Ask Dr. Bryan Killett About Climate Change and GRACE 122
Bryan Killett is a physicist working on the Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment (GRACE) for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. GRACE is a joint mission of NASA and the German Aerospace Center which collects satellite data to learn about Earth's changing gravity field, specifically the high frequency changes associated with ocean tides. As the high tide comes in, more water is present, so gravity in that location is temporarily strengthened. These changes are detected with GRACE and used to improve ocean tide models. Dr. Killett provides the open source (GPLv3) code used to process GRACE data on his home page. Bryan has agreed to take a break from measuring gravity fields and answer your questions about GRACE and the climate changes it has revealed. Feel free to ask as many as you like but please confine your questions to one per post.
Letter from Ex-Employees? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
referenced document for the below post [quackwatch.org]
Yes, because most slashdotters aren't very good at applying the pseudoscience test to ideas. Climate change pretty clearly falls into the realm of 5-15% depending on how generous you are for pseudoscience characteristics. Compared against obvious pseudoscience like astrology or homeopathy which tend to score in the 95-100% range. And "skeptic" theories tend to hit in the 30-50ish% range, depending on the extent to which they allege conspiracy.
But people don't operate
Re:plantsneedco2.org? (Score:4, Insightful)
" And "skeptic" theories tend to hit in the 30-50ish% range, depending on the extent to which they allege conspiracy."
Alleging conspiracy is not a valid measure of pseudoscience. While it is true that popular culture derides those who they perceive to be "conspiracy theorists", alleging conspiracy has absolutely nothing to do with the underlying science. Nor, for that matter, is a bald allegation any evidence either for or against any actual conspiracy.
While it is fun to laugh at such theories, it is important to remember that the actual historical record contains a huge number of documented and proven conspiracies, many small, but also many great.
Re:plantsneedco2.org? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's true that sometimes conspiracies actually exist. However claims that mainstream science is engaged in a conspiracy to suppress some bit of research makes it more likely to be pseudo-science, because (far) more often than not the claims are false. It's not a guarantee that it's pseudo-science but it is a red flag that indicates further examination may be required.
Re: (Score:2)
"However claims that mainstream science is engaged in a conspiracy to suppress some bit of research makes it more likely to be pseudo-science, because (far) more often than not the claims are false."
You are confusing raw probability with evidence. They are two very different things.
This is precisely why racial profiling doesn't work. Let's just say hypothetically (without going into details of demographics which are irrelevant to the argument): 30% of the crime in Neighborhood A is committed by black people.
That statistic says NOTHING about THIS particular black person whom you just met in Neighborhood A.
Without much more information, you cannot attribute mass probabilities to specific events.
Re: (Score:3)
I will put it a different way.
Let's say you're a professor, who has come to realize that his student's papers closely follow Sturgeon's Law (that is: 90% of them are crap).
So when a new semester rolls around, and his new students are turning in their first assignments, he scarcely bothers to look at them. Because he knows that they're all 90% crap. (I pulled a subtle switch on you here, in case you didn't notice.)
Re: (Score:2)
I suggest you read the link provided [quackwatch.org]. It seems to me, that In the original post, i kan reed, was referring to the percentage of pseudoscience characteristics exhibited by AGW and alternate theories. That's not a statistical measure of how many of the theories are correct, it's the percentage of red flags they raise from the list. Raising even one of the flags isn't a good sign, raising multiple ones is very bad. I'm not sure if there is even a single example of a theory that trips half or more of the fl
Re: (Score:2)
The one thing it DOES say that might relate, however loosely, is that pseudoscientists are fond of conspiracies. But even if that is true, you can't validly turn it around, and say a claim of conspiracy makes one a pseudoscientist. Logic doesn't work that way.
I'll stand by my comments, thanks.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
He's using the longer list with 22 characteristic of pseudo-science, he's saying that climate change could be showing between 1 and 3 of those characteristics.
Re:plantsneedco2.org? (Score:5, Insightful)
Didn't even click the link. Didn't present your own findings. Trolling concluded.
To respond to your request:
Pseudoscience displays an indifference to facts:
DOES NOT APPLY climate change, as data driven observation is at the core of the argument. New facts brought up by critics are addressed with data.
