I'm just a guy

I've been lurking this site for a few months, finally registered but just now got around to posting.

I have an Atmospheric Physics and Dynamics Degree. I worked with the DoD in studying TLE's but outside of the government not many Scientific Academies like the study because it flies in the face of standard theory. So after searching for a new job for a long time (I had to leave HI) and telling people what I had been doing for the last few years (Hey, I study electrical flow in space..."WHAT ELECTRICITY DOESN'T FLOW IN SPACE!?"...Well, yes it does, we've been measuring it for years in conjunction with NASA and the Air Force..."WE DON'T LIKE YOUR KIND HERE! GET OUT! SPACE IS ELECTRICALLY NEUTRAL YOU FOOL!") [So now I'm a IT Systems Infrastructure Engineer]

Which is why I started lurking this site. While I don't think there is any grand conspiracy among scientists to block knowledge, I do think that there are a lot of ego's involved and they do everything they can to protect themselves. I think as a few of the "leading" guys die off, we'll see some advancements in Atmospheric and Space Sciences. Where I DO see the conspiracy is global warming/climate change.

We got all kinds of cool measurements doing studies based out of HI, most of which completely contradict the models of Anthropogenic Global Warming and actually show that an electrical stimulation from most probably the Sun results in warming and cooling trends we see on the planet...that is a bastard theory right now and have fun seeing anyone in main stream (Outside of the DoD/Air Force) getting grants for the study of it. We provide measurements to universities and they typically sit on it. Have fun trying to find papers that reference the work we were doing. It isn't like the DoD tries to hide anything either, we pretty much gave all of our information to the right people. None of my superiors even wanted to write papers on it and they all suggested none of us try to use it for Thesis when we went for Ph.D.'s. (Those same superiors would actually laugh and crack jokes about it).

So that's basically me. I'm disillusioned with the political world of science, and have broken into the private sector to do my hobby of "making computers work". With that said, I also am very skeptical of conspiracy theories because in the sciences we are "supposed" to be trained to look at everything logically and without a preconception about how we think things should turn out. I find most people who spout theories are already hoping for a specific conclusion, and will mold ideas to fit that conclusion. I remember one professor said the most invaluable thing while in school:

"They say science is two steps forward one step back. I say it's better to go 10 steps back to make sure you are going forward in the right direction."

reply to post by raifordko


Great intro!
Welcome to ATS!

reply to post by raifordko

Welcome raifordko

It's great to have you with us! (Great intro, btw. Electric flow in space is something some of us would like to discuss further.)

Now just pull up a non-electric cyber-chair...
...and sit a spell and we'll go through a few things that could be helpful to know.

First of all, as ATS is a big community and there are lots of forums, you might like to check out the Forums page and see what catches your eye. It will also give you some idea on where to put a new thread if you want to start one after you have your first 20 posts. (Oh, and regarding our 20-post rule, perhaps I should just add that besides giving new members a chance to settle in, it also helps in picking up the obvious spammers before they can wreak too much havoc.)

Because there are so many threads already, it's not a bad idea to do a search here before you eventually post yours. Okay, you won't always find an exact match, but it's helpful to check. You can also use it if you just want to find threads on a certain topic.

Here's some of the threads that are worth a visit early on, though having lurked you might know of a few of these already:

Terms & Conditions Of Use (Important stuff!)
The ATS Freshmans Forum
and...
Starting a New Thread ?... Look Here First

If you need help with anything, feel free to send a message to any of the staff. Just mouse over the “member” tag under any staff member's avatar, then click “send message”.

Also, if you see a post that you think is a problem under the T&Cs, then mouse over the poster's "member" tag like before, but this time click “ALERT!” and perhaps write a few words about why you've alerted it. The alert goes straight to staff (with a link to the post) and we'll look into it as soon as we can.

As you're probably aware from watching the boards, if you get “flags” on your thread, this is actually a positive thing! So don't worry if your thread gets “flagged”.

Anyway, have a good time and see you around the forums!

~Mike

Originally posted by Darkblade71
reply to post by raifordko

 

Great intro!
Welcome to ATS!

Thanks, I actually just learned that because I have Type O (Rh-) blood, Blonde hair and Blue eyes along with vivid dreams that I am actually a "Hybrid"...who would have thought?

Originally posted by JustMikeIt's great to have you with us!

(Great intro, btw. Electric flow in space is something some of us would like to discuss further.)

