KLB

In the hearings the USADA has tried to use another cyclist who admitted to doping to claim that testosterone is used to help with overnight recovery, not to actually improve performance directly. Also, Floyd Landis rides with special rear hub on his bicycle that measures his power output, which he routinely released to the public. His power output on the stage he had that amazing recovery was not out of line with his normal performance. It is not uncommon on endurance sports for someone to have an off day (especially if they screw up and not eat enough) and then to be back at 100% the next day. It is almost like the body is enforcing a rest day so that it can recover. The only odd thing about these bad days is that we are seeing fewer and fewer of them in professional cycling over the years. Even Lance Armstrong got hit by bad days. Floyd's amazing recovery in the standings really came down to tactics and suckering the main field who had written him off because of the previous day. Floyd was never a favorite to win the Tour de France to begin with so when he cracked and hit the wall the rest of the peloton simply thought their suspicions had been confirmed and wrote him off. Thus Floyd's win on that day was as much a tactical coup on his part as tactical disaster by the other teams. By the time the other teams realized Floyd wasn't bluffing it was too late for them to do anything more than limit the damage. These types of one stage breakaways do happen in cycling, its just not common that they upset the top standings in the race as normally teams pay closer attention to riders they deem to be a serious contender.

No, he absolutely denies ever doing it. Someone more cynical might add the comment "like everyone else".

About the Borg, doesn't seem egotistical that Humans have been the only race to have reasonable success standing up to the Borg? That has always troubled me.

besides the "Trust But Verify" (TBV) blog another site that has been running play by play coverage of the trial is http://rant-your-head-off.com/WordPress/. TBV has been covering this story with a tenacity that deserves a Pulitzer Prize, and has become a primary go to source for all other outlets reporting this story, but the "Rant your head off" blog is doing a good job of providing another perspective. Both sites work and coverage on this story has been far superior to anything in the mainstream press, which only shows up for the side shows (like LeMond).

The biggest problem with cleaning up doping in cycling is going to be transparency and due process with the "prosecution" of drug cheats. The science must be iron clad without any potential for accusations of self confirming bias. Right now it is a witch hunt where WADA is judge jury and executioner. I don't really know if Landis is guilty or innocent and we will never know because of bad control measures in the case. How can we trust a system where the same drug testing lab (let alone the same technicians) are testing both A and B samples? How can we trusts testing results where the technicians knew who's samples they were testing (yes the technicians admitted this in the hearing)? How can we trust labs that admits to overwriting files, failing to log all steps, has breaks in the chain of custody, and labeling errors on samples? These is a basic breakdown of scientific processes. If we are to eliminate asterisks from the history books and to ensure that individuals are not falsely accused or wrongly exonerated there must be absolute certainty and transparency with the testing and prosecution process. At the very least there needs to be very robust scientific controls where labs are not validating their own work thereby avoiding the appearance of cover up. Furthermore how can these cases be prosecuted without the basic rules of law and discovery, and where the rule makers are not required to abide by their own rules? No matter the outcome of the Landis case, everyone loses because no one will ever truly know the truth except for Landis and if he is truly innocent there is no way for him to prove it.

Has anyone else been monitoring the progress of the Floyd Landis doping hearings via the blog Trust But Verify? They have been maintaining a running transcript of the testimony, and I have found it interesting how science is used (or abused your choice) in the hearings. I also find it interesting how a particularly relevant scientific witness can be overshadowed by an irrelevant "monkey dance" (as it has been called on TBV) from a completely irrelevant but headline grabbing witness.

Cracking is often done on heavy crude oil to turn it into gasoline, where as "light sweet" crude can be distilled. This is why light sweet is preferred over heavy crude. Another reason cracking is used is to convert a higher percentage of crude oil into gasoline as opposed to using heavier grades for fuel oil, etc. It is all market driven. The more demand there is for gasoline and the higher gasoline prices are the more efforts oil companies will go to to get gasoline out of crude oil. Whereas if there were less demand for gasoline, they would refine more of the crude oil into other products.

