It appears “global warming” is now the most potent force in the universe, according to a scientist from the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics. An actual scientific paper preprint published in the Cornell University science archive makes the connection to black holes in the title, and includes “climate change” in the abstract.
Sigh. It isn’t even past coffee on Sunday morning and already we have our winner. This one… is weapons grade stupidity. I would not believe that a scientist from a prominent research institute could utter such a statement had I not read it in a prominent science magazine. It’s another “Vinerism” in the making: Children just aren’t going to know what black holes are.
It immediately reminded me of the famous line uttered by Tom Cruise in the movie a A Few Good Men:
“Should we or should we not follow the advice of the galactically stupid!
But then again, this is The New Scientist. Read on, emphasis mine.
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Something must have limited the growth of these black holes. Now Takamitsu Tanaka at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Garching, Germany, and colleagues have a climate-based explanation.
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Black holes need cool gas to grow so this would have slowed down the growth of other black holes in smaller protogalaxies, even as the growth of black holes in the most massive protogalaxies continued apace (arxiv.org/abs/1205.6467v1).
“This global warming process could have basically quenched the latecomers,” says Tanaka. “The early ones end up being the monsters and they prevent the overgrowth of the rest.”
Tanaka probably should have said the “galactic warming process”, and maybe he did, and this could is a misquote by the unnamed author of the article at TNS. UPDATE: This line from the abstract tends to suggest it was a deliberate statement from the scientist:
Our calculations paint a self-consistent picture of black-hole-made climate change, in which the first miniquasars – among them the ancestors of the z 6 quasar SMBHs – globally warm the IGM and suppress the formation and growth of subsequent generations of BHs.
Either way, it shows how global warming on the brain tends to create an environment for such ridiculous comparisons to make it to press.
I decided I should make a screencap of the paper abstract, becuase I have a feeling it will disappear:
Next I suppose we’ll be reading comparisons of the “global warming process” to problems at the atomic interaction level, such as maybe the sun is now producing fewer neutrinos or some such rot. Don’t laugh, it could happen.
Read The New Scientist article here.
Unfortunately, comments are only allowed from subscribers, so if there are any subscribers out there, please leave a comment pointing out this idiotic comparison. Better yet, write a letter to the editor of the magazine.
In the meantime, feel free to use this motivational poster:
Jimbo:
You’re assuming motive, which is a logical fallacy, and having assumed motive, what you came up with makes no sense. Come on… NSF is going to give him more funding for studying black holes because he used the term “global warming”???
This is just dumb, sorry. He said he was making a play on words, I have no reason to doubt him, it’s perfectly sensible in the context he provided, just as I have every reason to doubt your Jedi mind reading skills, and possibly your reasoning skills too.
Brad:
I thought this too until I got his reply (I admit not having bothered reading his paper, I just queried him on the meaning and whether he used the right word). He emphatically doesn’t mean “galactic”, he says that would be “local warming”.
By the way I think this article establishes that “global” is a term of art in cosmology, to distinguish it from “local”.
(Again programming example: “global variable” versus “local variable”.)
Well it had to come to this. Our climate diseased earth is already decreasing the number of sun spots.
Who’s going to save the universe from this infection.
@Carrick The New Scientist made no reference to global/local variables. While they may mean different things in cosmology, surely this guy and the New Scientist writer can’t be living in caves and never heard of the most common use of the term. At the very least, they should post a caveat, and generally they should know better than to mix the terms for articles destined for public consumption. Even physicist Lubos Motl thoug this was akin to “climate porn”, and suggests the terms were intentionally mixed to promote interest in the article.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2012/06/global-warming-has-stunted-black-holes.html
Christopher Watson says:
June 10, 2012 at 3:26 pm
“The Japanese gentleman is obviously using the term ‘climate change’ analogously – not trying to draw a direct connection but trying to illustrate a point. ”
I agree. He just follows the advice from this youtube tutorial, that’s all.
DJ says: “Sorry jaymam, it’s there. I just read it, as advertised.”
Incorrect.
On June 10, 2012 at 7:27 am, the phrase “galactic warming process” (including the quotes) existed nowhere but on this site (i.e. WUWT), according to Google.
