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The Forum > Article Comments > It's no global warming storm in a tea cup! > Comments

It's no global warming storm in a tea cup! : Comments

By Gareth Walton, published 4/2/2005

Gareth Walton argues that we need to act now to halt global warming.

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You can't blame Gareth for spewing forth his pseudo-science rhetoric. Without the global warming monster he'd be back to waiting tables while he completed his 8th uni degree.
Posted by bozzie, Friday, 4 February 2005 11:52:04 AM
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Gareth - What are the direct and indirect subsidies to fossil fuels? Why have they been implemented and what are their impacts?
Posted by ericc, Friday, 4 February 2005 12:09:20 PM
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Of course there are scientists who disagree and are quite reputable..

Here is a recent paper on how human influences have delayed or even stopped an ice age, and that if we had stopped all the emissions etc, we would not be in a great position right now...

It's never so straight forward is it?

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_aset=B-WA-A-W-A-MsSAYZW-UUA-AAUYDAEAUW-AAUZWEEEUW-YZVCUWEYZ-A-U&_rdoc=1&_fmt=full&_udi=B6VBC-4DTK6RV-1&_coverDate=01%2F01%2F2005&_cdi=5923&_orig=search&_st=13&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000043031&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=777686&md5=b816c76f923052b0cd8cf28324d2f9dd

News article on paper for those without oodles of spare time required to read the full paper: http://www.examiner.ie/pport/web/world/Full_Story/did-sgsAtWaxCKF0EsgTbBP-2fa91M.asp
Posted by Grey, Friday, 4 February 2005 12:49:47 PM
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As Michael Crichton has pointed out Greenpeace is in the business of augmenting Public fears. I would possible take their Greenhouse rants more seriously if that organization changed its views towards nuclear power generation. After all I understand that the founder of Greenpeace, Patrick Moore is no longer opposed to the nuclear option.

None-the-less there is an argument that will allow Greenpeace to retain both its opposition to nuclear power and its dire warnings re climate change. The historical records and records of tree rings and ice cores etc all point to the reality of climate changes. Ice ages followed by warm spells.

The questions are:

1. Is climate change determined by other forces then atmospheric CO2
2. What percentage of atmospheric CO2 is derived from non-human sources?
3. What evidence is there that curbing human CO2 emission will reverse global warming?
4. How sure are we of global warming? Recent reports from N. America and Europe seem to suggest a mini ice age
Posted by anti-green, Friday, 4 February 2005 1:47:35 PM
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A few qualifiers first before I start my rant

I am not an industry hack (whatever that is)
I have never worked for an oil company (although i do use petrol often to drive my kid to pre-school and to get to work that sort of thing.
I am not part of a right-wing think tank
I don't love George Bush
I have studied environmental science
I have studied the politics of the green movement

OK.

Global warming is going to have more positive benefits than it will negative ones, if it is occurring at all.
Warmer temperatures mean longer growing seasons, less people dying of the cold, less extreme weather not more.
Computer models used by the IPCC are sketchy at best given the unknowns.
Even so, the models predict extremely wide ranging outcomes - some of the links Gareth had predicted between 1-11 degrees warming.
The average temperature of the earth is around 15 degrees so these predictions range from a six to a 70 per cent change in temperature.
Warming and cooling cycles have happened throughout the 4.2 billion year history of the earth and will continue to do so.
taking a thirty year slice of climate now (which includes the heat island effect) will not give a true indication on a cycle which is 100,000 years old.
It is like watching just the final credits of a movie and assuming the whole thing was black background with white writing.
There are other problems in the world which money could be better spent and certianly better environmental projects.
As someone from the country, money would be better spent enclosing irrigation canals to stop evaporation and ensure water supplies for rural communities. water projects in other parts of the world would also be more beneficial.
Money is scarce - use it on solutions to problems we can confirm are happening.
Posted by the usual suspect, Friday, 4 February 2005 1:52:19 PM
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According to anti-green's sources, instead of global warming we are about to face a mini-ice age. And the usual suspect assures us that global warming will be a positive rather than a negative.

Both contributors might not appreciate how steady-state systems, such as our global weather system, might be tipped into catastrophe through negative feedback. Relatively "minor" perturbations resulting from initial global warming, such as the melting of the polar ice caps and tundras already occurring, could themselves produce further and worse perturbations that we cannot yet discern.

The increasing frequency of extreme weather events that we are now observing around the planet may well be the first signs that the balance of the global weather system is "wobbling" towards catastrophe. Perhaps we boil, perhaps we freeze. We just don't know, but we should be very alert if not alarmed given all the signals.

Anti-green could be partly right, in that the global warming effects that are already being observed could tip parts of the planet into a mini-ice age. I am not sure that is any consolation. But the usual suspect is probably wrong because global warming is not occurring uniformly at a predictable pace, even if we could adapt fast enough to benefit.
Posted by grace pettigrew, Friday, 4 February 2005 5:52:34 PM
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more extreme weather? -

less tornados and hurricanes in the US over the past 50 years, fewer droughts and floods as well. read satanic gases by patrick and ballings.
Posted by the usual suspect, Friday, 4 February 2005 7:08:57 PM
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I agree with the usual suspect to a certain degree. There is simply not enough data to say what the trend of global weather patterns have been in the past. The best knowledge we have of weather conditions over periods of five hundred to one thousand years come from paintings and literature, which seem to indicate it is cyclic (there is a surprise). However, it can't do any harm to keep an eye on it, can it? And reducing polution can't actually hurt either.

I wouldn't go so far as to say global warming is a good thing though, because, again, there is not enough data. It is still supposition to say it will reduce extreme weather and increase productivity. No one knows that yet, as no one knows what other effects it will have. If it disrupts the current in the Atlantic, Europe will freeze. Of course, it might not...
Posted by jcl, Saturday, 5 February 2005 6:05:50 AM
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[Editor's note - some of this post has been deleted for copyright reasons. This note is so that other posters understand the comment has been changed.]

The calibre of Greenpeace’s expertise in environmental matters can be judged by the silly stunt they tried to pull in August 2002 regarding the Blomstrandbreen glacier, on Svalbard. It should be noted that the 2002 publicity shot could have just as easily been taken in the 1920s when the bulk of the glacier had retreated. So much for their "evidence" of recent global warming.

http://www.scientific-alliance.org/news_archives/climate/greenpeacestunt.htm

Greenpeace glacier photo stunt
Jo Knowsley, The Mail on Sunday
11th August 2002

Scientists dismiss Greenpeace pictures as stunt - Global warming claim meaningless as glacier photos show 'natural changes in shape'.

