It’s August. Is hurricane season heating up?

A low pressure disturbance out over the open Atlantic–in what’s called the hurricane “main development region”–is now being given an 80 percent chance of becoming a named tropical cyclone by the National Hurricane Center.

If so, this would be the first “Cape Verde-type” storm of the year–so called because it developed near the Cape Verde islands. Cape Verde type storms show up once the season really gets going, and are frequently the most intense and powerful.

Here’s an image of 91L, which everyone will be watching closely:

I knew that Yao Ming’s parents are very tall. Though his father, at 6′7, arguably contributed less than his mother, at 6′3, which is farther above the female mean in standard deviation units. But check this out from Superfusion: How China and America Became One Economy and Why the World’s Prosperity Depends on It:

Yao had essentially been bred. Both his parents played basketball. His 6′2 [different height from Wikipedia -Razib] mother, Fang Fengdi, perhaps the tallest woman in China, had been married to an even taller man. She had served as a Red Guard during the height of the Cultural Revolution and had been an ardent Maoist. She enthusiastically participated in the glorious plan of the local government to use her and her husband to produce a sports superstar. The Shanghai authorities who encouraged the match had gone back several generations to ensure that size was embedded in the bloodline. The result was Yao, a baby behemoth who just kept getting bigger.

What’s the chance of Yao? Let’s start with his mother being 6′3, his father being 6′7. Let’s assume that the genetic potentiality of Chinese women leaves a median height of 5′2, and men at 5′8. I suspect I’m low-balling this because there’s likely a fair amount of variability within China, with northerners being taller. Additionally, if Yao’s mother lived through the Cultural Revolution I’m wondering if she and her husband are even at their full height assuming normal nutrition. But let’s go with that. With 2 inches per standard deviation, ~85% heritability, you’d expect any of their children to be 6 standard deviations above the population norm in height (sex corrected). For a male that’s 6′8 (using the 5′8 figure as the median). Yao’s taller than that. In fact, at 7′6, he’s 5 standard deviations above the expected value. A freak if you will.

I think that that indicates that I’m being too conservative about the genetic potential of Yao’s parents, the full median height of the source population from which they derive assuming modern nutrition, and the heritability constraining to Yao’s family. In other words, I assume that the Chinese officials knew that neither of Yao’s parents were quite total freaks within their lineages, which indicates that there’ll be less regression back to the mean because their height is less likely attributable to non-replicable environmental variables. Though Yao is still freakishly tall in relation to both his parents, so I don’t think he was inevitable. Though of course the odds of someone of Yao’s height being born to his particular set of parents was orders of magnitude higher than for two random Chinese.

Note: To do the back-of-the-envelope I just used the breeder’s equation. Probably so far above the norm there are more non-linearities at work so that deviations from the expected values are probably higher. I guess only the Chinese officials who did the genealogical inquiries will know….

If you’ll be in the Atlanta area on September 2 — the night before Dragon*Con — then I strongly urge you to attend the Second Annual Atlanta Skeptics Star Party. This is a charity event to raise money for the American Cancer Society Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, in memory and honor of our friend Jeff Medkeff, an astronomer who died of liver cancer two years ago. Jeff was a good man, naming asteroids after noted skeptics, and did a lot of work to promote critical thinking.

Last year’s event was fantastic: there was a full house of people listening to short talks by Pamela Gay and me, and then migrating outside to view the heavens. This year, the speakers include Fraser Cain (from the newly remodeled Universe Today), Pamela once again, and musician George Hrab (who made a typically over-the-top cool promo for it).

I won’t be there this year — months of travel for my TV show have made me long to be home for more than a week at a time — but I hope some BABloggees will be able to attend. And don’t forget: Surly Amy and I have teamed up to raise money for the event as well. It’s a great night, a fun time, and a way to help us all kick cancer’s butt.

The sun kind of burped yesterday, and sent gigatons (or maybe hellatons?) of material streaming our way – to Earth that is. There is an awesome video of it over at SpaceWeather.com. The particles, mainly electrons and protons in the sub-100-eV range, are expected to reach earth tomorrow (Aug. 3) and could give vigorous auroral activity. I am not sure that northern California is northern enough to see it, but who knows? Take pictures, someone!

Once, about six or seven years ago, on an airplane flight from Chicago to California, I was on the right side of the plane and stared for hours at the shimmering curtains of green and red and purple, slowly waving as if in a breeze. It was an amazing sight!

This has been an fairly quiet solar cycle, and we are now heading to a solar max in three years which is on track to be just over half as intense as the last one in 2001, and the lowest in over 100 years. Too bad, just when I got into amateur radio…

Determinants and consequences of female attractiveness and sexiness: realistic tests with restaurant waitresses.

