back to article US Republican enviro-vets: 'Climate change is real. Deal with it'

A quartet of former US Environmental Protection Agency administrators has come out in favor of immediate action on anthropogenic climate change – and all four worked in conservative Republican administrations. "We served Republican presidents, but we have a message that transcends political affiliation: the United States must …

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  1. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    Especialy surprising given Shrubs fondness for never-go-to-jail-cards for the Clean Air & Water acts

    Which partly explain the hostility to fracking in the US.

    Interestingly they agree that a "carbon tax" would be the best way to get companies thinking about moving away from CO2 producing systems.

    But note once again the US political system is not the solution it's the problem

  2. jake Silver badge

    Whatever.

    Climate changes. That's a fact. We do not know why.

    Assuming humans are causing it, without actual proof, is hubris at best.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Whatever.

      Hundreds of credentialed climate scientists agree that human-generated CO2 and its associated radiative forcing is increasing global temperature rise, and you say, "We do not know why"?

      Get a grip, man, get a grip.

      1. jake Silver badge

        Re: Whatever.

        CO2 isn't (by an order of magnitude or so) the largest component of "green house gas". Good old dihydrogen oxide is.

        Think, man, think.

        Also, please note that your "hundreds of credentialed climate scientists" are drawing a pay-check from fueling your fear ... Or fueling Al Gore's $LargeJet, on his latest World Tour.

        1. Ian Bush

          Re: Whatever.

          "CO2 isn't (by an order of magnitude or so) the largest component of "green house gas". Good old dihydrogen oxide is."

          Certainly H2O is the major comtributor to the Green House effect (order of magnitude is debatable). However that's irrelevant. The greenhouse effct is mostly a good thing, making the planet on average ~30 degrees warmer than one would expect. The problem is pushing a good thing too far, so what is at issue is not the major contributor to the greenhouse effect, but how the different contributions are changing. And CO2 is certainly a major contributor to the effect, and also it's concentration in the atmosphere has markedly increased over recent history.

          1. Werner McGoole
            Happy

            Re: Whatever.

            Water vapour is the most powerful greenhouse gas, but it is usually not described as such by climate scientists. This is because they regard any changes in its concentration as being driven by changes in CO2 concentration. So it's not an independent player.

            The thinking is that atmospheric water vapour concentration simply depends on atmospheric temperature, because water evaporates and condenses continually (whereas CO2 doesn't). So changes in CO2 concentration drive changes in temperature which drive changes in water vapour, which cause more heating. The feedback isn't strong enough to run away, but may be strong enough to amplify the original effect of CO2 changes. Estimates of the amplification factor vary.

            So both sides are right on this issue. Water vapour is sort of irrelevant if you accept the simple feedback model as it's just a slave to CO2. But it's also a potent greenhouse gas. That means that if your simple feedback model is wrong, then the error you make could be quite big.

            In my view this issue still isn't settled yet. Water vapour affects things that aren't perfectly understood by a long way - cloud cover probably being the most important . So I'm still on the fence over this one. I wouldn't be surprised to see new feedback effects involving water being found that change the conclusions.

            Just trying to advance the debate a bit to scientific issues (instead of name calling), you understand!

            1. Tom 13

              because water evaporates and condenses continually (whereas CO2 doesn't).

              So let me get this straight....

              All H20 is constantly recycled. It never get trapped in ice or underground streams. And it certainly gets injected into the air as part of a Pacific Rim island having a volcanic eruption.

              Furthermore, only humans produce CO2 in their manufacturing processes so CO2 must be continually increasing by whatever that industrial process is. There are no trees, bushes, mosses, or algae which convert CO2 to O2. And therefore there can't be any feedback processes which might increase as the temperature goes up.

              Right.

              Get back to me when you have two brain cells to rub together.

          2. kars1997

            Re: Whatever.

            Wait a minute..... so 30 degrees of global warming is a good thing, but 30.5 would suddenly be a catastrophe?

            1. Ian Bush
              Boffin

              Re: Whatever.

              "Wait a minute..... so 30 degrees of global warming is a good thing, but 30.5 would suddenly be a catastrophe?"

              Please define catastrophe, otherwise that has little to do with science.

              All one can say scientifically is that

              a) Current models estimate that the greenhouse effect warms the planet by ~30 degrees

              b) Those models seem to do a reasonable job at describing (pre-)historic climates

              c) These models correlate increasing CO2 in the atmosphere with increasing temperature

              d) According to the models increasing global temperature has a number of climatic consequences

              Anything beyond his is politics, and not science.

            2. Vociferous

              Re: Whatever.

              No, it wouldn't be a catastrophe, but neither is it negligible.

              The present average temperature of Earth is +15 Celsius. The projected increase is in the order of 2-6 degrees Celsius. You, and everyone, will notice that difference. By comparison it's how much colder the Earth was during maximum glaciation in the ice ages, and close to the world maximum attained during the Cretaceous, when the entire planet was tropical or subtropical, including the polar areas.

              The "comfort" temperature window for our civilization is very narrow.

          3. John Hughes
            Facepalm

            Re: Whatever.

            The other fun fact about H2O as a GHG is that the H2O in the atmosphere is in equilibrium with the liquid H2O on the surface (bloody big oceans - you may have noticed them).

            As long as the temperature doesn't go up H2O can't contribute to increased warming. Wait, what...

        2. Tom 7

          Re: Whatever.

          The best scientific proof available that global warming is a myth is that someone got paid to do some research.

          Thank fuck Newton didn't get paid to find out about gravity or we'd all be floating around in cloud cuckoo land.

        3. Tom 79

          Re: Whatever.

          Jumping out of a building is totally cool, because the fall isn't the major component of your death, the landing is.

          1. Tom 13

            Re:Jumping out of a building is totally cool,

            Great! Let's climb the Eiffel Tower so the fall lasts longer.

            Then, you go first.

            We can resume our debate over your religion when you get back up here.

        4. Vociferous

          Re: Whatever.

          God you're dumb.

          You think that all climate scientists in the world are in on a big conspiracy because the money in basic science are soooo good. Because you're too dumb to realize they could instantly triple their salary if they started saying climate change _isn't_ real.

        5. Gnomalarta
          WTF?

          Re: Whatever.

          "Also, please note that your "hundreds of credentialed climate scientists" are drawing a pay-check from fueling your fear"

          Can you please point to evidence that the scientists concerned earn their living by scaring us and not by being employed as academics and/or researchers. Whilst you are doing that perhaps you might also like to ponder on how you might discus this issue a tad less emotionally. TIA.

        6. John Hughes
          Trollface

          Re: Whatever.

          Jake, you are a troll.

          Your first post was "Climate changes. That's a fact. We do not know why. Assuming humans are causing it, without actual proof, is hubris at best."

          Now you follow up with "CO2 isn't (by an order of magnitude or so) the largest component of "green house gas". Good old dihydrogen oxide is."

          Which is it? "We don't know why it's warming" or "it's warming because of H2O, not CO2".

      2. andreas koch
        Meh

        @ AC 0647hGMT - Re: Whatever.

        There are likewise other scientists who say the opposite or something in between, probably with the same credentials. So?

        1. Burb

          Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

          "There are likewise other scientists who say the opposite or something in between, probably with the same credentials. So?"

          So...

          1. Tell me who they are.

          2. Tell me what their credentials are.

          3. Tell me what their theories are.

          1. andreas koch
            Stop

            @ Burb - Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

            Lazy, are we? I'm not going to play Russell's teapot with you; there's lists of them about, google it.

            Even Freeman Dyson is somewhat doubtful about it.

            1. Steve Knox
              Boffin

              Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

              1. Lazy, are we? No, just wary of those who cast assertions without evidence.

              2. I'm not going to play Russell's teapot with you; there's lists of them about, google it.

              You made the assertion; yours is the burden of proof. That's the standard in logical debate. Live up to it or admit defeat.

              3. Even Freeman Dyson is somewhat doubtful about it.

              Well, he's convinced it exists, but feels that (as of 2007) our models need more refinement before they can be used to accurately predict the magnitudeor theconsequences (http://edge.org/conversation/heretical-thoughts-about-science-and-society1). What I find most interesting about Dyson's piece how he closes his opinion piece, talking about himself:

              Even a smart twenty-two-year-old is not a reliable guide to the future of science. And the twenty-two-year-old has become even less reliable now that he is eighty-two.

              Now, I do not take that as a man casting aspersions on himself, more as a tounge-in-cheek warning not to depend on one individual's opinion. What you've provided thus far is a weak link to one scientist's opinion. The article provided 4, with references. Even if we ignore you unwillingness to provide evidence for your assertions, you're 3 down, by the numbers.

              1 See that? That's what we call a reference. Supporting evidence, that is. Even hyperlinked it for you.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

                "Now, I do not take that as a man casting aspersions on himself, more as a tounge-in-cheek warning not to depend on one individual's opinion."

                I like his statement, but I take it differently. I think his brain skipped and he forgot what audience he was addressing, or he mixed 2 together out of too much personal reflection. However, his statement would go over with laughs if addressed to 80yr old steel workers :-).

                In regards to global warming, if trees can affect climate, why can't humans?

              2. andreas koch
                Thumb Up

                @ Steve Knox - Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

                Thank you for your lecture. I now see that you have won the logical debate.

              3. Bob Armstrong
                Boffin

                Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

                See http://cosy.com/y12/NewsLetter201212.html for a link to a brilliant video of Dyson dismissing the hysteria . Also links to Burt Rutan , Richard Lindzen , and Physics Nobel winner Robert Laughlin .

                The notion that changes in CO2 concentration at these already saturated levels makes even a measurable change in our global mean temperature is profoundly stupid nonscience beyond any mass delusion I ever expected to see in my lifetime .

                It illustrates what a small portion of the population can actually independently think and analyze even rather basic physics .

            2. Leslie Graham

              Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

              So - you don't have any proof whatsoever. What a surprise.

              Typical denier tactic. Just make something up, repeat it ad nauseum, ignore requests for evidence, claim victory, make something else up, repeat that add nauseum etc etc etc etc.

              There are NO 'lists' of qualified climate scientists who dispute AGW because there aren't any qualified climate scientists who dispute AGW.

              The denial industry have even resorted to faking online polls that anyone with a degree is entitled to sign and then claiming that as 'evidence'.

              I kid you not - google 'Oregon Petition' if you doubt me. It's a motley list of assorted engineers, chemists and bottle-washers with a smattering of pop-singers and even one imaginary TV detective included!

              This is the sort of utter junk that the denial industry offer as 'proof'. Do you really think they would pull stunts like that if they had any genuine proof?

              Pathetic and desperate in equal measure,.

              Now that climate change is simply obvious and even the Republicans are begining to realise that ignorance is a vote loser the denial from the ignorati has become hysterical. Classic psychological reaction.

              1. Captain Save-a-ho
                Coat

                Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

                Google is your friend. Regardless of your AGW point of view, don't stand in your bully pulpit, ranting like a denier or believer idiot when ten seconds of searching produces:

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

                Pathetic? Likely, but the mirror isn't forgiving whether you bother to look into it or not. Geez.

            3. Burb

              @Andreas Koch Re: @ Burb - @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

              "Lazy, are we? I'm not going to play Russell's teapot with you; there's lists of them about, google it."

              Somehow I missed this reply yesterday. I think it was because I was looking out for a more substantial answer than you have been able to give.

              No - I am not lazy. I have been looking for an answer to this question for about 3 years now and I haven't found a convincing answer to it. The very few names I am aware of on the 'sceptic' side who seem to be close to genuinely qualified scientists have been debunked too many times to be taken seriously any more (e.g. Lindzen, who has all but admitted that his 'iris earth' theory was wrong, or Spencer, who has a string of well-documented errors under his belt as well as having admitted that one of the motivations for his opinions is his evangelical Christian beliefs).

