Of course this is BOGUS,right Al?

Question

Sun, Not Man, Main Cause of Climate Change, New Study Says
By Monisha Bansal
CNSNews.com Staff Writer
December 11, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - According to a new study on global warming, climate scientists at the University of Rochester, the University of Alabama, and the University of Virginia found that the climate change models based on human influence do not match observed warming.

That is contrary to the views held by former Vice President Al Gore, who accepted the Nobel Prize on Monday along with the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and who thinks that climate change is largely caused by human action.

Gore wants nations to tax carbon dioxide emissions and not build any new coal plants, among other steps. "It is time to make peace with the planet," Gore said in his Nobel speech, as reported by the Associated Press. "We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war."

The new report, which challenges the claims of Gore and the IPCC, was published in the December 2007 issue of the International Journal of Climatology of the Royal Meteorological Society.

The report was written by David Douglass at the University of Rochester, John Christy at the University of Alabama, and Benjamin Pearson and S. Fred Singer at the University of Virginia.

"Our findings basically are that fingerprints - that is to say the pattern of warming - that's predicted by greenhouse models does not match the fingerprints of observations, so there is a disconnect between greenhouse models and the actual reality of observations," Singer told Cybercast News Service.

"This means that the greenhouse effect - while real - is not very important in producing climate change," he said. "It's a lot smaller than what the models calculate."

Singer said the reason why the models "overestimate the effectiveness of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is that the models ignore what are called negative feedbacks which occur in the atmosphere, such as clouds, which reduce the effect of the greenhouse gases."

"Their models just don't consider them properly," he said.

But Bracken Hendricks, a senior fellow at the liberal Center for American Progress, told Cybercast News Service, that the study is "radically out of step with the complete scientific consensus."

"The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is not just a report. It's not just a random gathering of scientists. It's the largest scientific body ever assembled," he said. "Their most recent assessment determined that there's 90 percent certainty that global climate change is happening and that it is caused by human beings."

But Singer said, "We have to remember that the climate has always been changing ever since we have records, and we have geologic records going back millions and millions of years. We know that there have been huge climate changes on the earth long before human beings actually came into existence.

"We are fairly sure that what's causing the warming are changes in the sun," he said. "These are very subtle changes that are very difficult to observe. The sun is really a quite variable star."

Hendricks, however, said because of the IPCC report, "the assertion that this is caused by increased solar activity or these sorts of things is out of step with the vast consensus."

"It's dangerous to get into a game of dueling science," he added. "We don't want to be gambling with the fate of the planet."

But Singer said because global warming is a natural event. "There is little point to try to control emission of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, which means that all of this legislation and all of these efforts to find substitutes for fossil fuels are pointless, useless and very, very expensive," he said.

Hendricks countered, saying that alternative energy will be a multi-billion dollar industry and "an opportunity to revitalize our global competitiveness" through innovation and job creation.

Answer 1

THANK YOU!

Some one else gets it. However there will always be those that still believe the Earth is the center of the universe.

People have so much invested in "man made" global warming, that they aren't going to give up their ideas anytime soon.

Answer 2

Rick,

I know you're trying hard to find something that refutes the theory of manmade global warming but in all honesty, what you've found here is meaningless, completely distorted and contradictory.

The whole premise of the article is that levels of anthropogenic greenhouse gases do not match with the predictions made by the models.

Conveniently there's one vital piece of information that has deliberately been left out - greenhouse gas levels have risen FASTER than the models predicted.

Mind you, the primary author is professor Fred Singer. Until very recently he claimed there was no such thing as global warming - natural, human or othewise. He also claimed until very recently that there was no such thing as cancer, that AIDS doesn't exist and made a string of other ludicrous claims. To this day he still maintains that smoking is harmless.

I suppose such claims are to be expected from a person who is himself funded by, and his organisations are funded by, the likes of Philip Morris, Exxon, Chevron, Conoco etc.

The other authors are David Douglass - a physicist not a climate scientist and a person with an apparent intense personal dislike of Al Gore, it would appear that his stance against global warming is driven by personal reasons. John Christy is not a skeptic and has stated that he is "convinced that human activities are a cause of the global warming that has been measured". Nobody seems to have heard of Benjamin Pearson so I don't know who he is.

I'm sorry Rick but it would appear that you've come across yet another article that has no scientific basis and is driven by the motivations of certain oil companies and their beneficiaries.

Answer 3

Yes, there seem to be reasons to seriously question this. Singer's been playing this tune since 2004.

Instead of CBS news, let's give people access to the paper:

http://216.109.125.130/search/cache?ei=UTF-8&p=International+Journal+of+Climatology+of+the+Royal+Meteorological+Society+DOI%3A+10.1002%2Fjoc.1651&fr=yfp-t-501&u=icecap.us/images/uploads/DOUGLASPAPER.pdf&w=international+journal+climatology+royal+meteorological+society+doi+10+1002+joc+1651&d=SKTl5rXiP7hn&icp=1&.intl=us

"If these results continue to be supported, then
future projections of temperature change, as depicted in
the present suite of climate models, are likely too high."

Let's hope so! They do stop short of saying global warming isn't happening.

"The last 25 years constitute a period of more complete and accurate observations and more realistic modelling
efforts. Yet the models are seen to disagree with the
observations. We suggest, therefore, that projections of
future climate based on these models be viewed with
much caution."

