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The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, smashed its way into the world's consciousness earlier this month when it seized Mosul and the Beiji oil refinery in Iraq. Starting last fall, ISIS began imposing its theocratic rule over a wide swath of Syria, then quickly wrested control of the emblematic Iraqi cities of Fallujah and Ramadi. With the more recent attacks, it menaced the government in Baghdad; it also forced President Obama to reengage with a war from which he thought he had extricated the United States.
In trying to explain ISIS's rapid success, alarmed observers have pointed to the extreme tactics that drew condemnation even from Al Qaeda: mass executions, beheadings, and crucifixions. Some see local conspiracies, believing Arab governments allowed the group to grow in order to justify their own heavy-handed crackdowns. Others suggest that Shi'ite Iran indirectly funded the movement as part of its own strategy to divide the Sunnis from within.
Most analysts predict that ISIS's conduct will ultimately limit its future: They say it has no meaningful political program or ability to form a state, and its extremist views will alienate the people who live under its rule.
But that view of ISIS's success and prospects overlooks one key element. A look at both ISIS's written edicts and its tactics suggest that the group has gotten one important thing right: It has created a clear—and to some, compelling—idea of citizenship and state-building in a region almost completely bereft of either.
ISIS's support comes from a direct appeal to Sunni Muslims as a religious and political constituency. It has made clear that it expects people under its power to take an active role in establishing a new Islamic state. And it has enlisted them in a project to assert the power of their religious community over the Shia, who currently dominate the territory from Iran to Lebanon.
Its idea of statehood is far from the modern Western one, to say nothing of its idea of citizenship; anyone not considered part of ISIS's goals is subject to death, the more grisly and public the better. But the brutality of ISIS can distract from the way it has offered its constituents something they've been denied by the despotic regimes of the region.
During decades of independence, post-colonial Middle Eastern governments have failed to establish national identities strong enough to counter the attraction of violent, intolerant groups that promise members a genuine stake in their own futures. Whether in fractured states like Lebanon, Iraq, and Libya, or strong centralized dictatorships like Egypt and, before its civil war, Syria, Middle Eastern governments have ruled more by force than persuasion, eliciting only shallow loyalty from their people. As repugnant as its tactics are, ISIS offers Sunnis a rare opportunity: a chance, in effect, to be a citizen. Irreconcilable fanatics might form the group's core membership, but it has attracted broader support in the Sunni community. Understanding that appeal is the key to countering it.
The rebellions that have ripped apart Iraq since 2003 and Syria since 2011 are complex, pitting a confusing patchwork of militias against the regimes in Baghdad and Damascus, and often against one another. Even in that tortured context, ISIS stands out for its brutality, its uncompromising theology, and the rapidity of its success.
Originally established in 2004 as Al Qaeda in Iraq, the group changed its name after its founder Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed by the US military in 2006. Its current leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, took over in 2010, and has steadily expanded the group's power and reach. (Al Qaeda formally disavowed ISIS at the beginning of this year.)
Olivier Roy, a French political scientist and author of several definitive books on political Islam, reflected the consensus on ISIS when he dismissed it as a classic jihadi group. "ISIS is an army of militants, not a political party, nor a social movement," Roy told The New Republic. "It succeeds because the others failed; and as everywhere it will confront a backlash of the civil society."
The extensive paper trail that ISIS leaves wherever it goes, however, suggests a more complex and deliberate strategy, combining a typical religious-splinter-group playbook with a genuine interest in building a state and a citizenry.
DISCUSS: What do you think draws supporters to ISIS?
When ISIS stormed into Mosul in June and sent the Iraqi Army running, it did not begin governing by whim. Rather, it published rules. In a 16-point communiqué signed by the secretive al-Baghdadi, ISIS stated expectations for the local population that were clear, direct, and to the point. Women had to "dress decently" and only go outside "if needed." Muslims must go to prayers on time, and thieves would have their hands cut off.
These requirements were placed in a larger ideological context. "People tried secular forms of government: republic, Baathist, Safavids," ISIS declared. "It pained you. Now is time for an Islamic state."
The decree announced that all Iraqi government property was confiscated and could only be distributed by ISIS leaders. Tribal leaders were warned not to cooperate with the government. Guns and flags were banned. Police and soldiers were instructed to register at special "repentance centers."
In territory under its control, ISIS has followed a methodical script. Once it has established military dominance, it takes over power plants, factories, bakeries, and food supplies. Its lawyers draft modern contracts that spell out the Islamic responsibilities of local organizations that want to work with the displaced. Even its name is telling. Critics address it derisively by its acronym, but ISIS members call it "al-Dawla," or "the state."
Like all the movements that have built influence in the region, ISIS asks its constituents to take active responsibility—enforcing moral codes, reporting crime and corruption, spreading the call to God.
"It's not the old model where the citizen is passive and plays no role," said Brookings Institution scholar Shadi Hamid, author of the book "Temptations of Power: Islamists and Illiberal Democracy in a New Middle East." "Within certain limits, if you agree to abide by these strict rules, there is an active role for citizens under ISIS."
In countries where citizens have well-established political rights, this level of participation might seem inconsequential. But in modern Middle Eastern states—where regimes rule through benign neglect or, worse, by deliberately seeking to keep their populations passive and disengaged—even the smallest call to action can feel appealing.
Hamas in Palestine, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt have all thrived by mobilizing members around a project and a shared identity. So have smaller groups led by clerics or militants in Bahrain, Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere. Much of the early enthusiasm behind the Egyptian uprising of Jan. 25, 2011, arose from the promise that after decades of effective military dictatorship, Egyptians could finally live as citizens, with both rights and responsibilities.
To Westerners, ISIS's combination of participatory, grass-roots governance with total rejection of pluralism and democracy can be puzzling. But like the Islamic Jihad and Al Qaeda, ISIS draws from the Sunni jihadi tradition, which has always demanded huge commitment and involvement from its followers while excluding everyone else. ISIS takes these concepts to their limits; in its view of sharia, or Islamic law, "heretical" sects like Shia Islam should be eliminated. Christians and Jews would theoretically be allowed to live under ISIS protection as heavily taxed second-class citizens.
That may strike observers as extremism, but in fact, sectarian governance is already the de facto rule in much of the Middle East. To supporters and fellow travelers, the ideology of groups like ISIS can seem like a rare acknowledgment of reality: Ruling parties only pretend to believe in a national identity while actually just enforcing the power of one sect or clique. Iran holds elections, but only to calibrate the balance of power within one faction of the Shia clerical establishment. Iraq is a multi-ethnic democracy that is in practice run by a Shia warlord. Saudi Arabia, the richest and possibly most influential state in the region, is run as a feudal monarchy by a single family that enforces many of the same intolerant religious rules as ISIS.
DISCUSS: What do you think draws supporters to ISIS?
As a result, ISIS has won support, or at least acceptance, from people who would never identify as extremists. "They're in control, and they're no worse than the regime," said one engineer named Abdullah. He was speaking at the bus station in Kilis, Turkey, where he had brought his family to escape regime bombing in Aleppo. Some of his relatives lived in ISIS-controlled areas, others under the Assad regime, and some, like Abdullah himself, under the less virulently Islamist Free Syrian Army. Abdullah said he didn't share the views of ISIS but didn't mind them either. "Their rules are clear. If they leave people alone, it's not so bad."
Nihilist extremists have managed to attract armed followers in corners of the United States, Europe, India, and elsewhere, but they remain nothing more than a violent nuisance when countered by an effective state that commands the loyalty of its citizens. Not so in the Arab world. So far ISIS has bested the armies of Syria and Iraq, which appeared unwilling to fight, and small Syrian militias that have gone head to head with ISIS but are at a colossal disadvantage in funds and firepower.
ISIS hasn't yet clashed directly with the Shia sectarian militias, like Hezbollah and like the reconstituted Mahdi Army, Badr Brigades, and others in Iraq, which display a similar fanatical sectarian zeal and lack of restraint. It already has some advantages over some of these organizations, however. Unlike Al Qaeda's vague vision of a borderless world run by extremist jihadis, ISIS has a plan to build a viable state right now. In less than a year it has secured a de facto country, and acquired an arsenal of American weapons as war booty. It has formed alliances with non-jihadi Sunni leaders, including Baathist allies of deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. And crucially, it has laid out a blueprint for a viable self-funding Islamic state, drawing a steady income instead from a commercial tax base and the crucial energy industry it has captured.
Until the Arab states come up with a counter-appeal, groups like ISIS will continue to rise and peel away the loyalty of their citizens. The obvious solution is a system of Middle Eastern government that grants genuine representation and a national identity to people regardless of sect or ethnicity. Two hundred years ago, the Ottoman Empire provided a template that allowed its subjects to live locally within their own religious and ethnic communities while leaving matters of law and commerce to a transnational authority. Fifty years ago, governments flirted with Baathism and Arab Nationalism, both ultimately failed experiments to create a transcendent and unifying ideological identity.
As the region has grown more diverse and its population more educated, its governments have moved in the opposite direction, acting more repressive, intolerant, religious, and antipluralistic. Today, there is not a single alternative vision of citizenship being offered in the region, not even a bad one. Groups like ISIS, or for that matter Hezbollah—which in all other matters is its polar opposite—thrive because they have an idea of what a citizen should do and be.
Today fragmentation and sectarianism seem to have the upper hand, but the regional uprisings that began in 2010 bespoke a widely shared desire to break free of the old categories of identity and the old relationship of omnipotent rulers and passive subjects. Unless those revolutions bear fruit, the people who rose up will face waves and counterwaves of domination from two difficult kinds of masters: tyrants who offer no shot at citizenship, or extremists who offer it to a select religious group on their own violent terms.
More coverage:
• Discuss: What do you think draws supporters to ISIS?
• Alan Berger: US shouldn't let Iraq be bargaining chip with Iran
• Militants declare independent state
• Mass executions claimed in Iraq
• Jordan fears expanding home-grown ISIS could take action
Thanassis Cambanis, a fellow at The Century Foundation, is the author of "A Privilege to Die: Inside Hezbollah's Legions and Their Endless War Against Israel." He is an Ideas columnist and blogs at thanassiscambanis.com.


