User talk:William M. Connolley: Difference between revisions
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::So pointing out your incivility is "much the same" as a vendetta? I don't follow. You may, by the way, strike the "vendetta" accusations and I will drop this, but as long as they are out there I'd prefer a clarification on how my pointing out evidence of your incivility is equated to either my holding a vendetta, or my accusing you of holding one. [[User:ATren|ATren]] ([[User talk:ATren|talk]]) 19:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC) |
::So pointing out your incivility is "much the same" as a vendetta? I don't follow. You may, by the way, strike the "vendetta" accusations and I will drop this, but as long as they are out there I'd prefer a clarification on how my pointing out evidence of your incivility is equated to either my holding a vendetta, or my accusing you of holding one. [[User:ATren|ATren]] ([[User talk:ATren|talk]]) 19:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC) |
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− | ::: Your edits speak for you; take a look at your recent contribs [[User:William M. Connolley|William M. Connolley]] ([[User talk:William M. Connolley#top|talk]]) 19: |
+ | ::: Your edits speak for you; take a look at your recent contribs. You might find [http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2010/01/theres_no_light_the_foolish_ca.php] illuminating; or perhaps not [[User:William M. Connolley|William M. Connolley]] ([[User talk:William M. Connolley#top|talk]]) 19:50, 26 January 2010 (UTC) |
Revision as of 19:50, 26 January 2010
The Holding Pen
Ocean acidification
A reader writes:
- "Leaving aside direct biological effects, it is expected that ocean acidification in the future will lead to a significant decrease in the burial of carbonate sediments for several centuries, and even the dissolution of existing carbonate sediments.[31] This will cause an elevation of ocean alkalinity, leading to the enhancement of the ocean as a reservoir for CO2 with moderate (and potentially beneficial) implications for climate change as more CO2 leaves the atmosphere for the ocean.[32]"
I'm not sure, but it sounds odd. You can beat me to it if you like William M. Connolley (talk) 18:09, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
- Hmm, looks like it was User:Plumbago [2] William M. Connolley (talk) 18:27, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
- Correctly deduced. It was me. It may not be worded well, but I think that it's factually correct. Basically, as well as its other effects on living organisms in the ocean, acidification is also expected (see the references) to dissolve existing carbonate sediments in the oceans. This will increase the ocean's alkalinity inventory, which in turn increases its buffering capacity for CO2 - that is, the ocean can then store more CO2 at equilibrium than before (i.e. the "implications for climate change" alluded to). As a sidenote, it also means that palaeo scientists interested in inferring the past from carbonate sediment records will have to work fast (well, centuries) before their subject matter dissolves away! Hope this helps. --PLUMBAGO 06:08, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
Double diffusive convection
Bit surprised there is no article on DDC? Has the term gone out of fashion? It was half the course in "Buoyancy in Fluid Dynamics" when I did Part III 23 years ago. --BozMo talk 13:13, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
- I remember is was a nice demo on the fluid dynamics summer school DAMPT ran. Not sure I would still be confident of writing it up 10:05, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
- What a kind offer. I have started here: Double diffusive convection--BozMo talk 10:55, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
CSS site
Forgive the quick note, but I happened to notice the comments at the top about CSS, and some places to learn about it. I second the site mentioned, but also take a look at the CSS Zen Garden at [[3]] - it's a great place to quickly see what CSS is capable of doing. Basically, it's a site where people take the exact same HMTL page, but use a different .css file, and completely change how the page looks. Ravensfire2002 (talk) 14:48, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
Current
Your ArbCom userpage comment
Need to finish this off |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
I haven't looked to see which arb was accused of being a "fool," but am curious how would "Stephen Bain should not be entrusted with anything more valuable than a ball of string" would be received. I'd like to know before I say that. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:34, 12 September 2009 (UTC) |
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley
Ditto |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
This arbitration case has been closed, and the final decision is available in full at the link above. As a result of this case:
On behalf of the Arbitration Committee, Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:58, 13 September 2009 (UTC) I'm am sorry to see that your adminship has been revoked. I believe that our circumstances are similar in a way. I too was once an admin and lost my tools mainly due to conflicts on articles related to the events surrounding the 9/11 attacks. I know that the vast majority of my content creation and all my FA's were done after I was desysopped...with that said I am hoping that we can still look forward to your wisdom and guidance in those areas you have so instrumental in and that you will continue to help us build as reliable a reference base as we can achieve. Best wishes to you!--MONGO 03:24, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
I ask that you please accept my nomination to regain your administrative rights at RFA. 99.191.73.2 (talk) 13:23, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
