Dear O Dear who dug this clown up cant you just rebury him quietly,the fool is a broken record like the rest of his ilk.

Just when you think OLO has exhausted its pool of climate contrarians they come up with yet another. The reason for fuel tax is to contribute to government revenues. The reason for carbon trading is to force a steady shift away from carbon intensive energy use thereby avoiding a range of problems including adverse climate change. The reason why Australia and a few other countries should take the lead is get an early advantage climbing up the learning curve while setting an example to greenhouse rogue nations.

Far from falling behind Australia's emissions reduction scheme should spawn a range of new industries and jobs that will still be there in twenty and forty years time. The ETS is not a tax in the sense that the revenue is directly handed back to those it affects. They just can't spend it on carbon. This week's media shows the hapless residents of Beijing experiencing the effects of growth-at-any-cost. Those countries who don't follow the emissions reduction path will ultimately drag themselves down as well as the rest of the world.

I'm going to take my rolled gold intellect, put the kettle on and grab a seat over at Comedy Central for the rest of the day:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/

- join me anyone?

As usual a very sensible article.

It will still be some years before it becomes accepted that humans producing CO2 do not cause "Global Warming". In other words a few years before it is commonly accepted that there is no cause and effect relationship.

On can only hope that in the meantime an ETS will not actually get up.

Sigh......

Yet more paranoid garbage from David Flint, but although this article probably doesn't merit serious analysis, I'll just use a bit of logic to refute a part of his argument.

He states "[i]f only one [of these questions] produces a negative response, the ETS is exposed as just another energy tax. The ETS will be nothing more than an Energy Tax Swindle."

This is clearly wrong for his last 3 questions.

" 3. Do no other factors beyond human control significantly affect the weather?"

Even if the answer is no, that is no reason to do nothing. Speed is a significant factor in causing car accidents. Allowing untrained drivers unlimited access to the roads would also be a major cause of car accidents. That doesn't mean we shouldn't bother with a system of licensing drivers just because speeding is also a problem.

"4. Will the advent of an Australian ETS persuade China, India and the US to enter into a similar world wide ETS almost immediately?"

Assuming AGW is correct, it is clearly in our interests for China, India and the US to enter into a similar process. If we do nothing that will only encourage them to go in the other direction.

"5. Will an Australian ETS by itself have any significant effect on the weather in Australia?"

This is absolutely no reason for doing nothing. As has been pointed out so many times before, just because some people still go around stealing from others, it doesn't mean it's ok for me to do so.

Australia is the largest per capita carbon emitter in the world. We have no excuse for sitting back and waiting for the rest of the world to act before we do - morally or economically.

OK, there is still some doubt whether global warming is caused by man-made carbon emissions; but there is enough evidence to suggest it is very much the case, and therefore to do nothing is a far more reckless act than to make the small changes that are being proposed

We need to put this issue in the public's face on a daily basis. This is a threat to our economic well being. The people must write or email their elected officials and scream NO, NO, NO! If these officials ignore us, we have to turn them out. Period

ETS amounts to nothing more than a system for transferring money from our pockets to those of big business and lobbyists. Even if one could feel good about "saving" the planet and thus justify the cost of ETS, they will not see one thing different happen than what Mother Nature intended to happen. Nothing! If ETS becomes reality, many parents won't afford college for their kids. Will they tell the kids, too late, that we should have made our voices heard and stopped ETS from happening? The world has not run out of the inexpensive energy that built our Country... unless ETS becomes reality.

What will become of the economy? Of the economic security of the average working family? The people must make a stand against this nonsense.

Jeff

I find it difficult to choose between the relentless idiocy Mr Flint and the occassional skerrick of common sense that he buggers up with his usual nonsense.

Actually, unusually nonsensical lines like "All we have left is mining and the talents of people in the private sector.." does make this beef farmer feel somewhat unloved.

Then again, the conservatives when in govt under their poorly negotiated US "F"Trade Agreement will keep the finest steaks from my finest steers off the USA market for the next 20 years (the best of my working life), so perhaps Mr Flint's mining & private sector comment offers as much an insight as it does a flippant observation.

That said, without wishing to agree with the Sov's self-appointed idiot prince, I do have grave suspicions about the proposed ETS and how it'll be reduced to observing a debate between 'experts' supported by various lobbying groups. In the end, I suspect it'll be farmers who'll have to carry the worst of any half-thought-out nonsense.

