Global warming is obviously a man-made, current phenomenon. What kind of idiocy is required to dispute this?

Question

Sorry, my question was unclear and makes it look like I'm interested in some farcical debate. If you can read, it is clear that global warming is non-cyclical and man-made. What I'm interested in is the motivation for denying this. What happens between the massive wealth of non-debated scientific theory and the populace that engenders this alleged controversy?

You, whoever you are, getting het up about yet another green activist post - what do you have in terms of respected scientific theory that proves your case? How do you justify it to yourself? It's not actually ok to just say "There are diffferent opinions on it" anymore without being able to cite those opinions. Is there a single scientific opinion out there disputing global now?

Names and dates if you could please.

Toptuner1: The kind of idiot who backs the objectively most likely scenario.

I don't fear resonsibility, and I'm willing to play the odds. Global warming is real, man made, and growing, and I take responsibility for my part in it.

Good luck to you.

Answer 1

The kind of “idiocy” required is the “rational, impartial, unemotional thought” kind.

Have a read of my sources, especially the stuff by Christopher Monckton.

Monckton was an adviser to Margaret Thatcher on science issues. His basic procedure was to look at the actual science itself and then look at what was being said about that science. If what was being said was a fair representation of the science, then it was reasonable. If however, what was being said constantly quoted the extremes of the science and always in only one direction, then it was not reasonable, it was a scam.

After spending several months reading the leading scientific papers and assessing the arguments put forward, he came to the following conclusion:

“The official case depends crucially on a series of assumptions whose truth has not been demonstrated, some of which are not easily testable. In particular, the temperature effect at the surface of the incompletely-saturated peripheral absorption bands of CO2 at the tropopause cannot be confidently estimated. Air and sea temperatures have failed to rise anything like as much as “global-warming” theory predicts. Explanations for the shortfall of observed outturn against theoretical projection are mutually inconsistent and scientifically dubious. I conclude that, on the balance of probabilities, the contrarians are significantly closer to the truth than the UN and its supporters.”

Any rational person can’t help but have doubts after reading his articles. Make sure that you read his “references and detailed calculations”, which I’ll link for you here…

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2006/11/05/warm-refs.pdf;jsessionid=TP035XX4QDORVQFIQMFCFFOAVCBQYIV0

It’s full of references to the learned scientific journals.

Be sure to read his response to Al Gore’s attempt to rubbish his article, it’s included in my sources below.

Ultimately, I have trouble accepting something when I discover that I’ve been lied to in an effort to convince me. Thus, the Mann et al, “hockey-stick” graph is a big problem for me. One look at those 8 graphs (on page 9 of the link above) and you can’t help but realise it’s a fabrication. But what’s really disturbing is not just that Mann and co, lied about this, but that it was “peer reviewed” several times, so all those scientists are lying too, or are completely incompetent, which is just as bad. And even today, Mann and co. are trying to defend the indefensible on their website. In the end, there’s just no getting away from it; if your model produces a hockey-stick graph even with random data in it, then it’s valueless.

Add to this other lies such as the politicians writing the summaries of the IPCC reports changing the scientists’ words to make them sound more dramatic and scary:

The 1995 IPCC draft report said, "Any claims of positive detection of significant climate change are likely to remain controversial until uncertainties in the total natural variability of the climate system are reduced." It also said, "No study to date has positively attributed all or part of observed climate changes to anthropogenic causes." Those statements were removed, and in their place appeared: "The balance of evidence suggests a discernable human influence on climate."

Says who? Certainly not the scientists who wrote the report! Doesn’t that make you wonder? Just a little bit?

Or how about Chris Landsea? He resigned from the IPCC because the results of research were being announced, with predictable dire conclusions, before the research had even been begun. (See- http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html ) Surely that must cause a few raised eyebrows?

Finally, given that satellite data is currently showing that global warming has stopped (see- Figure 7 at the bottom of http://www.remss.com/msu/msu_data_description.html ) with a bit of luck, this trend will continue, or better yet trend downwards. I wonder whether the Global Warming Alarmists will admit to their scare mongering then?

Sadly, I doubt it. They’ll just look for the next scam to scare people with. Y2.1K anyone?

As ever with global warming - don't believe the hype.

Answer 2

If Global Warming is so obvious, then why all the name calling? Why resort to ad homonym? If someone denies the existence to gravity, do you call him an idiot? All you have to do is demonstrate it. If someone denies evolution, do you jump over a bridge? You could care less because the scientific evidence is strong enough that you can have a rational debate about it.

