Weird Science

There could soon be shortages of staple foods like potatoes due to the effects of climate change.A new report on global warming released by the United Nations committee on world food security has suggested that we may soon need to get used to eating different foods. A study in to the impact of climate change on key agricultural commodities and natural resources has revealed that crops we currently take for granted may soon be unable togrow in some countries.Potatoes for example are primarily grown in China and India, if global temperatures were to rise then these countries would no longer be a suitable place to grow them and alternatives such as bananas may have to be grown in their place.Experts also believe that three of the world"s most staple crops ( wheat, maize and rice ) will be more difficult to grow in the future.

The United Nations committee on world food security has issued an alarming new report onthe impact of global warming: we may have to stop eating potatoes and get used to bananas instead.  

View: Full article |  Source: Time  

Large quantities of greenhouse gases could be released in to the atmosphere over the next century.It is believed that as much as 850 billion tons of carbon and 44 billion tons of nitrogen are stored within the Arctic permafrost, a ticking time bomb of greenhouse gases that could be released as the ground warms up over the next few decades. If that were to happen then the gases would contributesubstantially to global warming, further exacerbating the existing problem."While the permafrost of the polar latitudes may seem distant and disconnected from the daily activities of most of us, its potential to alter the planet"s habitability when destabilized is very real," said US Geological Survey director Marcia McNutt.

The release of carbon and nitrogen in permafrost could exacerbate the warming phenomenon and will impact water systemson land and offshore according to USGS scientists and their domestic and international collaborators.  

View: Full article |  Source: Science Daily  

It is a question that has been debated by philosophers and scientists alike for thousands of years.The idea that the world we see around us is actually a complex computer simulation gained popular recognition following "The Matrix", but outside of the film is there a chance that there is any truth to this idea ? Scientists have been attempting to come up with a way to prove that the world we know and see is actually real and may havecome up with a novel way to accomplish this.The technique involves the use of mathematical models to reproduce a theoretical simulated reality.

While there is still a long way to go, scientists are confident that by building a simulation of our universe it will be possible to determine if such an exercise is possible and if, therefore, there is a chance that we ourselves may be living within one. Professor Silas Beane, a theoretical physicist at the University of Bonn in Germanysaid that his group of scientists have developed a way to test the "simulation hypothesis".  

View: Full article |  Source: Telegraph  

Six Italian scientists face up to six years in prison because they failed to predict an earthquake.The seismologists were part of the National Commission for the Forecast and Prevention of Major Risks when a court found them guilty of providing "inexact, incomplete and contradictory" information regarding an earthquake that occurred at l’Aquila in April 2009. The ruling has prompted a significant international outcry including an open letter to the Italian president from the AmericanAssociation for the Advancement of Science."Years of research, much of it conducted by distinguished scientists in your own country, have demonstrated that there is no accepted scientific method for earthquake prediction that can be reliably used to warn citizens of an impending disaster," read the letter which was signed by 5,000 scientists.

Anyone who has been feeling that life these days is not sufficiently medieval need look no further than the Italian seismologists just sentenced for manslaughter for failing to predict anearthquake they had no scientific basis to believe was coming.  

View: Full article |  Source: Washington Post