuels
supposed to be for blame for that?
I thought people just thought it was another natural ice age (they do
happen).
Scott Bryce
> I knew about the ice age scare of the 70s, but how were fossil fuels
> supposed to be for blame for that?
Air pollution was supposed to get so bad that the amount of sunlight
reaching the ground was reduced.
Yes, in the 60s and 70s they were prediction man made global cooling.
dorayme
Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> Instead, our politicians are
> proposing changes in energy policy that will send our technology back to
> that of the middle ages,
This is not true of most Australian politicians, I don't know about
yours?
--
dorayme
Chris F.A. Johnson
It's not true anywhere that I'm aware of. In fact it sounds totally
unfounded.
dorayme
"Chris F.A. Johnson" <cfajo...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2009-12-09, dorayme wrote:
> > In article <hfoeq3$rfp$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Instead, our politicians are
> >> proposing changes in energy policy that will send our technology back to
> >> that of the middle ages,
> >
> > This is not true of most Australian politicians, I don't know about
> > yours?
>
> It's not true anywhere that I'm aware of. In fact it sounds totally
> unfounded.
Ah, you cynic, Chris! In Australia, come over some time, we are very
advanced, various government figures talk of nuclear power, solar
energy, carbon coal capture, wind energy and not so much about having
slaves sweating and turning wooden wheel arrangements... <g>
--
dorayme
Scott Bryce
> Ah, you cynic, Chris! In Australia, come over some time, we are very
> advanced, various government figures talk of nuclear power, solar
> energy, carbon coal capture, wind energy and not so much about having
> slaves sweating and turning wooden wheel arrangements... <g>
In the USA, they are proposing something called Cap and Trade, which
will limit the amount of available energy to present day levels, unless
someone can find a cost effective alternative which does not put carbon
into the air. As yet, no such alternative exists. Economic growth is not
possible in developed nations without an increase in available energy.
The current administration is hoping to drive up the cost of energy in
order to force a switch to alternative energy sources, making the
currently non-cost effective alternatives cost effective by making
current cost effective energy sources artificially cost prohibitive.
When that happens, people will be forced to accomplish the same tasks
with less energy, accomplish fewer tasks, or pay more money to
accomplish those tasks.
One problem with many "green" energy technologies is that it takes more
energy to produce them than they will generate over their expected life
times. Even the word "green" used in this context is a bit ironic, since
green plants flourish in a carbon dioxide rich environment.
dorayme
Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > Ah, you cynic, Chris! In Australia, come over some time, we are very
> > advanced, various government figures talk of nuclear power, solar
> > energy, carbon coal capture, wind energy and not so much about having
> > slaves sweating and turning wooden wheel arrangements... <g>
>
> In the USA, they are proposing something called Cap and Trade, which
> will limit the amount of available energy to present day levels, unless
> someone can find a cost effective alternative which does not put carbon
> into the air. As yet, no such alternative exists.
There are two projects I find rather fascinating, one is solar
collectors (focussing sun rays via mirror farms in the Sahara desert,
for example), electricity transmission is much more advanced these days
and Europe will benefit. The other is building giant greenhouses with
towers that contain turbines (the air heats up in the maybe Sarah desert
greenhouse farm and it rises up a chimney tower or two, turning turbines
as it goes up).
I have been thinking that either a big development in fusion or some
piggy back on nature's own chemistry for using sunlight would be the big
ones in the future. But, all ye of little faith, I say unto you, there
is much we can do now!
--
dorayme
Scott Bryce
> There are two projects I find rather fascinating, one is solar
> collectors (focussing sun rays via mirror farms in the Sahara desert,
> for example),
Yes, I remember hearing about those... when I was in grade school 40
years ago. And we still are not able to use this technology to produce
electricity, and make it available to the general population in a cost
effective manner.
> electricity transmission is much more advanced these days and Europe
> will benefit.
I cannot help but wonder how much copper will need to be mined and
processed to transfer electricity from the Sahara to Europe.
