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Are Climate Change Skeptics Ignorant Or Are They Liars?
So- we all know that the greenhouse effect is real, and that it is causing climate change. I remember environmental scientists back in the mid-90s trying to get the enlightened to say "climate change" instead of "global warming" because they worried that exceptionally cold winters, drastic floods, etc., would seem to undermine the theory in the minds of the public if the phenomenon was referred to as "global warming."
(My opinion is that awareness of the problem of the ozone layer was helped by the term "hole in the ozone layer," and that some in the environmental community felt that "climate change" was too tame to get people actively solving the problem.)
Are those who mock climate science unaware that an exceptionally cold winter actually HELPS PROVE the hypothesis? Or do they know that they are advancing nonsense but don't care as long as it improves their credibility with the scientifically ignorant?
The always absurdly stupid Erick Erickson is today's clown:
www.redstate.com/erick/2009/10/19/links-for-2009-10-19/
(In which the low temperature in Macon, Georgia is taken for evidence against climate change.)
I have been watching this for a while and I really am confused. I mean, conservatives do tend to hate science, so maybe they really don't know... I thought I'd put this out there and see what you think.
(My opinion is that awareness of the problem of the ozone layer was helped by the term "hole in the ozone layer," and that some in the environmental community felt that "climate change" was too tame to get people actively solving the problem.)
Are those who mock climate science unaware that an exceptionally cold winter actually HELPS PROVE the hypothesis? Or do they know that they are advancing nonsense but don't care as long as it improves their credibility with the scientifically ignorant?
The always absurdly stupid Erick Erickson is today's clown:
www.redstate.com/erick/2009/10/19/links-for-2009-10-19/
(In which the low temperature in Macon, Georgia is taken for evidence against climate change.)
I have been watching this for a while and I really am confused. I mean, conservatives do tend to hate science, so maybe they really don't know... I thought I'd put this out there and see what you think.
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Yes, and yes.
October 19, 2009 1:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Global warming mediated by human greenhouse gas emissions (mainly CO2, but also methane, nitrous oxides, etc.) is associated, as one might expect with generally warmer temperatures, but the warming is most apparent in the winter (i.e., milder winters) and at night (warmer nights) compared with summers or daytimes, when the temperature increase is less. This reflects the relative influences of solar input vs. atmospheric heat trapping.
A colder winter doesn't help prove the phenomenon, but the warming trend over the past 100 years has inevitably beeen accompanied by short term ups and downs, due mainly to internal climate dynamics (ENSO, PDO, AMO, etc.), volcanic eruptions, changes in aerosol emissions, and other factors, including a small effect of cyclic changes in solar irradiancee, and so an isolated example of a cold winter globally (e.g. 2007-2008) is part of the normal pattern. Regional and local variations have almost no relevance to global mean temperatures (which are dominated mainly by ocean temperatures in any case), and so what happens in Macon, Georgia has no significant bearing on climate change.
October 19, 2009 2:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, yes, though the denialists are constantly screaming that because it's not always hotter today than yesterday - everywhere at once, global warming/climate change is "proven" false.
There are two possibilities for this.
1) They don't know what they are talking about.
2) They are lying.
I see no third possibility.
October 19, 2009 2:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
You neglect the obvious possibility that they are right and you as usual are wrong. Global warming kooks constantly point to some area having a hot summer or warm winter as proof, but then reject any evidence of areas having colder than normal summers or winters. Temps have been declining for a decade now. How does your theory explain that?
October 19, 2009 9:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
I explain it very simply - and correctly: You are lying through what remains of your teeth, Chihuahua.
Explain to me then the decreasing sea ice cover of the Arctic Ocean. Explain to me the disappearing glaciers and rising sea levels. Explain to me the shrinking of the ice shelves in the Antarctic. Explain to me the permafrost melting.
You know you're lying, or you are an ignorant little bag of shite. There are no other options.
October 19, 2009 11:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Warmer nights are the result of the urban heat island effect, the radiating of heat at night from pavement. If it were the result of atmospheric CO2 there is no reason why it would not be apparent in the day as well. It is also worth noting that temps have been declining for a decade now, having peaked in 1998. Global temps are determined by ocean currents which move in multi decade cycles and by solar radiation. There is no evidence that man made (or more accurately man released) CO2 has any effect on climate. It has been proven by atomic analysis that CO2 is resident in the atmosphere for less than 10 years before being absorbed (by plants or by the ocean). The IPCC totally ignores this fact and claims 100 - 200 year persistence because otherwise the fraud of AGW would be revealed. Here is a recent link whining about the disappearance of global warming:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8299079.stm
October 19, 2009 9:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
"There is no evidence that man made (or more accurately man released) CO2 has any effect on climate."
You're just trying to get a rise out of us by filling my page my crap!
October 19, 2009 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Usually, Bulldog, commenters ignorant about climate science achieve a mixture of right and wrong statements, but somehow you've managed to get every one of them wrong. It's quite an achievement, but reflective of the level of ignorance that prevails when someone with an ideological agenda derives his information from the Internet or the media rather than the climate science literature. If you are truly interested in climate science, I can provide you with some reference sources to get you started - warning, though, they will require several hundred hours of scrutiny, particularly the more rigorous quantititative sources with their dependence on differential equations at the heart of climate change dynamics. After that, if you have access to a science library, you can begin to look through the literature - Geophysical Research Letters, J. Geophys. Res., Nature, Science, Nature Geoscience, J. Climate, and about a dozen more. None of this will make you an expert, but it will give you the background to understand the basics of greenhouse gas-driven warming, the role of internal climate modes, the solar contribution, and a variety of other relevant factors.
Let me know if you would like to get started with an elementary understanding of basic principles, and we can take it from there.
October 19, 2009 11:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
for joe on his way to work flipping through the radio. it's a matter of finding an "expert" who's spewing what he wants to believe -- there's no climate change, it's just another conspiracy by the rich ny liberals to steal your hard earned cash.
Now, as for the "experts" on the radio...spawn of Satan?
October 19, 2009 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink