Comments gzuckier has made

aha! but

if you read the fine print, you can  usually decline the USA Today daily delivery and get like 50 cents a day credit. On Slate tricked into publishing a parody of its own reflexive contrarianism posted 8 months, 3 weeks ago 4 Responses

Mental proceedings of the AGW denialists:

"Al Gore and those AGW activists who keep a high profile generate a lot of CO2, so they're hypocrites and I can dismiss their message."

"Ed Begley and those AGW activists who maintain a low CO2 lifestyle drive around in those little electric cars and cut their energy use to the point of discomfort, so they're crazy and I can dismiss their message."

"Therefore, there are no reliable, reputable, trustworthy people who advocate action on AGW!"On The NYT asks: are we shaming our politicians about their lifestyles enough? posted 9 months ago 10 Responses

i got the solution

people can run their cars on the lard they have liposuctioned from their butts!On USDA sees a food problem, but not the solution posted 9 months, 1 week ago 1 Response

huh

see, i would have thought that the "global warming advocates" were the folks who said that the globe is warming, and we should encourage it, because it will be good for us, and agriculture will benefit from higher temps and more CO2, and so on. now that is global warming advocacy. i would have thought that "we" are global warming opponents. On Lou Dobbs works to make CNN viewers less informed posted 10 months, 2 weeks ago 8 Responses

our friend co2

tell ya what, i'll fill a room with co2, you sit there for a while until you feel good and healthy.On What Obama's new science adviser has to say about climate change posted 11 months, 1 week ago 4 Responses

true patriots

is everybody supposed to have forgotten the 1993 Chrysler Patriot, Chrysler's last foray into efficient alternative powerplants?

"The Patriot was heavily hyped, but then dropped without fanfare. ... Evan Boberg, in Common Sense Not Required, wrote that the Patriot never actually worked and had to be towed in its video (the tow truck, he said, was edited out). He also said that the flywheel - holding nearly the kinetic power of a truck at 100 mph - destroyed several test cells and killed an employee before being abandoned. "
http://www.allpar.com/model/patriot.html

Yeah, that makes me feel like giving them some money on the promise of electric Jeeps.

Too bad, I think Chrysler deserves to live, they've always been very engineering-driven; hemispherical combustion chambers, torsion bars, etc.
On CNNMoney reports that electrification is key to Chrysler's bailout pitch posted 11 months, 1 week ago 15 Responses

and if that's not enough

for a slight additional $2,000, we won't stick you with the Caliber!On Car dealers offering two for the price of one posted 11 months, 3 weeks ago 2 Responses

oh noes!

Now Putin will be rearing his head into Alaska so he can sail down here! Save us Governor Sarah!On First commercial ship sails through Northwest Passage posted 12 months ago 4 Responses

experimental evidence

well, sometimes real life constitutes a good experiment.
have you ever had any occasion when the ground was the warmest thing around, except when the sun was beating down on it, like the beach? in particular, in the middle of winter, when solar heating is minimal, is the ground warm? is the ground warm at night when there is no sun? how about at night, in the winter? is there any evidence at all of any heat coming fron the ground when the solar heating is at its minimum? if, like me, you can answer with a solid "no", then how can anyone possibly believe that there is a significant quantity of heat leaking upwards from the core? On 'Global warming comes from within'--Is heat at the Earth's core the real cause of global warming? posted 1 year, 1 month ago 10 Responses

it ain't comparable.

yeah, but one reason they do as well as they do is because Rickover made the nuclear navy into an absolute heirarchical totalitarianism; but a benevolent one, where responsibility went along with authority and anybody who messed up paid the price and so mostly everybody did their job right. i can't see that applying to our civilian society; and i can't see American society switching over to that mode of operation.