Anthony, to be honest, I think it’s similar to the problem that occurs commonly when a person who isn’t a native English speaker tries to create a joke, in English. I don’t think we can though argue that global is a prior term of art in cosmology. .
One can always argue whether levity has a place in something so grave as a journal article (especially given the multi-national nature of the readership). That’s an ongoing debate
As to the New Scientist reporting, well… it wouldn’t be nice if I said I what I thought about the editor who generated this whopper “Cosmic climate change may have stunted black holes”.
I’m pretty sure “Cosmic climate change” is not a “term of art” in cosmology. 😛
Then again, I’ve not had a high opinion of reporters as a group for a long time. (There are definite exceptions.)
* I should have said “One can always argue whether levity has a place in something with such gravity as a journal article”.
** See meaning 2
Using ‘global warming’ in the title of a paper and necessarily in any funding application appears eminently prudent, given today’s climate… #sarc
“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.”
Marcus Aurelius Augustus
I wrote Taka, and here’s his response:
The title is a play on words. We are using “global” in the sense “occurring everywhere”. That we do not mean the planet Earth should be clear from the context of the paper.
We also chose “global” in the sense that the quasar feedback is not local, which is the context most frequently discussed in the literature; that is, it occurs on scales far larger than the black holes’ own galaxies. We therefore certainly did not mean “galactic”, as that adjective would imply local feedback.
Global is commonly meant in terms of the “globe” but I’m pretty sure global variables don’t mean variables pertaining to the Earth. Of course Kernighan and Ritchie could have been wrong on that.
“Global” can be used in the more general sense used by Taka, and he meant it as a clever play on words.
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Hmmm. Looks like I was right. 😉
Just to be clear, I fully know what is going on with this paper, and have the same thoughts as Anthony expresses. My point about our global warming propagating to distant places was simply a means of heading off any linkage a warmist might mistakenly make of a miss reading of this paper.
Note the globe has warmed since the Little Ice Age, hence I use the term Global Warming.
From Merriam Webster:
Definition of GLOBAL
1 spherical
2 of, relating to, or involving the entire world : worldwide ; also : of or relating to a celestial body (as the moon)
3 of, relating to, or applying to a whole (as a mathematical function or a computer program) : universal
See definition 3.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/global
Sorry I agree with GOOCH if you weren’t involved in the stupidity that has become climate science debate it makes perfect sense. As much as we disagree with Climate Science it does contain descriptions of process and predictions that supposedly would pertain to any planet with an atmosphere. Scientists rightly or wrongly talk about Venus with a runaway greenhouse effect etc the extension onto young black holes is an extension.
In some ways such thought excercises are useful because if the atmospheric science is right it should be able to be to be taken to other planets.
Interesting enough WUWT carried a series of articles on the stupidity that is “Unified Climate Theory” that violates QM, GR/SR and would require the rewriting of half of physics but basically did the same thing took an AGW theory and took it to other planets to prove or disprove it.
WUWT carried the same argument in reverse seems to be lost on most on here because it has global warming in the discussion preordained stupidity positions kick in.
I am very lukewarm on AGW theory but like Spencer and Linzden I do like my science cold hard and calculated and for the same reason as unified climate theory took there calculations to other planets “IF” climate science is correct it should be transposable to other planets and even young black holes.
Ouch, ouch, ouch. See Takamitsu Tanaka’s home page:
So it appears that Dr. Tanaka posesses both an outstanding command of English language, a cosmopolitan experience of culture … and a sense of humor. 🙂
I see the creation of this paper going down something like this…
First Astrophysicist: Did you see some of those new papers published in The New Scientist?
Second Astrophysicist: You mean the ‘Climate Science’ ones. Man, those were weak.
First Astrophysicist: I know, right? Can you believe how they can get published just by linking anything back to ‘Global Warming, no matter how tentatively?
Second Astrophysicist: I sure wish we could get our papers published just by adding the right phrase.
First Astrophysicist: …Well, why can’t we?
Second Astrophysicist: What, you mean come up with our own unfalsifiable theory that can be linked to any cosmological effect?
First Astrophysicist: No,no. I mean we could start adding Global Warming to our papers.
Second Astrophysicist: I don’t know. The climate scientists don’t like it when you play in their sandbox. Look how much trouble they’ve given to Svenmark over his cosmic ray/climate theory. They won’t tolerate anything that might lesson their CO2 effect.
