Samm

Samm, I suggest you read up on the "Younger Dryas" period. You are talking about a .7 degree increase in 150 years, (Note that your starting point was the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, so it is unsurprising that it's getting warmer) the Greenland cores show a temp decrease and increase of roughly 15 degrees in under 70 years. Allowing for polar amplification that would mean circa 3 degrees in the tropics.

 

.7 degrees in 150 years or 3 degrees in 70 years, which is the higher warming rate?

Yes, "Younger Dryas", was a very significant event. The temperature changed significantly, because of a massive change in the ocean currents. However, that sort of drastic change is not occurring at the moment, except in the case of levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases. Second of all, it is unsure that the Little Ice Age was global, while we are sure that the current temperature rises are global.

Do you dispute the fact that greenhouse gases trap heat?

P.S. You might like to look at the names of the authors of those "different studies". Funny how the same people using the same data get the same answer, isn't it? BTW, if you look here you'll find some hundreds of temperature reconstructions that don't match the wiki graph. By all means have a look at the reconstructions and the proxies used. You will find that temperatures were not, as you say, "relatively stable" at all.

 

It is better to read the literature than to swallow the hype. (And there is plenty from both sides in the climate debate)

Yes, I understand that the climate is variable. However, many of the temperature reconstructions are local or confined to a small part of the world. The graph I have shown you depicts global temperature. Additionally, the same people do not use the same data, they use different data, and there are a number of different people actually building that reconstruction.

I think one way to provide an objective measure of the complexity of a musical composition is to look at all the data bytes that go into instructing people how to reproduce the sounds desired. If you look at the conductor's score for Wagner's 'Goetterdaemmerung,' detailing all the music which has to be played by all the different instruments and subsections among the instruments (first and second violins), and you consider the work of interpretation that goes into synthesizing all this material to produce the conductor's distinctive approach, plus the interpretive work of each player, then the total complexity of the music is massive. I don't think that there is any way to indicate how a musical composition is to be played that is any more simple than the standard musical score, so the number of bytes of information in classical music is not artificially inflated by taking that as a measure.

Okay, in all good measurements, you need to have a baseline. Of what skill level are the performers before they learn to play the composition? Are they complete novices, who haven't seen a musical instrument before, or are they proficient musicians who are just ignorant of the piece? Second of all, I believe that this measure is inflated by having a large orchestra. Teaching 2 violinists to play the same piece makes the piece more complex than teaching one violinist the same piece. So... I don't think this is a valid scale of complexity. In short, of course classical music is more complex using your scale, because they have far larger groups of people playing the music, even if they're playing the same piece.

I'd consider the average skill level required of the performers to be a superior indicator of complexity. This assumes the piece is played by the intended number of musicians. This measures how hard a piece is to play, and indirectly how complex it is, and it is not affected by the size of the band/orchestra as much as your method.

My point was that most progressive rock is not considered popular. Rush, despite releasing 19 studio albums and another on the way in 2011, only get about 4 songs total played on the radio in most classic rock formats. Emerson, Lake, and Palmer don't get a lot of playtime. Yes doesn't get a lot of playtime. King Crimson doesn't get a lot of playtime. Dream Theater and Porcupine Tree, despite being among the most popular progressive rock bands today, don't get a lot of playtime. etc.

 

The exception to that is Pink Floyd, who does get a fair amount of play time, especially later in their career when the moved away from psychedelic rock. And, my example of a progressive rock that is truly popular is Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. That is, in spite of it being firmly in a genre that isn't very popular, it is a truly popular album.

 

Not that other progressive rock albums haven't sold. But compare the 30 million to Pink Floyd's other works and it is dominant. In terms of popularity, their Wish You Were Here is only 13 million. Rush's Moving Pictures (generally considered one of their strongest albums) only sold 4 million. Porcupine Tree's Deadwing, one of their most popular, has only sold a half a million albums, and Dream Theater's Images and Words just over half a million as well.

 

To put it in perspective of popularity, Brittney Spears routinely sells 3 or 4 million copies per album, and I suspect that most of us would agree that her work is not progressive or complex.

 

I am sure that there are a few other progressive rock albums that have sold well. Jethro Tull's Thick as Brick must have sold well, too, I just couldn't find any sales figures quickly on Google.

 

I hope that I made my point clearer -- that progressive rock, typified by being complex, normally isn't very popular, though there have been exceptions such as DSotM selling very well.

Okay, I agree entirely with what you're saying there. However, I believe that the Dark Side of the Moon actually sold 45 million copies instead of 30 million copies.

Perhaps you are being misled yourself then. So you agree that the current temperature relative to temperatures in the 1600-1800's is not and issue since historically the temperatures have been much higher in the not too distance past, certainly since humans have been on earth.

