What a disappointment Des Moore's article and the majority of the responses has been.

Unlike Mr Moore, I have downloaded and read the Garnaut Report. Unlike Mr Moore, I am not writing from a perspective of preconceived notions about its content and an apparent personal antipathy towards Professor Garnaut.

Unlike Mr Moore, I do not demand that Mr Garnaut obtain qualifications in each discipline on which he comments, but note that the short CV of the author at the foot of the article suggests a background in the chalk-and-talk game. By his own criteria, Mr Moore should keep his opinion to himself!

Basic scientific principles about CO2 as a grenhouse gas were established well over a century ago. From the 1970's to the present, successive science-based predictions regarding the effects of fossil fuelled climate change have been shown to be true. Consistently, not only have they been correct, but repeatedly, the natural conservatism of scientists has been demonstrated when the observed changes have been measured at the upper end of the range of expectations.

I suggest that Moore do a bit of self-education. Start with James Hoggan "Climate Cover-up", then progress through George Monbiot's "Heat, Naomi Oreskis' "Merchants of Doubt", Massimo Pigliucci's "Nonsense on Stilts - How to Tell Science From Bunk" and conclude with Gwynne Dyer's "Cimate Wars".

This subject is far too important for the debate to be led by know-nothings like Moore.

Gorofus "Unlike the author or any of his supporters I really care about what kind of a world is going to be left for my grandchildren. It really appears that in this country the lunatics are running the asylum."

How caring Gorofus

I do recall only 20 years ago, the free west prevailed over the despotic collectivists of USSR and their fettered satellites

Here, we seem to be fighting that same battle again, oh the excuse "Global Warming" has changed but the subtext remains the same -

So I too, consider what sort of world should my grandson (I only have one so far) will inherit -

and would prefer a "free" one


and not a world where previously free men and women are hogtied to stupid leveling regulations and the ordained dictates of despotic watermelon politicians and their flunkies.

Tombee: the 4 sets of surface data are essentially one and the same, to 95% according to Phil Jones author of Hadley-CRU and Climategate. The two satellite data sets UAH and RSS show no significant trend since 1979 for the USA, and much less than Gistemp, NCDC and clones, and HadleyCRU for the globe. Ocean heat has been declining since 2003 when the Argos system came into full coverage.

Linear regression of climate variables and CO2 shows that the physics is quantitatively insignificant in the real world, see the great paper by Tim Curtin (!) up at Lavoisier.com.au

And who is Tim Curtin?

He is Tom Tiddler of course!

I'ts becoming more and more obvious that if climate change deniers live see their children floating about in floods that are rising up to the rooves of their houses, they still will not give up their denial.

JohnBennetts
Ah, you've read the original Garnaut report.. good stuff.. then I have a question. I was trying to make sense of it last night. How does Garnaut manage to work the sums to make it worthwhile to reduce carbon emissions?

His chapter on costs versus benefits seems to be a commentary on the various models. But the only one who managed to make the economic case add up to taking action, UK's Nicholas Stern, had to make extreme assumptions concerning storms and the rediscount rate (works out to investment rate of return) to make his case. Everyone else.. such as Nordhaus, couldn't make the sums add up at all, or come anywhere close.

I'm told that Garnaaut makes an assumption about effective emissions-reduction technolgy becoming available in mid-century to make the sums work. Ther is a reference in the chapter I was looking at but it is far from clear.. can you comment?