Thanks to funds from the U.S. government, researchers at Harvard University have equipped a tree with a Twitter account to “amplify messages of climate change.”
With funds from various National Science Foundation grants, post-doctoral fellow Tim Rademacher and his team have outfitted a red oak tree with sensors, cameras, and code, allowing it to piece together tweets using collected data and pre-written text.
The tree, located in Petersham, Mass., has been dubbed the “Witness Tree,” according to a Harvard news release.
The tree has been tweeting for about a month, taking the scientific data collected by the cameras and sensors and translating it into statements largely focusing on the tree’s apparent concern for the summer heat.
“Yesterday, it was very hot,” the tree’s first tweet read. “With a daily average of 27°C (80.5°F), it was the 24th hottest day I can remember.”
Yesterday, it was very hot. With a daily average of 27 ℃ (80.5 ℉), it was the 24th hottest day I can remember.
— A witness tree (@awitnesstree) July 22, 2019
“The last 2 days were extremely hot for July. When is this heatwave going to end?” the tree tweeted less than a half-hour later.
“Last month was warmer than usual, with an average temperature of 20.3°C (68.6°F). July is usually 1.8°C (3.2°F) colder at Harvard Forest!” it tweeted a few days afterward.
The tree’s Twitter bio reads: “Witnessing life as a tree in a changing environment for more than a century. Views are my own – sort of (data translated by scientists and communicators at HF).”
Rademacher says he and his team worked hard to “equip the tree with a voice,” according to the news release.
He says the team decided that tweets from the tree’s Twitter account “made the most sense in the first person, and even with a personality, in order to make it relatable to a larger audience.”
“But most importantly, our Witness Tree is an objectively data-driven account, which I expect will amplify messages of climate change. But we don’t decide what gets posted, the tree does,” he added.
Rademacher told Campus Reform that the project is funded by four separate National Science Foundation grants, including amounts allocated to summer students working with him on the project, as well as monies meant for broad climate change research within the forest, but that the “material cost” of the witness tree is “comparatively small,” being only a “few thousand dollars.”
Read more at Campus Reform
Woo Hoo when it comes to wasting our Taxes the National Science Foundation takes the cake Now just wait for all the idiotic stuff from the NYT’s
Is this like having a pet rock ? Well at least it won’t be turned into pulp for the NYT to waste .
“The tree decides what gets posted ” . Hmm … OK Harvard . Or Harvey for short… rant on . A bird poo’d on my fifth branch , I hear a chain saw OMG .
Stick around Harvey your worst enemy might just be one of those natural occurring climate variables … lightning .
What is the cost to go to Harvard ? I guess if u have to ask u need not apply .
Get a PhD in tree whispering for $300,000 .
Reminds me of something from years ago, that scientists were able to detect a tomato screaming when it was sliced. Urban legend? maybe. If you want to chain yourself to a condemned tree, or send flowers to a melting glacier, go ahead. That’s you, nutter.
Earth is healthy as ever. I’m not sure about the human race’s collective mental health. So easily tricked, so gullible.
The tree deciding on what to send is one of the largest piles of BS I have ever heard of. The only things tree decide are to respond to the seasons, send their leaves towards light and roots towards moisture. Just like the UN climate models, what the “tree says” is programmed by men to support their political agendas. What is outrageous is tax payer money is being used to promote the agenda of the environmental left.
Imagine if we could get the reaction of what String Beans,Peas and Squash think about UN Vegans this bring to mind Invasion of the Body Snatchers or a episode of the Animated Star Trek episode the Philosians were a race of intelligent plant creatures