June 11, 2010 | 0 comments
As the Climate Turns: It's Just Incredible
The ups and downs of the climate debate strain credulity.

By Bill Chameides

The ups and downs of the climate debate strain credulity.

Senate Does Not Approve Of Disapproving
The Senate hasn't done much about climate.

In keeping with the gridlock spirit that is so very much in vogue these days, 47 members of the august body voted on Thursday to make the Senate's first significant climate act a non-act -- a "resolution of disapproval" (S.J Res. 26) that sought to block the Environmental Protection Agency's ability to regulate carbon dioxide (CO2). Alas, it wasn't to be: a whopping 53 senators voted down the disapproval by rejecting a vote on it. (See how your senator voted.)

Highlights From The Disapproving Side: Travel And Orwell
Six Democrats voted with their Republican colleagues to approve the disapproval.

Among them was "first comes my people" Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), whose opposition to EPA's authority was apparently largely a matter of travel experience -- in his floor speech he argued that while "most people have never been down a mine," he, after 25 years in Congress, doesn't "even know where EPA is located" and therefore he wanted to vote to disapprove. (You can watch all or part of yesterday's proceedings in the video below.)

To be fair to the senator, things tend to happen at a glacial pace in Congress, and EPA just moved into its current headquarters a mere nine years ago

Balance of article at URL above.

It's disgraceful. We keep electing these politicians and they can't even control the weather. What we need is a guy in a chariot with a supply of lightning bolts. That and a large number of goats for sacrifice. That will have exactly as much effect on the weather as the latest nutty religious beliefs of the Church of Global Warming.

Are they affiliated with the Church of Evolution?

I think they are rivals: Evolution deals with adaption to a changing environment over millions of years. The Church of Global Warming says we are all doomed unless we keep everything exactly the same.

I was more pointing out the similarity of language used by evolution deniers and global-warming deniers.

There are parallels but I see different ones:

Deniers of evolution prefer to 'believe' (or with evolution disbelieve) because to them it is emotionally more satisfying than looking at and trying to understand the mass of evidence. We also have massive evidence to show that the world has warmed and cooled many many times in the past and most likely therefore will do so in future. The fossil record proves both evolution and climate change.

However some who accept accept evolution insist upon an outside guiding hand ('Intelligent Design') because it is beyond them to understand a purely natural process operating over millions of years.

Similarly some of those who recognise that warming and cooling have taken place also insist that it can no longer be a natural process. It must be caused by mankind. This makes as much sense as insisting that after billions of years the evolution of the natural world has come under human control and natural processes have stopped.

The same natural processes that warmed and cooled many times before do still operate today. That is emotionally unsatisfying for some people but it is nevertheless the truth. Emotionally it is more satisfying to believe that somebody up there is looking after us or that we can control the weather by sacrificing goats, buying carbon credits or paying pots of money to fatty Gore to make another speech.

You are in a science forum not a political soapbox.

Either put up supporting documents that say natural factors are the primary cause of current warming or take your tripe elsewhere.

Every major science body on the planet and the climate science community as a consensus acknowledge human activity as the primary cause of current warming - the physics and the observations coincide on this.

This from boots on the ground climate scientist who unlike you, understands the situation - both the science and the reality of change

Here is what Gammon had to say concerning links between humans and climate change.

This is like asking, ‘Is the moon round?’ or ‘Does smoking cause cancer?’ We’re at a point now where there is no responsible position stating that humans are not responsible for climate change. That is just not where the science is.…For a long time, for at least five years and probably 10 years, the international scientific community has been very clear.”

In case there is any doubt, Gammon went on:
This is not the balance-of-evidence argument for a civil lawsuit; this is the criminal standard, beyond a reasonable doubt We’ve been there for a long time and I think the media has really not presented that to the public.”

