Randy Olson has a new movie that is premiering today: Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy. We all know it’s going to be funny, and that because it will also criticize the scientists studying climate change, it will be infuriating and annoying and will draw lots of fire from both sides.
Go ahead and start sharpening your knives, but do keep this in mind: Olson is the only guy we’ve got trying to widen the market for science documentaries beyond the gray-haired, PBS-watching, NPR-listening audience. He’s opening this thing at Outfest, the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, rather than as a collection of droning heads airing in some godforsaken hole of blandness right after the News Hour with Jim Lehrer, so give him some credit, too. While he doesn’t sing in tune with the rest of the chorus, he’s going to force us all to think, which is something we’re supposed to like. If you’re in LA, go to it and give us a review.
Besides, it’s got Muffy Moose in it. How awful can it be?
should be good, but sizzling is a lesser worry when compared to famine, plague and the general homogenization of the planet.
It’s not merely sizzling (in fact, to imply that it is is to repeat one of the denialists’ favorite talking points), it’s changing and therefore weather patterns along with it. As such, it contributes to famine and plague, although homogenization is outside its scope.
Why do I automatically get nervous when a film has a colon in the title?
First invite two experts to the screening and then ban one as they enter the theater. Make sure there is internet access nearby for the banned expert to go and tell the blogoshere and it probably get alot of publicity.
I should have had /sarcism with the last post.
Er, what moose?
How can a moose be muffy? (Actually, what is muffy?)
Mind you, moose bites can be pretti nasti…
Muffy Moose has a blog!
Highlander II: The Quickening is surely reason enough.
Having said that, there’s also E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, which has both a colon and two full stops. I appreciate that you folks over there call those “periods”, but really, talking about a movie featuring an alien’s colonic periods is walking into dangerous territory.
aw, jeez. How to go about criticizing Olson’s inclusion of his mom–again–without seeming to, you know, rag on the guy’s mom?
Put it this way: I do not find her the compelling character he seems to think she is…
I don’t know what a Muffy Moose is but a muff here in Aus is a colloquialism for a , gosh its soooo slutty of me to say this, girl’s “ladybits”. Muffy Moose might therefore add a quite unintended humour factor to the movie should it be released here.
PZ, I resemble that remark I’ll have you know.
Having not seen Olsons work, why would he bash the scientists? isn’t it the policy makers that need bashing?
Bride, it means the same thing here in the states hence the term “Muff Diving”
Maybe it’s a takeoff of “Buffy” as in Vampire Slayer. I wait with baited breath.
“Moose Knuckle” is another funny, dirty neologism.
mmmmm …. “ladybits”.
people, People! Enough with the “muff” jokes…it’s the guy’s mom fer goshsakes.
It wasn’t anyone here who hung the name “Muffy” on somebody’s mother.
Talk about low hanging fruit. Peaches anyone?
It’ll probably matter about as much as Expelled did, or Flock of Dodos, for that matter.
Seriously, if he can use movies to promote science, good for him. I just don’t see much chance that he, or anyone else, really will.
If science documentaries were likely to appeal to other than the PBS-watching audience, we’d have science documentaries where they really matter, on commercial TV. And there even is some, on cable channels. But they don’t look like they’ll move much beyond there current places any time soon.
So good for Randy, and I wish him success. I simply won’t expect much of the latter.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
A muff is a furlined hand warmer.
Be careful…don’t say it.. OK go ahead.
I dunno, but this one must have you biting your nails right to the quick: Colon: The Scatological Columbus Epic. It has a colon and a Colon!
Hey! I watch PBS and listen to NPR all the time, and there is nary a gray hair on my head.
And “The Newshour with Jim Lehrer” is much better journalism than you’ll find on most other stations, especially the cable networks.
I was always surprised there weren’t more of these.
So how many resources did he consume making this entertainment that will convince very few people of anything?
Allonym, you’re too much. Thanks for… sharing.
I can’t be the only one thinking of this:
Surprised the AGW denialist crew isn’t here yet. They will be.
