Riveting panel with Gov. Sarah Palin and other guests
(March 31, 2016) The U.S. premiere of CFACT’s groundbreaking new documentary, Climate Hustle will take place at a Capitol Hill briefing in the historic Rayburn Office Building, including a riveting panel discussion on climate change featuring Gov. Sarah Palin and other notable guests. The invitation-only briefing and panel discussion will be held on April 14, 2016 from 4 to 6 p.m. The event comes just a week prior to the opening for signature of the U.N. Paris Agreement on climate change on Earth Day (April 22), and just a short time before Climate Hustle is seen in select U.S. cinemas for a one-night presentation by Fathom Events and SpectiCast on May 2, 2016 at 7:00 p.m. local time.
With welcoming remarks by Congressman Lamar Smith (R-TX), Chairman of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee and headlined by Gov. Sarah Palin (2008 Republican Vice Presidential Candidate; 9th Governor of Alaska), the panel will be taped and shown during the national theater event. The discussion will be moderated by Brent Bozell, Founder and President of the Media Research Center, and will also include other notable experts including respected climatologist Dr. David Legates and a special video appearance by Emmy Award-winning educator Bill Nye the Science Guy. The panel will further examine some of the science, politics, and media coverage of the climate issue, and go far toward helping debunk much of the alarmism and hype exposed in the Climate Hustle film.
David Rothbard, Executive Producer of the film and President of CFACT, said “We are honored to be having Climate Hustle’s U.S. premiere take place on Capitol Hill, and are excited to be bringing the film to life with a provocative discussion featuring some of the biggest names in the climate debate.”
About Climate Hustle
Climate Hustle presented by CFACT and CDR Communications, in partnership with Event Cinema provider SpectiCast, will be seen nationwide in a one-night engagement in select cinemas that debunks the myths and hype about man-made global warming in an informative and entertaining style. The film examines the question of whether there is a genuine scientific consensus about alleged man-made global warming and features more than 30 scientists and experts.
About The Participants:
Sarah Palin was elected Governor of Alaska in 2006 following work in journalism and public service as a Mayor/City Manager, and an Oil & Gas Commissioner. In 2008 she made history as the first woman nominated by the Republican Party for national office. Palin has been a successful television host & commentator, international speaker, three times New York Times best-selling author, and star of the Mark Burnett produced, “Sarah Palin’s Alaska” on TLC. She has sold more than 3.5 million books and has more than 5.8 million followers on social media. Palin is one the Smithsonian Institute’s 100 Most Influential Americans of All Time, twice listed among Time magazine’s Most Influential People in the World, Forbes 100 Most Powerful Women, NEWSMAX’s 100 most influential advocates, and twice one of Barbara Walters’ 10 Most Fascinating People.
Lamar Smith is the U.S. Representative for Texas’s 21st congressional district. Under Smith’s leadership the House Science, Space and Technology Committee has held hearings that have critically examined global warming.
Brent Bozell is a nationally recognized conservative writer and activist who founded the Media Research Center, CNSNews.com and ForAmerica. Bozell serves on numerous conservative boards and has a nationally syndicated column by Creator’s Syndicate.
His work has appeared in publications including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The New York Post, The Los Angeles Times and National Review.
David Russell Legates is a Climatologist, a Professor at the University of Delaware, and the former Delaware State Climatologist. Legates has authored or coauthored more than 75 peer-reviewed scientific studies, more than 30 book chapters, monographs, communications and reports, and has served on the editorial board of six different professional journals. He has spoken openly in opposition to the extremist view of man-made climate change claims posited by the United Nations.
Climate Hustle will be shown as a one-night event on May 2, 2016 in select cinemas nationwide. For locations and tickets (available Friday, April 1, 2016) and more information visit www.ClimateHustle.com.
Media Access: Because of very limited space, credentialed media who wish to attend the event should kindly request access in advance from our press contact.
About CFACT and CDR Communications:
Climate Hustle is a production of CFACT and CDR Communications, Inc. CFACT, the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow, is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit public policy organization, founded in 1985, that works to promote sensible policies on issues of environment and development. With an influential and impressive scientific advisory board, aggressive collegiate program, CFACT Europe, United Nations representation, Adopt-A-Village project, Global Social Responsibility program, and “Just the Facts” national radio commentary, CFACT continues to offer genuine positive solutions to today’s global challenges.
CDR Communications, Inc. is an award-winning media production firm founded in 1984 and based in Northern Virginia. CDR has produced thousands of products over the years, one of the latest being the feature film, “For the Glory,” which is currently being distributed around the world. CDR’s professional staff works with high-end motion graphics, animation, music, and celebrity talent in order to effectively and creatively touch audiences.
P.S. I will be traveling to this event and am quite exited about it. If anybody felt so moved to help out with my travel expenses please click the donate button. Thanks.
CFACT gets a lot of its funding from ExonMobil and the Koch Brothers, major players of the fossil fuel industry. Lamar Smith represents Texas, a state that bases 40% of its economy on fossil fuels. Palin from Alaska has similar conflicts of interest. These people are exactly like the folks who told us smoking does not cause cancer a few decades ago. Major conflicts of interest all of them.
Don’t get your climate science from the fossil fuel industry. Get it from NASA (climate.NASA.gov), NOAA, or the IPCC. Pure science, no conflict of interest, and some very serious forecasts for us if we continue to add CO2 to the air by burning fossil fuels as we have been doing since the industrial revolution at an increasing rate.
Don’t let the Fox-News type name calling manipulate you, it is not ‘alarmist’ to be concerned about AGW (human activity of burning fossil fuels is increasing average global temperatures at an increasing rate, which is causing changes in the Earth’s climate and causing sea level rise at an increasing rate). The vast majority of climate scientists are in agreement: human activity has increased CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere by 40% in the last 150 years, and 30% of that was in the last 20 years, and it is now starting to cause measurable, increasing repercussions for life on Earth that will continue to get worse.
From the AR5 report (http://ar5-syr.ipcc.ch/topic_summary.php):
Human influence on the climate system is clear, and recent anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases are the highest in history. Recent climate changes have had widespread impacts on human and natural systems.
Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia. The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, and sea level has risen.
Graphs: http://ar5-syr.ipcc.ch/ipcc/sites/default/files/download.php?img=AR5_SYR_Figure_SPM.1.png
There are so many questions regarding the credibility of IPCC that I don’t even know where to begin. You are welcome to accept the honesty of the United Nations on this issue but not me.
Also, NOAA is a government agency and they have been often accused of
lowering the records of temperatures during the early part of the 20th century in order to make more recent reporting appear significantly higher than it actually is.
Common sense recommends considering a few things. We’ve increased CO2 in the atmosphere by 40% in the last 150 years, to where it is now .04% of the atmosphere. In other words over 3 trillion tons of the stuff. Take a look at Venus if you don’t think CO2 in the air causes green house warming….. The thick atmosphere of Venus produces greenhouse warming that makes Venus hotter than Mercury (which has a very thin atmosphere), even though Mercury is about half the distance from the Sun and has a darker surface exposed to the Sun.
You should read Carl Sagan’s classic book, The Demon Haunted World. It is a good primer on science and the reasonable way to be skeptical of the various sources of information available.
Governments can be manipulative, and some scientists are bad. But you have gone off the deep end and should really do some probing on Wikipedia to learn the funding of the sources of the information that runs contrary to the global climate science community. The fossil fuel industry and Koch Brothers account for most of it. That is the heart of the conflict of interest on the issue, not a government or scientific conspiracy.
Evidently you are far more “involved” with aspects of global warming than I am or want to be. I don’t believe that .04% of the atmosphere is an overwhelming number. I am very impressed with 3 trillion tons of CO2 and will take your word for that too, but the earth and its environs are way beyond my scope and maybe yours too to measure those numbers against the overall dimensions of earth’s total atmospheric contents..
I am not acquainted with the CO2 levels of Venus. I’ll leave that to others to figure out how far away we are from being another Venus.
I am very annoyed and angry with the current “Chicken Little” attitude toward “fossil fuels”. When did we all of a sudden determine that fossil fuels were so bad for us and our environment? I guess I am ok with renewables, once we have them but until then it’s kind of like bad mouthing your family because you don’t like their lifestyle. Hoping and wishing and taxing people and countries in order to develop alternatives reminds me of the comment: “If we had some ham we could have ham and cheese sandwiches if we only had the cheese”. It’s very easy to invest in alternatives that flop and fail as long as someone else is paying for it right, ie: Solyndra, A123, etc.
In the meantime, I presume that you are putting your money where your mouth is and assume you are using public transportation and or bicycles or you walk to work or you work at home. I also assume that you have invested in high efficiency temperature controls for your home too. You know what? I am sick of the libs who don’t practice what they preach and use the taxpayer to fund their “theories”. I am thinking of DeCaprio who flies all over the world and tsk, tsks about what we should be doing. I am thinking of Kerry and Company who joins his cohorts in Paris who all fly in individually by the hundreds or thousands and dictate to the common man and the 3rd world what they should or should not be doing. These people would do all of us a great big favor by listening to others who might have a better idea. My guess is that in 1904 97% of the public would have put their money into horse shoes and buggy whips while Henry Ford was developing something that no one had heard about. Sorry to be so long winded but I’m fed up with people who pretend to be smarter than the rest of us.
