Chuck's Chatter

OK folks ... One more time

2012-01-29T21:26:00.000-06:00

If you offer comments about any of my blogs, you must include your full, real name (e.g., Bill Murray). I will not publish comments from people using incomplete names (e.g., BillM), or pseudonyms (e.g., GroundHogDay)! If you're not willing to abide by this rule, don't waste your time and mine by sending comments on my blog entries. I won't publish them! If you use a false full name and I find out about it, your comments will be deleted immediately. I have no use for "keyboard warriors" hiding behind anonymity to say whatever. If you're not willing to own your own words, why are you bothering me?

The big American educational lie

2012-01-29T15:57:00.000-06:00

I clearly have been the beneficiary of a lot of good fortune ... it definitely could be called "luck". For many years, I congratulated myself because the educational process I went through culminated in my obtaining what was for me a dream job right out of graduate school. I like to think I used that opportunity productively and became a contributor to science as a result. At the time it happened I realized how fortunate I was - in fact, it was hard to believe things worked out that way. But the notion that "luck is the combination of opportunity and preparedness" is only valid when there's an opportunity! As time has passed, I've reflected on that good fortune and I've become aware of several stories of people who have not been so fortunate as I.

The big American educational lie often is part of what is spouted by the right-wing conservatives and their sycophants who oppose vehemently any social welfare program (unless it's for the benefit of rich people and corporations). They portray the recipients of social welfare as cynical parasites, feeding at the trough of governmental largess at the expense of the rest of "hard-working Americans". They've produced extended arguments that are little more than stereotyping of welfare recipients. I've seen within my circle of friends some of the people who like others are unable to find good jobs and so would be included in the right-wing category of lazy layabouts. Some of them refuse to accept welfare, in fact! They just keep on struggling, too proud to take what they could receive from government programs.

As an example, I know one young man who went to extraordinary lengths to obtain his diploma from a university program of national repute. In order to pay for this, since he had no financial assistance - no one to pay his academic bills (to say nothing of the cost of living) - he has had to work at menial jobs after school to pay for his education and support his family. These jobs are far below his intellectual capability, and his wife had to help support the family by working as well. His earlier diploma from a lesser university wasn't enough to satisfy him - he felt he had to earn a diploma that carried more clout! So he stayed the course and graduated from this more challenging program, in a process that demanded years of sacrifices from him and his wife. So what does he have to show for all that effort and sacrifice? He must be living the American dream by now, right? Actually, he has precisely ... nothing! His diploma guaranteed him absolutely zero, of course, and he's been unable to find work in the discipline for which he worked so hard and sacrificed so much. Seeing his plight makes me very sad, but it also makes me very much aware of the good fortune that worked in my favor during better economic times. And to think the right-wing ideologues would unhesitatingly classify him as a parasite if he accepted welfare makes me furious!

This young man surely deserves something for all his hard work and, according to the mantra of the right-wing advocates I know, it should be his reward for all the effort he put out. He isn't shiftless and lazy in any way - far from it! But the big lie is that hard work and education are the keys to success in America. The reality is that they aren't much of a guarantee of anything. I'm not so arrogant as to infer that my good fortune was due only to my efforts - I worked hard to be prepared but I'm also willing to admit that I was the beneficiary of luck. My young friend has not been lucky - he worked hard to obtain an education and his reward is nothing more than an empty promise.

It's infuriating to hear all this patronizing crap from the right wing about how the jobless need to get a job and earn their place in the American paradise. It's outright rubbish to paint everyone in need of welfare as some sort of social parasite, and to preach the mantra of "Get an education and get a job!" Even if they can somehow manage to pay the educational system what it costs to receive the "benefits" of a diploma, those institutions who were delighted to take that tuition money from their students, will shrug their shoulders when that diploma doesn't land their graduates a good-paying job in the subject area of their academic degree. The universities hire only a small fraction of university graduates - the rest must look elsewhere. In hard times, many graduates have a tough time finding that good job the universities seem to promise, but which is actually beyond their capability to give. They take in that tuition money but it's no guarantee of anything!

Many welfare recipients are ashamed and embarrassed to be forced to depend on social welfare programs to survive. Must we make needy people be ashamed of their condition, even when they did all the right things and by bad fortune, were not rewarded with their share of the American dream?

My love affair with the Great Plains

2012-01-26T03:44:00.000-06:00

When I began storm chasing, I was obsessed with seeing tornadic storms. As it turned out, I wasn't often successful at seeing a tornado. Therefore, I had two simple choices: give up storm chasing, or persist in the effort. Giving up was not an option. No matter what the outcome, I was going to be on the Great Plains every spring, with the purpose of chasing storms in hopes of seeing tornadoes. It still is not clear to me why I had this passion, but what was very evident was that my success or failure on any given chase day was not important. I felt a compulsion that simply couldn't be denied. Failure couldn't discourage me.

What few successes I had in those early years (beginning in 1972) made it obvious that the reality of storms far exceeded my dreams! The few successes I had in pursuing my goal to see tornadic storms far outweighed my frustrations over not seeing such on most chase days. If this was the price of success, then I was more than willing to pay that price! Failure became both my constant companion and an incentive to succeed. The rest is history, now. But what's more important even than those occasional successes is what happened in the process of not giving up in the face of frequent failure.

Storm chasing in the nominal peak of the storm chase "season" puts me on the Great Plains. And given the likely failure of my hopes to see a tornadic storm on most chase days, this meant that I had a lot of days when I was not going to see a tornado. If storm chasing was only about seeing tornadoes, this was not going to be a process that rewarded me frequently! With the prospect of a lot of days when I was going to "fail" to see a tornado, I was faced with the inevitability of frequent failure. What was I going to do with that time when I did not see a tornadic storm?

Eventually, something else began to intrude in my consciousness: there was more to the experience than tornadic storms! I found that by being immersed in the Great Plains, something wonderful began to happen: I was falling in love with the place! Upon my arrival in Oklahoma for graduate school in the late 1960s, I had the odd experience of feeling "at home" in a place where I'd never lived. Somehow, it felt as if I'd arrived "home" in a place that had never been my home. The sights, the sounds, the smells, the "feel" of the place made it evident to me that I never wanted to be separated from it again. To this day, I can't explain that. I can only bow to the inevitable: I love it here!

The powerful storms of the Great Plains are an important part of the region's attraction to me - but it's become far more than just the storms. It includes the people of the Great Plains, the history of the place, the oceans of emptiness, the infinite skies, the sensory experiences of being there - the total experience has become what keeps me here.

For me, a storm chase involves far more than just the potential for seeing a tornadic storm. The chance to be on the Great Plains is an opportunity to experience something special in its own right. If that experience includes a tornadic storm, so much the better, but it's become important to me just to be there. The chance to see a tornadic storm adds another layer of significance to the experience, but it's no longer necessary to me.

Thus, it concerns me that the plains are under threat from those who would exploit them for monetary gain. The Great Plains are far more than simply a dumping ground, or some sort of cash cow that can be exploited for monetary gain. I wasn't an "environmentalist" before I became a storm chaser, but I now have become one, arguing that the plains have their own beauty and value that needs to be preserved, not destroyed for the sake of profit. They have a beauty that may not meet the eye so aggressively as the beauty of the mountains or the ocean, but they are beautiful, nonetheless. They're no more deserving of destruction in the name of profit than the Rocky Mountains, the national wetlands, or the coastal zones. Unfortunately, champions for the Great Plains are few.

The economic viability of the Plains is declining rapidly. Much of the land is absentee-owned now; the owners want to make their investments pay, without regard for the damage to the ecosystems this might cause. The small towns that have characterized the plains are dying, and so the people who characterize the best of American human values are being squeezed out by the economics. Corporate owners care little or nothing for the Plains, per se. Only profits matter to them. Anything, no matter how unsustainable it might be, that creates short-term profit is acceptable. And the small towns increasingly have only empty storefronts and abandoned farm homes to show for a once-thriving local agricultural economy.

My chase images necessarily merge the storms with the environment in which they occur. The two are inseparable. If you like severe storms, you must also champion the Great Plains! To appreciate the Great Plains, you have to slow down and feel in your soul the pulse of the land. If you can't or won't feel that pulse, then I feel sorry for you. And you don't truly understand severe weather.

What to do with chaser images?

2012-01-26T01:34:00.000-06:00

I've had this conversation with several veteran chasers, and it's a vexing dilemma. The passage of time means that some veteran storm chasers soon will be passing on (dying). A few chasers have died already and the issue of what to do with their images remains problematic. The question arises: what can be done to preserve the legacy of their chasing? There's no central place to save the still and video imagery from their many years of chasing. Part of the problem is that each veteran chaser may have a different wish for their imagery: they may see it as a legacy for their families, or as a source of educational material, or as a collection of commercially valuable photos/video. Our personal wishes surely would be relevant, but - just what do we want to see happen with regard to our imagery?

Speaking only for myself, my imagery formally belongs to the corporation I formed and, as such, could be an asset that I pass on to my family to do with as they wish. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure the most they could do with it would be to try to sell it for whatever they might be able to get for it. How much might a collection of still and video images of storms (and other subjects) be worth? I have no idea, but I'm guessing my family would have no idea of the value of my imagery, or how to obtain a reasonable price for the legacy I would leave. Fact is, I don't know myself! It might be a large value or it might be worth little or nothing. Families are unlikely to know what the worth and significance of chase imagery is. It's just "stuff" we've left behind.

The challenge I see is this: the real value of these images likely would be associated with the context in which the images were obtained. Some are simply cloud photographs, some represent documentation of important severe weather events, some are just interesting imagery I captured during my long career of storm chasing (40 years as of 2012). It would be nice to have them sorted in some systematic way, but the best I can do now is to identify them by date. It would be great to have some sort of narrative to associate with them, but to do so would be an enormous task, and my memory of them is fading with each passing year.

It might be good to have some sort of central collection point where veteran chasers could deposit their imagery in an archive. The cost of such a "Museum of Storm Chasing" could become large. My imagery includes film, video, and digital content. The digital content alone, which represents only a fraction of the total, occupies almost a terabyte of storage. The 35 mm and medium format film transparencies have mostly not been scanned into digital form. Film must be stored in an appropriate environment and even then it deteriorates with time. Images stored on digital media become unreadable as those media become obsolete, and they also deteriorate with time. We have no digital media that can outlast properly stored film images right now. Digital media are changing constantly, so images would need to be transferred to new media as the technology changes.

I'd guess I have at least another terabyte of uscanned images that, and it's likely that I actually have several times that. I have neither the time nor the inclination to convert all my imagery to digital format. Let's just say for the sake of argument that I have 5 terabytes of imagery - I'm just guessing about that of course. With the cost of digital storage devices, that's not a lot of expense these days, but organizing and managing such a database would not be a trivial, inexpensive exercise!

If we consider the pioneers of storm chasing - Al Moller, Dave Hoadley, Gene Moore, Jim Leonard Tim Marshall, and so on - to say nothing of more recent chasers - Roger Hill, Bill Reid, Charles Edwards, and so on - this likely represents many, many terabytes of material. What's going to happen to all of that amazing imagery as these chasers pass on? Will it be lost or preserved as an important legacy? I wish I knew.

This blog isn't going to offer a solution, unfortunately. The best I can do is open up the topic for discussion. We all need to think about this and ask ourselves what we would like to see happen to our personal legacies of storm chasing imagery. Do we want a central archive? Is that even realistic? What about commercial uses for our images? What about scientific and/or educational uses? Do we want them rat-holed away in some dusty archive, or do we want them actively marketed for commercial use, or what? I just don't know. I'm wide open to suggestions.

A passion for facts?

2012-01-24T14:24:00.002-06:00

Of late, I've run into a lot of what I consider to be either outright factual errors, or misinterpretations of the facts. Facts are the foundation upon which scientists base their work; they are the observations and other evidence that provide the basis for a scientific interpretation. Hopefully, the facts behind such an interpretation don't include errors of one sort or another. Many different sources for errors are possible and it's widely understood in science that our facts may not be so unshakable as we hope. The possibility of factual errors needs to be recognized in any scientific work, and efforts expended to reduce the chances for such errors to creep into the facts we use as evidence for or against our hypotheses.

We've recently seen an example of journalistic factual errors with regards to the tornadoes in Alabama - it was reported by Diane Sawyer on ABC's World News Tonight that the tornadoes "struck without warning" when the fact is that there were excellent warnings for the tornadoes, at least in terms of the current state of the science. And information included in the story recommended that the viewers consider taking advantage of a FEMA service that, in fact, doesn't exist! Nothing was said about weather radios and other means of obtaining weather information that people should be using to keep themselves up to date with developing hazardous weather - facts that would have been of service to the public. Saying "It struck without warning!" is an outright factual error in this case, and no responsible journalist should ever make such an error. But it seems we've come to accept, for the most part, that journalistic standards in the USA have deteriorated substantially. Fact-checking has become optional, in the haste to get the story out. Journalists should have a deep-seated passion for facts, just as scientists should, but - fact is, most journalists and even some scientists seem unconcerned about factual errors anymore.

Even if you have your facts correct, unfortunately, this doesn't necessarily mean that your interpretation of them is correct. You may have overlooked other, mitigating facts (intentionally or otherwise) that would obviate your hypothesis, or reduce the probability that it's a correct interpretation. In my experience with journalists these days, many of them are not only unconcerned about facts - they've also made up their minds before their research is even fairly begun. The "story" is already written, and they're simply seeking confirmation of their story during their "research" into the story. They have an "angle" on the story that represents a powerful bias when they should be as unbiased as is humanly possible. Journalists should let the facts speak for themselves, rather than imposing their will on the facts. This is just as wrong as it is for scientists who are busy trying to confirm their interpretations, when in fact, they should be trying instead as hard as they can to refute their interpretations! Scientists should pursue vigorously any avenue by which their ideas could be refuted, without having to be told not to overlook such things! Anyone can overlook something, but we should try as hard as we can not to do so. We scientists tend to be fond of our own ideas and not so fond of the ideas of our colleagues. That is, we tend to have a "confirmation bias" - we want to accept facts that confirm our ideas and to explain away facts that refute them. Only by being aware of this tendency and seeking actively to overcome it can good science be done. The same can be said for journalists, who should make a professional re-commitment to fact-checking.

Confirmation bias is rampant in the political polarization that characterizes the USA right now. Many citizens seem unaware of the fact that all humans are biased and so by default fail to work hard to overcome their personal biases. Those who give free rein to their biases allow those biases to reinforce themselves into hardened positions that can't be overcome by any rational argument, no matter how fact-based. Journalists have a serious responsibility to help the public obtain accurate factual information and to offer as unbiased an interpretation of those facts as possible. Unfortunately, in my experience, the facts suggest many journalists fail in this obligation. The facts are not represented by two polar opposites having a confrontational debate, either - the shades of gray in between bipolar positions are simply not being represented. The two sides of a polarized debate may not be equal, as is the case in the global warming "controversy". Presenting them as equals is a factual error!

Ignorance of the facts is just as dangerous as an outright factual error. In some discussions with which I'm familiar, various people engage in a sort of revisionist view of historical facts (such as those who claim US law is directly descended from biblical law). A journalist who's unaware of the history of ideas and their underlying facts is ill-equipped to do interviews with people concerning those ideas. Such journalists are easily bullied by adroit politicians, for example, as seen in most of the recent GOP debates among the candidates for President.

I'm told by some that my concern for the facts in crockumentaries is just my nerdishness showing. Who really cares if the facts are all screwed up? It's my belief that we all need to have a passion for the facts, and to act on recognition of our own biases and ignorance during discourse about how facts are to be interpreted.

Shifting sands of meteorology research

2012-01-21T19:10:00.000-06:00

It's likely that most non-scientists have very little knowledge of how research gets funded and how the process works. For many years, I was a research scientist working in the Federal Civil Service (CS) system for various agencies. Then, when I retired from Civil Service more than 10 years ago, I began the process of research in a state-supported university. Thus, I've seen how research gets done from two very different perspectives.

Of late, however, things have been changing. When I was with NOAA, researchers were paid as CS employees, and were expected to pursue research topics relevant to their respective agencies. If the research required resources beyond the salaries of the researchers, it was up to agency management to allocate whatever research funding to support those activities they might (or might not) have available. The process of getting additional research funding was mostly aimed at your own management. If you didn't get resources to do a particular project, then either those tasks weren't done or you did them as opportunity permitted. As I was leaving NOAA, the process was changing, however. The process was beginning to resemble university-based research: projects running over a more or less fixed time scale of about 3 years, lists of deliverables, formal proposals being written to obtain funding support, with peer review, and so on. I can't speak to what is now going on in NOAA from my own experience, but my friends suggest that the evolution of how research gets funded has continued along the lines I could see beginning as I was retiring.

Frankly, I don't think this is a particularly good development, but the process of transforming the CS research system seems irreversible. I liked the old system, but I must admit that it permitted some folks within it to survive for decades without being very productive. I wonder if productivity has improved under the new processes? Some of the drones I knew personally are still employed!

In the university system, the primary funding agency has been the National Science Foundation. I've had several NSF proposals funded and it's been very satisfying to see those projects reach fruition. NSF has been changing its procedures to reflect pressures being brought on them as a result of the climate change controversies (among other things). There also has been a greater emphasis on applications of NSF-sponsored research, compared to even the recent past, when basic research was the primary activity that NSF sought to support. Things do seem to be changing.

The public surely knows very little about how NSF support for research works, so the myth perpetuated by climate change deniers that researchers are enriching themselves at public expense persists. That such nonsense is given any credibility at all leaves me frustrated with the extent of public ignorance of reality in research. If we expect the public to support our research, we need to be able to inform them about how it actually works.

There's some reasonable chance I'll be able to get a few more years of NSF funding support for my research. But the economic crisis underscores the reality that nothing is guaranteed. When I was in NOAA, my own income was the only thing "guaranteed" - and even that was vulnerable to economic conditions. The times, they are a-changing and it remains to be seen how things will evolve, of course. As my research career winds down, it will be interesting to see just what will survive ...

On the Tebow phenomenon

2012-01-11T13:56:00.001-06:00

I thought I'd add my two cents to the widespread discussion about Tim Tebow's football success and his personality. Not that I have any particularly deep insight into his character - I can only react to the public persona he puts on display.

It's pretty evident that Tebow is passionate about his football and he understands two important aspects of football: (1) it's a team game, and (2) the quarterback position demands leadership. Tebow's public statements indicate that he wants to deflect the attention from himself to his teammates, which I have to believe plays well in the locker room, as well as on the air. I can't possibly know the extent to which he actually believes that he doesn't rate the attention being showered upon him - but I hope his comments reflect accurately what he thinks. Surely at least a few people in sports (and elsewhere) exist who are not all about calling attention to themselves and ignoring the necessary support from their team. Many players, including what seems to be an inordinate percentage among wide receivers in the NFL, seem to need the attention desperately, rather than being satisfied with being successful in their team roles and helping the team win games. It's very refreshing to hear Tebow giving praise to his teammates and not playing to the hype about him.

It's also very clear that Tebow has assumed the role of team leader, as any good quarterback should. He isn't the best at the position the league has ever seen, at least in terms of raw quarterbacking skills, but he's proven he can carry the team to win. In team sports, that's all that really counts. Quarterbacks win when they can elevate the play of those around themselves - Super Bowl champion quarterbacks include some of the great quarterbacks of all time, but their ranks also include some rather midde-of-the-road quarterback talent. Some great quarterbacks have never won a champtionship. It remains to be seen what Tebow's future will be in that regard, of course.

It's amusing to see how the notion of a quarterback who is a threat to run the ball seems to be a new phenomenon in the NFL. Tebow joins a long tradition of quarterbacks who can make plays by running, as well as dropping back in the pocket to throw. It always has created problems for the defense to have to account for the quarterback as a ball carrier. Why is this aspect of Tebow's game such a big deal in the media? Frankly, I don't understand why it's being hyped as a new sort of quarterback play. His size and power add a particular intensity to his running, but this is hardly the dawning of a new style of play.

If there's anything about Tebow I don't like (other than leading his Florida Gators to a win over my Oklahoma Sooners in the BCS National Championship game a few years back), it's when he pushes his religious beliefs while he's got media attention as a football player. I have no problem with him believing whatever he wants, and pushing his religion on people in his private life, but ... he should keep his faith out of his football. When he says he wants to thank his lord and savior jesus christ for all his success, this seems to be another aspect of his modesty. However, it also suggests that a supernatural deity has picked sides and is helping Tebow beat other teams. Would a supernatural deity do such a thing? Is the almighty creator of the universe a Broncos football fan? Frankly, the idea that Tebow's success follows from the intervention of an all-powerful deity on his behalf strikes me as arrogant, not modest. Why should the creator of the universe want Tebow to succeed, thereby causing the failure of other players and their teams? Doesn't that seem to suggest Tebow believes himself to be one of the omnipotent and omniscient creator's favorites?

When football players thank their deity for their success, and Tebow is only the most visible among many athletes who do this, it overlooks their mistakes and screw-ups. Do they point to the sky on bended knee when they throw interceptions or fumble the ball? "That one's on you, lord - my screw-up was your fault!"??

Why do I have such a problem with Tebow's open declarations of his faith? I have no issue with him doing so in his private life to whatever extent he wishes. But when he's granted an opportunity to gain media access to the public because of his football, then his remarks should be confined to football. I don't turn on football games in order to hear religious proselytizing!

To understand how utterly inappropriate this behavior is, imagine that I'm attending an international scientific conference to present a scientific paper on which I collaborated with several colleagues. After offering acknowledgments to my colleagues, I then declare, "The same sort of rational analysis of objective evidence I've presented here, when applied to religious beliefs, provides a substantial argument against the existence of any mythical supernatural deity, often given by believers the name of god, jesus christ, or allah!" Such a clearly irrelevant and discordant note would be an inappropriate intrusion of my personal spiritual perspective while on the stage in my role as a scientist. I'd be pushing my opinions on people who, after all, didn't gather there to learn about my atheism. By the same token, I find it disturbing that Tebow feels he can preach his religious beliefs from his platform as a football star.

I respect Tim Tebow as a football player, but I have no need to hear constantly about his religion. Nor does anyone else. He should keep that confined to his private life.

Thoughts on NCAA BCS football - part 2

2012-01-02T18:13:00.001-06:00

Continuing where I left off ...

So I'm a fan of NCAA BCS football, for whatever reason, with the Oklahoma Sooners at the top of my short list of favorite teams. With all the brouhaha about the post-season and the mythical national champion of BCS football being chosen primarily by polls that rank the teams subjectively and/or objectively via various arbitrary formulae, I've been forced to consider the possibility of an eventual playoff format. I have mixed feelings about that, now.

All the other divisions of NCAA football already run playoffs to determine a national champion on the field of play, rather than being based primarily on polls. There's no plausible logical reason why the former Division 1A couldn't or shouldn't have a playoff, other than the greed of the universities because of the money generated by post-season bowl games. Presumably the bowl games have an inherent need to survive in any future post-season scenario involving playoffs. This is, of course, all about the money.

And the same goes for the frantic re-alignment of the BCS conferences, with some teams now leaving one conference to join another. Yet another case of it all being about the money. The money drives the programs and the programs generate the money, in a nice case of the snake swallowing its own tail ...

At some point in the past, I had the naive notion that athletic competition in colleges was about sports and, for lower-level sports (referred to as "non revenue-generating" sports) like wrestling or gymnastics, or even college baseball, that's mostly what it's still about. The student-athlete is not a myth in collegiate sports, but it is truly a vanishing species in NCAA BCS football. The football players on NCAA BCS teams are recruited first and foremost as football athletes, not as students. We don't care about your SAT scores, so long as they meet the minimum requirement.

In thinking about things going on with BCS football of late, I was forced to recollect my past experiences. Thinking back, what I truly enjoyed were the traditional rivalries between teams that had long histories, going back in some cases a loooooooong ways: OU-Texas, Michigan-Ohio State, Notre Dame-Southern California, Auburn-Alabama, and so on. There were also lesser rivalries among teams that historically have had few aspirations to be national champions: Minnesota-Wisconsin for the Paul Bunyan Trophy, Purdue-Indiana for the Old Oaken Bucket, Oregon-Oregon State in the "Civil War", and so on. With the ongoing demolition of conference team lineups, some old rivalries have been ended with no apparent concern for the loss of tradition. College football with its regional rivalries had an aura of fun and friendly competition, that only marginally were related to pulling in tubs of cash. This is being destroyed in the NCAA BCS.

In college, individual teams of the past didn't copy relentlessly the strategies used by winning teams. College teams had personalities of various sorts and part of the fun was when teams with vastly different strategies clashed on the field. College football had diversity in the style of play. This is changing as the need to train NFL rookies seems to be a primary goal. And it seems everyone must copy the style of football played in the SEC to have a chance to win a national championship.

The bowl games used to be mostly a reward for a successful season and a chance for some teams to play each other that ordinarily would not meet very often during the regular season because they were in different regions. When the bowl games became a process increasingly focused on deciding the mythical national championship and the final rankings for the year, this fun-focused perspective on bowl games changed into something dark and filled with emotional meanings: vindication and joy for the winners, but also humiliation and sorrow for the losers. And the BCS formula has given us a rematch this year of a game between teams that have already met.

If NCAA BCS football eventually goes to playoff with 4 or more teams, which seems inevitable, then a champion of sorts will be determined on the field, but something else will have died. College football will have become nearly indistinguishable from NFL football, except for the salaries paid to the players and the overall average talent level. Most collegiate football players don't go on to play in the NFL - some play for "minor league" professional teams like arena league football, or american-style football in Europe or Canada. But for most collegiate athletes, even at the BCS level, the end of their college playing days is the end of competitive football for them. Interestingly, the NFL continues to draw many players from schools in the "lesser" divisions; NFL-quality athletes are not found exclusively in the BCS.

For those not destined to become professional football players, these athletes remain mostly students and are football players only secondarily. If their football careers are terminated prematurely by an injury, no big payoff is lost - they just get to focus their attention on academic issues, not athletic performance.

In some ways, I'd like to see a playoff for the NCAA Division 1A national championship - to see the issue settled on the playing field rather than some arbitrary process other than athletic competition. But in other ways, I'll probably lose interest in the process. The NCAA football game will be entirely about the money, and the rich will likely get richer at the expense of the poor. Another microcosm of our society, I suppose.

Thoughts on NCAA BCS football - part 1

2012-01-02T12:55:00.001-06:00

I don't resemble an athlete in any way, and never have. My athletic prowess is minimal and I've never had much involvement with sports on a competitive basis at any level. I played at various sports as a boy and realized I had no talent for it. But over the years, I became something of a sports fan - not a true fanatic, but definitely a willing spectator. My two favorite sports are NCAA football and NCAA wrestling. These are two very different athletic competitions: football is one of the ultimate team sports, whereas wrestling is one of the ultimate individual sports.

Anyway, we're now in the process of winding down the NCAA football season for another year. My favorite team, the Oklahoma Sooners, finished the year 10-3, having won the Insight Bowl game. But it was a year that began with high expectations for a BCS national championship. The team played really poorly in the three games they lost, including a thorough beatdown in Stillwater. I'm among the many fans disappointed at how this year's team performed. But a friend recently drew my attention to the long period of consistent football mediocrity at the University of Minnesota, and I regained my perspective on the Sooners. Oklahoma football has had an incredibly long run of football success, with occasional short spans of relatively poor performance on the field. We Sooner fans are terribly spoiled, like those of other "top tier" NCAA football teams: Michigan, Ohio State, Alabama, Notre Dame, Nebraska, Texas, Southern California, and so on. To not be competing for the national championship is to fail.

It's obvious that the main result of being consistently competitive at that level is a huge fan base that essentially pays for the program's success with their ticket purchases, game concessions, purchases of team memorabilia from the university-sanctioned franchises, and huge donations from rich alumni. The fans want their teams to be competitive at the highest possible level and are willing to pay the price to make that happen. In fact, some fans go beyond the legal limits on what they should be doing in order to help their favorite team become successful. This corruption is but one of the downsides to the transformation of NCAA top-tier football into a business, rather than a mere sporting event. [This transformation mirrors the transformation of universities from being educational institutions into businesses!] As with any business, success breed more success - just as failure breeds more failure. Big-time NCAA football schools tend to remain successful for long periods and the next tier can only hope for occasional flashes of moderate success that aren't sustained.

The BCS system emerged from the legacy of the old Division 1A within the NCAA. But the BCS has become a huge cash cow for the universities that manage to make it to the top levels in the sport. The bowls that form the post-season for good teams mostly are big money-makers for the sponsors. The fans spend their money on travel as well as tickets, concessions, parking, and memorabilia. Successful coaches command enormous salaries before they even win a game at the institution that's buying their services. Some of the players themselves are corrupted by the vast amount of money flowing into the university coffers, wanting to get a piece of the action in exchange for their services to the success of the program. After all, they get little or nothing in return for their contribution - except a free education, and room and board [for which non-scholarship students (or their parents) pay many tens of thousands of dollars], which isn't valued very highly by some of these athletes who believe, with some reason, that they aren't ordinary students. Sports agents hover around the top athletes, hoping to convince the players to buy their services and command the largest possible salaries as NFL rookies. To many of the athletes, the university is mostly a path to the big NFL payoff to come, not an education. In turn, the university regards their athletes as expendable assets.

I enjoyed NCAA football most at OU because the four years I spent following football at the University of Wisconsin were characterized by declining football success on their way to an extended period of mediocrity. Of late, things have changed for Wisconsion, and although I still root for them as an alumnus, I don't have the same emotional involvement with them as I have with OU. Why is that? My very first year at OU, the fall of 1967, the Sooners had a 10-1 season, winning the Orange Bowl. Being at the games in Owen field was tremendously exciting and I was hooked as a Sooner fan. Everyone likes a winner, of course. When the team is winning, it's "we" are winning - when losing, it's "they" who are losing! Clearly, I loved being associated with a winning team, like any fan, after the blah feelings I experienced in Camp Randall.

More to come in Part 2

More crockumentaries ...

2011-12-26T23:56:00.002-06:00

I just watched an awful show on Discovery Channel: 2011: The year the Earth went wild. It was a long litany of distortions and outright hogwash, including blaming La Niña for all the weather events. I also got to watch the sound bites contributed by my friends offered in support for all the terribly distorted conclusions mandated by the show's producers. I feel for them. I've been there, done that. I, too have had my name associated with more than one TV "documentary" laced liberally with lies and distortions. My sympathies to them.

The idea that the natural disasters of 2011, of which there certainly have been many, are the result of the Earth "going wild" is perhaps the most ridiculous notion of the entire program. The premise is apparently that when bad things happen, the planet is somehow going insane. I can't even begin to imagine what such a concept might entail. How can a planet go insane? It's pure nonsense.

The very idea of what is "normal" has been distorted by the producers of these crockumentaries - in reality, it's normal for the geophysical hazards of the Earth to occur at irregular intervals. It's normal for earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, wildfires, tsunamis, and so on to happen. It's normal that in some years, more of these disasters happen than in other years. In some years, these hazards happen normally, by bad luck, to occur in places where loss of life and vast property damage is possible. Obviously, 2011 has had more than its "normal" share of bad geophysical disasters if you believe that every year is exactly like every other year. But what happened in 2011 is actually part of normal geophysical processes! Every year is not just like every other year. It's normal for the occurrence of disasters to be variable! It's normal for some years to have more disasters than other years!

The fact is that the Earth has been "going wild" from time to time, in one place or another, all along, for its entire history. This is actually what is normal! It's normal planetary geophysical behavior. Yes, the disasters caused by geophysical hazards create immense social impacts, and people seem to feel comforted, somehow (for reasons that escape me entirely) with the reassurance that this is the planet "going wild" rather than accepting the unpleasant reality that geophysically-created disasters are not freak events. They're normal!! The Earth is not always benign and friendly to humans - never has been and never will be - in fact, it can be downright hostile to human life and well-being from time to time.

So the show blames La Niña for all the bad weather - pure fabricated baloney!! La Niña is but one element in a complex tapestry of processes that produce the actual weather. To assign blame for weather disasters solely to La Niña or El Niño, or the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, or whatever, is scientifically unjustifiable. It's offering a pseudo-explanation to the great unwashed viewing public, rather than meaningful scientific content. If we assign blame to some process, does this make the victims feel any better? "Oh well, what could we expect? It was the evil La Niña that devastated us! Just knowing that makes it all better. And we certainly understand it so well, now."