besides which, a major reason for whatever problems nuke plants have is the decision to basically just scale up shipboard reactors instead of starting with a more logical/reliable/safe design for a stationary electrical power plant, like the various graphite modulated reactor designs. On McCain spins concerns about nuclear safety as anti-troops posted 1 year, 1 month ago 10 Responses

ooh they're all coming out

at least two of them.
and to think that my biggest complaint about obama is that he is not progressive enough.On Town hall again reveals just an anti-science, out-of-touch McCain posted 1 year, 1 month ago 10 Responses

jackpot

if either one says "torture", "Abu Ghraib", or "Guantanamo"On A Palin/Biden bingo game to help you veep score during the debate posted 1 year, 1 month ago 5 Responses

if AGW was real

then President Bush would tell me what I need to know. since he hasn't, then I know for a fact it's a liberal plot.On Gallup polls indicate that Republicans are less likely to recognize global warming posted 1 year, 2 months ago 52 Responses

she should be czar

since you can see russia from alaska, she's a natural to be czar of something. On GOP VP candidate says she'd be in charge of McCain's energy policy posted 1 year, 2 months ago 6 Responses

friedman persona non grata

unfortunately (for his credibility, anyway) friedman is now lumped in with bush, cheney, rumsfeld, coulter, et al as the idiots who thought it would be a good idea to reform iraq by force. unfortunate, because as i discovered after reading his book on lebanon, he's not an idiot at all re the middle east, let alone in general. anyway, i wonder if that's the reason his book gets consigned to the slash and burn review pile?On Gregg Easterbrook still knows nothing about global warming -- and less about clean energy posted 1 year, 2 months ago 9 Responses

the new thing

another 15 minutes, she'll be over. On Giuliani parses McCain on 'Meet the Press' posted 1 year, 2 months ago 3 Responses

smugly ignorant twitty thing

that was a smugly ignorant twitty thing for me to say, and i apologize. if i can't learn not to post when i'm in a bad mood, i should at least learn to take a minute topreview what i write before i post it.On Republican platform acknowledges climate change but spurns 'no-growth' radicalism posted 1 year, 2 months ago 25 Responses

grist bloggers are all far left of center, eh?

reminds me of the middle ages, when  it was clear to all right thinking christians that the vatican was, literally, the center of the universe and galileo and his ilk were heretics. now we're much more advanced, and we no longer believe that wherever you happen to be standing is the center of the physical universe; now it's just the center of the political and/or moral universe. like somebody's hiked out to each end of the political spectrum and pounded in a stake so's you could measure and find the objective center and thereby determine who's way out there beyond the pale.

in case i'm not making myself perfectly clear; what a smugly ignorant twitty thing to believe.On Republican platform acknowledges climate change but spurns 'no-growth' radicalism posted 1 year, 2 months ago 25 Responses

relentless republicans

sort of similar to ants. however, the good lord in his wisdom saw fit NOT to give ants the power to destroy human civilization.On Republicans revert to base-rallying strategy posted 1 year, 2 months ago 19 Responses

but individual cars make so much sense

dogs love to ride in cars too. nobody suggests that that means it's the most logical thing for them to do. you can rationalize all you want about how cars are necessary, but i still suspect they're only necessary because we've built our lives around them.

If you have any doubts, then explain why all of sudden everybody needs not just a car, but a 2-3 ton truck.On A three-pronged approach to getting off oil for transportation posted 1 year, 3 months ago 36 Responses

shame on mit

i realized none of these articles/press releases/puff pieces were going to be worth doody when i saw that they all addressed generating oxygen and generating hydrogen as though they were two separate processes.On 'Major discovery' from MIT unpractical, and ignores present advances in solar baseload posted 1 year, 3 months ago 22 Responses

we wish to control you

yes. that's it exactly. we're not at all sincere about saving billions of humans from unnecessary suffering, and helping civilization move forward instead of crashing. no, we're all interested in controlling your life. like making laws about what kind of sex practices you can have. or listening to your phone calls and email to see if we should investigate you. oh wait, bad examples. yes, you are right, however, half of your fellow Americans are just pure Evil and must be fought. good thing the half which is Good just happens to be the half with all the money and power and access to legislators and publicity.On Conservatives will drill-and-burn this planet to the point of destruction posted 1 year, 3 months ago 11 Responses

