What is Digg?119 Comments
- PopcornDave, on 10/11/2007, -17/+48If global warming concerns are based on science, why are the alarmists so afraid of checking out opposing views?
- Johann4u, on 10/11/2007, -25/+46Countless studies by expert scientists, panels & international committees
vs.
James Taylor, fellow at Heartland Institute's 650 word article
Also CHECK THE SOURCE! The Heartland Institute has long thought to have been in the pocket of both ExxonMobil & the Tobacco Industry: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heartland_Institute
I'm diggin this up just to show where this argument comes from. - Robart, on 10/11/2007, -17/+31Won't find this on the front page of digg.
- zelig, on 10/11/2007, -4/+16COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING
MYTH 1: Global temperatures are rising at a rapid, unprecedented rate.
FACT: Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the last three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term rate of increase in global temperatures. Average ground station readings do show a mild warming of 0.6 to 0.8C over the last 100 years, which is well within the natural variations recorded in the last millennium. The ground station network suffers from an uneven distribution across the globe; the stations are preferentially located in growing urban and industrial areas ("heat islands"), which show substantially higher readings than adjacent rural areas ("land use effects").
There has been no catastrophic warming recorded.
MYTH 2: The "hockey stick" graph proves that the earth has experienced a steady, very gradual temperature increase for 1000 years, then recently began a sudden increase.
FACT: Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time. For instance, the Medieval Warm Period, from around 1000 to1200 AD (when the Vikings farmed on Greenland) was followed by a period known as the Little Ice Age. Since the end of the 17th Century the "average global temperature" has been rising at the low steady rate mentioned above; although from 1940 – 1970 temperatures actually dropped, leading to a Global Cooling scare.
The "hockey stick", a poster boy of both the UN's IPCC and Canada's Environment Department, ignores historical recorded climatic swings, and has now also been proven to be flawed and statistically unreliable as well. It is a computer construct and a faulty one at that.
MYTH 3: Human produced carbon dioxide has increased over the last 100 years, adding to the Greenhouse effect, thus warming the earth.
FACT: Carbon dioxide levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout geologic time. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased. The RATE of growth during this period has also increased from about 0.2% per year to the present rate of about 0.4% per year,which growth rate has now been constant for the past 25 years. However, there is no proof that CO2 is the main driver of global warming. As measured in ice cores dated over many thousands of years, CO2 levels move up and down AFTER the temperature has done so, and thus are the RESULT OF, NOT THE CAUSE of warming. Geological field work in recent sediments confirms this causal relationship. There is solid evidence that, as temperatures move up and down naturally and cyclically through solar radiation, orbital and galactic influences, the warming surface layers of the earth's oceans expel more CO2 as a result.
MYTH 4: CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas.
FACT: Greenhouse gases form about 3 % of the atmosphere by volume. They consist of varying amounts, (about 97%) of water vapour and clouds, with the remainder being gases like CO2, CH4, Ozone and N2O, of which carbon dioxide is the largest amount. Hence, CO2 constitutes about 0.037% of the atmosphere. While the minor gases are more effective as "greenhouse agents" than water vapour and clouds, the latter are overwhelming the effect by their sheer volume and – in the end – are thought to be responsible for 60% of the "Greenhouse effect".
Those attributing climate change to CO2 rarely mention this important fact.
MYTH 5: Computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming.
FACT: Computer models can be made to "verify" anything by changing some of the 5 million input parameters or any of a multitude of negative and positive feedbacks in the program used.. They do not "prove" anything. Also, computer models predicting global warming are incapable of properly including the effects of the sun, cosmic rays and the clouds. The sun is a major cause of temperature variation on the earth surface as its received radiation changes all the time, This happens largely in cyclical fashion. The number and the lengths in time of sunspots can be correlated very closely with average temperatures on earth, e.g. the Little Ice Age and the Medieval Warm Period. Varying intensity of solar heat radiation affects the surface temperature of the oceans and the currents. Warmer ocean water expels gases, some of which are CO2. Solar radiation interferes with the cosmic ray flux, thus influencing the amount ionized nuclei which control cloud cover.