Makes me want to puke!! We continue to fill the American public's mind with massive doses of bullshit!

Disbelief is not a belief!

2011-12-21T11:22:00.001-06:00

I just saw a YouTube posting about Sam Harris taking on a believer. But the post is not so interesting to me as the comments to follow, in which both sides offer some pretty sorry dialog on the topic. It starts off with a comment:

Like, I'm not even a believer. I'm just comfortable saying I don't know. But even this to many atheists is morally Wrong so there have been times where I've mentioned this off hand and been accused by atheists of being soft on religion or something of that sort. They can't keep their beliefs to themselves anymore than religious people can - they have to shove it down the throats of all the rest of us.

and he goes on to say:

A lot of the atheists I've met NEED to believe in atheism in the same way that some Christians NEED to believe in Christ. Its part of their psychological anatomy. Anything that diverts from atheism represents sin (or I guess "backwardness", "obscuratsm" [sic], etc.) to them. When one feels the need to prostelyze [sic] about their beliefs at EVERY available opportunity that person is DEPENDENT on their beliefs.

I see this sort of nonsense all the time in Internet forums. First of all, I have to say that it's not possible for atheism to be a belief system. Atheism is disbelief in a deity! Disbelief - the absence of belief - cannot logically be a belief! If this person is, as he says, not a believer, then he's an atheist whether he realizes it or not! The argument here seems to be a common one against atheists who choose to be open and "aggressive" about their atheism. Just what is "aggressive" atheism?

Consider the accusation in this comment that atheists are shoving their atheism down everyone's throat. I think what's happening is the following. If an atheist calls the logic of religious beliefs into question, this is perceived as shoving their atheism down everyone's throat. If atheists pursue litigation against government sponsorship of religion on the basis of the Constitutionally-mandated separation of church and state, this is seen as shoving atheism down everyone's throat. If atheists respond in any way to the open advocacy of religious beliefs that appears in every possible medium all the time, then they're shoving atheism down everyone's throat. Believers can pour out their beliefs repeatedly in every possible way but atheists can't respond in any way, it seems.

I'm probably wasting my time with this blog, but I hope at least a few readers might grasp the utter absurdity and hypocrisy of such claims about "aggressive" atheism.

Just how is questioning the logic of something forcing anything on anyone? Yes, of course, if someone questions someone else's religious beliefs, it's common for that to be perceived as a personal attack. Religious believers often are so deeply attached to their belief system that any logical criticism is interpreted as a personal attack on them. Almost always, the atheist has no such intent. The atheist isn't even attempting to convert the believer to a belief system (which atheism logically cannot be!), but rather is attempting to get the believer to see and acknowledge the illogic of their beliefs. It's usually the case that the believer brought the subject up in the first place and the atheist is simply responding to this.

In such discourse, believers usually resort to comments like the one in the Sam Harris video - to the effect that they're not making a scientific, logical, or evidence-based statement, but simply accepting their religious beliefs on faith. As an atheist, I have no problem with anyone believing whatever they want on faith or evidence or whatever but, as Sam Harris suggests in the video, some belief systems are considered generally to be completely illogical and worthy only of derisive laughter, such as his example of believing that Elvis is still alive. For the most part, atheists see most religious beliefs as in that category. You may be offended by that contention, but using logic to question religion is not shoving anything down your throat - unless you choose to reject logic as the basis for any argument whatsoever. If you categorically reject logic and evidence, then of course there's no point to further discourse. Your beliefs are logically unassailable because you reject logic! If you accept logic in, for example, scientific arguments, isn't it being consistent to apply logic to religion, as well?

People who support such things as teaching creationism in public education or putting religious icons on government property are the ones doing the shoving! They are the ones forcing their beliefs on everyone else. They cry "persecution" when atheists lead campaigns to oppose state sanctioning of any particular religion. They rewrite history to create the absurd notion that the basis for our US legal system is based on religious tradition, when it is quite clear that the very opposite is true. The religious right-wing projects their own aggressive behavior regarding their theocratic agenda onto atheists whenever those atheists speak up and oppose the destruction of the wall of separation between church and state here in the USA. The intrusion of religion into government is fast becoming one of the serious threats to Constitutionally-guaranteed freedom in the USA. But many believers feel that any protest against this gathering storm is "aggressive" atheism. Apparently, they're offended by any contrary viewpoint.

The commenter I mentioned at the top of this blog is typical of some atheists, who seem to think that atheists should keep their opinions to themselves and never question anyone's beliefs. Of course, they're entitled to their opinion. Perhaps they feel threatened by possible reprisals against anyone who isn't a believer wearing their belief on their sleeve. This isn't just a paranoid fantasy, of course - it's a fear backed up by reality! Atheists are discriminated against around the world and even in the USA - that's an undeniable fact. So for some timid atheists, the correct reaction is to shut up and quit trying to say or do anything about it. Most atheists aren't at all focused on shoving our disbelief down anyone's throat. You can believe anything you want, but don't force us to do so! For the time being, we have the Constitutionally-guaranteed right and we're free to exercise that right!

The Iraq war ends with a whimper ...

2011-12-15T12:05:00.002-06:00

The ill-advised burden of GWB's pointless war on Iraq has come to end. Its end kinda sneaked up on me. I'd forgotten the timetable for withdrawal, but we now have withdrawn, finally. The end of this agony is long overdue, and of course, it's another war that should never have been fought. No ticker-tape parades, no final victory. Just withdrawal - a whimper.

GWB's father chose not to remove Saddam Hussein at the end of the first Gulf War to liberate Kuwait. I can't pretend to know why he made such a choice, but I have to believe he understood what it would have involved and chose wisely not to follow that path. GWB, on the other hand, justified the war based on little more than lies about weapons of mass destruction and about the actually non-existent ties of Saddam to terrorism. It had no valid justification other than GWB's strange neo-conservative obsession with removing Saddam Hussein and installing democracy at the point of a gun. The Iraq War featured a classic blitzkreig campaign to seize the nation and remove its leader, but the army that accomplished that feat was not equipped or prepared to stay on as an occupying force. It would have taken many, many more soldiers to police Iraq after the "regime change" and to occupy them than it took to conquer it. Our all-volunteer military has been stretched to its limits by our wars, with many of them serving multiple deployments and having their deployments extended involuntarily.

Our troops have paid a heavy price for this war. Not just the thousands of US military deaths, the tens of thousands of injuries, the hardships on families, the lingering poison of post-traumatic stress (with all its impacts on soldiers, their friends, and families), and its hundreds of billions in dollars in costs (with its huge contribution to our national economic malaise). Some of our troops have participated in vile acts (e.g., Abu Ghraib), which is an inevitable price we pay in any war, even while the majority of our soldiers serve honorably, of course. War is always ugly and our politicians have disgraced the nation and let its warfighters down by leading us into this one for no good reason. We surely should be thankful it's finally over.

Perhaps the most difficult pill to swallow is that our troops have endured this agony for no good reason. They have not been defending our freedom in America. With the exception of the blitzkrieg campaign at its beginning, our troops haven't even been fighting another army. It's been yet another war with negligible justification against "insurgents" (a guerrilla war), where we suffer casualties without any strategy for "winning" that conflict. History has shown repeatedly that when one nation invades another, and the invaded nation is forced into guerrilla tactics, the war becomes unwinnable for the invader. Casualties continue to mount up, but the insurgency goes on indefinitely. Nationalism (a form of tribalism) always trumps political ideology.

As a Vietnam veteran, it has been painful for me to watch this war unfold. I even had to endure my son's deployment there, with its awful sense of deja vu. We have GWB and his neo-conservative politics to blame for this disgraceful mess. The christian nationalist party's (i.e., the GOP) politicians have taken the stance that withdrawal from Iraq has been a mistake. Show them how you feel about this "mistake" in the next election!

Although there's more direct justification for battling terrorism in Afghanistan, the history of that nation makes it clear that the war there is another unwinnable one. We need to stop being the world's self-appointed police. Get our troops out of that mess, too!

It was a tragic mistake to remove a sovereign nation's regime unilaterally when that nation actually posed no valid direct threat to us. The threat of terrorism is not anywhere near enough to justify the price we're paying - not just in ruined lives and dollars, but in the increasing willingness of a fearful US population to be more willing than ever to trade our freedom for what amounts to only an illusion of security. The terrorists are winning because they're forcing us to pay the disproportionate cost of responding to their terrorist actions. I say "disproportionate" because the actual impact of terrorism is minor. It's a tactic for the weak, and we should be strong enough to not give in to the fear being shoved in our faces by politicians for the sake of political gain.

More reflections on a career

2011-12-14T15:23:00.000-06:00

I was making a presentation recently to some forecasters about science-based weather forecasting methods. After the presentation, which included an extended discussion of my thoughts on what how best to use numerical weather prediction models in forecasting by human beings, I was thinking once again about the future of humans in the weather forecast business. I have a number of essays that touch on this general topic, and I'll not go through all of that here.

My recent thoughts were focused on what I maintain is the likely outcome in the future - that public sector forecasting will come to be dominated by automation. Humans may stick around like useless appendages, much as firemen continued to ride on diesel locomotives long after the need to maintain a hot fire in a locomotive had disappeared. But the role of humans as creators of the forecast will be increasingly limited. The economics of weather forecasting are inexorably aligned against human forecasters. We don't invest in improving in human forecasters to anywhere near the extent to which we invest in automation. The eventual outcome of that imbalance seems pretty obvious. As most human forecasters add less and less positive value to the automated forecast products, they hasten the day of their eventual disappearance. There may continue to be some role for humans in the private sector, of course, although even there the drive to rely on automated products is strong.

My entire career in the science of meteorology has been motivated by a hope to unite the science and its research results with operational forecasting. A large fraction of that time has been spent seeking ways to use science to help human forecasters, many of whom I'm proud to call my friends. Some of them have found my work to be helpful, and that alone justifies any effort I spent on their behalf.

Whatever miniscule measure of "fame" that might be attached to me as a consequence of my work can be attributed to my having chosen to spend my efforts doing something that had only a small number of "competitors" - there just aren't many folks occupying the interface between research and operations. It's relatively easy to be a "star" when there are so few folks doing it!

What I see in the future, then, is the eventual obsolescence of most everything I've striven to accomplish. If human forecasters disappear, at least in the public sector, then my career will have achieved little of any real permanence. But the more I think about it, I do not see this as something to make me feel sad or regretful. I'm not ashamed of what I tried to do, certainly. The impermanence of science is part of its attraction to me. The field moves on - new ideas replace the old, new methods supplant earlier approaches, and so on. If you're hoping to achieve a scientific form of immortality, it likely won't happen. Isaac Newton is still remembered today, and it's likely he will be indefinitely. But I'm most assuredly not in that rarified air at Newton's level!! I'm quite satisfied (and feel fortunate, in fact) to have been a participant in the science that had attracted me so strongly as a boy.

Something of my work may continue to be mentioned in historical reviews, but in 500 years, it's unlikely that a meteorologist of the future will have heard of me or what I've worked so hard to produce. I'm just fine with that. The thought doesn't depress me or indicate that I'm depressed. There's a good chance I won't live long enough to see the eventual destiny for human forecasters that I foresee - I'm becoming a dinosaur - but I had a lot of fun doing the "work" and the science has been very good to me.

Just what does the Heisman trophy mean?

2011-12-11T06:32:00.001-06:00

Robert Griffin III (known as "RG3") is the most recent Heisman trophy winner, and he certainly had quite a year for a 9-3 Baylor team that achieved far more than most Baylor teams of late. This quarterback clearly was a valuable player on his team and has been for virtually the whole time he's played for Baylor. How many times has Baylor beaten both OU and the shorthorns of UTx in the same year? Besides, anyone with III as a suffix to their name has to get my respect!

That said, however, I've struggled of late trying to grasp just what the Heisman trophy means. Wikipedia says the Heisman trophy is awarded annually to: the player deemed the most outstanding player in collegiate football. The entry goes on to discuss some of the controversy regarding the Heisman, including regional biases and so forth.

What I find so puzzling is the clear dominance of quarterbacks and running backs in the history of the award. Just how is "the most outstanding player" to be defined? What criteria are used? How does one compare performance at different positions? Although players at positions other than quarterback and running back have on very rare occasions been selected, who's to say the most outstanding player in college football that year wasn't a tight end, or a blocking fullback, or (horrors!) a lineman? Defensive players are not generally given much consideration, either. Neither are the players limited to special teams.

This very clear bias for quarterback or running back raises the question: which position is the most valuable? Evidently, the belief in football is widespread that quarterback and running back are the most important/valuable. But football is a team game and this bias in awarding a trophy to the putative year's "best" player is simply inexplicable and unjustifiable. There's no plausible reason to restrict potential Heisman winners to two positions on a team with 22 positions to fill (to say nothing of special teams). As good as RG3 has been, his team has been mired in mediocrity most of its history. Why? Almost surely because the players around even good Baylor quarterbacks (like RG3) haven't been the kind of supporting cast that would permit Baylor to be a dominant team.

It's also clear that a Heisman winner must come from a school with a winning season that year. Apparently, the "best" college football player of the year must play with one of the top-ranked teams. Presumably, this is because if the "best" player is on that team, he elevates it to the top tier that season. But who's to say the "best" player of the season isn't on a losing team? Why not some lineman struggling to achieve and doing so on a team otherwise loaded with mediocre players? From where I sit, however, winning (as well as losing) doesn't depend on just one player! One reason I enjoy being a fan of college football is that it's the ultimate team sport - every player must perform consistently at a high level for the duration of the game if the team is to perform at a high level.

Landry Jones, this year's OU quarterback, was mentioned in the Heisman discussion for a good part of the season, but the team failed to perform in three dismal losses and Landry Jones had bad "numbers" for the last three games of the season, with zero TD passes and a number of turnovers. Can we lay the responsibility for that entirely on Landry Jones? He certainly fell out of consideration for the Heisman trophy after the second loss of the season. Apparently, the team's losses were entirely his fault, at least insofar as the Heisman debate was concerned. By the way, OU finished 9-3, just as Baylor did.

In my book, the Heisman trophy is both without a clear and justifiable definition of the terms used to judge its winner and based on a concept that is antithetical to the very game involved. It's a type of popularity contest that's unjustifiably limited to a few offensive team positions on a winning team. No player could ever win the Heisman without the consistently good performance of his teammates! I decline to attach much significance to the Heisman trophy, and it certainly is not a good predictor for football performance in the NFL. It's a trophy with no meaning.

Lingering thoughts after Veteran's Day ...

2011-11-30T15:17:00.001-06:00

A respected friend posted some comments about the outpouring of support for soldiers that got me to thinking. Among other things, he said, "I don’t get all gooey over US soldiers. ... Yes, I applaud the admirable courage our soldiers show, and our veterans have shown, as well as their commendable devotion to duty. But that courage extends only so far: our military men and women can face enemy fire without fear, but they cannot face down our misleaders with the same audacity."

I've told the story of my "service" in Vietnam and the circumstances by which I came to be there on my Website. As a draftee who was pulled from graduate school, I surely had no wish to go, but was presented with three options:

1. Allow myself to be drafted
2. Go to Canada
3. Go to jail

[The only way I could claim to be a "conscientious objector" was to call upon religious beliefs - not an option available to atheists like me. The apparent assumption is that it's impossible for atheists to be conscientious!] The latter two options were unacceptable as they would have destroyed my intended career. I definitely had no wish to be a soldier and certainly was afraid of going to Vietnam. It's often said that courage is not about being without fear, but rather doing what is needed despite that fear. For years, I despised myself for not having the courage to take either option 2 or 3 - I saw my actions as cowardly, not courageous. I opposed the war in which I eventually was to serve and yet couldn't find the courage to oppose those who demanded my service - my "misleaders" as so accurately named by my respected friend. So his comment is accurate: it takes a lot of courage to defy military orders on conscientious grounds! Far more than most warfighters are able to muster.

With time, I've come to see that military experience as valuable to me, regardless of how I felt about it at the time. I'm no longer ashamed of being a Vietnam veteran, and have forgiven myself for not being courageous enough to avoid military service. It's not really possible for anyone not a veteran of military service to understand what it's like. Since I think I have some insight into that experience, I find myself very much "gooey" about today's young people in the military. It's easy for me to be empathetic, and the ongoing military service of my son is only a small part of the reason for that.

As a nation, we've evidently learned that we can hate the war without hating the warriors, so I'm happy to see the respect given to those serving today (that we who served in Vietnam did not receive from the general populace). As pointed out by my respected friend, no war fought since WWII has involved a direct threat to our national freedoms, despite the political posturing that even today asserts that our warfighters are "defending our freedom." Those freedoms are under more threat from chickenhawk politicians who wrap themselves in the flag and carry a cross to display their "values" than they are from those "enemies" we've fought against in our many wars since 1945, including Vietnam, of course. Virtually none of these politicians have sons or daughters in the military, and most of them never served themselves. They can gamble the lives and well-being of others by calling for military interventions, but not their own, in service of their political ends.

It's not the fault of those serving in the military that we have put our young people at risk in stupid, unwinnable wars. It's the chickenhawk politicians who are responsible for wasting the lives of our young people and those of the foreigners we kill in the process. The soldiers are simply doing what they're ordered to do. To refuse to do so on conscientious grounds is to incur massive recriminations. Mutiny or defiance of direct orders are serious offenses in the military. Young people are preferred as soldiers because they're relatively easy to manipulate. Making a soldier out of a civilian young person involves rewarding them for doing what they're ordered to do and punishing them severely for any hint of defiance. Service to one's nation in the military is to do whatever is required of the warfighters by the politicians, who decide the ends and sometimes choose to use military action as the means to those ends.

There are few demonstrations against the wars we currently fight because Vietnam taught the politicians about the danger to their political ends from conscription (i.e., the draft). No more college students at the barricades if we just avoid drafting them. College students aren't so likely to be concerned about those who choose the military as a viable career option; they're too busy preparing for their own privileged careers to risk being beaten up in a demonstration against foreign wars. Our all-"volunteer" military is stretched thin by the wars we're fighting now; there simply aren't enough soldiers, so the ones who are serving are required to bear the risks of multiple overseas deployments and involuntarily extended tours to combat assignments, rather than the one-year tour in Vietnam given to many 2-year draftees back in the 60s and early 70s.

Those young warfighters deserve our respect and support! They're making huge personal sacrifices every day to carry out the ends decided upon by chickenhawk politicians who don't have to suffer the consequences of those decisions.

Yes, let's leave god out of Thanksgiving!

2011-11-29T00:10:00.002-06:00

I was watching Jon Stewart's Daily Show tonight and found that Faux News apparently was incensed about President Obama-Fail having left god out of his meaningless Thanksgiving Day address. Of course, I missed all of the holiday celebrations as I was overseas last week. Evidently, the clear intent of this sermonizing masquerading as news reporting was to provoke even more negative feelings about our President within that group of right-wing ideologues who actually watch and believe what they see on Faux News - sort of preaching to the choir, that. More justification for liberal-bashing and demonizing the heathen Democrats? Is there some crying need by Rupert Murdoch (who pulls all the strings on his Faux News marionettes) to increase polarization in America still further?

As much as I dislike all the religious pontification during the christian holidays (Christmas and Easter) about the secularization of these apparently religious celebrations and the canard of christian persecution in the process, I'm simply astonished at the need some folks have to bring the subject of god up on the clearly secular holiday of Thanksgiving. If believers want to thank their deity for their blessings, that's fine by me, but I see absolutely no reason to force that requirement on the rest of us by means of making it politically necessary that the President do so. [Apparently, according to Faux News, even GWB left god out of his Thanksgiving address to the nation one year out of his eight, but apparently this wasn't considered newsworthy by them at the time. Can they not see their own grotesque hypocrisy? Guess not.] The President is the titular head of a secular nation, despite the revisionist, false American history the religious reich wants to force down our throats.

Of course, Christmas and Easter celebrations are not actually religious events - as holidays, they predate christ. These particular holidays originated as pagan festivals associated with the winter solstice and vernal equinox, but were co-opted by the christian church hundreds of years ago, who inserted their own self-serving mythology into heathen celebrations and claimed these occasions as their own. Hence, all of this weeping and gnashing of teeth over the putative loss of christian religious significance during the christmas and easter holidays is misguided: they weren't christian to begin with!

I don't necessarily enjoy the crass commercialization of holidays, either. Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are just marketing tools to get more people to buy more stuff they don't need and can barely afford, just to keep the big corporations rolling in cash to give to their grotesquely overpaid management. If there ever was a "true" meaning to these celebrations, it was to be happy that (a) the days would begin to get longer again [winter solstice] and (b) the end of winter [vernal equinox] - these are Earth-centered celebrations about getting through the tough times of winter. Given our economic situation, there may be even tougher winters to come ...

Thanksgiving is a time when Americans recall that "First Thanksgiving" when heathen savages (native Americans) helped the Pilgrims celebrate their harvest in 1621. This despite the Pigrims having stolen their land. Of course, in the years to follow, the new European settlers would be consumed with the hubris of "manifest destiny" as justification for committing genocide on the native Americans who participated in the first Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving was proclaimed a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, in the midst of a tragic Civil War. Although the Civil War era was also characterized by deep religious fervor on both sides (each believing sincerely in the clearly delusional thought that the same god was on their side, of course), this was a secular holiday. It should remain so. The religious reich seems determined to push their beliefs into every corner of American life, but to do so would be eventually to destroy this nation.

Trust and credibility: Hard-won, easily lost

2011-11-09T09:06:00.003-06:00

Just days after a public outpouring of praise and honor for Joe Paterno's 409th victory as an FBS coach, we've seen a public spectacle of contempt and dishonor for Joe Paterno's moral failures as an FBS coach. All of the salutes for Joe's old-fashioned virtues and the squeaky-clean football program at Penn State have died away as accusations of sexual predation by an honored assistant coach have come to light.

In today's world of the Internet, social media, blogs, paparazzi, tabloid journalism and so on, the past 20 years have been drenched with instances in which highly respected people have committed gaffes of varying severity and in consequence been vilified, fired, and disgraced. The speed of ascent to fame and honor is often exceeded by the even more rapid pace of disgrace and downfall in today's world. An old saying has become a routine part of the way public figures must behave: With great opportunity comes great responsibility. Much is expected from those to whom much has been given. We now seem to delight in throwing our heroes down from the pedestals on which we placed them.

As someone who was molested as a young person, I can say without any qualification, that I believe sexual predators need to be prevented from having the opportunity to molest more victims, and no one should ever hesitate to call the police and report any allegations of sexual misconduct, no matter who is the alleged perpetrator. Jerry Sandusky has yet to be convicted of any crime, however. Joe Paterno may not be guilty of a crime, but by his own admissions, he's guilty of a moral error that would allow a sexual predator to remain free and unpunished. It's only recently that I find myself able to admit that I was molested and raped - the shame of this remained bottled up within me and, like many victims, the shame was too great for me to speak out. Many years can elapse between the deeds and their revelation. Fortunately for me, I managed to overcome what was done to me and my life has turned out quite well despite this incident when I was too young to know what to do about it. But my experience makes my emotional response to hearing about such predators pretty strong. Make no mistake, I have nothing but the deepest possible contempt for sexual predators - these are despicable acts of violence that have nothing to do with sex, per se. I feel no inclination toward mercy for those who commit these unspeakably abhorrent acts!

But the current spectacle of the sharks circling the Penn State campus, waiting for the inevitable firing of Joe Paterno, doesn't fill me with pride regarding our culture. Many media people are pontificating about what they would have done, without ever having been in that situation, and without knowing precisely what was said and done in the Penn State cases. None of us know what we would do until we're actually confronted with such a situation. It's clear that in the court of public opinion, no "due process" is necessary. Yes, it's easy to go along with the contempt stampede, and Joe Paterno's successes as a football coach are indeed quite irrelevant to this situation. What Joe Paterno failed to do with the information he had about the alleged sexual predation is indeed a mistake. It's indeed wrong to have failed to report what he knew to the police and some might even consider it criminal negligence. But can all of the people calling for his head honestly say they've never done something morally wrong? It isn't Joe Paterno who's accused of sexual predation, after all.

Joe Paterno has been on a pedestal for many decades, not just because of winning (although that certainly is a big factor), but perhaps even primarily because of the apparent integrity of the Penn State football program. No recruiting scandals, no coaches abusing the players, no payoffs by local boosters, high graduation rates, and so on. Whether that was his goal or not, Joe Paterno was being held up as the epitome of coaching integrity just days before this scandal broke. So when we find out that our hero was flawed by being unwilling to report the allegations of misconduct by a colleague and friend, all of those decades of integrity are instantly swept aside. Honor and praise are instantly replaced with contempt. It's as if all that came before had never happened, and the mighty fall with a great crash.

I've learned that decades of trustworthy behavior mean nothing when a single act (of commission or omission) can result in the loss of trust forever. A single mistake is obviously one too many for a legendary figure. Our heroes are held to what might actually be an unrealistic standard, since our heroes are human beings, never truly gods. Joe Paterno's coaching legacy is forever stained, no matter what plays out in the courts: the real judicial courts or the court of public opinion. Is that fair? Absolutely not. But fairness is a concept that has little to do with the real world, as most children learn eventually. Much of life is not fair. Trust and credibility must be upheld every day, without fail. If you wish to keep trust and credibility, there can be no failure. This is just as true for nobodies as it is for legends, but it's the downfall of legends that we seem to find so fascinating. Fascinating enough for a blog entry, at least.

This spectacle of the fall from grace of a formerly revered public figure saddens me, not just because of the cost to the alleged victims of Jerry Sandusky, but because it exemplifies the unrealistic expectations that we place on other, fallible human beings. I know I've made mistakes - many mistakes, in fact. And not all of them in the ignorance of my youth.

What does freedom of speech mean to you? Part 2

2011-11-02T08:53:00.000-05:00

Social networks allow "information" of all sorts to "go viral" and spread rapidly around the world. An example showed up this morning on Facebook - a photo of a young man (a fool) shitting on an American flag as a crowd cheers around him. This was attributed to a group of Occupy Wall Street protesters, so it sparked the stereotypical responses of knee-jerk American conservatives (who apparently oppose the OWS movement without really having any idea what the protesters represent), proposing that such acts should be made a felony, shoving the flagpole up the guy's ass, zapping the guy's testicles with a taser, making him "walk point", etc.

Turns out the photo is not actually associated with the OWS movement at all, but rather with an antiwar protest in Portland, OR, in 2007 - see here. Whoever started this photo circulating on social networks must have known this was not an OWS protester, so the obvious intent was to discredit OWS by stirring up the reactions of "patriots" who fail to understand certain key principles. Given the speed by which misinformation spreads by "going viral," it would take time to tease out the truth, and by then, the damage to OWS credibility would be done.

I'll get to those key principles shortly. First, however, I want to say that I find this photograph disgusting and will not share it on this blog. Such an act of desecrating our flag is not something I condone nor do I find it particularly effective in expressing unhappiness over our participation in unwinnable, pointless wars (like Iraq and Afghanistan). Obviously, if it were the acts of an OWS protester, it would reflect only discredit on the movement and not help their cause in any way. Such are the deeds of a fool, no doubt carried away with the emotions of a protest and likely an attention-seeker who may be in need of some serious counseling.

Now, let's move on to the reactions to this disgusting act. Any nation's flag, and ours is no exception, is only a symbol. Our secular society recognizes no truly sacred objects, so while an important symbol to many, the flag is not a sacred object. The specific symbols on the flag represent the 50 states and the original 13 colonies, but the symbolism has a deeper level: our flag is a symbol for the freedoms we share. The great experiment embarked upon with the founding of our nation involves protection of "inalienable rights" for all Americans. Rule of the majority, certainly, but protection of minority rights at the same time. That is the key element that made America unique in the world.

Freedom of expression/speech is one of those constitutionally-guaranteed rights that many Americans have given their very lives to preserve. And that freedom means exactly nothing if it only is extended to those with whom we agree. Burning or otherwise desecrating our flag is a symbolic act. It's a form of expression of opinion, and so is protected by the Bill of Rights, no matter how offended we might be by such an act.

In their haste to condemn the OWS movement, the conservatives have reverted to the 1960s: the protesters are stereotyped into dirty, lazy, irresponsible bums who want to destroy the nation that gave them birth and opportunity. Well, our nation has come to be dominated by wealthy, modern-day "robber barons" who've used their wealth and power to plunder the economy and walked away scot-free for the most part. They retain their yachts, their luxury homes, their limousines, and their huge incomes despite being responsible for vast economic disruption via actions that are either illegal or only marginally legal thanks to a compliant government that has become convinced that economic stability is gained through deregulation. It was deregulation that opened the doors for these greedy bastards that presently run Wall Street and, indirectly, the American economy. Most of the OWS protesters are people who have suffered huge economic losses with the implosion of the housing bubble and the costly bailouts of the too-big-to-fail corporations. It seems to me we have cause to protest what's going on, as the gulf between the haves and have-nots widens - these protests are just the beginning of what is to come if something isn't done about our present policy of "welfare for the rich". The wealthy aren't creating jobs, aren't hiring the unemployed, and the "trickle-down" theory has been completely discredited by reality.

The right-wing ideologues want to demonize the protesters to maintain "business as usual" for their corporate allies. As noted, there are some parallels with the 1960s - although the government learned from the events of the 1960s not to start drafting students if they wanted to maintain peace and tranquility. The OWS movement isn't about protesting stupid wars, but rather protests our stupid acquiescence to being fleeced by wealthy thieves who break the law with near-impunity and then have the gall to pontificate about the righteousness of the law when it's applied to protesters!

Unfortunately, the protection of the rights of such fools as this guy in Portland for expressing his opinion in a particularly disgusting way is a critical part of protecting what our flag represents. Such deplorable acts do not touch in any way those principles that made our nation so great. Those principles can only be hurt if we choose to abandon them in our pseudo-patriotic fervor. The greatest desecration of our nation would be to make such acts illegal and prosecute our citizens for expressing unpopular opinions in unpopular ways. By upholding the rights of a fool to desecrate our flag, we actually affirm the principles represented by that flag! Surely we understand that our freedoms are quite capable of enduring the attacks of fools!

What is it about sports? Part 4 - Which team is best?

2011-10-29T10:15:00.003-05:00

Having just seen the St. Louis Cardinals squeak into the postseason and then win it all, it reminds me of some thoughts I've had regarding postseason playoffs, especially with regards to college football. There's probably a majority of fans who want to ditch the BCS one-game "playoff" and go to some sort of a playoff for FBS teams to determine a "true" national champion.

Given that virtually all other NCAA championships are determined by some sort of postseason tournament, there seems to be no reason not to make big-time college football the same as other collegiate sports competitions. But I'm of two minds about this. Yes, it would be nice to wind up with what would become an undisputable national champion, supposedly settled by performance on the playing field rather than something so heavily influenced by opinion polls and computerized ranking schemes. Then FBS college football would become indistinguishable from pro football (except for the salaries!). And that's the rub for me.

As we witness the degrading spectacle of FBS teams engaging in an orgy of "realignment," it becomes quite obvious, even for anyone who has been operating in a vacuum for the past 25 years, that FBS football has become all about the money that football generates. Traditional rivalries? Who cares, when big money is at stake? After all, universities are businesses now - they long ago ceased to be primarily about education, anyway. NCAA football is simply the low-paid minor leagues for pro football now, and all of the fun and tradition of amateur athletics is disposable in pursuit of the almighty dollar! For the best athletes that universities can buy (and offer them a showcase for their talent in pursuit of a roster spot on a pro team), they rake in millions in revenue - which allows them to attract even more top athletes. No one cares much about the majority of college athletes who don't go on to a career in the pros, anyway. They're only along for fun and to support the play of the real playmakers - big-time collegiate sports is about revenue, not fun!

And just what does a playoff produce? It inevitably produces a champion at the end, of course. But the arguments go on about just which team is the "best"! [My definition of "best" is to be offered below.] In the minds of some fans - the fans of the championship team - their team was best because they won the playoff. Period. End of story.