MAY APPLY TO "skeptics", depending on exactly what they are skeptical of. It is an undeniable fact that, for example, temperature measurements are going up quite rapidly year-to-year.
Pseudoscience "research" is invariably sloppy
Given the criteria listed in the linked article: DOES NOT APPLY to climate change. An opinionated counter-argument could be given, if one were unwilling to examine the definition listed with any seriousness. Global examination of carbon/temperature data with a wide variety of tools, cross-indexed with each other, tabulated, peer reviewed, and published in complete detail does not qualify as sloppy. Sorry.
ALSO DOES NOT APPLY to "skepticism" in any meaningful way.
Pseudoscience begins with a hypothesis—usually one which is appealing emotionally, and spectacularly implausible—and then looks only for items which appear to support it.
COULD BE CONSTRUED TO APPLY to climate change: I think we can agree "we're all going to burn due to our negligence" is an emotionally appealing hypothesis. I don't really think the hypothesis came before the climatological observation, looking at the early papers in google scholar, though. Lower temperature years are included in every single report on global warming, in spite of the fact that, at face value, that would appear to a layman to undermine the hypothesis.
COULD BE CONSTRUED TO APPLY to "skeptics": I think we can also agree "we don't have to change anything because we're not doing anything wrong" is also emotionally appealing. Being that this is the null hypothesis position, it's fair to say that the "hypothesis first" doesn't really apply. However, selective examination of data IS an extraordinarily common argument from this camp, and to treat it as a non-component would be disingenuous. (i.e. "it was cold in winter")
Pseudoscience is indifferent to criteria of valid evidence.
DOES NOT APPLY to climate change. Not in the slightest. "stories" do not make up the basis of support for the theory, known thermodynamic effects, and temperature trends do.
MAY APPLY to some forms of "skepticism". As per above "winter is cold" type arguments, are strictly anecdotal, and do not actually examine the temperatures in winters globally compared to previous years.
Pseudoscience relies heavily on subjective validation.
DOES NOT APPLY to climate change. The verification comes entirely in the form of statistical analysis of temperatures versus previous predictions. Relatively accurate, but requiring improvements in predictive techniques.
DOES NOT APPLY to "skepticism" BUT IN A VERY BAD WAY because no counter claims or predictions to test. The null hypothesis of "no change" is clearly invalidated, but no valid alternate predictions are given instead. This is a serious sign of pseudoscience.
Pseudoscience depends on arbitrary conventions of human culture, rather than on unchanging regularities of nature.
DOES NOT APPLY TO EITHER, if you examine the listed definition in my link, this is about data being purely subjective and prone to multiple understandings depending on cultural factors like language.
Pseudoscience always achieves a reduction to absurdity if pursued far enough.
DOES NOT APPLY TO EITHER. Feel free to contest this if you want.
Pseudoscience always avoids putting its claims to a meaningful test.
DOES NOT APPLY to climate change, predictions from 10,20, and 30 years ago are all being tested and examined today.
APPLIES TO "skepticism". "Skeptics" tend to hide behind vague claims such as "it's a natural cycle" without providing assertions about what that means in terms of cl
Re: (Score:3)
Feel free to contend points you disagree with.
I might as well, since you went to so much effort to put this together. For the record, what I was keying on were the six points in the "Science / Pseudoscience" chart, and it was unnecessarily disingenuous of you to claim that (1) I didn't click on the link (I did), and especially that (2) I was trolling (don't be a dick).
Pseudoscience relies heavily on subjective validation.
DOES NOT APPLY to climate change. The verification comes entirely in the form of statistical analysis of temperatures versus previous predictions. Relatively accurate, but requiring improvements in predictive techniques. DOES NOT APPLY to "skepticism" BUT IN A VERY BAD WAY because no counter claims or predictions to test. The null hypothesis of "no change" is clearly invalidated, but no valid alternate predictions are given instead. This is a serious sign of pseudoscience.
