More Hot Air

Have you heard we're having a bit of global warming? There's quite a bit of funny business going on about which the average person knows nothing. Here's an example.

We've been hearing on the news that atmospheric carbon dioxide is now at a record level of 381 ppm (parts per million). How do we know this is a record? Because we measure the CO2 content of ice core samples drilled in Antarctica and elsewhere, giving us a snapshot view of what the atmosphere was like hundreds of years ago.

But hold the presses! It turns out the CO2-in-ice measurements produce values between 160 and 700 ppm, sometimes going as high as 2450 ppm. Apparently, numbers that are too high are discarded because they are too high. (This is science?!?)

Sometime last year a Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski of Poland testified before the United States Senate that measuring carbon dioxide content of ice core samples is not valid for a number of reasons, most of which result in lower readings as the CO2 escapes from the sample.

Just thought you would like to know (more here).

This is somewhat reminiscent of the hockey-stick temperature graph that was created using tree-ring data (and other stuff). Then a pair of Canadians discovered that if you fed random numbers -- okay, that's an oversimplification, they used "red noise" -- into the program instead of tree-ring data, it produced the same hockey-stick temperature graph. Doh!

Anthropogenic Global Warming -- NOT

Do you believe humans are to blame for global warming? One of my favorite reasons not to believe is represented by the following news item from Reuters. (I've seen the same information in a NASA press release, but I didn't save a copy before it got yanked.) I've added some bold for emphasis.

Mars Getting Warmer, May Have Quakes


Tue Sep 20, 2005 9:39 PM ET

By Jill Serjeant

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The climate on Mars is showing a warming trend and recent images have shown the first evidence of seismic activity on Earth's neighbor planet, scientists said on Tuesday.

...

Malin [NASA, Michael Malin, principal investigator for the Mars Orbiter Camera] said images of Mars' southern polar cap showed that scarps formed there are retreating at "a prodigious rate" of about 10 feet per Mars year. Mars years are nearly twice as long as Earth years.

The images, documenting changes from 1999 to 2005, suggest the climate on Mars is presently warmer, and perhaps getting warmer still, than it was several decades or centuries ago just as the Earth experienced its own Ice Ages. Malin said scientists had no explanation yet as to why Mars might be warming.

...

So, there you have it. Ice caps on planet earth are melting because of human activity. Why the melting of the ice caps on Mars? Anybody's guess, apparently.

Let me offer a politically-incorrect clue: both planets receive energy from the same source, the sun. If the solar output were to increase, both planets (as well as the seven others we know about and one we sort of know about) would experience a warming trend.

Just a thought.

When you mesh that with the amount of carbon dioxide produced by human activity, we begin to look pretty insignificant. Most people don't realize, for example, that permanently shutting down all motor vehicles in North America would not make a measurable difference in the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide. It doesn't even come close.

Go ahead, do the math. Somebody's counting on you not doing it. The word algore mysteriously appears in the 8-ball window...

More Creation

Well, it's been a month since I've posted anything. I guess it's time to try again...

One of the things I wonder about often is why the "traditional" account of the creation, as spoken of by the LDS, differs from the written accounts. I assume that so-called orthodox Christianity doesn't likely understand the difference between a spiritual creation and a physical creation, but the LDS really ought to.

Today's reading was from Abraham. Here is the sequence of events in his description of the creation:

(Oops, sorry for the interruption. The phone rang, and the caller ID said "Acupuncture Ass". No kidding. That's gotta hurt! Better there than the face, though...)

1. Formed the heavens and the earth
2. Created light, separated it from darkness
3. Created expanse between waters under the expanse and waters above the expanse
4. Separated dry land from the great waters
5. Prepared the earth to bring forth plants
6. Organized the stars, sun (I know, it's a star), and moon
7. Prepared the waters to bring forth fishies and birdies
   
8. Prepared the earth to bring forth animals
9. Went down to organize man [but did what?]
   
10. Rested a bit
11. Caused a mist to water the earth
12. Formed Adam from the dust of the earth
13. Planted a garden in Eden
14. Created Eve from Adam's rib (we're told this is figurative)
    
15. Created the beasts and fowls, and brought them to Adam to be named

Hmm. Sure sounds like Adam got here -- in the flesh, anyway -- before the animals.

Let's try Moses (not from Genesis, but similar):

1. Created light, separated it from darkness
2. Firmament between waters beneath and waters above
3. Water and dry land separated
4. Earth brings forth plants
5. Stars, sun, and moon
6. Waters bring forth fishies and birdies (what do birdies and fishies have in common?)
   
7. Beasts and cattle and creeping things (that's creeping, not creepy)
8. Rest a bit
9. An explanation is inserted here that all these things were created spiritually, that it hadn't rained yet, there was "not yet flesh upon the earth, neither in the water, neither in the air"
10. Mist to water the earth
11. Adam formed from the dust of the ground -- first man and also "first flesh"
12. Garden planted (first physical plants on the earth?)
13. River to water the garden
14. Beasts and fowls formed and brought to Adam to be named
15. Eve formed from Adam's rib

The "traditional" order of creation appears to be consistent with the possibility that macroEvolution might have been employed by God in order to create life on this planet, since it begins with lesser life forms and progresses up to homo sapiens. However, I don't think that matches the physical creation. My reading of the physical creation mixes up the order.

If anyone is still reading this post clear down to here, get a life!!!