              As for Freeman Dyson, his position is ambiguous as pointed out elsewhere, and I seem to recall that his statements have been of a very general nature and have revealed that he has not made much of an effort in getting up to speed on climate science.

              1. Tom 13

                Re: looking for an answer to this question for about 3 years now

                Then you are an incompetent searcher or don't know much about basic science.

                It took me about 3 hours with Google once to figure out how crappy the assertions of the The Holy Church of Man-Caused Global Warming are. I followed the link to a paper on the model and read some of the basic assumptions. One in particular caught my eye: the one where they assume constant solar output for their model to simplify things. Then I went and looked up measured solar radiative output. First up, the number on the charts I found for measure output was 1-3% above the assumed number for the calculation. That's a really bad start. Then I found measurable variation in the solar output. So they don't even make it out of the starting gate.

                Full disclosure: I went looking for it because more than 20 years ago during the semester I was taking Astro 440 (which included calculating radiative outputs for the sun depending on certain assumptions about transfer), or as I called it Applied Mathematics, as my 3rd math course for the semester, I finally realized math and I don't get along well enough for me to have gone into the field. I did manage to understand a fair bit of the radiative transfer theory though. And the bottom line was, beyond some ideas about the nuclear reaction chain, we don't know squat about how the sun really shines. If you can't calculate that, you don't have a baseline from which to work your CO2 theory. If you don't have a baseline, you don't have anything.

                You want to know why we keep working to refine the measured distance of an AU, even though we know it to more than 4 decimals in the Celestial Goofy Shit* system (CGS, or centimeter, gram, second for you non-astro types)? It's because when your baseline is long enough, those missing decimal places work out to billions of light years. The same thing applies to repetitive feedback mechanisms.

                *Why the name? Because, I mean really?! When you know from the outset that you're going to wind up putting a 'x 10^Y' in your notation, why would you intentionally add more digits to the exponents than you need to?

          2. Tom 13

            Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

            2. Tell me what their credentials are.

            Real scientists don't give a shit what your credentials are. Only whether or not your data supports your theory.

            3. Tell me what their theories are.

            Show me you raw data first.

        2. Leslie Graham

          Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

          There are NO climate "scientists who say the opposite". Or they so vanishlingly small in number as to be irrelevant. You always get a couple of cranks in any crowd.

          Even 'skeptics' like John Christie and Roy Spencer don't dispute that CO2 is causing global warming. They just didn't think it was going to happen as fast as it.

          The denial industry have made it a priority to attack the consensus and spend millions of dollars spreading misinformation to that effect. They don't have to do any research so a few million bucks buys a LOT of lies.

          You have obviously fallen victim to some of these lies.

          If the denial industry had any proof that the near unanimous consensus wasn't a fact they would cite it.

          But of course they cant'. All they can do is wheel out the same tiny handfull of shills and fake 'experts' over and over again. These people have become household names due to their extreme rarity and the fact that the same few are paraded repeatedly.

          Stop parrotting the same old thousand-times-faslsified denierblog junk. We don't have time for flat earthers any longer.

          1. Slawek

            Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

            Perhaps you should spend less time writing on "denial industry" and go to e.g. http://climateaudit.org/ and check how crappy the "climate change science" is.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: @ AC 0647hGMT - Whatever.

              @Slawek

              Perhaps you should spend less time writing encomiums about a website run largely by Steve McIntyre, a non-scientist mining-industry veteran and CGX Energy (oil and gas exploration) consultant who attempts to discredit true, peer-reviewed client science, and instead get a copy of the McIntyre (and McKitrick) paper, “Corrections to the Mann et al. [1998] Proxy Database and Northern Hemisphere Average Temperature Series" published in the industry-centric Energy and Environment in 2003, which famously tried to discredit Michael Mann's "hockey stick". Read it, and then try to justify their removal of a shedload of Mann's publicly available proxy data, and their misunderstandings – distortions? – of other of Mann et al.'s data for any reason other than merely to prove him wrong.

    2. Thought About IT
      Thumb Down

      Re: Whatever.

      "Climate changes. That's a fact. We do not know why."

      Rule #1 for astroturfers: get in first and sow the seeds of doubt. Check!

    3. Michael 31

      Re: Whatever.

      It is not hubris.

      Humans current put 36 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year - about 1% of the total already there. CO2 is in an infrared active gas and it has to be doing >SOMETHING<. It is extremely unlikely that we could put this much infrared-active gas into the atmosphere and it have no effect. You can calculate the likely effects and every calculation from the three line one on the back of an envelope to the results of Earth Simulators predicts pretty much the same - that it should warm the Earth a bit. Why can you not acknowledge this?

      And we do understand pretty much most of the factors that have affected climate change historically. It would be nice to have another planet to play with - but actually we only have this one, and personally, I don't want to experiment with it.

      M

    4. Tom 79

      Re: Whatever.

      >is hubris at best.

      Yes, but how silly we are to suggest that humans can do anything that nature can't recover from. You are correct, nature will recover, but we might not. See giant layer of dinosaur bones for evidence of this happening in the past.

      1. Rukario
        Angel

        Re: Whatever.

        > See giant layer of dinosaur bones for evidence of this happening in the past.

        But... but... but...

        They were only put there to test our faith!

    5. Leslie Graham

      Re: Whatever.

      "We do not know why".

      What ridiculous drivel. OF COURSE we know why!

      Just because YOU don't know the schoolboy basics doesn't mean everyone else is ignorant too.

      We have known all the main forcings for climate change for decades - well over a century in the case of variations in CO2 levels.

      We have known that CO2 is a 'greenhouse gas' since 1896 and it was long-suspected before that.

      By the time G N Plass published "The CO2 theory of climate change" in 1956 it was already mainstream science and every study since then has only served to reinforce the theory. There is now a consensus of evidence and it is a 'robust theory'. Which in laymans terms translates to a scientific fact. It is as much a fact as the theory of gravity and the theory of evolution.

      Deal with it.

      The other forcings such as the orbital and axial variations that result in the Milankovitch Cycles, the variations in sun activity and the cooling effect of volcanic eruptions are also well understood and have been for decades.

      In the distant past - every sinle time CO2 levels have risen as a result of the Milankovitch Cycles so has the global temperature. The laws of physics don't care if the CO2 is outgassing from some ancient ocean or is coming from humans burning 35 billion tons of fossil fuels every year. They just do their thing regardless.

      Every single time.

    6. Vociferous

      Re: Whatever.

      Hahahahaha yeah, and the ocean is so vast that it's hubris at best to think humans could ever pollute it!

      The fishes of the ocean are so numerous that it is hubris at best to think that humans could ever deplete the stocks!

      The rainforests of the world are so enormous that it is hubris at best to think we could ever cut them down!

      The oil reserves of the world are so huge that it is hubris at best to think that they would ever run out!

      The buffalo herds are so big that it is hubris at best to think that they could ever be hunted to extinction!

      Seriously, even for an argument from ignorance yours is the dumbest I've ever seen. Not just because there are countless examples of humans affecting vast resources, but because _we actually know that humans are increasing the CO2 level of the atmosphere_.

    7. ElectricRook
      Trollface

      Re: Whatever.

      The only fact I see, is the political hacks are going to make serious bank ($$) from whatever regulations they get passed.

    8. td97402

      Re: Whatever.

      Your assert that there is no actual proof of humanity contributing to climate change. So we are to take your word that there is no proof? Let me reword your statement a bit...

      "Assuming humans aren't causing it, without actual proof, is asinine at best."

    9. fzz

      Re: Whatever.

      Science isn't about proof as you probably mean it. It's about stating a hypothesis that fits observations, then trying to refute the hypothesis. Those which can't be refuted after some considerable effort to do so are accepted until they are refuted.

      Observing correlations doesn't prove causality. Until we observe gravitons, we can't prove the causal mechanism for gravity, but we get by pretty well with Newton's and Einstein's theories of gravity.

      With regard to US Republican legislators, we know guns with bullets kill and injure tousands of people per year, and most of those killings and injuries are either due to criminal intent or accident rather than to people defending themselves, but Republican legislators are as immune to that evidence as they are to evidence of man-made climate change.

      Simple faith is bliss.

    10. Rampant Spaniel

      Re: Whatever.

      There are many factors we believe affect climate, solar activity, atmospheric composition, variations in orbit, ocean flows, size and position of continents etc etc.

      It is a complex system with atmospheric composition only being one part. Are humans affecting the system, it is probably wise we consider at least that we may be affecting it for now and look at several things

      1- The ways we are affecting it,

      2- If there are sane ways we can reduce any impact should there be one

      3- Ways to adapt to changes (hotter and colder, wetter and drier) that will happen anyway.

      No matter if we are or aren't causing climate change it is something we would do well to better understand anyway. History has shown us the climate does change. It would also be wise to have some independent answers on how releasing certain gases in large quantities may affect the weather. Right now either outright denying any kind of climate change or believing we are the only cause and throwing economies into chaos is both silly and seemingly what people seem to actually be doing. We don't know for sure. We should better understand it and even if we aren't doing much to cause it we should be able to deal with the effects. A big issue is global consensus, theres bugger all point doing much by way of prevention if other large countries can negate huge efforts by throwing up coal power stations on a weekly basis. Get some credibility back into the 'science', get some perspective into the discussion and then maybe we can begin to make some progress. Non human related climate change is probably something we will have to deal with anyway.

      Just to clarify \ may etc above is just to indicate that I do not know for sure that we are causing it, not that I fully believe we are or are not.

    11. veti Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: Whatever.

      What would "actual proof" look like, in this case? Can you put together a thought experiment that would convince you?

      If not, you're just blowing smoke.

      1. Tom 13

        Re: Can you put together a thought experiment that would convince you?

        Sure.

        A model that accurately predicts the climate for the next 15 years and then matches it.

        Which is why I reject the current warmist agenda. Five years ago you said we couldn't claim the current lull in global warming proved anything because until you got to 20 years of data you weren't outside the normal variability of the system. Now that we're closing in on the magic number from your last defense, you've thrown out a new number. Just like those end of the world preachers who finally gave up.

    12. doughensley

      Re: Whatever.

      We who agree with the scientists and with some of the policymakers on this point think we have proof. Our reasons may not seem convincing to you but they are reasons, not assumptions. Have you looked at our reasons? Considered them in good faith?

      (1) CO2 absorbs IR radiation. This goes back to John Tyndall and the 19th century. Pretty solidly established fact.

      (2) The earth's heat balance involves sunlight in and IR out. To balance when the IR has to fight its way through a layer of CO2, the earth has to initially radiate more, at a higher temperature. This is pretty basic thermodynamics and it's confirmed by the fact that the moon, without any CO2 or water vapor to speak of, averages considerably colder than the earth.

      (3) Atmospheric CO2 is increasing because of human fossil fuel use. This is pretty solid too. Who can pretend that we don't burn coal for electricity? Who can explain the rise in CO2 over the last century from about 300 parts per million to now near 400, as being a natural fluctuation?

      (4) It's warmer than it was a century ago. This might be put down to natural events, but in view of 1, 2, and 3, it seems to us more likely to be our own doing.

      (5) This is just a thumbnail sketch. For more details, go to realclimate.org or wikipedia.

      1. Tom 13

        Re: Whatever.

        Except that even armchair scientists know

        (2) While ultimately the radiative transfer is responsible for cooling, at lower levels the density of the atmosphere makes convection the dominating cooling transfer. In some locations you also have conduction as the primary cooling transfer. Also, what exactly are the data on the CO2 densities at which atmospheric levels? If you're assuming it is constant as a percentage through out the whole atmospheric shell, I don't need a reference article to know you've got your ass hanging out the car window on the autobahn.

