Whatever you may think of the hypothesis that industrial emissions are warming the atmosphere - and I have pointed time and again to the problems with it - carbon trading is a straight waste of time. In fact it is difficult to think of any initiative that has seriously reduced emissions on a national, let alone world-wide basis.

Most of the activites suggested or which have actually occured, amount to little more than gestures.

The one consolation activists can take away from this mess is that the IPCC projections for carbon dioxide emissions, and most certainly those for methane, are almost certainly completely wrong in the first place.

Mark, you may want to comment here: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11072#187198

HoHum
Go right ahead and stop consuming.

The term "cargo cult" doesn't mean going to the shop and buying things. It means not understanding that the 'staka goods long stoa' comes from people supplying them for payment of money, and believing instead that they have some kind of divine provenance, and can be procured by rituals or activities that do not in fact have the effect of procuring a supply of manufactured goods. A closer analogy would be the socialist belief that by invoking government we can make everyone better off.

And of course the cargo cult has failed for many people in the USA. And what we are seeing is a right-wing populist revolt fueled by the inevitable anger and frustration of this failure.

In the form of the Tea Party. See also Farewell Mon Amour by Henry Giroux via Truthout.

The article a load of codswallop - whilst there are reasons to look carefully at the effectiveness of specific policies the need to reduce emissions is based on good science and lots of it, starting with the absorption and emission characteristics of atmospheric gases and the changes in their concentrations.

For cult beliefs that are bound to result in disaster it's hard to find worse than the cult of disbelievers of climate science. When every peak scientific body, including the very conservative and prestigious US Academy of Sciences, finds the science to be fundamentally sound, betting the future of our world on the tiny and false hope that they are all completely wrong is dangerously irresponsible.

Dangerous denialist drivel - that's what this appalling opinion piece is Michael. Give me the real story from real scientist at real institutions that actually study climate any day over your twisted misrepresentations.

The drought is over for Aust and it will be interesting to see if our mean temps fall.According to the AGW cult,we should have an expodential rise in temps comensurate with rises in CO2.

There so many people making a living out of AGW theory,that any real science and stats will get buried in ad hominen invective.