Redstate

Now that's the enlightened response I was looking for.

Hey Tbone, pass the beer nuts.

Shill For Hallburton!

Fool!  Idiot!  Can't you see?!  We're Doing It!  You're Doing It!  ARGH!!!!

Now that that's over, I think we can dispense with all the Left posts that typically accompany threads like this...

Anyway, on to a more serious and Important point:

Erick, I was just wondering why you and Paul Cella never seem to go "below the fold" so to speak, except with your longest diaries...

I enjoy Redstate most days, and I consider myself a fiscal conservative. I don't really care about social issues; I'd rather let society decide what it wants to establish as its norm than try to force them to do what I think is best. I hate judicial activism, and, although I'm pro-choice, I think Roe was one of the worst decisions in American judicial history. All in all, I would probably be a "swing vote" in most elections, except for stuff like this.

I don't understand how so many on the right think that they just know better than scientists, especially when it comes to evolution and man-made global warming. There is overwhelming agreement among scientists on both, but many just adopt an "I know better" attitude and move on.

What really puzzles me is that the conservative movement has tradtionally been the side most in touch with reality (e.g. "I know its sad that group X is suffering, but dumping government cash in won't help.").

I'm not saying that just because global warming is happening and is man-made that there is an obvious course of action to take (Kyoto=worst idea ever). But why not just acknowledge that the problem exists?

I was a little worried about the wording of 1.  I wasn't trying to presuppose anything by use of the word 'excessive' -- I meant by 'excessive' something like 'leading to measurably greater levels of atmospheric CO2', ie more CO2 than the ecosystem would  handle by itself.

As for 2 and 3, I believe they are testable, with the caveat that what 'testable' means is a little fuzzy.  In any case, they are falsifiable -- the amount of CO2 in a system is a controllable variable, and thus if we can create systems where varying the amount of CO2 alone does not vary the temperature, our hypothesis would be refuted (barring other considerations).  Ramping up these tests to scale introduces complexities, of course, and this may be the sense 'testability' you're worried about -- but if you really want to be able to prove our causal-explanatory theories in that sense, you'd have to throw out almost all of science.  

So, I'm not sure which of my theses is most plausible.  I'm just trying to defend the options I put on the table, and the way I worded them.

I may have seen this on Redstate before but demonstrates scientifically how hard it actually is amidst all the panic:

http://www.livescience.com/technology/destroy_earth_mp.html

hypothetically- and this is the key to anything beyond 150 years of recordings on a planet said to be a billions of years old- there were extreme levels that contributed to the planet being a jungle some 450 million odd years ago.  Apparently there have been findings under arctic or antarctic ice showing vegetation consistent with the rainforest.

When it comes down to it IMO our greatest minds really know so little about the sun, the earth's core, wind, even clouds for crying out loud yet somehow we are deemed wackos for not believing man is a catastrophic presence on the earth.    

Tbone, are you the same Tbone as this guy:

http://nakedtrucker.com/nt.nupix/nt.pages/tbone_peace.htm

http://nakedtrucker.com/nt_calender.html

He's in a band called "The Naked Trucker". Great band. Wondering if you're the same person.

MIT did a study where they found that computer models varied HUGELY depending on what institution was running it. They showed maps of North America and what places were trending drier and what were trending wetter. Now these maps werent off by a little (i.e. the wetter region ended in new jersey on A and new york on B), no some models had entire areas looking wetter and the exact opposite from another model.

maybe they need to get those in sync before they start the frenzy.

Just out of curiosity -- I'm not gonna post a follow-up or anything like that, I just want a bit more information -- what part of the man-made global warming story don't you buy?  

I don't intend to put words in your mouth, but do you believe in some or all of these statements?:

1. We are not producing excessive levels of carbon dioxide
   
   
2. The carbon dioxide that we produce does not contribute to a warming trend
   
   
3. The warming is due only in small part to the carbon dioxide levels
   
   
4. We don't have enough information about what is causing the warming yet

And, obviously, this list isn't exhaustive.  But, I guess the point is, calling your opponents dogmatic is one thing, but actually saying where you get off the bus would be more helpful in general.

I know I said I wouln't follow-up, since I was only seeking clarification and not goading Erick (or anyone else) into further argument, but I do want to respond to this argument, since I find it kinda strange:

"I am not vain enough to believe we have any significant contribution to either extreme."

The world has been hotter before than it is now, and the world has been cooler before than it is now.  I can't imagine any serious person trying to deny that.  But, that we can't swing the Earth one way or the other?  Why ever not?  Let's say we launched every nuclear weapon that we had -- do you believe in nuclear winter?  That would be one way of swinging the balance.  Do you believe that greenhouses work?  That swings the balance on a small scale.  The question of if we can swing the balance on a large scale by doing what we're doing -- well, that's the question at hand.  And it's begging the question (in the classical sense of the phrase) to just assert that we can't.

Skeptics always point out that the earth has been much hotter and much colder than it is now as if that makes it all right. The problem is, except for the last few thousand years, the earth wasn't a very hospitable place for us humans. The question is, can we minimize the impact of 6 billion humans before the earth once again becomes inhospitable.

Not when your culture includes trading goats for women. About 98.5% of the guys would make that deal. The other 1.5% would be protected by the remnants of the ACLU.

If we can just stop global warming, eat right, and have socialized health care, we will all live forever!!!!

Live forever!!!!

(exception for unwanted fetus, unwanted grand parents, unwanted right wing extremists, racists, sexists, homophobes, blah, blah, blah.

the mental picture of naked truckers is not a good one.

Ah, but you should see the man play tha gitar.

A sight to behold. With TBone singing on the side. And drinking cheap wine.

Krakotoa is minimally estimated at 500 megatons and up to 1600 megatons. Furthermore on average every 2500 years on average we have VEI 7 eruption. And then there are the caldera explosions.

Seeing as we are on the megatonnage kick we can look at hurricanes. Typical hurricane energy release is on the order of 10000 megatons a day or 10 gigatons.

I fear yellowstone much more than I do global warming. Living in florida I fear hurricanes more than either. The only man made disaster I worry about is russians building reactors for islamic idiots.

Why are we supposed to accept that man is so stupid that he's warmed up the earth, yet so smart that he could design a computer model factoring in a massive amount of factors to prove that he is responsible for global warming?

Even if we had a comprehensive computer model that proved the mechanism of global warming, the complexity of a model that could forecast the effects of man's attempts to undo global warming is more complicated by a factor of ten.

Conservatives understand that one of the most powerful forces of nature is the Law of Unintended Consequences. By contrast, "Progressives" tend to be very literal in their understanding of the universe: Want more government revenue? Raise taxes. Want smarter kids? Spend more money on schools. Want world peace? Disband the military.

Even if we were to stipulate that there is global warming and that it is anthropogenic (which I am not ready to do), we certainly aren't smart enough to come up with a risk-free cure that is guaranteed to be better than just living with the "disease".

like an idiot in discussions here?  Are you asking: prove something doesn't exist/isn't happening?

?

can 6 billion people blowing hot air into an environment and burning naturally occurring elements like coal even come close to the earth's powerful gyrations over billions of years?  This simpleton says no way...

5. Yes, it's as bad or worse than Al Gore says, but we like it warm.  
   
   
6. Even if it's as bad or worse, that will only hasten the cure for poison ivy.  Too long has this dreaded nemesis of mankind been allowed to pretend to be a harmless plant affecting only rednecks and careless campers.
   
   
7. Even if it's as bad as Al Gore could only dream, we'll find a way to fix it, or at worst mankind will adapt.  That's what we do.