One argument heavily propagated for AGW is "consensus" of scientists or "peer-reviewed papers". A fallacious argument on its face, and while numbers are not subjective, statistics and th
Re:plantsneedco2.org? (Score:5, Insightful)
consensus
This talking point has always bothered me, if consensus is not part of science then why do scientists place so much importance on peer-review? Consensus is not a dirty word in science, it's the modern term for what Karl Popper called "the republic of science", it is a measure of agreement amoungst the experts in a particular field as documented in Journals and text books. It is the difference in confidence between the phrases "A scientists says" and "Scientists says".
[predictions] don't really show a compelling amount of accuracy
The one's I've seen from Hansen (1980's) and those from IPCC (early 90's) are all well within the error bars given with the predictions. Therefore they are accurate to within the stated margin of error which is all you ever get from a scientific prediction. Note that such predictions usually come in sets with different emmission senarios and it's common for intellectually dishonest people to ignore this and present a "worst case senario" prediction as a "most likely senario" prediction in an attempt to ether, discredit the work for political reasons, or try to scare people for political reasons, (depending on wich side of the politics they take)
Um, if you listen to the latest news reports, they have a lot of self-proclaimed scientists claiming today that the heat waves and droughts the US is experiencing right now are clear evidence of climate change.
There are psudeo-scientists on both sides of the political divide on this issue. I have followed the issue with interest since 1981, I don't recommend "news reports" as a reliable source of information about climate science (particularly in the US), and if you are a geek "El Reg" is also a noteable bottomless pit of misinformnation on the issue. I will however say that many reputable climate scientists have been predicting for at least the last decade that the US grain belt is in danger of sever droughts from AGW. The basic physics says the sub-tropical desert zone will dry out more and expand, while at the same time monsoons will become wetter. Both are an expected consequences of increased convection in the equitorial "Hadley Cells". This is complicated by the jet stream in the N. Hemisphere which can cause the western half of the US to be in drought while the other is flooded. Having said that, what is undisputable is that long term climate predictions are much more accurate on a global scale (global temp, humidity, etc) than regional predictions, regional predictions will always be more difficult and less precise.
Re: (Score:2)
Well. TapeCutter has posted a reasoned, well-written response, entirely free of hyperbole and insults! Where are mod points when you need them?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
But for TapeCutter, I do have an answer to one of your questions:
The reason consensus is not science, is because it doesn't matter how many scientists agree that something is plausible; it only takes one counterexample to prove them wrong.
And it has often been INDIVIDUALS, outside the field, who have provided that counter-evidence. Such is the history of science. Recorded history is riddled throughout with individuals proving the "consensus" to be wrong.
Almost EVERY major scien
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, consensus is not science however it's the exceptions that get all the press. When a consensus is not overturned you never hear about it. If I were a betting man I would bet on the consensus all of the time and I would come out way ahead in the long run.
Regarding the consensus on climate science it has been studied intensely since the 1950's and the consensus position does a pretty good job of explaining what is observed. If the consensus was egregiously wrong you would expect there to be instances w
Re: (Score:2)
Classic Projection (Score:2)
They make fun of creationists but don't notice that this stuff is no different. Arrogant, libtards most of em.
Psychologists call that projection [wikipedia.org]. It is one of the key ego defence mechanisms [wikipedia.org], and is present surprisingly often in politically motivated speech, due to the cognitive bubble [rpi.edu].
Somebody is being an arrogant %&*#-tard. It must be the 1000s of scientists of all political persuasions, who have dedicated their lives to what Karl Rove pejoratively referred to as [wikipedia.org] the reality based community [wikipedia.org].
Of course you have the "truth", and your mind is firewalled to uncomfortable ideas.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, it was totally out of left field. I responded [dumbscientist.com] in an internal JPL email, and copied the email to my (other) website.
-Bryan Killett, aka khayman80, aka Dumb Scientist
(This was copied from very far down so readers don't have to wade through all these charming comments just to read my answ
Re: (Score:3)
Yes, it was totally out of left field. I responded [dumbscientist.com] in an internal JPL email, and copied the email to my (other) website.
-Bryan Killett, aka khayman80, aka Dumb Scientist
Observation & Simulations Vs Control (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
One modest example is extracting energy from the ocean tides. I've explained [dumbscientist.com] that harnessing tidal power would actually move the moon farther away from the Earth, even faster than its current ~3.8cm/year recession rate. Tidal amplitudes are influenced by the coastlines and bathymetry, so in principle we might eventually be able to change the tidal amplitudes in some location (bigger for more tidal power, smaller for easier navigation) by carefully modifying the bathymetry.
