Even the business community is no longer ignoring global warming, author Eugene Linden points out in an op-ed piece for the Los Angeles Times. Defenders of Bush’s foot-dragging approach to the problem are disappearing. Linden writes:
“Two things happened to change corporate attitudes. The destructive power of extreme weather events has become impossible to ignore (for instance, Hurricane Katrina and the 2003 heat wave in Europe that killed nearly 35,000 people). Even to the casual observer, the climate system seems to be popping rivets. And multinational corporations couldn’t afford to be too out of step with their customers and stakeholders, particularly in the many countries where global warming is viewed as a clear and present danger. . . .
“So, President Bush, if the scientific, evangelical and business communities can’t sway you, what will it take to persuade you to help halt our lunatic meddling with Earth’s atmosphere?”
Posted by Melissa Cooley
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53 Comments
Bush admit he was wrong or change his mind? Please. Can you imagine being the handler who is tasked with giving him facts about global climate change that contradict his assumptions? Good f____ng luck.
The picture with this blog article tells you everything you need to know about bush and his attitude toward global warming. He doesn’t care because he will probably be dead by the time it is time to pay the piper on this one.
The problem is that there is not a definitive causal link between these “climate changes” and what science says is global warming.
It is not as clear cut as you supporters make it.
Nathan, I am really starting to question more then your sanity, my questioning is now going more toward your seriousness about what you say? I see you more a reverse “Chick little” As the pieces of the sky strike the earth you are running around shouting “ The sky IS NOT falling …. the sky IS NOT falling.
“So, President Bush, if the scientific, evangelical and business communities can’t sway you, what will it take to persuade you to help halt our lunatic meddling with Earth’s atmosphere?”
Exxon, Shell, Dick Cheney, etc. etc. giving him permission.
Nathan. Please.
Nathan – virtually ALL scientists agree that there IS a definitive causal link. In fact, the unanimity is stronger that that which existed about tobacco/health back when the tobacco industry trotted out their “doctors” who swore to Congress that there was no link and that nicotine was not addictive.
The only difference between then (tobacco) and now (CO2/warming) is that the energy industry is spending even more money on their lies.
I know W. Bush and the big bad terrible corporations caused Global Warming, but I actually have some serious questions to ask about it.
I was listening to somebody (enviromental global warming expert) talk about the parts per million of CO2 and the average temperature going up a couple of degrees in the last 100 years.
She said that Global Warming is a concern because it will cause more weather catastrophes in the future. Ok! I’ll give her that, but my question is:
If we cooled the earth would there be less catastrophes or even the elimination of them? No more tornados and hurricanes?
How can we cool the earth?
If we stop the production of greenhouse gasses completely today, would it be enough to stop global warming?
Is global warming a bad thing for the entire planet or just some locations of the earth. Meaning that some areas would suffer while others benefit? Or is Global Warming so bad that nobody will benefit and the earth will turn into a barrien desert?
Is reducing greenhouse gasses the only thing we can do?
How responsible is the average person in contributing to this so called disaster?
Should we care about Global Warming…honestly?
Joe,”s global warming a bad thing for the entire planet or just some locations of the earth. Meaning that some areas would suffer while others benefit? Or is Global Warming so bad that nobody will benefit and the earth will turn into a barrien desert?”
Those are relevent questions. Earth models predict some good, much bad. Where is anybodys guess. I would ventuer that because of increased world temperatures, so areas of the world will see more rain than they do now, and changing weather patterns will change where the jet stream ventures, making some parts drier and some wetter.
The rising water levels will mean the losss of some islands and coastal communities. That is one of the really bad things that will happen.
Everyone is to some degree responsible. But how much is everyone willing to reduce their “carbon footprint” is anybodys guess. Is it too late? I could only guess. But as a nation, and a world, if we reduce as much as possible what we contribute to the problem, we should be able to lower its effects.
Honestly? YES!
Bad for most of the earth – some posible benefit in high latitudes in the northern hemisphere. However, even these areas will have problems with soil type transitions since the rate of change is to great for proper adaptation. Warming of these soils will release additional CO2 and CH4.
Greenhouse gas reduction only way – YES. (actually we are talking about reduction of rate of increase)
Fewer catastrophic storms – YES. It is not that we are getting more tropical waves off the ITCZ but that more of them are getting stronger. That is a function of energy availability (sea surface temps in the equatorial Atlantic and the Gulf)
While the past century was only a couple of degrees with the positive feedback loops (ice/albedo and temp/carbon) now in operation the next century will be much more.
This earth has been around for how many years?
We have a mere 100 years of temperature data, less than that of full global accurate data.
