oceans dominate the global climate. of course you would know that from your countless interactions with your phd friends.

2/19/2007 9:59:15 PM

Dude, just admit it.

You're either trolling, or you just shifted your whole argument.

2/19/2007 10:00:24 PM

^^so your definition of global warming is "increased temperatures on earth"?

^what is my argument? what is your argument? you dont know shit i'm afraid...all you can do is call people trolls or throw out words like strawman and ad nauseum...why dont you start off and actually read the damn article cause the ONLY thing you do is jump to conclusions and put words in peoples mouths

my argument has ALWAYS been "i dont know if humans are causing dangerous global warming"

how is that so hard to understand?

your stance goes from "humans are causing horrible damage to the planet without a doubt according to all scientists" to "ok, scientists say humans are contributing to global warming"

i'm glad you're learning but you're NOT one to talk about changing stances

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 10:03 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 10:00:51 PM

Hahah, dude.

You've argued against CO2->climate causation waaaaaaay too many times in the SB to try and pull this crap now.

2/19/2007 10:03:24 PM

um. yes. warming of the globe. globe meaning earth. and since the oceans account for the majority of the fluid on earth, i'd say oceans warming is a big deal for global warming. the climate has more to do with low atmospheric temperatures and weather. of course this is affected by oceanic temperatures. the article that you apparently read and i apparently didn't (according to you) goes into this. as do many other scientists and as does al gore in the movie for which this thread was made.

2/19/2007 10:03:51 PM

^^show me one single quote i've ever posted where i said that manmade emissions didnt affect climate

it should be easy since ive done it waaaaaaaay too many times

and please note the difference in "increased temperature" and "global warming"

^i said BOONE didnt read the article...maybe if you give me a split second to edit a post when im responding to 2 people you wouldnt be confused

Quote :

"warming of the globe. globe meaning earth"

by your defintion when the seasons change is that global warming

because every single scientific definition mentions human caused temperature rise as "global warming"...not simply "increased temperatures" in general http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:Global+Warming&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 10:07 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 10:04:51 PM

We are past this point. There is an extremely strong consensus in the scientific community. The rest of the world is looking at ways to adequately address this phenomenon. We here in America are trying to convince the so called "skeptics" that it even exists.

George Bush has a 34% approval rating. That means that 34% of people still think he is doing a good job, although this administration has started a war on false pretenses, run up a huge spending deficits, violated the constitution repeatedly and appointed unqualified, partisan hacks as political appointees to head our nations regulatory agencies.

People like TreeTwista are like the people above. They do not study policy. They do not care about cause and effect. They do not care how they are manipulated. No degree of evidence or reason will ever convince them to think otherwise. You might as well just discount them as the mindless automatons they are, and hope they will be content driving their Mustang, drinking Budweiser and listening to the newest Toby Keith album, and that Bush will not appoint them to be the head of FEMA in the future.

2/19/2007 10:06:23 PM

all your false stereotypes sure do make your point

George Bush! Budweiser! Toby Keith!

hey i can act like a moron too

Michael Moore! Tofu! Drum Circles!

i guess i win now too!

When someone makes a valid SCIENTIFIC point you like to turn it into a POLITICAL issue dont you?

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 10:15 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 10:08:30 PM

Quote :

"by your defintion when the seasons change is that global warming"

sorry, over long periods of time.

2/19/2007 10:08:49 PM

see the link with all the definitions i posted

and try to pay attention to when i use the term 'global warming' or if i say 'climate change' which is probably what you meant

because there are clear differences and you need to know the terminology

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 10:10 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 10:09:55 PM

considering the first handful of those definitions came from such reputable sources as dairy.net/kids.

but one of the ones halfway down seems to be about what i'm saying:

Quote :

"Global warming refers to an average increase in the Earth's temperature, which in turn causes changes in climate. A warmer Earth may lead to changes in rainfall patterns, a rise in sea level, and a wide range of impacts on plants, wildlife, and humans. Greenhouse gases make the Earth warmer by trapping energy inside the atmosphere. ..."

