Greenland melting at record levels

Graphics tell the story of record melting in Greenland
[Via CEJournal]

 

This movie, produced by the Cryospheric Processes Laboratory, consists of stills and video collected during 2009 and 2010. Meltwater is the theme. The vocal is a Shaman Inuit Chant.

Greenland experienced a record amount of melting in 2010.

New records were set during the year for surface melting, runoff of water, the number of days when bare ice was exposed due to melting snow, and the decrease in the total mass of Greenland’s ice sheets, according to a paper published Friday in Environment Research Letters.

NOAA is also out with its annual Arctic report card for 2010, which among other things summarizes what was observed in Greenland this past year:

Greenland climate in 2010 is marked by record-setting high air temperatures, ice loss by melting, and marine-terminating glacier area loss. Summer seasonal average (June-August) air temperatures around Greenland were 0.6 to 2.4°C above the 1971-2000 baseline and were highest in the west. A combination of a warm and dry 2009-2010 winter and the very warm summer resulted in the highest melt rate since at least 1958 and an area and duration of ice sheet melting that was above any previous year on record since at least 1978. The largest recorded glacier area loss observed in Greenland occurred this summer at Petermann Glacier, where 290 km² of ice broke away. The rate of area loss in marine-terminating glaciers this year (419 km²) was 3.4 times that of the previous 8 years, when regular observations are available. There is now clear evidence that the ice area loss rate of the past decade (averaging 120 km²/year) is greater than loss rates pre-2000.

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Two places where melting will raise sea levels – Greenland and Antarctica.

Recent models indicate that these sheets may be less stable than we thought. Not a good thing for beach front property.

Apple fuel cells?

Apple granted first Liquidmetal patent
[Via Edible Apple]

2 weeks ago, Cult of Mac reported:

Apple has been granted its first patent related to Liquidmetal, a space-age metal alloy. But the patent isn’t for a new iPad enclosure or iPhone antenna, as experts have predicted. Instead Apple’s Liquidmetal patent is for an internal component of a fuel cell.

Apple’s new patent describes “amorphous alloy” collector plates for fuel cells, an electrochemical battery that uses hydrogen to generate electricity. Although the patent doesn’t reference the Liquidmetal trademark, the material is an amorphous alloy or “metallic glass.”

If you recall, back in August Apple signed an exclusive licensing deal with Liquidmetal to use their metal alloys in their product line. Classified as a “glassy metal”, Liquidmetal is already used in golf clubs, tennis rackets, and perhaps, to an Apple product near you.

So why fuel cells? Cult of Mac theorizes,

Fuel cells are a hot technology in Silicon Valley right now. The technology promises to be cheap, efficient and environmentally friendly.

Miniature fuel cells could power mobile phones for more than 30 days without recharging and notebooks for 20 hours or more…

The problem is manufacturing fuel cells that are a safe, hard-working and reliable over many years. Lots of companies are working on developing the right materials. Because Liquidmetal can be made to be super hard, corrosion proof, and durable, it may prove to be the ideal material for fuel cells.

The collector plate described in Apple’s patent acts as a catalyst for a chemical reaction that separates electrons from hydrogen to produce electricity. Its only byproducts are water and heat. As long as the cell is topped-up with fuel, it will continue to generate power. The process is clean, quiet and highly efficient — up to three times more efficient than burning fuel.

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I usually do not quote the whole article but this is such a cool speculation. I really don’t see Apple developing fuel cells – more likely it would buy the company making them.

But it would be so cool if they did. No more battery life worries. And how long would it take for their competitors to catch up?

What a wonderful fantasy!

Some reasons why Apple is one of the first 21st Century companies

[Crossosted at SpreadingScience]

by leoncillo sabino

Reasons for Apple’s Greatness? How ‘Bout The Cook Doctrine?
[Via Mactropolis.com - Your Friendly Global Mac Community]

Asymco has a great post up titled simply ‘The Cook Doctrine’. It’s a compilation of statements from Tim Cook in a financial earnings call (for Q1 2009), while he was the Acting CEO for Apple during Steve Jobs’ leave of absence.

We believe that we’re on the face of the Earth to make great products, and that’s not changing.

We’re constantly focusing on innovating.

We believe in the simple, not the complex.

We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.

We believe in saying no to thousands of projects so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to us.

We believe in deep collaboration and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to innovate in a way that others cannot.

And frankly, we don’t settle for anything less than excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we’re wrong and the courage to change.

And I think, regardless of who is in what job, those values are so embedded in this company that Apple will do extremely well.

Taken together, these add up to one hell of a great company philosophy. They also offer cause for optimism on the company’s prospects even when Steve Jobs is no longer in charge.

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I’ve written about what some 21st Century companies will look like – The Synthetic Company part 1, part 2 and part 3.

And the strength of these organizations is that the core principles are not dependent on just one charismatic man at the top of the hierarchy.

Cook gets is. As did Lassiter at Pixar, another 21st century company until bought out by Disney. As I wrote back then:

In the Innovator’s Dilemma, Clayton Christensen discusses the difficulty organizations have in utilizing disruptive technology in novel ways. The dilemma is that often the same processes that helped make them successful now prevent them from making the leap to a new technology set. See Clay Shirky’s article on the collapse of business models for some examples.

Even when they know that they have to change and even what the changes must be, they almost always fail in making the leap.

That is mainly in the way they are organized, how they are run and the types of communities they represent.

Yet companies that have Steve Jobs organizing them seem to have been able to do this. Apple defined personal computing, it defined the graphic user interface, the laptop, the MP3 player, the smartphone, the tablet computer. Pixar defined computer generated animation.