“Waitresses completed an on-line survey about their physical characteristics, self-perceived attractiveness and sexiness, and average tips. The waitresses’ self-rated physical attractiveness increased with their breast sizes and decreased with their ages, waist-to-hip ratios, and body sizes. Similar effects were observed on self-rated sexiness, with the exception of age, which varied with self-rated sexiness in a negative, quadratic relationship rather than a linear one. Moreover, the waitresses’ tips varied with age in a negative, quadratic relationship, increased with breast size, increased with having blond hair, and decreased with body size. These findings, which are discussed from an evolutionary perspective, make several contributions to the literature on female physical attractiveness. First, they replicate some previous findings regarding the determinants of female physical attractiveness using a larger, more diverse, and more ecologically valid set of stimuli than has been studied before. Second, they provide needed evidence that some of those determinants of female beauty affect interpersonal behaviors as well as attractiveness ratings. Finally, they indicate that some determinants of female physical attractiveness do not have the same effects on overt interpersonal behavior (such as tipping) that they have on attractiveness ratings. This latter contribution highlights the need for more ecologically valid tests of evolutionary theories about the determinants and consequences of female beauty.”

Photo: flickr/ercwttmn

Related content:
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Gentlemen prefer blonde hitchhikers.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Bust size and hitchhiking: a field study.
Discoblog: NCBI ROFL: Ovulatory cycle effects on tip earnings by lap dancers: economic evidence for human estrus?

WTF is NCBI ROFL? Read our FAQ!

For the third year in a row, Discover hosted a panel on science in science fiction at this year’s Comic-Con. This year’s edition was moderated by Phil Plait and featured a great lab-meets-film panel: Jamie Paglia (creator of Eureka); Kevin Grazier (JPL planetary physicist, Science Not Fiction blogger); Zack Stentz (writer for Fringe, Thor); and Sean Carroll (Caltech theoretical physicist, Cosmic Variance blogger).

The conversation was good and lively, with a nice mix of funny and interesting bits. But don’t take my word for it:

As Sean pointed out, we weren’t allowed to include a few of the video clips in this footage, so here are the two clips he brought to show-and-tell: a forward-looking philosophy of the proper relationship between science and narrative, and an example of carefully exploring the logical consequences of an imaginary world:

Unfamiliar with duck loving? Here are the basics: Corkscrewed vaginas and long, temporary, lymph-filled penises that uncoil in fractions of a second. Now researchers have found that some males’ members grow longer when they’re fiercely competing for a mate.

The photo we have to illustrate this magnificent mating equipment is so graphic–in a duck kind of way–that we’re putting it below the jump. As Carl Zimmer memorably put it when writing on the kinkiness of duck sex, it may not be “appropriate for ducklings.”

Last week, Yale University’s Patricia Brennan presented another finding on duck phalluses at a meeting of the Animal Behavior Society. When competing for females, it seems males of the scaup species try to out-size one another.

Brennan found this after placing male scaups in two setups. In one, seven to eight males lived with five or six females, while in the other, drakes lived in more equal numbers with females. As Science News reports, males with more competition grew longer penises–usually around 15 percent, but up to 25 percent longer than those living with more females.

She told Science News that this competition may be the reason for the bird’s unusual penis size to begin with.

“It’s really likely that having a longer penis evolved in male-male competition.”

For more about duck mating, Brennan’s research, and … videos, check out Carl Zimmer’s post.

Related content:
The Loom: Kinkiness Beyond Kinky
Discoblog: Mixed-Up, Adopted Ducks Try to Mate With the Wrong Species
Not Exactly Rocket Science: Ballistic penises and corkscrew vaginas – the sexual battles of ducks
Not Exactly Rocket Science: Infants match human words to human faces and monkey calls to monkey faces (but not quacks to duck faces)
80Beats: Mockingbird to Annoying Human: “Hey, I Know You”

Image: Patricia Brennan

Just over 100 days after oil started gushing into the Gulf of Mexico, BP says they will embark, later today or tomorrow, on a “static kill” effort that may just seal the leak once and for all.

Perhaps remembering the company’s repeated failures to stanch the flow over these past months, some officials are calling the maneuver only one possible solution. National Incident Commander Thad Allen said:

“Static kill is not the end all, be all.” [The Telegraph]

Still some hope it is; said Darryl Bourgoyne, director of the Petroleum Engineering Research Lab at Louisiana State University:

“It could be the beginning of the end.” [AP]

Temporary fix or permanent plug, here’s how BP will do it:

Step 1 — Temporary Cap (Check.)

