Category Archives: education

What’s wrong with Massachusetts? Land wind turbines!

For groups of people who seriously embrace land wind turbines, there is no downside.

Posted in American Conservation Coalition, American Solar Energy Society, Ørsted, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, Cape Wind, capitalism, CleanTechnica, climate activism, climate disruption, climate policy, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, distributed generation, ecocapitalism, ecomodernism, ecopragmatism, education, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, global weirding, Green Tea Coalition, Hermann Scheer, Karl Ragabo, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, microgrids, mitigating climate disruption, On being Carbon Dioxide, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, solar revolution, Sonnen community, statistical ecology, Talk Solar, the energy of the people, the green century, the tragedy of our present civilization, Tony Seba, tragedy of the horizon, unreason, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | Leave a comment

“The truly common core”

Repost of “The truly common core“, from Ben Orlin‘s Math with Bad Drawings blog. https://mathwithbaddrawings.com/2020/02/19/uncommon-core-standards/

Posted in education, mathematics, mathematics education, maths | Leave a comment

So, y’say you want a Green New Deal …

There isn’t a lot known about the Green New Deal or “GND”. Its proponents are certainly making the rounds, but it is light on specifics, heavy on urgency, heavily coupled with advancing jobs and justice, racial, climate, and environmental. As … Continue reading

Posted in American Solar Energy Society, Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, anti-intellectualism, Ørsted, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, cement production, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate business, climate change, climate economics, corporate citizenship, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporate responsibility, corporate supply chains, decentralized electric power generation, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, distributed generation, ecomodernism, ecopragmatism, ecopragmatist, education, electric vehicles, electrical energy storage, electricity, electricity markets, energy utilities, engineering, environment, extended producer responsibility, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, Gaylord Nelson, George Monbiot, global warming, Green Tech Media, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, ILSR, investment in wind and solar energy, John Farrell, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, Mark Jacobson, Mary C Wood, Peter del Tredici, population biology, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, rationality, rhetorical mathematics, rhetorical science, rhetorical statistics, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, Spaceship Earth, stranded assets, sustainability, sustainable landscaping, T'kun Olam, Talk Solar, Tesla, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets, wishful environmentalism | 2 Comments

“What’s new with recycling”

South Shore Recycling Cooperative Director Claire Galkowski, spoke in Norwell, at the South Shore Natural Science Center, a couple of weeks ago:

Posted in Amory Lovins, Anthropocene, biofuels, Carbon Cycle, Claire Galkowski, coastal communities, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, EBC-NE, ecomodernism, ecopragmatist, education, extended producer responsibility, extended supply chains, green tech, greenhouse gases, local self reliance, Massachusetts, microplastics, paper, plastics, public health, quantitative ecology, recycling, science, solid waste, South Shore Recycling Cooperative, sustainability | Tagged | 1 Comment

How to Describe Numbers

Source: How to Describe Numbers from the Stats With Cats blog.

Posted in abstraction, anemic data, anomaly detection, descriptive statistics, education | Leave a comment

Is the answer to the democratization of Science doing more Citizen Science?

I have been following, with keen interest, the post and comment thread pertaining to “Democratising science” at the blog I monitor daily, … and Then There’s Physics. I think the core subject being discussed is a little different from my … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, astronomy, astrophysics, biology, citizen data, citizen science, citizenship, data science, ecology, education, environment, evidence, life purpose, local self reliance, marine biology, mathematics, mathematics education, maths, moral leadership, new forms of scientific peer review, open source scientific software, science, science education, statistics, the green century, the right to know | Leave a comment

Papers of the day

From the Machine Learning and Computational Modeling Lab, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran: A. Ahmadian, K. Fouladi, B. N. Araabi, “Writer identification using a probabilistic model of handwritten digits and Approximate Bayesian Computation,” International … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Statistical Association, approximate Bayesian computation, Bayesian, civilization, computation, denial, education, engineering, evidence, free flow of labor, physics, science, science education, statistics | Leave a comment