A look at archeo-history, from the dim times to the present, shows that when the climate is warm, people (as well as most other life forms) do better.  Even polar bears are better off, since they have more food available.  Cries to the contrary are alarmist cruft.

he's not allowed to call him that on here.  ;)

out of you. You just spent too much time listenin' to sissy, girlie men professors and other liberal riff raff. Let's go kill somethin' and eat it.

You have completely invalidated any postition you have taen. You might as well have said republicans are potty heads and been done with it.

"You have to start somewhere" implies that you are starting. Kyoto did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. The signatories are ignoring it, and the nations that did not sign it (including the largest countries in the developing world) don't even have to ignore it, since it doesn't apply.

CFCs were a small, definable, and replaceable entity. Even so, the costs to replace them were immense and we're still, in 2006, seeing dislocations around the issue. Don't believe it? Consider the shortage of Albuterol for asthmatics this spring, due to the lack of a CFC-free inhaler.

The dislocation required to dramatically drop the use of fossil fuels would make the Depression look minor. Even if it were necessary, it would be impossible to achieve. Any government suggesting such a plan would find itself out of power before the plan could be implemented.

"If we were to detonate all of our nuclear weapons at once -- that is, create explosions with yields of trillions of megatons -- well, honestly, what do you expect would happen?"

My opinion is that not much would happen - atmospherically and environmentally speaking. I will not state with certitude that nothing would happen, because I cannot confidently assert it.

True, we could arrange the placement of our nuclear detonations in such a way as to maximize human death - one H-bomb per city over 1 million inhabitants, enhance fall-out drift to contaminate food-growing regions, subterranean contamination of aquifers, etc.

But my assumption is that you were asking about our ability to affect massive or even significant atmospheric change by our own devices (whether by nuclear bombs or CO2 production).

Based upon the destructive events absorbed by the earth over recorded human history (as I outlined in the post of natural calamities), and the lack of significant long-term effect on the environment (it is acknowledged that Krakatau and Pinatubo likely had some short-term lingering effect on atmospheric cooling for 1-3 years), I do not believe that humanity's current or past efforts could have a significant influence on the planet's atmosphere.

I even wonder if man tasked himself with destroying the earth (or the live-ability of the earth) whether it could be done. We probably could kill every mammal with some hideously toxic poison, but could we effect the atmosphere in a passive way as to make mankind unable to live on earth?  I have my doubts, but it isn't a pleasant thought experiment.

all us Republicans.

Suppose I were to grant the Kyoto crowd their scenario of man-caused global warming (and I do no such thing, but hypothetically).

So what? Even from their projections, as fluffy and half-baked as they are, there is no chance that human action can stop the trend. Kyoto was a joke - a collection of nations that together don't account for half the people on earth, promising to drop their CO2 output by a miniscule amount. And meaning to do no such thing, but promises sound nice.

Collective political action is a brutally hard thing to pull off, and the absence of a meaningful sense of progress makes it impossible to get people to put up with even a little bit of pain. The complete absence of compliance with Kyoto is proof, and the environmentalist crowd all but admits that restrictions far deeper and more invasive than Kyoto would be needed to drop atmospheric CO2 to pre-industrial levels. If there is anyone reading who believes that this is even remotely possible, there's a nice Christian man with his hands on a Nigerian fortune who would like your email address.

There are no alternatives to fossil fuels available right now, especially in the developing world. China isn't going to slow down. Brazil isn't. Mexico isn't. If atmospheric CO2 is really going to kill us all, it's going to kill us all, and destroying our economy won't help.

Better to work on mitigating impacts, building technology, and working toward the day a couple of centuries from now when we can actually control some of this stuff.

I particularly liked your second paragraph, where I believe we have some level of agreement on scientific theory but not interpretation.

Your sentence: "Ramping up these tests to scale introduces complexities, of course, and this may be the sense 'testability' you're worried about -- but if you really want to be able to prove our causal-explanatory theories in that sense, you'd have to throw out almost all of science."

You are right that I am concerned about the ability to confidently falsify or scientifically test a hypothesis without the ability to perform controls. Conclusions drawn from observations from a single, uncontrolled system (such as the Earth) makes it very difficult to be confident of one's conclusions. Laboratory based science can achieve such tight controls, that only one variable can be assessed, and conclusions confidently made.

You don't have to throw out all of science, because much science is done with exquisitely controlled experiments. To do less, gets you laughed out of the field.

Those sciences that cannot do controlled experiments, such as atmospheric cause-and-effect on this planet, need to speak with care about their deductions, if it can be called deduction at all. There is an strong element of caution and humility required when speaking of "scientific conclusions" in such fields.

I don't a priori dismiss your proposal that man-made CO2 could have some effect on warming. It is just that the claims of certitude (not necessarily by you) are so over the top that they are beyond the realm of science.

Back in the 1980's everyone was arguing about the ozone hole over the south pole and whether it was caused by hair spray. Despite the lack of concensus, the Montreal Protocal was enacted and CFC's were banned world wide. Even though people said we would have to give up hair sprays and air conditioning, new technologies were developed to replace ones that were causing the problem. While the hole is still there, the rate of increase has dropped dramatically and many believe it may even be reversing. My point is by doing something, and not sitting on our thumbs, we were able to reduce our impact on the environment in a positive way without destroying our economy. The same can be done with carbon dioxide if we just put our minds to it.

Here's a decent link about beavers.

The point is - if these little critters can have a profound effect on Earth's ecosystems, humans have a much greater one!  The planet may be a huge ball of rock in space, but the atmosphere is a comparatively miniscule - the thickness of a tightly held sheet on a basketball.  You bet we affect it.

I'll leave it to ya'll to debate if it's "good or bad" and to discuss the severity and whether the Earth's systems are overwhelmed or not, but saying we have "no effect" is quite false.

global warming nonsense is a fool, period. Arguing computer models, etc. is a waste of time, period. Even if it were true, there is virtually nothing, short of exterminating 80% of the worlds's human population and returning the rest to hunting and gathering, that is going to reverse it. So for all you Gorebal Warming aficionados out there, you would far better spend your "righteous concern" about the people who really do want to eliminate 80% of the world's human population and return the rest to hunting and gathering and, perhaps goat herding.

exists. Moving on now.

To be honest, with goats they'd have a point.  Little buggers are like organic vaccuum cleaners.

It is a religion.

Our nuclear weapons are quite remarkable. The Castle Bravo explosion (the largest H-bomb ever detonated by the US) was undoubtedly a major event in the human unleashing of energy.

However, we should have some humility and consider the relative magnitudes of simultaneous H-bomb detonations with any of the following:

-- Volcanos: Pinatubo and Krakatau, incomprehensibly massive explosions and these are not even the largest of human history

-- Earthquakes: Chile 1960 and Alaska 1964 (the 60's were a bad decade), colossal releases of energy, but honestly not much effect on geography

-- Hurricanes and Typhoons: Camille, Mitch, Katrina, the post-Katrina recriminations are ridiculous when one understands that the Gulf Coast was on the receiving end of more energy in one day than the entire US energy usage could muster in a year.

-- Solar flares

-- Floods and Tsunamis

-- Etc.

The Earth has been subject to unimaginably horrendous levels of energy release through natural means far outstripping the potential of man. We are amazing creatures, but humility is not one of our common traits.

It always boggles my mind how so many in the blogosphere (and this applies to both Left and Right) feel so confident in disputing the research and conclusions derived by experts in the field in question.