We have volcanoes which when they arrupt can spew out more “greenhouse gasses” in a day than all of human activity creates in ten years.
We have a sun which is not like a light bulb putting out a constant level of heat, but constantly flaring and subsiding. We have about 20 years worth of data about how much solar energy reaches the earth and how much it varies.
Chicago(or where it stands) used to be covered with a sheet of hundreds or thousands of feat thick and it melted without help from man.
You greenhouse Gassers ridicule Kansas Republicans for their stance on evolution but on global warming you use the junkiest of junk science to claim you know whats going on. God how stupid.
Your junk science completely ignores the greatest factors that effect our planets temperature and climate, or you treat them as constants. Go away. Your so stupid.
Sigh,
Scientists have taken elaborate steps to correct for variations in solar irradiance, they have considered the long term Milankovitch cycles for glaciation and they take place on too long a time scale to account for the abrupt changes seen.
What do we know?We know the earth would be at about -18C if there were no CO2 in the atmosphere.
We know that there are more potent greenhouse gases than CO2..like the fluorocarbons, methan, etc.
We know that the presence of a couple hundred ppm CO2 raises earth’s temperature from -18C to perhaps 15C on average.
We know that CO2 has increased from significantly in the last 200 years.
We know that the rise in atmospheric CO2 is not due to natural terrestrial or oceanic phenomena because many independent observations show that the carbon content has also increased in both the oceans and the land biosphere (after deforestation). If the oceans or land had contributed to the rise in atmospheric CO2, they would hold less carbon.
So, we know that CO2 is a potent greenhouse gas (as are methane, CFCs, etc.) and that it has increased substantially in the atmosphere since industrialization. We know that the best work of scientists shows that solar irradiance variations can only account for less than 30% of the observed rise in temperatures. We know that the Milankovitch cycle takes place on too long a timescale. We know that the onset of the current warming trend correlates with the start of the Industrial Revolution. We know that it has accelerated since widespread industrialization began about 1900.
Someone, I’m sure is going to point to Mars to say it is also warming. Indeed it is. Since solar irradiance variation accounts for some warming here, it should also lead to warming elsewhere. And, the other planets independently go through their own Milankovitsch cycles that perturb their orbits. There is no direct connection between what is observed on another planet and what is observed on earth, for example, since Mars’ orbital oscillations do not occur in lock step with those of earth.
Come to your own conclusions.
Sigh is right. Us “Greenhouse Gassers” as the uninformed like to call us have been studying this for decades. We have ice core data going back a million years and the evidence tracks well. The only junk science here is that of the carbon industry that is following in the footsteps of the tobacco industry when it claimed that cigarettes were good for you. The lies today are similar.
Ben,
Are you directly involved in climate research?
Not currently; however I try to keep up with the literature and routinely communicate with my fellow scientists.
An interesting sidenote to this administration’s lack of respect for science came when Mayfield gave his warnings about hurricane Katrina. Since he is only a scientists rather than an energy industry lawyer his warnings were discounted.
I think it is interesting that we were not supposed to wait for a mushroom cloud to be the smoking gun on Iraq, but no amount of scientific research and common sense is enough for us to be proactive against our contribution to global warming.
Allie – point well made.
Hey Brian?
The mars melting thing is the only “rushism” dittohead platitude that Heckler forgot to mention. He got all the others.
bush has not actually denied that the problem exists. That would require some evidence. And evidence that global warming does NOT exist well……….doesn’t exist!
No what bush does is say “we should study the problem” and then of course he ignores his own nasa environmental scientists when they bring him the troubling studies.
JR,
amen and hallelujiah.
Nathan and his dad believe that the universe is only 10,000 years old, because that’s what they think the Bible “says.”
They’re close–they’re only off by about 13 billion years or so.
So, we can completely disregard anything they say about science, since they have already shown they are willing and even EAGER to ignore science to justify their faith-based conclusions.
Bizzarely, even on a Biblical basis, the young earth fails, but I digress.
Regarding Joe Williams’s contention that global warming will only raise temps “a few degrees,” a few degrees was the difference between the last ice age in which the northern part of the US was covered under glaciers.
A few degrees increase in ocean temperatures is the equivalent of increasing the energy available for storm formation as much as hundreds of thermonuclear explosions.
Better to be a “greenhouse gasser” than a “head-up-your-asser” like the Rushies are.
Don’t try changing Bushytail’s mind on global warming. All you have to do is change the Bushytail Tailwaggers and he will lock step right in line.
