Governor Brown Launches Site to Refute Global Warming Deniers

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heatwaveEditorial Carried by Enterprise Notes How Hot This Summer Has Been –

Governor Jerry Brown on Monday announced the launching of a new website to document the dangerous effects of global warming and call on those who still deny its existence to “wake up and honestly face the facts.”  The website is Climate Change: Just The Facts.

“Global warming’s impact on Lake Tahoe is well documented. It is just one example of how, after decades of pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, humanity is getting dangerously close to the point of no return,” said Governor Brown. “Those who still deny global warming’s existence should wake up and honestly face the facts.”

According to a release from the Office of the Governor, “The impacts of climate change are clear and global.”

“America is seeing dramatic increases in food prices as a direct result of the worst drought in a half century,” the release reported.

According to the National Center for Atmospheric Research, the percentage of the earth’s surface suffering drought has more than doubled since the 1970s.

Moreover, “Last year, Arctic sea ice was at the lowest level ever recorded. Satellite images show that Arctic summer sea ice has decreased nearly nine percent per decade since 1979.”

In addition, “Last week a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showed that events like the Russian heat wave of 2010 and the European heat wave of 2003 would likely not have happened without global warming caused by greenhouse gases.”

Governor Brown participated in the annual Tahoe Summit and used the occasion to report on the impact of Global Warming on Lake Tahoe.

“In 2010, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory confirmed that over the last 25 years, the world’s largest lakes, including Lake Tahoe, have been steadily warming, some by as much as four degrees Fahrenheit,” the Governor’s office reported. “This is seven times faster than air temperatures have risen over the same period in some cases.”

They added, “That same year, researchers at UC Davis studied the impacts of climate change on the Lake Tahoe basin and concluded that there will be a continuing shift from snowfall to rain, earlier snowmelt and more runoff; an increase in drought severity, especially toward the end of the century; and a dramatic increase in flood magnitude in the middle third of the century.”

Furthermore, “In 2008, a UC Davis study predicted that climate change will irreversibly alter water circulation in Lake Tahoe, radically changing the conditions for plants and fish in the lake.”  They add, “In 2005, researchers found that Lake Tahoe is warming at almost twice the rate of the world’s oceans because of global climate change.”

“Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary there are still recalcitrant skeptics who ignore the findings of climate scientists and assert that global warming is not a problem,” said the governor’s office.

The Climate Change: Just The Facts website “debunks the claims of deniers and documents the serious impact of climate change on California – its economy, environment and public health.”

The site details “how rising global temperatures have far-reaching consequences for Californians, including sea level rise, more frequent and hotter heat waves, a declining water supply and large, intense wildfires.

“How every major scientific organization in the United States with relevant expertise has confirmed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s finding that there is a 90 percent probability human activities are causing global warming.”

And finally, about “California’s groundbreaking efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and prepare for the unavoidable effects of global warming which are now irreversible.”

“Governor Brown has pressed for increasing investment in renewable energy, efficiency and reduced dependency on fossil fuels. Last year, he signed legislation to increase California’s use of renewable energy to 33 percent by 2020,” the report indicates.

Meanwhile an editorial that appears in the Davis Enterprise today (but has been making its way around in various iterations) indicates that July was the hottest month on record and it brought with it the worst drought in 24 years.

They report that the average July temperature was 77.6 degrees, which is 3.3 degrees above average from the 20th century.

The previous record was 77.4 in 1936, the depths of the Dust Bowl.  The editorial notes, “That 0.2 degree may seem small to the layperson, but climate scientist Jake Crouch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration called it “a pretty significant increase over the last record.””

The editorial notes that the five hottest months, unsurprisingly, have been Julys, and three of them have been recent, 2006 and 2011.  The others were in the Dust Bowl years of 1934 and 1936.

What is interesting is that Sacramento may tie its second longest run this week of 100 degree temperatures, surprisingly a modest 9 (when you consider that places in Texas had 45 straight days over 100 last summer).  The record was set in 2006 – I remember that summer very well because it was not only over 100, but often over 110 and it was lying on my couch trying to escape the heat that gave birth to the Vanguard.

Despite this hot stretch here, the editorial notes that California is one of only four states with temperatures close to normal.

It goes on to report, “January through July also set a record as the warmest first seven months of a year for the United States – 56.4 degrees, 4.3 degrees above the long-term average. Moreover, last August through this past July was the hottest 12 months on record. The second hottest 12 months were June 2011 to July 2012.”

The immediate culprit for the heat is a massive dome of high pressure settling over the middle of the country that has not moved.  Along with the heat has been the worst drought in 25 years, “affecting 64 percent of the contiguous states and precipitating what could be a serious agriculture crisis. Congress, living up to the low standard it had set for itself, left for five weeks vacation without acting on a drought relief bill.”

The editorial concludes: “The science behind climate change is complex, and we are constantly warned not to conflate weather with climate but those heat records seem to bear out the warnings of scientists.”

This is an unfortunate conclusion because next time we have a cold winter, the climate deniers will be able to use a similar line.  Climate is not weather.  It is the overall trend of weather.  The strongest arguments for climate change lie in the last ten years, last twenty years and the overall trend.

A hot summer could just be a hot summer.  After all, it doesn’t take global warming for a high pressure system to set up and not move.  Just ask the folks from the Dust Bowl era.

—David M. Greenwald reporting

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About The Author

David Greenwald is the founder, editor, and executive director of the Davis Vanguard. He founded the Vanguard in 2006. David Greenwald moved to Davis in 1996 to attend Graduate School at UC Davis in Political Science. He lives in South Davis with his wife Cecilia Escamilla Greenwald and three children.

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76 thoughts on “Governor Brown Launches Site to Refute Global Warming Deniers”

  1. David M. Greenwald

    “I think Mr. Brown should quit trying to change the subject from the budgetary problems we face and that he has yet to fix.”

    Until the economy turns around, there is little he can do other than hope his tax plan passes. In the meantime, it is illogical to me that a governor with the size of staff he has, can only focus on a single issue.

  2. 91 Octane

    “dangerous effects of global warming and call on those who still deny its existence to “wake up and honestly face the facts.”

    Mr. Brown, is issuing a similar statement to the statements I’ve heard by others, particularly by many who are supportive of global warming. For some reason, many who support climate change theories feel the need to insult those who simply have not been convinced they are right. So those of us who don’t buy it yet have to “wake up” and “face the facts.” Apparently, reasonable minds cannot agree to disagree.

  3. 91 Octane

    “Until the economy turns around, there is little he can do other than hope his tax plan passes. In the meantime, it is illogical to me that a governor with the size of staff he has, can only focus on a single issue.”

    I think Mr. Brown knows full well his “tax plan” is not going to do much to resolve the crisis whether it passes or not. and I think he’s worried he’s going to take a lot of political heat for it. So we need to change the subject.

  4. rusty49

    “The previous record was 77.4 in 1936, the depths of the Dust Bowl. The editorial notes, “That 0.2 degree may seem small to the layperson, but climate scientist Jake Crouch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration called it “a pretty significant increase over the last record.”

