Integral Life's First Online Group!

http://en.sevenload.com/videos/UsTF3KX-The-Great-Global-Warming-Swindle

What you think?

We are having a debate. Thats my point. The debate is not over. Please watch this video:

http://en.sevenload.com/videos/UsTF3KX-The-Great-Global-Warming-Swindle

Article : "Nobody listens to the real climate change experts" (Look at the comments, think their is not a debate?):

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/4990704/Nobody-listens-to-the-real-climate-change-experts.html

Brian,

It has taken a century to reach a scientific consensus on global warming.  "Consensus" means that a certain agreement, position, or debate has finally been settled by a community of scientists.  The scientific community has since moved on to debate new questions or concerns such as how to resolve the climate crisis, predicting rate of change and assessing the extent of ecological damage: not whether global warming is real, whether it is man-made, whether man evolved from apes or how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.  The two to three percent of scientific dissenters who continue to debate whether global warming is man-made or real will continue to do.  This does not make it a "debate" in the scientific sense, since the consensus view is that global warming is occurring and is furthermore anthropogenic.  To reiterate, it took a full century, much debating, and a vast and overwhelming body of evidence for many scientists to adopt the scientific consensus but most eventually did.  Those who support the consensus view, which is 97 percent of the scientific community, appear to do so not out of coercion, intimidation, or for funding as you contend but appear to be convinced by the ever-growing body of scientific evidence in support of anthropogenic global climate change.  Of the scientists who have reported fear and intimidation tactics used against them, it was always in reference to people in government and company officials who tried to suppress their opinion on climate change and attempted to coerce them into climate change denial.  So the evidence suggests the opposite of what you claim with respect to fear and intimidation.

Let's first define what "scientific consensus" means (Wikipedia):

Scientific consensus is the collective judgment, position, and opinion of the community of scientists in a particular field of study. Consensus implies general agreement, though not necessarily unanimity. Scientific consensus is not by itself a scientific argument, and it is not part of the scientific method. Nevertheless, consensus may be based on both scientific arguments and the scientific method. [1]

Consensus is normally achieved through communication at conferences, the process of publication, replication (reproducable results by others) and peer review. These lead to a situation where those within the discipline can often recognize such a consensus where it exists, but communicating that to outsiders can be difficult. On occasion, scientific institutes issue position statements intended to communicate a summary of the science from the "inside" to the "outside". In cases where there is little controversy regarding the subject under study, establishing what the consensus is can be quite straightforward. Scientific consensus may be invoked in popular or political debate on subjects that are controversial within the public sphere but which may not be controversial within the scientific community, such as evolution.[2][3]

The "debate," then, is confined in the public arena (as here) and is highly politicized as you can see.  It is being kept alive by nonscientists who merely latch on to the viewpoints of the two to three percent of dissenting scientific opinions for reasons that are more political or philosophical than scientific. 

The video length is 1 hour and 41 minutes long.  My computer is very slow and plays for two seconds, pauses for eight, and then plays another two and pauses for another eight.  And so on and on.  At this rate, my estimate is that it will take 5 hours and 64 minutes for me to see this video so am wondering if it's even worth my while to do so.  I've decided to opt for a summary of it at Wikipedia instead.  Based on the Wikipedia article, I'm not convinced that it's worth my while to see:

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

Scientists will continue to monitor the global climate and the factors which influence it. It is important that all legitimate potential scientific explanations continue to be considered and investigated. Debate will continue, and the Royal Society has just hosted a two day discussion meeting attended by over 300 scientists, but it must not be at the expense of action. Those who promote fringe scientific views but ignore the weight of evidence are playing a dangerous game. They run the risk of diverting attention from what we can do to ensure the world's population has the best possible future.

(Statement by the Royal Society in response to The Great Warming Swindle, one of a long list of negative scientific responses to this video).

The Great Global Warming Swindle does not represent the current state of knowledge in climate science… Many of the hypotheses presented in the Great Global Warming Swindle have been considered and rejected by due scientific process. This documentary is far from an objective, critical examination of climate science. Instead the Great Global Warming Swindle goes to great lengths to present outdated, incorrect or ambiguous data in such a way as to grossly distort the true understanding of climate change science, and to support a set of extremely controversial views.

(Statement by the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society).

There were many other scientific objections too numerous to list.

And the fact that it uses outdated charts and omits information that contradicts its assertions (such as ommitting the past 20 years of scientific data indicating dramatic increases in temperature rise corresponding to dramatic rises in atmospheric CO2), the video strikes me indeed as something that is fraudulent and misrepresenting the facts.  The following article goes through each of these assertions point by point.  I haven't seen the video so can't verify if it is misrepresenting the views expressed by the makers of the video.  However, based on my limited understanding of climate change, it is fully in agreement with my understanding of climate change:

http://www.durangobill.com/Swindle_Swindle.html

Considering that the assertions made in this video contradicts 97% of all climate sciences and that you persist in presenting any and all viewpoints that appear to be at odds with the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming,  I suspect that you have already formed your opinion on climate change and are being selective in your choice of scientific "experts."  This leaves you in a very small company of oddball scientists from the scientific fringe (less than 3%) and in a dubious position of trying to discredit the vast body of evidence on climate change as well as the scientific consensus supporting it as "propaganda," seeking funding, or anti-industry environmentalist fear-mongers; while not necessarily showing that you are able to evaluate the science behind climate change itself, whether "for" or "against."  So long as it appears to be "against" the scientific consensus, then you are "for" it.

For instance: I tried to follow the link to the source claiming that "The sun is behind global warming, not man" in your comment number 2 (I thought you said that it was global cooling; but whatever), which is attached to an article written by Fred Pearce so is presumed to be the position of Fred Pearce.  When I clicked on the link to check the source, I was brought to a long list of articles written by various people with no way of knowing which one that the statement came from.  The article on your post beneath the title, "The sun is behind global warming, not man," which is presumably the title of the article and written by Pearce, begins with something obvious and given ("switch the sun off, and it gets cold") but ends stating that the sun, cosmic rays, and sunspot activity have little if anything to do with recent global warming trends, thus contradicting the title up above it and the point of your whole post, unless you or he is purposefully trying to be confusing and ambiguous.

Fred Pearce is an author and journalist who specializes in global climate issues.  Fred Pearce is a nonscientist but has established himself as a popular science writer.  Thus, like Al Gore, a nonscientist, Pearce is regarded by the mainstream media as a trusted voice on issues of climate change and global warming.  That is to say, Pearce is ultimately a writer, not a scientist; and has not published any peer-reviewed scientific papers.  As above, he appears to be ambiguous in that he claims to be a "skeptic" of global warming while supporting the consensus view on global warming.  Take his last two books:

With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change (2007)

Review

http://www.beacon.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=1848

How environmental "tipping points" may affect the speed of future climate change

Fred Pearce has been writing about climate change for eighteen years, and the more he learns, the worse things look. Where once scientists were concerned about gradual climate change, now more and more of them fear we will soon be dealing with abrupt change resulting from triggering hidden tipping points. Even President Bush's top climate modeler, Jim Hansen, warned in 2005 that "we are on the precipice of climate system tipping points beyond which there is no redemption."

As Pearce began working on this book, normally cautious scientists beat a path to his door to tell him about their fears and their latest findings. With Speed and Violence tells the stories of these scientists and their work—from the implications of melting permafrost in Siberia and the huge river systems of meltwater beneath the icecaps of Greenland and Antarctica to the effects of the "ocean conveyor" and a rare molecule that runs virtually the entire cleanup system for the planet.

Above all, the scientists told him what they're now learning about the speed and violence of past natural climate change-and what it portends for our future. With Speed and Violence is the most up-to-date and readable book yet about the growing evidence for global warming and the large climatic effects it may unleash.

"If you want to quickly get up to date on climate change and its consequences, I recommend With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change. If you can read only one book on climate change, this is it." -Lester Brown, president, Earth Policy Institute

another review, same book:

http://www.curledup.com/wspeedvi.htm

Pearce is a self-described climate-change skeptic. He’s not a naysayer. To the contrary and while remaining skeptical, Pearce thinks the mainstream of climate science may not go far enough. So he’s kindly assembled a menagerie of horrors which, perversely, make for fascinating reading.

“Welcome to the Anthropocene,” Pearce writes, referring to the recently named heir to the Holocene era which, like the fabled days of September, were mellow when humans were young. In the Anthropocene, human activities act as climate-change drivers: no need to wait for a super-volcano to erupt or a comet to smack the earth. Thanks to billions of cook fires and cars warming the planet, we’ve now heated the place up to worry about melting ice caps raising sea levels and warming peat bogs farting super-heating methane into the air. Say hello to drought, fire and hurricane and clear sailing through the Northern passage (at last!); say goodbye to well-known agricultural areas, parks and ports. The world’s rainforests could shift from the Amazon to the Sahara in something much less than the blink of the geological eye. Who knows which way the winds will blow?

An interview of his most recent book:

Confessions of an Eco Sinner (2008)

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/12/the-th-interview-fred-pearce-1.php

An in-depth interview where Pearce lightheartedly discusses his ecological sins, where things came from, and estimates carbon footprints left by modern living and expresses a need to reduce them. (my summary)

 
Based on these book reviews and on other articles in reference to Fred Pearce (one of which is a response written by Pearce to debunk Bob Carter's claim that the earth is "cooling," which can be found beneath your Bob Carter article), he does not appear in any way, shape, or form to endorse the view that "the sun is behind global warming, not man."  It is very clear that based on these reviews and elsewhere (such as his stance that the clean coal industry is deceptive and practices "greenwashing") that Pearce is concerned about climate change, believes that the earth is warming and that humans are behind global warming.  I'm not sure if you were aware of that since you cite him as one of the scientific dissenters, which leads me to wonder whether you truly have sufficient domain knowledge to evaluate your own criteria or sources. 

A final comment: In comment 1, you state that the "global warming bandwagon spells disaster and misery for third world populations who are trying to develop their countries and wrestle themselves free from the shackles of poverty."  This is a concern expressed by Michael Crichton and by information posted on the video page, so I thought that I'd address it.

A strictly economic argument against action on climate change ignores the fact that the vast majority of third-world countries are closer to the equator and are the most vulnerable countries to the effects of global warming.  Thus, developing nations--most of which are conveniently located "south of the border" in Mexico, Central America, south of the Mediterranean, Sub-Sahara Africa, South Asia, and elsewhere across the developing world south of our border or in more southerly latitudes are, in fact, the very regions that are the most vulnerable to global warming and to the effects of positive feedback, which is triggered once a "tipping point" is reached in carbon output and the oceans are no longer able to absorb the excess carbon emissions. 

Over the past century, the ocean has worked as a buffer to slow the rise in average global temperature by absorbing 97% of these carbon emissions which would have otherwise caused global temperature to rise much faster.  Recent studies, however, suggest that the ocean is now showing signs that it is no longer as efficient as before in absorbing this carbon.  Whatever excess carbon that is mined or drilled from the earth and that cannot be absorbed by the sea is injected into the air, where it stays; resulting in increased concentration of greenhouse gases and an acceleration in the rise of average global temperature. 