2/19/2007 10:16:07 PM

yeah i mean thats certainly part of it and thats what the term means verbatim, but the majority of those definitions refer to greenhouse gases or co2...i think this one is pretty accurate

Quote :

"Global warming has occurred in the distant past as the result of natural influences, but the term is most often used to refer to the warming predicted to occur as a result of increased emissions of greenhouse gases"

2/19/2007 10:17:52 PM

Quote :

"because every single scientific definition mentions human caused temperature rise as "global warming"...not simply "increased temperatures" in general http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:Global+Warming&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title"

We are way past definitions kiddo. May I reiterate:

http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/

Find articles> Academic Search Premier> EBSCOhost search for "climate+change"

12,874 Results

feel free to report on what you read

2/19/2007 10:22:39 PM

^^that def is from ncbuy.com

2/19/2007 10:24:41 PM

^^a lot of us are not past definitions...you and boonedocks included

^so? its a paraphrase of the accepted definition

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 10:26 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 10:25:00 PM

I guess it was an ideological fallacy of mine to believe you had the intellectual capacity to discuss this issue on even a basic level.

2/19/2007 10:37:02 PM

no you just didnt read the context of the thread to which those defintions were in reference

maybe your tired rhetoric about george bush and budweiser is something you picked up in one of those 10,000+ articles?

2/19/2007 10:39:15 PM

nah, that was just a little red meat to get a rise out of you

2/19/2007 10:41:22 PM

and sadly thats how you will be thought of in TSB...as a person who actually thinks like that

Bush partied in college? He's a cokehead in 2007!

2/19/2007 10:43:35 PM

1. Make dumb arguments
2. Get called out
3. "OMG I was being sarcastic!" / "That wasn't even my argument!"
4. Repeat

2/19/2007 10:49:25 PM

Hey, you're the one with a picture and song about weed in your profile

it seems evident that you make bad decisions, or at least want people to think that you do

2/19/2007 10:50:54 PM

^,^^ excellent posts that relate to the topic of the thread

^^holy shit the pot kettle irony is enormous

[Edited on February 19, 2007 at 11:11 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 11:09:52 PM

First in a three-part series:

Quote :

"The political left's favorite argument is that there is no argument. Their current crusade is to turn 'global warming' into one of those things that supposedly no honest and decent person can disagree about, as they have already done with 'diversity' and 'open space.' The name of 'science' is invoked by the left today, as it has been for more than two centuries. After all, Karl Marx's ideology was called 'scientific socialism' in the 19th century. In the 18th century, Condorcet analogized his blueprint for a better society to engineering, and social engineering has been the agenda ever since. Not all the advocates of 'global warming' are on the left, of course. Crusades are not just for crusaders. There are always hangers-on who can turn the true believers' crusades into votes or money or at least notoriety. Whether the globe really is warming is a question about facts -- and about where those facts are measured: on land, in the air or under the sea. There is no question that there is a 'greenhouse' effect. Otherwise, half the planet would freeze every night when there is no sunlight falling on it. There is also no question that the earth can warm or cool. It has done both at one time or another for thousands of years, even before there were SUVs. If there had never been any global warming before, we wouldn't be able to enjoy Yosemite Valley today for it was once buried under thousands of feet of ice. Back in the 1970s, the environmental hysteria was about the dangers of a new ice age. This hysteria was spread by many of the same individuals and groups who are promoting today's hysteria about global warming. It is not just the sky that is falling. Government money is falling on those who seek grants to study global warming and produce 'solutions' for it. But that money is not as likely to fall on those skeptics in the scientific community who refuse to join the stampede. Yes, Virginia, there are skeptics about global warming among scientists who study weather and climate. There are arguments both ways -- which is why so many in politics and in the media are so busy selling the notion that there is no argument. If you heard both arguments, you might not be so willing to go along with those who are prepared to ruin the economy, sacrificing jobs and the national standard of living on the altar to the latest in an unending series of crusades, conducted by politicians and other people seeking to tell everyone else how to live. What about all those scientists mentioned, cited or quoted by global warming crusaders? There are all kinds of scientists, from chemists to nuclear physicists to people who study insects, volcanoes, and endocrine glands -- none of whom is an expert on weather or climate, but all of whom can be listed as scientists, to impress people who don't scrutinize the list any further. That ploy has already been used. Then there are genuine scientific experts on weather and climate. The National Academy of Sciences came out with a report on global warming back in 2001 with a very distinguished list of such experts listed. The problem is that not one of those very distinguished scientists actually wrote the report -- or even saw it before it was published. One of those very distinguished climate scientists -- Richard S. Lindzen of MIT -- publicly repudiated the conclusions of that report, even though his name had been among those used as window dressing on the report. But the media may not have told you that. In short, there has been a full court press to convince the public that 'everybody knows' that a catastrophic global warming looms over us, that human beings are the cause of it, and that the only solution is to turn more money and power over to the government to stop us from our dangerous ways of living. Among the climate experts who are not part of that 'everybody' are not only Professor Lindzen but also Fred Singer and Dennis Avery, whose book 'Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years,' punctures the hot air balloon of the global warming crusaders. So does the book 'Shattered Consensus,' edited by Patrick J. Michaels, professor of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, which contains essays by others who are not part of 'everybody.'"

