The Skeptic's Guide To Global Warming

[AxeMental]

Q: "I think humans are responsible for increases in global temperature because that is the commonly believed scientific state. "

Global Warming is not anywhere close to being a concensus. Even the global warming scientists admit this (they say it "might" exist, please shell out 4 billion in research grants thankyou). Anyhow, your nuts if you believe things (from the scientific community or not) spoon fed to you. What if these scientists are being dishonest? There are just as many if not more who disagree with their theory.

So far I've heard alot of noise from the global warming side and seen very little scientific evidence presented. And no one has delt with the logical question I presented above (as far as I have seen) from the GW camp.

[blackprinceofmuncie]

I think humans are responsible for increases in global temperature because that is the commonly believed scientific state. Once there's as large a body of peer-reviewed research stating humans have not influenced global temperature as there is stating they have I'll move into the "we don't know-it's under debate" camp.

Welcome to the camp. Pull up a log and toast some marshmallows.

Seriously, Joe, I know we've sort of gone over this before, but the fact is that there isn't now and never has been any scientific consensus on whether human activity is contributing to global warming. The vast majority of articles published in peer-reviewed journals simply don't take a position (even if the scientists publishing the articles believe one way or the other) and those that do are basing their assertions on assumptions, not scientific fact. Any reasonable person should be in the "we don't know - it's under debate" camp, because (leaving aside all the political wrangling and chest-thumping in the popular media) that's exactly where the vast majority of the people who actually study this stuff are.

[jgbrowning]

Anyhow, your nuts if you believe things (from the scientific community or not) spoon fed to you. What if these scientists are being dishonest? There are just as many if not more who disagree with their theory.

I'm nuts.

the fact is that there isn't now and never has been any scientific consensus on whether human activity is contributing to global warming.

I have to disagree. Here's one article pointing out scientists who oppose the mainstream view and another article articulating the mainstream view.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientists ... al_warming
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_Fourt ... ent_Report

To me, that means that yes, there is a scientific consensus, and that's good enough for me.

And to be crystal, I really am basing my belief on the consensus - I would personally rather believe in man not having an influence in global warming.

joe b.

[blackprinceofmuncie]

I don't quite understand your stance here. You said "Once there's as large a body of peer-reviewed research stating humans have not influenced global temperature as there is stating they have I'll move into the "we don't know-it's under debate" camp." Nothing in those Wiki articles does anything to disprove my assertion that such a body of peer-reviewed work exists. The first one doesn't even come close to listing all of the scientists who actively disagree with the theory of anthropogenic global warming and it doesn't even attempt to list all of the many, many scientists who believe it's possible but that there isn't currently enough evidence to reasonably pick one theory over another.

The fact that several reports exist claiming that consensus has been reached can't alter the facts, it just obfuscates them. The wiki article is also misleading in that it suggests that nearly 1000 scientists "reviewed" the IPCC report and approved it. This is untrue....

The media is in error when it states that,

“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change –made up of thousands of scientists from around the world — reported earlier this month they are more certain than ever that humans are heating earth’s atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels….”

Are there really “thousands of scientists” who wrote this report? Hardly. The IPCC is actually led and written by just a few dozen scientists.

There is a summary of the final stages in writing the 2007 IPCC Statement for Policymakers in the February 18, 2007 edition of the Denver Post. The article is by Kevin Trenberth and is titled Climate report on deadline.

The article states that

“A full report that’s the basis for the summary was drafted by 154 lead authors and more than 450 contributing authors and runs to about 900 pages.

As one of about 30 lead authors attending the meeting, I found the experience both exhilarating and grueling.

We assembled on Saturday and Sunday, Jan. 27 and 28, to go over the written comments by governments on the draft summary. We prepared possible responses and text to update the report. The approval process is very demanding, as it requires unanimous consensus on the text, which is approved line by line. The rationale is that the scientists determine what can be said, but the governments help determine how it can best be said. There are detailed negotiations over wording to ensure accuracy, balance, clarity of message and relevance.”

This candid report confirms that the Statement For Policymakers was actually written with a small number of climate scientists. That such a small number of scientists are actually involved in the writing may make sense from the perspective of efficiency, but it also is guaranteed to result in a report that emphasizes the particular perspectives of the small group of scientists who wrote it. The biases that result would have been balanced if other climate scientists were able to write alternative perspectives, but this was not done. A “unanimous consensus” is hardly how science should be presented by a subset of the climate science community.

The use of the term “lead authors” is also misleading as most are co-authors with one lead author per chapter. The contributing authors provide material and comment, but, based on my experience in the 1995 IPCC report process, do not function as true co-authors. Thus the actually number of true lead authors actually corresponds to just the first author on each chapter.

