But if a chap had to take those points into account, Andrew, it would be a less
decisive article, fewer people would read it and less money would be available
from ads.
I watched the BBC programme last week and the CO2 -> acidification part was
balanced and persuasive; the speakers, both British and American, were worried
but not totally pessimistic. However, that programme came just after a
Dispatches about phone-hacking by the News of the World; News International,
the police and the body politic would appear to be too close. Just you wait
for the arrival of a ghastly Fox News equivalent . . .
. . . I might want to join you in Oz. Wait, though, the passage is a little
more pricey now, I understand ;-)
Chris
On 9 Oct 2010, at 08:10, Andrew Fildes wrote:
> I'm not sure who is guilty of the inaccuracies in this article - the writer
> or the sources he read - but they display a clear misunderstandingof the way
> that scientists describe change.
> 'Acidification' - if the pH of a body of water changes from 8 to 7.5, then it
> has been 'acidified', that is, moved towards the acid end of the spectrum, i
> despite the fact that it is still basic by usual understanding. It is more
> acid than it was.
> Corals themselves will doubtless survive but which corals and where. There
> are many, many species. If the sea level changes, then existing reefs bleach
> or 'drown' as coral only survives in specific shallow water conditions. Of
> course, other reefs will begin to grow in the new zone but they will not be
> the same reefs and the same species will not dominate. Incidentally human
> populations are a nice analogy to corals as we tend to inhabit a zone as
> restricted above sea level as the corals below sea level.
> The theorist's DO pay attention to the empirical data - these comments are
> not based on the data but on a sociopolitical misreading.
> The fact that the seas will remain slightly basic and the corals will survive
> in some form or place is actually irrelevant to the overall argument.
>
> Andrew Fildes (M.Env.Sci.)
> afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
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