The Fallacy of the Greenhouse Effect 3

(Index)

In this part I rebut Joseph Fourier's 1827 paper Dissertation on the Temperature of the Terrestrial Globe and the Planetary Spaces, often attributed as being the first mention of an atmospheric greenhouse effect. 

Fourier does not in fact claim an atmospheric greenhouse effect for the earth; rather he offers a thought experiment that if our atmosphere were to have something like a layer of glass high in it, it would have a greenhouse effect.  The mention is very brief and the idea that such dense layers in the atmosphere could exist is not substantiated and is not pursued any further by Fourier, presumably because the notion is clearly unrealistic. 

Reasons why Germany lost WW2

After the war, during the Nuremberg War Trials, the court was shown a film of the German war machine in full production.  Bombs and airplanes being assembled on a production line; a nation revelling in its newfound military confidence.  The spectacle was not only reminiscent of Nazi-era propaganda movies, it probably consisted of them.

On seeing these films Hitler's right hand man, Herman Goering, laughed and expressed aloud proudly: what's wrong with that?  Indeed, why shouldn't a country have a strong military?  Germany's military had after all been eviscerated by the terms of the Versailles Treaty.   What's wrong?  Well it depends on what you do with that military.  A strong military should only be used only for defensive purposes, not offensive ones -- at least that's the Western narrative of WW2. 

Olympic "Performance Rating"

The 2012 Olympics are done, the last race is run.  How did your country go?  Some punched above their weight, others disappointed. Australia's performance was in the latter category.  Interested to see how poorly they did relative to other nations I devised a crude way of evaluating the performance of nations. 

Athletes by country at 2012 olympics

Frustrated, I couldn't find a convenient list on the Internet of how many athletes per country at the 2012 Olympics, so I compiled this list from the wiki page:

2012 Summer Olympics

Craig Thomson's Statement to Parliament

New koala law to curb land owner's rights

Now the Labor federal government has a new raft of in-your-face laws to control and restrict what you do with your land.

Despite the species as a whole flourishing -- their numbers actually require "managing" i.e. culling, in South Australia southern Australia (see article below) -- the government is about to park itself in your back yard and tell you what you can and can't develop in the name of "saving" the koala.

Infant male circumcision is genital mutilation

This post is of a very different topic than the ones I usually post on.  If this isn't a topic to your taste or you are too young to read it please do not continue.

A few web articles have come to light in recent days describing human male infant circumcision as male genital mutilation.  They are correct and I must say I can attest to many of the negative repercussions described as I am a victim of this procedure as well.  Taking a perfectly good and necessary organ of the body and removing it for some kind of societal trend is shocking.

Kevin Rudd's sleight of tongue

I've heard Kevin Rudd say this many times in interviews. He calls the IPCC the International Panel on Climate Change instead of what it really is: the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 

Janelle Saffin contradicts herself

Just had to laugh at this answer from Labor MP for Page, Janelle Saffin to the media at Canberra airport today:

Question: If Julia Gillard won [the leadership challenge] would you worry about losing the next election?

Did Gleick make the faked Heartland Document?

Environmental activist Peter Gleick enticed a staffer at Heartland Institute -- a libertarian think tank and sceptical science funder based in Chicago -- to email him some internal Heartland documents.  You can get them from DeSmog blog here including the allegedly faked one here:

2012 Climate Strategy (3).pdf

Gleick has thus far admitted to being the receiver of the emails which show some fairly run-of-the-mill financial workings of Heartland.  But Gleick has stopped short of admitting to being the author of the one document that stands out from the pack.