So ABC Breakfast told me this morning, and according to the Australian 2013 is shaping up to be the hottest year on record Australia-wide.
So, how’s that “global warming hiatus” (aka a small slowdown in the rate of warming although the globe has continued to heat up during this “hiatus”) looking now, denialistas?
As part of chatting away on the world and its problems over the weekend, I noted that I see a very strong overlap in the online membership of the do-no-public-works (because taxes!) climate-change denialists and the spend-no-public-money (because taxes!) austerity-economics cultists. The overlap seems to be heavily populated by Ayn Rand fans, too. That’s why this cartoon which I personally find brilliantly perspicacious will never ever work on them:
CLIMATE SUMMIT
* Energy Independence
* Preserve Rainforests
* Sustainability
* Green Jobs
* Livable Cities
* Renewables
* Clean Water, Air
* Healthy Children
* etc etc
What if it’s a big hoax, and we create a better world for nothing?
Cartoon by Joel Pett
Categories: ethics & philosophy, media, Science
Today in Tangential Learning: the smell of chloroform 
Hoyden About Town 
Meanwhile, Perth has had it’s wettest September in about 40 years. However, the dams here aren’t showing any benefits – they’re only about 38% full. The majority of the rain fell on the coastal areas (ie. the city) rather than penetrating to the catchment areas in the interior (or rather, such rain as did penetrate there got soaked up by a landscape which has been suffering from diminishing rainfall for most of the past thirty years, and therefore isn’t really giving us much run off into things like creeks and rivers).
Climate change is just so much fun to live through.
I’ve seen the rain reports for Perth, Megpie. Seems like its enough to make getting around town no fun at all without filling the reservoirs. Good for those who’ve got backyard rain tanks, I guess.
The bush fires this summer are going to be horrendous.
Same here in Adelaide (the record that is). Also the whole ‘it’s slowed down over the last 15 years’ is a prime example of cherry picking. 1998 was an extremely hot year, and the last year there was an El Nino. Draw a line between now and then and it’s not surprising it looks a bit flat. Since then we have also had two La Ninas, and a period of low solar activity, so we would actually expect the world to get a bit colder, and yet the average temperature has still increased.
re the ethos of Joel Pett’s cartoon in the OP, I’ve just caught an interview with British environmentalist Jonathon Porritt talking about his new book The World We Made. I do love the way he rebutted a question about his advocacy for women to limit their families to 2 children at most (as just one part of an environmental conservation/sustainability worldview), a question which referred to his stance as population control – Porritt immediately said “I don’t use that term” and when Trioli pushed with “I can see why you’d be uncomfortable with the term” he said “it’s not an uncomfortable term, it’s a totally inaccurate term – recommending voluntary family planning is not any form of control at all, and given UK statistics that 50% of women are already limiting their families to 2 children it’s hardly an extreme point of view either” (n.b. the above is all paraphrased)
Dear politicians, that is how you answer a leading question from a journalist.