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Welcome to Snowtown Primary School and School Based Preschool
Snowtown Primary School is situated 150 kilometres north of Adelaide adjacent to the Augusta Highway. Serving the township of Snowtown and the surrounding areas, it is centrally located between the Clare Valley to the east and the Copper Triangle to the west.
Staffed by a team of dedicated teachers and SSOs, the school provides solid learning opportunities for students in all areas of the curriculum, especially for literacy and numeracy. With the motto, "Striving for Excellence", the values of respect, trust, honesty, kindness and listening are at the forefront of what is done in the school. As the State winner of the Primary section of the 2014 Anzac Day Schools' Award, the school has a proven track record of quality learning.
Vision Statement
Snowtown Primary School develops critical thinkers that are confident, resilient and can function positively so as to reach their potential even when challenged.
Mission Statement
Snowtown Primary School encourages independence in students through a safe, engaging learning environment that is positive, supportive and rigorous. This inspires them to learn from, and contribute to their community.
Department for Education trading as South Australian Government Schools & Preschools

subset: commoncrawl


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Edinburgh Floor Sanders
Floor Sanding in Edinburgh by Past & Present
We at Edinburgh Past & Present Wood Flooring have many years experience when it comes to sanding and floor restoration.
Edinburgh ( (listen) Scots: [ˈɛdɪnbʌrə]; Scottish Gaelic: Dùn Èideann [ˌt̪un ˈeːtʲən̪ˠ]) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. The city was historically part of the county of Midlothian (formally called the "county of Edinburgh" or Edinburghshire until 1947), but was administered separately from the surrounding county from 1482 onwards. It is located in Lothian on the southern shore of the Firth of Forth. Edinburgh is Scotland's second-most populous city, after Glasgow, and the seventh-most populous city in the United Kingdom. Recognised as the capital of Scotland since at least the 15th century, Edinburgh is the seat of the Scottish Government, the Scottish Parliament and the highest courts in Scotland.
Abbeyhill, Balgreen, Bankhead, Blackford Hill, Bonnington, Broomhouse, Bruntsfield, Calton Hill, Canonmills, Carrick Knowe, Clovenstone, Coates, Craigour, Crewe Toll, Duddingston


