RIP AA Gill

Shocked to hear at the weekend of the passing of AA Gill, a fabulous writer and a constant companion on a Sunday with the style and wit to delight, in his Sunday Times 'Table Talk' articles. No one can replace him and our lives are that little worse that he is no longer with us.

Here We Go

The first objections to Shale Gas are appearing. I see news reported that the recent minor tremors in Blackpool were due to the 'fracking' that is a part of extracting Shale Gas. Though the report also said that these tiny rumbles were not likely to get larger if the extraction continued and that they would cause no damage, I'm guessing all the latter stuff will get lost. No, I think we will be seeing 'Shale Gas Causes Earthquakes' and that will be it.

In the Sunday Times (hell, that used to be a good paper) I read a story about how the climate was very much hotter 55 million years ago and that even the poles were lush with vegetation and the temperature and humidity that was likely would have meant large scale, long lasting hurricanes would have raged.

Entirely to be expected the article went on to say that this was due to there being more CO2 in the atmosphere and that we are causing that again through our burning of fossil fuels. Whilst it did point out that the current situation is something less than 500 parts per million of CO2 in the air and that 55 million years ago is was more like 1,500-2,000 ppm, it did skip some important detail.

It struck me that there was a glaring omission in the article; why did the CO2 concentration increase? And why so sure that this was responsible for the warming? Usually, it is the other way around, the increase follows the warming. Still, a computer model said it would cause the storms and you know computers, they are never wrong. Not least because the 'experts' knowledge of weather is absolute and complete and programmers only write perfect software, that is never influenced by ideology.