We have had a very hot late summer, extending all the way into October. I looked at the daily high temperatures from May through October 4, and counted 87 days when the high temperature was 90F or higher. The Atlanta tv weather people have been talking about the new record this year of 91 days of 90 or higher, exceeding the old record of 90 days.

I don’t know whether Rome’s 87 days is a record. I wanted to check the historical data but I didn’t have time (or take the time) to look for them. The only thing I found was a site that let me look at the daily high and low for a given month. It would be way too much trouble to go back through the entire history of Rome’s weather on a month-by-month basis. I might look later for a site with all the months tabulated. I’m pretty sure I have found such a site before.

We are now predicted to have a high under 90 for the foreseeable future, which, in the case of my iPhone weather app, is through next weekend. So, 88F Saturday, 86 Sunday, 81 Monday, and upper 70’s to low 80’s from then on. And lows in the 40’s next weekend!

Even better, the forecast also calls for fairly widespread, through light, rain on Monday. Too bad the rain gods took the summer off. We could have used some more rain a little earlier.

Neil DeGrasse Tyson is the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History. He has a PdD in astrophysics. Although he has published research papers, the last one I could find was in 2008. These days he is known for his popular books on science, and as a science popularizer on TV, radio and online. That in itself is not a bad thing; in fact, it is a very good thing to do, assuming it’s done well.

As a famous person (at least in some circles), Tyson apparently often makes public statements regarding current events. One of his recent statements, delivered via Twitter, has been the object of criticism. Here is Tyson’s tweet:

“In the past 48hrs, the USA horrifically lost 34 people to mass shootings. On average, across any 48hrs, we also lose…

• 500 to Medical errors
• 300 to the Flu
• 250 to Suicide
• 200 to Car Accidents
• 40 to Homicide via Handgun

Often our emotions respond more to spectacle than to data.”

I have a PdD in atmospheric science. I am neither a working scientist nor a famous public figure. You won’t find any research published by me after my dissertation. None of the work I did for nearly 30 years was pure science, and none of it will ever be published in any open literature. Not that anyone would be interested. But I, too, have opinions about current events, although I seldom publish them on this blog. I make an exception in this case. Here is my response to Tyson’s tweet:

Tyson’s statement isn’t even nonsense. It’s basically just a list of facts followed by a non sequitur. A list of facts is meaningless in itself without a relevant conclusion. It reminds me of something I saw in graduate school. A doctoral candidate does research (hopefully original), analyzes the data and then draws a conclusion in his dissertation. Then the dissertation must be defended before a reading committee. I attended the defense of one of my fellow students. At that meeting he went through his data, and there was a lot of it. He then applied a lot of statistical analysis. And then he stopped. One of the committee members asked what his conclusion was. He had none. They told him to go back, finish his work, draw some meaningful conclusions, and then come back to defend his work.

I was surprised that his advisor had allowed him to reach that stage without doing the very thing that a dissertation is supposed to do, which is draw conclusions.

All the data in the world is meaningless without some kind of analytical conclusion. Tyson gives us “Often our emotions respond more to spectacle than to data”? What does that even mean? Does it mean that mass shootings are spectacle? Does it mean that we should look at lists of data rather than reports of a mass shooting? Does it mean that the deaths of 34 people from one cause is not important because more people have been killed from other causes? Is it merely an academic observation on the failings of human nature? Is it a Delphic pronouncement from on high?

He issued an apology on Facebook with some explanation for what he intended. His apology was even worse. Here it is:

“My intent was to offer objectively true information that might help shape conversations and reactions to preventable ways we die. Where I miscalculated was that I genuinely believed the Tweet would be helpful to anyone trying to save lives in America. What I learned from the range of reactions is that for many people, some information–my Tweet in particular–can be true but unhelpful, especially at a time when many people are either still in shock, or trying to heal–or both.”

This is not nonsense, but it is bullshit. I assume that his list of causes of death is accurate (it seems to be reasonably accurate, although it is not an exhaustive list of preventable deaths), but in what way does that help shape conversations and reactions? In what way could it possibly be “helpful to anyone trying to save lives in America”?

He says “for many people some information … can be true but unhelpful…”

Really? Subtle dig there, right? I guess “many people” are not smart scientists like he is. Perhaps he should not have been so subtle.