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Para leer en español.
Reader Interactions
168 Responses to "¿Están las tendencias de la temperatura del aire afectadas por la actividad económica?"
I'm going golfing in Pennsylvania in December and will be going in January also. So before you educated readers tell me there is a difference in weather and climate and before you go back eating your chinese and toasting to the betterment of the human condition, let me say the land masses are heating up and will be the demise of most land dwelling creatures including people. The human condition is that people are reactive, as the state of the world shows today. In a very short while, perhaps 300 years, land masses will be in the 110 degree range, and there is nary one thing we can do about it. Go back and observe, analyze, and make predictions, but do it as a Don Quixote, because we are not getting out of this one.
Economic activity is rooted in the now global capitalist push for both the desire for energy and desire for profit, deadly bedfellows for the planet, and mankind lacks the collective proactive skills to do anything different than buy and burn fossil fuels until we all die. Are temperature trends affected by economic activity? decidedly, yes. The question should be Is economic activity causing temperature trends, and we all know the answer to that.
Well, if by "econmic activity" they mean consumption of fossil fuels and forests, economic activity has a conspicuous effect. And the economic slowdown expected by many would be a relief. Moreover, or so it seems to me, if they divorce the economy from consumption of fossil fuels and forests, they risk irrelevance on economic or ecological grounds.
The probability that RC will comment on a paper being actively discussed elsewhere is approaching unity.
re Svalbard:
Economic activity centres on coal mining, supplemented by fishing and trapping. In the final decades of the 20th century, tourism, research, higher education, and some high-tech enterprises like satellite relay-stations grew significantly. A 200 nautical mile (370 km) Fisheries Protection Zone around Svalbard was established in 1977 pursuant to the Act of 17 December 1976 relating to the Economic Zone of Norway. Despite recent discussions, Russia and Norway dispute their maritime limits in the Barents Sea and Russia's fishing rights beyond Svalbard's territorial limits within the Svalbard Treaty zone.The Svalbard Undersea Cable System which started operation in January 2004 provides dual 1440 km fiber optic lines from Svalbard to Harstad via Andøy, needed for communicating with polar orbiting satellite stations on Svalbard, some owned by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), both United States government agencies.
The Norwegian state-owned coal company employs nearly 60% of the Norwegian population on the island, runs many of the local services, and provides most of the local infrastructure. Coal production has increased significantly over the past 10 years, rising from less than 500,000 tons in 1994 to over 2,500,000 tons in 2004.[6]
Exploration for oil and natural gas is underway.
Coal mining in Svalbard:
The Ny Ålesund mine was closed down in 1963 after an explosion in 1962 when 21 lives were lost, and has since been converted to a scientific post.As of 2006, there are three operational coal mines in Svalbard. There are large mines in Sveagruva (production 2 million tonnes per year,[13] and Barentsburg, while the small mine in Longyearbyen is used mainly to supply the town's own power plant.
Svalbard has a population of approximately 2,400 people as of 2005. Approximately 70% of the people are Norwegian; the remaining 30% are Russian, Ukrainian and Polish.[citation needed] The official language of Svalbard is Norwegian. Russian is used in the Russian settlements, but formerly, Russenorsk was the lingua franca of the entire Barents Sea region. The annual population growth is -0.02% -
Economic activity obviously has no direct effect on climate. Some things related to economic activity, such as urbanization, energy use, and pollution, do have effects on climate, both local and global, but economic activity in and of itself has no effect and it's just silly to state that it does.
Economic activity means money changing hands (if we're talking about GDP), and a few electrons, piles of paper, or sacks of gold changing hands are not going to change the climate.
At best, it's sloppy use of language. At worst, it makes the results meaningless by not distinguishing between agriculture and coal plants (high climate effect/GDP) and a financial district (minimal climate effect/GDP).
PS: It appears that this paper is wrong on plenty of other counts, as mentioned in the main article.
Re 4. Indeed. This site has been losing its innovative edge (and some of its contributors), and has deteriorated into a column commenting other people's work. This is not what the headline promises: Climate science by climate scientists. Furthermore, the choice of topics gives the impression that the so-called climate contrarians are the only people finding out anything interesting (true or not) about climate and its change.
You said: "I think it is difficult to argue that factors such as the urban heat island effect plays an important role here"
Consider the fact that many of the weather stations are located within the ever expanding "Heat Islands" mentioned. It would seem logical that the temperatures taken over time would reflect a corresponding rise with the growth of the urban heat islands.
Joe Alderman
What's with the RealClimate bashing in 4 and 6? This post exemplifies what's best about RC: it's educational and directly on-topic. This caviling borders on trolling.
Re: #4 (Steven Mosher), #6 (Dodo)
Don't blame RC for sidetracking the discussion from real climate science to bogus pseudo-science. Place the blame squarely where it belongs: on McKitrick, Michaels, and Loehle.
The non-stop stream of sloppy research in order to discredit genuine climate science makes it necessary for RC to set the record straight. Keep up the good work!
Rasmus : They find that the greatest differences between measured and adjusted trends at Svalbard and other places in the Arctic and Antarctic (See marked sites in Figure below). This is not convincing. Thus, the results themselves provide examples of spurious values obtained by their analysis. Even if they were identified as 'outliers' (Svalbard was apparently not one), the fact that their analysis produced highest corrections for economic activity at these places suggest that their analysis is not very reliable.
I'm still reading M&M2007, but it seems they study two kinds of "artifact": one due to local anthropic effect on measured data, other due to inhomogeneities. Could the Arctic and peri-Arctic biases be mainly related to observationnal difficulties (inhomogeneity) rather than economic activity as you suggest here ? There are probably few meteo. stations north to 60°N, so a lot of interpolation.
For example, I empirically observed that on Nasa Giss (Gistemp), when you smooth at 1200 km, 2007 is bit warmer than 1998, but when you smooth at 250 km (no data when no covergage), that's the contrary. The main differences between the two estimates arise from Africa and… peri-Arctic, precisely (70-90°N).
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/[Response: Good question. If you want to look at trends over a longer period, inhomogeneouity is definately a problem, but is has not been a problem since 1979. THe very strong recent warming is also supported by bore holes on Spitzbergen. -rasmus]
Another point : this paper of Hinkel et al. showed that UHI effect can be huge in peri-Arctc areas too : at Barrow (Alaska), 71,3°N, during the winter period, the urban area is 2.2 K warmer than the rural area.
Hinkel K.M. et al. (2003), The urban heat island in winter at Barrow, Alaska, International Journal of Climatology, 23, 1889-1905.
re: #11
The paper under discussion is outside my areas of expertise, but I get the impression that the author primarily focused on data from the physical world. Getting a handle on the quality of that data seems to be an issue.
For any given piece of research there are basically an uncountable number of things that were not done; some of more importance, some of less. Let's make a list of what apparently has not been thought of with respect to, say, the NASA/GISS ModelE computer code. Many would say that because of what apparently has not been thought of, the 'data' from the code has no quality and is useless.
[Response: Your argument can be applied to anything and therefore nothing has quality or usefulness. Including your argument. Which is then self-contradicting. Think of it this way instead. All analysis is incomplete in some way. Thus conclusions should always be preliminary. As more analysis is done, the preliminary conclusion becomes stronger or falls. Writing an op-ed declaring that M&M proves that the surface record (and satellite record!) are contaminated by UHI effects is rather putting the cart before the horse, don't you think? Especially, since most of the ideas for further analysis were already put to them in Rasmus's original comment in the journal, and are pretty obvious in any case. If you have some obvious things to test with ModelE or new analysis you want to do, go ahead. That's why the code is public. – gavin]
It is important that RC stay current with those such as McKitrick who believe that there are aspects to the science which are overlooked. RC represents the mainstream and as such is under continual attack. I often come here looking for specific refutations of contrarian views, especially when (as often) those views undermine orthodoxy.
RC should present current work and latest understandings as well, of course, but it is simply necessary to, sometimes, comment on other work, especially when that work gains a bit of traction.
We don't see RC wasting much time disputing obvious denier rhetoric, but when a paper represents a seeming legitimate effort to do science, I (and I'm sure others) want to know what RC thinks.
I am unable to pull up the original papers (subscription required, etc.)
Is the "Michaels" in the M&M2007 paper Patrick J. Michaels at the University of Virginia?
(And, FWIW, I also thought the analysis by Rasmus was interesting and useful — Thanks!)
[Response: Yes. FYI there is a preprint on McKitricks' site. – gavin]
At the center of this discussion is the explicit role of the GHGs in the observed warming. The terrestrial data likely remain contaminated to some degree by factors related to land use change, including vegetation change, urban heat island, changes in wetland distribution, etc. I have no doubt that due diligence has been exercised to remove the effects of the urban heat island from the terrestrial record (this has been discussed at length elsewhere on RC and other forums), but it is reasonable to conclude that artifacts related to economic activity likely remain. In light of this probability, which data should we use to validate the forcing effect of the GHGs? What are the implications of using only the ocean record?
I am an academic ecologist, and I speak and write regularly about land use change and climate change. While I have a better understanding than most on issues related to climate sensitivity, I would benefit from a direct, clear discussion of the relative importance of the forcing agents as they relate to the temperature record. Has the IPCC AR4 derived an incorrect estimate of climate forcings and feedbacks related to the GHGs? While it is unlikely that we can obtain complete certainty on this issue, it is important for mainstream climate scientists to continue to debate this issue in a manner that can be interpreted by rest of the academic community.
There is an ongoing tug of war between the global climatologists and those academics that seem to hail more from the meteorology groups. This debate is often contaminated by pejorative, and could benefit from more light and less heat. Within the academy there is a small, but influential and vocal group of GHG skeptics, including Pielke, Sr., M&M, Christy and others who variously argue that we are placing too much emphasis on mitigating the GHGs, to the detriment of the economy and human well being. While it is apparent that a low carbon economy could be a thriving economy, climate scientists must be as clear as possible about the explicit role of the GHGs. Pielke, Sr. has repeatedly claimed that the IPCC estimate of the forcing effect of the GHGs is in error. I urge the scientists at RC and elsewhere to develop a detailed analysis of this and deal with this issue as best they can. Please don't refer me to an earlier post – instead let us see the most recent thinking on this issue explicitly addressing the most recent claims.
This issue is especially crucial to the construction of sound policy. I have recently returned from DC where I spoke with policy makers about the energy bill and cap-and-trade. My personal view is that a risk assessment approach is far preferable to a cost/benefit approach, and thus we should aggressively mitigate GHG emissions. Unfortunately, this is not sufficiently compelling to policy makers given that there are some credible scientists who argue that our money is better spent on other measures. It is arguable that we should also develop a portfolio of mitigation options related to compensating for changes in land use.
I look forward to seeing more discussion of this issue at RC and in the peer-reviewed literature. I agree with 8 and 9. It is essential for RC to do its best to clarify and set the record straight. Although I am skeptical of its conclusions, M&M2007 is being published in a top tier journal, and thus needs to be addressed as serious science.
rasmus wrote in the essay:
I find it a bit ironic when people use satellite data measurements to argue that GHG is unimportant. They rely on the fact that these measurements are derived using the very same type of physical laws as those predicting an enhanced greenhouse effect due to increased GHG levels (neglecting feedback processes).
What makes this especially ironic is the fact that we measure the levels of greenhouse gases at various altitudes by means of the increased opacity of the atmosphere to various wavelengths (i.e., "channels" in satellite lingo). This is the mechanism by means of which greenhouse gases have an enhanced greenhouse effect as their concentrations increase over time.
The probability that RC will comment on a paper being actively discussed elsewhere is approaching unity…
the choice of topics gives the impression that the so-called climate contrarians are the only people finding out anything interesting (true or not) about climate and its change.
Complaints of this sort are right out of the creationist/IDist playbook. When scientists and mathematicians attack claims and arguments made by [ID]creationists, the response is … "look, our work is so important 'darwinists' have to attack it to support the 'darwinist conspiracy'. So obviously, we're right!".
I suspect it's common among science denialists of all flavors.
Paul, your golfing experience notwithstanding, the east coast of the U.S. has actually experienced cooling. This site explains that in the FAQ section on the Michael Crichton book "State of Fear."
As for this article, I think the author missed the point. The HADcrut dataset and analysis presumes a randomness in the data for the purposes of assessing error. Even if the dataset is smooth and continuous, if there is a non-random component (i.e. a correlation), the correlation will need to be modeled in the error bars. IF that didn't happen, this new paper is pretty significant. I suspect the reviewers at JGR-Atmos have representation in IPCC and must believe this new paper is significant.
This view of Longyearbyen give a slightly different perspective than the Google Earth view you provided.
Economic impact on temperature? Depends on where the thermometer is.
[Response: Thanks for the nice picture. The thermometer is located near the airport (with about two landings/departures a day), to the far left of the picture. Other measurements from nearby sites, such as Ny Ålesund, Sveagruva, Hopen & Bjørnøya, show similar warming as Longyear byen. There is no economic activity near these sites, except for at Sveagruva. -rasmus]
Every action within an economic system has associated with it an ensemble of ghg emissions. Those emissions can be traced and accounted for in the carbon accounts of the economic unit, and specific patterns and relationships can be identified amongst the myriad of self-organising economic units and subsystems. Thus, provided one accepts the relationship between ghg and temperature, it would be fine to assume that temperature trends are affected by economic activity. Economic activity is in effect an order parameter. Interestingly, the inverse problem can be examined. Does temperature trend affect economic activity? It certainly does.
Robert Edele #5:
The utilization of natural resources is the very basis of economic activity, therefore it IS economic activity with a direct and measurable impact on many facets of the environment, climate included,.
Money does not change hands just so the "exchangers" can have fun!
Every time I start my internal combustion engine I am taking part in econimic activity. Why? Because I have to work to buy gasoline, and in a cascade of "economic activity" a fossil fuel company has to employ and pay people to make the fuel available.
When I start my automobile, just because money is not changing hands at that instant, does preclude that activity from being economic.
We all know what is meant by the term, is it then not a bit, in your word, "silly" to argue that economic activity has no direct effect on climate?
Steve Horstmeyer
Statistics is such a difficult and counter-intuitive subject that we and the public need the best possible assistance in countering the claims of liars. Statistics makes life too easy for liars otherwise. Since very smart and honest professors have been known to make mistakes in statistics, checking by other professors is needed. Thank you, rasmus, for making us aware of a few of the pitfalls the unwary may fall into, and the level of care required to write a good paper on the subject of climate.
Here is a planned 'economic activity' which ought to have a positive impact, not only on climate, but also on the well-being of the peoples of the Sahel:
John Norris (#19) wrote:
This view of Longyearbyen give a slightly different perspective than the Google Earth view you provided.
Economic impact on temperature? Depends on where the thermometer is
You can get windspeed here:
http://www.unis.no/research/geology/Geo_research/Ole/TemperatureGruvefjell.htmSeveral meters per second looks pretty standard.
This has links to the information on the various climate monitoring equipment in the area:
http://www.unis.no/research/geology/Geo_research/Ole/ClickableLongyearbyenSurroundings.htm… including the location of the thermometer.
Economic impact on temperature? Depends on where the thermometer is.
And satellites are SUCH hotbeds of economic activity …
And your panorama makes it clear that Longyearbyen is a small place.
Was that photo created by the surface stations photo documentation project, by any chance?
(end sarcasm)
Could someone please tell me how this paper got through peer-review at JGR-Atmosphere? I am stunned and disheartened that something this horribly flawed is coming out of an AGU publication.
If urban heat islands are to be discounted when looking for trends – surely they must be included when looking at the big picture.
If one looks at those classic images of The Earth at Night one can see the twinkling evidence of mankind's presence most places. And those lights are mostly identifying the location and extent of UHIs.
Is not the heat from UHIs entitled to sit at the same table as heat from bare earth when we ask about the present global temerpature? When does the data from the UHI's get considered – when their sweltering streets, shimmering towers and streaming chimneys cover more than 50% of the earth, or somewhat sooner?
Re 25
The UHI effect IS accounted for, and its (rather negligible) effect is mentioned in the IPCC 2007 and other documents. It is not whether UHI is discounted or not; the question is what effect that has on the the Global mean temp, and regardless of what McKitrick says, it is not a practical amount. It is also not influencing increased ocean heat content, melting ice caps and glaciers, satellites showing tropospheric warming or strato cooling, etc
Nigel Williams (#25) wrote:
Is not the heat from UHIs entitled to sit at the same table as heat from bare earth when we ask about the present global temerpature? When does the data from the UHI's get considered – when their sweltering streets, shimmering towers and streaming chimneys cover more than 50% of the earth, or somewhat sooner?
Love the poetry, but the answer is still no.
Not when you are trying to determine global or latitudinal trends in temperature. Need to keep things weighted according to area – and cities are pretty tiny in comparison to the countryside.
Fortunately we don't seem to have to worry all that much regarding urban heat islands — most of the time. As is well-known, there are various corrections made to eliminate any urban heat island effect, and they appear to have been quite successful:
Assessment of Urban Versus Rural In Situ Surface Temperatures in the Contiguous United States: No Difference Found
Thomas C. Peterson
Journal of Climate, VOL. 16, NO. 18, 15 September 2003
