Global Warming and Business Intelligence
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On the point of BI being misused to create problems rather than solve them, I definitely have to agree.
On the point of driving for enjoyment, I have to say that I hate driving, but if you enjoy it, go for it.
On the point of cleaning up our energy and industry for the sake of having cleaner, healthier cities, absolutely.
On the point of CO2 greenhouse-effect induced global warming, I have to say that it's positively junk. All of the evidence shows that higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere cause an increase in biodiversity and base biomass. In other words, more CO2 is a good thing for living organisms. This has been proven in EVERY test ever done on the subject.
It also should be pointed out that mankind and our symbiots (cattle, etc.) are responsible for less than one half of one percent of CO2 that goes into the atmosphere every year, and that volcanoes are the primary source of almost all atmospheric CO2. I seriously doubt that Gore and his co-criminals have any plans for doing anything other than scamming money out of people on this. The fact that everything he's ever said on the subject has been debunked already is my main clue on this point.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
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Frank Caliendo on Al Gore
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On the global warming "debate" (akin to debating whether the earth is round or flat), you wouldn't request to see a podiatrist if your left arm started feeling numb and you felt sharp pain in your chest. Yet some here are asking us to disregard the broad concensus among climatologists on the basis of the opinions of "scientists", which if you look at their professions, include an array of geologists, meteorologists, medical doctors, physicists, environmental researchers (i.e. anybody with a library card or internet access) and even a science-fiction writer.
Among the specialists, there is no debate. Climatologists from all over the world agree that global warming is real, and that it's threatening our food chain and water supply. If we're smart, we'll listen to them.
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Andy Lennon (2/12/2009)
Although using business intelligence to investigate and model global warming may seem like a good idea, it also introduces the very real risk of over-interpretation. if an analysis is done, it is expected that there will be conclusions. Unfortunately, it may not be possible to verify anything with such a small pool of data (150 years worth of weather data to identify trends that last thousands of years?). It seems sometimes that people get so caught up in how useful and powerful BI can be that they forget basic rules of statistics.Good point, Andy -- I doubt that any analysis would pass a T-Test 🙂
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Chris (2/12/2009)
On the global warming "debate" (akin to debating whether the earth is round or flat), you wouldn't request to see a podiatrist if your left arm started feeling numb and you felt sharp pain in your chest. Yet some here are asking us to disregard the broad concensus among climatologists on the basis of the opinions of "scientists", which if you look at their professions, include an array of geologists, meteorologists, medical doctors, physicists, environmental researchers (i.e. anybody with a library card or internet access) and even a science-fiction writer.Among the specialists, there is no debate. Climatologists from all over the world agree that global warming is real, and that it's threatening our food chain and water supply. If we're smart, we'll listen to them.
Actually, no they don't. Do some research on the subject, and you'll find that such unimportant library card carriers as the founder of "The Weather Channel", and seven of the original eleven IPCC researches, all disagree with the conclusion that AGW even exists.
Freeman Dyson, one of the most important scientists of our age, hasn't challenged the science of global warming, he's studied the subject and come to the conclusion that it simply isn't science at all.
One of the important distinctions of science vs faith/witchdoctory/fraud is that, in science, you publish your biases and assumptions, you publish your methods, and you publish your conclusions. The so-called-scientists who are claiming AGW exists have refused, repeatedly, to reveal their methods, their measurements, the assumptions and biases used in cleaning up their numbers, etc. That's not science. What they are engaged in is marketing. Has nothing to do with science.
Scientists worthy of the title would not have cooked the "hockey stick graph" (should be called the "hokey stick graph"), by assuming that all earlier measures erred on the high side and all later measures erred on the low side. Take their numbers, apply a standard margin of error, without bias, and the whole graph changes. Instead of supporting their point, it directly refutes it. They had to alter history and assume that the whole Roman Empire essentially did not exist, and that the Little Ice Age was a mass delusion, and that the Mideaval Warming Period was a typo, in order to get their theory to work. So they altered their data to match their theory. That's not "science", that's fraud.
So, no, it's not just "anyone with a library card" disagreeing with "them". It's not just people in disrelated fields of study. It's their own statements and actions that lose them all credence.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
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How about simply applying BI to comparing the R.O.I.s, of maintaining fossil fuel tech, versus building free-fuel tech?
*THOSE* could be quantified and analyzed... and in that light, I don't think we'd need to talk so much about global warming.
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Chris (2/12/2009)
Among the specialists, there is no debate. Climatologists from all over the world agree that global warming is real, and that it's threatening our food chain and water supply. If we're smart, we'll listen to them.I believe that that there is some question about the reality of global warming, but the bigger issue to me is - presuming that it does exist, what is the cause and can we significantly alter the situation. This is the crux of the question and where you can find very little agreement.
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Not sure what you mean by "free fuel tech". If you mean solar power, wind power, tide power, et al, those currently have a higher cost per watt than fossile fuel systems. Nuclear is potentially cheaper than fossile fuels, but has a very high political hurdle in the US, and definitely isn't free. Cost effective, yes, free, no.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
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Steve S. (2/12/2009)
Chris (2/12/2009)
Among the specialists, there is no debate. Climatologists from all over the world agree that global warming is real, and that it's threatening our food chain and water supply. If we're smart, we'll listen to them.I believe that that there is some question about the reality of global warming, but the bigger issue to me is - presuming that it does exist, what is the cause and can we significantly alter the situation. This is the crux of the question and where you can find very little agreement.
Global warming has certainly existed. The period from the 1960s to the late 1990s was definitely subject to a warming trend, by all usual measures. Temperatures since then have been falling in average. Those are pretty easily verified. And very, very normal. There's a 30-year temperature oscillation that has been observed through standard measures, and has probably been going on for thousands of years.