Bare in mind that the atmosphere itself is only a very thin transparency or layer of air surrounding the earth (think of Scotch tape or a laminated surface covering the planet).  It doesn't extend very far, and doesn't have near the volume or capacity of the ocean to absorb these excess carbon emissions.  Therefore these greenhouse gases will become increasingly concentrated in the atmosphere as more and more carbon emission is injected into it and less and less is absorbed by the ocean.  Thus amplifying sunlight and heat and causing arctic ice to melt, which is needed as a white surface to reflect sunlight and heat back into deep space.  Without it, we have the deep blue sea (which is actually turning bright green and turning acidic due to the absorption of carbons), which, whether bright green or deep blue, is deeper in colour and less reflective than white and therefore absorbs heat rather than reflecting or deflecting heat into space; triggering a positive feedback effect.

With continued output of carbon emissions from developed countries combined with the development of outmoded fossil-based economies in developing countries, this positive feedback effect will escalate beyond control.  This accelerated output of carbon emissions is expected to reach a tipping point in global temperature once it rises above two and a half degrees or thereabouts, triggering thus the flooding, typhoons, droughts, water shortages, crop failures, starvation, and other natural disasters in those developing countries that are closer to the equator.  And all this, in the name of progress and economic freedom for these poorer, developing countries. 

The economic argument sounds noble and egalitarian enough in theory; we certainly don't want to deny  development and economic freedom to those who are shackled to the chains of poverty.  The problem is the insistence that a fossil-based economy is the only way to go.  What to do, then, once these climate change refugees south of the border make their exodus and begin migrating en masse to northern countries due to starvation, lack of water, economic and social collapse, and rising sea levels where they currently live made possible by fossil-based economy and climate change?  No doubt that by that time, we will be experiencing our own resource problems and food and water shortages but not to the extent that our neighbors to the south will be affected (not "yet," at least) and hence the massive influx of climate change refugees.  Therefore, an economic argument as above is useless unless it can offer a remedy on how to deal with this massive influx of climate change refugees caused by economic progress and climate change disasters.  If we want to keep the food and water for ourselves and be stingy, at least in the short term, the government will have to step up border patrol and close its borders to any further climate change refugees from the south, who by that time will be so hungry and desperate that they will risk their lives and die trying to sneak through.  The government will ultimately have to erect an electric barbed-wire fence and deploy the U.S. military with a new mission to patrol these borders, with strict orders to machine-gun these climate change refugees dead if any more try to cross our border to gain access to our food and water supplies.  Such draconian measures will most assuredly alienate 1/5 of the U.S. population of Hispanic descent if not more.  So where will our humanity and egalitarianism be then?  (The scenario above is courtesy of "Climate Wars" audio.  Have you had a chance to listen to it?  I would highly recommend it). 

Thus, denial and delay and political paralysis combined with increased carbon output worldwide will ultimately spell disaster for everyone.  Yes, the whole world will ultimately be consumed by this disaster; but those who are closer to the equator (i.e. poor countries) will be the first to be affected and will also be the hardest hit.  The most regrettable thing is that while we have the resources and technology to fix this problem globally, we do not have the political will to follow through and will likely experience such a tragedy in our lifetimes due to lack of scientific understanding and being forever mired in denial and debate.

  This is mostly a reply to Marita's note about our intellectual babel and how I helped get myself out of the morass, at least to a degree.

First a copy of a note from David Sunfellow in the "real" Climate Change Forum:

Here's the kind of "high-impact solutions" that I think we should be seriously considering. Notice the exceedingly dramatic results that Willie Smits reports and how he is including many diverse needs and perspectives to come up with a healthy, system-wide solution to achieve these results. Smits gave this talk at TED in February of 2009 and received a rousing standing ovation at the end. Go to: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/willie_smits_restores_a_rainforest.html.  (unfortunately I, Mike Breland, don't know how to do links like this, so suggest you please cut and past to see Willie Smits: "How to re-grow a Rainforest."  You'll be inspired by it.  Next, my note about my response to Willie Smits's talk:)

Dear Climate Change Forum Participants: 

  Please watch Willie Smits presentation referred to by David Sunfellow.  It was so enspiriting it brought tears to my eyes.  I had not heard of him before (shame on me), but after watching his talk, I am fired up about getting more involved in climate change, especially the way he is involved.  After reading/listening to numerous scientific talks and debates on this forum about climate heating, cooling, El Nino, 60 year cycles, statistical analyses of glacier cores around the world, and some egos, whining, conspiracy this and that, blah, blah, blah, I was starting to feel a little disconnected from the whole climate change discussion.

  But Willie's talk hooked me back in.  I'm mainly a problem solver kind of person.  Overall my feeling is this:  Even if I did not believe in climate change, I would still want to do just about everything that has been put forth to stop global warming.  To me it's like: "Hello?  Don't you see you're ruining the earth?"  And I'm not even an eco-nut.  I'm a chemical engineer turned physician.  I like hard science.  But I also love and know Spirit.  And I'm concerned about our children. 

  Thus, the debate to me is not about whether or not there is global warming, but what can we do to stop and reverse the negative things we've done to the earth, especially in the last century or so.  This is why Willie's talk has fired me up.  He is incredibly logical about what he does (any controversies aside about anything else related to this) and very integral.  First he says: Get a legal foundation, so he buys the property.  Second: Get the native people involved.  Third: Adjust what is done to fit with the local culture/customs.  Fourth: make money doing it (this is the really amazing part).  Fifth: set up a local ownership and justice system involving the native people so they have further investment in protecting/managing the project.  Last: think integrally about successions of plantings and improve diversity while doing it: native plants, mammals, bird, insects, etc.  Spirit loves diversity. 

............
 

  He ends up by stating: "Integration is the Key."  I found myself giving him a standing ovation even though I was just sitting in my room at my computer.  I want to be like him when I grow up...

Yours,

mb

I figure with all the conspiracy and denier labels that I get on this forum which is being used very easily, I would share a real persons story:"

HTTP://GREEN-AGENDA.COM/

09.03.08, 5:52pm

Since publishing this website I have received a number of enquiries regarding my background and motiviation. So I have decided to add this page to describe my personal 'path of discovery' and why I felt compelled to write these articles. So here goes...

During my youth I spent many hours in the 'great outdoors' hiking, climbing, fishing and sailing, and I came to the conclusion that protecting and managing the environment would be an interesting and useful career. So I headed off to university and completed a bachelors degree in Biology, and then earned a postgraduate diploma and a masters degree in Environmental Science. Since then I have worked for a number of government environmental agencies and am currently employed as an Environmental Analyst in an agency that is responsible for implementing sustainable development in accordance with the requirements of Agenda 21. Although I had studied various UN conventions, treaties and protocols at university I did not realise their true implications until I became involved in preparing policies and action plans to implement them 'on the ground'.

Over time I became more and more disconcerted with the intrusive regulations being introduced in the name of environmental protection. It seemed to me that almost every activity now required a government permit. I kept asking myself 'what has this got to do with environmental management?' Even more disturbing was the fact that all our policies and plans were required to begin with a description of how they met the objectives of Agenda 21 and various other UN agreements, and were audited too determine how they complied with UN requirements. So I started looking into who the primary architects were behind Agenda 21, the Earth Charter, the GBA, the Kyoto Protocol, and the various conventions on biodiversity and conservation.

I was amazed to find that the same names kept appearing. In fact the same person is listed as the chief author of all those documents I just listed. He also headed the UN Reform Committee, authored the UN report on Global Governance, was the Assistant Secretary-General of the UN (#2) in charge, president of the UN 'University of Peace' and the leader of the Baha'i movement in North America. His name is Maurice Strong.

So I read every book, speech and lecture I could find authored by Mr Strong. I was absolutely anstonished by his worldview. And this man was #2 in charge of the UN for 12 years!! I also researched the other leaders, and most vocal proponents, of the modern green movement. I was amazed that the same phrases and concepts were being used by all of them. I read all the UN environmental reports and policies, all Al Gore's books, all of James Lovelock's books, Robert Muller, Paul Erhlich, Tim Flannery, and many more. They are full of references to the earth as a sacred sentient super-organism which is being destroyed by humanity's untamed destructive behaviour.

Then I started researching the speeches given by political leaders who are the most vocal about green issues e.g. Tony Blair, Angela Merkel, Arnie, Gordon Brown, Gorbachev etc. It is as if they are all singing off the same songsheet. I also looked into the writings of the most vocal scientists such as James Hansen, Stephen Scheinder and Michael Mann. I was again amazed how many times they refer to the earth as a sentient super-organism called Gaia. Anyway ... I have been researching lots of people and documents. And then I wondered if there were any links between these people, since they had such similar ideologies.

Then I discovered that many of them belonged to a group known as the Club of Rome. Current members of this 'Club' include Al Gore, Javier Solana, Bill Clinton, Mikhail Gorbachev, Tony Blair, Jimmy Carter, Stephen Scheider, Bill Gates, David Rockefeller, George Soros, Ted Turner and many other influential leaders. Sometimes I think this must just be a bad dream, but when you read what they say, in their OWN words, and then you see it all unfolding...

And so I have become personally convinced that 'man-made' climate change is a deceitful and devious fraud being used to implement a much deeper agenda. In order to protect Gaia from the 'voracious beast of capitalism' they must strike at the beast's lifeblood - fossil fuels. And in order to transition to 'sustainable global earth community' they must implement a new form of governance which will allow them to control, and ultimately reduce, human activity on this planet. I was quite dismayed when I first discovered all this, especially since I am a Christian, and wondered 'why did I waste seven years training for a career in an area that is being used to deceive so many?' and I then felt strongly compelled to warn others as best I could. And so I decided to write this website. I have tried to keep it as clear and concise, except it seems for this page, and use as many quotes and excerpts from official documents as possible. "
 

I feel like I am talking to the historically uninformed on this integral forum. And that makes ME a conspiracy global warming denier in your eyes. Folks, I was in your point of veiw in the 90's. I already know everything your saying, But do you know where I am coming from, NO. You do not know your history?? What is the history of the Club of Rome, Bildeberg, CFR, Trilateral Commission. Have no idea. These are the groups that are the think tanks that you guys here are promoting their ideas. Your in a herd mentality. I was in herd mentality in the 90's with this. My dad still makes fun of me because I would wear "Save the Planet" shirts all the time in the 90's. Integral has alot to say about reducing us to the web of life and Gaia. Or is that to much. To use Integral theory to remind you of the traps of green.  SES anyone.

