Our Life in a Technology-Driven World

Summary. Our lives in the early 21^st century benefit from remarkable changes wrought by science and technology in the last 200 years.  As a human endeavor, science consists of a method of inquiry into the natural world based on open-minded investigation, rather than one biased in one direction or another that develops support for a desired point of view.

Certain science-based phenomena have come to light in recent decades that adversely affect human health or damage the environment.  Rigorous study showed that, in each case, products or practices of large corporations turned out to be responsible.  Those commercial interests sought to raise questions about the scientific results in the minds of the public, rather than continue further research to develop sound solutions to the problems.

We humans have benefited from the advances provided by science and technology.  We cannot justifiably select the science we like and dismiss the science that we don’t.

 

Benedict (Benny to his friends) is waking slowly, after having stayed late at a party last night.  He’s already enveloped in the soothing sounds of his favorite music, Sounds from Space, that invariably puts him in a mellow mood.  His radio came on with the music using an alarm setting.   He also plays music on his CD player; over the years he’s accumulated an extensive library of CDs.  His tastes run quite eclectic.

At last Benny swings himself out of bed and hops on to his Stair Stepper for a workout.  It’s equipped with a TV monitor so he can watch the latest news as he exercises.

After a leisurely breakfast, he gets ready to head out for his weekly frisbee match.

After the vigorous physical exertion of the game, he comes home and turns on his air conditioner to make his apartment more comfortable.  Air conditioners are effective because they lower the air temperature, but equally importantly, they remove some humidity from the air.  Lower humidity makes the body feel cooler because its perspiration evaporates more easily, cooling the skin.

Later, that afternoon, Benny has decided to attend a lecture at the local library on the shoreline habitats for all manner of wildlife. Lately he’s become even more interested in the natural world, and how different species interact in their habitats.  The lecturer is using a computer-driven digital projector, and he emphasizes his discussion as he goes along using a laser pointer.

In the evening, Benny and Valerie, his girlfriend, went out for dinner and came back to relax with a movie streamed over the internet.

                     *                    *                    *                    *                     *

Benny’s day, a rather routine one in today’s world, benefited from many products that rely on developments in science and technology.  Here we’ll discuss two classes of appliance, and a third that because of careful scientific investigation, became quite controversial.

Telegraph, and radio and television.  For all of history before the industrial revolution, news, books and artwork traveled only as fast as humans could carry them.  Walking and travel by horseback could transmit physical objects, whereas drumbeats, smoke signals and semaphore signaling could communicate more terse messages. 

In the 1830’s and 1840’s clusters of inventors in the U.S. and England separately developed the telegraph.  In the U. S., one of those was Samuel Morse.  The previous post mentioned that nineteenth century physicists developed an understanding of the reciprocal interactions between electricity and magnetism.  With the telegraph, a key pressed by a sender completed an electric circuit so that current could instantaneously flow as far as a conducting wire could be strung.  At the destination, the current activated an electromagnet to sound a click.  In addition to developing the technology Morse invented Morse code, by which the spacing between clicks permitted coding every letter of the alphabet.  The technology developed into the Western Union Company (cofounded by Ezra Cornell, for whom the university is named) which strung wires across the U. S.  This revolutionary technology liberated the transmission of information from the historical limits of personal or visual/auditory messaging.

The telephone built on the electromagnetic transmission of coded messages to the direct, immediate transmission of sound, especially the human voice.

The laws of physics relating to electromagnetism also led to radio and television transmission.  Perhaps, if you live in an older home, you’ve noticed that a window sash will buzz or vibrate in its track as an airplane or a truck passes by.  The window sash has its own characteristic vibration.  The sound from the passing plane or truck can set the window vibrating, but only if the vibrations of the sound waves have the same pitch as the natural vibration of the window sash.  This is variously called forced vibration or sympathetic vibration. 

Radio and TV transmission and reception work the same way.  A radio transmitter is designed to emit radio waves at a specific vibration frequency.  If a specific receiver circuit in a radio or TV is adjusted to vibrate at the same frequency, the broadcast signal is picked up by the receiver, amplified, and delivers sound and picture images.  If the tuner is not adjusted to the appropriate frequency it will not receive the broadcast signal.