MYTH 6: The UN proved that man–made CO2 causes global warming.
FACT: In a 1996 report by the UN on global warming, two statements were deleted from the final draft. Here they are:
1) “None of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed climate changes to increases in greenhouse gases.”
2) “No study to date has positively attributed all or part of the climate change to man–made causes”
To the present day there is still no scientific proof that man-made CO2 causes significant global warming.
MYTH 7: CO2 is a pollutant.
FACT: This is absolutely not true. Nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere. We could not live in 100% nitrogen either. Carbon dioxide is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is. CO2 is essential to life on earth. It is necessary for plant growth since increased CO2 intake as a result of increased atmospheric concentration causes many trees and other plants to grow more vigorously. Unfortunately, the Canadian Government has included CO2 with a number of truly toxic and noxious substances listed by the Environmental Protection Act, only as their means to politically control it.
MYTH 8: Global warming will cause more storms and other weather extremes.
FACT: There is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that supports such claims on a global scale. Regional variations may occur. Growing insurance and infrastructure repair costs, particularly in coastal areas, are sometimes claimed to be the result of increasing frequency and severity of storms, whereas in reality they are a function of increasing population density, escalating development value, and ever more media reporting.
MYTH 9: Receding glaciers and the calving of ice shelves are proof of global warming.
FACT: Glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for hundreds of years. Recent glacier melting is a consequence of coming out of the very cool period of the Little Ice Age. Ice shelves have been breaking off for centuries. Scientists know of at least 33 periods of glaciers growing and then retreating. It’s normal. Besides, glacier's health is dependent as much on precipitation as on temperature.
MYTH 10: The earth’s poles are warming; polar ice caps are breaking up and melting and the sea level rising.
FACT: The earth is variable. The western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer, due to unrelated cyclic events in the Pacific Ocean, but the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder. The small Palmer Peninsula of Antarctica is getting warmer, while the main Antarctic continent is actually cooling. Ice thicknesses are increasing both on Greenland and in Antarctica.
Sea level monitoring in the Pacific (Tuvalu) and Indian Oceans (Maldives) has shown no sign of any sea level rise. - davecor, on 10/11/2007, -6/+17We are at the tail end of an Ice Age - Where I'm sitting now was once under 1,000 feet of ice. Humans had nothing to do with that.
Hitching your political future to an global weather cycle has one major drawback. Once you are in power and cut CO2/ use Hydrogen, etc and the warming trend doesn't reverse - you are screwed. - PopcornDave, on 10/11/2007, -4/+15No more than your scientific observaional study that you seem to have conducted. I look outside my window and I see that we're having a cooler summer in California than years past. Should I then conclude it's global cooling because I looked outside my window?
- tubo5555, on 10/11/2007, -2/+11Global warming is inevitable. The problem here is that people in general have not done their own independent research to see if any of this is true or not. This is what we do know- every 450,000 years there is on average a new ice age. The time in between is called the interglacial period. Ice core data reveals this regular pattern between glacial periods.The ice cores also reveal that at the end of each interglacial period there is a significant warming trend and then the ice age. We don't get gradually colder and then an ice age. We get warmer and warmer and then comes the ice. What the scientist have also seen is a rise in CO2 levels as the temperature gets warmer. Guess what- we are at the end of this interglacial period. Yup, it has been roughly 450,000 years since the last ice age. CO2 levels are rising as they should be. So, what is the issue? The issue is whether or not man is causing the CO2 levels to rise faster then they should on their own before the next ice age, and thus man is bring on the ice faster. This is extremely difficult to figure out. There have been interglacial periods in the past in which the CO2 levels were a lot higher than they are now. Unfortunately, the media and the alarmist confuse this whole issue. Nobody says we are due for another ice age, or that it is normal for CO2 levels to rise. No, they say we are destroying our planet and the price to pay is an ice age. We are getting one soon....is man making it happen faster.....that is what we should be asking. I don't know and I don't think anyone else does either. Actually, the one thing that man is doing, and it is destroying the planet is deforestation. Jared Diamond in his book Collapse proves this. Do I have all the answers, in a word NO. If we are amplifying the CO2 levels and causing an ice age to hit us soon than later than I will be an alarmist. Until then, I want to see the real science, not some movie telling making ***** up. And yes, Gore made ***** up. The studies quoted in the article above are real and do suggest that Gore is full of *****. So, lets have a real debate and start off by admitting that we don't know ***** right now and then as a team work together, without political agendas to figure this out...if we can.