Dr. Richard H. Gammon
Professor of Chemistry and Oceanography*
Adjunct Professor Atmospheric Sciences, University of Washington

You have this to overcome - including over a century of understanding the physical impact of C02 on the atmosphere
Instead of wasting our time here....you could inform yourself

Background/history
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/summary.htm

and the fossil fuel companies knew this in the mid 90s..

Industry Ignored Its Scientists on Climate

By ANDREW C. REVKINPublished: April 23, 2009

For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming.

“The role of greenhouse gases in climate change is not well understood,” the coalition said in a scientific “backgrounder” provided to lawmakers and journalists through the early 1990s, adding that “scientists differ” on the issue.

But a document filed in a federal lawsuit demonstrates that even as the coalition worked to sway opinion, its own scientific and technical experts were advising that the science backing the role of greenhouse gases in global warming could not be refuted.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/scien ... .html?_r=2

But of course you in your science based wisdom know better.....think so?
Prove it...we'll wait.

Meanwhile...dolts in the Senate akin to you dither

Macdod wrote
Either put up supporting documents that say natural factors are the primary cause of current warming or take your tripe elsewhere.

Supporting documents eh? Four and a half billion years of natural warming and cooling not enough eh? What documents do you want? Those that prove the world is four and a half billion years old and/or those that prove many incidents of warming and cooling over that time? Or do you want me to prove a negative by showing that natural processes are the same over the past 30 years as they have been in the previous four and a half billion?

I don't know of any science, not astronomy, not geology, not biology, not physics, not any at all that operates on the basis that the rules changed 30 years ago. I think the onus is upon anybody who follows such an irrational viewpoint to come up with evidence, any sort of evidence, and we can then all have a good laugh.

I would say the rationally sceptical point of view is to presume business as usual. Anything else is indeed tripe.

Every major science body on the planet and the climate science community as a consensus acknowledge human activity as the primary cause of current warming - the physics and the observations coincide on this.

Every major science body on the planet eh? Even those who know nothing about the climate then. How political can you get! By the way congratulations, that's the most comprehensive Appeal to Authority I've seen for a long time.

This from boots on the ground climate scientist who unlike you, understands the situation - both the science and the reality of change

These would be the scientists who say the sea level is rising when it isn't? I don't need a scientist to tell me when it's raining and I don't believe scientists who tell me things are different to what I can see with my own eyes. I don't dispute the reality of change, change is normal.

Here is what Gammon had to say concerning links between humans and climate change.

This is like asking, ‘Is the moon round?’ or ‘Does smoking cause cancer?’ We’re at a point now where there is no responsible position stating that humans are not responsible for climate change. That is just not where the science is.…For a long time, for at least five years and probably 10 years, the international scientific community has been very clear.”

Ten years. Good lord. If they can keep this going for another few centuries they will have a record as impressive as Ptolemy and his epicycles. Quite frankly that statement is scientific rubbish as your own comments above show. You do I think concede that there are natural climate change processes. You claim that the primary cause of current climate change is human action. That is a respectable theory. The disagreement comes between the two extremes:

1. Most of the recent climate change is man-made and natural processes have had only a minor effect.
2. Most of the recent climate change is due to natural processes and human actions have had only a minor effect.

Anybody who totally ignores natural processes is either ignorant, political or both. He/she is not acting scientifically.

In case there is any doubt, Gammon went on:

This is not the balance-of-evidence argument for a civil lawsuit; this is the criminal standard, beyond a reasonable doubt We’ve been there for a long time and I think the media has really not presented that to the public.”

Ha, ha, ha. HA, HA, HA. HAR! HAR! HAR! There is not a person on the planet who has not had man-made global warming thrust down their throat by the media morning, noon and night for the past couple of decades! A documentary on just about anything and everything doesn't get on the air without a global warming aspect being included.

For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming.

Good lord, how evil of them. A different point of view. We must put a stop to that! We have to make sure that everybody has the same opinion on everything.

“The role of greenhouse gases in climate change is not well understood,” the coalition said in a scientific “backgrounder” provided to lawmakers and journalists through the early 1990s, adding that “scientists differ” on the issue.