By Thomas Sowell:
PhD in economics, University of Chicago
AM in economics, Columbia University
AB in economics, magna cum laude, Harvard College
Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University


[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:01 AM. Reason : .]

2/19/2007 11:54:31 PM

Greg Fishel from today: "Since December [2006], there have been 43 above-normal temperature days and 37 below-normal temperature days." It seems to me that things are just about evening out.

And before you attempt to diminish Fishel, here's a little something:

Quote :

"Gregory B. Fishel ([Penn State] '79 Meteorology), chief meteorologist at WRAL-TV in Raleigh, NC, has won a special award from the American Meteorological Society (AMS) for his work in developing and implementing a new broadcast meteorologist certification program for the AMS. The Society is the nation's leading professional society for those in the atmospheric and related sciences. Fishel was honored for "extensive and exceptional work over the years on the development, writing, implementation and execution of the new standards for broadcasters through the American Meteorological Society Certified Broadcast Meteorologist program." Fishel was one of six to be honored with the award which was presented at the AMS 86th Annual Meeting in Atlanta on February 1, 2006. Fishel has been at WRAL-TV for nearly 25 years, first joining the station in 1981. A native of Lancaster, PA, he began his career in broadcast meteorology at WMOT-TV in Salisbury, MD, after completing a bachelor's degree at Penn State. He is an active member of the AMS and won the Society's Award for Outstanding Service by a Broadcast Meteorologist in 1985. He currently serves on the Society's board for broadcasters and also participates in the local AMS chapter. Fishel was instrumental in developing a network of observing systems across the southeastern U.S. and especially North Carolina in partnership with North Carolina State University, the North Carolina Supercomputing Center and Capital Broadcasting Company."

2/20/2007 12:11:41 AM

Quote :

"Thomas Sowell (born 30 June 1930), is an American economist, political writer, and commentator, generally from a socially conservative and economically laissez faire perspective."

So, hes an economist, not a scientist.

Quote :

"Sowell primarily writes on economic subjects, generally advocating a free market approach to capitalism. "

Quote :

"In 1990, he won the Francis Boyer Award, presented by the American Enterprise Institute"

AEI is a think tank for partisan hacks. They have posted a reward for $10k for peer-reviewed scientific proof that global warming doesn't exist, a reward that has yet to be claimed. The "institute" also has received millions in support from ExxonMobil.

Quote :

"He has a regular politics column that appears on the conservative Townhall.com website. He also regularly writes a column for Capitalism Magazine"

Well educated people can be partisans, look at Bill O'Reilly and Ann Coulter.

He's an economist that is making (opinionated) social judgements and economics based arguments. And nothing he says can be construed as being objective and scientific. He uses all the key buzzwords to elicit emotions from the conservative base. He's right about one thing. The implications of global warming are expensive to confront. Other than that, his arguments are as baseless and partisan as Limbaugh or Hannity. We are discussing the science behind climate change, not the economics.

I wish you could present this argument at a conference so you could experience the shame you deserve for making such a bullshit argument, especially without a source.


BTW http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sowell



[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:24 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:15:03 AM

he hit the nail on the head with that article about someone like scuba steve...probably why he got so worked up and defensive

Quote :

"He's an economist politician that is making (opinionated) social judgements and economics based arguments. And nothing he says can be construed as being objective and scientific. He uses all the key buzzwords to elicit emotions from the conservative liberal base"

HEY LOOK YOU JUST DESCRIBED AL GORE

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:26 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:25:10 AM

You're pathetic

2/20/2007 12:31:15 AM

you sure do hate it when your simpleton cliche blanket statement arguments get shot down or the same irrationale you use gets used against you

GUYS? BOONE? HEY ANYBODY? I NEED SOMEBODY TO VALIDATE MY CLAIMS THAT ONLY REDNECKS WITH IQ'S OF 20 DONT FULLY BELIEVE HUMANS ARE DESTROYING THE PLANET

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:35 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:32:28 AM

how did you get into State?



