Do You Believe Human Activity Causes Harmful Climate Change?

[Jingthing]

Interesting to see those of us with degrees are now split 50/50

I never realised so many professional climate scientists were members of Thaivisa. I wonder why they don't contribute their extensive knowledge to this thread.

4 Climate scientists have voted No, and 0 have voted Yes ------ kinda points to something.

The original premise by Jingting at the beginning is also incorrect. Bangkok's problems are 90% caused by subsidence and not global warming.

But subsidence is not emotive enough, so better to ignore it ---- maybe it will go away. LOL.

No it is not.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotne...0-years,-expert

[Jingthing]

4 Climate scientists have voted No, and 0 have voted Yes ------ kinda points to something.

That Thaivisa members lie about their qualifications, perhaps?

More like probably. Statistically, the vast majority of climate scientists would vote yes, so finding the result here FISHY is perfectly reasonable.

Edited December 15, 2009 by Jingthing

[jombom]

Interesting to see those of us with degrees are now split 50/50

I never realised so many professional climate scientists were members of Thaivisa. I wonder why they don't contribute their extensive knowledge to this thread.

4 Climate scientists have voted No, and 0 have voted Yes ------ kinda points to something.

The original premise by Jingting at the beginning is also incorrect. Bangkok's problems are 90% caused by subsidence and not global warming.

But subsidence is not emotive enough, so better to ignore it ---- maybe it will go away. LOL.

No it is not.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotne...0-years,-expert

Exactly JT. If you read the article you posted, and do the math, you will see that 3mm from sea level rise will take 330 years to get to 1 metre. 20mm per year from subsidence is 1 meter in 50 years.

Therefore sea level rising becomes an issue 280 years after bangkok subsides beneath the waves, from subsidence.

[bonobo]

Global Warming is pretty much a fact at the present time.  Whether it will continue to warm is debatable, and just how much, if any, of the warming is due to human activity, can be debated as well.

You can even debate if Global Warming is a bad thing.  People in Greenland, for example, are now able to grow gardens in the summer where previously, this would have been impossible.  And growing seasons in Canada and Russia are getting longer.  However, with something like 25% of the world's human population living in litoral regions, and with the low fertility of the soil in northern areas which might open up to agriculture, it is obvious that Global Warming would have a severe impact on the human population and would probably result in mass migrations and even conflicts. 

What I personally don't understand is the point some anti-GW proponents make is that since they believe the warming cycle is natural, then we should pretty much ignore it.  For those of us living in BKK, for example, we can ignore it as our homes slowly fall victim to rising water levels. Natural cycles or man-made, or perhaps a combination of the two, does it really matter when the water covers your home?

And blaming Al Gore for as some sort of boogeyman is really ridiculous.  So what if he is rich?  Is it right to kill the messenger?

I am not so sure that carbon credits are the answer.  But it is foolish to stick our heads in the sand. We need to do something, even if only to slightly mitigate the effects of global warming, worse case basis. And the thing is, many of the steps advocated to reduce GW are beneficial without regards to the GW question.  For example, increasing fuel efficiency in cars, one of the steps advocated by GW scientists.  Reduce cost to consumers, reduce dependency on fossil fuels, reduce air pollution, increase economic activity as the new cars are produced--exactly where is the downside, even if the scientists are wrong and doing this has no effect on the global temperature?  If the scientists are right, doing this helps mitigate rising temperatures.  If they are wrong, well, we still come out ahead. 

[Gerontion]

From the very recent Copenhagen Diagnosis, an interim IPCC report:

Sea-level predictions revised: By 2100, global sea-level is likely to rise at least twice as much as projected by Working Group 1 of the IPCC AR4; for unmitigated emissions it may well exceed 1 meter. The upper limit has been estimated as ~ 2 meters sea level rise by 2100. Sea level will continue to rise for centuries after global temperatures have been stabilized, and several meters of sea level rise must be expected over the next few centuries.

Subsidence is clearly a very pressing problem in Bangkok but climate change only adds to this; it reason to be twice as worried, not half as worried.

[RickBradford]

Al Gore is one of the best friends the climate change skeptics have.

Witness his latest speech in Copenhagen

Gore at climate talks - Polar ice may go in five years - COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009

Even the scientist whose figures he quoted says Globulous Al is wrong:

“It’s unclear to me how this figure was arrived at,” Dr Maslowski said. “I would never try to estimate likelihood at anything as exact as this.”

Mr Gore’s office later admitted that the 75 per cent figure [of ice loss] was one used by Dr Maslowksi as a “ballpark figure” several years ago in a conversation with Mr Gore.

“This is an exaggeration that opens the science up to criticism from sceptics,” Professor Jim Overland, a leading oceanographer at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said

.

It's the same old stuff -- peddling more meaningless alarmism based on hopeless computer models to an army of gullible twits.

[pjclark1]

I never realised so many professional climate scientists were members of Thaivisa. I wonder why they don't contribute their extensive knowledge to this thread.

I didn't realise there was any legitimate qualification to become a 'climate scientist'

Although some of the lower educational establishments offer such courses to those who have the very lowest of 'a' level passes and who can't get on any other course (apart from sociology)

What's you degree in?