> The other is building giant greenhouses with towers that contain
> turbines (the air heats up in the maybe Sarah desert greenhouse farm
> and it rises up a chimney tower or two, turning turbines as it goes
> up).
This sounds like another project that will never generate as much energy
as it takes to build it.
> I have been thinking that either a big development in fusion
Another non-existent technology that people have been talking about for
decades.
> or some piggy back on nature's own chemistry for using sunlight
That technology exists. It is called "trees." But utilizing trees to
generate electricity is neither cost effective, nor clean.
> But, all ye of little faith, I say unto you, there is much we can do
> now!
I have a Facebook friend who is very into green technologies. He posts
links to articles about these technologies on his Facebook page. Almost
all of them have one thing in common... they are prototypes that will
require at least a decade of development before they can be used by the
general public.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-09, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
...
> > ...I am confident that soon enough the
> > scientists themselves will sort weaknesses out. They will be not be
> > defeated by temporary distortions and the truth will out.
>
> Eventually you would have thought so. It also depends what the weather
> does. The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come
> true.
>
Well, I am not sure. I am one of those gullible characters that think of
CO2 as forming a blanket that helps warm the planet... I am always a
little puzzled by some of your sentences about CO2. It is not that it is
a bad gas in itself... anyway, you know all this, I am sure. You are
suspicious of the way the whole case has been put together for human
induced climate change.
...
> > Let us wait and see if there was any real fraud going on. The evidence
> > is not in on this one and things are happening as I type...
>
> It seems very likely to me that MBH98 (the original hockey stick) was a
> fraud. The main thing the emails show is the continued activity of that
> same clique of people and which pies their fingers are in. It is only
> rational to subtract their contribution from the "consensus", and then
> ask what remains.
>
Well, yes, and what remains will be outed. I simply do not believe that
scientists, unlike politicians and mass public movements and
acquiescences, will be silenced for long in this day and age.
...
>
> For a lot of reasons I think the most reliable temperature record we
> have is the satellite record from UAH which goes back to about 1978, and
> it appears to falsify the models.
>
I think we better start compiling our own list of the evidence that we
all accept and never mind fancy doodle dandy computer models, just have
a bit of a look to see if all the bits from diverse sources more
plausibly point in one direction rather than another. At least that
would be a start.
We might be able to save the world right here in this thread. Think how
this might boost the reputation of the OT thread, a much maligned object.
--
dorayme
dorayme
Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > There are two projects I find rather fascinating, one is solar
> > collectors (focussing sun rays via mirror farms in the Sahara desert,
> > for example),
>
> Yes, I remember hearing about those... when I was in grade school 40
> years ago.
er... sure ... but .... Have another look at the latest.
> > electricity transmission is much more advanced these days and Europe
> > will benefit.
>
> I cannot help but wonder how much copper will need to be mined and
> processed to transfer electricity from the Sahara to Europe.
>
There are other ways to save Europe electricity, having servers in the
Sahara. They need a lot of cooling, you see.
...
> > But, all ye of little faith, I say unto you, there is much we can do
> > now!
>
> I have a Facebook friend who is very into green technologies. He posts
> links to articles about these technologies on his Facebook page. Almost
> all of them have one thing in common... they are prototypes that will
> require at least a decade of development before they can be used by the
> general public.
What can I say? If you keep this up and depress us all, where will come
the hope and motivation for the natural selection to better cleaner
technologies come from. I beg you Scott, be more encouraging! There is
nothing evil about cleaner and different technology that requires any
passionate attack on them...
--
dorayme
Ben C
> In article <slrnhhutcr....@bowser.marioworld>,
> Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-12-09, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> ...
>> > ...I am confident that soon enough the
>> > scientists themselves will sort weaknesses out. They will be not be
>> > defeated by temporary distortions and the truth will out.
>>
>> Eventually you would have thought so. It also depends what the weather
>> does. The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come
>> true.
>>
>
> Well, I am not sure. I am one of those gullible characters that think of
> CO2 as forming a blanket that helps warm the planet...