A letter to 45

I received a link to this letter regarding the 27th January 2017 White House Executive Order on visas and immigration from the American Meteorological Society. I am also a member of the American Statistical Association, the Ecological Society of America, … Continue reading

Posted in Adam Smith, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, citizenship, compassion, criminal justice, Donald Trump, economics, education, evidence, fear uncertainty and doubt, free flow of labor, Joseph Schumpeter, politics, the value of financial assets | Leave a comment

The Azimuth Climate Data Backup Project, in association with ClimateMirror

(Updated the afternoon of 31st May 2017.) The Azimuth Climate Data Backup Project, operating in association with ClimateMirror, is being funded via the Kickstarter available at this link. Give what you can. Thanks! See our goal statement. This is all … Continue reading

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, citizen science, civilization, climate, climate change, climate data, climate disruption, climate education, climate justice, Climate Lab Book, cynicism, denial, Donald Trump, education, EIA, ethics, evidence, fear uncertainty and doubt, forecasting, fossil fuels, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, NASA, NOAA, open data, open source scientific software, rationality, reason, reasonableness, risk, science, science denier, science education, smart data, statistics, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, UU, ``The tide is risin'/And so are we'' | 6 Comments

Westwood Solar & Energy Fair

Today. Flyer. Position yourself to ride the Energy Revolution. Adapt to warming due to human-caused climate change in the Northeast U.S. by changing over your heating and cooling sources. Make Money. Increase the value of your home. Move towards your … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to somewhere, Buckminster Fuller, business, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate business, climate economics, consumption, Debbie Dooley, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, disruption, distributed generation, economics, education, efficiency, EIA, electricity, electricity markets, energy, energy reduction, energy storage, engineering, environment, Epcot, Equiterre, exponential growth, feed-in tariff, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, Green Tea Coalition, green tech, grid defection, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, making money, marginal energy sources, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, Massachusetts Interfaith Coalition for Climate Action, New England, public utility commissions, PUCs, rate of return regulation, rationality, reason, reasonableness, regime shifts, RevoluSun, Sankey diagram, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Solpad, Spaceship Earth, stranded assets, SunPower, supply chains, sustainability, Tea Party, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, wind energy, zero carbon | Leave a comment

Cathy O’Neil’s WEAPONS OF MATH DESTRUCTION: A Review

(Revised and updated Monday, 24th October 2016.) Weapons of Math Destruction, Cathy O’Neil, published by Crown Random House, 2016. This is a thoughtful and very approachable introduction and review to the societal and personal consequences of data mining, data science, … Continue reading

Posted in citizen data, citizen science, citizenship, civilization, compassion, complex systems, criminal justice, Daniel Kahneman, data science, deep recurrent neural networks, destructive economic development, economics, education, engineering, ethics, Google, ignorance, Joseph Schumpeter, life purpose, machine learning, Mathbabe, mathematics, mathematics education, maths, model comparison, model-free forecasting, numerical analysis, numerical software, open data, optimization, organizational failures, planning, politics, prediction, prediction markets, privacy, rationality, reason, reasonableness, risk, silly tech devices, smart data, sociology, Techno Utopias, testing, the value of financial assets, transparency | Leave a comment

Polls, Political Forecasting, and the Plight of Five Thirty Eight

On 17th October 2016 AT 7:30 p.m., Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com wrote about how, as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s polling numbers got better, it was more difficult for FiveThirtyEight‘s models to justify increasing her probability of winning, although … Continue reading

Posted in abstraction, American Statistical Association, anemic data, citizen science, citizenship, civilization, economics, education, forecasting, information theoretic statistics, mathematics, maths, politics, prediction markets, sociology, the right to know, theoretical physics, thermodynamics | Leave a comment

“Holy crap – an actual book!”

