The Whale And the Supercomputer: on the northern front of climate change.THE WHALE AND THE SUPERCOMPUTER supercomputer, a state-of-the-art, extremely powerful computer capable of manipulating massive amounts of data in a relatively short time. Supercomputers are very expensive and are employed for specialized scientific and engineering applications that must handle very : On the Northern Front of Climate Change CHARLES WOHLFORTH Average winter temperatures in interior Alaska have risen 7[degrees]F since the 1950s, and annual precipitation precipitation, in chemistry precipitation, in chemistry, a process in which a solid is separated from a suspension, sol, or solution. In a suspension such as sand in water the solid spontaneously precipitates (settles out) on standing. has increased by 30 percent. Other indicators of global warming global warming, the gradual increase of the temperature of the earth's lower atmosphere as a result of the increase in greenhouse gases since the Industrial Revolution. show up in measurements of local ice cores and air analyses. Native Inupiat Eskimos are keenly aware of atmospheric changes causing thinning ice and increased fog during whaling whaling, the hunting of whales for the oil that can be rendered from their flesh, for meat, and for baleen (whalebone). Historically, whale oil was economically the most important. Early Whaling Whaling for subsistence dates to prehistoric times. season. Wohlforth has traveled with both scientists and Eskimos to see how each group studies the environment. Employing both scientific detail and eloquent el·o·quent adj. 1. Characterized by persuasive, powerful discourse: an eloquent speaker; an eloquent sermon. 2. nature writing, he explores how this knowledge can be shared--specifically, how scientists could learn rom the people who have essentially studied a northern climate for hundreds of years. The author also describes how people in this region are adapting to climate change that he and many scientists believe will soon affect the rest of the world. North Point Pr, 2004, 322 p., hardcover, $25.00. |
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