I thought AGW would happen in the 1980s due to the law of cause and effect. Doubling CO2 had to do something.
1. So realistically are we actually going to do something other than talk, wave our hands, and blame someone else?
2. Realistically can we actually do anything other than adapt. Our civilization is based on fossil fuels. The rest of the world wants what we have and why shouldn’t they get it? More food, more medical care, personal transporters aka cars, electric lights, the usual.
Give the choice between AGW and a first world lifestyle, what are the third worlders going to choose?
My answers. No we won’t doing much if anything.
Can we do much if anything? Probably not
Keep in mind my opinion is worth what you paid for it and, as 1/6.7 billionth part of the human population, not very important.
Totally OT – thank you Aussies for sending over the Australorps. I have three in my flock, and they are super. Damn fast runners though!
No Raven, your opinion does matter. All 6+ billion of our opinions matter because our opinions can change what we do.. no we can’t stop the changes already in process but we can change it so it won’t get worse in another 10 years. We have at least 10 years to wait to suffer what we’ve already dumped. We need to get the oligarchs and governments to change too, so we can put a halt to our dumping. We’ve got to make changing cheaper and less difficult to do otherwise we won’t change in time.
My rant. sorry
Alright, this is not Muffy Moose. But may I present The Muffs.
OK, I’ll bite. what’s an Australorp?
What can I say, I love Muffs!
Janine ID #29.. the Muffs totally grossd out my 12 y/o twins ’cause their foggey Dad was watching it. Shock & Awe of youth.
Let us try again.
Barklikeadog, that is funnier then hell,seeing that their sound could have come from anytime in the last forty years. But I do hope your twins end up as cool as Kim.
#33 Janine ID.
That was much better. They didn’t blush this time.
The girl twin liked the 2nd one. The boy twin is too cool to watch it. I think he’s still secretly embarassed that his Dad actually likes stuff like that. All he sees me do is watch the Science Channel & listen to NPR.
Barklikeadog, the song, Lucky Guy is older then your kids. I guess I have entered Foggeyland.(The Grumpiest Place On Earth!)
Barklikeadog
An Australorp is a chook. And a damn tasty one at that.
Well, Carrie Brownstein, from one of the coolest bands ever, Sleater-Kinney, blogs for NPR.
Ok so what’s a chook?
Grumpy land isn’t so bad, I at least have some perspective now.
Not only that, it has both a colon and a hyphen, which reminds me of a line I saw long, long ago on and online forum far, far away. In the middle of a heated, totally anal-retentive exchange about hyphenation (yes, this forum was that geeky), one correspondent interjected…
“Hey, does ‘anal retentive’ have a hyphen?”
…to which the instantaneous response was…
“No! ‘Anal retentive’ has a colon!”
[I’ll be here all week, ladies and gentlemen; don’t forget to tip your waitress…]
Sorry, Chook = Chicken. You name it, us Australians can find a nickname for it.
The gist of it is….
Reminds me of a sign I saw in Tanzania that instructed us not to “Fark on the Grass”
Bill Dauphin. How could you have forgotten to add “…and try the veal!” ?
An Australorp is a breed of chicken developed in Australia about 100 years ago from the Black Orpington breed from England. Oddly enough, we just lost one of my wife’s Black Australorp hens two days ago. It seemed to have suffered heatstroke; ta-daa, right back on thread topic!
Was it tasty? I prefer grilled or fried…so long as it Sizzles.. Ta da. On Topic too.
Know your Chook?
Naaaa, it doesn’t work.
Late to the party, as usual – still obsessing about ‘ladybits’; I like it! It seems to fall somewhere in the euphemism range between ‘down there’ and ‘coochie.’