Originally posted on mathbabe:
Yo, everyone! The final version of my book now exists, and I have exactly one copy! Here’s my editor, Amanda Cook, holding it yesterday when we met for beers: Here’s my son holding it: He’s offered…

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Buckminster Fuller, business, citizen science, citizenship, civilization, complex systems, confirmation bias, data science, data streams, deep recurrent neural networks, denial, economics, education, engineering, ethics, evidence, Internet, investing, life purpose, machine learning, mathematical publishing, mathematics, mathematics education, maths, moral leadership, multivariate statistics, numerical software, numerics, obfuscating data, organizational failures, politics, population biology, prediction, prediction markets, privacy, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, rationality, reason, reasonableness, rhetoric, risk, Schnabel census, smart data, sociology, statistical dependence, statistics, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the value of financial assets, transparency, UU Humanists | Leave a comment

David Spiegelhalter on `how to spot a dodgy statistic’

In this political season, it’s useful to brush up on rhetorical skills, particularly ones involving numbers and statistics, or what John Allen Paulos called numeracy. Professor David Spiegelhalter has written a guide to some of these tricks. Read the whole … Continue reading

Posted in abstraction, anemic data, Bayes, Bayesian, chance, citizenship, civilization, corruption, Daniel Kahneman, disingenuity, Donald Trump, education, games of chance, ignorance, maths, moral leadership, obfuscating data, open data, perceptions, politics, rationality, reason, reasonableness, rhetoric, risk, sampling, science, sociology, statistics, the right to know | Leave a comment

Mark Carney: Why are financial regulators and central bank governors looking at climate?

http://www.cbc.ca/i/caffeine/syndicate/?mediaId=725874755644 “We don’t want a Minsky moment about climate.” Update, 2016-07-19 Interesting that Carney talks about “stabilizing at a temperature” when emissions are stabilized using a Carbon tax. He agrees with a Carbon tax, but he seems to have his … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BLUE, central banks, civilization, climate, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate education, climate justice, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporate supply chains, demand-side solutions, ecology, economics, education, environment, false advertising, finance, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, global warming, greenwashing, grid defection, insurance, investing, Joseph Schumpeter, liberal climate deniers, local generation, organizational failures, rate of return regulation, rationality, reasonableness, solar domination, Spaceship Earth, stranded assets, sustainability, the right to know, the value of financial assets, zero carbon | Leave a comment

Climate Denial Fails Pepsi Challenge

Originally posted on Climate Denial Crock of the Week:
Stephen Lewandowsky specializes in conducting research that pulls back the curtain climate denial psychology. He’s done it again. Washington Post: Researchers have designed an inventive test suggesting that the arguments commonly used…

Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Statistical Association, card draws, card games, chance, climate, climate change, climate data, climate education, confirmation bias, data science, denial, disingenuity, education, false advertising, fear uncertainty and doubt, fossil fuels, games of chance, geophysics, global warming, ignorance, mathematics, mathematics education, maths, obfuscating data, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, science education, sociology, the right to know | Leave a comment

A Sankey diagram showing influence of big oil on climate policy

I’ve written about Sankey diagrams before. Here’s a novel use: InfluenceMap has used a Sankey diagram to demonstrate “How much big oil spends on obstructive climate lobbying”. The figure that’s available for media is shown below. (Click on image to … Continue reading

Posted in American Petroleum Institute, Anthropocene, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, Chevron, citizenship, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate education, climate justice, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, data science, destructive economic development, disingenuity, economics, education, energy, Exxon, false advertising, fear uncertainty and doubt, fossil fuels, global warming, greenhouse gases, Gulf Oil, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, lobbying, methane, natural gas, pipelines, politics, rationality, reasonableness, risk, Sankey diagram, Standard Oil of California, Texaco, the value of financial assets | 1 Comment

Massachusetts Solar Suburbs (a Google group)

I have just created the Massachusetts Solar Suburbs Google group. It’s Welcome Message reads: Welcome to the Massachusetts Solar Suburbs! This group exists to provide a forum for owners of solar installations, typically residential, or serving residences, to share their … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Carbon Tax, Carbon Worshipers, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, climate, climate change, climate disruption, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, diffusion, diffusion processes, economics, education, efficiency, energy, energy reduction, energy utilities, engineering, environment, ethics, fear uncertainty and doubt, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, global warming, Google, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, MA, meteorology, microgrids, optimization, physics, planning, politics, public utility commissions, rationality, reasonableness, risk, Sankey diagram, solar energy, solar power, SolarPV.tv, sustainability, Tony Seba, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | Leave a comment

“No – no words. No words to describe it.”