The actual case being made is more subtle than that. The amount of CO2
emitted by humans is less than 10% of the amount that goes in and out of
natural sources and sinks. This fact is not disputed as far as I know.
That this extra CO2 should cause any significant extra warming depends
on a lot of positive feedback and a model in which climate is extremely
sensitive to small changes in CO2.
The only reason to believe the real world resembles that model given,
that I have seen, is that models built on that assumption reliably
"predict" the past and that they can't think of any other factors that
might drive climate.
That's a very weak argument anyway. But then you consider also that the
models have predicted the future very badly since 1988, and that there
is actual empirical evidence from ice cores that CO2 does not drive
climate.
[...]
>> It seems very likely to me that MBH98 (the original hockey stick) was a
>> fraud. The main thing the emails show is the continued activity of that
>> same clique of people and which pies their fingers are in. It is only
>> rational to subtract their contribution from the "consensus", and then
>> ask what remains.
>>
>
> Well, yes, and what remains will be outed. I simply do not believe that
> scientists, unlike politicians and mass public movements and
> acquiescences, will be silenced for long in this day and age.
Indeed, and there are quite a few of them out there.
>> For a lot of reasons I think the most reliable temperature record we
>> have is the satellite record from UAH which goes back to about 1978, and
>> it appears to falsify the models.
>>
> I think we better start compiling our own list of the evidence that we
> all accept and never mind fancy doodle dandy computer models, just have
> a bit of a look to see if all the bits from diverse sources more
> plausibly point in one direction rather than another. At least that
> would be a start.
Yes, and let me know if you find any at all! I've yet to find any AGW
"evidence" that doesn't depend on trusting a computer model.
dorayme
Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> On 2009-12-10, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > In article <slrnhhutcr....@bowser.marioworld>,
> > Ben C <spam...@spam.eggs> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2009-12-09, dorayme <dorayme...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > ...
> >> > ...I am confident that soon enough the
> >> > scientists themselves will sort weaknesses out. They will be not be
> >> > defeated by temporary distortions and the truth will out.
> >>
> >> Eventually you would have thought so. It also depends what the weather
> >> does. The predictions James Hansen made in 1988 simply haven't come
> >> true.
> >>
> >
> > Well, I am not sure. I am one of those gullible characters that think of
> > CO2 as forming a blanket that helps warm the planet...
>
> The actual case being made is more subtle than that. The amount of CO2
> emitted by humans is less than 10% of the amount that goes in and out of
> natural sources and sinks. This fact is not disputed as far as I know.
>
> That this extra CO2 should cause any significant extra warming depends
> on a lot of positive feedback and a model in which climate is extremely
> sensitive to small changes in CO2.
>
And, I imagine, having to take into account a few things like the impact
of humans on forests, on their building huge cities, on all sorts of
things to do with life on earth, maybe even including the demise of some
frogs with the rise of wireless technologies...
> The only reason to believe the real world resembles that model given,
> that I have seen, is that models built on that assumption reliably
> "predict" the past and that they can't think of any other factors that
> might drive climate.
>
It would be a grave problem if mere past *known data prediction*
continued, I grant you that. Let's see.
> >>
> > I think we better start compiling our own list of the evidence that we
> > all accept and never mind fancy doodle dandy computer models, just have
> > a bit of a look to see if all the bits from diverse sources more
> > plausibly point in one direction rather than another. At least that
> > would be a start.
>
> Yes, and let me know if you find any at all! I've yet to find any AGW
> "evidence" that doesn't depend on trusting a computer model.
You will be the first to know, I promise.
--
dorayme
Ben C
Yes, all kinds of things-- it's a very complicated system with lots of
positive and negative feedbacks.
And it's not just limited to what happens on this planet-- the "weather"
in the solar system and galaxy (whose centre the solar system is
orbiting so there may be "seasonal" variations in the 250 million year
long galactic year) also influence temperature. There is clear empirical
correlation at least between solar wind and temperature. The suggested
mechanism is that cosmic rays increase cloud formation.
