HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Bad science
Date: 16 Dec 92 18:55:02 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder CO

In article <77616@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM> mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson) writes:
>In <4066@master.CNA.TEK.COM> mikeq@freddy.CNA.TEK.COM (Mike Quigley) writes:
>
>|In article <1992Dec15.195331.16086@vexcel.com? dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:
>
>|*stuff deleted
>
>|?	Three thousand years before Christ, the saplings of
>|?	bristlecone pines poked through the earth and began 
>|?	recording what would become 5,000 years of climatic
>|?	changes.  In studying these trees, University of
>|?	Arizona scientists have detected no fatter outer
>|?	rings that would inevitable announce the so-called
>|?	greenhouse effect.
>|?
>|?	The findings of UA`s Laboratory of Tree Rings Research
>|?	will hardly shake up most climatologists: Only one in six
>|?	accepts the apolcalyptic version of global warming.  But
>|?	pity true-believing environmentalists, the oft-mocked
>|?	"tree-huggers."  One of their major tenets is weaker than
>|?	before, thanks to the perfidy of the pine.
>|?
>
>|*stuff deleted
>
>|Okay. Now that we've reduced the greenhouse-effect theory to shambles, well work on
>|our spelling and grammer next.
>
>|By the way, who's sponsoring this study, the chemical industry?
>
>
>Excellent technique, instead of trying to discredit his data, you try to
>discredit him.  First by flaming his spelling, and then by charging him
>with bias.
>
>What's your next trick going to be?
>
>-- 
>Mob rule doesn't become any prettier, just because the mob start to call itself
>a government.
>It ain't charity if you are using someone else's money.
>Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com

Actually, my spelling is pretty good.  Now my typing (and proofreading) ...
-- 
==============================================================================

	Dean Myerson	(dingo in boulder)	(dean@vexcel.com)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Subject: Re: Bad science
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 17:21:02 GMT

In article <1992Dec15.223424.4024@daffy.cs.wisc.edu> tobis@skool.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes:
>In article <1992Dec15.195331.16086@vexcel.com>, dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:
>|> Since it has been popular recently ti disparage environmentalists for
>|> occasional misinformation that they spread, I thought I would include
>|> the following article that appeared in the 12-15-92 edition of the
>|> Rocky Mountain News on the editorial page:
>|> 
>|> 	Three thousand years before Christ, the saplings of
>|> 	bristlecone pines poked through the earth and began 
>|> 	recording what would become 5,000 years of climatic
>|> 	changes.  In studying these trees, University of
>|> 	Arizona scientists have detected no fatter outer
>|> 	rings that would inevitable announce the so-called
>|> 	greenhouse effect.
>
>Well, apparently there _is_ a recent U AZ project that explicitly addresses
>the question. This at least takes some of the heat off Austin @ csu-pomona.
>
>I would still very much like to know who did the study and what they
>actually concluded. The press habitually mixes up "no evidence for A"
>with "evidence for not A", with A in this case being global warming. It is
>entirely possible that one of the participants in the study feels that "not A"
>and is pitching this angle to the press with carefully chosen words that
>the press proceeds to garble. I've seen this phenomenon before.. Did the News 
>mention a name or a journal for the actual study? (wishful thinking) 
>
>I'd like to see this study since it seems it is going to be much quoted
>in the debate. I certainly don't wnat to dismiss its findings, if at all,
>before I know what they actually are and how they were obtained.

This study is likely to have little bearing on the greenhouse debate
in as much as scientists have very much better instrumental records
available to them during modern times than tree rings. The warming
is only now supposed to be *starting*, so tree ring records can only 
serve as a historic record of natural fluctuations in the temperature
record. They could not be expected to show the effects of a temperature
increase that has not yet shown up on much more sensitive instrumentation.