The pictures appeared to be the most shocking evidence so far of the devastating effects of global warming. But last night scientists who work on the spot where they were taken dismissed them as a misconceived publicity stunt. The two photographs, taken 84 years apart, were released by Greenpeace International last week. They appear to show a radical shrinking of the Blomstrandbreen glacier, on Svalbard, 375 miles north of Norway.

But scientists on the ground at Svalbard say the illustration is 'meaningless' as a measure of climate change because glaciers retreat and advance constantly as part of a natural cycle. At the same time, there has been no significant drop or increase in temperature in the region since the Twenties.

...
Posted by A is A, Saturday, 5 February 2005 1:37:09 PM
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A is A, you say "Earlier this year, the journal Science published evidence that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet had not only stopped shrinking, but was growing at a rate of nearly 27 billion tons a year"

Here is a short extract from a BBC World News report dated 24 September 2004, entitled "West Antarctic glaciers speed up":

"Many glaciers in West Antarctica have substantially increased their rate of shrinkage compared with the 1990s. US-Chilean teams report to the journal Science that the glaciers are losing 60% more ice into the Amundsen Sea than they accumulate from inland snowfall. They say the ice loss corresponds to an annual sea-level rise of 0.2mm, or more than 10% of the total global increase of about 1.8mm per year. The study incorporates satellite data and measurements from aircraft.

It also shows the glaciers are moving faster. One, the Pine Island Glacier, has sped up by about 25% over the last 30 years. Bob Thomas, who is attached to the US space agency's (Nasa) Wallops Flight Facility and one of the authors on the Science report, cautions that the observed changes apply to only a short time period. It is too early, he says, to tell if the accelerated thinning is part of a natural cycle or is a sign of a longer-term change. "Continued observation is important," he added.

What gives, A is A?
Posted by grace pettigrew, Saturday, 5 February 2005 3:58:04 PM
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Grace,

If you had read the article I posted, carefully, you would have seen that the increase in Antactic ice metioned occurred at that time, in 2002.

Please be more careful, in future, before you rush in to comment.
Posted by A is A, Saturday, 5 February 2005 4:44:58 PM
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A is A, my posting was in the nature of a question to you, not a rushed comment. But now I will comment that I think your original assertion was unclear, and could even be construed as misleading. Not your intention, I am sure.
Posted by grace pettigrew, Saturday, 5 February 2005 5:14:59 PM
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Germany during the twenties and thirties had a number of severe economic problems. There was no doubt that Germany had a problem and today there is no doubt that global warming is a problem. But many Germans blamed the Jews for their problems and today the Green Left blames the multi-nationals.

Global warming is a problem, however, for many on the Green Left the solution is as simplistic as that adopted by the Nazis. Substitute the multi-nationals for the Jews and one has a battle cry to rally support. The recent anti-global protests owed nothing to logic but were simply a vehicle for people to express their visceral hatred of capitalism.

Signing the Kyoto Protocol may well be today's equivalent of Nazi book burning. It solves nothing but makes one feel good. If the Green Left really believed their alarmist statements then at the very least they might consider some of the following as a possible solution to global warming:

More nuclear power stations.

The trialling and adoption of GM crops.
More R&D involving better use of technology.
Support multinationals in setting up companies in third world countries. (A long bow this one, but I think that factory workers have less children than peasant farmers).

The fact that the Green Left opposes all of the above may indicate that they are not interested in solving the problem of Global Warming but they are really interested in destroying capitalism.

The Green Left may well be using the environmental movement—a movement that contains its share of ‘useful idiots’—as a vehicle to political power. The radical left has been consistently defeated and capitalism appears to have been universally adopted worldwide. However, as the Nazi party obtained power by demonising the Jews—so it may be that the radical left is trying once again to obtain power through demonising the corporation.

More development and more consumerism may well be the only way to reduce the world’s population to a sustainable level. GM crops might be the only way to feed the world’s population in the short-term and nuclear power might be the least environmentally damaging way of providing humans with the energy they need. The multi-national corporation may not be the villain but instead may be the means to solve the problem of global warming. The lessons of Nazi Germany might have to be relearned but in a fresh context.
Posted by JB1, Sunday, 6 February 2005 9:33:25 AM
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I see, Gareth, that you are from Greenpeace.

I should have guessed. It's their typical spin!

You start by regarding an insurance company as a reliable(!) direct source of information but I dare say like most of Greenpeace you consider any research funding from the fossil-fuel industry to be tainted. Please tell me why insurance companies would not be using a global warming scare campaign to increase their income !

You seem to believe that science should be resolved by consensus. Christians around the world have the consensus that God exists and will claim to have evidence so do you expect us all to believe that God really does exist ?

If all the fossil fuels are to blame Gareth, then why have global temperatures not exceeded the levels set in 1998? It would appear that the extra 10ppm of carbon dioxide has either had no effect or that other climate forces have counteracted it. Don't you think we should learn more about those other, more powerful forces ? And wouldn't Kyoto be a complete waste of time/money/effort if CO2's influence is minor compared to these other forces.

Proper scientifc studies - not excited media reports - have shown that extreme events have decreased in several regions and been unchanged in many more. I see that you claim that "better reporting of extreme events" has played a part in the increase of these events. Huh ?

You claim that climate change has made the current Australian drought and the European heatwave of 2003 worse than it would have been. (By the way, it was only a western European Heatwave; Moscow suffered from unseasonably cold weather.) Take a good hard look at the assumptions used in the computer models and you will find them dubious to say the least. Drawing - or repeating - these claims in relation to perfectly explicable natural events is either stupid or playing politics. On the other hand, maybe you believe everything that comes from a computer...

If you had bothered to look at Bureau of Meteorology data (at http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/cyc.shtml) you would find that there is no correlation between temperatures in northern Australia and either the number of cyclones or their intensity.

It is obvious that you have blind faith in the CSIRO's projections and never attempt to validate their claims. You really should try to, especially when their projections for temperature and rainfall from 1960 until today are very different from Bureau of Met observations. Temperature has varied less than their projection and rainfall has been about double the projections and the decline in rainfall is far less. (See http://mclean.ch/climate/Murray_Darling_climate.htm)

If the validation of the CSIRO models against known climate conditions shows it to be in error, then why on earth would we assume that their predictions of future climate would be even ball-park ?