Josiah Jenkins
<sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
>dorayme wrote:
>> There are two projects I find rather fascinating, one is solar
>> collectors (focussing sun rays via mirror farms in the Sahara desert,
>> for example),
>
>Yes, I remember hearing about those... when I was in grade school 40
>years ago. And we still are not able to use this technology to produce
>electricity, and make it available to the general population in a cost
>effective manner.
Like these ?
(PS10 and PS20, both in Spain)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Spain
http://www.bloggersbase.com/environment/spains-big-solar-collector-tower/
--
http://www.ian-stewart.eu
Scott Bryce
> What can I say? If you keep this up and depress us all, where will
> come the hope and motivation for the natural selection to better
> cleaner technologies come from. I beg you Scott, be more encouraging!
> There is nothing evil about cleaner and different technology that
> requires any passionate attack on them...
I am all for cleaner technologies. The technologies we have now allow us
to do more than we could during the industrial revolution, and to do so
with less pollution. That shows us that clean technologies can and do
work. What I am wary of is a rush to "green" technologies and policies
that are not green at all in the name of man-made climate change, for
which there is no solid scientific evidence.
Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
could use a little warming.
So if you want to set up a wind farm, be my guest. I'm all for it, as
long as you don't kid yourself into thinking that it makes you the
earth's savior. What I don't want to see is our current technologies
being replaced by less efficient technologies just because our current
technologies put a naturally occurring substance, which is exhaled by
all animals as they breathe, into the air.
dorayme
Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> What I am wary of is a rush to "green" technologies and policies
> that are not green at all in the name of man-made climate change, for
> which there is no solid scientific evidence.
>
No one wants to rush to green that is not green. There are technologies
that are very iffy in this regard. Depends on a lot of things, but
making biodiesel on a large scale with known methods suddenly now would
be a good example of something to be wary of.
It is also understandable to want solid evidence before making costly
decisions. But that is not always possible where there are risks that
are hard to assess. Until many more scientists start to get up and start
saying things against what appears to be a lot of general consensus
among so many of them, I would be careful of stressing too much how
"unsolid" the evidence is. There is a lot at stake.
> Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
> dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
> activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
> temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
> the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
> be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
> could use a little warming.
Feel free to take some of the heat from over here! Do you have any idea
what it is like to live on days over 40, even 50 degrees C?
>
> What I don't want to see is our current technologies
> being replaced by less efficient technologies just because our current
> technologies put a naturally occurring substance, which is exhaled by
> all animals as they breathe, into the air.
I wish it was only this naturally occurring substance! Burning coal
would have a better press at least. (I lived in England before they
introduced "smokeless" coal and it was fun crossing Manchester village
bridges when the big shielders would go under on their way to Scotland).
England was covered in grime. I miss it!)
--
dorayme
Scott Bryce
> No one wants to rush to green that is not green. There are
> technologies that are very iffy in this regard. Depends on a lot of
> things, but making biodiesel on a large scale with known methods
> suddenly now would be a good example of something to be wary of.
So there are some things we can both agree on.
> It is also understandable to want solid evidence before making costly
> decisions. But that is not always possible where there are risks
> that are hard to assess. Until many more scientists start to get up
> and start saying things against what appears to be a lot of general
> consensus among so many of them, I would be careful of stressing too
> much how "unsolid" the evidence is. There is a lot at stake.
There is a lot at stake either way. I do not want to see us make radical
changes in the way we live--changes that can have severe economic
consequences--when there is not adequate evidence to show that those
changes are necessary.
> Feel free to take some of the heat from over here! Do you have any
> idea what it is like to live on days over 40, even 50 degrees C?
Since I grew up in the land of Fahrenheit, no I don't. But I understand
122F, which is probably hotter than I have ever experienced.
> I wish it was only this naturally occurring substance!
Well, yes, there is also water vapor.