Some celestial event. No – no words. No words to describe it. Poetry! They should’ve sent a poet. So beautiful. So beautiful… I had no idea. (From Carl Sagan’s Contact, the movie version.) Hat tip to Climate Denial Crock of … Continue reading

Posted in AMETSOC, Anthropocene, astronomy, astrophysics, Bill Nye, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, Carl Sagan, citizenship, civilization, climate, climate change, climate disruption, conservation, consumption, COP21, Disney, ecology, education, energy, environment, ethics, forecasting, fossil fuel divestment, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, IPCC, James Hansen, meteorology, NASA, NCAR, NOAA, oceanography, physics, Principles of Planetary Climate, rationality, reasonableness, science, science education, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, Walt Disney Company, zero carbon | Leave a comment

House Science, Space, and Technology Committee vs National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administation

Originally posted on Open Mind:
[Climate blogger Michael Tobis has written the best summary of the Smith-vs-NOAA brouhaha that I’ve yet seen. Please read it in its entirety, then follow the link and read it again. More important, pass it…

Posted in AMETSOC, Anthropocene, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Worshipers, citizen science, citizenship, clean disruption, climate change, climate disruption, climate justice, denial, disingenuity, education, environment, ethics, Exxon, fear uncertainty and doubt, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, games of chance, geophysics, global warming, hiatus, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, meteorology, NCAR, NOAA, physics, politics, rationality, reasonableness, science, statistics, time series, zero carbon | Leave a comment

Holy F_____’ Sh__: Bill Gates, climate champion

Bill Gates. In The Atlantic. “We need an energy miracle.” “Bill Gates versus global warming.” I gotta say, whatever you think about him, he is truly alive, and engaged. He changes his opinion when the evidence indicates it. And that … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, Bill Gates, climate change, climate disruption, education, energy, engineering, environment, ethics, games of chance, geophysics, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, meteorology | Leave a comment

“… [A] fair, legally binding and truly transformational climate agreement …”

Bishops from around the world have appealed to the COP 21 meeting in Paris to create a “fair, legally binding, and truly transformational” climate agreement. That’s from Vatican Radio which has the full statement. There is more coverage from the … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Bill Nye, bridge to nowhere, Cape Wind, carbon dioxide, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, climate change, climate disruption, climate justice, compassion, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, ecology, education, efficiency, energy, energy reduction, energy utilities, environment, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, microgrids, natural gas, pipelines, politics, public utility commissions, PUCs, rationality, reasonableness, religion, solar energy, solar power, SolarPV.tv, sustainability, Unitarian Universalism, UU Humanists, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon | Leave a comment

The Art and Science of Stefan Rahmstorf

Updated, 21st September 2015 I particularly like the last scene from TDAT. James Hansen and Makiko Sato have an update titled “Predictions Implicit in ‘Ice Melt’ Paper and Global Implications”. WHOI has studied the Irminger Sea and continues the study … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, art, bifurcations, carbon dioxide, Cauchy distribution, civilization, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate education, destructive economic development, disingenuity, ecology, economics, education, environment, ethics, Exxon, games of chance, geophysics, global warming, humanism, Hyper Anthropocene, icesheets, IPCC, James Hansen, mathematics, maths, physical materialism, physics, rationality, reasonableness, science, sea level rise, statistics, sustainability, the right to know | Leave a comment

Ahmed: arrested for having electronics in his possession simpler than a smart phone

I have made my comments at The Times news article on the subject. If I, as a youngster, brought my Newtonian telescope lens-in-progress into school, and because it looked like it was wrapped in putty, would I, in this day, … Continue reading

Posted in astronomy, astrophysics, atheism, Bill Nye, Boston Ethical Society, Carl Sagan, citizenship, civilization, Dan Satterfield, disingenuity, education, engineering, ethics, humanism, ignorance, physical materialism, physics, politics, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, science education, Susan Jacoby, the right to know, Unitarian Universalism, UU Humanists | Leave a comment

Bob Inglis: “Energy optimists. Climate realists.”