    To this layperson that doesn’t sound like a significant increase.

  5. rusty49

    “A hot summer could just be a hot summer. After all, it doesn’t take global warming for a high pressure system to set up and not move. Just ask the folks from the Dust Bowl era.”

    That’s how the climate alarmists have to shape their argument because they know they can’t blame the Dust Bowl on greenhouse gas.

  6. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]The editorial concludes: “The science behind climate change is complex, and we are constantly warned not to conflate weather with climate but those heat records seem to bear out the warnings of scientists.”

    This is an unfortunate conclusion because next time we have a cold winter, the climate deniers will be able to use a similar line. Climate is not weather. It is the overall trend of weather. The strongest arguments for climate change lie in the last ten years, last twenty years and the overall trend.[/quote]

    Interesting when global warming adherents use a hot summer as “evidence” their theory is true, they deem it perfectly sound science. But if doubters use a cold summer as “evidence” to bolster doubt in the global warming theory – the global warming adherents howl in protest it is only “normal weather patterns”…

    [quote]I think Mr. Brown knows full well his “tax plan” is not going to do much to resolve the crisis whether it passes or not. and I think he’s worried he’s going to take a lot of political heat for it. So we need to change the subject.[/quote]

    I think Brown is terrified his “tax plan” is not going to pass…

  7. E Roberts Musser

    I think Brown is terrified his “tax plan” is not going to pass… especially when the state parks department was found to have underreported how much money they had to the tune of X $$$$ (can’t remember the figure, but it was huge – what an embarrassment!)

  8. SouthofDavis

    I think we should shift the debate from “is there global warming” to can a state with ~1/2 of 1% of the world’s population do anything to change the GLOBAL climate. California has done a lot to clean the air in the state since the 70’s, but I think we should focus on our own state and not pretend that paying millions (to a big campaign contributor) to put in solar or LED lights at a government owned building is going to do anything change the GOLBAL climate.

  9. E Roberts Musser

    To SouthofDavis: Excellent point – it is a question of diminishing returns. Do we expend gobs of money to reduce GHG emissions infinitesimally? Where I would agree with Gov Brown is to decrease our reliance on foreign oil and explore [u][b]all[/b][/u] alternative fuels (including nuclear) to obtain energy independence.

  10. Rifkin

    From The Enterprise editorial ([url]http://www.davisenterprise.com/forum/our-view/its-getting-hotter-and-hotter/[/url]): [quote]In only four states — California, Washington, Arizona and Louisiana — were temperatures close to normal.[/quote] This summer* has been very typical from my long experience living in Davis. If you were here in Davis in the late 1960s through the late 1970s, you would know we had some really scorching hot summers back then in the Sacramento area. Lots of nights where it did not cool off at all. And because the tree canopy in Davis was far less full back then, than it is today, it was much less comfortable here on a 100 degree day in the ’70s.

    That said, this morning was weird. I went out on my normal Tuesday morning bike ride at 7 AM. The ambient temperature was high for that hour–about 72 degrees–yet perfectly comfortable. What was so strange was the sky. Overhead were streaking puffs of cumulus clouds mixed with a slightly hazy blue sky. Off to the west, toward the Pacific Coast Range, it was very hazy, even smoky, perhaps due to the Lake County fires. To the east, the sky was also hazy, but not smoky. It looked like stormy weather, maybe some stratus clouds building up in the Sierra Nevada.

    If that haze moves into Davis–likely from the West–we are going to have some bad air to breathe late this afternoon. And it likely will feel humid, too. That happens sometimes. But humid summer days are not typical.

    —————-
    *This past spring was cooler than normal.

  11. Rifkin

    SOUTH: [i]”I think we should shift the debate from ‘is there global warming’ to can a state with ~1/2 of 1% of the world’s population do anything to change the GLOBAL climate.”[/i]

    I don’t buy the shift you propose. While I certainly agree that we cannot solve or even make much of a dent in the global problem of greenhouse gas emissions and atmospheric build-up–that requires a global effluent tax to fix–the debate California needs to have is this: What can we do in our state, given our limited resources, to best deal with the worst effects climate change will have on California in the future.

    We can only have that debate if we stop listening to the morons like Rush Limbaugh and his radio clones who are still arguing that global warming is a hoax.

    The two most serious effects climate change will have in California–the science is doubtless on this–will be on our water storage and on our coasts, where sea levels will rise from 40 to 55 inches.

    Due to significantly hotter winters, the Sierra Nevada snowpack will hold much less precipitation, and what it has will melt off much earlier. This is going to cause summer and fall water availability problems, because the creeks and rivers that take the snow-melt and run year long will dry up for months every year.

    So what to do about that? We need to build more dams, more reservoirs. We need to store much more water than we do now, and we obviously will need to conserve water and waste less.

    As to coastal problems from sea-level rise, most of the answers will have to be figured out at the local level. Cities may have to rezone coastal areas, so new homes are not built in land which will be under water. Those cities may have to help relocate businesses and residents and construct sea walls, and so on. At a state level, there may be highways and freeways and bridges and so on which will have to be rebuilt or re-routed. If we don’t bury our heads up Limbaugh’s butt, we can plan for these things and take action before it is upon us.

  12. Rifkin

    ELAINE: [i]”Where I would agree with Gov Brown is to decrease our reliance on foreign oil and explore all alternative fuels (including nuclear) to obtain energy independence.”[/i]

    One problem California is now dealing with is that the San Onofre nuclear power plant (in North San Diego County) is shut down. Without that electricity the state is having a hard time coping with the heat wave, as every business and many homes are using air conditioning all over our state.

    When the sea level rises, that is probably going to cause a long-term problem for San Onofre. It is right on the beach. As the Japanese tsunami demonstrated, having sea water flood over your nuclear power plant is a bad idea.

    What I would like to see is for our state to agree to a single, new model of a modern (so-called Fourth Generation) nuclear power plant. I am not an expert on this, but a letter-writer to the Davis Enterprise ([url]http://www.davisenterprise.com/forum/letters/cost-does-not-equal-value/[/url]) says that these “Integral Fast Reactors use the spent fuel to make electricity. … and (they produce) a very small amount of low-level waste (half-life of about 300 years).”

    Once we adopt a good, common model, I would like to see the state (or better, the private and public utilities) build 10 or so copies of that model. The advantage of building in scale is that they would spread the regulatory cost out over the larger number of power plants, as opposed to having a huge regulatory cost for each one.

    I don’t think we need to hurry to start this sort of (expensive) project. But once half or more drivers in California are ready to drive electric cars (or hybrid electrics, like the Volt), the 10 new nuclear power plants could provide the electricity for all those cars. And by doing so, we would be greatly reducing our carbon effluence in California, we would end our reliance on oil (foreign and domestic) for transportation, and (because electricity is much cheaper than petrol) we would end up saving money.