        (3)a The output of CO2 from burning coal can be readily calculated. A decade of us burning across all the continents on the surface of the planet is less than the CO2 output of a single volcanic event like Mt. St Helens. Furthermore, the volcanic eruption will put the CO2 into the atmosphere at much higher altitude than a factory smokestack, so it has less chance of interacting with trees and plants to be converted to sugar. If CO2 were to have the strongly coupled affect on temperature as claimed, we should see measurable shifts that correspond to each similar volcanic eruption in history. We don't.

        (3)b 1. Lack of evidence of a natural source to increase CO2 is not proof of a lack of natural sources. 2. I gave you one such source in (3)a above, but you deny it's truth.

        (4) Do you see that bit above where I mention my astro background? Yeah, I got news for you baby. This Creationist can guarantee you that even for a 6000 year old Earth, your data baseline isn't nearly long enough to predict anything. If I put it into the context of a 6 million year old Earth as required by Evolutionists, your data baseline ain't even a pimple on a gnat's butt.

        1. doughensley

          Re: Whatever.

          You are in error in the claim that the Mt. St. Helens incident released more CO2 than a decade of world industrial activity. In fact, the release was insignificant by comparison to our industrial output. This can be seen from a glance at the graph of CO2 concentrations, month by month, as measured atop Mauna Loa in Hawaii. The same goes for any other eruption since the beginning of the collection of the CO2 data for that graph.

          It shows no significant spike. Certainly nothing comparable to the total of any ten recent year over year changes. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keeling_Curve for details.

      2. Bob Armstrong
        Boffin

        Re: Whatever. : Tyndall

        @ doughensley : I found it quite interesting that in his 1861 talk Tyndall pointed out that a good absorber is also a good radiator . CO2's spectrum cannot , for instance , explain the surface temperature of Venus being 2.25 times a gray ball in its orbit .

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

    New satellite dataset finds global temperatures decreased from 1982-2006 http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/new-satellite-dataset-finds-global.html

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

      Yawn... Dream on, dream on, dream on.

    2. John Bailey
      FAIL

      Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

      Climate change denier uses cherry picked out of context data to mislead.

      Surprised? Not really.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

      might be worthwhile reading a paper (even just the abstract) before presenting it as evidence to support your opposite view.

      "Temperature reductions MOST LIKELY DUE TO INCREASED CLOUDINESS" i.e. the air is warmer and holds more water.

      The areas where a 'significant temperature increase were found' are "explained in terms of major human interventions in the hydrological balance at the earth surface"

    4. Vociferous

      Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

      The article you're referring to is published in "Energy and Environment", a junk.science mag which deniers use because _it isn't peer reviewed_. One can publish anything there, and the deniers do. That specific paper makes a lot of erroneous assumptions, and would not have been publisheable in a real science journal.

      And, in other news: "NASA scientists say 2012 was the ninth warmest of any year since 1880, continuing a long-term trend of rising global temperatures. With the exception of 1988, the nine warmest years in the 132-year record all have occurred since 2000, with 2010 and 2005 ranking as the hottest years on record." http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20130115/

      1. Ross Nixon

        Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

        Peer Review (unfortunately) makes little difference these days. Just look at the cosy club of global warming alarmists at East Anglia's Climate Research Unit to easily see that.

        P.S. Please post a reliable link to these so-called "erroneous assumptions", if you can, thanks!

        1. Don Jefe
          Facepalm

          Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

          Peer review makes no difference? Really? Christ.

          It's a shame the award for the dumbest comment was already given out. Try again next time but do try and get your entry in sooner.

    5. John Hughes
      Mushroom

      Re: Cold enough yet? No? Just wait...

      "A new peer-reviewed paper published in Energy & Environment ".

      What? E&E? "peer-reviewed"!

  4. Julian Bond

    There is no possibility of action; The crash is coming.

    Because of human nature It's very, very unlikely we'll change. So we'd better work out how to deal with it. Or we can just leave it to our great-grandchildren to work our how to deal with it.

    As for the puppets above, you need a new pair of socks. Those one's have got holes in them and I can see your fingers moving.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I'm looking forward to it, actually.

      The only reason I really bother to live my boring pointless little life is there is a really big LOL on the horizon when humanity, en masse, realises just how screwed they have let themselves become. All the waling and whining and name-calling and blame-pointing and general gnashing of teeth will be tedious in the long run, I guess, but in a way, it will also be a most amusing spectacle to behold.

  5. David Leigh 1

    Utter tosh

    '[O]ur world continues to warm, with the last decade the hottest in modern records, and the deep ocean warming faster than the earth's atmosphere. Sea level is rising. Arctic Sea ice is melting years faster than projected."

    Every single one of these claims is utter tosh, unless you happen to be one of the many 'scientists' making a very handsome living out of scaring idiot politicians into paroxysms of fear and angst.

    Anyone who believes this nonsense probably believes that windmills with diesel generator back-up (STOR) is a sensible replacement for gas/nuclear/coal power generation. (I'm not joking, this crass plan is being implemented by our pathetic government).

    BTW Anonymous Coward (and I can understand why you want to remain anonymous!) 'Hundreds of credentialed climate scientists' is a figure taken from a widely discredited 'survey' of allegedly 12,000 scientists. Once you dig into the figures, you will find that a grand total of 65 actually agreed with that statement. (http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/5/prweb10772757.htm)

    1. Burb

      Re: Utter tosh

      "BTW Anonymous Coward (and I can understand why you want to remain anonymous!) 'Hundreds of credentialed climate scientists' is a figure taken from a widely discredited 'survey' of allegedly 12,000 scientists. Once you dig into the figures, you will find that a grand total of 65 actually agreed with that statement. (http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/5/prweb10772757.htm)"

      This is nonsense. The arguments being made in these 'discreditings' are like saying that biologists do not agree with the theory of evolution because they do not explicitly say so in every abstract of every paper that they publish.

      Incidentally, there have been a few similar surveys over the years, with slightly differing methodologies, and they have all reached broadly the same conclusion. I am not aware of any surveys to the contrary, certainly nothing with any degree of rigour.

    2. Burb

      Re: Utter tosh

      " '[O]ur world continues to warm, with the last decade the hottest in modern records, and the deep ocean warming faster than the earth's atmosphere. Sea level is rising. Arctic Sea ice is melting years faster than projected."

      Every single one of these claims is utter tosh..."

      Why? Just because you say so?

      1. TheOtherHobbes

        Re: Utter tosh

        It's the 'Don' wanna clean my room you can't make me!' school of climate commentary.

        Which is basically the misguided fantasy that the opinion of a know-nothing who reads a bit of news on the Internets is worth exactly the same as the opinion of professionals with PhDs and at least a decade of experience.

        We don't do any other kind of engineering or planning like that in our culture. Which is why when we build things they usually work and don't fall down (unless someone stops maintaining them, or corners are cut for 'economic reasons.')

        The wider problem - the huge, planet-destroying uber-problem - is that we do still run politics, economics, and a lot of business on the basis that the people best qualified to run things are assholes with a vastly inflated, impractical, and utterly unrealistic view of the usefulness of their cognitive skills and talents.

        And that basically all you need for success is opinionation+self-serving childish bullshit.

    3. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      Re: Utter tosh

      "Every single one of these claims is utter tosh, unless you happen to be one of the many 'scientists' making a very handsome living out of scaring idiot politicians into paroxysms of fear and angst."

      OK. An opinion.

      Now, in the interests of a balanced view, can you think of any parties with vested interests in continuing to drill / frack / dig and convert sources of energy, which took millions of years to form, and at ever-increasing rates? And any economies whose continued fingers-in-ears approach makes a few so much money short term that they'd rather sing La-La-La than think about where they're heading fast?

      What's that? You can't?

      Well, not a surprise, really, given that your post had certain ostrich-like / highly selective belief attributes about it.

      But, just so you know, we're not all that blind / stupid. You know, some of us give some credibility to the vast majority of experts, rather than worshiping an ever-diminishing band of La-La-La-Can't-Hear-You cultists.

    4. Leslie Graham

      Re: Utter tosh

      What desperate nonsense.

      You are seriously claiming that the Arctic isn't melting and then expect to be taken seriously in your other parrotted denierblog junk?

      Laughable.

      The last decade IS by far the hottest decade in at least 7,000 years.

      Simple, measurable, verifiable fact.

      http://planet3.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/marcott-B-1000-500x342.jpg

      The deep oceans ARE warming rapidly.

      Simple measurable fact from thousands of ARGO bouys.

      http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/AR4WG1SeaSurfaceTemp.jpg?711122

      Sea level IS rising.

      Simple measurement.

      http://www.aviso.oceanobs.com/en/news/ocean-indicators/mean-sea-level/

      80% of summer Arctic ice volume has melted in the last 35 years.

      Simple measurement.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YgiMBxaL19M

      There are hundreds of other studies that all confirm these examples.

      There are none that refute them.

      That you can post such utter rubbish with a straight face when it's so blatantly obvious you are talking the most absurd tosh is classic denier tactic. You have no shame whatsoever.

      1. uncredited

        Re: Utter tosh

        > The deep oceans ARE warming rapidly.

        > Simple measurable fact from thousands of ARGO bouys.

        > http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/AR4WG1SeaSurfaceTemp.jpg?711122

        Well four out of five studies on the Argo data seem to indicate the exact opposite...

        http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/06/new-paper-on-argo-data-trenberths-ocean-heat-still-missing/

  6. MatsSvensson

    I don't like it!

    What if we make a world with clean air and water, and it turns out we did didn't have to after all?

    Then what, Mr smarty sientist?

    1. cosymart
      Megaphone

      Re: I don't like it!

      I for one have no objections to a world with clean air and water, and that in it's self is an admirable goal. I am just not convinced that climate warming is solely attributable to mankind. I didn't say mankind is not having an effect just not 100% attributable.

      1. Steve Knox

        Re: I don't like it!

        I didn't say mankind is not having an effect just not 100% attributable.

        No sane person is claiming that 100% of climate change is anthropogenic. The problem is that the % that is attributable to human causes is growing and has reached a point where its effects are noticeable and in many cases negative. Furthermore, our share is reaching (well, in the case of some models has reached) a level where it becomes difficult if not impossible to stop or reverse.

        If you wish to discount the models of the consequences, I understand that -- there are some valid reasons to doubt them.

        But if you simply take the mathematics1 of our inputs into the system, along with observed effects of similar experimental systems and observed measurements of the actual system over time, it's pretty clear that we are causing significant changes to climate without understanding or preparing for the consequences.

        And significant change without understanding the consequences is the very antithesis of the conservative2 philosophy.

        1 I find this piece: http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/08/recipe-for-climate-change/ covers it quite nicely.

        2 I'm talking actual conservatism here, of course, not the self-serving reactionary political conservatism of US Republicans, for example.

      2. FredBloggsY
        Facepalm

        Re: I don't like it!

        "I for one have no objections to a world with clean air and water, and that in it's self is an admirable goal. I am just not convinced that climate warming is solely attributable to mankind. I didn't say mankind is not having an effect just not 100% attributable."

        Does *anyone* claim that mankind is 100% responsible?

        Do you *think* that anyone does?

        You know what? I'm not convinced that Mr. Jones of Surbiton is 100% responsible for traffic accidents.

        Good. Now that we've discredited the '100% responsible' beliefs we can move on to more productive debate.

    2. itzman
      Thumb Down

      Re: I don't like it!

      First of wall, what IS clean air and water?

      The air for example is full of water, nitrogen, oxygen, sulphur and nitorogen dioxide methane radon bugs bacilli, spores, pollens, dust volcanic ash and the odd meteor and carbon 14 atom and not a little high energy cosmic rays.