“I am very annoyed and angry with the current “Chicken Little” attitude toward “fossil fuels”. When did we all of a sudden determine that fossil fuels were so bad for us and our environment?”
Well, as one who has been following the science for over 40 years, which has been quite clear about the fact that humans burning fossil fuels and deforestation is raising atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and that global warming and sea level rise are some of the results, I feel a bit ‘annoyed’ myself when I hear a vocal minority deny it is happening, deny people are causing it, deny it is a problem, or deny that we can afford to change it.
You sound surprised about the facts of AGW. Blame it on your news sources, and the fact that the fossil fuel industry have done a good job in the last 40 years injecting unfounded doubt about the science into the public’s understanding of the issue. It is nothing new.
For example, here is a brief history of scientists’ and society’s understanding of the issue:
https://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm
Check out this entry in 1979: US National Academy of Sciences report finds it highly credible that doubling CO2 will bring 1.5-4.5°C global warming
As you can see from the time-line, the issue has been well known from the science perspective for a long time. The reason it is finally making it’s way back into public consciousness is we are at (or beyond) the point of it being a very expensive problem. Leaders around the world can no longer ignore it, because insurance companies and banks are now including it into their business formulas, and governments are starting to have to devote a noticible amount of money in dealing with the changes AGW is triggering now, and will continue to increase in degree in the future.
Regarding my personal carbon footprint and that of a few high visibility AGW talking heads, your argument does not make sense to me. One person could literally set up a natural gas firepit, burning all year round 7×24, drive a Hummer, and leave their windows open a few inches and their thermostat at 80, and fly around the world every few weeks, and still not make any significant difference in the 35 billion metric tons of CO2 humanity releases from fossil fuel use each year. But by putting visibility on the issue, raising social awareness of it, and in the end putting enough political pressure on government leaders that a national (and world-wide) discussion about the science and the solutions, those people will do more over-all good than a stay-at-home, off-the-grid, vegan will ever do. No society is going to be changed by a few people doing the right thing, and leaving the rest of a quite ignorant general population to do as they may.
Once the science is accepted and the problem acknowledged, then society can start to figure out how best to deal with it. There are many ideas. Google ‘revenue neutral carbon fee and dividend’ for one idea that makes sense to me, because it allows the net cost of energy to remain the same for people, and yet over time encourages massive private investment in the science and technology of carbon neutral solutions.
I do think a non-fossil fuel economy will leave us far better off in the medium and long term. For example if we were not dependent on oil we would have saved the $5 trillion dollars the Iraq war has cost us. But even more than that, basing our country’s infrastructure investment on mainstream science rather than on the direction people with major conflicts of interest want it to go (e.g. the fossil fuel industry and political leaders from states whose economies currently depend on fossil fuel money) makes a lot more sense to me, and I don’t know why more people don’t seem to agree.
Most of your comments are focused on the “dangerous” levels of CO2 that you and many others find so worrisome.
Here is another point of view:
UK Professor Emeritus of Biogeography Philip Stott of the University of London explains the crux of the entire global warming debate and rebuts the notion that CO2 is the main climate driver.
>“As I have said, over and over again, the fundamental point has always been this: climate change is governed by hundreds of factors, or variables, and the very idea that we can manage climate change predictably by understanding and manipulating at the margins one politically-selected factor (CO2), is as misguided as it gets,” Stott wrote in 2008. It is not simply, the sun or CO2 when looking at global temperatures, it is the Sun, volcanoes, tilt of the Earth’s axis, water vapor, methane, clouds, ocean cycles, plate tectonics, albedo, atmospheric dust, Atmospheric Circulation, cosmic rays, particulates like Carbon Soot, forests and land use, etc. Climate change is governed by hundreds of factors, or variables, not just CO2.<
I guess you do not appreciate how the scientific process works. The fact is that all those factors have been included in the climate models used to figure out what is going on today. What happens as a theory matures over the course of 100 years is that new considerations are introduced, evaluated, and either incorporated or discarded on their individual merits. That is how over time we can be confident in a mature scientific theory, as opposed to the skepticism of a few fringe scientists who disagree. Science depends on that skepticism, and no theory ever has 100% support from scientists. Which is why you will always be able to find people like Philip Stott. But I get my scientific conclusions from the mainstream, majority group, not the fringe elements. Sure, fringe ideas sometimes help move the science forward. But it is much more common to see those ideas fade away over time as evidence of the consensus theory continues to add support to it.
No serious climate scientist ever claims it is only the Sun and CO2 that controls climate. That is a weak straw man argument.
But it is quite another thing to deny that in a system controlled by hundreds of variables, I greatly increasing one of the more important of those factors can be simply ignored. And many of the related other factors are positive feedbacks for temperature and climate, so tweaking one factor can and indeed does seem to have a magnified effect.
Go with NASA and all other US and global scientific bodies, not the fringe scientist or two with fringe beliefs. You’ll end up being on the right side of the issue nearly always.
Dear John,
Your comments are indicative of the most significant reason why many people are not buying into the “settled science”. Your opening line to me is fairly dripping with pomposity and arrogance. Interpretation: You don’t understand the science and are really not bright enough to grasp what we who are smarter know and understand. Your overall comment says,”sit quietly and listen to me explain and we all hope that you will grasp what we are trying desperately to explain to you”.
You also have a propensity for accepting whoever we hold out as a legitimate, highly regarded skeptic scientist and manage to put the label of “crackpot”, “fringe scientist”,”unaccepted” onto their credentials. So your scientists are the “right” ones and mine are the “wrong” ones.
I have followed some highly qualified scientists who have spent their professional lives assessing this science. I particularly appreciate the experience and commentary of Richard Lindzen of MIT and Harvard. Dr. Lindzen has been doing this for over 50 years and knows the science inside and out but I am supposed to toss him out as a qualified, competent observer and listen to the government scientists who are pushing the government agenda.
Here are a couple of contrarian items that are written by highly accepted experts in the field. I don’t believe that these are “fringe scientists. I find their comments compelling.
>Climatologist Dr. Patrick Michaels and Chip Knappenberger declared 400 ppm of CO2 was cause for ‘celebration.” “In some circles, this announcement has been met with consternation and gnashing of teeth. The proper reaction is celebration,” Michaels and Knappenberger wrote on May 14, 2013.
“Fossil fuel energy supplies about 80% of the world’s energy production—a value which has been pretty much constant for the past 40 years. During that time, the global population increased by 75%, and global energy use doubled. Global per capita energy use increased, while global energy use per $1000 GDP declined. We are using more energy, but we are using it more efficiently. In the developed world, life expectancy has doubled since the dawn of the fossil fuel era,” they wrote.
“As we continually document (see here for our latest post), more and more science is suggesting that the rate (and thus magnitude at any point in time) of CO2-induced climate change is not as great as commonly portrayed. The lower the rate of change, the lower the resulting impact. If the rate is low enough, carbon dioxide emissions confer a net benefit. We’d like to remind readers that “it’s not the heat, it’s the sensitivity,” when it comes to carbon dioxide, and the sensitivity appears to have been overestimated,” Michaels and Knappenberger added.
“400 ppm of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere should remind us of our continuing success at expanding the global supply of energy to meet a growing demand. That success which ultimately leads to an improvement of the global standard of living and a reduction in vulnerability to the vagaries of weather and climate. 400pm is cause for celebration. ‘A world lit only by fire’ is not,” they concluded.<
Hi Richard,
First of all, I want to make clear that I think you and many others with your viewpoint about AGW are intelligent and thoughtful, and I especially appreciate the civilized way in which you yourself communicate. Also, I greatly appreciate the respectful sharing of ideas we are having. Yes, I may sometimes sound like a bombastic know-it-all. In my defense, I spend a lot more of my free time learning about science than most, and watching the current remedial level of public discourse about much of it is distressing to me. It is a fact that a majority of the people in the US are scientifically illiterate. One recent study estimates that only 28% are scientifically literate. But sounding condescending is very far from my intent, and is in fact detrimental to my goal.
To better quantify this between the two of us, try taking this quiz I just found while searching for the statistic used above: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-much-do-americans-know-about-science-27747364/
I’m not trying to brag, just provide a data point: I got 12 out of 12 right, no guesses. I love science, and my honest aim in contributing to online discussions such as this is that I want to share the joy of knowledge and learning real science. Trying to feel superior is the opposite of the reason I am here.
I do try to always be respectful in my discourse. But find I do have to proofread and sometimes edit my comments to pull out occasional emotional non-constructive phrases that seem to slip in despite my best intentions.
