Difference between revisions of "Global warming denialism"

From RationalWiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
m (category)
(liberal myth, stupid liberals who do not know how to do math.)
Line 1: Line 1:
Global warming is the atmospheric consequence of the [[greenhouse effect]]. This atmospheric warming is vital to all life earth as without it the planet would be as cold as the moon.
+
Global warming is a liberal myth, and is due at least in part to liberals attempting to learn how to program computers.
  
The greenhouse effect interacts with other planet-wide influences such as the Milankovitch cycles in order to produce long term climate movements.  Many gasses contribute to the greenhouse effect, some of the most important being water vapour, methane and carbon dioxide.
+
For example, Steve McIntyre deduced, and NASA later admitted, that NASA programmers had a Y2K bug in their source code.<ref>[http://www.norcalblogs.com/watts/2007/08/1998_no_longer_the_hottest_yea.html 1998 is no longer the hottest year]</ref>
  
== Anthropogenic Climate Change ==
+
Steven McIntrye deserves rational wiki cudos for:
 +
:#Proving how the Mann "hockey stick" used in all Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth, was based on unsupportable data and methods.
 +
:#Proving how yearly temperature anomalies for the USA are based on data that had been processed incorrectly.
  
  
The phrase “Global Warming” is also used to refer to the rapid rise in temperatures the planet has experienced since the start of the [[Industrial Revolution]].
+
== See Also ==
 +
*[http://www.climateaudit.org/ Climate Audit.org].
  
Basic physics can be used to demonstrate that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas.  As the increase in the level of carbon dioxide which began at the start of the industrial revolution correlates with the rise in global temperatures, it is generally accepted by climate scientists that the recent radical additional rise in worldwide temperatures has occurred as a result of human activity.  The scientific consensus is that if we wish to reduce man made global warming we should reduce the quantity of carbon dioxide we emit into the atmosphere.
+
== Referneces ==
 
+
<references/>
Because there are many entrenched interests - including oil companies and oil producing nations - which would stand to lose a lot of money if action were taken to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere, a lot of effort and money has been put into attempts to discredit the science behind man-made global warming. The disinformation campaign is similar to that embarked on by the tobacco companies who wished to persuade people that cigarettes were healthy, and that carried out by the oil companies when they wished to continue adding lead to petrol.
 
 
 
== Hierarchy of Global Warming Denier Rationalizations. ==
 
 
Global warming deniers have found it necessary to defend and abandon the following series of ideas as scientific information has become more compelling. Depending on their depth of understanding of the subject deniers may be at any of the following stages:
 
 
 
1.  Global warming isn’t happening - so we don’t have to do anything.
 
 
 
2.  Global warming is happening, but it’s not caused by humanity - so we don’t have to do anything.
 
 
 
3.  Global warming is happening, it is caused by humanity, but it may be a good thing - so we don’t have to do anything.
 
 
 
4.  Global warming is happening, it is caused by humanity, it is a bad thing, but China isn’t doing anything - so we don’t have to do anything.
 
 
 
5.  Global warming is happening, it is caused by humanity, it is a bad thing, but even if China does something it’s too late for us to do anything and it would cost us money - so we don’t have to do anything.
 
 
 
6.  (There is an hypothesized sixth step, "Global warming was happening, it was caused by humanity, it is a very bad thing and we should have done something.")
 
 
 
When debating global warming skeptics, it is wise to establish beforehand where they are on the above rationalizing scale - otherwise you can waste a lot of time proving the wrong point.  It may be similar to arguing with someone you think is a YEC, only to find out that he holds some other idea such as OEC.
 
 
 
The Global warming sceptics have however raised a number of more scientific arguments which are covered in the article [[arguments against man made global warming]].
 
 
 
==Arguments against mainstream opinion==
 
===Glacier retreat calculations===
 
Scientists have found DNA from ancient animals in an ice layer of Greenland, 1.2 miles beneath the surface.<ref>"[http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/317/5834/111 Ancient Biomolecules from Deep Ice Cores Reveal a Forested Southern Greenland]"</ref>  Since this study indicates that the ice layer survived the last interglacial, it has led to speculation that the ice caps may be able to also withstand global warming.  <ref name="boston">[http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/07/06/greenland_ice_yields_hope_on_climate/ Greenland ice yields hope on climate]</ref> However, the main author of the study dismissed suggestions that his team's data indicated that sea levels would not rise to predicated levels, saying that "during the last interglacial, sea levels rose by 5-6m, but this must have come from other sources additional to the Greenland ice cap, such as Antarctic ice. I would anticipate that as the Earth warms from man-made climate change, these sources would still contribute to a rise in sea levels."<ref>[http://www.nerc.ac.uk/press/releases/2007/25-greenland.asp Greenland's ancient forests shed light on stability of ice sheet]</ref> Another scientist pointed out that it may not reasonable to extrapolate the study's results to our current situation, because the temperature changes in previous interglacials occured at a much slower pace.<ref name="boston" /> Ironically, this article provides evidence that the world is at least 120,000 years old, which flies in the face of creationists who claim the earth is 6000 years old.
 
