Global Warming? Real or Political junk science?

Question

What do you think about global warming? Is it caused by man or a natural swing in temperatures?

25 years ago scientists said it was "global cooling" (wikipedia).

If it is caused by man, can we really help by changing lightbulbs while china, india, and others pump tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere?

Answer 1

Junk science. Global warming is a joke. The Global Warming Hoax can no longer be blamed on man. All of the planets in the solar system have global warming, including Pluto which is no longer a planet. The global warming on mars mirrors the global warming on earth. (Watch this video for some of the facts: http://en.sevenload.com/videos/ha4PoKY/The-Great-Global-Warming-Swindle )

Al Gore is wrong says "The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change". The IPCC has said there will not be massive flooding like what Al Gore's movie says. They say the ocean will rise by 2 feet at most.

And new data from brand new solar satellites show that the temperature of the sun is constantly changing. Also, the strongest solar flares on record have been happening during the past decade. Because of a recently launced satellite, we now know the sun's temperature is changing constantly. http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=3067117
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kriqm3DITRQ&NR=1

The man-made global warming theory has not been proven true. The IPCC only reached a "CONSENSUS" and that proves nothing. There is a lead IPCC author that disagrees with the theory. Video: http://en.sevenload.com/videos/ha4PoKY/The-Great-Global-Warming-Swindle

"The sun is heading into a new season of turbulent solar activity. Just like its seasonal hurricane predictions, on April 25, 2007, the National Oceanic and" http://www.technologynewsdaily.com/node/6852

NASA says the sun caused the earth to leave the great ice age in less than 20 years. 20 years is like a second. And there is nothing humans can do to change how the sun changes the temperature of the earth.
NASA: "Rapid changes between ice ages and warm periods (called interglacials) are recorded in the Greenland ice sheet. Occurring over ONE OR TWO DECADES, the warming of the Earth at the end of the last ice age happened much faster than the rate of change of the Earth’s orbit."
NASA link: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/Paleoclimatology_Evidence/Images/gisp2_temperature.gif

NASA data has proved that the "Little Ice Age" was caused by less light reaching the earth ("solar variability", which means changes in the sun). NASA's data about the little ice age: http://tinyurl.com/227h3p (This data can be copied and pasted it into Excel to chart it.)

Other facts:
1) 6,000 years ago, the earth was hotter than it is today. 6,000 years is less than a second when compared with the age of the earth.
2) Temperatures dropped in the 1950's and 1990's when CO2 levels were increasing.
3) 140,000 years ago the earth had record CO2 levels and there were no gasoline powered cars.
4) 20,000 years ago, Canada was one big ice cube and half of the U.S. was covered with Ice. The grand canyon was formed by melting ice ages over 20 million years.
5) The temperature of the Earth has only increased by 0.65 of a degree in the last 110 years. There were faster increases in temperatures around 10,000 years ago and there were no gasoline powered cars during that time.
6) Strong hurricanes are normal. Hundreds of years ago, they used to sink ships off of the coast of Florida.

Answer 2

if you want the consensus view of the scientific community have a look at the joint statement on climate change by the national academies of the G8 nations (including the US National Academy of the Sciences) and the national science academies of Brazil, India and China
http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/document.asp?latest=1&id=3222

Also have a look at this guide by the Royal Society (the UK's National Academy of Science)
http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/downloaddoc.asp?id=1630

Climate changing has overwhelming support in the scientific community. Unfortunately the very small number of minority dissenting scientists have received disproportional attention by sceptics trying to bolster their support. It should not be taken that the scientific debate on the principle of climate change is evenly split.
There are other factors that affect global temperatures (the Sun's cycle and volcanic emissions from major eruptions), the problem with global warming is that the changes indicates an increase that is faster and over and above the natural cycle.

Problems arise in the debate when it is transferred to lay people. The actual science can be quite esoteric and the mainstream media from which most people get their information on the topic is not good at focusing on details and complexity. A lot of the research is quite a dull read and so doesn't make good TV or articles so reporters (generally not scientist) have to simplify the information which can lead to distortions. Furthermore the media tends to focus on more sensational aspects which leads to exaggerations because it makes it more entertaining. As has been pointed out this can be seen by the disproportionate attention giving to the ides of cooling a few decades ago (the idea had nowhere the same amount of support in the scientific community as climate change does now) and the exaggerations in films like The Day after Tomorrow.

Another major problem is that when it enters the sphere of politics it becomes tainted by people's prejudices towards those leading the arguments as you can see by reading some of the other answers to this question. People use it as a weapon to strengthen their positions on other issues or resort to an entrench position that they should oppose something just because their usual enemy is a proponent of it rather than objectively looking at the merits of an argument. This is a reflection of the poor state of political discourse (particularly in the US) and not of the science of climate change.

As to your second question. The US and other developing countries still emit very high levels of carbon dioxide. Cutting it down will certainly help and in addition as solutions are developed their effect and use will gradually be spread to other countries.

