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andygatesSome bunch of jokers calling themselves the European Federation put this collection of tired canards among the right-wing pigeons, who have dutifully published it as a great and mighty scoop. This from the Express and the Mail, mind you, the "MI5 Killed Diana" and "Hooray for the Blackshirts" papers. Caveat lector. Anyway, as it's slow, I'm going to see how many I can whack without breaking a sweat.
(Later) Wow, that was easy. Is this the best they can do? Note the massive logical inconsistency (it's happening! it's not! it's the sun! it's the clouds! it's Obama!) and the use of repetition to fake up a hundred points, the use of all manner of logical falseness, and especially the treatment of science as ideologically, rather than observationally driven.
Frankly, this is all crap.
8) The IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers not the 4,000 usually cited.
An appeal against the ivory tower? That doesn't mean they are wrong.
9) Leaked e-mails from British climate scientists – in a scandal known as “Climate-gate” - suggest that that has been manipulated to exaggerate global warming
Here we go with the first climategate smear. Data is all for manipulating. You try making sense of noisy data otherwise. This word, 'manipulation', is used to suggest sneaky stuff. 'Correction' is closer to the truth, or 'normalisation' for people who have the maths understanding for it.
10) A large body of scientific research suggests that the sun is responsible for the greater share of climate change during the past hundred years.
The solar correlation broke irrevocably in the 1970s. But upthread you were saying it was natural CO2? Which is it? Consistency, please - this "Gish gallop" is only effective on the ADHD brigade.
11) Politicians and activiists claim rising sea levels are a direct cause of global warming but sea levels rates have been increasing steadily since the last ice age 10,000 ago
Warming-driven thermal expansion is the main driver this century. Lots of references at the wiki page. This is an appeal to constancy; the idea that t'were ever thus. While appealing to the gambler's fallacy and fuzzy notions of sameness, it has no basis in the physical world.
12) Philip Stott, Emeritus Professor of Biogeography at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London says climate change is too complicated to be caused by just one factor, whether CO2 or clouds
Biogeography is not atmospheric science. I'll take my atmospheric science from professional, peer reviewed and published atmospheric scientists, thanks. The good ones are contributing to the IPCC. Note also the appeal to authority in "emeritus professor hooha bignob". Science is hard. It's really really specialised and non-specialists often find themselves talking crap. That said, nobody actually says it is just one factor. It's CO2, clouds, CH4, black carbon, land use, and scads more. CO2 is the demonstrated Kingpin in this family of climate crime.
13) Peter Lilley MP said last month that “fewer people in Britain than in any other country believe in the importance of global warming. That is despite the fact that our Government and our political class—predominantly—are more committed to it than their counterparts in any other country in the world”.
Appeal to the masses? Irrelevant.
14) In pursuit of the global warming rhetoric, wind farms will do very little to nothing to reduce CO2 emissions
Appeal to Clarkson. Irrelevant. Wind farms are part of a policy response to climate change and have nothing to do with its causes.
15) Professor Plimer, Professor of Geology and Earth Sciences at the University of Adelaide, stated that the idea of taking a single trace gas in the atmosphere, accusing it and finding it guilty of total responsibility for climate change, is an “absurdity”
Plimer is an ass. Again: not a climate scientist. He thinks it's all volcanoes, which is demonstrably wrong: http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm
16) A Harvard University astrophysicist and geophysicist, Willie Soon, said he is “embarrassed and puzzled” by the shallow science in papers that support the proposition that the earth faces a climate crisis caused by global warming.
Willie Soon is not a climate scientist either. He's a space boffin and a contributor to the denialist thinktank SPPI. His work reviewed existing papers, the authors of which mostly declared that he had the wrong end of the stick; when re-done with better proxies his conclusions disappear.
17) The science of what determines the earth’s temperature is in fact far from settled or understood.
It's a chaotic system, you'll never absolutely settle it. "We do not know everything" is not the same as "we know nothing". This is an appeal to ignorance, suggesting that maybe we'll discover anti-global-warming in the future. That would require us to find a massive negative feedback and to explain why that feedback cancelled out the CO2, CH4 and water vapour effects so tidily. That's as likely as me turning into Princess Peach.
18) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, CO2 is a minor greenhouse gas, unlike water vapour which is tied to climate concerns, and which we can’t even pretend to control
CO2 isn't minor at all. You get about 3 degrees forcing per doubling of concentration. Business as usual will more than double it again by the end of the century. This is a deceptive appeal to fatalism.
19) A petition by scientists trying to tell the world that the political and media portrayal of global warming is false was put forward in the Heidelberg Appeal in 1992. Today, more than 4,000 signatories, including 72 Nobel Prize winners, from 106 countries have signed it.
A petition is not a reviewed, challenged, robust piece of science. Once againt the political lobby seem to think this is an ideological issue when it is not. The Heidelberg Appeal is actually about developmental fairness - it's an economic policy appeal, not a climate science appeal at all. It's deliberately misrepresented by the denial lobby, as it is here, where the statement looks like the mean ol' consensus is quashing 4000 scientists' objections. Fail.
20) It is claimed the average global temperature increased at a dangerously fast rate in the 20th century but the recent rate of average global temperature rise has been between 1 and 2 degrees C per century - within natural rates
Natural if you go back to the eocene! The point is that there's no sign of this rate slowing.
21) Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski, Chairman of the Scientific Council of the Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection in Warsaw, Poland says the earth’s temperature has more to do with cloud cover and water vapor than CO2 concentration in the atmosphere.
...and he's not a client scientist either. Cloud cover and water vapour is important, but the net is a positive forcing (clouds reflect, vapour insulates).
22) There is strong evidence from solar studies which suggests that the Earth’s current temperature stasis will be followed by climatic cooling over the next few decades
What stasis is this? This is one of a number of appeals to cyclic stability, that look at the current trend and think, "eee, that's got to top out soon enough".
23) It is myth that receding glaciers are proof of global warming as glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for many centuries
Since the middle of the century? Down down down, baby. Ancient data is absent.
24) It is a falsehood that the earth’s poles are warming because that is natural variation and while the western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer we also see that the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder
Picking specific locales does not deny the truth of the overall trend. The Arctic is warming, the ice is melting, and that trend is accelerating. The high Arctic, because it has no land, is especially sensitive to change - it's the canary in our coal mine.
25) The IPCC claims climate driven “impacts on biodiversity are significant and of key relevance” but those claims are simply not supported by scientific research
Irrelevant to the claim that global warming is natural. This is just name-calling.
26) The IPCC threat of climate change to the world’s species does not make sense as wild species are at least one million years old, which means they have all been through hundreds of climate cycles
Irrelevant to the claim that global warming is natural. Some species do well, some die, and finely-tuned agriculture will probably be significantly disupted. That's why it's an IPCC concern. But it has nothing to do with the causes.
27) Research goes strongly against claims that CO2-induced global warming would cause catastrophic disintegration of the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets.
No, it doesn't. This is simply false. It's not imminent, and keeping under the "2 degrees C by 2100" target should hopefully prevent it. That's one reason the 2 degree target exists: ice sheet melt is bad, hm'kay?
28) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels are our best hope of raising crop yields to feed an ever-growing population
Pure speculation and, again, nothing to do with the cause. Don't forget that weed yields will increase too, if this statement is correct. ;)
29) The biggest climate change ever experienced on earth took place around 700 million years ago
Irrelevant and wrong. Try 3.5 billion years ago when the archaea farted out oxygen to poison themselves and create the blue skies we know and breathe.