You Aussie’s certainly know your chooks. My Australorps can out run all the other pullets by a good three lenghts. We’re raising them for the eggs. In July our New Jersey Giants arrive. My neighbor’s have Australorps and they swear the Giants won’t compare… we’ll see. But damn them Aussies are fast! And I don’t mean sluts. ;)
Screw this movie, I’m watching Dennis Kucinich introducing 35 articles of impeachment against that fuckwad that your religious nutbars and reactionary redneck peckerheads put in the the whitehouse.
Go Dennis!
http://www.c-span.org/watch/cs_cspan_wm.asp?Cat=TV&Code=CS
Everyone amazes me with the way you can haul out the YouTube links! The Muffs and the Chicken bit are too funny. If I had the skill I’d link to the Black Adder episode in season three where Hugh Laurie ‘speaks chicken’, as the stupid Prince George – it’s funny as hell. Hugh is a chook… oh, a hot chook – that’s on topic!
Shonen Knife has ESP, but since you don’t…
Religious fuckwad nutbar reactionary redneck peckerheads. Sir/madame the vast population of unwashed peckerheads (NOT Australorps!) deserve the moniker – however, this hillbilly proudly sports two political buttons – Impeach Cheney FIRST, and – The only Bush I trust is my OWN.(Muff) It does raise the heat index at the local bookstore. Back on topic!
Barks, if you have “baited” breath, you should consider changing your diet. Maybe you meant “bated”?
this hillbilly proudly sports two political buttons
There is a part of my brain that imagines that the way you wear them makes it just safe enough to display them on broadcast television…
Patricia, it is easy. I have no computer skills yet I can make links.
(a href=”The page you want to link to.”)What ever statement you want.(/a)
Make sure you use <> instead of () and you can link what you like.
Dammit. There I go again – “Some like Patricia just fall apart into a stream of obscenities.” Brenda von Ahsen
Ken Cope, that was not even remotely on topic. But some Shonen Knife is always welcome. Though it looks like The Flaming Lips are now using that stage. And I like the Jimi Hendrix impersonation.
…a stream of obscenities.
Would that be anything like Bubbly Creek?
Janine, of course it was off topic.
I was looking for Shonen Knife’s cover of The Rutles’ “Goosestep Mama” but this just worked for at least one other thread as well.
Upstairs, every once in a while, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots in 5.1, and the two speakers on the back wall feel left out.
Funny, the first time I heard Shonen Knife, they were doing a cover of Big Dipper’s Faith Healer. Alas and alack, there is not a video. But it is a damn good excuse to post some Big Dipper.
Bride Of Shrek, you must remember these guys!
Speaking of movies, has everyone already heard of this?
http://www.apple.com/trailers/lions_gate/religulous/
#56 – I’m sorry, you loose me. I have no idea what a href is. Just because I can’t do it doesn’t mean I don’t get a charge out of the rest of you brain-i-acks!
But dammit, the cost of Depends and Monitor Wipes has spiked since I started hanging out here.
Patricia, I have no idea what a href is either. But all you need to do is type out what I laid out. And use <> instead of (). If I can do it, you can do it.
Hugh Laurie’s chicken impression on Blackadder, at just after 2:00 minutes in this clip:
You can do the proper html, or you can just paste the link in and explain what it is beforehand (e.g., do it the lazy way and let your “framing” cover up your lack of skillz).
“Ladybits” is such a nice euphemism. My husband calls that body part the “sweet round bits”.
Barks, enjoy your twins at 12. Mine are 14, and the last two years have been the transition from kids to larval adults . . . boy twin is six feet tall now, and girl twin is 5’7″. Fortunately, they are as nerdy as their father, Mr. Science, and I are — and they still think we have geek chic.
Back on thread . . . at our house, we talk a lot about GW and the end of oil as the fuel for transportation and energy technology. This will be the one-two punch that sends humanity to the canvas. Climate changes are going to send our crop yields into the toilet, we’ll be increasingly ravaged by severe weather, and we’re going to run out of the fuel that makes our technology work.
Raven, there is an alternative to adaptation, it grieves me to say; it’s mass starvation. Extinction is unlikely, but six billion people can’t be sustained in first world comfort without oil. We’re already seeing food riots, and I fear we may be witnessing the beginning of the end, a Malthusian nightmare.