      Te seas are full of even worse. Just about anything that shits ends up with its shit in the seas. There is also methane., heavy metals, and lord knows what other muck in there.

      That's one point.

      Now think about cost. If we cripple the wortld economically and use every ounce of available energy is a massive effort to 'clean up the world' all we will achieve is almost zero people.

      Or is that the agenda?

      1. FutureShock999
        Mushroom

        @itzman - BULLSHIT

        Seriously, show me how installing carbon dioxide scrubbers on every coal power plant, continuing to cut emissions on autos, and building more nuke plants than coal plants over the next 40 years will "cripple" the world economy.

        Because THAT right there gets you a big CHUNK of improvement. And it's all technology that we know, have relatively mastered (with "clean" diesels and hybrid cars, and 4th Gen nuclear plants), and is available right now, in the marketplace.

        Yes, it might cost a few million per power plant to install and service scrubbers - but out of the total cost of the life of that powerplant, it's a pittance.

        What you are succumbing to is CORPORATE NOISE...that ANY single cent they have to spend that affects their stock price (and exec compensation) one millionth of one percent is ECONOMIC DOOM FOR US ALL. And that's just SELF-SERVING CORPORATE BULLSHIT - designed by business to ensure that it doesn't have to suffer even the _slightest_ impact on it's stockprice (and thus exec compensation, which is usually linked to it). Despite a multi-year recession, America has cut joblessness from over 9% to 7.4% over the past few years. CORPORATE PROFITS and WALL STREET are at an all time high - higher even than before the crash.

        Do you really, really believe their FUCKING BULLSHIT that "oh, we can't afford to save the planet, and it isn't necessary anyway....blah blah blah"???

        Sucker.

        Do you know how LITTLE the seas have to rise to basically wipe out the harbours and shipping terminals that the world relies upon for global trade? And nearly every major city is built on a waterfront. You worry about the costs of lessening CO2? Worry about the cost of relocating many major cities away from their current locations, and doing it relatively fast - say in a 50 year timespan. TRILLIONS of dollars wouldn't even start to cover it.

        Those CEOs who's noise you believe will be on their private, secured, ranches in Montana, or on the hilltops of their private islands, when it all goes to shit. Where will you or your children be?

        1. Nial

          Re: @itzman - BULLSHIT

          > Seriously, show me how installing carbon dioxide scrubbers

          > on every coal power plant

          Can you link to one working example of carbon capture technology?

          Nial.

          1. Tom 13

            Re: Can you link to one working example of carbon capture technology?

            Actually we've done a pretty good job at cleaning up the first 90% of all the pollutants in coal plants compared to say the 1940s. The problem is, after the big push back in the 70s all the easy conversions were done. So we're now working on either the hugely expensive ones, or trying to get the same benefits out of that last 10% that we got cleaning up the first 90%. The Warmists won't admit to this, because it makes their wailing less effective. If you know you've spent $2 billion cleaning up 90% of what you can, and that the next 9% is going to cost $200 billion, the head has a better chance of winning against the heart.

            Of course this has been exacerbated by their "you have to do it all or don't do anything" with respect to coal (at least in the US). If part of a coal facility breaks you can either repair the equipment at the level at which it was installed, or you can refit the entire plant with current technology. You can't just refit the part that broke with current technology to reduce your pollution output for that part of the plant.

      2. Naughtyhorse

        Re: I don't like it!

        And you think a 5 degree increase in global average temp will be good for wall st?

        Or is that just someone elses problem?

        dolt

        1. Nial

          Re: I don't like it!

          > And you think a 5 degree increase

          Which 'peer reviewed' paper did you get this from?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I don't like it!

      4 choices:

      1. Do nothing. The scientific consensus is shown to be wrong - carry on as now.

      2. Do nothing. The scientific consesus is shown to be accurate - our children and grand-children die.

      3. Do something. The scientific consensus is shown to be wrong - huge economic costs with no benefit.

      4. Do something. The scientific consesus is shown to be accurate - our children and grand-children albeit at huge economic costs.

      Place your bet.

      1. MonkeyCee

        Re: I don't like it!

        How about:

        5. Do things that create efficiency (insulation, grid infrastructure improvements, grid balancing through stored power, smart controls for load balancing) that prove to be worthwhile regardless of outcome.

        In general, no-one can deny climate change. At all. It's sheer insanity, not just that it's in a fairly rapid change at the moment (we live 80-100 years, that the climate changes during our lifetime is a pretty big thing I'd have thought) but there's both long term (~400,000 years) and short term (victorian chilliness) evidence that climate change happens, is real, and is gonna happen again.

        So it's more a question of what we do (including nothing) in terms of reacting. If it is being pushed faster by human action, then I fear we're past the point of doing anything realistic about it. Well, non-psychotic realistic. Lots of things work if you wipe out 80% of the population....

        Whilst I believe in climate change, and AGW, the worrying thing for global warming is it's been part of the NWO from the 60's as being the cause that the world will agree that governments can't by themselves solve this issue, hence justifying a world government. Like a number of my beliefs that a decade ago would have been considered pretty nut job* maybe this will just be accepted in the future. I mean, it's clear multinationals are clearly running rings around the laws of nation states, so who governs them? But as I say, anything that seems too much like we're being herded makes my hair prickle.

        *Chiefly Bilderburg. Not anything zany like they sacrifice virgins and drink their blood, but that the 0.001% controlling 50%+ of the world's wealth and resources get together for a cozy chat, and that this happens to always include the leaders of the political parties from wither side of the aisle from the major countries. Got laughed at, asked if they're lizards, do they drink blood etc. Now it's the upmarket G8/G20, and it even has a press office.

      2. Birdulon
        Joke

        Re: our children and grand-children die.

        So ¾ of the outcomes are our descendants being immortal then?

    4. Tom 13

      Re: Then what, Mr smarty sientist?

      Be flippant if that's your thing.

      As for me, I'd rather not have the deaths of a billion or two human beings on my hands over a religious agenda. But maybe that's a Christian thing that doesn't bother the godless.

  7. bri

    The problem is approach

    It is with great level of certainty evident that the planet (well, its surface and atmosphere anyway) is warming up. We can bicker whodunnit, but this is going to solve nothing.

    At best there are people who are eager to 'do their part' in curbing emissions with some often hysterical actions. But climate has enormous, enormous inertia. The same applies to the global society (not to be confused with western society). Westerners are small minority now with unfavourable demographics. We and our actions are starting to be less and less relevant.

    Biggest green leap has been achieved in many western countries by outsourcing to China and India with net loss for global environment. We tend to think that when we do something 'green' , it will have some real impact. Well, there are 6 bn people who beg to differ and want the same level of comfort we have, regardless.

    Even if majority of westerners climb back up trees, it will be only a blip in the global society given the cold demographics facts and time.

    All in all what we do now in prevention etc. is fairly likely not going to cut it given the scale and inertia. And I feel that this is also a fact.

    We have to focus on developing technologies that will enable us to adapt and transform our environment to be more resilient in the face of violent weather, disruptions of energy grids, draught here and flood there with at least the same zeal as the one manifested today in 'prevention'. Otherwise there will be violent weather AND violent turbulences in society. We can still prevent the second from happening.

    1. itzman
      FAIL

      Re: The problem is approach

      It is no longer even certain that the world IS warming up any more. Certainly the second differential is negative - rate of warming are slowing, not accelerating, whereas CO2 content is accelerating.

      It s all very well for the warmists to scratch around for reasons why this is so, but why didn't they scratch around before? And if they missed one significant effect, how many more have they missed?

      And as far as human political decisions are concerned, a theory that may well be right, but needs correcting to such an extent that its predictive value is now meaningless, is about as much use as a chocolate teapot.

      One again the Bandar Log are out in force 'we all say it, so it must be true' - but wiser denizens of the jungle have learnt to ignore their mindless chatter, and indeed the lumps of shit they throw down on everybody.

      AGW isn't dead yet, but its sure beginning to smell that way. And these last desperate attempts to prop it up are the death throes of an industry whose mythology and marketing is predicated on the assumption its true. And that industry is in serious financial trouble.

      Not the least because its cosmetic remedies are utterly and completely ineffective at combating the very effect they were legislated to do.

      AGW isn't science any more, it's business and marketing, and this is what happens when you believe too much in the spin.

      http://www.platts.com/latest-news/electric-power/london/german-coal-fired-power-rises-above-50-in-first-26089429

      Nuclear power generates more electricity in Germany than ALL renewables? more CO2 is being emitted than ever before?

      Electricity prices up by three, no end to nuclear, and carbon emission on the rise?

      That's not what was supposed to happen, after a trillion dollars has been tossed into the 'Energiewiende' was it?

      That there has been something rotten in the state of Denmark has been tacitly accepted by those in the know. That the stench has now settled over Germany is becoming apparent, as the golden parachute erupts out of the boardroom windows at Siemens AG, with times proving 'difficult' for its renewables division, and offshore windfarms are standing idle because no one can afford the extension cable to plug them into a grid that cant handle the peak flows anyway.

      All seems well in the climate change/ renewables industry. Millions of PR agencies and spin merchants are orchestrating a concerted attack on the public consciousness, but the reality under the glossy optimism and the Climate Of Fear FUD machine is observable to those who care to dig. Having summarily failed to deliver either any accurate predictions, or any actual emissions reduction, the money is pouring into the press releases, to get even more subsidies, on the basis that something that has already failed, must, like banks, be bailed out with yet more taxpayer money.

      Its not the end, it may not even be the beginning of the end, but its the send of the beginning.

      There are only so many times one can cry 'wolf'

      And indulge in manifest Belling of the Cat.

      1. bri
        WTF?

        @itzman

        Well, everything today is marketing, global warming as well as anti-global warming, there is shrill hysterics in both camps. There is too much emotion and too little honest science and engineering.

        What you have failed to observe is that what I said is we need to refocus on infrastructure and make it more resilient and adaptable (while still pursuing ways to prevent global warming as a hedge). Extreme weather incidents are more and more expensive as we grow more prosperous, so even if the global warming alarmism of today is unfounded, we'd benefit from this (on the contrary, from the CO2 curbing alone we'd benefit very little should that be the case).

        However, the climate is ALWAYS changing. Granted, usually on far longer timescale, but it IS changing. We've had spells of cold as well as of warm in our history and it usually had profound effect on the wellbeing of the affected society, changing rain patterns, cold weather causing famine ... If we are to live in prosperity, we need to invest in resilience and flexibility.

      2. FredBloggsY
        Facepalm

        Re: The problem is approach

        "AGW isn't science any more, it's business and marketing, and this is what happens when you believe too much in the spin."

        And "Denism" *is*science?

        And *isn't" business and marketing?

        And you *don't* believe too much in the spin?

        1. Don Jefe
          Happy

          Re: The problem is approach

          Is "Denism" even a word?

          1. This post has been deleted by its author

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: The problem is approach

            "Is "Denism" even a word?"

            Refers to the belief one should live in a den, perhaps ...

            1. Tom 13

              Re: should live in a den, perhaps ...

              No, that would be spelled with two n's.

    2. Naughtyhorse

      Re: The problem is approach

      not strictly true as your average merkin produces about a gazzilion times the crap that your typical sub saharan african dude does. Factor that in and the relatively small number if first worlders has a significantly greater impact that you are making out

      1. bri

        Re: The problem is approach

        That's the reason I wrote about demographic facts in *time* - in the context of climate we are talking about 20, 30 or 50 years' timeframes. This is not a matter of 5 years...

        A few years ago there were almost no cars in China. Look there now. What about India and other fast growing countries? Subsaharan Africa is a poverty poster child and I completely agree that they are incomparable to the US for instance. Still, there are some fast growing economic powerhouses that are playing catch-up vigorously while having population many times larger in total than US and Eurpe combined.