Your article is absolute farce. You rely on assertions without bothering to take just a few steps to confirm them. Note that I am being kind and crediting you with hopeless research rather than deciding not to let the facts get in the way of a good story.


PS. Advanced warning - it is not worth producing evidence in your arguments with Grace because she made it quite clear wrt Des Griffins recent similar nonsense about global warming that she is not interested in evidence, only persuasive argument.

cheers
Posted by Snowman, Monday, 7 February 2005 10:28:38 AM
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Snowman, you say: "Advanced warning - it is not worth producing evidence in your arguments with Grace because she made it quite clear wrt Des Griffins recent similar nonsense about global warming that she is not interested in evidence, only persuasive argument."

Your rhetoric is heating up again Snowman.

This is what I said in part in responding to you on Des Griffin's essay: "Like most people, I am content to let the experts slug it out, and make my conclusions on what is available before me, including my reading and listening elsewhere. There is a universe of information out there, and I don't live on this website.."

And this is what Peter King said in responding to you in the same forum: "The problem is as Grace commented, that most of us don't have the time to research every article written and analyze every data set collected. This leaves us with having to rely on generalist articles in forums such as Online Opinion and robust discussion in this specific forum.." and, "We may be entirely wrong in blaming our outputs for warming but if we are not wrong the consequences are disastrous. As Grace says our children and grandchildren will not look kindly on our response or lack thereof..."

I stand by my comments, and those of Peter King.

However, I am bemused by your increasingly heated rhetorical play with religious doctrine and scientific consensus. Perhaps you have been reading too much Thomas Kuhn. But to continue the analogy, you remind me of a religious fundamentalist, lacking the perspective that might allow you see a little further beyond the set of evidence that you find persuasive, but hundreds of thousands of other scientists around the world in the WMO, the IPCC and various National Academies of Science do not. They cannot all be deluded.

And you entirely miss the point about the insurance industry. These companies are in the game for profit, and use the best research available to set their prices and their profit margins. If they find that the number of damage claims from extreme weather events and the like are increasing around the world, then they must increase their premiums or face extinction. To my mind, the hard-headed behaviour of the insurance industries around the world is of real interest in the global warming debate, and is likely to end up being the one of the most persuasive to governments. Perhaps you could let us know just how deluded they are too.
Posted by grace pettigrew, Monday, 7 February 2005 2:24:59 PM
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Grace,

I think you are being very selective in your quotes and you only give part of the picture.

I provided links to a variety of information and you said "- sorry, but you will have to argue your case here or not at all. I will not be following any of your links, or reading your further writing on the subject. Like most people, I am content to let the experts slug it out, and make my conclusions on what is available before me, including my reading and listening elsewhere. There is a universe of information out there, and I don't live on this website.

"Nothing you have said so far has persuaded me that I should agree with your personal take on the evidence, selective as it appears to be, any more than I should agree with the Bush/Howard administrations and their business cronies, on the political context of the global warming debate. In any case, my interest in your postings is more to do with the way you aggressively argue your case. The harder you push, the less convincing you are."

So there we have it. You refuse to look any further even when the links are provided to you and you clearly indicate that your position will be based on the persuasiveness of the arguments.

Put together that means "Forget the facts I just want to be persuaded; I don't care if the argument has no basis in reality."

You also made statements then refused to back them up and to show why your claims of "self interested tripe" did not also apply to the arguments of proponents of global warming.

You then claimed that your stance on global warming was facing reality but it seems that you were unwilling to look at the evident to see that your concept of reality was not reality at all.

You seem to not be aware of some basics about that IPCC TAR of 2001. The Observation section of that report was generally not too far off the mark (except for Mann's "hockey stick" which was highly praised in the chapter in which he was lead author). Together the Scientific sections contained statements honestly expressing uncertainties and doubts.

The problems lay with the Summary document which, according to authors that I have had contact with, was (a) written by policy-makers, not scientists and (b) replaced uncertainties with absolutes. This misleading summary is regarded as the "abridged edition" of teh entire document but it is no such thing.

You may have heard that 2500 scientists signed off the TAR of 2001. The reality is that each section was signed off by the respective contributors and authors, not by everyone. Further, the summary document was signed-off by the policy-makers who created it, not by the scientists on whose work it was based.

Several authors - including some lead authors - of the scientific section have objected so much to the Summary that they now oppose the the claims that man's carbon dioxide is the cause of warming.


It is also worth remembering that both the IPCC and WMO are international organisations created by the UN with the support of governments. It is almost inconceivable that the UN would disagree with its own organsaitions or that governments would openly disagree with a UN body.

If memory serves correctly, a survey of US state meteorologists in the late 1990's found that more than 60% disagreed with the fundamental claims about anthropogenic global warming.

I think it is you who is missing the point about the insurance industry. It is in their interests to fan the flames of global warming so they can increase premiums. Their higher pay-outs in extreme events are simply a consequence of greater population in certain areas that are susceptible to weather events (eg. Florida). On a proper inflation-adjusted basis, the hurricanes in the 1920's caused damage of the greatest cost.

But I know that evidence means little to you, and so if you want to be persuaded by people who stand to make significant gains from the spectre of global warming then it is up to you
Posted by Snowman, Monday, 7 February 2005 11:45:06 PM
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Snowman, thank you for posting the full text of my sterling prose, I was trying not to bore other readers with too much of it. And I still stand by what I said. However, you should be very careful about putting words into my mouth. You don't win arguments that way.

You have chosen to re-interpret my words to say, "You refuse to look any further when the links are provided", (I don't always Snowman, but as I said before I don't live on this website, and I don't respond kindly to autocratic demands like yours), "and you clearly indicate that your position will be based on the persuasiveness of the arguments" (that's right Snowman, like most people in this world I have to rely on the experts in most things, and I just do not think that your arguments are more persuasive than the thousands of scientists who take a different view to you).

Then you say, "Put together that means I just want to be persuaded, I don't care if the argument has no basis in reality". That is totally over the top Snowman, and demonstrates better than I could the reason why you are generally so unconvincing, and unable to sustain an intelligent debate without going into meltdown. Nowhere have I said that I am uninterested in the facts or reality.

As to the "self-interested tripe" comment of mine in an earlier forum, you chose to take this personally, when it was clearly directed at others. Go back and check and then stop wasting your time and mine with this sort of childish nonsense.

The rest of your posting is a re-iteration of your position in opposition to the consensus of most scientists on this planet. You should be taking your detailed arguments up to them instead of flooding this small forum with reams of detail. Report back to us when you score a win against the experts..