I mean, when a General is testifying before Congress or even giving a press conference from Iraq, I almost always take their assessment at face value. It's their job to know these things. They've spent decades in their field training to become experts.

I don't know whether the overwhelming majority of the scientific community is correct in their conclusions about Global Warming. And I recognize that there are equally qualified albeit vastly fewer dissenters in that same scientific community.

And I value the informed opinions of that community. I don't value pundits, political operatives, or bloggers with no climatic science background commenting on a field of study that requires such extensive understanding.

I don't value that any more than some clown over dKos commenting on military strategy or troop levels or what have youl.

My father is a surgeon, who has spent 30 years in the medical community.  He is a specialist in his field. He trained and studied for many years, and is paid (handsomly) for his expertise and to be right.

His favorite stories in the world are to recount the many completely uninformed comments from some of his loonier patients who take issue with his diagnoses or his recommendations for surgery.  Typically these patients are recounting something they read in some magazine or passing on a story they heard through a friend who also isn't in that specific medical field.

My dad's conclusion: people are going to believe what they want to believe, and most are too naive or too arrogant to admit to themselves they have no idea what they're talking about beyond some cursory, superficial understanding.

And so it goes ...

The warming is due only in small part to the carbon dioxide levels

As I said, I don't buy into man made issues being a significant factor.

People on either side of this argument can point to specific locations around the world like Britain and argue that they were once warmer or colder than they are today but the truth is, the global mean surface temperature has been rising for the last 100 years. Skeptics point to predictions thirty years ago that we were entering another ice age as reason to doubt current predictions, but these were based on the measurements of a single glacier. Measurements of atmospheric carbon dioxide, the most prevalent greenhouse gas, are continuing to rise. Separating natural causes from human may be difficult but when there are twice as many people living today as there were in 1960 it is difficult to believe that we don't bear any responsibility. Regardless of whether you believe global warming is real and caused by humans, it would be morally irresponsible of us to ignore the facts and do nothing.

Though you've posed the question directly to form for a MCGW advocate.  It's quite the same conversation that we had awhile back on this site.  

I said it's not proven to what degree man contributes to global warming, and you came back with a snarky reply about cigarettes and lung cancer not being proven.  This is an inappropriate analogy.  Here's one that might be better.  For around 30 years, people with high blood pressure and or high cholesterol were told to eat low fat diets by the FDA and the US Surgeon General.  This became conventional wisdom to the extent that virtually all doctors confronting these symptoms prescribed this dietary course of action, despite no scientific evidence that it would help.  Study after study was done on people eating low fat diets and no benefits could be documented and replicated that this worked.

It's the same thing with you MCGW folks.  

1.  You have too much fat in your blood.
   
   
2.  People with that much fat in their blood must eat too much fat.
   
   
2.  Therefore, please don't eat so much fat.  

The problem is the fat in your blood is caused by elevated insulin levels which are caused not by eating fats but by eating carbs, and more directly, highly refined carbs.  So the conventional medical wisdom was wrong.

1.  The temperatures are rising over the past 30 years.
   
   
2.  There's more people on the planet than there were 30 years ago and more people burning fossil fuels than 30 years ago.
   
   
3.  We know fossil fuel combustion results in rising CO2 levels which traps heat in the atmosphere.  
   
   
4. Therefore, people are to blame, the US is most to blame (more energy consumption than anyplace else) and we must stop this.

Trouble is, to paraphrase a previous poster, correlation is not causation.

For the same reasons that you can't prove your point, I can't disprove it to your satisfaction other than by reasoned argument about what is known and what can and cannot be inferred from what is known.  

We know that the earth has seen glaciers cover much of North America.  We've recently heard that ice core samples suggest tropical climates in the arctic at some time in the past.  We therefore know that natural temperature changes have been dramatic in the history of the earth.  We also know that this kind of range in temperature dwarfs anything that is being discussed in relation to the MCGW side of the argument, certainly dwarfing the 0.6 degree C rise over the past 30 years.  

With substantial evidence that natural temperature variations of much greater magnitude have occured before without any human causation, how in the world can you be so certain that this recent miniscule rise is PRIMARILY due to human causation?  

It therefore seems to me that the burden of proof is more appropriately on your side of the argument.  We already know naturally occuring effects can alter temperatures to a much greater degree than this.  The problem that remains is explaining them, ie providing solid evidence of cause and effect.  That is what is still lacking in the science that you purport to exist.  The scientists still do not know to what extent warming is a function of naturally occuring phenomena and what is caused by human activity.  

We know CO2 levels are higher but not why they are higher and not what this means.  Using the graph that you selected from GISS NASA, I would ask you a different question.  We know that the global 5 year mean temperature declined from 1940 to 1970 by nearly 0.2 degees C even though CO2 levels were rising during that time.  Has your science provided an explanation for that phenomena?

I know I don't get your $100.  My guess is that no one else will either.

One of the strangest things you'll find, PJ, is that I actually agree with you on a lot of what you say.  The anthropogenic side of the equation is still a matter of debate, but to me, global warming is almost beside the point:

The real issue, for anyone truly interested in the continued progress of the human race from scavengers and scroungers to people burning primarily carbonaceous (I won't say "fossil" because nobody really knows) fuels for energy is that it's extraordinarily inefficient and wasteful.

Let's say we take an optimistic view of the "population bomb" and say that the Earth could be the home of 30 billion people, and that all of those people could survive at a standard of living commensurate with what we have in Western, industrialized nations (albeit very wastefully.)  That is where the truly progressive argument about energy and human life and environmental protection of the planet has to start.  

I think that I would agree with what you are saying as well :). Western living standards for a population 5x the current will be a big issue in the future as well. Global warming is probably more near term than that and definitely related.

I'm no expert here -- my numbers come from the wikipedia -- but the Krakatoa explosion, immense as it was, was rated at a VEI of 6, or about 200 megatons.  The largest nuclear weapon (in megatons) tested was a Russian device at 50 megatons.  All nuclear testing in total has been about 510 megatons.

Now, of course, there's a lot more than just the size of the explosion -- volcanic ash effects climate.  But then, so would the ash and soot from those nuclear weapons.  And then there's the effect fallout would have on the atmosphere and on vegetation.  And it may be the case that a meteor impact or supervolcano would have a similar effect -- all I'm trying to show is that we can effect the climate on a grand scale.  You you say it's vanity to suppose that we can effect climate, but I say it's wantonness and recklessness to deny that we can.  If we were to detonate all of our nuclear weapons at once -- that is, create explosions with yields of trillions of megatons -- well, honestly, what do you expect would happen?

if you look at the actual measurements of solar irradition for the last 30 years, there's no net increase that would correlate with the current temperature increase. Are you sure every planet in the solar system is experiencing global warming? Links? Some are, but not because of the sun, oh and some aren't. Thanks for playing.

Ah, yes, I remember you, how have you been? I think my smoking example was in response to your need for certainty before acting politically. Certainty is a very high standard that is rarely applied when making policy, such as for smoking: when policies were enacted it wasn't certain that smoking caused lung cancer, and it still isn't 100% certain because that would be impossible to prove. 95% is the usual standard that science uses for certainty - of course that still means there's a 1 in 20 chance it could be wrong, as many scientific skeptics like to point out. But, we digress.

So, your example isn't quite correct, is it? Low fat diets do help people with high blood pressure and cholesterol, although it's not the total amount of fat that's important, but the type of fat consumed - they should have been more specific and said low trans fat diet, which is what the FDA and Surgeon General currently recommend limiting. So, I wouldn't call this a total lack of failure by science, they were fairly close. But, OK let's just say the low fat diet didn't work for everyone.

