An Inconvenient Scientist

[Kulaf]

Well next time an ant who is infertile has genetic material extracted so they can concieve and pass on a genetic weakness......you let me know.

[Kulaf]

So?... We exceeded "the planets "natural" ability to sustain us" approximately 10,000 years ago, the very first time some brilliant man or woman had the idea of clearing out a patch of dirt and plunking seeds in it. Every single crop plant and domesticated animal has had its evolutionary course charted by man for thousands of years. That is the way of things. Direct genetic manipluation, rather than breeding, has only reduced the number of iterations to one suitable for our populace. (By the way: Your "devestated" oceans have stabilized, and are likely to start to recover in terms of population numbers: http://www.fao.org/docrep/009/y5852e/y5852e00.htm .)

The problem is.....that report only counts "legal" fishing statistics. It in no way tracks illegal fishing.....which is what is killing the oceans:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/09/11/ ... eafish.php

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg1 ... hips-.html

Drift-net fishing has been the focus of international controversy because of its devastating impact on dolphins and fish of all sorts. The average drift net in the Pacific reaches across 50 kilometres of the ocean, and each evening some 35 000 kilometres of nets are lowered into the northern Pacific.

On the computer display at the NMFS, where each ship is represented by a dot, the Asian drift-net fleet shows up as a solid yellow band stretching from Japan to a point 1600 kilometres off the coast of Oregon. 'There's not much that swims of any size that is getting through there,' says Mager.

[Arathena]

Well next time an ant who is infertile has genetic material extracted so they can concieve and pass on a genetic weakness......you let me know.

That would be silly, as most hive insects have to deliberately create fertile females in the first place. But, I'm going to bet you're not capable of comprehending how that's a strength, since it leads to the hypermajority of the ants not reproducing at all.

And your example is a prime, nearly textbook example of the evolutionary advantage of humans.

[Kulaf]

So if we continue to allow women who cannot concieve naturally and require a C-section to deliver because they lack the bone structure......to pass that trait on, that is an evolutionary advantage of humans? That we could someday not be able to concieve naturally?

I understand the points you are making......and I'm just taking a guess here but I am pretty confident you fully understand the points I am making. I'm not going to ping pong this issue back and forth.

[Embar Angylwrath]

So if we continue to allow women who cannot concieve naturally and require a C-section to deliver because they lack the bone structure......to pass that trait on, that is an evolutionary advantage of humans? That we could someday not be able to concieve naturally?

I understand the points you are making......and I'm just taking a guess here but I am pretty confident you fully understand the points I am making. I'm not going to ping pong this issue back and forth.

I think what you're missing here Kulaf is that while the physiology of a certain individual may not be a viable one in other situations, it is now becuase the human speicies EVOLVED a mechanism to deal with those (and other ) issues. Its called intelligence. You see, all animals modify their environment to some degree. We just do it more extensively.

[Kulaf]

Wow! How insighful.....I hadn't thought of that. Or course wihtout a nice clean hospital.....sterile instruments......and a skilled doctor.....

I know you're not dense Embar.....stop pretending.

[Ddrak]

I think to a certain extent both arguments are true.

As a biological species, the human race has stopped evolving as the premise of "survival of the fittest" is fairly obviously no longer in force. We've decided as a race that all life is worth keeping and therefore we expend excess energy in keeping the "less fit" alive, for whichever definition of "less fit" you choose. If anything we're regressing as the "more fit" choose to use birth control to maintain their own higher standards of living.

However, the species itself continues as a whole to be subject to the environment and to it's own influence on the environment and rapidly adapts to any changes which come about. Even if global warming causes a 10 degree rise in temperature over the next 100 years I have little doubts of the human race's ability to adapt to the change. In fact, I think global warming is the least of our problems compared to the looming issues with overpopulation of the planet and finding alternate non-"natural" sources of food.

Dd

[Kulaf]

Well we are seeing the results of both overpopulation and food shortages yearly in China with the various strains of avian flu (caused by improper food processing) and just recently hand, foot and mouth disease:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 876031.ece

I agree that global warming should definatly take a back seat to global population control.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Kulaf -

Take a look at history. Famine has always plagued the human population from time to time, with a fraction of the human population as today. Your argument lacks context.

[Klast Brell]

We will always live under the specter of Thomas Malthus. Fortunately our big human brains give us the ability to keep ahead of the curve most of the time.

[Arathena]

I think to a certain extent both arguments are true.

As a biological species, the human race has stopped evolving as the premise of "survival of the fittest" is fairly obviously no longer in force. We've decided as a race that all life is worth keeping and therefore we expend excess energy in keeping the "less fit" alive, for whichever definition of "less fit" you choose. If anything we're regressing as the "more fit" choose to use birth control to maintain their own higher standards of living.