I totally neglected the LR quadrant and zones 7 and 8 in addressing Brian's concerns, which I think are the zones and quadrant that Brian found problematic.  Although I still suspect, Brian, that you may have a problem with green itself.  KW, for instance, notes that some integral people claim that they never went through the green stage and moved from orange to integral.  To do so and to still be "integral" is not possible, since integrality doesn't skip stages and results in transcendance and inclusion of all prior structures.  My suspicion is that those who claim to have "skipped" green have an aversion or hang-up to green because of its association with left-wing ideology or Boomeritis.  This is not to suggest that Brian makes such an assertion (on the contrary; I think you claim the opposite and instead of "skipping" green, you simply got wiser and rejected it).  This to me sounds more like dissociation than transcendance or supersession.  So I do see a need for many who are integrally-minded to integrate healthy green into overall consciousness.  My discussion on zone 7 and 8 methodologies can be found in my response immediately following the post below:

Hello Brian,

This is my final comment to this thread, unless you care to respond to any of my rebuttals above or below which I think is a thorough response from the scientific consensus to everything you've argued from a global warming dissenter or skeptic standpoint.  The purpose of this exercise was not to "win" an argument, but to offer you an opportunity to respond back to the scientific consensus response to contrarian positions.  In truth, I feel that I am more the skeptic than contrarians; but my skepticism is aimed toward not the scientific consensus but to the scientific contrarians or skeptics instead who claim to be the "real scientists" or "skeptics"; since the burden of truth is on the contrarian to disprove the scientific consensus and not vice-versa; so far as I can tell.  For this reason, I personally don't think that the contrarian position is a skeptical position but is, instead, a denialist and contrarian position for predominantly political and non-scientific reasons.  I do not see this as a good reason to oppose the science behind climate change if you cannot respond back to my rebuttals.

You wrote,

"So the earth and its movement and all other matter (solids, liquids, gases) are being effected in its location and movement by plasma forces that are sub atomic. So really our weather is the weather of the sun and the galaxy. We are in its atmoshpere (Sun and Galaxy)."

Subatomic Plasma Forces

Yes, while true that all physical events are affected to some degree by subatomic forces, Occam's Razor demands the simplest possible theoretical explanation for data while eliminating those that make no difference in observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory.  In climate change, the science says that explanations based on subatomic forces and the sun were found to make no difference in what is currently being observed.  

The principle of Occam's Razor is also expressed as lex parsimonieae: "entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity."  Applied to climate change, entities must not be multiplied beyond those that leave actual fingerprints and carbon footprints on the planet and contribute specifically to the current global warming.  These entities are thought to be primarily human entities so are human, rather than plasma forces, which were carefully considered and rejected by due scientific process and eliminated.  To hypothesize it once again is to be redundant, since these arguments were considered and refuted by legitimate science.  When recycled many times on the 'net by contrarians, it multiplies beyond necessity and serves to confound the topicality for others. 

A more straightforward explanation would be to consider the role of human-induced carbon emissions rather than to attribute climate change to some mysterious far-flung plasma forces that are subatomic and flung from space.  As things stand, "there is no obvious discrepency that requires some new exotic physics to explain it. That doesn't mean that there isn't some other mechanism we haven't thought of yet, but it does mean that you can't claim that there must necessarily be such a mechanism."

Earth atmosphere vs. "sun" or galaxy atmosphere

The earth's atmosphere is the product of cosmic collisions, rays, and bombardments but more importantly is the product of billions of years of biochemical modification by living organisms in the paleoatmosphere.  For this reason it differs dramatically from the sun's atmosphere and from the virtually nonexistent atmosphere in interstellar space. 

The relative distance of the earth from the sun combined with its unique atmospheric signature of oxygen, water, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, hydrogen, and other gases exist in correct amounts to support life on earth.  Change the chemical composition of the atmosphere and temperature ever-so-slightly, the planet would no longer be habitable.  And where would we go then?  The earth's atmosphere is "the sun's atmosphere," after all; thus nothing particularly special or unique about it, in particular (if I understand your argument correctly).  So where to go, the sun?  The sun's atmosphere would turn us into plasma.  Venus?  That's a hellish greenhouse and we'd melt there, as well.  Mars?  The atmosphere is wrong there, too; and we'd freeze to death.  And these are all, by definition, "the sun's atmosphere," too. 

Even if we were to travel a mere 15,000 feet from the earth's surface without taking portable earth atmosphere with us, the time of useful consciousness would be 30 minutes prior to losing consciousness and dying of hypoxia.  I am competent to speak on this matter as I was a flight attendant for Delta Air Lines.  Thus, there is something unique about the earth's atmosphere as it is uniquely suited for life on earth and sustains it.  And also vice-versa, since the atmospheric composition on Earth is largely governed by the by-products of the very life that it sustains.  Nowhere else in the solar system or elsewhere in the galaxy is this possible.  The earth's atmosphere therefore differs significantly from the sun's atmosphere and from the atmosphere in the galaxy, although we need the sun and galaxy too for obvious reasons.  Not as an explanatory device for man-made global warming, which was already considered at length but was eventually abandoned as a hypothesis as a driver of man-made global warming as new evidence emerged; although solar activity is responsible for previous climate changes.  I think you may have overstated the role of the sun's atmosphere and understated the role of earth's atmosphere in man-made global warming.

Our atmosphere

You wrote,

Co2 with out the sun would only insulate. And as far as green house gasses, it is one of the weak green house gasses. Water vapor is dominant, then sulfur dioxide, then methane, then the weak greenhouse gasses. I am not saying that greenhouse gasses are not apart of the equation, just that it is a very weak factor. The sun is the driver and the green house gasses are the oven. Male and female. To much female its suffacating , too much male and we get burnt.

True, CO2 without the sun would only insulate, as on Mars.  And it is also true that as a greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide is weaker than methane and other greenhouse gases.  It is also true that it is the major contributor to man-made global warming.  So this doesn't mean that CO2 isn't deadly at some level or can't produce a runaway greenhouse effect (take a look at Venus, composed of mostly carbon dioxide and is a seething runaway greenhouse). 

Given our further distance from the sun than Venus and lower concentration of CO2, we might even consider ourselves lucky to be immune from such a hellish fate.  However, considering that carbon emissions on Earth triggered a runaway greenhouse in ancient climates, we can confidently say that we are not too distant from the sun (as on Mars) for insulation or immunity by carbon dioxide, that CO2 is a potent greenhouse gas, that it is responsible for global warming in the past, that CO2 and not other greenhouse gases are responsible for the current warming,  that the accepted scientific view says that human-caused carbon emissions are responsible for the current warming, and that it doesn't take very much of it to trigger the more deadly methane from permafrosts to trigger a positive feedback and a runaway greenhouse here on Earth.

My whole point in making this debate is so we see the problems that are critical. Like sulfur dioxide. Read this small article on it:  So my belief at this point is that the Sun and the Cosmic rays are the drivers with the effect of clouds and solar atmosphere that give us our major movements in climate. Then volcanic activity and human sulfur dioxide  (easily fixable at this time in tech) can cause drastic changes that over time will come back to the norm that the sun and cosmic rays make. So we do have a problem with emissions its just not CO2 but Sulfur Dioxide.

Please see my note above on sulfur dioxide.  Sulfur dioxide is a coolant, not greenhouse gas, and is composed of tiny glass particles and rock.  You are welcome to respond to any of these rebuttals if you like.

Your other arguments concerning the sun's influence, cosmic rays, and other arguments as alternative theories to the scientific consensus on man-made global warming have been considered by scientists and ultimately rejected by due scientific process in light of more recent evidence.  These arguments persist on the 'net nonetheless by global warming contrarians, so FAQs can be prepared for those who are confused by the so-called "debate.":

Objection:

According to the IPCC, 150 billion tonnes of carbon go into the atmosphere from natural processes every year. This is almost 30 times the amount of carbon humans emit. What difference will any reductions we try to do make?

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/03/natural-emissions-dwarf-humans.php

Answer:

This is quite true that the natural fluxes in the carbon cycle are much larger than anthropogenic emissions. But in the natural process, for roughly the last 10K years until the industrial revolution, every gigatonne of carbon going into the atmosphere was balanced by one coming out. What we have done is to alter only one side of this cycle. We put approximately 6 gigatonnes of carbon into the air but, unlike nature, we are not taking any out.

Thankfully, nature is actually compensating in part for our emissions, because only about half of the CO2 we are emitting is staying in the air. Nevertheless, since we began burning fossil fuels in earnest over 150 years ago, the atmospheric concentration that was relatively stable for the previous several thousand years has now risen by over 35%. So whatever the total amounts going in and out on their own, humans have clearly upset the pre-existing balance and altered significantly an important part of the climate system.

 

It's the Sun, Stupid
Category: sceptic guide
Posted on: April 26, 2006 11:25 PM, by coby

This is just one of dozens of responses to common climate change denial arguments, which can all be found at How to Talk to a Climate Sceptic.

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/04/its-sun-stupid.php
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Objection:

The sun is the source of all the warmth on earth. Any increase in temperature is most likely due to changes in solar radiation.

Answer:

It's very true that the earth is warmed, for all practical purposes, entirely by solar radiation. So if the temperature is going up or down a reasonable place to find the cause would be the sun. Well, it turns out that it is more complicated than one might think to detect and measure changes in the amount or type of sunshine reaching the earth. Detectors on the ground are too susceptible to all kinds of interference from the atmosphere. After all, one good cloud passing overhead can cause an instant shiver on an otherwise beautiful, warm day, but not because the sun itself changed. The best way to detect changes in the actual output of the sun versus changes in the radiation reaching the earth's surface because of clouds, smoke, dust or pollution is by taking readings from space.

This is a job for satellites. According to PMOD at the World Radiation Center there has been no increase in solar irradiance since at least 1978 when satellite observations began. This means that for the last thirty years, while the temperature has been rising fastest, the sun has shown no trend.

There has been work done on reconstructing the solar irradiance record over the last century before satellites were available. According to the Max Plank Institute where this work is being done, there has been no increase in solar irradiance since around 1940. This reconstruction does show an increase in the first part of the 20th century that coincides with the warming from around 1900 til the 1940's. This trend in irradiance is not enough to explain it all, but it is responsible for a large portion of that trend in temperature. See this chart of the observed temperature, the modelled temperature and the variations in the major forcings that contributed to 20th century climate.

Real Climate has also done a couple of detailed discussions both about what the conclusions about solar forcing are, as well as exactly how they were arrived at. Read them here and here.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/07/the-lure-of-solar-forcing/

Q:  To what extent does the Sun's variability affect and/or cause global climate change?

http://solar-center.stanford.edu/sun-on-earth/FAQ2.html

A:  For decades, scientists have tried to understand the link between winds and temperature and the Sun and its cycles. There were tell-tale signs of a connection. For instance, the Little Ice Age recorded in Europe between 1550 and 1700 happened during a time of very low solar activity.