Add to Bush’s follies the rape of his own country
The despoilment of the Appalachians is typical of the President’s bankrupt environmental policies
Henry Porter
Sunday March 12, 2006
Observer
Eastern Kentucky is a long way from Britain. What do we care if another million acres of the Appalachian mountain range are lost to strip mining? If the habitat of the flying squirrel and the cerulean warbler is blown up and bulldozed? If one of the oldest temperate forests in the world with some 80 species of trees is destroyed by the greed of a few coal companies? Why should it matter to us?I’ll tell you why. First, because this story exposes the pathological destructiveness of the Republican political and religious elite. Not content with the ruin it has caused in Iraq, George W Bush’s administration lays waste the great American wilderness in a way that tests your faith in the reason of man.Second, this campaign against nature is being plotted, sanctioned and carried out by men – it is exclusively men – who are on their knees in little, white churches every Sunday praying to a god whom they believe created this earth. The same people who reject Darwin and promote the idea that life on earth is too complex and varied to have been created by evolution, a theory known as intelligent design, are the ones who show such contempt for God’s creation.And let’s not forget the last crucial point. With the United States accounting for 30 per cent of the world’s CO2 emissions, much of it from heavily polluting, coal-burning power stations, we may all to some extent consider ourselves downwind of what’s going on in the coal industry of Kentucky and parts of West Virginia.In Britain, we are not exposed to the horrors of ‘mountaintop removal’, but owing to a new book by Erik Reece, Lost Mountain: A year in the Vanishing Wilderness, which I happened on in a New York bookshop, I learned that it has nothing to do with coal mining in the traditional sense. Mountaintop removal is just that. You blow up the top of the mountain with a mixture of ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel, the same combination used by Timothy McVeigh in the Oklahoma City bombing, and bulldoze the millions of tons of debris into the valleys and streams below. A slender seam of coal is then exposed, at which point a fearsome machine called a dragline is deployed to strip out the coal.The result is that local water supplies are polluted with mercury and the chemicals used in the mining process; the uninterrupted habitat of many rare creatures and plants is destroyed; and the landscape is ruined forever. The scars that you are now able to see on satellite pictures will be there until the end of time.In the American media, you will find little mention of this shocking state of affairs. Indeed, people generally know more about the burning of Amazon rainforests than they do about the devastation wrought by their own people in their own country.It is true that a grim picture of strip mining did appear as the background of a recent film called North Country, the story of a woman, played by Charlize Theron, fighting for her rights as a mine-worker. To a European eye, this minor heroic tale is all very well, but why didn’t it occur to director Niki Caro that the demonic mess created by strip mining was more than incidental? But perhaps that is where America is – individual rights come way ahead of the trashing of nature in the public’s concerns.In 1968, Bobby Kennedy visited the mountains of Kentucky and West Virginia with the message that strip mining was a way of putting miners out of work. His son, environmental campaigner Robert F Kennedy Jr, has written an excellent account of the rape of Appalachia in Crimes Against Nature, which reveals that mountaintop removal was encouraged by George W. Bush after the Republicans received $20m from the coal industry.In 2000, a lobbyist named J Steven Griles was appointed to Bush’s team and swiftly managed, among other things, to get the ‘waste’ created by mountaintop removal reclassified as ‘fill’, thus bypassing the Clean Water Act that was impeding the coal companies. He spent four years in the administration, during which he was paid ’severance’ at the rate of $250,000 per annum from his lobbying firm. He then returned to the private sector without having suffered a loss of income.Leaving this shady arrangement aside, it is difficult not to gasp at an administration which clutches the Bible to its chest and mouths those first verses from Genesis: ‘And God said, “Let us make man in our image … and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air and over the cattle, and over all the earth.’That may appeal to a Texan oil man and cattle rancher but the inconsistency between the professed beliefs of the Christian right on ‘intelligent design’ and the conduct of environmental policy under Bush is staggering. If the flying squirrel, the copperhead snake and cerulean warbler, the sugar maples, the black gum and hickory trees of the forest of the Appalachians were, indeed, all designed by God, why destroy them so wantonly?This is partly explained by a certain cultural entitlement to inconsistency which permits some Americans to complain about secondary smoke while climbing aboard their sports utility vehicles and, as Condoleezza Rice did last week, to list the human-rights violations in Iran while ignoring Guantanano. Yet this is not the whole story. A supreme right accorded by American individualism is to make a profit and, somewhere in the psyche of the quail-shooting conservative, decked out in his impeccable weekend hunting gear, is the idea that to assert dominion over the earth you must destroy.It is all rather depressing, but let me make clear that there are good Americans out there, whose voices are only just being heard above the whir of the Republican money-counting machines – people such as Erik Reece and Robert Kennedy Jr and many unknown environmental campaigners. They deserve our support during this Appalachian spring, however distant.Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
Ben – LOL! “head-up-your-asser” – that’s too much. :)
HUGE chunks of ice have tumbled off Argentina’s Perito Moreno glacier – a rare spectacle that prompted a vigil by hundreds of tourists.