If I had my way, I'd put most people who don't catch their own water or grow their own food and put them on the B Ark, "Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy" style, and launch you all deep into the cosmos.

Also, if I do have to listen to it all unfold, I would like to see the base of argument in support of an ETS strengthened to address what strikes me as its weakest presumption, that is, I think, that something of a "climate status quo" or "climate unchanging" is the norm. Afterwards, it might be easier to comprehend the more sophisticated modelling concerns, etc.

But hey, I'm just the bloke who plants the trees, the crops, grows your food and pays too much tax to support your lifestyles. What would I bloody know.

Simon Bedak
Wagga Wagga

Whether one agrees,or not, with all of David Flint's comments the fact remains that an ETS is unnecessary and there is absolutely no chance that China and India will participate anyway.

David Flint seems to have forgotten that the Australian Government is there to serve the PEOPLE (who vote) not a profit guarantee for business (who don’t vote I wonder why?).

Has anyone ever seen a plan forcing change that didn’t favour big business that didn't upset them?

One wonders why David didn't simply contribute to previous discussions on GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE. He offers no more than his unscientific if some what arrogantly put political opinions.
He seems to be behind the state of play as far as the evidence goes.
Pity he doesn’t watch the ABC and then check out stated facts.

I note that he believes head of OECD with his superior range of advisors isn’t “a serious commentator”.

As for “inheriting a rolled Gold economy and determined to roll it back” give us a break! Hasn’t he heard of the sub prime crisis (a crisis caused by corporate greed)?

Of all the articles I've read on this site this is the most worthless as it is simply a load of hyperbole worthy only of an Alan Jones rave to the great unwashed.

Even as a pitch for the Libs it’s so asinine (I’m sure) is an embarrassment to most of them.

At least other Liberals, even Malcolm Turnbull is more in touch with reality.

Mr Flint is seemingly out of touch and locked in some past era with Howard and their decayed perceptions.

David Flint is 100% right.No one on OLO will answer a very simple question of mine which undermines the whole basis of CO2 being responsible for AGW.In 2003 the new ice core research showed that CO2 follows the heating of the planet by some 800 yrs.Dr Christopher Scotese also found this out decades ago by studying fossils.They have found out that cause and effect happens in reverse.I have not heard one GW Cultist explain the reason for this.It makes a lie of their total hypothisis.

The AGW Cultists have but one simple policy,attack the dissenter,ignore the facts and repeat the mantra.They will not engage in any debate outside of the parameters dictated by them.It is "faite accompli",AGW is happening and you will have to take your ETS medicine even if it kills you!

Would love to hear Runners response or otherwise to Arjay

Kipp ,as you know so much and are so assured of AGW happening,do it yourself.Tell us why heating has caused the rise of CO2 ppm instead of the reverse. Your response is like 80%-90% of the pop.It is true because some authority told me so.You have not thought it out for yourself!

It is just a convienent hypothesis that fits into your socialist philosophy.Tax the life out of people who make a difference and reward the layabouts.

OLO, you're just embarrassing yourself now. First the 'lesson for Rudd' which included nothing of the sort, and now an article under 'domestic politics' without discussing domestic politics: it attempts economics and environment and fails even that.

This is complete trash. Flint doesn't even know what he's describing. "Changing the weather"?! It's changing climate - there's a difference, and if he doesn't even realise this simple point then there's no point in continuing.

He makes all sorts of statements that are unsupported, and he never backs up. What does he think he's writing for, The Australian?

I haven't a clue what David Flint's real day job is but I guess he has to find a way of maintaining a profile as guest writer for right wing think tanks and obscure journals who produce rants on anything that limits mankind's ability to do whatever is in their self interest. The quantum leap from "who says global warming is happening" to ETS and socialism was breathtaking. I wouldn't suppose he would stoop to watching that purveyor of left wing, or rather communist propaganda, the ABC and its 4 Corners program about climate change in the Arctic? God! the lengths they went to to digitally create those scenes of melting ice sheets. Of course the fact that it hasn't occurred previously in God knows how many millions of years and is happening at an unprecedented rate in the past few decades or less means that it is all due to a solar glitch or some such thing. Come on David Flint, you are an academic, trained to present reasoned and sound arguments backed by facts and supportive evidence. Where is yours?