you think that's weird

you obviously haven't clicked on the "remote control" link at the bottom of the page and started looking at their showOn Grape-Nuts releases global warming ad posted 1 year, 4 months ago 5 Responses

local generation

making a push for local point-of-use generation, with solar panels on the roof, a waterwheel in the streamm out back, whatever will have the benefit of being more rapidly doable (although i don't know whether industry could deliver the products fast enough) and avoid the need to upgrade the power grid; plus, the American people might respond well to "having control over their energy" or some such thing, that pioneer spirit we're supposed to have.

of course, all the companies that make all these things are overseas now. shows where our past energy policies have taken us.On The media's central arguments for and against Gore's challenge to the nation posted 1 year, 4 months ago 18 Responses

lighthouses

i just recalled that a lot/most? of the lighthouses, at leas up here in new england, are now automated and running off solar power. so, how unreliable can it be? "i'm sorry your ship ran aground, but it was cloudy to day so we didn't have enough charge to power the lighthouse"? On The media's central arguments for and against Gore's challenge to the nation posted 1 year, 4 months ago 18 Responses

bad judgement

humans are just not equipped with a good mechanism for judging risk and allocating effort to avoid it. we've outrun evolution on that front. as evidence, consider that the vast majority of premature deaths are the result of something that would have been avoided had a functional risk assessment system been operational; whether it's car crashes, smoking, bad food and exercise choices, russian roulette, whatever. On Yes, Americans are a bunch of whiners ... posted 1 year, 4 months ago 21 Responses

in an alternate universe, maybe

if the infrastructure for natural gas fueling of automobiles were already in place, it would be wonderful. in the short term, of course. As it is, however, revamping the entire vehicular fueling infrastructure to supply natural gas to a vehicle fleet which will take a decade or more to turn over and eliminate all the gasoline fueled automobiles but will become obsolete pretty soon after doesn't seem the brightest idea to me, although i have nothing but respect for pickens. On His energy plan is half brilliant, half dumb posted 1 year, 4 months ago 21 Responses

it can't happen

god wouldn't let it.
we're too smart to let it happen.
the earth isn't warming.
the warming is due to the sun's changes.
the warming has ended.
the solar system is entirely warming.
the warming will be good for agriculture.
the arctic ice cap is not melting.
the arctic ice cap is melting because of undersea volcanoes.
the earth warms up and cools down for a few million years at a time and it's probably about time for it to switch.
the warming is due to the solar system traversing the galactic plane.
the warming is just an artifact of sloppy measurements.
the carbon dioxide level is not rising.
the rising carbon dioxide level is due to volcanoes.
the rising carbon dioxide level is because rising carbon dioxide follows warming not the other way around.
carbon dioxide doesn't absorb IR in the atmosphere, only in the laboratory.
water vapor is more important than carbon  dioxide.
it would be too expensive to stop global warming.
it would be doable to stop global warming but cheaper to just let it happen and deal with it.
we couldn't stop global warming anyway.
it's all the fault of china and india.
it would be a hardship to change our lifestyle.
the enviromeanies won't let us build nuclear plants that we need to stop global warming.
somebody will make  a breakthrough soon.
greedy climate scientists pretend there is global warming so that they will get research grants for nothing.
we need more research.
it's all a socialist plot.
socialists could never make the population afraid of anything like terrorism or global cooling, it has to be global warming.
al gore is fat and uses too much energy.

i hope the above conclusive pieces of evidence have convinced you that civilization is not in any threat from AGW.On Venture capitalist John Doerr shares four lessons on climate change posted 1 year, 4 months ago 24 Responses

impact of solar vs nuclear

i think he/she was being sarcastic. i sure hope so. but you can never be so out there that some rightwingnut won't agree with it seriously. On BLM contemplates two-year moratorium on solar power plant construction in the West posted 1 year, 5 months ago 68 Responses

who ya gonna believe

hansen's been right about AGW longer, and more times, than anyone else. i wouldn't bet too much on his being wrong. On The new testimony before Congress posted 1 year, 5 months ago 4 Responses

"only 58 nuke fatalities"

"How many people have died from nuclear accidents in the industry's 50-year history? Exactly 58, all from Chernobyl. "

That thought ballon's easy to burst:

1945. Two workers killed in the Manhattan Project in two separate incidents when hand assembled fissile material got too close and reached partial criticality.