But as we have seen in the World Series of 2011, the outcome of games can be highly dependent on things that may have relatively little to do with onfield performance: injuries, random bounces of the ball (or whatever), just missing or just making a play, the weather, coaching decisions, bad calls by the referees, the playing field conditions etc. Athletic contests are a fine example of nonlinear dynamics and it becomes quite possible for the hypothetical best team to lose a game during the playoffs owing to one or more of these non-performance factors. In fact, the larger the field of teams in the playoff, the more likely it becomes that the hypothetical best team will be beaten. Although playoffs always yield a final, surviving champion, the determination of which team was best that year remains undone. Arguments can continue indefinitely. And that seems rather like the way things are now, using the BCS system: a champion is determined but the arguments go on.

So here's my modest proposal for determining which FBS football team is truly the best. Each team will meet every other team multiple times, under a variety of playing conditions, weather, roster status for all the team's top players, home/away/neutral field, and so on. Just for the sake of a number, let's say each team will play every other team 100 times, and each game will involve different conditions. Since there currently are 120 FBS teams, this will amount to a rather large number of games for each team [(119 x 100) = 11, 900 games, so the entire regular season of FBS football will involve 11, 900 x 120 = 1, 428, 000 FBS games]. I guess this means the end of Saturday afternoon college football - they'll have to play multiple games every day of the week to fit in the required games (see below). But of course, college football has already spread to other days of the week! After all, prime time TV revenue is important.

At the end of this expanded "season" (from 12 games to nearly 12,000 for each team), the 16 teams with the highest winning percentage (ties will be broken by some sort of tiebreaker rules) would then enter the championship playoff. Each team would again play every other team in the playoff 100 times under a variety of conditions [for a total of 16 x 15 x 100 = 24, 000 games], and the team with the highest winning percentage would be declared the national champion (again with a set of tiebreaker rules). Think of the revenue this scheme would generate!! And the old argument that "If X played Y 100 times, they'd win PP percent of the time!" would actually be played out!

This "ensemble" approach to determining a national champion is a logical way to determine which team is actually the best, because the random, non-performance factors that seem to be so important to the outcome of a single game against an opponent would tend to even out over 11, 900 games. I admit, there are some practical issues that would need to be worked out, such as the degradation of the playing fields from playing multiple games every day, or the fact that it would require each team to play 10 games, 7 days per week, for 170 weeks (3.3 years) to just to complete the regular season, or wear and tear on the players. But these are just minor details. What counts is the enormous revenues this would generate and the chance finally to know which team is best! Once every few years ...

ENSO and tornadoes?

2011-10-27T20:44:00.002-05:00

Today, I had a nice discussion with a colleague who showed me some fascinating preliminary results of some analysis he'd done regarding the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and tornadoes. I don't want to steal his thunder, but what he showed me was that ENSO could explain about 10% of the variability in tornado occurrences. This number struck me as being a reasonable one - my position is not that ENSO is irrelevant to tornado occurrences, but rather that it's only a part of a much more complex set of processes that ultimately control tornado events. Much of that complexity is beyond the pale of existing atmospheric scientific understanding, unfortunately. The notion that only a relatively small portion of the variability can be attributed to ENSO seems both plausible and consistent with what understanding atmospheric science can offer at present.

Imagine my dismay when, later in the day, I read in the prestigious science magazine Nature for 22 September (p. 373) that "El Niño, a quasiperiodic cycling of tropical Pacific water temperatures, causes extreme weather around the globe." This tidbit of journalistic excess really set my teeth on edge after my earlier discussion today! ENSO is just one of many quasiperiodic "cycles" (e.g., the North Atlantic Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, etc.) that affect the global weather patterns and no doubt more will be discovered with time. ENSO is a player but far from the dominant one, and the resulting global weather pattern is the result of the interplay between all these processes (and those as yet undiscovered!). Attributing events exclusively to El Niño is outright nonsense!

Although ENSO apparently does modulate global weather patterns, there are many causal linkages between that global pattern and tornadoes, many of which remain unknown to science, at least in detail. To say that El Niño causes extreme weather is a ludicrous exaggeration of its influence. This sort of easy "explanation" often appears in media coverage of extreme weather events as a sort of non-explanatory explanation, similar to the "clash of air masses" nonsense often heard in media coverage after tornado outbreaks.

Once again, I'm reminded of the vast gulf between what's offered to the public and what I know as a severe weather scientist. I expected better of Nature, clearly, and was disappointed to see such an ignorant "explanation" for extreme weather events within this magazine. I've seen many scientists tempted by the siren song of ENSO as a way to explain interannual variability of tornadoes. It appears to be a seductive hypothesis, perhaps because there is just enough of an actual influence to convince many to pursue the topic - I wound up publishing a paper addressing some of the myriad problems in trying to establish a causal connection between El Niño and tornadoes. But the beat goes on, nevertheless - like the "clash of air masses," it's a simple "explanation" that just won't go away.

Is something wrong with tornado warnings?

2011-10-25T08:19:00.000-05:00

In the wake of this year's massive April tornado outbreaks and the 22 May Joplin tornado, there's been a lot of talk about changing the National Weather Service (NWS) tornado warning process. I don't know the inside scoop on what is being considered by the NWS, but there certainly has been a lot of media attention on the topic and it's my understanding that NWS is indeed considering changes. I see all of this as an inappropriate reaction to the large fatality toll this year. In some ways it's good to review the system and at least discuss whether change is necessary after a tragedy like this year, when so many lives were lost. But hastily-constructed change is not an appropriate answer to what happened in the spring of 2011.

The public should understand that the NWS system evolved over decades as a series of more or less ad hoc decisions made in a cloud of ignorance. If one were to ask today if the existing system is the best of all possible systems, I believe the answer would be a resounding "NO!" The NWS warning system was not constructed after careful study of what is best to do and how best to do those things. It was built on the fly, as it were. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that it's worked effectively over the years to produce a much-reduced fatality toll from tornadoes compared to those in the 1920s and before. If we change the way NWS warnings work, we should be careful not to to do so in haste under political or media pressure. Otherwise we run the risk of screwing up a system that has worked to save thousands of lives over the years.

This is not the place for a discussion of what's wrong with the NWS warnings - that's a topic far too complex to be dealt with properly in a blog. What I want to do here is to point out something I've been saying for a long time. If people in the tornado-prone areas of the country choose not to take warnings seriously, is this because of failures in the warning system? I find it to be extremely difficult to understand how people could not take a tornado warning seriously!! Nevertheless, it seems that this is not uncommon.

Consider the tale of three tornadoes - two in 1990 and one in 2011 ... the F5 tornado that hit Hesston, Kansas, the F5 tornado that hit Plainfield, Illinois, and the EF5 tornado that hit Joplin, Missouri. In the Hesston event, tornado warnings were issued and people apparently took them seriously - only one life was lost. In the Plainfield event, tornado warnings were not issued before the tornado, with 29 lives lost as a consequence. For the Joplin event, warnings were issued about 20 min ahead of the tornado and the current figure I have for fatalities is 159 - the most from a single tornado since 1947.

Not all NWS offices do an equally good job with tornado warnings. After the Plainfield event, for instance, a disaster survey team found many problems with the performance of the Chicago office. Having an F5 tornado strike with no warning remains possible, but is much less likely today than it was in 1990. The Springfield office that issued the warnings for the Joplin event did a decent job with a challenging situation, although they may have had a history of many false alarm warnings. Some of us have been saying for quite some time that large fatality counts are not necessarily a thing only of the past, and 2011 has shown those dire predictions to be true. We have been lucky for decades and in 2011, our luck simply ran out. It will do so again, in the future.

The sad, and seemingly inescapable conclusion I draw from this trio of major tornado events is that people in the tornado-prone parts of the USA need to understand the true risks from tornadoes. They don't need to live their lives in constant fear - far from it. The NWS offers state-of-the-art information about the threat of tornadoes and all people need to do is take it seriously enough to take actions to protect themselves. Why is this so difficult? Is it a matter of public education? I think that might well be an important factor, but not the only one.

There's been a lot of talk about too many false alarms from the NWS. While I agree the NWS warning performance is not perfect and not even as good as it could be, there inevitably will be uncertainty implied (if not stated explicitly!) in their forecast and warning products. People need to understand and accept that principle. The public must accept their share of responsibility for what happens when tornadoes strike, rather than placing the whole burden onto the NWS to provide some product for which the science of meteorology offers little hope of being an improvement over the existing system. Learning about the simple and inexpensive things anyone can do to protect themselves from natural hazards seems like common sense to me, not something too challenging for "the public" to do.

Making hate speech a crime?

2011-09-25T13:00:00.001-05:00

Today, via this blog, I came across this essay, written by an abortion rights activist. It's a thought-provoking essay, no matter what you might believe about the points she makes. It addresses the inevitable dilemma regarding free speech and its consequences. No sane person could rationalize the act of falsely yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater - the hackneyed example of a limitation on free speech. A while back, I wrote my own essay on the subject of free speech.

I'm not going to repeat all Ms. Arthur's arguments or go through them point-by-point here. The problem, as I see it, boils down to words and their consequences. It would be extremely naive to suggest that words are just words and have no impact other than what we choose to allow them to have (although I've made arguments to that effect). My right to free speech ends where it infringes on your rights as a human being. As already noted, after all, there are justifiable limits we've imposed on the right to free speech. Hate speech against someone, especially from a public forum, can inspire violence, even if the words contain no explicit call for violent action. The example Ms. Arthur gives of Bill O'Reilly's comments about Dr. Tiller, the abortion provider, make it clear that even though O'Reilly does a marvelous Pontius Pilate imitation when it comes to accepting any responsibility for Dr. Tiller's murder, it seems pretty obvious to me that he should be called to account in some way for his very public and very provocative comments. Mere words can have fatal consequences, it seems.

But we have a dilemma. If we make "hate speech" a crime, then its implementation would have to be very narrowly prescribed. Who among us has, at one time or another, not made strongly critical or even offensive remarks about someone else? Just where might we be able to draw a line separating such instances from prosecutable, criminal hate speech? How many children (and adults!) engage in verbal bullying of others? Lately, we've seen that such verbal bullying can result in terrible consequences - suicide or violent rampages by the target for such words. Should we prosecute any and all bullies, putting them in prison with thieves, murderers, and rapists?

Moreover, I find it pretty naive to believe that making hate speech a crime is going to eliminate hate speech, and make us a more tolerant society. Prosecution for theft, murder, rape, etc. hasn't caused those crimes to disappear, after all. Tolerance isn't going to become widespread if we make intolerant words a crime - rather, we'll only have made criminals out of people whose only crime is intolerance. The Westboro "Baptist" Church strikes me as a classic target for hate speech prosecution, and I just can't see how putting them behind bars (as detestable as they are) is going to be the key to developing a society willing to embrace all people.

Insofar as I can tell, we humans aren't wired for tolerance. Some of us may have the ability to overcome our tribalism by sheer will power and a commitment to rationality. But the "us vs. them" mentality is so pervasive that "hate speech" is pretty much everywhere. If I accuse a religious fanatic of being an "idiot" for saying that I'm going to hell because I don't accept his/her religion, is that "hate speech" that makes me liable for prosecution under a statute outlawing hate speech?

In some circles, using the word "nigger" (spoken by white person) is considered hate speech. Not only is it seen as being "politically incorrect" - it's seen by some as an incitement, rather than a mere word. If we start to "sanitize" free speech - to restrict it in ways that go far beyond the existing restrictions (many of which are listed in Ms. Arthur's essay) - by criminalizing "hate speech", then we'll have gone too far in restricting free speech.

We need to keep in mind that the Constitutionally-guaranteed right to free speech is not restricted to those words with which we agree or condone! If "hate speech" does wind up producing criminal actions, then we should prosecute those crimes, rather than adding the words that might have inspired them to the list of criminal acts. There's nothing in words that forces people to act in unlawful ways. Our actions are choices we make as individuals. Restricting free speech in this way simply inhibits the discourse among free people that we Americans traditionally have valued so highly.

Funding of the Norman Weather Center - An edifice complex

2011-09-23T12:40:00.001-05:00

Quite some time ago now, I wrote an essay regarding the funding of the Norman Weather Center (NWC). Some recent information I received from Ed Kessler (former Director of the National Severe Storms Laboratory) suggests that the fallout continues from the political decision to divert some of the underground oil storage tanks cleanup fund to this purpose. A few of us chose to offer our feeble protests in response to this environmentally unfriendly political decision by OU and the state government, but we were too few and marginalized to be effective, so we were simply ignored.

The growth of meteorological science in Norman was not the result of having a fancy building (with its imported Italian marble staircase and gurgling water feature). Rather, its growth into what it has become was driven by the science and the participating scientists, who generally shared cramped and decidedly unfancy facilities for most of their histories. The connection between the local OKC forecast office of the National Weather Service, the OU Department (before they became a "School") of Meteorology, the National Severe Storms Laboratory, the Oklahoma Climate Survey, and some other facilities represented a pretty loose collaboration of agencies. From my perception of things, they really didn't interact that much or that well. There's a host of reasons for that - but there always was some level of interaction despite being scattered in different physical locations.

Mere proximity doesn't mean interaction will necessarily follow. Interaction among people flows from the needs and interests of the participants. It can't be mandated effectively from above - it must come from a mutual desire to interact by working staff members in the respective agencies. There may have been a few examples of collaboration since the construction and occupation of the NWC building, but it might be difficult to show conclusively that they arose simply as a result of proximity and wouldn't otherwise have developed even if the agencies were still separated physically. The security paranoia that dominates government has led to restricted access to the NOAA components of the NWC. There still is only modest interaction among the elements of the NWC, as I see it. I'm certainly not opposed to proximity, per se, but it was promoted as necessary for the good things that were promised in order to justify the funding decision.

The price we paid for this fancy new building (that now attracts visitors who just want to see the fancy new building!) still seems excessive to me. If we've seen an increase in visitation by meteorological professionals from outside of Norman, that's a good thing, but did we need to have a fancy new edifice to accomplish that? I doubt it.

I wanted to use this blog to remind folks of what was done to allow us to have this building. I imagine that few folks in the NWC know about or remember the environmental price paid by Oklahomans to allow us meteorologists to have this facility. Our little community of professionals is permanently stained by the shame of putting our comfort ahead of the environmental needs of all Oklahomans. The ultimate irony is that we're supposed to be environmental professionals!

Growing up as a fan of Chicago sports teams

2011-09-12T17:23:00.000-05:00

I've often described, to anyone foolish enough to listen, the reasons for why I hate certain sports franchises. Having grown up in Chicago, I especially learned to hate the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned Yankees. Chicago sports fans have never gotten spoiled by the success of their teams. It seems that the owners of said franchises have a history of devastatingly stupid moves, guaranteeing years of mediocrity or outright incompetence for their teams in most years. It's no mistake that the Cubs have gone the longest without winning a World Series - despite having had many great stars on their teams over looooooong time since their last World Series win (1909).

Chicago authors, like Jean Shepherd, tell the tale of how much we Chicago fans hate the Yankees. Being permanently the "Second City" isn't bad enough. The Yankees fans, with their proud heritage and swagger about all their World Series championships, epitomize everything we Chicago fans wanted to be, and apparently couldn't have. In all the time I've been a Chicago sports fan, only the Bulls with Michael Jordan came close to being a seriously successful team - and were dismantled when Jordan retired for good. The Bears have mostly wallowed in mediocrity, but they managed to win the NFL championship in 1963, beating the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned New York Giants in the process! Oh happy day!! To be followed by 22 years of mediocrity and failure, despite such stars as Gale Sayers and Dick Butkus. The 1985 Bears seemed destined for a dynasty, which ... never happened.

The Blackhawks unexpectedly won the Stanley Cup in 1961, while I was in high school, with such stars as Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita, and Pierre Pilote. To be followed by decades of near misses and mediocrity until the miracle of the 2009-10 season. And of course, the next season, the Hawks were outsted from the playoffs in the first round (after a valiant effort that ... surprise! ... fell short.

Basically, if every New York sports franchise were to lose every game infinitely far into the future (a consummation devoutly to be wished!), it would take many, many years for our Chicago franchises ever to catch up. To be a Chicago sports fan is to know disappointment and classic chokes, punctuated with just enough success to keep the franchises packed with the faithful fans. Try to buy a Cubs or Sox or Bears ticket and you'll discover our fan loyalty. It's our fate ...

It helps somehow to have the Blues Brothers roaring down Lower Wacker Drive with the cops in tight pursuit. It helps when Man vs. Food features a show about Chicago's Italian beef sandwiches. It helps when we discover so many fellow Chicago sports fans to be here and there - the faithful scattered like autumn leaves around the nation. But the beat goes on for Chicago sports, and I guess I'll never get out of my mostly unrequited love affair with those teams.

New thoughts about 9/11/01

2011-09-11T10:06:00.003-05:00

Shortly after the tragedy of the 11 September 2001 attacks, I wrote an essay expressing my feelings. In reviewing that essay, I see no reason to change a word I wrote. I maintain that violence is not the solution to violence committed against us. We gain the dubious satisfaction of vengeance, but it can't bring back the lives of those whose lives were lost. It doesn't fill the hole left in the lives of family and friends of those killed in the attack.

I'm not saying that the efforts to root out and eliminate the perpetrators are wrong or misguided. Far from it, in fact. But if one considers the results of our "war on terrorism" - we now have lost more Americans in the name of that war on terror than were killed in the 11 September 2001 attacks. Politicians sent them to do the dirty work and they've died doing their duty. Add to that the horrible, disfiguring, life-changing injuries. And that number of American casualties is dwarfed by the deaths and injuries visited upon innocent civilians in those very wars. We've been involved in unwinnable wars of occupation in foreign lands, just as we were when fighting an ideological war in Vietnam. Our war on terror is a very effective recruiting campaign for terrorists.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have clear origins in religious conflict. The fanatic muslims responsible for terrorism are using religion as a tool for their political goals. Notice how it's not the leaders who are strapping explosives to themselves, or flying themselves into buildings. No, they inflame young, gullible people to do their dirty work without any risk to themselves. These muslim fanatics are the worst kind of "chicken hawk" - someone who supports combat so long as they themselves are exempt from its horrors.

In America today, there are christian fanatics who are, to me, indistinguishable from their muslim brethren. They seek to divide the world along religious lines and lead a holy war, a jihad, against the enemies they see. If we go down that road, a path that is openly in contradiction to the christian doctrine of leaving vengeance to the lord, and turning the other cheek when attacked, then we have become what we claim to despise. If we sacrifice our freedoms for the illusion of security at the behest of power-hungry politicians seeking to benefit from our irrationally exaggerated fear of terrorism, then we have lost something very precious that long has been the most important achievement of the United States of America. We have been a beacon standing for freedom and human rights, despite some setbacks to those freedoms during times of war. If we vote to make our nation a christian theocracy, we will have repudiated one of the crucial things that made America great. We will have let fear drive us to give up all that has made us into a light of hope for oppressed minorities around the world.

In this time of reflection on the events that occurred ten years ago, it seems to me that we would bring the greatest honor to the lives lost on that terrible day if we renewed our commitment to the system that so many Americans have died to preserve. The most effective way to fight terrorism is to preserve the very things in American society that the terrorists most despise and fear: our freedoms and the preservation of the rights of all Americans - especially those with whom we disagree!

Excuse me ... for living ... ?

2011-09-05T11:25:00.000-05:00

Many people spend a lot of time worrying about being polite. If by polite, one means being civil, I have no problem with that. I much prefer civil discourse to a shouting match. If by polite, one means saying "please" and "thank you" I have no problem with that. If by polite, one means saying "pardon me" when bumping into someone accidentally, I have no problem with that, either. Politeness is a set of conventions designed to prevent people from becoming upset with one another unnecessarily, which is all to the good. Being polite is a very human way to signal our good intentions.

Where I have a problem with politeness is the supposed convention of saying "excuse me" after some natural bodily function. There can be a large difference between an exaggerated belch, done for effect, and a simple burp. If someone is attending a solemn ceremony and belches unnecessarily loudly, does saying "excuse me" paper over what they just did? Does it make it O.K. to do such things? Intentionally disrupting a solemn event is usually seen as rude and signals a disrespect for the occasion. Mere words strike me as ineffectual when seeking atonement and irrelevant to the situation.

On the other hand, if someone simply burps in a relatively discrete way, I see no reason for apologizing or begging for forgiveness. Burping and flatulence constitute a natural consequence of the way our bodies work, so allowing those functions to occur isn't being impolite. It's just being human.

When a group of boys get together, it's almost inevitable that the conversation will come around to passing gas from the rear end of the digestive system - farting. In the silly world of boys (and men), belches and farts become something of pride, and the more odorous (and odious) and louder, the better. For some mysterious reasons having to do with our societal conventions, when girls fart, it's supposed to be quiet, discrete, and characterized by a smell akin to a rose garden - all untrue, of course. As most any married man can testify, most wives feel much less inhibited by such conventions with their families and cut 'em off just like a sailor, and then giggle about it. Saying "excuse me" after such an event strikes me as superfluous and even hypocritical. I'm on a hopeless one-man quest to eradicate the necessity to excuse oneself for acts made inevitable by living. And if they're obviously done with no effort made to be discrete, I'm even less inclined to accept "excuse me" as an excuse.

I don't advocate loud, noxious gaseous explosions in solemn situations. I know that the sound of belches and farts can be controlled to a certain extent, and I agree fully that it would be inappropriate to exaggerate such acts in some situations. Sometimes, however, the intensity is unanticipated by the person needing to expel that gas (from either end). It might well burst forth at a bad time. Asking for forgiveness afterward would be a natural consequence of the embarrassment associated with unintentionally calling attention to oneself by such a loud (and/or) malodorous act. Saying "excuse me" under such circumstances makes sense to me. The act amounts to an inadvertent "social mistake" and if one truly feels ashamed or embarrassed by that act, then it seems perfectly logical to ask for forgiveness.

But I think such forgiveness might be more difficult to grant if the deed were done with evident "malice" aforethought. No simple "excuse me" can atone for doing something intentionally disrespectful. If the same acts are done intentionally but in a situation where no real embarrassment is involved (e.g., between spouses), then the "excuse me" is again completely unnecessary. There are times and situations permitting loud belches and farts, and learning when to do them and when not to do them is part of becoming socialized. It seems obvious to me that learning when to say "excuse me" is also part of that socialization - it's just unnecessary in many situations.

I note in conclusion that in some societies, loud belches after a good meal aren't indicators of disrespect at all, but rather signal the host that the guest had a satisfying meal. So what is polite is simply a social convention and can vary from one society to another. So long as everyone understands the intent, then it works.

That's more like it?

2011-08-27T17:22:00.003-05:00

Many years ago, I first heard a story, although I no longer recall how I heard it. The story concerns Allen D. (Al) Pearson, who at the time was the Director of the National Severe Storms Forecast Center in Kansas City, MO (which eventually became the Storm Prediction Center and moved to Norman, OK). The story goes that some old woman was known to call the NSSFC and complain about every tornado warning for her location that turned out to be a false alarm. After a tornado outbreak in that area, Al got a call from the woman, whose home (the story goes) was utterly destroyed by a tornado. Her words to Al? "Now that's more like it!" This story may be apocryphal. I don't know for certain, but it illustrates something that has always left me puzzled about how "the public" responds to weather warnings.

This has been a year characterized by some of the worst tornado events in our nation's history. After several decades of relatively low tornado fatality counts, the nation has surpassed 500 fatalities with several months yet to go in the year. We've had a single tornado in Joplin, Missouri, kill more than 150 people for the first time since 1947 (the tornado that hit Woodward, Oklahoma). It's evident that tornadoes remain a deadly threat, which is what many of us have been saying for decades. There's already considerable whining and complaining that Hurricane Irene hasn't lived up to the "hype" generated by the warnings.

It seems that there are many folks who, like the old woman in my story involving Allen Pearson, seemingly would prefer to become storm casualties and have their lives and property devastated! I completely fail to understand the "logic" of this attitude. Of course, no one wants to alarm people needlessly, but the fact is that our ability to predict storms falls well short of perfection. False alarms are an inevitable consequence of meteorological uncertainty, as are occasions where a warning fails to go out and yet the event happens. The only way to never miss an event is to predict the event everywhere, all the time. The only way to never issue a false alarm is to never issue any warnings at all. Reality is such that the science leaves us somewhere between these two unacceptable extremes. An objective evaluation of the tornado warnings show that a considerable majority of them turn out to be false alarms. By the way, for most of its history, the USA's public weather forecasters never issued tornado warnings because they were forbidden to do so! It was feared by many otherwise intelligent folks that such a warning would cause a panic!

Some people have complained that the National Weather Service issues too many needless tornado warnings. There may be some validity to such complaints, especially when considering individual NWS offices, whose office policies regarding warnings can vary from one office to another. The basic idea behind this concern is the so-called "cry wolf" problem, where the working hypothesis is that "the public" is desensitized by too many warnings. Various proposals by various people have been made to remedy the problem, mostly impractical or unjustifiable from the point of view of the science of storms.

I've argued that the overwarning problem (if it is indeed a problem) is the direct consequence of one inescapable fact: no one is ever killed (at the time) by a false alarm! Forecasters are much more likely to be condemned for not issuing a warning, thereby missing a storm event that winds up killing someone, than by issuing a warning that turns out to be a false alarm. This is beyond any doubt the primary cause for the overwarning bias. I've argued that one way to reduce or eliminate this bias is to convert to probabilistic warnings. I hear constantly about how and why that won't work, but that's drifting off-point in this blog.

Consider the "desensitization argument": One comment that I hear quoted in the media from time to time is "Oh, we hear tornado warnings all the time, and nothing ever happens!" All the time? Really? I don't think the objective evidence comes anywhere even close to that clearly hyperbolic declaration. In any given location, even in "Tornado Alley", tornado warnings are relatively infrequent. Are people seriously expecting to hit by a tornado every time a tornado warning is issued? Why would people think that? What shortfall is responsible for such a patently absurd expectation? Surely all the weather broadcasters who are complaining about NWS warnings could have done a better job of explaining the reality of the warning challenge to their audiences! Nor am I attempting to make excuses for the NWS - in fact, I believe the accuracy of their warnings certainly could use some improvement. But someone needs to understand just why "the public" has this attitude and start a public information campaign to eliminate it!

This has been a terrible year for weather tragedies: not just tornadoes, but also high winds, floods, hurricanes, etc. Surely people should be thankful when a warning for potentially dangerous weather turns out to be a false alarm! There are hundreds of dead people from storm hazards so far this year, and likely thousands of their friends and families who, if given the option, would prefer that those events had not happened at all. That they had simply been another false alarm. Any of them happily would change places with some whiner grousing about false alarms.

If you choose to take the attitude that so many warnings are false alarms that you can ignore them indefinitely, there's a chance you may be wrong at some point in the future - dead wrong! Not a high probability, though. So you're most likely going to be able to live a long and productive life, complaining about false alarms to the end of your days. Shouldn't you be grateful?

Stock photography for storm photographers - Part 2

2011-08-24T03:41:00.001-05:00

So the landscape for photographers with regard to stock photography agencies has evolved into an exploitative relationship with corporate behemoths. While that might be good for the corporations, it's been bad for the photographers. What's gone on with regard to the niche market associated with storm photography, in particular?

When I began storm chasing, it was a very small "fraternity" (mostly males) that produced an even smaller number of serious photographers with (expensive) high-quality photographic equipment. As late as the late 1990s, there were just a few of us shooting medium-format images of storms. This was the apex of the niche market for storm photography and we all pretty much knew each other - it was a friendly competition, because there were so few involved.

But after the turn of the century, things began to change. Twister flooded the "community of chasers" with hordes of brand-new new chasers who gave little thought to the market for storm images. They were focused on themselves and their notoriety, not the photography market and not even the storms. At about that time, digital cameras were becoming commonplace, including some with relatively high resolution at affordable prices. Within a few years (say, by 2002), there were numerous chasers out there producing relatively high-quality images - often hungry enough for recognition that they would license their images for small licensing fees (even to the point of literally giving away their photographs for nothing!), in exchange for "fame" and personal recognition (worth little or nothing, in reality).

The corporate stock photography giants exploited the mass market of royalty-free and "microstock" images for their corporate "bottom line", where the price of individual images was reduced to very small values, in the interest of generating large corporate sales volumes (but giving back to the photographers only a very small percentage of the sales). Some well-known storm chase photographers participated in this "sell-out" by contributing their "seconds" to these "el cheapo" markets of royalty-free images and microstock. This, combined with the now-numerous chasers, flooded the niche market for storm photographs with inexpensive images of relatively high quality, contributing to a decline of market prices for everyone's photography. A few selfish pricks (I could name names!) among the serious storm photographers contributed their images to this inexpensive market niche, essentially accelerating the overall decline of value associated with storm images, to the point where the originally small niche market now is saturated with relatively inexpensive images. It's become impossible to ask for a reasonable price to license storm images - clients can find inexpensive or even free images with a little searching. You may think it's beneficial for promoting yourself to give images away for little or no value, but you're actually killing off the market value of your photographs, to say nothing of those from other photographers!

Relative newcomers to the storm photography market invariably are willing, more or less, to give away their images for the "credit" offered by image consumers. This "credit" is, of course, worthless! It gives virtually nothing back to photographers for the real costs associated with obtaining their storm images, but that illusion of recognition still seems to be an irresistible offer to the newcomer storm photographer. The result: the bottom has dropped out of the storm stock photography business. Naturally, a small number of self-promoters (again, I could name names!) might still be able to command relatively high prices for their storm images, but the rest of us are shit out of luck! It's become a dog-eat-dog world for storm stock photography. If you're able to make a living at it, you likely have squeezed out those of us who find self-promotion problematic.

Storm photography always was a small market, and it's been saturated by newcomers who evidently haven't thought through the business-related issues in their eagerness to promote themselves and their photographs. The "fame" associated with licensing an image for a low price not only kills off the market for other photographers - it destroys your market, as well as that of others!

UPDATE: I hasten to add that although I sell images at what I believe to be their fair market value, I'm not a pro photographer. Image sales have never accounted for more than a tiny fraction of my income, so I don't depend on image sales to keep a roof over my head and food on the table. Any profits I might have made have gone into supporting my photography habit. Nevertheless, I respect those who are pro photographers enough to refuse to give my images away for peanuts. Since I don't have to sell image licenses at all, I can charge whatever price seems right to me. If buyers don't want to pay that much, they're free to look elsewhere.

Stock photography for storm photographers - Part 1

2011-08-23T15:35:00.002-05:00

Back in the latter parts of the last century (mid-1990s), after years of occasionally licensing the use of my storm photography on my own, I was invited to join the stock company managed by Tony Stone. This was quite an honor, actually, since Tony Stone Images (TSI) was one of the most prestigious image stock photography agencies in the world. This promised to transform my storm photography into an operation that could help pay off the very real costs incurred by storm chasing, and perhaps even generate a modest profit, with which I could maintain and upgrade my equipment. It was around this time that I formed my own Oklahoma corporation, Chuck Doswell's Outdoor Images, Inc., which has become C. Doswell Enterprises, Inc.

Unfortunately, shortly after I began to submit images to TSI, they were bought out by what was then the start-up corporate giant, Getty Images. Tony Stone himself likely was paid handsomely from the sale, but we photographers who were bought out had no say in the matter. My original contract with TSI rant a scant two pages, as I recall. After TSI's takeover by Getty, all the former Tony Stone photographers were offered a new contract to sign, with a very clear black-and-white decision to make. It was about 27 pages long, mostly in unintelligible legalese (lawyer jargon). That sent a very clear message to me! The particulars of the contract offer by Getty were non-negotiable, which was another unmistakable signal! Anyway, I didn't sign. For five years after that, by the terms of the buy-out (about which I had no say, remember) Getty had exclusive rights to market those images of mine that they paid for when they bought out TSI, so I couldn't sell those particular images on my own. That time has long passed, of course.

