If I'm not mistaken you, Karl, are firmly convinced that climate change is a hoax, and that there is no such thing as a threat to our climate as a result of human activity. I am curious to know how you have come to that conclusion. Or, put another way round, where is the flaw in the case for climate change?
This is, as I understand it, the case for human induced climate change:
1) The temperature of the earth is significantly affected by the concentration of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. These greenhouse gases effectively trap the heat of the sun on the surface of the earth.
2) There are many greenhouse gases. CO2 is one of the more significant.
3) The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has been going up in recent years. This rise in CO2 concentration correlates almost exactly with human use of fossil fuel, beginning with coal, and then more recently oil.
This is the case for human induced climate change. The argument then goes on: The above is essentially theory. Do the facts support this theory? Is there evidence that global warming is occurring?
4) A science has grown up around the testing of this theory, which has come to be called climate science. Scientists are, by their nature skeptics. It is their job to be skeptical. As a class, I dare say, scientists are the most skeptical of any grouping of people. They are constantly questioning and testing their theories and revising them.
There is a fundamental difference between scientific skepticism and credible skepticism (I have never read about this, but it makes sense to me). I am considering buying a car. The salesman makes the claim that it will go 80 mpg. Scientific skepticism has to do with my doubts that the car can actually do that. Credible skepticism has to do with my doubts about the salesman -- is he a liar, an ignoramus, or misinformed.
5) These scientests have, by an large, concluded that the observations support the theory.
If scientific skepticism is what is missing from the "climate-change deniers" (again, the left-wing attempt to demonize the individuals not so readily duped into believing the hype around climate change) here is some:
ReplyDeleteAn analytical chemist who works in spectroscopy and atmospheric sensing, Michael J. Myers of Hilton Head, S. C., declared, "Man-made global warming is junk science," explaining that worldwide manmade CO2 emission each year "equals about 0.0168%
of the atmosphere's CO2 concentration ... This results in a 0.00064% increase in the absorption of the sun's radiation. This is an
insignificantly small number."
Here's more. For nearly 30 years, Professor John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville has been in charge of NASA's eight weather satellites that take more than 300,000
temperature readings daily around the globe. In a paper co-written with Dr. Douglass of the University of Rochester, he concludes that while manmade emissions
may be having a slight impact, "variations in global temperatures since 1978 ... cannot be attributed to carbon dioxide."
So here we have a scientist, in charge of NASA's weather satellites, claiming the CO2 emissions are not significant. These people are not "crank" scientists, either..or they would have been sacked my NASA some time ago.
I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. Are you disputing global warming theory, or are you saying observation does not support the theory.
ReplyDeleteI have never been on the side of those who say global warming is a closed case. Given the number of scientists who are working as "climate scientists" I would be surprised if they all agreed.
Although I am not a scientiest, I would expect a scientist to say "the evidence points in this direction." In the end we want the truth.
You have not given me a basis for giving greater significance or credibility to Myers, Christy and Douglas than the 3,000 page IPCC report, prepared by how many scientists, where we know of 3 errors.
I'm glad you realize that not all climate scientists agree on climate change. I personally maintain that CO2 emissions pose little threat to climate and that pollution due to NOx and SOx, phosphates etc is a far more serious problem. Observations do not seem to corroborate the theory of increasing temperatures. In fact there hasn't been an increase in global temperatures since 1998. They have actually declined since then and have erased the warming trend of the past two decades.
ReplyDeleteThere may be only 3 errors, but one major error in the IPCC report is that the famous hockey stick graph of CO2 and temperature increases has been based on data that is seriously deficient, as we now know from the leaked emails from the East Anglia CRU.
I totally agree with you that CO2 emissions are only one of many real [and possible] pollution threats to our planet. And I have long been mystified as to why CO2 emission gets all the press and all the attention, when these other problems also exist. I personally think peak oil or financial collapse due to out of control deficit spending is going to catch up with us well before we see major climate impact from CO2 emissions.
ReplyDeleteI also recognize there are many forces that affect global temperature, and atmospheric CO2 concentration is only one. So how will we ever know FOR SURE, whether our burning of fossil fuels is the determining cause of climate change. I submit we can't and won't.
But I do not share your apparent conviction, that a focus on CO2 emission is taking attention away from other pollution. It is my contention, that society [east and west, rich and poor] has abandoned the "Polluter Pay" principle. It is, apparently, too expensive [on the short run], and too inconvenient [on the short run]. Think of CO2 emissions, think nuclear waste.
