There's certainly a lot of froth and bubble here, isn't there.

But very little that advances the discussion, one way or another.

When we reach the level of Protagoras' insight...

>>One can speculate that Leo Lane trolls under a bridge and smells more like a terrestrial polecat than a Kryptonian woman – ‘up, up and away’……hopefully?<<

...we know that we have reached a point where facts have taken a back seat to gratuitous invective, and are correspondingly harder to find.

On which point, it is most interesting to me that Leo Lane's request - a rather polite request, in my view - has remained unanswered for so long.

Leo Lane asks for...

>>...a reference to one peer reviewed study from reputable scientists giving a basis for asserting that human emissions contribute in any measureable way to global warming.<<

When I first read the request, I expected a flood of "look, here you go" responses to appear, and was a little surprised that this did not occur.

It is an important debate.

It is not about faith, or belief, or good vs.evil. It is ultimately about economics.

Is there a problem, and can it be fixed with money? If so, let's be very clear about what we are sacrificing, and what we are gaining.

The message clearly is not convincing, right at the moment. And relating someone's views to their body odour does not in fact make the story any more so.

Shadow Minister

>> While I believe that action needs to be taken against global warming, I cringe at the ever more extreme doomsday predictions that get published, and the extreme calls of the greens for immediate and drastic action.

The end result of this is that the general public have been desensitized and have become somewhat skeptical. This makes fertile ground for the anti action group to sow seeds of doubt.

While trying to hammer the message through with a sledge hammer, Joe public has stopped listening. <<

Very well said!

And to fulfill the Amicus prophecy - all scientists are sceptics, either by training or by some innate capability ... they are sceptics in the scientific sense.

I agree with you entirely and do understand why Joe Public becomes "sceptical". However, that does not mean they have the ability, nor indeed the resources, to test theories or hypothesises, as some here say they want to do - in any field of the 'climate sciences'.

Yes, many "sceptics" don't want to believe the globe is warming, but they do so based on either their political ideology, their religious doctrinnaire, or their socio-economic standing - not by doing atmospheric physics, or biogeochemistry, et al.

For what it's worth, I don't want to believe that humanity has been complicit in significantly impacting the Earth's climate either. However, I have the opportunity and ability to do the real science - and what I conclude is not comforting.

Yep, the 'alarmists' do need to pull their head in, and the 'deniers' do need to extract theirs from the sand. The science IS telling us that the planet is "squealling" (look it up) but it is not about to end in 2100. Nevertheless, it would help if everybody worked together to solve a common problem - unfortunately, it ain't happening (for the above reasons). My guess is that this is why some people are getting a tad anxious - we do have a relatively small window in time.

I'd agree with Mark Lawson though, the SRES is flawed - pesky econometricians!

Pericles

May I suggest that you go to google's 'Advanced Scholar' and search "climate sensitivity". You may wish to limit your search results to 2010. However, for the gammut, leave the dates open.

Most so called 'sceptics' don't do this. Certainly, no matter how many times they ask the same question, they are never satisfied with the answers - they don't appear to want to listen. That is probably why we get sick of answering to the likes of Leo - he refuses to move on to being part of a solution.

I must have missed something, qanda. You say my question has been answered many times.

The allegation by the alarmists is that human emissions contribute to global warming. If that is not so, then all the fuss over a paltry warming of seven tenths of a degree in 100 odd years is pointless.

It is probably pointless anyway, because the world has been warming and cooling for millions of years, and life would not be here if it were otherwise.

My question is, where is the science which gives support to the assertion that anthropogenic activity has any measureable effect on global warming?

I have asked it many times, on this and other threads, and am amazed that you have seen it answered. I never have, You have never answered it, and you make the ridiculous assertion that I have been answered many times.

You might understand why you have in the past, been referred to as “pea brained”, qanda.

What I have noticed is that posts in reply to my question are full of information about anything but the scientific basis of the belief that human emissions have any demonstrable effect on global warming. We know the reason for this. There is no such science.

Protagoras says that 31,000 scientists supporting the refutation of the IPCC’s unscientific assertion of “very likely”, in respect of AGW is “not many”. There are 5 scientists who support the IPCC assertion. I wonder how he would quantify that support?

I am a Realist, not a denier.

Naomi Oreskes, and the substance deficient hecklers, here, are the deniers. They deny the science which shows that all warming is accounted for, from natural sources, and there is no room for the assertion of anthropogenic contribution to global warming

If anyone is interested in the science, please go to this site:

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/McLeanetalSPPIpaper2Z-March24.pdf

There's probably a good reason for this, qanda.

>>Most so called 'sceptics' don't do this. Certainly, no matter how many times they ask the same question, they are never satisfied with the answers - they don't appear to want to listen.<<

But the question was not "how many articles on climate sensitivity can you find with one Google search."

The answer to that is, in Google's own words "Results 1 - 10 of about 1,550,000"

I did actually have a look at a couple of the articles that came top of the list. I found their approach to be gratifyingly scientific, and totally honest.

But fundamentally lacking in certainty, of any kind.

From the preamble to the first (presumably most "popular") article:

"Many of the discrepancies in the responses of different models can be traced to differences in the simulations of present-day climate. The choice of convective parametrization appears to influence the sensitivity of the simulated response in the tropics..." etc etc.

It is that honesty, of course, that prevents them from re-stating any of their conclusions in layman's terms, that might be used in any sort of guide to policy-making.

That would be asking them for certainty. They are in the business of experimentation, estimation, and scholarly caveat.

Terms such as "if other factors remain unchanged" abound (taken from the second-most-popular article) - as indeed they should - in order to be quite clear that the scope of their experiment was limited to that which they could control.

Leo Lane's question was, once again, that we are shown "a reference to one peer reviewed study from reputable scientists giving a basis for asserting that human emissions contribute in any measureable way to global warming".

If there is no such study, shouldn't we be told?

But you see, Protagoras, I *wasn't* hypothesising. All I was doing was pointing out that there are several competing hypotheses trying to explain the Permo-Triassic extinction ranging from bolides to methane hydrate release, of which 'great warming' is but one. So, to state categorically, as you did, that the Permo-Triassic extinction *was* due to 'great warming' is, as I said, more than a little disingenuous.

If you really had gleaned your information from palaeontologists, you'd know that, and presumably be honest enough to admit it.

But then, doubt doesn't win debates, does it? And I suspect that winning the debate is more important to you than strict adherence to 'normal truth', as Mike Hulme might say.