[Ulysses G.]

He has a B.S. with honors.

Bachelor of Science

Edited December 15, 2009 by Ulysses G.

[Gerontion]

I didn't realise there was any legitimate qualification to become a 'climate scientist'. Although some of the lower educational establishments offer such courses to those who have the very lowest of 'a' level passes and who can't get on any other course (apart from sociology)

Cambridge is highest-ranked in Earth Sciences by RAE and they run a research programme in "Climate Change and Earth-Ocean Atmosphere Systems". MIT also have a "Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Climate Change" as well as a department of "Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences". Those were just the first two universities which I checked. If you want to look for yourself, I'm sure you'll find that most universities of standing run similar programmes.

What's you degree in?

Not in climate science or a related field. As I said earlier in this thread, my knowledge is that of an educated layman.

[neverdie]

You are not helping the GW discussion with your small-minded attitude.

Small-minded indeed.

I was actually laughing at the 'notion' that all the big brains had already commented on this thread

[Gerontion]

What I personally don't understand is the point some anti-GW proponents make is that since they believe the warming cycle is natural, then we should pretty much ignore it.  

Yes, I always wonder about this as well. It's extremely common to hear people say man-made climate change isn't real - someone no doubt said it on this thread - because the climate is naturally variable but - aside from the fact that it's a shitty argument because the two parts of it are completely unconnected - the obvious response is well does pumping bazillions of tons of greenhouse gases into a system which you agree is unstable sound like a good idea? The answer is obviously no. And the corollary of that is the necessity of curbing the emission of greenhouse gases: you end up in exactly the same place.

[RickBradford]

What I personally don't understand is the point some anti-GW proponents make is that since they believe the warming cycle is natural, then we should pretty much ignore it.

Natural causes include such things as solar activity or gradual warming from the Little Ice Age 300 years ago. Even cosmic rays have been suggested as having an effect.

What do you propose we do about them?

Anti-GW proponents do not say we should ignore warming -- they only say that imposing huge taxes and burdensome regulations in a futile and misguided attempt to control warming via CO² restrictions is the wrong solution. A better solution is to adapt to a warming world, which humans, being very inventive creatures, can do without totally disrupting our way of life.

This comes from the fact that anti-GW proponents reject the notion that the warming being experienced now is catastrophic, and believe it may even be beneficial, despite all the scare stories put out by IPCC.

Edited December 15, 2009 by RickBradford

[bonobo]

What I personally don't understand is the point some anti-GW proponents make is that since they believe the warming cycle is natural, then we should pretty much ignore it.

Natural causes include such things as solar activity or gradual warming from the Little Ice Age 300 years ago. Even cosmic rays have been suggested as having an effect.

What do you propose we do about them?

Anti-GW proponents do not say we should ignore warming -- they only say that imposing huge taxes and burdensome regulations in a futile and misguided attempt to control warming via CO² restrictions is the wrong solution. A better solution is to adapt to a warming world, which humans, being very inventive creatures, can do without totally disrupting our way of life.

This comes from the fact that anti-GW proponents reject the notion that the warming being experienced now is catastrophic, and believe it may even be beneficial, despite all the scare stories put out by IPCC.

I think it is logical to assume that at least some of the global warming is due to natural cycles.  But it is also logical to assume that mankind's actions on the planet also contribute.  Why does this have to be an all-or-nothing argument?

And of course it is easy to argue that no, global warming does not exist, but if it did, it will be beneficial.  How could warming temperatures be beneficial to northern Africa, the countries which are fed by the Ganges and the Mekong, the US grain belt, California, Australia, etc?  Sure, it might be beneficial to Greenland, Canada, and Russia, but just think of the dislocation, if nothing else (like war) in the areas which can no longer support their current populations?

Just because something is natural does not mean that we should accept it and live with it.  We dam rivers, irrigate crops, seed clouds, etc.  What is that but changing the effects of Mother Nature?

Finding ways to live in a warmer world makes sense to me.  And no, I am not so sure that carbon credits are the way to go. But taxes, if used correctly should not be taken off the table.  A "gas guzzler" tax as is currently on the books in the US is a tax which, if the funds are allocated correctly, can help reduce emissions which probably have at least some effect on global warming, but certainly have an effect on simple pollution. So how is that wrong?

To ask me what to do about solar cycles, warming from the Little Ice Age, etc is of little use.  Unlike four of us here ( ), I am not a climate scientist.  But certainly, with a concerted effort from all nations, those who are experts can come up with methods to mitigate climate change and/or the effects of it.

[Jingthing]

There seems to be more frequent reports that the effects of the climate change are happening much more rapidly than previously projected. If the warming goes up too much, it will be the end of our species within 100 years (or even much less) and there is always the real danger that once we reach the point of no return, emergency measures will be too late. That is what the mainstream climate scientists are saying.

So, those who breed.

What is better to tell the kids and grandkids.

The "believers" saying, so sorry, we overestimated the danger and we were wrong. The measures we took turned out to be unnecessary.

OR

The denial artists saying, so sorry, in our greed, cynicism, and refusal to change our ways in the face of overwhelming scientific evidence from the vast majority of mainstream scientists and world leaders as well as decades of dire warnings, you are all going to prematurely suffer and die! So sorry.