MolotovCocktail I am familiar with the fractionalization process of crude oil and yes a great deal of energy is required for the process and no the energy doesn't necessarily come from coal in fact oftentimes it comes from burning oil or gas. My point wasn't that all of the crude lost during the refining process was turned into products, but rather much of it is. As you pointed out crude oil consists of a mix of carbon chain lengths and the exact mix depends upon the nature of crude oil. As crude oil is heated and distilled, different lengths of carbon chains stratify at different elevations in the tower and are drawn off for different purposes. Certain carbon chains are preferred for gasoline, and others for road tar. Yes around 67% of a gallon of crude (depending upon refinery and grade of crude) gets turned into gasoline, but much of the rest still ends up being turned into some sort of product. It doesn't just get thrown away. One way or another refineries want to try to turn as much of the crude oil into some sort of marketable product as is possible to increase revenues and decrease waste disposal costs.

@MolotovCocktail, In regards to crude oil to gasoline, how much of the crude oil that is not turned into gasoline is turned into other types of fuel and/or industrial products? Biofuels may not be a utopia fuel source either. For instance corn is a highly inefficient source of energy and the more arable land we divert from growing food to growing fuel the less crops that will be available to feed the world. When it comes to biofuels we really need to focus on producing it from sources that do not impact our food supplies (e.g. inedible byproducts) or at least focus our biofuel production on the most efficient sources of biofuel (e.g. sugar cane).

@ParanoiA, I agree with your post #273 entirely. I've felt this way for a long time. Oh and yes SkepticLance has been bringing up good points about how bad an offender coal is. Really it is something that should stay locked in the earth if better options are available.

Actually with vehicles less than 15% of the potential energy in fuel is turned into forward motion so there is massive room for improvement in the fuel economy of vehicles. Here is a chart from http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/atv.shtml showing how energy is losted: If you visit the page this chart is from you can actually click on the image and see more details about each form of energy loss.

I agree with your dislike of coal and the liquification of coal. In general I think for too long there has been too much focus acquiring energy from all fossil fuels via government funded research and tax breaks to the fossil fuel industries. Those tax breaks and research dollars should have been pumped into non-fossil fuel energies and energy efficiency . If this had been done consistently since the energy crisis, we would not be so dependent on fossil fuels today and would not be in such a pickle when it came to the situation in the Middle East nor with the situation of refineries being constantly at their maximum capacity here in the U.S. Regardless of the climate change issue, I really do believe that from an energy policy standpoint, we should do everything possible to improve the energy efficiency of everything from the vehicles we drive, to our homes, to electronics, to our manufacturing processes. The energy efficiency related technologies should also be shared with rest of the world, particularly the developing world. It would be a heck of a lot better for society if we could stretch out our oil and gas reserves to last for as many years as possible so that we can phase in real long term replacements rather than being forced extremely high energy prices that damage our economies. Improved fuel efficiency of all vehicles would also reduce the cost of transportation for everyone, which is good for the economy and personal household budgets.

SkepticLance in regards to oil, gas, coal, and CO2 think of it this way: improving the fuel efficiency of vehicles will help reduce our annual release of CO2; save consumers money on fuel costs; reduce stress on our refineries, which are running near their capacity; AND allow us to divert oil and gas from fuel from vehicles to existing oil fired power plants. In turn this would help relieve the need for coal generated power.

@ SkepticLance, In regards to your last post (#264), we agree on this part of the issue more than you may realize. I do think that we can act with urgency without counterproductive panic. Many things that we can do today also have substantial benefits beyond the CO2 footprint issue. For instance it really wouldn't be that big of an issue to improve the average fuel efficiency of vehicles 20% in the U.S. (heck this would just put us on par with other countries). The side benefit to this would be that it would take a tremendous amount of stress off of American refineries. Personally even though my wife and I live in a small apartment and have always tried to be careful with our electrical usage, we have been able to cut our electrical usage an additional 20% by doing simple things like swapping out our incandescent bulbs with CFLs, putting our electronics on electrical switches such that they are truly turned off and reducing the temperature on our hot water heater. The point of my example is that there are lots of ways for individuals to have an immediate impact on their energy consumption and thus CO2 production without "panicking" and this is a point that many have been trying to make. We should do what we can immediately and strive to archive those changes that require more time. It will be good for the environment, help reduce national demand for energy and save individuals money.