Solar scientists have long known that solar variability changes the distribution of energy in the Earth's atmosphere. During the Sun's 11-year cycle, from solar maximum through solar minimum, the energy released by the Sun changes by only about a tenth of a percent. New studies have clarified that when the solar cycle is at a maximum, it puts out a larger percentage of high-energy radiation, which increases the amount of ozone in the upper atmosphere. The increased ozone warms the upper atmosphere and the warm air affects winds all the way from the stratosphere (that region of the atmosphere that extends from about 6 to 30 miles high) to the Earth's surface. The change in wind strength and direction creates different climate patterns around the globe.

However, according to Drew Shindell, a climate researcher from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, NY, the most recent studies have confirmed that changing levels of energy from the Sun are not significant enough to be a major cause of global warming: "...the solar increases do not have the ability to cause large global temperature increases...greenhouse gases are indeed playing the dominant role..." The Sun is once again less bright as we approach solar minimum, yet global warming continues." For more details, see Link Between Solar Cycle and Climate is Blowin' in the Wind

You might also like to read the paper Solar Irradiance Since 1874 Revisited by S. K. Solanki and M. Fligge, Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 25, no. 3, pages 341-344 (1 Feb 1998)

 

Objection:

Climate scientists never talk about water vapor, which is the strongest greenhouse gas, because it undermines their CO2 theory.

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/02/climate-scientists-hide-water-vapor.php

Answer:

There is no climate model or climate textbook that does not discuss the role water vapor plays in the Greenhouse Effect. It is the strongest Greenhouse gas, contributing 36% - 66% to the overall effect for vapor alone, 66% to 85% when you include clouds. It is however, not considered as a climate "forcing" because the amount of H2O in the air basically varies as a function of temperature. If you artificially increase the level of H2O in the air, it rains out immediately (in terms of climate response times). Similarly, due to the abundance of ocean on the Earth's surface, if you somehow removed all the water from the air it would quickly be replaced through evaporation. This has the interesting consequence that if one could somehow instantly remove all CO2 from the atmosphere, the temperature would begin to drop, causing precipitation to remove H2O from the air causing even further drops, in a feedback effect that would not end until no liquid water was left, only ice sheets and frozen oceans.

CO2 put into the air by burning fossil fuels, on the other hand, has an atmospheric lifetime of centuries before natural sinks will finish absorbing any excess from the air. This is plenty of time to have substantial and long lasting effects on the climate system. As the climate warms in response to the CO2, the humidity rises and the increased H2O concentration acts as a significant amplifier of CO2 driven warming, basically doubling or tripling its effect.

This article from Real Climate has an good discussion of this: "Water vapor, forcing or feedback?"

Objection:

H2O is 95% of the Greenhouse effect, CO2 is insignificant.

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/01/water-vapor-is-almost-all-of.php

Answer:

According to all of the scientific literature and climate experts I am aware of regarding this question, CO2 contributes anywhere from 9 to 30% towards the overall greenhouse effect. Depending on the method you use to determine these percentages they may even add up to more then 100% due to overlap and saturation of the particular frequencies of infra-red radiation each gas absorbs. The 95% number does not appear to come from a scientific source, though it seems to get tossed around a lot.

Please see this paper, the textbook referenced here and the article at Real Climate here.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is just one of dozens of responses to common climate change denial arguments, which can all be found at How to Talk to a Climate Sceptic.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Do cosmic rays cause global warming?

A: Not likely.

Blogs/Bad Astronomy: Cosmic Rays and Global Warming, Discover

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2007/07/03/cosmic-rays-and-global-warming/

Objection: cosmic rays or clouds are bigger drivers of climate change

http://www.skepticalscience.com/cosmic-rays-and-global-warming.htm

What the science says...

While the link between cosmic rays and cloud cover is yet to be confirmed, more importantly, there has been no correlation between cosmic rays and global temperatures over the last 30 years of global warming.

The fatal flaw in the theory that cosmic rays (or lack thereof) are driving global warming is that cosmic radiation has shown no correlation with global temperatures since 1970.

Furthermore,

The bottom line is even if these difficulties can be resolved and the causality link between cosmic rays and cloud formation is proven, all they'll find is the cloud formation 50 years ago is similar to now and has had little to no impact on the last 30 years of long term global warming.

 

An interesting story on the Heartland Institute's conference that you cited in comment 1 of this thread with respect to scientific dissenters and the lack of mainstream media to cover them.  It has a video, but I was unable to see the video.  The Heartland conference lists among its sponsors the Ayn Rand Institute.  Why am I not surprised?

Meet the sceptics:

Barack Obama may be worried about greenhouse gases - but not everyone is.

Suzanne Goldenberg reports from this week's gathering of climate change deniers (Guardian UK), with video from conference

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/12/climate-change-sceptic-environment

A roomful of cynics

A look at the non-experts speaking at Heartland Institute's denialist sideshow

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2009/3/6/95445/42836/

I think I've pretty much addressed all of your arguments concerning climate change.  Everything you've posted thus far appears to have been refuted already by orange rationality.  I see little purpose in addressing your issues on the green ethics or politics behind climate change unless you can respond to some of my rebuttals in orange.  It's almost as if you don't like it because it is green; which is not a good reason to reject it scientifically on the level of orange; nor in keeping with the principles of Integral to "transcend and include."  I'm not saying that you're not integral; I'm sure that you are in some line or lines of development.  I certainly don't claim to be "integral" on the social line and many other lines. 

But with respect to science, a more integral stance would be to accept the scientific consensus on issues of science when the contrarian argument cannot adequately refute it.
 

CLIMATE DENIAL CROCK OF THE WEEK

http://www.youtube.com/user/greenman3610

RECENT PROGRAMS INCLUDE:

MARS ATTACKS!!

It seems to be agreed among deniers, that there is a warming happening on other planets in the solar system. And not just one or two planets. It is considered climate denier gospel that all the other planets are warming, and that this is proof that some kind of solar activity is warming the whole system. Let's look at the evidence.

............

THE "URBAN HEAT ISLAND" CROCK

Could the scientists at Nasa, the National academy of science, the American Meteorological Society, and every professional scientific organization on the planet really have been so silly as to miss something this obvious?

...........

I LOVE THE 70S!!

Everyone has a favorite decade, and for Climate deniers, that decade has got to be, the 70s. Yes, the decade of disco, kung fu, and watergate. Because in the 70's, Deniers will tell you, all climate scientists believed an ice age was coming. Those crazy climate scientists! Why can't they make up their minds? But is that really true? Maybe a little historical perspective is in order.

............

THAT 1500 YEAR THING

Climate Deniers S. Fred Singer and Dennis Avery make their living by confusing and obfuscating the science of climate change. Their latest book, "Unstoppable Global Warming every 1500 Years", is a compendium of vintage as well as cutting edge climate crocks. Let's find out who they are and how they are bamboozling their audience.

.............

MEDIEVAL WARMING?

The so called Medieval Warming Period is an article of faith among deniers. But what does the "Supreme Court of Science" say?

.............

SOLAR SCHMOLAR

A favorite hobby horse of Climate Denialists is that there is some kind of invisible, undetectable influence from the sun that is responsible for the unequivocal warming of the last century. Let's put that crock under a microscope and see where the cracks are.

.............

ICE AREA VS VOLUME

Denialists continually try to confuse the issue of northern polar ice caps. Here are the facts from the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

.............

"IT'S COLD. SO THERE'S NO CLIMATE CHANGE"

"I looked outside, and it was snowing, therefore, there is no climate change." If that's what passes for rational thought in your social group, you owe it to yourself to watch this edition of Climate Denial Crock of the Week.

............

THE SCOOP ON SOUTHERN POLAR ICE

Don't back down from the watercooler wars. Climate Denial Crock of the Week shoots down the brainless, Rush Limbaugh factoids of global climate denial. Keep coming back each week for more real science on climate change, and send me your suggestions for climate crocks to crush.

..............

ABOUT THE CREATOR, PETER SINCLAIR

Peter Sinclair is a long time advocate of environmental awareness and energy alternatives. An award winning graphic artist, illustrator, and animator, Mr. Sinclair runs Greenman Studio from his home in Midland, MI.

Mr. Sinclairs cartoons and illustrations have appeared in newspapers around the world, and his work has been profiled in numerous publications, including the New York Times, The Utne Reader, and HaAretz of Jerusalem.

30 years of writing and activism in the areas of energy and environment, including extended study in Nashville with Al Gore and the worlds leading climate experts, in addition to skillful creation of audio visual presentations, have made Mr. Sinclairs presentation on Climate change and alternative energy one which has been called a must see!

Constantly updated information, made vivid with striking, clear graphics and animations, many derived from NASA, The National Snow and Ice Data Center, and top international sources, an expert knowledge of the issues of energy and environment, and an informal, good humored delivery, make difficult concepts easy to see and grasp.

No issue will have a greater impact on the new century than the decisions we make on energy and the impact of global climate change, and Peter Sinclairs presentation makes the critical points dramatically clear and immediate.

............

NHNE's Climate Change Resource Page
NHNE's 1000 Most Recent Climate Change Articles

............

Integral Rising
Integral NHNE
Community Organizers

I really didn't want to be involved in this conversation any more unless Brian could respond to my questions. 

Brian's Chance to Win the Nobel Prize

Brian, I take it then that you either do not have a response to my questions, or either the Senate Minority Report is your definitive response, which in any case is unrelated to the truth of your claims which you have yet to argue convincingly. 

I thought this was a debate.  I was willing to debate you but you do not seem to have a response.  Instead, you present new and different claims irrelevant to the previous claims. 

Everything to you seems to boil down to conspiracy theories and the elite bankers.  Even climate change.  I'm frankly surprised that integrally-minded people fell for such things. 

I'm no climate expert, but at least I can say that I'm familiar enough with the issues to refute the common denier arguments that you have presented.  I can even do it in my own words.  This in itself is no great accomplishment since anyone at rational orange can look up the common denier arguments and understand what the science says to offer a rational rebuttal.  The question is, can you respond back in a manner that is rational.  If you can (in your own words, please--no more links to irrelevant opinions), we might at least understand your position and be more sympathetic as to why you believe the way that you do.  We might even come to agree with you if you can convince us otherwise what science doesn't know.  Heck, you might even be up for the Nobel Prize for single-handedly debunking the scientific consensus and the banker elites all in one.  If you cannot, then I will presume that your skepticism is simply an article of faith that cannot be explained by you by rational means.

Beyond rational?  Hardly.  Regress Express sounds more like it.

In case you forgot, here are your main points:

1. There is no global warming; the earth is cooling instead.
2. Humans are not responsible for climate change.  Instead, it's a) the sun, b) water vapors, c)cosmic rays/clouds, and/or d) volcanoes.
3. CO2 is not the most important human emission; sulfur dioxide is more important as a human emission and greenhouse gas.

In case you forgot, here are my responses:

1. There is no global warming; the earth is cooling instead.

The science says that the Earth has been steadily warming since the start of the Industrial Revolution and continues to rise in close correlation with CO2 rise. The expert you cite, Bob Carter, claims that global warming "stopped" in 1998.  Carter's theory, in turn, has been thoroughly debunked by legitimate science, as it is based on the observation of a sharp decline in average global temperature in the aftermath of El Ninio, which initially produced an anomolous high and then a dramatic fall as temperatures returned to their normal rate of global warming in 1998.  Based on this anomoly, Carter declares that global warming "stopped" or had "reversed" in 1998.