Scientists differ on every issue. Or at least they should. It is when they all agree that I start counting my change.

But a document filed in a federal lawsuit demonstrates that even as the coalition worked to sway opinion, its own scientific and technical experts were advising that the science backing the role of greenhouse gases in global warming could not be refuted.

A document eh. Well that's the end of it. 'A Document' no less. I'm obviously wasting my time.

But of course you in your science based wisdom know better.....think so? Prove it...we'll wait.

You're asking the wrong guy. I'm just somebody who is rationally sceptical. I couldn't even disprove Ptolemy's epicycles. Guess that means he got it right after all.

Meanwhile...dolts in the Senate akin to you dither

Stick to what you do best, that's what I say.

Leonidas wrote:
Similarly some of those who recognise that warming and cooling have taken place also insist that it can no longer be a natural process. It must be caused by mankind. This makes as much sense as insisting that after billions of years the evolution of the natural world has come under human control and natural processes have stopped.

WTF are you talking about? The claims the you claim the claimants of global warming are claiming are completely wrong. Climatologists take the fact that the world heats up and cools down into consideration as far as I know. They have ice cores documenting hundreds of thousands of years testifying to this fact but in all those years we don't see trends like the ones we do now.
You have it arse backwards.

Leonidas wrote:buying carbon credits or paying pots of money to fatty Gore to make another speech.

Irony. You're talking about people who accept man-made global warming as a fact being "emotional"!? When all the anti-global warming people I come across, like you, use emotive language like "The Church of Global Warming" I couldn't care less about Gore or even the Green Party. I'm actually apolitical. A non-voter. I'm only interested in the science. Have you got it?

So now that the denialists have lost the science debate (like there was ever any real competition), all that remains is equating scientific understanding to religious belief - something that's all the more ironic as AGW denialism bears all the hallmarks of being religious in nature?

Well, I suppose that after science winning the fight after SwiftHack, denialists would be getting desperate, but right now it's just sad. I'd ask the denialist in this thread to embrace reality and stop living in a political and/or religious fantasy land, but It'd be easier teaching my dog to speak.

Yet the temperature is still not rising (thermometer readings rise though when lots of air conditioning units are sited nearby). The seas are still not rising. There is plenty of ice (and polar bears!) at the north pole. There is plenty of ice at the south pole. I wonder how many years of this will pass before the last believers finally realise they are flogging a dead horse.

Sorry guys: "Believe me I'm a scientist and lots and lots of other scientist agree with everything I say honest" got old a long long time ago. Man-made Global Warming is well on the way to joining the great junk yard of consensus science and pseudo-science containing such gems as epicycles, land bridges, eugenics, martian canals, lamarckism, steady-state creation, the luminiferous aether, preformationism and many more.

Good science provides good predictions:

Lots more hurricanes like Katrina - nope
Lots more droughts and floods - nope
Low lying islands drowned by rising seas - nope
Polar bears becoming extinct - nope
Less sea ice - nope
Milder winters - nope

Quite frankly I cannot think of a single man-made global warming scare that has had any truth to it at all. This is the hallmark of junk science and woo. Just like with Nostradamus the same bunk is endlessly recycled to show that the end of the world or whatever is going to happen soon, this time honest.

Ha, Ha, Ha!

Leonidas wrote:Yet the temperature is still not rising (thermometer readings rise though when lots of air conditioning units are sited nearby).

Yet, 2010 is likely to be the hottest year on record according to NASA. I suppose your thermometer is better than everyone else's.

Leonidas wrote:
The seas are still not rising.

You know, you should really publish your research, because it contradicts everyone else's. I'm fairly sure there's a Nobel prize in it for you.

Leonidas wrote:
There is plenty of ice (and polar bears!) at the north pole.

Again, NASA disagrees with you, but I'm sure you know better. When it comes to polar bears it seems your claim contradicts science yet again, but I suppose you being the world leading expert on everything imaginable should be enough for us to take your word for it.