Finally, to Tommy B. Are you aware that if the Carbon Dioxide levels were 60% then life would die out due to suffocation. Picking random numbers doesn't help your case. The Carbon Dioxide levels in the Karoo Ice age 320-350 million years ago were less than 300 parts per million. There isn't enough carbon on Earth in one form or another for 60% of the atmosphere to consist of carbon dioxide.

Answer 3

We have several different issues. I remember the 'cooling' situation....it wasn't put out as an established fact...it was a suggestion that required more research. It never reach the kind of public discussion as the current situation. A second issue is the term, 'global warming'....that's not where the science is. The scientific discussion is about 'climate change'...warming is only part of the picture. Third, and most important is that we can lead in transforming what is pumped into the atmosphere. New technology originated in the US is always picked up by other countries...which is why they're building all kinds of manufactured goods in 3rd world countries....technology has no borders. Doing nothing is not an option...moving forward even incrementally is all to the good. As far as being 'junk science', major corporations are planning ahead to take advantage of climate change and attempting to get out ahead of any regulations. Canada is attempting to secure what will be the Northwest Passage through the artic as their territory....the US says it's international waters. Stay tuned on that. The US Navy already has plans to patrol an ice free artic ocean.....and believe me...these guys know what's what!

Answer 4

Not many people doubt Global Warming exists, but to say it's man-made is to ignore even the most basic logic available. It used to be much warmer than it is today, as soon as a few hundred years ago. England used to have widespread vineyards all over the place, and we've discovered old settlements in Greenland where crops were being grown on what is now permafrost. All of the planets in the solar system are currently warming. We're seeing melting of the Martian icecaps, and atmospheric venting from a few of Jupiter's moons. This is a sun cycle, and it too shall pass. Cleaning up the planet is always a good idea, but global warming is just scientific sensationalism that is making a lot of people VERY rich.

Answer 5

Well if it is the problem they make it out to be much more serious action needs to be taken on industries and developing countries that pollute a lot (china, etc) instead of using different lightbulbs and turning the lights off when you don't need them. The small steps people take in their lives to become carbon neutral are not enough to stop global warming when industrial countries are producing huge amounts of pollutuion with no control.

Answer 6

I'm skeptical of global warming because, despite technology being available, the only evidence being brought forward to support global warming is a list of average temperatures for the past 150 years.

Technology exists today to measure carbon dioxide in frozen ice core samples to give us a better picture of global temperature tendancies from thousands of years ago. Yet, despite the availability of this technology, it is ignored and only the most recent temperatures are used.

Isn't that a bit suspicious? Why would these so-called experts ignore such a plenthora of data?

Maybe because it doesn't support their views.

Answer 7

Global Warming is real. But as you said it, America by itself can't do nothing unless the whole world cooperate with us. That means including India, Japan, China, Europe and the rest..

Answer 8

25 years ago, scientist had three decades less information than they do now. And the term scientist use is "global climate change".

Is there a natural component? Probably. Is there a man-made component? Almost certainly.

Why should we bother trying to address the problem when others are still contributing to the problem? Think fo the trash analogy.

Why bother picking up trash when other people are going to litter? Because if we don't it gets a lot worse a lot faster.

Answer 9

Shut UP a bush family member THERE will be flooding and it is caused by us


As its true why do I say this look at the facts?

Firstly the ice caps are melting but I can't see that for my self as I don't live near there

but I do live in the uk AND the current date is 13 of July THE middle of our summer time the drink loads bbq food time of the year but where IS MY beer still in the fridge AND why you may ask because of rain. This time last year we were having warnings of heat waves and warnings to stay in side BUT this time its floods with over 8 different cities over run by floods houses ruined families destroyed this has been going on for 4 weeks now with no end at sight

hummm no flooding hey I have watched the temperature disintegrated rapidly SO they say turn off a light turn off a tap change bulbs I SAY NO screw you

I no bit weird saying in one breath its true its us then in another breath saying don't help. But whats the point in me doing any thinning

when china pollute so much or how all pub shops entertainment complexes on my street leave there florescent lights on even when they are not open. WHATS the point? for every person who turns off a light there is a company leaving one on leaving theses flashy lights on

So the change is happening and if ALL countries AND people DON'T contribute ASAP then what’s the use as we will slowly send earth down the slippery slope

Answer 10

I don't know if Americans or Europeans are aware of this, but last month a FREE DVD of Al Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" was available with copies of certain magazines in Belgium.
We bought the magazine and watched it... wonderful.
(young people are not interested at all)

Then, Last night on the Nederlands channel KRO, there was a rebuttle to this, and stated how everything that is happening now is totally 'natural' don't worry.... relax.

I find BOTH extremely naive. Of course there is nothing good with pollution, CO2, smoke, cars, waste, excessive garbage and plastic.

Why don't we all just use more common sense, and less pollution? POLLUTION is what I object to. Who, in their right mind is PRO-pollution?