Benny’s air conditioner is filled with a refrigerant gas, a chlorofluorocarbon.  The technological principles underlying operation of refrigerators and air conditioners were explained in the preceding post. 

Use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) is an example where a useful technology turns out to have harmful consequences.  When they were developed and entered the market, the use of CFCs as refrigerants and in other applications became widespread. During the 1980’s, however, researchers discovered that the amount of ozone in the stratosphere (a zone centered around 15 mi. above Earth’s surface) was diminishing compared to earlier years. Stratospheric ozone is beneficial because it filters out ultraviolet light from incident sunlight.  (This should not be confused with ground level ozone, a health hazard, which is produced by smog on hot days.) If ozone becomes depleted, more ultraviolet (UV) light can reach the surface of the earth.  The additional UV could increase the incidence of skin cancer the world over if the ozone depletion were to continue.

After some years atmospheric scientists showed clearly that chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) caused the ozone depletion.  These compounds enter the atmosphere when refrigeration equipment leaks its refrigerant or is improperly disposed of; when we use spray cans, such as hair spray; and when CFCs are used as industrial foaming agents.  Even a small amount of CFCs has a powerful destructive effect because the active component derived from CFCs is re-used in the chemistry of ozone destruction many times over.    For this discovery, Paul Crutzen, Mario Molina, and Frank Rowland were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1995. 

In light of this new understanding almost 50 of the world’s nations, the main producers and users of CFCs, agreed to the Montreal Protocol of 1987 to phase out use of these compounds.

Corporate Interests generated doubt and delay.  Early on the manufacture of CFCs, and of the spray cans that use them, became a lucrative business.  Rigorous scientific  research, pursued as a quest for understanding of basic properties of the natural world, led to evidence showing that CFCs were responsible for destroying stratospheric ozone.  As this evidence was accumulating, however, the companies  sought to neutralize the impact of the scientific results (Wikipedia; N. Oreskes and E. M. Conway, “Merchants of Doubt”, 2010, Bloomsbury Press, New York), without offering scientific evidence to support their position. 

In one paper, prepared by Greenpeace for the 9^th meeting of participants in the Montreal Protocol in 1997, a threefold corporate strategy of disinformation used by a major corporation was summarized:

Deny that CFCs are responsible.  The corporation wrote in 1979: "No ozone depletion has ever been detected...all ozone depletion figures to date are based on a series of uncertain projections." 

Delay.  In the years surrounding the signing of the Montreal Protocol, this corporation sought to delay implementation of its terms by lobbying activities.  In 1986 it testified before Congress: "we believe that there is no immediate crisis that demands unilateral regulation."

Dominate.  The industry had already developed alternatives to CFCs, closely related in chemical structure to the banned compounds, by which they intended to dominate the world market for refrigerants and propellants.

Discussion

This post and the preceding one, and perhaps a few more to come, strive to point out that humanity benefits from scientific endeavor, in all its varied subject matter.  Scientists work by pursuing characterization of our natural world in an open, unbiased fashion.  The results of scientific investigations and the technologies that result from those studies benefit our lives in innumerable ways.  The progress we humans have made began largely with the industrial revolution in the nineteenth century; it represents a revolutionary departure from the way of life humans had known throughout history.

Telegraph and radio communication point out how scientific development permitted humans to communicate instantaneously across great distances.  Prior to this time human communication traveled primarily only as fast as we could move across land and sea.

The example of CFCs used as refrigerants and propellants likewise shows how research creates new materials intended to have beneficial properties.  The detrimental aspect of their use, promoting the destruction of stratospheric ozone, was unforeseen.  It is thanks to further atmospheric research that the mechanism of ozone destruction was unequivocally identified, and still newer substances that avoid this downside were created.  (Unfortunately, both CFCs and the newer refrigerants are extremely potent greenhouse gases.  It will require still further efforts to overcome this detriment.)

When the drawback of CFCs was identified the powerful corporations that manufactured them sought to diminish the significance in the mind of the public of the scientific research underlying the problem.  But science proceeds in the same way regardless of whether we consider the results to be favorable or harmful.  As shown above, the same scientific process led to potential solutions that overcame the disadvantages. 

