Week in review – science edition

by Judith Curry
A few things that caught my eye this past week.

Was Common ra glacier expansion in the Arctic Atlantic region triggered by unforced atmospheric cooling? [link]
The amplitude and origin of sea level variability during the Pliocene epoch [link]
Ghil and Lucarini: The physics of climate variability and change [link]  A long, but worthwhile read.
Roy Spencer: Record Antarctic stratospheric warming causes Sept. 2019 global temperature update confusion [link]
Revised historical solar irradiance forcing [link]
The U.S. corn belt is making its own weather [link]  Cooler temperatures and more rain
Amplification of the North America dust bowl drought through human-induced land degradation [link]
“Does Rapid Urbanization Trigger Significant Increase of Cumulative Heavy Rains in China?” [link] Answer in paper is yes.
Droughts in far off places are contributing to the amount of heat transported to regions experiencing heat waves [link]
No increase in global temperature variability despite changing regional patterns [link]
The North American hydrologic cycle through the last deglaciation https://eartharxiv.org/8q5kz/
Evolution of sea surface conditions near northwestern Greenland margin during the mid-Holocene [link]
Advances in extreme value analysis and applications to natural hazards [link]
A paper in Nature reports that Earth’s vegetation may not be able to continue to absorb human carbon dioxide emissions at current rates, which could accelerate climate change and exacerbate its effects. [link]
The climate theory casting new light on the history of Chinese civilization [link]
Policy & technologies
The role of nonfarm influences in estimates of climate change impacts on agriculture [link]
New Michael Moore documentary tackles alternative energy [link]
Biomass burning not sustainable, scientists say subsidies must stop [link]
Democratic candidates undervalue farm productivity and R&D [link]
Is eating beef healthy? [link]
Essay by Reto Knutti: Closing the kowledge-action gap in climate change [link]
How the U.S. power grid is evolving to handle solar and wind https://ensia.com/features/us-power-grid-renewables-wind-solar/…
Granger Morgan Opinion: Climate change needs more than ‘muddling through’ [link]
Declining CO2 paths [link]
We need to talk about how we adapt to climate change [link]
Energy use and height in office buildings [link]
New route to carbon neutral fuels from carbon dioxide [link]
Pielke Jr: Net zero CO2 emissions by 2050 requires a new nuclear power plant every day [link]
Pielke Jr: t’s Time To Get Real About The Extreme Scenario Used To Generate Climate Porn [link]
The future of nuclear power in the US: beyond Yucca mountain [link]
Utilities big promises on CO2 reductions questioned [link]
Harnessing new technologies to prevent hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico [link]
NASA is getting serious about protecting Earth from killer asteroids. [link]
About science and scientists
Heterodox Academy: Seizing the means of knowledge production [link]
Highlight negative results to improve science [link]
The accuracy of German citizens’ confidence in their climate change knowledge https://go.nature.com/2mZxbc0
Political Disparities in the Academy: It’s More Than Self-Selection One reason for the extreme political skew of the academy? Initially Republican profs convert to Democrats. But why? [link]
Turkish scientists gets 15 month jail sentence for publishing environmental study [link]
Has reductionism run its course? [link]
Confessions of a climate scientist [link]
Here’s @AliceDreger‘s story of what happened to the great Napoleon Chagnon, the pioneering anthropologist who suffered one of the worst academic witch-hunts in history https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12110-011-9103-y
Computers Are Making Huge Mistakes Because They Can’t Understand Chaos, [link]
Democracy requires discomfort [link]
Cambridge scientist sacked for ‘racist’ research is suing university [link]
Study: Science denial is found on both sides of the political aisle http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1948550617731500
Are politically diverse teams more effective? [link]
Nir Shaviv: How climate pseudo science came to be publicly accepted [link]
Book defending free speech has been cancelled by the publisher [link]
Behind the energy and climate hypocrisy in all of us [link]
Dueling weathermen of the 1800s [link]
Climate scientist or activist – where’s the line? [link]
 

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