Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

businessinsider.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 80 posts

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#11

Post by soperj »

mikeash wrote: post #9
soperj wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can it have happened before and be record breaking? Why the unrelated note? Why assume I am an idiot?

“Record” refers to past data. “Record breaking” means you’ve exceeded the past data, not that you’ve exceeded anything that has ever happened. For example, regular and reliable temperature records only go back to the late 1800s, so any “record breaking” temperature just means it hasn’t happened since 1888 or whatever.

Would you include these stones as data? They're certainly a record of low water levels.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#12

Post by soperj »

mortenjorck wrote: post #8
soperj wrote: post #3

It's almost as if this has happened before... But no, it's record breaking drought.

What you are saying is not greatly removed from “well if the world’s gettin’ so dang warm, why’s it so cold right now?” Climate science is much more complex than isolated data points such as a local temperature or river level, and to counter multivariate studies with anecdotal reductionism is the tool of demagogues.

What you're saying is that you want to argue on the internet about something completely unrelated to what I've said. You can clearly do that without me.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#13

Post by pdpi »

soperj wrote: post #6
bsder wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, the fact that the last time it was this bad was 400 years ago is pretty much the definition of "record breaking".

uhhh... the fact that there was a time that was "this bad", means that at most it's record equaling.

The fact that it hasn't been this bad in 400 years suggests that it's a capital-B Big problem though.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#15

Post by soperj »

pdpi wrote: post #13
soperj wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

uhhh... the fact that there was a time that was "this bad", means that at most it's record equaling.

The fact that it hasn't been this bad in 400 years suggests that it's a capital-B Big problem though.

We will only see the comet lovejoy every 622 years, that doesn't suggest it's a problem at all, let alone a big one. The fact that the water levels are very low suggest there's a big problem, that we haven't seen them this low in 400 years suggests only that we've seen them this low before and that the world has survived that.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#16

Post by mikeash »

soperj wrote: post #11
mikeash wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Record” refers to past data. “Record breaking” means you’ve exceeded the past data, not that you’ve exceeded anything that has ever happened. For example, regular and reliable temperature records only go back to the late 1800s, so any “record breaking” temperature just means it hasn’t happened since 1888 or whatever.

Would you include these stones as data? They're certainly a record of low water levels.

No, they are not the record being referred to here.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#17

Post by mywittyname »

soperj wrote: post #3

It's almost as if this has happened before... But no, it's record breaking drought.

The associated study claims that these stones have been seen many times - they are likely to appear about five times per century. The study points out that the causes of droughts have changed. Previous droughts were largely due to a lack of precipitation. The current levels of precipitation is actually as high as it has even been.

The cause of the current drought is record levels of heat. Despite statistically high levels of rain fall, the temperature of the region is so high that the rivers are drying up anyway.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#19

Post by a_w »

soperj wrote: post #6
bsder wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, the fact that the last time it was this bad was 400 years ago is pretty much the definition of "record breaking".

uhhh... the fact that there was a time that was "this bad", means that at most it's record equaling.

I think it depends on when the record keeping of the event began. So in this case if they started keeping records 250 years ago and they haven't experienced this level of drought since then, then it is considered record breaking. It doesn't mean that there haven't been worse droughts say, 300 or 400 years ago. It just means that either the official record keeping doesn't go that far, or that there may not be scientific research available to show that worse drought did occur before the the record keeping began.

Re: Sinister 'hunger stones' with dire warnings have surfaced as water levels drop

#20

Post by ABCLAW »

soperj wrote: post #15
pdpi wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that it hasn't been this bad in 400 years suggests that it's a capital-B Big problem though.

We will only see the comet lovejoy every 622 years, that doesn't suggest it's a problem at all, let alone a big one. The fact that the water levels are very low suggest there's a big problem, that we haven't seen them this low in 400 years suggests only that we've seen them this low before and that the world has survived that.

The planet isn't going to die if we irradiate ourselves into caves, but that doesn't mean irradiating the surface of the planet for shits and giggles is a good idea.
Post reply on HN