My participation in discussions such as ours is challenging and rewarding to me in that it makes me do research and think critically about my position, facts, sources, and communication style. I have been learning a lot along the way. For example, I recently heard the argument several times that “since CO2 makes up only 0.04% of the atmosphere, therefore it can not be a problem”. Well my initial reaction to it was that there is no logical way of starting with only that fact and concluding anything about the possible effects on global warming from it. So I did some research and found that it means there is over 3 trillion metric tons of CO2 in the air. That number also tells us nothing about what effect that much will have on global warming, but it’s a very interesting fact none the less. And it does convey the fact that there is an enormous amount of CO2 in the air, so it at least opens people up to the possibility that even 0.04% may be plenty of CO2 to have some effect.
I stand by the intent of my first sentence, but regret the tone. What I meant is explained immediately after it. My reliance on the opinion of the majority of climate scientists from around the world is 99% more likely to be correct than your reliance on a few vocal skeptics. My superior sounding attitude came from the certainty I have of my position, but certanly was a lousy way to express it. Sorry about that.
I am in near the end of reading a book I recently recommended to you: Carl Sagan’s ‘The Demon-Haunted World, Science as a Candle in the Dark’. I think it should be required reading for everyone. His ability to describe science, the scientific process, and the difficulty our society has in using it properly is unparalleled. There is an interesting chapter on the balance science requires between skepticism and acceptance. Scientific theories must be accepted as the best current explanation, but we also must always be receptive to facts which disprove them, and ready to discard them when proven wrong. To me, two theories which are accepted by the vast majority of scientists and by over one hundred years of followup study, data and testing are evolution and climate change. Skepticism about their basic tenets is not reasonable.
Please consider reading that book, I am very interested in what you think of it.
BTW, regarding Richard Lindzen: https://www.skepticalscience.com/Richard_Lindzen_arg.htm
Thank you for your response and for the tenor and tone of your comments.
I will try to respond to some of your comments as best I can. I would probably have to assume that you know a great deal more about the subject than I do so I am at a distinct disadvantage in trying to make my case. That said, there are a lot of people who are experts on the bible and are far more informed than I am but that does not necessarily make them more correct than I am when discussing religion.
I would also like to point out that I admire Dr. Richard Lindzen of MIT. You provided me with a link to “Climate Skeptics” which is in the business of demeaning or finding fault with people who do not accept the “settled science” consensus.
Here are some of Lindzen’s achievements and affiliations:
>Lindzen has published papers on Hadley circulation, monsoon meteorology, planetary atmospheres, hydrodynamic instability, mid-latitude weather, global heat transport, the water cycle, ice ages and seasonal atmospheric effects. His main contribution to the academic literature on anthropogenic climate change is his proposal of the iris hypothesis in 2001, with co-authors Ming-Dah Chou and Arthur Y. Hou.[8][9] He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Science, Health, and Economic Advisory Council at the Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy. He joined MIT in 1983, prior to which he held positions at the University of Washington (1964–65), Institute for Theoretical Meteorology, University of Oslo (1965–67), National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) (1966–67), University of Chicago (1968–72) and Harvard University (1972–83). He also briefly held a position of Visiting Lecturer at UCLA in 1967.[10] As of January 2010, his publications list included 230 papers and articles published between 1965 and 2008, with five in process for 2009. He is the author of a standard textbook on atmospheric dynamics, and co-authored the monograph Atmospheric Tides with Sydney Chapman.[11]
He was Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at MIT from 1983,[1] until his retirement which was reported in the Spring 2013 newsletter of MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS).[2] On December 27, 2013 the Cato Institute announced that he is a Distinguished Senior Fellow in their Center for the Study of Science.[12]<
Given the above partial resume of this distinguished scientist's achievements Climate Skeptics manages to find and list at least 30 areas where they take issue with Lindzen. I find this to be brazen, arrogant and juvenile on their part. This man's credentials are impeccable. I listen to him often and find him to be refreshing and amusing and very believable. Yet, people like RFK Jr. and Senator Whitehouse would have him prosecuted and sentenced to prison. If this doesn't touch on Stalinist tactics then I don't know what does.
By the way how many scientists does the 97% consensus actually refer to? Can you give me some sort of idea? Does it mean 20,000, 100,000, 1 million? If you had a survey of 10 scientists and 9 of them agreed that would mean a 90% consensus. But it would be representative of only 10 individuals which is hardly compelling.
Just wanted to see if you had an answer to this question which I believe is very important. I apologize if you have been to busy to answer.
>By the way how many scientists does the 97% consensus actually refer to? Can you give me some sort of idea? Does it mean 20,000, 100,000, 1 million? If you had a survey of 10 scientists and 9 of them agreed that would mean a 90% consensus. But it would be representative of only 10 individuals which is hardly compelling.<
Ya sorry, got busy outside.
Yes I agree statistics can be used to be very misleading. But I think it is safe to be less skeptical about them when you are referred to them from NASA.
I learned a while ago to avoid using the ‘97%’ statistic myself because both sides have their opinion about it, and it does seem to be an area where some subjectivity can come into play. I prefer to say ‘vast majority’ or similar, because that is my experience from reading and seems a decently vague description that is in line with the 97% statistic. But since NASA stands behind the 97%, and because I do believe it (because the theory of AGW is so very well backed up with data and theory), I did a little digging to see where it came from.
I found the following:
http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/
http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002
https://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-scientific-consensus-intermediat
The NASA link provides the second link as a reference. That second link is:
‘J. Cook, et al, “Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature,” Environmental Research Letters Vol. 8 No. 2, (15 May 2013); DOI:10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024024
From that paper (second link) you see where the biggest survey got it’s numbers:
‘Following a similar methodology, C13 analysed the abstracts of 11,944 peer-reviewed papers published between 1991 and 2011 that matched the search terms ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’ in the ISI Web of Science search engine. Among the 4014 abstracts stating a position on human-caused global warming, 97.1% were judged as having implicitly or explicitly endorsed the consensus. In addition, the study authors were invited to rate their own papers, based on the contents of the full paper, not just the abstract. Amongst 1381 papers self-rated by their authors as stating a position on human-caused global warming, 97.2% endorsed the consensus.’
I did read your opinion of SkepticalScience, and although I have not read the site much, the information I found in it is supported on other respective scientific sites. In the third link is a list of “Scientific organizations endorsing the consensus”, which contains many major global scientific communities. I am in disagreement with those who claim there is a grand conspiracy among scientists and governments around the world to twist the science to prove AGW in order to achieve some nefarious world domination. That is just not how the scientific world works, and would be quickly exposed by someone anyway. I group those conspiracy theories along with other similar pseudo-science and anti-government off-the-deep-end ideas (Area 51, alien abductions, crop circles, etc.).
John sorry to respond in bits and pieces but I have been pretty busy. Here is some specific information regarding the subject of sea level rise:
>The end of the last Ice Age 18,000 years ago caused the sea level to rise by a huge amount…about 400 feet. This change happened rapidly at first, caused primarily by the melting of huge ice sheets covering North America and Eurasian land masses which disappeared about 8000-5000 years ago.
The West Antarctic Ice sheet began to melt at that time also, but at a much slower rate, and that melting continues today. We might expect this melting to continue until it is gone in another 7,000 years or so… or until the next Ice Age, whichever comes first. Other smaller ice sheets that once existed in the Antarctic are already gone. The oceans will continue to rise, despite anything President Obama may attempt in order to stop them.<
John I am only going to worry about the next 50 years or so.
I am not able to deal with changing or altering the earth's climate. To the best of my knowledge the average world mean rise of sea level has been about 1CM during the past 100 years. Don't we really have more important things to worry about? If someone gives me some ocean front property in New England I will gladly take it and worry about sea level rise another day.
On Wikipedia’s page about ‘Sea Level Rise’ there is a graph that shows the change you describe over the last 18,000 years.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise
From the curve it seems most of the big rise happened in the first 10,000 of those years, then rate of change greatly decreased and has a very shallow slope for the last 8,000 years. I’ve read that sea level was rising about 1mm a year for the past few thousands of years, until about 200 years ago (when we started increasing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels). Since then the rate has been increasing at an increasing rate. The current rate of sea level rise is about 3mm per year (1 inch per decade), and increasing. Recent projections are for a sea level rise of 4 feet from the current levels in the next 80 years or so if we continue with the current global fossil fuel use pattern.
If you consider the value of current coastal infrastructure and property that will be affected by that rise, and the costs of moving the hundreds of millions of people (or building solutions to prevent those areas going underwater) the costs of doing nothing about adding CO2 to the atmosphere are huge. New York, Miami, Boston, New Orleans – all will have to deal with extremely expensive options in the next few decades if major changes are not made to greatly reduce the burning of fossil fuels.
Based on a straight cost-benefit analysis, even if you only care about the next 50 years you can see that dealing with the predicted rise will be very expensive. If you are worried about Social Security being around for a while, not having greater and greater FEMA expenses should be a consideration. Even if sea level rise were the only consideration related to burning fossil fuels, it seems likely that it would be worth trying to minimize the damage. A 1 mm rise per year would quite easy to deal with over a lifetime: after 100 years you would end up with about a 4 inch rise.
