I am not a climate scientist. I studied history, economics, and Latin in college. I dabbled a bit with political science and creative writing but never took a class even remotely related to climate science. Despite all that, I hold that the "climate crisis" is a hoax. Here are some interesting points:
1. When I was 10, the earth was heading toward an Ice Age. As a family, we would watch 'In Search of' hosted by Spock. I liked it because it had Spock. This episode provided a dark glimpse of what the world might be like in a single lifetime. If the scientists were wrong here, why are they right now?
2. 1816: The Year Without a Summer. In the wake of the 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, so much debris was thrown into the atmosphere that the following year saw mass starvation from failing crops. New England had severe frosts every month of summer. Despite decades of pollution, humanity has been unable to duplicate the Year Without a Summer.
3. The Medieval Warm Period (950 to 1250) saw temperatures roughly equivalent to today. The Vikings found Greenland to be habitable and transplanted their agricultural and pastoral lifestyle there for several centuries. By 1400, the Greenland settlements were nearly gone and vanished soon thereafter because of the increasing cold. Clearly, this warming was not anthropogenic. Why is the current warming trend different from the Medieval Warm Period?
4. The Earth is currently in an ice age that began 2.6 million years ago. An ice age is geologically defined as the presence of extensive ice sheets in the northern and southern hemispheres. Because the ice sheets/glaciers have retreated for several millennia, the earth is experiencing an interglacial period. This 10,000 year warming is not anthropogenic. Why is the current - comparatively insignificant - warming different from that trend?
5. During the Mesozoic Era (252 million to 66 million years ago), the earth was 10 degrees Celsius warmer than it is today. There were no ice caps at the poles. This was not anthropogenic. Was 2016 hotter than an average year in the Mesozoic? If not, is it really the Hottest Year Ever?
The earth has been much warmer and much colder than today. The climate experienced these huge swings with no input from humans. These variations have developed over millions of years. Though these points may provide the layman some reason to doubt the ongoing panic about climate change, that isn't a reason to call it a hoax!
Like all living things, government wants to grow and prosper. Studies that 'prove' that climate change is anthropogenic provide cover for government to expand its power and reach. Taxes on pollution, regulations to make sure cars get more miles to the gallon, laws to make washing machines more energy efficient, and so on and so forth. There is so much that government can do, provided there is a basis for it. Thus, scientists who find that humanity is to blame and the problem could be solved by government intervention are handsomely funded. Scientists who conclude that it is the sun - which governments have no legislative authority to control - are not funded. Anthropogenic warming = funding. Natural climate cycles = no funding. Scientists are smart people and see the pattern.
2 comments:
1. "In Search Of" also featured aliens, mummies, ghosts, Nessie and other similar monsters, Atlantis, ESP, reincarnation, and haunted houses/castles. It might not be out of place to suggest it was popular entertainment, and has precious little to do with any scientific argument.
2. So the particulate pollution we produce isn't enough to match a large volcano. I will have to admit the truth of that point. I also have to admit I'm somewhat perplexed what that fact has to do with the completely different subject of a carbon dioxide based warming trend.
3. "Clearly, this warming was not anthropogenic. Why is the current warming trend different from the Medieval Warm Period?" How handy - you placed the answer just before the question.
4: "This 10,000 year warming is not anthropogenic. Why is the current - comparatively insignificant - warming different from that trend?" How handy - you placed the answer just before the question. Also, the "comparatively insignificant" is a big clue: the insignificance you mention is (I assume) the short time frame over which this has happened. You see, that's a big part of what makes it significant.
5: "This was not anthropogenic." You know, it's getting to be a trend that you're wondering why warming trends that weren't anthropogenic are different from the one that is. "Was 2016 hotter than an average year in the Mesozoic? If not, is it really the Hottest Year Ever?" OK, you get this one - it's not the hottest year ever. I imagine it was also hotter when the debris that became the Earth hadn't yet been ejected from the Sun. So I'll allow that the headlines engaged in a bit of hyperbole.
"The earth has been much warmer and much colder than today." True, and some kind of life has managed to survive. OK, there have been major die-offs accompanying these changes, but life is life and will survive. I suppose we need not be too sentimental about the fate of any given species. And the difference between changes that take place of millennia and those that take place over decades (and are increasing) surely won't amount to much.
But that's all just the lead-up, isn't it? Now we get to the meat of the matter...
"Anthropogenic warming = funding. Natural climate cycles = no funding." There you have it. It's all just a ruse to make sure those science dollars keep flowing! It's not a case of numerous follow-up work building upon and confirming the models that have been developed over the last century and a few cranks that maintain that the majority's data should be ignored. No, it's just the smell of sweet, sweet funding dollars. Never mind that those few cranks who stick around enough to let people call the science "unsettled" and "controversial" are also funded. Never mind that the funding for most of those cranks comes from the oil industry. They're just the capitalist good guys fighting the socialist pro-regulation behemoth. I understand - I too have read Ayn Rand.
- Jamie
1. Yes, In Search of covered some kooky stuff, the Loch Ness Monster being the kookiest that I recall. I chose that particular example because I had a link to the video but the coming Ice Age reported in many reputable publications of the time as well. I offered some of those other links in this blog: http://hicsum-musings.blogspot.com/2016/01/the-coming-ice-age-er-global-warming-er.html
2. Yes, it is cooling instead of warming but the idea is the same. A volcano erupts and there is a year without summer. Decades of coal smoke from the Industrial Revolution could not equal it.
3. That was handy, wasn't it. Just trying to be helpful and to point the reader in the right direction. Of note, the Medieval Warm Period was followed by the Little Ice Age between 1300 and 1850. We happen to be in an upward trend, which is good. Imagine all the farmland that would become available in Siberia and Canada if it got warm enough.
4. Good point. Yes, if it took 10,000 years to warm by 20 Celsius and then it took 100 years to warm by 1 Celsius, that would be a sudden streak of warming. But variations by a degree might have been common through that period but we only have hyper accurate data for the last 100 years.
5. The point of the trend is that there has been warming just like this without human influence. That raises the bar for proof, especially since just emerged from the Little Ice Age. It does not help the case that Mars has seen recent warming, giving a big boost to those who argue solar activity is the culprit.
I have little faith in government and thus distrust anything that proposes government needs more authority. In the late 19th and early 20th century, governments around the world jumped on the new academic discipline of eugenics. Governments - not private businesses - began passing laws to sterilize the unworthy. Hitler gave it a bad name and now the widespread eugenics policies are virtually unknown. Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, was a proponent of eugenics.
Government is like fire. As long as it is contained in the hearth, it is helpful. Once it gets too big, it will burn down the house. Climate change is just the latest excuse to throw more fuel on the fire.
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