Interesting[4] Hardly surprising that arbcom wants to keep their mess as far from view as possible. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk)
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Fools and their foolishness
Yes, it needs finishing |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Regarding [5], you are quite welcome to raise any of your concerns or points on my talk page. I'm quite open to constructive feedback, even if it's harsh or drastically opposed to my views or actions. I even promise not to seek a block if you call me a fool. However, if you call me Mungojerrie or make me listen to "Memory", it's war! :-) (If you prefer to keep everything together, we could easily have the same discussion at User talk:William M. Connolley/For me/Misc arbcomm-y stuff.) Vassyana (talk) 14:42, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
Thanks Bozmo. I've cut my hair recently so we may not be too far opposed on that aspect (unless you now have long hair). As to expanding the page - that will come in time. I'm glad you (V) are watching but I'm afraid I've grown rather discouraged by arbcomms ability to learn, so I won't be in a hurry. That page is mostly for me, though you are free to ask questions there if you like and I'll probbaly answer. In the meantime, on the "fools" issue, User:William_M._Connolley/For_me/On_civility#Misc_arbcomm-y_stuff refers William M. Connolley (talk) 20:11, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
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I just found this
Oh look: http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/web-iquette-for-climate-discussions/ Isn't that good? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:31, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
- He used web-iquette for medical discussions as a guide. That reminds me of How Doctors Think which is a great work on how brilliant, well trained, experienced people can get things wrong every day. I wonder if there is a way to do the same thing. Ignignot (talk) 13:17, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
Wondring aloud
I have to wonder if there isn't some deliberate foot dragging, given sentiments previously expressed by Arbcom and other insiders. Lt. Gen. Pedro Subramanian (talk) 22:59, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
- Um. I missed the Raul stuff in August and now feel guilty about not expressing my sympathy (literally in this case :-(). Old score settling I suspect William M. Connolley (talk) 23:05, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
- Nothing secret, just not common knowledge. It is off on some arbcomm-y type page; Raul dropping CU tools; I'd find the link except someone watching can probably find it quicker William M. Connolley (talk) 09:39, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Raul654 -Atmoz (talk) 17:06, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
- Nothing secret, just not common knowledge. It is off on some arbcomm-y type page; Raul dropping CU tools; I'd find the link except someone watching can probably find it quicker William M. Connolley (talk) 09:39, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Atmospheric soot (of more than one kind :-)
I've got enough to get into without getting into this (I see "the emails!!!" as bs), but will comment...
Based on vast knowledge of scattered info-fragments pooled in brain from leaving cableTV playing in background ... I'd say there's some cooling arising from "atmospheric soot" ... and we could just encourage China to burn more and dirtier coal ... to "solve" global warming problem ... but that "solution" is problematic. ;-) Yet cooling from atmospheric particulates (including incompletely gaseous male cow farts) may appear (e.g, to bs consumers) to complicate the evidence of warming. Proofreader77 (talk) 22:54, 7 December 2009 (UTC)
- Ah, this is the Superfreakonomics heresey William M. Connolley (talk) 23:13, 9 December 2009 (UTC)
- You mean the Discovery channel was wrong!!! (lol) Anyway ... I see you got your bit back. I'd like your flag. Do you have a Steward friend who'd make me an admin for ten seconds (the length of some blocks I've seen lately :) ... then I can fly that flag. So cool. (Um, not globally, just cool) ... Silly mood at 6 AM and not slept yet ... Don't forget about that 10-second admin thing. In any case, best of luck in the election (won't tell you how I voted, but, did I mention I liked your flag? lol) Happy holidays. Proofreader77 (talk) 13:45, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
- PS On a more serious note, since the issue of particulates from burning coal still rang rather true in my neural net ... I needed to find this on brown cloud particulates in Asia ... which warm the air, but still cool the ground. lol Still pondering that .. but wouldn't have found that article without this light holiday exchange. Thanks. Proofreader77 (talk) 14:21, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
bas email address
Still here http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/contact.html might want to fix that --BozMo talk 10:24, 31 December 2009 (UTC)
- Sigh. That poor old site badly needs some maintenance. I used to have a geocities account once, you know William M. Connolley (talk) 18:17, 31 December 2009 (UTC)
Silverspoon
Seen http://s3.amazonaws.com/infobeautiful/climate_skeptics_960.gif ? --BozMo talk 16:43, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
Ah ha