30) The slight increase in temperature which has been observed since 1900 is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term natural climate cycles
You said that already and it's still wrong. Repeating a lie doesn't make it true.
31) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels of some so-called “greenhouse gases” may be contributing to higher oxygen levels and global cooling, not warming
This isn't gramatically correct, but the net effect is warming anyway.
32) Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the last three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term rate of increase in global temperatures
Correct. The rate is consistent at around 0.2 degrees C per decade. That's not relevant to your argument though, is it?
33) Today’s CO2 concentration of around 385 ppm is very low compared to most of the earth’s history – we actually live in a carbon-deficient atmosphere
Another appeal to the dinosaurs. We also live in a velociraptor-deficient environment. Neither are relevant.
34) It is a myth that CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas because greenhouse gases form about 3% of the atmosphere by volume, and CO2 constitutes about 0.037% of the atmosphere
Wait, what? The greenhouse gases are trace gases. That's a lot of trace.
35) It is a myth that computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming because computer models can be made to “verify” anything
That's why models run on the basic physics, and why they run 'em back through time to see how well the predict the current real world. You can do this yourself with the Boinc climate package. Computer models are not the same as computer games. Model code is widely shared and open to inspection: arbitrary or silly code would be outed very, very fast.
36) There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes
There's more energy in the system - higher sea surface temperatures, for example - and extreme weather is fuelled by that energy. Again, though, this is bait-and-switch. This is nothing to do with causes.
37) One statement deleted from a UN report in 1996 stated that “none of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed climate changes to increases in greenhouse gases”
Thirteen years ago? Do keep up at the back. Science is progressive, it's not value statements.
38) The world “warmed” by 0.07 +/- 0.07 degrees C from 1999 to 2008, not the 0.20 degrees C expected by the IPCC
Cherry-picked figures. You need +- 10 years to get a valid trend. This is deliberate deception.
39) The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says “it is likely that future tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense” but there has been no increase in the intensity or frequency of tropical cyclones globally
Give it time. Again, causes are not involved. This is another bait and switch: mean old IPCC smell of poo.
40) Rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere can be shown not only to have a negligible effect on the Earth’s many ecosystems, but in some cases to be a positive help to many organisms
Again, irrelevant. Also, rising CO2 will be harmful to many. Ocean acidification is a prime case: more acid sea water means that carbonate critters (coral, shell plankton) 's shells fail. These are bottom-of-the-food-chain speces.
41) Researchers who compare and contrast climate change impact on civilizations found warm periods are beneficial to mankind and cold periods harmful
Another bait-and-switch, this also has nothing to do with causes. Specific impact will depend on specific situation. For every "farms in Siberia" you'll get a "drowned rice paddies" so it's silly to make a blanket statement.
42) The Met Office asserts we are in the hottest decade since records began but this is precisely what the world should expect if the climate is cyclical
No it's not. It's only what you'd expect if the climate was cyclical and we happen to be in the hot bit which is a hell of a coincidence.
43) Rising CO2 levels increase plant growth and make plants more resistant to drought and pests
You're repeating yourselves again. CO2 will boost as many pests as crops, and some plants don't like it.
44) The historical increase in the air’s CO2 content has improved human nutrition by raising crop yields during the past 150 years
Citation needed. The repeat technological innovations - mechanical plough, fertiliser, and so on - have raised crop yields. And again, this is not a cause. These guys are just flapping their jaws.
45) The increase of the air’s CO2 content has probably helped lengthen human lifespans since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution
Probably? They've degenerated to hand-waving now. Nothing to do with medicine, nutrition, electricity?
46) The IPCC alleges that “climate change currently contributes to the global burden of disease and premature deaths” but the evidence shows that higher temperatures and rising CO2 levels has helped global populations
Have they given up on causes entirely? Heh. Between extreme weather, weather pattern changes and crop changes, it's already hurting people.
47) In May of 2004, the Russian Academy of Sciences published a report concluding that the Kyoto Protocol has no scientific grounding at all.
Kyoto is a policy paper and a compromise one at that. Kyoto is not scientific proof of anything, and it never claimed to be. Irrelevant.
48) The “Climate-gate” scandal pointed to a expensive public campaign of disinformation and the denigration of scientists who opposed the belief that CO2 emissions were causing climate change
No, they don't. The 'denigration' refers specifically to a really bad paper that got snuck into a publication, and which the reviewers and editors were embarassed about because it was a stinker. Again, confusion over the difference between a scientific objection and an ideological one. The denialist idealogues aren't engaged in a reality-based discussion at all! Also, irrelevant as the CRU are jus tone thread in the tapestry of work.
49) The head of Britain’s climate change watchdog has predicted households will need to spend up to £15,000 on a full energy efficiency makeover if the Government is to meet its ambitious targets for cutting carbon emissions.
Irrelevant yet again. Also, an appeal to pocketbooks. Ideology not science.
50) Wind power is unlikely to be the answer to our energy needs. The wind power industry argues that there are “no direct subsidies” but it involves a total subsidy of as much as £60 per MWh which falls directly on electricity consumers. This burden will grow in line with attempts to achieve Wind power targets, according to a recent OFGEM report.
See previous repsonse to wind power.
51) Wind farms are not an efficient way to produce energy. The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) accepts a figure of 75 per cent back-up power is required.
Ditto. C'mon guys.
52) Global temperatures are below the low end of IPCC predictions not at “at the top end of IPCC estimates”
See the Copenhagen Diagnosis for the latest science: this is untrue.
53) Climate alarmists have raised the concern over acidification of the oceans but Tom Segalstad from Oslo University in Norway , and others, have noted that the composition of ocean water – including CO2, calcium, and water – can act as a buffering agent in the acidification of the oceans.
Unrelated to cause AGAIN. I can't find much about this, but if true, what about paleoclimate CO2 concentrations?
54) The UN’s IPCC computer models of human-caused global warming predict the emergence of a “hotspot” in the upper troposphere over the tropics. Former researcher in the Australian Department of Climate Change, David Evans, said there is no evidence of such a hotspot
The predicted hotspot looks to be an artifact of bad data going into good models; when the data is tidied up, the models are in good agreement with the observations. http://www.skepticalscience.com/tropospheric-hot-spot.htm The hot spot never was a 'fingerprint' of AGW.
55) The argument that climate change is a of result of global warming caused by human activity is the argument of flat Earthers.
This is just an insult with no content whatsoever.
56) The manner in which US President Barack Obama sidestepped Congress to order emission cuts shows how undemocratic and irrational the entire international decision-making process has become with regards to emission-target setting.
Again unrelated to causes. This is just "we don't like the government", well, boo hoo. The atmosphere is not a democracy.
57) William Kininmonth, a former head of the National Climate Centre and a consultant to the World Meteorological Organisation, wrote “the likely extent of global temperature rise from a doubling of CO2 is less than 1C. Such warming is well within the envelope of variation experienced during the past 10,000 years and insignificant in the context of glacial cycles during the past million years, when Earth has been predominantly very cold and covered by extensive ice sheets.”
That number's low compared to current forcing figures; also there's more to come because it's not cyclical: as long as we add more CO2 to the atmosphere, the forcing increases.
58) Canada has shown the world targets derived from the existing Kyoto commitments were always unrealistic and did not work for the country.