I see that, with one sweeping gesture, you are prepared to dismiss the views of all major international organisations under the umbrella of the UN just because they represent the views of the contributing governments. I think it is a bit more complicated than that, Snowman, especially as the major polluter on this planet plants itself in opposition to the UN by refusing to sign the Kyoto protocol at the very least, and the Bush administration continues to misrepresent the independent views of its own scientists and prefers the self-serving views of its own giant energy industries. The profit motive has a lot to answer for in this debate.

As for the insurance industry, I suggest you take a closer look at how they are betting on future trends (rather than depending on past history). You are right that the profit motive drives their industry, which is precisely why I am interested, but I think you need to do a bit more research on how and why they are placing their bets as they are.

And finally, whether you like it or not, I will continue to make up my own mind about global warming on the evidence and arguments presented to me by the experts, and if this includes listening to people who stand to gain very little from global warming (such as environmentalists), and treating with some scepticism those who stand to gain enormous profits from ignoring global warming (such as the major international energy cartels), then I am content.

Despite your vitriol, I wish you well in your lonely struggle Snowman, and let me suggest a bit of further reading for you: "Don Quixote" by Cervantes. If you don't read it I will get very cross.
Posted by grace pettigrew, Tuesday, 8 February 2005 11:10:17 AM
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Grace,

You really should take on the responsibility of doing your own research and following up the leads given you, rather than relying on the noisy assertions of others, supported or unsupported, as the case may be. To do otherwise is to leave yourself vulnerable to accepting, uncritically, the position of whoever shouts the loudest. That is the way of the second-hander, not the independent thinker. If that requires time and effort, then that is the price you must pay.

I am not sure what you mean by my original assertion being unclear. I thought it was abundantly clear, that Greenpeace has no credibility in commenting on environmental questions, when they were guilty of perpetrating their typical type of stunt in Norway in 2002. It was a blatant attempt to garner support for a political stance, devoid of rationality or credibility. To use the recession of the Blomstrandbreen glacier as "evidence" of recent warming, when the recession took place in the 1920s, long before global warming became fashionable, is blatantly fraudulent. By going to the opposite side of Svalbard, to the surging Friddjovbreen glacier, they could have made an equally fraudulent case for global cooling. I wonder why they didn’t?
Posted by A is A, Tuesday, 8 February 2005 12:58:51 PM
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A is A, is there anything you would like to say about the Science journal report from 2004 in my earlier posting?
Posted by grace pettigrew, Tuesday, 8 February 2005 1:25:41 PM
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Grace,

You claim now that you are interested in reality and yet you rely entirely on others for what you believe to be reality?

You are unwilling to support your assertions with any evidence. Saying that others believe something and you believe them is not evidence.

Being sceptical is all very well but having that attitude to just one side of a discussion makes it impossible to form a rational judgement based on evidence.

My earlier use of religious consensus to question the assumption that consensus provides the correct answer seems most appropriate.

Your attitude to global warming is nothing short of a religious - beliefs based solely on faith, refusal to examine evidence which might undermine your beliefs, attempts to ridicule those who don't agree with you and blind acceptance of the word of your leaders, "the experts".

If your attitude is fixed, then what are you doing in this discussion or any other discussion about global warming ?

It is clear that you don't want to learn or you would be interested enough to look at the evidence. Is your sole purpose in being here to attempt to denigrate those who don't share your faith in your "experts"?
Posted by Snowman, Tuesday, 8 February 2005 5:04:05 PM
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The thing about global warming, "Climate change" is that it we know how it is caused. We also know what will happen to the planet if it continues at its current rate.

There are only two things that we should be doing right now. We should be re-forresting the planet quickly. Paper should cost 10 to 100 times what it does now, to slow down wood chipping etc.

We should be using alternate energy sources. Sola panels could be made for a few dollars a each if there was demand and competition. With that, hydrogen could be manufactured by solar/wind energy to drive our vehicles.

The solutions are not difficult. It primarily the greed of our governments that is killing our planet.
Posted by mark, Tuesday, 8 February 2005 8:59:39 PM
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The global warming debate has been running on OLO for the past couple of months, with opinions from Alan Oxley and Alan Moran arguing the case against global warming and the Kyoto Protocol, and opinions from Des Griffin and Gareth Walton arguing the case for global warming and the Kyoto Protocol. As I understand it, the position adopted by Griffin and Walton is supported in general terms by world-wide scientific consensus that global warming is already upon us, that is is probably due mainly to human activity, and that we should do something to rein in our environmental destruction.

By contrast, as I understand it, the position adopted by Oxley and Moran is that this scientific consensus on global warming is based on bad science and bad politics and that any actions we might take in deference to the “precautionary principle” would be a waste of time and money.

Oxley and Moran have two strong advocates for their case in the comments forums. Snowman and A is A challenge the scientific consensus on global warming on the basis of “bad science” (Snowman), and it would appear, “bad politics” (A is A). Both have challenged my position, which is to generally accept the evidence and arguments put by the majority of scientists world-wide, until I am otherwise persuaded. So far, Snowman and A is A have not managed to persuade me to their point of view, and I have been variously accused of being lazy, stupid and irresponsible. In line with Snowman’s extensive 15 page posting of his arguments on a previous forum, here are a few more pointers in support of my own position.

In essence, I am very sceptical of economists with vested interests in support of big business dumping on a world-wide scientific consensus on the basis of fictionalized accounts of the real world (Oxley and Moran), and very sceptical of anonymous commentators who, on the one hand appear to harbour a grudge against any notion of scientific consensus (Snowman), and who on the other hand, put forward unscientific, but highly rhetorical arguments that sound very much like the the authors they support (A is A).

On Dec 31 2005, an article was published on OLO by the economist Alan Oxley entitled “Howard Vindicated on Kyoto strategy”. Oxley is a well-known public advocate for big business and untrammeled free trade, and a part of the anti-Kyoto Lavoisier lobby group, together with Hugh Morgan, former CEO of Western Mining Corporation. Oxley’s article made approving mention of a book of fiction called “State of Fear”, written by Michael Crichton, the same novelist who bought us Tyrannosaurus Rex incarnate in “Jurassic Park”. According to Oxley, Crichton’s novel provides a “full vindication of the position taken by the Howard Government on Kyoto”. So that’s all right then.

