The "Latest" Global Warming Denial Drivel
Sometimes I look with considerable interest at the global warming deniers because I think, for a brief moment, they may have found something of importance to say. So far, though, I always find that they are as dazed and confused as ever. This is the case with the recent salvo from self-proclaimed "rocket scientist" David Evans. David Evans claims expertise on global warming because of two things: his being a "rocket scientist" and his having previously done "carbon accounting" for the Australian government. Now ANYTIME someone tells you they are a "rocket scientist" it should be a red flag to you. I have never met anyone, including people who work for NASA, to identify themselves professionally as a "rocket scientist." Turns out Evans has a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and has not published a single peer-reviewed research paper on the subject of climate change. In fact he has published only a singlepaper in his entire career, and that was back in 1987 and had nothing to do with global warming. THis puts him on par with me vis a vis global warming: educated, smart and probably informed. I don't claim to be an expert in the field. Instead I cite experts in the field to support my claims. Evans himself claims to be an expert in the field despite having no real experience in climate change research.
Evans also claims to be a recent convert to denial, yet he is associated with an Australian global warming denial group (founded my a mining company executive) called the Lavoisier Group. Australian economist John Quiggin once commented that the Lavoisier Group is "devoted to the proposition that basic principles of physics...cease to apply when they come into conflict with the interests of the Australian coal industry." So take this mining industry connection into account when considering Evans' comments.
Look. They guy is probably smart. But engineering and bean-counting for the Australian government does NOT make you either a rocket scientist OR a climate expert.
But, he may still have a good understanding of the topic and merely be overstating his credentials. Hell, in my book, if he gets the science right then he is worth listening to even if he is being a tad untruthful about his qualifications.
Sadly, I quickly found his presentation of the science to be largely wrong. I was helped in blowing holes in his arguements by my wife (a climate sceintist at Columbia University) and this article on ScienceBlogs by Tim Lambert, a computer scientist at the University of New South Wales and hence somone with far more expertise than either David Evans or myself on computer modeling of climate. I am also trying to talk to people over at RealClimate.org, a forum for climate scientists for climate scientists, but have yet to hear back. But Tim Lambert's article essentially shows the actual data that soundly debunks Evans' claims.
Evans makes four points.
1 The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics.
He makes an unsupported statement here that is the basis of this first point and probably the second point. Claiming that there is one definitive "signature" to look at is a big leap and any real scientist would give actual data for this. Specifically, anthropogenic global warming does NOT require the formation of "a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics" according to my wife. She would be very interested in Evans' evidence for this, but you might notice he asserts it unsupported. That is unscientific. But what is interesting is Evans' claim for "a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics" being the identifying characteristic of carbon dioxide-caused global warming is completely untrue. Tim Lambert's article shows two graphs, one based on models where carbon dioxide doubles and one based on models where solar output increases. Both show a hot spot. In reality, the defining feature of the carbon dioxide based model is stratospheric cooling. The hot spot is not the defining feature of carbon dioxide based models...stratospheric cooling is. And we have indeed detected stratospheric cooling, thus SUPPORTING the anthropogenic global warming model. In fact that stratospheric cooling for awhile masked ANOTHER prediction of the anthropogenic global warming models. The current models predict that surface warming would be accompanied by tropospheric warming. Satellite data (as I mention above) originially did not detect such a tropospheric warming. This was used by deniers as evidence against global warming, and was, in my mind, reasonable evidence. However, a couple of years ago this issue was resolved. The satellite data combined measurements from the stratosphere and troposphere in a way that was not at first appreciated, if I understand correctly. The new info came when these were separated. What was found was tropospheric warming AND stratospheric cooling, which are predictions of the current global warming models based on anthropogenic CO2 release. This is the kind of thing I mean when I say the predictions based on the anthropogenic global warming models are proving correct. Something as complex as surface warming, stratospheric cooling and tropospheric warming, have come true. By conrast the models based on increased solar output do NOT predict stratospheric cooling, so are less acurate. Evans was either showing his ignorance (being an engineer and bean-counter, not an actual climate scientist) or being outright dishonest here.
