Posts Tagged ‘weather’
“Before beginning, plan carefully”*…
The marvelous Matt Levine on one of the vexing challenges facing those who preserve themselves cryogenically…
See, if you go to a regular trusts and estates lawyer, she will ask you questions like “if your spouse and children die before you, whom do you want to inherit your estate,” but if you go to a science fiction trusts and estates lawyer, she will ask you questions like “if your frozen head cannot be attached to a fresh body and reanimated in 200 years, but your consciousness can be cloned in a computer simulation, would you like your estate to go to the cloned consciousness or stay with the frozen head?” Meanwhile I suppose if you go to a regular financial planner, he will ask you questions like “how much equity risk are you comfortable taking between now and retirement,” while if you go to a science fiction financial planner, he will ask you questions like “where are you most comfortable investing for the next 200 years, given that you will not be able to change your asset allocation decisions during that time, because you’ll be dead?”
When you are a kid, science fiction is fun because it imagines amazing futuristic technologies. And then you grow up and you realize that what’s really fun are the legal and financial technologies that are called into being by those physical technologies: Sure sure sure reviving a frozen head is great, but how does the frozen head get a credit card? Bloomberg’s Erin Schilling reports:
Estate attorneys are creating trusts aimed at extending wealth until people who get cryonically preserved can be revived, even if it’s hundreds of years later. These revival trusts are an emerging area of law built on a tower of assumptions. Still, they’re being taken seriously enough to attract true believers and merit discussion at industry conferences.
“The idea of cryopreservation has gone from crackpot to merely eccentric,” said Mark House, an estate lawyer who works with Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Alcor Life Extension Foundation, the world’s largest cryonics facility with 1,400 members and about 230 people already frozen. “Now that it’s eccentric, it’s kind of in vogue to be interested in it.”
He and others are trying to answer questions that at times seem more like prompts in a philosophy class.
Can money live indefinitely?
Are you dead if your body is cryonically preserved?
Are you considered revived if you have only your brain?
And if you’re revived, are you the same person?
So many good legal questions — “House considers the revived person to be different in the eyes of the law, in part because a person can’t be the beneficiary of their own trusts” — but also great financial ones.
Here’s one: Should you buy Bitcoin for your long sleep? The argument for Bitcoin is that you can hold it, indefinitely, without relying on anyone else: If you put 10 Bitcoin in a wallet and only you know the private key, and then you die and get frozen and come back in 200 years, no one will have taken your Bitcoin, legal rules about inheritance and perpetual trusts don’t matter, and you don’t need some succession plan for the trustees and financial advisers who will take care of your assets. You just have to make sure you remember your private key as you’re dying. Legal rules can change, human institutions can change, but your Bitcoin is immutable.
The argument against Bitcoin is, of course, what if people stop valuing Bitcoin? Putting your money in Bitcoin is a hedge against change in other human institutions, but it puts a lot of eggs in the basket of one human institution, “treating Bitcoin as money.” It’s a bit weird to bet that that’s more permanent than anything else.
More generally, what is money anyway? “It may be difficult to know what role money will play in a post-[artificial general intelligence] world,” says OpenAI to its investors, and what if OpenAI gets to artificial general intelligence before anyone gets around to unfreezing the heads? You might be leaving your future self all the wrong stuff…
Very long-term planning: “Cryogenics Law,” from @matt_levine via Ingrid Burrington’s wonderful newsletter, “Perfect Sentences” (in this instance, “Sure sure sure reviving a frozen head is great, but how does the frozen head get a credit card?).
* Marcus Tullius Cicero
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As we chill, we might recall that it was on this date in 1983 that the coldest (natural) temperature ever recorded on Earth was registered by the research station at Vostok, Antarctica: -128.5 degrees Fahrenheit (-89.2 degrees Celsius).
We might also note that today– July 20, 2024– is the date on which the action in Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower begins: “…in 2024, when society in the United States has grown unstable due to climate change, growing wealth inequality, and corporate greed…”
“Men argue. Nature acts.”*…
Further to yesterday’s post, an elegant (albeit frightening) tool from our friends at The Pudding…
Climate scientists say that we’re headed for more than a two degree rise in earth’s temperatures. But for most of us, that’s not really helpful in providing a tangible vision of our future.
Perhaps that’s because we’re more familiar with weather: the daily, short-term forecasts that make you pack an extra sweater or wear your rain boots. Climate, on the other hand, describes average weather systems over long periods of time.
150 years ago, German scientist Wladimir Köppen attempted to bridge the gap between climate and weather by using vegetation growth, average temperature, and precipitation levels to classify the world into five distinct climate zones: Arid Tropical, Temperate, Cold, and Polar…
To distinguish the differences within these categories, the five climate zones are divided into subcategories.