Which brings us back to the biodiesel thing. An acre of corn can give
off over 7000 gallons of water in the form of water vapor into the air
each day. And water vapor is a greenhouse gas. So growing corn to make
biodiesel or methanol contributes to global warming. You can't win.
It wasn't that long ago that scientists were saying that all that water
vapor would reflect the sun's heat back into space before it reached the
ground, so maybe it all works out.
dorayme
Scott Bryce <sbr...@scottbryce.com> wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > No one wants to rush to green that is not green. There are
> > technologies that are very iffy in this regard. Depends on a lot of
> > things, but making biodiesel on a large scale with known methods
> > suddenly now would be a good example of something to be wary of.
>
> So there are some things we can both agree on.
>
> > It is also understandable to want solid evidence before making costly
> > decisions. But that is not always possible where there are risks
> > that are hard to assess. Until many more scientists start to get up
> > and start saying things against what appears to be a lot of general
> > consensus among so many of them, I would be careful of stressing too
> > much how "unsolid" the evidence is. There is a lot at stake.
>
> There is a lot at stake either way. I do not want to see us make radical
> changes in the way we live--changes that can have severe economic
> consequences--when there is not adequate evidence to show that those
> changes are necessary.
>
There is a lot of hysteria about the changes that reasonably
conservative and sensible governments are proposing. Putting a tax
carbon and such things, with subsidies to deserving cases (both
individually considered and otherwise) will not seem as radical as
critics are making out. It seems eminently sensible to me to put a price
on various things that could be described as important human capital,
clean air being one, clean water being another. It makes good economic
sense to make it count againtnst you even in the short term if you want
to make a few bucks degrading this capital. Not all capital is normal
physical infrastructure or dollars in the bank.
Anyway, this is off off topic. The key question that is off topic and
relevant here is whether the earth is warming *due to the actions of
humans*.
> > Feel free to take some of the heat from over here! Do you have any
> > idea what it is like to live on days over 40, even 50 degrees C?
>
> Since I grew up in the land of Fahrenheit, no I don't.
I made many experiments in learning this. I found, no sweat, it feels a
bit cooler on days that it is 15.6 degrees C than on days it is 60
degrees F...
--
dorayme
Jonathan N. Little
> Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
> dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
> activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
> temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
> the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
> be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
> could use a little warming.
Don't know where you are getting your data from but I would trust NOAA's
data
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/warmest.html
--
Take care,
Jonathan
-------------------
LITTLE WORKS STUDIO
http://www.LittleWorksStudio.com
Jonathan N. Little
> Scott Bryce wrote:
>
>> Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
>> dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
>> activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
>> temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
>> the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
>> be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
>> could use a little warming.
>
> Don't know where you are getting your data from but I would trust NOAA's
> data
>
> http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/warmest.html
>
vacillation but the trend is still not good, and it looks even more
dramatic if you trend over the last century
<http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/2008/ann/global-jan-dec-error-bar-pg.gif>
Ed Mullen
> There is a lot of hysteria about the changes that reasonably
> conservative and sensible governments are proposing. Putting a tax
"reasonably conservative," "sensible" and "government" do not rationally
belong together.
--
Ed Mullen
http://edmullen.net
"Don't make no sense that common sense don't make no sense no more." -
John Prine
Ed Mullen
> Scott Bryce wrote:
>
>> Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
>> dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
>> activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
>> temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
>> the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
>> be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
>> could use a little warming.
>
> Don't know where you are getting your data from but I would trust NOAA's
> data
>
> http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/warmest.html
>
I would normally have agreed with you except for reading recently and
severally that more than half the reporting weather stations in the USA
are built and/or situated in violation of recommended scientific
standards. Such as being situated on blacktop parking lots. Or next to
exhaust vents for heat systems. Or in non-conforming enclosures (i.e.,
black roofs, unventilated, situated in the shade or full sun, etc.)
Which means their data is, generally, junk.
Mark Twain: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and
statistics."
My brother-in-law: "PhD = Piled Higher and Deeper." It's what we had
engraved on the pewter mug we gave him when he got his PhD in Physics.