If you want to know just how plummy and posh my accent is I am number 44 [6]. Sorry about the "ums" I am out of practice. --BozMo talk 10:19, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Or the video version here: [7] alongside Vicky Pope who you may know, Frank Kelly and Ewan Kirk but I am a long way in. --BozMo talk 10:28, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Not very plummy, but certainly interesting, though I haven't had time to hear it all yet. For entertainment, though, you can't match Electric Six :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 10:41, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Only because the sound of rotating corpses can be heard clear across the Atlantic. ;) the best thing about Lincoln is the wig and mitre I seem to remember. --BozMo talk 11:57, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Is that hairline natural? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:32, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Mine or Lincoln's? Despite being older than you, Stephan, the barber still needs to thin my hair on top. But I do have rather more middle aged spread...turns out after much research that this is linked to eating too much. --BozMo talk 13:11, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- My hair has been successfully converted to auto-thinning. I can confirm the spreading, but I deny any relationship to eating. That's just an international conspiracy of know-nothing nutritionists. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:19, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- You guys are weird. Stop it. Ignignot (talk) 15:53, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Why? It's not as if the world is not in need of a decent amount of weirdness... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:20, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- You guys are weird. Stop it. Ignignot (talk) 15:53, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- My hair has been successfully converted to auto-thinning. I can confirm the spreading, but I deny any relationship to eating. That's just an international conspiracy of know-nothing nutritionists. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:19, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Mine or Lincoln's? Despite being older than you, Stephan, the barber still needs to thin my hair on top. But I do have rather more middle aged spread...turns out after much research that this is linked to eating too much. --BozMo talk 13:11, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Is that hairline natural? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:32, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Only because the sound of rotating corpses can be heard clear across the Atlantic. ;) the best thing about Lincoln is the wig and mitre I seem to remember. --BozMo talk 11:57, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Not very plummy, but certainly interesting, though I haven't had time to hear it all yet. For entertainment, though, you can't match Electric Six :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 10:41, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Love the stats in Excel analogy. :) Guettarda (talk) 16:17, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
William Connolley
The William Connolley article could do with a better picture. Is there any PD images taken front on that you know of? -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:44, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- I like that pic :-). You can have the arbcomm one if you like William M. Connolley (talk) 22:52, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- This is an encyclopaedia not the family photo album! :-) Need something at least a bit more formal. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:58, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- [8]? (I know, that is tasteless, but I couldn't resist). Anyway, I don't have his ties. You aren't the first to ask though, so I'll dredge the albums William M. Connolley (talk) 23:13, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- By golly, that's a relief. Still, I've fixed it now William M. Connolley (talk) 23:29, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
- Just that one :-( I'll try harder next time :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 23:44, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
Thermal underwear
Idealized greenhouse model, or the section below
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May I ask a question? I stress that I am not trying to do any original research, but only want to improve the GW article by explaining what is fundamental to the AGW hypothesis. I don't think the current article really explains it very well. My question: I did some Googling and the Stefan-Boltzmann equation (or rather a derivative of it) seems to be fundamental. But there are two versions of it, as follows:
where alpha is albedo, S0 is a constant solar radiative flux (units W/m^2), T is temp in K, and sigma is a constant. The two sides of the equation both have units W/m^2. In the first equation e is 'emissivity' which is unitless and is the ratio of energy radiated by a particular material to energy radiated by a black body at the same temperature. I think of it as an 'underpants factor'. You have a black body throbbing with radiation, which will cool unless you keep it warm. So you put some underpants on it, to keep the cold out, i.e. stop it radiating so much. Hence CO2 and water vapour are like thermal underwear to keep the earth warm (if e is 100%, the temperature is about -18 deg C, for if you solve for e with current temperature, assume 15 deg C, you find e is about 60%). I am assuming e is constant whatever the temperature for exactly the same material, is that correct? In reality e will change as the material of the atmosphere changes (more CO2, or more vapour). In the second equation G is a number, units also W/m^2, which is a measure of the influence a factor has in altering the balance of incoming and outgoing energy in the Earth-atmosphere system. If you solve for G for 15 deg C, you get about 150 W/m^2. My puzzle is whether G is also constant, if for other reasons (e.g. change in solar radiation, change in albedo) the temperature changes. Intuitively it won't be constant. Why represent it this way? Apologise if I have misunderstood, and please correct any mistakes (I am quite new to this, but it is interesting). Again, I am not trying to do any research, just finding out some facts that could be put into layman's language and hopefully into the article. I think thermal underwear is a better analogy than greenhouses, e.g. HistorianofScience (talk) 11:52, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