        People there are feeling the progress, they are better off now than before. This whets their appetite for more. This is only natural and we should acknowledge the fact and plan accordingly.

    3. doughensley

      Re: The problem is approach

      China has a huge stake in limiting the scope of climate change. They're big enough that their share of the damage due to their own fossil fuel use is greater than what it would cost them to mitigate it. They're also big enough that if they can cut a deal with the US to both reduce emissions, everybody wins.

      China also has a big solar PV industry and stands to rake in some offsetting profits to soften the blow of the costs she'll bear in the short term by limiting construction of coal-fired generating plants.

      With the US and China on board, it ought to be possible to persuade more of the world to step up as well. Trade advantages and disadvantages could be deployed to add weight to the persuasion.

      The cost of transitioning to wind, solar and nuclear is far from ruinous. With some luck in the R&D department, we might even come out ahead. Sunlight, after all, is free. Coal is not.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "There is no longer any credible scientific debate about the basic facts,"

    That's only because Climate Change Believers do everything they can to stifle genuine scientific discussion on the subject. The "evidence" is only clear if you refuse to consider any data which contradicts their believe that man is responsible for climate change.

    Climate change is natural, they question is by how much man's activities are affecting natural change. And despite what these "believers" want you to think, that argument is still open for discussion. At least, it would be if they didn't jump down the throat of anyone who dares to question the percieved wisdom that man IS responsible.

    Just because a majority believes something does not automatically mean it is true.

    1. Burb

      "Just because a majority believes something does not automatically mean it is true."

      True. I would expect that a majority of people in the USA, for example, do not believe that AGW is true.

      The real question is the majority of whom, their credibility and their credentials. I am still waiting for a alternative consilient scientific theory that explains the evidence as well as the the current mainstream understanding of climate. Let me know if you can point me towards one.

      1. Naughtyhorse

        Duhhh!

        It's the decline of pirates, as any fule kno!

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

    2. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      >Just because a majority believes something does not automatically mean it is true.

      And just because a minority of deniers believes something... similarly?

      1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
        Flame

        "And just because a minority of deniers believes something... similarly?"

        Umm...no.

        "I believe..." means just that. No evidence required.

        "I don't believe..." means just that. No evidence required.

        On the other hand, a "believer" will continue to believe while a "non-believer" is likely to change their outlook based on evidence.

        Now, we get to "deniers". Denying something due to lack of evidence is neither belief. nor non-belief

        Denier != non-believer.

        1. Steve Knox
          Boffin

          Wooly language

          "And just because a minority of deniers believes something... similarly?"

          Umm...no.

          "I believe..." means just that. No evidence required.

          "I don't believe..." means just that. No evidence required.

          On the other hand, a "believer" will continue to believe while a "non-believer" is likely to change their outlook based on evidence.

          Now, we get to "deniers". Denying something due to lack of evidence is neither belief. nor non-belief

          Denier != non-believer

          If I read your post correctly, you're saying that a denier is not a non-believer, it's an anti-believer. If that's what you're trying to say, than the reversal you disagreed with is a sensible argument. It's essentially saying that if the quantity of people who take a positive position with respect to proposition A is not an indicator of A's truthfulness then logically the quantity of people who take a negative position with respect to A is not an indicator of A's falsehood.

          Your description of believers and non-believers illustrates one of the woolier aspects of our language: we dont have a good phrase for "I believe that not" and many people confuse it with "I do not believe" which is a different statement entirely. The point is, belief isn't a two- or even a three-state quality. It's a spectrum comprising:

          True believers -- those who would believe A regardless of any evidence.

          Casual believers -- those who believe A, but who would be swayed by a certain level of evidence.

          Non-believers -- those for whom the evidence is not significant enough to prove or disprove A, or those who simply don't care.

          Casual deniers -- those who believe A is false, but who would be swayed by a certain level of evidence.

          True deniers -- those who believe A is false regardless of any evidence.

          (There are other dimensions to belief as well, such as the degree to which one will go to affirm or deny the proposition, but the spectrum suffices for the original statement.)

          Given that, I would rephrase the original statement and the reversing corollary as:

          Human nature being what it is, the average level of belief or denial of a given proposition A is a recipriversexcluson1 -- i.e, it is anything but the actual level of truth of proposition A.

          1as defined in Adams, D. Life, the Universe, and Everything

    3. Vociferous

      No, the reason there no longer is any credible scientific debate about the basic facts is because THAT debate was held in the 80's, and is long since settled.

      That the oil industry and their astroturf disagree, is irrelevant.

    4. ElectricRook
      FAIL

      have the facts, lost the data

      The anthropomorphic climate change folks are long on the facts, but they unfortunately lost the supporting data. Kinda "the dog ate my homework" line. But hey, they got the facts.

      1. Rukario
        Linux

        anthropomorphic climate change

        Show me one credible study demonstrating that furries are responsible for climate change.

        (Tux because he's anthropomorphic.)

    5. John Hughes
      FAIL

      "That's only because Climate Change Believers do everything they can to stifle genuine scientific discussion on the subject."

      Projection.

  9. andreas koch

    What I have yet to hear

    is the freaking 100's of scientists actually telling me what the correct temperature of the planet is, and at which point in time this was. On average, over the lifetime of Earth, temperatures will have been in the, for us, uninhabitable range.

    (Unless, of course, the world is 6000 years old. then we have a different picture: it's all the faggots (which GOD hates), hippies (HE really dislikes those) and foreigners (dubious, shifty bunch, all of them) that cause it, with their ungodly ways. WBC)

    OK. So, when exactly was the right temperature? When grand uncle Oliver was a little boy, the summers were always a lot warmer, I was assured; That's not it, then. 1748, maybe? 1491? 239 BCE? 15000 years ago? As this <annoying airquote with actual little curtsy> correct </annoying airquote with actual little curtsy> temperature seems to have happened at some arbitrary time and has an equally arbitrary value, I, for myself, declare the baseline to be the 19th of May, 219056 BCE. And 298.8K.

    1. Burb

      Re: What I have yet to hear

      "is the freaking 100's of scientists actually telling me what the correct temperature of the planet is, and at which point in time this was. On average, over the lifetime of Earth, temperatures will have been in the, for us, uninhabitable range."

      Just because the temperature has in the past been outside the habitable range for human civilisation as we know it and, left to its own devices, will do so in future isn't an excuse for forcing temperatures outside that range now. Obviously on long time scales there will be natural variations that might make things very uncomfortable for us but if we can survive a few centuries and continue the sort of technological progress seen in the last 100 years or so maybe we would have the technology to do something about it by then.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I don't really care.

    But if we coat every building with solar PV, and put more and more windmills up, (they already supply one quarter of the electricity of coal fired powerstations,) then we won't have to deal with backward countries like Saudi Arabia.

    1. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
      FAIL

      Re: I don't really care.

      But then you get a cold winter's night with a blocking high over western europe........

      1. itzman

        Re: I don't really care.

        Exactly...

        http://www.templar.co.uk/downloads/Renewable%20Energy%20Limitations.pdf

    2. itzman

      Re: I don't really care.

      I care. I care that a blatant lie like 'they supply one quarter of thee electricity of coal fired powerstations', is manifestly untrue.

      In the UK at least, using the most generous estimates for unmetered wind, wind supplied less than 20% of what coal did in the year 2013.

      Solar is barely worth mentioning.

      http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk

      By contrast, nuclear - even the 'old, grumpy, need-constant-maintenance' nuclear, supplied 70% of what coal did.

      1. Joel 1
        Headmaster

        Re: @itzman solar comment

        As solar is often used locally and generated locally, it doesn't appear on the gridwatch stats - it can only be determined in arrears when people report their generation stats.

        There is ~1.5GWp installed on domestic and business premises according to https://www.renewablesandchp.ofgem.gov.uk

        This is electricity that won't go anywhere near the metering that is reported on by NETA (source for data on gridwatch). It is produced onsite and used onsite (or in near vicinity).

        My panels produced 20KWh today in North Yorkshire. Whilst that is insignificant, multiplied by the 400,000 installations, it begins to add up. With a demand today of ~30GW, solar is probably in the region of 3% or so, which isn't including the output of the solar farms, who won't be running on FIT.

        So should be worth mentioning, and there are an awful lot of roofs left in the country. Why don't all warehouses cover their roofs with them?

        1. Tom 13

          @ Joel 1

          I've never bought the "not reported" argument in the Linux uptake threads, I'm not buying it here either.

          Solar has it's own problems which will eventually come home to roost. I'd rather have a new coal fired electrical plant next to my house than one manufactures solar panels which produce electricity.

    3. ElectricRook
      Unhappy

      Re: I don't really care.

      When PV installations can generate more power than it takes to install them we might be somewhere. Until then, we are operating at a net loss. If the US government ever stops funding solar and they actually have to be economical, then we will see if solar really works.

      1. Steven Hildebrand

        Re: I don't really care.

        ElectricRook

        "If the US government ever stops funding solar and they actually have to be economical, then we will see if solar really works."

        If the US government ever stops funding petroleum and they actually have to be economical, then we will see if fossil really works.

        1. Nial

          Re: I don't really care.

          > If the US government ever stops funding petroleum and they actually

          > have to be economical, then we will see if fossil really works.

          Are you REALLY saying the US oil industry would dry up if it wasn't for the money they're getting from the government?

          It's a funny old topsy turvy world some people live in.

  11. Denarius
    Trollface

    EPA, EPA, oh those process droids

    isn't this the organisation that refused Dutch and Norwiegen offers of help to mitigate the Deepwater Horizon overflow ? Process only cleaned up 98.5 % of oil and standard was 99.5% so best to let 100% of oil foul all and sundry. Yep, I trust people from that organisation with that track record.

    1. Don Jefe
      FAIL

      Re: EPA, EPA, oh those process droids

      People who knock the EPA either aren't old enough to remember how bad air and water quality got in the 70's or they willfully forget. 'Market Forces' chose to do nothing and forced the government to step in and make changes.

      Only a fool would want to go back to the days of the early 80's when everyday was a 'Code Red Air Quality' day. The air was so foul you couldn't even rank it; it was just fucked. If you think you're OK with that you can go visit Beijing, they've reached late 70's early 80's US levels of pollution and even they know it has to stop.

      1. Disco2000

        Re: EPA, EPA, oh those process droids

        The global warming scam is nothing to do with air pollution. Everyone, even us so-called 'climate-deniers' want clean air and clean water.

      2. Denarius
        Holmes

        Re: EPA, EPA, oh those process droids

        ah, the careful misread. Did I attack the EPA itself or its original goals ? Nope, forcing industry to clean up after itself is necessary. Until it costs the PHBs in the boardroom, its not their problem. However when a sensible goal like clean water gets ignored because arbitary standards are more important than reasonable application of sense one can tell the organisation has reached the third stage of bureaucracy,. This is where it has become counter productive to its original goals. Staffers from organisations at this stage tend to be unsurprisingly, process droids who follow current dominant mindsets. But I digress. So now again, why should a sane person trust representatives of an organisation in endstage irrelevance ? Lastly and probably more inflamatory, anytime I hear "scientific concensus" on any non-repeatable, nontestable, unfalsiable hypothesis I know some world view fanatic is prosletysing. And comitting censorship. No apologies for modern grammer fail either.

  12. Richard 126

    Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

    Hundreds of climate scientists believe in anthropogenic climate change.

    Hundreds of engineers believed the Titanic was unsinkable.

    Hundreds of engineers believed that the propellent sealing O-Rings on the Challenger space shuttle would withstand a launch in freezing temperatures.

    The fact that hundreds of qualified people believe something does not necessarily make it true.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

      Do you listen to yourself when you talk, or do you just drift in and out?