As DISCOVER blogger Andrew Moseman put it on July 16th, “Do you hear that? That’s the sound of oil not gushing uncontrollably into the Gulf of Mexico from BP’s leak, for the first time in nearly three months.” BP has had a temporary seal in place for two weeks and it seems to be holding. But leaving just that seal in place would be foolhardy, experts say:

“No one has come out and said the well has full integrity,” said Greg McCormack, program director of the Petroleum Extension Service at the University of Texas, Austin, suggesting that it was still possible for the well to leak before the relief well was completed. For that reason, he said, the static kill operation makes sense to potentially kill the well two weeks earlier than the relief well would. “This is just an ultraconservative approach,” Mr. McCormack said, “and at this point in time we should be taking the most conservative approaches. I can’t see any risk.” [New York Times]

Step 2 — Static Kill: First Mud, Then Concrete

While the temporary cap keeps the oil under control from above, the static kill will require the company to block the flow from underneath the seal–a “bottom kill”–providing multiple layers to protect the Gulf from more oil. First engineers will pump mud underneath the cap. If the pressure remains stable and the mud forces oil down into its reservoir, then they will follow the mud with concrete. Engineers installed the lines to pump these materials into the Gulf’s depths during a similar (failed) top kill effort.

If the static kill attempt sounds familiar, that’s because it is. The company tried a similar process, called a top kill, to choke the well with mud in May. It failed partly because the mud couldn’t overcome the flow of the oil. There’s reason to hope this time will be different. For one, the oil is no longer freely flowing from the well, thanks to the temporary cap. That means that engineers won’t have to pump in mud with as much force, [BP executive Kent] Wells said. [AP]

Step 3 — Relief Wells and Clean Up

Even if the static kill appears to succeed, BP will continue to dig two relief wells as another backup. The relief wells are expected to intersect the original pipe just above the spot where it enters the oil reservoir (about 18,000 feet below the ocean’s surface), and will be used to pour in mud and cement.

Of course, another next step is to continue cleaning up the oil. As many reported last week, that oil seems to be disappearing from the Gulf’s surface, apparently as a result of evaporation, oil-eating bacteria, dispersion from storms, and clean-up efforts, such as controlled burns. But as tar balls continue to land on Gulf shores, some question the oil’s deeper damage.

“Less oil on the surface does not mean that there isn’t oil beneath the surface, however, or that our beaches and marshes are not still at risk,” Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said in a briefing on Tuesday. “We are extremely concerned about the short-term and long-term impacts to the gulf ecosystem.” [New York Times]

Related content:
80beats: One Cap Off, One Cap On: BP Tries Another Plan To Catch Leaking Oil
80beats: BP Oil Update: Tar Balls in Texas & Lake Pontchartrain
80beats: Gulf Coast Turtle News: No More Fiery Death; Relocating 70,000 Eggs
80beats: Next from X Prize: An Award for Cleaning up BP’s Oil Spill?

Image: BP

Between office jobs, motorised transport, the Internet and television, it’s never been easier to be inactive. Many humans in Western countries are masters at conserving energy but in the rainforests of Borneo and Sumatra, there is an animal that would put hardened couch potatoes to shame – the orang-utan. These apes are no slackers – they lead active lives in the jungle canopy. But relative to their size, they still use up less energy than any other mammal except for sloths.

Herman Pontzer from Washington University, who made the discovery, thinks that orangutans have evolved to live life in the slow lane because they can’t be sure of a steady food supply. They mostly eat fresh fruit and, being large animals, they need lots of it. But rainforests are chaotic places where ripe fruit can disappear quickly, unpredictably and for a long time. If orangutans aren’t getting any fuel, they have to minimise the amount of energy they spend, so that they don’t starve to death. And they’re very good at it.

This has many implications for zookeepers who care for captive orangutans. These are animals that eat as much as they can when food is around and burn off their calories very slowly – they’re easy to overfeed and prone to obesity, even in enclosures with plenty of opportunities for exercise. Learning about the energy needs of these great apes will allow keepers to plan more appropriate diets for them.

It’s a lesson that the staff of the Great Ape Trust sanctuary are taking to heart. The sanctuary, a sprawling 230-acre campus in Des Moines, is where Pontzer carried out his research. He studied four of the resident orangutans, including Azy, an adult male; Katy and Knobi, , adult females; and a young male called Rocky.

Pontzer tracked their activity with a technique commonly used in humans. The method involves ‘doubly-labelled water’, made of rarer and heavier versions of the normal hydrogen and oxygen atoms. These heavy atoms can be tracked as they make their way through the body, whether they end up in the animal’s urine or in the carbon dioxide it breathes out. In fact, the amount that ends up in these two waste products is related. So by taking regular urine samples, Pontzer could work out how hard the orangutans were breathing out, and thus how much energy they were using up.

It turned out that they were using very little indeed. All the orangutans, including Rocky the youngster, were in the bottom 1% of all mammals in terms of the calories they burn every day. Adjusting for their size, they use less energy than humans from industrial societies, where inactive lifestyles are common. They even use less than macaque monkeys on a strict diet or lemurs undergoing temporary hibernation.

You might think that captive orangutans might be more lethargic than their wild cousins, but that’s not the case for Azy and his chums. Their enclosure comes with climbing frames, rope and easy access to a three-acre forest, where they spend much of their days. The four apes spent around the same amount of time feeding, resting and sleeping as their wild counterparts, and they walked and climbed over similar distances. They may be more familiar with their surroundings and know the easiest routes, but even if they spent twice as much energy moving around, they’d still burn fewer daily calories than almost all other mammals.

