There's Still Time To Cut The Risk Of Climate Catastrophe, Study Shows Oct 6, 2009
For any given climate model scenario, there is always a probability distribution of possible outcomes, and it turns out that in all the scenarios, the policy options have a much greater impact in reducing the most extreme outcomes than they do on the most likely outcomes. For example, under the strongest of the four policy options, the average projected outcome was a 1. (Science Daily)
IDSS: deformation invariant signatures for molecular shape comparison May 23, 2009
Our IDSS is stored as a histogram which is a probability distribution of inner distances between all sample point pairs on the molecular surface. We show that IDSS is insensitive to shape deformation of flexible molecules and more effective at capturing molecular structures than traditional shape descriptors. (BioMed Central)
Stick or twist May 22, 2009
Furthermore, there are various statistical tests that can be employed to see whether the "excess" mortality rates are significant at a certain level of confidence, or whether they should be deemed as part of an ordinary probability distribution. Antony, London. (BBC News -- UK)
Brain's Decision Mechanism Underlies Certainty May 8, 2009
The authors went on to add, "Our findings suggest that when the brain embraces truth, it does so in a graded way so that even a binary [yes/no, true/false, left/right] choice leaves in its wake a quantity that represents a degree of belief. The neural mechanism of decision making doesn't flip into a fixed point, but instead approximates a probability distribution.". The Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the National Eye Institute of the National Institutes of Health, and the National Center for... (Science Daily)
AGU Journal highlights -- May 6, 2009 May 7, 2009
They plot the probability distribution functions for decadal temperature trends and find that in the observed record and all models, decade-long periods of cooling can occur even within a strong overall warming trend. The authors expect that due to the natural variability of the real climate, in the 21st century there will probably be some multiyear periods of cooling or constant temperature within longer-term anthropogenic global warming. (EurekAlert!)