As to that hot spot (which is a more general prediction of global warming, not just carbon dioxide based global warming) this is discussed in the comments to Lambert's article: (comment by Joel Shore)
By the way, the hot spot in the upper atmosphere of the tropics is a basic result of moist adiabatic lapse rate theory, as Santer et al., [Editor's Note: See, Evans...this is what is called a citiation. Real scientists use them when arguing a point] pointed out. This is basically just a statement that when a parcel of air traveling upward in the atmosphere is saturated with water vapor, the warmer the air is to start with, the less rapidly its temperature drops as it rises through the atmosphere (because as the air expands and cools, the water vapor condenses out releasing latent heat warming the air...and more water vapor has to condense out for the warmer air than for the colder air). Because the warmer air cools more slowly, the difference in temperature gets magnified as you go up in the troposphere.
The Santer et al. paper showed that this expected magnification is in fact seen in the data for temperature fluctuations on monthly to yearly timescales. So, the observations on those timescales actually verify the model physics. It is only when one looks at the multidecadal trends in the data that one doesn't see the expected magnification (at least in some of the data sets). So, if there is any new physics coming in to mess up the agreement between models and observations, it has to come in on very long timescales...which seems rather difficult to imagine, since the convective processes that seem to be controlling the physics happen on much shorter timescales. (As a concrete example, the recent paper by Spencer et al. that purported to find some sort of negative feedback in the tropics was looking at timescales of days...so this mechanism can pretty much be immediately ruled out as a solution to such a discrepancy.)
Emphasis and Editor's Note mine.
Now turning to Evans' second point.
2 There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.
This is a bit silly. Or, as Lambert puts it, "outright denial." I always assert that the physics behind how any particular gas affects the absorption of heat and affects the greenhouse effect is pretty well worked out. We know that if you put more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere you WILL get warming. We have put more carbon into the atmosphere and we have seen a warming trend that matches the curve of increased CO2 very nicely. There is no other source of CO2 or methane or anything that has changed over the same time period with the same dynamics. But CO2 and warming match very well and we know the CO2 we are putting into the air. Occam's razor (NOT a scientific principle, mind you, but a convenient tool) suggests we explore the CO2 warming idea first.
Lambert, being a computer guy, goes to a comparison of warming models with and without anthropogenic factors. The blue bands on each graph show temperature changes modelled using only natural effects, while the pink bands include anthropogenic effects (the carbon dioxide we have put into the atmosphere). The black line shows actual observations (the raw data that scientists have to pay attention to). The observations fit the model where anthropogenic carbon dioxide is a factor.
This is very clear from this figure. And it is in line with the prediction from pure physics that if you pump more carbon dioxide into the air you WILL get warming. And it directly contradicts Evans' second point. Again, is this ignorance because Evans isn't an engineer and bean-counter, not a scientist, or is Evans deliberately dishonest here?
On to Evans' third point. Here he has several components, all of which are based on the criticism that the anthropogenic global warming models only use incomplete data to make their point. Again, this is demonstrably not true.
He first claims that anthropogenic global warming is based mostly on surface data and this is "corrupted" by the urban heat island effect, which is where the city itself for various reasons creates an "island" of warmth. My wife laughed at this. Simply put the "urban heat island" thing is a red herring. Climatologists have been well aware of this and have taken it into account for years now. Even I know this, so Evans certainly should. The surface measurements are NOT corrupted by the heat islands. They are corrected for it.
Then Evans makes the old arguement that satellite data doesn't support global warming. That went out the window when the stratospheric and tropospheric measurements could be properly separated, as I outline above. Since then the tropospheric and ground measurements agree well, with stratospheric cooling indicating that the warming is due to carbon dioxide.
Finally, Evans' claim that the anthropogenic global warming theory doesn't include ocean measurements is also untrue, as shown by Lambert. He points out the title of this well known NASA temperature graph:
What part of "Land-ocean" index suggests to Evans that the data only looks at land based measurements? Again, is Evans unaware of the current data or is he deliberately misleading? Onto Evans' fourth point:
4 The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect.
My wife really laughed at this claim. No one...NO ONE claims to be able to use ice core data to pinpoint cause and effect within an 800 year time frame. Current warming of course is not judged by ice core measurements, but the half a million year record that provides context does depend on ice cores. Ice core data is not precise enough to make the claim Evans does about cause and effect. No one can say anything about which is cause and which is effect from ice cores, so his fourth point is completely invalid. Evans' claim is further refuted here. He is probably just looking at a graph without taking into account the statistical error, so he is assuming a precision of the timing of events that is misleading him. I guess that is the kind of error an engineer or accountant might make, but not a scientist.
