After the original hoopla over Rita and predictions of the horrific flooding and wind damage it could potentially bring to us, DFW escaped the hurricane with only a blustery afternoon.  We had a high wind warning for last evening with gusts up to 60 mph (96 kph), but that only lasted a few hours and otherwise left us with sustained winds between 20-30 mph (32-48 kph) and gusts up to 40 mph (64 kph).  The rain field from the then tropical storm never reached us; it literally stayed just one county east of the metroplex.  That means I could have taken a quick 20 minute ride in the car and would have been within the rain field and main circulation of the storm as it passed.

The wind certainly cleared the atmosphere, though, as the night sky was crystal clear.  Even with light pollution from Dallas, the stars last night were stunningly bright and unobstructed by atmospheric debris such as water vapor, haze, and pollution.

I find it a wee bit entertaining that, despite dire predictions of torrential flooding, severe wind damage, tornadoes and the like, DFW didn't even get so much as a single drop of rain.  Everything stayed east of us.

This brings me to another weather-related rant.

After all the warnings and all the predictions, Rita has demonstrated clearly that our understanding of the climate, and therefore our ability to predict it, is still a work in progress and extremely limited.  Every forecast was proven wrong.  The best they could do was predict it's current status and impact and what it would do within the next six hours.  Anything beyond that proved futile and inaccurate.  Even as of this morning I found the last forecast from the previous evening had once again been proven invalid.  The now tropical depression was doing precisely what they said it would not do — continuing to move toward the north and east.

It did not come ashore as a category 4 or 5 storm as predicted; it did not make landfall in the central Texas coast (hell, they weren't sure where it would come ashore until it actually made landfall, perhaps already scared to make more predictions which would likely be proven wrong); there was no stalling and torrential floods from a stationary storm; there was no reversal to the Gulf (including the prediction that it would move back down through Louisiana and bring more problems to New Orleans); it did not stay at hurricane strength well into North Texas (it was downgraded to a tropical storm before it got here)…  Shall I go on?

Not to beat the global warming dead horse more than it already deserves, but here we are again.

When we still cannot demonstrate sufficient understanding to predict what a storm like this will do in the next 12 hours, let alone in the next 24-48 hours, how in hell can anyone claim to know that humans are causing any kind of climate change on this planet?  That level of expertise in Earth's global weather simply does not exist, and there is no data whatsoever to support the claims.

Sure, there's anecdotal evidence that could mean there's a causal relationship between human-generated greenhouse gas emissions and global changes in climate, but it is only anecdotal and, as yet, cannot stand against the facts of what we know and the details of what we admit to not knowing.  That same anecdotal relationship can easily be explained through natural phenomena and weather cycles which are scientifically proven and historically represented throughout the planet's history.

Earth has decadal and centennial weather patterns which we have witnessed and which have been borne of the historical record dating back millions of years.  These are things we know exist but do not clearly understand.  The interaction of weather phenomena across the globe escapes our ability to predict since, as with all chaotic systems, the number of variables and their influence on each other are simply too vast to fully comprehend at present.

Atmospheric physicists, climatologists and meteorologists who find themselves members of the global warming cheerleading squad are betraying the sound principles of science and voicing assumptions based on data which do not support such conclusions.  While it would be scientifically acceptable to voice a theory by formulating a question (in this case, that of global warming and the possible human influence on such), following the scientific method — which is a must for true science — would dictate the next steps to be: collect data about it through observation and experiment, then test a hypothetical answer.  If, after application of the method, the original theory is not proven, a real scientist goes back and examines the original theory to determine where it was wrong so they can rectify the discrepancy and start over.

This method of approaching science has been and continues to be the only way to ensure accurate findings.  True scientists will never — NEVER — assume the answer without following this methodology.  Doing so has always — ALWAYS — been the cause of incorrect information, bad assumptions, false conclusions and, basically, all manner of junk science.

I agree that the global warming question is one of my pet peeves.  It is because I am a scientist who believes in sound scientific principles and practice, including the absolute application and use of the scientific method.  Doing otherwise is the purview of witchdoctors and radicals and religious fanatics.  This is the true separation of science and religion — scientists accept nothing by faith.  Why is this situation being treated so differently?

It's a corruption of science and undermines the solid foundation upon which findings are based, the foundation which helps non-scientific members of society feel secure in presented conclusions.  How we have such extreme assumptions based on data which support no such thing and are taken out of context is abhorrent because it's solely based on alarmist attempts to grab headlines and be the first to declare the sky is indeed falling.

Hopefully, as hurricane season winds down, the mass media will stop screaming "global warming" so much and will instead go back and review the facts.  I thought, after all, that they were supposed to do that before they reported something, but obviously I completely misunderstood the definition of the word "news."

As for the self-proclaimed scientists who are doing the same, they are nothing more than charlatans playing at science.  They offend true scientists and make a mockery of the scientific method and all that it stands for.

[I promise I will try not to rant on this again for at least a day or two 😉 … if only the media and misguided screaming masses would do the same]