The public at large, and corporate entities impacted by research results, cannot cherry pick the results they like and dismiss the ones they don’t.  Rigorous pursuit of the scientific method is the only way forward.

 

© 2017 Henry Auer

2014 Was the Warmest Year Globally Ever Recorded

2014 had the highest global average temperature ever recorded.  The U. S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)  and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) jointly announced on Jan. 16, 2015 that the year 2014 was the hottest year since record keeping began in 1880.  This result represents the globally averaged temperature, for both land and ocean surfaces, over the entire year. 

A 1½ minute video from NASA gives more information on this finding.  It includes a speedy review, year-by-year and location-by-location across a map of the globe, of how annual average temperatures, in ºC (multiply by 1.8 for ºF), have increased from 1957 to 2014.  (They are shown as the differences from a 30-year reference period from about 1945 to about 1975).

The ten hottest years on record occurred between 1998 and the present (see Details section at the end of this post). 

[Update added January 26, 2015]: The United Kingdom Met (i.e., meteorological) Office jointly with the University of East Anglia reported, using their own data set, that 2014 was tied with 2010 as the being the warmest year on record, within the 95% confidence limit of their data.  This occurred even though 2014 did not experience a Pacific Ocean warming event known as El Nino.

The “pause” in rising temperatures of recent years is misleading. The new warm record for 2014 is significant because those who doubt the reality of global warming have pointed to an apparent “pause” in warming from about 1998 through 2013 (i.e., up to the time of the new NOAA/NASA report).  The apparent “pause” may be seen in the image below, compared to the clearly rising temperatures before 1998.

                 Global average temperature from 1980 to 2013.
                 Source: Data table from National Aeronautics and Space Administration;
                 http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.txt


The new result for 2014 places its data point slightly higher than the two next-warmest years, 2005 and 2010.  Although it is too early to tell, the new information suggests that the earth may be resuming its climb to higher global average atmospheric temperatures.

The “pause” is understood to be temporary, in any case, in view of the image below.

Global average temperatures from 1850 to 2012, presented as differences from the average temperature from 1961 to 1990.  The different colored lines represent different data records.  Top, annual data points; bottom, 10-year averages with the gray shading showing confidence estimates.

Source: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 5^th Assessment Report, Part 1; http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/uploads/WGIAR5-SPM_Approved27Sep2013.pdf

The graphic shows that there was an even longer “pause” between the late 1940’s and the mid 1970’s; nevertheless, that “pause” ended and the global average temperature rose dramatically in the three following decades.  Since trends in global warming become apparent only on long time scales, a decade or longer, the bottom panel in the graphic above, presenting atmospheric temperatures as ten-year averages, suggests that the purported “pause” in the first decade of the 21^st century may not be a significant “pause” at all.

Ocean Heat Content.  The temperatures discussed above relate only to surface air temperatures around the globe.  But 90% of the excess heat retained by the earth system is absorbed in the oceans, measured in an upper zone down to a depth of 700 m (2,296 ft), as well as in a deeper zone from the surface to 2,000 m (6,562 ft).  A graph showing the time dependence of the ocean heat content to both depths is seen in the image below.

Five-year averaged relative global ocean heat content through 2013 for the upper zone (0-700 m) and the full-depth zone (0-2000 m), evaluated as the difference from the average heat content between about 1975 and 1990. Source: NOAA; http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/ .

Significantly, the image above shows clearly that during the present “pause” in the global average air temperature (1998-present) heat continued to accumulate in the waters of the oceans down to 2,000 m without any “pause”.  Thus, most of the excess heat absorbed by the earth system due to global warming is stored in the oceans.  Climate scientists have identified the role of the oceans in storing excess heat in recent publications, and pointed out that sooner or later that excess heat will be transferred back to the atmosphere (see Details, below).

