http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2010/13dec_globaleruption/
There’s something in Classical Studies about climate change—remember, we’re the guys [in my old academic field] that deal with the oldest written accounts and oldest civilized remains in the world. And somebody noted something interesting back before the 1970’s…
The rhythm of civilization is on a 500 year cycle. Every 500 years, the barbarians ride out of the steppes and trash the farmers in the Tigris-Euphrates; dynasties fall; famine hits the Tarim Basin; the Gauls (later in history) invade Rome (then move on to Asia Minor). Ie, every 500 years, the apple cart upsets and things rattle for a while.
Some enterprising folk have wondered if our Sol is a periodic star, with a 500 year cycle. So I always told my history students to look out for the year 2000, that there might be climate glitches, famines (crop failure), or weather upheaval. What went on in history was a drought in the Tarim, forcing horse-using barbarians to move on, which nudged the next guys over, and they nudged the next: it was dominos, all along the trade routes and migration routes. People who’d matured into a power would try to go south to get food around the Med (or north, from Africa) and weaker civilizations would go down. When Rome ruled, they did what any selfrespecting global civilization would do, and used their ships to move grain from regions of plenty to regions of famine and kept civilization together in that one; but come 500 AD, they blew it, got caught in a period of disorganization; 1000 AD, give or take a century, you’ve got the Vikings and the Normans, not to mention chaos in Asia; 1500—heck, explorers were out in ships, and TRADE was big because there were areas where they really wanted goods like food…etc.
Just some food for thought.
It was the misfortune of the Clovis folk that there just was no cooperative mediumsized milkgiver like goats at hand. That really helped the situation in the Middle East. And their land was too rich, one suspects: more than one has theorized that mankind, if bananas drop into his lap from off rich trees, will not get off his behind to go invent the wheel. Or try to domesticate a deer or buffalo. In this case, the seasonal migrations of animals were the banana tree.
And then something happened. One theory is that there was an asteroid which hit somewhere north of Winnepeg and caused all those mineral deposits that have created a new ‘gold rush’ mentality up there.
One fairly new theory about diamonds is that they are not just from volcanic vents (or Washington would be hip deep in them) but from meteor impact sites: and the concominant notion is that this deposit under northern lakes is the result of an impact that created a global winter—hence the black mats and the simultaneous collapse of Clovis groups and the global extinction of the megafauna.
On distortions of the climate change debate, see this story which has just come up about Fox News:
There are many other articles about this if you search Google News.
As the LA Times puts it, “Fox News boss: It’s not warmer until we say it’s warmer”
Do spin doctors get dizzy?
🙂 😀 😆
Fox news, yep: not my favorite. If I really suspect a story’s getting spun, I take a listen to the BBC and several other news services overseas, plus sources such as Science Digest and Scientific American, National Geographic, etc. Deliberate distortion of the information that enables an educated electorate to function is nothing new: it’s been done consistently through several wars (Movietone News, which used to present carefully chosen news with inspiring background music.)
But the urging of certain groups to prevent their followers from even listening to other sources of information is a new wrinkle. I urge everyone to listen to EVERYTHING, even the bullshit, and check out the facts, which with the internet is not as hard as it used to be.
IMHO, an honest news source is going to report things that annoy both sides of an issue, often simultaneously, or at least in the same program, and if they don’t, or if they’re assigning reporters only to stories that consistently turn out to please only one view of the world, they have a credibility problem with me, up and down the range of what they’re report. There is no ‘balanced’ version of truth that can be gotten by suppressing information.
I often consult mediamatters-dot-org. when something seems off the wall. It’s a good starting point for any questionable info.
I’m pondering a New Year’s Resolution to refrain from mentioning “UN”, “climate change”, and “DHMO” in the same paragraph, but thanks to some jokers down in Cancun, I’m not sure I will be able to keep that one.
Aliso Viejo, CA still hasn’t lived down their embarrassment of about six years ago.
What happened in Aliso Viejo? eh? Ah! Clever searching found it!
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4534017/ns/technology_and_science-science/
That’s a great one.
Some news sites that I find useful:
‣ UK:
BBC – yes
The Guardian – guardian.co.uk (more Labour-supporting)
The Telegraph – telegraph.co.uk (more Tory-supporting)
‣ Asia Times – atimes.com – For serious, intelligent, in-depth opinion about international news this site is hard to beat. It often has a different take on things, and it has a highly skeptical, fact-based attitude towards all countries, whether Asian or Western.
‣ Some independent, progressive US news magazines:
Huffington Post – huffingtonpost.com
Salon – salon.com
Slate – slate.com
Alternet – alternet.com
‣ Google News – of course! That way you get articles from newspapers all over the world about any subject you are interested in.