Gary
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: The Labeling of Environmentalists
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
Date: 11 Dec 92 22:14:38

Paul Cass includeds in a long post:

	  How then should the level of confrontational
     polarization be reduced?  Redwood Summer achieved some
     success in mutual understanding by inviting loggers to their
     non-violence training seminar.  Such a gathering, which was
     not expected to induce mood effects, may have been the basis
     for the more successful conclusion.
	  Perhaps the best way to avoid walking down the road to
     increased polarization, stereotypic characterization, and
     extreme confrontation is to be vigilant against the use of
     labels.  Organizations using schema-primes against
     environmentalists should be called to justify their
     statements at the time, rather than awaiting behavioral
     confirmation.
	  After all, it shouldn't be difficult to argue that at
     the heart of environmentalism is conservativism, and what
     could be less extreme?

We see that the level of confrontational polarization is to be
reduced with no concessions at all on the part of environmentalists.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.energy
From: alanm@igc.apc.org (Alan McGowen)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Carrying Capacity and Sanity
Date: 13 Dec 92 01:16:00 GMT
Nf-ID: #R:hpindda.cup.hp.com:149180155:cdp:1466601983:000:452
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!alanm    Dec 12 17:16:00 1992



I do describe the choice in "stark terms", Dean, because I believe that
this is the best way to get the largest number of readers to think
about it. A little controversial language isn't a bad thing on UseNet.

The *ideal* way to increase readership is to be interesting and 
entertaining. But if you are too lazy/busy/harried/tired or temporarily
brain-dead, the second best way to do it is to be controversial. Take
it from the mass media :-)

Alan
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman)
Subject: Re: SAVE THE TREES!
Organization: Oracle Corporation
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 19:25:47 GMT
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by an unauthenticated user
              at Oracle Corporation.  The opinions expressed are those
              of the user and not necessarily those of Oracle.

Mike, Please do not delete attribution lines.  You are quoting people
without crediting them.  This is generally considered extremely
obnoxious and border-line dishonest.

In article <1992Dec10.162750.865@pbhye.PacBell.COM> mjvande@PacBell.COM (Mike Vandeman) writes:
>-----           PLEASE DO NOT KILL A TREE FOR CHRISTMAS!!!
>-----             THE WORLD NEEDS ALL THE TREES IT HAS.
>-----              GET A LIVING TREE AND KEEP IT ALIVE.

>--I have a 6" square cloth xmas tree embroidered by Hmong. I scotch tape
>--it to the mantle every year, & it does nicely. Industrial tree business
>--is obsolete.

>- Good for you.  I hapen to LIKE having a real Christmas tree, and I will
>-continue to put one up every year.  Industrial tree business is obsolete?

>There it is. "I want it, so I'm going to do it, regardless of morals or
>any other consideration". Surely one of mankind's lowest points,
>culturally speaking!

>-One more thing - what was that 6" square cloth made of?  I hope it wasn't
>-cotton.  After all, cotton plants have rights too.

>Cotton plants don't die, to produce cotton, unlike Xmas trees. I guess they
>don't make students like they used to (i.e., with brains).

First off, I would like to congratulate PacBell on its dedication to
our community, in particular its aggressive program to employ the
mentally handicapped.

Now, Mr. Vandeman, has it occurred to you that Christmas
trees are grown on Christmas tree farms, that the tree will be cut
whether or not you buy it, and that the only effect of a drop in the
number of Christmas trees purchased will be to make Chrstmas tree
farmers grow other crops or develop their properties?

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am not an official Oracle spokesman.  I speak for myself and no one else.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska)
Subject: Re: Population growth and cultural destruction (Re: Nasty ...)
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder CO
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 20:23:28 GMT

In article <JMC.92Dec11180555@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>Some years ago the _New Scientist_ reported on the outcome of an
>appropriate technology project to bring a new design of cooking stove
>into East Africa.  The new stove used local materials, used local fuel
>and was efficient in energy.  Meetings were held in villages, and
>after a few years 250 were in use.  About the same time, a new stove
>made in the Far East using kerosine was introduced through normal
>trading channels and sold 10,000 in about the same time.
>
>Was this a case of "appropriate technology" doing more harm than good?
>
>I'm inclined to think so.  It used up an extremely scarce resource
>in all backward countries - initiative and organization - with an
>essentially trivial result.