Post-hoc policy is irrelevant to causes or science. This is just a smear on "Kyoto" as a poster child.
59) In the lead up to the Copenhagen summit, David Davis MP said of previous climate summits, at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Kyoto in 1997 that many had promised greater cuts, but “neither happened”, but we are continuing along the same lines.
A failure to enact policy promises has nothing to do with cause either.
60) The UK ’s environmental policy has a long-term price tag of about £55 billion, before taking into account the impact on its economic growth.
The Stern report gives a century ROI of about 500%. This statement first hides the benefits of not being adversely affected, then does the cause-and-effect backflip to suggest that if the policy is unpalatable, maybe we should disregard the principle that drives it. Again, politics not science.
61) The UN’s panel on climate change warned that Himalayan glaciers could melt to a fifth of current levels by 2035. J. Graham Cogley a professor at Ontario Trent University, claims this inaccurate stating the UN authors got the date from an earlier report wrong by more than 300 years.
Again, nothing to do with causes. All do to with saying "it's not that bad". Cogley's opinion is a minority one; the Copenhagen Diagnosis sticks with the Himalaya melt as a serious potable water supply problem for Asia.
62) Under existing Kyoto obligations the EU has attempted to claim success, while actually increasing emissions by 13 per cent, according to Lord Lawson. In addition the EU has pursued this scheme by purchasing “offsets” from countries such as China paying them billions of dollars to destroy atmospheric pollutants, such as CFC-23, which were manufactured purely in order to be destroyed.
Irrelevant.
63) It is claimed that the average global temperature was relatively unchanging in pre-industrial times but sky-rocketed since 1900, and will increase by several degrees more over the next 100 years according to Penn State University researcher Michael Mann. There is no convincing empirical evidence that past climate was unchanging, nor that 20th century changes in average global temperature were unusual or unnatural.
The proxies used to make this statement are as good as you get. 'no convincing evidence' in this case would probably require a time machine and a bloke with a thermometer.
64) Michael Mann of Penn State University has actually shown that the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age did in fact exist, which contrasts with his earlier work which produced the “hockey stick graph” which showed a constant temperature over the past thousand years or so followed by a recent dramatic upturn.
They existed but were smaller than the deny-o-sphere likes to suggest, also they were regional not global in nature. They don't break the AGW model.
65) The globe’s current approach to climate change in which major industrialised countries agree to nonsensical targets for their CO2 emissions by a given date, as it has been under the Kyoto system, is very expensive.
Appeal to pocketbooks again. This is ever so Cnutish: I don't want it so it can't be so. Irrelvant to the facts.
66) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had emailed one another about using a “trick” for the sake of concealing a “decline” in temperatures when looking at the history of the Earth’s temperature.
"Trick" is nerd parlance for clever technique, the 'decline' is a well-known and widely-published bogosity that needs correcting. This statement is phrased to suggest that the world is really cooling and sneaky scientists are concealing it, which is absolutely not true.
67) Global temperatures have not risen in any statistically-significant sense for 15 years and have actually been falling for nine years. The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed a scientific team had expressed dismay at the fact global warming was contrary to their predictions and admitted their inability to explain it was “a travesty”.
This is just false. And the 'travesty' statement referred to the lack of fine data in certain specific atmosphere levels - this whole statement is beyond bogus into a nasty, misleading lie.
68) The IPCC predicts that a warmer planet will lead to more extreme weather, including drought, flooding, storms, snow, and wildfires. But over the last century, during which the IPCC claims the world experienced more rapid warming than any time in the past two millennia, the world did not experience significantly greater trends in any of these extreme weather events.
Conflating warming rate and temperature is bogus. And again, no relation to cause, just another snark at the IPCC.
69) In explaining the average temperature standstill we are currently experiencing, the Met Office Hadley Centre ran a series of computer climate predictions and found in many of the computer runs there were decade-long standstills but none for 15 years – so it expects global warming to resume swiftly.
The standstill - a zag in a zig-zag around the trendline - is mostly beleived to be down to el Nino / la Nina activity. That's changed so expect a zig. 2009 currently looks well on target for some hot zig action.
70) Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote: “The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the Earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. Such hysteria (over global warming) simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth.”
The "cry wolf" gambit, and Lindzen's article is full of the usual canards. Nobody should be *panicking*. But given the lag between CO2 and temperature, actions not taken now would impact decades down the line.
71) Despite the 1997 Kyoto Protocol’s status as the flagship of the fight against climate change it has been a failure.
No matter how many times they say it, Kyoto ain't going to be anything but a response. Give it up already.
72) The first phase of the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which ran from 2005 to 2007 was a failure. Huge over-allocation of permits to pollute led to a collapse in the price of carbon from €33 to just €0.20 per tonne meaning the system did not reduce emissions at all.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
73) The EU trading scheme, to manage carbon emissions has completely failed and actually allows European businesses to duck out of making their emissions reductions at home by offsetting, which means paying for cuts to be made overseas instead.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
74) To date “cap and trade” carbon markets have done almost nothing to reduce emissions.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
75) In the United States , the cap-and-trade is an approach designed to control carbon emissions and will impose huge costs upon American citizens via a carbon tax on all goods and services produced in the United States. The average family of four can expect to pay an additional $1700, or £1,043, more each year. It is predicted that the United States will lose more than 2 million jobs as the result of cap-and-trade schemes.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
76) Dr Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, has indicated that out of the 21 climate models tracked by the IPCC the differences in warming exhibited by those models is mostly the result of different strengths of positive cloud feedback – and that increasing CO2 is insufficient to explain global-average warming in the last 50 to 100 years.
That's because clouds are the biggest unknown in the models - we know CO2 well, but clouds form at different heights, add or subtract water vapour, insulate or reflect heat. Of course the models varied around the cloud feedback. Nobody says that CO2 is the whole cause, except for the deniers who wish to erect a strawman.
77) Why should politicians devote our scarce resources in a globally competitive world to a false and ill-defined problem, while ignoring the real problems the entire planet faces, such as: poverty, hunger, disease or terrorism.
The zero-sum argument, again a response not a cause.
78) A proper analysis of ice core records from the past 650,000 years demonstrates that temperature increases have come before, and not resulted from, increases in CO2 by hundreds of years.
They're repeating the lag fallacy, see above.
79) Since the cause of global warming is mostly natural, then there is in actual fact very little we can do about it. (We are still not able to control the sun).
Wrong and, thus, wrong. Don't forget that the CO2-primed warming we start with controllable emissions goes on to provoke water vapour feedback. Cut the CO2, ease the pressure on that pump. We can do a lot about it.
80) A substantial number of the panel of 2,500 climate scientists on the United Nation’s International Panel on Climate Change, which created a statement on scientific unanimity on climate change and man-made global warming, were found to have serious concerns.
Good, that's their job. Plenty were concerned that it was not severe enough. Doesn't affect causes though.
81) The UK’s Met Office has been forced this year to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by revelations about the data.
The UK Met Office has chosen to publish the data to queit the rabid attack dogs of the denialist political movement. The data's sound as any historical data you'd like. There are no substantial concerns - only shills squawking. Also: the Met Office ain't the globe, the rest of the global data concurs and comes from many, many sources.
82) Politicians and activists push for renewable energy sources such as wind turbines under the rhetoric of climate change, but it is essentially about money – under the system of Renewable Obligations. Much of the money is paid for by consumers in electricity bills. It amounts to £1 billion a year.