The denial artists remind me of people who get a cancer diagnosis from a doctor at the Mayo Clinic and then seek out the opinion of a quack astrologer to tell them they actually don't have cancer and require no treatment.

This denial is not benign. Its OK to commit suicide on your own body. You have no right to do the same thing to all human beings. This whole denial political movement is extremely dangerous, a psychological weapon of mass destruction, as it were.

Edited December 15, 2009 by Jingthing

[RickBradford]

^

Yes, we've all watched The Day After Tomorrow, but most of us can recognize it for what it was -- a piece of entertainment, not a reflection of real life.

This "you are all going to prematurely suffer and die" stuff comes purely form your imagination -- even the IPCC isn't saying anything remotely like that, nor are "mainstream scientists."

I understand it is comforting to feel that because of your support for global warming, you are in some way defending the planet from the ravages of capitalists, but that's not really the case.

Humanity certainly needs to clean up its act, but this needs to be done in a rational and considered way, not by hysterical declarations that "it will be the end of our species within 100 years (or even much less)"

[Gerontion]

the IPCC isn't saying anything remotely like that, nor are "mainstream scientists."

Have you ever read any of the IPCC publications? Somehow, I very much doubt it.

Kofi Annan's organisation, Global Humanitarian Study, recently carried out a study of the current consequences of climate change and found that there are an estimated 300,000 deaths a year right now from climate change, along with annual economic losses of $125 billion. Of course, these deaths happen far away from TV cameras, and the corpses have brown and black skin so they're obviously far less important than some rich guy's flashy car or foreign holiday. And, if you look at work on the consequences of temperature rises of, say, 4 degrees and over, you'll find that really large-scale death is very much within the realms of possible outcomes. Our species won't go extinct within 100 years but this century we can certainly create the conditions which make its extinction a distinctly raised possibility.

[RickBradford]

Have you ever read any of the IPCC publications? Somehow, I very much doubt it.

Typical extremist Warmist position - if someone disagrees with you, write them off as uninformed.

I have read the AR3 (2001) and AR4 (2007) Summary for Policymakers, parts of the main text of AR3 and some working group inputs to that.

It is not for me to comment on the science contained in those reports, there are many well-credentialled scientists who disagree with the IPCC findings, not to mention that many of the authors of those reports have been exposed by Climategate as having demonstrated a systematic, self-serving, ruthless readiness to invent, fabricate, distort, alter, suppress, hide, conceal or even destroy scientific data for the sake of reaching the answer they want.

Virtually all the conclusions in the IPCC report can be disputed -- and have been. Dismissing people who disagree as "deniers" or "global criminals" doesn't make the disagreement go away.

But for the sake of discussion, let;s accept the IPCC figures.

Even in its most pessimistic assessment, IPCC rates, by the year 2100, the most likely rise of global temperatures as 4C and a sea-level rise of between 26cm and 59cm.

How you translate that to: "but this century we can certainly create the conditions which make its extinction a distinctly raised possibility.", I don't know.

Humanity has lived through repeated Ice Ages and periods much warmer than today.

Do you have so little faith in the resilience of our species?

[H2oDunc]

Here's 100 reasons the whole thing is a crock of!

HERE are the 100 reasons, released in a dossier issued by the European Foundation, why climate change is natural and not man-made:

1) There is “no real scientific proof” that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man’s activity.

2) Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute less than 0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the earth during geological history.

3) Warmer periods of the Earth’s history came around 800 years before rises in CO2 levels.

4) After World War II, there was a huge surge in recorded CO2 emissions but global temperatures fell for four decades after 1940.

5) Throughout the Earth’s history, temperatures have often been warmer than now and CO2 levels have often been higher – more than ten times as high.

6) Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time.

7) The 0.7C increase in the average global temperature over the last hundred years is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term, natural climate trends.

8) The IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers not the 4,000 usually cited.

9) Leaked e-mails from British climate scientists – in a scandal known as “Climate-gate” - suggest that that has been manipulated to exaggerate global warming

10) A large body of scientific research suggests that the sun is responsible for the greater share of climate change during the past hundred years.

11) Politicians and activiists claim rising sea levels are a direct cause of global warming but sea levels rates have been increasing steadily since the last ice age 10,000 ago

12) Philip Stott, Emeritus Professor of Biogeography at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London says climate change is too complicated to be caused by just one factor, whether CO2 or clouds

13) Peter Lilley MP said last month that “fewer people in Britain than in any other country believe in the importance of global warming. That is despite the fact that our Government and our political class—predominantly—are more committed to it than their counterparts in any other country in the world”.

14) In pursuit of the global warming rhetoric, wind farms will do very little to nothing to reduce CO2 emissions

15) Professor Plimer, Professor of Geology and Earth Sciences at the University of Adelaide, stated that the idea of taking a single trace gas in the atmosphere, accusing it and finding it guilty of total responsibility for climate change, is an “absurdity”

16) A Harvard University astrophysicist and geophysicist, Willie Soon, said he is “embarrassed and puzzled” by the shallow science in papers that support the proposition that the earth faces a climate crisis caused by global warming.

