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May 29, 2005 Although we don't always agree completely, I tend to nod my head "Yes" while reading articles published here by Dr. Brooks Mick. Following are some items from the internet that support his recent writings. On April 24 and May 7, 2005, Brooks said there is more danger of a powerful geological-cycle "ice age" than of human-induced "global warming." Although I don't think anyone knows for sure (the scientific specialists in this field don't all agree), you can quickly see something I published about this, if you search google.com for "shanefield sciencenews" (paying attention to the space between the words, but leaving out the quotes). That would lead you to a short letter I wrote for the magazine Science News, in which I pointed out what their own graphs logically indicate. There have been several periods of atmospheric warmth, each lasting about 10,000 years, and we are slightly past the end of the present one, if the many cycles get repeated again. OK, it's just a short letter in a little magazine, and I am not an expert on this subject, but that letter does carry some weight. The magazine has a huge circulation among teachers, and the editors tightly screen the letters that get printed, by having several experts review each manuscript. All this still doesn't prove that I am right, but if you bother to look up the graphs that were printed earlier, it looks pretty convincing that we'd better start thinking about "global cooling." Judging from past history, it could happen surprisingly fast (a few decades, and we're ice!). By the way, it's interesting that the end of the previous ice age, in 12,000 BC, triggered the start of civilization (agriculture, cities, metals, writing, Asian religions, etc.). You can quickly see a time-line of these events, if you visit http://historylist.blogspot.com. Brooks wrote that the U.S. is doing OK compared to Europe, on May 15 and 17, and I had said something similar on April 24. (By the way, Frederick Smith and possibly others of you readers disagree.) Regarding "life expectancy," Brooks pointed out some problems with simply comparing the raw data of America versus European countries. Here is another factor: The U.S. is now about one third Black, Hispanic, and Pacific Islanders. You can see that from the year 2002 census data at http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/race/black/ppl-164/tab01.txt and divide 194 million Whites by 282 million total population. (You might also look at the other figures at that website.) Note that minority people such as Black males in the U.S. have life expectancies of only 63 years (compared to 79 years for White females), according to http://www.fww.org/articles/misc/njohnson.htm. This tends to lower our overall life expectancy numbers compared to Europe. My final conclusion: if you happen to be a White female and have a thick winter coat, maybe you'll survive for a while. ------------ About the author: Dan Shanefield is a retired engineering prof, who worked at Bell Labs and then at Rutgers University. He wrote the book "Industrial Electronics for Engineers, Chemists, and Technicians". Visit his website or email Dan Shanefield: shanefield@ieee.org Tell a friend about this site! ------------ |
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