    Also, when we build the new nuclear facilities, we could install large numbers of electricity fueling stations, if they are necessary.*

    *I don’t know if they would be needed. If you have an electric car, today, you simply plug it into a normal outlet in your house at night and for 1/6th the cost of gasoline, you fill up for the next day’s driving.

  13. Don Shor

    The state needs to build Sites and Temperance Flat reservoirs. That is the simplest near-term action needed to deal with possible long-term effects on water supply.

  14. Frankly

    Rich – I think your morning was weird because of the fires up north and one in Vacaville yesterday. I am still waiting for the science that blames lightening on man-made global warming.

    Elaine, the amount of missing funds they found in the State Parks accounts was about $50 million. It brings up a classic conundrum for those demanding greater government. Government regulates and audits private business, but who regulates and audits the government? How many other piles of $50 million are missing in government accounts?

    “America is seeing dramatic increases in food prices as a direct result of the worst drought in a half century,”

    Here we go. Global warming is the new scapegoat of politicians for their failed economic policies.

    The larger problem here – again – is the politicization of science. Climate scientists should be furious about the launching of this website. However; I bet that few are. The reason? Scientists are generally complicit in support of politics that provide the best opportunity for grants to fund their research.

  15. Frankly

    Question?

    If the world adapts to climate change while we succeed in lowering carbon and reducing greenhouse gas, won’t we then have to adapt again? For example won’t the new “Inconvenient Truth” be a lack of carbon in the atmosphere and global cooling?

  16. Frankly

    Videos of presentations from scientists attending the most recent International Conference on Climate Change (ICCC-7):

    [url]http://climateconferences.heartland.org/iccc7/[/url]

    Here you will find plenty of reputable scientists disagreeing with the media and political template of man-made global warming.

  17. Rifkin

    [i]”Here you will find plenty of reputable scientists disagreeing with the media and political template of man-made global warming.”[/i]

    Actually, you won’t. That group of chosen “skeptics” does not include one single independent climate scientist. The conferences that put together these folks were selected by the oil and coal companies. Those are the funders of “the Heartland Institute.” This same group used to take its funding from Phillip Morris. And guess what? The “scientists” for the Heartland Institute found that there are no health risks from second-hand smoke. How convenient.

    Jeff, I know it is a hard habit to break. But you really need to actually speak with a real climate scientist and learn the facts. You are proving you are not seriously giving climate change any real thought by turning to these ideologues and industry shills and thinking they are in the climate science field. None of them is.

    I have confidence that once you interview an IPCC climatologist–UCD has a few of them–you will change your mind. The evidence is not difficult to understand. It is all there.

  18. Rifkin

    A funny Heartland Institute anecdote. Just after the tsunami struck Japan last year, a guy from Heartland came on Fox News–I was flipping the dial and tuned in for a moment–and he was presented as a PhD. nuclear power expert from the Heartland Institute. I was quite heartened by his presentation, because he said there was nothing to worry about, that no radiation would get out of the affected nuclear power plant and that Japan would recover in a matter of days.

    A week later, when it was clear his original prediction was so very wrong, I again saw this guy on Fox News, still spouting the same line, still being identified as a nuclear power expert. I wish I recalled his name now. But I looked him up at the time, and it turned out that his PhD (from some no-name school) was in economics. And his “expertise” in nuclear power had nothing to do with nuclear physics or engineering.

    The entire episode made my already low opinion of the network of stupid blonde anchor ladies even lower.

  19. Rifkin

    [quote] I looked him up at the time, and it turned out that his PhD (from some no-name school) was [b]in economics[/b]. And his “expertise” in nuclear power had nothing to do with nuclear physics or engineering. [/quote] I just tried to find this person’s name. I am not sure I found him. But if I did, his name is Jay Lehr and it turns out I remembered one thing incorrectly: Mr. Lehr has a PhD in “environmental science,” not in economics.

    Here is an exchange on Fox News with Mr. Lehr ([url]http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/hannity/transcript/are-fears-catastrophic-nuclear-meltdown-japan-warranted[/url]), which sounds just like the one I remember hearing:

    [b]HANNITY:[/B] Jay, I’m looking at not only the contamination story of the USS Reagan Navy crewmembers but, you know, “this is a race against time.” You know, “Japan’s frantic efforts to avoid a meltdown.” Some people say, “we were told not to breathe the air, it’s scary.” How realistic is this threat?

    [B]JAY LEHR, THE HEARTLAND INSTITUTE:[/B] Sean, it is not at all realistic. I can tell you with the utmost confidence there will not be a health impact of anything that is going on at the Fukushima power plant. A meltdown, people interpret it as virtually a disaster, and explosion, destruction like an atomic bomb that is not true at all. A meltdown just means that the cooling of the rods has failed. The temperature is higher than can be controlled in order to create the hot water that ultimately flashes to steam and turns a turbine. So, they immediately install rods to bring the radioactive decay down to subcritical but they have leftover heat and residual radiation that has to be brought under control, it will happen naturally within a few days. They are doing the best they can.

    [b]HANNITY:[/B] I love it!

    [b]LEHR:[/b] But a total meltdown has only occurred at Three Mile Island back in 1979. That was a disaster of a nuclear plant considered 10 times more serious than Fukushima. And the rods actually did melt down, fell to the floor of the reactor building. And they only melted five-eight of an inch into five inches of steel before they cooled and the situation stopped. And as you well know, there were no health impacts from Three Mile Island.

    [b]HANNITY:[/B] Awesome!

    [b]Lehr:[/b] [U]There will not be any health impacts here.[/U] The nuclear engineers in Japan are doing a magnificent job under a situation that could never be expected. And the public in Japan has enough to worry about with a horrible disaster without worrying that there is going to be a nuclear explosion.

  20. Rifkin

    No health impacts from Fukushima? This is from Science Daily ([url]http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120717084900.htm[/url]) last month: [quote] Radiation from Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster may eventually cause anywhere from 15 to 1,300 deaths and from 24 to 2,500 cases of cancer, mostly in Japan, Stanford researchers have calculated.

    The estimates have large uncertainty ranges, but contrast with previous claims that the radioactive release would likely cause no severe health effects.

    The numbers are [b]in addition to the roughly 600 deaths[/b] caused by the evacuation of the area surrounding the nuclear plant directly after the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami and meltdown. …

    The Fukushima Daiichi meltdown was the most extensive nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. Radiation release critically contaminated a “dead zone” of several hundred square kilometers around the plant, and low levels of radioactive material were found as far as North America and Europe.

    But most of the radioactivity was dumped in the Pacific — only 19 percent of the released material was deposited over land — keeping the exposed population relatively small.