Likewise, according to Peterson and Vose (1997) analysis cited by IPCC 2001, the long-term (1880 to 1998) rural (0.70 C/century) and full set of station temperature trends (0.65 C/century) showed that rural stations were trending slightly higher. More recently, a 1998 analysis for the long-term trends (1951-1989) rural (0.80 C/century) and full set of station temperature trends (0.92 C/century) showed urban stations trending slightly higher.
However, in both cases, the difference between urban and rural trends were not statistically significant. As such, it would appear that the Urban Heat Island effect is either negligible or corrected for when climatologists derive their trends for temperature.
Please see:
22.214.171.124 Land-surface air temperature
What I would be interested in is whether GISS corrects for the Urban Heat Island effect in Barrow. I would presume they do. That is standard operating procedure, I believe. And we have known that it would be a problem if left uncorrected since 1983. For the winter, not summer, since for the latter it is weak to non-existent.
Please see:
Conversely, summer demand for lighting and interior temperature maintenance is minimal compared with mid-latitude or tropical settings, where air conditioning is required. The presence and strength of the UHI in Arctic regions, therefore, has a strong seasonal component with maximum development and intensity in winter, and only weak or nonexistent expression in summer (Benson et al., 1983).
Hinkel K.M. et al. (2003), The urban heat island in winter at Barrow, Alaska, International Journal of Climatology, 23, 1889-1905.
Am I the only one who noticed that reducing the land warming trend by 50% would make it lower than the ocean warming trend??
land =http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/crutem3vgl.txt
ocean =http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/hadsst2gl.txtgiven that land responds faster to solar warming "seasons" it would make some sense that land should also warm faster
also there are some cool spots that surprised me like the east coast of the U.S.A and Australia
personally I think their trying to make a case for urban heat continents..
[Response: You get the prize for being the first to mention it. Well spotted! -rasmus]
Firstly, I've only had a 15 minute look at this paper, but the quality of the analysis concerns me.
In the abstract M&M say, "…we test the null hypothesis that the spatial pattern of temperature trends in a widely-used gridded climate data set is independent of socioeconomic determinants of surface processes and data inhomogeneities. The hypothesis is strongly rejected (P= 7.1×10−14 )…"
Rasmus is completely correct. They have not considered correlation between data points. If they'd doubled the number of grid points the p value would be infinitesimal.
I noticed they left out outliers – such as Arctic and Antartic "hot-spots" when fitting the model. Outliers can be a result of measurement errors or even chance results, but high lattitude "hot-spots" are clearly neither of these. They are regions of stronger than average warming trend. These outliers are most likely a sign of model failure.
I'm still coming to terms with their model, but the inclusion of many non-significant parameter estimates in Table 1 is a worry.
I suspect another big problem with the model is omitted variable bias. The rate of southern hemisphere (and tropical) warming is slower than northern hemisphere warming and that includes landmasses. But economic activity is strongly associated with the extra-tropical nothern hemisphere. As far as I can tell there is no variable in the model to account for this hemisphere effect. This effect will then be incorporated into other variables associated with hemisphere – i.e. GDP, coal production etc – resulting in a biased estimate of these effects, the so called "omitted variable bias".
From the abstract of the paper
Using the regression model to filter the
extraneous, nonclimatic effects reduces the
estimated 1980-2002 global average
temperature trend over land by about half.So I'm confused – is there a global average temperature or isn't there? ;-)
PaulM posts:
[[Economic activity is rooted in the now global capitalist push for both the desire for energy and desire for profit]]
And yet the Soviet Union and Peoples' Republic of China were/are the most egregious polluters in the world. Funny how that works.
All due apologies for going OT.
On CNN this morning (around 6:30AM 10 Dec), their science reporter Miles O'Brien did a story on Al Gore at the Nobel Prize ceremony. This is a SCIENCE reporter! Instead of illuminating us on the SCIENCE (and Gore's efforts to publicize the science) behind the Prize, Miles lead off with Chris Horner (of "Politically Incorrect Guide to GW") denouncing Gore. I won't repeat Horner's trash talk, only that it was vicious ad hominem.Why they gave this luddite corporate hack a platform in the middle of this story is puzzling, to say the least!
The piece may show up on CNN.com. This style of reporting is despicable and must be protested.
Maybe OT, but does anyone have any idea of what kind of money it would cost in the way of funding to research and produce a paper like this? McKitrick has been recieving what looks to be rather substantial funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council to do this work (into the $100,000s).
What I'm trying to understand might be in the post but I haven't been able to dig it out. Sorry.
I take it that a simple summary of the paper's contention is that climatic terrestrial temperature measurements have been and are overstated because of increases in economic activity. My question: do they contend that economic activity per se is the culprit, or that heat islands are the culprit — stemming from economic activity which tends to move things from rural to urban areas. It's not obvious how economic activity per se can add any heat without extreme stretching of the meaning of "economic activity", other than maybe its increase in GHG output, which would form a ludicrous circular logic. In other words does their argument boil down to simply the heat island effect? Or would they claim something else?
I'm posting this before reading the comments which might have the answer….
Re #30 (Barton Paul Levenson)
"PaulM posts:
[[Economic activity is rooted in the now global capitalist push for both the desire for energy and desire for profit]]
And yet the Soviet Union and Peoples' Republic of China were/are the most egregious polluters in the world."
Not really, at least so far as GHGs are concerned: neither approached/approaches the per capita emissions of the USA, Canada, Australia, or even western Europe – though not for want of trying. With regard to the PRC, a considerable proportion of current emissions result from manufacture for export to the rich world; and more fundamentally, it is arguable that China is now an integral part of the capitalist world-system (although the USSR was not). It is the very success of capitalism in increasing economic activity that now threatens to bring about its own collapse.
Hello Rasmus. Thank you for your comments on my new paper. Here are some responses.
Spatial autocorrelation is an issue, in principle, with any cross-sectional study. I agree with you. You should have mentioned, though, that we applied a GLS estimator with White's HCCME terms and clustering structure built in. Adding in local spatial AC coefficients would, for many of the regions, be redundant on top of the exiting off-diagonal elements. My conjecture is it would not affect things. However, that's no more than a conjecture. Perhaps a reader who is interested, and better than me at programming, will figure out the math to put spatial AC controls in the GLS estimator while also controlling for heteroskedasticity and clustering.
I accept your concerns about whether we used the most updated data possible. It was a large data base to put together. It's available at my web site. If someone wants to swap in columns with newer series (making sure the definitions are consistent) then the code can easily be re-run.
I don't agree with your concerns about over-fitting. Over-fitting becomes a detectable problem when you have a high r2 and very low t-stats. We don't have that, and the variance inflation factors indicate that our covariates are contributing unique explanatory power.
Your paragraph beginning "I have not examined the economic data…" seems to rule out using socioeconomic covariates under any circumstances. Yes, they change abruptly at national borders. Yes, an ideal data set would have them change continuously, but discrete changes doesn't mean a variable can't be used in a regression model. You've set up a criterion where it's Heads-disqualified, Tails-disallowed. Can you state what circumstances you would permit socioeconomic covariates for this type of test?
You raise concerns about spurious results, but we have a few tests for this, including the endogeneity discussion in Sct 4.4. Can you be more specific? Your point was rather vague.
The oceans are obviously not at issue here. Perhaps there is an issue whether data collected from ship intakes will prove to be comparable to data collected by the argo network, but that's for others to examine.
It is not true that our discussion of the effect of urbanization and land-use change rested only on our 2004 paper. In the on-line preprint (http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/jgr07/jgr07.html)
pages 4-11 discuss anthropogenic surface processes and inhomogeneities, and there are many references therein.Yes, we used the UAH data. I will eat my toque if that choice matters greatly, but, again, the data base is on-line and others can easily check.
Is 24 years too short to extract a trend? Well, 30 years would be better. If we had 30 years and the same results emerged, would your position change? I doubt it. So maybe the point is at most a secondary one.
Re the use of MSU data. Nothing in my paper disputes the idea that GHG are infrared-absorbing, or that oxygen emits microwaves. I'm not in a position to say anything about these things either way. But your qualifier is key: "…neglecting feedback processes…" Feedback processes are pretty much what is at issue.
Your conclusion says that there may very well be some contamination of the data. I suppose this admission represents progress. But considering the importance of the data at issue, is this an adequate response on your part? I have made the case that there is substantial contamination of the data. You don't accept my results, which is your prerogative, but if you want to argue that there is only a small contamination problem, taking into account both surface processes and inhomogeneities (i.e. not just UHI effects), you should make the case with clear empirical methods.
Oh, and bcl, this kind of research doesn't cost much at all. I used a bit of time of one of my research assistants for part of the data assembly. Otherwise the data are free and I used software I already own. And there are page charges for JGR. I am funded by SSHRCC for a range of research projects.
[Response: Thanks for your response, Ross. I think that your model is over-fit because I think that you have not eliminated the dependence and include too many inputs without any clear/understood connection. A regression analysis will always find a combination of weights giving the 'best' fit. You find greatest 'biases' in locations far away from places such as the Arctic and Antarctic. I don't find that convincing. -rasmus]
Re 34 McKitrick
"the oceans are not an issue here"
If the oceans are warming, and we know that heat is going in and not going out or just being redistributed, then we know an external agent is acting on the climate system and this is unequivocal across the globe from ice sheet/glacier responses to SST/atmosphere/surface temperatures, snow cover decline, etc. I am not sure why this wouldn't be an issue in a study going over UHI impact of global land temperatures, since one would imagine this external agent is also acting on land. One couldn't say that the CO2+feedbacks are just acting on oceans and polar and rural regions, but not in urban areas, and that UHI makes up for this in the instrumental record.
As for the UAH data, it was not right, so shouldn't have been used but I have no reasonable insight into how that would have effected your study. — C
John Cross (#29) wrote:
From the abstract of the paper:
Using the regression model to filter the
extraneous, nonclimatic effects reduces the
estimated 1980-02 global average
temperature trend over land by about half.So I'm confused – is there a global average temperature or isn't there?
The following might help:
Inter-annually, the 18-year Pathfinder data in this study showed global average temperature increases of 0.43 Celsius (C) (0.77 Fahrenheit (F)) per decade.
By comparison, ground station data (2 meter surface air temperatures) showed a rise of 0.34°C (0.61°F) per decade, and a National Center for Environmental Prediction reanalysis of land surface skin temperature showed a similar increasing trend in global and land surface temperature, in this case 0.28°C (0.5°F) per decade. Skin temperatures from TOVS also prove an increasing trend in global land surface temperatures. Regional trends show more temperature variations.
April 21, 2004
Earth Observatory: NASA News Archive
Satellites Act as Thermometers in Space, Show Earth has a Fever
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NasaNews/2004/2004042116878.htmlAccording to the Pathfinder data, it would appear we have slightly underestimated the trend in the global temperature (by 0.09 C) — using ground-based measurements from 1981-1998. NCEP reanalysis of the data had shaved another 0.06 C, so it underestimated the trend by 0.15 C, according to the Pathfinder data. Not sure how statistically significant that is though.
> It is not true that our discussion of the effect
> of urbanization and land-use change rested only
> on our 2004 paper. In the on-line preprint …Can we assume the journal's peer reviewers approved the online preprint version? I am not sure why they differ.
The real question here is whether measured global warming has been exaggerated by changing human activity in the vicinity of the measuring stations.
There is no question that the measurements themselves are affected by local human activity. We attempt to adjust for this "contamination" (to use McKitrick's term) algorithmically.
Are these adjustments correct? For purely algorithmic reasons, I have long been skeptical.
The way to test this is to do precisely the sort of study that McKitrick has done. The correlation that McKitrick has shown between socioeconomic activity and the temperature anomaly is truly startling. I'm surprised that so many here are willing to dismiss it so quickly.
I agree with Rasmus that spatial correlations would tend to reduce the confidence with which McKitrick makes his conclusions (and I simply don't have the background to understand McKitrick's response), but even if the conclusions are overstated, the correlation is real, and difficult to question.
Isn't it incumbent on purveyors of global temperature data to prove that their data is NOT "contaminated"?
Doesn't McKitrick's analysis STRONGLY suggest that this is not the case?
RE Longyearbyen
Does anyone know of a site with graphs of cloud cover and temperature anomalies for Longyearbyen? I'm particularly looking for records that cover the period from about 1935 to present. Anomalous high temps at west-facing near-ocean locations are my interest, and this looks like a prime candidate. All the papers I've googled have been behind a pay-to-view wall.
I would expect it to exhibit a rising temperature spike starting in 1939.
re #34/Rasmus: I think overfitting due to dependence and too many inputs without clearly understood connection might be a problem also in other areas like multiproxy temperature reconstructions (many uncalibrated proxies regressed on, say, instrumental temperature PCs). Maybe you could help Ross by explaining how the problem has been avoided, e.g., in the landmark paper by Mann et al. (1998)?
[Response: Step-wise regression is often preferred, but I'd recommend a proper cross-validation. -rasmus]
[Response: Cross-validation (and objective selection rules) are the key here, as indeed emphasized by Mann et al (1998), and driven home fairly convincingly by the followup papers by Wahl and Ammann we've referenced above. You should read these (and obviously, re-read Mann et al 1998) to understand the issues better. -mike]
Thanks Timothy 26.
Need to keep things weighted according to area – and cities are pretty tiny in comparison to the countryside.
I would have thought you needed to keep 'things' weighted in terms of energy content per unit area not just area alone? Thus won't the energy of the UHIs figure rather more strongly in the overall picture?
Otherwise it just seems to me that we are looking for trends among a sample we are ever-reducing as old stations are knobbled by the UHI effect. Isn't this obscuring how 'inconvenient' the truth really is about warming globally?
Yet would not the UHIs put more (in fact most) anthropo-energy into circulation, capture more insolation and (because of effects like inversions holding higher concentrations of GHGs) retain more energy locally at lower altitudes?
That there is still an upward trend to be found in the remaining non-UHI stations is useful info, but what do we see if we use all stations on say a 10km square grid (or 10″ grid or whatever) with stations within a square averaged and look at the past and present energy content (Joules) of the total atmosphere globally over time?
Isn't that total energy content including UHIs the figure that matters because that energy is the meat in the sandwich between the energy additions to the system and the energy loss to space which in turn defines the global temperature?
Re: #11 Response by Gavin
[……..If you have some obvious things to test with ModelE or new analysis you want to do, go ahead. That's why the code is public. – gavin]
Is this a valid challenge? Many (Most ?) of us don't have the expertise or the capacity( by a long shot) either in our gray matter or on our hard drives to run alternative tests on Model E or any equivalent. Also Nasa/ Giss works as a team and on company time. Do you really expect a poster working alone in his spare time to take you up on the above statement. I don't much like the way the war in Iraq has been handled, but if somebody were to say "We'll put you in charge – go ahead and solve the debacle", I'm sure I couldn't do any better.
You shouldn't have to have the knowledge of say a four star general or an expert climate modeler in order to make good faith criticisms. Also this works both ways. Because you're unhappy with the M&M paper, you shouldn't have to develop your own paper on the same topic, using their method of analysis or another method of analysis with their own or your own data.[Response: I agree. Good faith criticisms should be welcome. But McKitrick's op-ed and declarative statements seem to have done before any of those criticisms were dealt with. (PS. you could run ModelE on your home linux box if you want, and we have a port for windows in the works- you don't need to do that to make good faith criticisms, but if you wanted to see how it worked you could in fact see for yourself). – gavin]
RE Nigel Williams (#40)
In principle, global average temperature over a given period would be defined as the integral over the surface area, then integrated over the time period under consideration, then divided by the product of the surface area times the time.
As stations measure temperature over a limited number of points, one will need to interpolate temperatures between stations over a given area, but in no small part this will involve removing the effects of Urban Heat Islands. Technically such an average will be refered to as being weighted by area and will make reference only to temperatures, not heat content.
Satellite measurements should be more accurate, both in arriving at global average temperatures and in identifying trends over a given period as they are able to take readings from a far larger number of points. As such when Pathfinder satellite gives a larger trend in global temperature of 0.43 C/decade but groundbased measurements give 0.34 C/decade, I suspect that the higher satellite-based trend is more accurate.
But yes, urban temperatures are important for their own sake — but they are relatively insignificant when compared to the effects of greenhouse gases, and without corrections for UHI would give a distorted picture of the rise in global average temperature. However, given the results of Pathfinder, it would appear that we have overcompensated for the effects of UHI.
#41 Timothy, what is Pathfinder Satellite ? (The link leads to another discussion without a precise reference). If you look at UAH data for lower troposphere trends on land and NH (used by M&M 2007), you get 0,24 K/dec (0,33 K/dec CRU, 0,34 K/dec NCDC, 0,29 K/dec Giss, cf AR4 tab. 3.2 p. 243). Anyway, even if the trends were the same, I guess it's not the M&M2007 purpose to look at global correlation, rather to assess local (grid by grid) correlations between Ts, Ttropo, economic activity.
Other point (more general) : UHI is detectable even for small towns (see Torok 2001), not just big cities, and anthropic effects on surface energy budget is not limited to urbanization.
Torok S.J. et al. (2001), Urban heat island features of southeast Australian towns, Aust. Met. Mag., 50 1-13.