Here's another example: in the 1970's scientists realized that halocarbon compounds have a long atmospheric lifetime and could be contributing to the increasing depletion of the ozone layer. This was known to happen naturally, but the recent increase could only be explained by including industrial pollution as a major source of these compounds. In the late 70's the National Academy of Sciences concurred with the scientists finding and recommended governments take action, while continuing to study the phenomenon. A consensus of scientists soon agreed this was an important problem to tackle. In the late 1980's the Montreal protocol was ratified and industrial halocarbons were banned for most applications. This was passed despite objection by some skeptical scientists claming natural variations (e.g. Fred Singer) were dominant. Also, the chemical industry has claimed it would go bankrupt because of regulation. Since this time, the ozone depletion has stabilized and a reversal of the ozone hole is expected by mid-century.

What are the differences between my example and yours? Degree of success, I suppose.

What do they have in common?

The scientific knowledge of the time was applied. If the scientific knowledge was not quite correct it was adjusted to account for new findings. In both cases something was done to tackle the problem. Even if the science was slightly incorrect, there were positive benefits to proceeding with trying to find a solution. Also, no economies were destroyed in the process, despite dire warnings that they would be. In fact, new economies were created to account for the old ones that may have suffered slightly.

So, in a way your example is a good one in that we should do something to address the problem even if we are not 100% certain it will solve it. Fortunately, scientists are a little more certain about anthropogenic global warming, just as they were about ozone depletion. So, why should we behave any differently than in the past?

Since you have brought up ice core records, we know that the rate of temperature is unprecedented relative to the natural variability in the past - about 10 times faster than anything seen in the past. What natural process has changed so dramatically to account for this? There isn't one. There's a perfectly reasonable explanation using greenhouse gasses, which explain why Venus is hot and Mars is cold (at night). The rate at which these gasses are collecting the atmosphere is also 30% larger than those seen than any natural level seen in the last Holocene (from ice cores again). We know that we output 5-7 metric gigatons of CO2 into the atmosphere each year and only 2 gigatons can be absorbed by the oceans (the largest sink). The evidence seems pretty clear to me.

Oops - gotta go...

The decrease in temperature from 1940-1970 was an effect called http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming ">global dimming caused by an increase in aerosols (i.e. pollution) in the atmosphere. But thanks to one of those other crackpot scientific endeavors (airborne particulates are bad), the Clean Air Act of 1971 was passed (among others) and that effect has largely disappeared.

No, you don't get the $100 because you haven't provided a natural explanation to the temperature increase over the last 30 years - sadly you didn't even try. At least Raven tried.

Toodles.

that's what i get for depending on spell-check..

That's true.  So, putting my cards on the table (though I'm sure it's already clear): I am a believer in anthropogenic global warming.  However, I also believe that those people on my side who pound their fists and say that they're certain discredit the cause.  I think they're over-playing their hand in an attempt to move on an issue that they think is important.  

That said, I do think there's quite a bit of consensus in the field.  And I think that consensus among experts is good (though defeasable) reason to accept their conclusions.  So, the trick then is to balance a) how certain we are of this conclusion (hint: we're not certain to degree 1)  b) what the cost of the solutions on the table are (to the best of our estimation)  c) the cost of doing nothing (to the best of our estimation) and d) the probability of our solutions working (you get the idea...)   Yeah, it's hard, and that's why I'm not very good at being a cheerleader for the cause.

But let me close with an analogy: take economic theory.  Economics is less a science than climatology, for all its faults.  Nonetheless, we can let arguments from economics move us toward political conclusions, so long as we're careful about what's going on.  We use our best economics and our best predictors of what will happen.  Sometimes we'll go wrong, for want of better economists -- but is that reason to ignore what economists are telling us?  And why can't the same kind of thing happen here?

You underestimate yourself and WAY overestimate the others.

An option I left off the table is:

5) We are causing global warming to a large degree, but it's (good / manageable / whatever).

So, again, I don't mean to engage on the merits of these theses (though I've gotten into the tangential points).  But I think it's interesting to map out where the possibilities are for this debate...

Arguements against global warming have appeared everywhere except where it counts most, in scientific peer-reviewed publications. If their scientific evidence is so strong, why are they not publishing in these venues?

this?

Naaah... no one ever let their ethics get in the way of a peer-reviewed journal. (not the first, nor the second but the THIRD time...) Now I know that this is not a climate journal, but it is probably the most-read peer reviewed journal. And what peer reviewed journals are you referring to anyway... I don't have time to sit around all day and research this, but if you insist, I will dig up some actual climatic science peer-reviewed journals...

in a previous post , everyone has heard of Ice Ages... I guess it takes a bit too much thought to figure out what happened in between.

Since my earlier GW post, several good items have been published to provide some scientific evidence refuting human influence here and here .

The argument I like the most is that scientists bread and butter is the grant (funding), and you can't get grants by saying that a problem does not exist.

I think the lessons we will learn about sustainability by tackling global warming (or at least starting) will be helpful for solving the other related issues of large population growth in the future. Either that or we need to start thinking about increasing the space exploration budget.

I don't see how anyone could claim certitude to 1, 2 or 3.

Numbers 2 and 3 have the benefit of being hypotheses, albeit not testable by controllable empirical science.

Number 1 is question-begging and loaded. What is scientifically defined as "excessive" levels of CO2?

The warming associated with the Dust Bowl can hardly be attributed to increased output of man-made CO2; after all, hasn't our capacity for man-made CO2 production increased vastly since the early to mid 1930's? Some misguided environmental apologists have argued that the Dust Bowl caused the high temps of the 1930s, when logic would suggest the contrary.

Just as there is variation and statistical noise in all scientific phenomena, it is best not to assume too much in the way of cause-and-effect without considering a more mundane explanation - that humans may be here but, like ants in the vast desert, don't have much effect.

was a fireball at one point and an icicle at another- we are somewhere in between the two now and will vary for some undertimed point in the future.  More importantly I am not vain enough to believe we have any significant contribution to either extreme.    

I'm always curious as to what percentage of people commenting on Global Warming have extensive scientific backgrounds.

It's like when issues of tax policy come up. I almost always avoid entering that debate as I know that I know next to nothing about macro economics, monetary policy, or taxes.

"What's with all these dang computer models predicting this or that?" I'm tempted to say, "They're wrong as often as they are right!"

But I don't bother commenting. As I know that almost any comment I make will be the idle speculation of someone who knows nothing other than what I read in the occassional magazine.

Hence, I tend to keep my mouth shut, and defer to the communities of people who know what they're talking about.

Thats gotta count for SOMETHING, I mean ABC is asking people to let them know if they think it is warmer than it used to be.

I heard a comment on the radio this morning that it will be the hottest it has ever been today, July 18th, since recorded time in the 1700s (with a snark afterward "suuuuure theres no global warming").

Now, ignoring that the control groups and accuracy of a 1700s thermometer is probably way off to calculate a .10 degree change in temperature. Also ignoring that if tomorrow could be the coldest day ever recorded for July 19th nobody would say anything about global cooling, that proof has got to count for something, right?

Right?

instead of what you said

As mentioned higher up this thread, is that CO2 levels Increase and Peak AFTER the hottest point of the warming cycle.

So your explanation of the theory of Global Warming fraught with instability from the getgo.

However, the mental picture of naked truckers is not a good one.