This does not prove anything with respect to long term climate trends, since the warming trend has meanwhile continued in the background amidst the sharp rise and fall in average global temperature produced by the El Ninio anomoly.  Carter simply cherry-picked 1998 as his starting point because it happens to show the highest recorded temperature in recent history (so long as we can exclude the data from 2005, which indicate that 2005 surpassed 1998's record, according to other measurements).  Data from a variety of sources (please refer to charts on my original response) can easily confirm the steady rise in average global temperature nonetheless.

If you do not believe that the earth is warming, this puts you at Stage 1 denial of global warming along with Bob Carter.  Most dissenting scientists are well beyond Stage 1 and at least concede to the fact that the average global temperature has risen by 0.8 C over the past century.  So this position is at odds not only with the scientific consensus, but with most dissenting scientists as well.  Even Sarah Palin believes in Global Warming.  She doesn't know why she believes in it, but is certain that it is not made-made.  Putting her at Stage 2 denial and beyond that of your position.

But with respect to global cooling, we can also make the same observation of the recent cooling trend.  2007-2008 resulted in a temporary cooling trend because of La Nina.  Many global warming contrarians jumped at these cooler periods as "proof" that global warming did not exist (as did Morano's 2007 hype from your previous reference), unable to distinguish long-term climate change from short-term weather trends produced by El Ninio and La Nina.

    2.  Your argument that human CO2 emissions are not responsible for climate change, because

a) the sun is responsible

The sun cannot be responsible for global warming in recent years, since the sun is currently experiencing low solar activity due to the solar minimum.  This has been the case for some time now. Whereas it was once a plausible theory when the sun was at solar maximum to posit that the sun was the driver of global warming, most scientists abandoned it when they observed that temperatures continued to rise even after the sun shifted into solar minimum.  If the sun were the driver this would have resulted in cooling, not warming; so solar activity cannot explain the continued rise in temperatures in recent years.

b) water vapors are responsible

While true that water vapor is the most predominant greenhouse gas and that it is many times greater than the greenhouse gas produced by human CO2 emissions, a slight increase in CO2 emissions causes more water to evaporate from the oceans and elsewhere producing a positive feedback, thus amplifying the effects of water vapor beyond a purely CO2 effect.  Without any feedbacks from water vapor, the doubling of CO2 emissions would only result in a 1 C increase.  However, once including the feedback of water vapor, this CO2 doubling results in 3 C temperature increase, pushing temperature beyond the tipping point, at which point we will have put in place the natural forces of climate change that are no longer within our control.

c) cosmic rays/clouds are responsible

The theory goes something like this: when the sun is at low solar activity, we are bombarded by galactic cosmic rays that are normally shielded out by the sun's magnetic force.  The cosmic rays penetrate the earth's atmosphere to ionize in the atmosphere to produce cloud formations to produce climate change.

Two things wrong with this.  No connection has been shown between cosmic rays and clouds.  This is merely a hypothesis.  A Cern lab experiment is setting up an experiment to see if cosmic rays can be correlated with clouds.  By the time that they have set it up in four years, the sun should even be at lower solar activity making it an ideal time for discovering the connection of cosmic rays to cloud formation.  Even if this could be proven, however, cloud cover has been observed to be essentially the same since the past 50 years in spite of temperature rises.  So clouds don't really appear to have anything to do with the current warming trend.

Two.  Since satellites were in orbit 30 years ago, they have detected no correlation between temperature rise to cosmic rays.

d) volcanoes are responsible

Theory: volcanoes erupt carbon emissions and sulfur dioxide, a natural greenhouse gas according to Brian; therefore they are drivers of climate change.

Problem: sulfur dioxide is not a greenhouse gas but is bits of glass and rock.  Injecting sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere results in temporary global cooling, as shown by all recent major volcanic eruptions.  The black carbon soot from the volcanic emissions are essentially negated by the cooling effect from sulfur dioxide.

Thus volcanic activity cannot account for recent temperature rises.

3.  CO2 is not an important human emission; sulfur dioxide is more important as greenhouse gas.

Human sulfur dioxide has been reduced significantly over the past several decades throughout the world in industrial plants (including China).  It is not a greenhouse gas, and is currently not thought play a role in global warming.

Human emission of CO2 is very likely to be the most significant culprit of man-made global warming.  According to ice core samples, CO2 levels began to climb beyond the normal rate of change along with temperature rise at the beginning of the industrial period, when it was 285 ppm.  Since then, it has gone off the charts at 385 ppm.  Ice core samples, which now date back to 800,000 years, indicate that CO2 levels have never gone beyond 315 ppm and that the rate of CO2 increase has never been more than 3.6 ppm per century for the entire 800,000 until the start of the industrial revolution.  These slight increases were always offset by CO2 declines in the following ice age from the Milankovic cycles.  The current rate of CO2 increase, at 100 ppm per century, began around 1850 and is 33 times the rate of change of any previous increase going back to 800,000 years.

Since the oceans have been acting as a buffer to absorb much of the carbon emissions, we have been shielded from much of global warming that would otherwise have occurred.  Soon the ocean will have reached its capacity, at which point CO2 in the oceans will be released into the atmosphere producing a sudden temperature rise and sudden catastrophic changes, such as methane released from melting permafrosts and a return to the ancient greenhouse during the carboniferous period.  Unless policies are enacted globally to reduce emissions to previous atmospheric levels soon.  This is not likely to occur, since most do not believe in global warming.

You seem to have a consistent pattern of recycling old objections that were finally answered and settled by science between the 1950s-1980s.  Water vapors, solar cycles, volcanoes, and CO2's effect on greenhouse are debates that have been largely settled in science.  I would highly suggest that you read the history of the science behind CO2 emissions and its connections to climate change first, before trying to debunk it with economic history.  There's an excellent site that provides an overview of the history of this science that I'll have to fiind the link to and insert.

The Senate Minority Report

As to the Senate Minority Report, I prefer to see data, not opinions.  The IPCC annual reports are the largest and most rigorously peer-reviewed scientific collaborations in history.  They are based on data and assessment of this data, not opinions, are open to refutation and are regarded by experts in the field worldwide to be the most authoritative sources climate change.  Furthermore, the IPCC reports have been highly scrutinized by thousands of qualified scientists from around the world.  The IPCC is endorsed by every scientific journal and association with the exception of the National Association of Petroleum Geologists, which still doesn't endorse the consensus but withdrew its statement of dissent in 2007. 

But since you prefer opinion over data, let's go straight to the Senate Minority Report, which isn't data but is full of opinion from "dissenting" scientists holding Ph.Ds, whether or not they are actually dissenting scientists or even qualified to refute the consensus on global climate change.  So long as they sound "scientific" and "dissenting" (with preferably a peer-reviewed paper under their belt published to any scientific journal), they are included in the list of "experts."

If you click on the main page of Morano's blog and read the Senate Minority committee's statement on the Environment and Public works, what immediately is evident is the hypocrisy, not scientific objectivity.  Based on their statement, their primary concern does not appear to be the environment or public works (as the name suggests) but anti-regulation laws.  Why someone would trust the opinions of politicians and lobbyists over the scientific consensus on matters of science is beyond me. 

Considering the fact that Inhofe's report cites such people as Ray Kurzweil (who is in nanotechnology and was quoted out of context) and Bob Carter (who has never published a peer-reviewed paper in climate science) as climate "experts," the authors were obviously forced to scrape the bottom of the barrel for scientific dissent.  Some scientists who are on this list, according to Wikipedia, were not aware of being on it and demanded to have their names removed, which the preparers of this report refused to do because they claimed that they (the scientists demanding removal of their names) represented the minority opinion of the science of the Senate Minority (or something to that effect), and were selected on that basis.

The author of the two previous comment links you referred us to, Marc Morano, worked on the staff of Rush Limbaugh prior to being hired by Senator Inhofe as his assistant.  Morano wrote the following in 2007 (from Brian's link above):

"Washington DC – An abundance of new peer-reviewed studies, analyses, and data error discoveries in the last several months has prompted scientists to declare that fear of catastrophic man-made global warming “bites the dust” and the scientific underpinnings for alarm may be “falling apart.” 

While true, perhaps, that in the United States, dissent is growing in the GOP (along with diminishing support in the public due to economic concerns, a recent cold spell from La Nina, and a hugely successful disinformation campaign by anti-regulation think-tanks), dissent is not growing but diminishing in the scientific community.  On the other hand, "dissent" is growing among non-scientists and politicians.  The link above is to an article on the Pew Report that discusses the declining concern among non-scientists and especially among conservative Republicans in America on global climate change issues in 2008, compared to 2007.  Of course, this is not the case in all Republicans (such as Olympia Snowe, who demanded that Exxon Mobil stop funding anti-environmental think-tanks).  So it is more a conservative traditional amber issue than Republican. 

Since 2007, environmental concerns have fallen considerably in public opinion polls.  Overall, belief of a scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change among nonscientists has dropped to 47%.  This is not at all surprising considering that 47% of the public still doubts that there is a scientific consensus on the theory of evolution.  A significant percentage still believing in ghosts.

Among the college-educated Republicans, only 19% in 2008 believe that global warming is man-made; a 20-point decline from 2007.  Here is similar poll except conducted on scientists, broken down by scientific field (to be inserted).  This poll, conducted in 2008 and sent to 3,000 scientists, had 400 respondents, with an average of 90% of all scientists in all fields agreeing with the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming.  This is a 30% increase from 20 years ago.  Thus, agreement with the scientific consensus on man-made global warming in the scientific community has increased overall, not declined.  It is not likely that these viewpoints have changed significantly from 2007 as would be the case among nonscientific politicians and the public, unless scientific viewpoints also shift with the political or economic winds. 

Broken down by field, scientists who had the highest agreement with the consensus on man-made climate change were those who worked directly in the field of climate science, with a 97% agreement.  Petroleum geologists were the least likely to agree at 41%, which is not surprising considering that their livelihoods depend on fossil fuel extraction and therefore with alliances with fossil fuel industries.  These are followed by meteorologists--a fancy term for "weather man (or woman)."  Meteorologists are not climate scientists and do not study climate change, but only study short-term local weather patterns.  There is thus considerable variation on agreement among scientists depending on the field's relevance to climate science (which is not the same as "weather").  In general, however, scientists whose fields are more relevant to the field of climate science agree most strongly with the consensus view while those whose fields are less relevant to the field tend to be more in agreement with non-scientists' opinions.  The overall percentage of agreeing scientists is still comparatively high at 90% compared to nonscientists at 47%.  And given the Senate Minority Report's high percentage of "meteorologists" and "geologists" consulted as "experts" (a considerable percentage of whom were found to be connected with anti-regulation industries and think-tanks so are suspected to be petroleum geologists), it is clear that this report cannot be objective or be taken seriously.  Simply because one is a scientist does not make one an expert.

