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ORIGINAL: Politesub53

" So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have."

Are we back on WMd`s again ?

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To be honest the earth has had seismic weather changes throughout history. Ireland and Scotland were once at the Equator. The North Atlantic, North Sea and English Channel didnt exist. mankind have only been on earth for the tiniest fraction of its history.

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Yet to claim that we are not affecting the planet by our behaviour is just a crass way of denying the obvious. How do people think an island of plastic and rubbish, twice the size of Texas, came to be floating in the pacific ocean ?

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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To be honest the earth has had seismic weather changes throughout history. Ireland and Scotland were once at the Equator. The North Atlantic, North Sea and English Channel didnt exist. mankind have only been on earth for the tiniest fraction of its history.

All quite true but ignored by AGW ethusiasts.

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ORIGINAL: Hillwilliam

LaT. A lot of folks on both sides confuse weather which is a local short term phenomenon with climate which is a worldwide long term thing.

Weather is easy to determine. Climate, not so much.

I'll restate tho that even the deniers admit things have warmed in the last 150 years they just argue that A: we arent the cause and B: things wont keep getting warmer.

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Do you honestly believe that scientists don't understand the age of the earth, continental drift (which, by the way was unknown as recently as 50 years ago) and the fact that things have changed back and forth over the past 4.6 billion years?

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1. Climate is changing faster than can be accounted for by looking at past trends.
2. CO2 concentrations are greater than they were prior to the industrial revolution as a consequence of burning fossil fuels.
3. CO2 is one of the so called 'green house gasses' that WILL trap heat. (if it went for a little CO2, the planet would be basically uninhabitable)
4. It is reasonable to assume that more CO2 in the atmosphere will probably lead to higher temps.

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The problem is that by the time you have definitive evidence of manmade warming, it's too late. Kind of like starting down the mountain in a car that 'probably' has good brakes. By the time you fond out otherwise, it's too late.

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We're going to have to change from fossil carbon based energy eventually anyway. Why not get a head start on the rest of the world before the Chinese decide to kick our ass.

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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As I said ... "consensus" isn't science. Neither is much of the information and conclusions about AGW "science", since the basis of it isn't based on the scientific method of inquiry.

The crystal ball of the carny fortune teller has been replaced by a computer. But still GIGO.

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A claim is considered proved if the probability can be demonstrated to be of the requisite dimensions.

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Think the Theory of Evolution for example

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

A claim is considered proved if the probability can be demonstrated to be of the requisite dimensions.

Nothing is proved in science. The null hypothesis is tested to a degree of probability or improbability.

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Think the Theory of Evolution for example

A consensus was formed over a long period of time, not just a decade as in the current case, and not by political committee!

Off to watch Yank football. Back tomorrow - the good lord willing and the creek don't rise

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
Ultimately something is considered scientifically true when the vast majority of scientists agree it's proved ie when a scientific consensus is established. There are lot of problems and flaws with using risk analysis as a proof or standard of truth IMHO. Nonetheless it is science as it is practiced.

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Earth could be entering a new Ice Age within the next millennium, but it might not, the deep freeze averted by warming from increased carbon dioxide emissions. Humans could be thwarting the next glacial inception, a new study says.

Even in the comparatively long time scales of Earth history, we’re kind of overdue for another ice age — our current Holocene era has lasted about 11,600 years, roughly 600 years longer than the average interglacial (between-ice-age) periods of the past. If atmospheric CO2 levels were lower, the next ice age might have started sometime within the next 1,000 years, according to researchers from University College London and Cambridge University.

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ORIGINAL: Aylee

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-01/human-co2-emissions-could-avert-next-ice-age-study-says

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Earth could be entering a new Ice Age within the next millennium, but it might not, the deep freeze averted by warming from increased carbon dioxide emissions. Humans could be thwarting the next glacial inception, a new study says.

Even in the comparatively long time scales of Earth history, we’re kind of overdue for another ice age — our current Holocene era has lasted about 11,600 years, roughly 600 years longer than the average interglacial (between-ice-age) periods of the past. If atmospheric CO2 levels were lower, the next ice age might have started sometime within the next 1,000 years, according to researchers from University College London and Cambridge University.

Fallen Angels anyone?

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ORIGINAL: InvisibleBlack

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
Ultimately something is considered scientifically true when the vast majority of scientists agree it's proved ie when a scientific consensus is established. There are lot of problems and flaws with using risk analysis as a proof or standard of truth IMHO. Nonetheless it is science as it is practiced.

*blink*

Wow. Is that what they're teaching these days? No wonder things are falling apart. Wow.

Science has nothing to do with consensus. I will in fact state that consensus is probably inimical to science in general. Science requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus.

Getting a "majority" of scientists together who will all claim that you're right does not make you right, certainly not if your experiment cannot be reproduced nor if even a single person can conduct an experiment which disproves your theory. Group agreement is not valid science.

Scientific consensus is garbage. Historically it has served only to shackle, suppress and restrict the growth of human knowledge and to repress discovery and free thinking. If that is the state of current dogma, if that's what they're preaching these days, then they deserve every catastrophe that's going to hit them.