    “There are groups of people who have said there would be no effects,” said Jacobson. [/quote]

  21. Rifkin

    [i]”… it turns out I remembered one thing incorrectly: Mr. Lehr has a PhD in “environmental science,” not in economics.”[/i]

    I found a source, Mr. Lehr’s own website ([url]http://jaylehr.com/JayLehr/A-Jay_Lehr.htm[/url]), which says that Jay Lehr is “an economist and a futurist.” It seems he wears many hats, depending on who is signing the checks: [quote]Dr. Jay Lehr is a powerful, entertaining speaker who combines a deep understanding of both science and economics in describing the impact of advancing technologies on the local, regional, national, and global economy. [b]Economist and Futurist[/b] Dr. Jay Lehr makes people feel good about the environment and American Agriculture. [/quote] But wait, there is more. Jeff Boone cited that oil industry group of skeptics as “experts” on global climate: It turns out Jay Lehr also bills himself as a global warming expert ([url]http://nancyjthorner.wordpress.com/2012/05/26/18-facts-to-combat-global-warming-scare-tactics-presented-by-jay-lehr-the-heartland-institute-science-director-at-heartlands-7th-international-conference-on-climate-change-in-chicago-may-21-23/[/url]).

    One word of caution about “Dr. Leher”: Doctor.

    Whenever someone with a PhD., but no M.D. or DVM, insists on being called Doctor This or That, chances are there is something wrong with him. He is compensating. He likely lacks expertise and uses the “doctor” title as a credibility crutch. I am not saying this is always the case. But in my long experience, people like Dr. Phil or Dr. Laura are not the people I would turn to when I need an expert. Same with Dr. Lehr.

  22. Frankly

    From the Heartland Institute’s website:

    [quote]The Heartland Institute is a publicly supported charity under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Its funding comes from tax-deductible contributions from approximately 1,600 individuals, foundations, and corporations.

    Heartland does not solicit or accept grants from government agencies, does not conduct contract research, and does not rely on direct mail to raise money. No corporate donor contributes more than 5 percent of its annual budget.

    People contribute to The Heartland Institute because they share our belief that better information and understanding can improve public policies in such important areas as education, environmental protection, and health care. For 27 years, Heartland authors have discovered and promoted free-market solutions to social and economic problems.

    We do not take positions in order to appease or avoid losing support from individual donors. We have, in fact, a long record of standing behind our research even when it means losing the support of major donors.

    For many years, we provided a complete list of Heartland’s corporate and foundation donors on this Web site and challenged other think tanks and advocacy groups to do the same. To our knowledge, not a single group followed our lead.

    Regrettably, listing our donors in this way allowed people who disagree with our views to accuse us of being “paid” by specific donors to take positions in public policy debates, something we never do. After much deliberation and with some regret, we now keep confidential the identities of all our donors. This is standard practice by nonprofit advocacy organizations regardless of their philosophies.
    [/quote]

    Also from their website:
    [quote]More than 125 academics and professional economists serve as policy advisors to The Heartland Institute, including members of the faculties of Harvard University, The University of Chicago, Northwestern University, Georgetown University, Pepperdine University, Vanderbilt School of Law, and scores of other respected universities.[/quote]

    Here appears to be the fundemental conflict:[quote]The important point at the base of this controversy is that the published work of many scientists, even those who publicly support the alarmist position in the global warming debate, supports the view that most or all of the modern warming is due to natural causes. This is simply a fact, and an embarrassing one to global warming alarmists. No amount of PR spin can hide this.[/quote]

    I understand that the scientists working for this entity submit their research articles for peer review.

    Here is a link to a FAQ that answers the attacks against them:
    [url]http://heartland.org/reply-to-critics[/url]

    Instead of dismissing and demonizing qualified people having a different opinion, wouldn’t it be better to have some real debate on the substance of these different opinions?

  23. Rifkin

    [i]”Instead of dismissing and demonizing qualified people …”[/i]

    Not one single qualified climatologist in that entire group. Not one.

    These are a combination of non-experts posing as experts–Jay Lehr, nuclear energy economist with a degree in environmental science seems to fit the non-expert expert category–and people who are legitimate scientists who have never done any peer reviewed science in the field of climatology, but are happy to spout off their opinions on research they have neve done or even given serious study to. A good example of that latter group is now former skeptic and Koch brothers’ paid physicist Richard Muller.

    Two important facts about Muller: one, he is a physicist, not a climatologist. So when he was a paid skeptic, his skepticism was about a field he did not actually study. There are a lot of other paid skeptics with similar expertise, where their real science is in areas other than climate science; and two, once he actually got around to studying global warming, actually doing his first science in the field, he found out his earlier skepticism was based on myths, not reality. That is true of many actual climatologists, who started out doubtful, but then after doing real research, they found out there is no scientific doubt about global warming, there is no doubt that human activity is the cause and there is no doubt that there will be very serious problems going forward (that we ought to be planning for now) due to global warming caused by humans activities, principally burning coal and petroleum.

  24. David M. Greenwald

    Good points Rich, especially with regards to Muller. Personally the fact that Muller, using Koch brothers money to test the research and finding the data supported the global warming theory is devastating to the skeptics and I am not sure they have a leg to stand on at this point.

  25. Don Shor

    Heartland:[i] “Our climate work is attractive to funders, especially our [b]key Anonymous Donor[/b] (whose contribution dropped from $1,664,150 in 2010 to $979,000 in 2011 – [b]about 20% of our total 2011 revenue[/b]). He has promised an increase in 2012…”[/i]
    Desmogblog (http://s.tt/197zO)

    Have fun with the links: [url]http://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-institute-exposed-internal-documents-unmask-heart-climate-denial-machine[/url]

  26. Frankly

    Ok, so then are we saying that only climatologists should be allowed to contribute the science of this debate? That is pretty restricting in terms of theories of causation don’t you think? Isn’t the field of climate studies informed by many different disciplines?

    Here is a list of scientists with opinions differing from the mainstream…[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming[/url]

    Are all of them disqualified?

  27. David M. Greenwald

    “Ok, so then are we saying that only climatologists should be allowed to contribute the science of this debate? “

    Depends, do you want a physicist to operate on you or would you prefer a medical doctor?

  28. Frankly

    Here is another group of scientists that signed an opinion piece “No Need to Panic About Global Warming:
    [quote]Claude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris; J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting; Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University; Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society; Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences; William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton; Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.; William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology; Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT; James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University; Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences; Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne; Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator; Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service; Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.[/quote]
    Are all of them disqualified?

    I think this random disqualification is why people can write statements like: “97% of scientific experts agree that man-made climate change is real”. The standards for who qualifies as a “scientific expert” seems to be pretty tightly controlled and potentially significantly understates the number of scientists that disagree.

  29. Frankly

    [i]Depends, do you want a physicist to operate on you or would you prefer a medical doctor?[/i]

    That is a funny analogy.

    Related…

    Anesthesiologists have changed the procedure for surgeons harvesting organs from donors. They now administer anesthesia as a result of what anesthesiologists observed in patient response during the years where surgeries were done without anesthesia.

    My point here is that it is generally a very good idea to involve other experts to think outside the constraints of a single discipline. Otherwise, there is a greater risk we will all be unnecessarily harmed.