Add to that cost the health care costs of not having the cleaner air and water we will get if we switch from fossil fuels, and other effects of raising the average temperature (species loss, etc), and it seems that the costs of switching will be an investment with a very high return in the next 50 years.
Hi John, I have been perusing some older climate calamity newspaper articles that date back to the late 1890s. It’s kind of interesting to see how little things have really changed in well over 100 years. I am attaching an article that dates back to the mid 1950s that predicted much of the doom and gloom scenario that i being pushed today. I thought that you might be interested to read some of this.
http://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Screenshot-2016-01-26-at-04.50.48-PM-down-392×1024.gif
Hi Richard,
We read this 60 year old article very differently if you consider this a good example of inflammatory scare mongering from the scientific community.
Because I on the other hand am quite impressed with how accurate the predictions in the article turned out to be.
For example the article predicted navigation through the arctic ocean becoming possible in 50 years from 1955. According to wikipedia that became possible in 2009.
Perhaps you have heard talk in the news about China considering using the Northwest Passage for commerce. That is the same route. For more on that:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Passage
http://www.britannica.com/place/Northwest-Passage-trade-route
Regarding the estimates about how much the sea level would rise if all the ice on Antarctica and Greenland were to melt, those estimates are quite a bit less than current estimates. If you misunderstood the article to claim that all that ice was predicted to happen in 50 years, please read it again. I am sure the science never predicted that. It will take several thousand years for that to occur, in a greenhouse effect worst case senario. The statement could have been worded more carefully in the article to be clear nobody was saying all that ice melting was predicted to occure in 50 years. That time estimate is more like 5000 years.
http://www.sciencealert.com/this-animation-shows-what-earth-would-look-like-if-all-the-ice-melted
2015-12-18-12-01-35
U.S. Data Since 1895 Fail To Show Warming Trend – NYTimes.com
The current NASA graph has eliminated the 1930-1999 cooling.
GISS_US_1999
Regional variations do exist, the US land makes up a small percent of the total.
It’s time for you to respond to my previous responses. Look at climate.nasa.gov for global data and conclusions.
For a while now I have shown your sources to be wrong, and asked you to think about things and respond, but you are recently just throwing junk science at me rather than digging in to any of my conterarguments to the previously raised issues.
Nobody, especially me, wants taxes to be raised for this conversion away from fossil fuels. I am for a small, fiscally conservative government (ie. balance the budget). But I am strong in science, which the Republican party has decided to ignore. If done right and with enough time, this can be very good for jobs and the economy. Not to mention health and geopolitics. But for that to happen Dems and Reps will need to work together. Healthcare is a good example of something both parties at different times have tried to address, and when they don’t work together we end up with a mess.
John,
I believe that before we spend much more time on this that it is important to understand how close or far apart we are.
I guess the question that I would like you to answer is simply do you believe that climate change or global warming is a “settled science”? If in fact that is your position then you and I are on different platforms and talking over, under and around each other. As you state, you believe that:
1) my sources are wrong
2) I use junk science
3) My examples are either “regional”
4) Can be explained by the theory of “random chance”
You believe that as a Republican I am tuned out on Climate Change. You believe that the government can help to lead us in the right direction by having us develop alternative energy sources. Do you mean like Solyndra or A123 or other energy debacles that the federal government has blown billions of dollars on while chasing rainbows with your and my money.
Again, if you believe that this is a “settled science” then you believe that your responsibility is to convince and convert me to your beliefs. This has become a religion for some within the movement to the point of wanting to punish those who stand in the way of your enlightenment.
You send me websites and get frustrated because I don’t dig into the weeds of what NOAA is selling but I send you a NYT article from 1989 quoting NOAA that said that “no significant temperature or precipitation changes in the past 100 years” and yet you have no comment.
When I give you startling temperature information your response is to use Johnny Carson’s “Carmac The Magnificent” method of mind over matter as an explanation.
I guess John that it is fair to say that you and I come from two significantly different points of view and will most likely never agree. Only time will tell who is right and who is wrong and I for one will not live long enough to find out.
Hi Richard,
In that I think you are right: we both seem convinced of our point of view. That is one reason I suggested you read Carl Sagan’s ‘A Demon Haunted World’, because from my perspective he does a great job examining why mainstream science is often not followed by a lot of Americans. That is what you are doing. But you seem well read, inquisitive and intelligent, so for someone like you to be convinced that mainstream science is not pointing the right way on such an important issue is wholly aligned to why he wrote one of his most significant works.
I would never use the term ‘settled science’ because fundamental to the nature of scientific discovery is the concept that the current explaination is just the best theory given the available data. Always in the back of the mind is the knowledge that if new data comes along and proves a theory wrong, a new theory will need to be developed. Scientific theories are simply the best description of what is going on at any point in time. Newton’s laws of motion are fine for solving most trajectory problems. However as data was collected there were variations from the expected when speeds got very fast or mass got very large. Einstein came up with the general theory of relativity which explains those deviations, and also predicted other effects many of which have since been validated. That is how science works. Newton’s theory is still great, but an understanding of gravity not as a force, but as a measurable effect of the curvature of space-time by mass and the theory that got us there lets physics continue to make further progress in explaining how the world works.
That said, there are a number of basic theories that are supported by many fields of science and have withstood the test of time and are at least close enough to being correct that we can land people on moons, cure diseases, explain where the human species came from, and explain why sea levels are rising faster now than they were 100 years ago with tools and knowledge that are based on those theories.
I would say your examples that I responded to were mostly cases of ‘cherry picking’, which is another way of saying they were carefully selected examples from out of many data points. Like the guy who called 8 coin tosses in a row correctly (a 2 to the 8th power, or 1 in 256th chance), or the claim I often see made that most makes me cringe in embarrassment for the claimee: ‘since 1998 there has been no warming’. It’s a great example of cherry picking, because when you use nearly any other starting point, it’s wrong. It must start on that year because it was an El Niño year, and in that cycle there is one year in 5-20 that is higher than the others around it. Picking the peak year as a starting point, it will take a while to make a new high. Of course, I think we probably just did that in 2015 as it was another El Niño year, so hopefully we’re done hearing about that one now. Take a look at climate.nasa.gov for some larger-scale global temperature graphs. It shows 1998 to be an anomaly. And it is easy to see that temperature is on the rise at an increasing rate.
I disparage, after responding to 6-8 of your issues and explaining why I do not consider them valid, of responding to one NYT article that refers to one 30 year old study. The science available from NASA, NOAA, IPCC, and the global climate science community now is better to go to for the information about global temperatures over that and many longer time ranges. I referred you to NASA (and should have to NOAA also) rather than comment because a lot more study has been done on historic temperature since then.
To me it is a sad world that is filled with conspiracy theories and fears of government hiding scientific data. The real science, current data and theories, and mainstream science is extremely interesting to me. The world is a very interesting, understandable thing. People seem drawn to assume science must have alternative motives: vaccines, moon landings, fossil fuel warnings. Things science has given us the power to understand and do. Many people don’t believe them, but I think they simply have not been taught the scientific method properly or are not applying critical thinking well. Yes it is right to be skeptical of everthing. But that doesn’t mean ignoring facts or giving the mainstream scientific theories the benefit of the doubt.
If you objectively look at why most of the information that is contrary to climate science was created and distributed, it can be traced back to the fossil fuel industry itself. Or to political people who are elected in areas currently dependent on the fossil fuel industry.
Regarding the Republican Party – currently none of the candidates will say they think the theory of evolution through random mutation and survival pressures on populations best explains the development of man. Or that they think that going with the mainstream scientists view on AGW is correct. Don’t get me started, they are not fit to be leaders they would fail a seventh grade science class.
I think the US has got to get focused on real issues: the ethics of GM, pesticide use, how much to control computer learning and automation, the risk of epidemics, how much are humans changing the planet and our environment vs how much change can we tolerate, etc. I don’t know how we can do anything other than drive ourselves off the edge if we do not take the power of our science and technology seriously and use it thoughtfully. To do so, we all need to be able to have a rational discussion of science.
I must admit that I am not a huge fan of Carl Sagan. I think that he permitted his science beliefs to be driven by his political, philosophical and religious views. He believed in big government managing, directing and driving our cultural, economic and scientific endeavors. He was not only not a fan of religion but was sometimes motivated by strong anti-religious sentiment. On their own his scientific knowledge and beliefs were probably beyond excellent but they were ultimately somehow at the root of his strongly held opinions.
Regards global warming and climate change I believe that Sagan had a built in bias against industry, capitalism and consumerism and believed that they were all in concert working toward destroying our planet. I must admit I am not excited at the prospect of allowing Carl Sagan’s socialist agenda to sway my thinking regarding global warming.
All that being said, he was a very interesting and wonderful spokesman for science in general and astronomy in particular. I watched him very often on PBS.
