There IS a problem with global warming...
it stopped in 1998
By Bob Carter
(Filed: 09/04/2006)
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RE: [RC] Fw: geology & climate change (long) - Mike SherrellTake your
head out of the sand.
Mike Sherrell -----Original Message-----
From: ridecamp-owner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ridecamp-owner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Gary Fend Sent: Tuesday, April 11, 2006 2:30 PM To: jlong@xxxxxxxx; Elkenchild@xxxxxxx Cc: dotwgns@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; PNER@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; JAppleg597@xxxxxxx; Marjaliisa04@xxxxxxx; RUUSUVUORI@xxxxxxx Subject: Re: [RC] Fw: geology & climate change (long) Found an interesting editorial on Drudge yesterday. It came from
telegraph.co.uk.. Here it is:
For many years now, human-caused climate change has been viewed
as a large and urgent problem. In truth, however, the biggest part of the
problem is neither environmental nor scientific, but a self-created political
fiasco. Consider the simple fact, drawn from the official temperature records of
the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, that for the years
1998-2005 global average temperature did not increase (there was actually a
slight decrease, though not at a rate that differs significantly from zero).
Yes, you did read that right. And also, yes, this eight-year
period of temperature stasis did coincide with society's continued power station
and SUV-inspired pumping of yet more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
In response to these facts, a global warming devotee will
chuckle and say "how silly to judge climate change over such a short period".
Yet in the next breath, the same person will assure you that the 28-year-long
period of warming which occurred between 1970 and 1998 constitutes a dangerous
(and man-made) warming. Tosh. Our devotee will also pass by the curious
additional facts that a period of similar warming occurred between 1918 and
1940, well prior to the greatest phase of world industrialisation, and that
cooling occurred between 1940 and 1965, at precisely the time that human
emissions were increasing at their greatest rate.
Does something not strike you as odd here? That industrial
carbon dioxide is not the primary cause of earth's recent decadal-scale
temperature changes doesn't seem at all odd to many thousands of independent
scientists. They have long appreciated - ever since the early 1990s, when the
global warming bandwagon first started to roll behind the gravy train of the UN
Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - that such short-term climate
fluctuations are chiefly of natural origin. Yet the public appears to be largely
convinced otherwise. How is this possible?
Since the early 1990s, the columns of many leading newspapers
and magazines, worldwide, have carried an increasing stream of alarmist letters
and articles on hypothetical, human-caused climate change. Each such alarmist
article is larded with words such as "if", "might", "could", "probably",
"perhaps", "expected", "projected" or "modelled" - and many involve such deep
dreaming, or ignorance of scientific facts and principles, that they are akin to
nonsense.
The problem here is not that of climate change per se, but
rather that of the sophisticated scientific brainwashing that has been inflicted
on the public, bureaucrats and politicians alike. Governments generally choose
not to receive policy advice on climate from independent scientists. Rather,
they seek guidance from their own self-interested science bureaucracies and
senior advisers, or from the IPCC itself. No matter how accurate it may be,
cautious and politically non-correct science advice is not welcomed in
Westminster, and nor is it widely reported.
Marketed under the imprimatur of the IPCC, the
bladder-trembling and now infamous hockey-stick diagram that shows accelerating
warming during the 20th century - a statistical construct by scientist Michael
Mann and co-workers from mostly tree ring records - has been a seminal image of
the climate scaremongering campaign. Thanks to the work of a Canadian
statistician, Stephen McIntyre, and others, this graph is now known to be deeply
flawed.
There are other reasons, too, why the public hears so little in
detail from those scientists who approach climate change issues rationally, the
so-called climate sceptics. Most are to do with intimidation against speaking
out, which operates intensely on several parallel fronts.
First, most government scientists are gagged from making public
comment on contentious issues, their employing organisations instead making use
of public relations experts to craft carefully tailored, frisbee-science press
releases. Second, scientists are under intense pressure to conform with the
prevailing paradigm of climate alarmism if they wish to receive funding for
their research. Third, members of the Establishment have spoken declamatory
words on the issue, and the kingdom's subjects are expected to listen.
On the alarmist campaign trail, the UK's Chief Scientific
Adviser, Sir David King, is thus reported as saying that global warming is so
bad that Antarctica is likely to be the world's only habitable continent by the
end of this century. Warming devotee and former Chairman of Shell, Lord [Ron]
Oxburgh, reportedly agrees with another rash statement of King's, that climate
change is a bigger threat than terrorism. And goodly Archbishop Rowan Williams,
who self-evidently understands little about the science, has warned of
"millions, billions" of deaths as a result of global warming and threatened Mr
Blair with the wrath of the climate God unless he acts. By betraying the
public's trust in their positions of influence, so do the great and good become
the small and silly.
Two simple graphs provide needed context, and exemplify the
dynamic, fluctuating nature of climate change. The first is a temperature curve
for the last six million years, which shows a three-million year period when it
was several degrees warmer than today, followed by a three-million year cooling
trend which was accompanied by an increase in the magnitude of the pervasive,
higher frequency, cold and warm climate cycles. During the last three such warm
(interglacial) periods, temperatures at high latitudes were as much as 5 degrees
warmer than today's. The second graph shows the average global temperature over
the last eight years, which has proved to be a period of stasis.
The essence of the issue is this. Climate changes naturally all
the time, partly in predictable cycles, and partly in unpredictable shorter
rhythms and rapid episodic shifts, some of the causes of which remain unknown.
We are fortunate that our modern societies have developed during the last 10,000
years of benignly warm, interglacial climate. But for more than 90 per cent of
the last two million years, the climate has been colder, and generally much
colder, than today. The reality of the climate record is that a sudden natural
cooling is far more to be feared, and will do infinitely more social and
economic damage, than the late 20th century phase of gentle warming.
The British Government urgently needs to recast the sources
from which it draws its climate advice. The shrill alarmism of its public
advisers, and the often eco-fundamentalist policy initiatives that bubble up
from the depths of the Civil Service, have all long since been detached from
science reality. Intern-ationally, the IPCC is a deeply flawed organisation, as
acknowledged in a recent House of Lords report, and the Kyoto Protocol has
proved a costly flop. Clearly, the wrong horses have been backed.
As mooted recently by Tony Blair, perhaps the time has come for
Britain to join instead the new Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development
and Climate (AP6), whose six member countries are committed to the development
of new technologies to improve environmental outcomes. There, at least, some
real solutions are likely to emerge for improving energy efficiency and reducing
pollution.
Informal discussions have already begun about a new AP6 audit
body, designed to vet rigorously the science advice that the Partnership
receives, including from the IPCC. Can Britain afford not to be there?
* Prof Bob Carter is a geologist at James Cook University,
Queensland, engaged in paleoclimate research
Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of
Telegraph Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without
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Joe Long <jlong@xxxxxxxx> wrote: On Tue, 11 Apr 2006 12:13:52 EDT, Elkenchild@xxxxxxx wrote:
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