Of course, Pontzer only studied four orangutans but these individuals are hardly sluggish members of the species. They’re as active as their wild peers and they get in about as much exercise as human farmers who lead physically demanding lives. They have lively existences, but they use their energy very efficiently. When they’re at rest, their metabolic rates are slightly lower than expected for their size and much lower than in humans and chimps. The odds of finding four humans that use similar levels of energy, even in a Western population, are 1 in 10,000.

The orangutan’s extremely sparing use of energy is just part of an entire lifestyle that takes place in the slow lane. It grows more slowly than any primate except for humans, and it breeds less frequently than any ape. It lives alone so it doesn’t have to share any food it managed to find. It even moves with incredible efficiency – rather than jumping across an opening in the treetops, it can rock the tree it sits on so they sway across the gap. All of these traits make orangutans “consummate low-energy specialists” that can survive in an environment where their food of choice is hard to come by.

But not all orangutans are the same. Carel van Schaik, who has spent many years studying orangutans, points out that there are two species or orangutan – one that lives in Sumatra and one that lives in Borneo. “The northern part of Sumatra is less subject to the dramatic lean periods seen in most of Borneo, so we might see some interesting differences between the two orangutan species in physiology,” he says. Unfortunately, the individuals at the Great Ape Trust are all hybrids so they have nothing further to say on the matter.

Van Schaik also thinks that energy-saving adaptations might be a common feature among Borneo’s mammals. There’s some evidence that these creatures have a tendency to become smaller. And while orangutans are still relatively large, those from the most unreliable regions seem to have smaller brains for their size. Van Schaik also wants to see if gibbons share the same traits, especially because they lead slow lives with little risk of predators and they share the orangutan’s problem of unpredictable food supplies.

Reference: PNAS http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1001031107

More on orangutans:

• Orang-utan study suggests that upright walking may have started in the trees
• Scientists tickle apes to reveal evolutionary origins of human laughter
• Orang-utans use leaves to lie about their size
• Photo safari – Orangutans Part 1, 2, 3 and 4

The Sun is getting active. Click for larger. Credit: SDO/NASA

The Sun is getting more and more active as time goes by.  Currently we have a Coronal Mass Ejection heading at us.  The CME is part of a series of events on the sun being called a global magnetic disturbance because it involves the whole Earth facing hemisphere.  Discovery has a nice article/video(s) and the SDO site has video’s you should check out.

Is something bad going to come of this?  Probably not and it’s not like it hasn’t happened before.  Our detection and observations are vastly improved over what they were just a few years ago.  Communications satellites can be configured to lessen any damage.  The power grid could be affected, but I’m not sure that this is a big problem with this particular event.  We could be treated to some nice auroral activity though – YAY!

It is not without any consequence though; you may have heard there was a problem when s spike in electrical current tripped a circuit breaker shutting down half of the cooling system on the ISS.  Efforts to reset the breaker and get the coolant pump going again were unsuccessful.  The station stable the affected areas are either running on redundant systems or being powered via jumper cables for now (insert you might be a redneck joke here).  It’s going to take a spacewalk to two to see if they can fix the problem.  Sounds like the spacewalk is scheduled for Thursday and the problems from the CME should be over by then.  Being caught outside during a CME probably would not be a very good thing.  Read more about the cooling failure at NASA.

As we all know it won’t be too much longer and the shuttle will be no more.  How are they going to get a new 780 lb pump up there if they need it?  They won’t.

So keep an eye to the sky tonight for possible northern or southern lights and don’t forget the good vibes for Marian.  I think she needs them.

Yes, you saw a similar headline in 80beats in January of 2009, but this time we mean it. We think.

Back in 2009 the FDA approved an application from Geron Corporation to begin the first human safety trials of a therapy derived from embryonic stem cells, a move that was heralded as a strong vote of confidence in this controversial but exciting area of medicine. But before the treatment of patients with spinal cord injuries could begin, the FDA reversed course and put a hold on the trial, noting that Geron had discovered cysts in some rats injected with the cells.

Since then, Geron has been scrambling to prove that its treatment is safe via new animal studies, and has agreed to change some procedures to minimize the likelihood of cyst formation. Now that the FDA has signed off, Geron expects to begin the small safety trial (involving only 7 to 10 patients) before the year’s end.

“I think it’s a very important milestone for the whole industry,” Alan Trounson, the president of California’s stem cell agency, said Friday, adding that the hold on the trial had been a cloud over the field. “It’s very important that they get on and treat the patients and demonstrate the safety” of the therapy. [The New York Times]

Geron’s treatment is intended to help patients with mid-back spinal cord injuries who are paralyzed below the site of the damage. The cells will be injected within the first two weeks after the injury.