Just to clarify the summary, GRACE
Re: (Score:2)
As I explained in that link, the Earth's rotational kinetic energy is currently decreasing at ~3.8 TW. (Just to compare, the world used 15 TW [wikipedia.org] in 2008.) But anyone who clicked on that link would learn that only ~3% of the lost ~3.8 TW goes into raising the moon's orbit. As Pete Bender pointed out, the other ~97% is converted to heat in the oceans and the core-mantle boundary layer. Because this percentage isn't necessarily fixed, it's very difficult to predict exactly how much faster the moon would ascend fr
Investigating Gravity? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'd be very interested in learning a little bit about the General Relativistic effects observed with GRACE. I hadn't thought about it until you brought it up, but you're right, it does seem to be sensitive enough, and to be observing over a long enough period of time that GR corrections may be observable. Can you observe Lense-Thirring effect? Or are you just correcting geodetic precession?
Re: (Score:2)
See here [harvard.edu] and here [sciencedirect.com]. With respect to the Lense-Thirring effect, the first abstract suggests you need both GRACE and LAGEOS, but I don't know if they analyzed GRACE by itself.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That's why I said it looks like you need both LAGEOS and GRACE.
Re: (Score:2)
See here [harvard.edu] and here [sciencedirect.com]. With respect to the Lense-Thirring effect, the first abstract suggests you need both GRACE and LAGEOS, but I don't know if they analyzed GRACE by itself.
Thanks!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
What do you suppose happens in oceanic waters, other than you pissing in them? Think about, you fucking halfwit. Better understanding of tides allows us to understand everything from risks of erosion to oceanic currents (affecting everything from weather systems to shipping) to the best upgrades for ports, harbors and other sea-facing services.
Solar Storms (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
What does this have to do with Climate Change? (Score:2, Interesting)
What does this have to do with Climate Change? There's no reference to it in any of the pages linked. I assume mapping tides is important if sea level rises, but that's just a guess.
Melting ice (Score:4, Informative)
GRACE's main use in climate change is to detect the loss of mass from melting glaciers (mostly in Greenland and Antarctica), which results in sea level rise. It can also help map surface currents in the ocean, and track the motion of water through the hydrological cycle.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
GRACE also measured the 2005 Amazon drought [harvard.edu], regarded as the worst in over a century. Just five years later, the 2010 Amazon drought [skepticalscience.com] might have been even more severe.
GRACE also measured the 2010-2011 floods [discovermagazine.com] in Australian and Columbia, which dumped so much water on land that sea level temporarily dropped by ~6mm.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:What does this have to do with Climate Change? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nobody's doubled down on AGW. As the MASSIVE body of evidence removes doubt (except for those who would have their world view threaten by said evidence), its the responsibility of NASA to utilize space based resources to predict, measure, understand and if at all possible mitigate the impacts of AGW. Just as it is the National Forestry's job to plan for fighting and prevent the already growing impact of AGW on large and destructive fires in the Western U.S. There are now places whose fire seasons now run all year. Every agency, that is responsible to serve the public, and for whom there is a measurable impact from AGW is honor bound to do what it can to protect services and prevent loss of life and property. How is any of this inappropriate or antithetical to the proper management of resources?
Recent Greenland Melting (Score:2, Interesting)
We've seen a lot of surface melting on Greenland over the past few weeks. Does GRACE provide enough detail quickly enough so to quantify that melting, and shed any light on how well we understand ice sheet melting dynamics?
Re: (Score:2)
The GRACE gravity field data product has monthly time resolution.
Re: (Score:2)
Other satellites noticed Greenland's extensive surface melt [nasa.gov] because melting snow lowers the ice sheet's albedo [osu.edu]. However, water has the same mass as a liquid or solid, so GRACE can't tell the difference between ice and meltwater. GRACE can measure how much meltwater flows into the ocean, because in that case there would be less mass on Greenland.