  30. wdf1

    Rifkin: [i]Two important facts about Muller: one, he is a physicist, not a climatologist.[/i]

    DMG: [i]Depends, do you want a physicist to operate on you or would you prefer a medical doctor?[/i]

    I have to take issue, here. Earth science is a field in which many subfields may contribute and overlap. Climate processes heavily involve concepts of physics. Muller has made peer-reviewed contributions to the field of Earth Science, including Nature, which is a biggie in science. That fact gives him baseline credibility for commenting on climate change, in my view. You can check out his website ([url]http://muller.lbl.gov/[/url]), if you want. And by all means, call up your contacts in science at UCD for a second opinion on the matter. His credibility as a scientist on the matter is what made his recent conclusions noteworthy.

  31. Don Shor

    “No need to panic” is completely different from “97% of scientific experts agree that man-made climate change is real.” Those two positions are not mutually exclusive.
    There are [i]thousands[/i] of geophysicists studying climate change, and lots of places where they convene. The American Geophysical Union conference is their main gathering place. There is a wide range of research focus presented there. There are also researchers in other disciplines who work on other aspects of climate change. They publish in peer-reviewed journals.
    Heartland Institute is a front, to put it simply. Their meetings are a gathering place for people [i]paid[/i] by Heartland and its related front organizations to convene to try to give an air of respectable opposition on climate change. It is unnecessary. Researchers across the spectrum can present at AGU meetings. Well-done research can be published in legitimate peer-reviewed journals. Lively discussions take place on forum boards all around the internet. Geophysicists participate in those discussions.
    You find out who that anonymous donor is that covers 20% of their budget, let us know.

  32. David M. Greenwald

    Interesting response in Forbes to that:

    [quote]But the most amazing and telling evidence of the bias of the Wall Street Journal in this field is the fact that 255 members of the United States National Academy of Sciences wrote a comparable (but scientifically accurate) essay on the realities of climate change and on the need for improved and serious public debate around the issue, offered it to the Wall Street Journal, and were turned down. The National Academy of Sciences is the nation’s pre-eminent independent scientific organizations. Its members are among the most respected in the world in their fields. Yet the Journal wouldn’t publish this letter, from more than 15 times as many top scientists. Instead they chose to publish an error-filled and misleading piece on climate because some so-called experts aligned with their bias signed it. This may be good politics for them, but it is bad science and it is bad for the nation.[/quote]

    cite: here ([url]http://www.forbes.com/sites/petergleick/2012/01/27/remarkable-editorial-bias-on-climate-science-at-the-wall-street-journal/[/url])

  33. Don Shor

    Seriously, Jeff, if any liberal organization was making such concerted, well-documented, secret effort to propagandize on a particular issue — paying researchers, paying government officials, funded by special-interest groups — would you give it the slightest credence?

  34. Rifkin

    JB: [i]”Ok, so then are we saying that only climatologists should be allowed to contribute the science of this debate?”[/i]

    Yes, of course. This is a debate about climate science. It’s not a debate about hydrology. The real problem for the coal and oil companies who are funding the skeptics–I know this in part because my annual financial report I get from Exxon Mobil tells me they are funding the Heartland Institute and others of that ilk–is that the paid skeptics never, ever do any climate science. And if they do, like Muller finally did, they are no longer skeptics, and certainly no longer will they get money from the coal and oil companies to pretend they know something factual.

    All of this bogus “skepticism” is just a re-run of the tobacco companies’ approach to health research. They would pay various quacks to make statements that tobacco was no big deal, that second hand smoke was fine, that tobacco additives were just for flavor and not for addiction, etc. The Heartland Institute itself, which got millions of dollars from Phillip Morris, was at the heart of this ruse. Other doctors or medical researchers who were likewise tobacco-is-bad skeptics, but who were not quacks were never engaged in the science of studying tobacco’s health effects and so on. So they were billed as experts and doctors, which was true, but they were not really experts on what they tobacco companies were paying them to be.

    So if you believe that the oil and coal companies’ paid skeptics are being honest, then I guess you believe that the experts who are funded by Phillip Morris are equally reasonable “experts.”

    How about this challenge: Show me one single climate scientist who studies climatology at a major research university and has done peer-reviewed science in the field of climatology who is a skeptic. When you cannot name one, not even one, you know your argument is blown.

  35. Rifkin

    [i]”I have to take issue, here. … Muller has made peer-reviewed contributions to the field of Earth Science, … His credibility as a scientist on the matter is what made his recent conclusions noteworthy.”[/i]

    I never questioned him as a scientist. He is a physicist. But per his own admission, until this year, he had never studied any actual global warming science and he said he had never reviewed the science from any part of the IPCC studies.

    So, yes, he was qualified to do climate research. But he had never done any when he was a paid skeptic. What then happened once he actually studied the science?

  36. Frankly

    David, on the Forbes article on the WSJ, there is much more we would need to undertand about the reasons why the article was turned down. This is the opinion section. The opinin section does tend to lean right. However, the articles pages are balanced and objective. Neverhtheless, was the article too long? Did it have an appropriate tone?

    Frankly, there is plenty of media stuff supporting the theories of global warming. Maybe the WSJ just decided it was too reduntant and boring.

    Don, you just described much of what I dislike about the man-made global warming group-think, fear-fest. And I do give it the slightest credence because, frankly, it is all we have.

  37. Frankly

    David – you do also realize that the article you quoted as an opinion piece by a biased scientist with connections to a known leftist organization.

  38. David M. Greenwald

    “David, on the Forbes article on the WSJ, there is much more we would need to undertand about the reasons why the article was turned down. This is the opinion section. The opinin section does tend to lean right. However, the articles pages are balanced and objective. Neverhtheless, was the article too long? Did it have an appropriate tone?”

    It’s not an article, it’s a letter. They could have made it work. I’m not really as interested in WSJ editorial policies as I am the writers of the letter.

    “Frankly, there is plenty of media stuff supporting the theories of global warming. Maybe the WSJ just decided it was too reduntant and boring.”

    I’m obviously not the WSJ, but I would consider this kind of submission liquid gold for my site.

    I think Rich makes a good point – I think you should see if any of those 16 authors authored a peer reviewed article on Climate science. Reading it myself, it seems most of their arguments were debunked ironically by Muller’s own research.

  39. Rifkin

    Jeff, how about this: call up UCD’s leading climate scientist, Prof. Bryan Weare (752-3445) and ask him about the science of global warming. Alternatively, drop by his office (247 Hoagland Hall) and ask him every question you can think of. Weare is a very moderate man who is not driven by politics. He is a scientist who actually studies the climate.

    I would hope that you are not so sclerotic that your mind cannot be changed by hearing the facts.

  40. Frankly

    Rich, from the wikipedia link I posted…

    [quote]William M. Gray, Professor Emeritus and head of the Tropical Meteorology Project, Department of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University said in a 2006 newspaper interview: “I am of the opinion that [global warming] is one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated on the American people.”[/quote]

    Don: [i]Huh? Please explain[/i]

    You made the comment:
    [quote]Seriously, Jeff, if any liberal organization was making such concerted, well-documented, secret effort to propagandize on a particular issue — paying researchers, paying government officials, funded by special-interest groups — would you give it the slightest credence? [/quote]

    My point was that you were describing exactly my opinion of much of the man-made global warming alarmists. And my point was that I do consider their opinions because everyone is suspect of bias and conflicts of interest. If I disqualified all experts for this, there would not be very many people left to listen to. So, I listen to all and draw my opinions. And I have no problem changing my mind if the evidence provides me what I need to do so.