text:
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text:
Dallas Austin Drops Hit on ATL "Housewife"
Apparently nothing about Kim Zolciak is "Real" -- her hair, her alleged age (30!) or her singing career!
Major-huge record producer Dallas Austin is lashing out at the "The Real Housewives of Atlanta" star on his MySpace page after Kim announced he was helping her with an upcoming album. Austin's newest blog screams, "We are not doing a song, we are not doing an album ... that was only for television!"
Austin made several appearances on the show -- he was even shown working with Kim in a record studio. But after the rant, it looks like the only thing Dallas will put on blast -- is Kim.


text:
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville Jaguars have released receiver Mohamed Massaquoi and offensive linemen Jason Spitz.
The moves were somewhat expected since both had fallen on the depth chart during training camp and preseason.
Massaquoi was behind Cecil Shorts III, Justin Blackmon, Ace Sanders, Mike Brown, Jordan Shipley and Tobais Palmer. Spitz, who snapped a ball over quarterback Mike Kafka's head in Saturday's preseason game against the New York Jets, was working with the third-team offensive line.
Massaquoi, a second-round pick by Cleveland in 2009, has 118 receptions for 1,745 yards and seven touchdowns. He signed with Jacksonville in April, getting a $65,000 bonus.
Spitz, a third-round pick by Green Bay in 2006, has started 45 games over seven seasons. He missed all of last year with a foot injury.


