Don't quote latin; say what you have to say, and then sit down.

                               Arthur Wellesley

See also: http://studioghibli.wikia.com/wiki/Spirited_Away

See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_myth

and: http://noc.ac.uk/news/global-sea-level-rise-end-last-ice-age

Regional studies of modern sea level are generally consistent in their overall picture, but not in the details. Much of the disagreement is related to the local factors described above. While scientists might debate the specifics, they are in universal agreement about one thing - both global temperature and sea level continue to rise today, the latter at a rate of approximately 1-3 mm/year on a global scale similar to that for the late Holocene .

Even this modest rate of rise has had a significant effect on coastal and nearshore areas when private homes and public facilities have been built close to the water's edge. In Cape Hatteras National Seashore, the protection and repair of private homes were perennially subsidized by public funds until the Federal government realized that keeping ahead of the retreating shoreline in the face of rising sea level was a futile effort. In other areas where enormous investments have been made in private development or public infrastructure (i.e., Miami Beach), federal funds are still being expended to either fortify the shoreline with concrete walls or to replace beaches washed away by seasonal storms and the slow rise of the global tide. Eventually, these will be abandoned as well, once the cost of stemming coastal loss exceeds the revenues generated by those facilities.

More problematic is the question of how much of this rise is part of a larger, natural cycle and how much is the result of man-induced changes in the planet. Temperature records over the past century show a warming trend . Furthermore, a strong correlation has been demonstrated between this pattern and anthropogenic activities such as the burning of fossil fuels, increasing nitrous oxide and methane emissions from factories and automobiles, the use of chlorofluorocarbon-based aerosol propellants and other activities related to the progressive industrialization in our modern society.

These are highly debated points. Three graphs are presented, but not discussed. Look at these and see what you think.

• comparison of CO2 rise and temperature rise
• temperature rise on the west coast of North America
• temperature rise on the east coast of North America

The September 4, 1990 Time Magazine presents new data and a new view of global warming together with figures from NOAA research. Since 1980 temperatures have climbed in the Arctic faster than the rest of the earth, and climatic changes are expected to move more rapidly in the polar region. Warming in the Arctic is a factor in the global climate system because the difference in temperatures between the tropics and the poles drives the system. Formation of the North Atlantic deep water gives off staggering amounts of heat in the North Atlantic and sends water into abyssal depths. At 14,000 yBP the pattern of ocean and atmosphere changed; oceanic circulation shifted dramatically and glaciers in both hemispheres began retreating, starting global warming. Studies have shown that this current was shut down until the last ice age ended.

The Younger Dryas, 11,000 yBP, links the transport of fresh water and ocean circulation. In as little as 100 years, northern Europe reverted to glacial conditions. To cause this event, the NADW system had stopped, and the warm intermediate depth water that supplies Europe's extra heat no longer flowed. A massive influx of fresh water from the melting North American glaciers was diverted to the St. Lawrence seaway when the normal Mississippi route was blocked (this blocked sinking of the water mass and formation of NADW). This was recorded in the change from low O18 /O16 ratio in Gulf of Mexico foraminifera to a high ratio (the meltwater discharging from the Mississippi was 016 rich). The event shows linking of freshwater flow, ocean circulation, and climate, but the effect was only regional.

If the poles continue to warm faster than the tropics, the circulatory system may diminish as the pull created by the sinking NADW decreases. Concurrent with this the movement of warm water in the Gulf Stream could slow or stall reducing temperatures in North America and Europe. The melting 11,000 years ago sent freshwater from the St. Lawrence River into the North Atlantic to create the 1,300-year Younger Dryas. It has been suggested that this new Arctic melting could follow the same pattern. A significant result of such a change is that during the Younger Dryas the monsoon weakened in Asia and the Sahara expanded - a change in precipitation accompanied the climate event and this could have dramatic effects. This type of result is presented as an alternate view to the end result of modern global warming.