Also, Ambitwistor referred to the popular monthly GRACE fields, which are available as spherical harmonics [nasa.gov] and gridded fields [nasa.gov]. In addition, CNES produces 10 day solu [smsc.cnes.fr]
Is There Evidence of Shifting Poles (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
GRACE just detects mass; solar storms are a source of noise because they exert non-gravitational forces on the satellites which need to be subtracted to analyze the gravitational forces.
Re: (Score:2)
Reword for clarity:
Warmer water doesn't weigh more (except for absurdly small relativistic corrections), but it does take up more volume. This is called the thermosteric effect; ...
Focus (Score:2, Interesting)
Should science drop the "Climate Change" mantra and get back to basics like pollution and sustainability? I believe climate change has become a political boogeyman and that science would be better off focusing on more clearly defined goals (making renewable energy usage more affordable etc).
Re: (Score:3)
Should science drop the "Climate Change" mantra and get back to basics like pollution and sustainability? I believe climate change has become a political boogeyman and that science would be better off focusing on more clearly defined goals (making renewable energy usage more affordable etc).
I think you're under the mistaken impression that "scientists" all do one thing at a time.
We already *are* focussing on renewable energy, improved drugs, advances in medicine, the search for the Higgs field...
It's only the media and various special interests with a financial stake in discrediting the inconvenient results of climate science that create such a stir. In the actual world of science and research, climate science is just a small part. It gets far more media attention in proportion to the work and
Re: (Score:2)
Measuring the melting of the Earth's ice sheets, such as the GRACE mission does, is not a clearly defined goal? And should we just stop doing basic geoscience simply because it's politically controversial?
GPS Radio Occultation (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
For those who may not be aware, GPS signals can be used to measure atmospheric properties. As GRACE (or any satellite with a modern GPS receiver) listens to a GPS satellite that's about to pass below the horizon, the GPS signal passes through [nasa.gov] the atmosphere. Thus the GPS signal is refracted and delayed in ways that can reveal the temperature, pressure, and refractivity of the atmosphere at different altitudes. These are known as GPS occultation measurements.
I've never used GPS occultation measurements, so I
Changing Evaporation Rates (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Detecting anthropogenic movement on the surface (Score:2)
I recognize that this is a way out there question to the point of making me laugh, but nevertheless, it's a real physics question in the same general domain as GRACE's measurements. A general idea of the magnitudes involved would certainly be interesting.
By how many orders of magnitude do orbital measurements of local gravity fall short of being able to detect human or human-generated movement on the planet's surface, for example the travel of a train across the country? Related, would the main difficul
Re: (Score:2)
Partial answer: GRACE has a horizontal spatial resolution of several hundred kilometers. I think its time resolution ends up being monthly, after a lot of post-processing of data from individual orbits (not realtime). So pretty far from what's required. There's talk of a GRACE follow-on mission with 1 angstrom inter-satellite distance resolution (compared to its current micrometer resolution). Not sure what that would translate into in terms of Earth's gravity field resolution.
Re: (Score:2)
GRACE can resolve nearly uncorrelated mascons that are blocks 400km on each side with a noise floor of ~1cm equivalent water height. (This is latitude dependent because GRACE's denser ground tracks near the poles allow for better resolution.) Each mascon has a mass of ~1.6 gigatons, and a fully-loaded coal train [yahoo.com] is ~10 kilotons, so GRACE falls short by about five orders of magnitude.
The improved [anu.edu.au] laser ranging on the GRACE follow-on will increase sensitivity, and David Wiese [dumbscientist.com] analyzes improvements due to lowe
Definition of 'climate' (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
One definition of climate is the statistical accumulation of weather data over long time periods.
Re: (Score:2)
That's a good question; I described [dumbscientist.com] the difference between climate and weather at the beginning of my article. I later updated it with a better analogy [noaa.gov] from NOAA: One way to distinguish between weather and climate is that the climate of your hometown will determine how many sweaters you have in your closet. The weather will determine if you should be wearing a sweater right now.
Many times the climate being discussed is global, so an average is taken over the entire Earth. For global temperatures, Santer et [agu.org]
Re: (Score:2)
GPLv3? (Score:2)
If the code and his research are federally funded by the US Government, shouldn't it be released into public-domain instead of GPLv3?