Has the link to the website where the evidence is posted.  Should be something about the fact that the Sun has gotten hotter and EVERY planet in this Solar System is experiencing Global Warming right now because of it...

Peer-Reviewed journals:

Climate Research

International Journal of Climatology

Journal of Climate

The list goes on...

There are several articles that describe studies in specific regions, as well as those that asses specific effects of "global warming" but these don't address the phenomenon itself... they just start with the premise that there is global warming and go from there. These articles cannot support the phenomonen itself.

However, I did come across several that did address the causes of GW and ... surprise... they found the idea of anthropogenic global warming suspect... Check out this PEER REVIEWED article, as well as this other PEER REVIEWED article.

NEXT

Great parody of the real global warming religionists... you've really got their hand waving down pat.

Just a response to your analogy. I find it quite fitting. Yes we use our best predictions but communists also probably call themselves economists and in that case, when you throw communism into the 'economic" argument, then yes, it IS reason to ignore what they are telling us.

The reason the "same thing cant happen here" is because the recommended solutions are so radical that it isnt worth talking about. Just as a communist is trying to take away your social and economic liberty by imposing government regulations, environmentalists are doing the same thing.

Actually they are the same people in the environmental movement. A better analogy about economic theory would be to ask why are we discounting the scientists that are making recommendations about economics? In GlobalWarming there so much anti-capitalism that the science is lost.

There is also so much outright deception on the left that if they stuck to science they may have retained some credibility.

A while ago on the same discussion someone made an analogy about global warming ang drinking and driving. They asked "why risk driving if you know youve been drinking?" The radical environmentalism is closer to going to a party, only thinking there is liquor in the punch and you respond by torching your car...and also your neighbors car.

The writer is dead-on. Modern environmentalism is primarily a religion. A desire for transcendant knowledge and heretical enemies is built into human nature. We all want to know the Truth (tm) and enjoy the thrill of moral condemnation. People want to believe deep in their soul that they are on Team Good (enviros) -- and that requires an identifiable Team Evil (capitalists, polluters, etc).

Modern environmentalism is just a Romantic overlay on top of Christianity. We have the Eden-like purity of the world before man. We have the selfish sinner polluting the world to fullfill his carnal desires (fast food, Best Buy). And we have public self-denying penance (curbside recycling).

The religious impulse is an ineradicable part of human nature. And the enviros have tapped into that deep vein, which explains why the enviros react so passionately, sans thinking, when challenged.

2.

The experts have a pretty good track record of being wrong. (See their predictions of global cooling in the not too distant past.) Part of what being a Republican/conservative means is to be skeptical of "the experts".

I know its sad that group X is suffering, but dumping government cash in won't help.

Yes, but you miss the point that there is no shortage of experts to insist that piles of government cash is exactly whats needed to help group X. Look at education as one example. Expert opinion is that more spending is required.

"... it is difficult to believe that we don't bear any responsibility."

The comment above about the progressive mind and literal interpretation applies. In this one sentence I see the sum total of evidence that I have been presented with by liberals promoting their "we're destroying the earth" agenda.

It's difficult to believe. It seems likely. I don't find it even remotely difficult to believe that we haven't had an impact. To the contrary I find it incredibly difficult to believe that we have.

Liberals, and liberal scientists and ex-vice-presidents among them, think with their feelings and feel with their guts. But that's no reason to surrender our economic freedom.

are willing to contradict experts:

Experts who enter the public process are either academics working in the grant-driven publish or perish world or they are "experts" for hire.

If you are going to get a grant, you get it because you are likely to find something that the grantee wants found, and if you don't, you aren't likely to get the second grant.  There goes your department or your chair.  Can't tell me that doesn't influence the research.

In the publish or perish world, you have to get past your peers.  In that world, academic rigor consists of rigorously adhering to the current dogma.  If you don't, your work gets trashed, you don't get published, and there goes your academic career.

And experts for hire are simply intellectual prostitutes; they'll find any "scientific fact" that someone pays them to find.  I've hired a fair share of "expert" witnesses over the years - doctors, psychiatrists, engineers, economists.  If they couldn't look at the facts as I presented them and arrive at the conclusion I desired from them, I found one who could.  Never had any trouble finding one.

I well know that there are dedicated objective experts out there but they are not the superstars of the "peer reviewed" literature, the stars of the "news" magazines, or the talking heads that the networks call.

Grant money, foundation money, government money, and expert witness fees have perverted science.  I think the first question that should be asked of any "expert" is who paid for the research; then you follow the money.

It seems that the way that you present it, there is no reason to trust anything coming out of the hard sciences. It's all run by people just trying to get paid. I find that suggestion absolutely ridiculous. You are, of course, free to believe whatever you like, but I can't say that I'll ever throw my support behind a party that thinks the words peer reviewed belong in quotation marks.

I chose my words carefully, try reading them.  I'm actually a firm believer in scientific inquiry and am a long, long way from the "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it" type to address that insinuation in this thread.

What I said was that public and published "science" is perverted by the culture in which much of it is done and the way that much of it is paid for.

BTW, I think I'm getting a whiff of troll here.

What enviros lack is the slightest interest in economic reasoning. In fact, they have fought tooth and nail to prevent the EPA from doing cost-benefit studies on proposed regulations.

With global warming the enviros say:

1. The temperature is rising!
   
   
2. Humanity is to blame!
   
   
3. Therefore a massive slow down in economic activity   on the order of trillions of dollars is called for. Any suffering is deserved for despoiling the Earth.

The skeptic says:

1. The temperature seems to be rising.
   
   
2. Humanity is possibly the cause.
   
   
3. Let's wait and see what happens and spend the billions, if necessary, on solving those future problems.

...

Humanity's best option is to get as wealthy as possible so we have the resources to deal with any potential future problems -- be they environmental or not.

Enviros also never acknowledge all the suffering that otherwise would have been prevented if we hadn't economically crippled ourselves like they want.

It all comes down to opportunity cost -- Econ 101. Most enviros I've known purposefully avoided learning any economics. (Of course, most hardcore enviros I've known have also been rich kids, but that's a separate point.)

...

The enviro movement is the main reason I'm a Republican. It's a modern religious movement that, at it's core, is profoundly anti-human. It's against free markets, free trade, population growth, technological advancement. All the things that have made the modern world such a prosperous, enjoyable place.

The enviros want to impose their humanity-hating, progress-destroying religion on the rest of the world. I have enviro friends who honestly believe that humanity is like a cancer on the Earth, they look forward to a world population of less than a billion. I'll stand with any party that opposes such insanity.

Do we know for certain that the changes we made made the difference?

Plus which, ozone is basically a one-component system, much less complicated than the temperature effects of CO2 in the atmosphere and the processes that counteract same (ocean uptake of excess CO2 and photosynthesis, to name two).

There has been so much hullaballoo over global environmental issues over the last twenty or so years (tropical-rain-deforestation, ozone hole) that if mankind has successfully won one of these battles, it should be shouted from the rooftops. Can you provide a link?

Since we're asking such silly questions ...

You should follow the politics involved with string theory if you want to see how the need to be employed and published so greatly affects what is pursued and reviewed. Ask string theorists and proponents of the 'brane' model how many dimensions the universe has and you may get a wry chuckle before you get an answer.

The scientific community is notorious for cronyism, blackballing, exclusion, closed-mindedness and resistance to change. And that's according to them. Anyone who's followed ANY major theoretical science would know this.

Why should we suddenly believe in this case they've broken the model?

