Is a significant contributory factor in Global Warming human activity?

Question

Where is your proof that human activity is a major contributory factor. I have studied the data and it is NOT clear cut. It is entirely possible that the main cause is simply that the Earth's periodic swings to and from Ice Ages is responsible.

Perhaps people should read "state of Fear" by Michael Crichton.

Answer 1

No it is not a significant factor, but it is a contributory factor. The amounts of CO2 and SOX's release by a major volcanic eruption far surpasses the output by man's activity.

As to the amount of increasing CO2 in ice cores which the "believers" like to hold forth, that presumes that the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is the same value over the entire globe at any given time. A change in prevailing winds, a cold period or a warm period, proximity to open water, volcanic eruptions, plankton blooms, etc. can result in radically different CO2 content within a given area compared to the rest of the global CO2 content.

Unlike most gases, CO2 is more soluble in warm than in cold and is therefore greatly affected by precipitation rates and temperatures.

So to leap to GLOBAL WARMING being documented by ice cores is like blind men describing an elephant -- each will have his own interpretation of the same facts. At best it is a theory (but not the only one) to explain increased CO2 in ice cores. The same for other "facts" that "prove" GLOBAL WARMING.

Answer 2

I have not idea as to why the whole issue of global warming has been such a fashionable topic in the last few years when so many have yet to understand the basic principals of good scientific study. I have a dislike as to why this has been branded as it has since it only addresses a small proportion of the picture and not a 'good lot' of other factors which contribute to the potential idea. For instance, seasons have only existed for teh past few million years, and for the 4.5ish billion years before that it was different also, so taking a slice of only 10,000 years is like asking one person to do a poll on bahalf of a nation.
What is also not considered to its full potential the the orbit of the planet around the sun and the effects of the magnitism of the earths core which any good scientist will tell you affects the climate of the planet tremondously. Lets not forget that temperatures have only really in the past 200years been recorded so how can that make plausiable reason? I have no doubt that the science behind ice cores, profiling, pollen, sea level change hold some credit for the small timescale its was analysed for, but a larger more comprehensive understanding of the mechanisms of our climate need to be assertained before we can comprehensively state that humans have contributed to the natural process of global warming.
Saying that, any attempt to reduce our overwhelmingly greedy consumption of material goods can be beneficial in the long term.

Answer 3

I hope we ARE to blame, as only then do we have a hope in hell of reversing the procxess, but I fear it is, as you say, just the natural cyle of the Earth. Human history has taken place during a period that appears, on a geological timescale, to have been unusually benign. Besides, we have only had serious heavy industry and mass transit for about fifty years, and even our deepest mines represent just a very thin film on the surface of the Earth. How arrogant are we to think that we have that much effect on the planet?

Answer 4

Yes reputable science has reached the verdict that human activity is a significant contributory factor in global warming. If one is inclined one can always perceive doubt and it is particularly easy to be in a state of denial about inconvenient truths. To say that we have reached this conclusion because it is easier than admitting that it is something we cant do anything about seems to me to be another fatuous conspiracy theory the great and wise public seem to take on so readily.

Answer 5

The rate of climate change is the issue. When there have been fluctuations in average climatic temperatures over geological time the changes have been gradual over periods such as 10,000 to 1M years. For example the average change in temperature for us to plunge into an ice age is of the order of only 2-3oC. The relatively recent four Ice Ages happened over a considerable length of time (go look it up yourself). The current changes in average temperatures over the last 100-150 years are occurring several orders of magnitude faster than has been ever observed before. There is little doubt that gases like CO2 and CH4 contribute to global warming. The fact is that the increase in the concentrations of greenhouse gases is due to man's activities, and these concentrations have changed far faster than has been seen in natural history.

(My thesis was on Palaeoclimatic temperatures using dC13)

Answer 6

It is not proven, but is a very popular opinion. Personally, I am not convinced, and I am definitely not convinced that the considerable reduction in the standard of living that would be entailed in any systematic effort to do something about it is justified.

Answer 7

releaseing all of the carbon monoxide/dioxide, killing trees that turn those into oxygen so we can breathe, fossil fuels and all of the plants, and radiation (chernobyl), and bombs going off, humans are definatly the only ones killing the earth, not the deer and lions who just eat grass and each other, they just give the humans more oxygen by taking another animals life they are takign up soem oxygen, so yeah its all humans,

Answer 8

Yes. Cars, planes, concrete, deforestation.....