Argentine television stations interrupted regular programming with live coverage of the break-up of the glacier known as the “White Giant,” which was caused by building water pressure in the lake that it extends across.
Perito Moreno, which Argentine officials say is the world’s only expanding glacier, spreads across a large swathe of southern Patagonia, ending in a translucent blue wall of ice along the Lago Argentino. Many of the world’s glaciers are retreating as a result of global warming, scientists say.
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,18472702-1702,00.html?from=rss
And more…
Ghostly coral bleachings haunt reefs
When marine scientist Ray Berkelmans went diving at the Great Barrier Reef earlier this year, what he discovered shocked him – a graveyard of coral stretching as far as he could see.
“It’s a white desert out there,” Berkelmans told Reuters in early March after returning from a dive to survey bleaching – signs of a mass death of corals caused by a sudden rise in ocean temperatures – around the Keppel Islands.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Ghostly-coral-bleachings-haunt-reefs/2006/03/16/1142098586702.html
The BIG glacial retreat going on right now is Greenland. Its collapse will be quite interesting.
And the experiment continues …
A disturbing new study finds that bush finds studies disturbing.
Enough with demanding studies to prove that global warming is real and happening and that human activity is a part of it.
I demand of bush that he prove that global warming is NOT real NOT happening and that human activity is NOT part of it.
Brian
I’m an engineer. I deal in hard facts. Sometimes when I’m trying to solve for an unknown I have to make some educated assumtions. I’m honest enough to admit when something is an approximation. The thing that makes me laugh about “global warming caused by human activity” is that it is 99% educated guess!!! Yes we have some very limited scientific data to go on but be honest with yourself if with no one else. Its 99% SWAG!!!
I laugh again when I think of some of the stuff that I learned in high school science class (during the 70’s)that was taught as FACT that is no longer considered valid.
When you couple science that is 99% estimation based on assumption and couple it with a political agenda you end up with—- Junk.
Heckler,
I’m an engineer too..my sympathies. Most people think science and engineering discoveries are made by careful plodding through facts that lead ultimately to the answer. This is in fact far from the truth. Most scientific discoveries are made in “sartori” moments, or moments of sudden awakening when light dawns on marblehead and everything falls into place. Take Einstein’s many theories..more the result of brilliant insight that huffing and puffing a long to an answer.
Models may indeed be misformulated..but data may also be in error. The good scientist recognizes the shortcomings of both and tries to reconcile, as best he can, what is undoubtedly true with that which might be true, with that which is patently false. Science is an artform ust like any other.
It is clear, that if you read the literature, climate models get the vast majority of things right (at least qualitatively) in their modelling.
You must also always remember that things reduce to a balance principle. The rate of accumulation of something is equal to the ratee that the something are put into the system by mass and non-mass tranfer related processes plus the rate of generation of the something in the control volume. That is the only way it works. So, nw, if you see greenhose gases entering the atmospher via pollution (a source), and you see the land and oceans soaking up carbon (a sink), and mass is not generated, you have a complete mass balance. Now, if you look at accumulation of solar energy in the atmosphere, it comes from the variance in the sun’s output, and it comes from the rebroadcast of absorbed solar energy as IR by the greenhouse gases. There are no other sources or sinks. So, you’re left with the situation that solar energy comes into the atmospher and is rebroadcast as IR from the greenhouse gases.l Unless you can postulate another soiurce for climate forcing besides those included, you’re left with only one conclusion.
Take a simple example, start with an empty cup and start to fill the cup with water. You’ll not that the cup “accumulates’ water until it reaches its brim, and then it overflows. In the first few seconds, the water accumulated in the cup because waster was added but it had no exit. At the end, the water that was added exited the system because the cupo was full and overflowing. I can identify why the cup fills and why it stays full and overflowing by identifying the balance principle for the cup. Same idea for the atmosphere.
GMC,
You’re such a putz. Many social health issues have been decided by wee designed experimets in the public domain. Cholera in Britain in the 19th century was eradicated because a public officieal took it upon himself to identify where city well were relative to the most serious outbreaks and to the level above the thames where water was drawn. He immediately correlated well location and height above tham with cholera outbreaks…a fine piece of detective work.