No, I can't tell you what he does for a living. I asked him and he said
he could tell me but then he'd have to shoot me.
--
Ed Mullen
http://edmullen.net
Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste
good toasted.
dorayme
"Jonathan N. Little" <lws...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Scott Bryce wrote:
>
> > Do you want some good news? Average global temperatures have been
> > dropping over that last decade. It is probably due to a drop in solar
> > activity. (Who would have thought of that--the sun influencing global
> > temperatures!?!?!) Of course, if the current cooling trend continues,
> > the ice age predicted in the 70s may come upon us yet, which would not
> > be good news. Right now the temperature where I live is 9F (-13C). We
> > could use a little warming.
>
> Don't know where you are getting your data from but I would trust NOAA's
> data
>
> http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/warmest.html
<http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/news/latest/uk-science-stateme
nt.html>
These are *some* of the scientists who are, according to climate change
skeptics, being badly duped.
Part of this lot's statement:
"We, members of the UK science community, have the utmost confidence in
the observational evidence for global warming and the scientific basis
for concluding that it is due primarily to human activities..."
--
dorayme
dorayme
wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > There is a lot of hysteria about the changes that reasonably
> > conservative and sensible governments are proposing. Putting a tax
>
> "reasonably conservative," "sensible" and "government" do not rationally
> belong together.
Ed, it is a matter of degree. There are some huge differences around the
world. Be fair!
--
dorayme
Ed Mullen
I thought I was very egalitarian in my comment.
I didn't say anything about any one nation's version of implementation
of idiocy. Rather, it was a general observation intended to be applied
equally well to all governments, past, present and future.
(Coincidentally, see my random sig-tag. Now THERE'S a notion govenment
can get its head around!)
BTW, for you folks outside of the US, Jeff Foxworthy is a comedian.
Perhaps best known for his series of rants on: "You might be a Red Neck
if ..."
Samples ...
http://www.fortogden.com/foredneck.html
--
Ed Mullen
http://edmullen.net
"Getting married for sex is like buying a 747 for the free peanuts." -
Jeff Foxworthy
dorayme
wrote:
> dorayme wrote:
> > In article<3bp02d....@news.alt.net>, Ed Mullen<e...@edmullen.net>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> dorayme wrote:
> >>> There is a lot of hysteria about the changes that reasonably
> >>> conservative and sensible governments are proposing. Putting a tax
> >>
> >> "reasonably conservative," "sensible" and "government" do not rationally
> >> belong together.
> >
> > Ed, it is a matter of degree. There are some huge differences around the
> > world. Be fair!
> >
>
...
>
> ... it was a general observation intended to be applied
> equally well to all governments, past, present and future.
That was my complaint!
--
dorayme
Ben C
First, 1850 was the end of the Little Ice Age (associated with the
Maunder Minimum) when it was unusually cold, so if you start a graph at
1800, the trend will mostly be upwards.
Second, 1998 was a freak year, because of El Nino or something.
Third, we only have really accurate temperature (especially considering
that people in the field are making bold inferences from tenths of a
degree over decades) going back to 1978 when the satellite record
starts.
Here is a graph I plotted myself from UAH's satellite data:
http://www.tidraso.co.uk/misc/temps.png
Showing the spike in 1998. (I don't know why your graph has the spike in
1997 though-- 1997 had a global average of only 0.05C compared to 0.5C
in 1998 according to the UAH data).
Temperatures have been mostly going up since 1978, but then, as your
graph shows, the 1970s were also rather cold (that's partly why people
were worried about an ice age back then).
Finally, observe also that on your graph, temperatures rose until 1940,
while human CO2 emissions were still very low. Then between 1940 and
1980, when human CO2 was increasing the most, temperatures went down. We
can't therefore claim that there's any obvious reason here to believe
that the warming between the 1980s and 1997 looks had anything to do
with human CO2.
Of course no doubt we could do a computer model, which accounted for
everything perfectly...
So I don't think your graph shows any cause for alarm.