“[Carl Satan] permitted his science beliefs to be driven by his political, philosophical and religious views.”
The way this book reads, he puts the scientific method first above all else, and analysed the world, including the history of politics and religion, using only that method. He did arrive at conclusions, but they were unbiased by anything other than that process. His view is that the scientific method is the best way to understand the world and is the basis on which we should base all important policy decisions.
Regarding his view on big government controlling the direction of scientific exploration, I just finished reading a chapter in which he argues for the exact opposite. He was for funding pure science, because of the unknown but predictable benefits that a better understanding of how our world really works often yields. His example of the history of James Maxwell’s equations and how his using them to realize the relationship between electromagnetism and light, and how that lead to practical applications such as radio and TV broadcasting, and radar, is some of the best reading I’ve done in quite some time.
John here is another piece of somewhat compelling anecdotal information that seems to fly in the face of us being told year after year that we just had the hottest year on record.
This is a comparison of temperature readings that were taken at Fairfield, Iowa during the month of July in 1936 and 2015. This shows that the temperature was hotter ON EVERY SINGLE DAY in 1936 compared to 2015 which we have been told was the hottest July on record. I really find this type of information to be troubling when we are being asked to throw away our fossil fuels and trade in our combustion engine autos for battery operated cars.
During July, 1936 afternoon temperatures at Fairfield, Iowa averaged 19F hotter than 2015. Every single July day in 1936 was hotter than 2015 (the hottest year ever™
Hi Robert,
You are not using the scientific method. There are lots of coincidences you may claim disprove global warming, but coincidences do not refute careful scientific data collection and analysis. Based on our recent discussion of it I will help you through this example.
You will always be able to find cases that break the rule. The science of the ‘hottest year’ records are of the global averages – land, sea, air – not for any specific location on the planet for one month in two selected years.
I recently saw a good example of how a seemingly impossible coincidence can be used by someone to try to prove a point while sounding scientific, but in fact by misusing the scientific process to do so. The person asked their audience to stand. He then split it in half down the middle and asked the left half to try to ‘will’ a coin to land heads, and the right hand to will it to land tails. He flipped the coin, and had the side that got it wrong sit down. He then repeated the process of splitting, flipping, and sitting the wrong half down seven more times. He then asked the one person left standing at the end, who had called it right 8 times in a row, if they had known before about their incredible power of being able to use mind-control on coin flips. LOL. Of course, when he then tried to verify the power by having the person call heads or tails and focus on it, that person did no better than random. This is a good example of finding patterns after the fact, then trying to use them to prove something. To prove or disprove a hypothesis or theory, you have to define the expected pattern or prediction before the test, then use multiple blind testing to verify or disprove it. Otherwise you are either being dishonest or not doing good science. ‘Bad science’ means butchering the scientific method, then trying to use the results to show that the findings prove or disprove a scientific theory.
In the case of Iowa’s temps in July in 1936 and 2015, this is obviously not a randomly chosen month. To be a little more scientific about it, we would need to plot the highs, means, and lows for each month in Iowa and graph them between 1936 and 2016. Then if you see a pattern we probably do have something interesting, but it would not be proof that global warming was wrong since this is only one point on the globe. It would probably show what happens to the climate of Iowa when CO2 is increased, but there are also other factors to consider. In fact, as energy is added to the entire global system through global warming, some areas very might well cool down, and others get a lot warmer than the average.
Hi John,
You have given me a lot of information and comments to think about and respond to so I hardly know where to begin.
Actually, I will start here. My name is Richard not Robert.
I think in fact that I did preface one of my comments by saying that it was somewhat anecdotal information so I realize that it was not pure science. However to dismiss it out of hand is I believe not totally objective and open minded. This was not a case of 80% or 90% or 99% comparison but a complete 100% blowout, 31 days out of 31 days were hotter than the infamous “2015 hottest July on record”. This happened during the middle of the Dust Bowl that hit the heartland of the U.S. and included Iowa. During that period over 350 Iowans died from the extreme heat that affected the country during the 1930s. Yet rather than admit that this is something that flies in the face of what we are being told by NOAA you believe it could be explained by “random chance” or that it should be subjected to deeper research that will help to explain it away.
We have had far fewer major hurricanes hit the East Coast of the U.S. during the past 10 years or so than in previous years. Is this also random chance? Probably the most disastrous hurricane to hit the U.S. was in 1900 in Galveston, Texas where up to 8000 people perished due to the devastation caused by this hurricane. If this hurricane happened today the Climate Alarmists would be out in mass telling us that we had to get rid of fossil fuels immediately or we would be facing impending and immediate disaster.
This stuff is absolutely outrageous.
I keep asking for someone to tell me how many scientists represent the infamous 97% number and no one can tell me. I believe that the number is far less than the “experts” are willing to admit. I have seen figures that imply that the 97% number is based on 75 qualified respondents to a survey. I believe that the “overwhelming”, “amazing”, “vast” number of scientists who believe that the earth is going through a significant and potentially disastrous climate change event caused by human activity is far less than some people would have us believe.
Hi Richard.
Sorry about the Robert thing. Your response cracked me up – thanks.
A few days ago I did a fair amount of digging and wrote up what I found about that 97% claim. Here is the meat of it again:
‘analysed the abstracts of 11,944 peer-reviewed papers published between 1991 and 2011 that matched the search terms ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’ in the ISI Web of Science search engine. Among the 4014 abstracts stating a position on human-caused global warming, 97.1% were judged as having implicitly or explicitly endorsed the consensus. In addition, the study authors were invited to rate their own papers, based on the contents of the full paper, not just the abstract. Amongst 1381 papers self-rated by their authors as stating a position on human-caused global warming, 97.2% endorsed the consensus.’
In other words, for all the published scientific articles of a recent 10 year period, the ones that ThomsonReuters included in their search catalogue that included ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’ were identified. About 1/3 of the 12,000 articles found stated a position on AGW, and of those 97% were found to endorse the consensus. The number of scientists that published those 4000 papers is not provided, but it takes a while to write a paper, go through peer review, and get it published. My guess for a very conservative estimate of independent scientists writing 4000 papers on a specific subject is 10 per scientist, so I think 400 scientists would be a very safe number. From the third link I provided in the previous response there are other studies that rated between 200-600 climate scientists.
If you read the quote above I think you get the fact about that survey you mention. I doubt 75 scientists wrote 1381 papers in 10 years.
The dust bowl period in US history is interesting from a conservative naturalist and science perspective. It is a prime example of how man’s hubris, a market gone crazy (wheat), and government distortion of motivations can lead to environmental disaster and human suffering. I don’t know how much extra heat was generated having dirt rather than blue grass covering 8 million acres of land in the Great Plains, but those summer months in the mid 1930s for the Plains states were certainly being heated quite a bit more than normal due to the exposed earth rather than hardy natural grasses.
You missed the correlation I tried to make between your comparison of an Iowa July in 1936 and 2015, and a select person who correctly focused on a coin 8 times and called the right result of the toss each time. My point is this: In a complex system with lots of data, you can often find special patterns after the data is collected that seem to be impossible given our understanding of ‘randomness’. But in fact, random should not be taken as meaning homogenous. It means given enough samples, you will get to the expected average eventually. It says nothing of the random path you will take to get there.
John, sorry for the wise guy stuff. Your info on the 97% is good and indicates significant input. I have seen other information that does boil down to 75 “legitimate” respondents out of 77 who were accepted. I will send you backup for that thesis.
I did want to respond to your comment about the Northwest Passage being navigable. There is no regular sea traffic that is currently using what could be construed as a NW Passage at this time. There have been some vessels that have made their way through during summer months but not cargo vessels.
The NW Passage was sought out by explorers hundreds of years ago. This would indicate that even then that some hardy souls did believe that it was possible to find that route so that means that they believed that there was open routes to the Pacific Ocean.
It is also believed by some geographers that the Arctic was much warmer during the Middle Ages and could have been navigated. There have been whale skeletons found in that area that indicates that even whales were able to get through during that period.
Not sure what all of this means or implies but interesting non-the-less.
Thanks for your comments and thick skin.
The NW Passage would have been a great trade route, but it was never found because it did not exist hundreds of years ago. It has been frozen, as you can see in the time-lapse movies of Arctic ice that show the summer edges creating further north as the years progress.
This decade for the first time companies are starting to talk about using it for shipping and even a cruise ship journey (even with warming that sounds risky to me for the next decade or two!).
They were not doing so 20 years or 200 years ago because it was not an option.
Hi John,
I did want to send you this information regarding the infamous 97% statistic that is so often quoted by the warming and change adherents. This seems to be one of the main linchpins that so many believers push as the reason why skeptics should accept the science, get on the ship and row with everyone else.
A survey was sent out in 2009 by the AGU with two basic questions to 10,257 Earth scientists. The first question was “When compared with pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen, or remained relatively constant”? Based on the fact that the planet began thawing after the Little Ice Age, few would be expected to dispute this.
The second question asked “Do you think that human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures”?