I would disagree. Temperatures have been higher, inter-glacial periods, permian etc., but the rate of temperature increase is actually the issue. And I was making a comparison to the climate change we are seeing at the moment, when I said "relatively stable".

If it can be shown that even the rate of rise is not significant, then do you agree we are back to the null hypothesis that natural factors alter global temperatures over time? The long term average temperature is estimated at 17 and the estimated typical variance is 7 degrees C. By that standard, our current temperature is now below the average at about 14 degrees C.

Yeah, I would agree, if it can be shown.

This wiki graphic is a good example of how one can "trick" the data to make a trend seem more significant by making apples to oranges comparisons. The long term proxies graphed are tree ring proxies, selected because on the whole (averaged over the globe) they tend to de-emphasize the medieval warming and little ice age particularly with respect to any rapid changes. Then when the tree data fails to track the current instrument temperature, the black line substituted to carry on the trend, the tree data is not displayed so as to not tip off the viewer that the data series are apples and oranges. If we are interested in comparing the rate of change in temperature for the current trend to historical rates of change, let's be sure we are comparing the same data type.

Are you suggesting that we cannot compare temperature records using proxies with direct thermometer records? Why? I understand that temperature proxies may not be as accurate as thermometer records, but a comparison still can be made. The tree ring data was omitted, because it was wrong from that point onwards. It's called the Divergence Problem and if you wish to illustrate a record of temperatures as best you can, you probably should remove the data that is known to be wrong.

Here is a consistent ice core proxy that also includes the present time up to 1999. Note that temperature rates of change have been comparable over many thousands of years. The current temperature rise does not stand out, though CO2 concentration does.

 

 

Here is the corresponding article.

It's interesting to note, that the last few hundred years are actually squashed into a very small horizontal space, and that the temperature rises depicted in that graph are slow in comparison to the increases occurring at the moment. The reason the CO2 has increased dramatically and the temperature hasn't increased as rapidly, is because the oceans are actually absorbing much of the heat.

Indeed. Can you identify the underling trend when one does not use data that is Cherry picked for that reason?

I don't know, I'm not a climate scientist. I might be able to, but I'm not exactly sure.

I think you have to distinguish between induction and deduction. Seeking patterns in data is inductive research. Once you become conscious of such a pattern, this is the beginning of theory-building. The pattern itself is not an empirical fact just because you have synthesized it from systematic observations of empirical facts. It is just a stepping stone toward building a more rigorous, falsifiable theory. The theory should explain the observed data and make predictions about new data on that basis. It should contain testable hypotheses that detail reasons why/how the theory could be false or require modification. The goal of science is to shed light on HOW knowledge is misconstrued by identifying indefensible claims/ideas/concepts/etc. Science is not meant to be used to build up knowledge to a level of efficacy that falsifying it becomes unfathomable. That would be verificationism.

Okay. Fair enough.

Samm, I am confused. 30 million copies is indeed popular. Truly is an emphasis on just how popular it is. Truly as in sincerely, genuinely, truthfully, accurately, in a true manner, etc. I will assume that this was just a miscommunication...

However, you seemed to suggest it wasn't. But I'll have to let that slide, it probably was a misunderstanding.

Bignose was not pushing this point that you have misinterpreted but I will! The Wall was a popular album in terms of sales but in terms of sheer ubiquity (air play and persistence in charts,polls etc), general reverence and mass consumption over the years Dark Side blows it away. Dark Side also appears, on reflection, to have a timeless quality that The Wall lacks (as a whole piece) which will ensure it's existence into the future. I can see Dark Side still being played and appreciated a hundred years from now but not The Wall because it's layout and presentation ties it to it's era but Dark Side's does not because the sonic quality and concepts embodied within it will still respectively excite and be relevant to any future generation that hears it...the human condition will always be a source of angst and interest which it portrays so well. I'm trying to be critically objective here but I adore both of those albums.

 

Dark Side deserves the accolade of 'truly popular' because of its consistent continued existence within the public conciousness against which it has few peers.

I see.

Well, if the magnetic field contained light emissions, first causing the (flat) Earth to appear curved, then spherical, it would appear to completely disappear by the time you actually escaped it. This could be confused with achieving a very large distance, if you assumed that the spherism was caused by Earth's actual shape instead of the magnetic bending of the light at increasing altitude.

 

If (flat) Earth had multiple magnetic fields, you could get stuck retracing the same routes around on section of it using a compass, while other people in other sections/regions could have their own magnetic field causing them to traverse the same routes around their "sphere." The question would be how to find a route between two distinct magnetic regions.