1958. Operator killed in Los Alamos when plutonium recovery process reaches criticality.

1961. Three workers killed in Idaho Falls as they adjusted fuel rods in preparation for routine reactor startup. They are so heavily contaminated that their bodies had to be buried in lead coffins  and their hands treated as high level radioactive waste.

1986. Explosion at Kerr McGee nuclear reprocessing plant in OK fatally contaminates lungs of one worker.

A ten fold increase in childhood thyroid cancer of a very aggressive type reported downwind of Chernobyl (Vasili S. Kazakov et al., "Thyroid cancer after Chernobyl", Nature, Vol. 359, 3 September 1992);

University of Pittsburgh researchers estimated that Three Mile Island alone can be linked to over 400 excess infant deaths; researchers at Columbia University found a 64% increase in leukemia and other cancers after Three Mile Island (Maureen C. Hatch et al., "Cancer Near the Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant," American Journal of Epidemiology, vol. 132, no. 3, pp. 397-412 (1990); Maureen C. Hatch et al., "Cancer Rates After the Three Mile Island Nuclear Accident and Proximity of Residence to the Plant," American Journal of Public Health, vol. 81, no. 6, pp. 719-24 (1991); Evelyn O. Talbott et al., "Mortality Among the Residents of the Three Mile Accident Area: 1979-1992," Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 108, no. 6, pp. 545-52 (2000); Evelyn O. Talbott et al., "Long-Term Follow-up of the Residents of the Three Mile Island Accident," Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 111, no. 3, pp. 341-48 (2003); Stephen Wing et al., "A Re-Evaluation of Cancer Incidence Near the Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant," Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 105: pp. 52-55, (1997) http://www.tmia.com/images/wingmap3.jpg).

Of course, these are susceptible to the same "you can't PROVE it" defense as tobacco-related deaths and CO2-climate change. So you can be reassured that there will NEVER be any deaths of this kind PROVED attributable to the nuclear power industry, no matter what. But bear in mind that releases of radioactivity of comparable size to TMI also occurred at Indian Point in CT and Oyster Creek in NJ, in addition to innumerable smaller releases, not always reported.

Of course, this does not include non-radiation related industrial accidents in the industry, radiation deaths attributable to mining or the highly radioactive and toxic uranium mining tailings, etc.

I tend to suspect any form of advocacy, pro or anti any particular policy regardless of its liberal-conservative orientation, which relies too heavily on too-good-to-be-true urban myths alien to the human experience; particularly those which can be easily punctured by a little research (which can nowadays be done quickly, easily, and in the comfort of home via the internet) were the True Believer not inclined to avoid anything which might instill some doubt. Experience teaches us that human beings get sloppy and careless, and that big industry cuts corners in search of profits; "statistics" that whitewash this need further inquiry.On The latest sorties in the war over nuclear power posted 1 year, 5 months ago 43 Responses

if it's monday then

skeptic's weekly calendar:
Mon weds fri: "more research is needed to determine whether anthropogenic global warming is real or not, before we spend trillions of dollars on fixing it"
Tues thurs sat: "Global warming chicken littles need to keep this global warming hoax alive in order to keep their fat research grants rolling in"
sunday: church.On The real reason conservatives don't believe in climate science posted 1 year, 6 months ago 7 Responses

boeing boeing

are blimps coming back? the strategic helium reserve may be called back into action.On Last flight out posted 1 year, 6 months ago 7 Responses

slow news week, fer sure.