Geron … turns embryonic stem cells into precursors of neural support cells called oligodendrocytes. The precursor cells would be injected into the spinal cord at the site of the injury. The hope is that the cells will repair the insulation, known as myelin, around nerve cells, restoring the ability of some nerves to carry signals. While this is not expected to allow people to rise from their wheelchairs, it may conceivably restore some movement or sensation. [The New York Times]

Related Content:
80beats: Stem Cell Society to Get Tough on “Charlatans” & Unproven Treatments
80beats: The Trouble With Lab-Created Stem Cells—and Why They Won’t Displace Embryonic Ones
80beats: Biotech Co: First Human Embryonic Stem Cell Trial Hit Small Speed Bump
80beats: FDA Approves the First Clinical Trials Using Embryonic Stem Cells
80beats: GE Plans to Use Human Embryonic Stem Cells as Lab Rats

Image: flickr / planetc1

Last week was Comic Con, and for the third year in a row, the Hive Overmind Discover Magazine sent me along to be on a panel. Every year we do a variation on discussing the science of science fiction, and this year we focused on its abuse. We asked our panelists (Jaime Paglia [Eureka], Kevin Grazier [science advisor for Eureka and Battlestar Galactica], Zack Stentz [Fringe, Thor], and Sean Carroll [cosmologist and DM blogger]) to pick examples of good and bad science in the movies.

The results? Well, watch for yourself:

A couple of notes:

• The panel was a bit short. The panels in the room had been running long all day, and the Comic Con Powers That Be were pressuring me to end the panel really early. Sticking it to The Man is one of my favorite things to do, so I let it run almost to the full length.
• It pained me to admit I wasn’t fully caught up on Eureka, which is really a fun show. My own TV show, the blog, and a billion other things have been swamping me lately, but since the panel I’ve been dutifully watching it, and it gets better with each episode! I really recommend it along with Fringe.

To more meaty matters: Zack brought up the point that science is important, and important to get right, but not at the cost of the story. This may surprise you, but I agree. As I said in my opening comments, I was inspired as a kid by some shows that abused science in a pretty awful way. But the science itself wasn’t the key thing, it was just that science and scientists were there. And in many cases, they were the key characters, figuring out what was going on. Spock, Victor Bergman, and many others were my heroes.

Of course, I hate it when science is flogged to death in movies, like in "Armageddon", "The Core", and a gazillion others, but even then it can still inspire someone. I’d rather it were treated with respect, as it was in "Deep Impact", or even "Iron Man". That’s when it really can come alive for kids, and even adults.

But the important thing to remember is that these are stories. Keeping the science accurate but screwing up the story makes for a bad movie or TV show. It’s OK to mess up the science sometimes if it’s necessary.

But only if it’s necessary. Many times, accurate science can vastly improve a story, and that’s the part of the aim of the Science and Entertainment exchange, which in part sponsored the panel. Writers can be very good at their craft, but they may be limited simply by not knowing all the possibilities the science of their story provides them. Nature is more clever than any of us, so I think that looking to the real science can inspire the writers. The more information they have about reality, the more likely they will see avenues and twists in the plot that would’ve been hidden otherwise.

That’s why I like that producers are using more science advisors. They can always ignore the advice if they want, and that’s OK. But sometimes it also provides a more entertaining story, too, and that’s the most important thing of all.

Panelist Sean Carrol provides his own thoughts on this at Cosmic Variance.

I’ve just returned from my second trip to Cambridge, England, as part of the now completed Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowship in Science and Religion. (Evidence at right: Yours truly at Trinity College [photo credit: Julia Vitullo-Martin].)

Because this fellowship has been much criticized and also much misunderstood, I think another report on the experience and what it entails will be helpful (for my prior reports, see here and here).

Critics depict the fellowship as a kind of Kumbaya love-fest in which journalists are taught that science and religion have always been and always will be best friends. However, I’ve grown increasingly convinced that this critique really isn’t aimed at the target.

The problem is that the field of “Science and Religion” is much broader than critics seem to think. It isn’t just about examining, on a philosophical level, whether the two are in some way “compatible.” Neither is it simply about exploring, from a history of science perspective, how they relate. That may be the clichéd understanding of what we’re about when we talk about “science and religion,” but in truth, it barely scratches the surface.

On our last official day in Cambridge, program director Fraser Watts made some remarks about what really is covered under the field of “Science and Religion.” Regurgitating my notes on what Watts said (and adding some extensions of my own), one might study:

1. The religious views of scientists—aka, Elaine Ecklund’s work. And conversely, the scientific perspectives of religious believers.

2. The history of the relationship between science and religion.

3. The philosophy of the relationship between science and religion.

4. Particular case studies of conflict or cooperation between science and religion, or of how advances in a particular aspect of science challenge (or have some other implication for) religion.

5. The science of religion—e.g., what is it about the human brain, or the evolved beings that we are, that have made us so inclined towards religiosity? What is the neural or cognitive basis for religious belief or experience?

6. A comparative analysis of scientific and religious perspectives on a particular topic of great import—like, say, suffering. Or altruism. Or free will. Or morality. Or any number of others.