It might be on a .GOV websites, but look at the source who wrote the opinion piece, Marc Morano. You can read articles and opinions he has published via: http://www.changingworldviews.com/guestcommentaries/marcmoranocom.htm If you don't want to take the time to read his writings here are a couple of bio summaries: Marc hardly qualifies as a "fair and balanced" source and defiantly isn't scientific source. Comments by another "non-scientist" that can be watched on this subject is a webcast conducted by Rupert Murdoch of News Corporation (the owners of Fox News) at: http://www.newscorp.com/energy/energywebcast.asp Rupert Murdoch's webcast is over one hour long, but only the first 20-30 minutes are dedicated to Rupert Murdoch's comments. I watched it the other day and found it very interesting. I particularly found it interesting how he see business sense (as in significant money savings) by going carbon neutral even if the whole climate change thing turns out to be wrong. A choice quote from him in the webcast is: Australia's The Age (http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/climate-of-change-gives-murdoch-a-new-face/2007/05/11/1178390558705.html) quoted the following comments Murdoch made last November in Japan: Really I see this as a measured and pragmatic response to the issue. He accepts that the earth is warming and that there is a strong possibility that man is responsible. Rather than waiting to see definitive proof he wants to take action now while. In part because reducing is company's carbon footprint will result in significant financial savings over time and in part because if it is a real problem, the sooner we address the problem the less it will cost.

You had better remove the word "you" from your comment "numbers provided by you or other GW proponents" because you have not used ANY numbers provided by me. I take strong issue with ANY use of uncited numbers because they only lead to false conclusions (as you have made). If you can not build your argument on citations of peer reviewed research then you have no argument to make. There is no reason anyone should waste energy disproving an argument in a science forum like this that is not based upon peer reviewed sources to begin with. It is a waste of time. --edit-- So you copied and pasted a big bibliography from some paper. It does not help support your argument. You need to form your argument such that each step of your logic is referenced back to something that can be validated. At this point in time you can not do that because you have freely admitted that you relied on numbers from this thread.

Are you saying you question the integrity of thousands of scientists and one of the most stringent peer review processes ever undertaken in scientific endeavors? I believe skepticlance took exception to me doing this when I called into question the actions of ExxonMobil and its proxies. If I can not question the motives and methods of ExxonMobil and the climate change skeptics they funded through proxies then you can not call into question the motives or integrity of the IPCC. In turn we MUST accept the conclusions of the IPCC's reports as fact as they been through a rigorous peer review process.

Until you build a mathematical "model" or argument that starts on sound numbers and cited reasoning for the correlations you want to make, you have no one but yourself.

A bad place to start is with unverified numbers, regardless of the source. When it comes to the numbers I don't think anyone has a monopoly on accuracy with their numbers in this thread. Instead I see a lot of sloppy numbers cast about and then reused to make an argument, which results in more sloppy numbers. All any of this proves is that people are sloppy with their use of numbers. Oh I don't know, maybe to make sure you were making your arguments based on a sound foundation maybe? I assume your purpose in debating GW is to disprove man being the culprit. To do this you need to be using sound data otherwise your argument falls apart the moment someone like DAK decodes your math. based on "tricky" numbers of dubious reliability (unverified numbers by other members).

Dak, now that you were able to jump through his mathematical gymnastics, I'd advise you to take some aspirin for your headache. All kidding aside, you did a better job of following the bouncing ball then I was able to do (I tried but it made my head spin). I now see what theCPE was trying to "prove" and why the logic was so flawed.

