Global warming?

Question

Global warming hasn't been proven... I challenge anyone to quote any REAL evidence that human behaviour is responsible for global warming or that any flood/storm is caused by global warming!

The truth is the earth's temperature has always fluctuated and the hottest time was actually WAY before humans started driving cars, or riding in planes... The time when you would expect there to have been the most global warming, in the post - war Economic boom when people were pumping the most fumes into the air, there was actually a dip in the earths temperature...

The earth's temperature actually coincides with the activity of the sun... when the sun omits more radiation towards the earth, the earth unsurprisingly heats up.... It has absolutely nothing to do with humans, and I challenge someone to come up with some actual, convincing evidence

Okay, people have come up with scientific theories... but do we have any PROOF that this is actually causing the earth to heat up? Isn't the fact that the earth is actually cooler now than pre-co2 emitions a bit of a problem to those who have theories that co2 must be causing the earth to heat up?

Oh, and dzjynn, you are wrong... please actually READ my question... the point is, the earth ISN'T the hottest it has ever been, the correlation between industry and temperature ISN'T an exact match....

IngelaD, I agree that we need to be careful incase, I don't endorse people wasting things for the sake of it but the point is, a lot of evidence points AGAINST global warming, just as much, if not more than evidence FOR it. Just so you know, I copied this from a channel 4 website:

'For some people, the final nail in the coffin of human-produced greenhouse gas theories is the fact that carbon dioxide is produced in far larger quantities by many natural means: human emissions are miniscule in comparison. Volcanic emissions and carbon dioxide from animals, bacteria, decaying vegetation and the ocean outweigh our own production several times over.'

http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/G/great_global_warming_swindle/arguments_4.html

Answer 1

Long question requires a long answer.

1) GW hasn't been proven. Scientifically speaking there's a great many things that haven't been proven including light, gravity and relativity - like GW, these are all theories. Calling GW a theory does cause confusion even though it is the correct scientific term.

2) Providing 'real evidence' depends what you require as the burden of proof. If you throw something up in the air there's no proof it will come back down again yet the existence of gravity is universally accepted. We know how and why global warming occurs, this has been known since 1896 and despite numerous attempts, has never been shown to be wrong. It comes down to a simple physical property possessed by 'greenhouse gases' - the ability to retain heat within Earth's atmosphere.

3) Floods and storms. No reputable climatologist or meteorologist would claim that any one event is the result of global warming; to do so would be both ignorant and foolish. What we do know is that as Earth warms up the frequency and intensity of such events is increasing and that the increase is directly proportional to the rising temperature. This is what we would expect to see, has been accurately predicted for a long time and is in fact what we are seeing. Meteorologically speaking the reasons are very simple so what we're witnessing now is no great surprise.

4) Earth's temperature does indeed always fluctuate. However, it's 140,000 years since temperatures were higher than they are now, contrary to the popular misconception that it was warmer during the time known as the Mediaeval Warm Period. Historically temperature changes have occured very slowly over thousands and millions of years.

5) In the middle of the 20th century global average temperatures did indeed fall and it was precisely because of increased atmospheric pollution levels that they fell. The pollution blocked out sunlight and lead to what is referred to as Global Dimming.

The same thing happens following massive volcanic eruptions - the amount of particulate matter ejected into the atmosphere blocks out the sun and the temperatures fall, most recently this occured following the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo.

The pollution in the mid 20th century masked the underlying global warming trend, if we were again to pollute our atmosphere to the same levels we would see temperatures fall. (More specifically it was the sulphur dioxide content in the pollution that was the primary driver of global dimming, this gas is 'reflective' and reflected the solar radiation back into space before it had chance to penetrate through the atmosphere, be absorbed and re-radiated as thermal radiation).

6) Earth's temperature does not coincide with solar activity per se. If it did we would have an 11 year cycle of warming and cooling that coincided with sunspot cycles. In fact, in the last few decades solar output has been declining and the world has been warming.

There are a series of solar cycles resulting in solar variation, coupled with the cycles that Earth goes through these can and do cause significant climatic changes. These cycles are regular and we know whereabouts in time we are in each of the known cycles, as such we can predict the net effect (some cause warming, some cause cooling). Also, changes due to natural cycles are very slow and happen over thousands of years. The current rate of change is 17 times as much as can be attributed solely to natural cycles.