7. I seem to recall that Watts listed several other possibilities that aren’t in my notes. In any case, I think this list still barely scratches the surface.

It is only if you are working on # 3 or # 4 that, it seems to me, you are likely to fall into a spat over the validity of what is called “accommodationism.” None of the other areas really require strong stance-taking on the compatibility of science and religion, although they might perhaps imply a position (I think # 2 does, for instance).

But the point is that much work in this general area is simply not interested in that most hotly debated of questions–if only because the debate has a way of getting old, not everyone is a controversialist, and there are many other things to talk about. Indeed, that came out very clearly last week, when it came time for the ten Templeton-Cambridge fellows to present on the topics of their research.

In my assessment–and these are my likely imperfect categorization attempts–nobody really presented on # 3. There was one presentation that I would classify as being about # 2, and another one that was about # 4. There were two presentations that I have a bit of a hard time categorizing using the groupings above–in some ways, they might fit into # 3. As for everybody else: They were dealing with # 1, # 5, or # 6. In particular, there were at least four presentations that fell into the category of # 6.

I have decided not to say explicitly what people were presenting on, because I don’t want to scoop fellow journalists (or myself). But I can say that the experience of our group refutes the idea that the point of the fellowship is to teach journalists to make “accommodationist” arguments. Rather, it is to have journalists do work in the field of “science and religion,” and that’s a very different thing.

Update: The title is way too strong as a reflection of my opinion. I’ve added a question mark.

A friend once observed that you can’t have engineering without science, making the whole concept of “social engineering” somewhat farcical. Jim Manzi has an article in City Journal which reviews the checkered history of scientific methods as applied to humanity, What Social Science Does—and Doesn’t—Know: Our scientific ignorance of the human condition remains profound.

The criticisms of a scientific program as applied to humanity are deep, and two pronged. As Manzi notes the “causal density” of human phenomena make teasing causation from correlation very difficult. Additionally, the large scale and humanistic nature of social phenomena make them ethically and practically impossible to apply methods of scientific experimentation. This is why social scientists look for “natural experiments,” or involve extrapolation from “WEIRD” subject pools. But as Manzi notes many of the correlations themselves are highly context sensitive and not amenable to replication.

He concludes:

It is tempting to argue that we are at the beginning of an experimental revolution in social science that will ultimately lead to unimaginable discoveries. But we should be skeptical of that argument. The experimental revolution is like a huge wave that has lost power as it has moved through topics of increasing complexity. Physics was entirely transformed. Therapeutic biology had higher causal density, but it could often rely on the assumption of uniform biological response to generalize findings reliably from randomized trials. The even higher causal densities in social sciences make generalization from even properly randomized experiments hazardous. It would likely require the reduction of social science to biology to accomplish a true revolution in our understanding of human society—and that remains, as yet, beyond the grasp of science.

At the moment, it is certain that we do not have anything remotely approaching a scientific understanding of human society. And the methods of experimental social science are not close to providing one within the foreseeable future. Science may someday allow us to predict human behavior comprehensively and reliably. Until then, we need to keep stumbling forward with trial-and-error learning as best we can.

It tends to come in autumn. The Venetians call it acqua alta–the seemingly seasonal flooding of their historic city center. But a paper published in the Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres suggests that Italians eager to predict the next flood shouldn’t study the Earth’s seasons, but should instead look at the sun.

A project led by David Barriopedro at the Universidade de Lisboa in Lisbon, Portugal analyzed hourly recordings of water levels in the city from 1948 to 2008. His team noted a correlation of these “high-surge events” and the eleven-year solar cycle: Periods of maximum solar activity, when sun spots usually appear, seemed to herald the acqua alta.

Historically, finding a causal link even between longer term climate changes and sunspots has proven difficult. As a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) site on sunspots says, a period of very low sunspot activity from the 1600s to the 1700s, dubbed the Maunder Minimum, corresponded to cold temperatures in Western Europe, a period known as the Little Ice Age. This could be a coincidence, the site says, given the complexity of the Earth’s climate.

The study of Venice’s floods also says that any link between these short-term weather events and the sun is “indirect.” The researchers note that the solar activity corresponds to changes in pressure systems over the Atlantic Ocean, and these pressure systems in turn correspond to how storms move over Europe. As New Scientist reports:

Records of air pressure over Europe over the same period revealed “acqua alta years” saw a lot of low-pressure systems over the north Adriatic Sea, while in quiet years these systems were further south. This makes sense, because flooding events in Venice are known to be triggered by low-pressure systems from the Atlantic.