First, there are about 4 Billion more people on Earth now than 100 years ago...all breathing and exhaling the dreaded gas.  We already KNOW that urban areas create and retain enormous amounts of heat just by all the concrete, steel, asphalt retaining heat and giving it off at night.

Models:  Yesterday there was a clear blue sky with one small cloud.  Of the course of an hour, that cloud grew considerably.  Can any model, predict where a cloud will form?  If that cloud will grow?  If that cloud will eventually produce a storm or rain?  The United States has tens of thousands of reporting stations and almost complete cover, but the odds that today's weather forecast for tomorrow will be 'highly accurate' is probably no better than 50/50.   How the hell can such models reasonably forecast what the entire PLANET is facing over the next 100 years?

As a student of economics, I can suggest that weather forecasting has the same problem as economic forecasting: too few data points.

Last, extended growing seasons, extensive algae growth, all add biomass to the earth's ability to USE the extra CO2.  To assume our planet lacks the ability to respond to changes ignores large parts of its past where true devastation occurred.

Sure theres some science involved but, as pointed out in another post somewhere, you cant set up a good control group to come to a specific conclusion and there is so much complexity that there is not much precision in the science and even complete contradictions (as in computer models).

This is where the politics come in and why conservatives are very skeptical. Any mention of a contradictionn is written at the end of the article as a vague comment. Even a comment like "Hmm, that could be interesting, possibly maybe plausible", by a scientist is heralded as concrete endorsement.

Then you have Greenpeace with its deceptive "melting iceberg" ad and admitting it lied about the fact that there are more trees in the US now than in Colonial times.

Then you have environmentalists opposing drilling in a frozen tundra while showing pictures of lush mountains with bears and butterflies and unicorns (yes not directly GlobalWarming but fits the pattern).

Then you have reports that EVERYTHING is caused by GlobalWarming. Its hotter? Its GlobalWarming. Its colder? Oh well global cooling is caused by GlobalWarming. More rainstorms? GlobalWarming. Its drier today? Yep. GlobalWarming. or Global Dimming, but thats GlobalWarming anyway.

Then you have the media. Every hear an interview with a scientist  with an opposing opinion on the MSM? Probably not. So, do you think that there is not a single scientist on the planet that disagrees with GlobalWarming? Not likely. But you wont hear it from the MSM. Once I saw an interview, but it was John Stossel interviewing a roomful of scientists from MIT and the like. But if you missed that you are out of luck. I also remember a "newscast" where Peter Jennings said "Scientists in Britain have now proven, without a doubt, that global warming exists." That was the whole story, no background, no info, nothing. He could have just pulled that out of his a--. Bombard the public with stupid stories like that and they start to believe it. They dont know why, but they know its true.

Then you have groups like A.N.S.W.E.R. and others that are just communists that hate any kind of profit and will back the GlobalWarming bandwagon for their own ends.

So, no, sceince isnt a farce, but this isnt it. Actually, if the left stuck to science, admitted it is shaky and didnt exaggerate and lie they may get more sympathy from the right.

Progressives listen to the experts and then form an opinion while the current "conservative" administration forms an opinion then pushes the experts to back their position.

the recent article about how GlobalWarming is making poison ivy bigger. Is that science or politics?

How would people react if the article said "Global Warming is causing higher yeilding food crops and lowering starvation rates."

but I'm not sure where exactly we are supposed to find any factual information about the hard sciences if not in peer-reviewed journals. It seems to me that if one denies that peer-reviewed journals are more or less objective means to determine the current state of knowledge in a given field, then it all boils down to "I'll believe whatever I want about whatever I want."

It seems odd to me that you believe that the scientific community is "perverted" by grant money but have no problem with the fact that those railing the hardest against the idea of man-made global warming have quite a bit to gain themselves. The money trail is much shorter from those who deny global warming to their personal financial interests than it is from those who accept that it is occuring to any sort of economic gain. (Not that economic profit necessarily refutes ones argument.)

Finally, I'm sorry if you think that I'm a troll. I don't comment much here at Redstate, so I'm not sure what constitutes the title here. I've stayed on topic, avoided being inflammatory or engaging in name-calling, etc. All I've done is to disagree with the anti-sciencist position of many conservatives on this issue. Is that enough to get one so-labelled here? If so, then I'll be glad to sit out of comment boards.

Are we doing this in rounds or something?

As a student in economics, you have probably learned some methods for projecting where markets are headed even though you can't tell where Joe Public will spend his next dollar. While no prediction can be 100% accurate, macro treands are much easier to extrapolate than micro trends. Comparing weather forcasting (micro) to studies in climate change (macro) is like comparing apples to oranges.

Classifying legitimate disagreement as "anti-scientist" might be a starting point.

that you put both "science" and "evidence" in quotes in your very first post here in which you were doing your best to sound like a "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it" fundmentalist.

Perhaps you should take the step inplied by your screen name.

is there is not overwhelming argeement amongst scientists but it is being forced down our throats anyway.

The "facts" I've read put out by various scientific journals (which I do read) and scientific reports usually have a consnsus of:

1. The earth is in a warming cycle.
   
   
2. Due to man-made causes, there appears to be more CO2 in the atmosphere than what we expect (note: than what we "expect").
   
   
3. The sun has more influence on global cycles in the short term than previously thought.
   
   
4. From studies of past climatic cycles (via ice cores, etc.), it appears rises of CO2 levels FOLLOWED global warming trends rather than leading the warming trend. Thus, we do not really know what part CO2 plays in global warming.
   
   
5. Our computer modeling of this complex system is so inadequate, no model can be described as being even close to accurate.
   

Basically, it comes down to "We don't know what the hell is going on."

To base policies on this is ridiculous. That is where my problem lies.

politics. As I indicated above that I don't believe that accepting that people are behind our current global warming problem indicates that we should take any specific action (or even any action at all). What we should DO about global warming is a completely different issue from what is happening. All I'm trying to say is that climatologists agree that global warming is happening and that it is man-made. I will admit that I don't know much about their methodology, but I don't know much about rocket science. I trust that climatologists know how to work within their field just like I trust that NASA physicists understand how to get stuff into space.

In either case, the question that falls OUTSIDE the realm of science is what we should do about the information we have. Should we curb greenhouse gases, should we launch a rocket into space, should we use embryos for stem-cell research? These are questions upon which many people will disagree.

Unfortunately it seems that we have one group of people who accept (and exaggerate) the evidence and demand radical responses (GreenPeace, Gore, etc.) and another that denies that the evidence exists. All that I'm suggesting is that we start with what scientists in the field agree to be the current state of affairs and talk about how to respond to that state of affairs rather than trying to undercut the evidence itself.

So by that logic, the smattering of scientists who oppose theories of global warming are equally unreliable.

They too (if not more so) are backed by think tanks, corporations, and grant monies. And therefore, following that logic, have a strong financial incentive to arrive at certain conclusions.

So we're back to square one. No one can be trusted. No one can be believed. All the experts are biased.

"anti-science." By it I merely meant people who accuse (at least some) scientists of being corrupt an untrustworthy, rather than "anti-science" in the sense that science is the devil or something like that.

Liberals are liberals because they have a deep and abiding faith in "the experts", who they believe can diagnose and correct all problems.  

We trust NASA to get stuff into space because they have a track record of doing so. The "climatologists" have little understanding of how the climate works and no record of being able to manipulate it.

sarcastically. It would have been clear in context. I was replying to someone who called people who believed in evolution "idiots." I was merely pointing out that Genesis 1 has more problems than most admit. I have never intentionally misrepresented myself at this site (unless one missed the irony in the abovementioned comment, in which case, I apologize).

and coming to an informed conclusion yourself.  I am no more compelled to accept a study financed by Exxon than one financed by Greenpeace, but I can read them both, analyze them both, and decide what I can and cannot accept.