How useful is the kerosene stove to a population for which kerosene
may get too expensive?  How many  of the local design
swould be in use if the kerosene stove
had not been available?  How much local intiative was used to design
a stove thousands of miles away?  Do you believe local people wer at
all involved in its marketing?  Why?
>
>My opinion is that strengthening a country's connection to the world
>market is the main way of modernizing it, and making the country
>or some part of it technologically special is a mistake.  To the
>technological romantic, having a network of wholesalers, having the
>means of advertising new products and having the commercial institutions
>permitting taking part in world trade are all rather dull things.
>However, their lack is often the main barrier, because the technology
>per se is well described in books and courses.

Modernization and how the developed world can help is a very long
topic.  The current debt burden (another long subject) overwhelms
most other aspects since virtually all hard currency is spent servicing
this debt.  I believe that all developed counties, including the newly
developing countries of east Asia, practiced extensive protectionism.
The question is how much contact is needed and to what degree local
conditions should be taken into consideration.  Stein suggested that
local people should be given a lot of control.  This is not the case now.

>
>In support of that, the Soviet Union was nowhere near behind in
>the aspects of computing that could be read about in journals as
>it was in those aspects of technology normally transferred by
>salesmen.

The Soviet Union had limited tranfers to the people partly because
of security reasons and partly because they had a centralized system
that stunted production.  I am advocating local decentralized 
decision-making in developing cultures.  Your suggestion that 
countries not be "technologically special" smacks of central control
by the World Bank or whatever.  
>

>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>*
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
>


-- 

		dingo in boulder	(dean@vexcel.com)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: parson_r@cubldr.colorado.edu (Robert Parson)
Subject: Re: toxic spill remediation
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Date: Sat, 19 Dec 1992 00:39:28 GMT

In article <JMC.92Dec17214441@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>, jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy) writes:
> In article <1992Dec16.214327.1@cubldr.colorado.edu> 
>  parson_r@cubldr.colorado.edu (Robert Parson) writes:
>    > 
>     Harmful effects of mercury vapor are usually due to repeated, prolonged
>     exposure.  If the mercury was sitting out in an open tray in a poorly-
>     ventilated room there could be problems. If it was just taken out of
>     a jar for a few minutes, probably not. The main hazard from playing with
>     the metal is spilling it - the liquid runs into cracks and is very hard
>     to clean up without special equipment (e.g. vacuum cleaners with special
>     filters).
> 
>     Robert
> 
> How nice to have some actual technical information.
> 
 Perhaps this is a plea for quantitative details, couched in John's 
 characteristic heavy irony?

 Anyway, the vapor pressure of Hg at 25C is 2.5E-6 at. From this I estimate
 that the equilibrium conc. of mercury in room-temp air in contact with the
 liquid would be about 20 mg/m^3, 400 times the threshold limit value of
 0.05 mg/m^3 (CRC Handbook, 1975 edition). Of course it would take a long
 time for such a concentration to build up - that's why the concern focusses
 on small amts. getting stuck in cracks and sitting there for long periods.
 According to my freshman Chemistry textbook, 3 cc of mercury could saturate
 the air in a poorly ventilated room in about a week; I haven't checked that
 calculation.