 The fact that the few scientific journals and associations which had previously issued a dissenting statement in response to the IPCC consensus have now withdrawn their dissenting statements (with the exception of one) and have written a statement endorsing the consensus clearly shows that dissent is diminishing in science, not growing as Morano contends. 

Secondly, is it rational to insist that the 15 or so peer-reviewed studies rejecting the consensus represents a growing scientific dissent?  For that matter, is it even rational to insist that one scientist whose computer model prediction calculates only a 1.1 C temperature rise by 2100 can bring the "Consensus" down in "one fell swoop"?  This scientist's study, after all, is based on a simple and SINGLE computer climate model which I thought was not allowed as evidence in global warming denialism on account of the weather's unpredictability, complexity, variations and inaccuracies of computer model predictions.  At any rate, Schwartz' paper was thoroughly discredited by scientists later as being far too simplistic as a computer climate model.

Let's not forget that dissent has always existed in science among a very small percentage of peer-reviewed papers rejecting the consensus.  The 15-item sampler cited by Morano is a far cry from "abundant" compared to the several hundreds of recent peer-reviewed papers which do not reject the consensus.  More specifically, the Orestes study shows that out of over 900 papers on global climate change published up to 2004, only 34 papers rejected the consensus outright.  A more recent study reviewing Orestes' work revised the number down from 34 rejecting the consensus to only one.  So whether one or 34, the number of studies rejecting the consensus is extraordinarily low given the overall high number of peer-reviewed papers, yet falls within the expected range of dissent.  Likewise, between 2004-2007, at least an additional 528 were peer-reviewed (based on a cursory glance on 'net) with only 15 dissenting papers (this is a generous figure based on Morano's 15-item "sampler," in spite of the fact that many of them LINK to not the actual data but to newspaper opinion articles instead). 

Since the vast majority of other studies were not cited by Morano and since of the studies cited, they were of questionable scientific value, it is presumed that the vast majority of scientific papers do not reject the consensus view.  Nor do they necessarily explicitly endorse them, since most researchers have moved beyond the existential reality of man-made global warming and focus instead on research based on this assumption.  Even if we were to exclude the 900 or so prior to 2004 to count only recent peer-reviewed papers from 2004-2007, allowing generously for the 15 dissenting papers and the conservative figure of 528 total, this represents a very small minority of dissent on the order of less than 3% (since 528 is the minimum based one scientist's web scholar search; so isn't likely to represent the total number of peer-reviewed papers on climate change published in that period).  This too falls well within the expected range of papers rejecting the consensus view; so doesn't represent a paradigm shift in science overturning global warming. 

And while the studies cited by Morano from 2007 may be relatively "new," similar hypotheses have been offered in the past and rejected by due scientific process.  Had these studies truly been groundbreaking, they would have received more attention and better reception in the scientific community than simply being dismissed and ignored except by the climate change deniers. 

Had any of their studies truly been as groundbreaking as the Senate Minority committee made them out to be in 2007, these scientists would have received the Nobel prize for refuting the IPCC's dire warning that human CO2 is causing climate change rather than being dismissed and ignored by the scientific community in general.   But as it stands, these "expert" opinions--from climate sensitivity to "it's colder now in Wagga Wagga" to short-term cooling oceans and so on are so commonplace that they have already been compiled in the skepticalscience.com faq.  There's no need for me to respond to them one-by-one, so here is the faq:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/

Climate Progress Blog had the following to say in response to the 2008 Senate Minority Report (touting 650 dissenting scientists instead of its previous 400 in 2007, including those scientists who asked to be removed from the list.  Now 59 more are added to bring a nice round number of "over 700"):

http://climateprogress.org/2008/12/11/inhofe-morano-recycles-long-debunked-denier-talking-points-will-the-media-be-fooled-again/

Inhofe recycles long-debunked denier talking points — will the media be fooled (again)?
Who will the media believe this time: The Senate’s leading climate denier, James Inhofe (R-OK), or their own lying eyes?

Deniers like Inhofe have a serious media problem — an ever growing number of studies, real world observations, and credible scientific bodies all point to human-caused emissions as the increasingly dominant cause of planetary warming and dangerous climate change.

What’s a denier to do? The answer is simple: Repackage previously debunked disinformation, release it as a “new” so-called “Full Senate Report” full of hysterical headlines, push it through right-wing news outlets, and hope the traditional media bites. Why not? It worked before.

You think the scientists that promote climate change alarmism stack up to Freeman Dyson. We have very, very few real scientist. Its like a lost art. For a real scientist, consensus means almost NOTHING as far HIS/HER thinking goes. I watched so many depend on consesus, or format to get answers. Does integral have its own mind on this or are they not going to look at the scientist methods and just beleive them. Very, Very hypocritical and not Integral to say the least. More like the terrible green-red pattern. Greens fine. Green-Red and I hit ya with orange. Gain confidence in your ability to handle scientific terms. They have there corralates in I-I. The scientist have taken a big authority image in our culture, its like a program we got for school. "This is the real real, beyond subjective process". You know this story, but then why are you not using Integral on the field of science itself?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/magazine/29Dyson-t.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&ref=WRH

The question of sea level? From a very,very,very(real scientist) credable scientist.

Dr. Morner

An article:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5067351/Rise-of-sea-levels-is-the-greatest-lie-ever-told.html#comments

And interview article:

http://www.larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2007/2007_20-29/2007-25/pdf/33-37_725.pdf

Is he a bunch of crock.

Notice the debate on this forum, is moving to the idea of censorship on this forum. Just like the roman church eh. Get the serfs out of the room. I am informed of what has been said by others on this site. I am presenting novel , new perspectives, that come from being WAY WAY more informed, not intelligent, INFORMED. If climate change is important to you and you already know it has a political and economic aspect, then why such a political and economic blind spot on this forum. So I am the crazy one for doing my homework. I understand we all have our time. But labeling me while not doing your homework is the easy way out. What I am presenting takes some time and consideration. Not some " He is a denier, go get him and linch him, lock him up in somether section so our agenda can go foward. " In history what kind of people has the mob done this to? Integral Mob anyone? He's a heritic.

I am in good company then.

From:Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Science, MIT

Lindzen on negative climate feedback

This essay is from an email list that I subscribe to. Dr. Lindzen has sent this along as an addendum to his address made at ICCC 2009 in New York City. I present it here for consideration. - Anthony

Simplified Greenhouse Theory

The wavelength of visible light corresponds to the temperature of the sun’s surface (ca 6000oK). The wavelength of the heat radiation corresponds to the temperature of the earth’s atmosphere at the level from which the radiation is emitted (ca 255oK). When the earth is in equilibrium with the sun, the absorbed visible light is balanced by the emitted heat radiation.

The basic idea is that the atmosphere is roughly transparent to visible light, but, due to the presence of greenhouse substances like water vapor, clouds, and (to a much lesser extent) CO2 (which all absorb heat radiation, and hence inhibit the cooling emission), the earth is warmer than it would be in the absence of such gases.

The Perturbed Greenhouse
If one adds greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, one is adding to the ‘blanket’ that is inhibiting the emission of heat radiation (also commonly referred to as infrared radiation or long wave radiation). This causes the temperature of the earth to increase until equilibrium with the sun is reestablished.

For example, if one simply doubles the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, the temperature increase is about 1°C.

If, however, water vapor and clouds respond to the increase in temperature in such a manner as to further enhance the ‘blanketing,’ then we have what is called a positive feedback, and the temperature needed to reestablish equilibrium will be increased. In the climate GCMs (General Circulation Models) referred to by the IPCC (the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), this new temperature ranges from roughly 1.5°C to 5°C.
The equilibrium response to a doubling of CO2 (including the effects of feedbacks) is commonly referred to as the climate sensitivity.

Two Important Points

1. Equilibration takes time.
2. The feedbacks are responses to temperature – not to CO2 increases per se.

The time it takes depends primarily on the climate sensitivity, and the rapidity with which heat is transported down into the ocean. Both higher sensitivity and more rapid mixing lead to longer times. For the models referred to by the IPCC, this time is on the order of decades.

This all leads to a crucial observational test of feedbacks!

The Test: Preliminaries
Note that, in addition to any long term trends that may be present, temperature fluctuates on shorter time scales ranging from years to decades.

Such fluctuations are associated with the internal dynamics of the ocean- atmosphere system. Examples include the El Nino – Southern Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, etc.

These fluctuations must excite the feedback mechanisms that we have just described.

The Test

1. Run the models with the observed sea surface temperatures as boundary conditions.
2. Use the models to calculate the heat radiation emitted to space.
3. Use satellites to measure the heat radiation actually emitted by the earth.

When temperature fluctuations lead to warmer temperatures, emitted heat radiation should increase, but positive feedbacks should inhibit these emissions by virtue of the enhanced ‘blanketing.’ Given the model climate sensitivities, this ‘blanketing’ should typically reduce the emissions by a factor of about 2 or 3 from what one would see in the absence of feedbacks. If the satellite data confirms the calculated emissions, then this would constitute solid evidence that the model feedbacks are correct.

The Results of an Inadvertent Test

From Wielicki, B.A., T. Wong, et al, 2002: Evidence for large decadal variability in the tropical mean radiative energy budget. Science, 295, 841-844.

Above graph:

Comparison of the observed broadband LW and SW flux anomalies for the tropics with climate model simulations using observed SST records. The models are not given volcanic aerosols, so the should not expected to show the Mt. Pinatubo eruption effects in mid-1991 through mid-1993. The dashed line shows the mean of all five models, and the gray band shows the total rnage of model anomalies (maximum to minimum).

It is the topmost panel for long wave (LW) emission that we want.

Let us examine the top figure a bit more closely.

From 1985 until 1989 the models and observations are more or less the same – they have, in fact, been tuned to be so. However, with the warming after 1989, the observations characteristically exceed 7 times the model values. Recall that if the observations were only 2-3 times what the models produce, it would correspond to no feedback. What we see is much more than this – implying strong negative feedback. Note that the ups and downs of both the observations and the model (forced by observed sea surface temperature) follow the ups and downs of temperature (not shown).

Note that these results were sufficiently surprising that they were confirmed by at least 4 other groups:

Chen, J., B.E. Carlson, and A.D. Del Genio, 2002: Evidence for strengthening of the tropical general circulation in the 1990s. Science, 295, 838-841.

Cess, R.D. and P.M. Udelhofen, 2003: Climate change during 1985–1999: Cloud interactions determined from satellite measurements. Geophys. Res. Ltrs., 30, No. 1, 1019, doi:10.1029/2002GL016128.

Hatzidimitriou, D., I. Vardavas, K. G. Pavlakis, N. Hatzianastassiou, C. Matsoukas, and E. Drakakis (2004) On the decadal increase in the tropical mean outgoing longwave radiation for the period 1984–2000. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 4, 1419–1425.