By creating organizations where innovations are not shuttled through layers of middle management, with each layer sucking the originality out, Jobs has been able to drive disruptive innovations rather than react to them.

The most amazing thing to me is that Apple has succeeded in being a market leader during two separate paradigm shifting market wars – first the graphical user interface wars between Apple vs Microsoft and now the Internet as interface wars between Apple vs Google. Microsoft’s inability to become a major player in the new way of the world is an example of corporations failing to make the leap, of suffering the Innovator’s Dilemma.

One important aspect of these sorts of  21st Century companies is that their strength is their community. It is very hard to alter the principles of a strong, cohesive community – living in Seattle I can still see the strong Scandinavian culture present, not only in businesses but in politics.

It looks like Cook certainly gets it.

Another view on Tunisia

by mcaretaker

TUNISIA and OPEN SOURCE REVOLT
[Via Global Guerrillas]

DK Matai has a great little outline on how the open source revolt spread in Tunisia.

It was very open much open source warfare (OSW, the dominant form of warfare in the 21st Century), but with a rapidly evolving protest/revolt twist (OSW + flashmobs).  Thing is, the conditions within which the revolt spread are becoming pretty common.  Here they are:

• Extreme price shocks in basic commodities.  Food and energy.
• Extreme corruption.  A globally connected elite appropriating everything.
• Extreme connectivity.  Cell phones and other social media.

Given that the global system is highly unstable (extreme leverage, concentration, tight coupling, etc.) and operating without a control system (hollow nation-states, transactional morality, etc.)  that can mitigate excesses, we will see many more situations like this in the future.

Flash bang, the government is gone.

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We tend to thing that only terrorists will take advantage these sorts of technologies but as seen in Tunisia, and in Iran earlier, democratic impulses can accomplish similar things.

The real question is whether, after they have brought down a corrupt, tyrannical government, they can replace it with something other than mob rule.

The amazing brain

by BlatantNews.com

Tracking the tell-tale signs of pure genius – Telegraph
[Via Telegraph]

A 70-year-old engineer who has just retired confesses that he has had a life-long urge to have his left arm amputated below the elbow. He has the arm removed and feels much better. Another man loses his arm in a car accident, but still feel its ghostly presence; this phantom limb is clenched in a painfully awkward position. A third man, a student of mine, makes a remarkable recovery from a coma, only to become convinced that his mother and father are impostors. All three case studies are fascinating. Yet as I argue in my new book, The Tell-Tale Brain, they can also teach us a great deal about how the brain does its near-miraculous work.

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The earlier Telegraph science article was pretty lame. This one is excellent.

For example, he mentions mirror neurons – these are motor neurons that fire when we watch someone perform a task. They help us mimic the motion when we have to do it. It explains visual memory. I learned this personally when playing tennis as a child after watching it on TV. I was always much better and consistent with my strokes.

And then the author wrote this, which so greatly explains the ascent of man, although greatly simplifying things:

A polar bear might have taken a few hundred thousand years to evolve a fur coat through natural selection, but a human child can acquire the skill by watching its mother hunt such a bear down and skin it.

He can then transmit the skill “vertically” (to his own offspring) or “horizontally”, to his peers. Indeed, it was this kind of sophisticated imitation that accelerated the emergence of culture in early hominids.

The point is that while the brain is beholden to evolution – he describes many – its adaptability and plasticity allows us to rapid alter ourselves and our surroundings in ways that are definitely non-Darwinian.

I may just have to get his book.

What happens when anonymity drops – civility

Tracking down my online haters – CNN
[Via CNN]

Matthew is a college student from a small suburban town in Missouri. He loves the Kansas City Chiefs and spending Sundays in front of the TV watching football.

Recently, in response to something I wrote on my blog about Jeff Bagwell and the Baseball Hall of Fame, Matt tweeted me a couple of times.

The words were snarky and snide and rude. His final message, however, left an extra special impression: “I got caught up in the anonymity of the internet. I’m sorry and here is a legit post with my criticisms.” Upon opening the pasted link, I was greeted by a nasty pornographic image that would make Sasha Grey vomit into the nearest trash can.

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This is a very intriguing article. It indicates that a lot of the hate invective seen in anonymous writing may be due to the feeling that no one is really listening.

And that the only way to get heard is to try and rile people up. It certainly is the example many in the MSM follow to get heard – riling people up.

I did like the fact that the two gentlemen he tracked down not only owned up to what they said but were actually very human in their subsequent responses – that is quite civil and polite.

Once they saw him as a real person, the treated him like such

So the author provided them the same credit they provided him – once he knew they were real people, he treated them with respect.

Jeff Pearlman will be a name I keep more track of; in order to see which side of Sturgeon’s Law he is on.

Second sun story reminds me of an important point Douglas Hofstatdter mentioned

by .ygor

‘Second sun’ on its way – Telegraph
[Via Telegraph]

The Earth could find itself with a ‘second sun’ for a period of weeks later this year when one of the night sky’s most luminous stars explodes, scientists have claimed.

The supernova could provide the biggest light show since Earth was formed, and will be so bright that night will become like day for one or two weeks, experts said.Betelgeuse, which is part of the Orion constellation 640 light years away from Earth, is a red supergiant, meaning that it is nearing the end of its life and is due to explode.

 

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This sounded really interesting until the last line of the article:

Brad Carter, senior lecturer of physics at the University of southern Queensland in Australia, said the explosion could take place before the end of the year – or indeed at any point over the next million years.

Color me unimpressed, it is an old joke