In commenting approvingly on Oxley’s article, A is A relied on testimony to a US senate committee last year by a certain Prof Zbigniew Jaworowski, which an internet source describes as an expert on nuclear explosions from Poland, and his evidence on Upper Carboniferous, Lower Permian and Quaternary and present day CO2 levels, and then concludes with this statement, “To ignore evidence from the earth’s long history, and to be mesmerized by computer generated fantasies is to be deliberately obtuse.” Such a finely-wrought scientific argument on the basis of one pro-Bush administration testimonial from Poland made me wonder whether A is A might be Alan Oxley himself, or perhaps Alan Moran...

On 20 January 2005 Alan Moran, Director of the Deregulation Unit at the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA), and an economist with an energy industry background, published an essay on OLO entitled “The earth’s power and might”. Again, Michael Crichton’s book of fiction, “State of Fear” was approvingly cited as providing evidence of the “blind fanaticism” of “a number of environmental activist organizations and their supporters” and “mendacious scientists playing on fears to improve their case for research grants”. Amazingly, “Crichton is his novel even predicts a tsunami”, and Moran concluded with the reassuring words, “The earth is a massive and stable structure…”. A is A made no comments on Moran’s article.

It is notable that the arguments presented by A is A in his postings in support of Oxley and against Walton are highly rhetorical and contemptuous of dissent, not to mention scientifically questionable at the most basic level. For example, A is A posted a comment earlier in this forum about the activities of Greenpeace in Norway, and ended his posting on a separate note as follows: “Earlier this year, the journal Science published evidence that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet had not only stopped shrinking but was growing at a rate of nearly 27 billion tons a year.”

In querying his comment, I posted a report of a Science journal article from 2004 showing not only that glaciers in West Antarctica have substantially increased their rate of shrinking, but that they are moving faster. Instead of explaining the apparent contradiction, A is A responded by announcing that he had clearly indicated in his earlier posting that the increase in the Antarctic Ice Sheet reported by him occurred in 2002. In fact, his earlier posting said no such thing.

This was followed by another posting from A is A which repeated some of the details about Greenpeace in Norway, but failed to mention his apparently fraudulent Antarctic Ice Sheet claim. And I was then pompously advised to take on the responsibility of doing my own research (in the Antarctic?) rather than relying on the noisy assertions of others (such as his own?). What is going on here? But lets be generous: in effect, the noisy opinions of A is A carry no more weight than my own.

As I understand it, neither Alan Oxley nor Alan Moran are scientists. They are both economists and hard right-wing, pro-business advocates of market deregulation and free trade. Oxley writes opinion columns for the SMH where he never misses a chance to boost the Howard Government’s economic platform, to pour scorn on environmental concerns about the state of the planet and to complain vociferously about the activities of non-government organizations such as Greenpeace, the World Wide Fund for Nature and others. Moran is employed as Director of the Deregulation Unit by the IPA, which is funded by undisclosed commercial and business interests, and which has been described as follows:

“Founded in 1943 by Charles Kemp (father of the Howard Government’s David and Rod), the Institute of Public Affairs calls itself “Australia’s oldest and largest private-sector “think tank”. An IPA form letter, dated soon after John Howard’s election as prime minister, stated: ‘Although measuring success is difficult in our business, IPA’s influence is clearly significant. Our views appear frequently in the media. We are regularly asked to write for newspapers and other publications, to comment on radio and television, to give public talks (with over 100 delivered in 1995), and to make submissions to public inquiries…Our publications are distributed to Federal and State politicians, to many educators and libraries, and to 4500 subscribers.’

“Long associated with the ‘dry’ end of the Liberal Party, IPA’s primary concerns have always been economic. From the mid-1980s however, it began pushing ‘family’ issues as well, with regular opinion columns in Rupert Murdoch’s Australian that argued for more durable marriage and more difficult divorce, for example…” (Marion Maddox, “God under Howard: The Rise of the Religious Right in Australian Politics”, Allen & Unwin 2005, p 210).

On page 254 of her book, Maddox further informs us that the IPA, being a Non-Government Organisation or NGO, jealously guards its special influence with the Howard Government, and enjoys the quid pro quo that follows. In 2003 the IPA, as an NGO itself, received a $50,000 contract from the Howard Government to investigate “the relationship between government and NGOs.” Maddox continues, “..the fact that the government had skirted the usual sources of background information and research, and gone instead to an organization with a long history of ideological campaigning on topics such as the environment, overseas aid and indigenous issues… in ways that have generally helped conservative governments against more progressive groups, gave the move a look of paying to get the advice you want.”

In other words, Alan Moran and the IPA have a clear vested interest, not least through their direct contract funding by the Howard Government, in dumping on other NGOs, particularly environmental NGOs, and publicly advocating the position of the Howard Government in relation to the Kyoto Protocol (which comes into effect at the end of this month, with the USA and Australia as non-signatories.)

And let’s not forget how closely the Howard Government (and the IPA and the Lavoisier Group) follows on the coat-tails of the Bush administration in relation to the science behind the Kyoto Protocol. In fact, you would be hard pressed to find any hard science at all in Howard’s policy position. It is more a case of doing as we are told by the Bush administration and their business cronies. As Des Griffin referenced in his essay, Paul Harris reported in The Observer on 21 September 2003 as follows.

White House officials undermined their own government scientists' research into climate change to play down the impact of global warming. Environmental campaigners claimed that efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions were sabotaged because of President George W. Bush's links to the oil industry. Emails and internal government documents obtained by The Observer showed that officials sought to edit or remove research warning that the problem is serious. They enlisted the help of conservative lobby groups funded by the oil industry to attack US government scientists if they produced work seen as accepting too readily that pollution is an issue.

Central to the revelations of double dealing was the discovery of an email sent to Phil Cooney, chief of staff at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, by Myron Ebell, a director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). The CEI is an ultra-conservative lobby group that has received more than $1 million in donations since 1998 from the oil giant Exxon, which sells Esso petrol in Britain. The email, dated 3 June 2002, revealed how White House officials wanted the CEI's help to play down the impact of a report by the government's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in which the US admitted for the first time that humans are contributing to global warming.

The email discussed possible tactics for playing down the report and getting rid of EPA officials, including its then head, Christine Whitman. Both Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are former oil executives; National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was a director of the oil firm Chevron, and Commerce Secretary Donald Evans once headed an oil and gas exploration company. Other confidential documents obtained by The Observer detailed White House efforts to suppress research that showed the world's climate is warming.

