This is starting to sound like science. For a long time, climate conservatives and climate liberals had great difficulty talking to each other. The fundamental problem is that there is a very good model to describe global climate, but the data does not all agree with the model.
But I continue to believe that the scientific method will eventually prevail.
Global warming is real, and the earth really did warm up a lot from about 1976 to 2002, and also from 1908 to 1945. But there was a hiatus from 1946 to 1976 and from 2002 till the present, during which time the earth's average temperature (as estimated by the National Climatic Data Center) did not increase.
I was heartened to see articles such as a recent study by Xianyao Chen of the University of Washington, and Ka-Kit Tung of the Laboratory of Physical Oceanography, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China publishing in Science (vol 22 August 2014: Vol. 345 no. 6199 pp. 897-903). Their research suggest that changes in the earth's circulating oceans allow global warming to slow down temporarily, or to speed up temporarily. This could cause the global average surface temperature to change by a few tenths of a degree, perhaps. This might explain why global warming has taken an apparent hiatus after a rapid rise in the late 20th Century.
I don't know whether it is right or not, but I do take it as a positive that they are trying to model the actual data, including the thirty year hiatus of the early to mid 20th century and our current hiatus of a dozen years or so. Maybe they are on the right track. We shall see.
To sum up, some amount of global warming has to occur because the absorption of infrared energy increases in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide increases. But the pause in global warming of the past twelve years is real, and so is the 30 year pause from about 1945 to 1975. These features should be obvious, but historically conservatives fail to observe warming trends and liberals have failed to note the pauses in global temperature rise. The oceans may act to produce temporary (but real) warming and cooling signals, which may confuse the climatologists. Most importantly, the Scientific Method cares not a whit about politics and the answers will ultimately be made clear.
Friday, August 22, 2014
Saturday, August 2, 2014
(disclaimer: I try not to give away any major plot twists or punch lines in this review, and instead concentrate on the characters, actors and viewability).
Bad Guy 101 Test Question:
Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), Drax the Destroyer (Dave Batista), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper), and Groot (Vin Diesel) are the Guardians of the Galaxy.
I love this movie, even though I have never read one of the comic books. The great thing about Marvel movies is that you never know what is going to happen next. And you also will meet totally unique characters. Marvel seems to always be striving to be original, rather than relying on recycled superheroes and bad guys from previous movies. The movie works because the cast did a great job of pulling this off and making their characters both interesting and believable.
First of all, there are no good guys in the movie. None whatsoever, only different levels of bad. The Guardians are an unruly, uncivilized group of talented misfits who would rather steal a bunch of money, but who instead find themselves forced to save the Galaxy. Peter Quill is a con man and hi-tech thief. Drax the Destroyer is a killing machine seeking to avenge the death of his family at the hands of Ronan the Accuser.
My kids liked Rocket Raccoon, a smart-talking genius who inhabits the body of a raccoon. He is furry and cuddly and will blow you away at the slightest provocation.
Gamora is a true babe, even if she is green. The character didn't make great sense, but I didn't mind.
Groot is a tree creature who doesn't talk much, but has amazing tree powers. He seemed to become (surprisingly) more interesting as the movie progressed.
Ronan (Lee Pace) definitely suffers from "Shakespearian Overacting Disease").
Ronan is definitely a bad guy and has awesome super powers. He better, because he is also super dumb. Consider this question from Bad Guy 101:
Bad Guy 101 Test Question:
When you have the opportunity to steal the most powerful weapon in the universe, you:
a. Send your entire army to go get it.
b. Send yourself to get it with your awesome superpowers.
c. Send one person to steal it.
Well, our boy Ronan picks option c, of course. That's rather dumb right there, but okay. So, who do you suppose Ronan sends?
a. Send a super powered bad guy.
b. Send somebody whose loyalty is unquestioned because you are holding their parents hostage or something.
c. Send your cutest employee.
Yup, old Ronan isn't very bright, and once again he goes for option c. Oh well. That was the option that made the director happy, I guess. Despite those mental lapses and a tendency to overact, Ronan is a formidable bad guy.
On the other hand, we can't be certain that the good guys are truly all on the same side, and indeed they all have their own agendas and tend to work at cross purposes. That indeed makes them interesting.
Definitely this movie is worth seeing, though not necessarily as good as the Avengers movie which came out earlier this year. My kids (age 12 and 9) seemed to like it, although some of the violent scenes were a bit much, especially for the younger one. If they liked Avengers and X-Men they will be okay with this one, I believe.