It was clear to me from the start that Getty Images wasn't a business partner with its "content providers" (photographers), as TSI had been all along. A business partner negotiates agreements (contracts), rather than dictating terms. Instead, Getty was exploiting the contributed images to gain further market share, with aggressive license fee reductions to drive out competitors (or force them to merge with Getty). When I started with TSI, the photographers received 50% of any sales with TSI - a so-called "50% split". With time, Getty cut the photographer's split down to 30% (last I heard), or even less for some sales. Reducing the pay-out to photographers increased their ability to leverage their market share. Typical sleazy corporate business tactics. Getty sold some of my images for $1, so my take from the "sale" (more like a giveaway) would be 30 cents!! Plus, they bought out other stock companies, such as Visuals Unlimited (VU) Sadly, when VU was bought out by Getty, I had a contract with VU for a 50% split. When they became "partners" with Getty (i.e., they sold out!), then my split from VU became 50% of the 30% from Getty - that is, 15%! Getty had reached out and bit my ass again, even though I had never signed a contract with them!!

I still receive occasional checks from Getty and Visuals Unlimited for image sales from past submissions, but they amount to a mere shadow of what I used to receive. I certainly have no plans to submit more images to VU (or Getty). The stock companies siphon off the profits and give the photographers (now referred to as "content providers") whatever percentage the companies want to, and no photographer can do anything about it. Some ex-Getty photographers tried to resist at first, and formed the Stock Artists Alliance (of which I was a charter member) to try to stand up to the Getty steamroller. They basically failed in that effort, and I finally stopped renewing my SAA membership in 2009. There was no point. SAA got some trivial concessions but all the important matters (the split, for example) were simply non-negotiable and the SAA was powerless to do anything to change that.

The major stock companies, Getty and Corbis, have swallowed up most of the small-time stock photography operations. In the process, the former relationship between photographers and their agents has been transformed into one of exploited "contract workers" for a giant corporation. It might still be possible for photographers in general to make a reasonable living by stock photography - I have no direct knowledge of that - but I seriously doubt if anyone truly making a reasonable income by licensing photographs can only be working for these corporate giants. During recent times, my income from stock image sales has declined to become just a tiny part of the income for my corporation, so I had to branch out into other things, such as scientific consulting. Hence, the name change for my company.

Next time, I'll discuss how the specific market for storm stock photographers has evolved.

Magnifying a tragedy

2011-08-14T11:46:00.006-05:00

A terrible tragedy caused by a severe storm has occurred at the Indiana State Fair. You can watch a horrifying video of the event here, and read my colleague's commentary. I agree completely with him that these disasters are preventable, and some of us have been predicting these 'large venue' weather-related events for decades. Anyone familiar with the history of severe weather must come to the conclusion that it's inevitable that a really bad storm will intersect with a large venue event and create a truly large, devastating tragedy. This and several other similar recent events associated with concert stage collapses are just the warm-ups, unfortunately. One day, a significant tornado will hit a crowded 'large venue' - it's just a matter of time and the clock continues to tick. There have been some notable near misses and it's simply inevitable, even though no one (besides a handful of us) seems to care.

What magnifies this Indiana State Fair tragedy is that, like recent similar events, no one will learn anything from it! The whole mess will be papered over as an unfortunate "Act of God" - since god can't be sued and apparently won't be testifying in his own defense, there will be no assignment of responsibility for these deaths and injuries. The promoters will collect their insurance money for the damages and won't be called to account for any failures in preparation for a severe storm. Almost certainly, the venue operator had no plan in place to respond to a threatening storm and the people attending the event were not made aware of any actions they could have taken to protect themselves. If the promoters had a plan in place, and people were killed by a storm anyway, then they could be sued for having an inadequate plan! It's actually better and less risky for the promoters in our twisted, litigation-obsessed society to have no plan at all, and write it off as god's mysterious ways than it is to have a plan that may still result in casualties.

The losers, naturally, are the people affected by these tragedies - the people who pay for the tickets to attend the event, who buy the hot dogs and beer at inflated prices, and who suffer the consequences for the absence of preparation by greedy promoters and venue operators. The families and friends of the casualties also have to deal with the loss of their friends and/or loved ones. The economic and human cost of these events is never known fully.

Stage sets have no construction codes (UPDATE: see comments) - they're not designed to resist the wind and so are always vulnerable to collapse even in a relatively modest storm gust - perhaps even less than that 58 mph that qualifies it as "officially" severe. Venue operators are not required to make any preparations to respond in the case of an approaching severe storm. The show must go on - after all, profits are at stake! - no matter what might actually be looming on the weather horizon. These large venues often don't have anywhere for the crowds to go in the event of an approaching severe storm - no shelters. All they can do is cancel the event and evacuate. Just imagine thousands of people rushing to their cars in a panic, and then creating instant gridlock in the parking area as a tornado bears down on them. It's a terrifying thought to entertain but the worst part is that it's a very distinct possibility someday! You just can't evacuate thousands of people in the relatively few minutes warning you may have before a severe storm hits. The time to cancel the event is always well before the storm hits - and no forecaster can guarantee that a storm actually will hit the facility very far in advance, which is what venue operators likely will demand if they're going to risk losing money by canceling the event before the storm is riding up their backsides!

This is a no-win situation for everyone, it seems, except the venue operators. They call it an "Act of God" and walk away with some damage they have to spend their insurance money to repair. Just how much do we in American society value human life? Pious claims about that notwithstanding, it seems to me that all one needs to do is review the budget for the Indiana State Fair concert that wound up with five fatalities (Update: now it is seven!) and you can see pretty clearly how much each life was worth to them!

And we all bear some responsibility for this. Most people will just shake their heads in sadness and vow to pray for the unfortunate victims and their families - apparently to the same god on whom they blamed the disaster in the first place! No grass-roots movement to demand safety standards with real substance for large-event venue operators is likely to arise. Why? Perhaps it's widespread apathy. Perhaps it's an inability to consider that the next tragedy could happen to us, not someone else. Perhaps it's the political clout of large-event venue operators to fight successfully against any mandatory preparations for severe storms.

I'm not a weather forecaster by trade, but I can make a prediction here about which I'm pretty confident: the important lessons from the Indiana State Fair disaster won't be learned, no one will be held accountable for those deaths, and things will roll along to the next severe weather-related disaster at a large venue. Maybe if the next one is a really big disaster, someone might actually be moved to do something substantial to prevent more of them. But I'm not optimistic, even then. After all, there are those profits to be made ...

Things as they are ...

2011-08-13T16:32:00.004-05:00

I was discussing some issues regarding tornado preparedness with my wife, Vickie, this morning. She was describing some problems she knew about where incompetent, power-hungry nitwits had kissed asses to obtain their way, and thereby managed to render hopelessly inadequate certain storm preparedness levels in a place where many lives would be at stake should they ever be hit by a storm. This topic had been brought up in some email correspondence she'd had with a friend of mine, This friend of mine has a resume of qualifications that any sensible person should be eager to add to their staff, but he inexplicably has trouble getting prospective employers even to return his phone calls and emails. He's not my only friend with this sort of problem, and it truly saddens me when qualified, competent people are not given the opportunity to contribute while nitwits and the mediocre sit in their rightful place.

This got me to mulling over something that's bothered me all my life. When I was a boy, I imagined that all the strange, contradictory, and outright stupid things I saw around me might begin to make more sense, once I got older and could learn about the whys and wherefores about things as they are. My imagination was to prove to be totally wrong! As I've grown older, and indeed have learned more about how things really are, for the vast majority of instances, my lack of respect for things as they are has increased well beyond what it was when I was a boy! For the most part, things are worse than I imagined!! This is a pervasive problem that's everywhere - schools, government, the private sector - everywhere!! There's no paradise to be found anywhere, because all organizations are run by fallible, often stupid, and unqualified people!

Call me a cynic, if it makes you feel better. The difference between me and a cynic is that I've never completely given up hope that things as they are could be transformed into things as they should be. In my view of how things should be, incompetent nitwits should be struggling to find work, whereas the most competent, qualified people should be filling all positions of importance. Policies and processes within organizations shouldn't be driven by office politics and petty human jealousies, but rather reflect the realities they're intended to serve. Real accomplishments should be given their due, whereas sham accomplishments with no reality behind them other than someone's ego should never be given any significance. Awards recognizing performance should be going to those who truly have earned them, not to pretenders who didn't do anything to earn them other that to find the right ass to kiss, or learn the gamemanship in their organization.

O.K., call me an idealistic dreamer, if it makes you feel better. It always seemed to me that if I give in to cynicism, then the worst possible outcome results: I become what I've always despised. I become one of those organizational naysayers who resists every possible change because they're convinced it wouldn't work, or it messes with their power trip in the office, or it makes them look bad if policies actually need changing. Cynics are simply disillusioned idealists, who wind up contributing to the very aspects of things as they are that caused them to become cynical in the first place.

I'm not a cynic, but a realist. I know how things are in situations that matter to me - learning "the rules" (the real rules, which don't necessarily match what's down on paper) is an adaptive strategy that has always been helpful. I'm not usually in a position to make the rules, but it always seemed to me that if I wanted to accomplish something, I had to understand the rules well enough to find work-arounds, if possible. By being willing to pull no punches in pointing out things as they are, I've been in trouble of one sort or another many times during my professional career. So be it. As I discussed in a recent blog, I make no apologies for that!

To the extent that you have the energy and the will, you should never give up working for positive change, no matter how many times you're beaten down by the bastards who are responsible for things as they are. If you truly wish someday to see things as they should be, you should never, ever give up that hope. Don't sacrifice your principles for the dross of "job advancement" or the fear of vengeance from the coneheads. I'm over 65 and I don't believe I've ever given up any of my principles for the sake of some prize the system could offer me, or by the threat of some punishment. I certainly haven't succeeded in every battle I fought, but I've never given up the hope that someone smarter than me, with more energy and perhaps a key insight, can finally achieve those things I've failed to accomplish.

Death by ignorance

2011-08-10T23:34:00.004-05:00

My career in meteorology began with the apparently simple goal of becoming a severe storms meteorologist. Along the way, I began to study not just the meteorology of severe storms but also the statistics of specific severe storm events, including the fatalities associated with each storm. I’ve learned that understanding why fatalities occur isn’t just about the storms and the forecast. We meteorologists could issue pretty much perfect forecasts and yet people still will die as a result of storms when they hit populated areas. Why is that?

It’s fatalities that justify the cost associated with studying severe storms. Society invests its resources in our research with the hope that increasing our understanding of storms will result in improved forecasts, in turn resulting in reductions of fatalities associated with storms. Perhaps there’s even some hope of mitigating the damage such storms produce, as well. In my examination of storms and the fatalities they produce, I’ve discovered that a significant fraction of storm fatalities arise from ignorance! Not all fatalities, to be sure – there are other factors that cause fatalities: poverty, physical handicaps, age, etc. But I believe the majority of deaths are directly or indirectly related to ignorance. People drive into tornadoes. People drive into rising flood waters. People ignore severe weather warnings. Why? In part, the answer seems to be ignorance, in one way or another.

There are two types of ignorance: the first is simply a lack of knowledge. Everyone has gaps in their knowledge for the simple reason that no one knows everything. But there’s another type of ignorance: willful ignorance. This is when someone has a good reason to know something, because that knowledge could save their lives, but they simply choose not to learn. This willful ignorance has a synonym: stupidity.

If you live in a mobile home in central Oklahoma, you surely must also know two things. First, violent tornadoes occur regularly in central Oklahoma. Second, your chances of surviving a violent tornado in a mobile home are about one-twentieth as high as if you live in an ordinary frame home. You may not know point #2, but if you live in a mobile home, this is information you certainly should know. Your mobile home is a death trap in a tornado and your ignorance of the facts could cost you and your loved ones your lives! Should you choose not to learn these facts, you could wind up as a statistic. The mobile home manufacturing industry has been successful in blocking state legislation requiring mobile home park operators to provide shelters – this means they’re putting the lives of mobile homeowners at risk for the sake of their profits!

If you live in Massachusetts, which has a much lower frequency of violent tornadoes than central Oklahoma, you might feel justified in not learning about tornado hazards. Unfortunately, 90 people died on 09 June 1953 when a violent tornado hit Worcester, Massachusetts – likely many of them died as a result of this willful ignorance: low frequency is simply not the same as a zero frequency. Why be prepared to take precautions if the chances of being hit by a violent tornado are so low? Because you still might wind up in the path of a violent tornado! This complacency in the face of reality is another example of ignorance that can be (and has been) fatal!

On 03 May 1999, a violent tornado hit central Oklahoma. In a FEMA study, it was found that many of the homes in the path of the tornado were poorly-constructed, thereby sustaining much more damage than had they been built soundly. Equivalent findings have emerged from similar studies of the 2011 tornadoes - the assessment of homes in the path of the 27 April 2011 tornado that hit Tuscaloosa, AL showed that many of them were flimsy and not much more protection than a mobile home. How many of those homeowners had thought to check the structural integrity of their homes when they bought them? Most homeowners don't know anything (i.e., they're ignorant) of the issues associated with structural integrity of their homes. Chances are they're far more concerned about the bathroom fixtures and the kitchen cabinets than they are about the attachment of the walls to the foundation or the connection between the roof and the walls. But in a tornado, those structural issues can be the difference between life and death in that home. Can you really be uncaring about your home's structural integrity when your life and those of your loved ones are at risk? This recent study is not the first to point out the flimsiness of most frame homes in America. The way to change this is via changes to the building codes in our communities, but the homebuilders have been effective at blocking any changes to the very lax building codes that exist throughout the tornado-prone parts of the US. We learned in 1999 on 03 May that poorly-constructed (but not necessarily low-priced!) homes in central Oklahoma likely resulted in fatalities. This begs the question: are we learning nothing from these studies? Can we not implement policies to do something about this shoddy construction that is so pervasive in the tornado-prone areas of the US? Flimsy homes mean an increased amount of flying debris in a tornado, which increases the degree of damage caused by that tornado. It also magnifies the risk to human life from flying debris (one of the biggest causes of death and injury in tornadoes).

If meteorologists choose to accept the challenge to put their understanding to use in saving lives, it’s not just about putting out an accurate forecast with useful lead time. It’s also about encouraging our society to take advantage of what we’ve learned about how people are killed in severe storms. And our society can’t just ignore what they’re being told. People in our society need to accept their personal responsibility to choose to do something about their ignorance, at the very least in matters where their lives can be at risk!

It’s frustrating to be able to anticipate tragic events in the future and yet be powerless to prevent those tragedies. History is the key to the future, and the history of severe storms makes it clear that there will be an increasing risk from severe weather as a result of urban sprawl and more recreational use of areas prone to such storms. The tornadoes of 2011 have inflicted horrific fatality counts, far beyond those of recent history. Unfortunately, some of us realized well before the events of April and May of 2011 that there was no reason to believe that our good luck would continue forever. Events of 2011 have proven us to be correct in our forecasts, but that's small consolation for the disasters we’ve seen. More of the same is in our future if we choose to continue our ignorance.

Another atmospheric tease ...

2011-08-10T01:50:00.002-05:00

In case you're unaware, Oklahoma and Texas are experiencing record-breaking heat and drought in this summer of 2011. The lack of precipitation goes back to last year. The rain mostly keeps on missing us here in central Oklahoma. It's been worse to our southwest, if that's any consolation (not! - their misery doesn't make ours any easier to take!).

Tonight, I was preoccupied in the evening and missed the development of storms to our west. They were charging at us and we actually had a chance for meaningful rainfall - but the storms headed our way fizzled, only to re-develop to our east after the line had passed through here with only light sprinkles to show for it. A similar scenario occurred last night: storms all around but none of substance here! As a meteorologist, I know that the processes that result in weather are highly nonlinear and essentially random. Eventually, I know, we'll get some significant rain. But the feelings of frustration over being teased with nearby rainfall remind me of the 4 years I spent in Longmont, CO.

In Longmont, it almost never rains in the warm season. Storms that develop over the mountains typically dissipate by the time they get close to Longmont, only to re-develop to the east. And Longmont is between the Cheyenne Ridge and the Palmer Divide, so storms might fire north or south of us on those topographic features, but rarely near enough to Longmont to help us. In the neighborhood where we lived in Longmont, every yard (including ours) had Kentucky bluegrass! The only way to maintain such a lawn is to water it most every day - it almost never rains there in the warm season, after all. I spent many an hour maintaining that damned sprinkler system some previous owner had installed and never felt good about it. What a stupid thing - to grow a water-thirsty type of grass in the semi-arid rain shadow of the Rocky Mountains! Almost as stupid as a golf course in Nevada or Arizona!! Buffalo grass (a drought-resistant native grass) would make more sense.

Here in Oklahoma, our Bermuda grass simply goes dormant when in a drought. It only takes rain to bring it back to life. But the drought has other impacts - the dry soil cracks and pulls away from concrete foundations (and our pool sides), which undermines those structures and invites damage. So even here, the drought has more consequences than a brown lawn! And I'm struggling to keep flowers, shrubs, and the vegetable garden hanging on by a thread with waterings every other day.

Life in the interior of a continent inevitably involves weather extremes. That's what continental climates are like. When there are few severe storms in Oklahoma, there's likely to be a drought. Most people don't realize that most severe storms actually are a positive thing owing to the mostly beneficial rainfall they bring. Some areas to our east have experienced flooding, as storms have frequently developed near us only to move eastward away from us, without much rain here. Interstate-35 seems to be coincidentally located on a climatological dividing line!

As I await the eventual relief (which may be "sooner" - pun intended - or later!), I have to acknowledge this alternation between feast and famine is characteristic of these plains. The weather here is almost never "normal" - normal is just the average of extremes, here (and in most places). The range of extremes on the plains make their climate a harsh one in which to live. Our lifestyles often fail to recognize that reality. Everything has a price, it seems, and when the natural balance swings toward hostility to those lifestyle elements that depend on having a benign climate, that brings home how tough it can be to live here. In a strange way, it's a big part of what appeals to me about living on the US plains. Even if you want to, it's tough to ignore the weather here for long! It'll flat reach out and remind you - in a way you just can't ignore!!

The truth can hurt!

2011-08-02T12:23:00.004-05:00

Recently, the consequences of telling the truth as one sees it were made evident in a personnel decision of which I've become aware. A person whose name I'll not give here has had a reputation of being outspoken, including being critical of decisions made by the organization for which s/he works. This has never been a formula for rapid advancement, as I've seen several times during the course of my professional life. My colleague was passed over for a position for which s/he truly was most qualified - of course, the real reason for that decision is prejudice against her/him for being outspoken. This is not the first time this has happened to a colleague!

To put this in perspective, let me tell something of my own story. When I was in high school, I ran afoul of "management" for being a critic of the school in a public medium. For this "sin" I was called in to the office, dressed down, and tasked with writing a public apology. I wrote my apology in such a way that it was a non-apologetic apology, something no one in the school administration apparently noticed (or if they did, they decided it was sufficient, anyway). I never have had any respect for arbitrary authority figures (those in a position they believe should command respect simply because of the authority of the position itself), although I find it easy to respect those who have earned respect!

From that point on, I made a decision about my future: I wanted to get to a position where I could say freely what I thought without regard for recriminations. I realized that having a doctorate was something that, once earned, couldn't be rescinded. Being a contributing scientist put me in a position where my obligations and commitment could be directed primarily to the science, and not to any organization for which I worked. Once I graduated with my doctorate, I embarked on a career in which I believed (and still believe) that it's my duty to speak the truth as I see it. From the start, I was outspoken, even before I achieved any status on the basis of my scientific publications. My policy has been simple - if I have to choose between saying what I think and sticking to my organization's "party line" then that's a no-brainer.

During much of my professional career, I've had people who supported me precisely because I was speaking the truth as I saw it. This has included folks who believed as I did but who were fearful of the consequences if they said what I was saying. I became something of a spokesman for those in "the system" who were unable to speak for themselves without fear of negative consequences. My version of John Paul Jones' famous saying, "Damn the consequences! Full speed ahead!" had consequences, of course. But those consequences were minor, and I think the reason for the modesty of those consequences was the support of my scientific colleagues (including some of my organizational managers), who valued my work and my honest opinion.

Many of the things I believe to be true could be wrong, of course. If I'm wrong, I expect someone to challenge what I say and to show me the error of my thinking in a convincing way. What I get, for the most part, is people thinking I'm a know-it-all, or people who fail to challenge me because they lack the courage to say what they think to my face. I dispute the accusation that I think I know it all, so I challenge anyone who thinks I'm wrong to confront me directly and explain why they think I'm wrong. Then we can both gain something from the confrontation, even if neither of us change our minds about the issue in dispute. And my mind can be changed by a sufficiently convincing argument, although I'm not going to roll over and concede just because you think I'm wrong!

As for people who lack the courage to challenge me - let me simply say that I don't respect such people for taking that position. And I similarly have no respect for those who punish people I know simply for being outspoken. In fact, seeing this happen to friends of mine is more infuriating than when it happens to me! Do they think that no one will notice what's going on? Do they think that someone actually believes the lies they use to justify their actions? That's insulting!

I made up my mind long ago to live with the consequences of my outspokenness. It's the only consolation I can offer to my friends when their outspokenness comes back to haunt them in their careers. I made it one level higher on the career ladder than I ever expected to reach, so for me, the consequences were not meaningful. I'm pleased about having a reputation for being able to call things as I see them - I say what I mean, and I mean what I say. When I look into the mirror, I'm not at all sorry for having stood up for what I thought was the truth! It's the only solace I need, and I commend it to my friends for their unhappiness over the consequences for their willingness to speak the truth.

Extremism - doing God's work?

2011-07-23T10:54:00.002-05:00

As the story trickles in, the mass murderer in Norway apparently is a right-wing, christian fundamentalist extremist. It's ironic that this comes soon after my friend R.J. Evans posted here about the distinction between being a militant and being an extremist. Of course, my christian friends and followers of this blog will complain that not all christians are extremists. This is quite true, just as it's true that not all muslims are extremists. I suppose not all nazis or soviet communists were extremists, either - some were forced to join when those extremist political regimes took over whole nations.

Nevertheless, when barbaric acts occur, such as the murders committed by this home-grown Norwegian terrorist or any of his terrorist brethren on behalf of any cause, you can be sure that some form of extremism is behind it. The demagogues who spew forth the hatred and incitement to violence that motivate these terrorists are usually quick to say "I didn't order him to do that!" These "leaders" frequently back-pedal away from accepting any responsibility for the deeds committed by what are probably insane people that happen to believe in the demagogue's cause. Some of these leaders say that we deserved the violence we got, of course. They believe they are carrying out acts of justifiable violence on us, no matter how innocent of wrongdoing the victims might be!

Religion and politics are commonly associated with extremism because the extremists among the religious or political followers take their cause so very seriously. When "holy scriptures" (of any sort) enjoin followers to slay unbelievers and sinners, the extremists are the ones who accept this as a literal commandment to action. They see it as doing "god's work". The moderates amongst the believers deny that these people are "true believers," preferring to presume that their more peaceful interpretation of those scriptures is the correct one - that those scriptures shouldn't be taken literally word-for-word. This is, of course, a convenient way to rationalize the contradictions within those documents, and to avoid the need to take certain actions despite the clear commands within the literal words of these scriptures that, after all, form the foundation for those belief systems.

Radical political groups grow out of the frustration over the inability of moderates to accomplish certain political ends. Barry Goldwater once said "I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice!" I disagree with him. The end never justifies the means!!

Political extremists want political action without having to wait for a consensus in the electorate, and without regard to the possibility of harmful consequences created by that action. In the U.S., where two-party dominance has deeply polarized the electorate, various extremist positions are being encouraged by the rhetoric of the parties. Some of the followers, notably these days on the right wing (but historically also on the left wing), are ready to commit acts of violence. All they await is their moment of rage-triggered insanity. We have seen this already here in the U.S., in the case of the Oklahoma City bombing of 1995. The right-wing extremists capable of such violence are still out there - like the Norwegian mass murderer, so consumed by anger and hatred that murder and destruction seem to them to be the only acceptable alternative. In the U.S. of today, left-wing extremists may exist, but are pretty impotent and generally quiet. These days, it seems that to be a liberal is to be a left-wing extremist! That sort of polarizing rhetoric is exactly what concerns me.

We only need to look to the islamic theocracies of the Middle East today to see what happens to "moderates" when extremists (be they religious or political) manage to take control: moderates are given the simple choice of "With us? Or against us?" They either go along or suffer the consequences. This is a familiar pattern in history, borrowed by the muslim extremists (and others) from the ruthless ideology-based dictatorships of the past. I don't need to enumerate the violent, extremist examples from the past. We all know them by heart, but ... have we truly learned the lessons that such extremism has inflicted on us all? Will we recognize it for what it is and not allow it to carry the day? Apparently not everyone has learned those lessons, so the boundary between being a militant for some cause and being an extremist is being crossed, and potential terrorists emerge, ready to commit violent acts when the situation arises. No matter how crazy some fringe group of fanatics may seem to be, the lesson of history is clear: ignore them at your peril!

Tribalism is an evolutionary strategy for the success of tribes. We all carry that instinct for tribalism in our genes. Religion and politics tap into that tribalism to benefit their cause - to seek power and control over their members. The members who commit violent acts to further their causes are being manipulated by leaders who stand to gain power from this sort of terrorism. The best way to avoid becoming ensnared in this is to think for oneself and not let mere rhetoric sway your thinking toward extremism. The Mahatma Ghandis and Martin Luther Kings of history have shown that violence is not the only alternative in the face of perceived injustice and persecution. Peaceful change is possible. But it's up to us to decide the path to follow in order to produce change. Militant or extremist? Which do you choose to be?

An announcement ... and one more thing about AGW

2011-07-17T13:51:00.005-05:00

First of all, henceforth, I will not publish any anonymous comments. If there is to be discourse here, it must be known who is making the comment.

Now ... back to anthropogenic global warming (AGW). I've become very irritated by the constant harping from AGW deniers that the scientists involved in climate research are advocating the AGW position for reasons of personal gain. This is both absurd and insulting.

Right away, naturally, I have to say that scientists are human, and occasionally a tiny minority of scientists engage in various forms of unethical behavior. Hence, the odd example of someone in science who forfeits their integrity for some perceived personal gain can be found. But this is nothing more than a reflection of the fact that science is a human endeavor, not some sort of broad-brush that can be used to tar and feather the majority of scientists. It says nothing that can be applied to the whole collection of scientists who participated in creating the IPCC reports. At most, it might apply to a handful of individuals, but I have little doubt that the vast majority of those scientists are supporting the notion of AGW because that's what the research shows, not for personal gain. When an individual scientist is shown to have engaged in unethical activities, their career in science is, for all intents and purposes, over. They will pay a huge price for their misdeeds within the scientific community, because honesty is a paramount virtue in science -- without it, the whole endeavor collapses. Losing the opportunity to be a practicing scientist would be very harsh punishment for the typical scientist, very passionate about the subject of their research, to say nothing of civil punishments for criminal forms of ethical transgressions.

Misrepresenting climate science for personal gain? It's simply nonsense to believe that such a conspiracy could exist among so many scientists. The risks are far too high for any imaginable rewards and only a very rare person or two would ever take such risks, and such rare instances likely would be very much "disturbed" persons.

Of course, any scientist worth his/her salt is a forceful advocate for their research. Is this an indication of moral turpitude? No way!! Anyone not believing in the value of what research they do shouldn't be funded -- if you don't believe in it, why do it? When scientists seek support for their research, it's so that they can do the work, not to become wealthy. In some very twisted minds, of course, this could be interpreting as seeking personal gain (i.e., doing something you want to do, as opposed to, say, something you're forced to do). If anyone wants to do anything, it has this "selfish" aspect, but the IPCC consensus is light years from some vast conspiracy among climate scientists for personal gain.

Of course, public funds are being used to support climate research (as well as most other forms of scientific research). The National Science Foundation (NSF) is a primary supporter of climate and weather research, mostly through universities.

How do NSF research grants work? I can't speak for other disciplines, but in weather and climate science, the contract is not between the scientist and NSF but rather between the university and NSF. The money isn't a check written into a researcher's bank account to dispense as they see fit! Rather, the funding must be used to accomplish the research as developed in the grant's proposed budget, an effort done jointly by the researcher and the university staff. Among the budget items, a university scientist usually seeks salary support for a few months out of each year of the grant. The salary support from NSF is dispensed over the life of the grant by the university (not NSF) to the researcher, at a rate determined by the researcher's status within the university, and fixed by the budget proposal.

The rest of the money in the budget mostly goes to support student research assistants, pay for travel to conferences, pay the page charges for publications coming out of the research, pay for field data collection, pay for office computers and supercomputer services, and pay the university to support the university's infrastructure within which the research operates (buildings, offices, lights, phones, power, etc.). This latter item is called "overhead" and it adds about 50% of the research cost to the grant, such that a $100,000 research project must be funded for $150,000. The overhead rate varies among institutions - 50% is just a representative value.

The only truly personal gain by the researcher is that few months of salary support. Note that most research universities only pay their faculty for 9 months of salary, so the faculty have to obtain grant support for the other 3 months. This is not a formula for the enrichment of the researchers! No Rolls-Royce limousines, no condos in the Mediterranean, no exclusive country club memberships, no Lear jets for personal travel, unless those scientists are independently wealthy to begin with. No university-based climate researcher is getting rich from NSF grants. Publicly-funded money from NSF to the universities is by a large margin supporting the research, not the research scientist!

Government scientists are not allowed to obtain salary support from the NSF grants -- if government researchers participate in an NSF grant, they can receive the benefits associated with the research (data collection, student research assistants, travel support, page charges, etc.) and nothing else. They are paid a regular government full salary according to their status in the agency for which they work. Although government salaries for research scientists are reasonably good (comparable to intermediate-level university faculty), it's not going to make them wealthy unless they can invest some of their income in some high-yield investment opportunity on their own. Government climate researchers also are not getting rich as a result of these grants, or this research.

These researchers are doing this work because, for the most part, they believe passionately in the science to which they are contributing. To question their motives in supporting the AGW consensus is monumentally astounding rubbish!! I know a few of the people involved in this work, and I find it really aggravating to hear ignorant people casting very negative aspersions on the motives of my friends.

Anyone has a right to an opinion, and when it comes to the use of public funds, it's anyone's right to question the merit of that expenditure. NSF was founded after WWII because it was realized by far-seeing people that federal support of research would pay huge dividends to this nation in terms of new technology for the good of everyone, and jobs for those who worked to make those new technologies available to the public. This is the way it has turned out, although it seems that we as a nation are having trouble deciding where to put our priorities and research of all sorts is being questioned.

Now a cruel spotlight has been directed at the climate scientists not because of their misdeeds, but because their findings are not pleasing to certain wealthy, politically-powerful segments of our society. In an effort to negate those research findings for reasons having nothing to do with the science, an absurd conspiracy theory has been hatched to dispute the science by discrediting the scientists! Their collective integrity has been questioned because of political and politically-inspired media pressure, not because of any widespread, validated wrongdoing in their actual research activities. Media accusations, innuendo, personal attacks on blogs, and so forth are fomenting discontent in the public regarding the climate research funded by their taxes. If you want to look for a conspiracy, look to the AGW deniers, not to the scientists doing the climate research. These AGW-denying narcissists are using a familiar tactic -- accuse your opponents of the very misdeeds you yourself are committing.

I, for one, stand ready to defend my climate science colleagues from this unwarranted attack on their personal integrity. Of course, any actual, proven wrongdoing by individuals is unacceptable, but does not automatically validate any conspiracy hypothesis.

The attack on "consensus" science

2011-07-17T01:21:00.007-05:00

I've just concluded an "argument" with an enormously ignorant non-scientist who has cited various blogs about science in support of his conclusion that "faith in global warming consensus isn't science, it is anti-science." This person, like a surprising number of others (including those who should know better), has no comprehension of what scientific consensus really means.

Anthropogenic global warming deniers cite such notions as the "consensus in science (and religion) [was once] that the earth was the center of the universe" as "proof" that consensus science is just an argument by authority. That isn't the meaning of consensus science at all! It's not an argument by authority but rather is the core of the ideas that are currently accepted by the majority of those who are actually participating in that science. If we have no core of agreement, we can have no discussion at all!

By the way, these folks also talk glibly about "proof" in science. I've already discussed that here, and it's a clear indicator of ignorance about how science really works to hear someone talk about "scientific proof". Even more pathetic is their understanding of the so-called "scientific method" - as if some simple formulaic approach can constitute the "scientific method". Pitiful, indeed!

