Is Global Warming the greatest deception in the history of science?

Question

Dr. Tim Ball, Ph.D. in Climatology states;
"Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide (CO2). This in fact is the greatest deception in the history of science. We are wasting time, energy and trillions of dollars while creating unnecessary fear and consternation over an issue with no scientific justification."

Do you agree with Dr. Ball?

Please read his article, very informitive.

http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm

Interesting that scientist who question the "consensus" must have ties to "Big Oil", while scientist who take money from gvmt, environemtal groups, and liberal PAC's have nothing but "pure" motives.

Is the climate warming? Probably so. The climate will always change. It will get warmer or cooler since there is no such thing as a static climate.

Answer 1

It's hard to tell if it's true or a hoax. Right now the ice caps are forming more ice than we've seen in decades. We've had record breaking temperatures. There were no hurricanes this year. We've also seen above average temperatures in the early 1900's just like we are now. They have been yelling Global Warming for the longest time and saying the world would end because of it. Years later we are still here. I have yet to be convinced. However I do believe we need to minimize pollution but not go to the extreme of global warming wackos. I do believe we are wasting our money giving it to scientist who are just wasting our time. With the facts about temperature patterns that only go back 100 years we've seen these patterns before and the other coming from the Industrial Revolution. The earth balanced out and we saw bitter cold temperatures again. I think the same will happen again and I think it may have already begun.

Answer 2

I read the article and few things jumped out at me:

1. Dr. Ball's credentials seem good.

2. Dr. Ball is peeved. In parts of the article he seemed almost petulant, "I'm a great scientist and nobody is listening to me". (fold arms, pout, stamp foot, start to yell)

3.Dr. Ball does not deny that global warming is happening, just that HUMANS are the CAUSE. This is significant. If humans aren't the cause then human activities that emit green houses gases e.g burning OIL aren't a problem.

4. I wonder if Dr. Ball has links to the oil industry, his comments in paragraph 10 seem a bit defensive.

5.I'm unsure whether the THEORY of the green house effect has been tested but it makes sense based on our knowledge of the physical world (atmospheric chemistry, thermodynamics, kinetics etc.).

6. The quotation in paragraph 14 casts doubt on the ASSUMPTION that CO2 is a greenhouse gases, NOT on whether there are such things are green house gases.

7.I read Michael Crichton's "State of Fear". He never denied that global warming and climate change are real. Deny or affirming climate change was not, in my opinion, what the book was about.

What he was trying to warn us against, and rightly so, is what happens when politics and propaganda take over the science. The conclusions become skewed to meet some (usually wealthy) person/group's intersts. This is a threat that now faces climate change and the credibility of its research. A lot of big powerful people and organisations are finding climate change in their interest and all that grant money floating about may damage objectivity.

Climate change needs skeptics and naysayers to keep researchers on their toes, producing high quality research.

Dr. Ball, eminent scientist as he is, would be more effective if his article didn't seem so petulant. The parts of the global warming theory that he warns against fit too well into "Big Oil's" agenda for me to be entirely comfortable with all he is saying.

Answer 3

nobody doubts the earth is warming. even those who say we haven't caused the problem still admit the earth is warming. The debate is the CAUSE of global warming. Is it man made or the earths natural warming cycle. If you look at the data found in the history of the ice you see a fairly regular pattern of warming and cooling trends. the earth has seen MUCH higher concentrations of CO2 and much higher temps and much higher sea levels. The earth then cooled, CO2 levels dropped and life continued on. Now are we making the situation better? No. But the real question is are we really having any effect at all? If we were to stop 100% of all fossil fuel burning, would the temps drop? Would CO2 levels drop? maybe, maybe not. Maybe the warming has nothing to do with us. I don't know for sure, but as with most everything I doubt the extreme point of view on either side is correct.

Answer 4

NOAA archives temperatures from all reporting stations in the U.S. They publish a table of the annual mean temperature for all the reporting stations in the U.S. for every year since 1895. These reporting stations cover a sufficiently large area of the earth to allow the assumption that other areas of the earth have behaved similarly. Any trend curve derived from this data shows an increase in mean temperature, and if the curve is non-linear, an acceleration of that increase. Therefore the conclusion that the earth is currently warming is inescapable.

