Diamond Sand, The Weather Makers, Antarctica's ice-sheets, Chernobyl, Greenpeace in Papua, Risperdal, Mahdi Army, Joshua Frydenberg

The Weather Makers Tim Flannery ©2005
A readable and alarming book on Climate Change
........................
Simulations: the largest study early 2005 Oxford U. using downtime on 90,000 PCs:
A doubling of CO2 would cause 3.4°C warming range 1.9 to 11.2°
But.. "at the end of the last ice age CO2 increased by 100 ppm and the Earth's average temperature rose by 5°C" p161
the difference may be explained by aerosols?
So Tim says jet travel is OK because the contrails may be cooling the earth. I wonder if this isnt self-justification by a guy who flies a lot. He makes me feel better about my 30 hours of jet travel each year. Apparently its best to avoid small flights, so no more jets to Koh Samui from Bangkok?
............................................
"If humans pursue a business-as-usual course for the first half of this century. I believe the collapse of civilisation due to climate change becomes inevitable" p209
............................................
"another decade of such profits may cost us the earth" p245
............................................
Sierra ClubCarl Pope (re USA New Coal burning Epower stations):
"If approved and built...They will also pre-empt the market for wind and solar. So if they are built, we are cooked."
...................
Tony Blair: " a challenge so far-reaching in its impact.. that it alters radically human existence... There is no doubt that the time to act is now."
By 2003 Britain's CO2 emissions had fallen to 14% below what they were in 1990,,,
.....................................
Australias 24 coal power stations.. CO2 output as liquid: one cubic kilometer per day
World output 50km³ /day
- there is Buckly's chance of burying this stuff. ("choke-damp" as miners call it) can asphyxiate multitudes if it escapes
.............
"Australia.. may find itself on the brink of collapse as a result of declining rainfall across its main population and agricultural centres, while Canada may enjoy bonanza harvests and mild winters.."
............................
TF says we must concentrate our efforts on Coal, not cars. He reckons if we fix electric generation, we can fix cars later. I dont know, but I can get behind his call for no more coal stations, none.
............................
Looking at the huge profits the Oil companies are making from high prices, and the subsidies that Coal industries still
gauge form govts. it seems to me that disaster is inevitable. No change of course will happen in time.
Its not clear what kind of Dark Ages we are about to enter. I reckon that information won't be lost, we will be living dirt-poor with global cell phones, wall sized TV screens with 1000 channels, but each truckload of supplies will be an expensive event. Around 2 Billion might be able to live this way, so 4 billion are set to starve. Expect a lot of raiding as they refuse to go quietly.
Each surviving village may have Micro-fabs, so be able to manufacture a range of precision machinery independently of Industrial Centres... Printed photovoltaics may provide cheap electricity, but doubtful if that will give Ammonia and Tractors enough for our existing negative-Joule-output-agriculture.
...........................
Arthur C Clarke reckons we must save our coal, in a few thousand years we may need it to prevent the next ice-age.
In the meantime we might need to suck CO2 from the air.
Where to put it? and in what form? Liquid CO2 is ghastly stuff. Much better is Diamond Sand.
Solar powered Nanobots will build sand grains of diamond, which we can scatter on beaches, or on the sea-floor.(not over the plate divergences please, those vent communities are way too fascinating to smother)
Im not sure what a beach of Diamond Sand would feel like. Diamonds are extremely good heat conductors, so it might burn the feet. Also tough, so sunglasses might get scratched.
............................
TF does mention peak oil, saying we should use today's cheap energy to build a sustainable future before oil peaks around 2015. It seems that peak oil will arrive before gross greenhouse effects, so expect big coal to get further boosts. not looking good...

---

gizmag
March 6, 2006 A new rapid manufacturing and prototyping system that makes 100 percent solid metal parts has been introduced to the market - the ARCAM EBM S400. Employing a patented CAD-to-Metal process, which is based on Electron-Beam Melting (EBM), the highly efficient system produces parts from titanium powder

---

Clive of India's Clive of India's tortoise dies, aged 255

---

nytimes
by about 2100, average temperatures could be 4° warmer than today and that over the coming centuries, the world's oceans could rise 13 to 20 feet — conditions last seen 129,000 years ago, between the last two ice ages.