Since he can’t seem be bothered to give us any conclusions, we are left to come up with some meaning on our own. In that case, why does Tyson even bother to tweet? It adds nothing to the public debate about a serious health and policy issue. It adds nothing to the problem of suicide. It adds nothing to the problem of medical errors. It adds nothing to our understanding of causes of mass shootings, or any of the other causes of death, for that matter. It tells us nothing about what we might think or do about any of these causes of death. It adds nothing because most of those causes of death are completely unrelated, and efforts to reduce those numbers would also be completely unrelated. Trying to reduce medical errors has nothing to do with trying to reduce the incidence of mass shootings. What is the flu doing in the list? How are we supposed to relate deaths from car accidents to deaths from mass shootings? Are we supposed to tackle all of these causes of death one at a time, starting with the biggest numbers and proceeding to the smallest? Can we not work on, let’s say, two at a time? Or even three? Or maybe even all of them?

I think Tyson has fallen prey to a weakness that other scientists have. It’s the idea that because they know, understand, and can speak authoritatively about some particular subject, they must be able to speak with authority about any other subject. There are enough counter examples that a science popularizer ought to be familiar with the dangers inherent in that belief. I guess he felt like he had to say something, and it had to be sciencey. Unfortunately, it seems that even coming up with something that reaches the level of nonsense is beyond him.

My understanding is that Neil DeGrasse Tyson does not do actual scientific research any more. If this tweet is an example of how he would apply his knowledge and analytical skills to science, then it’s probably a good thing he’s no longer a scientist.

Last Friday I happened to be driving back up the mountain around lunchtime. When I got to the top, right at our road, I saw something I have never seen around here before — a backpacker. He had just crossed the top of the mountain from Little Texas Valley and was starting down Fouche Gap Road towards the bottom on the other side. I slowed down to make my turn, so I got a pretty good look at him. He was a middle-aged man with a large backpack. I assumed that maybe he had been camping somewhere in the forest. There are certainly a lot of places where you could do that.

I mentioned it to Leah after I got home, and then I forgot about it. Later in the evening we went down to a fast food place to get some chicken. We stopped at the store on the way back home, so we went home by a different route from the one we took into town. There we passed a man standing stooped over with his hands on his legs and a huge pack on his back. As we passed I realized it was the same backpacker I had seen on the mountain. We turned around and went back to make sure he was OK.

It turned out he was fine. He was just resting his back and shoulders. We asked where he was headed. He said a nearby convenience store to get a little something to eat. So we offered him a ride and he accepted.

At the convenience store we talked a little. We asked if he would prefer to eat somewhere else and he said he would. So we ended up taking him into town to eat at a Steak ’n Shake,* a hamburger joint that stays open 24 hours. 

Tim was his name. He had spent the morning hiking from a lakeside campground down in Texas Valley. I estimated that to be at least six miles from the top of the mountain, and I later got an actual distance that was a little more than that. He had spent all morning hiking up to the top of the mountain, and the rest of the day hiking down to where we found him. I measured that distance with the car trip meter. It was also a little over six miles. That was a 13-mile hike with a big pack on a very hot, sunny day.

Tim used to live in Rome, and his daughter still does. He had visited her for some time, and than set off to somewhere else. We asked where he was headed, but he was indefinite about it. All he was concerned with was where he would spend the night. He said he had several options in town because he knew several people from when he lived here. He also mentioned a homeless shelter.

He said he had had trouble with drugs in the past but was clean now. He told us he had worked in a lot of different fields, from mechanical work to healthcare. He said he had come from South Carolina, but we never got a straight answer on exactly how he had reached Rome, by foot or some other way.

He was a 43-year-old free spirit. Whether he was free by choice or necessity was never clear.

When he got out of the car he offered to let me get a feel for his pack. It was far heavier than any pack I ever hauled in my backpacking, and it was not a particularly good pack.

We gave him some money so he could have as big a dinner as he wanted. He seemed to need some help, but he never asked. That’s one reason I volunteered a little donation. He later texted us a photo of his Steak ’n Shake dinner, so we know he actually spent the money there.

We asked him let us know how he was doing, but he hasn’t contacted us since the hamburger dinner photo.

It’s hard to know exactly what to make of Tim. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy, and we’re happy we helped him out. He was a little old to still be trying to find out who he is, but I guess we all start on that job at different times.

For all we know he could have been an axe murder on the run. But he didn’t murder us, so we’re happy about that, too.

* Despite needing two apostrophes, Steak ’n Shake uses only one.

We have had not only a lot of rain over the last week, but also some wind. A couple of days ago the wind was so strong that it snapped a few dead pines in our yard. The thick fog on Saturday makes it a little hard to see.

I think the visibility was less than 100 yards. I counted six dead trees that had been broken off, either near the base or about halfway up the trunk. I was not surprised to see some broken, but I had hoped a few of them would be good for firewood. If they break like these did, they are too rotten for that.

This is just off our driveway, opposite the house, in an area that I haven’t even walked through yet. Down the driveway a little there are even more downed trees. It’s a tangled mess that I have just barely begun to clean up. It’s going to take a long, long time.