[TAG] Weather

[Benjamin A. Okopnik]

On Wed, Apr 19, 2006 at 08:38:34PM -0400, vince werber wrote:
> Ok... here I go...
> 
> The weather IS changing...  Why?... the Sun is getting hotter and the sun 
> being a 'star' normally gets hotter as it burns out...  Basic physics... 
> Therefore... global warming is real but we have little to do with it...

Not Linux, but - destroying the ozone layer, which blocks a large
percentage of the damaging UV from the Sun, permits those wavelengths to
penetrate our atmosphere. More energy coupled into the system = greater
heat. Basic physics, and we have lots and lots to do with it.

Also, that little star we're discussing is about 5 billion years old,
and is projected to live to a ripe old 10 billion. Claiming that the
weather change over the past couple of years is relevant to the age of
the Sun doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

> Depressing aren't I???  (I hope anyway...)

[grin] Nope. Too many optimists here.

  I have often said there are two kinds of mystics, the optimystics and 
  the pessimystics. Now, pessimystics seem to be more in touch with
  "reality," but optimystics are happier and live longer for some reason.
  The pessimystics have been crying, "The sky is falling, the sky is
  falling!" The optimystics say, "No. It just looks that way because we
  are ascending."
   -- Swami Beyondananda (Steve Bhaerman)

> As for 'the great lizzards'...  (Dinosaurs)

Are they related to the Great Wizzard?

> The stories of my people (Cherokee) claim that we moved south about 15,000 
> years ago because of an 'ice-age'...  such was the ways of 'Turtle 
> Island' (North America) in those times...

[blink] The Cherokees claim to have records going back that far? That
would be a fascinating new discovery, given that, in general, the reach
of recorded (in the roughest sense) human history is considered to be
~13,000 years, at which point (as far as I know) we had not yet spread
to the Americas. Africa, however, is indeed supposed to have experienced
an "aridity event" lasting from 20,000 to 11,000BC (cooler, drier
climate with less rainforest and greater desert spread.)

> As for G-d...  read and understand what Einstein was saying...  Do you think 
> the newly formed Nation of Israel would have even considered a 'non-believer' 
> as their first leader?

Um, yeah, actually. Israel was never a theocracy - and Einstein had
clearly, repeatedly, and publicly stated his absence of belief in a
"personal God".

http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/albert_einstein/

> Why do I use Slackware?  To avoid all of the above and all of those Microsoft 
> 'undocumented features' (bugs)... <heh>
> 
> Have a good day and a better tomorrow!
> 
> BTW
> Theory's are just that... theory's... based in air... not provable... Keep the 
> 'truth' and pass me the 'facts'... <grin>

Erm... I think you've confused the popular and the actual meanings of
"theory", Vince. As used by scientists, it means "a well-substantiated
explanation of some aspect of the natural world", not "wild guess".
However, scientists - in contrast to priests - are willing to learn new
and better explanations for natural phenomena, and thus change their
theories. This is what intelligent human beings do; this is how our
state of knowledge continues to improve.


* Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://linuxgazette.net *