      There are of course examples where multiple experts are wrong, but picking them out as a basis for ignoring other experts is almost comical confirmation bias. It is the most naive form of anti-science blowharding. What about the literally millions of occasions on which ships haven't sunk, all the shuttles that didn't blow up, etc.? Are you proposing that a sensible means for deciding public policy is to find an expert in a particular area, and do the opposite of what they say? Because experts say that sugary foods make people fat, so perhaps we should be prescribing cake to diabetics...

      Yes there is a *chance* that the scientific consensus is wrong, but evidence-based evaluation suggests that risk is tiny compared to the risk of what happens if we do nothing and they were right.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

        Interesting that you choose to make you statements as an AC... some kind of interest in promoting belief in AGW have we?

        Here's one for your list, hundreds of scientists over decades assured the world that feeding extract of goat to cattle, was perfectly safe... and they were all wrong.

        Next time you want to tell us that scientific consensus is meaningful, and that we must all 'believe' them just to be safe, you might like to consider all the previous times they've been completely wrong, and fucked peoples lives completely.

        Scientific evidence... show us a model which actually works. Until you have one, fuck off with your speculative theories.

        1. Don Jefe
          Thumb Down

          Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

          You don't know what the word theory means do you?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

            Speculative = Engaged in, expressing, or based on conjecture rather than knowledge.

            Theory = A supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, esp. one based on general principles independent of the thing to be...: "Darwin's theory of evolution"

            So my use "speculative theories" was correct, in that it represents theories based upon conjecture rather than knowledge. The best part is having someone question its usage, presumably because they have an accurate climate model which works... or maybe some actual real evidence that man has 'caused' the greenhouse effect....

            Oh no that's right, the reasoning doesn't actually extend any further than "we produce CO2 and CO2 is 'bad', ergo we are bad, and we must therefore be the cause of the bad things which are happening"

            ^^ When that is the foundation of your claims you shouldn't be surprised when lots of us shout "show us the evidence"... "show us some evidence"... "show us a single piece of evidence"...

            And for evidence we're not talking about changes to the climate... they've always been happening. No we're talking about some kind of proof of causation between those events and mans activities.

        2. Naughtyhorse

          Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

          All those victims of science could have been saved....

          if they had died of smallpox as children

          fuckwit

    2. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

      "Hundreds of climate scientists believe in anthropogenic climate change.

      Hundreds of engineers believed the Titanic was unsinkable.

      Hundreds of engineers believed that the propellent sealing O-Rings on the Challenger space shuttle would withstand a launch in freezing temperatures."

      Is that repetition of "hundreds" without any context or indication of the proportion of experts with aforesaid beliefs and their credentials really something you believe to be a rational argument?

      Or is rationality not really part of your world view? You know, like certain fundamentalists' anti-evolution or 6,000-years-since-creation lines of reasoning. (*)

      (*) "reasoning", that is.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

      Rubbish.

      The Titanic was only described as 'unsinkable' after it sank.

      There were plans for watertight bulkheads and a double skin in the plans, but these were considered too expensive and left out.

      So, do you trust the people who knew what they were talking about or do you go along with the few whose only interest is money?

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

      Err... Your examples are all untrue. The Titanic being unsinkable was something said by the owning company. The engineers at Morton Thiakol (Can't spell) said that the O rings weren't safe, but management bullied them into signing off.

    5. Tom 13

      Re: Worse disasters happen when everyone agrees.

      No, hundreds of politicians believe they can shake us down for more money if they link their pocket lining schemes to Climate Change. Since they line a few scientific pockets, this has worked out well for them.

      No, an egotistical shipping magnate believed his ship was unsinkable. His engineers told him otherwise.

      Not even a hundred engineers worked on the O-rings for the shuttle, and their team was telling the manager to recommend against the launch on the day in question. For this error alone you should be flogged 39 times.

      Finally we get to a true statement. Still, not one that will help Warmists see the truth for they have no eyes with which to see.

  13. itzman
    Happy

    Hundreds of climate scientists believe in anthropogenic climate change.

    Er ...Hundreds of climate scientists whose jobs salaries funding and positions depend on it , say they believe in anthropogenic climate change, without wishing to be tied down as to exactly how significant it is

    Let's be accurate in this.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Deep Ocean

    Tell me one thing, if humans are causing global warming because of our release of CO2 emmissions, then why is the majority of warming occurring in the deep oceans and not in the atmosphere? Deep ocean warming is not being caused by us, it is most likely being caused by increased volcanic activity within the deep oceans. No amount of carbon credits, tree hugging activism, nor political action is going to fix this!

    1. Don Jefe
      Meh

      Re: Deep Ocean

      Is that really your question? Why is the largest heat sink on the planet heating up?

      If you think your question through just a little bit I believe (I hope anyway) you'll see your error...

  15. John Savard

    A Strong America

    If clean energy means making America dependent on wind and sunshine, while China goes ahead and burns coal like there's no tomorrow, then dealing with climate change is understandably a non-starter.

    But if clean energy means providing America with energy independence and abundant supply through the use of nuclear power, I think that conservative politicians could be brought on-side.

    1. ecofeco Silver badge

      Re: A Strong America

      China is moving away from coal as fast as it can. Hence, the proliferation of solar and wind manufacturers there.

      But it's not something that happens overnight.

      1. Nial

        Re: A Strong America

        > China is moving away from coal as fast as it can.

        > Hence, the proliferation of solar and wind manufacturers there.

        The proliferation of solar and wind manufacturers is to sell stuff to the west.

        The Chinese are building coal fired stations like crazy for their own supply.

  16. btrower

    They all go in, but they never, never come out again

    We have seen this before, over and over and over again. The public appears never to learn:

    http://www.gutenberg.org/files/24518/24518-h/dvi.html#prophecies

    The broad strokes of the catastrophe narrative are so common and so foolish that many of us learn about it as children. It might be helpful for people to review this children's story and think about how such things are promoted, why they are promoted and how the story is likely to end:

    Chicken Little

    Chicken Little likes to walk in the woods. She likes to look at the trees. She likes to smell the flowers. She likes to listen to the birds singing.

    One day while she is walking an acorn falls from a tree, and hits the top of her little head.

    - My, oh, my, the sky is falling. I must run and tell the lion about it, - says Chicken Little and begins to run.

    She runs and runs. By and by she meets the hen.

    - Where are you going? - asks the hen.

    - Oh, Henny Penny, the sky is falling and I am going to the lion to tell him about it.

    - How do you know it? - asks Henny Penny.

    - It hit me on the head, so I know it must be so, - says Chicken Little.

    - Let me go with you! - says Henny Penny. - Run, run.

    So the two run and run until they meet Ducky Lucky.

    - The sky is falling, - says Henny Penny. - We are going to the lion to tell him about it.

    - How do you know that? - asks Ducky Lucky.

    - It hit Chicken Little on the head, - says Henny Penny.

    - May I come with you? - asks Ducky Lucky.

    - Come, - says Henny Penny.

    So all three of them run on and on until they meet Foxey Loxey.

    - Where are you going? - asks Foxey Loxey.

    - The sky is falling and we are going to the lion to tell him about it, - says Ducky Lucky.

    - Do you know where he lives? - asks the fox.

    - I don't, - says Chicken Little.

    - I don't, - says Henny Penny.

    - I don't, - says Ducky Lucky.

    - I do, - says Foxey Loxey. - Come with me and I can show you the way.

    He walks on and on until he comes to his den.

    - Come right in, - says Foxey Loxey.

    They all go in, but they never, never come out again.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: They all go in, but they never, never come out again

      One day while she is walking an acorn falls from a tree, and hits the top of her little head.

      I remain sceptical; I looked at a tree once and didn't see any acorns. What credible scientific evidence do you have for the existence of acorns?

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Pollution is a healthy sign of a booming economy. Look at China, the pollution is a good thing, it is a side effect of millions of souls being lifted out of poverty. Get rid of the pollution and you will end up murdering millions of people. Is that what you want?

    That is what the EPA want. They don't like industry or the economy and they hate industries to be able to dispose of waste economically, so they invent all kinds of rules and regulations to harm industry. Do I like smog? no, not personally, but for the sake of freedom we should live with it not fight it.

    1. Don Jefe
      FAIL

      Jesus Christ man. That may be the dumbest fucking thing I've heard all week. What in the hell is wrong with you?

      1. Naughtyhorse

        Orly?

        WTF did you hear last week that was dumber?

    2. Don Jefe

      After some consideration I've decided I was wrong. That is the dumbest thing I've heard all week.

    3. ecofeco Silver badge

      >Pollution is a healthy sign of a booming economy.

      Worst. Troll. Ever.

    4. skeptical i
      Devil

      BWAH- HAH- HAH- HAH!!!!! Good one!! [to AC Sat 03AUG2013 14:43GMT]

      Sorry, still wiping tears of laughter out of my eyes, this was good, well played sir/ ma'am/ comrade! :D

      1. Rukario
        Happy

        Re: BWAH- HAH- HAH- HAH!!!!! Good one!! [to AC Sat 03AUG2013 14:43GMT]

        So am I.

        Obvious troll is obvious.

  18. FredBloggsY
    Thumb Up

    Nice to see an El Reg article aligned with the majority of scientific opinion at last. Head-in-sand denial did stand out a bit like a throw-back to Flat Earth belief.

    1. Don Jefe

      Don't worry. There'll be an article by Lewis Page in the next few days that throws everything out of balance again. We probably won't be able to comment on it though, the comments section will be buried in the forums.

    2. Naughtyhorse

      thats just cos lewis is tied up taking the piss out of 3d printers just now.

      not a bad article for a change... hammered snot :-D

    3. Denarius
      Big Brother

      stale myth as usual

      you don't realise the flat earth myth was invented in 19th century by Washing Irving? thought not, inhaled own propaganda too much. And the candanian who is currently head of flat earth society is an evolutionist ? Delightly appropriate. Out of cynical curiosity, what do you call someone who is merely skeptical of a current (drum roll please ) "received truth" ? Or is dissent now frowned on ?

      1. Don Jefe

        Re: stale myth as usual

        Are you saying we should blame Canada or Irving, or both? What are you saying?

      2. FredBloggsY
        Facepalm

        Re: stale myth as usual

        "stale myth as usual

        you don't realise the flat earth myth was invented in 19th century by Washing Irving? thought not, inhaled own propaganda too much. "

        Oh dear. Straw dogs are breeding like rabbits today.

        Try Wikipedia: Flat Earth - disambiguation.

        See, there are various entries. You happen to have picked "The myth of the Flat Earth is the modern misconception that the prevailing cosmological view during the Middle Ages saw the Earth as flat, instead of spherical."

        Now think for a moment. Are you really not able to distinguish between:

        (i) a myth about what was the predominant belief during the Middle Ages

        and

        (ii) the substance of the belief itself?

        (i) is to do with how many people believed what in the Middle Ages.

        (ii) is to do with the substance of the belief itself.

        They have separate entries because they are about different things. You picked the wrong one to construct your straw dog argument.

        If you are not able to distinguish then you are out of your depth and might wish to find a forum which treats reasoning and argument at a more basic level.

        Sorry to be so pointed, but this forum is mostly populated by people who can manipulate concepts pretty well and it's a bit embarrassing for many when elementary mistakes in reasoning are made repeatedly.

  19. Paul Hovnanian Silver badge

    So AGW exists. Fine. Now, what is the proposed fix?

    Having some economic conservatives on board formulating solutions might be a good thing. So far, the whole argument is too tied up in other political agendas to make any sense. When AGW becomes serious enough to give the same carbon sequestration credit to Monsanto's genetically engineered super trees as is granted to third world trees owned by Al Gore Inc. I'll buy into their solution. Otherwise, its just an excuse for a wealth transfer scheme. And if this is the case, then we have some more time to study the problem and come up with economically sound fixes.

