Climate Change

The question of if there is Climate Change and if there is, what is the change in question, comes up frequently.  I admit to being a bit of a sceptic about all the panic in the streets.  I think this grew out of the events on the evening of 13 October 1992.

But, be that as it may, there is new word on rising sea levels.  I will not live to see a boat ramp at the bottom of Mansur Street here in Lowell, but the crowd at a conference on Climate Change in Copenhagen, Denmark thinks current estimates are too conservative.  The report in New Scientist talks to a little over three feet by 2100.  They actually used one meter, being Europeans and all, but for those of us sticking to the English system, a little over three shoe lengths, give or take, is close enough.

I expect that if you are down by the beach you may not notice this for a while, but eventually folks who have waterfront property, especially those back from the crashing surf, will notice a loss of property.  Or, more likely, their children will.

On the other hand, if we reverse the CO2 in the atmosphere, we might not get there.  Or, atmospheric CO2 might have nothing to do with it.  We are still in the position of not really knowing, but still having many people dig in to defend their positions.

The "G" Section of The Boston Globe today had an item on a play about Galileo ("Two Men of Florence").  Louise Kennedy, the reviewer from the Globe Staff, panned the play.  The interesting thing to me is that Galileo was generally correct, but that in order to make his theory work he had to fudge on comets.  That is the problem with scientific progress.  Sometimes there are pieces that just don't fit the general theory.  And, as we learn more about our planet and the universe, there will be new theories and new loose pieces.  A touch of humility becomes a genius.

What did Einstein say?  "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."  Probably apocryphal.

Regards  --  Cliff