How about providing some peer reviewed citations? Again you need to provide reputable citations (Wiki does not count as reputable). However, with that said our planet does depend upon a certain percentage of the sun's heat energy being locked down by our atmosphere in order to maintain a habitable climate. If you ever want to see what life is like if the heat is not reflected down to earth, go to the middle of a desert at night or the arctic in the winter on a cloudless night (lets just say it is wicked cold). With that said if too much is heat is reflected back to earth things get wicked hot. Even if your math is correct, I'm not convinced of the logic to draw your formula or that you used the base numbers correctly. So you are basing your number on numbers and stats posted here without verifying their source? How about building a mathematical model based on peer reviewed numbers and providing specific citations for the rest of us to confirm. Make sure that when you grab different numbers that you are comparing apples to apples so to speak. over what time frame again provide citations. I've seen proofs that showed 1+1=3, it doesn't mean it is true. What I see is a bunch of numbers being thrown together from multiple sources to draw a conclusion. On the surface it sounds good, but I think the term bascule used for it was non-sequitur (see: http://www.google.com/search?q=define%3Anon-sequitur). This is the problem with many GW skeptical arguments. If you jump through enough mathematical equations you can convince yourself of anything. All I see is a bunch of mental gymnastics based on dubious numbers that appears designed to confuse more than inform.

Because of the sheer overwhelming amount of peer reviewed research that has been conducted on this subject for scores of years. Simply put, it is inconceivable that the "evidence" currently touted by GW skeptics wasn't already seriously evaluated and definitively ruled out over the previous decades of research. Remember in the beginning (many decades ago) global warming was the novel theory that was rejected by mainstream science. It was only through a very long process of research and peer review by a scientific community (where the skeptics were in the majority) that a "consensus" was built. The majority of a previously skeptical scientific "community" now accepts that global warming is real and that man's burning of fossil fuels is a major cause of it. Yes there is a small minority of scientists who honestly doubt climate change is caused by man. HOWEVER, as I have previously tried to bring to light, much of the "evidence" and rational currently being used to discredit climate change (as the majority of scientists now accept it) has been manufactured by corporate interests (namely ExxonMobil) to sow confusion on this issue (and yes this has been documented in painful detail). Simply put, bad apologies, non-sequitur mathematical models and non-peer reviewed research have been sown into the public consciousness as real peer reviewed research in a cynical effort to manufacture debate on this issue. Skepticlance does not like it, but a very serious part of this discussion needs to be separating out that disinformation that has been sown by proxies of ExxonMobil and that skeptical research that has been truly peer reviewed by the larger scientific community. Look all of us have a vested interest in the entire theory of climate change being disproved, because life would be so much simpler if we didn't need to worry about how our actions impacted our climate and ecosystems. It would be very convenient to be able to prove that any climate change taking place was the result of natural forces that we can not affect; unfortunately sometimes the truth is not convenient. Since the late 1800s scientists have been studying greenhouse gases and since at least the 1930s scientists have been studying man's impact on climate change. Our understanding of how man is affecting global warming is not just some self loathing fad; it is a well understood and generally accepted reality. While there may be some minor theories and evidence that may lessen the roll man plays in climate change, the overwhelming mass of peer reviewed science shows that man plays a significant roll in climate change. The time for debate on this subject is over. We now need to act so that whatever man's roll is in climate change, we can lessen our contribution to global warming and limit the damage global warming does to our civilization.

Maybe a better way to state this is to say that the experts are overwhelmed by vastly greater numbers of rabble.

I think this is one reason people should quote comments correctly (as I have done here) such that they contain the user's name and post ID such that vBulletin will automatically create a link back to the quoted comments. It would benefit all of us. I searched for your use of the word extremist in this thread and this is what I found: I don't think I could disagree with this. It is a very good observation. This is from page 10 (normal settings) post #191. The little arrow next to your name in the quote box leads to the post in question. While you did not say "KLB is a GW extremist" your post #191 does infer that people in this discussion are GW extremists. There isn't much difference.

I was being a little sarcastic about the 19.5% thingy. If we converted enough O2 into CO2 to bring the atmosphere down to 19.5% I'm quite certain we would have already faced other existence threatening problems. My own stats on the periodic table on my environmental chemistry site shows basically the same thing so we are in agreement on this. Keep in mind that all of that oxygen is locked up in chemical compounds in the earth and not readily available. The problem is that nature corrects and compensates over eons of slow change. If we royally screw things up rapidly, we could do ourselves in before nature could compensate. Our actions or lack of actions could have bad consequences.