17) The science of what determines the earth’s temperature is in fact far from settled or understood.

18) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, CO2 is a minor greenhouse gas, unlike water vapour which is tied to climate concerns, and which we can’t even pretend to control

19) A petition by scientists trying to tell the world that the political and media portrayal of global warming is false was put forward in the Heidelberg Appeal in 1992. Today, more than 4,000 signatories, including 72 Nobel Prize winners, from 106 countries have signed it.

20) It is claimed the average global temperature increased at a dangerously fast rate in the 20th century but the recent rate of average global temperature rise has been between 1 and 2 degrees C per century - within natural rates

21) Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski, Chairman of the Scientific Council of the Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection in Warsaw, Poland says the earth’s temperature has more to do with cloud cover and water vapor than CO2 concentration in the atmosphere.

22) There is strong evidence from solar studies which suggests that the Earth’s current temperature stasis will be followed by climatic cooling over the next few decades

23) It is myth that receding glaciers are proof of global warming as glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for many centuries

24) It is a falsehood that the earth’s poles are warming because that is natural variation and while the western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer we also see that the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder

25) The IPCC claims climate driven “impacts on biodiversity are significant and of key relevance” but those claims are simply not supported by scientific research

26) The IPCC threat of climate change to the world’s species does not make sense as wild species are at least one million years old, which means they have all been through hundreds of climate cycles

27) Research goes strongly against claims that CO2-induced global warming would cause catastrophic disintegration of the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets.

28) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels are our best hope of raising crop yields to feed an ever-growing population

29) The biggest climate change ever experienced on earth took place around 700 million years ago

30) The slight increase in temperature which has been observed since 1900 is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term natural climate cycles

31) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels of some so-called “greenhouse gases” may be contributing to higher oxygen levels and global cooling, not warming

32) Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the last three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term rate of increase in global temperatures

33) Today’s CO2 concentration of around 385 ppm is very low compared to most of the earth’s history – we actually live in a carbon-deficient atmosphere

34) It is a myth that CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas because greenhouse gases form about 3% of the atmosphere by volume, and CO2 constitutes about 0.037% of the atmosphere

35) It is a myth that computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming because computer models can be made to “verify” anything

36) There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes

37) One statement deleted from a UN report in 1996 stated that “none of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed climate changes to increases in greenhouse gases”

38) The world “warmed” by 0.07 +/- 0.07 degrees C from 1999 to 2008, not the 0.20 degrees C expected by the IPCC

39) The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says “it is likely that future tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense” but there has been no increase in the intensity or frequency of tropical cyclones globally

40) Rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere can be shown not only to have a negligible effect on the Earth’s many ecosystems, but in some cases to be a positive help to many organisms

41) Researchers who compare and contrast climate change impact on civilizations found warm periods are beneficial to mankind and cold periods harmful

42) The Met Office asserts we are in the hottest decade since records began but this is precisely what the world should expect if the climate is cyclical

43) Rising CO2 levels increase plant growth and make plants more resistant to drought and pests

44) The historical increase in the air’s CO2 content has improved human nutrition by raising crop yields during the past 150 years

45) The increase of the air’s CO2 content has probably helped lengthen human lifespans since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution

46) The IPCC alleges that “climate change currently contributes to the global burden of disease and premature deaths” but the evidence shows that higher temperatures and rising CO2 levels has helped global populations

47) In May of 2004, the Russian Academy of Sciences published a report concluding that the Kyoto Protocol has no scientific grounding at all.

48) The “Climate-gate” scandal pointed to a expensive public campaign of disinformation and the denigration of scientists who opposed the belief that CO2 emissions were causing climate change

49) The head of Britain’s climate change watchdog has predicted households will need to spend up to £15,000 on a full energy efficiency makeover if the Government is to meet its ambitious targets for cutting carbon emissions.

50) Wind power is unlikely to be the answer to our energy needs. The wind power industry argues that there are “no direct subsidies” but it involves a total subsidy of as much as £60 per MWh which falls directly on electricity consumers. This burden will grow in line with attempts to achieve Wind power targets, according to a recent OFGEM report.

51) Wind farms are not an efficient way to produce energy. The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) accepts a figure of 75 per cent back-up power is required.

52) Global temperatures are below the low end of IPCC predictions not at “at the top end of IPCC estimates”

53) Climate alarmists have raised the concern over acidification of the oceans but Tom Segalstad from Oslo University in Norway , and others, have noted that the composition of ocean water – including CO2, calcium, and water – can act as a buffering agent in the acidification of the oceans.

54) The UN’s IPCC computer models of human-caused global warming predict the emergence of a “hotspot” in the upper troposphere over the tropics. Former researcher in the Australian Department of Climate Change, David Evans, said there is no evidence of such a hotspot

55) The argument that climate change is a of result of global warming caused by human activity is the argument of flat Earthers.

56) The manner in which US President Barack Obama sidestepped Congress to order emission cuts shows how undemocratic and irrational the entire international decision-making process has become with regards to emission-target setting.

