Category Archives: Science

A persistent La Niña leads to a long stretch of dryness

This year national weather and climate forecasters said they saw a La Niña condition developing in the Pacific, and promised dryness, as they did last year. This year, for virtually all of California, and much of the nation as well, they've been right. Here's the drought forecast, in a graphic from NOAA [National Oceanographic and AtmosphericContinue reading “A persistent La Niña leads to a long stretch of dryness”

Researchers find high levels of mercury in CA coastal fog

This is the story I found at this year's fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union — how fog off California's coastal coast may be importing mercury from the ocean on to the land.  The team, led by chemist Peter Weiss-Penzias, reported finding "very high" levels of mercury, a neurotoxin, in the fog, according toContinue reading “Researchers find high levels of mercury in CA coastal fog”

Alien abduction a myth: U.S. government

From the White House: The U.S. government has no evidence that any life exists outside our planet, or that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of the human race. In addition, there is no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public's eye.  Well, that'll put theContinue reading “Alien abduction a myth: U.S. government”

The trouble with climate change: New York City

Today New York released a 600-page report on the consequences of climate change in the state, which so far (mysteriously to me) only The Guardian has covered, near as I can tell. Their opening: Irene-like storms of the future would put a third of New York City streets under water and flood many of the tunnels leadingContinue reading “The trouble with climate change: New York City”

Revkin unbound: Another successful satellite launch

Andrew Revkin, the leading climate reporter of our time, turns out not to have just a phenomenal (and huge) blog, the justly famous Dot Earth on the New York Times, but also a more informal and visual tumblr, Revkin.net, with which yours truly has fallen instantly in love.  From that tumblr, here's a terrific picContinue reading “Revkin unbound: Another successful satellite launch”

Climate change skeptic turns on deniers: some details

Eugene Robinson wraps up the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project results in an op-ed for the Washington Post:  [Richard] Muller found that skeptics are wrong when they claim that a “heat island” effect from urbanization is skewing average temperature readings; monitoring instruments in rural areas show rapid warming, too. He found that skeptics are wrongContinue reading “Climate change skeptic turns on deniers: some details”

Reconciling religion and evolution: The Tree of life

From an unpretentious and persuasive visual essay on the most debated movie of the year, The Tree of Life, by Matt Zoller Seitz:  There is this central notion in all of Malick’s films that every individual person is just one tiny part of nature. Not too much more important in the larger scheme of thingsContinue reading “Reconciling religion and evolution: The Tree of life”

Another bad day for climate change denial

Richard Muller, a MacArthur fellow at UC Berkeley, and a contrarian who led a group of scientists — mostly physicists — into the foul waters of climate change denial, funded in large part by the justly-infamous Koch brothers, has been forced to admit by the extensive resampling of data from 40,000 field stations that yes, theContinue reading “Another bad day for climate change denial”

What part of that extreme was due to climate change?

Superb — and available! — story in this month's Nature on how researchers are beginning to parse the contribution of global warming to extreme events. Highly recommended.  It's called "fractional attribution." Here's an easier way to grasp the concept: To put it in English: Inspired by the observation that intense rainfall in the Northern HemisphereContinue reading “What part of that extreme was due to climate change?”