feedback
edyong | February 28, 2010We've all experienced the agonising wait for feedback, whether it's for exam grades, news from a job interview, or results from a grant application. These verdicts can have a massive influence in our lives but they can often take weeks or even months to arrive. And that's a big problem, according to Keri Kettle and Gerald Häubl from the University of Alberta.
They have found evidence that we do better at tasks the sooner we expect news about our performance. If we think we'll be evaluated quickly, the threat of a negative appraisal looms ever larger. And this greater sense of danger…
illconsidered | February 25, 2009Contrary to the popular talking point, climate models do take into account H2O as a greenhouse gas. In fact, it is the largest single feedback factor in the climate system. And also contrary to another popular talking point, models are being validated in many ways.
Go have a read at Gristmill for a post by Andrew Dessler on a recent paper he co-authored[PDF] that seeks to assess the state of current climate science literature on the topic of water vapor feedback in models and the climate system. He describes papers raw material as a "mountain of evidence" supporting a strongly positive…
illconsidered | October 30, 2007Oceans are 'soaking up less CO2' is the headline of a recent BBC News article. (Well, it is recent in most senses of the word though not in blogger-land...Rabbet Run discusses it here, Stoat did it here, and Michael Tobis blogged about it here).
So the news is that a some new research indicates that the rate at which atmospheric CO2 is being absorbed into the ocean is falling. The findings are new, the authors are not sure if natural varibility is involved or not, but regardless it is a troubling sign. If it does turn out to be the case it signals the cessation of a free ride nature has…