Flint's silly essay should have been condensed to 350 words and submitted as a comment under the "Capitalism and Gays" discussion.

Hey Hot Air! Remember 80% of India still cooks their food by burning cow dung and China is not represented by what we are currently seeing in Beijing or Shanghai; all neon lights and nose to tail traffic. They still aspire to have what you and I have enjoyed for decades and they deserve the opportunity to enjoy the spoils before you and others pull up stumps and demand they save the world for our sakes. If you want to lash out at anyone try having a go at the US. Remember too, that China produces a thousand times the amount of solar and renewal power that we do and will doubtless be exporting it back to us in the near future. It is not unreasonable to expect first world countries to show leadership and even a modicum of self sacrifice. Then let me give you the drum; the first world will, like it or not, be forced to forgo some of the differential in lifestyles it currently enjoys as the third world claims some of what we have had for for too long often. We live in a first world country with a third world economy and the Asian tiger economies will soon overtake us if they don't buy us first.

Dear OLO, ad hominen attacks on contributors degrade your forum, and coarsen discourse. The many against Prof Flint reveal their authors' quality of mind, but that is no good reason to infect this particular public square with personal contempt.

j5o6hn, Taswegian, Cazza,

You all personally attack David Flint.
You are the only three contributors who disagree with David's AGW view.
And therein lies the weakness of the AGW alarmists case. Personal attacks rather than debating the points raised by David Flint.

You didn't disgree with David's view of reducing fuel excise. I agree with that wholeheartedly. It's simply another government/bureaucratic rort. A rolled Gold rort. ETS taxation is just another of those feel good rolled gold rorts.

I am a fence sitter when it comes to climate change. I think the climate is changeing. Warming or cooling I don't really know. But I do know that the current warming started at least 100 years before humans increased significantly CO2 emissions. And if the AGW alarmstscan explain how that fact fits within their range of ideas and tell me in view of that then why their theory is correct then I'll probably lean towards their view.

Btw Taswegian CO2 is colourless and ordourless and has absolutely no impact on the smog in the olympic city of Shuking

Simon Bedak add yourself to my previous list and .... oh farmers still belong in the private sector ... they haven't yet been nationalised... unless you know something I don't.
And Simon I'm a sailor whot catches and eats fish, de-salinates my own water and buys veges. Where does that leave me in your estimation?
Oh and I often launch into the ocean, I know not quite the cosmos but I think you'll get my drift... so to speak. My vessel is the yacht 'Sunshine' not quite the B Ark but close.

And as for taxes well ... go figure.

Examinator. You're on that list too. Sub prime ... haha you ain't seen nothing yet. Nothing is going to bail out the organisations that lent to the next level up. Not the jerks who had no credit rating, no income and no assets but the next level idiots who had a good credit rating but insufficient income and no assets. A huge part of the so called Prime these days apparently! The credit rating wasn't the only difference between them and the Sub Prime jerks. The period of time before the real interest rates repayments and repaying the principal kicked in wasn't 3 years(as in the subprime) but 5 years. (Oh and they parcelled and sold those to bank F...heads all over the world ... as prime lending). Hold onto your properties at your peril for the worst is yet to come.

Kipp you're on the list too.

Chade ditto.

Thylacine take a bow, you too.

Oh dear CJ I thought better of you ... once.

"Btw Taswegian CO2 is colourless and ordourless and has absolutely no impact on the smog in the olympic city of Shuking"

Keith, I don't know of one environmental toxicologist on the planet who would agree with you. The smog to which you refer IS anthropogenic and is a result of carbon emissions, resulting from chemical reactions in the pollutants emitted from industrial processes.

Ozone (O3) is the component of smog that is of the highest concern in polluted areas. Ozone's a secondary pollutant, formed as a result of reactions between fossil fuel combustion by-products and sunlight, having harmful health effects. This low-level ozone pollution is known as "tropospheric ozone" and at ground level, ozone is a caustic gas, creating smog and damaging body tissues.

Think London Keith. The London smog of the 50s, a result of coal burning (a fossil fuel = carbon.) The colder it became the more coal was burnt by London's inhabitants. Citizens could not see in front of them for several days and many thousands died as a subsequence.

