Andy1
You make some interesting points:

1)”Parallels include earlier debates regarding ozone depletion”
So, are you saying that the behaviour of the hole was wholly consistent with the modelling that NASA & others developed i.e. has the modelling developed been able to predict the size and frequency of the holes expansion and contractions?

2) You talk of “ global average temperatures” increasing –which has to mean some areas have warmed and some have cooled, but on balance there has been an overall warming. Can you relate this (patchy) warming directly to the plight of sub Saharan Africans & Ethiopians who claim climate change as the root cause of their poverty , a claim seemingly uncritically endorsed by most AGW believers .
How are you so sure it's due to AGW and not to land management practises or regional factors ala :
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg17723871.800-the-mayas-arid-end.html

I also note this little comment:--which seems to shot a hole in AGW: post-industrialisation warming!
“Such thinking marks a sea change for both archaeologists and climatologists. Until just a few years ago, they assumed that climate has been stable since the ice age ended more than 10 000 years ago. But recent studies revealed strong climate fluctuations starting about 6000 to 3000 years ago as early civilisations emerged from the Stone Age.”
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg16221874.500-born-in-a-storm.html

PS: caught Hansen on The Letterman Show the other night. Was far from impressed, showed too much of a willingness to play to the audience .
More the style –at least in that performance – of a travelling showman than a scientist.

thomasfromtacoma, I'm not sure what your points actually were or even if they were specifically aimed at me. For my part the debate over the scientific credibility of AGW sounds like a dispute between every scientific institution that studies climate, using multiple measures and conducting multiple lines of research versus arguments like a hot spike in a warming trend proves it's cooling and there's a grand conspiracy for no purpose but to impose control. No question which I find more credible. Or which should underly future policy.

I don't see that wanting to face the reality of problems climate change, sustainability and environmental destruction with eyes open and head on is evidence of hidden agendas or anything but honest acknowledgement of the constraints of the world we live in and the impacts we are making. We may fail to deal with these problems - it really looks to be shaping up that way - but it's the people who insist AGW lacks scientific credibility that will end up looking like they've been running on intellectual empty with eyes shut.

Many of the comments reflect a misunderstanding as to how science works, incorrectly assuming that either:
(1) Scientists need to be able to predict the future with accuracy, which is impossible, since this "experiment" which Homo sapiens is conducting with the atmosphere/ocean system, spewing over 320 billion tons of carbon into the air, has not been done before. Or
(2) That scientists are involved in some huge conspiracy in order to obtain research funds.

Had such a view been applied, for example, to medical science, or aviation engineering, or food processing - people would never go to their doctors, or board planes, or even eat ... Recall the lessons of the tobacco "debate", involving vilification of medical scientists by vested interests and their hired mouthpieces.

Much of the debate bears a close anaogy to the type of questions creationists raise regarding Darwinian evolution. Since their starting point is not to accept evolution, the "debate" is meaningless.

Could there be a connection between the massive disinformation campaign financed by vested interests on friendly media platforms and what appears to be a resurgent anti-science campaign?

For those who are "not convinced", if you are sincere, why don't you try and read recent comprehensive scientific reports, such as Steffen's report to the Department of Climate Change (http://www.anu.edu.au/climatechange/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/climate-change-faster-change-and-more-serious-risks-final.pdf), or even just basic text books in climate science.

Then there may be those content with continuing to use the atmosphere as an open sewer for carbon gases, though by the time they find out what are the consequences it may be too late.

KenH

In this age of information overload, you may have suggested at least one area for Andy1 to "look for a new interest". Sun spot cycles have been mentioned, so why not check out-

www.holoscience.com.au

Not everybody at ANU agrees with global warming.

shmuel

While all the debate continues to heat up, the Mt. Mayon volcano and the bushfires are spewing thousands of tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere and I have yet to read or see that these emissions are part of the scientific consensus. Do these leave the ETS as a credible means of reducing carbon emissions or just a selective tax?

The Government proponents appear to be struggling to find credible justification for it having already announced the amounts of money that will be handed out to half of the 3.6 million middle income recipients and the pensioners to compensate for the increase costs which the Government has not disclosed.

It is quite astonishing,that Government would continue to bury its credibility in an ETS with the bushfires in our face such a stark reality. If Penny Wong needed support to sustain the announcement that these hundreds of millions "will come from industries FORCED to pay" - (it's on the public record) - then Peter Garrett wading in will not help. I believe that money is where the reality is embedded and the crushing inability to admit a mistake must be very stressful on the Ministers.

Thanks to Mr. Yu for his PERCEPTIVENESS in seeing through my rant on GW.
Thanks also to Mr. Shmuel who also points out that, due to the unpredictable forces of nature that all at The ANU don’t support the AGW situation.
So all to you media fed buffoons and google-ized morons that accept the first thing you read as gospel the first question I would ask is
- Why?
Unfortunately you are committed to defending your pathetically structured arguments you don’t have the ethical fortitude to admit you’re wrong.
What I am trying to do, with obvious success, is point out that there are other issues apart from the so called knowledge base that you google-izers feign understanding.
That’s what makes the outright blind faith acceptance of this issue n absoluter farce. To accept without knowledge is ignorance to accept without understanding is downright Neanderthal.
Andy1
Your statement that scientists aren’t capable of predicting the future is about as accurate as your argument goes. The first law in political defense is to place your main arguments up front in order to disqualify comment. So the next point after the one those scientists can’t predict anything, that you neatly qualified by the spewing of an actual figure amount, puts firmly into know -it-all but retard bracket.
Followed by the conspiracy theory the second line of defense the GW official will use as a discrediting statement.
How about showing the world your not a retard and wring something intelligent for change instead f quoting hear say figures and blind faith point of view/
As I continue to state the issue here is a government warning issue , is beware of you ask for, you might just get it