For example, here you can see these European temperate climates broken up into four subcategories: Temperate – Dry summer, hot summer, Temperate – Dry summer, warm summer, Temperate – No dry season, warm summer, Temperate – No dry season, hot summer.
Overall, there are 30 unique subclassifications, and together they make up the Köppen Climate Classification (KCC). The KCC helps us not only differentiate between weather systems of neighboring countries, but also brings insights into cities oceans apart that on average will have similar weather throughout the year…
A 2018 study, led by climatologist Hylke Beck, used projected data from climate models along with the current Köppen Climate Classification to give a glimpse at what our world may look and feel like in 2070.
At a zoomed out level, some of these changes are hard to notice: Temperate climates shifting north Tropical and Arid climates growing Cold climates disappearing.
But what if we were to zoom into the city level to see how these changes affect the way each city feels?
This project looks at 70 global cities, and tracks their classification from present day to 2070.
And with climate change, your city isn’t just getting hotter: it will resemble the distinctive climate of completely different places…
Here we see our 70 global cities listed in their current climate classification. [With this tool], we can transport any city into its future classification…
Bracing: “Climate Zones- how will your city feel in the future?” from @puddingviz.
See also: “Conservation Imperatives: securing the last unprotected terrestrial sites harboring irreplaceable biodiversity,” a paper from two dozen climate scientists with a plan to protect Earth’s remain biodiversity by conserving a tiny percentage of the planet’s surface: “Our analysis estimated that protecting the Conservation Imperatives in the tropics would cost approximately $34 billion per year over the next five years. This represents less than 0.2% of the United States’ GDP, less than 9% of the annual subsidies benefiting the global fossil fuel industry, and a fraction of the revenue generated from the mining and agroforestry industries each year.”
* Voltaire
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As we reconsider our customs, we might note that on this date last year, the Earth set a record for the hottest day every recorded… a record that lasted until the next day, Tuesday, July 4th. July 6, 2023 currently holds the record– but it is deemed likely to “fall” this summer…
“What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps me in a continual state of inelegance.”*…
… and it’s likely, climate scientists Matthew Barlow and Jeffrey Basara suggest, to get more uncomfortable still…
… Although heat waves are a natural part of the climate, the severity and extent of the heat waves so far this year are not “just summer.”
A scientific assessment of the U.S. heat wave estimates that heat this severe and long-lasting was two to four times more likely to occur today because of human-caused climate change than it would have been without it. This conclusion is consistent with the rapid increase over the past several decades in the number of U.S. heat waves and their occurrence outside the peak of summer…
… Although heat waves are a natural part of the climate, the severity and extent of the heat waves so far this year are not “just summer.”
A scientific assessment of the U.S. heat wave estimates that heat this severe and long-lasting was two to four times more likely to occur today because of human-caused climate change than it would have been without it. This conclusion is consistent with the rapid increase over the past several decades in the number of U.S. heat waves and their occurrence outside the peak of summer…
At the peak of the last ice age, some 20,000 years ago, when the Northeast U.S. was under thousands of feet of ice, the globally averaged temperature was only 10.8 F (6 C) cooler than now. So, it is not surprising that 2.2 F (1.2 C) of warming so far is already rapidly changing the climate.
Countries promised in 2015 as part of the Paris Agreement to keep warming well under 2 C, but current government policies around the world won’t meet those goals. Temperatures are on pace to continue rising, with the increase likely to more than double again by the end of the century.
While this summer is likely be one of the hottest on record, it is important to realize that it may also be one of the coldest summers of the future…
Read on for more on: “How climate change is heating up the weather, and what we can do about it,” from @MathewABarlow and @OUWXDoc in @ConversationUS.
See also: “The rise of the truly cruel summer,” (gift article) from @TheEconomist.
* Jane Austen, in a letter to her sister dated 18th September, 1796
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As we chill, we might recall that it was on this date in 1922, the day before his 19th birthday, that Ralph Samuelson invented water skiing. Samuelson had already mastered aquaplaning (riding on a sheet of wood while being pulled by a powerboat) but wanted a summer equivalent of snow skiing. He had unsuccessfully tried barrel staves and snow skis before succeeding with 8 foot long pine boards, the front tip of which he bent up (by boiling them in his mother’s kettle). His first successful outing, on a wide portion of the Mississippi River near Lake City, Minnesota, involved starting on an aquaplane, then stepping off onto the skis.
Samuelson didn’t patent his invention, nor was his work sufficiently publicized at the time to prevent U.S. Patent 1,559,390 for water skis from being subsequently issued, on October 27, 1925, to prolific inventor Fred Waller, who marketed his product as “Dolphin Akwa-Skees.” (Waller also invented Cinerama, which he used to publicize his skis…) Still, Samuelson, who became a turkey farmer, was a guest of honor at a water skiing 50th anniversary in 1972, and was inducted into the Water Ski Hall of Fame in 1977. His slightly-modified second pair (the first pair broke) still exists, and are on display at the Lake City Chamber of Commerce.