We now have police reports from various city, county, and state agencies assembled willy nilly with no particular attempt to organize the data to be most effective in helping researchers ferret out the underlying causes of various assaults and attacks. They are, for example, not sent to a nationalized database where scientists can apply powerful statistical algorithms on them real time. The forms receive no feedback from the researhers who might ask for more details on the crime, its location, time, etc. Conclusions are based on knowledge, the more complete the knowledge the better.
You say thaere has been no “expolsion” of crimes in CCW states, but how do you know since the statistics are ambivalent. I say the same, the statistics are ambivalent. before you are able to avail yourself of you constituional right, you must establish that it causes no harm to your fellow citizens. You haven’t ..PERIOD.
Let me give you one final example..You may think cities and legislators can se speed limits to whatever values they want. Sorry, they can’t..it is a requirement based on the US Code that speed limits be set according to scientific methods (like traffic surveys, prior traffic incidences, average speed of motorists using the road). In this wasy, police are not free to set up “speed traps” for revenue generation by simply lowering a limit in a certain area. Law must be based on irrefutable, non-partisan, facts. All that is being asked is that hte same irrefutable, non-partisan evidence be presented,
Brian
My problems with global warming are many, but let me explain one of the biggies.
Look at all of the natural sources of carbon dioxide on our planet. Organisms in the ocean put out vast quantities of the stuff. We can only ESTIMATE it. Look at all the green stuff on earth that consumes seeOtwo. We can only ESTIMATE it. These things no doubt vary considerably from decade to decade in an enormous and complex system.Then throw in a good volcano which by ESTIMATES can put out volumes of greenhouse gasses that dwarf human output. And you want to tell me that scientists can figure it all out and tell me diffinitively that they know whats going on?????
I’m sorry, I’m not buying it, especially when you couple it with a political agenda. And make no mistake, the entire Global Cooling/Warming debate was not started by scientists, it was started by political activists. And it is driven by political activists.
Heckler,
Then perhaps you’d do your own inventory balance for us:
d(greenhouse gases)—————— = inputs viadt
industrial activity + natural inputs-outputs from chemical destruction – outputs due to oceanic and terrestrial absorption, etc.
d(ENERGY)________ = input from solardt
sources + input from reradiation – absorption by the earth an oceans +….
In other words, you can formulate your own couled differential equations, solve them, and if you see temerature rising you need to identify other “energy sinks” to get rid of the accumulation in the atmosphere. No matter how people have tried they can’t come up with sinks to remove the offending gases to the requisite degree.
Since balance principles make perfect sense, you can’t suddently have a temperature rise with a term or feedbak that gives rise to it. The only thing doing the forcing now is increased gas emissions and some solar flux increases.
But you’re free to formulate your own world climate model to see if you can find the missing terms which will make everything come out hunky dory.
Brian
This isn’t a thermodynamics lab. You’re talking about an unbelievably complex system and predicting what it will do when 99% of what you know is an educated guess.
Better to be a “greenhouse gasser” than a “head-up-your-asser” like the Rushies are.
Ben, that post wins for the year!!
The post about coal mining reminds me of a John Prine song. Of course everything reminds me of John Prine since he covered the world so well.
The song’s chorus:
“Daddy wont you take me back to Mulenburg county, down by the Green River where paradise lay.
I’m sorry my son, but you’re too late in asking, Mr. Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away”.
Do you think we could get John Prine elected presnit?
Heckler,
Science works the same all the time. You write balance equations supplemented by equations of state, etc. That’s just how it works. there’s no voodoo math. You write balance equations for masss, balance equations for energy, balance equations for momentum. It always works in the same way. the trick is identifying sources and sinks.
Scientists do this all the time. They have put limits on sources and sinks based on experiments in the field..and guess what they find? Solar radiation contributes 25% to the observed warming, the earth and oceans are absorbing CO2, so they are sinks..CO2 isn’t coming from them. So where could the CO2 be coming from? How about industrial activity as a source???
Actually Brian, the earth (soils) may start becoming a source instead of a sink. This is due to oxidation of soil carbon as they become dryer and warmer. This is one of the positive feedback loops I have mentioned (warming begets more warming). In Europe they found that during the severe drought/heatwave forests became sources rather than sinks. Add to that vegetation die-off and wildfires …
We just better hope the oceans remain sinks instead of sources. However, increasing water temperatures could even shift that.
Brian
No the math isnt voodoo, but the numbers going into the math are ESTIMATES about what we THINK is happening.
Ben points out some things of interest. The phytoplankton in the ocean absorb co2 but as they die and the creatures that eat them die they give off c02 that comes back off the ocean as the water warms. It is BELIEVED that some of the co2 stays in the ocean and sinks to the bottom but the percentages arent known for a FACT. The normal cycles of heating and cooling (i.e. El Nino vs La Nina)further complicate what is going on.