Some ability to logically analyze an argument is essential and sadly often lacking.  Analyzing the argument for logical validity allows a person who is not a subject matter expert to analyze the the way the premises are organized to support the conclusions even if one cannot analyze the premises with certainty.

While logically valid arguments based on false or unproven premises are common, invalid arguments are far more common and more obvious to the person who is not a subject matter expert.

here, but I'm sure that suggesting someone kill himself is at least in bad taste in what purports to be a civilized discussion.

But, I don't have any more confidence that my analysis or opinion on Global Warming is worthwhile than I would telling my doctor how to diagnose cancer or a military technician how to design a spy satellite.

Not my field. I don't know anything beyond what I read in laymen's periodicals. And all I'd be doing is regurgitating a laymen's understanding of the issue - and then skewing it to whichever political side I see fit.

Those guys are the experts. They've spent their lives studying and practicing in their fields of expertise. I'll leave it to the people who've actually been educated in the field to debate the issue back and forth.

If I want armchair quarterbacking, I'll tune into NFL Live.

aren't necessarily any better at "correcting" problems than anyone else. What I'm saying is that I do believe that scientists are better at "diagnosing" problems. That is describing what is happening and what is causing it to happen.

That the current mass hysteria is being sold by algore?

That just because a lot of peop;le are infected with the meme, we should roll over and play along?

The thing is that at present, there is no problem. You are saying that you believe that scientists can accurately predict what the worlds weather will be like fify or a hundrd years from now, and that they can prescribe actions which can alter it. Both of those are unproven, to put it mildly. So your belief in them is somewhat unscientific.

The idea that global warming is coming to eat us all if we don't all start riding bicycles tomorrow is disgustingly overblown. People who assert such idiocy need a valid counter-point. Unfortunately the response has largely been that deny that global warming is happening or that it's manmade and to declare that the scientists are simply wrong. What I'm asking is, why not accept the science and offer sane (read: not GreenPeace) ways to deal with the problem (whether that be more modest action or no action at all; how about some nice cost-benefit analyses concerning the cost of action vs. inaction?) rather than to deny it exists at all?

can accurately predict the world's weather fifty years from now or that they can prescribe actions that can change it. No scientist says that. What I am saying is that scientists CAN tell us that global temperatures are rising and that carbon emissions are largely responsible. They can also show us some things that might happen as a result (granted with much less certainty than they can describe what's already happening and why). They can NOT make the value judgment as to whether or not this process is worth slowing or stopping. That is the place for policy makers. I'm saying that scientists should stay out of policy decisions, but that policy makers should accept the diagnosis of scientists.

Analyzing the argument for logical validity allows a person who is not a subject matter expert to analyze the the way the premises are organized to support the conclusions even if one cannot analyze the premises with certainty.

You may be able to, but with all due respect, I doubt it.

I don't say that in any way to disparage you or your intelligence, I just don't buy that you - without a rigorous scientific background - can effectively draw informed conclusions based on complex scientific and statistical studies and data.

Any more than you - without the benefit of a rigorous medical background - could read a bunch of medical journals, and draw an informed conclusion on complex pancreatic cancer studies and projections.

I just don't. But let's just chalk that up to a difference in philosophies, I suppose.

And again, no offense intended.

I haven't read all the books mentioned there.  Looks like I'll have to.

is not "...can we minimize the impact of 6 billion humans before the earth once again becomes inhospitable..."

It Is:

Ok, if the world is going to be inhospitable in X amount of time, regardless of cause, what can we do to prevent it?

Bottom line is, If it's going to happen, Humans won't be the cause.  And do you think humans are sufficiently Godly to be able to affect whatever that cause actually is?

My money says "NO"

It does not take an "expert" to read the temperature. What the scientists are offering, and what the whole debate is about, is the prediction of what the future will be like unless certain specific steps are taken.

When a doctor gives a diagnosis of cancer to a patient, he is making a fairly accurate prediction of what will happen to that person in the future, and can offer some specific steps which may be taken to avert that future. When you refer to "diagnosis" here you are implying that understanding of the earths climate is on a par with understanding of the human body.

Always ask questions and try to get the specialists to make the answers make sense.  You might just force them to think in a way they never have before and cause the next Great Leap of science...

find the goalposts in this game; take your football and leave as I'm doing.  This has become just argument for the sake of argument from ever-changing positions.

a. The act or process of identifying or determining the nature and cause of a disease or injury through evaluation of patient history, examination, and review of laboratory data.

b. The opinion derived from such an evaluation.

c. A critical analysis of the nature of something.

d. The conclusion reached by such analysis.

(from dictionary.com)

I distinguish diagnosing from "prescribing" a solution to the problem "diagnosed."

As with any problem of this magnatude, you have to start somewhere. People didn't think they could live without CFC's twenty years ago but we have found replacements. There will never be a single solution to cutting CO2 emmissions but if we don't at least acknowledge the problem, we will not get anywhere. Kyoto is not the final solution but at least it would get the ball rolling. Developing countries were not included because, as you pointed out, they do not have the resources to address this problem. Just imagine the economic possibilities if we can develop the necessary technologies then distribute them to the rest of the world.

What I am saying is that scientists CAN tell us that global temperatures are rising and that carbon emissions are largely responsible.

The second half of this sentence is more political than science and that is where conservatives get off the bus. You will see on this site that there isnt an argument that there are warming and cooling cycles. You will, however,  see an argument against the hypothesis that carbon emissions are LARGELY responsible, if at all or if it is man made. The thing is if you dig down to the studies, the science is not clear cut. Even this link given by camanintx:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/ggccebro/chapter1.html

speaks of rising CO2 numbers, but it also has a lot of fancy pie charts that just state levels of emissions. My personal gas can have a pie chart breakdown. Doesnt mean it causes anything. Most importantly you will find a lot of maybes, etc. as well (emphasis mine):

What Effect Do Greenhouse Gases Have on Climate Change?

Given the natural variability of the Earth's climate, it is difficult to determine the extent of change that humans cause. In computer-based models, rising concentrations of greenhouse gases generally produce an increase in the average temperature of the Earth. Rising temperatures may, in turn, produce changes in weather, sea levels, and land use patterns, commonly referred to as "climate change."

Assessments generally *suggest that the Earth's climate has warmed over the past century and that human activity affecting the atmosphere is *likely an important driving factor. A National Research Council study dated May 2001 stated, "Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and sub-surface ocean temperatures to rise. Temperatures are, in fact, rising. The changes observed over the last several decades are likely mostly due to human activities, but we cannot rule out that some significant part of these changes is also a reflection of natural variability."

However, there is uncertainty in how the climate system varies naturally and reacts to emissions of greenhouse gases. Making progress in reducing uncertainties in projections of future climate will require better awareness and understanding of the buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the behavior of the climate system.

doesnt sound very clear cut. Heck I could come up with an alternate theory of rising CO2 levels. Grasslands consume more CO2 than trees. we have more trees (thus less grasslands) in the US than 200 years ago. Coincidence? I think not!

I suggest starting with Bjorn Lomborg and The Skeptical Environmentalist.

And even Kyoto will not do anything significant, then what do we do?