text:
Immigrants, Asian Americans, and the Decline of Entrepreneurship in America
VIEW EVENT DETAILSAsian America Now Program Series
As of 2011, first-generation immigrants or their children — from China and India in particular — had roles as founders at more than 40 percent of the Fortune 500 companies, with combined annual revenues of more than $4.2 trillion and a workforce of 10 million people worldwide. From 1995 to 2005, the share of Silicon Valley technology and engineering firms with at least one immigrant founder rose to 52 percent. But today, just when our economy desperately needs new jobs, the number of immigrant entrepreneurs launching businesses in the U.S. has stagnated and is on the verge of decline. The main culprit, many experts argue, is America's broken immigration system. What is the role of Asian and Asian American entrepreneurs in the U.S. economy, and how is it changing? What went wrong with immigration policy in the U.S.? How can it be fixed?
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Speakers include Buck Gee, Co-founder, Chinese American Community Foundation; ASNC Board Member; Vivek Wadhwa, Vice President, Academics and Innovation, Singularity University; author of The Immigrant Exodus; Annalee Saxenian, Professor and Dean of the Information School at UC Berkeley; and Dan Siciliano, Professor of the Practice of Law and Associate Dean for Executive Education and Special Programs, Stanford University. Moderated by Carl Bass, President and CEO of Autodesk.
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Consumer advocates cheered and the banking industry fumed when the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau made its credit card complaint database public last week. Banking analyst Ken Thomas got to work. Thomas sifted through this mountain of data and crunched numbers to figure out which credit card companies are the best — and the worst — when it comes to satisfying their customers.
The gold star goes to USAA, followed by HSBC. USAA has only 90 complaints and HSBC 171 — the fewest complaints in proportion to the size of their customer bases, respectively. Discover, American Express and JPMorgan Chase, in that order, round out the top five.
Who's at the bottom of the list? That dubious distinction goes to SunTrust. The large regional bank has the highest rate of complaints against it, according to Thomas's research. It's surprising, he notes, given that SunTrust is a relatively small player among the titans of the credit card industry. Still, it managed to rack up 45 complaints — half as many as USAA, an issuer with a footprint many times SunTrust's size.
(MORE: Ticked Off at Your Bank? Finally, a Sympathetic Ear)
In the worst-to-first list, TD Bank is number two behind SunTrust, followed by GE, Capital One and Barclays, in that order.
"This is the first comprehensive analysis of 13,502 credit card complaints filed with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for the second half of 2011 and most of first half of 2012," Thomas says. (Right now, the CFPB's public database contains only the complaints that have been filed since June 1. Thomas got the whole batch of complaints by filing a Freedom of Information Act request, and calculated banks' market share by looking at data they provide to regulators.)
The 18 banks with more than 45 complaints each in his analysis make up 98% of the total number of complaints in the CFPB's database. Capital One and Citigroup, the two banks with the highest number of complaints, together comprise 38% of all complaints.
(MORE: The CFPB Wants to Give You Better Overdraft Fee Protection)
But looking at this number alone doesn't give a clear picture of how good a bank is at responding to customer complaints because it doesn't take into account how big the companies are, Thomas says. For instance, although Citigroup accrued 2,378 complaints — a bit less than 18% of the total — it's also the biggest issuer, with roughly 20% of the credit card market, according to Thomas's research.
"It only makes sense that the biggest credit card issuers will have the most complaints by the law of averages," he points out. Capital One, which racked up the highest number of complaints with 2,713, has about 8% market share — a little less than half of what Citigroup has. This is why Capital One comes in third on Thomas's worst-to-first list, while Citigroup is down in 12th place.
These are the nuances American consumers should understand and keep in mind when evaluating their credit card choices, Thomas says. "This is just another reason why we need the new bureau. Not just for consumer protection, but also education."