Lets say you do experiments based on light, assuming it travels in straight lines on the flat Earth. When you exit the magnetic field the same experiments would give different results, and that would be how to tell if the magnetic field was bending the light. Then you'd know that something was a little weird. In theory, you may be able to back-calculate, based on a coefficient of bendiness, the amount the light bends and hence explore the regions that were previously though inaccessible.

I ask if the magnetic field is responsible for the Earth appearing spherical, why does it get stronger the further you are away from it? Spherical > Curved.

Look, I don't really think the Earth is flat. What I do with an idea like this is to "see how far I can get with it," as I mentioned in my earlier post. I'm perfectly aware that there are a million valid science-based reasons that can disprove that the Earth is flat, so when you guys jump in trying to prove me wrong I can't understand that. OBVIOUSLY you can prove me wrong if I claim the Earth is flat, so why do it?

Yeah, I know, I'm just saying that if that's the case the only grounds you can claim for the Earth being flat seem to be fallacious. But anyway, it's enjoyable thinking about the number of natural laws that would have to be violated/modified to accommodate a flat earth.

Having said that, how would you know that magnetism doesn't affect light in this way if all the tests performed were done within the magnetic field that causes curved lines to appear straight?

I don't imagine you would, unless you managed to step outside the magnetic field.

Samm, that's why I called it "truly popular". Re-read the quote.

So, "truly popular", doesn't include an album that worldwide sold 30 million copies? Fair enough...

It is misleading to describe the recent 20 years as if it stands out as a climate record. Relative to the previous few hundred years it is high, but relative to the history of the earth it is not unusual. Historical temperature proxies indicate that the climate has been up to 8 degrees centigrade warmer than today and about 4 degrees cooler during the period mammals are known to have existed on this earth.

Natural causes have the ability to warm the earth dramatically more than the trend over the past 200 years. This is the null hypothesis. How can it be obvious that something other than the null hypothesis is occurring? How has the null hypothesis been ruled out?

Well, I thought that before the industrial revolution, temperatures were relatively stable. Then when levels of atmospheric CO2 increased, temperatures started to rise, faster than ever before. The issue isn't the magnitude of temperature rise, it's the rate of temperature rise. 1 degree Celsius per 150 years is very quick in comparison to natural rates. I mean the graph you're show works on the scale of millions of years, while mine works on the scale of decades. In short, I don't believe this sort of rapid temperature rise has really ever occurred before.

Here is a graph constructed from the instrumental record, the black line and the various results of numerous different studies using proxies, the other colours. So, yes the sudden temperature rise looks rather sudden.

By that logic, if a person is arrested for theft and they are identified as racially similar to other thieves, it is supportive of a theory that criminality is a characteristic of that race; but if the person's racial identity is different from other thieves, it does not indicate anything about the thief's race more generally? So basically you are biased in favor of pattern-supporting evidence and you discount evidence that doesn't support observed patterns until there is sufficient data to indicate a new pattern? Doesn't that seem like weak science to you in any way?

I'm saying that if it's just noise, and there is no underlying trend either way, it's not really evidence of anything. However, if it later becomes part of an underlying trend, I will not discount it as noise. Instead I'll consider it as noise+underlying trend. The real evidence is in the underlying trend.

I have done my best to go as far as I can with the idea of a flat Earth. The best I can get is that light bends in a way that causes the Earth to appear spherical from high altitudes. It may also be the case that due to the magnetic field, explorers tend to trace the same routes and miss new routes into unexplored regions. This could be due to the magnetic field giving the illusion of a sphere while the actual Earth is flat. The spherical appearance of Earth from high altitude would resonate with the magnetic sphericism because light and magnetism are related. There may be a special path through antarctica or the Himalayas or somewhere else that leads to undiscovered land that extends infinitely. Sphericism may be ridiculed one day in the not-so-distant future!

The question is, how do you know the earth is flat, if that's the case?

If it was the coldest year on record, would that point to anthropogenic climate cooling?

Well, it really depends if it appears to be part of an underlying trend. If it is, it would be supportive of anthropogenic climate cooling, if it wasn't it wouldn't be.

Speaking of underlying trends:

It appears as if 2010 is going to be the warmest year since temperature records began 130 years ago. NASA, NOAA and the British Metrology office seem to be predicting this according to this recent article/blog post in the New York Times. http://green.blogs.n...=nytimesscience

At this current point in time, it looks as if it's becoming increasingly obvious that anthropogenic climate change is occurring.

Enough to necessitate the energy-density of UV frequency? Or could sufficient energy be supplied by the visible spectrum?

I wouldn't really know. At the moment, I'd just be saying, the more energy absorbed, the better.