Large sums of money have been invested in research to model the possible changes in global climate over the coming decades. The magnitude of the proposed changes in these "Global Climate Models" (GCM'S) varies considerably depending on the assumptions that are made and the particular model that is used. Regardless of the details, however, the existing record shows a marked increase in the rate of change over recent decades. And whichever model is used, a less than optimistic prognosis is associated with a scenario in which "business as usual" continues. As a best guess, global temperature would rise by 3° C over the next century with a worst-case estimate of 5° C. If the worst-case scenario proves true, then the world ocean could rise by a meter in the next century, at a rate tenfold that of the past 3,000 years. The impact on the world's weather patterns would have staggering impacts on business, and especially agriculture. Low-lying areas would be flooded at a rate too high for even the US Army Corps of Engineers to keep up with. Coral reefs might be left behind, exposing now-protected port areas to increasing wave energy. Combined with recent estimates that hurricane wind speeds could increase by 7-15 mph with a 2.2° C increase in global temperature, this portends for dramatic coastal-engineering problems. Because many important fisheries are related to reefs, implications to that industry are profound.

The final paragraph from the Time article is important to all of us:

At the entrance to the Churchill Northern Studies Centre, a base for investigations of regional climate change, a rusting rocket is a mute reminder of the complex's earlier life as part of defenses against Soviet nuclear attack. That threat never materialized, and now, belatedly, scientists venture from the base to study a threat that has materialized but against which no adequate defense has been mounted. Despite the danger that climate change poses, the resources currently devoted to studying this problem - and combatting it - are inconsequential compared with the trillions spent during the cold war. Twenty years from now, we may wonder how we could have miscalculated which threat represented the greater peril.

read all: http://geology.uprm.edu/Morelock/patterns.htm

Gus: And the surface of mother earth is still warming... while previous scientific calculation showed we should be going towards another ice age 5,000 to 15,000 years from now. The EXTRA CO2 in the atmosphere and in the oceans isn't going to let the cold happen. The extra CO2 in the atmosphere is that which is "added" to the natural equation (natural variations) of the last few million years by the burning of fossil fuels... We are adding energy to the system.

Sea temperatures around Australia are posting "amazing" records that climate specialists say signal global records set in 2014 may be broken this year and next.

March sea-surface temperatures in the Coral Sea region off Queensland broke the previous high by 0.12 degrees – a big jump for oceans that are typically more thermally stable than land. Temperatures for the entire Australian ocean region also set new highs for the month, the Bureau of Meteorology said.

The climate is on a performance-enhancing drug and that drug is carbon dioxide 

read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/record-seasurface-temperatures-in-pacific-point-to-record-warmth-in-2015-and-2016-20150413-1mjooh.html

Grass's works have a strong political dimension and are considered part of the German literary movement dealing with "coming to terms with the past" but he was also not averse to commenting on, and stirring, controversy beyond his nation's borders.

He likened the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that appeared in 2005 in a Danish newspaper to Nazi caricatures of Jews and criticised former United States president George W Bush for using religious terms to describe his "war on terror".

The novelist, poet, playwright and sculptor, often seen chomping on his pipe and sporting a walrus moustache, courted controversy with a provocative poem that painted Israel as the Middle East's biggest threat to peace.

The prose-poem entitled What Must Be Said, published in 2012, voiced fears that a nuclear-armed Israel could mount a "first strike" against Iran, triggering accusations of anti-Semitism and a ban from Israel.

After years of urging Germany to come to terms with its World War II past, the outcry further darkened the shadow cast by his 2006 bombshell admission that he had served in the Nazis' elite Waffen SS after being conscripted into the corps as a teenager.

Grass against ideologies that set 'absolute objectives'

Grass was born on October 16, 1927 in the Baltic port city of Danzig to parents who had a grocery shop.

A passionate visual artist who also studied sculpture and graphics, Grass's work and psyche were marked by Germany's past.

His first three books, known as the Danzig Trilogy, are set in the ethnically-mixed region of his childhood.

Danzig was handed to Poland after the war, when its ethnic German population fled or were expelled.

The Tin Drum was adapted into an Oscar-winning film by Volker Schloendorff.

His 2002 novel Crabwalk also deals with the effect of the past on the present.

Grass defined himself in a 1969 interview as a humanist allergic to ideologies of any kind "to the point of wanting to attack any belief that claims to set absolute objectives".

read more: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-04-13/german-author-gunter-grass-dies-aged-87/6390086

Note: ALL religious ideologies set absolute objectives. It's just for us to make sure they don't become political absoluts without us becoming fanatical as well. Meanwhile:

He [Greste] was at his most powerful in response to an audience question on the Koran and its alleged influence on terrorist acts.

His opening line dispatched the obvious but necessary: "I think if you dig around the Bible you'll find plenty of excuses as well."

Then he went on.

"Look, there are 1.5 billion Muslims in the world today, 23 per cent of the world's population is Islamic. We're not at war with 23 per cent of the world's population," he said.