Again with the windmills already. They weren't relevant the first time and they aren't now.
83) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had tampered with their own data so as to conceal inconsistencies and errors.
Corrected, not tampered. You don't have the maths to understand the difference, and nor do I, but that's what the expert peer review process and publication is for. Flaws get exposed.
84) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had campaigned for the removal of a learned journal’s editor, solely because he did not share their willingness to debase science for political purposes.
Again, this is the really, really bad paper. This was one of those "this is embarassing, I'm not being on the board for this crap - either he goes or I go" moments. The way it is spun here is nothing short of perfidious.
85) Ice-core data clearly show that temperatures change centuries before concentrations of atmospheric CO2 change. Thus, there appears to be little evidence for insisting that changes in concentrations of CO2 are the cause of past temperature and climate change.
Again with the lag. I don't think these guys can even count to 100.
86) There are no experimentally verified processes explaining how CO2 concentrations can fall in a few centuries without falling temperatures – in fact it is changing temperatures which cause changes in CO2 concentrations, which is consistent with experiments that show CO2 is the atmospheric gas most readily absorbed by water.
Irrelevant to the causes.
87) The Government’s Renewable Energy Strategy contains a massive increase in electricity generation by wind power costing around £4 billion a year over the next twenty years. The benefits will be only £4 to £5 billion overall (not per annum). So costs will outnumber benefits by a range of between eleven and seventeen times.
Again with the windmills!
88) Whilst CO2 levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout history, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased since the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the growth rate has now been constant for the past 25 years.
...and is expected to carry on growing as we add more CO2. What do you get with constant growth? Global warming!
89) It is a myth that CO2 is a pollutant, because nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere and human beings could not live in 100% nitrogen either: CO2 is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is and CO2 is essential to life.
"Pollutant" is an arbitrary term, and this statement is just gibberish. It attempts to say "scientists can say any old crap! " but just looks silly.
90) Politicians and climate activists make claims to rising sea levels but certain members in the IPCC chose an area to measure in Hong Kong that is subsiding. They used the record reading of 2.3 mm per year rise of sea level.
Various figures are used. Sea level rise is, as said at the top, well understood.
91) The accepted global average temperature statistics used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change show that no ground-based warming has occurred since 1998.
Tosh. 1998 was a freaky hot year. It's exactly the 'noise' in a noisy signal; this is why climatologists look at trends of +- 10 years. There is no mechanism proposed anywhere that says that 1998 was the peak of a cycle, which is what is implied.
92) If one factors in non-greenhouse influences such as El Nino events and large volcanic eruptions, lower atmosphere satellite-based temperature measurements show little, if any, global warming since 1979, a period over which atmospheric CO2 has increased by 55 ppm (17 per cent).
Temperature effects are expected to be different at different levels in the atmposphere. If you can't understand that, you lack the sophistication to critique the science.
93) US President Barack Obama pledged to cut emissions by 2050 to equal those of 1910 when there were 92 million Americans. In 2050, there will be 420 million Americans, so Obama’s promise means that emissions per head will be approximately what they were in 1875. It simply will not happen.
Again with the policy, not cause.
94) The European Union has already agreed to cut emissions by 20 percent to 2020, compared with 1990 levels, and is willing to increase the target to 30 percent. However, these are unachievable and the EU has already massively failed with its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), as EU emissions actually rose by 0.8 percent from 2005 to 2006 and are known to be well above the Kyoto goal.
Again with the policy, not cause. Are you a godsdamned parrot?
95) Australia has stated it wants to slash greenhouse emissions by up to 25 percent below 2000 levels by 2020, but the pledges were so unpopular that the country’s Senate has voted against the carbon trading Bill, and the Opposition’s Party leader has now been ousted by a climate change sceptic.
Again with the policy, not cause. Also an appeal to authority: a high-profile non-expert can be wrong just as easily.
96) Canada plans to reduce emissions by 20 percent compared with 2006 levels by 2020, representing approximately a 3 percent cut from 1990 levels but it simultaneously defends its Alberta tar sands emissions and its record as one of the world’s highest per-capita emissions setters.
Canada is a naughty hypocrite. But that doesn't change the causes. Again, policy!
97) India plans to reduce the ratio of emissions to production by 20-25 percent compared with 2005 levels by 2020, but all Government officials insist that since India has to grow for its development and poverty alleviation, it has to emit, because the economy is driven by carbon.
Again with the irrelevant policy. India wants to develop in a low-carbon way if it can. That'd be neat.
98) The Leipzig Declaration in 1996, was signed by 110 scientists who said: “We – along with many of our fellow citizens – are apprehensive about the climate treaty conference scheduled for Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997” and “based on all the evidence available to us, we cannot subscribe to the politically inspired world view that envisages climate catastrophes and calls for hasty actions.”
Another of these petitions, another appeal to authority. The physical world does not respond to petitions. The signatories have not published work - in the last twelve years - modifying the mainstream science. Fail.
99) A US Oregon Petition Project stated “We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of CO2, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.”
And another petition, again from around Kyoto - embarassingly out of date. Pathetic.
100) A report by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change concluded “We find no support for the IPCC’s claim that climate observations during the twentieth century are either unprecedented or provide evidence of an anthropogenic effect on climate.”
The NIPCC is, despite its deceptive name, an anti-global-warming lobby group. Of course they said that.
(Later) Wow, that was easy. Is this the best they can do? Note the massive logical inconsistency (it's happening! it's not! it's the sun! it's the clouds! it's Obama!) and the use of repetition to fake up a hundred points, the use of all manner of logical falseness, and especially the treatment of science as ideologically, rather than observationally driven.
Frankly, this is all crap.
1) There is “no real scientific proof” that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man’s activity.
Without defining 'real proof' - famously moveable goalposts in denier land - this is just an assertion.
2) Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute less than 0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the earth during geological history.
Meaningless planet comparison syndrome. There's this thing called the carbon cycle. Total emissions over history aren't relevant because most of that has been taken up and down again a jillion times.
3) Warmer periods of the Earth’s history came around 800 years before rises in CO2 levels.
Those were started by another means; CO2 both causes and feeds back on temperature rise. This popular canard will be repeated often: it's comprehensively debunked here: http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-lags-temperature.htm
4) After World War II, there was a huge surge in recorded CO2 emissions but global temperatures fell for four decades after 1940.
Anthropogenic warming really only kicked in in the 70s. Prior to that, there was a solar increase and then relax. http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-early-20th-century.htm
5) Throughout the Earth’s history, temperatures have often been warmer than now and CO2 levels have often been higher – more than ten times as high.
This refers back to geologically-ancient time, when pretty much none of the extant species were around, and is irrelevant. It doesn't mean this round is natural. This is an attempt to confuse the issue by saying it's no big deal: logically invalid and deceptive.
6) Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time.
You're repeating yourself.
7) The 0.7C increase in the average global temperature over the last hundred years is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term, natural climate trends.
8) The IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers not the 4,000 usually cited.
An appeal against the ivory tower? That doesn't mean they are wrong.
9) Leaked e-mails from British climate scientists – in a scandal known as “Climate-gate” - suggest that that has been manipulated to exaggerate global warming
Here we go with the first climategate smear. Data is all for manipulating. You try making sense of noisy data otherwise. This word, 'manipulation', is used to suggest sneaky stuff. 'Correction' is closer to the truth, or 'normalisation' for people who have the maths understanding for it.
