How do you know that global warming is a man-made thing?
I am interested in hearing from people who claim that global warming is clearly a man-made thing. How do you know? What have you specifically read, heard, or watched that made you so sure. Was it a book? (give author/title) Was it a web page? (give address). Was it a person? (name? what did he or she say?). Was it a t.v. or radio broadcast? (title, date broadcast, narrator, channel, etc.?).
I've heard SOOOOOO many people claim that "the evidence is overwhelming that the climate change is man-caused" and yet I have never had one of those people have the capacity to tell me why they think that (other than that they are just repeating a catch-phrase).
Well, let's get to it. Those of you claiming it's man-caused -- give us your sources -- the sources YOU PERSONALLY USED to come to that conclusion. I'm not saying you had to do the climate research yourself -- but you must have read or heard something of substance, right? Or, are you just repeating the catch-phrases?
2007-07-09T13:02:51Z
I never said I was "so sure" it isn't man made. I also never said that "nobody" ever showed me any sources -- what I said was that of those that run around screaming about how "clear" it is that it is man-made, I have never had one be able to articulate their sources. Those of you that have cited sources, I will review them them and appreciate you citing them. To the one who made this a personal attack and asked me if I had any ability to reason -- it's obvious that you don't, because most of what you cited (like man using up an area for agriculture and having to move on) doesn't have a thing to do with global warming. To say that "man has used resources" and "man has polluted" does NOT say we caused climate change globally. The world is, in some respects, a fishbowl, but it is a really big fish bowl.
Keith P2007-07-09T22:45:52Z
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1. CO2 is increasing in the air at an exponential rate, with no sign of slowing down. http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/ 2. The amount of CO2 in the air has increased 37% since the industrial revolution. http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/law/law.html 3. This rise is caused entirely by human beings. Isotopic analysis of the CO2 in the air shows that it increasingly contains "old" carbon combined with "young" oxygen. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=87 4. CO2 is a greenhouse gas which causes the planet to warm. This has been known (and unchallenged) since the 19th century, so I won't post a link. 5. The planet is actually getting warmer. http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcrut3/ http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt 6. Natural climatic forcings can be ruled out as causes of the current warmth: (6a). Ice ages and inter-glacial periods are triggered by small changes in Earth's orbit, called "orbital forcing." Since Earth's orbit can be computed for thousands of years into the past and future, we know that orbital forcing peaked 6000 years ago, and should be slowly cooling the planet right now. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/207/4434/943 (6b). Solar activity peaked in 1957-58, and has been unsteadily declining since that time. http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/SOLAR/solarda3.html 7. If the warmth is due to the greenhouse effect, we should see the stratosphere getting cooler as more heat is trapped at the surface. This is in fact exactly what we have seen. This also refutes non-GHG causes for the current warmth. http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/temp/sterin/sterin.html
In addition to the peer-reviewed science cited above, a good overview of the attribution evidence (including much more subtle statistical tests) can be found here: http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Pub_Ch09.pdf
I invite you to compare the quality of sources cited in this answer with anything cited by GW skeptics. Then draw your own conclusions.
Ok. The earth is getting warmer. Agreed. We need to conserve. Agreed. We need to find supplemental energy sources. Agreed. But, we were told for 15 years that it was caused by man made co2 build up. Then, the ice core data came in and showed that historically, hot temperatures came before increases in co2. Hmm. The 'consensus' scientists and Al Bore, err, Gore, dance around that like a hot potato. They have no answer, it was not what they expected. Recent analysis of plant data from the ice samples shows the earth has been hotter than it is now, long before anyone burned a drop of gas or an ounce of coal. I am sure the plethora of links quoted here will take you to these findings and they are in many reports, just google it. The very backbone of the 'man made global warming' theory is that more co2 causes hotter temps. But the evidence is not there. So why still cry that the sky is falling? Follow the money. Big business does not want to I can assure you. I am in big business. The last thing we want to do is raise prices. And raise prices is EXACTLY what we will do when we carbon taxes are foced on us. Who will pay? YOU will, and it will be a lot. More people will be forced into the poverty level. The cost of combatting global warming will be overwhelming. So who benefits? All the scientists who get government and private funding to study man made global warming, that is who. That is where the money trail ends. Remember, these are the same experts who said an ice age was coming in 1978 (Time Magazine cover story, among other rags). These are also the same 'experts' who predicted a 95% chance in 2006 of above average hurricane activity. We had ZERO U.S. storms. So if you want to believe them, go ahead. They will spin the data, but if you look real close, the dots just don't connect to definitively put the finger of blame on man alone.