Conclusions

The year 2014 had the hottest annual global average air temperature since record keeping began in 1880.  This result, and related information presented by NOAA and NASA, indicate  that there may be no significant “pause” in warming of the air temperature of the Earth, contrary to statements made by global warming skeptics and deniers.  The climate scientist Michael E. Mann, at the Pennsylvania State University, wrote  “It is exceptionally unlikely that we would be witnessing a record year of warmth, during a record-warm decade, during a several decades-long period of warmth that appears to be unrivaled for more than a thousand years, were it not for the rising levels of planet-warming gases produced by the burning of fossil fuels.”  Stefan Rahmstorf, head of earth system analysis at the Potsdam (Germany) Institute for Climate Impact Research stated   “[T]he fact that the warmest years on record are 2014, 2010 and 2005 clearly indicates that global warming has not ‘stopped in 1998,’ as some like to falsely claim.”

Indeed, 90% of the excess heat retained by the earth system is absorbed by the oceans, a process continuing without a “pause” up to the present.  Long-lived ocean currents redistribute this heat around the earth and among zones of varying depth.  It takes many years for heat to re-emerge to the surface and exchange back into the atmosphere.  Yet it is considered essentially certain that this will indeed occur. 

Global warming due to continued emissions of greenhouse gases will continue indefinitely unless greenhouse gas emissions are reduced.  If the peoples of the earth succeed in lowering annual emission rates to near zero, further warming will come to an end, and the earth will experience a new, higher global average temperature than we have now.  We must strive to reduce annual emission rates to (near) zero in order to minimize the additional warming of the earth.

Details

The ten hottest years on record occurred between 1998 and the present.  The second hottest years, only slightly less warm on average than 2014, were 2005 and 2010 (see the first graphic above).   The finding that 2014 exceeded all other records is even more significant because it occurred in a year in which the El Nino Southern Oscillation, a warming pattern in the Pacific Ocean, was absent. 

NOAA presents the global map, below, showing deviations in temperature from the reference period 1981-2010 as color-coded shades grading the deviations from the average.

Global grid showing color-coded deviations of the temperature in 2014 from the average temperature over the period 1981-2010.  Red shades represent temperatures warmer than the average, and blue shades represent temperatures cooler than the average.  (Grey regions had no data available.)

Source: NOAA; http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2014/13

  

The image above is noteworthy, since it shows that there were many regions, both on land and oceanic, recording record warmest average temperatures whereas there was only one region, south of South America, having a record coldest average temperature.  Indeed, most regions of the earth, both land and sea, had temperatures in 2014 higher than the 1981-2010 average.
 

Climate scientists have pointed out in recent publications that heat is accumulating in the oceans and that sooner or later the excess heat will re-emerge, so that the global average air temperature will resume climbing.

Loeb and coworkers (Nature Geoscience, vol. 5, pp. 110–113 (2012) doi:10.1038/ngeo1375) compared the energy imbalance of the Earth system with ocean heat content.   Combining satellite temperature measurements and ocean heat measurements to 1,800 m (5,900 ft) they found “between January 2001 and December 2010, Earth has been steadily accumulating energy at a [significant rate]. We conclude that energy storage is continuing to increase in the sub-surface ocean.”

Guemas and coworkers (Nature Climate Change vol. 3, pp. 649–653 (2013) doi:10.1038/nclimate1863)  examined the current “pause” in global warming.  Using historical ocean temperature data and a coupled ocean-atmosphere climate model, they “attribute the onset of [the “pause”] to an increase in ocean heat uptake.”  They verify that no reduction in the sun’s radiation was found which could explain the “pause”.

Chen and Tung (Science Vol. 345, pp. 897-903 (2014)  DOI: 10.1126/science.1254937) analyzed earlier data as well as more extensive newer observations gathered by buoys disposed worldwide at various ocean depths.  They found that “the [“pause”] is mainly caused by heat transported to deeper layers in the Atlantic and the Southern oceans….Cooling periods associated with the latter deeper heat-sequestration mechanism historically lasted 20 to 35 years.”  They further conclude “because the planetary heat [reservoirs] in the Atlantic and the Southern Oceans remain intact, the [“pause”] should continue on a decadal time scale. When the internal variability that is responsible for the current [“pause”] switches sign, as it inevitably will, another episode of accelerated global warming should ensue.”

© 2015 Henry Auer