Live data from Hacker News

There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

bbc.com

101–110 of 166 posts

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the GOP is like the useful boogeyman, but most Dems are no better. Hell, the most powerful parts of the Dems include folks like Joe Manchin, who's right in the bag of coal. Even in a world where Hillary Clinton won the 2016 election and followed through on her policy goals, they were still too timid to turn the tide.

Why is Joe Manchin’s vote more powerful than the other Senators’ votes? If you need 50 or 60 votes to do something, and you do not have it, then is the 50th or 60th vote more powerful than the other 49 and 59? And what about the other 49 and 39 votes that will not compromise? Kind of ridiculous to pin this on a party that has not had enough votes to make a change. Especially when the states making the most progress t…

Manchins vote matters more because it is the tiebreaker that matters.. we have to live in the real world. Here’s some questions: Have Democrats never had the political power to make change? Did the Obama presidency not exist? Let’s be real.. the Dems have explicitly made it a policy to move towards the right in order to appeal to GOP voters. This isn’t just some conspiracy theory, it has been explicitly stated by dem officials at conventions, in interviews, and covered at length in liberal venues like the infamous Pod Save America episode on the Clinton campaign strategy.

If democrats were as militant about their positions as the GOP, maybe they’d have more than one major liberal policy win made through legislation in the past 50 years.. but they’re not, and they don’t.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#102

[flagged]

The author at the link suggests many possible mechanisms for getting heat from within the earth to the oceans and atmosphere. I can't comment on the geology, but this from the link:

"Abyssal ocean conveyance belts pull novel heat content from small-footprint yet now much hotter contribution points exposed to the asthenosphere – and convey (not conduct, convect, nor radiate) this novel heat content through oceanic advection and upwelling systems to the surface of the ocean. Abyssal ocean currents (and consequently surface ones as well) speed up from the discrete addition of kinetic energy. Arctic and Antarctic polar ice sheets melt from the bottom up. Land dessicates more quickly and wildfires erupt earlier and out-of-season, especially near heat plumes."

I'd have to do the math (actually, a comment above says 10.9 Zetta Joules), but to get the kind of contribution suggested by this, it seems that these hot areas would have to be quite large and therefore observable - this would literally look like the ocean boiling (upwelling actually). If they were small, there would have to be areas of bottom warm-water-to-surface heat transfer occurring. As far as I know - as someone fairly familiar with the data - this has never been observed.

Meanwhile, we have a very simple, very reasonable model for what is going on, that works quite well.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#103

The last month I've thought about this clip at least twice a week. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg

"Once and for all!" I think of this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNYp6oc37ds

Wow, spot on :)

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#104
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had the money I would. But don't worry other people (idiots apperently) are. China and India are both some of the leading countries in added solar and wind capacity. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_by_country [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_by_country

Also coal and that lead is expanding, why?

Multiple factors. The grid infrastructure isn't always there, the upfront cost is often higher (even if it is cheaper in the long run), production capacities as well as the fact that battery storage is just starting to catch up.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#105
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also coal and that lead is expanding, why?

Multiple factors. The grid infrastructure isn't always there, the upfront cost is often higher (even if it is cheaper in the long run), production capacities as well as the fact that battery storage is just starting to catch up.

> battery storage is just starting to catch up

Wait a minute. I thought solar is cheaper. Now you are telling me they need batteries? I would've assumed that the batteries are part of that cheaper claim, otherwise you wouldn't have power at night at that claim would be very disingenuous.

Sounds like the developing world still needs fossil fuels to escape poverty.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#106

The last month I've thought about this clip at least twice a week. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SYpUSjSgFg

"Once and for all!" I think of this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNYp6oc37ds

Yes! And that's what is so interesting about all this (in a very morbid way): it's not as if we didn't know, and it's not as if we do not know. But nothing changes. Massive storms? Check. Maybe not quite at the level alluded to but we're getting there Wildfires out of control? Check. Depending on where you live already too much to deal with, migration is your only option. If you're lucky you can still ignore this one. For now. Global diseases? Check. And that won't stop as habitats dwindle further. But electric cars will surely save us...

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#107
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This pseudo-intellectual doubt in the face of overwhelming scientific consensus is pathetic and part of the problem. What is the goal? Laying breadcumbs for climate-change deniers to follow to some trap for the gullible?

This is the one thing I dislike about Penn Jillette. The way he excuses himself from his former stance on climate change. He accepts it now, but he says "there wasn't enough evidence back then" and "they didn't do a good enough job to convince [me]". But it's not their job to convince him. They're the ones who have spent their lives studying this. And they're convinced. The number of people with the education and exp…

David Attenborough was another skeptic, but he was eventually convinced by the weight of evidence. Perhaps we should praise them for being willing to change their minds when so few people seem able to.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#109
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the one thing I dislike about Penn Jillette. The way he excuses himself from his former stance on climate change. He accepts it now, but he says "there wasn't enough evidence back then" and "they didn't do a good enough job to convince [me]". But it's not their job to convince him. They're the ones who have spent their lives studying this. And they're convinced. The number of people with the education and exp…

David Attenborough was another skeptic, but he was eventually convinced by the weight of evidence. Perhaps we should praise them for being willing to change their minds when so few people seem able to.

Not just being able to change their minds but also to speak about it publicly. I'm sure plenty more have changed their minds but are afraid to speak up because they're afraid it will ding their popularity or cost them votes.

Re: There’s a heatwave in the sea and scientists are worried

#110
post #95
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the one thing I dislike about Penn Jillette. The way he excuses himself from his former stance on climate change. He accepts it now, but he says "there wasn't enough evidence back then" and "they didn't do a good enough job to convince [me]". But it's not their job to convince him. They're the ones who have spent their lives studying this. And they're convinced. The number of people with the education and exp…

But he changed his position, and that's all that really matters. Why he held a different position before isn't actually that important, and I'm not inclined to criticize or shame anyone for stances they no longer have.

It actually is important. Let me try to explain: the way he phrases it is is as though he needed some internal level to be crossed before he would change his mind. Even though he is way out of his area of expertise. He should have said instead "I didn't know what I was talking about". That way others who also don't know what they are talking about (see some of the commenters in this thread) might take the hint that this isn't about your personal standards for facts, it is about the scientists who have devoted their lives to this subject whose standards apply.

So he could have done a better job on the retraction.

Post reply on HN