How can people "not believe" humans accelerate global warming?
I don't understand how this is still a controversy. I thought it was already settled. Apparently people are using the fact that the earth has cyclical warm periods to"disprove" (in the loosest sense of the word) that humans accelerate global warming.
Let's see if I can clear this up:
The earth has cyclical periods of high and low amounts of CO2. High levels of CO2 warm the earth, low levels cool the earth, via the greenhouse effect. Humans, by burning fossil fuels, are releasing levels of CO2 that would not normally be released, thus increasing the temperature past where it normally would.
What part of this don't you agree with, and why? Are you aware that 97% of people who study this for a living, every day of their lives, disagree with you? (as opposed to only 58% of the general population) http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf
What, then, gives you the authority to say they are wrong? It seems to me that, when climatologists and the general public disagree with something involving the climate, I would imagine the climatologists would be right, since we all know how well-informed the general public is nowadays.
Oh, and yes I am aware that global temperatures have "dropped" over the last few years, but if you bother to compare that drop to the rise over the last 100, you will see it is insignificant, as the temperature rises and drops often, even though the overall trend is still going higher. (Here's a completely unofficial graph from Wikipedia, but it shows what I'm talking about. Youc an see the minor insignificant blip at the end that people claim "proves" humans aren't responsible http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png
So where is the controversy here? Is this just another conspiracy theory, like Obama's birth certificate or the WTC attacks, billowing out in an uninformed populace? Is there any real scientific evidence to show that humans are not at least partly responsible for the current increase in global temperatures?
(P.S. In case anyone wants to know, I too once disbelieved that humans were responsible, but then after doing my research, I realized the arguments against it were pretty weak. For instance, someone sent me a link with "50,000 scientists disagree with human caused global warming". When I read into it, they were all civil engineers and astrologists and the like, no one who actually studied climate change)QA
2009-09-22T08:28:45Z
PPS: Here's a graph of the last 2000 years of global temperatures http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c1/2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png
notice how much higher it is now than in the medieval warm period. Man's CO2 emissions have caused a normally high cycle to skyrocket.
prusa12372009-09-22T08:43:37Z
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Your graph shows a temperature variant of .6 degrees and is skewed to show a result that the graph creator wanted. What is the range of error in a graph going back 2000 years? Aren't actual temperatures from hundreds or thousands of years ago problematic?
Well, you may have done research but your research is flawed. (see below).
Even if levels of CO2 increase, they do not cause climate warming. Here are some facts. First, the Sun does not warm the air directly. The sun warms the sea and the ground which radiate the heat and warm the air. So, some use this to claim that increased CO2 has a "greenhouse" effect in that it hiders the radiation of heat back into space. True enough. However, that is not all increased CO2 levels do. They also increase cloud cover by raising humidity levels. Ever actually look at a greenhouse? See the condesation on the glass?
CO2 increases cloud cover which blocks the Sun's radiation and also results in cooler temperatures. So you see, this whole ecosystem is self-correcting. The more Carbon Dioxide you emit, the better plants grow. Plants breathe in Carbon Dioxide and give off Oxygen. CO2 has a greenhouse effect in that it inhibits heat from escaping but it also produces cloud cover that inhibits heat from getting to the surface to warm the air in the first place. Back to balance.
This ecosystem we call Earth is not all that fragile. The only thing great enough to cause dramatic changes is global climate is the Sun. It does this on all the planets. More Solar activity, global warming. Less Solar activity global ice age. All this long before the first man even existed. It occurrs now and will occurr long after man has gone.
Nothing I have stated here is untrue. I defy anyone to prove it to be false.
First thing, CO2 comprises a remarkably small percentage of our atmosphere. Only 0.0387%. Other gases such as water vapor contribute much more to warming this planet than CO2.
I don't care if 97% of people who study this stuff believe it. And quite frankly, you read that study wrong. Only 82% believed it was human caused. I know, 82% is still a big number.
Now look at the chart I link to. Sure, it's gotten warmer in the last 150 years, because we were just getting out of the Little Ice Age. At least twice before, we've been significantly hotter than we are now, long before the invention of the SUV. And during that Mideval warm period, records show it was a positive thing. Areas that were generally uninhabitable became habitable. It became easier to grow crops. Oh, and my chart says the mideval period was warmer.
Another reason why I disbelieve is that 4 times in the last century, "experts" flipped positions and were warning us about the how the earth was headed for warming or another ice age. Every couple of generations gets a new cycle of hot or cooling spells, and proclaims a new disaster is upon us. Only the GW folks figured this out, and now they are using the term "Climate Change." Now, any change in climate can be blamed on man, not just warming. They are setting themselves up for the long game regardless of which way the climate goes.
Another problem I have is that the big government types have latched on to Global Warming as their way of pushing higher taxes, lower standards of living and wealth transfer. Basically, the solutions fit their agenda anyway.
Another problem, and this one you won't read much about, but I have investigated, is the unreliability of weather station data. Oh, the temperatures recorded are correct enough, but the surrounding areas have changed significantly over the last century. Many went from being out in the country or small towns and are now in major metropolitan areas near artificial heat sources like Air Conditioners or industrial equipment, or just acres of blacktop. There's a web site that's been investigating this. See my second link.
There are still many republicans that disagree. And it's far more than 1% of the scientists that disagree about Global Warming. Start investigating the issue for yourself. These statements like "The Debate is over," or "The Deniers are funded by the oil industry," are a bunch of bunk. You in fact demonstrate the worst qualities. Every scientist that disagrees must be a whack job or funded by the oil industry in your opinion. No, heaven forbid a scientist disagree because the science doesn't back it up, or the outrageously hyped doom and gloom we are fed maybe isn't backed up by science. Apparently, there are no such honorable scientists that disagree in your opinion. You are being sold a bill of goods by the politicians and mass media that dislike America with it's current culture and economic system. They've all latched on to man made Global Warming as a way to change things for what they see America should be.
The fact is, they put the blame onto the normal working person. It is our governments that cater for us, they give us our energy sources. We do not ask for fossil fuels, especially when the technology has been there for years in the way of solar, tidal, wave, wind and geothermal which effectively could power the world forever but the powers that be, the corporations who use oil as a tool for leverage and power cannot survive without using fossil fuels or without causing serious pollution. They do not want or are ever going to finance such clean, sustainable energy sources but yet it is us who are being punished through crippling taxes for ''climate change''. Of course the climate is going to change if it is perpetually polluted at the rate it is just now. Taxing us is not going to change anything and until people wake up and notice this then nothing will ever change and climate pollution will continue to get worse.
At the end of the day my point is, we have a established system in place that relies on oil production. We are sold it by the established system but yet are punished for using it. Can anyone see the irony here?