 Mercury spills are a common hazard in teaching labs - unfortunately ours are
 closed now, but I'll ask the people in charge what their standard procedure is.
 Back when I was in high school, it was to clean up what you could, then
 spread sulfur on the floor in the area of the spill (this covers up the
 mercury in the short term, and in the long term converts it to mercury
 sulfide which is not especially dangerous.) I know that special vacuum cleaners
 with charcoal filters (obviously you don't want to use a Black&Decker!)
 now exist, but I don't know the details of their use.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: cdm@pmafire.inel.gov (Dale Cook)
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 00:22:50 GMT
Organization: WINCO
Subject: Re: toxic spill remediation
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Organization: WINCO
Keywords: 

In article <JMC.92Dec16113429@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>How was mercury used in making hats?  Was it heated?  Did it get
>ionized?  Probably the answers to these questions are not easy to
>obtain.  The Minimata disaster was caused by mercury that was
>methylated.

I don't know for sure, but it seems to me that it was elemental mercury
that was used.  
>
>I suppose it should be possible to make a realistic assessment
>of the amount of poisoning produced by playing with the stuff
>in junior high school.  Maybe it was trivial.  Maybe it was
>harmful though not directly observable.

My point was not to alarm people who may have played with the stuff in the
past, but to point out that simply because it can be played with a few
times does not prove that it's a safe material.  Someone in the business
of mercury cleanup would want to protect themselves each time to avoid
disastrous buildup of mercury in the system.

Another application for elemental mercury is in the gold mining business.
More than a few old prospectors have suffered the same fate as the hatters
of old, although since the miners had the benefit of often working with it
in the great outdoors, their doses were probably smaller.  In this case for
certain, the mercury was vaporized to remove it from the gold.  Several
rivers in old gold rush areas suffer from mercury contamination from this
application.  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
...Dale Cook    "I don't much care how a man prays -- there's plenty of
                 room in hell for all of us."  --- "Mad Jack" Duncan
The opinions are mine only (i.e., they are NOT my employer's)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Subject: Re: Natural Gas & Petroleum go together
Organization: University of Rochester
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 19:29:44 GMT

In article <1992Dec17.171104.23670@Arco.COM> dprjdg@inetg1.ARCO.COM (John Grasham) writes:

> Natural gas and Petroleum are most often found in the same well.
> A given well might produce 50% gas and 50% oil, or 90% oil and 10% gas,
> or 95% gas and 5% condensate, etc. etc.  Strictly gas wells are rare
> and usually found only in very high temperature strata ( > 200C ).  Very
> high temperature strata are usually extremely deep and are more expensive
> to drill (note: one does not DIG for oil & gas, one DRILLS for oil & gas).


I disagree with this!  Natural gas has most often been found with oil,
but that's mainly because people have been looking for oil.  People
have not, in general, been drilling into places where oil is unlikely
(where the rocks have at some point been buried too deeply, for
example, cooking the oil).  This is starting to change.

Unconventional gas deposits, such as geopressured zones or seafloor
clathrates, contain enormous quantities of methane, and are not
necessarily associated with petroleum.  These cannot be economically
extracted now, but that could change.

The dogma that gas is found only associated with oil has led to
consistent underestimates in the nation's gas reserves, and to
ludicrous policies like the ones that discouraged the use of natural
gas in electricity generation.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
Organization: Penn State University
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 12:19:18 EST
From: <PXF3@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: frogs in decline?

Another article folks interested in frogs might want to look at is my "Hard
Times for Frogs" which appeared in the Oct.  91 _Country Journal_.  If your
library doesn't have _CJ_, try the SIRS Life Science annual for 1992.  The
frog article is #27 in the anthology.

If anyone is really desperate to read it, and can't find it in a library,
let me know and I'll mail you a hard copy.  I have trouble uploading files
here, or I'd post it.

If you think in terms of food chains, amphibian declines is a _very_ sad
topic.