Fine. Writing it all out is quicker than finding it, so... simplifying, the sun shines 4S units on the uniform earth (and since the area of a circle is 1/4 the area of a corresponding sphere the 4 drops out), which is a black body (forget albedo for the moment, it makes no real difference). The atmosphere is transparent to SW, and can be considered as a single layer not in conductive contact with the surface. There is no diurnal cycle, all is averaged out, all is in equilibrium. So at the sfc (with atmosphere) we have the following equation:
(the surface is black, captures all solar SW and transforms it into LW which it re-radiates) and G is the radiation from the atmosphere. Meanwhile, in the atmosphere,
(the atmospheric layer is totally opaque to the surface LW, is itself isothermal, and being a layer radiates both up and downwards). As it happens G = r(T_a)^4 but we don't care about that for tihs analysis. Hence, S + G = 2G, hence S = G, hence T_1 = (2S/r)^0.25. Meanwhile, in the absence of the atmosphere, we clearly would have T_2 = (S/r)^0.25. T_1 > T_2 (by a factor of 2^0.25) and (T_1 - T_2) is the greenhouse effect. William M. Connolley (talk) 21:02, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Also, this [10] and the linked [11] also refers, but is harder William M. Connolley (talk) 21:12, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
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Blast from the past
Not to creep you out, but I was looking through old RfAs and I found this, from your second, and succesful, RfA. To the question of: How do you see Wikipedia in 2010 ?
OK, for what its worth, here is the rest: I see wikipedia continuing its growth and influence. The problems of scaling will continue: how to smoothly adapt current practices to a larger community. At the moment this appears to be working mostly OK. Problems exist with the gap between arbcomm level and admin level: I expect this to have to be bridged/changed someway well before 2010. I very much hope more experts - from my area of interests, particularly scientists - will contribute: at the moment all too few do. To make this work, we will have to find some way to welcome and encourage them and their contributions without damaging the wiki ethos. This isn't working terribly well at the moment. I predict that wiki will still be a benevolent dictatorship in 2010 - the problems of transition to full user sovereignty are not worth solving at this stage. William M. Connolley 20:36, 8 January 2006 (UTC).
Thought you'd be amused. Shadowjams (talk) 07:02, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
- Hmm yes. "Prediction is hard, especially of the future" as they say William M. Connolley (talk) 08:25, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
- Ha. So they say. I'm really good at the past prediction part though. Shadowjams (talk) 08:49, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
More thermals
All at Idealized greenhouse model it seems
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Thanks for your explanation which I am afraid I still don't really follow. I don't see how 'the earth heats the atmosphere' and 'the atmosphere heats the earth' can both be true.
| G ^ V Solar input. (4S ->) S | ---------------------------- Atmosphere. Emits G, up and down, thermal radiation. Absorbs S+G. ---------------------------- | | | V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S G V ^ S+G | ----------------------------- Sfc. Abs S(SW)+G(LW). Thus emits (S+G)(LW). Thus S+G = rT^4 Clear now? William M. Connolley (talk) 20:13, 12 January 2010 (UTC) Sorry, apart from the bit about not reflecting LW (that seemed picky, unless I misunderstood it), which of my claims was wrong? I said that the net outflow from earth to atmosphere has to be upwards. And that this outflow has to be exactly equal to the outflow from the atmosphere into space. Your diagram is incomprehensible. And what about Greenhouse effect where it says "Radiation is emitted both upward, with part escaping to space, and downward toward Earth's surface, making our life on earth possible." This is entirely wrong isn't it? It gives the impression that we are safe because only part of the radiation escapes to space, but the rest is trapped behind & keeps us snug and warm. The reality is that the net outflow from the earth has to be exactly balanced by the outflow at the edge of the atmosphere into space. Otherwise the atmosphere would keep on heating up until equilibrium was restored. HistorianofScience (talk) 20:31, 12 January 2010 (UTC) [edit] The unclearness of the diagram is the omission of the causality. You have the atmosphere radiating G downwards, e.g. Yes but where does the G come from? If we were to start with turning on the sun like a switch, at that instant there would be no G from the atmosphere. In which case the first thing to hit the earth would be S. Then earth would emit (not reflect) S. With no G. HistorianofScience (talk) 20:43, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
| 0 ^ V Solar input. (4S ->) S | ---------------------------- Atmosphere. At 0K. Doesn't radiate. ---------------------------- | | | V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S 0 V ^ 0 | ----------------------------- Sfc. Abs S(SW)+0(LW). At 0K. Doesn't radiate.