You have the same thing going on with vegetation living and dying. Again we are making Estimates based on what we Think is going on.
You are treating the numbers as if we know them for a fact and we dont.
Now look at the politics of the people pushing the global warming (caused by man) theory. The man who started it(he originally was pushing global Cooling)in the late seventies was a pretty far left wing anti-capitalist. If you look at the people who have pushed it through the past thirty years,if you look at their politics, they are all anti-capitalists and most of them have no scientific background. I FOR ONE AM HIGHLY SKEPTICAL!
Ben,
I hear ya. The point I was trying to make is that the models don’t involve any voodoo.They are based for the most part on balance priciple concepts. Even with uncertainty in the relative terms, it is clear that human activity has made a noticeable contribution to the result. Scientists also perturb the models to see what would happen if they were indeep mistaken on the magnitude of a term or terms, and the results have been that human activity is still a potent contributor to the problem
Brian
Then throw in the fact that you have a lot of researchers who count on federal grants to do research ( they generally but not always tend to be left of center university types who tend to be anticapitalist)saying that “oh we may have a problem here, we need to study this further, send us some money.
Follow the money and look at the politics of those pushing it the hardest.
Heckler,
Scientists in all fields grub for handouts from the Federal government. Theyare generally required to report on progress toward the stated goals and to have their work reviewed by outside peers. It is extremely difficult to falsify or fake results to stay on the gravy train. R&D grant application and review is pretty cut throat.
Brian
I want you to know I’m not saying you are wrong, I’m saying don’t be damn sure that you’re right. There’s a lot of politics involved here and bad politics don’t make for good science.
Heckler,I’m not claiming to be right. What I’m claiming is that a threat has been identified, and the threat has some probability of being true. That being the case, we should take steps to ameliorate the problem
Britain hasn’t suffered a major storm surge flood in quite a while, but they too the trouble to build storm surge gates to protect London from potential Thames flooding.
On a personal level, we buy fire and flood insurance to protect us from “what if” scenarios.
Doesn’t it make sense to take at leasts some steps to protect ourselves from a potential threat?
By the way, an ironic twist to all of this safety, health, pollution stuff, is that industry has gone to it kicking and screaming yet come out more profitable each time. Anti-pollution measures reduced cooling water consumption, smokestack emmissions, introduced new technology that recovered “waste” products for re-use in a higher value way, etc.
Brian, Heckler:
I’m not an engineer, but I’m not an idiot either. Here’s how I see it.
There is some evidence of “global warming.” I’m not sure that term adequately describes the problem, but it’s the term we have. I’m less than convinced those who argue that man’s to blame really know what they’re talking about. I have a feeling we know a lot less than we think we know. There simply aren’t enough good records, for long enough, to KNOW what’s going on.
That said, it only makes sense to take steps, NOW to amelioriate the problem. The harms, if the “sky is falling” types are right are catastrophic. And there are real benefits, right now, to acting. Lowering pollution, reducing dependence on a known limited and polluting fossil fuel with all the political an security issues oil dependence causes, etc. We develop this technology, and sell it to the rest of the world.
In short – the smart move is to act, now, to reduce greenhouse gases. Even if the “sky is falling” types are wrong, we win. And if they are right, well, it’s ugly.
There. My two cents.
And Brian – why the gun thread post is here, I don’t know. But I won’t bite. I still disagree, and you’re still wrong on legal/constitutional principles.
Reducing pollution is fine. Increasing efficiencies is fine.
But here’s a nice little read from another sceptic.
http://blog.sciam.com/index.php?title=are_you_a_global_warming_skeptic_part_ii&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1&ref=rss
He did a nice job of listing the skeptics’ claims. However, they have ALL been rebutted numerous times.
You will note that the compiler did not assert that the claims were true, only that they had been raised.
Perhaps when I have time I will cut/paste the piece and respond yet again to the specific claims.
Part I.Warming may not actually be occurring. Most respondents seemed to agree that the global average temperature is rising, but some did not. Their doubts hinged mostly on the reliability of temperature and CO2 reconstructions.A. This past winter was so cold. Where’s the warming?Past winter was quite mild.