That such individuals have such an influence of preparing a document for policymakers without the simultaneous publication of alternative views should be of concern to anyone who values open and free presentation of climate science. As we have already shown on Climate Science, as a result of the limitation on the number of indviduals who wrote the Statement, errors have resulted.

In other words, the "consensus" was falsely imposed on the report, not a result of actual consensus. Competing theories and alternative points of view were simply not allowed to be presented in that report. In addition, only 30 scientists participated in the actual consensus, hardly what I would call a valid statistical sample. The fact that those scientists were not selected randomly but chosen by a governmental body whose sole reason for existing depends on humans being the cause of global warming makes the sample even more suspect.

It is a fact that the number of scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals that propose competing theories for the cause of global warming or uphold the position that anthropogenic global warming is possible but not proven far outnumber the articles that take the position that global warming is definitely attributable to human activity, which exactly addresses the standard you set above.

The number of articles that uphold the point of view that anthropogenic global warming is a proven scientific fact are actually very, very few. The subset of those articles which actual present scientific data to support that point of view (rather than just taking it as given) are even more rare.

[jgbrowning]

Did you read the quoted article from the Denver Post that guy was quoting from? Here's other snippits from the same article that are contrary to his statements:

The IPCC process is very open. Two major reviews were carried out in producing the latest report, and climate "skeptics" can and do participate, some as authors. There were more than 30,000 comments by about 600 reviewers. The process is overseen by two editors for each of the 11 chapters. The strength is that it is a consensus report.

Moreover, these changes are now reasonably simulated in climate models for the past 100 years. The wide variety of observations gives a very high degree of confidence to the overall findings.

Twenty-three climate models from 11 nations were applied to simulate the past century or so, and to make projections for the future. Running the climate models with and without human-induced changes in atmospheric composition convincingly shows that it is humans who have very likely been responsible for the warming in the last 50 years.

Uncertainties remain, but the 2007 report definitively reaffirms in much stronger language that the climate is changing in ways that cannot be accounted for by natural variability.

My articles are misleading. Your articles aren't. See why I dislike this crap? It's all just appeals to authority argument or your authorities aren't as good as my authorities argument.

I can't think of a more mainstream source than wiki to demonstrate what is the mainstream belief. That belief may be scientifically incorrect and proven as such at a later point, but until wiki makes a change such as "This belief was prevelent in the end of the 20th century through the early 21th century but is now widely discredited" I'll believe that mankind is influencing global warming until the mainstream belief changes. I don't really care about arguing the points about who, what or when went into forming that mainstream belief.

So with that, I'm outta this thread as there's no point in talking and I should have known better to say anthing to begin with.

joe b.

[dcs]

I can't think of a more mainstream source than wiki to demonstrate what is the mainstream belief.

Well, the problem is that Wikipedia might demonstrate what mainstream belief is among Wikipedia users, not what it is among scientists who specialize in climatology or even the population at large.

And I'm guessing that on a "hot topic" such as global warming Wikipedia isn't as editable as it might be on other topics (can't say for sure, though -- I haven't read the articles).

I'm disappointed that no one seems to want to answer my question why global warming is undesirable.

[AxeMental]

Joe, no hard feelings. My point was that scientist are human too many with strong political views. Some will undoubtedly scew their data and experimentation to reach predetermined findings that support their political beliefs. Assuming thats true (for both sides) it comes down largely to a shouting match. It would be a shame if the loudest voices (which seem to be on the side of man caused global warming) win out (considering they own most of the world press). Your correct, we should wait till real objective science is done (where it can be reviewed and replicated) and a rational consensus formed.

The problem is while we wait for the "truth to get out" regarding global warming, real laws are being written that pre-suppose its true. Of course these laws and those soon to follow we will limit our freedoms (what car you can drive, what you can set your AC to etc.) grow government etc. etc. the same old song. And as most know, once a law is on the books and a freedom given up its near impossible to get it back. ALso huge populations are being told its the USAs fault in the 3rd world by the UN, driving the flames of hatered for us even higher.

Remember too that some brilliant rational scientists in the past had gladly allowed their work to be used as a tool to do questionable things for what ever reason (think the 20s and 30s).

[blackprinceofmuncie]

Did you read the quoted article from the Denver Post that guy was quoting from? Here's other snippits from the same article that are contrary to his statements:

The IPCC process is very open. Two major reviews were carried out in producing the latest report, and climate "skeptics" can and do participate, some as authors. There were more than 30,000 comments by about 600 reviewers. The process is overseen by two editors for each of the 11 chapters. The strength is that it is a consensus report.