First Astrophysicist: That’s true, but I don’t mean how Astrophysics can effect the climate, I mean how ‘Global Warming’ effects the cosmos.
Second Astrophysicist: … Wait, what?
First Astrophysicist: Think about it. What if ‘Global Warming’ is causing Pulsars to speed up, or It’s decreasing the expansion of the universe. Oh, I know, how about it slowing the growth of Black Holes. That sounds impressive.
Second Astrophysicist: Are you crazy! You’d never get a paper like that through peer review.
First Astrophysicist: Bet you $10 It not only gets published, but it makes it into AR5.
Second Astrophysicist: You’re on.
LdB says:
June 10, 2012 at 7:43 pm
“Interesting enough WUWT carried a series of articles on the stupidity that is “Unified Climate Theory” that violates QM, GR/SR and would require the rewriting of half of physics but basically did the same thing took an AGW theory and took it to other planets to prove or disprove it.
WUWT carried the same argument in reverse seems to be lost on most on here because it has global warming in the discussion preordained stupidity positions kick in.”
And as you fail to mention, Anthony expressed his reservations about it and that theory was roundly criticized here.
And BTW, how did Tanaka “take an AGW theory and take it to other planets to prove or disprove it”?
Oh. You mean he has proven AGW by theorizing about black holes. I see.
Ah yes, another quantum enigma?
Ya think?
I have no real objection to people using the language of global warming to describe black holes if they want to. It seems a bit risky for serious scientists who don’t want to be laughed at, but that’s their choice.
Mean while back on planet Earth, some people use the language of black holes to describe global warming, because of the amount of money it is sucking away from more deserving research.
I have no beef with this choice of words.
A black hole is a globe. Climate is not limited to Earth. Warming may or may not occur at the event horizon of a black hole.
Frankly, it undermines the whole idea that global warming/climate change are limited to the planet where humans produce CO2. The correlation is demolished. That could be a good thing in terms of public education.
Dirk:
Yes Anthony expressed reservations I am glad he did but WUWT still carried the article. Did anyone ask Lubos what he thought of “Unified Climate Theory” because what alot on here won’t realize Boltzmann and Planck’s corrections to Boltzmann is one of the few places QM meshes in with classic physics.
Applying the same standard the journal may have had reservations about the article but they still carried it does that make them worse????
Yanaka took a science theory to a black hole when it still has gases around it. The theory can’t be proven it can only be falsified by that test, we do the same thing the GR/SR we find weird extensions where if the theory is wrong it will fail and check.
So no standard AGW theory isn’t proven what I guess you could say is it didn’t fail badly enough to be blatantly wrong nothing much more than that.
paging dr. goatse…
I can remember way back to the olden days when New Scientist was worth reading for scientific development. I really do like the phrase ‘Weapons Grade Stupidity’ a lot.
Can someone explain how a greenhouse gas which can only have that name as it is not escaping the planet have any effect outside of this planet. Obviously i must be extremely stupid.
Carrick says:
June 10, 2012 at 2:51 pm
I wrote Taka, and here’s his response:
The title is a play on words. We are using “global” in the sense “occurring everywhere”.
So there you have it. They did use this wording deliberately. Global means everywhere when you’re in an earthbound context. If you’re on a scale larger than galaxies and you mean everywhere the appropriate term is universal, not global.
It’s not clear what the intended “play” was but they probably figured it would get some attention to their paper. It worked. It got them coverage in New Scientist and got coverage on WUWT.
They’re famous.
Just goes to show, even if you’re working on intergalactic physics, if you can work “global” and “warming” into there somewhere you’re onto a winner.
don’t count on the paper going away quickly. it is worth a few chuckles but it appears it’s all about the clunky nature of the choice of words as they appear in english. It’s rather obvious there was no actual claim of human CAGW involvement present and unless the authors were just trying to be cute or sarcastic with their choice of words, it was probably not intentional. If it was intentional, then it would appear to be a rather sarcastic dig at climate pseudo-scientists who make outrageous claims about what is being caused by CAGW.
it would seem too that their conclusions about the presence of SMBHs after less than 1Gyr could turn out to be controversial and possibly even a bit disconcerting for the cosmological status quo.