"likely" and "generally" to mean "We're just guessing." The way science has always worked is that you gather the evidence and provide the best solution to that evidence. Of course in 10 years we'll have a better idea of what's going on than we do now. New evidence is always being gathered. There is enough evidence out there at this point to lead the vast majority of climatologists to believe that global warming exists and that we are responsible for a good portion of it.

Rather than challenge climatologists at every step (especially in areas that I haven't spent my life studying), I think it wiser to trust them in regard to what is happening. I don't think that they have a right to tell us what to DO about what is happening though.

as my stat professor used to say.

This is why there is such skepticism about the environmental activists' presentation of global warming.  They offer loose correlations and automatically attribute it to a specific cause and then present a remedy, which mainly means more power for themselves.

No sale.

Considering that the sun is a nuclear furnace, much of the earth is molten rock and that the weather is still largely unpredictable (one wiggle in the jet stream can cause large weather variations, for example), CO2 emissions as the uncontested cause of global warming seems a bit of a stretch.

That being said, a reasonable person could conclude that Gore, Dean et al are making a contribution to hot air.  

 

10.  Is CO2 the biggest cause of global warming among the Greenhouse Gasses?

The GW folks have totally forgotten Methane (which is several orders of magnitude more effective of a greenhouse gas than CO2) and others that are more effective at locking in heat than CO2.

They have latched onto how BAD "Big Oil" is and just extended it into the GW debate.

There are VASTLY greater quantities of Methane produced than there is CO2 (mostly because of all those forests we agreed to regrow and not cut down).

Turning the gathering of evidence and the formation of a thesis on its head is a hman tendancy, not a political argument.

The fact is that the mcgw movement is relying on a pattern of thinking well known in religious circles. mcgw is an apocaplyptic system.

It just happens to be an apocalypitc myth with Mother Nature playing the part of Jehovah.

because what we have is observational data, not experimental data. To have experimental data, we'd need to have (say) two hundred identical planets earth, randomize them, continue our present pattern with half (control group) and do some sort of intervention with the other (experimental) group, and assess outcomes. As your old stats prof might say.

But we have one earth, and we have such compelling  evidence that the vast majority of climate scientists have achieved a degree of consensus rare in the community. Global climate change is real, we are largely responsible, and if we do not act, the world will be in many ways worse for our children.

This debate is tobacco all over again. We never did do a proper human experiment--that would have been highly unethical and immoral--but the observational data were finally compelling enough that most people accept the idea of causality--even if your stats prof might (very rightly) quibble.

Based on what I have read, blaming global warming on humans, in the context of millions of years is exactly that, a big guess.

And if you are only looking at the words 'likely' and 'generally' and ignoring sentences like "it is difficult to determine the extent of change that humans cause" then you are only selectively picking out info to come to your conclusion to tie global warming to human productivity.

A sentence like that is, scientifically, a lot different than, "it is difficult to determine whether this rock I am holding is a solid or liquid." It is the definition of a big guess and, if you get past the BS you will see more and more of the science is a big guess.

(sorry)  Otherwise I agree with you, we obviously affect the climate and planet, anyone who's flown has seen the smog clouds that often hang over cities.  The question is, of course, how much.

It is vain to assume we have no effect (in this case effect not affect ;-).  Even Beavers are said to be largely responsible for much of the wetland in North America by their damn building activities. (seriously, but can't find a link right now) Humans most definitely have a massively larger set of effects than beavers.  The question is - is it positive? negative? neutral? And the answer is that it's a combination of all that.

"What I am saying is that scientists CAN tell us that global temperatures are rising..."

So you're not saying that you think climatologists can tell us what the weather will be like in 50 years or so, but that they CAN tell us that temperatures will be Higher 50 years or so from now?

So, Temperature is No Longer part of the weather?

And you completely discount that 30 years ago the same group of "scientists" was claiming that Temperatures were Falling?

Let me take the Headline fron another Front Page Redstate article:  "Just how dumb do you think we are?"

"The Physical Laws, even the Law of Gravity, are just guesses that have not yet been proven wrong."

And you're trying to tell us that a Wild Hypotheses such as the ones at the core of Global Warming are ironbound, unchangeable laws...  Bah

Don't go there...

Was cripple American Economic capabilities so that Europe would be equal with us.

If you want something that actually gets a ball rolling on Environmental Initiatives, look toward Bush's treaty with other nations on the Ring of Fire.

And again, Science has failed to prove that there Is a problem.  All Science can tell us is that there is a global warming trend over the last 100 years or so and that the scientists don't know Why said trend exists (though they have hundreds of hypotheses).

And the only way to find out which of their hypothese is right (or at least not wrong) is to wait and see.

but saying that temperatures will by higher in 50 years is not the same as saying that one can "predict the weather" in 50 years. Its much easier talk about general trends that specifics.

have is in grant writing to get some one else to pay for their lifestyle of total unproductivity and lack of useful purpose. I spit on their credentials.

but I'd hope that policy discussions would assume that gravity does indeed exist than not.

That they're not based on the kinds of WAGs that are at the core of the entire GW debate...

Trend modeling (a favorite of the economist) is a bastard science.  I have hated the concept since 1977 when I first began studying economics.  Trend models are used when you have two impossible problems: too few data points; too many variables.

Our economy is based on the daily actions of over 300 million people and businesses plus the interactions of those with a billion other people and businesses around the globe.  

The climate is based on the daily interactions of billions of organisms, geological activities, and solar changes.

Yes, you can model 'trends'.  I can study the sky and know there is a trend in the length of daylight, but if I didn't know why the amount of daylight changes, the trend would suggest that the day will be completely gone by next March...

As brought up elsewhere, 30 years ago, they were predicting the next ice age - thanks to 'trends'.

If you don't understand the why and how of micro interactions, you can not understand the why and how of macro interactions. You can only count on trends...

(ps: I am coming from the POV of someone with an interest in nonlinear dynamics)

Every time I read a news story that quotes nameless "experts" or "top scientists" I get skeptical. Most global warming articles that I've seen that blame mankind never bother to name their "sources".

Just bringing up the idea that nature has it's own weather cycles is blasphemy.

Oh, and did you hear? Mars (and I believe Saturn) are also experiencing global warming. We'd better warn the Martians to quit burning so much coal and oil!

You are correct that trend analysis is misleading if the data sample is not large enough. Thirty years ago we didn't have much data, hence the predictions that we might be entering another ice age. However, today we have data going back 160,000 years which shows a very strong correlation between CO2 levels and average temperatures. The problem is CO2 levels are higher than they have ever been since humans appeared.

So, those of you who aren't scientists and might have slept through middle school, here's how science works: A theory is proposed based on some data (usually, and in this case definitely) and then other people test this theory out using additional data. If the most recent data does not support the theory or an alternate theory that better fits both sets of data is found, the theory is modified or thrown out altogether. If the most recent data supports the original theory, that theory is retained.

The theory of anthropogenic global warming has been around for about 100 years (yes, since 1896!). Of course the evidence that humans are affecting global temperatures is only definitive for the last 30-40 years. The original paper, merely stated that it could happen, not that it was in 1896. But, anyway, if there is an alternate theory (e.g. natural variations) where is the data to remove/modify the anthropogenic theory? Measurements over the last 5 years (since the last IPCC report) have only strengthened the anthropogenic theory.

So, I propose a challenge: I will give $100 (via paypall, seriously) to the first person here who can provide me tangible evidence that the measured global temperature increase of 0.6 deg. C over the last 30 years is not primarily due to human emmitted gasses. If you're going to argue against the science, use science to do it. Good luck!

PS The arguments made so far in this diary can all be refutted - yes, I read all of them.