[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:37 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:35:40 AM

770 math i guess

the least you could do would be address specific parts of the various articles and reports in the thread...but apparently thats too much to ask? i know its easier to say "only morons dont believe in global warming" than to actually discuss the things in the articles that you agree or disagree with...i guess in Seattle you dont run into any resistance when you make your bs claims

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:40 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:37:25 AM

Quote :

"They have posted a reward for $10k for peer-reviewed scientific proof that global warming doesn't exist"

I'LL GIVE YOU ELEVENTY BAZILLION DOLLARS IF YOU PROVE UNICORNS DONT EXIST!!!!!11!

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:39 AM. Reason : i like unicorns better]

2/20/2007 12:38:02 AM

NB (To stupid motherfuckers that cannot read): Thomas Sowell is a political columnist AND a senior fellow at Stanford University.

Quote :

"Part Two Propaganda campaigns often acquire a life of their own. Politicians who have hitched their wagons to the star of "global warming" cannot admit any doubts on their part, or permit any doubts by others from becoming part of a public debate. Neither can environmental crusaders, whose whole sense of themselves as saviors of the planet is at stake, as they try to stamp out any views to the contrary. A recent and revealing example of the ruthless attempts to silence anyone who dares question the global warming crusade began with a "news" story in the British newspaper "The Guardian." It quickly found an echo among American Senators on the left -- Bernard Sanders, an avowed socialist, and John Kerry, Pat Leahy and Dianne Feinstein, who are unavowed. The headline of the "news" story said it all: "Scientists Offered Cash to Dispute Climate Study." According to "The Guardian," scientists and economists "have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report." It is a classic notion on the left in general, and of environmentalist zealots in particular, that no one can disagree with them unless they are either uninformed or dishonest. Here they dispose of scientists who are skeptical of the global warming hysteria by depicting them as being bribed by lobbyists for the oil companies. While such charges may be enough for crusading zealots to wrap themselves ever more tightly in the mantle of virtue, some of us are still old-fashioned enough to want to know the actual facts. In this case, the fact is that the American Enterprise Institute -- a think tank, not a lobbyist -- did what all kinds of think tanks do, all across the political spectrum, all across the country, and all around the world. AEI has planned a roundtable discussion of global warming, attended by people with differing views on the subject. That was their fundamental sin, in the eyes of the global warming crowd. They treated this as an issue, rather than a dogma. Like liberal, conservative, and other think tanks, the American Enterprise Institute pays people who do the work of preparing scholarly papers for presentation at its roundtables. Ten thousand dollars is not an unusual amount and many have received more from other think tanks for similar work. Enter Senators Sanders, Kerry, Leahy, and Feinstein. In a joint letter to the head of the American Enterprise Institute, they express shock, shock, like the corrupt police official in "Casablanca." These Senators express "our very serious concerns" about reports that AEI "offered to pay scientists up to $10,000 for questioning the findings" of other scientists. The four Senators express how "saddened" they would be if the reports are true, "by the depths to which some would sink to undermine the scientific consensus" on global warming. If the reports are true, the Senators continue, "it would highlight the extent to which moneyed interests distort honest scientific and public policy discussions" by "bribing scientists to support a pre-determined agenda." The Senators ask: "Does your donors' self-interest trump an honest discussion over the well-being of the planet?" They demand that "AEI will publicly apologize for this conduct." As the late Art Buchwald once said about comedy and farce in Washington, "You can't make that up!" If it is a bribe to pay people for doing work, then we are all bribed every day, except for those who inherited enough money not to have to work at all. Among those invited to attend the AEI roundtable are some of the same scientists who produced the recent report that politicians, environmentalists, and the media tout as the last word on global warming. The trump card of the left is that one of the big oil companies contributed money to the American Enterprise Institute -- not as much as one percent of its budget, but enough for a smear. All think tanks have contributors or they could not exist. But facts carry little weight in smears, even by politicians who question other people's honesty."