So what constitutes “significant”? “Changing” wasn’t defined to clarify whether it meant warming or cooling or whether better or worse.
3146 of those surveyed responded which was a 31% return rate. Out of the 3146 respondents a small subset of 77 (2.5%) were registered as “climate scientists”. Of those 77 who were qualified 75 answered “yes” to the inquiry.
So the oft quoted overwhelming percentage of scientists who believe in global warming or climate change became the 97% statistic that the Bill Nye’s and Al Gore’s quote so often. This is not the compelling evidence that I need to change me from a denier to a believer. I am sure you can understand my reasoning. I am sure you don’t agree with it but I think you can see why I don’t believe like you do.
Thanks very much for your input and information. I have enjoyed trading ideas. Have a wonderful day.
Hi Richard,
Based on what you wrote above it does sound sketchy. But I found this paper that is quite convincing that the statistic that 97% climate scientists agree about AGW is indeed meaningful:
Expert credibility in climate change
William R. L. Anderegga,1, James W. Prallb, Jacob Haroldc, and Stephen H. Schneidera,d,1
http://www.pnas.org/content/107/27/12107.full.pdf
The researchers surveyed 1372 of the world’s top climate scientists (based on papers published and papers referenced), and 97-98% of them agreed with the IPCC AR4 findings that the human burning of fossil fuels is responsible for the CO2 increases in the atmosphere, and that is responsible for the global average temperature increases of the last 150 years, and of the increasing rate of those changes that is seen happening now.
The abstract:
“Although preliminary estimates from published literature and expert surveys suggest striking agreement among climate scientists on the tenets of anthropogenic climate change (ACC), the American public expresses substantial doubt about both the anthropogenic cause and the level of scientific agreement underpinning ACC. A broad analysis of the climate scientist community itself, the distribution of credibility of dissenting researchers relative to agreeing researchers, and the level of agreement among top climate experts has not been conducted and would inform future ACC discussions. Here, we use an extensive dataset of 1,372 climate researchers and their publication and citation data to show that (i) 97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field surveyed here support the tenets of ACC outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and (ii) the relative climate expertise and scientific prominence of the researchers unconvinced of ACC are substantially below that of the convinced researchers.”
John thank you,
I will look into the information that you have provided. I did do some initial inspection of the “paper” that you have referenced. I did see that Roger Pielke of U of Colorado has not been impressed by the report that you have asked me to look into and said the following:
>Roger Pielke, Jr., a professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder and a frequent commentator on climate issues, criticized the study as an oversimplification.
“This paper continues a pathological tradition of reducing debate over climate change to black and white — believers and non-believers,” Pielke wrote in a recent e-mail interview. “It also contributes to the well-worn but wrong notion that political action can be sped along by ridding the world of incorrect scientific beliefs about climate change.
“The issue of climate change is far more complex than represented by this paper, and the distribution of views among experts is far more nuanced than can ever be represented by two categories.”
Pielke wrote that he took particular issue with the study’s assertion that there is “substantial and growing public doubt” about the science surrounding climate change.
He pointed to an article by Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger last November, in which they wrote:
“Public opinion about global warming, it turns out, has been remarkably stable for the better part of two decades, despite the recent decline in expressed public confidence in climate science. Roughly two-thirds of Americans have consistently told pollsters that global warming is occurring. By about the same majority, most Americans agree that global warming is at least in part human-caused, with this majority roughly equally divided between those believing that warming is entirely caused by humans and those who believe it to be a combination of human and natural causes. And about the same two-thirds majority has consistently supported government action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions since 1989.”
Those conclusions are consistent with a number of other reputable polling results, notwithstanding poll findings of recent declines in concern over climate change.
Pielke called the PNAS study “‘red meat’ for those who would like to politicize the science of climate change (on all sides of the debate) through oversimplification and a conflation of views on science and views on politics.”
“It will do nothing to move policy debate forward,” Pielke wrote.<
I think he is wrong in two ways (I did read the paper).
1) There is no over-simplification being done. The paper divided the scientists into two groups: those who supported the IPCC AR4 report, which goes into great detail about AGW based on tens of thousands of scientific papers and the work of hundreds of climate scientists. 97-98% of all the climate scientists surveyed (1372) agreed with the findings in the AR4 report, which is the most comprehensive, details report there is about the causes, interactions, and results described by the AGW (called ACC in the report for anthrogenic climate change, which is the same thing as anthrogenic global warming). The conclusion of the paper is that nearly all climate scientists agree with the findings documented in the AR4 report.
2) His strange theory that it doesn’t matter how much the public agrees with the theory in relation to what will be done about it. It is a bizarre claim that people’s views on issues do not cause changes in political and societal directions. The fact is, the Republican primary candidates in this cycle have mostly not been in favor of doing anything about AGW, or if they discuss it as an issue, none do so as something that is one of the most important issues that our country and the world needs to address in the short-term. But Republicans voters have recently made a major shift and now over half of them feel AGW is real and is something that needs to be acted upon. You can bet that as higher percentages of voters agree AGW is a serious issue, more candidates will certainly follow those votes.
Candidates views (6 months ago): https://newrepublic.com/article/124381/2016-presidential-candidates-view-climate-change
Voters views (6 months ago, describing the recent shift in Republicans’ views): http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-23/americans-have-never-been-so-sure-about-climate-change-even-republicans
By the way, Pielke does not reject AGW, in fact completely agrees with it. Your quote above from him is about the process of dealing with it, not the science about it. From Wikipedia:
‘Pielke has also written extensively on climate change policy. He has written that he accepts the IPCC view of the underlying science, stating, “The IPCC has concluded that greenhouse gas emissions resulting from human activity are an important driver of changes in climate. And on this basis alone I am personally convinced that it makes sense to take action to limit greenhouse gas emissions.”[9]’
He is also one of the authors of a manifesto that describes a future in which humans deal with taking control of our future, and AGW is one of the major issues discussed:
http://static1.squarespace.com/static/5515d9f9e4b04d5c3198b7bb/t/552d37bbe4b07a7dd69fcdbb/1429026747046/An+Ecomodernist+Manifesto.pdf
http://cdn3.collective-evolution.com/assets/uploads/2013/02/sources-of-greenhouse-gases.gif
Hi Richard,
Your greenhouse gas chart is an example of the AGW denier myth that since water vapor is such a powerful greenhouse gas force, nothing else must matter. Why this is a myth is explained here:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php?p=3&t=231&&a=19
CO2 acts like a thermostat in the atmosphere. By increasing the concentration by an additional 40% we have turned up the thermostat a little bit. The problem here is that when the temp goes up just a little, other things behave differently. Specifically, the amount of water vapor in the air increases. As your graph shows above, increasing water vapor causes a further increase in temperature, which in turn increases the water vapor. But it’s not only water vapor. Methane, another powerful greenhouse gas, is added to the atmosephere in large quantities as the Arctic warms, because there is a lot of organic matter frozen in the permafrost which is now melting because of the warming, and the decomposition of the organic matter releases methane as a byproduct.
Also, you can’t just concentrate on the warming effects of CO2. The ocean is absorbing a large percentage of what we are adding each year by burning fossil fuels. That is causing it to become more acidic, which is killing coral reefs and affecting many other aspect of life in the sea. We have just passed the 400 ppm concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. Check out the chart in this page that shows some of the other effects of higher CO2 concentrations:
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/11/5-charts-about-climate-change-that-should-have-you-very-very-worried/265554/
And regarding the link you provided, I don’t see much in the way of scientific studies or data to back up any of the claims made. One person from the Weather Channel makes a claim, but no scientific studies are used to back it up. Then other emotional rhetoric is used to rally outrage about the issue, but without substantiation. Better to believe the claims of the IPCC, which is based on tens of thousands of published peer-reviewed scientific articles from around the world.
Better than just getting unnecessarily wound up from sites like the one you provided, you should spend your time equally on learning the basics that the majority of scientists accept as the best explanations. Browse around on the skepticalscience site. Or the climate.nasa.gov site. Or review the summary findings of the IPCC COP21 and AR5 report. Therein you you find the unbiased truth.
The problem with the issue is not the science, it is that there is a lot of misinformation spread by fossil fuel industry, and by politicians who are funded by that industry who are willing to mislead either through their own scientific ignorance or blatant vote pandering.
Kys
Hey “mousie”
1) You shouldn’t give yourself an upvote cause that’s called cheating.
2) Funny how you creeps find courage and bravery when you’re nowhere near the person you are insulting. Guaranteed that if you were in front of me you wouldn’t use your cheap, crummy, sleazeball comments to my face. You wouldn’t dare to!