Most believers in Global Warming don't really understand the science at all. Global Warming science is more of a philosophy than a science. The reason people project their desires onto the evidence is the following:

1. They are angry with big business, particularly oil companies. Oil companies are associated with Bush, Iraq, Terrorism, Billions in Profits, etc...

2. There is a group that is concerned about the preservation of the Environment which has always been threated by big business.

RESULT: Politicans have found a way of funneling much of the hate for big business and oil companies into a completely unrelated subject called Climate Change. They have made a natural molecule called CO2 into the boogieman and claim that by preventing this substance from being produced, all the answers to the world's problems will result.

In the meantime, they are only creating a carbon market.

1. Oil companies will benefit from this because they can afford to trade carbon credits since they can write of savings very easily simply by reducing CO2 outputs with artificial Dupont chemical mixes in the oil refining plants. It's only the little guys like hospitals and such that will suffer since they will have to buy carbon credits from these oil companies. Believe it or not, this is actually happening right now.

2. Big business will profit more than ever before. And they won't have to stop any pollution. As a matter of fact, they can legally pollute more than ever before since they can use Dupont chemicals to offsett carbon output. The only thing that will be controlled is natural CO2.

3. This reduction in CO2 may not even cause a dent in the environment. But that doesn't matter. It only matters what people think. Propogandists have found that all people need is a psychological band aid.

Answer 3

I think the biggest problem with both arguments for those of us who are not environmental/climate scientists is what to believe?

None of us are experts, which means we can only go on what we see, hear and read in the media.

It also doesn't help that all of the government funded scientists say global warming is a real issue and all of the corporate funded scientists say it is all bullsh!t. Who to beleive? The government scientists just want easy funding. And the corporate scientists get rich by being "influenced" as to their findings in the whole global warming theory.

While I beleive that global warming IS caused (or has at least been massively accelerated) by man, I have about as much "evidence" to prove this theory as someone who disputes it. Said evidence would be newspaper clippings, videos and sound bites. Hardly convincing evidence now, is it?

For this reason, who is right, and who is wrong? Ultimately, I fear the real answer will come about when it is simply too late to do anything about it....

Answer 4

You are not a green activist, you are just an ignorant biggot. Speaking as a omniscient scientist with decades of environment awareness, there is no certainty about what is going on. The global scientific community agrees with this as well. Having said that, our extremely crude climate models predict the posibility of a man made disaster which we could avoid very cheaply. So we might as well adopt a precautionary strategy.

For those ignorant people who talk about climates cycles, there have been none. The historic earth climate changes were due to known massive events, the positioning of the continents and the earths biomass. This is well understood.

Answer 5

Well I can't give you names and dates, but I can just ask how do these scientists know, what scientific evidence is there to say what the weather was like one million years ago? And do you know how much crap a volcano gives out? Because it's an awful lot more than I could in my lifetime (well, not me physically, but my car and my energy use etc).
I believe global warming is just another thing to tax us on and make people frightened, however, this is still the world that I plan on bringing up my children and grandchildren on, so I do still try to do my bit to not pollute it, but that has nothing to do with the temperature increasing, it has more to do with pollution and keeping hold of the rainforest and all that.
Call me an idiot all you like (its not as if I'd notice seeing as I have no idea who you are) but in ten years time this would all be forgotten and there'd be something new to be scared of and taxed from.

Answer 6

considering the fact that some of the criteria in question run in thousand year cycles there will be no definitive proof till next century or longer. giving the polluters plenty of wiggle room to kill us all.
studies have estimated that the Atlantic ocean has approximately a 2 thousand year cycle from when a contaminant enters the water drifts to the bottom(marinara's trench) and resurface
technically the water reaching our shores today is from rainstorms 2000 yrs ago, carrying contaminants similar to whats in our freshwater supplies today.
mathematically speaking there can be no more or less pollution in existence now as then we're just spreading it out in thinner increments across a generation or two...

Answer 7

I hear there is only a consensus, and that nobody in the IPCC can prove anything. They say that "The state of science at present is such that it is only possible to give illustrative examples of possible outcomes."-IPCC and "The long term prediction of future climate states is not possible."-IPCC
Considering that they admit this and have to use "models" instead of actual data and a PROVABLE conclusion, what kind of idiot would call global warming obvious?