Please do not peddle the propaganda that CO2 is benign. All carbon based chemicals, when burnt, convert to carbon dioxide. Many carbon based chemicals are among the most hazardous known to man and his environment.

In addition, chemical reactions, formed from the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels, are also responsible for the formation of dioxins.

Similarly, carbon monoxide which elevates ozone and methane in the atmosphere, also converts to CO2 etc.

Professor Flint et al conveniently and consistently fail to debate industrial carbon dioxide independently of climate change. This self-interested cabal is exploiting the small element of doubt correlating A/CO2 to climate.

These gentlemen need to perform a reality check and witness the desecration of the planet's eco-systems, systems violated from carbon-based industrial emissions - not least Australia's.

Industrial CO2 emissions will continue to choke the life from this planet - irrespective of climate change.

And senior bureaucrats, from the EPA and departments of environment in Australia will remain the lap dogs of the out-of-control, major polluters and we are paying dearly for that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropospheric_ozone

Dear Keith

You invited me to let you know where you sit in my estimation.

You're fine by me sport. There's a bunch I don't get about climate-change too.

Like, for instance, it's bloody cold here on the farm tonight and I'm burning wood from a tree that died here years ago to keep my family warm. I don't think it's wrong because we own the land and look after it and produce food to feed people from it. Plus, as mentioned it's bloody cold.

Nowadays, lots of meeja types will tell me it's bad to burn the wood because it's throwing carbon into the atmosphere. But I'm thinking, didn't the tree on our land which has been in the family for many generations, already off-set (for eighty or so years as a yellow-box gum)those less desirable elements given off in warming my family during the course of its life here on our farm before it died?

And, without wanting to sound like the hippy I'm possibly not worthy of being, isn't the burning of dead wood returning energy to the eco-system which was received from the sun in the first place to benefit & foster life?

Buggered if I know. Anyway, I envy your lifestyle Keith. Reckon the sea would be warmer than here tonight. Hope the weather where you are holds.

Warm regards

Simon Bedak
Wagga Wagga

I'm still waiting for the the AGW Cultists to explain why the new ice core data of 2003 reveals that CO2 follows GW by 800 yrs.Now this is a very simple proposition.Dr David Evans once believed that CO2 rose in ppm first thus causing temp increases or GW.Now the new undisputed science reveals that the reverse is true!

This is the whole basis upon which Al Gore and the majority of scientists who were once were true believers in AGW Theory,continue to perpetuate this notion of CO2 causing AGW.Now the whole premise upon which they have based their theory has fallen asunder!

Would some true believer on OLO come to the fore and argue the facts?The silence is deafening.

"Now the whole premise upon which they have based their theory has fallen asunder!"

Not at all Arjay. The denial industry (including Andrew Bolt) continue in their endeavours to influence readers into believing something that is simply not true. They try to muddy the waters so that people are confused and therefore restrained from lobbying governments and leaders to take responsible and correct action (whilst they continue to rake in record profits).

One needs to read the facts first.

The following links may be helpful. I can offer additional links if you require more clarification.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=13

http://n3xus6.blogspot.com/2006/10/bolty-sprung_07.html

As if you can point out where I "personally attack" David Flint, keith. I said the article is complete trash - which it is. It does his side of the coin no favours whatsoever.

Furthermore, lulz @ "list".

Arjay: "I'm still waiting for the the AGW Cultists to explain why the new ice core data of 2003 reveals that CO2 follows GW by 800 yrs."

I'm still waiting to know why you can't use Google. I'm still waiting to know why you need to use weasel words like "cultists" to try to get your argument across.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=13
(a commentary by by Prof. Jeff Severinghaus, Professor of Geosciences, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California)

Summary version: different regimes of of climate change have different initial causes.

Ours is the first one that is caused by humans and so we should not be surprised to see different behaviour. It is occurring on a much faster time scale, which is already an obvious different. It correlates very tightly with the growth of CO2-producing human industry over the last couple of hundred years. The others proceeded over time spans of several thousand years apiece.

There is also a more detailed letter form the Professor towards the bottom of this discussion page:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/the-lag-between-temp-and-co2/

keith: << Oh dear CJ I thought better of you ... once. >>

At least I'm in good company. Don't worry keith, I'd written you off as a climate change denialist quite some time ago. Ditto with Arjay, except I'd extend that to most topics.

