Climate change and shopping

I chose the NMR lectures this morning. One very nice presentation concerned Cu/Zn binding proteins and included NMR experiments on proteins expressed in live cells. Someone in Wuthrich´s lab already started such experiments in E. coli in the early 2000-years. It was nice to see that things have evolved to something useful.

A lecture in the grand auditorium concerned androgenic (created by humans) climate change. I remember that I was surprised when seeing this subject in the conference program as none of us here are climate scientists. Anyway, I looked forward to see some unbiased scientific facts on this subject. And it seemed like everybody at the conference felt the same way. The presenter was very good, but didn't really show any facts, that surprised me. He showed a curve of rising temperature from 1850 to present, ice-core data (bubbles of atmospheric air trapped in ice) dating back 800,000 years (!) and including 8 ice ages which showed that the CO2 content has gone up dramatically in modern times. Furthermore, he said that the data could not be simulated without the inclusion of the effect of androgenic CO2. During the question round, it came up, that the latest data actually show a slowing down of the rising temperature. I actually remembered reading this as well. Why didn't the presenter mention this in his presentation? So much for unbiased! While it is probably true, that androgenic CO2 has contributed to the rise in temperature, I have strong doubts about the projections being made for the future. As my Ph.D. advisor used to say "You can fit your data to an elephant, if you have enough variable parameters".

After today´s program, I decided to go shopping in Paris. I took the train to Havre-Caumartin and came up to this sight:

The department store "Printemps" - a temple for shopping.

I went to different shops and department stores. Printemps and Lafayette are the big, noble department stores, but actually Printemps looks great from outside, but quite shabby inside, compared to e.g. those in London. I got some exclusive food in Lafayette for my hotel room dinner after the work out.