Answer 8

I don't have long enough to explain.
Read a real book, not bbc.co.uk/news.
BELOW IS PART OF WHAT I TYPED FOR MY CASE STUDY. READ IT

The thermohaline circulation system, also referred to as the Basic Ocean System [New Scientist 2422] is a massive ocean “conveyor belt” which transports warm, fresh water along its course to the North Pole, and the subsequent cool water to the South Pole.
When the warm, equatorial water reaches the North Pole, it freezes and leaves behind a “super saline seawater” [New Scientist 2422] which, being very dense, sinks to the ocean floor and starts to re-circulate, and begins to warm and lose its salinity. As it reaches the North Atlantic Ocean, 1000 years after being at the North Pole, it remerges as the warm flow in the Gulf Stream. (see chart 1)

_____
Chart 1- Thermohaline Circulation System by NOAA

http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/paleo/ctl/images/belt.jpg


If this circulation were to switch off, it could have “big impacts on climate”. [new scientist 2422]. Data also suggests that the thermohaline circulation system “is capable of switching itself on and off” [New Scientist 2422].
If the circulation pattern changes and less warm water reaches the north Atlantic there will be an “immediate shift in the weather in Northern Europe” [P. Schwartz, D. Randall]. This exact phase has happened previously during the Younger Dryas, named after the flower Dryas octopetala which flourished during this era as it survives only in cold conditions.
The Younger Dryas ended 11 500 years ago, very abruptly. The abrupt change heated Greenland by 10º Celsius in only a decade. When evidence from the THC salinity chart is compared with the timeline of climate change, a pattern is very evident. (See chart 2). As the amount of fresh water enters the North Atlantic increases, the temperature changes. The less fresh water that enters the Gulf Stream the warmer the temperature rose in Greenland, and the more fresh water entered the Gulf Stream, the colder the temperature became in Greenland. Between 12 500 years ago and 11 500 years ago, the end of the Younger Dryas, the amount of fresh water in the Gulf Stream was at over 0.15 Sverdrup’s, at the same time, the temperature of Greenland, was, at its lowest point -50ºC. A Sverdrup (Sv) is equivalent to 106 cubic metres per second (0.001 km3/s).
Currently, the amount of freshwater in the Gulf Stream is rising due to the melting of ice in the poles. As more ice melts, the sea levels rise and the more fresh water enters the THC. If the global warming trend continues only a rise of “3º – likely in that part of the Arctic within a couple of decades – could start a runaway melting that will eventually raise sea levels worldwide by seven metres” [Jonathon Gregory, Hadley Centre,] would significantly raise the fresh water levels and “the THC works just fine … till one last melting iceberg shuts it down” [NS 2422].
The Hadley Centre in partnership with Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) created a document entitled “Climate change and the greenhouse effect” in which they speak of “concerns” raised by scientists over the stability of the THC in the ocean.

Answer 9

O. K.
The coal that fueled the industrial revolution took millions of years to form - that's millions of years of forests absorbing carbon from the Earths atmosphere.
The oil and gas that fueled the 20th century - the space race - two world wars etc., etc., etc., took millions of years to form - thats millions of years of living organisms living and dying and absorbing carbon from the Earths atmosphere.
So it seems that over the past 200 years we have released all the carbon dioxide trapped by millions of years of history.................
Is there anyone out there who still thinks this has no effect on the planet? Or are you all in denial because of your comforting religious bedtime stories.
It's time to dispose of your comfort blanket and face reality!
I have no proof that God does not exist!
You have no proof climate change does not exist!
You and I will probably know the truth about God before climate change does it's worst! - But our children will have to live with the decisions we make now! - and I for one would like to do the right thing by them, before this debate is resolved!

Answer 10

When taking the course 'Earth Science' years ago in high school, it was taught that the earth goes through cycles.....warm, cool, warm, cool. This has been proven through science. Also, our solar system makes one revolution in our galaxy every 25,000 years. The celestial bodies are constantly changing their their juxtapositions with one another, and magnetic fields change as a result......thus having effects on earths atmosphere.There have been palm leaf fossils found in Colorado ----- so it must've been somewhat warm there some time in the past......it could've been hundreds of thousands years ago. Our sun also has cycles. There is evidence of warming on Mars. The current warming is a solar event as it's effecting other terrestrials in our solar system.
I do not buy that it's man made....and I base this in my studies and education in earth science.
Concerning the hysteria of the present warming cycle ---
With the earth being possibly billions of years old, and having gone through countless cycles of warming and cooling, who made the decision that the present climate is the most perfect?