For people laboring under these ignorant delusions, I recommend they read my essay about how science works. In that essay, I state:

... it may come as something of a revelation to many that scientific consensus is the sole basis for scientific arguments. Most scientists accept certain principles and consequences of those basic principles as the starting point for their work. This large and pervasive consensus is the core of a science education curriculum - it takes years to be taught the fundamentals for a particular discipline and to know the acceptable rules for drawing deductions using those fundamentals. The "state of the art" in science is always on the margins of this dominant background consensus. Is the consensus always right? No. It's axiomatic that nothing in science is sacred, even elements that are widely accepted as fundamental and basic to all that scientists do. Most scientists understand this principle, but they don't act as if everything needs to be repeatedly validated. They simply accept the consensus - what T.S. Kuhn called the dominant paradigm. There are various levels of consensus on different topics - many scientists bristle at some of the consensus even as they accept the majority of its canons. Hence, on the whole, there's always an undercurrent of attack on the paradigms. Virtually all scientists accept another principle: if you take on something fundamental, you have to be prepared for a spirited response to your claims to have overthrown a paradigm. The saying goes (I know Carl Sagan said it in "Cosmos"), "If you make extraordinary claims, you have to be able to provide extraordinarily convincing evidence!" As already noted herein, someone with a talent for designing revealing experiments can go far in science. Some parts of the consensus understanding are always vulnerable, perhaps owing to their never having been tested sufficiently rigorously. Others may have seemed so obvious that they have hardly been tested at all, so there are always many targets for a young scientist seeking to make a contribution.

The basic notion here is that a consensus emerges when the majority of scientists active in some area of research accept "something", and this "something" is the consensus. No one is making any argument to the effect that the consensus is invariably and inevitably correct. This is simply what most scientists active in some field believe at any given moment. It's a provisional understanding that can be changed, but changing it will require evidence more substantive than just an opinion!

When it comes to the host of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) deniers, they're dominated by those who are not actively engaged in global climate research, including my recent "opponent" in an argument. They have opinions about this topic but those opinions simply can't carry the same weight as those whose work has been consistently in the field of global climate. Anyone is allowed to have any opinion they want, for whatever reasons, but in science, opinions are nothing particularly noteworthy unless they're backed up by serious research that is published in scientific journals. Not everything in journals is "true" in some absolute sense, but it has met some important standards (associated with peer review).

Yes, it's an elitist argument. But whose opinion should mean the most? Those who have been engaged in the field for many years, publishing articles in refereed journals on their scholarly research, or those who have no data of their own to present, no track record of publishing articles in scientific journals, nothing at all that is the result of their own research? Surely the answer to that is obvious.

As I've stated elsewhere, I know a thing or two about how the atmosphere works, and I know several of those whose work is represented in the IPCC "consensus". Although I'm not a climate scientist myself, I trust those people and I trust the consensus simply because I'm not qualified to gainsay their findings. But I understand enough of their arguments to be reasonably convinced about the consensus in which their work is represented. In any case , I daresay I'm a hell of a lot more qualified than those deniers whose background in science is nonexistent. A few of the deniers are, like me, atmospheric scientists but not participants in climate science. They should understand, as I do, that their credentials as a scientist in another subfield don't necessarily qualify them to contravene the work of specialists in another discipline. By far the majority of the deniers have essentially no credentials that would support their ability to dispute the consensus, notably including the person with whom I recently had an "argument" - sort of like debating with a moron, that. His contributions to science are essentially negligible and his credentials as a meteorologist are not such that he can argue credibly against the climate scientists.

Sure, the deniers might be right. That is a logical possibility, of course. Science is not determined by majority vote and the consensus understanding is not inevitably correct, as history has shown repeatedly. Science works because it fits the evidence - there is no other standard. But do I trust these amateurs to be able to marshal a convincing argument by scientific standards for their extraordinary claims to overthrow the IPCC consensus? No. A thousand times NO!

The whole debate is a slur on the integrity of those whom I know to have impeccable integrity. I resent the very notion that the IPCC consensus represents some sort of cabal to defraud the public for the personal gain of those framing that consensus. The very idea of such a conspiracy is ludicrous in the extreme for anyone who knows anything about how science really works, and who knows the people involved in developing that consensus.

A tribute to Nancy Knight

2011-07-16T10:28:00.003-05:00

Today I learned the sad news that my friend and colleague, Dr. Nancy Knight died on 26 June. Nancy spent her career studying hail alongside her husband, Charlie, at the National Center for Atmospheric Reseach in Boulder, CO. Her body of work is large and very meaningful, quite evidently a labor of love reflecting a lifelong fascination with the topic of her studies. Nancy Knight was one of the world's leading hail scientists and that simple statement needs no embellishment or clarification. When I first met her, while I was a graduate student at OU, she was pioneering the use of storm chasing in hail research, driving a specially-designed hail collection vehicle into hail shafts. I instantly fell in love with her!! How could anyone not like someone so evidently enthusiastic as to drive deliberately into hail shafts?

With time, I came to know more about Nancy and her husband and their research. They made a great team, but make no mistake -- Nancy was not riding on Charlie's coattails!! She was fiercely independent and that was another trait I found endearing. But she was also gentle and thoughtful of others when the occasion warranted it. Nancy was unselfconsciously kind and caring, although this side of her personality might not always reveal itself. My wife and I had occasion to see it from time to time. Nancy was the sort of person who could make friends quickly because she was an open book -- no one had to struggle to know what she thought about something. Yet another endearing trait!

Although all of us who knew her will miss her terribly, the fact is that she leaves this world a much better place for her having been with us for a time. I'm very grateful to have been her friend and I treasure her memory. Her scientific legacy will live on, of course. I know she was an inspiration to many young scientists, perhaps especially so to aspiring young women for whom role models historically have been scarce.

My deepest condolences go to Charlie in his grief over his loss. I trust he knows what a blessing it was to have shared this life with Nancy. My sincere thanks to Charlie for sharing Nancy and her irrepressible spirit with the rest of us!!

A tribute to Charlie Chappell

2011-07-13T01:37:00.004-05:00

This is not the first time I've posted about the incredible gift of friendship. It likely won't be the last. Last Tuesday evening, my friend Charles (Charlie) F. Chappell died. Unfortunately, it's an example of an opportunity I missed - to thank Charlie for the inspiration he provided me during the occasions we spent time together. Fortunately, my friend Mike Fritsch expressed his gratitude to Charlie for all that he gave to Mike in a very eloquent way in a letter before Charlie died. Mike has been an inspiration to me, in no small measure because he has done so much with the opportunities he was given. Mike is a brilliant meteorologist and was no doubt a source of great pride for Charlie. Charlie managed to inspire (directly or indirectly) five people who have received the Clarence Leroy Meisinger Award from the American Meteorological Society: Mike Fritsch, Bob Maddox, Da Lin Zhang, Dave Stensrud, and George Bryan. This is an amazing achievement for an amazing man. If you know these people, you must realize how important Charlie's legacy is! These people represent what Charlie was about - dedication to advancing our understanding of the science - and who have used what they were given to advance everyone's understanding. I'm proud to say I'm friends with all of them!

Mike Fritsch is an amazing man in his own rights, as is another "hero" of mine, Bob Maddox. Charlie inspired many of us, indirectly or directly, to achievements of substance. And it's been my privilege to know and admire many such people in my profession. I've known some amazing colleagues (living and dead) who have influenced me to achieve well beyond my own meager capabilities: Bob Maddox, Mike Fritsh, Fernando Caracena, Charlie Chappell, Fernando Caracena, Stan Barnes, Harold Brooks, Chad Shafer, Alan Moller, Ronnie Alberty, Yoshi Sasaki, Walt Saucier, Dave Barber, Barry Schwartz, Werner Schwerdtfeger ... the list is long and I have left out some here who certainly deserve recognition.

I often have said that the biggest regrets in my life are sins of omission: not having expressed my thanks to those who have helped me become what I wanted to be. Charlie Chappell's recent passing is one that bothers me because I never took the time to tell him how much he meant to me. For your own sake, please take that time to say "Thank You!" to those who played a positive role in your life. It probably means more to you than it does to them - they have been rewarded with seeing your success, whether you said anything or not. But to have expressed your gratitude helps a great deal when they've passed beyond your gratitude. Take the time now, while the opportunity still exists! Friendship with inspirational friends is important. Be grateful for it, as friendships inevitably end even as we live on.

What has happened to our national priorities?

2011-07-02T14:47:00.003-05:00

It's becoming very clear to me that we as a nation have allowed ourselves to be bamboozled by those presuming to be our "leaders" (religious, political, media-based, etc.) into becoming obsessive about a number of issues that are pretty much irrelevant.

Our nation faces a number of really important problems that will have devastating consequences in the future:

anthropogenic global climate change,
a hemorrhaging balance of payments,
an economic meltdown, especially for the middle and lower classes,
massive unemployment
corporate plundering to which the government seems uninterested in any meaningful response
skyrocketing medical care costs,
a public education system that has lost its focus on education,
foreign wars that are economically disastrous and which are costing American lives as well as leaving many of our warfighters with debilitating physical and psychological trauma,
aging physical infrastructure (roads, buildings, bridges, etc.),
growing vulnerability to natural hazards,
an inability to respond to astrophysical hazards such as asteroids,
drug dependency and the crimes it produces,
erosion of our Constitutional rights in the name of security,
the imminent energy crisis as a result of the inevitable disappearance of cheap oil,
rapid widening of the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots",

and so on. What we're now experiencing in the face of all these important problems is a national political standoff by the two dominant political parties, resulting in social paralysis caused by ceaseless political posturing rather than political compromise to find real solutions. The political parties may call attention to any of these aforementioned problems, usually to blame the other political party for what's going on, but our nation just can't seem to make any headway toward solving these problems.

Even more worrisome, we find our attention called to issues that are divisive, inciting passionate reactions, but which are diversions from what ails us as a nation. I find religion to be one of the most egregious of these diversions. Discussions about the separation of church and state are pointless -- it's the law of the land -- until we collectively choose to become a theocracy (of one flavor or another). Should we choose to become a theocracy, we will have repudiated the intentions of the nation's founders, embracing in the process another form of tyranny (which includes fascism and communism, as well as other despotic governmental forms) that our founders hoped desperately to avoid. Any discussion of this topic serves only to generate entropy (i.e., a disordered state) and waste our time. I consider the topic of "separation of church and state" to include all such related controversies as prayers in public schools, abortion rights, stem cell research, creationism versus evolution in public schools, religious icons on governmental property, and so on. Why would political "leaders" choose to involve themselves in this useless discussion that is outside the framework of the government created by the Constitution? The only plausible explanation I can think of is that it serves to position them for political power gain. Religion has become a litmus test for political candidates, despite the clear evidence in the Constitution forbidding such tests. Everyone in this nation (as it stands) is entitled to their religious beliefs (including to be free of any religious beliefs) - live and let live - let's move on to something useful.

In the name of responding to terrorism, we've embarked on pointless foreign wars that are bankrupting us, even as their pursuit leads to the loss of constitutional rights for American citizens. This is a political act right out of Orwell's 1984 - foreign wars to divert the attention of the public from more meaningful problems inside our nation. The number of Americans killed by terrorists now is considerably smaller than the number of Americans killed fighting in wars ostensibly intended to fight terrorism. Does this make any sense at all? The mistakes of Vietnam are being made again - having our warfighters as an occupying force on foreign soil without any clear military objective is a familiar formula that has inevitable failure written into its core.

And in the name of responding to the important national problem of drug dependency (and the crime it fosters), we've undertaken yet another unwinnable war - the national "war on drugs" - comparable to the absurd effort of national alcohol prohibition from 1920-1933. We've criminalized many Americans for a victimless crime - the use of drugs - warehousing many thousands of them in prisons and destroying their lives. We should be seeking to understand and do something about the reasons for why so many people become drug-dependent. Sending drug users to prison doesn't prevent other people from using drugs, clearly. As with national Prohibition, this "war" encourages the growth of massively organized crime. Going after the drug dealers just creates new opportunities for aspiring drug dealers. Going after the supply side doesn't stop people from becoming drug-dependent, and new suppliers will always step in to meet the demand, replacing those sent to prison for drug dealing. The same goes for other "wars" on other vices. Legislating morality by criminalizing various victimless acts is pointless and never works.

Our public education system, from elementary school right on through to universities, is in deep financial trouble. Federal, state, and local governments seek to "control" the educational content rather than letting educators do their jobs - to challenge students to learn how to think for themselves and to learn the concepts they'll need in an ever more complicated world. Governments exercise this control in various ways, including budget cuts, persecution of unorthodox educators, and mandates regarding standardized tests that are diluting the kind of things that can be taught. They apparently see public schools as indoctrination centers rather than educational institutions. At a time in our history when the demands on our citizens to learn about and understand the issues confronting us are becoming critically important, our public education is losing its ability to inform the electorate. A tragic "dumbing down" is underway, leading to increased vulnerability to demagoguery.

We as a nation seem obsessed by the private sexual choices made by some of our citizens. Do we really have the luxury of vast amounts of spare time to concern ourselves with such things? Can't we find more productive ways to use that time than to worry about what other people are doing behind closed doors? Many right-wing religious folks seem to be convinced that the failure to persecute homosexuals somehow will lead to the downfall of all sorts of things, including all of American society. I just don't see how homosexuality matters much in the scheme of things. It's been some part of all human societies for all time, but our nation has been whipped up into a frenzy over this issue, at a time when I believe we need to use our time to begin acting upon really important issues (see above).

I could go on - I'm under no illusion that writing a blog will change the world, but I wanted to make my position clear about what I see as real problems versus those problems manufactured by various "leaders" who I see as only leading our nation astray.

The sad state of American mathematics education

2011-06-19T18:25:00.003-05:00

Some recent discussions via various media have spurred me to post something about how pathetic mathematics education in this country has been for a long time -- long enough that I myself was influenced by its sorry state. As a boy, I began to encounter math phobia in grade school, where a tyrannical math teacher instilled the fear of math in me. I suppose her intentions were good, perhaps hoping to motivate me to greater achievement, but her methods were not successful in stimulating the response she probably wanted. Many subsequent teachers reinforced my fears, including my math teacher for 4 years in high school. His plan was to humiliate me into doing better, not unlike the tactics adopted by the fearsome math teacher in grade school. It worked no better in high school than it did in grade school. Instead, I began to doubt my ability to master the subject. Those doubts grew with time, to the point where in my college days, it was undermining my confidence that I could pursue the career I wanted for myself because I was performing so badly in math. Meteorology is a subject that uses mathematics to a considerable extent -- being incompetent at math was simply not an option.

It took the insight of a graduate student teaching assistant at the University of Wisconsin to begin the process of overcoming my math phobia. At that point, I had two C's and a 5-credit D in 3rd semester Calculus behind me, with no prospect for a good performance in Differential Equations. But Mr. Hunter found a way to open my eyes to the subject and I managed a B! He showed me that I could understand the material and enjoy it at the same time!

In graduate school, my advisor looked over my transcript and made it clear to me I needed to minor in mathematics! I swallowed the lump of fear in my throat and did what I was told. By some miracle, I had three straight excellent math teachers (in Tensors and Vectors, Complex Variables, and Fourier Series & Boundary Value Problems) and aced all three!! My first A's in math since 2nd grade!! My fears were vanquished and I became fully confident regarding math from that point on. It was math phobia that had been holding me back, not my ability! I wonder how many people that applies to? If I overcame my fear, then I came to believe others could, too.

Since then, I've seen many people who have been denied a career in my field owing to their lack of math skills, and I believe that the abysmal teaching of math is largely responsible. Learning how to do math can be inspiring and insightful -- skills that are useful in a technological world that can be fun and exciting to apply to real-world problems. Why are so many turned off by math? I believe it's because math teachers are among the worst at teaching their subject. Math isn't about cookbook recipes that need to be memorized -- it's about understanding the abstract world that math occupies and being able to use it to solve problems of significance to the real world. Math teachers usually suck at connecting the abstract world they inhabit to reality. Most math teachers have no clue why anyone besides a mathematician might need mathematics!

It's a universal truth that no one can teach a topic they themselves don't understand. Most math teachers feel at home in their abstract world but can't relate to those who seek to see the value of those abstractions in their reality! These so-called teachers can't relate to the reality inhabited by their students because those mathematicians don't inhabit it! When I was a graduate student, the Engineering School at OU taught several math courses because the Math Department pretty much sucked at teaching those subjects, and the topics were very relevant to engineering. I benefited from several good teachers of applied mathematics in the Engineering School!

If you have math phobia, believe me when I say it's largely been manufactured in your own mind, likely the result of lousy teaching. If you believe me when I say that math skills are useful to you, no matter what your profession, then you should accept the responsibility to learn math in spite of the lousy teachers!! I promise you it will be worth it!!

A simple way to fix politics

2011-06-18T08:42:00.003-05:00

Although I have great respect for the framers of the U.S. Constitution, I doubt very much that they'd be pleased with the political evolution that's taken place since the end of the 18th century. It's become commonplace to view politicians as lying, cheating, hypocritical swine robbing the public treasury to feather their own nests and caring not a fig for truth, justice, and the American way. We've become a nation divided by the silly label of which political party has our unswerving allegiance, indulging in the counterproductive tribalism of opposing everything carrying the label of our political "opponent." The majority of Americans seems to be adrift in a sea of ignorance about the important issues that confront us as a nation, confused and misinformed about those issues, and even about the very principles of individual freedom upon which our nation is supposed to be based. And political parties have become a handicap to moving the U.S. toward solutions to its very real problems.

So I have a modest proposal for a solution. Let's abolish the system of voting for political officeholders!! Rather than having a bunch of whores painting themselves the color of the day in order to attract votes, all government offices (at all levels of government, from town councils up to and including the U.S. President) now occupied by elected officials will be filled according to a random selection from the general public. I picture it as resembling how people are selected for jury duty or military service (when conscription is implemented). Every public office would be filled by ordinary citizens, selected at random -- not professional politicians. They would be paid a wage comparable to that of our military officers, with their pay grade determined by the level of the position they fill.

All people selected would be screened to eliminate certified lunatics, felonious criminals, terrorists, and peabrains. No one under 21 or over 61 would be selected. At this point, we're already ahead of the game, since there's clearly no such screening of those running for public office (witness the debates ongoing for the christian nationalist [a.k.a. the GOP] candidate for president or the Weiner scandal). Once the selectees pass the screening, they're given a mandatory leave of absence from any other employment they had, with that job guaranteed when their term of service is over. Anyone serving in the military or other forms of national service, say, the Peace Corps, would be given an automatic exemption for life. College students would be exempt during their time in college (including graduate school) and for 3 years thereafter (so they can find a job and hold it for a while).

All selectees would have a single 4-year term, during which they'd actually have a glorious civics lesson - an opportunity to see how government really works, with access to all the "inside" information about decision-making in government being required. Transparency at its finest! It would be pretty difficult for dirty little secrets to accumulate in smoke-filled backrooms and political party caucuses. "Aha, so that's how it works, eh?" Ordinary people would become informed about what is going on and so would be much more understanding of how their representatives make difficult and important decisions.

Since only one term in office is permitted, the professional politician will vanish from the face of the nation, to be replaced by ordinary folks from all walks of life, who would have their chance to serve their nation for a time, and then return to their important real lives. Everyone's professed desire to serve their nation when called upon would be satisfied for most Americans at some time or another in their lives. Most of us would have the honor of being able to say "When I was called to serve my nation, I did my duty!" And the public would be much more informed about what goes on -- much of which is now behind closed doors.

I can imagine the howls of protest regarding this modest proposal now -- "But-but-but ..." I can hear the naysayers spluttering, "These people wouldn't be experienced enough to run the country!" First of all, this is true of every last elected official when they take their first public office. And how do politicians gain experience in how things work? From experienced politicians and I think we all know what that means!! Corruption is learned behavior, taught to newcomers by their mentors. The more venal the new politician is, the easier it is for that self-service and hypocrisy to creep in from their peers wallowing in the political mud.

"But-but-but ... would you want your country represented in the halls of power around the world by an amateur?" All one has to do is look at Ronald Reagan or Arnold Schwarzenegger or Jesse Ventura to realize that amateurs have been elected to public office many times over the years. This is nothing new, actually. Could the use of ordinary citizens to represent us all be so bad? Isn't that what politicians try to present themselves as? They claim to be just like us in order to get our vote, but when elected, they behave as if they're the privileged elite and don't give a shit about the problems that ordinary people have anymore (if they ever really did care!). Could non-professional politicians do any worse than the politicians? Without the incentive of permanent power and lots of perks for life to drive their decision-making, I believe most ordinary citizens would do the best they can for their country and their fellow citizens during their term of service and yet be eager, for the most part, to return to their lives at the end of their 4 years in office. I've served on juries and been in the military and that's pretty much how ordinary citizens behave when asked to serve!!

"But-but-but ... wouldn't your plan exclude those who are serving or have served in the military?" Yes, it would. Although I respect those who have served or are serving in the military, I'm not a fan of those ex-servicefolks holding public office. It's an honorable profession but doesn't necessarily make for a qualified public officeholder. For one thing, they've done their duty and should be going about their ordinary lives outside of the military, allowing others the opportunity to serve in a different way. For another, the record of famous military men in public office isn't a very compelling argument for having more of them, however popular they may have been at the time. The qualities needed for military leadership don't necessarily overlap much with those needed to lead the nation.

Are all tornado warnings the same?

2011-06-15T14:56:00.005-05:00

In the fallout from the large tornado death tolls this year, there are some who are finding fault with the warnings from the National Weather Service. Anyone who knows something about the weather must understand that weather forecasts, even those short-range forecasts we call "warnings" have uncertainty associated with them. The science of meteorology as of this moment simply doesn't permit forecasts without uncertainty. Nevertheless, either a warning is issued or it isn't -- technically, this means warnings are dichotomous (or binary): yes, a warning has been issued or no, a warning has not been issued.

At present, warnings come in two "flavors": severe thunderstorm warnings (coded "blue") and tornado warnings (coded "red"). By definition, a storm that produces one or more of the following -- large hail (the current threshold value is one inch diameter hail), strong "straight" winds (the current threshold is 50 knots or 58 miles per hour), or a tornado -- is a severe thunderstorm. Some storms for which blue warnings are issued go on to produce tornadoes, many storms for which tornado warnings are issued fail to produce tornadoes. Some storms for which no warnings are issued go on to produce severe weather (including tornadoes). The science of meteorology at its best offers no guarantees that these important distinctions can be made perfectly in advance. Generally speaking, a red warning is associated with a greater sense of threat than a blue warning -- tornadoes are far more likely to result in fatalities. But some severe thunderstorms can produce as much damage (or more) as most tornadoes (the vast majority of which fall well short of being classified as "violent" -- EF4 or EF5) and nontornadic severe thunderstorms can result in deaths, as well.

There are no tornado fatalities from false alarms! It's widely recognized by forecasters that the cost in lives for not issuing a warning can literally be infinitely greater than that associated with a false alarm. Forecasters aren't stupid -- they know that if they fail to issue a warning for a fatality-producing storm, there would be sharks of various sorts circling the waters around them. Nevertheless, our society demands from them that no storm-related fatality ever occur without warning. The problem is that the science simply doesn't permit that. If we were to issue a tornado warning for every storm that might go on to produce a tornado, the number of false alarms would become vastly larger than it now is. If we "raise the bar" for the threat level to reduce the number of false alarms, many more tornadoes will not be warned for in advance!

Assuming that the presence of a storm is necessary to issue a warning, some threshold threat level has to be achieved in order for the warning forecaster to decide to go with a warning, and presumably this must include the perceived threat of a tornado if the storm may need to be covered with a tornado warning. As it now stands, there is no uniformly-defined threat level associated with any of the decisions a warning forecaster has to make -- every warning forecaster is more or less on their own. Obviously, not every forecaster is a carbon copy of every other forecaster. Some make warning decisions better than others.

Recently, a new type of tornado warning has come into vogue -- the so-called "tornado emergency" (which has not been defined formally, either), presumably when a populated area is in the path of a very dangerous tornado. Implicitly, the perceived need for this is driven by the fact that the tornado threat varies from one situation to another. Yet another tough decision for a warning forecaster to make!

In my view of things, warnings should use probability to express different levels of threat for different phenomena: wind, hail, tornadoes. This permits the forecaster to use the science to estimate the likelihood of various outcomes in the path of a storm. It's an established fact that forecasters can become quite good at estimating uncertainty. I don't yet know how best to formulate probabilistic warnings -- I believe years of research are needed to inform us how probabilistic warnings could be made most effective. This is a complex problem that involves far more than the science of meteorology.

In the meantime, I would hope people who are not meteorologists would begin to understand that they bear the lion's share of the burden of responsibility for their personal safety. If they expect warning forecasters to be perfect -- they're actually putting themselves in considerable personal danger. One important factor in dealing with a tornado is having planned what to do in advance. Another is to be "situation aware" when thunderstorms are about rather than counting on someone else to do that for you.

Media as carpetbaggers

2011-06-01T10:22:00.003-05:00

Recently I had a discussion with someone from Associated Press. Apparently, he was in the Intergalactic Weather Center to do yet another piece on tornadoes. Among other things, he asked me about Mark Svenvold's book on tornado chasing, which I reviewed here. In that review, I begin with:

This book is the product of another 'carpetbagger' - someone migrating temporarily into the world of storm chasing, doing his research, putting down his thoughts on what he's seen, and then packing his bags, off onto some new topic to write about and sell yet another book.

It dawned on me during this conversation with the person from AP that essentially all of the media reporting on tornadoes and science is being done virtually exclusively by carpetbaggers. The inaccuracy and lack of substance in media reporting is a direct result of the reporter's profound ignorance about the scientific subject. The people who actually know something about the subject matter typically are not those doing the media pieces. Reporters and documentary production teams roll in to do interviews either because of some recent events that call attention to tornadoes and tornado science, or because someone decided it was time to do another piece about the topic. Whatever the motivation, it's only a happy accident when they ask a meaningful question or know enough to interview someone who actually knows something and the interviewee manages to convey something accurately and clearly in his/her allotted soundbite(s) within the piece. That tidbit of reasonable information, however, will be overwhelmed by a veritable tsunami of misinformation in other pieces, or even by other content in the same piece containing the lonely morsel of accurate, meaningful information. How can the public tell the difference? Short answer -- they mostly can't.

Carpetbaggers frequently focus their interviews on "names" in the field, some of whom may be in management and who may not actually know much about the subject. Interviewees always have personal biases in how they see things (that includes me, of course!), so the tidbit that gets quoted from them may not be representative of how many members of the profession feel about any given topic. Given that everyone is biased, how does one distill the truth from all the media pieces? Seeking the truth is about getting information from many sources, not just the "names" in the field, or what the media provide. But most people don't seem to be all that interested in tornadoes (for example) -- except possibly when it's on the evening news or when it affects them personally. For many, it's evidently too much trouble to spend time searching for the truth by doing some serious study of the topic. So they view the garbage that spews out of the media and think they learned something, when most of what they received was superficial crap, much of it actually misinformation.

The media reporters are almost unanimous in their contempt for their audience. "Dumb it down to the 3rd grade level, please!" If all the public ever gets is 3rd grade content, then this contempt becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. No one seems interested in challenging their viewers to think, apparently because they believe they're incapable of it. That's not what the media are about, it seems.

The sad fact is that if media pieces are the primary process by which most people learn about tornadoes and tornado science (or any other technical topic), then any attempt to inform them via this pathway is doomed. There's no reason to attempt to interject your knowledge and experience into the torrent of media content, because it will end up being diluted beyond recognition. People who study and forecast tornadoes aren't writing these media pieces -- they're quite fully occupied with doing that work, which absorbs most of their attention (apart from whatever time they might devote to their families and hobbies). And the media moguls aren't very interested in seeking their contributions, anyway. What does a scientist know about journalism?

As luck would have it, I was a budding journalist in high school. And my journalism mentor made it very clear to me that if you do an interview, you have to work very hard to get your facts straight. You don't write the story until after you've done the research. And you should ask your source(s) to check your story for factual content before you run it! This standard of journalism seems to have become "old-fashioned" and mostly "out of style" today. The superficiality and outright misinformation pouring from the media on a daily basis is an inevitable result of this carpetbagging. Today's style of journalism makes this inescapable, so I don't do interviews any more!

Compensation

2011-05-30T22:54:00.002-05:00

From time to time, my observations of the way people behave lead me to despair for humanity. It sometimes seems that god must love shitheads, because there are so many of them. Fortunately, there is the gift of friendship, which reminds me that most of the people I know aren't actually shitheads, even if I don't agree with them about everything.

In fact, when I travel about, it seems that most of the folks I encounter here and abroad are really good folks with whom I have so much in common that whatever differences might otherwise divide us pale into insignificance. I've been privileged to know some amazing people, including a few famous ones, but mostly just "ordinary" folks like me who actually are extraordinary in their capacity to contribute to the world in ways that may not be visible to everyone. I know these people and their insights inspire me, their generosity shames me, and their spirits soar to heights I can only aspire to in my dreams. To have such people in my limited sphere is such an astounding blessing, on the occasions when I take the time to think about it (like tonight), all my despair falls away.

I continue to see hope for our species, however many shitheads try to dirty the water with their disgusting bigotry, phenomenal arrogance, pathetic tribalism, and stubborn ignorance. It strikes me that a lot of what is wrong with humans is their deep-seated insecurity, which drives them to attack what they don't understand and to deny that anyone not just like them has the right to be different. If we're to endure the trials I see in our collective future, we must overcome that insecurity and try our best to work together for the common good.

I've benefited tremendously from people with whom I have really deep-seated differences of opinion about various things. How can this be? Because I long ago outgrew the need to prove my own worth to myself and so have no need to prove it to them. My wife was a major factor in this change, as were my children, so if I seem to be reasonably well-grounded, it is directly attributable to my family. From the base of being comfortable in my own skin, it's been easy to accept differences of opinion with others. I've learned much and grown as a person precisely because I don't feel threatened by someone with a different viewpoint. In fact, a civil discussion with them about topics over which we differ helps me to clarify things.

How many total strangers do we curse and abuse because of some perceived flaw in their behavior? I might not like the actions of someone who drives stupidly on the highways, but I have to admit that if I knew them, I might like them despite their bad driving habits. I shouldn't feel anger about their behavior nor should I condemn total strangers.

At least tonight, I ponder the range of people I call my friends and I realize that many of them might not get along very well. In some cases, I know that for sure. The only things this group has in common, to the best of my knowledge, is that they're my friends, and they've all brought something I value into my life. For me, that's adequate compensation for the shitheads of this world. It gives me the hope to keep trying to make positive changes.

Pick your favorite bogus "explanation"

2011-05-25T14:00:00.006-05:00

Evidently, 2011 is going to be a bad year for tornado fatalities. A really bad year. You have to go back to 1947 to find a single tornado that killed more people than were killed on 22 May in Joplin, MO. We're approaching 500 fatalities with much of the tornado season yet to come, and the last time we had more than 500 fatalities in a single year was 1953.

1953 was a terrible year, with three major single violent tornadoes: Waco, TX on 11 May (114 fatalities), Flint, MI on 08 June (116 fatalities), and Worcester, MA on 09 June (94 fatalities), as well as many lesser outbreaks. At the time, there was speculation that the severe weather was being "caused" by the nuclear explosions going on as the United States flexed its cold war muscles. The media did what the media always do: spread wild speculation about the influence of atomic tests on the weather without regard for its scientific validity. Such talk went on for years, to be raised again in 1957 (another big year for tornadoes, but without the extreme fatality count).

Almost every time there are major tornado events, the media seem compelled to ask the inevitable stupid question: what's causing this wild weather? The production crews descend on National Weather Service offices with reporters and cameras rolling, endlessly asking the same ignorant questions. The media simply can't extricate themselves from their own ignorance, being inclined to believe that there must be something to "explain" what's going on with some simple phrase if they can just get their "expert" to utter it as a sound bite. Whenever severe weather happens, it's a "freak" storm, that struck without warning, sounded like a freight train, looked like a war zone afterward, occurred with a clash of air masses, etc. The media prefer hackneyed phrases to substance, it seems.

