Has NASA lost its way?

[gbigs]

OK, our point is that the fact that they are signatories to the document, means nothing (in terms of carbon emissions) . Bottom line.

 

Cheers

 

The agreement is a laugh - it's an old man with no teeth trying to gum a T-bone steak.  Setting emission goals is NOT the same as meeting emission goals.  Paris is just another carbon producing, expensive dining boondoggle on taxpayer dime.  Obama doing nothing then declaring victory is par for his kiddie course.

[ralarcon]

The agreement is a laugh - it's an old man with no teeth trying to gum a T-bone steak.  Setting emission goals is NOT the same as meeting emission goals.  Paris is just another carbon producing, expensive dining boondoggle on taxpayer dime.  Obama doing nothing then declaring victory is par for his kiddie course.

And further more producing "TONS " of carbon emmissions with all these jetsetters and heads of states attending and traveling in their jets. I will never produce , personally, that much CO2 even if I buy a Lincoln Navigator and replace my CTLS with an Embraer JET! It is like you say, the lack of perspective is laughable.

 

Cheers

[Ed Cesnalis]

In some circles to question is to deny, where stand we?

[Ed Cesnalis]

World leaders do not have to each fly their own big jet. David Cameron flew commercial to the US and didn't even fly 1st class.  Cameron was demonstrating austerity not global warming reform.  The current leaders that attended Paris would be far more believable if they actually walked the walk.  Its not that they met buy how they got there and how they got home,

 

China may be 'working on cutting' as you say but they add a coal fired power plant every week, recently Bejing closed factories, schools and most things when the smog got so bad you couldn't see.

 

[gbigs]

China is building 5 coal plants per month and have hard plans to build 155 more in 2016.  Japan is also adding 25 new coal plants.  India over 100 new ones in 2016.  US coal is being sold to these three nations at low prices because Obama and his EPA are sitting on new coal plants construction in the USA despite coal generating 50% of our power.

 

The bottom line?  The coal is going to be burned...the only real answer who will benefit.

 

Solar generates .04% of our electricity despite 25 years of subsidies... Subsidies that were increased in Obama's latest half-trillion buck deficit laden budget.  And solar is not carbon-neutral...the production and disposal of solar panels is equivalent to the same carbon footprint made by a coal plant generating the equivalent power over the life of that solar panel.

 

The extra hypocrisy over electric cars is also part of the grim picture.  Electric cars pollute twice as much as fossil fuel cars...why?  The power comes from the grid, not from the engine.

 

If greenies were rational and truthfully wanted to cut greenhouse emissions from electricity production they would quit killing nuclear energy.  Nukes are the ONLY zero carbon footprint tech.

[ralarcon]

Yes, I don't think any company should ever have any of their employees get together. There is no advantage to meeting face to face, especially among world leaders.

This is just whining.

Oh, and if you are following China, you know they are working at cutting down emissions even before the conference.

The above statements are rather naive. And oh yes, I have traveled to China recently. Pollution there is not getting better its getting worse.

 

Cheers

[ralarcon]

What measurements did you take, over what period of time? Or. is this just your personal opinion? If I am naive, (after 45 years studying macro economics with a background in science and engineering), you are misleading, unscientific and moribund.

:giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307:

 

Cheers

[FastEddieB]

Was this thread closed and locked or did I just dream that?

[ralarcon]

Was this thread closed and locked or did I just dream that?

Yep , you dreamed it

 

Cheers

[Anticept]

That was a different thread.

[FastEddieB]

That was a different thread.

Oops!

 

I see that now.

 

Carry on!

[FlyingMonkey]

Was this thread closed and locked or did I just dream that?

 

If only we could be so lucky.  

[Anticept]

I've been skimming over this thread as things have been posted, and I'm going to share my views now. I don't care to be drug into an argument with anyone else, but maybe this might offer some insight.

 

First, I personally am not a scientist, in the sense that I don't participate on a professional level in any scientific field, nor do I have the training, education, or experience. I still like science though and will read articles and do little experiments to satiate my curiosity.

 

That said, my perception of the scientific fields are very limited. I am not "in the trenches" with some of these people who spend most of their waking lives in research. So, this makes them considerably more qualified than I to make judgement calls in their field of research.

 

With these things said, if a considerable chunk of the scientific community says something really is a thing, I'm going to listen. I'm not qualified to argue against it. The whole thing on global warming is so widespread, so prolific, that even if I WERE qualified, I STILL wouldn't be able to match the combined research data that all of these people have been collecting for years upon years. Not even CLOSE. But, since I'm not qualified, I can't even begin to argue against it anyways.

 

Where disagreements are happening on the subject, are to what extent the world is warming. This is why linking to one or two articles doesn't prove or disprove anything, because one wrong proclamation doesn't make the whole theory invalid. Science itself is about data and drawing conclusions from it. Being WRONG doesn't invalidate everything you've done, or all the data you've collected. Being wrong can also give you a whole bunch of data; as much as being RIGHT in some cases. That's what science is about: gathering and accruing data and continuously drawing conclusions and adjusting the theory, and the more data gathered, generally the more accurate the conclusions. That's why you could link a hundred cases, and it still doesn't prove or disprove anything, because that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface when it comes to global warming research.

 

Yes, they are people, and mistakes are made. Yes there are political games being played that influence scientific research too. However, this isn't something that is limited to the United States. We don't exist in a bubble. This is a worldwide thing. Scientists and research organizations WORLDWIDE are agreeing on a global warming problem. That would have to be one HELL of a political machine to orchestrate such a widespread lie without information leaks or whistle blowing.