- KMye, on 10/11/2007, -2/+11This get the award for the most idiotic comment yet posted here. The author is not posing as a columnist, it's a ***** Op-Ed, that says exactly who he is at the end. He cites all of his claims very clearly. Did you go and check the sources and find he was lying? If not, what exactly are talking about when you say he's "getting away with it?"
Also, at the top of your comment, you're comparing all of AGW research over the past years vs. one article that takes issue with specific points within one movie. Apples to oranges might be too generous an analogy. Sloppy, sloppy thinking, man; try to clean it up. - Wootery, on 10/11/2007, -2/+11"Even if global warming pans out to be nothing and we do things to help prevent it, we're steps ahead aren't we?"
The "it can't hurt to assume it's true" argument doesn't stand when you look at why poor countries aren't allowed to build coal power-stations. If it is all *****, the fight against it will have actively caused harm. - GiggleStick, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8Was Michael Griffin, NASA Administrator a legitimate scientist? He only has 7 degrees, so maybe not. There's definitely more political pressure to agree with Human Caused global warming theories, than to doubt them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Views_regarding_global_warming - davecor, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8Dude... what melted the 1,000 feet of ice that used to be over the Midwest US?
It wasn't people.... and we are just seeing the tail end of a natural cycle. Stop all CO2 production - you can't reverse a 4 billion year old cycle.
There were once palms and ferns at the arctic (The fossil record is there) - and there will be again. Who is ignoring scientific evidence here? Take a step back and look at the BIG picture. - DreadPirate, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7It did, for about 5 minutes. The the global warming bury brigade came by and trashed the article.
- captinherb, on 10/11/2007, -4/+11"extremely tiresome is the unapolgetically ad hominem strategy of attacking the funding sources"
Of course the funding source matters. When it started coming to light in the 50's that smoking was bad for your health the cigarette industry formed the "Tobacco Industry Research Committee" to study the health affects of smoking. Shockingly they produced plenty of evidence that smoking was, in fact, safe. Would it have been inappropriate to point out that they were funded by the cigarette industry? All they did was confuse the public and slow down real research. - COINTELPROAgent, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7He was wrong, but it got pulled from the front page in less than 5 minutes.
- Stevanoski, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6Let's vote on where North is. It won't matter what the compass say's only what we decide. This is the logic of the Enviromental Wacko's
- DreadPirate, on 10/11/2007, -7/+13I love how people here are looking *only* at the sources of funding for the publisher of this article, and aren't even bothering to A) Read the actual article, or B) Check the sources that the article cites. Despite what the many leftists may claim, this is not "spam" nor "BS" but simply bringing together several bits of information to refute claims that Al Gore makes in his movie. And because this article has the courage to question one of the gods of the modern left, it must be buried and discredited, not debated factually.
- dungbeetle, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7I guess you were wrong.
- KMye, on 10/11/2007, -3/+9Didn't look very hard, did you?
http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2FJCLI3860.1 - KMye, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Not digging down for your comment, as that's petty...but. Attacking others for not checking sources when you haven't done the same yourself is dishonest, petty, or just silly. What do you mean the reasoning of the article is faulty, therefore everything in it is out of context. Hasn't anyone else on digg actually gone to college and learned what honest academic/scientific debate is about?? I feel like this great community has been taken over by a bunch of 14-17 year olds who have no idea how a real intellectual discussion should be conducted. I don't mean to discriminate against all people of a certain age, as there are always bright ones who understand argument and debate, but I'm getting ***** sick of this place. It's beginning to remind me of flame wars about the proper mortal kombat codes on Prodigy back in the day. *****.