  20. FredBloggsY

    'Is "Denism" even a word?'

    Not as far as I know.

    That's why it was enclosed in inverted commas, one of the uses of which is to distance the writer from the enclosed word(s); one of the reasons for which is because a "word" has been made up.

    But, yes, perhaps "Deny-ism", or "Denyism" might have conveyed the intent better.

    Thank you for the prompt. I hope you got the gist of the "un-word", anyway.

    1. Rukario

      Denism?

      Denialism?

  21. Disco2000

    The only people who still believe in the global warming scam are those with their fingers in the pie, and people who, a few years ago, would have been Christians. Now they consider themselves above such 'nonsense', yet still need to believe in something. How many Hindus, Muslims and other devout believers in some god or another believe that CO2 is some kind of evil poison, and that we are all going to drown/boil/starve if we don't worship the Green God.

    1. Don Jefe
      Stop

      For clarification, are you saying that believing in anthropogenic climate change turned Cheistians against their God?

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Believers & Deniers...

    Are as bad as each other. Both refuse to examine the data with an open mind.

    Believers refuse to consider that maybe, just maybe not all of the climate change is down to man's activity, while Deniers refuse to believe the evidence of their own eyes that weather patterns are changing.

    One sticks their head in the sand and goes "ner-ner-ner, can't hear you", while the other has their head in the clouds proposing changes which propably won't work and will cripple our economy all in the name of CO2 reduction while ignoring other issues which are just as damaging to the environment and are easier to address.

    Not sure which is worse...

  23. Msnthrp
    Thumb Down

    Distortions

    "Four Republicans ...". Should say "Four Republican politicians without scientific training say ...". I am waiting to see if they have the vaguest notion of thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, insolation, chemistry, horticulture, et al.

    Distortion #1. All persons who will not genuflect to the AGW cultists believe that the world is not warming.

    Truth. The world is undeniably warming. What is not proven is that the CO2 is the sole and only source of the warming. In fact, the melting of the North American ice sheets over 12,000 years ago proves that the earth is warming from reasons in addition to man made emissions. The climate would get warmer if mankind did not exist.

    Distortion #2. All reputable climate scientists believe in AGW.

    Truth. There are many reputable scientists of long experience who do not believe that man made emissions are the only driving force for global warming. They say these things without pay as alleged by the paid Al Gore minions. Reference the emails of Climate and ignore the whitewash where the AGW cultists investigated the other AGW cultists. The Climategate participants have done more to damage public view of science and the credibility of scientists than has occurred since the Inquisition.

    Implied Distortion #3. The current climate is the best climate there has ever been and we must do everything to keep it from changing.

    Truth. The current climate is the only climate we have ever experienced. Climate is a long term event, measurable in geologic time terms, not human time terms. There are indications that Medieval Warm Period in Europe (900 CE to 1400 CE) led to the construction of the magnificent cathedrals and events such as wine produced from grapes grown in Scotland. And the Medieval Warm Period has been reported as being significantly warmer than today. Perhaps because experiments have shown that plants grow better with higher concentrations of CO2, we might expect better crop yields from the same amount of land, which will be needed to feed the asymptotically increasing population.

    Of course, there would be increased likelihood of flooding in Miami, New York, Boston, New Orleans, etc., but would there be any BAD effects? Maybe those cities could hire engineers from The Netherlands to show them how to build dikes to keep out water.

    Climate has been changing back and forth for millions of years so climate change is not new. What is new is the hue and cry that "we can stop it if you will just give us money." Try looking at the different sources of change, starting with heat from the earth's magma via volcanoes and the changes in Earth's orbit, tilt, and precession as calculated in the Malankovitch Cycles.

    Why not stop worrying about the natural warming and start spending time and money investigating how to adapt to a warming climate? That would cut off funding for the AGW-hustlers but I am sure Al Gore would not have to start begging.

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      Re: Distortions

      "What is not proven is that the CO2 is the sole and only source of the warming."

      I haven't seen, *anywhere*, by *anyone*, a claim that "CO2 is the sole and only source of the warming".

      By attacking a claim which is the invention of your own imagination you risk appearing poorly educated and hard of thinking.

      This isn't the forum for intelligent, educated people to hold your hand through a remedial learning experience, but why not Google "straw man" (or go straight to the Wikipedia article) and learn about the nature of your approach. That could be the first step towards avoiding being perceived as stupid.

      Your other "refuted" "distortions", BTW, also seem to be inventions of your imagination.

      I guess it might be your hobby: sit down, invent unrealistic claims, construct arguments about why they are unrealistic. If it is your hobby, sorry for interrupting it.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Distortions

        "I haven't seen, *anywhere*, by *anyone*, a claim that "CO2 is the sole and only source of the warming".

        You obviously didn't see that stupid cartoon "infomercial" with the drowning dog put out on British TV showing what will happen all because of CO2 emissions.

        Scientists and those of a more rational persuasion may believe there are other causes, but most Governments - the UK in particular - seem to have swallowed that one hook, line and sinker.

        1. FredBloggsY
          Facepalm

          Re: Distortions

          So anyone who saw that "infomercial" would be likely to conclude that it was trying to say that CO2 is the sole and only source of the warming?

          And you managed to escape that trick they tried to play?

          Well done!

          (I had, too. And as you can see, I sort thought that everyone would be as smart as us).

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Distortions

            As was said, "Scientists and those of a more rational persuasion ..." - sadly, the average man/woman in the streeet isn't and will blindly believe whatever tripe they're told without condering the facts for themselves.

            The infomercial did imply that CO2 is the sole cause of global warming and sea level rise and will therefore the sheeple will believe that there are no other causes and that man's influenence is soley responsible for climate change.

            It was withdrawn after having been soundly derided, unfortunately too many still believe it.

            1. FredBloggsY
              Thumb Down

              Re: Distortions

              "The infomercial did imply that CO2 is the sole cause of global warming"

              Can you explain how it implied that CO2 was the "sole" cause?

              Go ahead. Make my day.

              http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mevxenJ6Mtc

    3. Nuffnuff

      Re: Distortions

      Isn't the mention of Gore an own goal by the Godwin principle? If not, it probably should be by now.

      By the way, I hear he has a big house and travels a lot. And Hitler liked cats and was a fairly good painter.

    4. John Hughes
      Unhappy

      Re: Distortions

      "Of course, there would be increased likelihood of flooding in Miami, New York, Boston, New Orleans, etc., but would there be any BAD effects? Maybe those cities could hire engineers from The Netherlands to show them how to build dikes to keep out water."

      Nice, so we spend billions building dikes for Miami, New York, Boston, New Orleans, Marseilles, London, Tokyo, Osaka...

      And I suppose we'll get around to Singapore, Shanghai and Mumbai.

      But what about Abidjan, Lagos, Saigon...?

  24. PleasefixtheEPAdirector'sname

    Please correct the error in your posting:

    William Kelly is in fact,

    WILLIAM K. REILLY (check wikipedia, epa.gov etc....)

    He would appreciate the correction.

    1. Don Jefe
      Happy

      You created an account just to say that?

      You're William K. Reilly aren't you?

  25. ElectricRook

    Funny that . . .

    Having been a computer user since the early 80's, disk crash on a PC is something I've never experienced. Even on a sparc2 that was thrown across a room. Neither can I remember any friends or coworkers having a disk crash. Turns out that dish crashes are the cannon fodder for tape backup salesmen. I used to be the backup guy in one of California's largest data centers from 1999 to 2005. In the data center we lost a few, but we had many thousands of disks, and the mean time before failure was many thousands of hours. The numbers were gonna add up on our disks eventually, but the failure rate was far under 1% per year.

    1. heyrick Silver badge
      Happy

      Re: Funny that . . .

      I had a disc crash. Was farting around, dropped a screwdriver on it...

      The most usual failures I have experienced is age. The bearings or something give up, so when you power up an old drive, it either does nothing at all or the thing spins up but the heads are stuck.

      But yes, never a disc crash that wasn't my own stupid fault.

  26. Syntax Error

    Nothing To Worry About

    People have just got weather neurotic. Calm down..

    All the scientists predictions so far are wrong. This is the main problem. If the scientists can't predict climate change accurately what hope is there for the rest of us.

    1. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      Re: Nothing To Worry About

      "All the scientists predictions so far are wrong."

      Really?

      That many scientists, eh? And that many predictions?

      So who is right in your belief system?

      And what system would it be?

      1. uncredited

        @FredBloggsY Re: Nothing To Worry About

        Well, can you point to even one prediction that has been correct so far?

  27. buyone

    Isn't

    Isn't CO2 a lagging indicator of temperature?

    Thus destroying all the predictive models!

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Man I love all the votes on this. Deniers with credible information, MASSIVE DOWNVOTES, supporters with no evidence massive upvotes. Hence why I expect downvotes here (and now expect those who auto downvote anyone against their own opinion to stop reading)

    I believe, from the people I've spoken to, and from the evidence currently available that climate change is real. I also believe that human interactions have had an affect on climate change. However, to what degree human interaction has had an affect on climate change we don't know. There are thousands, if not millions of factors which would affect how the worlds climate might change, these range from human interactions through to changes in the earth orbit. We do not know to what degree greenhouse gasses are having an effect.

    Personally, from the information I have read over the years, I believe that the main culprit is natural climate change, and that greenhouse gases, although having an affect, are having a very minimal one in the grand scheme. Like turning on the fireplace and then claiming it's the heat from the TV keeping the living room warm.

    However, there are more benefits to capping CO2 emissions than greenhouse gases, quality of life for one. So many people being born with allergies and illness who have to live in what could be considered dense fogs of carbon compared to how we used to live. Additionally much of this carbon is produced through energy production and will eventually run out.

    Therefore I'm in favour of CO2 caps and taxes, because it will accelerate a shift to more renewable energy sources (nuclear mainly since solar and wind are still pretty far behind) as well as improve air quality. These however are two things that politics don't much care for. They can't say "we're moving to green because it's clean" because people are against that. They can however say "If we don't make changes the world will die, so we're taxing your CO2 emissions, and giving subsidies if you decide to go green on your own"

    Same means, same result, different problem.

    Will fixing the CO2 levels make a big improvement in our climate change? No I don't believe it will

    Will it make a small change? Yes I believe it will.

    Will it make a big change to our quality of life? Yes I believe it will.

    1. Fink-Nottle
      FAIL

      So many people being born with allergies and illness who have to live in what could be considered dense fogs of carbon compared to how we used to live. Additionally much of this carbon is produced through energy production and will eventually run out.

      Rising CO2 levels are causing allergies and illness? Really?

      So if these folks stopped breathing for a while, they'd have a better quality of life?

      Nice try ... but, like a lot of the comments here, hardly credible.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=17112

        So kindly blow it out your hole.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

        2. Fink-Nottle
          Thumb Down

          > So kindly blow it out your hole.

          I've been blowing CO2 out my many orifices all my life, and it hasn't harmed me yet ...

          You, like the OP, seem to have conflated two separate issues - CO2 emission with hydrocarbon pollution. The OP stated that capping CO2 emissions will impact quality of life by reducing allergies and illness:

          However, there are more benefits to capping CO2 emissions than greenhouse gases, quality of life for one. So many people being born with allergies and illness who have to live in what could be considered dense fogs of carbon compared to how we used to live.

          To suggest that CO2, the natural product of cellular respiration, is somehow harmful to humans is utter bollox. And if you cannot accurately state simple facts - such as the health risk of CO2 - then your opinions on more complex issues are of very little value to me.

  29. heyrick Silver badge

    I'm not a denier...