B. The hockey-stick graph, which suggests the present warming trend is historically anomalous, is flawed. One respondent said it “has been proven false by many papers.” Others worried that, at least, it downplays the natural variability in climate.False assertion. We have seen much evidence to support the hockey-stickC. The ice core data, one of the ways used to reconstruct past climate conditions, are dubious. They may not represent the global paleoclimate because they sample only a few locations; they appear to contradict the paleobotanic (leaf stomata) data; and they cannot be meaningfully compared with modern surface temperature readings, because they are distinct data sets.Ice core data have been well correlated with both ocean sediments, terrestrial sediments, and paleobiology
D. Ground temperature readings are subject to systematic errors such as the urban heat island effect. One respondent went further and complained that the Climatic Research Unit raw temperature data are “kept under wraps,” so outside observers cannot verify that selection effects were properly accounted for.This is why satellite data is used so muchE. Ground temperature readings contradict satellite measurements.FALSE
F. Reports of changes in polar climate are anecdotal and could be localized effects.FALSE. Polar and subpolar studies are widespread.
More – part 2
IV. The present warming could be a natural uptick. Respondents pointed out that climate conditions fluctuate because of volcanism, the obliquity cycle, changes in solar output, and internal (chaotic) variability.
Why, they asked, do climate scientists attribute all pre-industrial fluctuations to such natural causes and all industrial-age ones to anthropogenic ones? One respondent put it this way: “Every time I read that we have had ‘the hottest summer in 100 years’ I wonder what caused that hot summer 100 years ago.”That summer 100 years ago was local – what we are seeing today is global.A. It could be a rebound from the Little Ice Age or indeed the last Pleistocene glaciation.FALSE. We have far exceeded the window of natural variation
B. It correlates “nearly perfectly” with solar output.FALSE. There is no solar variation of this magniture nor in phase.C. It could be explained by variations in cloud cover, which alter how much sunlight the planet absorbs. The cloud cover could, in turn, be explained by variations in cosmic ray flux, modulated by solar magnetic cycles.SAY WHAT? Cosmic rays making clouds?
D. It could be explained by decreases in Earth’s magnetic field strength.?????
E. It could be explained by natural methane sources, ranging from termites to the recently discovered aerobic processes in plants.This is part of the positive feedback loop that has been studied. Changes in climate lead to changes in biotic response – i.e. warming begets more warming.F. It could be partly anthropogenic, but the natural variability is larger. A number of respondents argued that it is hubris to suggest that humanity could have such a large effect on the planet. “Many people seem to have a very exaggerated view of how significant we—and our activities—are,” one wrote.
CO2 levels today are much higher than at any time in at least a million years. Today’s levels are as much higher than a normal interglacial period than an interglacial is higher than a glacial.
V. CO2 emissions cannot explain the warming. This is complementary to the previous item on natural causes, but I broke it out because respondents offered such a variety of hypotheses for why CO2 cannot cause warming.A. Negative feedbacks stabilize the climate system against the direct effect of added CO2. One respondent wrote: “The Earth’s ecosystem is far too robust to be affected by this minor change [in CO2 levels over the past century].”
Don’t we wish. There are stronger positive feedback loops that have been extremely well documented.
B. If CO2 drove climate, changes in gas levels should be followed by changes in temperature. Yet paleoclimate data show the opposite: temperature changes first, then the gas levels.
As has been well documents there are feedback loops. CO2 both drives and is driven by climate.
C. In modern times, temperature and CO2 have been only weakly correlated. For instance, there have been long periods of declining temperatures even as CO2 levels have risen. Climate scientists attribute this to masking by aerosol cooling, but their explanation struck many respondents as ad hoc. Also, most human emissions came after 1950, yet the rise in temperature started earlier.
Aerosol effects are well documented – they also tend to be regional rather than global.D. High CO2 levels earlier in geologic history (for example, during the late Ordovician) did not correlate with high temperatures.FALSE. Berner and others have shown the positive correlation between CO2 and temperature throughout the Phanerozoic.
E. CO2 is a pittance compared to water vapor. By one estimate, it can cause only 0.2% to 0.3% of the warming.
FALSE. CO2 is a major fraction as has been demonstrated. Water vapor is part of the positive feedback loop and equilibrates quickly.F. The greenhouse effect has “saturated”—further CO2 input does not increase it.FALSE. Continued increases of CO2 will lead to continued increases in infra-red opacity.Methan, by the way, is even better at increasing IR opacity.
G. No one has done lab experiments to study CO2 absorption.
Many studies have been done; both in the lab and in the field (field studies are more relevant)H. If CO2 causes warming, then the warmed air should rise, reducing air pressure at the surface. That is not observed. The correspondent who raised this objection cited Marcel Leroux’s “Mobile Polar Highs” theory.
Warmed air does rise but the total air mass remains the same. Where does this guy think it goes? By the way; this IS part of the reason for the increased severity of storms as the atmosphere attempte to redistribute energy.