"President Bush in Texas for daughter Jenna's wedding
By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer
Thu May 8, 8:08 PM ET
CRAWFORD, Texas - President Bush stuck out his right elbow Thursday, jokingly demonstrating how he'll escort his daughter down the aisle at her wedding this weekend. "
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080509/ap_on_go_pr_wh/jenna_ ...
On Politics gaining ground in popular celeb rags posted 1 year, 6 months ago 2 Responses

ddt myth a badge of rightwing brainwashing

ah, the ddt canard. In fact, the "banning" of ddt undoubtedly saved millions of lives, because:

1. DDT is not banned from disease fighting, only from agricultural use
   
2. the vast agricultural use of DDT (one farm could use more DDT than an entire country's anti-malaria efforts) generated DDT resistance in the mosquitoes in every country where it was used agriculturally (most of Africa, India, Ceylon, parts of Indochina, etc.)
   
3. by banning agricultural use, the further development of DDT resistance was halted. It's too late for the countries where mosquitoes are now still resistant, but countries where DDT still works on malaria mosquitoes have the agricultural ban to thank.

"Corr­elating the use of DDT in El Salvador with renewed malaria transmission,­ it can be estimated that at current rates each kilo of insecticide add­ed to the environment will generate 105 new cases of malaria."
(C­hapin, Georgeanne & Robert Wasserstrom, "Agricultural production an­d malaria resurgence in Central America and India", Nature, Vol. 293, ­1981)

"Endemic sporadic malaria close to the affected areas transm­itted by An. culicifacies, which has been considered DDT-resistant for­ many years"
(WHO report on malaria prevention following the 2004 tsunami)

It's entirely similar to the question of antibiotic resistance in bacteria, vs the vast quantities of antibiotics fed to farm animals. On Climate change must be examined over decades, not years posted 1 year, 6 months ago 68 Responses

but but but

but aren't biofuels just a way of storing solar energy for later use? aren't there likely to be more efficient/convenient/rapid forms of storage available?On I read a letter to the editor, the other day, I opened, and read it, it said they was suckas posted 1 year, 6 months ago 22 Responses

bushit

i'm still waiting for that manned mission to mars he promised us a few years back.On Nonsensical nuggets from the prez's press conference posted 1 year, 7 months ago 8 Responses

error error error

You've swapped Feb. 2008 and Feb. 2007; you mean

"But Feb. 2008 was 0.26 degrees C above the monthly mean, and a mere 0.37 degrees C colder than Feb. 2007."On Where is the media coverage of February's incredible warming and extreme weather? posted 1 year, 8 months ago 11 Responses

it's democracy

hey, just because you've been the acknowledged expert in a field for a lifetime doesn't mean that my opinion isn't just as good as yours.On NASA's Hansen responds to NYT's Revkin posted 1 year, 8 months ago 8 Responses

So called Skeptics are just deniers.

"Not the least amusing feature of all this is that without exception, all of the so called 'skeptics' are on the denier side of the debate. 'Skeptics' apparently, can be convinced that that the IPCC modelling is unduly pessimistic about the progress of global warming, but not the reverse -- that it's much worse than has generally been assumed. One might wonder why, if 'the science is not settled' 'climate is too complex to model accurately' that that must mean that there's nothing to worry about."

Indeed. There are now two sources of support for the AGW hypothesis: current observations, and climate models based on past observations; the models suggest a worrisome scenario, but the recent and current observations suggest that in fact things are worse than that; not surprising, since the models are conservatively biased in their predictions, that being what responsible scientists are trained to do rather than make a lot of hoohaw out of nothing, as the armchair climatologists seem to believe is their tendency.On Do Big Oil and Big Tobacco share a similar smokescreen? posted 1 year, 8 months ago 26 Responses

religion must not require stupidity

I have a vague recollection that Maimonedes advised the Jews against adopting any articles of faith which fly in the face of common sense or scientific truth. Physical coporeal resurrection, for instance. On No special revelation posted 1 year, 8 months ago 12 Responses