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:47 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:41:39 AM

thats the same thing boonedocks was asking for before i taught him what a scientific article was

THEY'RE OFFERING MONEY FOR PEOPLE TO DISPUTE THAT THE EARTH IS IN THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE? THEY MUST BE PAID BY THE EVIL SUN PEOPLE!

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:45 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:41:49 AM

^ People of the Sun is a great song

2/20/2007 12:46:25 AM

I know House of the Rising Sun and Here Comes The Sun but I dont think I know People of the Sun

2/20/2007 12:47:37 AM

Rage Against The Machine

http://youtube.com/watch?v=7hQgCJGNspI

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:48 AM. Reason : link]

2/20/2007 12:47:52 AM

^^^ I like Rage, but I was thinking of "Children of the Sun" by Billy Thorpe.

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 12:50 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 12:48:17 AM

oh ok yes i DO know the song

2/20/2007 12:48:45 AM

^^ blast from the past, there

2/20/2007 1:46:12 AM

Note: The following interview is too many words for one post.

The politics of global warming
By Bill Steigerwald
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Saturday, February 10, 2007

Timothy Ball is no wishy-washy skeptic of global warming. The Canadian climatologist, who has a Ph.D. in climatology from the University of London and taught at the University of Winnipeg for 28 years, says that the widely propagated “fact” that humans are contributing to global warming is the “greatest deception in the history of science.”

Ball has made no friends among global warming alarmists by saying that global warming is caused by the sun, that global warming will be good for us and that the Kyoto Protocol “is a political solution to a nonexistent problem without scientific justification."

Needless to say, Ball strongly disagrees with the findings of the latest report from the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which on Feb. 2 concluded that it is “very likely” that global warming is the result of human activity.

I talked to Ball by phone on Feb. 6 from his home on in Victoria, British Columbia, on Vancouver Island, which the good-humored scientist likes to point out was connected to the mainland 8,000 years ago when the sea level was 500 feet lower.

Q: The mainstream media would have us believe that the science of global warming is now settled by the latest IPCC report. Is it true?

A: No. It’s absolutely false. As soon as people start saying something’s settled, it’s usually that they don’t want to talk about it anymore. They don’t want anybody to dig any deeper. It’s very, very far from settled. In fact, that’s the real problem. We haven’t been able to get all of the facts on the table. The IPCC is a purely political setup.

There was a large group of people, the political people, who wanted the report to be more harum-scarum than it actually is. In fact, the report is quite a considerable step down from the previous reports. For example, they have reduced the potential temperature rise and they’ve reduced the sea level increase and a whole bunch of other things. Part of it is because they know so many people will be watching the report this time.

Q: Why should we be leery of the IPCC’s report -- or the summary of the report?

A: Well, because the report is the end product of a political agenda, and it is the political agenda of both the extreme environmentalists who of course think we are destroying the world. But it’s also the political agenda of a group of people ... who believe that industrialization and development and capitalism and the Western way is a terrible system and they want to bring it down. They couldn’t do it by attacking energy because they know that would get the public’s back up very quickly. ... The vehicle they chose was CO2, because that’s the byproduct of industry and fossil-fuel burning, which of course drives the whole thing. They think, “If we can show that that is destroying the planet, then it allows us to control.” Unfortunately, you’ve got a bunch of scientists who have this political agenda as well, and they have effectively controlled the IPCC process.

Q: You always hear the argument that the IPCC has several thousand scientists -- how can you not accept what they say?

A: The answer, first of all, is that consensus is not a scientific fact. The other thing is, you look at the degree to which they have controlled the whole IPCC process. For example, who are the lead authors? Who are the scientists who sit on the summary panel with the politicians to make sure that they get their view in? … You’ve got this incestuous little group that is controlling the whole process both through their publications and the IPCC. I’m not a conspiracy theorist and I hate being even pushed toward that, but I think there is a consensus conspiracy that’s going on.

Q: What is your strongest or best argument that GW is not “very likely” to be caused by SUVs and Al Gore’s private planes?

A: I guess the best argument is that global warming has occurred, but it began in 1680, if you want to take the latest long-term warming, and the climate changes all the time. It began in 1680, in the middle of what’s called “The Little Ice Age” when there was three feet of ice on the Thames River in London. And the demand for furs of course drove the fur trade. The world has warmed up until recently, and that warming trend doesn’t fit with the CO2 record at all; it fits with the sun-spot data. Of course they are ignoring the sun because they want to focus on CO2.