It's a fun topic I mainly focused on Plasma Phenomena (Sprites). We can actually measure an electrical flow coming down from the upper atmosphere, and one could actually make the case for, feeding Thunderstorms. (Which are more accurately and now commonly called Electrical Storms and can be Hail, Thunder, Lightning etc)

But imagine telling a Meteorologist, who believes air pressure and temperature differentiation alone feeds those storms, that a hurricane or tornado is probably an electrically induced phenomena. We see massive tornadoes on Mars and the Sun and you absolutely can't make a standard argument that those are caused by temperature differentiation and air pressure. We openly admit in science that tornadoes on the Sun are caused by twisted magnetic fields which generate an electric field. (Or it could be the other way around, we really only prove the one side with math. We can show electric fields generate a magnetic field in a lab, but we can't show that magnetic fields generate electricity...without first generating the magnetic field using electricity...if that makes sense to you.)

One thing that would probably be a disappointment for many people on these boards is that videos like this:

www.youtube.com...

Are most probably plasma discharge phenomena. We saw it when studying sprites and even created similar discharges in labs. If you have glow discharge plasma it can and will be accelerated rather quickly in an electric current.

reply to post by raifordko


Glad you joined I'm type O negative and rh- and have dirty blonde hair( that I dye dark) and blue eyes. What does that mean? I noticed you said that? I had to get a special shot when pregnant with my son,because they said there was a risk of some sort being rh- ...which I can't seem to remember the reason.

Anyway here's some welcome cheesecake enjoy your stay.
Peace and love
-nat the blue eyed cat-

Originally posted by natalia
reply to post by raifordko

 

Glad you joined

I'm type O negative and rh- and have dirty blonde hair( that I dye dark) and blue eyes. What does that mean? I noticed you said that?

After I posted this I read that "I'm a Hybrid" thread. I giggled as I don't take it seriously, though I have indeed always had very vivid dreams for as long as I can remember.

reply to post by raifordko


Oh I see now. I ran across that thread but didnt really read it...

Ah well.

Have fun!!
-nat

reply to post by raifordko


Nice intro

Welcome to the site and have fun

Welcome onboard the Madville express.....................

reply to post by raifordko

Fascinating stuff.

One area I'm interested in is earthquake precursors. Some recent studies indicate that just prior to major quakes (eg the Tohoku quake in Japan in March 2011), there is evidence of atmospheric and ionospheric heating, quite well detectable in the IR range by certain satellites. It's proposed this could be due to significant radon release from the lithosphere pre-quake leading to ionisation.

There's a nice if highly simplified article about it on MIT's Technology Review .com site here.

It's quite an exciting concept because if enough data can be gathered to support the hypothesis and it stands up, it could make it possible to narrow down times for potential major quake ruptures to weeks or days based on near-real-time data analysis, instead of the generally-used statistical methods and models which often cover years or decades (and which are useless for warning of any one, specific upcoming event anyway).

Anyway, while the above is more about ionisation I thought you might find it interesting.

Originally posted by raifordko
...I'm disillusioned with the political world of science, and have broken into the private sector to do my hobby of "making computers work". With that said, I also am very skeptical of conspiracy theories because in the sciences we are "supposed" to be trained to look at everything logically and without a preconception about how we think things should turn out. I find most people who spout theories are already hoping for a specific conclusion, and will mold ideas to fit that conclusion. I remember one professor said the most invaluable thing while in school:
..."They say science is two steps forward one step back. I say it's better to go 10 steps back to make sure you are going forward in the right direction."

Welcome to the machine.
I like the guidance from your professor.
On the other hand...being skeptical of conspiracy theories is simply being skeptical of what other skeptics have proposed as an alternate explanation... Besides - they remain theories until proven otherwise. And, while many on both sides of each argument cheer that their side has proven for or against...they are rarely correct.

Originally posted by JustMike
reply to post by raifordko

 

Fascinating stuff.

One area I'm interested in is earthquake precursors. Some recent studies indicate that just prior to major quakes (eg the Tohoku quake in Japan in March 2011), there is evidence of atmospheric and ionospheric heating, quite well detectable in the IR range by certain satellites. It's proposed this could be due to significant radon release from the lithosphere pre-quake leading to ionisation.

There's a nice if highly simplified article about it on MIT's Technology Review .com site here.

It's quite an exciting concept because if enough data can be gathered to support the hypothesis and it stands up, it could make it possible to narrow down times for potential major quake ruptures to weeks or days based on near-real-time data analysis, instead of the generally-used statistical methods and models which often cover years or decades (and which are useless for warning of any one, specific upcoming event anyway).

Anyway, while the above is more about ionisation I thought you might find it interesting.

Well I can absolutely discuss Ionization in the atmosphere 'cause this' 'Merica and in 'Merica we use a Z!