The short term variation in solar output is very small - it's an annual deviation from the mean of one twenty-three thousandth. The mean solar output is 1366 Watts per square metre per year, the variation caused by sun spots (the shortest solar cycle) is 1.3 W/m2/yr over 11 years.

7) The Earth isn't cooler now than it was 'pre CO2 emissions', I'm not sure where you got this information from but it's clearly an error, distortion or fabrication. There is a direct correlation between CO2 and temperature.

8) The evidence 'for' global warming is overwhelming and is based on credible scientific studies that have been conducted across the world by top scientists for many decades. The evidence 'against' global warming comes largely from the media, has no scientific foundation and does not stand up to scrutiny.

9) Volcanoes produce very little CO2, this is another myth perpetuated by those who seek to refute global warming by making unsubstantiated claims. In fact, humans produce 150 times the amount of CO2 that all volcanoes do.

We see yet another example of skeptics deliberately distorting the facts in the quote from the Channel 4 website. Oceans, biomass etc do release CO2 but conveniently the website omits to mention that they absorb it as well, the amount absorbed being slightly MORE than the amount released (oceans release 88 billion tons of CO2 per year and absorb 90 bn t, biomass relerases 119 bn t and absorbs 120 bn t).

Note the point I made in number 8 - it's the media that is the primary source of skepticism and their claims don't stand up to scrutiny.

10) Finally, your link is to one of the most discredited programmes to have beeb broadcast in recent years. So much so that the mainstream media refused to broadcast it, public apologies have been made, legal action is been taken. It further confirms point 8 - the source is the media and the producer is Martin Durkin who has no scientific background and makes a living by being controversial (he promotes communism, Naziism, claims that wars are good, and his response to people who question him is a tirade of abuse and swearing).

- - - - - - - - -

The evidence is everywhere. If you chose to ignore it or fail to see it then it doesn't make it go away.

Answer 2

The "evidence" of global warming is in all the signs together and the actual statistical data that shows on a GLOBAL scale temperatures is rising. (I'm not talking about local conditions.)

The 100% evidence that human causes global warming is probably just as invisible to your eyes as the greenhouse gases in the air. Still, the greenhouse gases is what makes this world habitable (the difference between -18 C and current +14 C) and we're making this greenhouse layer thicker... If the increased greenhouse gases depends on us cannot be questioned. It does depend on industrialization and deforestation and not on volcanoes or anything else.

Here's one article for you who believes the warming is due to the sun. http://environment.newscientist.com/article/mg19125691.100
This article SUPPORTS that theory but it also says:

"None of this means that we can stop worrying about global warming caused by emissions into the atmosphere."

and

"If the Earth does cool during the next sunspot crash and we do nothing, when the sun's magnetic activity returns, global warming will return with a vengeance."

Answer 3

I won't post the links because you can google the info and find it easily from tons of reputable sources.
1. Temperature now is the highest it has been in a million years.
2. The rise has occured in direct correspondence to the industrial revolution.
3. That much of an increase in less than 200 years is insane on a geological timescale.
4. The temperature increase and CO2 increase graphs are a near perfect fit.
5. The increase has gone up exponentially with cars and the explosion of fossil fuel use in the last few decades.
6. Data has been verified by ice core studies, which can be used to study atmospheric conditions hundreds of thousands years back.

The facts are everywhere and obvious. I have noticed that denialists aren't going to change their minds no matter what you show them so I usually don't waste too much time arguing.

Fortunately the world is waking up to the issue and things are being done. Because of information skewing by some corporate interest groups and the people who buy into it (mostly Americans, I hate to say) the solutions are being hampered.

Answer 4

It is simple really. Less than 1% of the atmosphere of earth is comprised of molecules that undergo dipole moment change in their vibrational modes. Under this change the molecule absorbs (traps) IR light reflected off the earths surface. This energy transfer either increases the temperature of the atmosphere or it is emitted (back to earth in one direction).

the greenhouse effect is a fact.

co2, ch4, HFC's, CFC's, SX's, and many other gases humans emit are greenhouse gases. This is a fact.

now put it together:

more greenhouse gas means more trapped heat,
see even a 3 year old can figure this out.