The other thing that you are seeing going on is that they have switched from talking about global warming to talking about climate change. The reason for that is since 1998 the global temperature has gone down -- only marginally, but it has gone down. In the meantime, of course, CO2 has increased in the atmosphere and human production has increased. So you’ve got what Huxley called the great bane of science -- “a lovely hypothesis destroyed by an ugly fact.” So by switching to climate change, it allows them to point at any weather event -- whether it’s warming, cooling, hotter, dryer, wetter, windier, whatever -- and say it is due to humans. Of course, it’s absolutely rubbish.

Q: What is the most exaggerated and unnecessary worry about global warming or climate change?

A: I think the fact that it is presented as all negative. Of course, it’s the one thing they focus on because the public, with the huge well of common sense that is out there, would sort of say, “Well, I don’t understand the science, but, gee, I wouldn’t mind a warmer world, especially if I was living in Canada or Russia.” They have to touch something in the warming that becomes a very big negative for the people, and so they focus on, “Oh, the glaciers are going to melt and the sea levels are going to rise.” In fact, there are an awful lot of positive things. For example, longer frost-free seasons across many of the northern countries, less energy used because you don’t need to keep your houses warm in the winter.

2/20/2007 1:55:47 AM

(Interview continued)

Q: Is the globe warming and what is the cause?

A: Yeah, the world has been warming since 1680 and the cause is changes in the sun. But in their computer models they hardly talk about the sun at all and in the IPCC summary for policy-makers they don’t talk about the sun at all. And of course, if they put the sun into their formula in their computer models, it swamps out the human portion of CO2, so they can’t possibly do that.

Q: Is the rising CO2 level the cause of global warming or the result of it?

A: That’s a very good question because in the theory the claim is that if CO2 goes up, temperature will go up. The ice core record of the last 420,000 years shows exactly the opposite. It shows that the temperature changes before the CO2. So the fundamental assumption of the theory is wrong. That means the theory is wrong. ... But the theory that human CO2 would lead to runaway global warming became a fact right away, and scientists like myself who dared to question it were immediately accused of being paid by the oil companies or didn’t care about the children or the future or anything else.

Q: Have you ever accepted money from an oil company?

A: No. No. I wish I did get some. I wouldn’t have to drive a ’92 car and live in a leaky apartment bloc.

Q: Why are sea levels rising and should we worry?

A: Sea levels have been rising for the last 10,000 years. In fact, 8,000 years ago, sea level was almost 500 feet lower than it is today. It’s been rising gradually over that time. It’s risen very slightly in the modern record, but it has risen no more rapidly than it has in the last 8,000 years. One of the factors that people forget is that most of the ice is already in the ocean, and so if you understand Archimedes’ Principle, when that ice melts it simply replaces the space that the ice occupied -- even if the ice caps melt completely. What they do is they say if we estimate the volume of water in Antarctica and Greenland, then we add that to the existing ocean level. But that's not the way it works at all. But it does work for panic and for sea-level rises of 20 feet, like Gore claims.

Q: Why are the sea levels rising, just because we are in a warming period?

A: Yes. We are in an inter-glacial. Just 22,000 years ago, which is what some people can get their minds around, Canada and parts of the northern U.S. were covered with an ice sheet larger than the current Antarctic ice sheet. That ice sheet was over a mile thick in central Canada. All of that ice melted in 5,000 years. There was another ice sheet over Europe and a couple more in Asia. As that ice has melted, it’s run back into the oceans and of course that’s what’s filled up the oceans. But if you drilled down in Antarctica, you go down almost 8,000 feet below sea level. That ice below sea level, if it melts, is not going to raise sea level. The other thing, just to get a little technical, is that sea level variation is called “eustasy,” and it can vary for a whole variety of reasons. It can vary simply because of the water being a little warmer by thermal expansion. The problem with that is, we really don’t know what sea level is. Sea level is not level. That means if you go through the Panama Canal, you are at different sea levels on the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans. There are areas off the coast of eastern North America where sea level is 100 feet higher than the surrounding sea, simply because of different gravitational pulls within the Earth.

Q: So there is no global sea level?