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Image: Wikimedia / EVenise

The United Arab Emirates announced this weekend that all BlackBerry mobile services will be banned beginning in October, forcing users of the smartphone to find other ways to surf the web and send email and text messages. The decision will not only affect the U.A.E.’s half-million BlackBerry users, but also international visitors–which could lead to business travelers going into abrupt “crackberry” withdrawal as soon as they hit the Dubai airport. The reason for the ban:

The Emirates have been in a long dispute with Research In Motion, the smartphone’s producer, over the BlackBerry’s highly encrypted data system, which offers security to users but makes it more difficult for governments to monitor communications. [The New York Times]

Saudi Arabia is likely to take similar measures, and Kuwait and Bahrain may also follow suit. The Middle Eastern nations have singled out BlackBerry because of its distinct system for transmitting messages. When a BlackBerry user hits “send” on an email, the data is encrypted and sent to a local cell phone tower. From there, it’s routed through RIM’s private global network of servers, which puts the data out of reach for government snoops. Other smartphones send data through the open Internet and can be monitored relatively easily.

“The U.A.E. has never been a place that offered much in the way of electronic privacy,” said Jim Krane, author of “City of Gold,” a history of Dubai. “The government makes no secret that it monitors electronic communication, including text messages, phone calls and e-mail. The revelation that secure BlackBerry data is frustratingly out of the government’s reach only confirms this.” [The New York Times]

This isn’t the first time the U.A.E. has taken aim at BlackBerry users, according to Research In Motion.

Last year, RIM criticized a directive by the UAE state-owned mobile operator Etisalat telling the company’s BlackBerry users to install software described as a service upgrade. Tests showed the download actually installed spy software on users’ phones that could allow authorities to access private information stored on the handsets. It strongly distanced itself from Etisalat’s decision and told users how to remove the software. [AP]

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Image: flickr / Honou

Saturday night just before 8 p.m. Eastern time, some 200 miles above the Earth’s surface, a circuit breaker tripped: No one on board the International Space Station is in danger, but the outpost is now one cooling loop down. NASA said in a statement that they are planning an emergency spacewalk to fix this part of the station’s cooling system later this week.

The cooling loop moderates the station’s temperature and regulates other station avionics controls, by keeping cooling ammonia circulating through it. Without any cooling system, the three Americans and three Russians currently on board might find conducting research difficult:

According to NASA figures, without thermal controls the ISS’s sun-facing side would roast at 250 degrees Fahrenheit (121 Celsius), while the outpost’s dark side would plunge to some minus 250 degrees Fahrenheit (-157 Celsius). A statement posted some years ago on NASA’s website suggested: “There might be a comfortable spot somewhere in the middle of the Station, but searching for it wouldn’t be much fun!” [AFP]

Besides the cooling loop, the malfunction also took down two of the station’s four gyroscopes, which are used to position the station, but one is already again up and running, and NASA says that three out of four is enough to operate the station for now.

Flight control has already given preliminary approval for a spacewalk later this week, the first of two walks to fetch repair supplies stored elsewhere on the station and install them. The walks will replace a scheduled spacewalk to install a power cable and platform for robotics work.

Although a final decision on a new spacewalk plan is still pending engineering and timeline analysis, the most likely scenario would call for an initial spacewalk no earlier than Thursday by [Doug] Wheelock and [Tracy] Caldwell Dyson to replace the Pump Module and structurally bolt it into place on the S1 truss, with an additional spacewalk by the duo two or three days later to mate fluid and electrical connections. [NASA]

NASA plans to vent any residual ammonia in the cooling loop’s lines (for the repair-astronauts’ protection) and says that the astronauts will perform the repairs no sooner than Thursday. A NASA TV briefing planned for 4 p.m. (Eastern time) today may give more details.

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DISCOVER: 20 Things You Didn’t Know About… Living in Space

Image: NASA

A new prize from AAAS recognizes one of the most important things a scientist can do:

AAAS Early Career Award for Public Engagement with Science
Nomination Deadline: 15 October

The Award

The AAAS Early Career Award for Public Engagement with Science, established in 2010, recognizes early-career scientists and engineers who demonstrate excellence in their contribution to public engagement with science activities. A monetary prize of $5,000, a commemorative plaque, complimentary registration to the AAAS Annual Meeting, and reimbursement for reasonable hotel and travel expenses to attend the AAAS Annual Meeting to receive the prize are given to the recipient.

For the purposes of this award, public engagement activities are defined as the individual’s active participation in efforts to engage with the public on science- and technology-related issues and promote meaningful dialogue between science and society.

The award will be given at the AAAS Annual Meeting.

Eligibility

Nominee must be an early-career scientist or engineer in academia, government or industry actively conducting research in any scientific discipline (including social sciences and medicine). Groups or institutions will not be considered for this award. AAAS employees are ineligible. One scientist or engineer will be chosen to receive the award on an annual basis.

“Early career” is defined as an individual who has been in his/her current field for less than seven years and pre-tenure or job equivalent. Post-doctoral students are eligible for this award.

Nominee will have demonstrated excellence in his/her contribution to public engagement with science activities, with a focus on interactive dialogue between the individual and a non-scientific, public audience(s).