  41. Rifkin

    [i]”[b]William M. Gray[/b], Professor Emeritus and head of the Tropical Meteorology Project, Department of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University …”[/i]

    Funny you should pick out another odd guy with a questionable history.

    Prof. Gray (who is 83 years old and has never published any peer-reviewed research on global warming and has never scientifically examined the scientific research done by others in the area of global warming–his area of meteorological expertise is with hurricanes) famously said 5 years ago that, while he believed there had been some global warming and he believed that it was partly caused by human activities, he was sure that in 3 or 4 years, the earth would be [b]cooling[/b] again. [quote] “I don’t question that (there has been global warming). And humans might have caused a very slight amount of this warming. Very slight. But this warming trend is not going to keep on going. My belief is that three, four years from now, the globe will start to cool again, as it did from the middle ’40s to the middle ’70s.”[/quote] Five years have passed since Bill Gray made that statement about global cooling. So how well has this unscientific skeptic’s unscientific prediction proven to be?

    * 2010, 3 years after Gray said we would be in a cooling period, was the hottest global year ever recorded ([url]http://voices.washingtonpost.com/post-carbon/2010/12/2010_hottest_climate_year_on_r.html[/url]).

    * 2011, 4 years after Gray’s statement, was one of the 10 hottest years ([url]http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/11/111130-global-warming-hottest-decade-year-2011-science-environment/[/url]) in recorded history.

    *July, 2012, 5 years after his claim, was the hottest month ([url]https://nes.ncdc.noaa.gov/pls/prod/f?p=100:1:1327210601656551::::P1_ARTICLE_SEARCH:359[/url]) ever recorded in the United States. And 2012 is again on pace to break into the top 10 hottest years ever recorded globally. Never mind that the warming trend in the arctic circle is much worse than actual global warming experts had predicted it would be 5 years ago.

    Based on the fact that Prof. Gray is not an expert on global warming, he has never scientifically studied global warming, has never published a paper in a peer-reviewed journal on global warming, has never scientifically addressed the research done by others on global warming and that his one famous statement about global warming turned out to be 100% wrong, I would hope that you might strike Bill Gray off your list of skeptics worthy of their skepticism.

  42. wdf1

    Rifkin: [i]So, yes, he was qualified to do climate research. But he had never done any when he was a paid skeptic. What then happened once he actually studied the science?[/i]

    Muller & MacDonald, 1997, [u]Science[/u]: Glacial Cycles and Astronomical Forcing ([url]http://muller.lbl.gov/papers/sciencespectra.htm[/url])

  43. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]Rich Rifkin: What I would like to see is for our state to agree to a single, new model of a modern (so-called Fourth Generation) nuclear power plant. I am not an expert on this, but a letter-writer to the Davis Enterprise says that these “Integral Fast Reactors use the spent fuel to make electricity. … and (they produce) a very small amount of low-level waste (half-life of about 300 years).” [/quote]

    Yes, I saw the letter and found it intriguing…

  44. Frankly

    Rich:

    Ok, so you don’t like Bill Gray.

    I need to get some time to pull out my previous research and recheck to provide you a list of qualified scientists opposing the template man-made global warming theories. Most of my efforts looking at this were 4 or 5 years ago. Obviously there are some still around.

    On another note:
    [quote]The first seven months of 2012 (January to July) were also the warmest of any on record since 1895[/quote]
    This begs the question… What the hell was going on in 1895?!

  45. wdf1

    JB: [i]I need to get some time to pull out my previous research and recheck to provide you a list of qualified scientists opposing the template man-made global warming theories.[/i]

    I would also be interested to see your list of qualified scientists opposing the template theory of gravity, atomic theory of matter, cellular theory of life, and plate tectonic theory. What would non- “group think” look like with those ideas?

  46. Frankly

    wdf1: I will work on those lists too. After all, while I am on the topic of intended and unintended conspiracies by politicized science to take down the Great Experiment, I might as well do so with a completely open mind! 😉

    Seriously though, how do you make a case to punish industrialized man and shift his “earth-killing exploitation” of natural resources to the much more honorable, effective and clean collective using these other scientific theories? I’m having trouble getting motivated to debate the theory of gravity on these grounds.

  47. Frankly

    [url]A recent experiment at the CERN laboratory in Switzerland is casting doubt on another idea believed by about 100 percent of scientists: Einstein’s theory of relativity. CERN scientists have found particles called neutrinos that seemed to have traveled faster than light, challenging a fundamental plank of modern science. According to the theory of relativity, a particle traveling faster than light will go backward in time.

    Environmentalists denounce climate skeptics as science deniers. But have the CERN scientists been denounced as Einstein deniers? No. The scientific community is shocked by the discovery but keeping an open mind — even about something as firmly established as the theory of relativity.[/url]

  48. Frankly

    oops… wrong tag. I meant to use the quote tag and include the URL.

    The article is here [url]http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/lets-prize-climate-skepticism[/url]

  49. wdf1

    JB quote: [i]A recent experiment at the CERN laboratory in Switzerland is casting doubt on another idea believed by about 100 percent of scientists: Einstein’s theory of relativity.[/i]

    So what would be the sensible strategy here? Hold off before declaring Einstein’s theory of relativity a certainty? Should we have held off on developing nuclear weapons during WWII? Should we cut back on our use of nuclear energy on this basis?

  50. Frankly

    wdf1: No, just have a bit of scientific humility allowing that there might be some other contributing explanations to tweak or challenge the templated theory. It is the absolutism that bothers me… and I think it bothers a lot of people and should bother most people.

    The thing is… we don’t need the level of alarmism generated by this absolutism. Every damn time a polar bear dies of hunger, I have to listen to the talking heads blame me for having the audacity to have killed the poor animal by burning some fossil fuel. I have to listen to Al Gore who leaves his 28 room Tennessee mansion to fly on his private jet to lecture me how I need to allow our politicians to saddle our economy with more crippling regulations so we don’t sink underwater or bake to death. I have to listen to Messiah Obama and the European socialist demand that all of us greedy Americans stop producing and consuming while they leech more of our earnings to redistribute to those that cannot or will not produce.

    We do not need this alarmism. I think it is the main reason that over 50% of Americans do not buy the theory. Alarmists entertain, but alarmist messaging does not resonate as a policy driver… unless something big blows up like Peal Harbor. The aggravating thing for me is the greediness of the forces wishing to exploit the “crisis” of global warming. There is so much that we can all agree to do… just for the sake of making a better life for more humans… without having to throw so much shame, blame, guilt, alarm, fear and absolutism at us. These are forces of anti-traditional Americanism expoiting the science. They want a transformed society and the theories of man-made global warming are analogous to their Thor hammer. They are using it to beat us into their vision of what American should be, and it is a very wrong-headed vision.