A four-page internal EPA memo reveals that Bush's staff insisted on major amendments to the climate change section of an environmental survey of the USA. Some of the changes include deleting a summary that stated: "Climate change has global consequences for human health and the environment." Sections on the ecological effects of global warming and its impact on human health were removed. So were several sentences calling for further research on climate change. A temperature record covering 1,000 years was also deleted, prompting the EPA memo to note: “Emphasis is given to a recent, limited analysis [which] supports the administration's favoured message.”

I would like to know what price Australia will pay in the longer term for blindly supporting this sort of self-interested and irresponsible fiddling with the scientific facts at the behest of giant energy interests who have a vested interest in ignoring global warming.

To continue, as pro-business and pro-Howard economists, neither Alan Moran nor Alan Oxley have any professional credentials in any area of science as far as I can discern, and have no particular understanding of the laws of nature, or the nature of scientific experimentation, scientific evidence or scientific consensus. Yet they are both keen to promote a fictional account of the global warming debate, because it happens to fit with their jaundiced view of global politics, and their bogeyman theory of environmental activism undermining economic growth at all costs.

Further, as economists they both believe in the God of the Free Market and the Wizard of Deregulation, human constructs based on human assumptions about human behaviour. The economic theories that they promote, many of which depend on highly complex and esoteric modelling far from the realities of our lives, are not scientifically testable or refutable, but ultimately dependent on selective hypotheses about human nature, to the effect that we are all competitive, individualistic and greedy. These selective hypotheses or conjectures about human behaviour operate at the level of faith, because they are not amenable to any rigorous scientific testing or refutation.

On the other hand, scientific theories about global warming and the complex computer models that support these theories, are based on real world observations that are testable and refutable in the longer run. Computer modeling of global climate systems is necessary in order to deal with the huge amount of observational data, evidence and information that is available to the scientists around the planet.

While it is easy to dismiss such modeling as “computer generated fantasies” (as does A is A), this suggests a lack of understanding of very large steady-state systems and the value of cybernetics in understanding how relatively small perturbations in such systems can result in larger perturbations through negative feedback. This is not something that can be easily visualized or experimentally tested in the real world in an immediate sense, because it would require a planetary laboratory, but mathematical theory, such as catastrophe theory for example, tells us that “the butterfly effect” is worth attention. This also suggests that anomalous observations on different parts of the planet, which produce such heated disagreements on the “evidence”, are to be expected, but the larger perspective should be kept in focus.

In summary, the highly rhetorical opinions of Oxley, Moran and A is A on the global warming debate appear to me to be based more in faith-based economic theory, the vested interests of big business, particularly big energy and mining interests, right wing political agitprop in support of Bush and Howard, and a single published work of fiction by Michael Crichton, than on any real understanding of global climate science and environmental concerns. All of which cautions me to be very sceptical about their opinions, however noisily expressed.

I continue to find the consensus of professional and independent scientific evidence and opinion around the world more persuasive in the global warming debate, and hope that our government will consent to listen and act before we, and our children and grandchildren, reap the whirlwind
Posted by grace pettigrew, Wednesday, 9 February 2005 12:17:11 PM
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Mark, give it a break.

Scientists have very little idea what causes climate change!

If you think it is carbon dioxide then why is it that temperatures have not equalled or passed their 1998 values? That's 6 years ago and a whole lot of carbon dioxide has been added to the atmosphere since then.

You'll be pleased to learn that deserts have been shrinking in the last 10 years ... and a lot of scientists put that down to the extra carbon dioxide acting as plant fertiliser.

If carbon dioxide isn't causing much warming then why do we need alternative energy such as solar and wind power? Look, they're fine for remote areas that are damn expensive to connect to the elctricity grid and perhaps for buildings that aren't used very often but right now their cost compared to their efficiency is pretty poor.

In principle I'd love to have a solar energy farm because we have plenty of sunlight but the cost of the solar cells and the cost of their maintenance (eg. washing) make it financially not worth doing - at least not yet.

cheers
Posted by Snowman, Wednesday, 9 February 2005 12:19:13 PM
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Des Griffin and Gareth Walton aren't scientists either.
Posted by the usual suspect, Wednesday, 9 February 2005 2:03:28 PM
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Then I suppose its just as well that I am, usual suspect. In any case, how do you know that Walton and Griffin are not scientists?
Posted by grace pettigrew, Thursday, 10 February 2005 9:13:36 AM
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What sort of scientist are you, Grace?
Posted by A is A, Thursday, 10 February 2005 3:11:14 PM
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BSc (Hons) ANU: MSC (UNSW). And you A is A?
Posted by grace pettigrew, Thursday, 10 February 2005 3:38:03 PM
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In what field(s)?
Posted by A is A, Thursday, 10 February 2005 3:47:35 PM
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Thus far and no further, A is A. You owe me some answers, old buddy, and its about time you answered them. Did you deliberately mislead readers with your earlier assertion about the Antarctic Ice Cap? And since you are so interested in my qualifications, what exactly are yours?
Posted by grace pettigrew, Thursday, 10 February 2005 4:16:55 PM
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Greenpeace is wasting its time on carbon dioxide. What they should be doing is trying to prevent sunspots.
Medusa
Posted by Medusa, Sunday, 13 February 2005 2:57:59 PM
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I love your certainty A is A. Isn't there room for just a little doubt? We're playing with the future of the planet and there is so much complexity, yet people like you know it all.
Posted by mtb, Monday, 14 February 2005 10:17:23 PM
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That’s a bit rich, mtb, accusing me, and other critics of climate alarmists, of false certainty. We are constantly being regaled with disasters du jour from the alarmist lobby with breathtaking "certainly". How’s this one, from The Guardian, and republished in last weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1405647,00.html

"Scientists warn growing acidity of oceans will kill reefs

Paul Brown, environment correspondent
Friday February 4, 2005
The Guardian

Scientists have given warning of a newly discovered threat to mankind, which will wipe out coral and many species of fish and other sea life. …Extra carbon dioxide in the air, caused by the burning of fossil fuels, is not only spurring climate change, but is making the oceans more acidic - endangering the marine life that helps to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.…The oceans have previously recorded an 8.2 pH reading, but this has now dropped to 8.1 and is continuing to fall."

I will leave it to you to spot the glaringly obvious contradiction in this latest offering in the propaganda war.
Posted by A is A, Tuesday, 15 February 2005 10:33:45 AM
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This started as a quick comment on a couple of matters that have come up in the now quite numerous articles about Global Warming. It has expanded. I make no apology for that.