Leonidas wrote:
There is plenty of ice at the south pole.

Yes, there really is. You didn't even contradict science there. However, the total land ice is dwindling, and the sea ice is growing despite rising temperatures.

Leonidas wrote:
I wonder how many years of this will pass before the last believers finally realise they are flogging a dead horse.

My guess is that denialists will be flogging this dead horse until about 2060-2080 when science predicts there will be no more ice in the Arctic. Perhaps even longer as most denialists seem to live in a fantasy land where the real world need not make itself known.

Leonidas wrote:
Sorry guys: "Believe me I'm a scientist and lots and lots of other scientist agree with everything I say honest" got old a long long time ago.

Yes, and still that's the only thing denialists do. Those of us embracing reality can at least back up our words with science. When are you going to start doing that? Wait, I forgot... you can't.

Leonidas wrote:
Man-made Global Warming is well on the way to joining the great junk yard of consensus science and pseudo-science containing such gems as epicycles, land bridges, eugenics, martian canals, lamarckism, steady-state creation, the luminiferous aether, preformationism and many more.

Maybe if you repeat that enough times it'll finally come true. While you're at it, you should wish upon a star and pray real hard too. When you're done you're welcome back to reality.

Leonidas wrote:
Good science provides good predictions:

Lots more hurricanes like Katrina - nope
Lots more droughts and floods - nope
Low lying islands drowned by rising seas - nope
Polar bears becoming extinct - nope
Less sea ice - nope
Milder winters - nope

I find what you say believable due to the fact that you sourced each one of your claims.

Oh... wai...

Leonidas wrote:
Quite frankly I cannot think of a single man-made global warming scare that has had any truth to it at all.

If you name one I'm sure we can help you.

Leonidas wrote:
This is the hallmark of junk science and woo.

Yes, denialism is the hallmark of junk science and woo. Climatology on the other hand is a well established science with as much positive evidence as the theory of evolution.

Leonidas wrote:
Just like with Nostradamus the same bunk is endlessly recycled to show that the end of the world or whatever is going to happen soon, this time honest.

This seems like projection coming from a denialist who engages in nothing but regurgitating the same old bunkum and lies that have been debunked years ago.

Leonidas wrote:
Ha, Ha, Ha!

It's fun being a troll, eh?

uke2se wrote
However, the total land ice is dwindling, and the sea ice is growing despite rising temperatures.

Wow! Amazing stuff this Global Warming. Rising temperatures produce more ice and less ice at the same time! So if the sea ice dwindles and the land ice increases that would also be due to Global Warming as well I suppose. More Sea Ice at the South Pole = Global Warming. Less Sea Ice at the North Pole = Global Warming. Fantastic! No, literally fantastic. Pull the other one, it's got bells on.

Is there anything that cannot be interpreted as evidence of Global Warming? Record Snowfall? Absence of sea level rise? People dying of cold in India and Bangladesh? Another Ice-Age?

Leonidas wrote:
Wow! Amazing stuff this Global Warming. Rising temperatures produce more ice and less ice at the same time!

It's fascinating if you'd care to look into it. My guess is that you won't.

Leonidas wrote:
So if the sea ice dwindles and the land ice increases that would also be due to Global Warming as well I suppose.

I don't know to be honest. As that isn't happening, it's purely hypothetical anyway. You are free to send an email to a climatologist and ask.

Leonidas wrote:
More Sea Ice at the South Pole = Global Warming. Less Sea Ice at the North Pole = Global Warming. Fantastic! No, literally fantastic. Pull the other one, it's got bells on.

You didn't read any of the articles I linked, did you? Your argument from personal incredulity is getting kind of tiresome. Then again, I don't blame you. Detachment from reality can be hard on people.

Leonidas wrote:
Is there anything that cannot be interpreted as evidence of Global Warming?

Quite some things, yes. Then again, science is more interested in positive evidence than negative evidence. Do you have any evidence against global warming? No?`Thought so.

