cmooney | April 6, 2007
I've had a very illuminating time here in New Orleans at the National Hurricane Conference, but now it's off to California for this event tomorrow:
Saturday, April 7, 7:00 PM-8:30 PM
California State University Channel Islands
Aliso Hall Auditorium
Camarillo, CA
* Public Lecture sponsored by the Political Science Program
Then I'm on to Utah for this one:
Monday, April 9, 4:30 PM-6:00 PM
University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law
Sutherland Moot Courtroom
Salt Lake City UT
* Public lecture
Blogging is always tough from the road, but I'll have more on responses to our Science article, as…
cmooney | April 6, 2007Today I asked Randy Olson, the documentarian behind the wonderful Flock of Dodos, what he thought of the recent article by Matt Nisbet and myself in Science. I did this because along with my conversations with Matt, watching Olson's Flock of Dodos was one of the catalytic events that got me obsessed with the science communication problem. I'm now posting in full Randy's reaction to our piece:
Nisbet and Mooney are taking on the odious job of being the messengers of the new era for the world of science with their excellent essay in Science this week. I'm afraid they will be greeted with…
cmooney | April 6, 2007
The responses are rolling in to our Science piece. At least as I write this, particularly thoughtful and in-depth ones have come from PZ Myers, Carl Zimmer, Alan Boyle, and Mike Dunford, among others. There have also been some more dismissive responses, which appear to miss our distinction between "spin" (which is indeed misleading) and "framing" (which is unavoidable in any form of communication), or which assert without proof that more traditional forms of science communication (the so-called "popular science" model) have been effective, even though traditional science media do not reach…
cmooney | April 5, 2007
As a journalist who reports frequently on science, I never expected to be publishing in the literature. But tomorrow I will actually have a paper in the Policy Forum section of the latest issue of Science (April 6). To be sure, this wouldn't have come about if I hadn't had a co-author who's a real (social) scientist--our fellow Scienceblogger Matthew Nisbet, author of "Framing Science." And indeed, that's what the article is about: Nisbet and I are advising scientists to start to actively "frame" their knowledge, especially on hot-button issues like evolution, global warming, embryonic stem…
cmooney | April 4, 2007
[Image courtesy of Meteo-France (click for full-size version) showing the tracks of tropical cyclones in the South Indian ocean during the 2006-2007 season. Note that cyclones 3 (Bondo), 5 (Clovis), 12 (Indlala), and 14 (Jaya) made direct landfalls in Madagascar. Cyclones 9 (Favio) and 10 (Gamede) did not make direct landfalls but their circulations affected the island nevertheless.]
When Britney shaves her head, everybody hears about it.
When Ana Nicole Smith dies, everybody hears about it.
But when Madagascar gets struck by a record six tropical cyclones in one season, killing hundreds and…
cmooney | April 3, 2007My latest blog entry at the Huffington Post is up: It's a reflection on the latest forecasts suggesting that, indeed, we're going to have a rough Atlantic hurricane season this year.
cmooney | April 3, 2007My apologies about the lack of blogging--I've been running around New Orleans, and it's been hard to get online.
I hope to post more soon, but in the meantime, a brief announcement: I'll be appearing on EarthBeat Radio later this morning--10:20 ET--and you can listen to the webcast at the WPFW site. The show host is Mike Tidwell, author of Bayou Farewell, and I'll be appearing with Joe Romm, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress who served in the Clinton Department of Energy. His blog, Climate Progress, is here.
Anyhow, I hope you'll listen in. I am sure the recent Supreme Court…
cmooney | April 1, 2007Yet another of these perennial data issues has come up with the latest tropical cyclone, Jaya, which is currently tracking mercilessly towards Madagascar. (As if they need another storm this season.) As is obvious from the image below, the storm has weakened considerably in comparison with how strong it was yesterday.
But the question is, how strong was Jaya at its peak? Both the Joint Typhoon Warning Center and Tropical Storm Risk (which uses JTWC's data) consider the storm to have peaked at Category 3. But the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies at the University of…
cmooney | March 31, 2007
Poor Madagascar. Another intense cyclone--Jaya--is heading in its direction. This storm, which just three days ago I was predicting would develop, has now intensified much faster than expected. According to the University of Wisconsin folks, it's already a Category 3 storm, with winds of 104 knots and a minimum sea level pressure of 941.2 millibars.
And as you can see, Madagascar may once again be the endzone.
I now pose a scientific question: Has anyone done a study over time of how many hurricanes per year rapidly intensify--by, say, more than 3 categories in 24 hours? I wonder if the…
cmooney | March 30, 2007It's probably a bit late for this notification, but I'm giving a public talk tomorrow:
Washington, DC
Lecture at "Restoring Scientific Integrity" Conference
Saturday, March 31
10:00 AM-12:00 PM
Center for Inquiry D.C.