Dr. Pielke points out the problem with the process though, when he says...

The approval process is very demanding, as it requires unanimous consensus on the text, which is approved line by line.

So all of those competing opinions and points of view get filtered out of the final document. The process creates false consensus.

Moreover, these changes are now reasonably simulated in climate models for the past 100 years. The wide variety of observations gives a very high degree of confidence to the overall findings.

Twenty-three climate models from 11 nations were applied to simulate the past century or so, and to make projections for the future. Running the climate models with and without human-induced changes in atmospheric composition convincingly shows that it is humans who have very likely been responsible for the warming in the last 50 years.

Uncertainties remain, but the 2007 report definitively reaffirms in much stronger language that the climate is changing in ways that cannot be accounted for by natural variability.

My articles are misleading. Your articles aren't. See why I dislike this crap? It's all just appeals to authority argument or your authorities aren't as good as my authorities argument.

That's not what I'm trying to do here and I'm sorry if the discussion is frustrating you. It frustrates me too sometimes. I'm not saying "my" quoted articles are more authoritative than your quoted articles. What I am saying is that, first, the articles you cite as proof of consensus don't address the issue that you brought up originally, which is the body of peer-reviewed scientific articles. I think both the wiki articles, the Denver Post articles and Dr. Pielke all do a good job of showing that, while a lot of respected scientists contributed to the document and it represents a valid scientific point of view, the IPCC report doesn't in any way measure the amount of agreement within the peer-reviewed body of scientific data. Nor does it give any indication as to what the competing hypothesis are or how many proponents they have within the scientific community.

Second, I'm pointing out that I have actually looked at the subject the way you described above (i.e. consensus among peer reviewed articles) and as far as I can see your criteria has already been met. I regularly read Science as part of my work. I have about 7 years worth of back copies in my office. That's one journal a week (52) times 7 years (364 issues). Searching through the Science online search engine for keywords like global warming, CO2, climate change, anthropogenic, etc. yields ~ approximately 700 articles. Looking through the abstracts only about 85 of those over the last 7 years address the causes of global warming. Of those 85 that I looked through closely, 48 draw no conclusion whatsoever and were counted in the "not enough evidence to tell either way" column. 18 propose competing theories (solar radiation variances, geologic events, etc.) and 12 of those actually come right out and suggest that the contribution of man-made CO2 is minimal or non-existant, 15 support the anthropogenic hypothesis (only 6 even suggest that they provide any real proof of this connection, the others just treat it as fact without addressing the evidence for it) and the other 4 I was unable to characterize because I simply couldn't understand some of the results (too far outside my field).

I can't think of a more mainstream source than wiki to demonstrate what is the mainstream belief.

I'm not arguing that the anthropogenic hypothesis isn't the mainstream belief in the population of lay-people and media-people; I would gladly agree that it is the most widely accepted hypothesis in the non-science community. I thought you were interested in whether there is consensus on it within the scientific community. I don't think articles on wikipedia (unless they specifically address the issue) can tell us much about the attitude of scientists since wikipedia is neither a scientific nor a peer-reviewed publication. The article you cite that lists "dissenters" is interesting as a source of information about individual scientists and their points of view on the subject, but I don't think (and I don't see that particular article claiming either) that it's a statistically valid count of the number of scientists who question the validity of the anthropogenic model.

I don't really care about arguing the points about who, what or when went into forming that mainstream belief.

So with that, I'm outta this thread as there's no point in talking and I should have known better to say anthing to begin with.

My intent wasn't to question your right to believe what you want or even to argue over the validity of the evidence you base that belief on. I saw you make the statement "I will change the way I think when X happens" and since I know, personally, that X is, in fact, the case I thought it might be informative to point it out. When I addressed your response I wasn't trying to insult the sources you used, I just didn't think they really spoke to your original point about the content of the peer-reviewed literature.

If you don't want to discuss it anymore that's fine and I hope there are no hard feelings.

[blackprinceofmuncie]

I'm disappointed that no one seems to want to answer my question why global warming is undesirable.

The main reason global warming would be problematic is that population centers grow up around ports, sources of potable water and areas of temperate climate. There is pretty good consensus that global warming would cause the locations of many of those things to shift around, causing massive economic impacts (and potentially loss of life depending on how quickly the changes occur). It's also possible that warming could cause an increase in catastrophic weather events, but that's less firmly established.

Your correct, we should wait till real objective science is done (where it can be reviewed and replicated) and a rational consensus formed.