Leonidas wrote:
Record Snowfall?

Can be a sign of global warming, yes. I won't waste my time explaining this to you as you wouldn't want to hear it.

Leonidas wrote:
Absence of sea level rise?

Absence of sea level rise? I just proved that there has been a sea level rise. Try to read people's replies in the future. It saves you from looking dumb.

Leonidas wrote:
People dying of cold in India and Bangladesh?

Extreme shifts in local climate is evidence, yes.

Leonidas wrote:
Another Ice-Age?

Well, again we're talking hypotheticals. There isn't another ice-age on its way, no matter what clowns like Watts tell you.

I must say, you really are way behind in your understanding of the subject you wish to whisk away. Normally when creationists and other people like you try to pretend science doesn't exist they read up a bit more on the subject first. I guess you skipped that part.

Let's face it I could link to articles to back up what I say but:

1. Most of them are opinion pieces, just like the opinion pieces of so many who accept the case for man-made Global Warming.
2. The usual response to any scientific piece which does not accept man-made global warming is (not from everybody but it is very common) an ad-hominem attack on the scientist on the grounds of 'big oil' etc etc.
3. 'Peer-reviewed' and 'consensus' generally come up at this point.
4. Nobody changes their view.

I am not going to post any links. I have read pieces that dispute that CO2 has any more than a minor effect on world temperature, that point out that increased CO2 is a consequence of warming not a cause of it and that warming and cooling coincide with output from the sun including its impact on cloud formation. I have also read pieces that say that even if every single factory on the planet was shut down for decades it would have only a trivial effect on world temperature.

What is the truth? The truth is that predictions of next weeks weather are very uncertain and next year's climate even more so. Climate and Weather predictions more than a few days ahead have a dreadful record of accuracy. All some scientists and weather men seem to do is take a nice looking graph and extend it off into the future as if a trend, any trend, will continue for ever.

And then there is the alarmist fringe: We are all doomed, we will all be flooded many feet deep, the sky is falling, all disasters are due to global warming and it is going to get worse. This is what I call tabloid science. It smells strongly and it's getting smellier.

Leonidas wrote:Let's face it I could link to articles to back up what I say but:

1. Most of them are opinion pieces, just like the opinion pieces of so many who accept the case for man-made Global Warming.

Except that I can present peer-reviewed science while you - as you so correctly point out - couldn't. In fact, if you look at some of the links I provided above, you will find such peer-reviewed science articles.

Leonidas wrote:
2. The usual response to any scientific piece which does not accept man-made global warming is (not from everybody but it is very common) an ad-hominem attack on the scientist on the grounds of 'big oil' etc etc.

No, the usual first response is a skeptical approach to the finding, especially if it contradicts the main body of science. As has been the case with every single denialist paper, it's normally very well deserved skepticism, and the reason the "science" presented by denialists is so bad is because 1, they are creating "science" that fits with a political agenda, and 2, they are wrong.

Leonidas wrote:
3. 'Peer-reviewed' and 'consensus' generally come up at this point.

Yes, the peer-review system, loathed by anti-science types and woo peddlers, like AGW denialists and creationists.

Leonidas wrote:
4. Nobody changes their view.

Wrong. Scientists change their view all the time as new evidence comes in. That's what most denialists don't get. Science is about the evidence, not about politics.

Leonidas wrote:
I am not going to post any links.

I never expected you to.

Leonidas wrote:
I have read pieces that dispute that CO2 has any more than a minor effect on world temperature, that point out that increased CO2 is a consequence of warming not a cause of it and that warming and cooling coincide with output from the sun including its impact on cloud formation. I have also read pieces that say that even if every single factory on the planet was shut down for decades it would have only a trivial effect on world temperature.

And I'm sure those opinion pieces were terribly convincing to you, mainly because they told you what you wanted to hear. I wish I could just tune out everything I didn't want to hear, but then again, I live in the real world, where bad things happen.

Leonidas wrote:
What is the truth?

