Can we please stop using the word "consensus" now?

I knew man made global warming was a hoax, it was only a matter of time before it was proven.

The analysis of the reports is fundemantally flawed. The majority of scientific reports concerning the subjects of global warming and climate change do not set out to prove or disprove global warming. Overwhelmingly they examine a single aspect or group of related aspects in an objective, scientific and unbiased manner. Written correctly the reader should not be able determine the authors inclinations.

There's a far better way to find out what climate scientists think - ask them. Doing so would not have produced the result the article wanted to portray. It would have been accurate and realistic but certainly not published by a somewhat one sided medium.

A challenge. Find the name of a single climate scientist that rejects outright the notion that humans are or may be contributing to global warming.

I think the answer is no, we can't stop using the word consensus, because it's important.

There is a consensus that global warming is happening, there isn't a consensus that it's man made.

The people who use common sense understand the inherent gamble. The selfish people just care about their money, the foolish people scream that there will be a disaster.

If we ignore the possibility that we're causing warming, and we are actually causing it, we could be destroying the world. We don't know how high the temperature could go if we're actually causing, or advancing warming. That's an infinite risk.

The cost of change can be measured in dollars, but most of those dollars we pay right back to ourselves. We grow local tech and sell it, so it might actually be a positive given a reasonable payback time.

If scientists are wrong and global warming is purely natural, then we're not any worse off if we make things cleaner, and by the way we'd be getting away from using foreign oil.

Even if you don't believe in global warming, there's no reason to fight alternative energy. It's just being pig headed and short sighted.

There is no disagreement that CO2 levels are going up and that the cause is the burning of coal, oil and natural gas. It is only the effect that this will have that is in dispute. But any way you look at it, if CO2 keeps going up like it has been, then at some point it WILL be a problem. It might be 1,000 years before it is a problem, and that problem might be CO2 reaching toxic levels or something else other than global warming, but at some point there WILL be some kind of problem.

Sorry, but no.

Just more nonsense by the Senator from Big Oil.

Here's the truth. The "skeptics" are few in numbers, if noisy. EVERY major scientific organization, including the official National Academy of Sciences says global warming is real and mostly caused by us.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on...

Even the article you cite says only 32 papers of 528 were skeptical, by the author's skeptical claim.

The bottom line:

"The fact that the community overwhelmingly supports the consensus is evidenced by picking up any copy of Journal of Climate or similar, any scientific program at the meetings, or simply going to talk to scientists. I challenge you, if you think there is some un-reported division, show me the hundreds of abstracts that support your view - you won't be able to. You can argue whether the consensus is correct, or what it really implies, but you can't credibly argue it doesn't exist."

Dr. James Baker - NOAA

The vast majority of scientists know that global warming is real and mostly caused by us. You can claim it's all a giant conspiracy, as ridiculous as that is. You can claim it's all because of Al Gore, which is even more absurd. But you can't credibly argue the scientific consensus doesn't exist.

3DM _ here's my definition of "the consensus". Global warming is real. It's mostly caused by us. It poses a major threat to our well being.

I'm comfortable with arguing the details and freely admit that exactly what will happen when are reasonable questions.

To me a skeptic is someone who thoughtfully questions (anything), and a denier is one who does so thoughtlessly, with no interest in learning anything. If you want to call me a skeptic, feel free.

I don't know.

I kind of like "the consensus" because it represents a well-defined set of ideas, so that when players such as Hansen wander off the range, you can point and say, "Sorry, not consensus, try again." The majority of catastrophic predictions, including the infamous "Inconvenient truths" do not adhere to the consensus viewpoint.

Since skeptics can be seen as all those who don't agree with "the consensus" view, then you can lump many of the AGW crowd (like Bob and Dana who are skeptical of the IPCC's sea level rise prediction) into the very same "denier" pool they so love to loath...

Can someone explain to me why a medical researcher is doing a survey of climate science papers, and why we should believe his survey over that of someone with a relevant (geology) background (Oreskes)?

From the article:

"However, while only 32 papers (6%) reject the consensus outright, the largest category (48%) are neutral papers, refusing to either accept or reject the hypothesis."

So by this non-expert's opinion, 6% reject the consensus (I doubt it's really that many) and 48% are neutral to it. This is supposed to prove that there's no consensus? Forgive me for being unconvinced.

Sorry but you don't get it. It's not 45% of scientist accept man made global warming, as the other 54% are employed by the oil corporations, so their votes don't count. The remaining 1% are just skeptics, which are different from deniers.

So if you look at the data again, an overwhelming percentage of scientist believe in man made global warming, there is a solid consensus, so majority wins, there IS the proof that man made global warming is a fact.

That's so much easier than actually having to come up with hard data.

Yet another F*****g blog! What this proves is that any idiot can post anything he wants on the Internet, and some other idiot will find it and cite it as proof (that he too is an idiot).

Well "consensus" is one of those terms used over and over again by the skeptics. Like Al Gore, it has nothing to do with Global Warming or science.

Show us one reputable scientific source. Oh that's right, I forgot. Those don't count, because they're peer reviewed and the scientists are growing fantastically wealthy by promoting a false theory, right? We know it's true, because somebody put it in their blog!!!

You can find "billions and billions" (as Carl Sagan would say) of blogs that repeat the asininities of the skeptics, but it doesn't make them any more true than when they are said by you or Jello.

A "medical researcher's" work in a captive denier journal?

You've got to be kidding.