Another article from a global warming skeptic. He's an IT engineer quibbling over scientific methodology and the cause of the warming.

Surely it's more important to ask - "Is global warming going to effect me?" The answer is "Yes".

The next question should be "Is global warming going to harm me?"
The answer is "Yes - unless you live in South East Queensland or Gascoine region of WA"

My next question is - "What can we do to prepare for global warming?"

A very interesting article but too technical for me.

But then again one wonders about someone who can write this:

"the fundamental duty of scientists....is that they do not deliberately conceal matters".

Most scientists either work for powerful corporations of Governments, and as such are obliged to conform to the interests of their employer,
and are therefore not likely to bring to the notice of the general public any "inconvenient truths" which may contradict the interests of their employer.

There is an interesting film on at the moment titled Michael Clayton. It is perhaps a bit overstated but it provides an interesting story as to how far powerful corporate interests will/may go to DELIBERATELY CONCEAL MATTERS.
I am sure the scenario depicted has happened countless times all over the world.

Plus the book Global Spin by Sharon Beder tells us how both mega-corporations and governments re--lie on spin to convince/DECEIVE the public.

The moral of the story is to always follow the money trail to see who pays the piper.

In my opinion most of the scientists involved in the IPPC were/are genuinely motivated by a very real concern for the future of life on this planet.

Discussing climate change is a waste of time.

The most vociferous and loudest 'experts' have won the day. We can all look forward to paying out huge swags of money for the totally useless theories of the big mouths to no good effect.

No matter what we are charged for energy and handouts, the climate will change when it, not humans, decides to.

I note of the IPCC - "the monopoly authority on the science."

The problem with all monopolies is the serve their own self interest.

Regardless of the willingness of the individual who are associated with them, as soon as a monopoly exists it ceases to serve the consumer (the electorate), it works to feed itself.

The over pricing and overmanning at Telstra was one simple examples of a tied consumer (us) being raped by a state monopoly.

The problem with a UN operated "monopoly" is the electorate are a more steps removed from and thus more vulnerbale to the oppressive power of the monopoly.

Ho Hum "the fundamental duty of scientists....is that they do not deliberately conceal matters".

It is a similar primary responsibility and ethos which is standard to my profession. We express it as an overriding responsibility to reflect a "true and fair view".

Global weather and temperature science lacks the historic analysis and experience to be able to provide a "true and fair view".

The best it can do is provide "a speculative assumption of a range of possible causes and effects".

That we have politicians who wish to hog-tie our national economy to "a speculative assumption with unknown causes and unknown outcomes" is an act of political lunacy.

My understanding of politics was "the art fo the possible", not "the blind application of high end speculation".

Get rid of the monopoly and get real objective debate going.

It will be the only thing which will save us from an agenda of "Socialism by Stealth" and enforced levelling of the "able and willing" to an involuntarily subsidy of the less-able and (more often) simply, less-willing.

For myself, I think, if I follow this IPCC thinking, there will be a great opportunity in Carbon Future Licence Derivatives, even though I am not sure how it actually adds anything to anyones quality of life.

Well said, Dave and Col. The IPCC has three elements, only one of which is dedicated to ascertaining the scientific facts about global warming. Around 1990, I was briefed by, and spoke to, the head of the scientific area, which at that time was regarded as the most important, the basis of the IPCC's work. (Sorry, I can't recall his name, Sir Frederick something.) He was a true scientist, seeking to ascertain the truth of the matter, and at that time he was quite clear that no convincing evidence for anthropogenic warming had emerged. Unfortunately, the IPCC has become a pseudo-scientific, highly political, self-serving bandwagon rather than a body of "seekers after truth" in the public interest. It's difficult at this stage to see how we will avoid heavy costs for actions which do not have a sound basis

David Holland, congratulations and thank you for your beautiful article. I finally know all about Global Warming. To think that for years and years I lived with the tale of a planet formed by the explosion of a big mass and the resulting earth was hot and magma-like and in cooling the various elements in it separated, and rocks and liquid and gases came to be. And probably from that chemical soups one combination came to reproduce itself and it was life. And in the millions and millions of years forests and animals grew and grew and were buried by the vicissitudes of the cooling rock formations and trapped in the rocks, were made into coal and petrol. And there stood locked for millions and millions of years again. And then we, Sapient came to stand up on two legs and learn how to grow crops and make tools and how try to enslave each other and how to survive longer and longer. And how, within 100 years, resurface and burn all that coal and all that petrol which had been in those rocks. No, it wasn't us upsetting the equilibrium that the planet had slowly acquired in the intervening millions of years. No, it surely was something or someone else.