    ...I would agree that action needs to be considered, given our propensity for building large cities at the edges of oceans. We are, evidently, still coming out of the last ice age (what I was told in high school science). This suggests that the planet has been warmer in the past (there is evidence to back this up), and will likely be warmer in the future. While humanity's actions are not exactly helping, it's ridiculous to believe that we alone are causing the heating - because that is likely to lead us to the misguided attempts to limit CO2 and raise taxes then we can all solve the problem. No. We can't. This is something way bigger than us, and maybe it is time to consider something more concrete than arbitrary limits that can be traded with other nations and additional taxes. We have paid eco taxes for a while. So where are flood defences for the major cities? When will the rivers and canals be dredged so heavy rainfall has somewhere to go? Oh, that's right, environmental taxes don't go on useful environmental things. So some day in the future the quiet country dwellers will be caught in the middle of a bitter bloody civil war as millions are displaced with nowhere to go and decades of them in charge saying "we need more wind turbines!".

    1. FredBloggsY
      Facepalm

      Re: I'm not a denier...

      "it's ridiculous to believe that we alone are causing the heating"

      Yep.

      And who, exactly, believes that?

      The only place it seems to crop up is in straw dog arguments. Wikipedia actually explains quite well what they are.

  30. J.G.Harston Silver badge
    Headmaster

    Grammar fail

    "from 1970-1973"

    "from" needs a matching "to". "from 1970 *to* 1973", or "in 1970-1973".

  31. Jorba

    Rucklehaus, you've got to be kidding

    This is the guy who gave us the second hand smoke rubbish. Saying, in effect, at that hearing that the second hand smoke crowd hadn't proved their point scientifically, but he was going to find for them anyway.

    And we're supposed to believe him now?

    These are exactly the sort of chicken little alarmists who cause the problem, they're not getting paid off (except for their EPA salaries and the consequent increase in it's range and power, and by extension their own). But they still have an agenda and a willingness to cast the truth aside when it doesnt suit their purposes.

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Climate change or not

    As the world population grows, resources are being sucked dry. Starving people need to reproduce as much as 16 year old's need to drive. The Earth will fix itself once It's human population controls itself. Life is bliss not knowing or forgetting what it is like to be horny.

    1. Don Jefe

      Re: Climate change or not

      You're a eunuch? Is that what you're telling us?

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not saying humanity is better off but this planet was a better place before man started playing Roto-Rooter with the earth's septic tanks.

  34. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    the argument should not be are we affecting the climate, but by how much and what WILL happen because of us, that always seems to be the debate...

    And the other thing.. is climate change bad? Will sea levels REALLY rise how they say? every time I read an article on it, it seems to be OOPS we were wrong, its not as bad as we thought on that front......

    Anyway its time we started to control our climate, I am fed up of cold summers!

  35. filter_guy

    Climate, does it really change?

    Deniers, and believers agree that climate changes, but can't agree "exactly" how,or why and can't agree on what to do about it, even though the same science is before them all. We "see" the results of severe weather (yes people do in fact suffer from severe weather events unless you think that every thing you see is just trickery and lies), and still mostly do nothing because we have not settled the "argument" yet. This is soooooo stupid. We are watching the barn burn and arguing about how it started. Don't people understand that science never "proves" anything, it merely shows likely hood of an assumption's truth, or untruth beyond reasonable doubt. There is never 100 percent proof in the real world, only in the world of abstract mathematics, philosophy and human arguments. Until we get this figured out and stop arguing about how the fires start and figure out how to put them out, we're screwed.

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    the new theology

    Reading this set of comments reminds me too much of religious zealots arguing. Both sides of this 'debate' lose credibility - with me anyway - when their views are expressed more like articles of faith than reasoned argument. Dogma is never attractive.

  37. Dodgy Geezer Silver badge

    @ Rik Myslewski,

    ...In these days of human-caused climate disruption, let me bring that sentiment up to date. There are only two kinds of people in the world: those who acknowledge the reality of anthropogenic global warming, and those who will....

    What a shame the data shows you to be an activist liar. But keep drinking the Kool-aid if you have acquired a taste for the stuff. Until the next scare comes around...

  38. mike panero

    wow

    theregister is now backing climate change

    Next thing the Conservatives will want to reduce the age of consent

    Shout over the stench of those corpses

  39. Rampant Spaniel

    Ok so how do we get China, India etc to agree to act? Anything we (Europe and the USA) do that isn't mirrored in large developing industrial countries will have an adverse effect. Whatever we do will cost us money, making what we do less competitive and more likely to be done elsewhere, increasing the amount of 'problem' caused elsewhere rather than decreasing it overall. Unless we can get a buy in from developing countries all we can hope to do is work on technology to mitigate the effects of temperature change.

    Developing countries are fine as long as we pay for it in it's entirety which isn't likely to happen.

  40. Tree

    What will the temperature be on August 5, 2090?I

    There are two questions that need to be answered before massive regulations and human exterminations are to be implemented. If they can't know how hot it will be tomorrow, how can they predict in 75 Years? Also, if it will be warmer, is that good or bad? If this is shown to be bad, when should we start culling the human race and with whom shall we start?

  41. IGnatius T Foobar
    FAIL

    liberal democrat communist socialist marxist america-hating warmists FAIL

    Global warming, climate change, whatever you want to call it, the whole thing is a scam propagated by the liberal democrat communist socialist marxist america-hating crowd that SIMPLY WANTS HIGHER TAXES ON ENERGY. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less. AGW is a lie, a myth, a scam. If Al Gore hates carbon dioxide then he should stop exhaling so much of it.

  42. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Climate change denial

    Has a strong link to the fundamental christian right.

    "Jesus will look after us" OR "It's part of His plan", etc...

    Science doesn't come into it.

    1. Rampant Spaniel

      Re: Climate change denial

      and if it should prove that the climate gets hotter etc, 'god is punishing you for gay marriage, women priests, Metallica and Nascar' etc.

      To be fair I am not convinced by the science as yet, mostly because it is statistical models which seem to frequently disagree with each other and because there have been scandals (climategate in the UK) which undermined the credibility of some studies. That doesn't mean I think we should bury our heads in the sand. Even if we aren't affecting the climate it will change anyway and we need to know how to deal with that. We need a genuine answer as to if what we are doing is causing or enhancing anything and what we can all do to fix it. Way too much BS on both extremes.

  43. Steven Hildebrand

    Why is it that the climate scientists who support AGW on dribs and drabs of grant money are suspected of taking part in some huge conspiracy by which they will all be paid countless fortunes by some shadowy, unnamed organization at a hazy future date which undermines their credibility, but deniers who are shown to be paid large sums of money right now by various fossil fuel interests are carrying out the purest science whose motives are beyond reproach?

    1. Fading
      FAIL

      Deniers like...

      Dana Nuccitelli?

  44. Gravis Ultrasound

    Repent!

    The end is Near!

  45. NomNomNom

    "A quartet of former US Environmental Protection Agency administrators"

    When even the musicians at the EPA are warning about this it is time to act.

  46. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Really?

    How can some of you manage be so absolutely certain one way of another?

    Perhaps some of you really are climate experts, if there really is such a thing, but I also suspect that many of you (like me) are not and are simply regurgitating views you've ready on the basis that, if it sounds good to you, it must be right.

    These conversations remind me of a deeply serious and very long discussion I overheard on a train journey between four Grazia and Heat readers solely about the actions, motives and inner thoughts of a group of fictional soap characters. All stated as if it was fact. All stated in tones of utter self-belief.

    And we just don't know. Given that collectively we can't seem to predict the weather accurately 7 days in advance anywhere, can we really model climate change successfully? Do you honestly believe that we can?

    Reducing noxious emissions has got to be good for our general health in the same way that making London a smoke free zone did wonders for the health of the populace in the late 1950s. So let's keep doing that.

    But go easy on the strident and constant rebranding of untested and untestable theories and models as fact.

    1. Rampant Spaniel

      Re: Really?

      Well said. However, if el reg has taught me anything it is never to be in the middle on something like this :-) If you aren't in one camp or the other you must be strange ;-)

    2. pklausner
      FAIL

      Re: Really? [weather != climate]

      > And we just don't know. Given that collectively we can't seem to

      > predict the weather accurately 7 days in advance anywhere,

      > can we really model climate change successfully?

      > Do you honestly believe that we can?

      >

      The old worn out weather == climate argument.

      If you are so convinced about its merits,

      then there is a good money saver tip for you:

      book you beach vacation for January/February in Sweden.

      You should get really good rates.

      After all, who can predict the weather 7 months from now?

      Might as well be 30 degrees and you win!

  47. hamcheeseandonion
    FAIL

    This is extremely boring...

    ...just a (largely) male cohort of children, with a narrowness of mind that would be laughable, if it weren't so sad.

    FFS, just stop and listen to yourselves...just stop all the jibber jabber, name calling, penis measuring, useless shit, and recognise who and what we are as a species...predators

    There are over seven thousand million of us; we won't or can't stop reproducing; our planetary resources are finite (look it up); there is no Technological Singularity that will save us; there is no miracle cure; there is only what we are and what we do...we consume.

    We are making a difference to this planet and its ecology, no doubts about it, no argument from me but let's face it folks, we all know that we are destructive - all sea life and all land-based life, even the cute ones (Pandas and dolphins...awwwww); the air and water; the soil.....all of it worse off for having us around, no exceptions.

    Forget endangered species tags, we'll kill, eat, discard, annihilate anything, and the really honest part?...we just don't, down-in-the-basement-of-our-souls, care enough...just look at what we do to our own!

    I have absolutely no doubt that we will make this planet uninhabitable for our kind, and take down a large proportion of our fellow, non-human inhabitants with us...no..doubt...at...all....just a matter of time, and not much of that.

    Coming to a place near you will be: Food wars; water wars; oil wars(again); have versus have-not wars...as one of the previous commentators quite rightly said...all wars are civil wars.

    Stripping away the verbiage? - we're fucked. Try to put that as kindly as you can to your children.

  48. The Dude

    CO2

    I am of the opinion that increasing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has only one significant effect: It increases the amount of biomass. Green plants, mostly.

    I am also of the opinion that we don't hear from a lot of respectable scientitsts on this topic because they have been bullied, intimidated, and slandered into silence.

    I know for a fact that much of what passes for "scientific research" (in Canada, anyhow) is defamatory ideological opinion, not true and not factual.

  49. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's real

    I don't doubt that climate change is real, nor do I doubt that human action has had an impact on the climate. You just have to show up in Las Vegas or Phoenix to notice that it's quite a bit more humid there now than it was 150 years ago. The farming in large areas, etc. have all had SOME impact.

    It's also farily well established that 90-150 million years ago, the sea temps around the equator were at least 5C warmer than they are now. There's ample evidence that some of areas that are now fairly cold, at one time supported more tropical plants and animals.

    I think it's a bit presumptious of humans to think that they've been around now for a few thousand years and that suddenly they're going to take controll of the climate and keep it from changing. I don't see the big problem with a changing climate. We'd certainly have to adapt. The farming areas of the US may not produce the same type or quantity of food that they have in the past. Maybe Canada would turn into the largest orange producing country. Certainly if the sea were to rise by 100m, someone would be out quite a bit of expensive real-estate.

    I've wondered those feeding the frenzy and fear of climate change are trying to make sure that they keep their power and influence, because if the climate really does change a lot, the power base will certainly also change. Those either don't want to think about it or want to prevent it.

    I say, it's going to happen regardless of what we do. Climage change happened without humans in the past it I don't think we're going to prevent it in the future, whatever we choose to do. We may slow it or temper it, or most likely, we'll just learn to deal with it.

    If we dream of settling on other planets, or setting up a sustainable base on Mars, but we can't deal with a climate change on Earth, we've really got bigger problems with the human race.

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