We have another thread running here “countering a climate of skepticism” by Roger Jones.

His final line

“Those who wish to discount this scientific effort are driven by their own ideologically dominated models, which are unreviewed, unaccountable and unverifiable. They should be disregarded.”

Suggesting only scientists should be allowed to comment on science.

David Flints article is about, fundamentally a tax system.

A tax system which could come in any form, maybe an extra 10% on GST or extra oil tariffs.

Being a tax system, should all debate be limited only to accountants, who are, to tax what scientist are to climate change (per Roger Jones at least)

I am an accountant – should we consider my view above and before everyone elses or should mine be an equal voice among many?

(I believe the latter but don’t let my prejudices sway you)

I see a lot more personal attacks on David Flint than I do the content of his article.

So will all those who have attacked or dismissed David Flints article kindly agree to pay my levy (in whatever form it takes) for the Emission Taxes which they are so eager to sign up for?

David Flints five questions (page one) are absolutely correct

David Flints summation (page three) is correct.

And what is in between is correct.

The purpose of tax is to finance the necessary work of government.

The necessary work of government does not include reducing the discretionary choices of the electorate through aggressive taxation. Government is there to serve the electorate, not to direct it.

I did some comparisons of national “life satisfactions” to “levels of taxation” from data available from www.nationmaster.com .

I have no reason to disbelieve the veracity of that data.

The result, on a nation by nation basis, a negative correlation between levels of tax and life satisfaction.

All that an ETS is going to do is make life less satisfying for Australians overall.

Like David Flint observes

“Governments typically are wastrels”

“Governments need discipline, and reducing taxes would bring them into the real world in which ordinary Australians live”

Dickie,Prof Jeff Severinghaus does not know.He only raises possibilities.Quote Jeff,"Warming takes 5000 yrs to complete.CO2 acts like and amplifer,it does not initiate warming."Jeff admits that the oceans store CO2 and upon heating it gets released into the atmosphere.Is it Chicken and egg syndrome?

If warming takes 5000 yrs to initiate and CO2 is only an amplifier, why do the AGW cult insist that GW is happening now and that it is caused by CO2?We have a serious anomoly here Dickie.At best it is all conjecture and nobody really knows.

Dickie,rather than making references to your higher authority,why not assimilate the knowlege yourself and then argue the reality here between you and I? You cannot continue to Google your way through life.Just because someone has a title like Professor,does not mean that they don't have a bias motivated by money or fear a loss of prestige because of a failed hypothesis.

Unfortunately, Professor Flint fails to offer any alternative to the ETS. One must presume then that the Professor is advocating a “do nothing” approach? If I’m correct, his “do nothing” stance is in stark defiance to the mountains of evidence that, even on the domestic front, carbon emissions need to be reduced very quickly.

Oddly enough, I'm not impressed with an ETS but for different reasons. To date, regulating toxic air emissions has been administered by fudging and obfuscation.

Large polluting corporations in Australia, with the aid of their lap dog regulators, have always put their financial interests before the ecological survival of this nation and the documented evidence is overwhelming.

As Sir Nicholas Stern advised, the biggest market failure of all is the global warming threat itself.

Therefore, what proposals does Rudd have for these corporations (which have reaped mega-profits for decades)apart from rewarding them, to share the burden of this tax and start paying for polluting the environment?

Should you and I prop up these corporations which have trashed these arid lands and the lands of others? And why should tax-payers’ funds contribute to the coffers of say, the “Big Australian” who, last year made a profit of some $17 billion?

What about another polluter who, last year, emitted 170,000,000 kilograms of SO2 and 6 tonnes of mercury? Or another who emitted 570,000,000 kgs carbon monoxide. Why? Because they can!

Why is trust being placed in this market to solve environmental problems?

Can we assume that increasing the cost of fossil fuel emissions will reduce their use rather than just increase our cost of living?

Is the ETS a system that aims to keep costs to Australian industries to a minimum rather than achieve the rapid and significant changes necessary to prevent ecological destruction and global warming?

And what place do renewable energies have in the ETS proposal?

The solution is environmental regulation. The legislation is in place. We must insist that it is enforced.