"We can dig around and find all sorts of excuses. To my mind this is one of the biggest problems. This is not a clash of civilisations."

Greste argued eloquently against the recently legislated collection of metadata - "we're creating a lot of dark spaces within government" -  and warned against falling into line a behind policy built around what host Tony Jones called "the T word".

Did Greste think Australia was exempt from politicians invoking it to justify their agenda?

"No, I don't," Greste replied.  

"I think terrorism is clearly a big issue  ... but I think there is a real danger that terrorism is used as a kind of scare tactic, as this way of government taking it as an opportunity to impose all sorts of draconian restrictions and limitations which it would never get away with under other circumstances."

Greste's presence had his two fellow panellists from the federal parliament - the Coalition's Mitch Fifield and Labor's Alannah MacTiernan - scrabbling to find areas of agreement with their heroic Q&A desk partner.

Fifield tried this, on the question of a global code of governance for the rights of journalists: "We've got to acknowledge that Peter has earned the right through his unique commitment to freedom of the press to have any proposition that he puts forward seriously looked at."

But Fifield, like MacTiernan, was pushing the proverbial uphill, as when the Labor MP tried to have it both ways on Labor's support for the metadata bill. As Jones told her: "That sort of begs the question as to why you voted for it."

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/peter-greste-delivers-warning-on-qa-if-we-ignore-it-it-will-come-back-to-bite-us-20150414-1mkdw2.html#ixzz3XE0AFtTD. 

Read articles from top... ALL religions rely on brainwashing and using legends/lies/porkies written in the past. Mostly inane and designed to keep people underfoot, pushed to the extreme, religions become dangerous. 

About 252 million years ago, massive volcanic eruptions sent a vast amount of lava flowing out onto the earth, and spewed huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the air, chemically altering the oceans in a series of events that would change life on earth forever.

It sounds like the dramatic plot of a science fiction thriller, but those are the findings of a new study published this week in Science that found that the largest extinction event on earth was caused by ocean acidification.

One of the lead authors, Matthew Clarkson, said in a press release, "Scientists have long suspected that an ocean acidification event occurred during the greatest mass extinction of all time, but direct evidence has been lacking until now. This is a worrying finding, considering that we can already see an increase in ocean acidity today that is the result of human carbon emissions."

read more: http://www.popsci.com.au/science/nature/ocean-acidification-caused-the-largest-mass-extinction-ever,402639

The man appearing on television screens across the country promoting the Abbott government's Intergenerational Report - science broadcaster Karl Kruszelnicki - has hardened his stance against the document, describing it as "flawed" and admitting to concerns that it was "fiddled with" by the government.

Dr Kruszelnicki, widely known as Dr Karl, has previously revealed that he had not read the full report before he agreed to front the taxpayer-funded campaign, which is expected to cost millions.

The Intergenerational Report - a snapshot of Australia's economy and society in 40 years - was criticised by Labor as a "highly political document" for, among other things, downgrading climate change from its own chapter in 2010 to three-and-a-half pages in 2015.

"As far as I can see, it's a flawed report," Dr Kruszelnicki told Fairfax Media.

He singled out the reduced focus on climate change in this year's report for criticism. "In no way am I endorsing the government's stance on climate change. I think it is incredibly short-sighted," he said. 

read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/karl-kruszelnicki-steps-up-concerns-over-flawed-intergenerational-report-20150414-1mktr8.html

Jochen Bittner (* 1973 in Frankenberg (Eder)) is a doctor of law, journalist and publicist.

Bittner studied at the University of Kiel, law and philosophy. Subsequently, he was a research assistant at the Kiel Chair of Public Law and Legal Philosophy. After a stay in Belfast was with a thesis on the legal system of the Irish Republican Army to Dr. iur. PhD.

Since 2001 he has been political editor at the time. From 2007 to 2011 he was its European and NATO correspondent in Brussels. Since the autumn of 2013 he wrote as a guest writer for The New York Times International. [1]

His main topics are European and Security Policy, terrorism, intelligence and legal policy. [2]

I was able to pinpoint my frustration only when I met Mr. Grass in person. A couple of months ago he came from his home in Lübeck, on the Baltic coast, to visit my newspaper’s office in nearby Hamburg. The conference room was packed: Everyone — editors, assistants, interns — all crowded in to see this living legend. Although I’m sure I wasn’t the only one with mixed emotions about the man, the atmosphere was one of near complete adoration. It was the kind of secular worship that I expect no younger author will ever experience, even if he or she wins a Nobel.