10) A large body of scientific research suggests that the sun is responsible for the greater share of climate change during the past hundred years.
The solar correlation broke irrevocably in the 1970s. But upthread you were saying it was natural CO2? Which is it? Consistency, please - this "Gish gallop" is only effective on the ADHD brigade.
11) Politicians and activiists claim rising sea levels are a direct cause of global warming but sea levels rates have been increasing steadily since the last ice age 10,000 ago
Warming-driven thermal expansion is the main driver this century. Lots of references at the wiki page. This is an appeal to constancy; the idea that t'were ever thus. While appealing to the gambler's fallacy and fuzzy notions of sameness, it has no basis in the physical world.
12) Philip Stott, Emeritus Professor of Biogeography at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London says climate change is too complicated to be caused by just one factor, whether CO2 or clouds
Biogeography is not atmospheric science. I'll take my atmospheric science from professional, peer reviewed and published atmospheric scientists, thanks. The good ones are contributing to the IPCC. Note also the appeal to authority in "emeritus professor hooha bignob". Science is hard. It's really really specialised and non-specialists often find themselves talking crap. That said, nobody actually says it is just one factor. It's CO2, clouds, CH4, black carbon, land use, and scads more. CO2 is the demonstrated Kingpin in this family of climate crime.
13) Peter Lilley MP said last month that “fewer people in Britain than in any other country believe in the importance of global warming. That is despite the fact that our Government and our political class—predominantly—are more committed to it than their counterparts in any other country in the world”.
Appeal to the masses? Irrelevant.
14) In pursuit of the global warming rhetoric, wind farms will do very little to nothing to reduce CO2 emissions
Appeal to Clarkson. Irrelevant. Wind farms are part of a policy response to climate change and have nothing to do with its causes.
15) Professor Plimer, Professor of Geology and Earth Sciences at the University of Adelaide, stated that the idea of taking a single trace gas in the atmosphere, accusing it and finding it guilty of total responsibility for climate change, is an “absurdity”
Plimer is an ass. Again: not a climate scientist. He thinks it's all volcanoes, which is demonstrably wrong: http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm
16) A Harvard University astrophysicist and geophysicist, Willie Soon, said he is “embarrassed and puzzled” by the shallow science in papers that support the proposition that the earth faces a climate crisis caused by global warming.
Willie Soon is not a climate scientist either. He's a space boffin and a contributor to the denialist thinktank SPPI. His work reviewed existing papers, the authors of which mostly declared that he had the wrong end of the stick; when re-done with better proxies his conclusions disappear.
17) The science of what determines the earth’s temperature is in fact far from settled or understood.
It's a chaotic system, you'll never absolutely settle it. "We do not know everything" is not the same as "we know nothing". This is an appeal to ignorance, suggesting that maybe we'll discover anti-global-warming in the future. That would require us to find a massive negative feedback and to explain why that feedback cancelled out the CO2, CH4 and water vapour effects so tidily. That's as likely as me turning into Princess Peach.
18) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, CO2 is a minor greenhouse gas, unlike water vapour which is tied to climate concerns, and which we can’t even pretend to control
CO2 isn't minor at all. You get about 3 degrees forcing per doubling of concentration. Business as usual will more than double it again by the end of the century. This is a deceptive appeal to fatalism.
19) A petition by scientists trying to tell the world that the political and media portrayal of global warming is false was put forward in the Heidelberg Appeal in 1992. Today, more than 4,000 signatories, including 72 Nobel Prize winners, from 106 countries have signed it.
A petition is not a reviewed, challenged, robust piece of science. Once againt the political lobby seem to think this is an ideological issue when it is not. The Heidelberg Appeal is actually about developmental fairness - it's an economic policy appeal, not a climate science appeal at all. It's deliberately misrepresented by the denial lobby, as it is here, where the statement looks like the mean ol' consensus is quashing 4000 scientists' objections. Fail.
20) It is claimed the average global temperature increased at a dangerously fast rate in the 20th century but the recent rate of average global temperature rise has been between 1 and 2 degrees C per century - within natural rates
Natural if you go back to the eocene! The point is that there's no sign of this rate slowing.
21) Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski, Chairman of the Scientific Council of the Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection in Warsaw, Poland says the earth’s temperature has more to do with cloud cover and water vapor than CO2 concentration in the atmosphere.
...and he's not a client scientist either. Cloud cover and water vapour is important, but the net is a positive forcing (clouds reflect, vapour insulates).
22) There is strong evidence from solar studies which suggests that the Earth’s current temperature stasis will be followed by climatic cooling over the next few decades
What stasis is this? This is one of a number of appeals to cyclic stability, that look at the current trend and think, "eee, that's got to top out soon enough".
23) It is myth that receding glaciers are proof of global warming as glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for many centuries
Since the middle of the century? Down down down, baby. Ancient data is absent.
24) It is a falsehood that the earth’s poles are warming because that is natural variation and while the western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer we also see that the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder
Picking specific locales does not deny the truth of the overall trend. The Arctic is warming, the ice is melting, and that trend is accelerating. The high Arctic, because it has no land, is especially sensitive to change - it's the canary in our coal mine.
25) The IPCC claims climate driven “impacts on biodiversity are significant and of key relevance” but those claims are simply not supported by scientific research
Irrelevant to the claim that global warming is natural. This is just name-calling.
26) The IPCC threat of climate change to the world’s species does not make sense as wild species are at least one million years old, which means they have all been through hundreds of climate cycles
Irrelevant to the claim that global warming is natural. Some species do well, some die, and finely-tuned agriculture will probably be significantly disupted. That's why it's an IPCC concern. But it has nothing to do with the causes.
27) Research goes strongly against claims that CO2-induced global warming would cause catastrophic disintegration of the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets.
No, it doesn't. This is simply false. It's not imminent, and keeping under the "2 degrees C by 2100" target should hopefully prevent it. That's one reason the 2 degree target exists: ice sheet melt is bad, hm'kay?
28) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels are our best hope of raising crop yields to feed an ever-growing population
Pure speculation and, again, nothing to do with the cause. Don't forget that weed yields will increase too, if this statement is correct. ;)
29) The biggest climate change ever experienced on earth took place around 700 million years ago
Irrelevant and wrong. Try 3.5 billion years ago when the archaea farted out oxygen to poison themselves and create the blue skies we know and breathe.
30) The slight increase in temperature which has been observed since 1900 is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term natural climate cycles
You said that already and it's still wrong. Repeating a lie doesn't make it true.
31) Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels of some so-called “greenhouse gases” may be contributing to higher oxygen levels and global cooling, not warming
This isn't gramatically correct, but the net effect is warming anyway.
32) Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the last three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term rate of increase in global temperatures
Correct. The rate is consistent at around 0.2 degrees C per decade. That's not relevant to your argument though, is it?
33) Today’s CO2 concentration of around 385 ppm is very low compared to most of the earth’s history – we actually live in a carbon-deficient atmosphere
Another appeal to the dinosaurs. We also live in a velociraptor-deficient environment. Neither are relevant.
34) It is a myth that CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas because greenhouse gases form about 3% of the atmosphere by volume, and CO2 constitutes about 0.037% of the atmosphere
Wait, what? The greenhouse gases are trace gases. That's a lot of trace.