A: Exactly. Then you add to that that the crust of the Earth also moves up and down. For example, if you fly into Hudson Bay, as you fly in you cross about 150 beach lines because Hudson Bay is rising. If you looked at that and stood on the shore at Churchill on the Hudson Bay, you’d say, “Oh, the sea level is dropping.” No it isn’t. It’s because the land is rising. That’s called “isostasy” and that, by the way, is what’s going on in the Gulf of Mexico. People are saying, “The ocean is coming in and we’re seeing the evidence of sea level rising.” What you’re seeing is the evidence of land sinking.

Q: Is there any aspect of global warming alarmism that you are worried about?

A: There are a couple of very minor things. I’m interested in and need more research done on commercial jet aircraft flying in the stratosphere. The research that’s been done so far says no, it’s not an issue, but I think the jury is out on that still. The other concern I have is that we’re totally preparing for warming. The whole world is preparing for warming, but I mentioned that we have been cooling since 1998 and the climate scientists that I respected -- particularly the Russians and Chinese -- are predicting that we’re going to be much, much cooler by 2030. So we’ve got completely the wrong adaptive strategy.

Q: Is it not inevitable that we will have another ice age?

A: Yes, I think there is another ice age coming, because the major causes of the ice ages are changes in the orbit of the Earth around the sun and changes in the tilt of the Earth. Those are things we’ve known about for 150 years, but we’re still telling our students that the orbit around the sun is a fixed elliptical orbit and the tilt is an unchanging 23.5 degrees. Neither of those things are correct.

The question is, why are we still teaching our students that the orbit is a fixed, relatively small, unchanging ellipse? The answer is because the whole of our view of the world -- in the Western world at least -- is something called “uniformitarianism.” This is the idea that change is gradual over long periods of time. It was basically established out of Darwin’s view, which had to overcome the church and accommodate his evolutionary theory. So what it means is that we are all educated to see change as gradual over long periods of time. So any sudden or dramatic change is seen as either wrong or unnatural. Of course, that plays into the hands of the environmentalists, because it means all of this is not natural, it is something humans are doing, when in fact nature varies tremendously all the time.

Q: If someone asked you where he should go to get a good antidote on the mainstream media’s spin on global warming, where should he go?

A: There are three Web sites I have some respect for. One is the one I helped set up by a group of very frustrated professional scientists who are retired. That’s called Friendsofscience.org. It has deliberately tried to focus on the science only. The second site that I think provides the science side of it very, very well is CO2Science.org, and that’s run by Sherwood Idso, who is the world expert on the relationship between plant growth and CO2. The third, which is a little more irreverent and maybe still slightly on the technical side for the general public, is JunkScience.com.

Q: If you had to calm the fears of a small grandchild or a student about the threat of global warming, what would you tell him?

A: First of all, I probably wouldn’t tell him anything. As I tell audiences, the minute somebody starts saying “Oh, the children are going to die and the grandchildren are going to have no future,” they have now played the emotional and fear card. Just like in the U.S., it’s almost like the race card. It’s not to say that it isn’t valid in some cases. But the minute you play that card, you are now taking the issues and the debates out of the rational and logical and reasonable and sensible and calm into the emotional and hysterical. To give you an example, I was talking to a group in Saskatoon and a woman came up after and she said, “I agree with you totally. We were having a party for my 7-year-old. I went into the kitchen and there was a bang in the living room. I went back and a balloon had exploded. The kids were crying and I said, ‘Why are you crying?’ And they said, ‘There’s going to be another hole in the ozone.’”

It’s completely false. There never were holes in the ozone, by the way. But when we start laying those kinds of problems onto shoulders that are very narrow, that is criminal. My comment to her was, I said, “Look, let the kids get on with the party. Give them another beer. Let 'em enjoy themselves.”

So I wouldn’t raise these kinds of fear with the children. What I would do with my children and grandchildren is what I’m trying to do with the public and say, “Look, here’s the other side of the story. Make sure you get all of the information before you start running off and screaming ‘wolf, wolf, wolf.’”

2/20/2007 2:00:07 AM

Hooksaw, you are an idiot.

That is all.

2/20/2007 2:19:51 AM

brilliant contribution...nice job of being specific with your disagreements

if someone completely disagrees with someone is it impossible for them to be slightly specific in what exactly they disagree with?