I. Although CO2 may be a factor, rising levels of this gas are due not to emissions but to reduced uptake by the oceans (perhaps caused by a diminished phytoplankton population).Another of the positive feedback loops that contradict the negative feedback loop falsity.
VI. Climate models are unconvincing. In this category, I put the argument that, whatever the inherent plausibility of anthropogenic global warming, climate scientists have yet to present a solid case. The concerns here revolve around the inability of models to capture the complexity of the climate system.
A. The correlation of CO2 levels with temperature is not causation.
The positive feedback loop between CO2 and temp have been fully described. It is both causation and caused.B. Weather forecasting is so unreliable. How could long-term climate forecasting be any better?
Climate involves the averages; specific forecasts tiny locations. By the way; Katrina hit as and where predicted.C. The range of model predictions is wide, casting doubt on their reliability.
(a) the range is not all that wide, (b) we acknowledge that range, and (c) no matter where you decide to look in that range it is far outside historical norms.D. Models can’t even predict El Nino.
Models do predict the ENSO cycle quite well. They have also shown the shortening of the cycle as overall temps have increased.E. Models can’t even explain past data. One respondent wrote: “Claiming the models can predict climate is either wishful thinking, ignorance or deceit.” Others were more circumspect. One of the few respondents to say what could change their minds wrote: “I’d like to see environmental data from the 1970s fed into today’s climate models and the ‘predictions’ match what actually happened.” Another asked whether models can explain climate over geologic time.Models have been well correlated with historical data over geologic time; particularly for the recent (million years or so) past.
F. Models are not proof. They can be used to prove anything. Being non-falsifiable, they are not really science.
Models are science. They are falsifiable in that we can feed in historical drivers and then compare predicted results with historical observations. This has been done.
G. The burden of proof rests with those claiming anthropogenic warming. Because mitigating climate change would entail huge costs, and because past warming episodes have been natural, it is up to climate scientists to dispel all reasonable doubts—not to climate skeptics to prove them wrong.I suppose there are those who believe that. It is like the cigarette industry making similar claims years ago. Perhaps AFTER the patient has died they will notice.
VII. Warming is a good thing, so we shouldn’t try to stop it. The arguments here varied from specific benefits of warming to general reassurances that Earth and its inhabitants have done just fine in earlier periods of warming.A. It will increase humidity in tropical deserts and improve the lot of high-latitude regions.Increased strength of the tropical high will have the opposite effect.
B. Higher CO2 levels encourage plant growth, and that’s good.
CO2 is not the limiting nutrient.C. Sea level will rise gradually enough that we can readily adapt. The example the respondent gave was beachfront property. Its value will gradually decline as sea levels gradually rise, encouraging a move farther inland over the usual cycle of property investment.Tell that to residents of island countries that disappear.
D. Historically, humanity has done better during periods of warmer climate.That is only true within the historical envelope of warm-cold cycles (Milankovitch). We are entering a hot phase well outside of that envelope.
E. For most of its history, Earth has been warmer than today. The idea is that global warming is nothing to fear because it merely takes us back to a more natural set of conditions. Animals and plants seemed to do just fine in those periods of warm climate. One respondent wrote: “Our present chilly climate is the aberration when judged on a geological time scale.” Over geologic time, the global mean temperature is 22 degrees C, versus today’s 15.5 degrees C.Over geologic time the continents were not where they are today.
F. It staves off the next glaciation, which we’re due for.In a few thousand years that might matter.
G. Claims that global warming has worsened storm damage, or will do so, are overblown. If storm damage seems to have increased, it is simply because more people live in storm-prone regions and their plight is more widely publicized than before.
FALSE. Record storm severity has been well documented. Yes, our stupidity in building on beaches and lowering New Orleans adds to the problem.
H. Attempts to stop global warming would do more damage they than avert. Warming might be bad, but it is better than the alternative, be it Kyoto or some other mitigation strategy. The underlying assumption here is that the null strategy—letting the economy adopt non-carbon energy sources as commodity prices dictate, without any explicit reference to global warming—carries the least costs.
FALSE. The destruction of arable crop lands through middle latitudes, particularly in the Southern Hemisphere, will cost much more than remedial actions would cost.
Most of the rest of it was simply a Luddite diatribe against scientists and science in general. Absolutely nothing new and nothing that has not been thoroughly examined and rebutted many times over.
What harm can come from global warming?
Uh, how about endangering health on a global scale, along with everything else? This article below is somewhat speculative, but it just happened to originally appear in Scientific American. . .
{By the way, I thought George Musser was quite generous in his presentation of contrarian views received.}
http://www.mindfully.org/Air/Global-Warming-Health20aug00.htm