35) It is a myth that computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming because computer models can be made to “verify” anything
That's why models run on the basic physics, and why they run 'em back through time to see how well the predict the current real world. You can do this yourself with the Boinc climate package. Computer models are not the same as computer games. Model code is widely shared and open to inspection: arbitrary or silly code would be outed very, very fast.
36) There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes
There's more energy in the system - higher sea surface temperatures, for example - and extreme weather is fuelled by that energy. Again, though, this is bait-and-switch. This is nothing to do with causes.
37) One statement deleted from a UN report in 1996 stated that “none of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed climate changes to increases in greenhouse gases”
Thirteen years ago? Do keep up at the back. Science is progressive, it's not value statements.
38) The world “warmed” by 0.07 +/- 0.07 degrees C from 1999 to 2008, not the 0.20 degrees C expected by the IPCC
Cherry-picked figures. You need +- 10 years to get a valid trend. This is deliberate deception.
39) The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says “it is likely that future tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense” but there has been no increase in the intensity or frequency of tropical cyclones globally
Give it time. Again, causes are not involved. This is another bait and switch: mean old IPCC smell of poo.
40) Rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere can be shown not only to have a negligible effect on the Earth’s many ecosystems, but in some cases to be a positive help to many organisms
Again, irrelevant. Also, rising CO2 will be harmful to many. Ocean acidification is a prime case: more acid sea water means that carbonate critters (coral, shell plankton) 's shells fail. These are bottom-of-the-food-chain speces.
41) Researchers who compare and contrast climate change impact on civilizations found warm periods are beneficial to mankind and cold periods harmful
Another bait-and-switch, this also has nothing to do with causes. Specific impact will depend on specific situation. For every "farms in Siberia" you'll get a "drowned rice paddies" so it's silly to make a blanket statement.
42) The Met Office asserts we are in the hottest decade since records began but this is precisely what the world should expect if the climate is cyclical
No it's not. It's only what you'd expect if the climate was cyclical and we happen to be in the hot bit which is a hell of a coincidence.
43) Rising CO2 levels increase plant growth and make plants more resistant to drought and pests
You're repeating yourselves again. CO2 will boost as many pests as crops, and some plants don't like it.
44) The historical increase in the air’s CO2 content has improved human nutrition by raising crop yields during the past 150 years
Citation needed. The repeat technological innovations - mechanical plough, fertiliser, and so on - have raised crop yields. And again, this is not a cause. These guys are just flapping their jaws.
45) The increase of the air’s CO2 content has probably helped lengthen human lifespans since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution
Probably? They've degenerated to hand-waving now. Nothing to do with medicine, nutrition, electricity?
46) The IPCC alleges that “climate change currently contributes to the global burden of disease and premature deaths” but the evidence shows that higher temperatures and rising CO2 levels has helped global populations
Have they given up on causes entirely? Heh. Between extreme weather, weather pattern changes and crop changes, it's already hurting people.
47) In May of 2004, the Russian Academy of Sciences published a report concluding that the Kyoto Protocol has no scientific grounding at all.
Kyoto is a policy paper and a compromise one at that. Kyoto is not scientific proof of anything, and it never claimed to be. Irrelevant.
48) The “Climate-gate” scandal pointed to a expensive public campaign of disinformation and the denigration of scientists who opposed the belief that CO2 emissions were causing climate change
No, they don't. The 'denigration' refers specifically to a really bad paper that got snuck into a publication, and which the reviewers and editors were embarassed about because it was a stinker. Again, confusion over the difference between a scientific objection and an ideological one. The denialist idealogues aren't engaged in a reality-based discussion at all! Also, irrelevant as the CRU are jus tone thread in the tapestry of work.
49) The head of Britain’s climate change watchdog has predicted households will need to spend up to £15,000 on a full energy efficiency makeover if the Government is to meet its ambitious targets for cutting carbon emissions.
Irrelevant yet again. Also, an appeal to pocketbooks. Ideology not science.
50) Wind power is unlikely to be the answer to our energy needs. The wind power industry argues that there are “no direct subsidies” but it involves a total subsidy of as much as £60 per MWh which falls directly on electricity consumers. This burden will grow in line with attempts to achieve Wind power targets, according to a recent OFGEM report.
See previous repsonse to wind power.
51) Wind farms are not an efficient way to produce energy. The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) accepts a figure of 75 per cent back-up power is required.
Ditto. C'mon guys.
52) Global temperatures are below the low end of IPCC predictions not at “at the top end of IPCC estimates”
See the Copenhagen Diagnosis for the latest science: this is untrue.
53) Climate alarmists have raised the concern over acidification of the oceans but Tom Segalstad from Oslo University in Norway , and others, have noted that the composition of ocean water – including CO2, calcium, and water – can act as a buffering agent in the acidification of the oceans.
Unrelated to cause AGAIN. I can't find much about this, but if true, what about paleoclimate CO2 concentrations?
54) The UN’s IPCC computer models of human-caused global warming predict the emergence of a “hotspot” in the upper troposphere over the tropics. Former researcher in the Australian Department of Climate Change, David Evans, said there is no evidence of such a hotspot
The predicted hotspot looks to be an artifact of bad data going into good models; when the data is tidied up, the models are in good agreement with the observations. http://www.skepticalscience.com/tropospheric-hot-spot.htm The hot spot never was a 'fingerprint' of AGW.
55) The argument that climate change is a of result of global warming caused by human activity is the argument of flat Earthers.
This is just an insult with no content whatsoever.
56) The manner in which US President Barack Obama sidestepped Congress to order emission cuts shows how undemocratic and irrational the entire international decision-making process has become with regards to emission-target setting.
Again unrelated to causes. This is just "we don't like the government", well, boo hoo. The atmosphere is not a democracy.
57) William Kininmonth, a former head of the National Climate Centre and a consultant to the World Meteorological Organisation, wrote “the likely extent of global temperature rise from a doubling of CO2 is less than 1C. Such warming is well within the envelope of variation experienced during the past 10,000 years and insignificant in the context of glacial cycles during the past million years, when Earth has been predominantly very cold and covered by extensive ice sheets.”
That number's low compared to current forcing figures; also there's more to come because it's not cyclical: as long as we add more CO2 to the atmosphere, the forcing increases.
58) Canada has shown the world targets derived from the existing Kyoto commitments were always unrealistic and did not work for the country.
Post-hoc policy is irrelevant to causes or science. This is just a smear on "Kyoto" as a poster child.
59) In the lead up to the Copenhagen summit, David Davis MP said of previous climate summits, at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Kyoto in 1997 that many had promised greater cuts, but “neither happened”, but we are continuing along the same lines.
A failure to enact policy promises has nothing to do with cause either.
60) The UK ’s environmental policy has a long-term price tag of about £55 billion, before taking into account the impact on its economic growth.
The Stern report gives a century ROI of about 500%. This statement first hides the benefits of not being adversely affected, then does the cause-and-effect backflip to suggest that if the policy is unpalatable, maybe we should disregard the principle that drives it. Again, politics not science.
61) The UN’s panel on climate change warned that Himalayan glaciers could melt to a fifth of current levels by 2035. J. Graham Cogley a professor at Ontario Trent University, claims this inaccurate stating the UN authors got the date from an earlier report wrong by more than 300 years.
Again, nothing to do with causes. All do to with saying "it's not that bad". Cogley's opinion is a minority one; the Copenhagen Diagnosis sticks with the Himalaya melt as a serious potable water supply problem for Asia.