Clement, A.C. and B. Soden (2005) The sensitivity of the tropical-mean radiation budget. J. Clim., 18, 3189-3203.

The preceding authors did not dwell on the profound implications of these results – they had not intended a test of model feedbacks! Rather, they mostly emphasized that the differences had to arise from cloud behavior (a well acknowledged weakness of current models). However, as noted by Chou and Lindzen (2005, Comments on “Examination of the Decadal Tropical Mean ERBS Nonscanner Radiation Data for the Iris Hypothesis”, J. Climate, 18, 2123-2127), the results imply a strong negative feedback regardless of what one attributes this to.

The Bottom Line

The earth’s climate (in contrast to the climate in current climate GCMs) is dominated by a strong net negative feedback. Climate sensitivity is on the order of 0.3°C, and such warming as may arise from increasing greenhouse gases will be indistinguishable from the fluctuations in climate that occur naturally from processes internal to the climate system itself.

An aside on Feedbacks

Here is an easily appreciated example of positive and negative feedback. In your car, the gas and brake pedals act as negative feedbacks to reduce speed when you are going too fast and increase it when you are going too slow. If someone were to reverse the position of the pedals without informing you, then they would act as positive feedbacks: increasing your speed when you are going too fast, and slowing you down when you are going too slow.

 

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/30/lindzen-on-negative-climate-feedback/

 

 

Thought I should update with an article. Looks like the IPCC is being very partial.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/06/the-global-warming-hypothesis-and-ocean-heat/

 I am wondering if you guys minds have been changing lately around climate change. I told many of you time will tell. I am wondering if you have noticed how the debate has changed. Many have become silent and Integral is not talking about the topic very much even though the Copenhegian meeting just finished. Anyway. I came across a lovely article on Climate change here.

Science, Politics and Global Warming  by Wallace Thornhill

23 December, 2009 In the end, science offers us the only way out of politics. And if we allow science to become politicized, then we are lost. We will enter the Internet version of the dark ages, an era of shifting fears and wild prejudices, transmitted to people who don't know any better. That's not a good future for the human race. That's our past.  - Michael Crichton, "Environmentalism as Religion," (A lecture at the Commonwealth Club, San Francisco, CA, September 15, 2003).

[Click to enlarge]

The Global Warming circus in Copenhagen was politics driven by a consensus that, by definition, has nothing to do with science. The apocalyptic nonsense that opened the meeting highlighted that fact. How many who attended or demonstrated at the meeting actually understand the (disputed) scientific grounds for the hysteria? Meanwhile, leading science journals allow skeptics of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) to be labelled "deniers" and refuse them the right of reply. It is doctrinaire denouncement, not science. It is the journal editors who are denying the scientific method by censoring debate. It is they who are peddling ideology.  Despite the glossy media image, modern science is a mess. When the fundamental concepts are false, technological progress merely provides science with a more efficient means for going backwards. At the same time, government and corporate funding promotes the rampant disease of specialism and fosters politicization of science with the inevitable warring factions and religious fervor. Science has become religion! ..although religion may have borrowed some of the jargon of science, science, more importantly, has adopted the methods of religion. This is the worst of both worlds.  - Halton Arp. There have been several warm climatic periods documented in history that had nothing to do with human activity. There seems to be evidence that the Earth has actually been cooling since 2001, in line with reduced solar activity. So it would be more realistic to consider climate change as a normal phenomenon and to plan accordingly because despite all of the hoopla in the media, modern science is founded on surprising ignorance. An iconoclastic view suggests the following: — cosmologists have been misled by theoretical physicists who don't understand gravity, which forms the basis of the big bang theory. Imaginary 'dark matter,' 'dark energy,' and black holes have been added to make models of galaxies and star birth appear to work. When all else fails, mysterious magnetic fields are invoked. The bottom line is that cosmologists presently have no real understanding of the universe;  — astrophysicists don't understand stars because they steadfastly ignore plasma discharge phenomena;  — particle physicists don't understand matter or its resonant electrical interactions. They prefer to invent imaginary particles;  — geologists have been misled by astronomers about Earth's history;  — biologists have had no practical help from theoretical physicists so they don't understand what might constitute the 'mind-body connection' or 'the spark of life;'  — and climate scientists have been misled by astronomers and astrophysicists so they have no real concept of recent Earth history in the solar system and they don't understand the real source of lightning and the electrical input to weather systems. For example, the major city in northern Australia, Darwin, was utterly destroyed in tropical cyclone 'Tracy' in 1974. The catastrophe was described in part, “At 3am, the eye of the cyclone passed over Darwin, bringing an eerie stillness. There was a strange light, a diffuse lightning, like St. Elmo's fire.” There was no solar energy being supplied to the 150km per hour winds at 3 in the morning. "A diffuse lightning" is an apt description of the slow electrical discharge (distinct from impulsive lightning) that drives all rotary storms and influences weather patterns. That is why the electrically hyperactive gas giant planets have overwhelmingly violent storms while receiving very little solar energy.  Yet with these unacknowledged shortcomings we have bookshelves filled with textbooks, science journals and PhD theses, mostly unread, that would stretch to the Moon, fostering the impression that we understand most things. And the public is assailed with documentaries that breathlessly deliver and repeat fashionable science fiction as fact. How can this be?  Science has left its classical and philosophical roots, rather like surrealist art departed from realism. The analogy is fitting. It is demonstrated by the fondness for expressing theoretical models in artists impressions, computer animations and aesthetic terms. The artist/philosopherMiles Mathis is of the opinion that “Science has become just like Modern Art. The contemporary artist and the contemporary physicist look at the world in much the same way. The past means nothing. They gravitate to novelty as the ultimate distinction, in and of itself. They do this because novelty is the surest guarantee of recognition.” So why does the media not have science critics alongside art critics? Has science become sacrosanct? Bluntly, the answer is yes. No science reporter wants to have the portcullises lowered at the academic bastions. Happily, the Internet allows the curious to circumvent such censorship.

The Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) Debate Mother Nature doesn't care what humans believe in.  - Bill Gaede. History makes it clear that climate does change. The real question is whether our activities today are a significant cause of global warming. We cannot simply label those who question Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) as "deniers" because climate science is not so well established, nor is the data so clear, that it can blame our CO2 emissions for climate change. In fact, the data suggests quite simply that global warming is not man-made. But like most of modern science, climate research suffers the negative aspects of specialism, which blinkers researchers and obstruct any global synthesis. Specialism allows a mistaken belief to infect one discipline and spread like a virus to others it touches. Other well-meaning specialists infected climate science before its birth with their misconceptions. As we shall see, theoretical astrophysics transmits the most virulent 'bugs' because it underpins our view of the Earth's situation in the cosmos. In climate science, which involves the entire Earth, we must truly understand the space environment as well. There may be a source of energy that has not been considered.  There is a human aspect to the debate. Why do we keep repeating the mistakes of the past? Why can't we 'get a grip' and witness our self-delusion and hubris in believing that in the last instant of our existence we have uncovered the secrets of the universe? Why do we so strenuously ignore the evidence for recent global catastrophe and, by doing so, not recognize the origin of our innate fear of doomsday? Is the AGW debate fuelled by the subconscious urge to vicariously revisit calamities that dimly echo from prehistory and keeps us firmly stuck in the past? Ignorance and fear are our undoing. And both are at the heart of the AGW debate.

>> We have an unexplained enthralment with stories of the end of the world.  [Click to enlarge]

To help us feel safe in this unpredictable universe we favour fairy stories to the truth. We cannot tolerate uncertainty. No matter how far-fetched the idea, if the climate is changing we must take the blame so that a remedy seems possible. But that exposes us to exploitation by authorities. It is a familiar pattern of behavior. The early astronomer/priests attained great power by presenting the facade of human control in being able to predict frightening eclipses. More recently, astronomer/priests received considerable funding and recognition by playing on our doomsday fear of comets. This game has been so successful that the same people are doing it again by pointing at Dante's inferno on Venus and suggesting a similar fate for the Earth. But for the adventurous few who accept the uncertainty of our existence, the fossil record and the ravaged faces of other planets and moons bear witness to a dynamic history of the solar system. It is abundantly clear that the story of Venus is quite different to that of the Earth. The scare campaigns only work because of our frightful ignorance.  “It's very disturbing that we do not understand the climate on a planet that is so much like the Earth,” said Professor Fred Taylor, a planetary scientist based at Oxford University and one of the ESA's chief advisers for the Venus Express mission. “It is telling us that we really don't understand the Earth. We have ended up with a lot of mysteries.” [Emphasis added]  Professor Taylor had written earlier about the Venusian north polar vortex: “the absence of viable theories which can be tested, or in this case any theory at all, leaves us uncomfortably in doubt as to our basic ability to understand even gross features of planetary atmospheric circulations.”Such an admission by a leading expert should be of fundamental concern to climate scientists. But apparently not. They are content with computer models that cannot predict "even gross features of planetary atmospheric circulations" provided the data can be manipulated to fulfill their beliefs.

>> Credit: Martin Kozlowski, Wall Street Journal  [Click to enlarge]