Do flat earthers even believe in gravity? What if they think it's not masses attracting, but just a universal "down" force? Or maybe the Earth is just perpetually accelerating uniformly up?

I think they support the latter. They'll say, the Earth accelerates upwards at a rate of 9.8m/s². Now this is ridiculous considering that within about 31 million seconds, the Earth will be travelling at light speed. That equates to about a year, if I've done the maths right.

I'm fairly certain that, given that the horizon is only 30 miles away or so, most flat earthers have a different explanation for horizons than "that's where the Earth ends."

I think they dismiss it as an optical illusion.

Maybe photosynthesis doesn't benefit but the plant could benefit for some other reason. It could help with water-transport, for example. I wonder about the UV, though, since energy-density increases rapidly with frequency-increase. Does plant growth consume a lot of energy or not much?

Well, I'd imagine it consumes a fair bit of energy. It's performing an endothermic reaction on quite a large scale in a way that produces very specific products. It's going to take a lot of controlling through various other chemicals, and the process itself is very complex, so I'd imagine it'd eat up a decent amount of energy.

The bigger point is that there are complex and unique songs in most every genre. Like most gold, you just have to dig for it. And, it isn't always the most popular songs -- in fact it rarely is. The only truly popular progressive album I can think of is Pink Floyd's Darkside of the Moon. But, the complex deeper stuff is out there, and can be very rewarding when found.

I would dispute that last paragraph there, Pink Floyd's The Wall was, I believe one of the better selling double albums.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best_selling_albums#Best-selling_albums_by_country

@Marat:

Blanket statements about modern music being all poor is a little presumptious. It's not all repetitiuous mush, there are some very interesting rock songs, that seem to be original and for want of a better word, brilliant. Take, Pink Floyd's Echoes for example, yes there is repetition there, but it's not boring. It actually goes somewhere; it soars. And furthermore, go listen to The Host of Seraphim by Lisa Gerrard, just do it.

If you want my opinion on classical music, I think it's overrated. Why is that period so special? Were people smarter then? Why can't we have musical geniuses arising in the present or the recent past? They didn't have the technology as we had; the range of sounds available to us now, is far greater. We now can achieve more in the present musically than we could in the past. Sure, plenty of it is rubbish, but I'm sure that plenty of Classical music back in the day was rubbish as well. We just don't hear that junk, because everybody left it behind.

As for my preferred music, I enjoy Pink Floyd, Muse, Coldplay, The Dead Can Dance, Coldplay, The Beatles and Iron Maiden.

This website explains it a bit more, the part you are looking for is around the middle.

http://www2.estrella.../BioBookPS.html

That looks like a really good website actually.

edit: I don't get the point of adding green LED except to make the plants appear green while they're growing. If they reflect it, then they're not absorbing it, right?

Well, I don't think they're absorbing it as much as the blue and red light. But it appears as if they're still absorbing it. I believe this website (http://www.digikey.c...tests_LEDs.html) actually said this:

However, the addition of green light may promote increased plant growth since green light penetrates the plant canopy better than red or blue light. Leaves in the lower canopy could use the transmitted green light in photosynthesis

edit2: I also wonder if plants don't get any benefit from infrared and/or UV in addition to visible colors.

Plants don't really get any benefit from infrared light. According the same site:

LEDs can illuminate near the peak light absorption regions of chlorophyll while producing virtually no near-infrared radiation (which is not [used] in photosynthesis),"

Emphasis mine.

Yeah NASA did a experiment a couple years back to see whether different coloured light affected the absorption of photosynthesis. It was basically to testing to maximise growing crops in space, to minimise the space taken up by crops but to maximise the yield.

 

The article is here: http://www.digikey.c...tests_LEDs.html

That's actually quite interesting. It's odd that different wavelengths of light make the plants grow in different ways.

Hi, I'm Samm. I'm from Australia, a secondary school student (we call it High School). I'm very interested in science, and have been looking for a while to join a forum that specialises in this sort of thing. Some of these posts are very interesting, and I learn quite a lot here.

Light intensity has a very large effect on the rate of photosynthesis. In most cases, the more light the faster photosynthesis occurs. However, at some point there's a limit that the rate of photosynthesis cannot increase above. This is because it's limited by other factors, such as the level of carbon dioxide in the air.

It's interesting to note that the wavelength of the light also influences the rate of photosynthesis. Here is the absorption levels of two of the different forms of chlorophyll, chlorophyll a and chlorophyll b in a solvent:

The significance of this is that, among other things, chlorophyll's main purpose is to absorb the light energy necessary for photosynthesis.

In short, the intensity and the wavelength of light both affect the rate of photosynthesis.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia....iki/Chlorophyll

http://en.wikipedia..../Photosynthesis