[Edited: Typos]

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ORIGINAL: Aylee

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-01/human-co2-emissions-could-avert-next-ice-age-study-says

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Earth could be entering a new Ice Age within the next millennium, but it might not, the deep freeze averted by warming from increased carbon dioxide emissions. Humans could be thwarting the next glacial inception, a new study says.

Even in the comparatively long time scales of Earth history, we’re kind of overdue for another ice age — our current Holocene era has lasted about 11,600 years, roughly 600 years longer than the average interglacial (between-ice-age) periods of the past. If atmospheric CO2 levels were lower, the next ice age might have started sometime within the next 1,000 years, according to researchers from University College London and Cambridge University.

Fallen Angels anyone?

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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Do you honestly believe that scientists don't understand the age of the earth, continental drift (which, by the way was unknown as recently as 50 years ago) and the fact that things have changed back and forth over the past 4.6 billion years?

Errmmm . . . not what I said. Have another look. I said nothing about 'scientists.'

AGWs refuse to consider the possibilities that (1) we are undergoing a natural, cyclical phenomenon, or (2) some other agency is involved. Well, they don't refuse to consider those possibilities; they set out to bannish them. And those who are sceptical of the received wizdom from the IPCC are attacked and denigrated as heretics. The OP, probably unintentionally and unknowingly [cuz I believe her to be of good heart] repeats the slanderous accusation that the sceptics are 'deniers' - a term emotional charged from its association with those who deny the Jewish Holocaust. Elsewhere I have read that we are ignorant, right-winger, flat-earthers. We are not all in the same category. Some of us simply are dubious of the science employed, the conclusions drawn, and the remedies proposed. Where is the Minority Report in the IPCC? There was 100% agreement? To borrow from Firm above: consensus is not science; it is politics.

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1. Climate is changing faster than can be accounted for by looking at past trends.
2. CO2 concentrations are greater than they were prior to the industrial revolution as a consequence of burning fossil fuels.
3. CO2 is one of the so called 'green house gasses' that WILL trap heat. (if it went for a little CO2, the planet would be basically uninhabitable)
4. It is reasonable to assume that more CO2 in the atmosphere will probably lead to higher temps.

1. depends on how far back you look. There have been previous warming trends. Grapes were grown in England. There is a Vinyard Street in London.
2. CO2 was highly accumulated in the atmosphere during previous interglacials prior to the evolution of man.
3. The major greenhouse gas is H2O not CO2. The major cause of methane CH4 is animal farts. All of these gases travel in cycles within a closed atmosphere. Hence they are subject to dynamic equilibria.
4. Not at all a reasonable or necessary assumption. If you look back at the 130,000 year interglacial shown previously somewhere above you will see that very high levels of CO2 remained in the air for 15,000 years as glaciation took place. That violates the current orthodoxy.

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The problem is that by the time you have definitive evidence of manmade warming, it's too late. Kind of like starting down the mountain in a car that 'probably' has good brakes. By the time you fond out otherwise, it's too late.

What constitutes 'definitive evidence?' The 'science' has already been proclaimed 'settled.' The Kyoto Protocol has already prescribed action that has the potential IMHO to be hazardous to the growing population of earth, especially the impoverished.

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We're going to have to change from fossil carbon based energy eventually anyway. Why not get a head start on the rest of the world before the Chinese decide to kick our ass.

It appears you are concerned more about geo-politics than science.

The proposed alternative fuels are inadequate for a variety of reasons to resolve our future energy needs. Here is a good read of the Pros and Cons Have a look.

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ORIGINAL: Politesub53

The one big problem with Green technology is the cost. You have to convince home owners and car users, who need to watch their budgets, that it is affordable short term. There is also a problem of reliability. Last winter wind farms were unproductive due to no wind, as obvious as that sounds, it took place during the very cold snap in the UK, the time when the energy was most needed (for heating). This winter we had the absurd sight of gale force winds causing turbines to explode. There are also a big question regards cost of hooking wind farms to the national grid.

All of the above are major problems that need to be solved before you can get the general public to fully embrace new technology.

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ORIGINAL: Politesub53

The one big problem with Green technology is the cost. You have to convince home owners and car users, who need to watch their budgets, that it is affordable short term. There is also a problem of reliability. Last winter wind farms were unproductive due to no wind, as obvious as that sounds, it took place during the very cold snap in the UK, the time when the energy was most needed (for heating). This winter we had the absurd sight of gale force winds causing turbines to explode. There are also a big question regards cost of hooking wind farms to the national grid.

All of the above are major problems that need to be solved before you can get the general public to fully embrace new technology.

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ORIGINAL: Sanity


Now theyre using the "climate change" religious chant as their holy grail in this crusade, while the leftist power brokers on top are working with their cronies to make vast fortunes off other peoples' misery

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Which is why certain leftists *cough* OBAMA *cough*would like nothing better than to see the cost of energy soar.

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I'm glad you now agree that consensus is the criterion of proof in science.

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FWIW, Invisible, I agree with most of the points you are making here. There are also the effects of a classic insider-outsider discourse to be taken into account. And the power associated with being granted the privileged position of arbiter of truth.