Tag Archives: Watts Up With That

Cooling is the new warming

Posted on May 19, 2018 | 1 comment

“NASA data show that global temperatures dropped sharply over the past two years. Not that you’d know it, since that wasn’t deemed news. Does that make NASA a global warming denier?”

—-Watts Up With That

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Posted in Blogosphere, Mediacrats, Weather/Climate

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Reversing our fertility decline?

Posted on June 27, 2015 | 1 comment

Every now and then I’ll read some twaddle about how humanity will soon over-populate the Earth, increase mass species extinctions, use up all available resources, etc., etc. Such babble ignores the worldwide decline in fertility rates since 1980 that ought to make people worry more in the other direction.

“Ecologists calculate that human populations require a fertility rate of 2.1 births per female to offset deaths,” writes ecologist Jim Steele. “A fertility rate below 2.1 causes the population to decline, while a higher fertility rate causes population to grow. In the 1950s, the decade of Baby Boomers, the USA had a fertility rate that averaged 3.7.

“By 1980 the rate dropped to 1.8. Now due largely to immigration, a slightly higher fertility rate stands at 2.0. Worldwide fertility rates similarly dropped from 2.67 in 1950 to 2.02 in 2000. These lower rates suggest the global human population will soon plateau and then decline. Thus decreasing population pressures will not cause an accelerating extinction rate. These decreasing fertility rates should be a cause for optimism.”

Unless, of course, you worry about civilization collapsing from too few new people coming along to sustain it. But maybe there’s a new trend in the opposite direction the demographers haven’t noticed yet. One of the adult beginner violinists I encountered at the orchestra workshop a few weeks ago was a young, Anglo woman who said that since her youngest finally had been weaned, she was taking the opportunity to be something other than a baby machine.

She has five children. You don’t look old enough to have five children, I said. Oh, I’m old, she replied, believe me, I’m old. She said the five were an accident, since two of them were twins. She and her husband had only planned on four.

Four. In an age when one or none is the rule among American Anglos. Maybe she and her husband are an aberration. Or maybe they’re a sign of an impending return to the 3.7 of the 1950s.

Via Watts Up With That.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Evolution, The Culture

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Google’s solar plant runs on natural gas

Posted on June 17, 2015 | 1 comment

For four hours a day, no less. But that’s not the funniest part. The funniest part about this giant bird burner, is this:

“Because of alarmism based on computer model predictions of rising temperatures in 100 years, we’ve built a fossil-fuel fired solar plant which is already in trouble because of failed computer model predictions of the clouds over the next few years …

“Now, even the best solar energy conversion devices don’t operate 24 hours a day, or even 12 hours a day. Generally, eight hours a day or even less is the norm. And that has been cut down by clouds … so at present, dreaded fossil fuels are likely providing a third of the energy to fuel the plant.”

Google’s plant, of course, is fully subsidized by the Democrat federal government, i.e. your tax money at work, because it isn’t efficient enough to turn a profit. Which isn’t funny at all.

Via Watts Up With That.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Obamalot, Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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That federal warmest evah claim

Posted on January 16, 2015 | 2 comments

2014, we’re told today by NASA and NOAA, was the planet’s warmest year evah. (Er, make that “evah” since record-keeping began in—get this—1880.)

What we’re not told by the trumpets of the snooze media is that 2014 was the warmest year evah by the teeny-tiny measure of four one-hundredths of a degree.

Whoppingly warm, eh? Truly toasty, for sure.

And, at that tiny amount, very likely a measurement error.

Via Watts Up With That.

UPDATE:  From Joe D’Aleo at WeatherBell:  “We know there are significant differences urban versus rural, mountain versus valley, land versus water, forest versus grassland, etc.. Trying to create a dataset with one number representing the Global Average Temperatures is a daunting task…”

But not necessarily so hard when your aim is political to begin with.

Indeed, as Judith Curry at Climate Etc. put it on Jan. 20: “Naive scientist that I am, it didn’t occur to me until last night that the timing of the NASA/NOAA [news release] on warmest year was motivated by the timing of the President’s SOTU address…”

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Posted in Blogosphere, Obamalot, Obsessions, Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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Looney-Tunes science

Posted on March 1, 2014 | 5 comments

The climate-change, wind turbine boys will do absolutely anything to promote their ridiculous, inefficient, high-maintenance product. Comes the latest laugher:

“Offshore wind turbines could weaken hurricanes, reduce storm surge.”

Ten thousand of them, to be exact. Not in the Gulf, please. We don’t need thousands of giant turbine blades flying this far inland after a Cat 5 rips into the windmills.

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE:  Now that fracking has slain the peak-oil dragon, windmills are facing decreasing government subsidies across the USA and Europe so the prospect of ten thousand “to weaken hurricanes, reduce storm surge” is nil.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Obamalot, Obsessions, Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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Why are hard facts always cold?

Posted on January 29, 2014 | 2 comments

Ditherton Wiggleroom (as Vodkapundit calls Wormtongue) in his SOTU:

“The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by…”

Recovery? In his dreams. Obamacare has taken care of the recovery by effectively putting a cap on middle class income.

But why, I ask, must the hard facts always be cold? For that matter why must the facts be hard? (Other than that the “genuis” public speaker DW always speaks in cliches and platitudes?) A lot of his “facts” are pretty squishy. Like this one:

“Every four minutes, another American home or business goes solar…”

And this beaut: “…the debate is settled.  Climate change is a fact.”

Just once I’d like to hear Wiggleroom speak of the hot, soft facts. It would certainly be more original. And the soft part more honest.

Naw. Never happen.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Obsessions, The Economy, Weather/Climate

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The coming ice age

Posted on August 13, 2013 | 6 comments

Folks at The Weather Channel keep shrieking about global warming making our temps higher than at any time in human history, blah, blah, blah, and their critics keep replying that the temp trend is down, the record is being manipulated and the Earth has been cooling since 2002. Meanwhile word is trickling out of a possible coming ice age.

This 1683 painting The Great Frost by Jan Grifier shows the Thames River in London frozen over with ice three-feet thick. Nobody’s saying that’s going to happen again, but who knows. Don’t look for it in your forecast. Meteorologists are awfully poor at predicting the weather beyond three days and the honest ones admit it.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Science/Engineering, Weather/Climate

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