62) Under existing Kyoto obligations the EU has attempted to claim success, while actually increasing emissions by 13 per cent, according to Lord Lawson. In addition the EU has pursued this scheme by purchasing “offsets” from countries such as China paying them billions of dollars to destroy atmospheric pollutants, such as CFC-23, which were manufactured purely in order to be destroyed.
Irrelevant.
63) It is claimed that the average global temperature was relatively unchanging in pre-industrial times but sky-rocketed since 1900, and will increase by several degrees more over the next 100 years according to Penn State University researcher Michael Mann. There is no convincing empirical evidence that past climate was unchanging, nor that 20th century changes in average global temperature were unusual or unnatural.
The proxies used to make this statement are as good as you get. 'no convincing evidence' in this case would probably require a time machine and a bloke with a thermometer.
64) Michael Mann of Penn State University has actually shown that the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age did in fact exist, which contrasts with his earlier work which produced the “hockey stick graph” which showed a constant temperature over the past thousand years or so followed by a recent dramatic upturn.
They existed but were smaller than the deny-o-sphere likes to suggest, also they were regional not global in nature. They don't break the AGW model.
65) The globe’s current approach to climate change in which major industrialised countries agree to nonsensical targets for their CO2 emissions by a given date, as it has been under the Kyoto system, is very expensive.
Appeal to pocketbooks again. This is ever so Cnutish: I don't want it so it can't be so. Irrelvant to the facts.
66) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had emailed one another about using a “trick” for the sake of concealing a “decline” in temperatures when looking at the history of the Earth’s temperature.
"Trick" is nerd parlance for clever technique, the 'decline' is a well-known and widely-published bogosity that needs correcting. This statement is phrased to suggest that the world is really cooling and sneaky scientists are concealing it, which is absolutely not true.
67) Global temperatures have not risen in any statistically-significant sense for 15 years and have actually been falling for nine years. The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed a scientific team had expressed dismay at the fact global warming was contrary to their predictions and admitted their inability to explain it was “a travesty”.
This is just false. And the 'travesty' statement referred to the lack of fine data in certain specific atmosphere levels - this whole statement is beyond bogus into a nasty, misleading lie.
68) The IPCC predicts that a warmer planet will lead to more extreme weather, including drought, flooding, storms, snow, and wildfires. But over the last century, during which the IPCC claims the world experienced more rapid warming than any time in the past two millennia, the world did not experience significantly greater trends in any of these extreme weather events.
Conflating warming rate and temperature is bogus. And again, no relation to cause, just another snark at the IPCC.
69) In explaining the average temperature standstill we are currently experiencing, the Met Office Hadley Centre ran a series of computer climate predictions and found in many of the computer runs there were decade-long standstills but none for 15 years – so it expects global warming to resume swiftly.
The standstill - a zag in a zig-zag around the trendline - is mostly beleived to be down to el Nino / la Nina activity. That's changed so expect a zig. 2009 currently looks well on target for some hot zig action.
70) Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote: “The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the Earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. Such hysteria (over global warming) simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth.”
The "cry wolf" gambit, and Lindzen's article is full of the usual canards. Nobody should be *panicking*. But given the lag between CO2 and temperature, actions not taken now would impact decades down the line.
71) Despite the 1997 Kyoto Protocol’s status as the flagship of the fight against climate change it has been a failure.
No matter how many times they say it, Kyoto ain't going to be anything but a response. Give it up already.
72) The first phase of the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which ran from 2005 to 2007 was a failure. Huge over-allocation of permits to pollute led to a collapse in the price of carbon from €33 to just €0.20 per tonne meaning the system did not reduce emissions at all.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
73) The EU trading scheme, to manage carbon emissions has completely failed and actually allows European businesses to duck out of making their emissions reductions at home by offsetting, which means paying for cuts to be made overseas instead.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
74) To date “cap and trade” carbon markets have done almost nothing to reduce emissions.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
75) In the United States , the cap-and-trade is an approach designed to control carbon emissions and will impose huge costs upon American citizens via a carbon tax on all goods and services produced in the United States. The average family of four can expect to pay an additional $1700, or £1,043, more each year. It is predicted that the United States will lose more than 2 million jobs as the result of cap-and-trade schemes.
Again, a criticism of the response does not affect the cause.
76) Dr Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, has indicated that out of the 21 climate models tracked by the IPCC the differences in warming exhibited by those models is mostly the result of different strengths of positive cloud feedback – and that increasing CO2 is insufficient to explain global-average warming in the last 50 to 100 years.
That's because clouds are the biggest unknown in the models - we know CO2 well, but clouds form at different heights, add or subtract water vapour, insulate or reflect heat. Of course the models varied around the cloud feedback. Nobody says that CO2 is the whole cause, except for the deniers who wish to erect a strawman.
77) Why should politicians devote our scarce resources in a globally competitive world to a false and ill-defined problem, while ignoring the real problems the entire planet faces, such as: poverty, hunger, disease or terrorism.
The zero-sum argument, again a response not a cause.
78) A proper analysis of ice core records from the past 650,000 years demonstrates that temperature increases have come before, and not resulted from, increases in CO2 by hundreds of years.
They're repeating the lag fallacy, see above.
79) Since the cause of global warming is mostly natural, then there is in actual fact very little we can do about it. (We are still not able to control the sun).
Wrong and, thus, wrong. Don't forget that the CO2-primed warming we start with controllable emissions goes on to provoke water vapour feedback. Cut the CO2, ease the pressure on that pump. We can do a lot about it.
80) A substantial number of the panel of 2,500 climate scientists on the United Nation’s International Panel on Climate Change, which created a statement on scientific unanimity on climate change and man-made global warming, were found to have serious concerns.
Good, that's their job. Plenty were concerned that it was not severe enough. Doesn't affect causes though.
81) The UK’s Met Office has been forced this year to re-examine 160 years of temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science on man-made global warming has been shattered by revelations about the data.
The UK Met Office has chosen to publish the data to queit the rabid attack dogs of the denialist political movement. The data's sound as any historical data you'd like. There are no substantial concerns - only shills squawking. Also: the Met Office ain't the globe, the rest of the global data concurs and comes from many, many sources.
82) Politicians and activists push for renewable energy sources such as wind turbines under the rhetoric of climate change, but it is essentially about money – under the system of Renewable Obligations. Much of the money is paid for by consumers in electricity bills. It amounts to £1 billion a year.
Again with the windmills already. They weren't relevant the first time and they aren't now.
83) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had tampered with their own data so as to conceal inconsistencies and errors.
Corrected, not tampered. You don't have the maths to understand the difference, and nor do I, but that's what the expert peer review process and publication is for. Flaws get exposed.
84) The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had campaigned for the removal of a learned journal’s editor, solely because he did not share their willingness to debase science for political purposes.
Again, this is the really, really bad paper. This was one of those "this is embarassing, I'm not being on the board for this crap - either he goes or I go" moments. The way it is spun here is nothing short of perfidious.
85) Ice-core data clearly show that temperatures change centuries before concentrations of atmospheric CO2 change. Thus, there appears to be little evidence for insisting that changes in concentrations of CO2 are the cause of past temperature and climate change.
Again with the lag. I don't think these guys can even count to 100.
86) There are no experimentally verified processes explaining how CO2 concentrations can fall in a few centuries without falling temperatures – in fact it is changing temperatures which cause changes in CO2 concentrations, which is consistent with experiments that show CO2 is the atmospheric gas most readily absorbed by water.