57) William Kininmonth, a former head of the National Climate Centre and a consultant to the World Meteorological Organisation, wrote “the likely extent of global temperature rise from a doubling of CO2 is less than 1C. Such warming is well within the envelope of variation experienced during the past 10,000 years and insignificant in the context of glacial cycles during the past million years, when Earth has been predominantly very cold and covered by extensive ice sheets.”

58) Canada has shown the world targets derived from the existing Kyoto commitments were always unrealistic and did not work for the country.

59) In the lead up to the Copenhagen summit, David Davis MP said of previous climate summits, at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Kyoto in 1997 that many had promised greater cuts, but “neither happened”, but we are continuing along the same lines.

60) The UK ’s environmental policy has a long-term price tag of about £55 billion, before taking into account the impact on its economic growth.

61) The UN’s panel on climate change warned that Himalayan glaciers could melt to a fifth of current levels by 2035. J. Graham Cogley a professor at Ontario Trent University, claims this inaccurate stating the UN authors got the date from an earlier report wrong by more than 300 years.

62) Under existing Kyoto obligations the EU has attempted to claim success, while actually increasing emissions by 13 per cent, according to Lord Lawson. In addition the EU has pursued this scheme by purchasing “offsets” from countries such as China paying them billions of dollars to destroy atmospheric pollutants, such as CFC-23, which were manufactured purely in order to be destroyed.

63) It is claimed that the average global temperature was relatively unchanging in pre-industrial times but sky-rocketed since 1900, and will increase by several degrees more over the next 100 years according to Penn State University researcher Michael Mann. There is no convincing empirical evidence that past climate was unchanging, nor that 20th century changes in average global temperature were unusual or unnatural.

64) Michael Mann of Penn State University has actually shown that the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age did in fact exist, which contrasts with his earlier work which produced the “hockey stick graph” which showed a constant temperature over the past thousand years or so followed by a recent dramatic upturn.

65) The globe’s current approach to climate change in which major industrialised countries agree to nonsensical targets for their CO2 emissions by a given date, as it has been under the Kyoto system, is very expensive.

66) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had emailed one another about using a “trick” for the sake of concealing a “decline” in temperatures when looking at the history of the Earth’s temperature.

67) Global temperatures have not risen in any statistically-significant sense for 15 years and have actually been falling for nine years. The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed a scientific team had expressed dismay at the fact global warming was contrary to their predictions and admitted their inability to explain it was “a travesty”.

68) The IPCC predicts that a warmer planet will lead to more extreme weather, including drought, flooding, storms, snow, and wildfires. But over the last century, during which the IPCC claims the world experienced more rapid warming than any time in the past two millennia, the world did not experience significantly greater trends in any of these extreme weather events.

69) In explaining the average temperature standstill we are currently experiencing, the Met Office Hadley Centre ran a series of computer climate predictions and found in many of the computer runs there were decade-long standstills but none for 15 years – so it expects global warming to resume swiftly.

70) Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote: “The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the Earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. Such hysteria (over global warming) simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth.”

71) Despite the 1997 Kyoto Protocol’s status as the flagship of the fight against climate change it has been a failure.

72) The first phase of the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which ran from 2005 to 2007 was a failure. Huge over-allocation of permits to pollute led to a collapse in the price of carbon from €33 to just €0.20 per tonne meaning the system did not reduce emissions at all.

73) The EU trading scheme, to manage carbon emissions has completely failed and actually allows European businesses to duck out of making their emissions reductions at home by offsetting, which means paying for cuts to be made overseas instead.

74) To date “cap and trade” carbon markets have done almost nothing to reduce emissions.

75) In the United States , the cap-and-trade is an approach designed to control carbon emissions and will impose huge costs upon American citizens via a carbon tax on all goods and services produced in the United States. The average family of four can expect to pay an additional $1700, or £1,043, more each year. It is predicted that the United States will lose more than 2 million jobs as the result of cap-and-trade schemes.

76) Dr Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, has indicated that out of the 21 climate models tracked by the IPCC the differences in warming exhibited by those models is mostly the result of different strengths of positive cloud feedback – and that increasing CO2 is insufficient to explain global-average warming in the last 50 to 100 years.

77) Why should politicians devote our scarce resources in a globally competitive world to a false and ill-defined problem, while ignoring the real problems the entire planet faces, such as: poverty, hunger, disease or terrorism.

78) A proper analysis of ice core records from the past 650,000 years demonstrates that temperature increases have come before, and not resulted from, increases in CO2 by hundreds of years.

79) Since the cause of global warming is mostly natural, then there is in actual fact very little we can do about it. (We are still not able to control the sun).

80) A substantial number of the panel of 2,500 climate scientists on the United Nation’s International Panel on Climate Change, which created a statement on scientific unanimity on climate change and man-made global warming, were found to have serious concerns.

81) The UK’s Met Office has been forced this year to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by revelations about the data.

82) Politicians and activists push for renewable energy sources such as wind turbines under the rhetoric of climate change, but it is essentially about money – under the system of Renewable Obligations. Much of the money is paid for by consumers in electricity bills. It amounts to £1 billion a year.

83) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had tampered with their own data so as to conceal inconsistencies and errors.

84) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had campaigned for the removal of a learned journal’s editor, solely because he did not share their willingness to debase science for political purposes.