    I frankly do not know what happen to the scientific community on this topic. When do they agree on anything? Let alone something as new and as complicated as climate change. One explanation is that we are rejecting the views of all but a narrow scope of scientific discipline. When have we done that before? Much interesting hypothesis, theory and problem solving comes from cross-discipline collaboration. Why cut others out now? I smell a rat. I smell a big mistake coming over some new discovery… or something missed. I smell future egg on the face of many taking a stubborn stand on this. However, they won’t pay any price for having done it. They will have succeeded in crippling the economy. They will have succeeded in winning more of their ideological war to shift us more away from our free market industrial might, to a Greece like state where everyone has to check with nanny government before taking a step.

    I think science needs a PR director to handle global warming. Its reputation is tarnished by how it is handling this one.

    Speaking of humble… how about that for my humble opinion? I know there is risk that I am wrong and man-made global warming theories are absolute and justify a level of alarmism. I am still reading, listening and thinking and will have no problem admitting my mistakes in judgement should I change my opinion.

  51. wdf1

    JB: [i]It is the absolutism that bothers me… and I think it bothers a lot of people and should bother most people.[/i]

    In science, technically, there is no absolutism. Just explanations that have various levels of certainty.

    W.R.T. anthropogenic global warming, though, the certainties are heading to increasingly higher levels.

    If you want to remain skeptical that’s fine. It’s good to have skeptics for everything, because it keeps everyone honest. But it is dishonest to claim your skeptical position as equivalent to that supported by the data trends, unless you can come up with a more plausible explanation than what is currently accepted. So far you have failed to do that.

  52. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]If you want to remain skeptical that’s fine. It’s good to have skeptics for everything, because it keeps everyone honest. But it is dishonest to claim your skeptical position as equivalent to that supported by the data trends, unless you can come up with a more plausible explanation than what is currently accepted. So far you have failed to do that.[/quote]

    More plausible explanation – there could be normal cyclical changes that occur every so many years or hundreds of years, but because we haven’t taken temperature data for that long relative to the age of the earth, there is really no way of telling whether global warming is real or not quite yet. We need more data over a longer period of time. But it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out 1) air pollution is not a good thing for human/animal lungs or plants; 2) being reliant on foreign oil is bad policy. So let’s address what we do know for sure… 😉

  53. wdf1

    ERM: [i]…there could be normal cyclical changes that occur every so many years or hundreds of years, but because we haven’t taken temperature data for that long relative to the age of the earth, there is really no way of telling whether global warming is real or not quite yet.[/i]

    Maybe you don’t have direct temperature measurements, but you can see the effects of temperature change. That’s how the Medieval Warm Period ([url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period[/url]) and Little Ice Age ([url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_ice_age[/url]) are defined.

  54. Don Shor

    Jeff: most of what upsets you is not coming from scientists. Al Gore is not a scientist. You are conflating alarmism with the high probability that global temperature increase is largely or significantly human-caused. The two are not the same. Not all geophysicists are alarmists. Not all alarmists are scientists.
    There is plenty of debate within the scientific community about the specific components of the various models that are used to explain climate change. I’ve posted links before to folks like the Pielkes, Judith Curry (who agrees with you about the group-think problem), outsiders like McIntyre who persistently and effectively criticizes the proxy data and more (and is annoying as heck to many climate scientists).
    Please stop judging climate scientists based on your attitudes about politicians. You need to look more into the actual debates going on within the field and stop focusing on what you’re reading and seeing in the media.

    Climate change is following much the pattern that plate tectonics did. The principles and models, if you will, were outlined. There was great debate, caustic criticism from established researchers, but slowly and steadily the data was accumulated and the holes were filled in. If you asked a geophysicist in 1960 what he thought about plate tectonics, you would have encountered skepticism and considerable discussion of the missing parts of the puzzle.
    By, say, 1965 enough mapping of the ocean floors had been done, magnetometer readings were showing important clues, and that same geophysicist would almost surely have been convinced that the conceptual framework of plate tectonics was sound. Now the overwhelming majority of geophysicists accept plate tectonics as the governing theory of their field. Debate about how the continents formed and moved had proceeded at a pretty slow pace through much of the 20th century. Then it all came together pretty fast, thanks to various important findings, as well as the major expansion of the number of people working in the field and the amount of data being collected and analyzed.

  55. wdf1

    Don Shor: [i]Debate about how the continents formed and moved had proceeded at a pretty slow pace through much of the 20th century. Then it all came together pretty fast, thanks to various important findings, as well as the major expansion of the number of people working in the field and the amount of data being collected and analyzed.[/i]

    The last credible and notable skeptic of plate tectonics was S. Warren Carey ([url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Warren_Carey[/url]), who made some important contributions to plate tectonics, initially, but then eventually insisted you could explain everything by an expanding Earth hypothesis. He didn’t believe plate subduction as a viable process. He died in 2002.

  56. Frankly

    Global warming theories don’t really compare with previous plate tectonic theories based on the level of alarmism.

    Now, if plate tectonic supporters included in their theory evidence that oil exploration or minining was responsible for making the earth’s crust unstable and causing larger and larger earthquakes… and only geologist were allowed to have an opinion on this… and 95% of geologists were reported to agree with and support this opinion… then you might have a point of comparison.

  57. Don Shor

    Global warming theories don’t have anything to do with alarmism. Some may consider it a logical reaction to what they see (James Hansen, for example), but that isn’t the theory itself. So you can reasonably say that you disagree with the alarmists, but understand and accept that anthropogenic climate change is real.

  58. Don Shor

    I remember when I was in 4th grade, my father came to class to talk about his work. At the time he was part of a group considering locations for an ambitious project to drill into the Mohorovicic Discontinuity; i.e., almost drill into the mantle. One of my classmates asked, with some alarm, “couldn’t that cause a volcano?” My father laughed with delight, and replied, “it might!”

    The point of comparison, Jeff, was to illustrate how the scientific research leads to the theory by the accumulation of data. It all fits. So as more data is acquired and more researchers look at the overarching theory, it is less and less likely that some breakthrough will come along that unravels all of that. The probability diminishes steadily, to the point that the remaining skeptics are usually iconoclasts who disagree for the sake of being disagreeable. There are plenty of scientists like that, and they always serve a useful purpose. But they tend to contribute less and less substance to the debate.