First, if anyone is unsure of my credentials and background and so on go to my website, it is quite extensive and explicit. Only an ignorant person would assert I am not a scientist. Consideration of my background would surely show that I have considerable experience in assessing science and scientific research. I have never claimed to be an expert on meteorology but I do have a concern for the natural environment and the future and an interest in the way decisions are made and in behaviour generally. That is background and not in itself a justification for the validity of any of my views.

Second, a set of people, particularly snowman, inhabit every forum concerning global warming. Their assertions are quite clear: the science supporting the proposition that global climate change has occurred is seriously flawed, the scientists supporting the proposition are doing so only through consensus, criticisms of sceptical views are playing the person not the issue and so on. And there is the argument that the statements of certain people are not worth considering because those people are biased. The last point is used by most protagonists.

Do these people believe that simply by maintaining and repeating these assertions that eventually the facts will change? One of the recent articles dealt with the book published by William Kininmonth. John Zillman, former Director of the Bureau of Meteorology, said the following.

"If Bill Kininmonth's purpose in emphasizing the limitations of the global climate models was to caution against taking their output too much on faith, and to focus attention on the need to improve them, I think he is playing a useful role and one which I fully support.

"But I believe that Bill goes much too far and, for whatever reason, misinterprets and/or misrepresents some important aspects of the science of climate change that are now pretty well understood. At least thirty times in the book he asserts, albeit in slightly different language in each place, that what he refers to as the one-dimensional IPCC construct of radiative forcing of climate change is fundamentally flawed. He makes much of the well known three-dimensional structure of atmospheric processes and energy flows in the climate system and implies that these have been overlooked by the IPCC. I offer two specific comments on Bill's characterisation of the IPCC:

"The IPCC is not, as Bill implies and many appear to have been lead to believe, some ideologically committed group of scientists with a particular position or perspective on the science which they seek to promote. Rather it is a highly transparent process, supervised by governments, which enables the contemporary state of knowledge of climate change as it emerges from the peer-reviewed published literature to be summarised and assessed by a representative group of the internationally acknowledged experts in the field with their summary assessment subject to one of the most exhaustive processes of peer review and revision that I believe has ever occurred in the international scientific community...

"Bill is wrong to assert or imply that the model results on which the IPCC assessments are based don't take account of all the various three dimensional energy transfer processes that he argues are so important. He is seriously misleading in his belittling as 'one-dimensional' of the IPCC's use of globally averaged versions of the energy budget..."

Yet people can laud Kinninmonth's book without noting any of these comments by Zillman, a person who is both a distinguished research leader and participant in this debate and one of the more careful and generous persons in that debate. Such behaviour is typical of the skeptics.

It is this kind of selective reporting that we see in the commentary by many others, the supporters of Fred Singer and of Lomborg. It is common that analyses of Lomborg’s statements and Singer’s assertions are not consulted. I referred to analyses by John Quiggin but I don’t note than the supporters of Lomborg have bothered to consider that.

I am not unaware of mistakes and bad judgments in science: it is a human activity. But are we really and truly expected to believe that several thousand scientists, several score scientific institutions, numerous countries, many companies (including insurance companies who are having to pay out much more in claims for the damage of extreme weather conditions which is one of the events forecast for climate change as long ago as the early 70s) are all wrong? Really?! Are we expected to reject Darwinian evolution because the majority of scientists consider it represents the most complete explanation of the diversity of life? Are we to reject the proposition that major geologic events are caused by the movement of tectonic plates because scientists consider this to be the best explanation?

Compare these issues and conclusions with those that underlie rational economics, neoliberal propositions concerning the economics of health care, education, social welfare, education, crime etc etc. Yes, this whole debate has an element, so far as I am concerned, of ideology. And yes, when the neoliberal ideologues like those of the Centre for Independent Studies bring out the Lomborgs of this world and the Competitive Enterprise Institute lobbies to have Bush reverse his undertakings on CO2 emissions and so on and so on, then we need to consider very carefully just what the evidence is on which these claims are based and what the motives of these people are.

Science is not some kind of cozy club in which people are into it for their own personal rewards to a significantly greater extent than in any other area of human activity including the arts and business. Simply quoting Thomas Kuhn doesn't get us very far. And yes of course scientists have their centres and their advocates.

The arguments which those who advance the proposition that rapid global climate change (carefully think about every one of those words) is occurring are based on huge amounts of data and huge amounts of analyses. They do not commence with some ideological position any more than did those who warned of ozone depletion or that the plagues was cause by bacteria carried by fleas who lived on rats.

That in a supposedly civilized world propositions are being advanced that are supported by next to no facts or observations of limited applicability, based on nothing more than an ideology no more robust than that which supported the national socialist and racist motives of the middle of the last century is an outrage. Millions die and will continue to die as long as this nonsense, of the kind advanced by snowman and his ilk, continues. And yes, this is an argument based on ideology. It happens also to be supported by the weight of evidence and not by self interest, other than the hope that those of seven generations on might inherit a life to be lived.
Posted by Des Griffin, Thursday, 17 February 2005 4:15:04 PM
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Des,

I heve never questioned whether you are a scientist or not. To me that is entirely irrelevant. Being a scientists doesn't make your immune from errors of logic, from distortion and from deriving inconsistent and unsupportable ideas from observational data acquired by either yourself or others.

Yes, I have recently looked at several posting on climate change and I keep finding the same assertions and assumptions either from the writers of the articles or from the posters to the forum. Surely you are not saying that their statements should not be challenged?

I note some distortion in your assumptions about me in your accusations about "a set of people" but I am most disturbed by your claim that I, like most protagonists, have an attitude that " certain people are not worth considering because those people are biased." I find it difficult to see how you can possibly draw that conclusion when I have simply asked people to explain certain observations and criticised them for failing to present evidence to support their assertions.

I see that you quote of John Zillman's remarks rather than make statements of your own and this is the kind of thing about which I have commented - accepting the word of some other person (often someone regarded as "an expert") at face value and never examining the facts and raw data for oneself.

By the way Zillman's comments are incorrect. He says "The IPCC is not, as Bill implies and many appear to have been lead to believe, some ideologically committed group of scientists with a particular position or perspective on the science which they seek to promote." but this is clearly refuted by the recent comments of Michael Mann and IPCC chairman Dr. Pachauri ?