Kudos. http://climateeye.republicen.org/ http://blog.republicen.org/ http://republicen.org/areyouen/ http://republicen.org/the-solution-element/ http://republicen.org/the-solution-element/realist-guide/ I’m not, by their definition anyway, a conservative. In fact, I’m pretty apolitical these days although I will do things like demonstrate. But it’s completely clear to me this problem isn’t going to get … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, atheism, bifurcations, Bill Nye, bridge to nowhere, capricious gods, carbon dioxide, Carbon Tax, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, climate change, climate disruption, compassion, conservation, consumption, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, ecology, economics, education, energy reduction, energy utilities, environment, ethics, finance, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, humanism, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, meteorology, new forms of scientific peer review, NOAA, oceanography, physical materialism, physics, politics, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, sociology, statistics, sustainability, Tea Party, UU Humanists | 1 Comment

“Ignorance is not a cultural identity to celebrate. “

From meteorologist Dr Dan Satterfield, from his blog post, “The Real Reason U.S. SAT Test Scores Keep Dropping“: Far too many Americans just don’t think education is important. They may claim they do, but when a state gives 250 million … Continue reading

Posted in Carl Sagan, citizenship, civilization, Dan Satterfield, economics, education, humanism, ignorance, mathematics education, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science education, sociology, Susan Jacoby | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Yep, power to developing countries as simple as that

No tanker trucks needed, no pipelines, no roads, no utilities, no security forces to defend them, and no government back-room-deals with oil and gas companies. Hat tip to Eco inventos for the original inspiration.

Posted in Anthropocene, civilization, clean disruption, climate education, compassion, conservation, consumption, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, economics, education, efficiency, energy, energy reduction, environment, ethics, fossil fuel divestment, humanism, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy | 2 Comments

What’s Beef?

Originally posted on Open Mind:
https://youtu.be/Lf_CMw-docI Open Mind View original post

Posted in Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, citizenship, civilization, climate, climate change, climate disruption, denial, disingenuity, education, exponential growth, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, humanism, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, obfuscating data, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, science education, sociology, sustainability, Uncategorized, zero carbon | Leave a comment

“Allocating a 2° C cumulative carbon budget to countries”: Gignac and Matthews

Abstract Recent estimates of the global carbon budget, or allowable cumulative CO2 emissions consistent with a given level of climate warming, have the potential to inform climate mitigation policy discussions aimed at maintaining global temperatures below 2° C. This raises … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, Anthropocene, Boston Ethical Society, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Tax, chance, chemistry, citizen science, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate education, climate justice, compassion, conservation, consumption, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, ecology, education, energy, energy reduction, environment, ethics, forecasting, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, geophysics, global warming, humanism, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, investment in wind and solar energy, IPCC, meteorology, mitigation, open source scientific software, physical materialism, physics, population biology, prediction, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, science education, scientific publishing, sociology, solar power, sustainability, temporal myopia, the right to know, time series, UNFCCC, UU Humanists, wind power | Leave a comment

Utilities for dummies: How they work and why that needs to change (from grist.org)

“Utilities are shielded by a force field of tedium.” “Solar panels could destroy U.S. utilities, according to U.S. utilities.” Utilities for dummies: How they work and why that needs to change“, a compact introduction, from grist.org. And there’s an additional … Continue reading

Posted in Anthropocene, bifurcations, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, citizenship, civilization, clean disruption, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate education, conservation, consumption, corruption, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, destructive economic development, disingenuity, dynamic linear models, dynamical systems, ecology, economics, education, efficiency, energy, energy reduction, energy utilities, engineering, environment, ethics, exponential growth, finance, forecasting, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, fracking, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, ignorance, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, mathematics, maths, meteorology, methane, microgrids, natural gas, optimization, physics, pipelines, politics, prediction, public utility commissions, PUCs, rationality, reasonableness, risk, science, solar power, statistics, sustainability, taxes, temporal myopia, the right to know, time series, Tony Seba, wind power, zero carbon | 1 Comment