The recent publication on the Internet of more than ten years of emails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) of East Anglia University in England underscores the way science is done, as distinct from the way it is said to be done. The media performances of politicians and climate scientists trying to downplay the significance of the scandalous behavior revealed in the emails have been notable for the emotive language used to describe those who dare to question climate change ideology. They are "deniers," or "stooges" for the coal and oil industries. In the worst examples, skeptics have been equated with holocaust deniers. The disingenuous excuse for the emails is that the “robust private exchanges only show that scientists are human.” Precisely! That's why some of those emails propose not sharing the raw climate data and others suggest preventing dissident authors from publishing in peer-reviewed journals.  The misappropriated emails may be the “normal repartee and discussion between climate scientists” claimed dismissively by Professor Andy Pitman, co-director of the Climate Change Research Centre, University of New South Wales. But they reveal frustration and anger with skeptics of AGW. They show how scientists allow their feelings to override scientific objectivity. However, I agree with him that the emails do not represent a scientific conspiracy. It is "only human" to defend one's core beliefs and status irrationally and by any means. It is significant that those who disagree with AGW are labelled "deniers." That smacks of religious conviction. It makes the arrogant and unscientific assumption that AGW is a fact beyond question, and that the "deniers" are operating merely from a misguided contrary belief. The 'scientific method' seems an empty ideal trumpeted by scientists who don't trouble to observe it. Real science requires that competing views from skeptics be welcomed and examined objectively and dispassionately in the search for truth. But competition implies a victor and the vanquished. Alas for science, it's a political and ideological battlefield and not a court of reason. (See this report of a meeting between government advisers and well-credentialed AGW skeptics). It's like religion. Heresy [in science] is thought of as a bad thing, whereas it should be just the opposite.  - Dr. Thomas Gold. Professor Tim Flannery, Chairman of the Copenhagen Climate Council and a media celebrity in Australia, in the opening to a television interview about the emails controversy was conveniently provided an "Aunt Sally" by the interviewer who asked if he was a part of “a vast left-wing conspiracy to de-industrialize the western world.” It was a leading question, easily turned to Flannery's advantage. He merely listed big companies who were on the committee. He didn't mention the beneficiaries —all of the usual suspects who want to trade in carbon— the big banks. He accused “skeptics and those who don't want to see action on climate change” of choosing their timing carefully in releasing the emails, the transparent implication being that the (generally unpaid) skeptics are the conspirators.  Flannery admits, “we don't understand all of the factors that affect Earth's climate.” So why do we foolishly indulge experts? Why can't we recognize the narrow limitations and often self-interest of specialist views and weigh them accordingly? Why do we still suffer the financial experts and grossly overpaid businessmen who couldn't see the global financial meltdown coming? Sub prime carbon is on its way. The problem is that we are not exposed to the skeptics and their views. Academia, politicians and the media see to that. It's not easy being seen if you find information that does not support the accepted views because the supporters of the accepted views have publicity, money and power to grant degrees. Going along is how proponents of the accepted view obtained their degrees, how they obtained funding and how they obtained their publicity. So how could so many smart people have got it so wrong? A few got it wrong; the rest went along. Self interest, not science, ensured the status quo.  - C. J. Ransom. Human nature is the greatest impediment to scientific progress.  The CRU emails expose the anonymous peer review system as a means of excluding challenges to ideology. They reveal the "herd instinct" in science. Journal editors are the "sheep dogs." As the late lamented skeptic, Tommy Gold, observed, “The sheep in the interior of the herd are well protected from the bite in the ankle by the sheep dog.” Of course, none of this is news to the dissident scientists who are vital to science progress. They are forced to publish in obscure journals, or self-publish, which lays them open to the accusation that their work is not peer-reviewed. And there's the catch-22. Often they have no mainstream peers. We must learn to ignore such hollow arguments and insist on open debate. What's Wrong with Climate Science? The unpleasant reality is that modern science is an inverted pyramid of hypotheses and beliefs teetering on a foundation of surprising ignorance and historical wrong turns. For example, the ideology of climate science is based on the story of the history of the solar system and the Earth. However, the usual story is a fable based on gravitational theory while gravity itself remains a mystery. Many-body gravitational systems are inherently chaotic, so that it would be a miracle if the order we see in the solar system today were long established, according to that model. But the climate change models take for granted an undisturbed Earth. The models also rely on steady radiant energy generated in the interior of the Sun. But what if that global-warming plasma ball in the sky is powered from the outside? Would not all the planets share in some of that energy? And if so, there is no climate model that accounts for it.  I wrote in February 2007, in Global Warming in a Climate of Ignorance, “Like Darwin's theory of evolution and Big Bang cosmology, global warming by greenhouse gas emissions has undergone that curious social process in which a scientific theory is promoted to a secular myth. When in fact, science is ignorant about the source of the heat — the Sun.”  Climatologists rely on astrophysicists for the basic assumptions they employ in their climate models. In particular, it is assumed that the Sun is a steady source of radiant energy and that the Earth and its atmosphere have been a closed, undisturbed system for longer than man has walked the Earth. However, the theory of how the Sun works is of Victorian vintage. It was formulated in the gaslight and horse and buggy era, long before the space age showed that space is not empty.

>> It was scientists a century ago with no experience of plasma who developed the theory of how the Sun works by applying perfect gas laws. It will be as amusing to future scientists, as the medieval belief in a flat Earth is today.  [Click to enlarge]

Space is teeming with charged particles, known as plasma. And plasma is a better electrical conductor than copper wire. Meanwhile, the geological and mytho-historical record of past global catastrophes shows that we cannot simply assume an Earth undisturbed by external factors, even within the memory of mankind.  When Eddington put together his solar model in the 1920s the Sun was thought to be isolated in the vacuum of space. There could be no external source of energy causing it to shine. Therefore, it was assumed, the Sun must provide its own fuel to shine for billions of years. Decades earlier, Kristian Birkeland determined that charged particles from the Sun must cause the auroras. So the Sun has an electrical environment. But Birkeland's discovery was not considered. It had no explanation at the time.  The next very peculiar assumption was that the Sun is composed mostly of hydrogen because it is the dominant element found radiating at the top of the Sun's atmosphere. That is like saying, if the top of the Earth's atmosphere were to be radiant, that the Earth must be composed mostly of nitrogen and oxygen. It is quite bizarre to propose that the lightest elements dominate the very core of celestial bodies. No source of energy is of any avail unless it liberates energy in the deep interior of the star. It is not enough to provide for the external radiation of the star. We must provide for the maintenance of the high internal temperature, without which the star would collapse.  - A. Eddington, The Internal Constitution of the Stars. The Sun's fuel could not burn at the surface, like any normal fire, because a ball of inert hydrogen of the Sun's mass requires somehow to be 'blown up' against gravity to be the size we see. A solution came to hand at the crucial moment; it had to be internal thermonuclear energy. The thermonuclear theory was cleverly force-fitted to the requirements but then there was the small problem that the lethal X-rays from the hypothetical thermonuclear core had to be 'toned down' before reaching the surface to give the relatively cool, benign radiance of the Sun. To do this, another strange assumption was introduced. The Sun, unlike any other body known, must transfer heat internally by radiation.  With such a far-fetched model it is little wonder that every observable aspect of the Sun denies it. It is one of the most amazing examples of group delusion that it persists. The temperature rises to millions of degrees as you move away from the Sun, which commonsense tells us must be due to energy arriving from outside the Sun. The surface of the Sun is not a seething convective cauldron transferring heat from the interior. It is ordered and granular. What's more, where the granulations are pushed aside in a sunspot, it is cooler down below. And the Sun and the solar system are threaded by magnetic fields, which signify electric current flows.  The solar discharge has a very effective feedback system to maintain steady radiant output while the electrical power input varies. In fact, the solar radiant energy is termed a "solar constant," which is critical to the AGW argument. However, no account is taken of the variable electrical power focused on the Sun but intercepted by the planets. The electrical connections have been traced from the Sun to the Earth's magnetosphere; from the magnetosphere to the ionosphere; and from the ionosphere into weather systems. No one can claim to be "a climate expert" while ignorant of the electrical nature of the solar system. This common energy source explains the reports of simultaneous warming on other planets. The Sun's galactic power source is the main driver of climatic variability. Human carbon emissions count for nothing in comparison.  Having an incorrect model of stars means that expectations are not fulfilled by observations. For example, in November a paper appeared in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society which expressed “a huge problem” with the behavior of a group of variable red giant stars. Typically they were found to vary in radius by twenty solar diameters, which should “lead to changes in [the effective temperature of the star] that are vastly greater than the directly observed changes from spectra or photometric colour.” But this is not a problem if the energy that lights a star comes from without rather than within. In fact it is normal behavior in a plasma discharge tube to observe little change in color or brightness of glowing regions as they expand or contract in response to changes in electrical input.  If astronomers have bestowed an invalid theory for the Sun, the source of our warmth and weather on Earth, then climate science is adrift from reality. We can forget the portentous climate models. Climate scientists are unaware of a principal driver of weather systems on Earth and all the planets. The strongest winds are on the most distant planet from the Sun and even the Sun has been found to have weather. Like computer generated doomsday movies, computer climate models can be programmed to give the same illusion of apocalypse.  Insulated from dissent by peer review and strict disciplinary boundaries, much theoretical science has become as useful as medieval clerics calculating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Only now there are supercomputers to reify and count the imaginary seraphim. The result is far-reaching inertia in the market of ideas. The tales our grandparents handed down tend to remain the basis of our ideology in the 21st century.  The ideology that underpins the climate change debate is that which assumes billions of years of undisturbed clockwork motion of the planets: “Once upon a time, long, long ago, all of the planets were formed from a dusty disk about the newborn Sun.” Like any good fiction it introduces a crisis. For reasons only guessed at, disaster strikes our "twin" planet, Venus. It suffers a "runaway greenhouse" catastrophe in its carbon dioxide atmosphere and the surface becomes as hot as a furnace. Forget the fact that the "science" has been made up to fit the story.  Venus is not the Earth's twin. The spectre of a similar fate on the Earth is merely the latest doomsday scare. The one before was a comet impact, and before that a nuclear holocaust. Apocalyptic nightmares are an instinctive part of human nature. It is a legacy of recent catastrophe in the solar system that involved our distant ancestors and which still echoes down the millennia. Scientists, being human, are not immune from this irrational fear. In fact, as the examples show, they are well placed to take advantage; to raise their status and their funding by playing on that fear. I have been interested, for a long time, in the psychological process of discovery as the most concise manifestation of man's creative faculty – and in that converse process that blinds him towards truths which, once perceived by a seer, become so heartbreakingly obvious.  - Arthur Koestler, The Sleepwalkers. A search for the truth must first establish a sound foundation and that requires a broad historical perspective that few scientists ever achieve. (Those who do take the trouble generally ask awkward questions and are ostracized as deniers, skeptics or cranks). Scientific truth cannot be arrived at democratically. Either something is true or it is not. The claim that most scientists believe in anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is worthless. The majority of scientists once believed the Earth is the center of the universe. Koestler is right, history shows that major progress is achieved by individuals, call them seers, and not by bureaucratic institutions. But seers are the people who today are shut out by peer review. Generally, seers have no peers. The established system may prevent stupid research but it also slows down originality and innovation, promotes timidness and conformity. Innovation, however, is absolutely necessary in science. At least in the USA and in England science was less institutionalised in the 19th century. A scientist like Darwin, who held no academic position and received no public funds, would probably not have been able to do his research on evolution under today's circumstances. Important breakthroughs back then were mostly produced by researchers who were neither professional scientists nor part of a bureaucratic system.  - Interview with Rupert Sheldrake, Die Zeit, July 11, 2002. Most of what you get taught is lies. It has to be. Sometimes if you get the truth all at once, you can't understand it.  - Terry Pratchett.

>> “By far the most terrifying film you will ever see.” Ironically the montage shows the most powerful electrical storm on Earth — the tropical cyclone. The scariest thing about the film is the misuse of science.  [Click to enlarge]

All science is provisional. There is no "inconvenient truth" about the climate. Any inconvenience is self-inflicted. At this early stage of science we do not understand the climate or the Sun. But that kind of uncertainty is not to be tolerated by experts who have achieved massive funding and a kind of fame with their dire predictions. This poses a big problem for the rest of us. How long will it take for the media to wake up that they have been taken for a ride? Hopefully we won't have to wait until the climate is obviously cooling again. You see, the Sun, like all electric stars, is a variable star.  We all, like Michael Crichton, wish to see "a good future for the human race." But please don't lazily turn to experts for answers. The past shows they will be the last to know. Look instead to those they push away to the boundary and use your own judgement and commonsense. To break away from our past we must first understand it. And if you would see the future, become a 'boundary rider' of science.  Wal Thornhill