  59. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]Maybe you don’t have direct temperature measurements, but you can see the effects of temperature change. That’s how the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age are defined.[/quote]

    How many millions/billions of years old is the earth? How can you know whether there are temperature fluctuations that occur every 4000 years? How do you know whether what is going on in the sun is not a contributing factor? There are an infinite number of variables…

  60. E Roberts Musser

    I guess what I am trying to point out, albeit inarticulately it would seem, why the obsession w a theory, when a simple explanation will achieve the same results? Air pollution is not good for people/plants/animals; dependence on foreign oil is bad policy. Why not work with this, and go from there? Why is it so important that everyone must believe the [u][b]theory[/b][/u] global warming? By the way, scientists are still trying to disprove Einstein’s theory of relativity, and recently they though they had done it – but had to backtrack. As you say, skepticism is a good thing…

  61. Frankly

    I understand all that Don, but the human stakes are much higher for this scientific theory than for any other you can compare. You are talking about science that can be used as a basis to develop and enforce Orwellian public policy. It becomes the potential plot to new world order that is the antithesis of the American experience: freedom and free enterprise. The stakes are very high and therefore the proof threshold should be very high. Therein lies the rub: you are satisfied with the proof, and I am not. Note too that your ideological worldview is significantly more left than mine… that might explain a bit why you are more comfortable with the potential outcomes of policy derived from the theories.

    Let’s use a hypothetical. Let’s say we have some explosion in anthropological finds and it leads to cultural anthropologists developing complex population density models predicting the probability of greater human extermination from conflict. These theories then drive public policy for the US to be more aggressively isolationist with a stronger military and a new mission to pro-actively attack enemies before they harm us.

    Of course this is an extreme and improbable comparison, but it should work to illustrate my point. You would likely bristle at the policy, and seek to combat the science.

    Anthropogenic global warming in an inconvenient theory for science because it can be exploited by some to force others to their worldview.

    I have another thought/point… Most of what I have read about the economics of global warming calculates the economic impacts from mitigation attempts to be much higher than the economic impacts from warming. This begs the question: what is the root problem we are attempting to solve? Is the concern the state of the natural world for the sake of nature; or is it a concern for the safety and well-being of the animals that populate the planet (including the human animal)? The natural world has survived warming and cooling periods… unless there are predictions that we will somehow bake off the atmosphere of the earth, it is 100% probable that the Earth will continue to survive the next warming trend. Assuming this, we are left with the second problem/solution: the welfare of the animals that populate the planet. This being the case, there is plenty of evidence that lack of economic activity is a source of profound animal misery.

  62. Frankly

    One more thought… are humans part of the natural world? Asked another way, should the carbon released into the atmosphere by human activity be considered a natural condition, or should it be excluded and measured as outside the natural system? Let me use another related hypothetical here. Let’s assume we go aggressive restricting Co2-releasing industry. The net impact is a slowing of the increase in atmospheric carbon and milder warming trends that preserve more ice cap and habitable land that can be farmed. This in turn supports greater global population growth which in turn puts more pressure on the environment. Also, since there is less industry, more people will be living in poverty. There will be more disease and hunger. There will be demands for greater taxation of a shrinking pool of producers; thereby causing less production and greater poverty.

    I had a memorable conservation with a gay friend of mine about the question about homosexuality being natural or unnatural. I pointed out that from a pure biological function of natural reproduction, homosexuality could not be considered natural. He then suggested a macro view of human biology and evolution, that a rate of homosexuality in humans might be a natural response to a need for population control. That view floored me because I had not previously thought of it. Even if not connected to any macro biological system of population control, then lacking modern conception technology, it would certainly have that impact (unless we adapted cultural norms allowing natural conception outside homosexual monogamy). However, even if one rejects the notion of a macro biological population control mechanism; one can also accept it as a natural human variation in sexual attraction tendencies.

    So, related to the prior, what if human activity was considered part of the natural world from a macro view? Maybe we are supposed to see the earth warm as humans multiply like rabbits and advance technology and industry as a response to care for more and more people. Then at some point the earth warms from that activity and then global population slows or even declines as a result. If you are a religious type, you might even consider this as being God’s plan. Whether it is natural or the plan of God, it seems to me that we can just as easily screw up thinking we have enough knowledge and power to predict and respond optimally to something as complex and unpredictable. Scientists are not Gods. They are as fallible as any human. In fact, because their field of expertise is plagued by infinite variables, they should very infrequently deliver theories of absolutism. The discovery box should always remain substantially open for almost everything that science attempts to explain.

  63. wdf1

    JB: [i]One more thought… are humans part of the natural world? Asked another way, should the carbon released into the atmosphere by human activity be considered a natural condition, or should it be excluded and measured as outside the natural system?[/i]

    Are you then saying we are justified in releasing any pollutants into the environment? DDT, mercury, lead, sulfur dioxide, CFC’s, chromium 6, etc.

    For that matter, why not just throw garbage out on the streets and highways?

    After all, humans are part of the natural world. Shouldn’t any pollutants released into the environment by human activity be considered a natural condition? Or should it be excluded and measured as outside the natural system?

    Okay. I have a tone a facetiousness, above.

    I value human responsibility. I don’t know if that’s supposed to make me a conservative or not, but I have seen a number of conservative public officials trot it out as such over the years. It seems like you’re excusing humanity from the need to be responsible.

    Please clarify where and why you draw the line.

  64. Frankly

    [i]Please clarify where and why you draw the line[/i]

    wdf1: I think you have covered the entire challenge in this one question.

    Note that carbon is a bit different than these other compounds and chemicals you mention. Man and the rest of the natural world have been releasing carbon from day one.

    And thanks for the facetiousness tone. I think it was warranted. Certainly it makes me feel better for all the times I have done the same!

  65. wdf1

    JB: So if some other non-human process of nature is “polluting” a particular substance, then humans are off the hook by the “but he’s doing it, too!” rule, regardless of the consequences?

  66. Frankly

    wdf1: I read your post a couple of times and I’m not sure I understand the question. I think sulfur dioxide is a greenhouse gas produced by non-human volcanic activity. I don’t know what humans can do about that. Carbon is also produced by non-human activity. Garbage is produced by both human and non-human activity. I’m not sure about the other compounds you mention.

    I don’t know for sure, but I suspect that carbon output per capita was higher in the late 1800s and early 1900s than today. People were buring wood, coal and oil to heat and light their homes and workplaces. In fact, one of the motivations for skyscraper design was to allow wealthy people the opportunity to live and work above all the particulate matter and stench floating in the air. Assuming I am correct here, we can say that a contributing factor in man-made global warming is population growth. Maybe we are reaching or exceeding maximum capacity and our natural world is need of correction… and man-made intervention will cause bigger problems as population grows to far exceed natural capacity.

  67. wdf1

    JB: [i]Carbon is also produced by non-human activity.[/i]

    This graph shows what background CO2 variation looks like. At the far right end is what industrialization looks like. But we don’t know how high CO2 levels will go. It’s all an increasing trajectory.

    [img]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/Carbon_Dioxide_400kyr.png[/img] wikipedia.org, last viewed 8/16.

    The reason that we know the last bit is a human contribution to the atmosphere is because in burning fossil fuels, there are other gases produced beside CO2. Those other gases are present in equivalent increasing concentrations.

  68. Nemesis

    We need to stop trying to convince people whether climate change is man made or not and start focusing on making sure we have clean water, clean air and clean soil. These are things people care about and we know how to achieve it and who the culprits are.

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