 
 
===Conservapedia===
 
 
 
{| width=100% cellspacing=10
 
|-
 
| width=45% valign=top | <h2 style="margin:0;background-color:#c0c0c0;font-size:135%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #000000;text-align:center;color:#f6f7ff;padding:0.2em 0.4em;">Conservapedia</h2>
 
| width=45% valign=top | <h2 style="margin:0;background-color:#c0c0c0;font-size:135%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #000000;text-align:center;color:#f6f7ff;padding:0.2em 0.4em;">Reality</h2>
 
|-
 
| colspan="2" |
 
==<center>Consensus = liberal conspiracy ?</center>==
 
|-
 
| valign="top" |Richard Lindzen wrote in 1992,
 
 
 
<blockquote>Indeed, a recent Gallup poll of climate scientists in the American Meteorological Society and in the American Geophysical Union shows that a vast majority doubts that there has been any identifiable man-caused warming to date (49 percent asserted no, 33 percent did not know, 18 percent thought some has occurred; however, among those actively involved in research and publishing frequently in peer-reviewed research journals, none believes that any man-caused global warming has been identified so far). <ref>http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv15n2/reg15n2g.html</ref> </blockquote>
 
 
 
Oddly enough, even though 82% of US climate scientists refused to support the global warming theory then, liberal activists were already claiming a scientific consensus for Anthropogenic global warming. (It's hard to understand how 18 percent credence in any global warming translates into "consensus" support for human-caused global warming.)
 
 
 
 
 
| valign="top" |Note that a full citation for the poll isn't given by Lindzen; perhaps this is because he intentionally lied about its results..? Despite the identical claims of Rush Limbaugh and George Will, the Gallup poll in question found that a majority (66%) of the 400 scientists questioned believed in human-caused global warming, while 23% were undecided and only 10% disagreed.  <ref>[http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3120&printer_friendly=1 In Denial on Climate Change]</ref> The San Francisco Chronicle published a correction from Gallup regarding this: "Most scientists involved in research in this area do believe human-induced global warming is occurring now."<ref>[http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-globalwarming.htm Myth: Humans are not causing global warming.]</ref> The fairly significant minority in this poll who ''did'' doubt human-induced global warming were likely borne of the relative scarcity of convincing evidence for it in 1991.<ref>[http://www.trumpington.co.uk/green/ The Debate on Radio 4]</ref>
 
 
 
|-
 
| colspan="2" |
 
==<center>Are the Himalayan glaciers retreating?</center>==
 
|-
 
| valign="top" |
 
Gore claims that Himalayan glaciers are shrinking and global warming is to blame. Yet the September 2006 issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate reported, "Glaciers are growing in the Himalayan Mountains, confounding global warming alarmists who recently claimed the glaciers were shrinking and that global warming was to blame." <ref>[http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/450392,CST-EDT-REF30b.article Alarmist global warming claims melt under scientific scrutiny] (The author of this article is a member of [http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=41 The Heartland Institute])</ref>
 
 
 
| valign="top" |In typical fashion, Conservapedia omits the [http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=129 wide body of evidence] that glaciers are retreating worldwide in favour of mentioning an expanding anomaly. [http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2FJCLI3860.1 Fowlera and Archer (2006)] is the study Conservapedia's source is referring to. It says,
 
<blockquote>"Temperature data for seven instrumental records in the Karakoram and Hindu Kush Mountains of the Upper Indus Basin (UIB) have been analyzed for seasonal and annual trends over the period 1961–2000 and compared with neighboring mountain regions and the Indian subcontinent. '''Strong contrasts are found between the behavior of winter and summer temperatures and between maximum and minimum temperatures.''' Winter mean and maximum temperature show significant increases while mean and minimum summer temperatures show consistent decline. ... '''This divergence commenced around the middle of the twentieth century and is thought to result from changes in large-scale circulation patterns and feedback processes associated with the Indian monsoon.''' The observed downward trend in summer temperature and runoff is consistent with '''the observed thickening and expansion of ''Karakoram glaciers'', in contrast to widespread decay and retreat in the ''eastern Himalayas.'' This suggests that the ''western Himalayas'' are showing a different response to global warming than other parts of the globe.'''"</blockquote>
 
 
 
This study clearly does not contradict Gore's assertion; in fact the authors ''reaffirm'' it in the abstract! (Other studies ignored by Conservapedia have likewise confirmed Gore's claim.<ref>[http://assets.panda.org/downloads/himalayaglaciersreport2005.pdf An Overview of Glaciers, Glacier Retreat, and Subsequent Impacts in Nepal, India and China]</ref><ref>[http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/jan102001/87.pdf Geomorphological evidences of retreat of the Gangotri glacier and its characteristics]</ref>)
 
|}
 
 
 
==References==
 
<references />
 
 
 
 
 
[[Category:Science]]
 

Revision as of 20:55, 13 August 2007

Global warming is a liberal myth, and is due at least in part to liberals attempting to learn how to program computers.

For example, Steve McIntyre deduced, and NASA later admitted, that NASA programmers had a Y2K bug in their source code.[1]

Steven McIntrye deserves rational wiki cudos for:

  1. Proving how the Mann "hockey stick" used in all Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth, was based on unsupportable data and methods.
  2. Proving how yearly temperature anomalies for the USA are based on data that had been processed incorrectly.


See Also

Referneces