For the last 30 years instruments have been taking direct readings of solar output and it has been shown that solar activity has been decreasing slightly over this time:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Solar-cycle-data.png

http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/dn12234-suns-activity-rules-out-link-to-global-warming.html

and If your with the "mars is warming too" crowd:

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast16jul_1.htm

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/070404-mars-warming.html


Your info about post war industry emmitting more greenhouse gas than today is totally incorrect. I won't even post a link for you, it is common sense really.

EDIT:

your missing another basic concept of earths atmosphere and channel 4 is clearly a bunch of scientific illiterates:

Human Activity = about 4% (increasing yearly) of all annual CO2 emmisions into earths atmosphere.

"natural activity" = 96%

what your not getting is that the natural part is taken back through the carbon cycle and the left over (human activity) builds up in the atmosphere. Also, CO2 is responsible for only about 55% of the increased greenhouse effect. Other gases are far more effective greenhouse gases than CO2.
These include CH4, HFC's, ect. Human activity produces over 50% of annual CH4 emmisions and nearly 100% of annual HFC emissions. Many of these gases including HFC's are not taken back by nature, so they stay in the atmosphere.

Answer 5

If you wish to receive grant money for climate research, do you think that you'll get a cheque if you say," I need the grant, as I think that I can prove that the figures that the current paradigm is based upon are wrong" ? The great environmentalist, David Bellamy, has been silenced, and refused airtime. There is still no proven causative link between the amount of Co2 in the atmosphere, and an increase in global temperatures. The WWWF photographs of the polar bears swimming were taken in the Arctic summer; when the ice cap partially melts, as they couldn't get up to photograph in the winter. The ice was too thick! The East-Anglian uni research figures. "Oh! The figures don't match our expectations. Oh well. Keep quiet. Because we know that we are right." When the belief, and the faith is more important than squarely facing the legitimate doubts of a lot of non grant-supported scientists, science has been superceded by religious zealots. As Oliver Cromwell colourfully said." I pray thee, in the bowels of Christ, consider that thou mayest be wrong."

Answer 6

POWERFUL evidence for global warming has been discovered by scientists funded by the US Government, demolishing the chief argument of sceptics who deny that the phenomenon is real.

A new analysis of satellite data has revealed that temperatures in a critical part of the atmosphere are rising much faster than previously thought, strengthening the scientific consensus that the world is warming at an unnatural rate.

The discovery resolves one of the most contentious anomalies in climate science, which has often been invoked by the Bush Administration to question whether man-made global warming is happening.

While it is generally accepted that surface temperatures are increasing by an average of 0.17C (0.31F) per decade, satellites have been unable to detect a parallel trend in the troposphere — the lowest level of the atmosphere, extending 7.5 miles above the ground, in which most weather occurs. This lack of tropospheric warming has long puzzled scientists, as it is predicted by all the major models of climate change. It has also been seized on by a small but vocal minority of scientists, who have used it to raise doubts about whether global temperatures are rising at all.

Sceptics have often argued that if temperatures are rising at all, this is down to natural variation in the climate as the world emerges from a “little Ice Age”. The tropospheric trend, however, is precisely what scientists would expect to see if man-made emissions of greenhouse gases were causing it to heat up.

Answer 7

I wrote this whole thing and then I deleted....the problem is that limited media sources and political relationships dictate research results, what professionals say, what information is circulated, etc.....and then it gets all argued amongst people who read it so that businesses are protected while we all suffer through the realities of the consequences of their damages. We could all bring the whole congress up to the supreme court for violations of the constitution that have brought us to these points, for making financial gains where our livelihoods are threatened. Our leaders want this to be debated and questioned so that nobody can be held accountable or lose power or profits for it. As long as their is doubt, no action will ever be taken, as long as there is unrest between us, amongst the people, then nobody looks to leadership.

Ask any engineer what is the relationship between how much gas a car uses and the tire - the better quality the tire, the less gas you need - and what is our current foreign policy solution? You don't ever hear anything about what engineers know to be true. That's the info that we need.

Answer 8

Well, Patrick just showed it to you. There are simple lab experiments that can verify the heating effect of GHG's in the atmosphere. I believe it was first shown in 1896? You're way behind your time!

Answer 9

You are correct. Gore is a nutcase and it's frightening to think he almost became president.

Answer 10

agree with u