85) Ice-core data clearly show that temperatures change centuries before concentrations of atmospheric CO2 change. Thus, there appears to be little evidence for insisting that changes in concentrations of CO2 are the cause of past temperature and climate change.

86) There are no experimentally verified processes explaining how CO2 concentrations can fall in a few centuries without falling temperatures – in fact it is changing temperatures which cause changes in CO2 concentrations, which is consistent with experiments that show CO2 is the atmospheric gas most readily absorbed by water.

87) The Government’s Renewable Energy Strategy contains a massive increase in electricity generation by wind power costing around £4 billion a year over the next twenty years. The benefits will be only £4 to £5 billion overall (not per annum). So costs will outnumber benefits by a range of between eleven and seventeen times.

88) Whilst CO2 levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout history, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased since the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the growth rate has now been constant for the past 25 years.

89) It is a myth that CO2 is a pollutant, because nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere and human beings could not live in 100% nitrogen either: CO2 is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is and CO2 is essential to life.

90) Politicians and climate activists make claims to rising sea levels but certain members in the IPCC chose an area to measure in Hong Kong that is subsiding. They used the record reading of 2.3 mm per year rise of sea level.

91) The accepted global average temperature statistics used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change show that no ground-based warming has occurred since 1998.

92) If one factors in non-greenhouse influences such as El Nino events and large volcanic eruptions, lower atmosphere satellite-based temperature measurements show little, if any, global warming since 1979, a period over which atmospheric CO2 has increased by 55 ppm (17 per cent).

93) US President Barack Obama pledged to cut emissions by 2050 to equal those of 1910 when there were 92 million Americans. In 2050, there will be 420 million Americans, so Obama’s promise means that emissions per head will be approximately what they were in 1875. It simply will not happen.

94) The European Union has already agreed to cut emissions by 20 percent to 2020, compared with 1990 levels, and is willing to increase the target to 30 percent. However, these are unachievable and the EU has already massively failed with its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), as EU emissions actually rose by 0.8 percent from 2005 to 2006 and are known to be well above the Kyoto goal.

95) Australia has stated it wants to slash greenhouse emissions by up to 25 percent below 2000 levels by 2020, but the pledges were so unpopular that the country’s Senate has voted against the carbon trading Bill, and the Opposition’s Party leader has now been ousted by a climate change sceptic.

96) Canada plans to reduce emissions by 20 percent compared with 2006 levels by 2020, representing approximately a 3 percent cut from 1990 levels but it simultaneously defends its Alberta tar sands emissions and its record as one of the world’s highest per-capita emissions setters.

97) India plans to reduce the ratio of emissions to production by 20-25 percent compared with 2005 levels by 2020, but all Government officials insist that since India has to grow for its development and poverty alleviation, it has to emit, because the economy is driven by carbon.

98) The Leipzig Declaration in 1996, was signed by 110 scientists who said: “We – along with many of our fellow citizens – are apprehensive about the climate treaty conference scheduled for Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997” and “based on all the evidence available to us, we cannot subscribe to the politically inspired world view that envisages climate catastrophes and calls for hasty actions.”

99) A US Oregon Petition Project stated “We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of CO2, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.”

100) A report by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change concluded “We find no support for the IPCC’s claim that climate observations during the twentieth century are either unprecedented or provide evidence of an anthropogenic effect on climate.”

Curtesy of express papers

Can anybody give me100 reasons why man is causing warming?

Edited December 16, 2009 by H2oDunc

[Gerontion]

if someone disagrees with you, write them off as uninformed.

Well, as your posts seem to consist almost entirely of facile strawman arguments against Al Gore and the like, it's a reasonable assumption; links to youtube videos of that imbecile Monckton are not the hallmark of someone with an interest in science.

many of the authors of those reports have been exposed by Climategate as having demonstrated a systematic, self-serving, ruthless readiness to invent, fabricate, distort, alter, suppress, hide, conceal or even destroy scientific data for the sake of reaching the answer they want.

There are a ton of explanations of the CRU emails on the internet, you can begin at realclimate.

Even in its most pessimistic assessment, IPCC rates, by the year 2100, the most likely rise of global temperatures as 4C and a sea-level rise of between 26cm and 59cm.