The best science can give us is a theory, and that's the theory of AGW. It holds up to predictions and is based on solid science.

Leonidas wrote:
The truth is that predictions of next weeks weather are very uncertain and next year's climate even more so.

You shouldn't mix up weather and climate. You seem to be at a grade-school level in your understanding of climate science.

Leonidas wrote:
Climate and Weather predictions more than a few days ahead have a dreadful record of accuracy.

Climate predictions are fairly good, actually. Weather predictions I tend to agree on to an extent, but only because of my rained-in picnic. Then again, meteorology and climatology are very different things.

Leonidas wrote:
All some scientists and weather men seem to do is take a nice looking graph and extend it off into the future as if a trend, any trend, will continue for ever.

I take it you've never actually met a scientist.

Leonidas wrote:
And then there is the alarmist fringe: We are all doomed, we will all be flooded many feet deep, the sky is falling, all disasters are due to global warming and it is going to get worse. This is what I call tabloid science. It smells strongly and it's getting smellier.

If you could bring up an example we could discuss it. You seem to be a very angry person, and I'd like to help alleviate some of that anger by explaining to you how you are wrong to disregard an entire field of science simply because it contradicts your political stance.

Leonidas wrote:Let's face it I could link to articles to back up what I say but:

1. Most of them are opinion pieces, just like the opinion pieces of so many who accept the case for man-made Global Warming.

Fortunately the non-denialist side of the debate has facts and science as well.

Sea levels are rising as a global average - Fact
Sea Ice volumes in the arctic are falling as an average - Fact
Average sea temperature are rising - Fact
Average land temperatures are rising - Fact.

As for the "higher temperatures because stations are near air conditioners", guess what? The entire rest of the world does not have the US love of air-con. The figures from the rest of the world also show comparable temperature rises. And studies in the US that either compensated for poor siting or excluded such sites confirmed that yes, temperatures are indeed rising.

Leonidas wrote:2. The usual response to any scientific piece which does not accept man-made global warming is (not from everybody but it is very common) an ad-hominem attack on the scientist on the grounds of 'big oil' etc etc.
3. 'Peer-reviewed' and 'consensus' generally come up at this point.
4. Nobody changes their view.

Yes 'peer-reviewed' does come up because its the method that stops people pulling results out of thin air or using shoddy methodologies. Its what helps differentiate between conclusions that can be verified and making stuff up.

Credible science overwhelmingly states: Global Warming is real, its happening more rapidly than at any previous time before we industrialised, and humanity is contributing to it.

Leonidas wrote:I am not going to post any links.

Well that's because you have no links to credible data.

Leonidas wrote:I have read pieces that dispute that CO2 has any more than a minor effect on world temperature,

Thats piece was lying then, even minor changes in C02 production disrupts the equilibrium between the amount that is produced and the amount that can be removed by natural processes.

Leonidas wrote:that point out that increased CO2 is a consequence of warming not a cause of it

More lies by the authors then, CO2 is a cause of warming, that is an undeniable fact of physics. The release of sequestered CO2 from some areas (i.e. due to melting permafrost) is a result of warming that ultimately causes more warming up to a certain point, its a feedback effect.

Leonidas wrote:and that warming and cooling coincide with output from the sun including its impact on cloud formation. I have also read pieces that say that even if every single factory on the planet was shut down for decades it would have only a trivial effect on world temperature.

It is true that Solar cycles do have an effect on temperatures, what the lying sacks of excrement that authored these articles obviously neglected to include is that at the point in the cycle we are currently at energy levels from the sun are falling so we should be seeing cooling, instead we are seeing warming. Gee I guess some other factor than the sun might be involved.

And more lies, If every single factory on the planet was shut down it would reduce human C02 output by about 25%, that would definitely have an effect on the rate of change of global temperature but not stop warming as we would still be producing enough CO2 to tip the balance between overall production and overall removal. The majority of C02 is produced by power generation and cars/trucks.