Salvation, if it comes, will be delivered by science — provided it isn’t hobbled by religious quackery and demogaugery. But when times get bad, the comfort of superstition finds more adherents than does reason.
I wish the landing could be softer, but we’re running out of time. We have a huge global infrastructure that is about to come crashing down around our ears. Our only hope lies in listening to our scientists and giving them the resources they’ll need to find a way out of this pit.
Janine @ #62
I am absolutely thrilled someone outside of Aus knows these guys. I was sooooo in love with them back in my “yoof” days. Ah, the era of permed mullet rock. Youngsters these days just can’t cut it.
Now, now, now – let’s have a bit of respect for a gentleman that is a fair judge of a paunchious, but sleek ass when a fine classic speciman is trotted out before him.
Sail on Ken Cope. :)
Aha #66 – you have it exactly!
As Grand Mistress of the Chicken Speakers Guild – I humbly thank you.
Someone should tell Randy that some devious cad has hacked into his server and replaced his clever and funny trailer with an unprofessional mess that in comparison makes Expelled look like an Oscar contender and is about as humorous as gout.
Seriously, I’ve seen more accomplished clips put on youtube as part of high school projects.
Randy, a few words of advice.
Please stop making ‘comedies’ (You aren’t actually very funny).
OK, thats just my opinion but when you call your film a ‘comedy’ you are inviting judgment on the quality of the humor.
OT so far as muffs and chooks go, but perhaps with some faint connection to the film: –
Leigh, the current high food (and oil) prices have a lot to do with speculation: after the fall in property prices and interest rates in the US, a lot of hot money has flowed into commodities – yet another bubble is inflating. I don’t mean there’s no problem, but if mass starvation occurs in the next few years it will be because of speculation and gross inequality, not an absolute shortage of food.
Some good news this morning (I don’t have many details): “leading scientists” from the G8 plus the five largest developing states (China, India, Brazil, Mexico, South Africa I think) have called for rapid investment in carbon capture and storage demonstration projects. It really is no good waiting for “The Market” to do things like this – you might just as well pray!
Mikey Day and Mitch Silva are in this. They’ve done some excellent sketch comedy, this might be funny.
Their David Blaine Street Magic Spoofs are hysterical.
Stuff like Carbon capture isn’t really well-established as a good solution is it? I mean, I don’t think there are any commercial plant which have 100% C02 capture. Also, I don’t know if long-term storage issues have been addressed. For example, what happens if there’s an earthquake, and C02 which is pumped & stored in a coal mine escapes?
Besides, most politicians in India are frankly clueless about such possible energy technologies, or the science behind it. The majority of the coal based power plants built are still the ‘dirty’ plants.
Also, the leading scientists in India don’t have anywhere near as much funding as the the US scientists. In fact, I think John Hopkins and MIT alone get more funding than all the Indian research universities put together.And, since most scientific equipment (like XRD’s ,electron microscopes, etc) are purchased outside India, the PPP is almost 1. It’s highly improbable that any new breakthroughs in energy (like PV technology) will come from developing countries. Why do you think most students here want to study in the US?
Nick, the current crunch in oil and food are indeed the result of speculation — but the speculation is the result of growing scarcity. My concern is that, unless we do something very soon, this is only the first rumbling of the catastrophe that will sweep down upon us.
Elements for the perfect storm:
depleted oil.
agricultural yields dependent on oil.
transportation for the food dependent on oil.
greatly increased demand for energy, goods, and food commensurate with first world levels from emerging > billion-citizen economies.
oil mostly located in politically unstable countries (Iraq situation writ large).
switch in warfare to unconventional terrorist techniques, making every country equally vulnerable.
increased burning of fossil fuels to support emerging economies.
ramped-up greenhouse effect from the hundreds of additional coal-fired plants.
increasing weather instability, reducing crop yields and unleashing devastating hurricanes, cyclones (both kinds), flooding, and drought.
