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Putting all the scientific stuff aside for a moment, I wonder what's more likely?

The notion that there is a world-wide plot by most of the governments of the developed world to further run down their economic (and electoral) prospects by invoking a host of punitive measures?
Add to this a never-ending list of reknowned scientists committing professional suicide by putting their names to such an evil scheme.

Or maybe there is actually some truth to the idea.

Although the risk of my house buring down is miniscule, I still take out fire insurance. Although the risk is low, the consequences of doing nothing can be very high so I continue to pay my premiums, even if the money can be used in other ways. Is this so wrong?

"Putting all the scientific stuff aside for a moment, I wonder what's more likely?

The notion that there is a world-wide plot by most of the governments of the developed world to further run down their economic (and electoral) prospects by invoking a host of punitive measures?
Add to this a never-ending list of reknowned scientists committing professional suicide by putting their names to such an evil scheme."

How about

a) The notion that scientists and the associated bureaucrats in the various funding bodies will put their funding and jobs at risk by denying the new orthodoxy:

vs.

b) The notion that governments will eagerly seize on and encourage a popular movement which promises to bring them new and sweeping powers of control and manipulation, regardless of the actual facts concerned.

Doesn't sound quite such a clear choice when you put it that way, does it? Remember the war on terror? The war on drugs? The war in Iraq? There was lots of 'evidence' to justify that too, I seem to recall. How many of the people who made money out of these misguided initiatives actually believed that they were based on reality, I wonder?

"Although the risk of my house burning down is miniscule, I still take out fire insurance. Although the risk is low, the consequences of doing nothing can be very high so I continue to pay my premiums, even if the money can be used in other ways. Is this so wrong?"

Fire insurance -- 0.5% of my annual income

Ultimate cost of useless global warming measures -- 5% of GDP? 10%?

Try a cost/benefit analysis.

Jon J: << The notion that governments will eagerly seize on and encourage a popular movement which promises to bring them new and sweeping powers of control and manipulation, regardless of the actual facts concerned. >>

Yup. Not only that, those evil governments have cunningly conscripted all those rainbow smelts, gizzard shads, phytoplankton and zooplankton to aid them in this vast conspiracy.

For those who don't understand evolution, here's a tip: the displacement of one existing species by another existing species due to ecological changes ain't it.

For those who've been babbling extraneously about blue-green algae blooms in the Darling, did you actually read the article? The algae to which Waldman refers are of completely different kinds. While blooms of blue-green algae in the Darling have increased over reason decades, this is most likely because of poor water management practices coupled with extended drought and longer periods of hot weather.

As for Godwin - who mentioned Hitler or Nazis? Denialism in this case refers to those deluded or ignorant people who stubbornly refuse to accept the vast weight of evidence that the global climate is warming, i.e. they are in 'denial'.

Like I said, there seems little point in trying to discuss global warming at OLO.

CJ Morgan said "...there seems little point in trying to discuss global warming at OLO"

That's because you refuse to discuss. Curmudgeon listed at least 5 sites and articles that represent a different point of view.

Did you discuss this? No.

Instead you infer that Curmudgeon is one of the "deluded or ignorant people who stubbornly refuse to accept the vast weight of evidence that the global climate is warming".

Maybe you should revisit your comment and say that there is no point discussing global warming with you.

The only thing that I believe is that no one really knows whats happening. It amazes me that they can't seem to accurately predict the weather 7 days from now, and yet people are willing to drop everything when the same people predict the weather 7 or even 70 years from now.

Okay, C J Morgan, I'll concede that my wording was flawed - perhaps I should better have put "the *processes* of evolution", referring *specifically* to the statement of "a giant ecological experiment".

My point was that the author seems to give the impression (perhaps I'm reading the article wrongly) that changes in ecologies are unprecedented and dreadful events, whereas surely the history of the earth shows that truly, "all is flux"?

Oh, and Ozandy, evolution need not always be something as spectacular as fish developing lungs. Yes, an individual adapting to a changed environment is not evolution, but surely changes in entire ecologies is at least part of the process of evolution (again, poor wording on my part)?