Winter???

I moved to Massachusetts a few years ago and I've gotten used to winters like this:

But this year I'm finding things like this:

In January.

NOOOOOO!  Go back to sleep.  It's not time for you yet, we still have February to get through.

Professor!  Professor!  Is this mild winter a sign of Global Warming?

It's nice to see some students are paying attention.  Good question.

I can't answer it.

I know, I know.  Scientists are supposed to know everything about everything (unless it's something you don't want to hear in which case we're all intellectual elitists without any common sense).

A single event does not Global Climate Change make.  It takes a LOT of data to determine if a long term change is occurring.  

Fortunately we have a lot of data and it's all pointing in the same direction.  The planet as a whole is getting warmer.  

This does not mean that where you live will get warmer.  It may be that where you live will get cooler or drier or wetter. What it does mean is this...

The higher the average temperature of the planet the more energy is in the atmosphere.  More energy means unstable weather.  Unstable weather means we should expect more frequent and larger storms.  This can include more blizzards (anyone heard from the poor folks in Nome lately?).

What kind of evidence do we have?  Lots. I'm not a climatologists so I can't speak to the historic and prehistoric temperature and weather patterns.  I'm a biologist.  And I can tell you that biology is changing.  And the changes look like a response to changes in the climate.

Bird migration patterns have changed.  Insect distributions patterns have changed.  Plant bloom times have changed.

For some of these we have a relatively long, documented history.

For others...  Well...  Some of the native peoples who live in the extreme northern parts of North America are starting to see birds and animals that they don't have a word for in their language.  They have no history that their people have ever seen them before.

To me that's just... well...  seriously interesting.  Wow, huh?

As far as the actual information about long term changes in the climate I'll leave that to the experts.  

The climatologists, not weathermen.  Weathermen go on TV and tell you what to expect when you go outside tomorrow (and how often are they wrong?).  Climatologists study long term atmospheric events that affect the weather, which requires a lot of education and a specialized degree (or two, or three).

Do I believe that Global Climate Change is occurring?

Yes.

Do I believe that the modern combustion engine and consumer culture are contributors to this change?

Yes.

Do I think that climate change will become a problem for future generations?

Yes.  But that's a topic for another time (and another glass of wine).

I'll leave you with a sign from my yard.

No, that's not snow.  That's a piece of paper.  We have no snow on the ground even though it's January in New England.

Maybe Global Climate Change won't be too bad after all...

Catalog Day

It's Catalog Day.  There is (finally) some snow on the ground; Mr. Pigeon, my cat, is laying on my pile of papers to be organized and filed and I'm just not in the mood to start working on lectures for the semester that starts Monday..  So today is Catalog Day.  The day I look through all of the Catalogs I've received and wish I had more space to garden.

I want one of those...  And three of those... and a bunch of those and...

Stop SOPA/ PIPA

You may notice that many of your favorite websites are dark today.  I'm not sure how to go completely dark but I did want to post my support of the anti-SOPA, anti-PIPA movement. 

What's going on, you ask?  I'm not the best one to address this but my understanding is that the Entertainment Industry (Hollywood) has asked bribed Congress into creating anti-Piracy laws to prevent the People from, well, stealing their intellectual property.

Sounds fair to me.

But the way the laws are written make it nearly impossible for the internet to remain free. 

I, for one, would no longer allow comments.

Why?  Because I would be legally responsible if you included copyrighted material in the comment section.

That's right.  I would have to CHECK and confirm that the comments were all ORIGINAL MATERIAL.

Yeah, not going to happen.

So call your Congresspeople today and ask them to actually understand the laws they are being bribed to write.

Or maybe to quit taking bribes and, you know, actually be a government OF the PEOPLE and FOR the PEOPLE instead.

To find congressional contacts go to http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml. 

Stepping off my soap box in 3....2.... 1

Starry, Starry Night

Last week I was down in the Florida Keys [ahhhh, warm!].  A nice break from the, uh, abnormally warm winter we've been having [weather in the 70s is still a lot better than weather with highs in the 50s].  

When I was a child [wait, did we switch topics here?  No, but you'll have to wait to understand the segway.  If anyone understands Segways.  I mean did the inventors really think they're replace cars?  I'm better off on my bike!  Oh, sorry.  Got lost in the stream of consciousness there.]

When I was a child I used to go outside at night and gaze up at the stars.  I lived at the edge of a suburb, near the woods and I could see thousands [tens of thousands?  Hundreds of thousands?  Millions?  I never counted them so lets say] an uncountable number of stars including the horizon to horizon stripe of the Milky Way.

I used to imagine other worlds, adventures in space, what might be out there.

I used to watch for falling stars, comets, Skylab burning up in the atmosphere [we had a small block party for that one].

Then I went off to college, my parents moved to "the Country" and I got distracted by other things.  Things like college.  Boys.  Work.  Boys.

When I went to look at the sky again I was living in a more urban area and the stars were fewer in number.  The curve of the Milky Way had disappeared in the light pollution from the city.

Then I moved to Los Angeles.

Stars?  Those are the famous people you occasionally bump into at the Farmer's Market [Hellllo Newman.  Sorry I stepped on your toes.].

Last time I looked up at the sky from my parents place in "the Country" and all I could see were a few stars and the glow of the nearby cities.

Even my house, in a small town North of Boston, has relatively few stars in the sky.

Back to last week.

The Husband and I went out to dinner at a nice restaurant [Marker 88 - yummy!  They have a lot of new and creative dishes, not the same old same old that you find in every other Keys restaurant].  The restaurant has a pier with a light underneath [the light is actually under the water].  So after dinner I took The Husband to the end of the dock to see if the underwater light had attracted any interesting fish or invertebrates [here, sharky, sharky, sharky].  Lots of fish [no sharks, though].  Then I looked up.

What I saw took my breath away. 

Stars.

A fine glowing stripe of the Milky Way.

The night sky I've been missing since I was a child.

Here are some pictures I stole from The International Dark Sky Association.  These were taken at the same location by a Todd Carlson [please don't get mad at me for using them here!  I couldn't find contact information to ask for permission and these are the absolute best examples I could find].  One was taken during a "normal" night and one was taken during that massive Eastern North America Power Blackout.  Guess which one was which?

 

 Sigh.  I really miss stars.

Now is when I should get on my soap box and rant about why dark skies are important for migrating birds, hunting nocturnal animals, how reducing light pollution can reduce air pollution and energy consumption.

But all I can think about is how much I enjoyed the view from the dock down in the Keys.  

And how that view reminded me of the night sky during my childhood.

And how much that view shaped the imagination of my childhood.

Damn I miss the stars.