How can you be sure it isn't? Maybe more research is needed to prove it conclusively, but that research should be done by scientists, not politicians. "I don't believe in global warming" is a catch-phrase too, and it's a foolish one because everyone knows the Earth is getting warmer. The only question open for debate is what's causing it. However, even George W. Bush, who made his anti-environmentalist stance a big part of his 2000 campaign, has acknowledged that something should be done. Think about that.
Personally, I don't care whether it's man-made or not, because that's not the only reason why we need to reduce emissions. Here in the Phoenix area, we have high pollution warnings on a regular basis, often serious enough that they tell even healthy adults to stay inside or limit their outdoor activities. If air that is unsafe to breathe isn't enough to convince you that something should be done to improve air quality, what will it take?
Danzr, you summed up the typical neocon attitude almost too perfectly: "We'll all be dead before it matters." Do you have any idea how selfish and shortsighted that is? What about future generations? What about your own children? This attitude is being applied to finances as well as the environment, and someday, not too far in the future, this selfish and twisted idea of utopia is going to self-destruct if we don't start thinking ahead.
Everything you need to know is on Google search engine. Everything that someone would site would either
A. Be too scientific because it would go way over your head trying to decipher government and NASA web sites that provide graphs with comparisons for you to come to the right conclusions.
OR B. The source that you would understand would appear as propaganda to you, so I know for a fact you never watched "An Inconvenient Truth" to debate about this properly.
I insist upon answering you through your capacity to reason.
The world is not very big and change is essential to growth. You don't think over hunting and cropping an area forced early civilizations to abandon their cities?
You don't think that the plankton bloom in the ocean is the bottom of the food chain of life and that it is directly influenced by polluted run off from an industrialized world?
You don't think that altering the very nature of our farming practices has altered what is emitted into our little planet?
Have you ever looked into a fish bowl? You have to change the water for the fish to stay alive, right? Well, the earth is one big gravity well in space, do you think the earth can keep up with changing or filtering our air in the oxygen belts that comprise of only 30% of our manufactured oxygen we depend upon?
C'mon, man... its common sense, there are now billions and billions of us when there were only a couple of billion not too long ago and not too long before that, only millions and millions.
Can you grasp even one billion?
Have you ever seen termite colonies or ants?
Have you ever seen that if one colony takes over a territory that it alters the very land scape and what will grow there or what insects it detracts or attracts or does it all just stay static with no environmental impact?
Look at a satellite picture of our planet on the dark side of the earth in outer space, and really get a perspective on what kind of an influence we have made on the planets atmosphere, just the electric lights alone lighting up the earth should give you some kind of a clue.
Global Warming ?? Of course it is warming. The studies of geology ( Univ. Colorado), Oceanology( Tex. A.& M.), Volcanology (Univ. St. Petersburg) [U.S.S.R.], Natural Climatology( Univ. Moscow) [U.S.S.R.], all agree, that since the last ICE AGE, 15,000 to 20,000 years, ago when the northern 1/3 of the USA was under giant glaciers, THE EARTH IS IN ANOTHER - ANOTHER TIME SPAN OF NATURALLY WARMING!!! The doom's day prophiets saying that man has totally caused this warming span, we are now in, is only trying to sucker the gullable in, so as to make BUCKETS OF MONEY, and work not, produce not( except for verbal scatology), benefit others not, etc. They also are quick to point the finger at every one who does not agree with them !! How ever, educated people know at least two (2) facts: 1. Some one is always trying to stir up scatology for fun and or profit, 2. The person doing the pointing, always has THREE FINGERS POINTING BACK TO THEM !!!!! WHAT IS THE POINTER TRYING TO HIDE, BY TRYING TO HAVE PEOPLE LOOK THE OTHER WAY, AND EXACTLY WHAT ARE THE THREE FINGERS TRYING TO TELL PEOPLE ???? Uncle Wil