Leonidas wrote:What is the truth? The truth is that predictions of next weeks weather are very uncertain and next year's climate even more so. Climate and Weather predictions more than a few days ahead have a dreadful record of accuracy. All some scientists and weather men seem to do is take a nice looking graph and extend it off into the future as if a trend, any trend, will continue for ever.

The truth is that as an average trend the world has been warming for many, many decades and it will continue to warm unless we cut our contribution to global CO2 production.

No one makes climate predictions a week ahead, weather is a localised chaotic system whereas climate is an averaged trend over huge areas. You obviously are unaware of the difference between the 2.

Leonidas wrote:And then there is the alarmist fringe: We are all doomed, we will all be flooded many feet deep, the sky is falling, all disasters are due to global warming and it is going to get worse. This is what I call tabloid science. It smells strongly and it's getting smellier.

Then read the actual fucking science, anyway you seem happy to rely in tabloid denialism so you have no grounds to criticise tabloid alarmism.

Does Leon the lion ever back his tripe up with a single bit of science..the din of pointless roaring and posturing is wearisome at best. His nonsense has no place in the science forum since positions are expected to be supported by science publications and "facts" - not op-ed tantrums.

Meanwhile it's getting hotter

Just a reminder for the "tell me it ain't so" cadre



It's still getting warmer and we're still mostly responsible. Reality sucks when it doesn't cooperate with your ideology eh?

NASA: First half of 2010 breaks the thermometer — despite “recent minimum of solar irradiance”


July 10, 2010
http://climateprogress.org/2010/07/10/n ... r-minimum/
We're primarily responsible....
Even the fossil fuel scientists knew this in 1995 - surprised Leo missed the memo.

Industry Ignored Its Scientists on Climate

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/scien ... .html?_r=2

but of course you know better.....



not.

Leonidas wrote:There are parallels but I see different ones:

Deniers of evolution prefer to 'believe' (or with evolution disbelieve) because to them it is emotionally more satisfying than looking at and trying to understand the mass of evidence. We also have massive evidence to show that the world has warmed and cooled many many times in the past and most likely therefore will do so in future. The fossil record proves both evolution and climate change.



Similarly some of those who recognise that warming and cooling have taken place also insist that it can no longer be a natural process. It must be caused by mankind. This makes as much sense as insisting that after billions of years the evolution of the natural world has come under human control and natural processes have stopped.

The same natural processes that warmed and cooled many times before do still operate today. That is emotionally unsatisfying for some people but it is nevertheless the truth. Emotionally it is more satisfying to believe that somebody up there is looking after us or that we can control the weather by sacrificing goats, buying carbon credits or paying pots of money to fatty Gore to make another speech.

One of the standard fallacies of the global-warming deniers: "It's been this warm before." What is almost certainly coming in the next few decades has not been seen since there were human beings on the earth. If the people who have spent decades studying this problem, people who actually know something about climatology, say that there is something different this time, it would behoove those of us who aren't climatologists to listen to them.
They aren't an infallible oracle or the Pope declaring what the faithful must believe, but they are by far the best advice we are going to get. It's idiotic not to take heed to what they are saying. To glibly dismiss what they are saying because we know of natural cycles, to dogmatically assert that human beings cannot be affecting the climate (this by a person who gives no evidence of knowing the difference between climate and weather) is a way to plunge headlong into disaster.

Macdoc wrote:Does Leon the lion ever back his tripe up with a single bit of science..the din of pointless roaring and posturing is wearisome at best. His nonsense has no place in the science forum since positions are expected to be supported by science publications and "facts" - not op-ed tantrums.

Apparently not. From what I've read so far, there is nothing in his argument but dogmatic assertion that human beings can't affect the climate. That has been the continuous mantra of Rash Limpjaw over right-wing US radio for the last decade. I don't know if we're dealing with one of his fans here, but he has apparently convinced some tens of millions of people totally ignorant of any science that their judgment is better than that of the academies of science of 110 countries.