Irrelevant to the causes.
87) The Government’s Renewable Energy Strategy contains a massive increase in electricity generation by wind power costing around £4 billion a year over the next twenty years. The benefits will be only £4 to £5 billion overall (not per annum). So costs will outnumber benefits by a range of between eleven and seventeen times.
Again with the windmills!
88) Whilst CO2 levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout history, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased since the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the growth rate has now been constant for the past 25 years.
...and is expected to carry on growing as we add more CO2. What do you get with constant growth? Global warming!
89) It is a myth that CO2 is a pollutant, because nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere and human beings could not live in 100% nitrogen either: CO2 is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is and CO2 is essential to life.
"Pollutant" is an arbitrary term, and this statement is just gibberish. It attempts to say "scientists can say any old crap! " but just looks silly.
90) Politicians and climate activists make claims to rising sea levels but certain members in the IPCC chose an area to measure in Hong Kong that is subsiding. They used the record reading of 2.3 mm per year rise of sea level.
Various figures are used. Sea level rise is, as said at the top, well understood.
91) The accepted global average temperature statistics used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change show that no ground-based warming has occurred since 1998.
Tosh. 1998 was a freaky hot year. It's exactly the 'noise' in a noisy signal; this is why climatologists look at trends of +- 10 years. There is no mechanism proposed anywhere that says that 1998 was the peak of a cycle, which is what is implied.
92) If one factors in non-greenhouse influences such as El Nino events and large volcanic eruptions, lower atmosphere satellite-based temperature measurements show little, if any, global warming since 1979, a period over which atmospheric CO2 has increased by 55 ppm (17 per cent).
Temperature effects are expected to be different at different levels in the atmposphere. If you can't understand that, you lack the sophistication to critique the science.
93) US President Barack Obama pledged to cut emissions by 2050 to equal those of 1910 when there were 92 million Americans. In 2050, there will be 420 million Americans, so Obama’s promise means that emissions per head will be approximately what they were in 1875. It simply will not happen.
Again with the policy, not cause.
94) The European Union has already agreed to cut emissions by 20 percent to 2020, compared with 1990 levels, and is willing to increase the target to 30 percent. However, these are unachievable and the EU has already massively failed with its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), as EU emissions actually rose by 0.8 percent from 2005 to 2006 and are known to be well above the Kyoto goal.
Again with the policy, not cause. Are you a godsdamned parrot?
95) Australia has stated it wants to slash greenhouse emissions by up to 25 percent below 2000 levels by 2020, but the pledges were so unpopular that the country’s Senate has voted against the carbon trading Bill, and the Opposition’s Party leader has now been ousted by a climate change sceptic.
Again with the policy, not cause. Also an appeal to authority: a high-profile non-expert can be wrong just as easily.
96) Canada plans to reduce emissions by 20 percent compared with 2006 levels by 2020, representing approximately a 3 percent cut from 1990 levels but it simultaneously defends its Alberta tar sands emissions and its record as one of the world’s highest per-capita emissions setters.
Canada is a naughty hypocrite. But that doesn't change the causes. Again, policy!
97) India plans to reduce the ratio of emissions to production by 20-25 percent compared with 2005 levels by 2020, but all Government officials insist that since India has to grow for its development and poverty alleviation, it has to emit, because the economy is driven by carbon.
Again with the irrelevant policy. India wants to develop in a low-carbon way if it can. That'd be neat.
98) The Leipzig Declaration in 1996, was signed by 110 scientists who said: “We – along with many of our fellow citizens – are apprehensive about the climate treaty conference scheduled for Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997” and “based on all the evidence available to us, we cannot subscribe to the politically inspired world view that envisages climate catastrophes and calls for hasty actions.”
Another of these petitions, another appeal to authority. The physical world does not respond to petitions. The signatories have not published work - in the last twelve years - modifying the mainstream science. Fail.
99) A US Oregon Petition Project stated “We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of CO2, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.”
And another petition, again from around Kyoto - embarassingly out of date. Pathetic.
100) A report by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change concluded “We find no support for the IPCC’s claim that climate observations during the twentieth century are either unprecedented or provide evidence of an anthropogenic effect on climate.”
The NIPCC is, despite its deceptive name, an anti-global-warming lobby group. Of course they said that.
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no subject
Date: 2009-12-16 09:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-16 11:12 am (UTC)No wonder they print such crap the rest of the time.
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Date: 2009-12-16 12:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-16 01:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-21 08:56 pm (UTC)(and when are you going to next visit up here?)
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Date: 2009-12-22 10:02 am (UTC)How does their reasoning cling to it? The argument that the MWP was naturally warm therefore this is natural too is logically bogus: it's no more valid that if you walk down a road and trip over, then later I trip you, me claiming that I can't have tripped you, it must have been natural, because you fell over once before.
The selectively-quoted "decline" is covered in detail here: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/11/the-cru-hack/
"Phil Jones in discussing the presentation of temperature reconstructions stated that “I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) and from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.” The paper in question is the Mann, Bradley and Hughes (1998) Nature paper on the original multiproxy temperature reconstruction, and the ‘trick’ is just to plot the instrumental records along with reconstruction so that the context of the recent warming is clear. Scientists often use the term “trick” to refer to a “a good way to deal with a problem”, rather than something that is “secret”, and so there is nothing problematic in this at all. As for the ‘decline’, it is well known that Keith Briffa’s maximum latewood tree ring density proxy diverges from the temperature records after 1960 (this is more commonly known as the “divergence problem”–see e.g. the recent discussion in this paper) and has been discussed in the literature since Briffa et al in Nature in 1998 (Nature, 391, 678-682). Those authors have always recommend not using the post 1960 part of their reconstruction, and so while ‘hiding’ is probably a poor choice of words (since it is ‘hidden’ in plain sight), not using the data in the plot is completely appropriate, as is further research to understand why this happens."
We know we're really in deep sh when:
Date: 2009-12-23 02:11 am (UTC)We get it in the business and economics a lot. The real figures are too scary to behold so they speak of 1% percent increases when the rate of increase going from 9 to 10% - or reductions against last year being 25% less (when that means the actual quarterly increase was -4% and went to -3% (ie the real effect was a higher increase!).
It'll start to come out soon watch in or.
no subject
Date: 2009-12-23 02:30 am (UTC)Not so much the Kingpin, but the easiest to be humanly and economically improved at this time. Also given that atmospheric CO2 for our comfortable breathing desires CO2 to be a very small percentage of the total atmosphere, so adding extras to that little margin is significant. Humans can also tolerate small amounts of cynanide, it doesn't take much to tip the scale because it is such small amounts. It also doesn't matter what the cause of the CO2 is; if it's natural then we better make allowance for it (a river changing its path and going through ones' house is also "a natural occurence", doesn't mean it should or could be ignored!)
Down here in the southern hemisphere we're having some of the coldest and wettest years on record. That doesn't mean climate change is out the window because we're already having to modify the ways we're growing food to suit the new seasons/rainfalls. And yes, just like Venus' orbit these things shift over time, but that just means we should be _more_ careful not less. One slows ones' car for the corners, even if they were there yesterday as it doesn't mean that today there isn't a car or kid around the corner.
I realise I'm preaching to the choir here, but I thought a wee sum up of some of the more relevant points was in order.
Most of the rest, as you've said is just opinion, petitions or government policys. None of which control the climate.