The bunk is CO2 greenhouse effect warming caused by human industry.
The most obvious cause of this cycle, and most/all other temperature cycles on Earth, is solar effect. During every warming period for which we have data on both things, sunspot activity has increased. During every cooling period for which we have data, sunspot activity has decreased. This is true right now, too. The current solar cycle is practically non-existent. So, we should expect about another 20-30 years of cooling, possibly followed by another warming trend.
Of course, the theory that I enjoy the most (note that I wrote "enjoy" as opposed to "support") is that the Earth is due for another major glaciation cycle, starting right about ... wait for it ... now! I expect Canada to be one big hockey rink starting in about 2011-2015. Well, perhaps "expect" is too strong a word. I think it would be cool. There, that's a better statement of it! 🙂
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
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Wow, once again things have gone sideways on my quite a bit.
The global warming debate inspired this, precisely because there is a debate. It got me thinking that we perhaps are moving too quickly on the science of whether or not we are the cause.
My thought was that in BI we can easily, and perhaps too quickly, use the results from our models without adequate testing. How can we test? time helps, but also smaller pilots, not huge, big, sweeping changes in our business.
I'm not against BI, I do think it's a good idea, I just think it's a bit of hassle to implement and hard. And expensive, and I don't think most companies have the patience to make the investment.
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GSquared (2/12/2009)
Not sure what you mean by "free fuel tech". If you mean solar power, wind power, tide power, et al, those currently have a higher cost per watt than fossile fuel systems. Nuclear is potentially cheaper than fossile fuels, but has a very high political hurdle in the US, and definitely isn't free. Cost effective, yes, free, no.You're right -- the *tech* isn't free, only the fuel is.
Fossil fuel tech is still cheaper than *most* free-fuel tech, and fossil fuel tech is certainly cheaper in the short run, than *any* alternative...
But some alternative tech is now cheaper in the long run.
Example below, from
http://www.unknownnews.org/071110-sd10-Lucinda.html
"PG&E recently charged our house $0.21 per KwH (Kilowatt hour). During peak hours of noon to 6 PM the cost goes as high as $0.52 per KwH because we vastly exceed the baseline allocation and our usage patterns have changed over time (i.e. the house is occupied 24 hours a day.)
"Let's compare that using rough estimates of the new solar paradigm's cost. Say one of FSLR's 1000Kw panels is installed at a cost of $2000 and that it produces 1000 watts for 10 hours of every day before it wears out and has to be replaced after 5 years. Disregarding interest expense (cost of capital) that works out to 365.25 days/year * 5 years * 10 hours/day = 18262.5 hours of use, and therefore (because it is a 1 kilowatt panel), 18262.5 KwH of production. Dividing total cost of $2000 by 18262.5 yields cost per KwH of $0.11.
"Even if installation cost of $1000 panel is included, which would cover connecting to the PG&E power line as well as situating the panel on the roof, the new cost rises to only $0.17 per KwH."
Granted, this will get more interesting if the initial outlay continues to decrease, as it has.
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Andrey (2/12/2009)
When floating ice melts, does the water level rise?Water expands when it freezes, so you might think that when it melts and reduces in size, the water level will go down. Alternatively, because part of the ice floats the water, you might think that when it melts, the water level will rise.
Neither is true, as explained by Archimedes principles.
When an ice cube (or an iceberg, which is a big ice cube) floats in water, then by definition the weight of the ice cube is exactly equal to the buoyancy force, which is equal to the weight of the displaced water.
When the ice cube melts, its volume changes, but its weight is conserved (law of the conservation of mass). So the melted water from the ice cube has exactly the same weight as the water that was displaced by the ice cube when it was frozen -- therefore the volume of melted water fits exactly in the previously displaced volume -- and the water level stays the same.
This may be true for the ice floating in the Arctic Ocean, but the glacial ice on Greenland, northern North America, Asia (Siberia) and Antarctic are all sitting on landmasses. When that ice melts, it will raise sea level.
I was previously a geologist (well, I am STILL a geologist, just not employed as such), so I am familiar with the massive climate changes that the earth has gone through over 4 billion years. I used to shrug off the global warming back in the 80's (before Al Gore and all the current debaters) as just one of Earth's cycles, until I had the opportunity in 1995 to see a graph of average temperatures for something like the last 500 years (sorry, I don't remember the source). The exponential increase in the past 150 years was compelling!
Just in the past few years, there have been disturbing developments. The Arctic Ocean is now absorbing solar energy more than it is reflecting it back out, so the Arctic ice is melting. The glaciers in the Italian Alps have shrunk at an increasing rate in the past 30 years. Coral reefs are dying due to the increase in water temperatures. These things are real.
When your house is on fire, do you want to debate whether it was a lightening strike or arson that caused it, or do you want to put the fire out? I vote for doing my part, no matter how little that may be. I do feel that the Arctic melting is huge, and may not be something that we can reverse, and I am concerned about what lies ahead.
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We could debate and argue about Global Warming for an eternity, or until either side is proven correct, but the question still remains..
Steve, are you going to keep your Porsche???
😀
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I get a Porsche magazine and I read about the RUF last month, and then another editorial this month that complained about it.
I wouldn't mind electric, I just want my manual transmission. As much as I like the whine of the engine, there are plenty of times it's annoying.
My car:
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Our analysis of the data warehouse has revealed the following compelling trends:
currently, an astonishing 100% of Porsche owners living in Colorado and named Steve Jones are happy with their vehicles, but would like to move to an electric model for altrusitic and noise-reduction reasons. Clearly, it's time for Porsche to adapt to current market conditions...
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