Earth

Humans

Depolarizing climate science

A study out this week attempts to probe why attitudes on climate risks by some segments of the public don’t track the science all that well. Along the way, it basically debunks one simplistic assumption: that climate skeptics, for want of a better term, just don’t understand the data — or perhaps even science. “I think this is sort of a weird, exceptional situation,” says decision scientist Dan Kahan of the Yale Law School, who led the new study. “Most science issues aren’t like this.” But a view is emerging, some scientists argue, that people tend to be unusually judgmental of facts or interpretations in science fields that threaten the status quo — or the prevailing attitudes of their cultural group, however that might be defined. And climate science is a poster child for these fields.

Life

Blue-green algae release chemical suspected in some amphibian deformities

Retinoic acid levels high in waterways rich in cyanobacteria blooms.

Earth

Supervolcanoes evolve superquickly

Huge underground chambers of magma appear and erupt within just several centuries, a study of California rocks suggests.

Humans

Climate skepticism not rooted in science illiteracy

Cultural values are more important than science knowledge in shaping a person’s views on global warming.

Animals

Bat killer hits endangered grays

The news on white-nose syndrome just keeps spiraling downward. The fungal infection, which first emerged six years ago, has now been confirmed in a seventh species of North American bats — the largely cave-dwelling grays (Myotis grisecens). The latest victims were struck while hibernating this past winter in two Tennessee counties.

Humans

Harappans may have lived, died by monsoon

Waning of seasonal rains over millennia gave rise to a civilization and then doomed it, a new study suggests.

Climate

Rising CO2 promotes weedy rice

There has been a lot of research, recently, showing how global change — especially warming — can alter the habitat and preferred range of marine and terrestrial species. But rising levels of greenhouse gases can also, directly, do a number on agricultural ecosystems, a new study shows. At least for U.S.-grown rice, rising carbon dioxide levels give a preferential reproductive advantage to the weedy natural form — known colloquially as red rice (for the color of its seed coat).

Life

Delay of bloom blamed on climate change

Flowers that appear immune to global warming in spring may simply be taking a cue from the previous warmer autumn.

Earth

Pumping groundwater raises sea level

Two new studies flag an underreported factor in global ocean change.

Life

Climate change miscues may shrink species’ outer limits

Ecological partnerships are getting out of sync especially at high latitudes, a study of hummingbirds suggests.

Humans

Redefining ‘concern’ over lead

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced May 16 that it would no longer designate any particular blood-lead value in children as representing a “level of concern.” Its justification: There is no threshold below which lead exposures are not a concern.

Earth

Natural sinks still sopping up carbon

Ecosystems haven’t yet maxed out their ability to absorb fossil fuel emissions, new calculations suggest.