Your generation has had it pretty easy, I wanted to blurt out. You grew big in times when strong ideology and determined judgment counted more than the hard work of examining what is actually going on around us. The way you saw the world counted more than the way it actually was. And there was always a lot of self in your righteousness.

Today we know that ideologies aren’t realities. Writers and intellectuals don’t have that crutch; what is demanded of them, in the first place, is not moral judgment, but clearheaded analysis of our ever-accelerating world. Only in your time, Günter Grass, could you become a moral authority. Today, you would never make it.

I wanted to say all of this, in front of my enraptured colleagues. But I didn’t dare.

read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/15/opinion/gunter-grasss-germany-and-mine.html

-------------------------------------

Gus: I could be wrong but my assessment of Jochen Bittner is that he is a babe in the woods despite having strings of university decoration galore... In the words of someone singing a Tim MacGraw song "you had to be there"... To say that Grass's generation had it easy is crap.

The fact that moral turpitude has infiltrated our compass should not detract from the fact that some people held some views, whether relevant or not in the present context. What comes to bear is that someone stirred the shit and steered the boat for a while, on a very rough sea in a tempestuous wind. 

I firmly believe and have stated so on many occasion that should Einstein come back and voice his proper scientific opinion on global warming, he would be cut in little bits by the establishment.

And this does not diminish Einstein contribution to the scientific knowledge nor him spending 30 years of his life failing at trying to disprove the Quantum Theory. 

Sure, things have move a bit on since Grass, but overall things have moved southward towards the cloaca of crap — political, social, religious and intellectual. So how can one find their philosophical kittens in a sea of flying pigs?...

Present intellectualism has fallen into the trap that "art" fell into at the turn of the 19th/20th century. Stylistically art has gone from personal 'expression" to stimulate discussion (an a lot was rubbished then) to personal rubbish (that no-one could possibly hang on a lounge-room wall)— a bit like comedians who are too afraid of tackling the big issues such as telling that a prime minister is a turd, thus they concentrate the insipid jokes on their own inadequacies at being lesbian, gay or stupid — or on their siblings shitting in their nappies. There are so many times one can say F**K in a self introspection. 

Yes, the stuff that holds modern societies together has gained momentum and it's a bit ugly. It's cash. everything seems to relate to cash. Cash defines the values of stuff, including what is presented to us as mediocre intellectual drivel. 

At least Grass had the courage to push and shove his views. Yes, there are millions of small gatherings in back rooms and on the net, talking on how to fix the world's problems and we're adding only a bit of hot air to the debate. Even public forums like Q & A (ABC TV) are full of emotional and partisan crap, but nearly always detached from the reality of what it means to be human. 

--------------------------

Bittner continues:

Someone once said that the days in which politicians decided the fate of entire nations over a glass of whiskey are gone. But so are the days when writers could sit down and divide the world into good and evil through the haze of a tobacco pipe, as Mr. Grass and other members of Gruppe 47, a writers’ group formed to renew German literature, did so famously in the 1950s and ’60s.

To say that this is a healthy development does not mean to slight their achievement. World War II left Germany without a moral compass; writers like Mr. Grass, Heinrich Böll and Siegfried Lenz provided it. The country needed intellectual leaders who epitomized certainty, however vain they came across.

There are times when moral rigor is needed, but they pass. And yet Mr. Grass was never able to move beyond them. Worse, he seemed to believe that, as the nation’s conscience, the rules he applied to others didn’t apply to him.

In 2006 he revealed, just before the release of his much-awaited memoir, that he had been a member of the Waffen-SS, the most murderous branch of the Nazi war machine. He maintained that he never fired a shot himself, but nevertheless his confession had a disturbing anticipation of impunity to it. Did Mr. Grass believe that being declared Germany’s most important contemporary writer outweighed the fact that he had been active in one of the worst Nazi organizations?

---------------------------

Hey, Jochen, give the fellow a break. He was but a young man, barely 17 when he got drafted — a cog in the machine that swallowed its young, including those "volunteers" who though WWI was going to be a heroic picnic. The former pope, Ratzinger, was in the same boat. Many of the young men (and women) who survived the ordeal did their best to stay upright, without being stupid nor hide nor claim righteousness. They had a few demons to deal with, which to say the least were far bigger than the young cell-phone generation of now.