Why not read this thread? I've already posted the revised projections for sea-level rises in The Copenhagen Diagnosis. And, if you are abreast of the topic, you'll be well aware the IPCC reports are by their very nature conservative documents because (a) they represents only the most established facts and ignores areas were research is anything less than iron-clad (for example the amplifying effect of feed-backs) and ( there's a significant time-lag between research and IPCC reports; current research, which is evolving very rapidly, is not represented in the reports. As a consequence of this, current research points to significantly worse outcomes. But at 4 degrees the chances of self-reinforcing feedback systems spinning away becomes significant. For example, at 4 degrees, if not long before, there's a significant chance of (i) the Amazon drying out and releasing a vast store of carbon (ii) the melting of ice worldwide decreasing albedo and so increasing warming (actually happening already), (iii) melting of the permafrost releasing enormous amounts of methane (possibly happening now, the research is unclear) and these leading to (iv) pulling the trigger on the clathrate gun, which will possibly trigger an extinction event similar to the PT boundary event. These won't happen now but it's quite possible - not certain, but possible - that we'll set in motion a chain of events which will lead to these outcomes. At these elevated temperatures all sorts of exotic horrors are possible including increasing anoxia and acidification of the oceans, the loss of ice cover, significant disruption to the Asian monsoon and the thermohaline circulation system, complete drying of glacier-fed water systems, crop failure through heat stress, the spread of disease, mass migration through the flooding of heavily-populated coastal plains, and, with that, the loss of huge areas of fertile land. And that all means war. The IPCC doesn't, I think, speculate on outcomes beyond 2100. That doesn't mean either that they're unlikely or that they're insignificant. Many denialists seem to confuse not knowing everything or not being certain about everything with knowing nothing and having no idea of possibilities but this is bad reasoning; the fact that these outcomes are statistical, rather than logical, doesn't mean that they're insignificant. Of course, as you're so set in believing that this is all either a gigantic mistake or a gigantic lie, you must know this all already in far, far more detail than I do.

Do you have so little faith in the resilience of our species?

World population will peak at at least 9 billion. In a stable climate with everything working well, it's going to be hard to support that many people. In a world with a degenerating climate it'll be virtually impossible. We've known about climate change for at least two decades - Margaret Thatcher made a speech to the UN in 1989 on the dangers of climate change - and yet we've moved at top speed in exactly the wrong direction. At Copenhagen, the Americans are offering to cut their CO2 emissions by 3% and the Chinese to increase theirs. I have faith in the bottomless stupidity of our species, not its resilience.

[Gerontion]

In his column on Bad Science, Ben Goldacre recently talked about zombie arguments. Denialists are addicted to them - no matter how often you point out the mistakes in these, they just won't die because some idiot's going to say the same thing over and over and over again. He's a good example:

Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time.

This thread is only four pages long and this argument's already coming round for the second time. You also have things like this gem:

Canada plans to reduce emissions by 20 percent compared with 2006 levels by 2020, representing approximately a 3 percent cut from 1990 levels but it simultaneously defends its Alberta tar sands emissions and its record as one of the world’s highest per-capita emissions setters.

I see. Climate science is wrong because the Canadian government are hypocritical liars.

I can't be arsed to answer - or indeed read - the rest of your pointless cut-and-paste. If you're interested - which you're not: ignorance is, after all, bliss - you'll find responses to all the standard denialist arguments on the internet.

[RickBradford]

There are a ton of explanations of the CRU emails on the internet, you can begin at realclimate.

It's very gratifying that the US Department of Energy is now investigating Climategate. It ( the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) General Council and the DOE Office of Inspector General) has issued a Litigation Hold Notice regarding CRU.

In other words,

Accordingly, they are requesting that ... [sub-offices] locate and preserve all documents, records, data, correspondence, notes, and other materials, whether official or unofficial, original or duplicative, drafts or final versions, partial or complete that may relate to the global warming, including, but not limited to, the contract files, any related correspondence files, and any records, including emails or other correspondence, notes, documents, or other material related to this contract, regardless of its location or medium on which it is stored. In other words, please preserve any and all documents relevant to “global warming, the Climate Research Unit at he University of East Anglia In England, and/or climate change science.

And given, Phil "The Trick" Jones' relationship with DoE, this is going to get ugly.

From: Phil Jones <[email protected]>

To: “Neville Nicholls” <[email protected]>

Subject: RE: Misc

Date: Wed Jul 6 15:07:45 2005

Neville,

Mike’s response could do with a little work, but as you say he’s got the tone almost dead on. I hope I don’t get a call from congress ! I’m hoping that no-one there realizes I have a US DoE grant and have had this (with Tom W.) for the last 25 years.

I’ll send on one other email received for interest.

Cheers

Phil

[Gerontion]

All of which has no bearing on how true or false the theories of anthropogenic climate change are.

[RickBradford]

All of which has no bearing on how true or false the theories of anthropogenic climate change are.

I'm pleased that you concede they are simply theories -- most Warmists have repeatedly declared AGW to be an incontrovertible fact.

Edited December 16, 2009 by RickBradford

[Gerontion]

Gravity is a theory. Evolution is a theory. Relativity is a theory. And, yes, climate change is a theory. There's nothing very remarkable in what I wrote.

[Orac]

I would be interested in knowing peoples thoughts on the linkage between economic growth and climate change. They appear to be treated as two seperate subjects, however, surely there is a correlation between economic growth which basically seems to involve more and more consumption of raw materials, including the fossil fuels, that it is argued are having a significant effect on the climate unless there are significant technological changes ahead, specifically on the energy front.

The UK government seems very much behind the current climate agenda, however, both major UK political parties have stressed that there primary concern from a policy perspective for the upcoming election is the economy and, apart from the blip in interest in climate change brought on by Copenhagen, the media still seems focused on the importance of economic growth worldwide.

Another arguement being made is that economic growth is a major factor in lifting the poor of the world out of poverty with China leading the way but needing to achieve growth of 8% just to maintain the current status quo.

I am not looking to deflect the AGW arguement to an economic one but as neither a scientist of economist would be interested to know if one debate can be as totally divorced from the other as appears at the moment.