- KMye, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Well, it didn't stay there for very long...
- KMye, on 10/11/2007, -4/+9This article is not offering alternatives theories; it's taking issue with specific information presented within AIT, and responding to it by citing studies in respected journals. How many people here actually read TFA?
- prophet5, on 10/11/2007, -27/+32It's funny that Leftists love to question the authenticity of any study funded in any way by any company, especially an oil company, yet they accept blindly statements from highly-partisan groups like Greenpeace (which have a known and stated agenda).
No matter how many scientists and studies show that Global Warming is bunk, the Believers will always discount any argument against it as biased or suspect.
It has become a religious cause for these anti-Capitalists.
The same people who are now shouting "Global Warming!" just a few decades ago were screaming "Upcoming Ice Age!". They twist any facts (or distortions, or lies) to suit their true agenda - reining in free-market economies in the interest of "global fairness". All they want is a world-wide legislated income-redistribution scheme that makes us all the same - miserable.
Unfortunately, these same people, in pursuit of their New World Order, are out to indocrinate new generations of kids into believing that we're all in peril unless we all give up our lifestyles and live a "carbon-neutral" life. We use less carbon than China, but no one asks China to curb their emissions, as long as they can buy their cheap plastic junk from Wal-Mart. Oh yeah, they hate Wal-Mart too, because they don't support unions.
The leaders from the 60's didn't go away - they retreated into colleges, to brainwash more people in their own image. That's why Biology professors show Michael Moore movies as class assignments.
When the Leftists realize they're wrong, they'll invent some new cause to pull behind. - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6For Pope Al Gore of the Church of Greenhouse Effect and Global Warmingology:
"Wrong is wrong, no matter how many people think it's right." G.K. Chesterton - DanThePainter, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Not Al Gore
Once upon a midnight dreary, as I wondered weak and weary
Why the Goreacle is such a tedious, monumental bore.
Surely in the loads of drivel, tripe to make a man’s brain shrivel,
Interspersed with jibes uncivil, there’d be something to explore?
Could that whole ungodly slideshow be but lies and nothing more?
Would that someone had kept score!
Frantically in search of answers to Al Gore’s extravaganzas,
Mine eyes did light upon a paper lying on my office floor.
‘Fore my eyes two words were forming, words that looked like “global warming”,
Soon I found myself a-storming, straight across my office floor
To snatch up that hopeful beacon like a ship in search of shore.
Wanting badly to learn more.
There, within its brittle pages, words of scientific sages
Summarized the essence of the Gorebot’s claims of yore.
Are the mountains’ snowy summits shrinking as the coolness plummets,
Or, as some say, due to forests fewer than there were before?
Who is right and free of folly with a hand on wisdom’s door?
Quoth the experts: “Not Al Gore.” >> more:
http://www.nicedoggie.net/2007/?p=804 - dugman74, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Years ago a civilization was in fear of expanding iceburgs. They knew that if they continued to grow, their crops would be destroyed. The sent holy men to cast the demons out of the ice.
The ice of course continued to expand, crops were destroyed, and millions starved.
This is what happens when you try to prevent climate change instead of preparing for climate change. - kyrandian, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5sounds like a plan... wait til its too late to act.
- rangerBravo, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7I think Global Warming is the new religion. Doubt it and perish in the everlasting rising tides and glacier-less mountains infidels. Moo-ahh-ahh-ahh.
Human induced global warming is about as real as that ice age that was predicted in the 1970s is. - Doofy, on 10/11/2007, -15/+19As much as you may hate the message/messenger, he DOES list all of his sources.
The author never claims to be a "source" of any of his data.
Try again. This time without your blinders on. - Jaymoon, on 10/11/2007, -5/+9Opposite of capitalism is communism. Big surprise that the left is against capitalist America's "pollution", but turns a blind eye to communist China's "pollution".