The standards of politicians these days is more than abysmal apart from a few — mostly women, who scrape a bit better than their male counterparts. 

The level of though is attached to how much money is (or isn't) in the bank and how to swat people who annoy us, here and abroad. War by lazy remote control comes to mind.

Of course, atheists often get the blame for this crap. Well, they are not so much to blame than the me-generations which have sprung like weeds from inventions such as the convenience of pressing buttons and looking oneself in a facebook mirror. Communications has exploded the old myths, including religions — apart from those on either side, still caught up in the middle ages, calling to arms in the Middle East — by making available information that would take months and months to analyse. Such conveniences help those who seek, but distracting inanity rules for the lazy bums, in order to keep uncertainty at bay. 

Narcissistic individualism of the 21th century has caught up with the break up of the arts, in the 20th century. It was inevitable. Mediocre often gets the gongs because one shouts most, or sleeps with the judges, or one is most individualistic with a sculpture of turds on sticks. The cult of celebs has replaced our veneration of proper thinkers, including scientists and philosophers. Mathematicians have been forgotten, though without their contribution, we'd still be using candlesticks for lights.

And it ain't going to improve. Blaming the old guard like Grass, is a disgrace. Between you, me and a lamppost, Grass could still rise above the present crap if he's been a bit younger. He would understand all the faulty mechanics of modern "thoughts" if we can call the birdbrain rubbish that inhabits our pigeon lofts. Grass' only problem would be that he would not be published, because today's publishers are more about entertainment, scandals and titillation than understanding. A bit like Q & A debating ideas on an emotional medium. Thoughts end up milled into pulp by the blancmange confrontational format.

We're idiots for good reasons. All of you, who have a cell-phone (mobile), now bend your head in religious adoration and heavenly contemplation of the little icons we call Apps... 

-----------------------------

Jochen Bittner (* 1973 in Frankenberg (Eder)) ist ein promovierter Jurist, Journalist und Publizist.

Bittner studierte an der Universität Kiel Jura und Philosophie. Anschließend war er wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Kieler Lehrstuhl für Öffentliches Recht und Rechtsphilosophie. Nach einem Aufenthalt in Belfast wurde mit einer Dissertation über das Rechtssystem der Irish Republican Army zum Dr. iur. promoviert.

Seit 2001 ist er Politischer Redakteur bei der Zeit. Von 2007 bis 2011 war er ihr Europa- und NATO-Korrespondent in Brüssel. Seit Herbst 2013 schreibt er als Gastautor für The International New York Times.[1]

Seine Schwerpunktthemen sind Europa- und Sicherheitspolitik, Terrorismus, Nachrichtendienste und Rechtspolitik.[2]

A regional body of the United Church of Canada will interview a clergywoman who is an outspoken atheist to see about her "effectiveness."

In June, the Toronto Conference of the UCC will enact a formal process known as a review regarding the Rev. Gretta Vosper, an author and founder of the Canadian Centre for Progressive Christianity who is also a professed atheist.

The Rev. David W. Allen, executive secretary of the UCC Toronto Conference, told The Christian Post about the investigative process.

"A review is a formal process within the United Church which is ordered when serious questions have been raised about a minister's effectiveness," said Rev. Allen.

"In this case, a team of five people will interview Ms. Vosper. They will report to a larger committee of 40 people, and that committee will give its opinion to the sub-Executive of Toronto Conference on whether Ms. Vosper is suitable for ministry within The United Church of Canada."

For Rev. Vosper, Allen explained that the review process will involve interviewing Vosper to see if she continues to affirm certain questions asked during her ordination.

Allen said these specific questions are "Do you believe in God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and do you commit yourself anew to God?" "Do you believe that God is calling you to the ordained ministry of Word, Sacrament and Pastoral Care, and do you accept this call?" and finally "Are you willing to exercise your ministry in accordance with the scriptures, in continuity with the faith of the Church, and subject to the oversight and discipline of The United Church of Canada?"

According to her website, Vosper came out as an atheist back in 2001 and wants the UCC, which she describes as "probably the most progressive Christian denomination in the world," to be more welcoming of atheism.

"After I spontaneously preached a sermon in which I completely deconstructed the idea of a god named God, rather than fire me, the congregation chose to step out on an unmarked path," reads the About section of her site.

"With them, I've laboured, lamented, lost, and loved. It's hard road but a worthy one with no finish line in sight. Let's walk this road together. I promise you'll be inspired."