“I’m having a magenta day. Not just red, but magenta!”*…
Your correspondent is still on the road; regular service resumes on or around May 6. Meantime, a colorful update…
Forget about red hot. A new color-coded heat warning system relies on magenta to alert Americans to the most dangerous conditions they may see this summer.
The National Weather Service and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday — Earth Day — presented a new online heat risk system that combines meteorological and medical risk factors with a seven-day forecast that’s simplified and color-coded for a warming world of worsening heat waves.
“For the first time we’ll be able to know how hot is too hot for health and not just for today but for coming weeks,” Dr. Ari Bernstein, director of the National Center for Environmental Health, said at a joint news conference by government health and weather agencies.
Magenta is the worst and deadliest of five heat threat categories, hitting everybody with what the agencies are calling “rare and/or long-duration extreme heat with little to no overnight relief.” It’s a step higher than red, considered a major risk, which hurts anyone without adequate cooling and hydration and has impacts reverberating through the health care system and some industries. Red is used when a day falls within the top 5% hottest in a particular location for a particular date; when other factors come into play, the alert level may bump even higher to magenta, weather service officials said.
On the other hand, pale green is little to no risk. Yellow is minor risk, mostly to the very young, old, sick and pregnant. Orange is moderate risk, mostly hurting people who are sensitive to heat, especially those without cooling, such as the homeless.
“When red-hot isn’t enough: New government heat risk tool sets magenta as most dangerous level,” from @AP.
* Stephen King, Needful Things
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As we reassess risk, we might recall that it was on this date in 1986 that Russia announced the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, two days after it happened.
“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.”*…
The estimable Henry Farrell on why, on average, we’re better at criticizing others than thinking originally ourselves…
… our individual reasoning processes are biased in ways that are really hard for us (individually) to correct. We have a strong tendency to believe our own bullshit. The upside is that if we are far better at detecting bullshit in others than in ourselves, and if we have some minimal good faith commitment to making good criticisms, and entertaining good criticisms when we get them, we can harness our individual cognitive biases through appropriate group processes to produce socially beneficial ends. Our ability to see the motes in others’ eyes while ignoring the beams in our own can be put to good work, when we criticize others and force them to improve their arguments. There are strong benefits to collective institutions that underpin a cognitive division of labor.
This superficially looks to resemble the ‘overcoming bias’/’not wrong’ approaches to self-improvement that are popular on the Internet. But it ends up going in a very different direction: collective processes of improvement rather than individual efforts to remedy the irremediable. The ideal of the individual seeking to eliminate all sources of bias so that he (it is, usually, a he) can calmly consider everything from a neutral and dispassionate perspective is replaced by a Humean recognition that reason cannot readily be separated from the desires of the reasoner. We need negative criticisms from others, since they lead us to understand weaknesses in our arguments that we are incapable of coming at ourselves, unless they are pointed out to us…
…
… It’s not about a radical individual virtuosity, but a radical individual humility. Your most truthful contributions to collective reasoning are unlikely to be your own individual arguments, but your useful criticisms of others’ rationales. Even more pungently, you are on average best able to contribute to collective understanding through your criticisms of those whose perspectives are most different to your own, and hence very likely those you most strongly disagree with. The very best thing that you may do in your life is create a speck of intense irritation for someone whose views you vigorously dispute, around which a pearl of new intelligence may then accrete…
…
… One of my favourite passages from anywhere is the closing of Middlemarch, where Eliot says of Dorothea:
“Her full nature, like that river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on the earth. But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”
Striving to be a Dorothea is a noble vocation, and likely the best we can hope for in any event; sooner or later, we will all be forgotten. In the long course of time, all of our arguments and ideas will be broken down and decomposed. At best we may hope, if we are very lucky, that they will contribute in some minute way to a rich humus, from which plants that we will never see or understand might spring.
Eminently worth reading in full: “In praise of negativity,” from @henryfarrell.
* Winston Churchill
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As we contemplate the constructive, we might recall that it was on this date in 1871 that a discipline wholly dependent on incorporating corrective critique into its methods was founded: Cleveland Abbe became the founding chief scientist– effectively the head– of the newly formed U.S. Weather Service (later named the Weather Bureau; later still, the National Weather Service).
Abbe had started the first private weather reporting and warning service (in Cincinnati) and had been issuing weather reports or bulletins since 1869 and was the only person in the country at the time who was experienced in drawing weather maps from telegraphic reports and forecasting from them. The first U.S. meteorologist, he is known as the “father of the U.S. Weather Bureau,” where he systemized observation, trained personnel, and established scientific methods. He went on to become one of the 33 founders of the National Geographic Society.
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