NOAA also publishes data on CO2 concentrations on the slopes of Mauna Loa measured since 1958. They consider this data to be pristine. Trend curves derived from this data show an increase in CO2 concentrations, and non-linear trend curves show an acceleration in CO2 concentration.

At this point global warming advocates make two assumptions of causality:
1. The increase in temperature is caused by the increase in CO2.
2. The increase in CO2 is caused by human endeavors.

"Validating" assumptions require ignoring masses of information. To begin with, both the temperature data, if examined monthly, and the CO2 data have sinusoidal variations. This is to be expected of the temperature, but what causes these variations in the CO2? These variations suggest, if anything, an inverse causality.

Answer 5

There is no doubt that humans are contributing to the demise of this planet in various ways, but the real question needs to be asked, "to what degree compared to natural events"?
It's interesting to see people draw emotive conclusions on the interpretation of limited data, that has been extrapolated to suit a desired outcome.
Two events can be mutually exclusive, yet with this debate, here we have 'experts' who draw long bows, linking 'cause and effect', expecting others to agree with their 'scientific' conclusions and they just ignore anyone who disagrees with their point of view.
An example of this over simplistic argument is that CO2 is blamed as the 'nasty' GHG, yet by their own admission, proponents of GW say that there are 'nastier' gases being generated, but by whom? Humans? Certainly not. Anyone heard of volcanoes, rotting grass and the byproduct of a cow's digestive system? See how silly the argument becomes!
I'm not an 'expert', but I don't draw conclusions from limited data either!

Answer 6

The greatest deception in the history of science may be Dr. Tim Ball's exaggeration of his academic credentials.

At various times, Ball has described himself as "the first Canadian PhD in climatology" (false), "32 years Professor of Climatology at the University of Winnipeg" (false), and "28 years Professor of Climatology at the University of Winnipeg" (also false). The fact is that Ball was Professor of Geography at the University of Winnepeg for 8 years, and various associate, assistant, and lecturer positions in Geography for 14 years before that.

And when the discrepancy between truth and exaggeration was revealed, what was Ball's response? Sue the truth-tellers to hide the facts. Why would anyone trust someone like that?

http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/Johnson%20statement%20of%20defence.pdf

Answer 7

I read his article, and I agree with David Suzuki, I think this guy has been paid by oil/corporate interests to come out against global warming.

Global warming is happening, there are now hundreds of scientific reports to back it up. Co2 is the highest on Earth in 650,000 years, the glaciers are melting, and any Inuit (Eskimo) can tell you that the arctic is changing drastically.

The only people who have anything to gain from denying global warming are those with interests in maintaining factory pollution emissions and low fuel efficiency vehicles so we keep consuming lots gas and oil.

The real truth is that this is more than just a Co2 global warming problem, all of these emissions are horrible pollutions that are harmful to all life and ecosystems on Earth, so even if global warming is a complete fallacy (its not) - these pollutions are still just as awful.

summary: that guy is full of &*%$, he's been paid off, global warming is real and any real scientist can back it up.

source:

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0203-03.htm

Answer 8

Lets have him explain why the Arctic is disappearing at a rapid rate. Global warming is caused by humans. The blame is largely on the USA. It is a very profit based economy and big business
does everything to survive. Even it it means destroying natural resources along the way. We all need global restraint and to change our ways soon. It does not take a Climatologist to figure this one out folks.

Answer 9

The proof is in the ICE. Look at the Antartic ice and you examine the data. For every Ice Age there has been a corresponding action in the ice. For every instance of global warming, there has been a corresponding CO2 increase. Measured precisely the two are proportional to each other. For the ages that this earth has been here, there has never been an increase this fast in CO2 and this high. It started somewhere at the beginning of the 19th century...hmmmmm. Earth's once large forests could usually breath large volumes of CO2 and compensate for an increase....but we have been cutting every damn forest to nothing for decades... NO denying man's involvement in Global warming is the real disaster.

Answer 10

We cannot say that global warming is or is not happening. We simply don't have enough real data over a very long time.