The "Charlie Charlie Challenge," the newest game sensation being played by children and adults throughout the world, should have Christian parents concerned that their children are committing an act "detestable" to God by summoning a forbidden demon, Dallas megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress said Friday.

More and more people are posting videos to social media featuring them trying out the Charlie Charlie Challenge, which requires setting up a child-like apparatus with two pencils — that many believe mysteriously move — to indicate the presence of a "Mexican demon" known as Charlie.

Participants set up two pencils in the shape of a cross on top of a piece of paper that is divided into four sections— two yes sections and two no sections. With one pencil balanced on top of the other pencil, contestants asks questions like "Charlie, can we play?" and "Charlie, are you here?"

The answer to the question lies on whether the top pencil shifts to the "Yes" or "No" sections, as it is believed that the pencil is moved by the demon spirit.

Jeffress, who is an author and pastor of the 11,000-member First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, explained in a Friday statement provided to The Christian Post that the Bible explicitly warns Christians not to try to summon a demon spirit.

"The Bible is clear that Christians should run — not walk — away from any attempt to contact or harness demonic powers through games like 'Charlie, Charlie,' Jeffress wrote.

"Deuteronomy 18:10 uses the term 'divinations' to refer to activities that involve contact with demons and warns 'whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord' (Deut. 18:12)."

"Any parent who takes the Word of God seriously will do whatever is necessary to keep his or her child away from games like these, which God has strictly forbidden," the 59-year-old Jeffress added.

Sometimes, it’s hard to believe we live in the 21st century. With technological advancements, global communications networks, the ability to watch the history of stars unfold in real time, and information accessibility continuing to expand, you’d think we’d have evolved beyond tribal fears and the violence associated with them. But we haven’t and all you have to do to convince yourself of that frightening fact is spend a little time in church.

Not just any church, of course. There are a lot of nice churches out there. I mean a fundamentalist church. Or, for that matter, a fundamentalist synagogue or mosque – anywhere people gather to have archaic ideas and the prejudices trapped within them traded for contemporary knowledge and understanding. As for the nice churches and synagogues and mosques, well, their messages – lovely though they may be – reinforce a divine hand in the documents that underpin hateful, fundamentalist beliefs. They’re guilty, too. I should know. I’m a minister in one of those churches.

Sort of.

My congregation belongs to The United Church of Canada, probably the most progressive Christian denomination in the world. It ordained women over seventy years ago and has been ordaining openly LGBTQ leaders for decades. But theologically it remains in the closet about the human construction of religion and all its trapping. I couldn’t stay in that closet.
I came out as an atheist in 2001....

http://www.grettavosper.ca/about/

Read more: http://www.theweek.co.uk/daily-briefing/63823/ten-things-you-need-to-know-today-sunday-31-may-2015#ixzz3bm1797qY

See also Eve and Adam in: 5 — eve and adam...

Australian producers have been inadvertently selling a mislabelled variety of wine for decades, DNA testing has revealed.

Key points:

A grape used by Australian vignerons to make a critically acclaimed, award-winning variety of wine was misidentified when it was imported

The CSIRO says it did not have the capacity to verify the variety when it was brought over in 1979, and says it imported the grape in good faith

Winegrowers say the important thing is the quality of the drop, rather than its name, and Wine Australia says it won't be recalling bottles on the market

Following an inspection by a French ampelographer and testing by the CSIRO, it has turned out that what growers and consumers thought was petit manseng is actually gros manseng.

The petit manseng grape was imported from France in 1979 by the CSIRO, three years after the organisation brought its larger, "coarser" cousin to Australian shores.

The CSIRO's Ian Dry said the varieties were obtained in good faith from the French National Institute for Agricultural Research at a time when DNA testing did not exist.

"Unbeknownst to us, we have distributed something we called petit manseng over a number of years," Dr Dry said.

"At the time there were no really objective measures which would allow us to identify them — you would need to be a real expert in the area of ampelography."

The CSIRO has tested 1,500 grape varieties in its collection and said some would need independent verification.

"The major varieties are completely safe," Dr Dry said.

"There's a few more obscure varieties that we need to double check."

Read more:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-06/decades-old-petit-manseng-mix-up-confirmed-by-csiro/12209306

Read from top.

As far as this household is concerned Red Ned is Red Ned... Chateau Cardboard is top shelf.