RESULT: Chaos as the infrastructure breaks down and people get desperate. The poorest nations suffer first and most. They bring the war to the soils of the developed nations, using easily-accessible, cheap terrorism techniques. The transportation, energy, and commerce infrastructure fails.
Night falls.
Patricia (#64), since I’ve recently discovered how to get the HTML for a hyperlink to display literally (and feeling very smug about it!!), this is what you should type. The example below links back to the SB homepage:
<a href=”http://scienceblogs.com/”>Sb’s homepage</a>
Replace the ScienceBlogs URL with the address pasted from your browser’s address bar, and whatever description you want instead of “Sb’s homepage”. As Janine says, you can do it!
Sigmund (#71): Having watched the trailer, I have to say I agree with you. In fact, I’m bemused. Is Olson making a film about making films about climate change? Is he emulating Ali G’s incomprehension of serious interviewees, or Borat’s wily exposure of people’s prejudices? Are we going to learn anything at all by watching? Or did he just get a DV camera for his birthday?
“Kentucky Fried Chook”?
And all this “muff” talk is making think about running out to a 24 hour Del Taco.
Man, that was uncalled for.
At least you’re not Chooking your Chicken
People, people, friends, colleagues…be kind to me. MAJeff is mentioning hard-ons in another thread and the muff and ladybits (which I always referred to as the “toy store”) being “displayed” here is too much for an old and lonely man early in the morning. Need coffee and a cig, and possibly the phone number of an escort serv…errr, never mind.
Ciao y’all
Jeffrey D
“Need coffee and a cig, and possibly the phone number of an escort serv…”
Bobby Earle
“And all this “muff” talk is making think about running out to a 24 hour Del Taco”
You are, undeniably a pair of sluts… or given you’re both of the “ladybit-less” persuasian… manwhores (manbitches, manginas or , my personal favourite, bloketitutes)
Bride of Shrek, #80, you are wonderful little Aussie bint and doing much to restore the good name of slut. (smile)
I actually like slut, but more than willing to accept manwhore. Bloketitute is new to me, but I do like that. Thanks.
Ciao, bella BoS
Posted by: Bride of Shrek
Bride of Shrek @42 wrote:
When I learned that, I finally got the joke in Muriel’s Wedding:
Rhonda: How are you?
Tania: Married. (shows off ring)
Rhonda: Muriel told me! (admires ring) Turkey.
Tania: Chook.
Rhonda: Chook, that’s right!
JeffreyD,
You might also want to consider the slang term Donkey* as suitable, conjures a lovely image of priapism IMHO.
*a Hee-haw (he-whore)
Masks of Eris wrote: “Mind you, moose bites can be pretti nasti…”
Subtle. Best comment in this thread. But then again, I’m a non-gray-haired NPR listening, Science Channel watching geek, so quotes of this variety carry a lot of cache with me.
It’s interesting how the Rightists preach worst-case scenarios (and beyond, into sheer paranoid) when the subject is terrorism, homosexuality, secularity, “forced redistribution of wealth”, gun control, immigration, etc. but invariably play ostrich when it comes to climate change and its global implications, which could be very dire indeed, particularly in light of the nuclear arsenals possessed by countries whose need for food and fuel are very high and will not decline anytime soon.
Geez, I guess it might have something to do with the rabid rejection of anything that has even the faintest whiff of “left” to it. You know, hey, Al “I Invented The Internet*” Gore champions the cause, ergo, it is false.
(* which he never actually said, of course.)
But he did claim to have “ridden the mighty Moon Worm!”…
I always thought it had to do with Man being given dominion over the Earth, and Jesus coming “soon” so cleanse the planet and create a new Eden.
coming “soon” to*
It’s early
Joe and I were covering a conference about climate change and gardens (!) up at UC Davis the weekend PZ was here in Berkeley. (I want you to know just how hard we worked to show up at that pub and recover enough to drive up there again the second day. And then spend the day trying to appear rational and all.)