Paula
--
Paula Ford   | Internet: pxf3@psuvm.psu.edu  | PO Box 674
"Snaefridh"  | Bitnet:   pxf3@psuvm          | Hollidaysburg, PA 16648
Den som har droemt Udfaerd og Daad senker ej Sejl uden med Sorg,
                                  --Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
From: parson_r@cubldr.colorado.edu (Robert Parson)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Questions About Ozone
Date: 17 Dec 92 01:37:42 GMT
Followup-To: sci.environment
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder

In article <1992Dec15.192747.20909@texhrc.uucp>, 
lbs@texhrc.uucp (Lindy Sisk) writes:
> Could some please define the unit "Dobson" for me?
>
 1 Dobson unit (DU) is 0.01 times the number of millimeters that a column of 
ozone overhead would occupy, if you were to compress it to 1 at. pressure  and
heat it to 0 degrees Celsius. Put another way, the ozone layer over  the USA is
~300-350 D.U. (depending on season); this means that  at 0C and 1 at. it would
be about 3 mm high.  1 D.U. corresponds to about 2.7 E16 molecules/cm^2.
Nothing subtle; just a way to get the numbers into the range 100-500.

> Also, does being in a location on the earth's surface where there is
> a quantity of ozone from manmade processes which exceeds the EPA's
> limit necessarily imply that one is enjoying protection from the
> ultraviolet component of the sun's rays in excess of what would enjoy
> were one NOT in such a location, and, if so, how high would the level 
> of low-level ozone have to be to compensate for ozone depletion in, say,
> the Antarctic?  

 Low-level ozone is actually somewhat more effective than stratospheric ozone 
at screening UV (at low altitudes more UV is scattered, so it effectively 
travels a longer path through the atmosphere, and has a greater chance of 
hitting an ozone molecule.) This  probably why UV levels in US cities seem not
to have increased during the  past decade, when the ozone layer over the US has
thinned by ~5%: the  increased low-level ozone (together with other urban
pollution) is enough  to compensate for the stratospheric losses. (UV in clear
areas, e.g. in the  Swiss alps and Australia, as well as Antarctica, _has_
increased as expected.) You'd need a lot of low-level ozone to compensate for
 the ~50% losses in the Antarctic spring, though.

 Robert
From: alanm@igc.apc.org (Alan McGowen)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Something to think about
Date: 14 Dec 92 04:59:00 GMT
Nf-ID: #R:439.38.uupcb@pcs.sj.ca.us:-2055316087:cdp:1466601996:000:734
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!alanm    Dec 13 20:59:00 1992


Relevance?

I wasn't arguing that hunter-gatherers were at all times throughout
all of human existence at equilibrium with the environment. I was
pointing out that *when* they were at equilibrium, that can't be
explained by ecosystem limitations alone -- something cultural must
be happening as well.

In fact the megafaunal extinctions strengthen this argument, don't they?
Because they happen around first appearance of modern humans and then
they stop. That is consistent with the idea that an equilibrium was
achieved and thereafter maintained not too long after first appearance.

The point of the beaver example is that it is hard to see how anything
other than cultural stabilization could explain it.

----------
Alan McGowen
From: MEK104@psuvm.psu.edu
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: SAVE THE TREES!!!
Date: 12 Dec 92 14:23:36 GMT
Organization: Penn State University

manley@optilink.COM (Terry Manley) in article Message-ID:
<13593@optilink.COM> writes:

>Now, maybe you can help me.  You see for the first time in ten years I've
>got a cold.  Runny nose, itchy eyes, sneezing, ...  the usual stuff up to
>now I've only heard about.  My dilemma is I can't decide whether to use
>handkerchiefs or tissue paper.

<big dilemma about the relative evils of cotton handkerchiefs or paper
tissues deleted>

>So far I'm just sucking the snot down and/or wiping it on my sleeve.
>Neither of these are too attractive.  Please help.

What you do is ...  dig a hole - not a big one - and whenever you have to
blow just lean over the hole, plug one nostril at a time, and blow like
hell.  But then, I read somewhere that "man's place is to impact the earth
as little as possible".  I guess you're left with the ol' suck-and-swallow
routine.  Sorry.

I hope you feel better soon.  Not because you're miserable - that doesn't
count - but because I don't think the ecosystem can handle it.
Xref: sparky sci.environment:13469 ca.environment:1072 ba.transportation:2804