
Scientists are floored by what’s happening in the Arctic right now - cryptoz
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/02/18/scientists-are-floored-by-whats-happening-in-the-arctic-right-now/
======
bendykstra
The headline that the Post chose seems intentionally vague. I also didn't see
any quote supporting the idea that scientists are 'floored.' One scientist was
quoted as saying, "It's a very interesting time." A more accurate headline
would be, "Scientists find that the Arctic is warming much faster than other
regions."

~~~
forgotAgain
Yes it seems like the Washington Post has fallen into the Business Insider
school of journalism. What a shame.

~~~
xlm1717
All of their headlines in the Most Read sidebar are obvious clickbait. It
really is such a shame.

------
manachar
Oof. Clickbait headlines are like watching evolution in action.

The article is a better read than the title suggests.

Of note, the extra cold spot in the North Atlantic is proposed to be connect
to the extra warmth of the Artic.

This radical and swift change to normal conditions is troublesome.

~~~
kordless
> Clickbait headlines are like watching evolution in action.

Actually, there's a theory for viruses of the mind:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viruses_of_the_Mind](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viruses_of_the_Mind).
Headlines and other memes can spread if they appeal to certain emotional
responses and "fitter" memes spread faster.

One way to mitigate this is to disallow words like 'floored' when used in the
context of emotions, but that's going to require some serious AI to help with
it.

~~~
manachar
It's a tough dilemma for any ad-supported news organization. You get paid by
getting eyeballs on a story. With most people getting their news via social
networks and aggregators you need a headline that is shareable and yet still
gets people to click through for the remaining article.

If the headline is too informative you get fewer eyeballs and less revenue.

So, if you're the editor of Washington Post, what do you choose? The headline
that appeals to emotion and encourages clicks, or an accurate headline that is
less appealing and less vague? Especially knowing that there's a fleet of
rebloggers out there who will take your story, turn it into 10 pages of slides
and "credit" you but have the more clickbait headline?

------
jhulla
With the massive drop in oil prices, global oil consumption and carbon
emissions will continue to trend upwards.

In aggregate, the American consumer is certainly not showing any concern for
climate change:

Americans Revert to Buying Gas Guzzlers:
[http://www.cbsnews.com/news/americans-revert-to-buying-
gas-g...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/americans-revert-to-buying-gas-
guzzlers/)

------
appleflaxen
The color scale for the chart makes it look worse than it is (red looks
"hotter" than the equator, for example) when it's really just measuring
variance from expected temps.

Nevertheless, the more data we get, the more terrifying global warming looks.
It is really a scary problem to confront, and discoveries like this show us
how poorly we understand our life support system as we perturb it.

------
gooserock
The really scary thing about this isn't the arctic ice; it's the permafrost at
high latitudes. The permafrost contains a whole heck of a lot of methane, and
as it melts it releases that methane, which in turn causes the atmosphere to
warm further.

We may look back on this moment as the start of a runaway greenhouse effect.

~~~
xlm1717
>We may look back on this moment as the start of a runaway greenhouse effect.

Sensationalist, scaremonger much?

------
jdblair
Obviously, the arctic is heating up more because heat rises.

Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all night.

~~~
cryptoz
I am hopeful that HN will have a useful and productive discussion about
climate change this time. Your comment is not helpful to that end. Please
consider how important this issue is and refrain from jokes about the
catastrophic destruction of our environment and its stability.

~~~
jdblair
So serious! I think we can make jokes and still have a serious discussion.

~~~
bryanlarsen
How? If jokes were encouraged, they'd naturally float to the top, pushing
serious discussion to the bottom. On Hacker News, we might appreciate your
joke, but we'll still downvote, because we prefer the serious discussion on
the top with the jokes on the bottom.

~~~
dang
People here mostly react adversely to lame/predictable jokes. Exceptionally
good ones get the opposite treatment. A current example is
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11124967](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11124967),
which currently has over a hundred points. Personally I don't care for it,
though pierrec's reply is amusing. But as an example of how the community
responds to humor, it's typical.

I think scott_s got it right
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7696013](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7696013)).
HN isn't against humor, it's against stock humor. Stock humor is internet
crabgrass.