At a recent conference Michael Mann was introduced as a IPCC Lead Author and then claimed that extreme weather events were increasing, a fact that was contradicted by recognised IPCC contributor Chris Landsea. Mann later claimed that he was speaking in a private capacity but by then it was too late, the belief was he was presenting the IPCC's view. (see Landsea's letter of resignation at http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html)

Chairman Dr Pachauri has recently made several comments to the effect that anthropogenic climate change is real and in support of the Kyoto Agreement.

So as much as Zillman might think otherwise, both Mann and Pachauri clearly hold certain positions and perspectives on the science which they seek to promote.

Des, you and others may not be aware that John Zillam was a contributor and author to the IPCC document. It is no surprise at all to find him asserting that everything that the IPCC does and the accuracy of their models is above board.

I have had personal communication with Zillman and his belief in carbon dioxide as the cause of warming is based on his perception that as far as he can see, there is no other suspect for the crime. Sorry but that is not proof.

You seem entirely unaware that Lomborg is of the opinion that carbon dioxide probably causes warming. True! His writing merely reflects a coldy rational assessment that more could be achieved with the money spent on other areas of human suffering especially in the third world.

I see that you resort to the old consensus argument again - "But are we really and truly expected to believe that several thousand scientists, several score scientific institutions, numerous countries, many companies (including insurance companies who are having to pay out much more in claims for the damage of extreme weather conditions which is one of the events forecast for climate change as long ago as the early 70s) are all wrong? Really?!"

I have responded to the notion of "consensus" in at least one forum so please search for my remarks to save repeating them here.

Are you entirely unaware that a similar consensus was held about cholera being caused by a "miasma" and that the stubborn refusal to accept the more sceptical view that it was water-borne caused the loss of millions of lives? This is not the only instance of consensus retarding science but it is probably the simplest.

Sure your examples of consensus about Darwinian evolution and tectonic plates are accepted but both have reasonable evidence to support their hypothesis. By the way, the person who first proposed the notion of tectonic plates was ridiculed by the scientific establishment for many year. (So much for a good example to support your argument !)

And don't trot out the insurance companies as if they are some paragon of virtue. They are in business to make money. That's it. Plain and simple. If they can encourage people to spend more money on their premiums than they need to do you really think they would say "No, we have enough already." ? Of course they will milk the notion of global warming for all it is worth! Do they care about whether they may be right or wrong with their statements? Give me a break! How naive are you?

Thanks for your confirmation that the debate about global warming is based on ideology. I did suspect as much and yes, we "need to consider very carefully just what the evidence is on which these claims are based and what the motives of these people are". More to the point we need to consider why you and others like you either won't look at the evidence provided by raw data or refuse to acknowledge what it is telling us.

The raw data says that temperatures have not exceeded their 1998 levels and says that since that time carbon dioxide levels have increased by 11 ppm, an amount equivalent to about 20% of the total between 1960 and 1998 inclusive. I know what this tells me, but what does it tell you? Or is your answer wrapped in motives and ideology ?

You say "The arguments which those who advance the proposition that rapid global climate change (carefully think about every one of those words) is occurring are based on huge amounts of data and huge amounts of analyses." so I ask you, please provide information so that I can access the raw data for myself and please provide explanation as to why these events cannot be caused by natural events.

These requests should be pretty simple if there are huge amounts of data and analyses.

"That in a supposedly civilized world propositions are being advanced that are supported by next to no facts or observations of limited applicability" Sorry.. what? I have produced the evidence and provided links to my data sources - which is a darn sight more than you have done in either your article or this forum - so how do you support this contention that I have no facts or that my observations are of limited applicability?

You conclude that your assertion "happens also to be supported by the weight of evidence and not by self interest, other than the hope that those of seven generations on might inherit a life to be lived. " That's a wonderful notion but now please provide all the raw data evidence that supports your claims.

If you cannot provide evidence to support your assertions then they should be rejected out of hand. Since any scientist worthy of the name will provide such evidence then it seems that your claim to being a scientist is also under a cloud.

My strong suggestion (but not demand) to you is to look at the raw data for yourself and to put aside your ideology while you consider what the evidence is telling you. Stretch your thinking beyond the "consensus" to question whether natural events may be the cause of what you see and whether the assumptions underlying the consensus viewpoint to which you subscribe are truly supported by the evidence.

If you are honest, I think you may become enlightened.
Posted by Snowman, Thursday, 17 February 2005 7:20:33 PM
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Snowman,

It is my understanding that carbon dioxide levels have been gradually increasing since the 1890’s, primarily because of man’s activities. Since that time a lot of carbon dioxide has been pumped into the atmosphere (together with many other contaminants).

There is now belief that a considerable amount of carbon dioxide has been absorbed by the oceans, but unfortunately forming carbonic acid in the process, and increasing the acidity of the oceans.

If the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is not forming a greenhouse gas, do we have to be concerned for the oceans?
Posted by Timkins, Thursday, 17 February 2005 8:22:15 PM
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Snowman - Des Griffin's scientific credentials were scorned by the usual suspect in his posting above on 9 February when he said "Des Griffin and Gareth Walton aren't scientists either". Des has every right to draw attention to his credentials when they are so blatantly misrepresented by others.

Des, you say, "Simply quoting Thomas Kuhn [on scientific consensus] does not get us very far". I agree that it does not add value to a discussion about scientific evidence in the global warming debate. However, my ironic comment was originally directed to Snowman, "perhaps you have been reading too much Thomas Kuhn" on 7 Feb, because he appears to have so little understanding about the way science progresses understanding through replicable experimentation, peer review, and ageement (or consensus) on evidence and facts etc.

Perhaps Snowman sees himself as the lonely dissenter, like Copernicus, who will one day triumph over the scientific consensus he rails against. What he should also understand is that most lonely dissenters have simply missed the point, and wander off into the dark alleys of history never to be heard of again. I also suggested he read Don Quixote.

I should add that Jennifer Marohasy, in a later forum, also queried my recommendation to Snowman about Kuhn. I don't think she has read it either, judging from her questions. Still, it was published first in 1962, and the world has moved on, so be assured, I will try not mention it again.
Posted by grace pettigrew, Friday, 18 February 2005 11:53:53 AM
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Look at my web site where I have described how the emissions of carbon dioxide is automatically reduced to a specific equivalence level depending on how natural forces such as thermodynamics and gravitation acts on the properties of the carbon dioxide which varying its density dependent of the pressure.

Ingvar Astrand, Sweden
ingvar_astrand@yahoo.se
http://www.theuniphysics.info
Posted by sia, Thursday, 3 March 2005 9:36:45 PM
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