Assume v. Presume

The other artificiality is that the start of the calendar defines a different season on the other side of the world.
 
Yep. The measurements I described still work wherever you are (except in the Arctic and Antarctic Circles of course); declaring 1st March as the first day of Spring doesn't.
 
I suppose they call it the first day of Autumn in Oz. Or perhaps they are not as stupid as our BBC met men.
 
Trev said:
I suppose they call it the first day of Autumn in Oz. Or perhaps they are not as stupid as our BBC met men.
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I fail to understand why they do it, unless they really are trying to migrate everybody else to their agenda. I have noticed it every season for the last year or so: they come on and (last year) say something like "today is the first day of Spring". I complained about it to the BBC and the Met.Office, and now they say "today is the first day of meteorological Spring", when really I want them to shut up about it (why say anything at all?) and save it for 21st March (not that I believe I was the reason for the change).
 
It's all part of the bad science agenda. Pillocks being interviewed about how the temperature is twice the normal February average (or something similar). BS! It may be ten degrees Celsius warmer that the average - because there is a wind blowing up from the Azores (I think). It isn't double. Don't forget "It's the warmest [insert month here] since records began". When did records begin? That is conveniently missing in many reports, and only a short while ago in some others. Could the choice of when records began have an ulterior motive? Are they defining meteorological spring so as to fudge some other statistics?
 
EEPhil said:
Could the choice of when records began have an ulterior motive?
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There is generally just the one motive - money. They get headlines, interest, kudos, advertising revenue, stay in business / pay the bosses more.
No mystery required :)
 
EEPhil said:
how the temperature is twice the normal February average
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Of course it's twice as hot. 20 is twice 10.
Ah, lets do that in Fahrenheit. 68/50 = . So now it's only 1.36 times as hot.
Ah again, let's do that in Kelvin 293/283= 1.035, so now it's only 1.035 times as hot hardly any increase at all.
Bollox. That throws my twice as hot theory right out of the window. :frantic:
 
The way to trap the stupid is to ask them how many times hotter 5 degrees is than freezing or 0 degrees. This usually blows their brain cell.
 
Something I don't know: Does an increase of 1K mean the same increase in energy no matter where on the scale that it happens, ie near absolute zero or the freezing or boiling point of water etc?
 
IIRC, when I was at school a long time ago , one calorie was the amount of energy required to raise 1gm of water through 1 degree C (K). Therefore it is independent of where on the temperature scale you are referencing. At least between 0 and 100C). There are now probably SI units that say pretty much the same thing.
 
gomezz said:
Something I don't know: Does an increase of 1K mean the same increase in energy no matter where on the scale that it happens, ie near absolute zero or the freezing or boiling point of water etc?
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Yes, on an absolute thermodynamic scale of temperature (which Kelvin is) as opposed to scales based on the assumption a liquid expands linearly with temperature (Fahrenheit, Celsius).

Trev said:
when I was at school a long time ago , one calorie was the amount of energy required to raise 1gm of water through 1 degree C (K).
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Still is. Bear in mind the "calorie" referred to in food is actually a kilo-calorie.
 
Yes. You will see them described in the blurb on food packaging as "kcals".

2000 kcals consumption per day is about the same power as required to run a 100W light bulb.
 
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And for completeness:
100 W for 24 hours = 24 x 60 x 60 x 100 = 8640000 J = 8640 kJ
2000 kCal = 4.186 x 1000 x 2000 = 8372000 J = 8372 kJ

4.186 being the specific heat capacity of water (and the conversion factor from Calories to Joules).
 
MikeSh said:
There is generally just the one motive - money. They get headlines, interest, kudos, advertising revenue, stay in business / pay the bosses more.
No mystery required :)
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Been there! Pure research looks into whether something is viable or not. Either result is the right result. You can only get one or two publications from showing something doesn't work. But when the research funding depends on it., the only "right" result is the one that attracts more money (and more publications). Never was very good at spinning a load of 💩 and pretending it was gold. Perhaps that's why I never got very far in academia. :D
 
Ye gods! I was out last night, and the MC said something like "welcome to the first Sunday in Spring", and my friend said it said so in her diary. Clearly this 1st March thing has spread further than I was aware of. :mad:
 
News coverage yesterday: "the most destrusive tornado for nearly..." (I was expecting some large number at this point, with bated breath) "...two years!"

Not that unusual then! What an anticlimax.
 
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