| 0 ^ V Solar input. (4S ->) S | ---------------------------- Atmosphere. At 0K. Doesn't radiate. ---------------------------- | | | V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S 0 V ^ G_T | ----------------------------- Sfc. Abs S(SW)+0(LW). Has warmed up somewhat, to T. Emits rT^4, call this G_T. So now the sfc has warmed up somewhat, so it is emitting G_T in the LW. Now the atmosphere isn't in balance: it is absorbing G_T but emitting nothing, since it is at 0K. So it will warm up. So it will start emitting downwards an warm further. And eventually we end up with the equilibrium solution William M. Connolley (talk) 21:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC) |
Service award update
Argh, I hate it when these things change :-( Oh well, I'll see if the new one looks any prettier than the old :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 12:59, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
- NOTE: I'm looking forward to this ribbon in September (No star version in March):
- Which is clearly the best one of the ribbons. (They ruined my current one, so I didn't change.) I knew you'd care desperately what I thought about this. ;-) Meanwhile: I'm required by law to keep nudging you until you're clear about brown cloud particulates and how that solves the entire public controversy thingy. LoL Proofreader77 (interact) 20:49, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
- Important note: I have an old account with a few edits ... and plenty of wiki-age for that ribbon! I want it now. LoL Ah, ribbon lust. Proofreader77 (interact) 02:06, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
A flash from the past
Hi, a quick flash past/forward. Unbelievable, be well, --CrohnieGalTalk 18:51, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
- I expect that kind of stuff from Abd. ATren I had thought was sane; he seems to be running off the rails, which is sad William M. Connolley (talk) 21:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
- Hi WMC, I assumed you wanted something when you ran into the ec on my talk. Heck even I can't edit my own talk. I sure wish I knew an administrator like you used to be right about now. I can't seem to find one that will put an end to what is hounding and now pounding me at every turn. Administrators are aware, editors have lost their tempers and have been blocked. Three editors that were in good standing have now been blocked and two are never coming back again. I am about to scream, oh wait a minute, I just did. :) I feel better now. :) What can I do for you? and thanks, --CrohnieGalTalk 23:00, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Heap bad medicine at that page User:Crohnie pointed at. I don't know what I find more surreal: the discussion, the placing of a link to the discussion here, or the subsequent conversation. It is not good to randomly point out instances of insane behavior for the purpose of entertainment. If there was any other purpose, it has eluded me, and apparently all others who have commented here up to this point. --TS 23:32, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
- Oh, I;m not so sure: [12] looks quite sensible to me. Pity arbcomm has gone insane again William M. Connolley (talk) 09:02, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Browbeating
This and some other recent comments by you import a degree of rudeness, impatience and nastiness into the discussion. You've been around far too long not to know that isn't on. Please take this as a reminder that there's a human being reading your humiliating public comments. In addition to that it raises the ire of others reading it. Yes it can be annoying reading the latest uninformed comment on a science talk page, but no that doesn't excuse your rudeness. --TS 14:48, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- He isn't a noob, he is old enough to know not to write rubbish on the pages. If he writes rubbish, he can expect to be corrected, bluntly. The best solution to this is for you to drop him, too, a polite note pointing out that his comment is pointless and best deleted. After he does that I'll be happy to delete my comment William M. Connolley (talk) 15:06, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Your rudeness places me in a difficult position. I can't ask Mark to drop his comments because it sends an inappropriate message: to wit, don't annoy William. If you try to avoid being rude I'll try to gently dissuade people from making pointless and uninformed comments on the talk. --TS 15:28, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- The problem I'm having here is asymmetry. You are letting what is, to be entirely frank, completely pointless drivel clog up the talk page with no hint of complaint. Only if someone points out that it is drivel to you complain, and then not to the driveller but to the messenger. I don't see why your position here is difficult, though: you can point to this discussion and say "please remove your comment and then William will remove hos reply". Incidentally, I notice that you've titled this "browbeating", presumably because that is a Bad Thing. Browbeating, however, is *exactly* what LHVU was indulging himself in recently: I see no complaints from you about that William M. Connolley (talk) 15:53, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- But the situation is asymmetric! We have all the good arguments and a reasonable understanding of the domain (you more, I less - but still more than most sceptics). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:31, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Perhaps the better reason to behave with intense civility is that people generally feel obligated to respond to provocation (as a matter of honor, pride, etc.), and behaving with civility can often, but not always, result in a happier situation that takes up less talk page space (e.g., no more "you suck." "no you suck." "your mom." "argh gobbedlygook!!!") though this situation may be pre-escalated. Awickert (talk) 16:46, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- But the situation is asymmetric! We have all the good arguments and a reasonable understanding of the domain (you more, I less - but still more than most sceptics). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:31, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- The problem I'm having here is asymmetry. You are letting what is, to be entirely frank, completely pointless drivel clog up the talk page with no hint of complaint. Only if someone points out that it is drivel to you complain, and then not to the driveller but to the messenger. I don't see why your position here is difficult, though: you can point to this discussion and say "please remove your comment and then William will remove hos reply". Incidentally, I notice that you've titled this "browbeating", presumably because that is a Bad Thing. Browbeating, however, is *exactly* what LHVU was indulging himself in recently: I see no complaints from you about that William M. Connolley (talk) 15:53, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Your rudeness places me in a difficult position. I can't ask Mark to drop his comments because it sends an inappropriate message: to wit, don't annoy William. If you try to avoid being rude I'll try to gently dissuade people from making pointless and uninformed comments on the talk. --TS 15:28, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Hang on, the page is full of nonsense because I'm letting it happen? Firstly I'd like to know who died and bequeathed the title of Talk Page Captain to me. Secondly have you seen the way I've been going on at MalcolmMacdonald and Ludwigs2 on their talk pages trying to coax them towards more intelligent contributions? Oh hang on, you won't see everything I've said to Malcolm because he deleted some of it, but you'll see it in the history. --TS 16:57, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Ah, well on this particular incident I'm complaining because you've elected yourself talk page captain and have decided to browbeat me :-(. If we're talking about this one incident, then I'm saying your first port of call should have been MM, then me. I did check your contribs before saying that to verify that you hadn't talked to him about this. If you've been getting at him for other stuff then I'm sorry I hadn't noticed; I'll have a check later on. The comment re LHVU still very much stands, however William M. Connolley (talk) 17:09, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Oh, but I should add that I think you are, taken as a whole, doing a good job on all this - thank you. I disagree about this one particular instance, but don't let me given you the impression that I hate you forever, Baggins William M. Connolley (talk) 17:10, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
What you seem to have done, as far as I can see, is blame your conduct on others and excuse it because you regard what they're doing as worse or because I didn't go after them for something recently. I do think you need to take responsibility for your own actions. I came to you to complain because your personal attacks are right there on the page, souring the atmosphere. --TS 17:33, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- As an outside view, the diff shows MM asking "please tell me to "shut up"." and Wm. obliging, rather tactlessly. A useful compromise would be for Wm. to generously strike the first two sentences of the comment, and the bit after "he correct response is "thank you"," then doubtless it would be easier to request MM to go along with deleting both comments. But what do I know about diplomacy? Goes off to be kind to creationist troll :-/ . . dave souza, talk 17:42, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
I've followed the letter of Tony's advice, albeit possibly not the spirit [13] William M. Connolley (talk) 18:30, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Great. Now we're edit warring over it :-/ With all this talk of spirit, are you psychic? The latest from ID appears to be that it was first formulated as support for natural selection and psychics by Alfred Russell Wallace. Whoodathunkit. . . dave souza, talk 20:08, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Arbcomm inanity
If anyone is watching this page :-) and is interested in watching insanity in action (and who isn't) then Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification#Motions is your page William M. Connolley (talk) 17:12, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Topic Necromancy
If you remember a few months ago I asked you about the confidence intervals on climate history and climatology in general. I found the recent [14] to be particularly interesting in that regard. The phrasing of error bounds seemed a little too complicated - but that was probably to prevent the "there is a 10% chance that 2005 was colder than 1998" headline. Incidentally in finance that would be considered a poor signal, but we have the advantage of a simpler data set and more degrees of freedom to use. Ignignot (talk) 18:32, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Hmm, OK, so which bit of that long post is interesting? I didn't read it all since it seemed to be mostly about what I think I know already :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 22:45, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