Re: (Score:2)
GRACE life span (Score:2)
There is obviously a lot of valuable information from the GRACE satellites that continues to change over time. How much longer are the GRACE satellites expected to last? Are there any plans for replacements once they die?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks, it seems to me the information from GRACE is so valuable that it's sad it won't be continuous. Will the GRACE follow-on be built to have a longer lifetime or is it more practical just to keep replacing them periodically.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
I think it's because they are in the business of science.
Re: (Score:2)
Bunch of stupid uneducated wankers, obviously.
Evidently. Read NASA's mission statement. "Scientific discovery" features prominently. GRACE is a space mission, you know. NASA does tons of scientific space missions, both for Earth observing and other observation.
Re: (Score:2)
I think it's because they are in the business of science.
Weird. Some of the unwashed masses thought that the funding for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was for the business of aeronautics and space. Bunch of stupid uneducated wankers, obviously.
I see you haven't read their mission statement. You also forgot to log in, kid.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh gee, another moron with an 8th grade misunderstanding of what science is. "No repeatable experiment"? By that criterion, astronomy, geology, etc. aren't science. "No testable hypothesis?" First, climate change isn't one single phenomenon with one single test. It's a series of interrelated phenomena, each of which are individually testable, starting from the infrared absorption properties of the CO2 molecule all the way up to stratospheric cooling, ocean warming, etc. "No science"? Doesn't even des
Re: (Score:1)
Uh huh. Except that study was lead by an AGW skeptic and funded by groups who had the agenda of disproving AGW. Yet it came to the opposite conclusion. But, no, clearly the study only had that result due to the Koch Brothers being a bunch of libtard envirowackos.
Re: (Score:1)
No testable hypothesis
No repeatable experiment
No science
For starters, here's two you can do yourself.
http://www.nuffieldfoundation.org/practical-chemistry/identifying-products-combustion
http://glory.gsfc.nasa.gov/globalwarmingexperiment.html
Repeatable, testable hypotheses. SCIENCE!
Re: (Score:3)
Why are aeronautical engineers, astrophysicists, rocket scientists, etc. involved in perpetuating a political agenda based on bad "science" for an administration that refuses to fund the organization's actual purpose?
I'll ask the opposite question: why shouldn't aeronautical engineers, astrophysicists, and rocket scientists be involved in trying to make unambiguous measurements of a critical issue, to try to resolve key questions in a way that's independent of computer models or temperature measurements? Making an independent measurement of key scientific claims using a different technique is pretty much the gold standard of science.
Re: (Score:2)
Why are aeronautical engineers, astrophysicists, rocket scientists, etc. involved in perpetuating a political agenda based on bad "science" for an administration that refuses to fund the organization's actual purpose?
I'll ask the opposite question: why shouldn't aeronautical engineers, astrophysicists, and rocket scientists be involved in trying to make unambiguous measurements of a critical issue, to try to resolve key questions in a way that's independent of computer models or temperature measurements? Making an independent measurement of key scientific claims using a different technique is pretty much the gold standard of science.
Because the budget has been cut so much that doing those things means there's no money left for the core mission of ... aeronautics and space?
Re: (Score:3)
Scientific discovery using spaceborne instruments, such as GRACE, is part of NASA's core mission.
Re: (Score:3)
But this isn't scientific discovery, since gravity was already discovered 150 years ago.
Oh good grief. Talk about tortured logic.
Let me explain this to you simply: the scientific purpose of GRACE is not to "discover gravity". It is directly to measure the Earth's gravitational field. Indirectly, it is to discover a lot of things about geoscience (ice dynamics, hydrology, etc.).
I may also point out to you that (as has been noted elsewhere in the comments) the Space Act which chartered NASA explicitly states that part of its mission is to expand human knowledge of the Earth (using spaceborne
Re: (Score:1)
I can't see how this furthers the exploration of space, which seems to be the very last priority on the budget sheet these days, and the one that gets entirely cut first.
Tell you what - you keep defending this kind of waste of resources, and I'll refocus my efforts from fully funding the agency to eliminating it entirely. Maybe then enough money will be freed up to help the private enterprises that are doing things like ... actually furthering our reach into space.
