Monday, September 08, 2008

 

Who Are You Going to Believe?



Here is the University of Illinois' chart about the extent of Arctic sea ice.


It seems to say that the extent of the ice is just .3 million square kilometers above last year, which is about a 10% difference.


Yet on the same site, you can compare this day's composite photo from space with last year's composite photo. That's the side by side comparison below. Does it look like so little a difference to you?



Looks more like a 30% difference to me. I've contacted the guy they say to send questions to in order to see what's up. I'll report back, but he's never responded to a question from me yet.

Labels:


Comments:
Man, you can do calculus in your head? That is impressive.
 
Thank you. I took calculus in high school both as a junior and a senior (it was a two year course). I took the AP exam as a junior and got a 3, out of the money. I took it again as a senior and got a 2. I decided then that anything with serious math was, to quote Senator Obama, above my pay grade. Do you agree that the visual difference is greater than 10%? Am I so involved with global warming that I actually can't see straight?
 
Hard to say as the shapes differ significantly. But yeah, probably more than 10%, but certainly less than 30% I would wager.

Still, I've always been a sucker for optical illusions.
 
The long and short of it is that we're ahead of last year with less than two weeks of melting to go but it's a thinner margin than I would have wanted.
 
Post a Comment

<< Home

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?