However, the species itself continues as a whole to be subject to the environment and to it's own influence on the environment and rapidly adapts to any changes which come about. Even if global warming causes a 10 degree rise in temperature over the next 100 years I have little doubts of the human race's ability to adapt to the change. In fact, I think global warming is the least of our problems compared to the looming issues with overpopulation of the planet and finding alternate non-"natural" sources of food.

Dd

The essential problem with this argument is this: Evolution has NEVER been driven by the concept of 'survival of the fittest'. It is driven by the opposite: The extinction of the unfit. There exist millions of species that are adequately fit to reproduce within the available resources, despite a superior competitor taking the lions share of the resources. This equilibrium is only altered when there is a change in the available resources, occasionally from 'disaster', but most often arising from the spread of a new factor through one of the interdependant populations.

Once this is understood, the question we have to ask is the following: 'How do we yardstick a species as being adequately fit?' There are two possible answers to this question, the first being : 'Is the species extinct or in the process of becoming so?' If not, then it is adequately fit, end of line. Please note that this does not mean that a species cannot experience a precipitous drop in population, then level off at a new population that fits available resources: The species was not adequately fit for the lean times, but is at the lower level. The other answer is to attempt to peg the viability of the species in evolutionary terms to some other criterion, which may, currently, have a relationship the the ability to reproduce, however, that same attribute may later become detrimental to reproduction.

There is no magical template of perfection of any species, and on the individual level, there is only survival until at least replacement reproduction, or death without reproduction. Bill and Melinda Gates? Adequately fit. Ariannda? (More than) Adequately fit. Ddrak and Arathena? No current demonstration of evolutionary fitness. And until such time as the complex resources of 'hospitals' and 'doctors' are taken away, then your hypothetical fertility clinic-and-c-section patient is also adequately fit.

None of this, mind you, helps formulate the ethics of population or eugenics, but attempting to call the increase in effective fertility permitted by the big human brain a weakness or outside of evolution is to blind yourself to the nature of evolution.

[Kulaf]

To get this back on track.....from the other thread:

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress. ... 990_v2.png

Trending up. You could just as easily compare 1983 to 1993 and say it has gone down......but the overall graph is still trending up.

[Ddrak]

What caused the spike in '98?

Dd

[Embar Angylwrath]

El Nino, I think. Just as the La Nina in 2007 caused the dramatic drop.

For those of you not familiar with the ocean current phenomena, El Nino is a warming of the oceans in certain areas, La Nina is a cooling. We can get into the math if you like, but in proportion to volume, it takes much less water to transfer heat energy than it does any greenhouse gas. Heat energy radiates up (generally) towards space. But it also radiates (convects) to any mass that is lower in heat energy than the adjacent mass. Any heat differential between a mass of water and a mass of air will be transferred into the atmosphere if the average temp of the water is greater than the average temp of the air. The reverse is true as well..., if the mass of water is cooler than the mass of air, the water will absorb the heat energy.

This, I will admit, is a TREMENDOUS over-simplification. It applies in a very general sense, since it doesn't account for humidity, wind velocity, atmospheric churning (the big conveyor belt of water-air energy transfer at the equator), etc.

Another thing I find missing in the CO2 emissions data, is a correction for the release (and absorption) of CO2 from seawater as the ocean temps rise and fall. As ocean temps rise, CO2 is belched out into the atmospher in huge quantities, purely as a result of the laws of physics governing gas absorption in a liquid. (Again, generally speaking, the higher the temp of a liquid, the lower its ability to retain dissolved gases).

If anyone has data, or a link to data, that shows a calculation of how much an average 1 degree of ocean temp rise would release X amount of CO2, I'd be interested in seeing that.

[Kulaf]

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/g ... n06306.htm

[Kulaf]

http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/tao/elnino/impacts.html

[Embar Angylwrath]

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/g ... n06306.htm

I don't see any answer here about quantitative CO2 retention in seawater in relation to temp. Perhaps you can point me to the part of this link that addresses this?

[Embar Angylwrath]

http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/tao/elnino/impacts.html

Not real sure what you're trying to illustrate here. Care to expound?

[Kulaf]

http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/g ... n06306.htm

I don't see any answer here about quantitative CO2 retention in seawater in relation to temp. Perhaps you can point me to the part of this link that addresses this?

http://content.cdlib.org/xtf/view?docId ... and=eschol

I'm no chemist but I think what you are looking for is in there.

[Kulaf]

http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/tao/elnino/impacts.html

Not real sure what you're trying to illustrate here. Care to expound?

Reference material since the subject of El nino and La nina has been introduced.