Re: (Score:2)
I can't see how this furthers the exploration of space,
It doesn't further exploration of space. My point is that exploration of space is not the only thing NASA does, nor the only thing that it is tasked to do.
which seems to be the very last priority on the budget sheet these days, and the one that gets entirely cut first.
I'm sympathetic to cuts in both exploration and science, but my point is that NASA is supposed to, does, and should, do both.
Furthermore, my reading of this year's NASA budget [nasa.gov] indicates that Earth Science got a 0.2% cut over the previous year, while Exploration got a 6.5% increase. ("Science" as a whole got a 0.2% increase, due entirely to a 3.7% boost
Re: (Score:3)
Because it's not their field of expertise.
Making gravity measurements, building the instruments to make gravity measurements, and the rockets to fly them, ARE their respective fields of expertise.
Because they should be focusing on what my tax dollars pay them to do - develop methods for space exploration and explore space.
Your tax dollars pay them to build and fly the GRACE mission and many other Earth-observing missions. So they already are focusing on what their tax dollars pay them to do. All of which, by the way, fall under NASA's mission statement.
NASA expertise [Re:Climate Change] (Score:4, Informative)
I'll ask the opposite question: why shouldn't aeronautical engineers, astrophysicists, and rocket scientists be involved in trying to make unambiguous measurements of a critical issue, to try to resolve key questions in a way that's independent of computer models or temperature measurements? Making an independent measurement of key scientific claims using a different technique is pretty much the gold standard of science.
Because it's not their field of expertise.
Precision measurements of the gravity field of the Earth using spacecraft? It most certainly is their field of expertise.
Because they should be focusing on what my tax dollars pay them to do - develop methods for space exploration and explore space.
Here is the wording of the Space Act of 1958, which established NASA and listed its mission and objectives. After declaring that NASA will be a civilian agency to undertake aeronautical and space activities of the U.S. "for the benefit of all mankind," it states: ..."
"The aeronautical and space activities of the United States shall be conducted so as to contribute materially to one or more of the following objectives:
(1) The expansion of human knowledge of the Earth and of phenomena in the atmosphere and space. (2)
Expanding human knowledge of the Earth and phenomena in the atmosphere: yes, the GRACE objectives fit into the mission that NASA is explicitly instructed to do.
Reference: http://history.nasa.gov/spaceact-legishistory.pdf [nasa.gov]
Re: (Score:2)
Absolutely. Spaceborne measurements of the Earth's gravitational field are both bad science and contradict NASA's primary mission ("to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research").
Re: (Score:2)
Who said the manned space program is NASA's main purpose? Have you read either the Space Act or their mission statement? Earth observation and science has always been a major part of their purpose.
Furthermore, you have no idea how NASA is funded, do you? It's not like if all of NASA's Earth observation activities were shifted to NOAA, Congress would suddenly give NASA more money for the manned space program.
Finally, it's kind of comical that you seem to consider Earth observation satellites "only vaguely
Re: (Score:2)
We'll never get manned space travel back with attitudes like yours.
And yes, I feel that earth observation satellites are just an expensive way of masturbating.
Re: (Score:2)
We'll never get manned space travel back with attitudes like yours.
Maybe so. I favor NASA's science mission over manned exploration. Both would be nice, but if it has to be one, I vote for science.
And yes, I feel that earth observation satellites are just an expensive way of masturbating.
Clearly you see no value in geoscience. I think that point of view is ridiculous.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, I see value in earth observation. I just think that this should be secondary to NASA getting a man back into space.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, the IPCC was formed 1988 so it's 24 years old. Two more years?
Re: (Score:2)
Correct. Here’s a figure [nature.com] from Royer et al. 2007 [nature.com] which concludes that “a climate sensitivity greater than 1.5C has probably been a robust feature of the Earth’s climate system over the past 420 million years”.
Re: (Score:2)
I hoped to end this interview with a concise, uplifting challenge to build a better future through human ingenuity. Oh, well. The modern anthropogenic skyrocketing CO2 concentration is a trend I desperately want to reverse, but here's a more relevant answer:
The end-Permian event an