- Oh, just the standard deviation in the temperature measurements. The two questions I end up asking about any number or statement about numbers is: 1) how much is it (warmer/cooler in this case) and 2) how sure are you? The second one is just as important (and sometimes more) than the first one. For 90%, I'd say that's pretty sure. To refresh the previous discussion, the question I was interested in was how sure are we when comparing recent years and hundreds of years ago. It could be more or less than 90% - I'm certainly not saying this is an upper bound - but this is almost exactly the format I was looking for. To me, the temperature and effect of CO2 pre-industrial revolution has a lot of weight, because all of those years are like a lever acting on my expectations of the future. The more sure I am about bigger differences relative to "normal", the more certain I am about where we're going. Just thought you would be interested since you said you didn't know of many papers examining the confidence in historical estimates. Ignignot (talk) 21:40, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
- Ah, but then you have to be careful what SD you're looking at. If you're looking at +/- on temperature trends, is that uncertainty in the measurements, the statistical uncertainty on the trend fitting, or both? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:01, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
- Yeah, I know. More precisely I was interested in the uncertainty on the explanatory variables involved in the temperature model - one of which would be the sensitivity to CO2, probably among solar variation, albedo, previous temperature, geothermal heat, etc. I was kind of relieved to see something about climate change that didn't involve the endless back and forth and just focused on some science I guess. Ignignot (talk) 22:07, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
Lawrence Solomon
Those are relaable sources, taken off of Infotrac which is a sholoarly database [15]. Please state more clearly your objections to these sources on the talk page. Solomon appears to be a Candaidan environmentalist. Why do you disagree? Cla68 (talk) 16:05, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
- I think it is best discussed on the article talk. As I said there: it doesn't look like you were aware of the prior discussion William M. Connolley (talk) 16:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
- Oh, and I specifically pointed you at User:William M. Connolley/For me/The naming of cats. Be a good boy, if you want me to be nice to you William M. Connolley (talk) 16:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
- Aha, monty python and the holy grain at Doune Castle – but what is zis holy grain? Oats? Also, Wm., do you do a page on herding of cats? Yrs. sncrly, dave souza, talk 16:53, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
Just curious
[16] did Bush really get to choose his chairman for the IPCC? --BozMo talk 13:57, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
- Yep. Basically correct. [17][18][19] --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 14:52, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
- Watson was too strong. Bush wanted someone far weaker, and selling someone from India to make the IPCC more "multinational" was easy. IPCC science is, obviously enough, dominated by US / EU; there is politicking going on (as I recall, the vice-chair is a Russian, despite being a non-entity) William M. Connolley (talk) 14:56, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
In breach of 1RR
The ipcc article is under a 1R rule under the current probation, you appear to have broken this [20]. Would you care to self revert? --mark nutley (talk) 11:04, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
- So it is, that should be on the article talk page. I'll self-rv to the silly version William M. Connolley (talk) 12:41, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Some help with links would be appreciated
I see that you're (still) neck deep in "The Dramaz!", but when you get a chance I'd appreciate it if yourself or someone you know could take a look at Eric Rignot and try to straighten out the climatology related redlinks there. Don't worry about the link to Lew Allen Director's Award, I'll take care of that myself eventually (unless someone else wants to write a little article about the award. Don't let me stop you!). Thanks!
— V = I * R (talk to Ohms law) 15:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
- OK. By golly, but that is an awful photo! William M. Connolley (talk) 15:49, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
On vendettas
[21] Can you please show me where I have accused you of having a vendetta? ATren (talk) 16:53, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
- Like I said, "much the same": personal attacks, incivility and assumptions of bad faith etc etc. And you're wrong about the septics bit William M. Connolley (talk) 18:54, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
- So pointing out your incivility is "much the same" as a vendetta? I don't follow. You may, by the way, strike the "vendetta" accusations and I will drop this, but as long as they are out there I'd prefer a clarification on how my pointing out evidence of your incivility is equated to either my holding a vendetta, or my accusing you of holding one. ATren (talk) 19:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
- Your edits speak for you; take a look at your recent contribs. You might find [22] illuminating; or perhaps not William M. Connolley (talk) 19:50, 26 January 2010 (UTC)