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 2:24 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 2:24:08 AM

Quote :

"Part Three by Thomas Sowell If you take the mainstream media seriously, you might think that every important scientist believes that "global warming" poses a great threat, and that we need to make drastic changes in the way we live, in order to avoid catastrophes to the environment, to various species, and to ourselves. The media play a key role in perpetuating such beliefs. Often they seize upon every heat wave to hype global warming, but see no implications in record-setting cold weather, such as many places have been experiencing lately. Remember how the unusually large number of hurricanes a couple of years ago was hyped in the media as being a result of global warming, with more such hurricanes being predicted to return the following year and the years thereafter? But, when not one hurricane struck the United States all last year, the media had little or nothing to say about the false predictions they had hyped. It's heads I win and tails you lose. Are there serious scientists who specialize in weather and climate who have serious doubts about the doomsday scenarios being pushed by global warming advocates? Yes, there are. There is Dr. S. Fred Singer, who set up the American weather satellite system, and who published some years ago a book titled "Hot Talk, Cold Science." More recently, he has co-authored another book on the subject, "Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years." There have been periods of global warming that lasted for centuries -- and periods of global cooling that also lasted for centuries. So the issue is not whether the world is warmer now than at some time in the past but how much of that warming is due to human beings and how much can we reduce future warming, even if we drastically reduce our standard of living in the attempt. Other serious scientists who are not on the global warming bandwagon include a professor of meteorology at MIT, Richard S. Lindzen. His name was big enough for the National Academy of Sciences to list it among the names of other experts on its 2001 report that was supposed to end the debate by declaring the dangers of global warming proven scientifically. Professor Lindzen then objected and pointed out that neither he nor any of the other scientists listed ever saw that report before it was published. It was in fact written by government bureaucrats -- as was the more recently published summary report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that is also touted as the final proof and the end of the discussion. You want more experts who think otherwise? Try a professor of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, Patrick J. Michaels, who refers to the much ballyhooed 2001 IPCC summary as having "misstatements and errors" that he calls "egregious." A professor of climatology at the University of Delaware, David R. Legates, likewise referred to the 2001 IPCC summary as being "often in direct contrast with the scientific report that accompanies it." It is the summaries that the media hype. The full 2007 report has not even been published yet. Skeptical experts in other countries around the world include Duncan Wingham, a professor of climate physics at the University College, London, and Nigel Weiss of Cambridge University. The very attempt to silence all who disagree about global warming ought to raise red flags. Anyone who remembers the 1970s should remember the Club of Rome report that was supposed to be the last word on economic growth grinding to a halt, "overpopulation" and a rapidly approaching era of mass starvation in the 1980s. In reality, the 1980s saw increased economic growth around the world and, far from mass starvation, an increase in obesity and agricultural surpluses in many countries. But much of the media went for the Club of Rome report and hyped the hysteria. Many in the media resent any suggestion that they are either shilling for an ideological agenda or hyping whatever will sell newspapers or get higher ratings on TV. Here is their chance to check out some heavyweight scientists specializing in weather and climate, instead of taking Al Gore's movie or the pronouncements of government bureaucrats and politicians as the last word."

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 2:36 AM. Reason : PS: You stupid fuckers.]

2/20/2007 2:30:53 AM

Quote :

"The very attempt to silence all who disagree about global warming ought to raise red flags"

2/20/2007 2:33:54 AM

Link to multiple peer-reviewed climate science papers critical of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report and the so-called consensus:

http://friendsofscience.org/documents/Madhav%20bibliography%20SHORT%20VERSION%20Feb%206-07.pdf

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 3:26 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 3:14:59 AM

please find the articles that are particularly illuminating. and please stay away from "letters" that generally means that the editing/reviewing process is minimal.

2/20/2007 9:32:35 AM

I'm not sure as to the objectives of "Friends of Science", but at least you posted some links to some journal articles that I can look at. I think that was what we all were looking for in some respect. I can't comment as to the validity of the assertions contained within the summaries without looking at the articles themselves. I'm certainly not going to take their word for it.

2/20/2007 10:36:17 AM

Quote :

"I'm certainly not going to take their word for it."

yet you take the consensus' word as fact

2/20/2007 10:42:21 AM

.

[Edited on February 20, 2007 at 10:52 AM. Reason : .]

2/20/2007 10:50:03 AM