Do you think global warming is a scientific fact, or a political debate?

Answer 1

Who knows, it's such a hard thing to "prove" with hard fact since we only have temperature data for two centuries. I know there are some scientists that say they can prove what the temperature was 2,000 years ago (due to ice formations & various markings in the poles), but that’s shaky data that other scientists dispute.

Personally, if you look at it, we (humans) are really insignificant compared to the size of the earth, and the way time changes things. I was in my back yard the other day raking leaves and preparing to till for a garden when I thought, “What was here 300 years ago…wait, let me start later, what was here 20 years ago?” I have no idea, according to my neighbors, the previous owners put about 25 cubic yards of soil in my back yard to even it out like 10 years ago, so there could be bodies, trash, relics, or anything buried under that 8 feet of soil I was standing on. My point is this, we have no idea what has happened in the past, so how can we know if we are putting more CO2 in the atmosphere than the forest fires 2,000 years ago were.

Most trees we see are between 1 and 100 years old, so what happened to all of the trees prior to our “destruction” of them? We see that unchecked growth leads to forest fires, grass fires, and other complete destruction of forests and fields. Imagine how bad it would be without the firefighters who slow these fires down! Any way, I guess what I’m saying is, there may be global warming, but I don’t think we can cause OR prevent it.

That doesn’t mean I’m going to leave my water running all day, and destroy as much earth as I can, I’m just not going to live in fear of the impending destruction of the earth by global warming.

Answer 2

It is a scientific fact.

Actually you will have a hard time finding a single scientist in a field related to climate/weather/atmophere who will tell you it is anything BUT a fact.

The only "scientists" who will tell you that are the ones who's research is being funded by lobbyists or interest groups that work for industries that have money to lose if laws are passed to control global warming.

Global warming is as much a scientific fact as the fact that cigarettes give you cancer. People argued against that too.

The trick in making your decision is to EXAMINE THE MOTIVES OF THE PEOPLE GIVING YOU THE INFORMATION.

You have person "A" who has millions of dollars to lose or gain based on what he gets you to believe.

Then you have person "B" who is interested only in reporting scientific fact as it is and giving you the truth. No money at stake.

Who are you going to believe?

They have MEASURED the oceans rising already. They have MEASURED the rise in temeprature and it is clearly not inline with historical norms --- even if you go back 1000's of years through MULTIPLE ICE AGES.

What is so hard to understand here people?

This isn't even a question, honestly. It is scientific fact and we will all realize it sooner or later. Unfortunately some people need their convincing a little more intense than others. 100 years from now when the ocean has risen 3 feet and it's 125 degrees in the summer in Vermont, there will probably still be men in expensive suits telling us it's all a natural shift in the Earth's climate and it will all be OK

Answer 3

The established facts in the debate are facts.. The unsubstantiated rumors are not fact (but may become). That it is an issue being studied is fact... That there are political implications, including a debate, is a fact. The political debate encompasses speculation and fact. Arguendo, even if some of the tenets of global warming are generally accepted within the scientific community (scientific "fact") - there is no guaranteed closure nonetheless... Even Einstein once made a huge scientific "blunder" he later admitted (the cosmological constant).

Answer 4

The world has been warming long before humans existed. It goes in cycles. Some scientists argue that there was a "spike" in the warming trend about the time of the industrial revolution (the "hockey stick" effect); however, there was not enough good data collected during this time period to really prove anything.

It's more of a political argument than anything else. The world was angry with Bush for refusing to ratify the Kyoto treaty, but as it turns out, none of the countries that DID ratify it held up to their end of the deal. In addition, by some estimates, if all the countries in the world complied with the Kyoto guidelines, it MAY lower the temperature of the earth by 1 degree over 100 years. The key word being "may".

Bush was right not to sign onto it.

Answer 5

The Earth should be warming considering the geologically recent ice age. As far as feeling the effects physically, the temperature rise is only in order of a few degrees. (You will not be able to tell the difference just by living.) Rather than try and stop the Earth from what it is going to do anyways we need to be thinking of ways to adapt to this new climate. For humans it really isn't going to entail a lot. The main things that will feel the effects of global climate change are organisms that are too specific to live in any other conditions than they have been. Sorry to say but evolution will take over from there. This is the course of life on Earth, the more adept survive. yours truly,

Mervin DePervin

P.S don't worry your pretty little heads about the seas rising or us boiling to death any time soon...most of the effects, if true, will only be seen in hundreds of years. (We'll all be too dead then to notice!)

Answer 6

Both, but mostly a political debate. It was not so much a political debate before the politician Al Gore made his movie, "An inconvenient Truth", and he made that movie specifically to make it into a political debate. Before that it was just debated by scientists. Personally, I think that is who should be debating it, scientists. Most people who are not educated in science will make up their minds based on personalities and not truth, because the truth is too complicated and confusing. The truth is that there is man made emission of CO2; there is natural warming; there is a heavy price to pay, in unemployment, lost health benefits, lost free time, high taxes, etc... if we just stop our emissions; there could be a high price to pay if we do not stop our emissions, in terms of bad weather and rising sea level. The political debate makes it seem that we could just trust some people we don't fully understand to fix the problem, which is not true.

Answer 7

Short and simple.

It is a scientific fact, as any scientist in the field would verify. However, the long-term implications of the trend, and more importantly, the economic implications is where the debate lies.

The temperature has increased significantly over the past 150 years, but we do not necessarily know if we caused it, and what it will mean for our society in the long run.

Answer 8

Without question it is more of a political debate. Many scientists (not all) will agree that the earth is currently in a warming cycle. However, the politics comes in when you start to attribute the warming to man's feeble actions.

Everybody is using it for their own purposes --- even those who don't have a clue whether it is real or not but believe what they are told if they are told it enough times.

Answer 9

Personally, a debate. I had to study this in college, covering both sides for and against global warming. Even thou my professor favored the scientific fact, I found too much evidence that showed it is just a cycle in our earths climate and has happend in that past.

Answer 10

I think it is mostly scientific fact. It's cause lay in the products of internal combustion engines which utilize fossil based fuels like petroleum as well as fluorocarbons which damage the filtration mechanisms of the atmosphere.

We are losing great masses of sheet ice which used to pervade the extreme northern and southern regions of the planet as proven by scientific measurements.

However, I don't feel that this situation is necessarily unprecedented in ancient history.