This seems identical to what Douglass and Singer summarized here in 2004, so what's new?
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=15727

Does it really take 3 years to get completed research published, or is that the case only if it's difficult to find someone who reviews it and then considers it valid and worth publishing?

Why weren't scientists convinced that this report had an impact, then or in the 3 years since? If scientists aren't impressed, why is is presented to the public as if it were significant?

Dr S Fred Singer is a co-author of the paper. This may help shine some light on his background and motivation:

"Climate skeptic S. Fred Singer founded Science and Environmental Policy Project in 1990. SEPP's mission is 'to clarify the diverse problems facing the planet and, where necessary, arrive at effective, cost-conscious solutions.'"
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=65
Dr S Fred Singer's Science and Environmental Policy Project has received $20,000 from ExxonMobil.

"SEPP was the author of the Leipzig Declaration, which was supposedly based on the 'scientfic' conclusions drawn from a November 1995 conference in Leipzig, Germany, which SEPP organized with the European Academy for Environmental Affairs. SEPP publicly used the Declaration to suggest there is little scientific consensus on global warming. According to P.R. Watch, news reporters discovered that in the end, twenty-five of the signers were TV weathermen - a profession that requires no in-depth knowledge of climate research. Other signers included a dentist, a medical laboratory researcher, a civil engineer, and an amateur meteorologist. Of the 33 European signers, four of them could not be located, 12 denied ever having signed, and some had not even heard of the Leipzig Declaration."
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=65

In a February 2001 letter to the Washington Post, Singer denied receiving funding from the oil industry, except for consulting work some 20 years prior. His organization SEPP, however, received multiple grants from ExxonMobil, including 1998 and 2000.
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1

So are we to believe that this guy who has set up his own organization to work for the past 16 years to discredit global warming and allegedly has multiple misleading acts to his credit is now dealing in the truth?

John Christy allegedly has a history of changing his mind on global warming:
"While he now acknowledges that global warming is real and the human contribution is significant, Christy has been a long-time skeptic who previously argued that satellite climate data do not show a trend toward global warming, and even show cooling in some areas. His findings have been widely disputed."
So global warming was not real, then it was real and the human contribution was significant, now his latest paper (not reflected in the excerpt above) says is, but greenhouses gases aren't particularly involved? Which way is it this week, John?
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=903

Of all of them John Christy is the most interesting. He's a professor and Director, Atmospheric Science Department, University of Alabama at Huntsville. He's in his field and I actually like that he seems to change his mind a lot since that indicates that he may be less attached than some to a particular answer.

On the other hand, why do you suppose a scientist would veer sharply away from the scientific study to make the specific point that Singer makes on his blog: "attempts to control CO2 emissions are ineffective and pointless. – but very costly"?
http://science-sepp.blogspot.com/2007/12/press-release-dec-10-2007.html
Suddenly in the press release for a "scientific" paper he jumps to assume the role of policymaker and economist? How much of that was present as intent as he conducted his analysis? Given that slip and his long history of clear ties to industry opposition, I have to conclude that Singer seems to be acting squarely in his SEPP advocacy role, so until his claims convince a healthy percentage of the people working in the field I have to question the context and intent of his research and result. To me it appears to have about as much credibility behind it as the Leipzig Declaration that Singer authored in 1995. He sure has been at this detractor business a long time.

Can't the GW opposition find anyone without this kind of history to publish something?

Answer 4

With temperatures not moving up as fast as CO2 is moving up since 1998 - it has most thinking scientists searching for other explanations.

If you want to see some of the other emissions the SUN puts out beyond just luminescence and sun spots - you can monitor them here:
http://spaceweather.com/

If you want to read a great scientific work on -
"SOLAR ACTIVITY:
A DOMINANT FACTOR IN CLIMATE DYNAMICS"

http://www.john-daly.com/solar/solar.htm

I have been monitoring this web site for years and this year the moisture levels & cloud covers have been unusually high in the northern hemisphere for longer periods of time. Remember if clouds block enough Sun = It can get rather cool on earth, you might even see record lows.
It's fun just to watch the storms - but we might also be watching history being made?
http://www.weather.unisys.com/satellite/sat_ir_enh_west_loop-12.html

Answer 5

Actually, yes. But Gore has nothing to do with science.

Solar activity (sunspots) may be increasing, but solar radiation (which is what warms us) is decreasing. Proof:

"Recent oppositely directed trends in solar
climate forcings and the global mean surface
air temperature", Lockwood and Frolich (2007), Proc. R. Soc. A
doi:10.1098/rspa.2007.1880

http://www.pubs.royalsoc.ac.uk/media/proceedings_a/rspa20071880.pdf

News article at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6290228.stm

This theory has been around for years, like the magic carburetor that gets 100 miles per gallon. It's been debunked.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/09/the-trouble-with-sunspots/
http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn11650

EDIT - The "great scientific work" cited below was written by a very prestigious.... (wait for it) .....

astrologer. Of course the guy did win the Marc Edmund Jones Award.... for astrology.

And this great scientific work is published... on the website of an economist. Why? "One of John (Daly)’s great legacies is the use of the Internet to publish scientific articles that had been rejected through the ‘peer-review’ control system."

Answer 6

"It's dangerous to get into a game of dueling science," he added. "We don't want to be gambling with the fate of the planet."

That says a lot, aparently Hendricks believes objective scientific research is evil. People need to be lied to for their own good. Aparently he believes we should all switch to solar, but we need some doomsday campaigning to cause it to happen.