Grist nails it

"But the more I've listened to these speakers, the more I've realized that for most of them, it's not about the science. Panels don't go five minutes without attacking Al Gore or comparing climate activists to socialists who want to destroy capitalism. Deniers are part of a political culture that frames the world in terms of left and right, so they've absorbed global warming into that broader paradigm of partisan politics."
(http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/3/4/155110/4814)

And as we see here, another prediction is verified.On Hansen throws cold water on cooling climate claim posted 1 year, 8 months ago 9 Responses

middle ground

yeah, it's a mammoth task which requires opening up the gates, but for something like this they really have to make sure they don't get the guys who spend their days posting "giraffes.... are totally gay"On Encyclopedia of Life up, but empty posted 1 year, 9 months ago 2 Responses

cellulosic ethanol

if that were feasible, wouldn't  liquor distilleries have discovered it long ago, rather than spend big money to grow dorn?On New study from mainstream ag economists at Iowa State posted 1 year, 9 months ago 46 Responses

Meanwhile, back in the real world:

1 Convicted Of Hiding Nuke-Plant Problem
Engineer Guilty Of Hiding Information About Ohio Nuclear Plant Corrosion; 2nd Worker Acquitted

TOLEDO, Ohio, Oct. 30, 2007

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(AP) A federal jury found a former nuclear plant worker guilty Tuesday of concealing the worst corrosion ever found at a U.S. reactor. A second defendant was acquitted.

David Geisen, the Davis-Besse plant's former engineering design manager, was accused of misleading regulators into believing the plant along Lake Erie was safe. He faces up to five years in prison.

Private contractor Rodney Cook was acquitted by the same federal jury.

Prosecutors said the men lied in the fall of 2001 so the plant could delay a shutdown for a safety inspection. Months later, inspectors found an acid leak that nearly ate through the reactor's 6-inch-thick steel cap. It's not clear how close the plant was to an accident.
On Nuclear plants require lots of water in an increasingly dry world posted 2 years, 1 month ago 28 Responses

standard technique

"They want to discredit Michael Mann, and now they are focusing on James Hansen"

It's standard rightwing "debating" technique for a while now. If you can't argue with the facts effectively, then switch the argument so that now you're arguing about the argument about the facts; or even better, arguing about the people who are arguing with you about the facts. You might only be able to convince a few people that eliminating the spring runoff that waters our crops might be a good thing, but you can always count on a lot of people who will sign on to blind hatred of people they've never met who tell them things they don't want to hear.On Hansen erroneously accused of predicting an ice age posted 2 years, 2 months ago 39 Responses

larouche vs the greenies

The Larouche organization is also a big force behind the 'rachel carson killed more people than hitler' 'ddt ban causes malaria' crap you see around. if you look at the article on wikipedia, for instance, there are people who post only to that point, and on the larouche page.On Where did the comparison start? posted 2 years, 4 months ago 3 Responses

You called that right

Yep, sure enough your observation that "There is constant drumbeat of accusations of hypocrisy against Al Gore" is rebutted by..... two comments accusing Al Gore of hypocrisy.On They just keep coming posted 2 years, 4 months ago 7 Responses

"No clouds" global warming theory

This might be a good place to note the "cosmic rays cause clouds; clouds reflect the sun; we are going though fewer cosmic rays now, therefore fewer clouds, therefore more warming" theories of Svensmark et al. Aside from the general haggling about the accuracy of the model and whether there is any correlation at all, and the question of how a 14 million year cycle can cause rapid warming over a couple of decades, there is this basic problem: the current measurements show a greater effect for nighttime temperatures than daytime temperatures, and a greater effect at the poles, which are more covered in snow and ice than the rest of the earth and therefore already more reflective; the opposite of what any "clouds reflect the sun, less clouds means more cooling" theory would predict.On 'Models don't account for clouds'--Clouds are complex and uncertain, but unlikely to stop warming posted 2 years, 4 months ago 6 Responses