 

Taking steps to reduce emissions and research renewable technologies, while costly now, is leading to new designs that will be useful in the future. A lot of research has gone into blade design for turbines and windmills, which could be extremely useful in colonization efforts in the future. Recent discoveries in solar power have dramatically risen efficiency, and someday they might become economical enough to be put in consumer grade panels.

 

In closing, even if global warming actually isn't a thing, we end up with cleaner running factories and a lower reliance on petroleum, two very good results regardless. I'm sure there are a lot of other benefits that haven't yet been seen.

[Doug G.]

Elon Musk’s SpaceX returns to flight and pulls off dramatic, historic landing - The Washington Post - www.washingtonpost.com

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2015/12/21/elon-musks-spacex-pulls-off-dramatic-historic-landing/

[FastEddieB]

YouTube video here:

 

 

Jump to about the 32 minute mark for them sticking the landing. I've got chills. Plays like a budget TV SciFi movie.

 

Maybe NASA is becoming antiqated and unnecessary, and can maybe just relegate itself to being NAA.

[Ed Cesnalis]

Climate change shock: Burning fossil fuels 'COOLS planet', says NASA

 

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/628524/Climate-change-shock-Burning-fossil-fuels-COOLs-planet-says-NASA

[Doug G.]

Climate change shock: Burning fossil fuels 'COOLS planet', says NASA

 

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/628524/Climate-change-shock-Burning-fossil-fuels-COOLs-planet-says-NASA

LOL. I hope you meant this as humor, one of their other stories says the ancient Romans landed in America. The National Enquirer of England. This says something about sources, credibility and confirmation bias.

[ralarcon]

"Maybe NASA is becoming antiqated and unnecessary, and can maybe just relegate itself to being NAA."

 

:giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: :giggle-3307: 

 

Cheers

[FlyingMonkey]

Doug, here is the actual article published in Nature:

 

http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate2888.html

 

Why are you such an anti-science denier?  

[Ed Cesnalis]

Judicial Watch Sues for Documents Withheld From Congress in New Climate Data Scandal

 

http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-sues-for-documents-withheld-from-congress-in-new-climate-data-scandal/

[Ian]

LOL. I hope you meant this as humor, one of their other stories says the ancient Romans landed in America. The National Enquirer of England. This says something about sources, credibility and confirmation bias.

Doug is quite right - the Daily & Sunday Express are suspect in the extreme - the owner is one Richard Desmond known also as dirty Desmond due to the many other more suspect titles he publishes

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Desmond

 

Or just Google "Dirty Desmond" if you have a strong stomach!!

[Doug G.]

Doug, here is the actual article published in Nature:

 

http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate2888.html

 

Why are you such an anti-science denier?

I am far from a science denier, but I don't confuse either lunatic rags or letters written to magazines (the "article" you pointed to in Nature) with science! This gets more and more ludicrous, and tiresome.

[FlyingMonkey]

Nature is THE preeminent peer reviewed scientific journal, dating back to 1869. It is the most cited scientific source in the world, and most ground breaking papers appear there first. It's hardly an article in a magazine. That's why I pointed out the source, and made the tongue in cheek jokes about deniers and anti-science.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nature_(journal)

 

Agree, this is tiresome. You say NASA data is the only data worth looking at, unless it disagrees with your viewpoint.

[Doug G.]

Nature is THE preeminent peer reviewed scientific journal, dating back to 1869. It is the most cited scientific source in the world, and most ground breaking papers appear there first. It's hardly an article in a magazine. That's why I pointed out the source, and made the tongue in cheek jokes about deniers and anti-science.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nature_(journal)

 

Agree, this is tiresome. You say NASA data is the only data worth looking at, unless it disagrees with your viewpoint.

It was not an article, it was not peer reviewed - look at the heading, Mr. Scientist - IT IS A LETTER to the editor, it is a comment, not research, not data driven, not a double blind analysis, but an opinion written in a letter.

If you can't even research a magazine submission, and don't know how to vet sources for credibility, I don't think you can even begin to think you can handle, or even contemplate, what real science entails. I hope others can see through this charade of pretend knowledge and fake fact.

If you want to talk about the things science is clueless about (so far) let's talk about the increasing speed of the expansion of the universe, or about the fact that 96% of the matter that exists is dark matter and we haven't figured out what that is, or that quantum theory can model the Big Bang back to 10-43rd of a second after it started but can give no reason why it started. At that point the Plank state changed, for an unknown reason, with the separation of one of the four forces. (It is presumed that gravity separated first.), or let's talk about the related question of how energy exists in a complete vacuum and can create matter (if only briefly). If you want to deal with what science is really struggling with try one of those. The climate thing is done, and I am done with the nonsense you keep posting.

[FlyingMonkey]

Um...no.  It is listed in the research section with the following:

 

"This list contains the 50 most recently published research articles"

 

Just because it is listed as a letter does not mean it's not reviewed, nor that it is not data driven.  Here is a link to the supplementary data information at the bottom of the citation:

 

http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/extref/nclimate2888-s1.pdf

 

This is a research piece posted by four NASA Goddard scientists, not a letter to the editor.  Short format pieces are considered "letters", longer pieces are "articles".  The only difference is the length of the piece.  From Nature's publication guide:

 

A. Articles are original reports whose conclusions represent a substantial advance in understanding of an important problem and have immediate, far-reaching implications.

Letters are short reports of original research focused on an outstanding finding whose importance means that it will be of interest to scientists in other fields.