Edited December 16, 2009 by Orac

[Gerontion]

It's a very good point and, as you say, something which everyone ducks. I remember reading on The Oil Drum someone pointing out that if you point out to most environmentalists "I've just heard the remainder of the Larsen Ice Shelf is disintegrating" they will unanimously be unhappy; if you say "the recession's over and the economy's growing", they'll - probably - unanimously be happy. This doesn't make any sense because - as sure as eggs is eggs - a growing economy is bad news for the Larsen Ice Shelf. There's a lot of talk about the green economy, green collar jobs, green growth but that all strikes me as &lt;deleted&gt;. How can, for example, we expect the British economy to be in 40 years time using 10% of the fossil fuel it currently uses and this not to have consequences for the economy? A healthy economy needs to grow at something like 2 or 3% per annum. That means doubling in size every 25 to 35 years. And doubling the size of the economy means, if not doubling, at least increasing dramatically inputs, including energy...but the world is a finite place. You can't grow indefinitely in a finite environment. That's obvious. A hundred years ago, economic growth had only a relatively slight impact on the global environment and it was possible - it probably even made sense - to ignore it. That's no longer the case. We need to convert very rapidly to a steady state economy and that poses very serious, in fact almost certainly fatal, consequences for capitalism. Your second point about poverty is also valid. Wealth inequalities and poverty survive because of economic growth. Without economic growth you have a hel_l of a problem and the only solution is wealth redistribution, both within and between nations. It means - for the West and elites in the global South - getting a lot poorer. Well, tough shit.

Of course, I don't expect this to happen; countries go to war for an awful lot less (as this decade has shown, as if it needed any more evidence). I can't imagine that in a choice between giving up wealth now and bequeathing a damaged world to our children later, anyone other than a small majority is going to select the former.

[Jingthing]

^

Yes, we've all watched The Day After Tomorrow, but most of us can recognize it for what it was -- a piece of entertainment, not a reflection of real life.

This "you are all going to prematurely suffer and die" stuff comes purely form your imagination -- even the IPCC isn't saying anything remotely like that, nor are "mainstream scientists."

I understand it is comforting to feel that because of your support for global warming, you are in some way defending the planet from the ravages of capitalists, but that's not really the case.

Humanity certainly needs to clean up its act, but this needs to be done in a rational and considered way, not by hysterical declarations that "it will be the end of our species within 100 years (or even much less)"

You are wrong. The feeling that if we get 4 C degrees warmer, we are heading for HUMAN EXTINCTION is part of the MAINSTREAM SCIENCE global warming theory. I guess your feeling is it will only be half that bad.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/20...1/climatechange

The main question is will we get that much warmer very quickly, as the trends are now pointing to. We don't know. But it is very possible. We must prepare and we must ignore the science denying ostriches.

Edited December 16, 2009 by Jingthing

[Orac]

It's a very good point and, as you say, something which everyone ducks. I remember reading on The Oil Drum someone pointing out that if you point out to most environmentalists "I've just heard the remainder of the Larsen Ice Shelf is disintegrating" they will unanimously be unhappy; if you say "the recession's over and the economy's growing", they'll - probably - unanimously be happy. This doesn't make any sense because - as sure as eggs is eggs - a growing economy is bad news for the Larsen Ice Shelf. There's a lot of talk about the green economy, green collar jobs, green growth but that all strikes me as &lt;deleted&gt;. How can, for example, we expect the British economy to be in 40 years time using 10% of the fossil fuel it currently uses and this not to have consequences for the economy? A healthy economy needs to grow at something like 2 or 3% per annum. That means doubling in size every 25 to 35 years. And doubling the size of the economy means, if not doubling, at least increasing dramatically inputs, including energy...but the world is a finite place. You can't grow indefinitely in a finite environment. That's obvious. A hundred years ago, economic growth had only a relatively slight impact on the global environment and it was possible - it probably even made sense - to ignore it. That's no longer the case. We need to convert very rapidly to a steady state economy and that poses very serious, in fact almost certainly fatal, consequences for capitalism. Your second point about poverty is also valid. Wealth inequalities and poverty survive because of economic growth. Without economic growth you have a hel_l of a problem and the only solution is wealth redistribution, both within and between nations. It means - for the West and elites in the global South - getting a lot poorer. Well, tough shit.

Of course, I don't expect this to happen; countries go to war for an awful lot less (as this decade has shown, as if it needed any more evidence). I can't imagine that in a choice between giving up wealth now and bequeathing a damaged world to our children later, anyone other than a small majority is going to select the former.

Personally I don't believe that the global governments have the balls to make the decisions required of them IF AGW is as real and dangerous as is being suggested though, since they are shouting their green credentials from the rooftops, we should get an indication of how much of this is hot air by seeing what decisions come out of Copenhagen.

[Jingthing]

Whether our governments respond properly or not is a totally separate issue than about the truth of the theory.

[RickBradford]

The feeling that if we get 4 C degrees warmer, we are heading for HUMAN EXTINCTION is part of the MAINSTREAM SCIENCE global warming theory

In that case, the Warmists are more wacko and religiously deluded than even I thought.