A slap on the wrist for the big polluters was never environmentally or ethically acceptable and self-regulation has been an environmental disaster.

Dickie ,you are arguing from the general to the specific.The real issue is CO2 and a tax on our fuels which determine our living standards.Yes there are many other pollutants like SO2 ie sulphur dioxide and mercury Hg,but they can be far more easily addressed than taxing CO2 the life blood of our living standards.

This is where the socialist so called environmentalists muddy the waters to push their own political barrows.You will not address the issues which I now pose and try to deflect the argument to another arena.

I'm ready to debate Dickie,but you hide behind a subterfuge of mis-information and slight of hand.

Arjay

When you bludgeon us with your unsubstantiated, un-referenced information, are you lurching from the Readers Digest to the Daily Telegraph or have you derived your information from the Woman’s Day? Surely you haven’t been “googling" Arjay? Tut tut.

And why have you been selective in quoting Severinghaus when you failed to include his following advice:

“Does this prove that CO2 doesn't cause global warming? The answer is no.

“The 4200 years of warming make up about 5/6 of the total warming. So CO2 could have caused the last 5/6 of the warming, but could not have caused the first 1/6 of the warming.”

In addition you have also selectively ignored Severinghaus’ letter to Crikey where he refuted Bolt’s claims:

“Many, many other studies have found that carbon dioxide causes the earth to warm. This is not controversial, and to continue to deny it is akin to denying that cigarette smoking causes cancer,” Severinghaus told Crikey. “The evidence for a human-caused warming of the globe is overwhelming. The scientific debate is over, and what we are seeing now is an attempt to mislead the public.”

“Severinghaus explained how Bolt had been slippery with the facts, "...Bolt omitted the key piece of information that the warmings took 5,000 years, thus misleading the reader into thinking that carbon dioxide was not warming at the same time as temperature and thus cannot have caused the warming...”

‘“At the very least I would like it to go on record that Bolt's abuse of my science is not done with my approval,” says Severinghaus.

“Crikey contacted Andrew Bolt this morning for a response, but he did not respond.”

So bereft of constructive argument Arjay, you have resorted to condescendingly offering up this admonishing swill:

“Just because someone has a title like Professor,does not mean that they don't have a bias motivated by money or fear a loss of prestige because of a failed hypothesis.”

That’s a very unkind and unprovoked attack you’ve made on Professor Flint. I suggest you offer him your apology forthwith, Arjay.

Dickie “Unfortunately, Professor Flint fails to offer any alternative to the ETS.”

In the matter of ETS and the TAX which will enable its collection, I think it is perfectly acceptable not to offer a suggestion.

The people of Australia do not need to be taxed more than at present.

In fact, whilst government is in receipt of monees far in excess of those needed for government to finance the legitimate work of government, many would reasonably argue in favour of less tax than at present.

It is the role of government to respond to the exdpectations of the electorate. It is not the role of government to direct the electorate on how they should spend their discretionary income.

ETS is purely an excuse to impose taxes upon the wealth generators of Australia and will, should it be implemented reduce the wealth incentive upon which government relies on to draw taxes.

It is a negative influence on the well being of the nation. I only trust the electorate will remember which political party resisted its implementation and which party ran headlong into its implementation at the next election.

My personal opinion on this matter is the AGW/ETS debate and strategy is a smoke screen presented by the failed entryist forces who infiltrated the green movement and now seek to override the natural superiority of the libertarian capitalism system by imposing this "Socialism by Stealth".

You may disagree with my view but you will not stop me believing it or espousing it and

the more I say it, the more other people see it for themselves.

Dickie, you are acting like a sterotype that Bob Carter predicts.Firstly you attack the dissenter,ie I have no credibility,ignore the facts,ie;you refuse to enter into direct debate without references to some higher authority,and repeat the mantra,ie;AGW is fact and we all must adjust.

Well sorry Dickie it is not fate accompli.Severinghaus said that CO2 acts like an amplifier and does not initiate AGW.He admits that CO2 gets released form the oceans when temps increase.CO2 is only 387 ppm of our atmosphere.This is miniscule.Water vapour and N2 have a far greater affect,not to mention the influence of the Sun,volcanoes and the nuclear reactions deep within our own planet.If C02 is and amplifier or a catalyst as he suggests,how does an inert gas affect the other gases in such a way as to make them absorb more energy from the sun?It is just all pure conjecture!