It's good you mention NOx and SOx. It is amazing, and a tribute to what is possible if the political will exists, that we have been able to deal with acid rain. We did, in fact, apply the polluter pay principle to those polluters, and acid rain is not nearly the problem today that it was 25 years ago. As our governments applied emission standards to the polluters, of course there were winners and losers, and I'm sure the losers raised a fuss -- I don't remember much about that debate. Could do the research I guess. And maybe the losers even used the word junk science to describe the scientists who were linking their emissions to acid rain. I don't remember.
So back to your comments, Bob. I don't know on what basis you determine that "in fact there hasn't been and increase in global temperature since 1998". I just did a quick google, and it is at least as easy to find graphs that say the temperature as increased as say that it has not. Whom do you believe? Do you believe you understand the significance of the deficient data or the leaked emails? I don't. I certainly am aware of the opinions of various columnists, and I know that there are those who say that these errors hardly affect the overall data at all. How do you decide whom to believe?
Figures don't lie, but liers figure.
I apologize for not being responsive of late, been very busy.
ReplyDeleteI want to just add my quick perspective. Here we are having debate on whether warming is even occuring. To me it is fairly convincing, when Phil Jones of the IPCC who has only disincentive to make a u-turn given he has been at the center of the hockey stick charts - admits there has been no warming since 1995. Are there any examples of where someone skeptical on global warming has changed their mind based on data, not that i have seen. Add this to the fact that the environmental cry for global warming/cooling has changed multiple times in the last 60 years, i find they had low credibility to begin with.
While whether it is happening is debateable, it is another whole leap to suggest it is human caused and additionally whether we have to make dramatic action to stop it. To end capitalism as we know it, on a theory, is unwise.
However, i still think we can build on the common ground of taxing polluters/consumers and eliminating the income tax.
Well, I'm more or less convinced we will need agree to disagree on this one. If we agree on the remedy, maybe a difference of opinion on global warming is not so significant.
ReplyDeleteI will just relate one personal observation.
In 1996 I introduced nitrogen based manure application into Manitoba. At the time, this was a novel idea, and I got provincial recognition for this practice. There were no government regulations governing the application of manure, and every farmer, including the large hog farms did what he thought was best. As a businessman, I introduced a system whereby we tested the soil for nutrient needs, and the manure for nutrient content, and matched that up. I was able to sell farmers on the idea because of the fertilizer saving they got that way.
Because of the testing we were doing, we also knew that we applying twice as much phosphate to the soil as the plants were taking up. I was uneasy about that, but spoke to the provincial soil science specialist, and some other people I considered knowledgeable, and all agreed that given the nature of Manitoba soils, they could not see how this could lead to a problem.
I had problems with this. My reasoning was that consistently over-applying a plant nutrient to a piece of land, must result in a problem at some point down the road. It just seemed totally logical to me. We may not know what that problem would be, nor could we know how long it would take before the problem became evident, but nature's balance, simply will not allow us to take a mineral from one area, and simply apply it willy nilly and consistently on another area, and for this not to have any effect.
Largely as a result of the way we had been doing business, the government introduced regulations governing the application of manure around 1999. The regulations governed only nitrogen.
I believe it was in 2007 we first heard of massive algae blooms on lake Winnipeg. The lake is dying, and it is primarily because of run-off phosphate. No one had anticipated that. I certainly had not.
As I hear the debate going on now, I do not hear anyone saying phosphate in Lake Winnipeg is not a problem. There are not deniers that the problem exists. The debate is whether the problem is caused by agricultural runoff, or by effluent from the cities. So there are deniers that agriculture is the problem, and there are deniers that the cities are the problem. And Karl, I am fully convinced that if all the pollution came from one source, there would be deniers who would be insisting that the problem was not man made. Cleaning this problem up is going to cost money, so who will foot the bill? I have no doubt that those bearing the cost would find “science” that would support their stance.
20 years ago, I might have agreed with you that emitting CO2 into the atmosphere was not a problem. Today I cannot. I have simply seen too many cases where small amounts of pollution have not resulted in any evident problems on the short run. But as the pollution continued, and as it increased, the natural system became overloaded, and problems developed. Sometimes the problems were exactly those predicted, other times they were not anticipate. If you need convincing, do some research on acid rain, Lake Erie, and nitrogen in drinking water.
When I look around me, and see the amount of CO2 being put into the atmosphere, and you see even more of it in California, I simply cannot believe that the atmosphere can take that without consequences forever.
"To end capitalism as we know it, on a theory, is unwise."
ReplyDeleteScientists will never give you anything but a theory. That is the nature of science. If you depend on scientists, that's all you will get. Economists give you "risk analysis", which is the same thing. In this life nothing is certain. Basically it is religious fundamentalists: whether they be communist, Christian, Muslim that try to seek certainty. In my view, they don't live in the real world - they just pretend to.