The tornado threat varies widely from year to year. In meteorological terms, every year is different, and so it's easily understandable that some years have many tornadoes, and other years not so many. It's called "interannual variability" and for tornadoes, our understanding of that variability is troubled with many issues regarding how accurately we know the facts about the tornadoes that happen.

In 2011, the popular "exotic" media explanations for tornado outbreaks include: La Nina, global warming, global cooling (!!), god's wrath, and local terrain features that are being blamed for these "weather gone wild" events. From the perspective of someone who's spent a career looking at tornado occurrence records, one thing is abundantly clear: these events require no exotic "explanation". The past is the key to the present and future. By looking at data from the past, it becomes clear that events similar to what have been going on this year have happened before (most recently in 1953) and they will happen again (although we can't yet predict exactly when and where). Major disasters occur when violent tornadoes track through populated areas. Since most tornadoes spin out their existence over open country or thinly populated areas, we don't have major tornado disasters every year. Really big tornado outbreaks happen at intervals of roughly 20-40 years or so. The vulnerability in any given year is increasing because of our increasing population at risk (suburban "sprawl" and increasing recreational use of some areas), but it seems that this has been mostly offset by better forecasts and warnings, improved methods of communication of the threat when it develops, and infrastructure enhancements promoting natural hazard preparation (at least until the past decade or so). But those improvements have not eliminated entirely the threat for high fatality counts, as events this year have demonstrated.

When these big fatality counts occur, it's mostly a matter of bad luck. For the most part, we've had good luck for several decades, but it seems this year that our good luck has deserted us. But there's no need to resort to "exotic" explanations for every bad event. Specific reasons for individual fatalities can be difficult to figure out after the event, since those killed are unable to explain to us what happened to them. In some cases, contributing factors can be deduced or nearby survivors may be able to tell the tale, but in other cases, it's simply not possible to know what contributed to the misfortune. We're now in the situation that more than 50% of modern casualties of late (at least in lesser tornado events) have been associated with flimsy mobile homes. The poor, the handicapped, the elderly -- all are particularly vulnerable in tornado situations. People can be killed in well-constructed homes when they experience violent tornadoes that simply sweep those homes away if they have no tornado-resistant shelter (as in much of the South, where basements and tornado shelters are relatively rare).

Major events causing many deaths are typically well-warned for by the National Weather Service. Nevertheless, when strong-to-violent tornadoes pass through populated areas, people almost certainly will be killed, even when warnings are issued with more than enough lead time. The reasons for that are complex and not entirely understood, but those fatalities are almost never the result of "it struck without warning" in the sense that a warning was not issued with useful lead time. Sadly, this loss of life continues to be inevitable despite our best efforts. No special explanation is necessary, beyond the bad luck of being in a tornado's path without anywhere to go.

A Growing Sense of Revulsion

2011-05-22T22:04:00.002-05:00

Tonight (22 May), on the 30th anniversary of a chase day that was wild and spectacular for me and my old chaser partner (Al Moller), I read with sorrow of the devastating events of yet another tornado disaster -- this time in Joplin, Missouri. 2011 already has been a terrible year for tornadoes, the like of which hasn't been seen since 1974, and we have a lot of the heart of the tornado season yet to go. Thing likely will get worse ...

Social media have revealed to me multiple videos so far this year of non-chasers caught up in these events who clearly have no clue about tornadoes, shooting video even as they come close to death. I also see videos posted from storm chasers whooping and hollering with excited joy about the spectacular things they're seeing in their videos aired on social media (a public venue, after all) -- quite evidently unconcerned about the feelings of those for whom these very same atmospheric events have turned their lives upside down.

Many of these videos are taken not by chasing hobbyists but by people who know little or nothing about storms, perhaps choosing to keep their cameras rolling in hopes of achieving fame and fortune, or for reasons of their own. They flirt with death and often have no idea what they're doing. Why? Is it the accumulated effect of of seeing videos on TV from storm chasers dancing on the edge of the precipice? How many people have died this year with video camcorders in their hands? How many will in the future? To what extent are we chasers responsible for that?

Ironically, the Discovery Channel premiered a program tonight about the 27 April tornadoes, showing (among other things) Reed Timmer seemingly just beginning to comprehend that what he has built his fame upon has the capacity to inflict death and disaster upon people caught in the track. The very phenomenon that excites storm chasers has a very dark side -- a side I saw with my own eyes within the second year of my storm chasing career (1973) -- see item #32 here for this little piece of my chasing history. Reed (and/or the Discovery Channel) seems still to believe that his calling in tornado reports was a significant contribution to the saving of lives on 27 April. Wrong! I have serious doubts that any chaser reports made any significant difference to the outcome on 27 April. That day's tornado outbreak is not the kind of event where chaser reports are going to make much of a difference in terms of saving lives -- see here for a discussion. How much science (of the sort associated with peer-reviewed scientific journal papers) has Reed actually contributed to the problem of tornadoes? Precisely ... zip! He may have the degrees to call himself a meteorologist, but he's not yet demonstrated by his publications that he's a scientist.

The fact of the situation is that tornado disasters are virtually inevitable when powerful tornadoes pass through populated areas; 27 April included several long, track violent tornadoes in a part of the world where the human vulnerability was large. You don't need exotic, poorly-researched explanations to understand the death toll on 27 April. Some of us have expected this sort of event to happen and, unfortunately, our predictions were accurate -- although we couldn't predict which year, which month, which days would fulfill that prediction. It doesn't make me happy to be right about this. In fact, it's awful to know that such events are coming and there's nothing I seem to be able to do to prevent them from happening. People seem immune to the message of our science until a tornado has left their lives shattered.

In this year's events, I repeatedly hear people in videos saying "I've never seen anything like this before!" Well, perhaps that's true in in the limited sense of having it happen in front of your eyes, but I guarantee that almost all of these folks have seen videos of tornado disasters on TV. Did you think you were somehow immune? What people find so astonishing is that it actually happened to them!! Well, I've got some news for you, folks -- it can happen to you, and if you don't think so, you're gambling your life and the lives of your loved ones that it won't. If you do nothing to prepare, then you have only yourself to blame for the outcome. It's time to take personal responsibility for your own safety, folks!!

I find the public celebrations of storm chasers more disturbing and repulsive every year, when the outcome of these events can be so devastating to so many people. Chasing is a hobby -- it's not about contributing to society for most chasers -- for many of the "new breed" of chasers, it's about personal success, fame, and fortune. As time passes, it's increasingly abhorrent to me to be associated with most chasers, whose egocentricity and superficiality are disgusting to me. They give little or nothing of value in return for their experiences but somehow have convinced themselves that they're saving lives. Obviously, there are responsible storm chasers, but their fraction of the chase "community" seems to be decreasing as storm chasing rapidly becomes a "trash sport".

Why I'm not celebrating

2011-05-02T16:35:00.004-05:00

I’m going to offer my thoughts about what’s been happening as a result of the announcement last night about the killing of Osama Bin Laden. My comments will not be universally popular. As the celebrations in the streets go on, Bin Laden’s well-deserved death doesn’t leave me particularly joyful or contribute in any way to my pride in being an American. My pride in being an American depends on constitutional freedoms that other people around the world envy (and even hate).

I should start off by saying that I have no sympathy for Bin Laden, nor am I sorry he's dead. He chose to live by the sword, and he died by it. Justice of the eye-for-an-eye biblical sort has been served. And I’m not a blanket opponent of the death penalty -- far from it, in fact. Osama’s actions have resulted in thousands of deaths -- perhaps tens of thousands if the final tally were to be completed comprehensively. He certainly can be said to have deserved to die. Of course, in muslim eyes, Osama Bin Laden is now a martyr to the cause of islam. This is untrue, of course. He's the now-dead leader of a terrorist group that has used the defense of islam as an excuse to serve political ends: seeking to install a world-wide muslim theocracy.

But I find the notion of my country sending out "death squads" to commit premeditated murder is not something in which I find cause for pride or celebration. This leaves us on the moral level of right-wing dictators in South America and elsewhere around the world. We're so pleased with our military right now, perhaps without realizing the "might makes right" implications of our government’s actions since 9/11/01. Note that I'm not condemning the warriors -- only the war. It's like in a movie, where if the crime is egregious enough, that justifies any response that might follow. Killing people in movies always seems to be a way to solve problems, but life is not a movie. Death only solves a small class of problems.

Moreover, this "justice" was accomplished without trial. At least the equally nasty dictator Saddam Hussein was given a trial before he was executed -- something neither Saddam nor Bin Laden ever gave their victims. In that sense, we remained on a higher moral plane than Saddam -- before we killed him. I suppose someone will argue that Osama was killed in a firefight, resisting capture. I suspect he was simply murdered but, of course, I have no way of knowing that one way or another. Who would want to give the bastard the forum for his hate that a trial would allow? But for a nation that professes to cherish law and order, summary execution seems rather inconsistent with those principles. People around the world see our actions as not being consistent with the principles we claim to cherish. Our hypocrisy reveals our lies to them, although many Americans are blind to that hypocrisy.

Another rationalization could be that this was an evil person who deserved to die. I'm reminded of the lines from the movie Lord of the Rings:

Many that live deserve death. Some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends.

There's little doubt in my mind that Osama deserved to die, perhaps many times over if that were possible. Does his death bring back the thousands of people killed as a result of his deeds? Of course not. The biblical god claims vengeance to be his, not belonging in the repertoire of humans [although the bible seemingly contradicts this principle, so choose your point of view]. Mere execution could seem to some to be letting this guy off too easy, of course. At the very least, we could've waterboarded him for a few weeks, right?

Nor can I say I'm particularly happy with our President claiming we're a nation "under god", and asking that his god bless America -- just which god is the one of whom the President speaks? Apparently, he's referring to the god of the bible. Not all of us in the USA believe in the biblical god invoked by the President. It seems the President can't be speaking on behalf of those who don't believe in his god. I guess that means he isn't speaking for me, in particular. Is not the god of the bible the same god (by a different name) claimed by islam? Can god possibly be on both sides of a war? It seems it must be so, since both sides are claiming him (which seems to happen a lot in history). In that case, what sort of god is this, playing both sides? Is this the sort of deity we choose to believe sanctions whatever we do in his name?

It seems we're willing to give up our liberties, sacrifice our youth in wars on foreign soil, and commit murder in the name of justice -- explain to me how these actions are different from the terrorists! One of the goals of the terrorists all along has been to demonstrate the moral bankruptcy of the USA. It seems they're succeeding. I've already discussed this elsewhere.

Recall how we all felt when we heard that Palestinians were celebrating in the streets after the attacks of 9/11/01? We were astonished that any people would actually be celebrating the death of innocent civilians. Osama Bin Laden was hardly an innocent civilian, but he had become a symbol of defiance for muslims around the world who feel persecuted (and they have the innocent civilian deaths to back up their claim). I can well imagine muslim youths lining up to volunteer to be suicide bombers, seeking vengeance for the death of Bin Laden. I'm sure they see our celebrations over the death of Bin Laden in the same way we saw those celebrations in Palestine. Vengeance begets vengeance, not justice. We may be pleased with ourselves for finally taking vengeance on him, but we likely won't be happy with what ensues.

People on both sides of this conflict between islam and the west have allowed themselves to be consumed by tribalism, spurred on by political "leaders" who have used religion and nationalism as tools to demonize the other side, justifying merciless jihad and vigilante "justice" in the process. The death of Osama Bin Laden will not cause terrorism to roll over and die. Our security has not been increased by this act of vengeance. The pain of our losses will not be eased by the absence of this terrible (but increasingly irrelevant) man on the Earth. I can see no cause for celebration, nor any end to the bloodshed and pain of this war on terrorism that employs terrorist tactics (murder and torture, among others) by Americans in retaliation.

Ignorance is not bliss

2011-05-01T00:41:00.003-05:00

The 27 April 2011 outbreak of tornadoes in the southeastern US clearly has achieved historic proportions. Its death toll has exceeded the so-call Super Outbreak of 03 April 1974. It remains to be seen what the final count of tornadoes and violent (EF4-5) tornadoes will be. It's possible that the "Super Outbreak" has been exceeded. Whatever the final tally turns out to show, it seems obvious that the 27 April 2011 event has achieved its place amidst the most infamous outbreaks in US history.

The media seem to be focused on the "freak" nature of this event, as usual. For those of us who have spent years studying the record of US tornado events, this outbreak is simply a reflection of what's possible as seen in the historical record and, in fact, what's most likely. Some of us have predicted this vulnerability. Events of the sort like 27 April 2011 occur roughly every 20 years or so -- the frequency is not at regular intervals, of course, and each event is different. But the long history of tornadoes in the US makes it clear that large fatality counts result from the infrequent coincidence of violent, long-track tornadoes with populated areas. Although outbreaks of long-track violent tornadoes in the southeastern US are relatively infrequent, the southeastern US is particularly vulnerable: a large fraction of mobile home owners, a relatively high density of communities at risk, a growing population at risk, a relatively low fraction of homes with basements, and so on -- all resulting in a high vulnerability whenever long-track, violent tornadoes occur. Thus, the tragic events of 27 April 2011 were quite predictable, although we couldn't know exactly when or where this would happen.

By studying the historical record, it's possible to anticipate events such as 27 April 2011, although we can't know precisely when they will occur. Despite advances in technology and in the infrastructure devoted to tornado warnings, when violent tornadoes interact with population centers, people will die. The infrastructure dedicated to saving lives in situations involving tornadoes has resulted in roughly a factor of 10 decrease since 1950 in average annual tornado fatalities. But the increase of population at risk has begun to offset this, in part associated with an increasing fraction of people living in mobile homes (where their risk is substantially higher than those living in "stick-built" homes). We've reached the point where the majority of tornado fatalities are those living in mobile homes, and there's a higher percentage of such in the southeastern US than elsewhere.

Thus, as I suggested in the earlier essay, the southeastern US was the most likely location for an outbreak resulting in a large number of fatalies. At times, being right is not a very satisfying situation. But it does underscore the reality that the US remains vulnerable to tornadoes, despite the new technologies and the new warning infrastructure. Even more devastating events are possible in the future. We aren't invulnerable to tornadoes and not likely to be anytime soon.

A disgraceful sham of a program

2011-04-29T10:22:00.004-05:00

We're on the second day after a historic outbreak of tornadoes in the southeastern US, that has had tragic consequences. Anyone familiar with these events knows that clean-up begins virtually immediately after a tornado has passed. A big part of the need for clean-up is to allow search and rescue by first responders, and so debris is moved off streets and highways to allow them access.

Although these and subsequent clean-up efforts are necessary and clearly need to begin as early as possible, one consequence is that they disturb the evidence needed for a "forensic" survey team. Therefore it has been deemed important that survey teams arrive as soon as possible after the event -- preferably early in the morning on the day following the event. They need access to the damaged areas (which often are closed off to prevent looting!) in order to glean the information they need before the rubble is piled up and carted away. BTW -- I've literally written the book on the subject and have been a national Quick Response Team member since it began -- I've been on precisely one damage survey (the 4 May 2003 event in Kansas City) since the QRT began! No one has called to ask me to participate in the survey for the current event.

In the past, we had Prof. Ted Fujita to do major event surveys. He had the influence and the resources to put a large team together and get them to the scene quickly, in order to obtain the information they needed to learn from these tragic events. With his death, there was a period when no one took any responsibility for doing scientific surveys after tornado disasters. The National Weather Service (NWS) was content with the "service assessment" process. Following the tornado outbreak of 3 May 1999 and especially the La Plata, MD tornado of 28 April 2002 (which was initially and erroneously rated an F5 tornado), the NWS instituted the Quick Response Team (QRT) -- the members of this national "team" were recruited from the ranks of those with experience at doing surveys of tornadic storms. They all volunteered to serve without compensation (save for travel costs) in order that we obtain the forensic evidence necessary first to understand what happened in detail, and then to learn whatever lessons could be gleaned from that evidence. The goal was to provide the advice of experienced people for the purpose of establishing the estimated intensity of the tornadoes (i.e, their F-scale - now supplanted by the EF-scale).

For a few years, this national QRT operated more or less as intended, but then it seemed that some tender egos in the NWS began to fear that they were losing control of the process. They felt they had sufficient "in-house" expertise to carry out the investigations and didn't require the services of "outsiders" in the process. I can't pretend to know precisely what NWS managers thought, but the net result has been that the national QRT is now a pathetic sham of a program. For all intents and purposes, it simply doesn't exist. The only person ever called to do a "national QRT" now is Tim Marshall, who is unquestionably one of the best. I'll leave it to the NWS to explain why Tim is the only one upon whom they now call who isn't an NWS employee. I don't understand why the NWS is refusing the advice of experienced "experts".

But a major event like the one of 27 April 2011 demands a team of folks doing the work. There are just too many tornadoes for one person to cover. Tim can only do so much and the clock ticks relentlessly as the clean-up proceeds. The 27 April 2011 outbreak of tornadoes in the southeastern US needs to be investigated using all available resources including the national QRT, and yet it seems the national QRT is on hold because the national Warning Coordination Meteorologist was out of the office yesterday!! And there are problems in coming up with the funding to support any travel by the team. Issues regarding travel support for the team should have been resolved years ago! This amounts to a disgraceful episode for NWS management. An important way to compensate our society for the damage and pain caused by tornadoes is for us to do our jobs and learn as much as we can from them. The moribund state of the national QRT is clear evidence of an inept performance and a lack of commitment by NWS management that is inhibiting the accurate assessement and comprehensive investigation of this tragic and historic tornado outbreak.

A dangerous illusion of safety

2011-04-27T09:45:00.002-05:00

Yesterday marked the 20th anniversary of an infamous tornado outbreak. I'm not going to discuss the event itself here, but want to focus on the continuing problem that the news coverage of the storm produced. In that video two reporters from Wichita TV station KSNW (cameraman Ted Lewis and reporter Gregg Jarrett) are shown, first attempting to run from the tornado and then taking shelter under an overpass on the Kansas Turnpike (Interstate-35) near El Dorado, KS, and helping passerby Butch Gilbert and his children up between the overpass girders. They all emerge unscathed after the tornado passes, but clearly are frightened by their experience.

There are many issues with this video that can be debated, but the main point I want to make here is that 20 years later, we're still dealing with the problem the video created: people seeking shelter from severe weather under highway overpasses. An extended presentation about why using overpasses for tornado shelters is a bad idea has been developed in an effort to counteract the impression that highway overpasses are viable shelter options.

Some friends of mine and I made the prediction soon after we saw this video that people would die taking shelter under overpasses. That prediction, sadly, came to pass on 3 May 1999, when three people were killed (and many others sustained major injuries) while seeking shelter under overpasses in Oklahoma. It's my opinion that the airing of that video is clearly and directly responsible for those fatalities. Those fatalities (and others, likely to come) are the unintended consequences of journalists doing their jobs.

What concerns me most here is the enduring impression created by the many, many airings of that dramatic video. The very evident message of this video, whatever reasons may have motivated its creation and presentation, is the erroneous notion that taking shelter under an overpass provides safety from tornadoes. My NWS colleagues tell me they've learned that some people are leaving their homes to take shelter under overpasses! It seems that no matter how many times people say this is absolutely not the correct thing to do, the impact of that video overwhelms those spoken (or written) words -- it's the old saying about a picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, a video is apparently worth tens of thousands of words. The video lives on via YouTube, of course.

Of course, someone might say, "Well, those folks sheltering under the overpass survived! What's the problem?" It's likely the reporter and his cameraman were ignorant of the fact that they could easily have outrun the tornado and then driven off an exit, at right angles to its path to escape the tornado. There was no need for them to stop and wait for the tornado to roll nearly over them. It's likely the reporters were ignorant of the inappropriateness of using overpasses as shelter. They simply did what they thought was right -- and took advantage of an opportunity to create dramatic video that no doubt profited them and the KSNW-TV station. Note that the tornado didn't pass directly over the location of the survivors under the overpass. And the tornado wasn't particularly violent at the time (although no tornado, even an EF-0, should be taken lightly). The violent tornado winds of 3 May 1999 blew people out from under the overpasses where they were hiding. The survivors in that video are lucky to have escaped unharmed. Their choice put them in considerable danger. What was clear to us when we saw the video was that if many others emulated this behavior, eventually someone would die as a result. It took several years, but the anticipated resulting fatalities eventually happened. If dangerous behavior is repeated enough times, someone will pay the price with their lives. When individuals survive unharmed after doing something life-threatening, that doesn't mean that the behavior is not dangerous!

Whatever their intentions, the damage from airing this video has been done and it apparently will take decades to repair that damage. Perhaps we need to air equally compelling, dramatic video of mangled overpass tornado victims? If on-air meteorologists and media journalists want to reinforce the message of not using overpasses in this way, they absolutely should never air that video! Never again! We must work to get that video out of people's sight, and perpetuating it on YouTube is only adding to the problem. Words alone have been ineffective in stemming the tide of people using overpasses as tornado shelters. If you show that video and say "Don't do this!" your words are wasted -- the evidence they see with their eyes overrides your words.

Humanity's hubris

2011-04-24T21:39:00.003-05:00

I'm often struck by the absolutely absurd notion that this planet was created for humans. What incredibly arrogant nonsense! We're only the latecomers on the block -- the last few seconds of the 24-h geological and astronomical clock marking the history of the Earth -- if you actually accept the scientific notions of geological deep time and evolution. Of course, if you choose not to accept those ideas, it may be because you're living under the self-centered delusions of religious fundamentalism. In that fundamentalist view, we humans are created by an omnipotent and omniscient deity to have "dominion" over the planet and everything on it. But humble in the face of the overwhelming power of this presumed deity (Might makes right? Pretty tough to challenge a being who is omnipotent, after all. Better bow down and kiss ass.).

No serious scientist would ever subscribe to such an silly notion. Every year, our planet demonstrates to us mere humans how pathetic and weak we are in the face of the meteorological, geological, and astronomical forces that can easily and without malice -- only indifference -- sweep us from existence on this planet. Natural hazards occur, such as the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan, that should make it clear to any rational creature that we are not the masters of this world! Of course, you can choose to attribute these hazards to an angry deity, punishing us for our transgressions, as did our ignorant ancestors who knew nothing of science. This is, of course, associated with the species-centric and pre-eminently religious notion that the putative deity, who presumably loves us above all of his/her/its creations, controls the processes that are responsible for devastation and destruction here on Earth. This deity, whose ways are mysterious (especially when no one can can offer a reasonable explanation for why he/she/it visits destruction on us, his chosen favorites), apparently uses natural processes to remind us of our place - subservient to the omniscient and omnipotent deity (which would seem pretty evident - why does he/she/it need to remind us of our insignificance in comparison to him/her/it?).

But leaving the religious nonsense aside, we humans seem only inclined to be worried about the planet and what we might be doing to it, when we ourselves are threatened. The late George Carlin noted that the planet doesn't need "saving" from the things we're doing to it. The Earth will return to its natural state quite nicely without us, should we be stupid enough to pollute ourselves into extinction. We depend on the processes ongoing here on Earth, but the Earth doesn't depend on us for anything!

Nevertheless, the only way to make any human care about what's going on seems to be to call attention to what we're doing to ourselves. What we might be doing to polar bears, or desert pupfish, or owls, or frogs, or spiders, or snakes, ... who cares? They're only lesser creatures, made by the mythical "creator" for our exploitation or indifference. "Let 'em go extinct. Who needs 'em?" says the species-centric idiot. Never mind the complex web of life on which we ourselves depend in the most critical ways. Endanger that web at our peril!

One of the most noble activities humans engage in is the rescue and rehabilitation of non-human creatures. When the Birds of Prey Foundation releases a healed raptor back to the wild, my sense of the ultimate value of humanity soars with them! This is an ultimate act by a thinking human being -- to seek to save the life of a member of a non-human species. Such acts on behalf of humans are magnificent, of course, but to do so for another species -- this is truly transcendental of your human arrogance. There are many advocates for non-human species who toil away in obscurity and indifference, but they tend to be drowned out by those who believe that all creatures are under our dominion! Must all species bow to our arrogance? Can we treat them all as disposable?

In the long run, it seems likely that humans are transients on this planet, not the chosen species of a mythical deity. Only our own hubris allows us to see ourselves as the crown of creation. We are nothing more than another step along a path that leads to a destination inconceivable and unknown to us. And that destination is not foreordained by some mythical deity who favors us above all other species. We'll be extremely fortunate to last as long as the dinosaurs, for instance. Our civilization and all its supposedly noble accomplishments (we're legends in our own minds) is meaningless in the context of deep time and evolution. We humans right now teeter on the brink of extinction from our own ignorance and arrogance. And the Earth would easily shake us off like a bad case of fleas (as noted by George Carlin) and go on its own way.

What is inevitable and what's not inevitable ...

2011-04-18T23:07:00.003-05:00

My often-underestimated spouse has offered an emotional tribute to the loss of a friend. This event, like others before it, makes me confront something both unpleasant and at the same time uplifting. In our relationships with others, it's inevitable that we'll be parted by the unrelenting reality of death. One of us will be first to go that way, and it's a harsh reality that we'll be parted in the process. Every human relationship is finite and will be terminated by the death of one.

Some of us cling to the forlorn hope that we'll be reunited in some mythical afterlife. I don't choose to accept that insubstantial promise of solace, that supposition of eternal life after an Earthly demise. Rather, what I choose to accept is that our interpersonal relationships will be severed by the inevitability of death. I've already had to accept the deaths of many friends and acquaintances. This is an unpleasant part of getting older. I miss them all, every day. But I have solace of a very different sort than the mythical promise of eternal life in some paradise of a supreme being.

Although separation is inevitable, what is not inevitable is the experience of having shared my time on Earth with someone who has brought joy into my life. This is indeed far from inevitable. My experiences with most people are fleeting and of little significance to me. Sorry, but that's the reality of life. However, some people leave an indelible and important impact on my life. These special relationships run a gamut of variety, but what they have in common is that I feel enriched and happy that I had some time to share my existence with these people. Losing them before I myself have passed means that my existence is impoverished by their absence -- but at the same time, I must acknowledge that my existence has been enhanced by the time I had to share with them. I choose to dwell on that, rather than my loss -- it's selfish to be absorbed by feelings of loss and bitterness over that loss. I prefer to be thankful for the joy these people brought into my life.

Laughter over light-hearted moments, empathy and understanding in times of sadness and loss, discussions that have enlightened me and enriched my time, love that we've shared, hobbies we've enjoyed together, wonder and awe at the natural world, arguments that have left me grateful for their willingness to give me their unadorned opinions of me and my thoughts, moments of profound connection as human beings that seem to go beyond normal communication. These and many more such are gifts that have flowed from the non-inevitability of the real relationships I've had and which continue to bless my Earthly existence virtually every day. I've welcomed many people into my life and been grateful for most of them. If they pass before I do, I refuse to submit to self-centered mourning for my losses. Rather, I exult in the times we shared and the connections we've made. Ultimately, we die alone, but the blessing of friends and family make our time here rich with experiences and shared humanity. At some point, my time will come and I don't fear that moment very much. Others have gone before me, and others will follow, inevitably. But the value we place on the time we spent with our friends and family is not mandatory -- it's a matter of choice. I choose not ever to regret that time nor to negate the joy of those times by my selfish sense of loss when those people have preceded me in the inevitability of death. And I embrace the principle that death is an inevitable part of life, not something evil or malevolent.

Monday Morning Quarterbacks

2011-04-18T11:24:00.003-05:00

How appropriate that I'm inspired to make this entry on my blog on a Monday morning. Some chasers have been commenting on the excellent performance of the Storm Prediction Center regarding the 3-day outbreak of severe weather starting on 14 April. Most of the posts are appropriately supportive of the excellent job done by my colleagues there over the past several days. But there always seem to be some trolls who want to play Monday Morning Quarterback (MMQ). This is hardly the first time I've seen such comments -- today's were only the latest in a long line of such over the years. Many people, including some storm chasers, seem to delight in finding fault with the SPC. Thus, I want to take some time to make a few things clear:

1. SPC forecasts are not only concerned with events of interest to tornado chasers. They include all forms of NWS-recognized "severe thunderstorm events": not just tornadoes, but also convective wind gusts and large hail. The SPC forecasts are not tailored specifically to the needs and interests of tornado chasers. If you're going to criticize the SPC forecasts, please keep this in mind. If you think you make a better chase forecaster than the SPC forecasters, then by all means -- define your forecasting criteria, post your daily chase forecasts in advance for a whole year, make the whole data set public, and show us the verification results for your chase forecasting. Note that successful chases can be associated with what amount to busted forecasts, so your tornado videos are not evidence of your forecasting capabilities -- only of your chasing capabilities!

2. The task of putting out severe convective weather forecasts for the entire USA, 24/7, is not a simple job. It's quite challenging, and I challenge anyone to produce the suite of products the SPC produces during the day shift every day -- products issued several times per day and others as needed -- for a whole year. Lest anyone think that the advent of numerical models and other objective forecasting aids has made this task easier -- think again! All the SPC forecasters put their names on all the forecasts as a matter of public record. After you've published your forecasts, then do an objective, statistical verification of them along the lines of the SPC verification programs, and compare your results to those of the SPC for that year. If you can provide such evidence that yours are even close to their results, then I might give you some credibility. If you can't exceed their results, then my recommendation is to shut the hell up!

3. The SPC suite of products is, like all other forms of weather forecasting, not perfect. It's likely impossible to put out an indisputably perfect forecast, so that's not even a worthy topic of discussion. The Facebook troll I encountered today made the statement that SPC forecasts are "wrong as often as they are right" -- thereby establishing beyond doubt that he doesn't have a clue about the subject. He was a legend only in his own mind, incapable of backing up his claims, naturally.

I'm far from blind to the shortcomings of the NWS, as anyone who has read even a fraction of my Web content can determine for themselves. But for a few years, I sat in the hot seat of the forecasters at the SPC (back when it was known as the SELS Unit of the National Severe Storms Forecast Center in Kansas City, MO) and, with all my education, I just managed to not embarrass myself as a severe weather forecaster. I wish I could convey the feeling of ignorance that swept over me as addressed a blank map of the US, onto which I had to produce my first ever convective outlook. Anyone who hasn't done this simply has no clue what it's like, or how challenging it can be. Even on those days when the SPC forecasts make significant errors, these forecasters are not just lollygagging around, spouting objective guidance-driven platitudes. They're doing a difficult job well every damned day! They're the best severe convective weather forecasters on the planet, so far as I'm concerned, until someone can step up and show me solid evidence that they're better than the SPC!

4. The fact that I respect the job being done by the SPC doesn't mean that I think they're perfect and metaphorically walk on water. They themselves would readily admit to shortcomings, I'm sure. When they make forecasting decisions, some of them turn out to be mistakes. The state of the science is far from complete and if you want to accomplish something useful to push forward the state of the science, I'm sure the SPC forecasters would be among the first to applaud your contributions. By all means, share your insights via conference presentations and publications in the formal meteorological literature. But if all you can contribute is after-the-fact MMQ'ing, then I suggest you shut the hell up!

A few folks with the capability to meet or exceed SPC forecasting standards might exist, but they're not doing the job right now that the SPC does. Until someone has done that job, they still have something to prove. If you can't produce the evidence, your claims to such capability remain undemonstrated and you have no qualifications to play MMQ!

Chasing has passed me by ...

2011-04-15T07:55:00.006-05:00

This morning, in the wake of the news about deaths from tornadoes in Oklahoma and Arkansas, I found my FaceBook status messages filled with chasers crowing about their great chase days, shaky video showing chasers getting close to large tornadoes, and -- as an afterthought -- comments like "our thoughts and prayers are with CityXX."

Next year will mark the 40th anniversary of my very first serious storm chase (on 18 April 1972). In the time that's passed since then, chasing has grown far beyond anything I could have imagined back then. Unfortunately, I may have had something to do with that growth, in my youthful ignorance of the consequences of extolling the virtues of chasing during interviews for crockumentaries about tornadoes and chasers. It's quite evident to me that chasing as a "sport" has passed by me, on its way to whatever destiny the future holds for it. I've become a gripy old curmudgeon, well removed from the "cutting edge" of storm chasing. I can't say I have any wish whatsoever to seek to keep up with what chasing has become, however.