You see Dickie,I did physics,chemistry,biology and maths for my HSC and that gave me a good grounding for logic.I smell a big rat and you still refuse to enter into direct logical,factual dialogue because you do not understand the basic science yourself!

Arjay

I do confess, your boasting, misinformation and manipulation of facts has grown quite tedious. Can’t you find someone else to play with? Must we now endure your "wise" counsel on the sun, volcanoes – what else was it? Oh that’s right, nuclear reactions. Good God man - settle.

And no mention of the "tax swindle?"

Ok the sun. Well sure, the Earth’s biosphere is maintained and molded by the flow of energy from the solar energy source to earth, and on to the space energy sink. This S–E–S energy flow maintains earth’s biosphere, and its living components, as open, intermediate, dissipative, non-equilibrium systems.

However, greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere influence the S–E–S energy flow rate.

And a major carbon cycle perturbation always involves re-adjustment of the outer physiochemical spheres of the earth. A greenhouse, one manifestation of a major carbon cycle perturbation, is the most dangerous natural phenomenon that life on earth can experience.

Enter your volcanoes Arjay. Well several paleontologists attribute the greenhouse conditions which existed during the Cretaceous–Tertiary mass extinctions of 65 million years ago to the carbon cycle perturbation of the Deccan Traps mantle plume volcanism in India, one of the greatest episodes of volcanism in earth’s history.

And out of the five mass extinction events, four, including the one that eliminated the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, are associated with greenhouse phases.

Now Arjay (Master of physics, maths and chemistry), scientists estimate that your volcanoes emit some 230 million tonnes of CO2 per year. On the other hand, human activities are responsible for emitting over 27 billion tonnes of CO2 per year but sadly you remain too obtuse to grasp the ramifications of that or of the rapid time-frame in the elevation of A/CO2..... too dense to realise that all things are bound together - all things connect.

Now I (“acting like a sterotype err...sterotype?? that Bob Carter predicts..errr....predicts??”) with great relief, having achieved a “fate accompli”……errr “fate?”..errr...??....... Oh well cheerio and may the force be with you.

Dickie

Your personal attacks on Arjay are a disgrace.

Touche Keith

And who cast the first blow? Right, so stop ya sookin!

Dickie “As Sir Nicholas Stern advised, the biggest market failure of all is the global warming threat itself.”

And if I recall, the Russians, in the mid 1980’s the problem with the American Star Wars project was the “threat itself”.

I do not seek or desire to be dragged, screaming and shouting along the path of global warming by Nicholas Stern or anyone else.

(Unlike the Russians, who capitulated to the ‘threat’).

I do not support paying government to buy off supposed strategies which are unproven.

In times of war, it might be prudent to accept more governmental direction in our lives.

But we are not at war.

We are not even playing at war.

Until the reason for “Global Warming” is proven, we should not re-engineer our entire economy and impose unnecessary and fraudulent taxes on a perceived threat.

If it reasons like a pig, stinks like a pig and grows fat on consuming swill,

it is, most probably just

Socialism by Stealth

Dickie has failed again to address the flaws in Severinghause's theory.How does CO2 act like an amplifer Dickie?Dickie's poses grandiose number sof 270 billion tonnes of Co2 being released into the atmosphere ,yet for every molecule of CO2 there is 2500 molecules of gases that make up the rest of our atmosphere.CO2 is a minor gas.

During the Jurassic period CO2 levels were 1000%[ten times] higher than now.CO2 levels have been as high as 18 times that of the present.We have only added 30% to the environment since the industrial revolution. Scientists still don't know caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.It is pure conjecture again on your behalf Dickie!

The role of a scientist is to be sceptical.It is not proven that CO2 is the major influence of our climate.There are no verifiable,repeatable experiments that show proof of C02 being the major cause.

All of us should remain sceptical,since the cure of carbon trading may well be far worse than the perceived disease.Politics,money and ideology have stolen the debate and the real science is coming a poor second.

Dickie your assault on me,says more about your own insecurities and flaws than mine.If your perceived truth is real,why is it not self evident?

Ah yes, this article reminds me why I will never vote Liberal again. All greed, no responsibility.