I guess my other thought or question might be that if you and others want us to do away with “fuels” because of the danger and risk that you are concerned about then what would you replace our automobiles with? How would I heat my home? It seems to me that most of the people who want us to change our lifestyle to fit their goals don’t practice what they preach. RFK Jr. and Senator Whitehouse from RI want to imprison some skeptics but are not willing to put their money where their mouths are. Al Gore owns huge homes that consume mega amounts of energy that does not come from wind turbines. So doesn’t Bill Gates, DeCaprio and Tom Steyer to name just a few. By the way, Steyer is the biggest hypocrite of the entire bunch. He made a mega fortune in coal. Now that he has milked that cow he wants everyone else to change their way of living. What a HUGE hypocrite that scam artist is. When they take some people to jail that guy should lead the pack for openly deceiving the American people. Anyone who falls for his bull is an idiot.
You have two points here:
1. You don’t want to stop using power.
This is an easy one, because the premise it is based on is just wrong. Of course you need power. We all do to continue living non-hunter gatherer lifestyles (and even 10000 years ago, people still had fire.) One part of the solution is to use it more efficiently, but that is easy to do and pays for itself. Another is to stop investments in fossil fuel infrastructure (pipelines, New oil exploration, tax incentives and loop holes, etc.) and instead increase those for alternatives.
Then you need to use the power of capitalism to find solutions.
Science and technology have already developed some alternatives, and if the market is motivated to do so, will explode with a wide range of options and solutions over time. Take solar panels for instance. The more people and companies buy them, the better and cheaper they will continue to get. Very soon they will be one of the cheapest sources of power. Moore’s law applied to photovoltaic cells.
The single thing that has prevented this from happening already is that there is a great cost of using fossil fuels that is payed not at the time of purchasing the energy by the consumer, but by everyone on Earth and by future generations over time. The unpaid damages are the land, air and water pollution, and the release of CO2 into the air which is causing an increasingly rapidly changing climate and sea levels. Droughts, flooding, more powerful storms, and coastal land loss to name the major ones. If those costs were included, we would already be rapidly switching from using fossil fuels.
To level the playing field but prevent current energy price increases from reducing overall consumer buying power, we need to do something like a revenue neutral carbon fee and dividend.
2. Your second issue is just attacts on people I have no connection to. Please take your issues up with them directly. I will say, however, that if the price of fossil fuels had accurately included the costs to society of using them, our power infrastructure would look very different right now. That is why our first priority must be to tweak the costs so that alternative power generation is naturally developed to replace them. When that is done your arguments against those people will be mute.
That is just it: they offer no realistic alternatives. Solar has potential, but also huge drawbacks.
What they want is really controls on the American economy, lifestyle, and
freedoms. Some countries and world organizations can’t stand it that the US has a high standard of living. They want to bring us down to their levels: riding bikes or rickshaws, living in one room houses, and grocery stores that have three shelves of food.
And add to that Al Gore who flies around in a private jet telling others to reduce their “carbon” print.
And many are tired of being told that there is no more argument, no more discussion, no more data. That is like saying that there is no more science research to be done.
I’m not going to defend any one person’s actions, but you are not balancing the pros and cons of the people who jet around to get major changes started to deal seriously with AGW.
Someone who makes a significant effect in moving people and governments to take action to move society off fossil fuels, regardless of their own carbon footprint, is in fact doing much more for all of society than thousands of off-the-grid, vegan bicyclers are doing as far as preventing an environmental trainwreck in the near future. Not to say people who are being very environmentally conscious aren’t also doing the right thing. We don’t all need to be jetting around, and until the energy infrasturcure is off fossil fuels efficiency and reducing or eliminating energy waste is important.
CO 2: .04% and less than..01% can be blamed on human activity. How about the C0 2 increases of hundreds and thosands of years ago ? Lots of cars and power plants around back then ?
There are many scientists who are making a case for the fact that an increase in CO2 in the atmosphere is not a bad thing but in fact a good thing. Crops grow better using less land and more land is available for water conservation. Less energy is consumed in controlling inside temperatures. More people die from cold weather than from warm weather. You are now beginning to see this administration beginning to blame global warming and climate change for slow downs in the economy.
Next they will blame climate change for crime.
Um, except for the fact that the warmer it gets, the faster the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets melt, increasing the rate of sea level rise. 500 million people live just a few feet above sea level. Many major cities around the world are just above flood level now. It is going to be very expensive to just live with warming.
We can do three things in response to AGW warming: adapt, mitigate, and suffer. (I.e., inconvenient, expensive, and painful). We will have to do some of all three of those things. The question is how much of each of those do we chose. Or we can chose not to continue on the AGW path, and reduce the amount of all three.
I receive the Boston Globe and subscribe to Boston Magazine and both of them list many ocean front properties that are priced in the millions. Many of these homes are very close to the beaches. None of them seem to be affected or are being price impacted by the potential sea level rise that you are saying is a huge risk. Boston’s new “Seaport District” is also adjacent to Boston Harbor but that hasn’t stopped investors from erecting building after building of apartment/condominium structures that are also priced in the millions. I am sure that many of the people who are buying or investing are concerned about the risk of flooding in the event that sea levels rise as you warn us of.
Much of Greenland was grazing and farmland 1000 years ago but I don’t think that Florida or Manhattan was under water then as they aren’t now.
Here is an excerpt from a report by NASA last year regarding Antarctica -> Zwally’s team calculated that the mass gain from the thickening of East Antarctica remained steady from 1992 to 2008 at 200 billion tons per year, while the ice losses from the coastal regions of West Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula increased by 65 billion tons per year.<
I guess that you can stop losing sleep about ice loss in the Antarctic.
Insuring structures close to the coastal high water line is very expensive, there is a reason for that.
But the fact that some people and investors are willing to pay a lot to live or put property a foot or two above high water lines tells you only that their assessment of risk is at odds with 97% of climate scientists’ assessment of the risk. Those people and investors may also be counting on the ‘too big to fail’ principle: ie. they may calculate that if a big storm does happen to wash out their building and the surrounding ones, a FEMA bailout will cover their losses.
That’s called moral hazard, which is when a group or individual is willing to take on more risk than they otherwise would because they expect to be bailed out by others if their risk taking does not work out for them. The rest of us end up paying for the poor choices and unreasonably risky investment behavior of others. I resented having to bail out banks that were too big to fail that took on unreasonable risks to make extra profits which caused the banking crises of 2008.
The sea level was rising about 1 mm per year until 100 years ago, when the rate started increasing due to the AGW-caused increase in average global temperatures. It is now rising at about 3 mm per year, and that rate is increasing, and there are predicted to be certain critical tipping points at which catastrophic ice collapse will occur, which would raise the rate of increasing rise dramatically more.
You can cherry pick from the data to prove any point you want, but you are not going to prove anything to me unless you can publish your scientific revolatuins in a peer reviewed scientific journal, and they stand the test of time and are backed up by many other scuentific studies. That is where the theory of AGW is right now, so it’s 99% more likely to be correct than your counter ideas.
The high insurance costs and coastal damage is due to storms and storm surges and not from rising sea levels. I doubt very much that insurance companies would offer policies if sea levels were rising at the rates that you suggest.
Take a close look at Boston’s new Seaport district which is being built precipitously close to the water line. Again, if levels were rising as much as you state the federal government and state governments would not allow this project to be built.
>You can cherry pick from the data to prove any point you want, but you are not going to prove anything to me unless you can publish your scientific (revolatuins) in a peer reviewed scientific journal, and they stand the test of time and are backed up by many other (scientific) studies. That is where the theory of AGW is right now, so it’s 99% more likely to be correct than your counter ideas.<
I don't know whether your 99% assertion is based on facts or just a number that you are using for effect.
Not sure what this is saying:
No comment about moral hazard?
Maybe you missed the connection, but that is my answer to why the government is not preventing low lying coastal development. As for insurance company rates, I’m not involved in them at the coast but I assume they have been going up recently as companies come to terms with the findings and predictions of climate science, and the probable lack of federal action due to the majority Republican stance in the issue.
For a good part of last century, as it was for the last several thousand years, the average sea level rise rise was around 1 mm per year. So it would be hard to notice the four or five inches of sea level rise between 1900 and 2000. But the rate has been increasing rapidly due to warming, which as the science predicted is happening faster at the poles. So now most climate scientists agree that in this century, if we do not change our energy sources away from fossil fuels (coal, oil and natural gas) soon, we will see an over four foot average global sea level rise. The rise has already increased to 3 mm per year, and that rate will continue to increase as human civilization continues to increase the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels.
My stated 99% was an estimate. The chance I am right and you are wrong is greater than that, but I rounded down to be conservative in my estimate. I have the backing of climate science on my side, you have the backing of people who believe the earth is 6000 years old and of the fossil fuel industry and its dark money minions, a rather biased group on the issue of AGW.
I am not informed on how and why people are taking on more or less risk than they should or shouldn’t. My main point is that the selling prices of most of these homes continue to rise no matter what the flood costs may or may not be. Some areas along the East Coast have seen beach erosion over time due to a number of reasons. One thing that I have observed is that off shore currents that changes over time and result in the breakdown of some sand barriers that leads to more direct ocean impact. I have lived near the New England coast all my life and have worked and lived in Boston (right on the Atlantic) and vacationed at beaches on Cape Cod, Maine, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. I have observed beaches like Revere, Plum Island, Hampton, York, Dennisport for nearly 50 years. It is my observation that sea level rise in my lifetime is negligible if at all at these areas. Maybe I should go swimming this summer to see if I get to the water sooner than I used to.