Objective, reviewed and repeatable science IS being done. Dishonest politicians, environmentalist quacks, loud-mouthed, ignorant, right-wing talk-show hosts and biased reporters may all ignore, misunderstand or purposefully misrepresent the results for their own ends, but it's not the fault of the scientists actually doing the research who are, arguably, the only people being even remotely "rational" about the question.

[jgbrowning]

Second, I'm pointing out that I have actually looked at the subject the way you described above (i.e. consensus among peer reviewed articles) and as far as I can see your criteria has already been met. I regularly read Science as part of my work. I have about 7 years worth of back copies in my office. That's one journal a week (52) times 7 years (364 issues). Searching through the Science online search engine for keywords like global warming, CO2, climate change, anthropogenic, etc. yields ~ approximately 700 articles. Looking through the abstracts only about 85 of those over the last 7 years address the causes of global warming. Of those 85 that I looked through closely, 48 draw no conclusion whatsoever and were counted in the "not enough evidence to tell either way" column. 18 propose competing theories (solar radiation variances, geologic events, etc.) and 12 of those actually come right out and suggest that the contribution of man-made CO2 is minimal or non-existant, 15 support the anthropogenic hypothesis (only 6 even suggest that they provide any real proof of this connection, the others just treat it as fact without addressing the evidence for it) and the other 4 I was unable to characterize because I simply couldn't understand some of the results (too far outside my field).

In this case then, I'll have to endevour to educate myself.

joe b.

[blackprinceofmuncie]

One thing that I'd like to note about my "stance" on global warming. There's a distinction between the anthropogenic hypothesis based on CO2 alone and the anthropogenic hypothesis based on all pollutants. During the 80s, human produced chlorofluorocarbons released in aerosols had a major impact on the ozone layer, which is likely to have increased the amount of solar radiation reaching the earth's surface and oceans. There are many models that incorporate all human-released pollutants into their data and then claim that the results support the "anthropogenic hypothesis". Usually these articles don't report the effects accounted for by CO2 and the effects accounted for by other human-produced pollutants separately, which can be incredibly misleading.

Just to be clear, when I have said there is no scientific consensus on the "anthropogenic hypothesis" in this thread I've been specifically talking about the "anthropogenic CO2 hypothesis". As far as I know there is absolute consensus amongst the scientific community that several non-CO2 pollutants have contributed to at least part of the current trend in global warming. Fortunately, all of those substances are now heavily controlled or completely banned and are no longer a threat to our environment (largely because there was scientific consensus concerning their effects) which is why I haven't mentioned them in the discussion. However, looking back through the thread I realized that this might be a point of confusion for some people reading my previous posts.

[JRMapes]

Fixed it for ya, BPoM

Objective, reviewed and repeatable science IS being done. Dishonest scientists, dishonest politicians, environmentalist quacks, loud-mouthed, ignorant, right-wing and left-wing talk-show hosts and biased reporters may all ignore, misunderstand or purposefully misrepresent the results for their own ends, but it's not the fault of the honest and ethical scientists actually doing the research who are, arguably, the only people being even remotely "rational" about the question.

[dcs]

The main reason global warming would be problematic is that population centers grow up around ports, sources of potable water and areas of temperate climate. There is pretty good consensus that global warming would cause the locations of many of those things to shift around, causing massive economic impacts (and potentially loss of life depending on how quickly the changes occur). It's also possible that warming could cause an increase in catastrophic weather events, but that's less firmly established.

Oh, I certainly understand why global warming would be undesirable for people who live in areas that could be adversely affected by it. It's less clear that it would be undesirable for those who do not live in those areas. Plus, I would imagine that some areas that are currently uninhabitable might be made habitable by a global increase in temperature. One might imagine a slogan for immigration to the Yukon along the lines of "Global warming getting you down? Come to the Yukon!"

[blackprinceofmuncie]

Fixed it for ya, BPoM

Are there any left-wing talk show hosts still around? I thought the plan worked (you know, the one where we get them all together on a single radio network and then let them sink under their own weight like rats on a ship).

[blackprinceofmuncie]

Oh, I certainly understand why global warming would be undesirable for people who live in areas that could be adversely affected by it. It's less clear that it would be undesirable for those who do not live in those areas. Plus, I would imagine that some areas that are currently uninhabitable might be made habitable by a global increase in temperature. One might imagine a slogan for immigration to the Yukon along the lines of "Global warming getting you down? Come to the Yukon!"

The main problem is that relocating infrastructure costs lots of money. It's much cheaper to keep living in New York city than it is to build New New York three and a half miles further inland.