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Lola's Alphabet Train is both a learning tool and a game, but it's quite clearly more the former than the latter. This isn't a bad thing at all, but it's important to know that when setting your expectations.
Lola is a chirpy panda bear who, aboard her titular train, presents children with a series of spelling and vocabulary based challenges. These challenges fall into many different categories. For instance, you might simply have to identify a letter, arrange several letters to spell a short word, or tap an object that begins with the letter in question.
It's a varied enough experience that children can learn from it in many different ways, and it's difficult to find fault with what is, overall, a very strong package.
Each time your child answers a question — it's worth noting that the game will wait for a correct answer, and does not punish incorrect ones — Lola's train will advance. Answer enough questions and the train will pass a toy store, allowing your child to drag one of its items off the shelf and place it on the train. It's a fun idea, and children will enjoy choosing the reward and accumulating, eventually, a train full of the toys they like best.
That's all there is to the gameplay. Everything is controlled by the touch screen, which makes arranging letters and selecting objects a pretty intuitive process. A clear, soothing female voice reads every instruction aloud, which means early readers will have little cause to struggle with understanding directions, and can focus instead on choosing their answers.
The full voicing in Lola's Alphabet Train is a definite bonus, especially when you consider that it also contains fully-voiced Spanish and French versions as well, which could very easily turn this into a tool for children of all ages to learn another language. It's an impressive addition and we're glad the developers made the effort.
There are a few minor concerns worth bringing up, however. For starters, the music is cheery and bright, but annoyingly repetitive. While this may not bother young gamers, parents might find it irritating before long. Visually, while the game looks marvellous, certain objects can tend to look like other objects, which can be confusing to a child. For instance, once we were asked to choose an object that began with the letter C. We picked what we thought was a "coat," only to learn that the game actually considered it a jacket. We were supposed to choose the cow, which makes sense, except that the cow looked a lot more like a Dalmatian. Larger objects would have helped here, and they would have also made them easier for children to select. It's a small gripe but worth mentioning, as confusion is never a useful thing for a learning game to instil.
Additionally, it might be worth mentioning that the child who helped us test the game for review purposes became rather bored with it very quickly. This was no reflection on the quality of the game, but it may speak to a lack of engagement. Of course, educational games don't have to be played for hours on end in order for the child to learn, but it does go to show that your child's particular level of interest may vary.
Overall though, Lola's Alphabet Train accomplishes what it sets out to do: it provides young children with a pleasant, enjoyable learning environment, and gives them a different assortment of spelling and vocabulary puzzles every time they play. There are also three modes of difficulty, which means it might even be useful for more than one child in your home. Again, it's more a learning tool than a game, but it's a darned charming one.
For gamers with small children, Lola's Alphabet Train may be a useful addition to their collection. A fun presentation, simple controls and full voicing means that youngsters are likely to respond pretty positively to this one; the only question is how long it will hold their attention. For the price, however, pulling it out for brief learning sessions can still make Lola's Alphabet Train worth the purchase.


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How would one letter change that name?
The omission of one letter changes "Orange" to "range." Quite a difference.
How would the omission of one letter from the surname for which you are searching change it? Would the soundex code be the same? Would the name even be pronounced the same? Would the error be easy to find in an index.
Think about one letter being dropped. You might be surprised at the variants you come up with.


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Who convinced Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg to kick Donald Trump off of their platforms last week?
Activists and organizers at Twitter and Facebook say it was pressure from employees. PR reps for the companies say that's not the case, and that the leaders of those companies made the call on their own.
Kevin Roose thinks the answer is somewhere in the middle.
On the one hand, the New York Times tech columnist says, the calls were partly the result of employee lobbying.
"An underreported part of the Twitter-banning-Donald-Trump decision was that the day before, a group of hundreds of Twitter employees had basically sent a letter to Jack Dorsey making it clear that they didn't want to work at a company that provided a platform for an insurrectionist," Roose told me on this week's episode of Recode Media. "And employees at Facebook have been agitating for harsher punishments for Donald Trump for years. And these companies live and die on their ability to recruit and retain top talent. That's a large part of what drives them to make these decisions."
On the other hand, Roose says, it is also very much a personal decision for the two men: "I think that, presented with something like a mob at the Capitol, I think they saw a very clear kind of fork in the road for them. Do they want to be the kind of company, the kind of executive who allows this to happen on their platforms, or do they not want to be? Ultimately, I think that in some cases it comes down to a judgment call about what you want to tell your kids and grandkids."
The debate over who gets credit for deplatforming the president of the United States won't get settled anytime soon — if ever — since it requires access to the inside of Dorsey's and Zuckerberg's brains. But there's a larger, more important point here: The reason the answer matters is that the companies Dorsey and Zuckerberg own and run have enormous impact on our lives. And there's no reasonable expectation that anyone outside their companies will have any meaningful impact on how they run them.
That was the point Roose made in his most recent Times column, and the main throughline of our conversation, which you can hear below or on the podcast platform of your choice.
The aftermath of the Capitol riot gave us plenty of other ideas to talk about as well. So on this one, you'll also find us discussing why Roose thinks Trump's forced departure from social media is a one-off event, not a slippery slope; why YouTube has a major-but-mostly-unexamined role in creating the environment that got us to last week's debacle; and why Reddit, surprisingly, could provide a model for a less toxic — or at least less dangerous — form of social media.
I wish I could tell you that I leavened this week's episode with something fun and light, but that would be false advertising: After talking to Roose, I also talked to NBC News reporter Ben Collins, who had already warned us about the enormous dangers of the QAnon cult last fall. But since QAnon was a major driver in the Capitol riot (see, among many others: Ashli Babbitt, the woman shot and killed by a police officer while storming the building), I had Collins back to explain the way QAnon has shape-shifted from a fantastical conspiracy theory about child sex slavery to a fantastical conspiracy theory about election fraud and Trump's dangerous attempt to harness it.
The only good news available here: At least many more of us are paying attention to this global information pandemic.