621 Pennsylvania Ave., S.E.
$ 10.00, RSVP required
Washington, DC 20003
(202) 546-2330
Sorry about the ten bucks, it's not my decision.
Then after that, I'm off to New Orleans for a week to visit the folks and attend the National Hurricane Conference. It's a big deal, obviously, that it's being held there. I'll be blogging from on site, as time and technology permits....
cmooney | March 30, 2007So says Roger Pielke, Jr., in a very illuminating post. He also adds: "On the very hot-button issues of climate change and the teaching of evolution, Republican political agendas require confronting current scientific consensus."
I agree entirely--indeed, that's the whole point of The Republican War on Science (of which Roger has been critical). This doesn't mean partisan alignments on these issues can't change; it doesn't mean that the situation has necessarily been the same in other periods in history; it doesn't mean the situation is the same in other countries. But right now, these are…
cmooney | March 30, 2007I'm particularly proud of this currently unnamed tropical cyclone, as I successfully predicted its development. Don't worry, I won't get cocky. Beginner's luck.
UPDATE: The storm now has a name, Jaya...
cmooney | March 29, 2007
I don't usually announce things like this. But I just noticed that Amazon.com has started selling my first book in hardback for $ 6.99. It was originally $ 24.95. So if you ever wanted a copy but didn't get one, now is probably the time.
To be sure, the paperback version of the book contains newer info and a new introduction--but, believe it or not, it's now more expensive than the hardcover.
How things change.
This announcement prompts a related musing: The Republican War on Science is now roughly a year and a half old. It first hit in hardback in the fall of 2005, right around the time of…
cmooney | March 29, 2007During the new Congress so far, we've seen multiple investigations related to the (mis)treatment of climate science by the Bush administration. These, I'm sure, will be ongoing. But as I've frequently said in public talks, perhaps the most pervasive abuses have occured on local endangered species issues, which have garnered less media coverage.
Now it's time for the Democratic Congress to start digging around here as well.
A new report from the Interior Department's inspector general, covered in the Times today, makes that clear. Substitute for Philip Cooney an Interior Department official…
cmooney | March 28, 2007I'm not a meteorologist. I haven't done an analysis of vertical wind shear, sea surface temperatures, or anything else. Moreover, even the best forecasters have a tough time determining when a severe hurricane will grow out of a more ordinary disturbance.
But all of that said, doesn't it look like this disturbance over the Indian Ocean is about to develop? You can already kinda see the spiraling rain bands.
(Disclosure: This is amateur hour. I'll be happy to be proven wrong.)
cmooney | March 28, 2007Well, as usual, there's much to say about the latest House hearing on political interferences with climate science. Beforehand, I had the honor of meeting Rep. Brad Miller, who's been a pioneer on this issue. For me, that was probably the highlight of the hearing. Miller was a nice, very personable guy. I told him I'd sent him a copy of Storm World. He represents North Carolina, after all.
Meanwhile, once the hearing started, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher once again, er, "distinguished" himself, using up all of his allotted time to speechify rather than ask the witnesses questions, talking about…
cmooney | March 28, 2007
This year, after being increasingly frustrated with poor or inaccessible records of past hurricanes (in basins other than the Atlantic and East Pacific, anyway), I started keeping my own records. And so I have noted every Joint Typhoon Warning Center advisory this year (er, almost). And in the process, I've noticed something interesting that I'd like to comment further upon, in the hope that some experts may drop in and share their thoughts.
With both Cyclones Indlala and Kara of this month, the same thing happened. In between official advisories, the storms substantially intensified and…
cmooney | March 28, 2007Later today I'll be heading to the Hill--but probably not blogging til I return. This afternoon action shifts to the House Committee on Science and Technology, and more specifically, to the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight. The chair, Rep. Brad Miller of North Carolina, has been a dogged exposer of science abuse, and that's the focus of the hearing today:
Shaping the Message, Distorting the Science: Media Strategies to Influence Public Policy
Witnesses:
Dr. James J. McCarthy, Harvard (a leading expert on climate change impacts, he blurbed The Republican War on Science)
Sheldon…
cmooney | March 27, 2007My last Huffington Post entry, about why many Republicans reject mainstream climate science, now has 125 comments. That's gotta be a personal best for me as a blogger. Of course, a lot of it has to do with the fact that there are global warming "skeptics" over there who post comments and tick everybody else off.....
cmooney | March 27, 2007The South Pacific island chain of Vanuatu is a kind of canary in the coalmine for global warming. A settlement on Vanuatu's Tegua Island has already had to be relocated due to sea level rise. (See also here.) The problem was that with ever rising seas, low lying islands--and those living there--are subject to ever higher surges during storms. Eventually, the assault from the ocean becomes too much and you have to move.
In this context, Vanuatu may get a test with cyclone Becky, whose projected path is shown above (courtesy of the RMSC-Nadi Tropical Cyclone Warning Center). So far Becky is…