One researcher who spoke mentioned in passing that she had a gripe with The Public, who’d spent years effectively demanding more research to “prove it!” about GW/CC and suddenly had turned around and said “OK, we believe you; why haven’t you scientists solved it already? Quick! Tell us what to do!”
{Sigh} Blame the media, I guess. Wait. That’s us.
Some of us have been carrying on about this stuff for decades, ya know. Crazy radicals.
Ron, keep in mind that this is the same public that was surprised by Katrina…
Hey, Bride Of Shrek. Back in the eighties, the record companies were trying to break Aussie bands like The Lime Spiders, The Hoodoo Gurus, The Hunter And Collectors and Mental As Anything. I even remember oddball Kiwi bands like The Swingers coming through. Thought they never really hit it big stateside like The Church, Midnight Oil and Crowded House; they were all great bands.
And I really liked the Spiders. (Though I had no idea Mick Blood had such a mullet. When I posted that video, it was the first time I had seen it.) And all these years later, I still have If You Leave Me, Can I Come Too racing through my head. Plus, you had to like a band where one of the members was named Greedy Smith.
Speaking of film promoting science, please see this fascinating article from recent New Scientist:
http://technology.newscientist.com/channel/tech/mg19826581.900-histories-microscopic-stars-of-the-silver-screen.html
In August 1903, a new form of entertainment made its debut at the Alhambra Theatre, one of London’s most famous music halls. The headline acts were Carmen, the New Grand Dramatic Ballet and the World’s Monarchs of Magic, but the “turn” that captivated the audience enough to empty the bars and silence the chatter was a shaky, grainy film shot through a microscope. Its unlikely stars were cheese mites, carefully cultivated on a nice piece of Stilton and now creeping and crawling over the newly installed big screen like monstrous eight-legged aliens. Cheese Mites lasted only a minute, but it was a sensation and played to a packed house for months.
Leigh #66
Thanks Leigh, mine are just developing both physically and emotionally. Their attitudes are turning black but I do have hope. The girl twin is determined to be a paleontologist and the boy twin wants to emulate Dad and do zoology. He’s got it in mind that he wants be be a zookeeper. Love it & them. They are cool.
Hey, I’ve heard the Hoodoo Gurus. There’s an old tape in the collection called (I think) Mars Needs Guitars that must be my dad’s. Pretty good stuff.
I also like Midnight Oil and Crowded House – a lot! I’ve never heard of those others, though.
There was another really popular band from back then, kinda poppy… my dad said they’d have been beaten to a pulp in average outback roadhouse… LOL… you know the band I mean. I just can’t think of the name right now.
Oh! Another one I know is the Divinyls. Rockin! There’s all kinds of weird stuff on the shelves at home.
There’s a contemporary Aussie band I really like: The Cat Empire. They’re awesome.
Nick # 72
Nick, listening to NPR after leaving the rheumatologists office, they were talking about the unregulated speculation & how it’s driving the price so high. The public is paying for their greed. It appears Goldman Sachs, BP and others are the culprits and that were allowing The British and Dubai to regulate. We’ve completly devested ourselves of the responsibility to oversee our oun affairs. It’s deplorable. The weak dollar is making it worse and is a result of the unregulated speculation. No light at the end of the tunnel w/o intervention soon.
Patricia, at #69
Now, now, now – let’s have a bit of respect for a gentleman that is a fair judge of a paunchious, but sleek ass when a fine classic speciman is trotted out before him.
Sail on Ken Cope. :)
Let it never be said about me that, “He knew not his ass from a hole on the ground.” I highly recommend foundational studies.
The Little River Band, I bet.
Lots of good music coming out of Oz these days. Paul Kelly, The Waifs, Weddings Parties Anything – they don’t get enough airplay.
I think that Crowded House was from New Zealand, which would be a critical distinction for them.
Wow, haven’t heard the Lime Spiders mentioned in YEARS! Big fan of The Celibate Rifles myself.
