Author Archives: gymnosperm

Ecology Now!

Posted on August 10, 2014 by gymnosperm

This exhortation has a strange ring to it now, and it is likely that no one under the age of fifty ever heard it, but  the image above is a poster of an actual flag created by the activist organization … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Biology, Climate, Ecology, Ethics, History, Religion | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

The Pacific Triangle, The Pacific doughboy, and the wave

Posted on July 14, 2014 by gymnosperm

Folks just don’t seem to have their arms around the disarray in the earth sciences these days. Climate science and plate theory are going to have to be rebuilt from the ground up, or more appropriately from the core-mantle boundary. … Continue reading →

Posted in Geography, Geoid, Geology, Large Igneous Provinces, LLSVP, LLSVP's are Doughboys, Oceanography, Pacific Triangle, Paleogeography, Plate Tectonics, Seafloor Isochrons, Seismic Tomography | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Broke Down in Bishop

Posted on July 11, 2014 by gymnosperm

Kyle, my son in law, missed out on circumnavigating Mt. Whitney last October. Unsure if it would work out we latched onto the latest available permit for the North Fork of Lone Pine Creek last Christmas and listed our means … Continue reading →

Posted in Geography, Geology, History of Life, Mount Whitney, Paleogeography, Sierra View | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Russians R Us

Posted on July 5, 2014 by gymnosperm

So perhaps you are red headed and fancy yourself Celtic. Well, I’ve got news for you. There may have been a few red genes somewhere but the Celtic genome and culture were centered in France and characterized by brown hair … Continue reading →

Posted in Anthropology, Geography, History, Plate Tectonics, Seismic Tomography | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Wild Rogue

Posted on June 25, 2014 by gymnosperm

It had been fourteen years since last running the wilderness section of the Rogue river with my two younger kids then chest high. The first June of the new millennium saw very high flows and few other boaters. The river … Continue reading →

Posted in Geology, Metaphor, River, Rocks, Wilderness | Tagged , | Leave a comment

What Climate Sensitivity Should We Expect?

Posted on June 6, 2014 by gymnosperm

The great failing of climate science has been the inability to constrain the range of climate sensitivity to human CO2. The possible range remains from slightly negative to +5 degrees for a “doubling”. The concept emerged when the atmosphere was … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, climate sensitivity, Dud PDO, Energy of Photons | Tagged | Leave a comment

The Homo erectus and the Climate Scientist.

Posted on May 15, 2014 by gymnosperm

Habilis probably had fire, but Homo erectus definitely had fire and he would have been around at the last glacial maximum to discuss with a climate scientist the dangers of burning a lot of campfires. He does not look impressed. … Continue reading →

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Pressure Broadening

Posted on May 14, 2014 by gymnosperm

In a recent blog post Dr. Roy Spencer took the skeptical community to task for a list of arguments he considers to lack merit. One of these was the argument that the CO2 absorption bands are saturated. He stated that … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, climate sensitivity, Optical Material Properties, Photon, Pressure Broadening, Spectra | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

The Dud PDO Index of Climate Sensitivity

Posted on May 12, 2014 by gymnosperm

Climate sensitivity is the response of the climate system to a given increment of CO2. It is often expressed as the response to a “doubling” of this gas from a pre industrial level. Estimates of climate sensitivity are all over … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, Climate Change, climate sensitivity, Dud PDO, Global Warming, PDO | Tagged | 1 Comment

On Being a Sheepherder and an Ignoramus

Posted on May 11, 2014 by gymnosperm

Most of us these days have never herded sheep. It is an ancient human occupation that afforded lots of time for contemplation and gazing at the stars. The reverie was punctuated by emergencies and predators and the mystique of living … Continue reading →

Posted in Metaphor, Sheepherders and ignoramuses, Wilderness | Tagged | Leave a comment