Prophet5 makes a very strong point. Even though YOU see it as a meaningless rant Johann4u, doesn't make it invalid. - Gadren, on 10/11/2007, -11/+15I don't know if global warming "alarmists" are afraid of checking out opposing views any more than evolution supporters are afraid of checking out intelligent design. Healthy discussion is certainly important, as long as we remember that giving equal time to both sides of a discussion in the interests of being fair and balanced isn't the best way to go about science.
- JohnGalt01, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4But I thought the science was "settled" and all arguments and skepticism were deemed blasphemy and were to cease immediately under pain of grant removal.
- DreadPirate, on 10/11/2007, -2/+6I am not "on the side of corporations" as you choose to put it. I just think that Gore is a blowhard, and that the whole global warming debate has a lot more to it than what has been considered so far.
Many conservation organizations look only at the past few hundred years, when climate change is something that has to be looked at on a scale of millenia and beyond. Climate "change" is a constant thing that has been happening for the entire history of th earth. Despite what many people believe (or would like to believe) there is no reason that the environment should stay exactly as it is, even if mankind were to disappear off the face of the earth tomorrow. - DreadPirate, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Kyrandian - a few other items to show that I am not "on the side of corporations"
1) I buy from farmers markets when I can
2) I eat organic when I can afford to
3) I buy most of my books used
4) I just got back from camping in the woods for a week
So try your pathetic strawman arguments somewhere else. - rangerBravo, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4I love how strong the support for Global Warming is by Al Gore. Isn't it kind of odd he feels he can pollute away as long as he can buy his way out of it. What a hypocrite.
- JimmyTheClam, on 10/11/2007, -8/+12Has anyone noticed that since the theory of human caused global warming is panning out to be crap that the GW alarmists have now switched to the catch all phrase "Climate Change"? No matter what happens, they still have their boogy man. Preventing "Climate Change" is like preventing the weather.
- rangerBravo, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7Oh and the countless scientists who get funded to research global warming on the premise that it exists are likely to be jumping at the opportunity to disprove global warming. Yah right.
Sorry, it works both ways here.
I really wish there was some sort of futures market where I could bet against global warming. In about 10 years I think I would be rich...rich I tell you .. - Drakkor, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5You might want to check out Venice, soon they'll all be underwater !
- foxgnaws, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3Goodness! You folks sure do post a lot of scripture from your Bible!
- dezmo, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4yeah! no REAL scientist would accept donations towards research!
- KMye, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4MUST...SILENCE...ALL...VIEWS...NOT...HELD...BY MYSELF...
- 10001, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2so scientifical studies funded by groups who already believe global warming is fact is ok?
- airphloo, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4Ummm... lots of people are asking China to curb their emissions. In fact, even the Bush Administration believes in global warming but don't want to sign Kyoto until China and India also have to make cuts to their carbon output.
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -6/+8NO liberal positions can stand close scrutiny. But they are in denial. They are more willing to believe this cult leader Gore than they are to believe scientists.
- GiggleStick, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3There are no legitimate scientists scoffing at man-made global warming within 100 miles of here!
Right now they are committing suicide outside of the liberal laboratories!
/Baghdad Bob - diggablog, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Will this make the front page?
- PopcornDave, on 10/11/2007, -4/+6Well so what's wrong with looking at the science from both sides instead of the players acting like schoolyard kids in a fight? Even if global warming pans out to be nothing and we do things to help prevent it, we're steps ahead aren't we?
I'm just curious why people are so quick to dismiss the claims of the other side. If the science is proven or disproven, it's still been verified. What's the problem with that? - Johann4u, on 10/11/2007, -14/+16Just tell me why a Senior Fellow @ a think tank that is clearly a tool of the oil industry is posing as a 'columnist' and writing an article that refutes the claims that may ruin the people who pay him.
Sorry but 98% of people do not check sources, thats why he gets away with it. - Barbarino, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4To quote James Taylor, I've seen fire and I've seen rain...
- 10001, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2but that truth is inconvenient!
- 10001, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2"I haven't yet checked those sources because [its inconvenient to my position]"
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