---

nasa
Antarctica’s ..ice sheet decreased by 152 ± 80 km^3 annually between April 2002 and August 2005.
..enough to raise global sea level about 1.2 mm.. 13% of the overall sea level rise
But confusion...
nasa
the contribution of the ice sheets to sea-level rise during the decade studied was much smaller than expected, just 2% of the recent increase of nearly 3mm/yr
[Ice-melting is a very new science]

---

newscientist
Wormwood deaths: "between 1986 and 1989, at least 200 more children than normal died before their first birthday. He calculates there were over 600 extra cases of babies born with Down's syndrome, spina bifida, cleft palate and other abnormalities in these years. One possible explanation is that radiation from the accident could have damaged the immune systems of the children or their parents, rendering them more vulnerable to harmful viruses.
The results, unveiled at a conference on low-level radiation in Dublin last weekend, were "unexpected but disturbing", Urquhart says. "We've probably been too complacent about health effects from Chernobyl in western Europe."

---

angelfire
energy list
The Planck Energy..energy that a subatomic particle contains when its Compton Wavelength is equal to the Planck Length, which is theoretically the smallest length possible..
Value In Joules: 1.96 E9
Equivalent In Gallons Of Gasoline: 14.8

---

Greenpeace in Papua
Posted by Sophie, blogger on board the Warrior

A black butterfly flits past and lands on the deck; soon mosquitoes and other insects are around. After a week at sea we are coming back to land. The days of walking around in shorts and sleeveless t-shirts are over – we’re covering up, to avoid malaria and other nasty mosquito-born diseases and out of respect for local custom.
____________________________________________________

Touched by His Noodly Appendages
____________________________________________________
Apollo 17 images
(for 60's fans... you had to be there)

---

Clean Hands
it has been known for decades — that an alcohol concentration under 60% won't kill the microbes
... If your hands are dry within 10 or 15 seconds, according to the C.D.C. guidelines for health care workers, you haven't used enough.

---

Anti Anti-psychotics
nytimes
The patients on full medication were taking older antipsychotics, like Haldol; similar studies have not been carried out with newer drugs, like Risperdal.
...
he other four studies found the opposite: that the less-medicated group did slightly better. Over all, the findings of the studies were a wash, showing no significant advantage for either group.
...
"The most striking observation in this review," Dr. Bola wrote in the paper, "is the dearth of evidence that addresses the long-term effects of initial treatment."
Previous reviews concluding that drugs provided significant benefits included many studies that did not have a comparison group of people who were not on medication, he found. [and a word of appreciation for Tom Cruise and all those in Scientology, who have been fighting bad medication for years]

---

nytimes
BAGHDAD 26March06 American and Iraqi government forces clashed with Shiite militiamen in Baghdad tonight in the most serious confrontation in months
..the militiamen who were killed worked for Moktada al-Sadr...[Mahdi Army]
Security in Baghdad seems to be deteriorating by the hour, and it is increasingly unclear who is in control. Earlier today, the Iraqi Interior Ministry reported that American forces raided a secret prison and arrested several Iraqi policeman. ... As night fell, American and Iraqi Army forces surrounded a mosque in northeast Baghdad that is also used as a headquarters for Mr. Sadr's militia, Iraqi officials said. Helicopters buzzed overhead as a fleet of heavily armed Humvees sealed off the exits, witnesses said. When the soldiers tried to enter the mosque, shooting erupted, and a heavy caliber gun battle raged for the next hour.
The Interior Ministry said 17 people were killed, including the mosque's 80-year-old imam and other civilians.
Sheik Yousef al-Nasiri, an aide to Mr. Sadr, said that 25 people were killed and that American troops shot the mosque guards and then burst inside and killed civilians.

---

AWB, Average White Bread, The sanctimonious pricks that have the govt in Australia, it is now clear, were the biggest contributors to Saddam Hussein. $300M in bribes.
____________________________________________
indymedia
"If there's a problem with building 7 then there's a problem with the whole thing," Charlie Sheen. 22Mar06

---

indymedia">indymedia
Joshua Frydenberg was just named as prime suspect in the criminal leak of top secret Iraq information to suspected ASIO/CIA agent Andrew Bolt. Joshua Frydenberg is Australias answer to G Gordon Libby.
He also appears to have the credentials for preselection for the plum seat of Kooyong
Diamond Sand The Weather Makers Antarctica's ics-sheet Chernobyl Greenpeace in Papua Risperdal Mahdi Army Joshua Frydenberg