You have used the infamous 97% figure like so many climate change advocates. Where does this number come from? Was it an actual survey? How many scientists does the 97% figure represent?
I appreciate your kindness in allowing me the 1% instead of taking the entire 100% for yourself. It certainly demonstrates your willingness to listen to and accept the opinions of others. It shows me that you are not obnoxiously arrogant about your position.
Don’t feel bad about consigning me to those Neanderthals who believe in myth and legend unlike yourself who are so fortunate to have the enlightenment of science and intelligentsia on your side.
Actually, over 44% of the CO2 in the atmosphere can be directly attributed to humans since the beginning of the industrial revolution. We have already made a major change in the concentration that has been pretty stable for about 10,000 years (through out the development of human civilization), and we are still increasing it by a few ppm (parts per million) per year now as we continue to dig up more fossil fuels and burn them. A CO2 concentration of 280 ppm was normal a few hundred years ago. We recently passed the 400 ppm level, and the science says that if we go above 450 ppm it will push average global temperatures above a 2 degree centigrade increase, which will cause many changes that will be very expensive for us (human civilization) to deal with: average sea level rise of 4 feet by the end of the century (and rising rapidly), loss of many species due to habitat change too fast for species to adapt to, and an increase of heat waves, droughts, and flooding.
It’s hard to imagine 0.04% of something causing a problem. But it truly can. A dark ink will turn clear water murky at 0.04%. Some toxins will kill an animal if 0.04% is ingested.
But with CO2, scientists have calculated what it does in the atmosphere. The current amount raises the global average temperature about 60 degrees F. If not for the existing CO2 we would live on a frozen planet. The right amount of green house gas warming is a good thing. If not for it most likely we would not be here at all.
Another way of looking at 0.04% of CO2 in the atmosphere is to think about what all that CO2 weighs: about three trillion metric tons.
https://micpohling.wordpress.com/2007/03/30/math-how-much-co2-by-weight-in-the-atmosphere/
Don’t try to convince me that 3,000,000,000,000 metric tons of something in the air can not have any significant effect! Or that increasing it by 44% would not change anything!
CFACT – Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow is a conservative Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization.
http://ecocidealert.com/?tag=the-global-climate-coalition
Among the groups that have received millions from Exxon and Koch Industries are The Cato Institute, The Heritage Foundation, the Cooler Heads Coalition, the Global Climate Coalition, The American Enterprise Institute (ALEC), Americans for Prosperity, Heartland Institute, Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), George C. Marshall Institute, the State Policy Network, The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
….
CEI, which describes itself as being “a leader in the fight against the global warming scare,” spent years denying that warming was real, and then, as the tsunami of evidence made that position untenable, pivoted to the more defensible posture that human beings are not causing it. CEI has more recently beat its final retreat to the terminal default position that global warming is great because it will “create a milder, greener, more prosperous world.” The floods, fires, drought, rising oceans, disappearing ice caps, melting glaciers, drowned cities and refugees have not exactly been “mild.” But things have been prosperous and “green” — if one means greenbacks — for the Koch Brothers and ExxonMobil, who are enjoying the biggest profits in world history.
http://climate.dot.gov/about/overview/science.html
Exxon’s internal and external views on climate change: http://graphics.latimes.com/exxon-arctic/
W_Hazen: Long term self-interest for people has to be whatever aids the long term health of the planet, upon which we rely for our very lives. This is not factored in to the short term business decisions of the wealthiest commercial enterprise in history, proving that corporations should not have the same rights as those whose obligation to continue on with sentient lives demands the highest priority at all levels of human intercourse
http://www.jeff-hester.com/reality-straight-up/climate-change-deniers-intentional-ignorance/
The greenhouse effect raises Earth’s average temperature from 33° F (18° C) below the freezing point of water to 27° F (15° C) above the freezing point of water.
….
Since 1750, humans have released over 300 billion metric tons of carbon into the atmosphere. There is 44 percent more carbon dioxide in our atmosphere today than there was before the Industrial Revolution. Half of that increase has come since 1980.
In the 1970’s there was the infamous gas shortage fraud. The American people saw through that. Even the gas companies admitted later on that there was no shortage, just some “inventory” problems. We see the same kind of pattern with the “climate change” issue: no argument allowed, put downs, alternative data disallowed, proposed new fees, taxes, and regulations which will fall on the American consumers and workers, politicians influence *, and the UN treaties (sustainable development 2030; which can put controls and rules on construction, transportation, individual freedoms, business, health care, food, and property ownership).
We have heard all this before: just another big government /corporate scam. People around here are not buying it. Even the local utility workers are saying it is just another way to raise rates and taxes.
* Al Gore – tells the people to cut back on their “carbon” use, but goes flying around everywhere in his private jet selling his books.
The 1970s oil crises was due to OPEC cutting back on the oil they would sell us because of our support of Isrial in a conflict. It opened the eyes of the US to our foolish dependence on foreign oil. Perhaps the ‘inventory problems’ you refer to were the ones of getting the inventory that was in the Mideast to the US?
It amazes me that people can be so skeptical about government, and so unskeptical about industry-sponsored information about their product that they believe anything except what 97% of the independent, peer-reviewed published scientists agree is what is happening.
The idea is to switch energy infrastructure from fossil fuels to other options that do not have so much downside on our environment. There is no need for bigger government to do this. All that is needed is to make carbon-based fuels more expensive to dig up and burn. If the money collected is re-distributed back to all US citizens, then our net expenses will be zero from that fee. If that fee on CO2 additions increases each year, the known rising cost of that fuel will end investment in it, and invigorate investment in all other options.
That is called a carbon fee and dividend, and to keep imports and exports on equal footing we can use border adjustments to prevent CO2 polluting contries from being able to under-cut US manufacturing based on ignoring environmental costs. Look it up on Wikipedia and think about it. It eliminates all your concerns above about government conspiracies, so that you get to the main point: is the human addition of CO2 in the atmosphere changing our environment, which will lead to mass species loss, rapidly rising sea levels, and more frequent and severe droughts and heat waves. 97% of publishing climate scientists say it is a problem. I trust in the science, and can see for myself many of the predicted effects starting to happen.
These are very good points. The problem is that the utility companies will just pass these taxes, fees, and costs onto the consumer.
Let me say that for the last several years the American people have been spending their own money and time making their homes more energy efficient by adding insulation, efficient appliances, new ac/heat units, insulated windows, window film, thermal curtains, tankless water heaters, caulking, sealers, water saving fixtures, and special light bulbs. Many have even built their own solar panels ! We have done our part. Now it is time for business and government to upgrade their structures. I for one am tired of the government telling the people they have to do more while their buildings are the most energy wasteful in town !
No, we are not going for some sort of taxes or controls. There are some misguided groups and individuals that push a hatred of American lifestyles and culture. They do not like our homes, yards, or heat/ac.
I completely agree with you about government buildings. From my child’s school that is over-heated so much that some teachers leave a few windows open all winter long, to the utter monstrosities in Washington DC built, maintained and secured by our tax dollars at a never ending rate. But really that is all just people’s bad decisions. Hopefully facilities management will become a more professional and modernized endeavor and efficiency promoted even (or especially) where tax dollars are being used.
I think you missed the beautiful part of the fee and dividend with border adjustment idea. The beauty part is the dividend. That is that the money collected will be redistributed back to us evenly (to citizens) when it is collected. So yes, the costs are all passed on to us. But, we all do not end up paying more at the end of each quarter: the extra we pay for the fuel and for higher costs is returned to us. The reason this works is that the fee rises each year, and at some point other choices will become cheaper than fossil fuel options. Over time those other choices will continue to get cheaper due to the economies of scale and the evolution of science and technology over time. So around the same time (or even before) the dividends start dropping, our energy costs from other sources will be even less than we are paying now.
Yes Sir. Guthrum knows whats up. John G spreads lies and propaganda on this site and others like it. You can find him saying how 97% of scientists agree… what a load of nonsense. Guy thinks that the IPCC and NASA are unbiased?? WHAT A JOKE. If that was true this ridiculous debate over CO2 emissions would be long over. There is zero proof. Science works on evidence. If there was compelling evidence with a scientific equation that proved CO2 greenhouse effect to be true than the debate would be over. But in fact we find that the data, reality and science show that greenhouse gas effect with CO2 is pure nonsense. There was an ice age at a time when CO2 levels were 10x higher than what they are now. Enough of the lies already its disgusting. Anyone reading this – realize John G is on all these types of forums spreading lies around.
“Riveting panel with Gov. Sarah Palin and other guests”
Excerpted without further comment.
I always wanted to learn something about riveting. This may be my chance.
LOL
She speaks the truth!
Islam is a far greater threat to mankind and the planet than the climate!