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Let me take this opportunity to thank the participants for an interesting discussion and offer my perspective on the areas of agreement and disagreement.
I agree with Sumner that achieving a higher level of nominal GDP growth over the last year would have been helpful and that the Fed put insufficient weight on this objective. In particular I have misgivings about the Fed's deliberate decision to encourage an explosion of excess reserves. I nevertheless believe that there were profound problems with financial markets which, once we had entered the fall of 2008, there was little that monetary policy could have done to prevent. I have emphasized that quarterly changes in nominal GDP, or if you prefer, quarterly shocks to velocity, are beyond the powers of the Federal Reserve to control or offset.
In his last entry, Sumner appears to be in agreement with this last claim, and indicates a willingness to discuss nominal GDP targeting as a loose multi-year objective. This is a much less controversial idea than I originally understood him to be proposing. My own preference would be to include nominal GDP growth among the many indicators we watch, but there may be substantial common ground between this view and what Sumner proposes.
On the possibility of using futures markets to implement the idea, I am afraid that we are unable to reach common ground here. My observation that the quantity of futures contracts written can not be used as a guide to forming monetary policy has nothing to do with whether the Fed is on one side of the contract or not. Yes, the volume of Fed open market operations is a meaningful number and yes if the Fed sets the money supply to zero that will have consequences. But the whole notion of using these contracts as a guide for policy seemed to be that the volume of positions taken by private participants is a meaningful number. I continue to maintain that price, not quantity, is the relevant signal, and remain unpersuaded that these contracts could be used in the way that Sumner envisions.


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These are all of the Met Office storm names for 2019-20 - did yours make the list?
Met Office and Met Éireann, along with new partner KNMI (the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute), have revealed the list of storm names for 2019-20.
The Name our Storms campaign has helped raise awareness of the potential impacts of severe weather in Britain and Ireland before it hits and earlier this summer, the Met Office and Met Éireann received thousands of suggestions from the public after asking people to send in ideas for future storm names.
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Hide AdThe list for 2019-20 has been compiled from these suggestions.
The full list
Why are some letters missing?
The letters Q, U, Y, Z and X are not included in this list to ensure that it is in line with the US National Hurricane Centre naming convention and will maintain consistency for national storm naming in the North Atlantic.
The Met Office explains that the criteria they use for naming storms is based on their National Severe Weather Warnings service, which is based on a combination of both the impact the weather may have, and the likelihood of those impacts occurring.
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Hide AdA storm will be named when it has the potential to cause an amber or red warning, but other weather types will also be considered - specifically rain, if its impact could lead to flooding as advised by the Environment Agency, SEPA and Natural Resources Wales flood warnings.
Derrick Ryall, Associate Director of Public Weather Service at the Met Office said, "We were delighted with the public response to our call for names earlier this year and are really pleased storm naming has been embraced by press, media and public to better communicate the potential impacts of severe weather so people are better prepared, when it matters."
This article was originally published on our sister site, Yorkshire Evening Post.


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I've already explained why Warren Buffett is either dishonest or clueless about tax policy. Today, on CNBC, I got to debate the tax scheme that President Obama has named after the Omaha investor.
One of my big points was that the United States already has a self-destructive set of tax laws for investment. As such, it would be very foolish to increase the double taxation of income that is saved and invested.
Mitchell on CNBC
And my closing point, which I snuck in before they could go off air, was that the left should want lower tax rates if they want more revenue from the rich. It's called the Laffer Curve.


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VANCOUVER (The Canadian Press) — The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has issued a recall warning for a sugar-free dark chocolate product.
The agency says Simply Lite's 50 percent cacao, low-carb, sugar-free dark chocolate contains milk protein that isn't declared on the label.
People with milk allergies are advised to avoid consuming the product since it could cause a serious or life-threatening reaction.
The chocolate was sold in stores in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario and may have also been distributed in other provinces.
No illnesses have been linked to the product.


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© ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company Ltd.
Tax benefits are subject to conditions of relevant sections of the Income Tax Act, 1961 and are subject to amendments made thereto from time to time.
ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company. IRDAI Regn No. 105. CIN: U66010MH2000PLC127837
Call us on 1-860-266-7766 (10am-7pm, Monday to Saturday, except national holidays. Valid only for calls made from India).
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The department of mineral processing began offering undergraduate degrees of mineral processing engineering in 1973, upon the establishment of Wuhan Iron and Steel Institute, the University's forerunner in modern times. Thereafter the discipline has achieved great progress. It was authorized by the central government to confer master's degreein 1983, doctoral degree in 2011 and postdoctoral scientific research station in 2014. It was listed as the key discipline andqualifiedas the outstanding brand discipline in Hubei in 2007. It was selected as the national characteristic specialtyin 2010 and the specialty of "the Plan for Educating and Training outstanding Engineers" in 2013. Nowadays, the discipline of mineral processing engineering makes great contributions to China'smining industry and metallurgy industry with the predominance of fine particle mineral separation, mineral wet metallurgy, agglomeration of iron ores, mineral material, comprehensive utilization of resources, and pollution control.
There are 25 academic staffs in the discipline of mineral processing engineering in WUST at present, which form a high-level scientific research faculty, including 8 professors and 7 associate professors.
The specialized faculty of the discipline obtained many honors, such as "National Science and Technology Plan to Perform Outstanding Contribution Award", "Special Allowance Expert of the State Council","National Outstanding Scientific and Technical Workers","China Iron and Steel Industry Outstanding Scientific and Technical Workers", "Hubei Province High Level Talents Project Selected in the New Century", "Hubei Province Outstanding Contribution Young Experts", "Hubei Province Outstanding Professional and Technical Personnel", "Hubei Youth Science and Technology Award", and "Excellent Teachers in Hubei Province". The department has gained more than twenty honorable titles, includingboth provincial-and national-level awards. Featuring in the processing and utilization of metallurgy mineral resource and clean mineral processing technology, the discipline of mineral processing engineering is approved as a key discipline of Hubei province and a key construction unit of "Collaborative Innovation Center"in WUST. Recently, it is titled as Hubei provincial "Collaborative Innovation Center of Efficient Utilization of Vanadium Resources". It has made a great contribution to the education and scientific research on mineral processing engineering in China and it also stands at a high academic position and owns great influence on this field in the world.
Prof. Yimin Zhang, graduated with a Bachelor Degree of Mineral Processing Engineering from Wuhan Institute of Iron and Steel (Wuhan, China) in 1976, and Master Degree of Probability and statistics from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (Wuhan, China) in 2000. Professor Zhang has been teaching mineral processing engineering, hydrometallurgy, and comprehensive utilization of mineral resources for 40 years. He has served as the head of experts in resources and environmental in the National 12th Five-Year 863 program, vice chairman of the committee of comprehensive utilization of resources, China Academy of Engineering and the managing director of Mineral Processing Society of the Chinese Society for Metals. Professor Zhang develops Mining Engineering education with a management focus on the Industrial Management Programme. The major research area of Professor Zhang and his team is vanadium shale efficient utilization. The research is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China. His research achievement enables him to guide start-up companies into commercialization channels by using technical solutions. He is a member of the national resources experts in the 13th Five-Year scientific and technological innovation planning.
Prof. Tao Liu, is an Associate Professor of School of Resources and Environmental Engineering of Wuhan University of Science and Technology. The major research area of Dr Liu is comprehensive utilization of resources. He is Deputy Secretary-General of Development and Utilization of Industrial Technology Innovation Strategic Alliance Vanadium Resources in Hubei. He was honored with Hubei Province Youth Science and Technology Award in 2013.
Prof. Tiejun Chen, graduated with a Master Degree of Mineral Processing Engineering from Wuhan University of Science and Technology (Wuhan, China) in 1999, and Doctor Degree of Mineral Processing Engineering from Central South University (Changsha, China)in 2008. Dr Chen is the lab manager of the department of mineral processing. His research focuses on iron ore agglomeration, mineral processing engineering, hydrometallurgy and mineral utilization of secondary resource. He is honored as "China Iron and Steel industry Outstanding Scientific and Technical Workers".
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