I look at the videos people claim are fantastic on FB but I see almost no quality video. Most of it is the "edgy" sort of "reality video" that's all the rage these days. People cheering and having "stormgasms" while they bounce down some road on the way to a close encounter. In those close encounters, for the most part, the video sucks (by my standards). In fact, it's my opinion that seeing a tornado up close is not the most dramatic or exciting visual content. What's so spectacular about dust and debris filling the viewfinder as it flies by? I could get that in a microburst or gust front! No, the standard for video is now to get the "dramatic" shot -- OMG! We're in the $%#@ing tornado! We're in the tornado! We're in the tornado! -- even when the video shows clearly that they're not in the tornado. Clearly, this reflects the fact that for most chasers today, it's about them and not about the storms. Look at me! I'm doing something fantastic! Pay attention to me!! Such chasers are quite evidently immature and have little or no real appreciation for the atmospheric spectacle they're ostensibly seeking.

I've seen video from in tornadoes and -- no surprise here -- it shows little or nothing! Air filled with dust and debris in very dim light. Big whup! The desire to see inside a tornado may have its roots in some interviews with tornado survivors in the 1950s, whose accounts strike me today as likely to be pure fabrication, or at the very least, wildly exaggerated. Many of us have expected the view inside a tornado to be a disappointment, and what evidence exists seems to confirm this. It really has little point outside of those who are trying to gather scientific observations close to and within tornadoes. It's just a stunt, otherwise. But such stunts sell well in the media, of course. They make movies and "reality" series about pointless stunts, and there's fame and fortune to be had ...

A while ago, I posted some thoughts about my feelings after the 24 May 1973 Union City, Oklahoma tornado (see item #32 here). Doing the damage survey brought home the reality that tornadoes do devastating things to people. This feeling was reinforced after the 03 May 1999 tornadoes. If I'm going to be excited about seeing these, I had to come to terms with this aspect of tornado reality. Whatever excitement I feel about seeing a tornado needs to be kept to myself and never given voice in any medium where tornado victims might be present. Stormgasms on video aired publicly sullies the image of all storm chasers, reinforcing the impression that all chasers are thoughtless idiots. Come to think of it, this impression is apparently in the process of becoming more and more representative!

My feelings as an atheist are that prayers have essentially zero substance and can't be shown to have any effect. Offering your prayers for tornado victims is to offer them nothing! If you can't do anything more meaningful than offer prayers, I'd rather you kept your mouth shut. I suppose it amounts to an expression of sympathy, and if taken as that, it nevertheless remains valueless for the victims. Empathy (i.e., knowing how someone feels because you've experienced what they've experienced) is more meaningful, and might lead someone to do something more substantive than offer your "thoughts and prayers". Most chasers have not experienced the devastation brought about by a tornado, and so are incapable of empathy. I detest it when infantile chasers are bragging about their exciting chase day and then throw away a "thoughts and prayers" comment at the end of their exultation over seeing devastating storms. A statement of this sort at the end of a stormgasm in a public medium like FB or TV rings hollow and hypocritical. Chasers need to think this one through quite a bit more thoroughly.

Nowadays, some chasers attempt to get involved in search and rescue efforts after tornadoes pass through towns. If someone is injured and you're right there, by all means do whatever you can to help. But going into tornado-damaged areas to "help" is misguided. Most chasers are ill-equipped (both materially and in terms of training) to be of much assistance to first responders, so it's likely that those who do this are only going to get in the way of professionals (i.e., first responders) and are likely to cause more harm than good. Further, these amateurs may be injured themselves -- there's considerable danger in walking through piles of tornado debris, especially for untrained, ill-equipped folks -- thereby creating more work for the professionals. Chasers doing this may believe they're helping, but it's unlikely that they can be of much help. Think it through, people. Stay out of tornado damage tracks and let the professionals do their job. Personally, I think a lot of this is motivated by guilt feelings after a stormgasm, but whatever the motivation, I think it's an inappropriate response.

Yep -- chasing has passed me by -- and I pulled over and let it do so.

The Greatest Doswell ... updated

2011-04-05T02:50:00.010-05:00

This is a short account of the greatest Doswell. It begins with a branch of my family that moved to and became established in Virginia during pre-revolutionary days. [I'm not a direct descendant of that line. My great-grandfather, John Indiana -- perhaps I'll have more on that story later.] The Virginia Doswells became landed gentry (no doubt with slaves) and moved in the same social circles with the truly famous Lees of Virginia. Many of these aristocrats had racing stables, and the Doswells were no exception. A Civil War skirmish was fought between Grant and Lee on Doswell land (near the North Anna River), during the interlude between major battles at Spotsylvania Court House and Cold Harbor -- a book I have about the skirmish (J.M. Miller, 1989: Even to Hell Itself, ISBN-0-919930-71-8) mentions "the celebrated horse breeder Major Doswell" on whose property part of the skirmish took place.

My friend David Hoadley sent me a story years ago that had appeared in a Virginia newspaper's Sunday supplement. The gist of the story is that the Virginia Doswells had a long history with horse racing, but fell on hard times and were forced to sell their stables at some point, presumably after the Civil War sometime. I can no longer find the article, and I can't remember the details regarding the date of the sale or to whom the stables were sold. Part of the arrangements associated with that sale, according to the story, was that any new owners would continue to race under the colors of the Doswell racing stables.

There recently was a movie about the great horse Secretariat and the horse breeding and racing operation under Penny Chenery Tweedy. The movie opens with a scene in Doswell, Virginia (a small town north of Richmond named for that branch of the Doswell family), home for Meadow Farm Stable. The star of that movie is undeniably the horse, Secretariat, a Triple Crown winner (the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness, and the Belmont Stakes) in 1973. The most famous and greatest Doswell is the celebrated horse, Secretariat! [We can claim him because he raced under "our" colors.] I've seen a color photo of Secretariat with Ron Turcotte (the jockey who rode him to the triple crown) aboard, and they got the colors (blue and white checked) more or less right in the movie.

A few years ago, I had a chance to visit Doswell, Virginia. It’s not much of a town but has an amusement park of significance, and apparently has something of a timber industry, but is otherwise not impressive. It seems to be little more than a “whistle stop” on the CSX rail lines that run through the town. The pimply-faced teenager behind the counter in the local convenience store was unimpressed with the fact that my driver’s license proclaims me to be related to the family for which the town is named. Nevertheless, it’s the home of a line within my family that at one time were local aristocrats and can claim the proud heritage of arguably the greatest race horse that ever lived and raced -- from Doswell, Virginia and under the Doswell racing stable colors!

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UPDATE: I recently located what appears to be a newspaper article by someone named John Markon that I hand-dated July 1982 from the Richmond, VA Times-Dispatch, where Markon was a staff writer. It makes no mention of the sale of the Doswell racing stables, but discusses the relationship one Major Thomas W. Doswell had with Capt. Richard Johnson Hancock. Major Doswell lived in the vicinity of Hanover Junction (later to be named Doswell) and had an estate called Bull Field, where apparently he put on some big horse races annually until his death. Doswell is recognized in the article to be the third in a line of horsemen. This is evidently the same Major Doswell mentioned in the book about the Civil War skirmish at the North Anna River. The article discusses a horse Major Doswell owned for a while, Eolus, which is claimed in the article to be the origin of an "equine empire" in the region.

According to the article, "By 1877. Doswell and Hancock had also begun a racing partnership with Hancock conditioning Bull Field colts and fillies in Albermarle and the horses later racing under the Doswell colors." The article goes on, "T.W. Doswell died in 1890 ... Eventually, Hancock gained ownership of much of the Bull Field stock, and race horses owned by the Hancocks have carried Doswell's orange silks, the first to be officially registered by the American Jockey Club, for the last 90 years." Apparently, it was the Hancock breeding operation at Claiborne Farm that's associated with Secretariat, who was born at Chenery's Meadow Stable .

Thus, it seems the memory I had that Secretariat ran under Doswell colors was mistaken. Christopher T. Chenery (father of Penny Chenery Tweedy, who bred and raced Secretariat) established his Meadow Stable on land adjacent to Bull Field. The article makes it clear that the Doswell colors were orange silks, not blue and white checks, so my recollection of the content of the material sent to me by Dave Hoadley was in error. We Doswells probably can't make much of a claim to Secretariat after all. The most famous Doswell is likely of lesser fame than Secretariat!

I also remember an article which ran in a Richmond Sunday supplement on this topic, but if that's still in my possession and not just another mistaken recollection, I can't locate it.

A pox on both houses ...

2011-04-04T23:26:00.005-05:00

The mock trial and burning of the koran (or whatever is the preferred spelling for this 'sacred' document) has caused muslim violence, including the deaths of Americans. The christians responsible for this sequence of events, led by Florida cleric Terry Jones deny any responsibility for the consequences of their actions, naturally. If their actions had no consequence, wouldn't that be a failure for them? Provocateurs fail precisely when they can engender no response! Unfortunately the ignorant, delusional muslim fanatics know only one sort of response to provocation: violence. I certainly have no more love for the muslim version of religion than I do for the christian version.

In the same way that the Westboro Baptist Church is free to carry on their pseudo-protests (which are actually fund-raisers!) according to the doctrine of free speech here in the US, Terry Jones and his followers are free to burn a book as part of their protest. But, like the WBC crowd's protests at the funerals of American soldiers, or the marches of American nazis in Skokie in the mid-1970s, this is not the sort of activity that most people should support. No doubt exists that book-burning is a highly symbolic act -- and the symbolism is far more meaningful to most people than the act itself. The same is true for flag burning, etc. Responding to provocations with violence is precisely what the perpetrators of those provocations generally seek! The most compelling negative response is to ignore the provocateurs!!

But when people commit acts of violence in the face of provocation, they must be given the same punishment for that violence that we would administer in the absence of provocation. The muslim fanatics have learned that we in the US cannot ignore violence, and so they know we will retaliate with the very violence that the provocations are designed to produce. As I said sometime back, we're losing the so-called 'war on terrorism' by responding more or less exactly as the terrorists have hoped for with their despicable acts. We seem unable to come up with any response short of violence of our own.

The real problem here with this instance of violence in response for 'sacred' book-burning isn't insensitivity, or political correctness, or even the right to free speech. The most important aspect of this is the nature of religion itself. Christianity (in all its tens of thousands of forms) and Islam (also divided into multiple sects) share traits common to all the main monotheistic religions: they are convinced that their path is the only true path, and all those not with them are against them. Unbelievers, in the versions of righteousness common to both islam and christianity, are fit only to die and be consigned to eternal damnation. The bible and the koran are steeped in the blood of unbelievers resulting from these exclusionary principles common to both. Christian and muslim fanatics actually have a great deal of common ground, though both would be outraged at the very notion that they share anything at all.

So long as church and state remain separated, the fundamentalist christians and fundamentalist muslims can be seen quite clearly as what they truly are: fanatics, driven by their own delusions to be willing to commit any act to support their faith. It's where religion and government become intertwined and the state reinforces religious dogma that the 'moderate' believers, who might otherwise not be inclined toward violence, may have the binary choice: with us ... or against us (with all the consequences of the latter being pretty apparent!) forced on them with state power as well as that of their religion.

The very principle of free speech that figures in the book-burning by Terry Jones and his delusional followers surely would be at risk should the christians in this nation succeed in making the US a christian theocracy. The conflict with the muslim world would be amplified into Orwellian proportions -- a jihad on both sides -- and take on an ever-growing stridency when voices of moderation are forced to choose: us ... or them.

It's the widespread delusion of religion that's to blame for this series of events leading to violent deaths in Afghanistan. The pointless christian provocation and the inevitable, predictable response by muslim fanatics are the logical outcome of the exclusionary principles characterizing most religions. These actions threaten the freedom here in the US that has been the grand experiment envisioned by the framers of our Constitution, and that we've enjoyed since the end of the 18th century here. If a US citizen can't see why the separation of church and state is so important, I'm at a loss for understanding how such a person could have failed so utterly, so completely to grasp the essence of democracy: protection of the rights of minorities, especially when we find minorities disagreeable. Of course, Afghani muslims know little of respect for the expression of minority opinions. But neither would US residents if a christian theocracy is established here!

A different sort of tsunami?

2011-03-11T11:17:00.010-06:00

Today, when the power of the Earth has been demonstrated dramatically and tragically by the devastating earthquake near Japan and its powerful tsunami, another sort of tsunami is looming on the horizon here in the USA. We're a deeply divided nation in the midst of a number of economic and societal crises, in this case largely of our own making.

We're reaping the harvest of the policies planted by the GWB administration -- allowed to flourish and ripen by the ineffectual Obama administration. In GWB's haste to deregulate our financial system (which cashed in on the housing boom and then bailed out of the resulting disaster), to maintain the lavish luxury of the elite few who sit atop the oil and financial industries, and to exploit bigotry and ignorance for political gain, we're now seeing signs of an impending societal tsunami. As the haves distance themselves ever farther from the have-nots, the stampede to push the corporate agenda on the American public has reached new levels of aggression.

The Wisconsin GOP governor has used a legislative loophole to push through the policy he wanted that limits severely the collective bargaining rights of public employees, including teachers in public schools. In the process, he demonized public school teachers as the sort of bloodsucking "fat cats" that he himself is representing so well! Democrats have been rendered irrelevant by such tactics and they can only stand powerless and amazed at this affront to the legislative process. The Michigan GOP governor has declared "financial martial law," replacing elected local officials with his own appointed minions. These are tactics familiar to those who would become dictators (Hitler and Stalin come immediately to mind, of course). When the elected representatives are able to block your agenda, simply sweep them aside in favor of your own followers and push through whatever you want. Who cares what the "other side" supports? They're irrelevant!

The true nature of the conservative right wing (as represented by the Christian Nationalist Party -- CNP, aka the GOP) in this nation is becoming ever more clear. Despite wrapping themselves in the flag and claiming the right to be the standard-bearer of American democracy (as well as legislating our national morality), they now are showing themselves to be crypto-fascists, quite willing to do anything to have their way, despite whatever opposition might come from roughly half the population of this nation. Why compromise when you simply run roughshod over your opposition? The sad part of this is that many politically conservative working people are being victimized by the very politicians they've voted into office. The CNP somehow has convinced their supporters that they are the champions of the working class, but the policies they impose on the body politic (by any means necessary, it seems) only favor the corporations and their fabulously wealthy executives.

How can anyone be so naive as to believe that public school teachers are to bear the lion's share of the blame for bankrupting the states? Apparently, someone even less well off than teachers, with less education and less marketable skills. Did schoolteachers cause the credit default swap disaster that has bankrupted so many and resulted in massive numbers of foreclosures? Did schoolteachers cause the failure of energy companies like Enron, with all the financial reverberations of those failures? Was it the schoolteachers who engaged our nation once again in pointless, unwinnable, expensive foreign wars? Did schoolteachers outsource vast numbers of American jobs in favor of cheap labor in other countries? Was it schoolteachers who mismanaged state and federal funds, resulting in massive debts? If the CNP is doing this to teachers, the CNP's working class supporters remain in the crosshairs of the very crypto-fascists for whom they're voting. When the teachers have been tarred and feathered, who's next? Evidently, not the corporations and their executives!

The left wing ("liberals") in this country have shown themselves to be astonishingly incompetent and impotent in the face of this tsunami of lies, distortions, and high-handed actions that are eroding the very system that the crypto-fascists claim for their own banners. Like political liberals in the eras before the ascendancy of fascism and communism, they're being swept into the dustbin of history, standing open-mouthed and paralyzed by the shock and awe attacks from the CNP. In the face of opponents who are willing to do virtually anything to have their way (including trampling on the rights of the minorities), they wilt -- because to oppose the radicals with similar tactics is to surrender the moral high ground. The problem is that the crypto-fascists don't have the same morals! They do whatever it takes to win the day and don't care about the rules of representative democracy.

When revolution becomes the only way for the oppressed people of a nation to have any hope, then revolution will follow. Remove the hope for incremental change and respect for the rights of minorities, and eventually those people have nothing left to lose. We're seeing that demonstrated dramatically right now in the Middle East -- Egypt, Tunisia, Libya -- with other revolutions only simmering just beneath the surface in Saudi Arabia, Iran, and elsewhere. Revolutions naturally tend to follow a course toward radicalization, and the outcome of a revolution need not be good for the people who began it. Revolutionaries tend to become more radical with time. In many cases, revolutions install a new boss who's practically the same as the old boss, rendering the revolution pointless in the end. Since no one knows how revolutions will turn out, if you've lost any hope for incremental change, why not foment a revolution?

Here in the USA, we had one successful revolution that threw off British colonial rule and installed our existing constitutional democracy, an amazing outcome, even in hindsight. Another revolution here in the USA became The Civil War, wherein Americans slaughtered each other for four years before the rebellion finally was defeated militarily. The South still smolders with resentment over that defeat nearly 150 years ago, despite now waving the American flag in CNP-dominated state governments -- the very political party that was responsible for their defeat in the Civil War! The liberal, pro-human rights agenda of the 19th-century GOP has been revised by the crypto-fascists and now embraces ignorance and bigotry as the means for making the rich richer and the poor poorer. Are we setting the table for another home-grown revolution? The CNP seems determined to make it happen.

Being involved with Earth science

2011-03-06T19:29:00.003-06:00

I've been deeply committed to "Earth Science" for more than 50 years, now. I can't explain the origins of my fascination with various aspects of this world, except to say that I've found the world in which I live to be a source of constant wonder. I understand an interest in such extraterrestrial topics as astronomy, but largely because I find it amazing to contemplate how we here on Earth have come to be here -- the debris of stellar supernovae come to self-awareness and a need to understand our roots in the physical universe. Extraterrestrial concepts are interesting to me in large part because of their comparison and contrast with what is going on here on Earth!

Anyway, the science of the Earth has been near and dear to me since I was a small boy. Not only is it a puzzle of monumental complexity that's quite capable of challenging the strongest intellects of our world, but the ramifications of Earth sciences have a clear relevance to everyone on the planet, whether they realize it or not! It pains me to see how aggressively ignorant so many humans are, willing to discard rationality in favor of cherished superstition or political agendas and unwilling to spend any time trying seriously to understand the grandeur of the physical processes upon which our very existence depends! Being ignorant is not a particularly good strategy for survival, but it seems to be quite popular these days. We ignore the contributions of Earth science at our peril.

Being a scientist necessarily involves the possibility of being wrong. As I've emphasized many times, being wrong is implicit in being a scientist. Fortunately for us, science is mostly self-correcting, including the occasional ethical transgressions of those whose ambitions exceed their commitment to the inherently honest work of science. Bad science is typically found out sooner or later, to the detriment of those who may have committed ethical transgressions in the process. If an idea is advanced that ultimately is inconsistent with the evidence, this will be noted and corrected eventually. Science is not a discovery of absolute truth, but an exploration of ideas created by fallible humans -- ideas in constant need of reconsideration in light of new evidence. We're often wrong in science, but we trust the process to correct our misunderstandings eventually.

Recently, I've seen some examples where some of my colleagues seem to be trapped inside the confines of what they've been taught. We're taught our science via the application of traditionally-accepted methods, that have been successful in the past. Those methods have been developed to deal with the particular challenges of our science, but it's disappointing to me when some of my colleagues feel that those methods define the processes. If science is to make progress, we need to avoid being trapped by traditional modes of thought that have worked in the past. We all should be prepared to be willing to embrace new ideas, even as we remain skeptical of all of them. It's a difficult road to walk, as it follows a narrow line between being blinded by old methods and being too willing to accept new methods.

Those seeking absolute truth must look to something other than science. Science simply does not deal in absolute truths! Skepticism about ideas that question the consensus is fine, but we must be able to recognize which of these new ideas is worth pursuing versus those that clearly are not. If we consider a hypothesis that goes against scientific consensus that involves, say, supernatural influences, this is simply not a meaningful path for the science to follow. If we wish to overthrow the consensus about something, it seems reasonable to ask for extraordinarily compelling evidence. An idea challenging the consensus that cannot provide compelling evidence is not acceptable, even if that idea ultimately turns out to be correct! The classic example of this is continental drift (proposed by Alfred Wegener, a meteorologist), the compelling evidence for which was lacking when Wegener proposed it, but was found many decades later. Science eventually came to embrace this notion, despite rejecting it when it first was proposed. This is a wonderful example of how science really works, but is misunderstood by most people.

Science is a marketplace of ideas. Good ideas eventually survive and bad ideas are discarded. Being a part of this is a lot of fun!

Dire threats to the National Weather Service?

2011-02-22T22:33:00.002-06:00

As I write this, there is much weeping and gnashing of teeth regarding the possibility of massive cuts to the National Weather Service (NWS), including a possible shutdown of the whole Federal government. I'm going to avoid any purely political aspects of this current situation. Instead, I want to offer some perspective on the existing financial 'crisis'.

First of all, during all my 30+ years of working for the Federal Government, I don't recall a single moment when the budget wasn't under pressure. I never experienced a time when everyone was satisfied with, and grateful for, their fiscal support -- it was only a matter of episodic fluctuations in the depth of the continuous 'crisis'! Somehow, we managed to muddle through all those crises, although I must say the long-term trend has been one of declining budgets relative to their buying power (thanks to inflation, among other things). Slowly, but surely, things have deteriorated relative to what they were -- see my essay here for an interpretation of this.

Second, let me begin by saying I'm not an enemy of the NWS! I have no vested interest in seeing them suffer. I have too many NWS friends for that, and though I have no illusions about its management, I believe sincerely that the NWS more than pays for society's investment in its services (perhaps many, many times over!), although it's difficult to put numbers on the return on investment. However -- given that we have only sketchy understanding, at best, of how valuable the NWS products are, it becomes difficult to justify the expense when we have yet another fiscal 'crisis'.

I've suggested via another medium that the cessation of products from the NWS might provide an interesting test of just how valuable their products are to the public they purport to serve. To what extent would an interruption in those services result in major problems for the broad range of public users of weather forecasts? Although I have no evidence to back up what I'm about to say, it seems clear to me that the biggest challenge to the NWS is that there might not be any noticeable effect, as perceived by the majority of the the public!!

Since the NWS has abdicated any meaningful role in product dissemination, preferring instead to leave that for the private sector, that same private sector could (and would) take up a lot of the duties abandoned by the NWS during a financial crisis. And they would do so more than a little gleefully! And it's likely that the products seen by the public would remain at some level close to what they now experience!! This could lead to some embarrassing questions, such as, "If there was so little impact, perhaps it's time for the government to divest itself of this enterprise and allow the private sector to do it?" There have been several attempts by certain political sectors to do just this in the past. Although those attempts were unsuccessful then, the time might be ripe for them finally to win this war. And those pressures will not go away even if they fail once again.

While the annual per capita cost to individual taxpayers for all the NWS services amounts to about the price of a meal at a fast-food restaurant (a huge bargain!), the biggest cost driver for the NWS operation is personnel. If you want to reduce the NWS budget to skeletal levels (e.g., only collecting observations, which the private sector doesn't want to pay for), the fastest way to do so is to cut staffing. Closing offices may be politically difficult, but it's possible that this 'crisis' or the next will see the draconian cuts that everyone in the system fears.

I don't know how to set national priorities (Does anyone?), but I believe that most people aren't particularly concerned about the weather most of the time. They want to know about when it will affect them personally, and they seem to expect perfect forecasts for those occasions when it does affect them, but -- for the majority of the time -- they have other things that concern them. Will there be a groundswell of support for the NWS this time? Maybe. Or maybe not.

Some of us have been anticipating the demise of the human forecaster in the public sector for some time, now. The economics of it are all against the humans. Automated systems run for pennies a day, never go on vacation, and don't get paid after they 'retire'. What's worse is tha human forecasters have, for the most part, chosen to allow the metastasis of meteorological cancer by not doing what it takes to add significant value to automated guidance, which only hastens the day when the economics of this will become so compelling as to result in the loss of those public sector forecaster jobs. I'm pretty confident that NWS managers aren't going to pour gasoline over their heads to help with the budget crisis, despite the bloated NOAA/NWS bureaucracy!

We may yet "weather" this crisis with minimal damage. But there is always another on the horizon. The words of the prophets are written on the Beltway walls and academic halls ... the sounds of silence may yet characterize NWS offices in the future.

Research, travel, and training are easy targets for budget cuts. The NWS does no meaningful training, of course, and they're already stingy with travel (except for bureaucrats). Cutting research will have no short-term impact, of course, but will have devastating results in the future. NWS forecasters argue that they are "essential" personnel (see above), but have little empathy for their research colleagues: when the pie shrinks, the immediate 'family' gets more pie than distant relatives.

Incompatible: Science and superstition

2011-02-21T13:59:00.007-06:00

I was watching "How the Universe Works" on the Science Channel today -- a relatively infrequent occasion when the so-called Science Channel actually aired a program about science! -- and it got me to thinking:

If we go back to the time of ancient Greece, the first glimmerings of science began as "Natural Philosophy" with Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Archimedes, Pythagoras, and Eratosthenes, among others. This was the beginnings of a different approach to understanding the world around us, built on logic and empirical evidence, rather than superstition, mythology, and blind faith. Greek natural philosophers were something very new!

During and after the Renaissance, in fact, the increasingly empirical science being done ran headlong into those entrenched followers of superstition. Copernicus, Galileo, Bacon, Bruno, and many other scientists in Europe suffered persecution and even death at the hands of the Catholic Church because their findings were seen as heretical -- they were incompatible with biblical scriptures. Of course, many famous scientists of the time were faithful christians, as well, including such luminaries and Newton, Leibniz, and Kepler.

Today, we see the same conflicts wherever science offers an interpretation of the way the world works that contradicts cherished scriptural superstitions (and no conflicts where science fails to intersect with scripture). Fortunately, the power of the church (in nontheocracies) has declined to the point where it can't enforce its teaching with torture, imprisonment, and death! Wherever religion and politics are deeply intertwined, of course, the church continues to show its claws when it comes to doubters and unbelievers!

Evolution, deep geological time, modern cosmology -- they all clash with various religious writings and teachings, so we have the growth of a profoundly anti-science movement that coincides with the growing acceptance of religious beliefs here in the USA. That this religious revival is associated with an anti-science movement is not an accident of history. And, as in the past, we have scientists who somehow manage to embrace both science and religion (although they represent a minority among scientists), which I maintain are so diametrically opposed as to deny any rational acceptance of both. I take it as a given that as the stature of the scientist grows, the fraction accepting deistic religious belief declines. The question becomes -- how to explain those scientists who do embrace belief in a deity!

Many aspects of science seem mysterious to non-scientists -- in particular, some say that science requires the same sort of faith that is embodied in religion. This is nothing less than a profound misunderstanding of science. Science offers hypotheses about the natural world that can be tested against evidence, not unsubstantiated claims. The acceptance of a hypothesis requires that it be consistent with the evidence, but its acceptance is always provisional, never final. New evidence may require a revision of the hypothesis, or it may re-affirm the acceptability of an existing hypothesis. The more tests a scientific idea can pass, the more highly regarded that idea becomes, but never to the point of becoming dogma, to be accepted on faith. And, contrary to the claims of some believers, science is never arrogant in its claims to understanding -- good science always is associated with humility in the face of all that scientists have learned we don't yet understand in the very process of gaining new understanding! We labor long and hard to learn the limits to our understanding, and typically resent those who come by their ignorance the easy way!

Religion (at least the major monotheistic faiths that dominate the western and middle eastern world) demands blind faith. Its highest ideal is absolute, child-like obedience and unquestioning faith. Doubt is not permitted, and considered heretical, to say nothing of pointing out religious contradictions with reality. Religion claims sole possession of truth for itself and its self-appointed leaders. When science and religion happen to clash on a subject, the faithful are required to reject science.

Consider what science has given us:

We now know that stars are suns, powered by thermonuclear fusion
We now know that all the matter of the Universe is the condensed energy from the 14 billion year-old "Big Bang" and that the Universe is not at all static and unchanging
We now know that our solar system, with the Sun at its heart, is about 5 billion years old, and includes a host of objects besides the Earth: planets (that are not stars at all, but other worlds), asteroids, comets. etc.
We now know that life has evolved from its earliest beginnings (as yet unexplained) into complex life forms, including we humans, during the existence of the Earth
We now know that volcanoes and earthquakes result from plate tectonics and the processes driven by the heat within the Earth's interior
We now know that storms are the result of processes associated with unequal heating

Many of the gaps in our scientific understanding have been filled, no longer requiring a role for a deity as an "explanation" for that phenomenon. At points in the past, all these things (and more) were not known, and various myths were proposed to "explain" such things, many of which revolved around some deity (many have been postulated!) whose wrath at our lack of belief was responsible for these natural events. Most human beings over the history of our species have lived out their entire lives with only superstition and mythology to explain what they saw around them. They never knew what stars are, they had no idea how we humans came to be here on Earth, and they had no clue as to why they experienced geological and meteorological hazards. Myths were an early, unscientific way, to try to explain things, but science has no place for the "God Hypothesis" as it offers no explanation at all. Gods are the ultimate deus ex machina.

It seems very strange to me to embrace both science and religion, since they involve such contradictory methods regarding knowledge of the world around us. It's at best a monument to the ability of humans to compartmentalize their thinking. The lifelong habits of successful science should disallow the very notion of accepting someone's ideas on faith, without question or doubt.

Living and dying with the models

2011-02-09T17:57:00.003-06:00

Oklahoma has experienced some dramatic weather events the past several days - we had a major snow event preceded by thundersleet (and some hail!) last week that was quite well forecast by the numerical weather prediction (NWP) models and so was well-anticipated. The confidence in the forecast was high enough that many schools and businesses actually announced they were going to be shut down the next day, well before the first precipitation even began! Given Norman's pathetic snow and ice removal capabilities, many schools and businesses stayed closed for the rest of the week thanks to an extended period of bitter cold (i.e., below melting temperatures).

Another significant event was anticipated for this week, but it turned out to have missed Norman, for the most part. We experienced considerably less than the forecast snow amounts. Of course, schools and businesses had again announced they were going to shut down before a flake had fallen. This time, it seems, such precaution was unnecessary, given the modest snowfall. In such situations, many folks want to blame the forecasters for "hyping" the event into "Snowmageddon" or a "Snopocalypse" and causing unnecessary alarm. I have a couple of things to say about this. I'm not the only one - see here and here for some thoughts by a colleague.

First of all, let me say that weather forecasting continues to be an uncertain business. If you want the weather forecasters to make your decisions for you, there inevitably are going to be times when they're wrong. If snow falls on a 10% probability of snow, that should be expected one time out of ten times they forecast snow with a 10% probability! And if snow doesn't fall on a 90% probability, that's to be expected one time out of ten when they forecast snow with a 90% probability! There is no prospect that forecasting will ever be so good as to be absolutely correct 100% of the time.

What is your cost associated with taking unnecessary precautions? How does that compare to the loss associated with the failure to take precautions when you should have? It can be shown that the ratio of cost over loss is important in deciding at what level of confidence in some event you should take precautions. If your costs tied to taking precautions are higher than the losses for not taking precautions, you should never take precautions! If your costs are very low compared to your losses, it makes sense to take those precautions at a low confidence threshold. Cost/loss ratios vary among decision-makers, so different forecast users should make different decisions in situations where the forecast probabilities are the same. Decision-makers should understand this, but many don't. That's their problem, not that of the forecasters. Ignorance is not always blissful.

Having said that, it's also clear that the NWP models were a major factor in the degree of confidence the forecasters had in their forecasts. As explained by my colleague, we now run ensembles of forecasts in order to establish how likely an event might be. The assumption is that the variability among the ensemble members is wide enough that, for the most part, the actual observed weather will fall somewhere within the range of possibilities revealed by the ensemble. As shown by this week's event, that isn't always true, however. Quantitative precipitation forecasting (QPF) is one of the most challenging things that forecasters attempt, and it's becoming clear with time that forecasters are relying heavily on the information provided by NWP models (including ensembles of model runs) to guide their QPF products. If you live by the models, however, there will be times when they lead you astray, and you will "die" (metaphorically) by them.

I'm not a forecaster and I make no pretense of being one. But there are times when I wonder about what their logic might be when they make their choices. I don't like to be a "Monday morning quarterback" when it comes to specific forecasts, of course. Nevertheless, I was nowhere near as confident about this week's event being a significant one here in Norman as were most of those folks paid to forecast the weather. Of course, I didn't put out my own forecast, so I have no way to validate that I'm not simply using 20-20 hindsight. You'll just have to take my word for that. Or not.