Us young English ladies call our muffs our lady gardens. A metaphor that can be stretched to it’s metaphorical limit.
/OT end
What an interesting thread this has been. Sex, rock and roll, and weighty issues — it’s as if we oldsters got in the wayback machine and were transported to our sophomore year in college.
“chook the chicken” — hah!
100+ posts and no GWDs, a new world record for teh intert00bz??
Chook the chicken caused my grape juice to fly…
My parents just came in to pick up the second shipment of chicks. More Aussies and Barred Rocks. By fall I’m gonna be in eggs up to my elbows! ;)
I listen to Free Thought Radio Network and KBOO over the interwebz. Free Thought is SO funny.
OK, somebody’s gotta do it:
I chooked the chicken,
But I didn’t do the deputy…
Who? :-)
Nope, but I remembered the name of the band I was thinking of: Men At Work.
Yup, the Finns and CH are from NZ, and I often make the distinction, but someone mentioned them in the same breath as Midnight Oil, so I just went with it. :-)
Stuff like Carbon capture isn’t really well-established as a good solution is it? I mean, I don’t think there are any commercial plant which have 100% C02 capture. Also, I don’t know if long-term storage issues have been addressed. For example, what happens if there’s an earthquake, and C02 which is pumped & stored in a coal mine escapes?
No, it’s not established – hence the call for public funding of demonstration projects. We do know gases can be stored for long periods underground, because natural gas (mostly methane with some CO2 and other impurities) has been. Escape of CO2 after an earthquake – well, you’d lose the cut in emissions you’d gained, but unless you were quite unlucky, it wouldn’t cause any deaths directly. My own feeling, and I think the scientists I mentioned share it, is that if CCS doesn’t work, we’re probably stuffed, because there’s no way China and India are going to leave all their cheap coal in the ground. The IPCC issued a special report on CCS in about 2005, which reckoned it could make a big contribution to cutting net emissions by 2050 (far bigger than nuclear power for example). One thing that report didn’t deal, however, with was the greenhouse gases produced by coal mining, which I’ve recently seen claimed to be a serious problem.
I have becoming interested in the use of biochar to sequester carbon and also replace chemical fertilizers. I think this idea, based on the terra preta soils of the Amazon, may solve a number of problems for us.
Here’s a ScienceDaily article about it:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080410153658.htm
Gardening is my passion, so this one really appeals to me. I am planning to try some experimentation on my own; Mr. Science is going to make me a small charcoal oven to try it.
And I hate to be dumb, but what the heck is a GWD?
@#107 Leigh —
It stands for Global Warming Denialist.
Just read “Under a Green Sky” by Peter Ward. He describes the current (published 2007) theories about the periodic mass extinctions that have taken place on our planet. He then explains his take on the mass extinction taking place now. He provides a lot of meat to the arguments about CO2 and climate change. Scariest science book I have ever read.
Flooding in the Midwest is the lead story on ABC news this evening.
Flooding has destroyed 20% on the corn crop in the Midwest. Additional rain is falling, so the situation remains dire and WILL get worse.
It’s not merely sizzling (in fact, to imply that it is is to repeat one of the denialists’ favorite talking points), it’s changing and therefore weather patterns along with it. As such, it contributes to famine and plague, although homogenization is outside its scope.
Posted by: QrazyQat | June 9, 2008 6:24 PM
yes hun, but.. plague and famine have alwys been with us but the march towards monoculture hasn’t been seen since the age of dinosaurs
Yah, when I think of global warming I think of COMEDY! I sure ain’t gonna see “Sizzle”. I haven’t even seen “An Inconvenient Truth” yet because I’d be too depressed over our stupidity. I just returned from a conference of govt. SCIENTISTS and the organizers, in response to some of the audience voicing doubt over whether gw was anthropogenic in nature, had to hastily cram in one more talk giving evidence that gw is anthropogenic! This from an audience of SCIENTISTS!!! Goddamn!!!!