Types of public engagement activities might include: informal science education, public outreach, public policy, and/or science communication activities, such as mass media, public dialogue, radio, TV and film, science café, science exhibit, science fair, and social and online media.

Entries

All nominations must be submitted fully completed and postmarked on or before midnight, 15 October. Nominations may be mailed, faxed, or emailed to the AAAS Center for Public Engagement with Science and Technology.

Nominations may be made by AAAS affiliate organizations, universities, government agencies, media, research organizations, and individuals.

Prior nomination does not exclude a candidate from consideration in subsequent years.

The selection committee will include distinguished scientists, engineers, science communicators, and science popularizers named by AAAS. The decisions of the committee will be final.

During the award year, AAAS will expect the recipient will continue participating in public engagement with science activities and initiatives.

Nomination Procedures

You should provide: name, position, institution, professional address and e-mail, professional phone and fax, home address and home phone number of the candidate; name, position, institution, and professional address and phone of the nominator; a statement of the public engagement activities that form the basis for the nomination; at least two representative material samples or other documentation which illustrate or describe the candidate’s contribution; the candidate’s vitae; and the names of two supporting persons whom AAAS may contact for more information on the candidate and his/her contributions.

All materials submitted become the property of AAAS.

Submit

Please submit information to:

AAAS Center for Public Engagement with Science and Technology
Attn: Tiffany Lohwater
1200 New York Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20005
Phone: 202-326-8737
Fax: 202-789-0455
E-mail: tlohwate@aaas.org
Deadline

All materials must be received by 15 October.

[Prize site]

To more broadly inform the US public about the upcoming hurricane season, the Project on Climate Science this morning arranged a national radio satellite tour with Greg Holland, a hurricane expert with the National Center for Atmospheric Research and director of its Earth System Laboratory. Some of the shows were live, some were taped, but I was allowed to listen in on both.

The experience was very revealing, and provided a lot of perspective on the upcoming season. Some highlights:

The Atmospheric/Ocean Conditions: Holland explained that this year is shaping up a lot like 2005, the worst year on record. On a Westchester, New York show, he commented that “unfortunately, the conditions that are out there at present are very similar to what we observed in the lead up to Katrina.” In particular, Holland pointed to the very warm ocean (with sea surface temperatures at “all time record levels”) and the fact that we’re coming out of an El Nino, which suppresses hurricanes in the Atlantic. The current conditions do the opposite.

“I sure hope the forecasts are wrong, but forecasts are going anything from 14 up to the mid 20s for the number of storms this year,” Holland said.

The Influence of Global Warming: There has been massive debate over just how much hurricanes could change due to the changing climate. Many parameters could be altered, including average storm intensity, average storm numbers, standard storm tracks or regions of occurrence, and so forth.

On a South Carolina show, Holland admitted that when it comes to the frequency of storms, “there’s a lot of debate.” He said that while people like himself think the total numbers will go up, other experts think the opposite.

As far as intensity is concerned, though, Holland asserted that there is “no real debate…if there is warmer sea surface temperatures and all other things are equal, you will get on average more intense cyclones.” And he went further. Down the line due to climate change, Holland argued, he expects “a very substantial, perhaps even a doubling of the category 4 and 5 hurricanes, even if the total number may not change much.”

When it comes to climate impacts on hurricanes, one other factor that we often don’t talk about is precipitation. A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture, and that will surely show up in the hurricane rainfall tally. On the Westchester show, Holland said the current prediction is that hurricanes “will carry about 20 percent more rainfall due to global warming.”

Specific Vulnerabilities: On a radio satellite tour, different regions of course want to know how they in particular could be impacted by hurricanes. It varies, but there are some pretty big specific vulnerabilities.

Take New York City. As Holland told the Westchester show, a big enough storm surge “could completely shut the city down for a long period of time if it got into the subway and knocked out your communications.” This is one of the hurricane worst case scenarios for the U.S. that I detailed in my book Storm World. Every year, the possibility arises again. The odds may be low, but some day, it will really happen.

The Oil Slick. There were questions about what happens when cyclone meets slick, of course. Holland’s view was that it was a good news/bad news situation. He said a storm would actually mix up the slick, breaking it into smaller “globules” that would be more easily consumed by bacteria.

But of course, if a storm headed towards shore across the slick, its storm surge could also “drive some of the oil into the fragile wetlands, where it will be a lot harder to remove it.”

How Does This Affect the Average Citizen? On an Ocean City, Maryland show, Holland was asked what this means for the average person looking ahead to a rough year, or many rough years. He made two points. First, for those living in storm-prone areas, the best idea is to get ready now in case you have to evacuate–and then, if the forecasts turn out to be wrong and we have a calm year, “the worst that’s happened is you’ve cleaned around the house and you’ve got a nice plan together.”

More broadly, Holland said we have to get ready for many years like this one. ”These are the sort of conditions we’re going to have to put up with,” he said. We have to adapt to that. Not pretty, but probably not avoidable, either.