Way back in 1977, Len Snellman introduced the notion of "meteorological cancer" wherein forecasters would come simply to pass on the NWP model guidance without any further consideration. It seems that Len Snellman was much better at forecasting the process of weather forecasting than we are at forecasting the actual weather!

Redefining Rape? You're kidding me, right?

2011-02-04T14:19:00.002-06:00

This past week, it seems that some members of the christian nationalist party (aka, the GOP) have been suggesting that we need to revisit the definition of rape - it seems that they want to limit it to purely "forcible" rape, and eradicate the term "rape" when it's committed on people who are drugged or drunk (date rape), or on underage children (statutory rape). This campaign isn't about rape, actually - it's about abortion. But now an idiot in Georgia wants those who identify rapists to be called "accusers" rather than victims, until the rapist is convicted of rape in a court.

For the vast majority of rapes, it's not a matter of sex - it's an act of violence. Since the majority of rapists are men and the majority of rape victims are women, it seems that violence by men against women is something of a lesser crime to these predominantly male "lawmakers." Rape victims are reluctant to accuse their rapist perpetrators because society chooses to see many of the victims as having "asked for it," and so are treated like prostitutes instead of victims. The shame and humiliation of it (which are essential elements of this violent act for the rapist) can keep victims from coming forth to accuse their rapist. We have seen repeatedly that those who accuse someone of rape are, in turn, accused of being wanton harlots, and testimony about their personal lives is used to discredit them as victims deserving of our sympathy and support.

Yes, there are false accusations from time to time, and having one's reputation sullied in this way can be an awful thing when the accusations aren't justified. But is the chance of that so important on our priority scale that we prefer to see rapists get off scot free, time and again, while their accusers are discredited and humiliated beyond the act itself? Our justice system provides the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" in a court of law, but we don't treat most victims of theft this way. We don't treat most victims of assault this way. Why should we treat rape victims this way?

Maybe these lawmakers should experience rape for themselves. Perhaps then they might be able to muster some empathy for rape victims and quit trying to turn victims into villains.

As it turns out, I know something about this on a very personal level. When I was a young teenager, I was raped by an older "friend" who had bought alcohol for me. I was horribly drunk when it happened, and totally unconscious when he began. I woke up in pain and surprise ... it went on an on forever, it seemed. Then he finally finished and left. I was so ashamed of the situation afterward that I never told anyone about it, including my parents. To have accused him surely would have implicated me in the illegal consumption of alcohol, as well. This incident from my past isn't something that makes me proud - far from it! - but it has forever made me a champion for victim's rights in rape cases.

I prefer that no one ever have to experience this act of violence, but no one should be made to feel like they somehow were at fault, either, when it happens to them. This is one situation where I can honestly say that I understand what female victims are going through and I'm entirely in their corner! Rape is a despicable crime and its perpetrators should be given serious punishment for it! This shameful political campaign to redefine rape needs to end and those supporting it need to be run out of public office, as soon as possible!

How much warning of danger is too much?

2011-01-31T13:37:00.006-06:00

As I write this (Monday afternoon - 31 Jan 2011), the midwestern US is under the threat of a major winter storm. This event has been anticipated for several days, thanks to the increasingly accurate numerical weather prediction (NWP) models that are the major foundation of weather forecasting these days. Amongst my meteorological acquaintances, there's been widespread grumbling about the "hype" associated with public statements regarding this impending event. Recent history shows a number of events that were "hyped" that turned out to be not much. A colleague has already written an extensive blog regarding the challenges associated with forecasting such situations. I have little to add to his excellent and detailed assessments of this situation.

However, I do want to comment about the issue of "hype" associated with weather warnings (which are forecasts, of course). First, I'll offer some background.

The local TV stations here in the Oklahoma City metropolitan area have been engaging in a decades-long "weather war" for ratings supremacy in this weather-conscious market. TV broadcasters here get much more air time than in most (if not all) other TV markets and it's been demonstrated (in the OKC market) that the most popular forecaster helps his station get the best ratings, on the average. One mechanism for this is their efforts to outdo each other to show how they're helping the public, which includes making almost any reasonably strong thunderstorm approaching the metro area sound like the imminent apocalypse. I've long felt that they have used the weather in this region as a mechanism for self-promotion in the battle for ratings, with service to the public a distant second in their priorities. In fact, I long ago quit watching the local stations (except when they're airing live tornado videos!), out of sheer disgust at their vacuous self-promotion. Of course, that's the industry standard in the media - ratings always trump service.

So much for the background. Now, I hear from some meteorologists I know that the warnings about the potentially serious impacts of this impending winter storm have been contributing to the "hype" associated with forecasting. I have two problems with such comments:

1) Any winter storm carries with it some significant hazards to human life (and property). That simply cannot be denied. Now, if we could forecast the weather perfectly (i.e., with absolute certainty) then the issue of what people choose to do (or not do) in response to those forecasts would be entirely in the hands of the users of the forecast information. I recall seeing news coverage in the past of, say, large numbers of cars abandoned on Interstate highways in a blizzard, even when the storms producing the blizzard were well-forecast. Apparently, those travelers either didn't receive the message, didn't understand the message, didn't know what to do about the message, or simply ignored the message for some reason (including not believing it, or not believing it applied to them). None of those options are in the hands of the forecasters, who are just trying to put out the best forecast they can. Perhaps some might blame the forecasters for these stranded travelers because the forecasters didn't word their forecast products strongly enough! Apparently, some forecast users need more than just a winter storm warning to take the threat seriously!! Forecasters are not to blame for this, however.

2) The seriousness of the wording in a forecast is likely related to forecaster confidence in the possibility for a major weather event. Some forecasters are more confident than others in any given situation, and disagreements about the confidence one might want to put into a forecast intended for public users of weather information are common. In the best of all possible worlds, forecasters would be "calibrated" so that their uncertainties wouldn't be widely different in a given weather situation. But we don't live in that best of all possible worlds - opinions about the likelihood of a given event will vary. If a forecaster is overconfident frequently, then s/he needs to re-calibrate, which necessarily involves doing a meaningful verification of the forecasts and learning how to use that feedback to achieve proper "calibration". Having said all this, if a forecaster is confident that, say, a major winter storm event is likely, why not spread the word about that in advance? Is that "hype" or just being honest about one's meteorological assessment of the situation? Should a forecaster suppress information just for the sake of not being accused of contributing to weather anxiety? It might not happen as forecast, but isn't it better to have prepared for the potential and have it turn out you didn't need it, than to make no preparations and then discover you should have? Better safe than sorry, it seems to me!! Err on the side of caution, if erring is inevitable. [I'm avoiding the subject of expressing uncertainty in the form of probabilistic forecasts. See here for some discussion.]

This brings up the subject of "panic" in relation to weather forecasts. For many decades, tornado forecasting was forbidden because some bureaucrats decided that the public would panic at the mere mention of the word "tornado" in a weather forecast. When the bureaucrats in the Weather Bureau were forced to being issuing tornado forecasts, no panic ever ensued. The notion that panic will result from telling the honest truth about weather expectations has no factual basis whatsoever. If foreknowledge of an impending winter storm causes people to rush to stores in order to stock up on items they might need for a period of paralysis in the wake of a storm, that isn't "panic" - it's common sense!!

As I write this, there's a debate ongoing about the need to add qualifiers to winter storm warnings - something along the lines of adding the "particularly dangerous situation" phrase to a winter storm warning. Personally, I see no reason for, or value to, such a step. If someone doesn't already know that a winter storm can be dangerous, it's not at all evident that adding such a phrase is going to make a difference for them. Of course, no one knows much about how the public sees such things because we have yet to do the hard work to validate some of these ideas. I could be all wet about this - adding such a phrase might make a huge difference. But I want to be shown some solid evidence before I change my mind.

We can never prevent some people from doing stupid things. There always will be those who will put themselves in danger deliberately, for reasons of their own. There always will be those who choose not to accept any personal responsibility for their own safety. There always will be those who refuse to make any preparations for weather hazards, under any circumstances. And I agree that we meteorologists can't simply put our best forecast out there and hope for the best when it comes to people being able to use our forecasts successfully. I've talked about this elsewhere. Public sector weather forecasts (including those by media forecasters) should be crafted to be of the greatest possible value to the greatest number of users, but we meteorologists are not knowledgeable about how to do that. We need factual information if we are to re-formulate forecast products to match that goal. Not guesswork, not opinions, and not speculation (without evidence).

Science, Public Policy, and James Hansen

2011-01-19T09:34:00.006-06:00

I've been carrying on somewhat reluctantly an extended argument for some time with a non-scientist friend of mine, who happens to be a skeptic regarding anthropogenic (i.e., human-caused) global warming (AGW). He's a very smart person and is quite passionate in his belief that AGW is some sort of scandalous conspiracy perpetrated by, among others, the majority of global climate change scientists. He's constantly bombarding me with the little nuggets he searches out on the Web that seem to support his position and challenging me to enter into this argument. For the most part, I prefer not to get sucked into such arguments, largely because I see them as a waste of time (see my discussion of civility in discourse). But like a stone in your shoe, sometimes you just have to respond. I've touched on the AGW topic in other blogs and essays, of course.

The latest thing to stir him up has been the rather intemperate remarks by Dr. James Hansen (head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Science), who was paraphrased by the Washington Times:

According to Mr. Hansen, compared to China, we are "the barbarians" with a "fossil-money- 'democracy' that now rules the roost," making it impossible to legislate effectively on climate change. Unlike us, the Chinese are enlightened, unfettered by pesky elections.

Democracies are infamous for being a poor and inefficient form of government. However, democracy is widely accepted by many of us (including me) as being better than any other known form of government. I'm certainly no fan of the current Chinese government - it's an oligarchical Communist autocracy coupled to corporate greed. However, pure majority rule is something the so-called founding fathers of the US feared, because the majority can be convinced easily to trample on the rights of minorities, which is the main reason for the Bill of Rights. The public apparently can be led down paths that might not be very good for their societies, and what is right and best for a society may not be popular enough at a given time to carry the day. I'm sure if the German public had been allowed to vote in 1914 when they were on the brink of WWI, they would have voted heavily in favor of the coming war. WWI turned out to be disastrous for them, of course.

Who knows what's best for a society? That can be a tough question. Opinions will vary but, to my knowledge, no one can be certain. When it comes to scientific issues, though, it seems logical to me to trust the scientists who study those topics. Science, like anything else done by humans, is not perfect. Individual scientists can stray from scientific ethics in disturbing ways (see here and here for examples). And consensus science is not inevitably correct (more on that later). Nevertheless (not unlike democracy), science is the best we have, in this case to answer questions regarding the natural world and how it affects society. We choose to disregard what science has to offer at our peril.

Hence, I think I understand Dr. Hansen's remarks as being a reflection of his passion about trying to do something substantial about AGW in the face of all the vocal and influential opposition marshaled by those who have something to lose if something is done to mitigate AGW. No doubt Dr. Hansen's comments will be spun by right-wing media "pundits" (who speak for and also influence the position of many political conservatives) as Dr. Hansen advocating Communism, of course. It wouldn't surprise me if his remarks will become the catalyst for a witch hunt aimed at removing him from his Federal position!

What bothers me most about all of this is the continuing powerful influence of people who are not global change scientists in the public discourse about AGW. The scientific debate on AGW is effectively over, at least for the moment - the vast majority of climate change scientists have accepted the consensus position represented by the IPCC Reports. I'm not going to discuss the particulars of that debate in this blog, but if science is to be the basis for making public policy decisions in certain situations, the scientific part of the AGW argument is no longer in much doubt.

What puzzles me is how AGW skeptics who are non-participants in global climate science have so much to say and have so much influence on the AGW public policy debate. From the point of view of a democracy, they're simply exercising their right to take a position favoring their own interests. They're equal to anyone in regard to the functioning of a democracy. No responsible scientist truly wants to take that right away, but when the continuing debate hampers efforts to mitigate a serious danger to our society's well-being, it's understandable how some scientists could become frustrated enough to make intemperate remarks. On the scientific side, the playing ground is far from level; it's highly tilted one way by the preponderance of evidence and our current understanding of how the atmosphere works. Those skeptics who aren't global climate change scientists are not equal partners in the scientific debate, regardless of their equality in a political debate!

The skeptics generally have chosen not to present their views in scientific journals or at scientific conferences where their peers can judge the validity of their evidence - that is, the appropriate venues for a scientific debate. Rather, some of them loudly proclaim themselves in the media to be the victims of a vast conspiracy to silence their point of view and routinely impugn the motives of the vast majority of climate change scientists. They represent the IPCC reports as political propaganda for a left-wing conspiracy to destroy capitalism (or whatever). In fact, their tactics are precisely those of a politician trying to stir up public support by using propaganda on behalf of the self-interests of the skeptics. I know of no global change scientists who are enriching themselves by doing their science (although I don't know them all), but I certainly can see the hand of powerful corporate interests behind the brouhaha associated with AGW skeptics. Some of them may be getting support from corporations who have a pecuniary interest in the outcome of the debate over public policy. Remember the scientists who proclaimed in the media that no one had 'proven' a connection between smoking and health?

Science is not inherently democratic. Scientific issues are not decided by majority vote, but on the basis of evidence. The consensus (i.e., the majority) interpretation of that evidence can be wrong, of course. In fact, it has been wrong about some things in the past, is wrong about some things now, and will be wrong about some things again in the future. But this is the way science works! Don't be asking for definitive "scientific proof"! Science never provides absolute "proof" of anything. New ideas replace the old ones in science all the time by a well-established process that is described loosely by the 'scientific method' phrase.

The current situation regarding the AGW debate isn't a scientific argument at all - that's been settled, for the time being, as already noted - rather, it's been transformed into a political conflict. It's about winning the hearts and minds of the American public. If science is supposed to be the basis for deciding public policy issues that involve science, then this endless back and forth is simply using up precious time, delaying meaningful responses to what has been established by science to be a problem. I can see how Dr. Hansen might wish to command American society to start moving toward mitigation of AGW, but I don't agree with allowing scientists become our society's oligarchical dictatorship. I don't seek that power and don't believe any scientist should. However frustrating it might be, grasping for the power to move society in directions we want it to go is not about science - it's ultimately only about power. That's what many of the skeptics are seeking, it seems to me, since they're not engaged in the scientific process.

Scientific "proof"?

2011-01-16T21:17:00.003-06:00

I've had many occasions to take issue with the notion of scientific "proof" and how that notion is understood by non-scientists. In particular, non-scientists have trouble accepting that scientific proof is, in fact, impossible!

Perhaps if one thinks back to one's happy days learning geometry in high school, the notion of mathematical "proof" will be recalled with fond memories! Or perhaps not. In any case, in mathematics, "proof" of a theorem is accomplished when one follows the laws of mathematical logic, beginning with some premise, say X, and then asserting that Y follows from X. If that theorem can be shown to be derivable from the axioms of the mathematical system in question (e.g., Euclidean geometric axioms) according to the laws of mathematical logic, proof is obtained. Once established, a proof cannot be contravened. No one disputes the Pythagorean Theorem of Euclidean geometry, for instance. Once proven, it remains proven for all time. There might be a different proof that's more "elegant" in some way, but the theorem has been established beyond doubt in any case. You can dispute the premises associated with a theorem (theorems typically involve an "if X, then Y" statement, so X might be disputed, but if you grant X, then a proof of the theorem makes Y inevitable), or you might see that in a different axiom system, that proof isn't valid, but within the constraints of the exercise, there can be no further dispute regarding that theorem. A proof in mathematics is forever, and has no qualifications whatsoever, other than the aforementioned possibilities: dispute the premise or consider a different set of axioms.

What about science? Many people believe that such a thing as "scientific proof" exists. For instance, one might argue that the Law of Gravity has been proven beyond any question. A large number of experiments (and common experience) suggests that it might be very difficult to come up with an example where the Law of Gravity has been shown to be invalid. However, "absolute proof" is tricky. No number of experiments can ever establish absolute proof, although they certainly can make a compelling case for those scientific hypotheses that survive a large number of rigorous experimental tests. Nevertheless, from a purely logical standpoint, it might be the case that we simply haven't done the right experiments to test the hypothesis in question adequately. In fact, it's impossible to "prove" that no experiment exists that would be capable of invalidating any scientific hypothesis. So we are entitled in certain cases to behave as if absolute proof has been obtained, since the hypotheses in question have survived some tough tests, but we must submit to the logical possibility that a counter-example might someday be found, even though we have yet to find any.

Scientific hypotheses are always provisional and can never be subjected to absolute proof! Einstein has, in fact, created a new version of the Law of Gravity that differs in very interesting and subtle ways from that first formulated by Isaac Newton. Thus, in this sense, Newton's Law of Gravity has been "disproven" and replaced by Einstein's Law of Gravity, even though for centuries no one ever dreamed of looking at the circumstances associated with what Einstein figured out regarding gravity. So far, Einstein's version has survived every test, as did Newton's version for centuries. There can be no logical guarantees for Einstein's version, however. Our understanding of gravity is limited and our hypotheses about it are always subject to re-examination, new tests, and possible revision. The putative Law of Gravity has nothing like the rock-solid standing of the Pythagorean Theorem, and never will.

It's the very nature of the scientific enterprise that we test our ideas against evidence. This is the fundamental basis of the so-called "scientific method." There is no simple formulaic way to describe the "scientific method," however. Hypothesis testing is dependent on the nature of the evidence available to use to test our ideas, and is a source for considerable creativity in science. It is by no means a simple algorithm to be applied to all scientific ideas. In some sciences (including meteorology, geology, and astronomy), it's impossible to run controlled experiments to test our ideas. Hence, such sciences depend on how to use and interpret whatever observational evidence is available, rather than running tightly controlled experiments (as in a laboratory). This doesn't diminish the scientific standing of those disciplines, however. They just have to be more creative in how to test their ideas and more cautious in their interpretations of the results of their tests.

To the extent that we can conduct experiments that can give our ideas a rigorous test, we can have some faith in accepting our current understanding as "not yet invalidated" hypotheses. But no scientific experiments can provide the sort of logical inevitability that mathematical logic offers. "Scientific proof" is not a valid understanding of how science actually works!

Hence, whenever you hear someone talk of "scientific proof," you can be assured that this person has an incorrect understanding of science!

Scientific scandal

2011-01-08T10:27:00.003-06:00

A colleague of mine has recently posted an excellent blog regarding the recent scandal arising out of the putative relationship between vaccinations and autism. Public views about science vary a lot but there are those who would point to this scandal (and others) to support an anti-science viewpoint. They might conclude that by being less than 100% perfect, science loses all credibility. Those holding such a 'holier than thou' position should perhaps examine their own lives and consider how perfect their behavior has been. Anyway, I have some comments regarding my colleague's blog:

Lest a gratuitous co-author (i.e., someone insisting on being added to the author list, or accepting an invitation to be a co-author on a paper about which they know little or nothing) choose to deny any responsibility for the content of any paper on which they are a co-author, they should realize that if they have any positive scientific reputation, they're lending their credibility to that paper. If they're co-authors on a fraudulent paper that gets published, they'll inevitably suffer a significant loss of credibility among their peers. No amount of rationalizing can wash their reputation fully clean after that.

That said, however, there has to be an element of trust in a scientific partnership. It's an ideal, but for the most part, individual scientists on a paper with multiple authors don't actually review and replicate everything in every paper. That's simply not a realistic obligation. Nor is it plausible to add a "statement of work" for each author to the paper. In the real world of scientific collaboration, individual authors bring different skills and efforts to the whole, and individual scientists legitimately may have only a superficial understanding of the specialty knowledge brought to the project by their collaborators. If don't trust your colleagues, you'd have to know everything about everything and do everything yourself. Why bother with collaborators in that case?

Funny thing about trust: it can be hard to gain and easy to lose, but as I see it, the default position should be to trust until something happens to violate that. If you trust no one until they've proven their trustworthiness in some sort of a crucible, you'll have a very limited set of colleagues. Anyone can be victimized by a collaborator who turns out to be untrustworthy. It's not fair that some scientist would take a serious hit to their credibility if they were so victimized, but the world isn't necessarily fair! You only have control over things that you do, so it behooves any scientist to behave with integrity, irrespective of what anyone else does.

It's unfortunate that science has such scandals, but it simply reflects the undeniable fact that science is a human endeavor, with all that that implies. Not everyone will always choose to abide by its standards. Science as a whole isn't tarnished by the scandals perpetrated by the deeds of an unethical few. But as my colleague has said, we all feel a collective revulsion and sadness when such things come to light. And there are those who will seize on such events to attempt to discredit science as a whole.

The scandal does underscore the risk you take as a "gratuitous" co-author, and I believe, like my colleague, that the benefit of adding another paper to your CV doesn't outweigh that risk. I always trust my collaborators to do their work with high integrity and I'd be shocked and ashamed to find that a co-author had done something so contemptible. But there's always a finite possibility it could happen to me. If something like this happened to some scientist I know, then my default assumption would be they weren't truly responsible for the ethical lapse of another. This doesn't contradict with my assertion that they're formally responsible for the content of a paper on which they're a co-author, however. Real life can be complicated ...

Aggravations - part 1

2010-12-27T22:04:00.003-06:00

I haven't had a whole lot to post of late. I pity those who have to crank out some content on a regular basis ... Anyway, what follows is me being gripy about certain things. There may be more of these in the future, so I'm labeling this the first installment of whining and complaining about things that annoy me.

1. I've come to really detest the combination dog tag/key card that gives me access to the Intergalactic Weather Center and my office therein. I dislike having to wear security "dog tags" in our building, anyway, but that's not why I'm griping about it. For the umpteenth time today, I set out to go to the office and realized after going about two miles that I didn't have my key card.* Sometimes I make it all the way to the office before realizing I've left the blasted thing at home! There's no point trying to enter the building without it, so I have no choice but to turn around and go back home, where I'll find it precisely where I've left it (e.g., next to my desk). In bygone days, we used a physical key to get into a building after hours, and perhaps another such key to open our office space. The key(s) would be safely and permanently on the same key ring that holds my car keys, so if I got into the car and was able to operate it, I'd be able to get into my office. With this damned thingy, if I forget to take it off before I leave the car, I'll have to take it off sometime in the house, and in doing so, there's a good chance I'll forget to bring it on my way out the door to get in my car next time. And, by the way, when the battery in my office lock goes dead, my key card won't open my office door. I dislike key cards!! Bring back physical keys!!

2. A common gripe of mine has been the extreme rarity with which other drivers use their turn signals here in AbNorman. However, of late, this gripe is being displaced by those who pull out of side streets into my traffic lane, at times in such a way that causes me to have to brake to prevent a collision, and then just poke-assing along. If you clowns were in such a hurry that you couldn't wait for me to pass before pulling out, why are you just dawdling along after you pull out? I would think you'd be accelerating like John Force and roaring down the road to get to your destination, so that I'd be left in your dust. Instead, after you force your way into traffic in front of me, it's the old helium foot on the accelerator! It's become almost laughable how many times this happens to me as I drive about AbNorman these days. I'm coming to expect it (and driving accordingly), just as I have to expect people to fail to signal their intentions to turn.

3. Some years ago, a colleague of mine used to amaze me by the vehemence of his reactions to certain stupid questions and comments that people would make. He was one of the true giants in my field and I admired his work but was always somewhat put off by his acerbic responses to certain questions regarding his work. I thought it was counter-productive to become upset with ignorance. Now, as time has passed, I find myself similarly put off by comparable stupid questions and/or comments. Although I'm still trying (sometimes unsuccessfully) to avoid my tendency for sarcasm as a way to respond to ignorant remarks, I have to admit that having to address the very same ignorant questions and/or comments about a subject over... and over... and over... for decades can become a serious source of aggravation. I think I now appreciate why this great man had this particular "flaw" in his demeanor. It seems that no matter how many times you show someone the errors in their interpretation, those errors never seem to go away. Someone new will express them, even if you've somehow managed to convince those who expressed them to you earlier. Of course, there's no guarantee that you will convince anyone to change their way of thinking. Ignorance is never in short supply, it seems. I still maintain it's counter-productive to become upset with ignorance, but experience continues to show me that my mentor blazed a path for me in this regard, as well.

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* Now some of you (you know who you are!) might be tempted to go off about my increasing absent-mindedness as a function of my "advanced age." Balderdash - I've been absent-minded all my life, so it's not at all evident that this is a sign of anything!

Chasing mythology - 2

2010-12-04T10:02:00.002-06:00

My next storm chasing mythology target is the often-repeated notion that storm chasing saves lives. Chasers rationalize their chasing in this way by claiming that they provide information about ongoing storms, including identifying when and where tornadoes are occurring. It may or may not be the case that an individual making such a claim actually takes the time to report what they're seeing in real time.

In any case, the fact is that it's only the National Weather Service (NWS) and civil authorities who can claim legitimately to save lives through the storm warnings they issue by using information that might (or might not) be provided by chasers. Chasing, per se, saves no lives, ever! In my experience, many chasers are too busy pursuing their hobby to be bothered with calling in their observations. In 1999, in a famous chaser convergence near Almena, KS, my wife and I were the only chasers amongst a multitude to call the NWS to report the development of a tornado. There were dozens of vehicles scurrying about in typical chaser convergence chaos, and no one apparently had called the NWS, even though a funnel cloud that would become a tornado was in progress! It was astonishing to me when we called the NWS to learn we had been the first to call!

The technology of chasing has made huge strides - now it's become possible for the NWS to follow the GPS locations of chasers and to call the chaser, rather than waiting for the chaser to call them. Live video streaming allows the NWS to see what some chasers see through their windshields. This is all well and good - it allows chasers the luxury of not having to bother with actively reporting what they see and to maintain the illusion that they're "contributing" information in this passive way. But it remains true that it's still not the chasers who are saving lives. That's the responsibility of the NWS and civil authorities (first responders, emergency managers, storm spotters, TV broadcasters, etc.) .

I know of no chasers who chase in order to save lives. Chasers chase because seeing storms is a passion, or because they want to become rich and/or famous people (drawing attention to themselves), or any of a host of other reasons, including science. Storm chasing is a basically selfish activity. Note that storm spotting can and does save lives, but spotting and chasing are very distinct activities! Spotters are volunteers serving their communities - chasers are simply pursuing their own interests.

Scientific storm chasers also like to use the "saving lives" card, arguing that their science will be put to use to increase warning lead times (an argument I've disputed here and here), or whatever. This argument is simply not valid - storm chasers working on a scientific project are also not chasing to save lives, although their scientific findings might someday be used successfully by someone who is responsible for saving lives. They're out there to do science, not to save lives. Their passion is for learning about the atmosphere. The new understanding they can derive from chasing might or might not have an impact on reducing storm-related fatalities. Life-saving isn't on their agenda when they go out on a chase.

Some storm chasers, myself included, have been involved in helping the NWS develop spotter training programs. I support this because I believe it's an important way for chasers to give something back to the society that supports the programs (like the NWS data) they use to intercept storms. In fact, I'm proud of having contributed to spotter training - but I make no claim that I saved lives by doing so. I give the credit for life-saving to the NWS and the civil authorities!!

The fact is that only the NWS and civil authorities save lives when tornadoes and severe storms threaten. Storm chasers are simply hoping to clean up their image by claiming that role for themselves. But no one has given them that responsibility (with the arguable exception of those chasers who chase for media broadcasters, a group that's been known to exceed their authority at times).

There is one way in which storm chasers might save lives - by stopping to render medical assistance to people injured by a storm. I know of no storm chaser who can say, however, that they've ever saved a victim's life. Perhaps a few such exist and I'm just unaware of their life-saving contributions. If so, I honor their unselfish actions. The number of lives saved via the direct first aid of storm chasers must be pretty small, though. Moreover, in order to save a life by this process, a storm chaser must stop chasing! In other words, it's not the chasing that has saved a life in such a case! The most such a chaser could say was that chasing brought him/her to a place where they could render life-saving aid. But saving a life wasn't on their agenda when they began the chase.

Thanksgiving thoughts

2010-11-27T09:07:00.003-06:00

My friend RJ Evans has written a wonderful essay, indicating that rather than expressing our gratitude to a non-existent deity, much of our gratitude should be directed to our fellow human beings. I agree completely with RJ's notion about this. I can begin by offering similar thanks to my wife, whose beauty and love have been the rock-solid core of my life for more than 35 years now. And thanks to the rest of my family (beginning with my mother and father), to the many friends along my path who have have added so much that is good to my life, and to my professional colleagues and mentors.

Through an accident of birth, I was born in a nation where I benefited from the economic prosperity provided by loving parents so that I could pursue my dreams. The nation into which I was born has granted me more freedom and prosperity (by means of those freedoms) than can be found in most countries around the planet, thanks to the wisdom and foresight of those who created this nation. There can be no doubt that I have many people to thank for what has been a very happy and fulfilling life. If I'm run over by a truck tomorrow, it will have been all of you who made my time on Earth so delightful. I offer my gratitude to you all.

But ... there's a missing element here. Through some mysterious accident over which none of us had any control whatsoever, we came into existence through a serious of "miracles" that we simply don't understand. Science has shed light on the process, but much remains unknown and could remain so for a long time. Somehow, a universe was created billions of years ago. Within this universe, stars formed, organized themselves into galaxies - many of those stars blew up in gargantuan explosions that seeded the universe with the heavier elements that today form the matter from which we and our Earth have been made.

On this Earth, that matter organized itself into life somehow, which then evolved over billions of years to create us and the environment which makes our lives possible. Within the Earth's environment, I've been fortunate enough to have the means to travel and to chase storms. By this means, I've experienced many times the wonder and awe of the natural world around me in ways that transcend mere words, transporting me into a place where I can lose my self and feel deep in my mind that wordless joy at knowing I'm a part of something that surpasses all understanding.

As Robinson Jeffers has put it:

Then what is the answer?— Not to be deluded by dreams.
To know that great civilizations have broken down into violence,
and their tyrants come, many times before.
When open violence appears, to avoid it with honor or choose
the least ugly faction; these evils are essential.
To keep one’s own integrity, be merciful and uncorrupted
and not wish for evil; and not be duped
By dreams of universal justice or happiness.
These dreams will not be fulfilled.
To know this, and know that however ugly the parts appear
the whole remains beautiful. A severed hand
Is an ugly thing and man dissevered from the earth and stars
and his history... for contemplation or in fact...
Often appears atrociously ugly.
Integrity is wholeness, the greatest beauty is
Organic wholeness, the wholeness of life and things,
the divine beauty of the universe.
Love that, not man apart from that,
or else you will share man’s pitiful confusions,
or drown in despair when his days darken.

Many people choose to create an anthropomorphic entity - a deity - to whom they attribute all the wonder around them. Many people choose to let a self-appointed clergy tell them how to worship this deity. Many people choose to become slaves to a religion, which can manifest itself in terribly cruel ways - justifying their excesses, their violence to others, their lies, their contradictions on the basis of those evils being the will of this imagined deity. They then express their gratitude for their many blessings to this deity. I choose not to follow this path.

But then, to whom should I be grateful for the many blessings provided by the universe in which it's been my good fortune to be born? I don't believe there's any being to whom I need to express my thanks. I don't believe the universe knows or cares about what I think, but to be allowed to glimpse the majesty and power begs for a target for my gratitude. The very indifference of the universe to me and my petty concerns seems to fill this disembodied spirit with something I admire. The universe has been about its "business" for billions of years before me. That "business" will continue for billions of years after me. Further, I don't feel any need to ascertain any personal meaning in the business of the universe - for me it's enough to know that I'm a player in something that I'll never understand. A part of the whole, not me apart from that whole.

What amazes me is that through processes I can't begin to fathom, I've been granted a brief time when I've become conscious that I'm a part of this majestic drama. We humans are only infinitesimal specks within this grand tapestry, but somehow, for no evident reason, we've been given the privilege of awareness of our connection to this vast process, and the curiosity to seek an understanding of it. We are self-aware matter - and I feel a deep gratitude for being given this existence. The fact that I can't express this gratitude to some being is irrelevant. But I'm grateful, nevertheless.