The same instruments we used in HI would be the same ones others use to measure down to the surface level. I will say that it's pretty common knowledge, at least in my community of science, that there is an Ionization of the atmosphere leading up to earthquakes. However, we don't know the breaking point if that makes sense (We also see the same for Volcanoes, I was lucky enough to be able to monitor the Eyja eruption in Iceland). We could measure a buildup for weeks and weeks and nothing happens and then it dissipates. Then we could see less buildup and BOOM, a 5.6 hits that area. So while there definitely seems to be a correlation, we don't know the exacts. Those measurements were few and far between though as our main objective was the upper atmosphere and effects on LEO's.

I will say this, build up regions more closely match a gravitational map of the planet than fault lines. This also includes the upper atmosphere.

www.youtube.com...

However if I had put that in writing I would have been fired...because common sense doesn't' get you really #ing far in science these days...sorry, bitterness coming out. I mean hey, there aren't any fault lines in the Mid West, the NA plate is a solid plate, but there are earthquakes exactly where Ionization and the GEOID map says they should be BUT HEY THERE'S NO #ING RELATION AMIRITE! WHOS WITH ME!?

Edit: I wouldn't have gotten fired, but I would have been told to chill...

Also, you might like this paper: www.meteoseisme.org...

I know Brian, he's pretty awesome. He was smart enough to get into private sector science instead of government funded science. They can actually come to real conclusions without losing grants.

reply to post by raifordko

This is terrific stuff. No, seriously. I can even follow most of what you're talking about!

And by the way, I don't mind if we use "s" or "z" as both variants are around. As we're a site with members from around the world we're quite adaptable. I used "ionisation" as that's what they use in the document hosted on that MIT website.

Down to some points you mentioned. I understand what you mean about not knowing what the breaking point is in respect of ionization rates as a form of quake precursor. It makes sense as there are so many other variables to be considered as well. However as this observation of ionization rate increase is something that could (perhaps) be better assessed as more data becomes available over time, the possibilities of effectively investigating hypotheses of correlation sure look interesting.

That video of the gravitational map is remarkable, really. Never seen that one before. I could puzzle that for hours, just trying to sort out some of the regions that seem rather anomalous (based on certain assumptions).

Okay, now this part:

I mean hey, there aren't any fault lines in the Mid West, the NA plate is a solid plate, but there are earthquakes exactly where Ionization and the GEOID map says they should be BUT HEY THERE'S NO #ING RELATION AMIRITE! WHOS WITH ME!?

I'm a bit puzzled by this, because there are some major fault systems in the middle of the US, including the New Madrid Seismic Zone (NMSZ), which was where the largest quakes known in the Lower 48 occurred back in 1811 to 1812. That is to say, the largest since "European" settlement of the greater region.

Anyway, as I expect you know that, I just wonder if you could elaborate a bit on your statement. (I mean this sincerely and with no malice.) Your frustration with trying to present a relationship that is apparent to you is almost palpable, but when you say "there are earthquakes exactly where Ionization and the GEOID map says they should be", are you referring to the NMSZ, or somewhere else? If you do mean the NMSZ (and of course the related Wabash Valley S Z as well), is the first part of your statement simply echoing (with frustrated sarcasm) common but actually incorrect statements by others?

In other words, I think I get your meaning but I might be entirely off track. So I'm asking.

Finally, thank you for the link to the paper. I'd love to see the whole thing if it's not hidden behind a paywall somewhere.

reply to [url=abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread953288/pg1#pid16536473]post by JustMike[url]


Hah! I was being beligerent and sarcastic. When I have access to a comp I'll post a legit reply :-) I like you already.

reply to post by JustMike


Being in IT I know all too well about the New Madrid Fault Zone. We want one Data Center East of the Mississippi (i.g. ATL) and a DR site West of the Mississippi (i.g. PHX) well out of the Seismic Zone.

However my Education is not in geology, it is Atmospheric Sciences. So while I can talk to you all day and night about what goes on above the ground, I can't talk to you much about what goes on inside it outside of the basics we learn in Highschool and College.

This is another problem I have with science as it is. It has become so segregated that it's hard for the different disciplines to communicate with each other. So if I go to a geologist and say "Hey, there is an Ionization in the atmosphere above Memphis so there is probably gonna be an earth quake!" They would say to me: "How about you leave the earth stuff to us sky boy!".

I think the best conversation you and I could have is to correlate our knowledge using commonalities.

reply to post by raifordko


raifordko welcome to ATS very interesting background info share, enjoy your stay and see you in the boards...

NAMASTE*******