Overall this Evans crap is no more convincing than that dumb denial "documentary" The Global Warming Swindle. I had actually hoped for better. Science is advanced by discussing and exploring alternate hypotheses. But this can only be done using an honest approach to the data. In every single case I have observed the denial lobby does not do this. Evans is one more example of that.
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Hang on a minute
Submitted by Steve (not verified) on 2 November 2008 - 10:21pm.
I think the point Dr Evans was making was about the fallability of the current computer model projections (I and the IPCC say projections not predictions). The computer model projections for CO2 climate change have a specific "fingerprint" as described here: http://joannenova.com.au/2008/10/26/the-missing-hotspot/. Which, as you say, have stratospheric cooling but also have the tropospheric warming in the tropics.
The point is the current observations don't match the model predictions. Therefore there must be some error either in the observations or in the computer models. The computer models that have a high CO2 sensitivity that is.
Also the only evidence I have seen so far that CO2 is the most likely cause of the warming that has happened in the latter part of the 20th centuary is that the IPCC can't think of any other natural process that could have caused it. Which, to me, is the same argument that used to be used in favour of Intelligent Desgin before Darwin's theory of evolution. Which basically boiled down to:
Life is so complex, I can't think of anything other than intelligent deisgn that could have created it, therefore it must be intelligent design.
The evidence you show in favour of the IPCC's assumption is based purely around their computer models.
The "evidence" usually runs this way:
ASSUME C02 has a large radiative forcing,
ASSUME other natural forcings are weak,
ASSUME that there is a large aerosol effect to counteract warming that should have already happened due to CO2.
Tune the parameters until they fit the observed temperature (we can do this as we have degrees of freedom). Then remove the ASSUMED athropogenic effects, leaving only natural warming effects. The graph no longer matches... Voila we have proved that the warming must be man made. The only problem is we have proved our assumption using our assumption. This is just circular logic and the same "proof" would worked if we substituted some natural forcing in place of the CO2.
Wrong, of course
Submitted by mole333 on 3 November 2008 - 7:51am.
Anyone, like you, who believes they know more than those actually studying the subject usually wind up being wrong.
As to the tropical hot spot, I addressed that. Let me repeat the quote I have above addressing that:
By the way, the hot spot in the upper atmosphere of the tropics is a basic result of moist adiabatic lapse rate theory, as Santer et al., [Editor's Note: See, Evans...this is what is called a citiation. Real scientists use them when arguing a point] pointed out. This is basically just a statement that when a parcel of air traveling upward in the atmosphere is saturated with water vapor, the warmer the air is to start with, the less rapidly its temperature drops as it rises through the atmosphere (because as the air expands and cools, the water vapor condenses out releasing latent heat warming the air...and more water vapor has to condense out for the warmer air than for the colder air). Because the warmer air cools more slowly, the difference in temperature gets magnified as you go up in the troposphere.
The Santer et al. paper showed that this expected magnification is in fact seen in the data for temperature fluctuations on monthly to yearly timescales. So, the observations on those timescales actually verify the model physics. It is only when one looks at the multidecadal trends in the data that one doesn't see the expected magnification (at least in some of the data sets). So, if there is any new physics coming in to mess up the agreement between models and observations, it has to come in on very long timescales...which seems rather difficult to imagine, since the convective processes that seem to be controlling the physics happen on much shorter timescales. (As a concrete example, the recent paper by Spencer et al. that purported to find some sort of negative feedback in the tropics was looking at timescales of days...so this mechanism can pretty much be immediately ruled out as a solution to such a discrepancy.)
As to the evidence that CO2 is causing it, you are leaving out basic physics. Basic physics predicts that adding more CO2 will raise global temperature. This is, of course, supported by atmospheric science comparing Venus, Earth and Mars. Humans have been adding unprecedented amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. Temperatures rise, precisely as physics predicts. To be sure, scientists test other reasonable hypotheses and NONE of them can account for the current warming. Furthermore, there is that stratospheric cooling which is a prediction of CO2 based global warming, not other hypotheses. And that stratosphereic cooling, a prediction of CO2 based global warming, is there. So you have basic physics, the finding of the real signature of CO2 caused warming being found, AND the inability of any other hypothesis to account for what we are seeing. In science that is called a pretty well supported theory, much like the Theory of Evolution.
Agree to Disagree
Submitted by Steve (not verified) on 4 November 2008 - 1:25am.
No doubt ... There are far more intelligent people than me working on this. I'm just not convinced of the science yet, it may be right it may not, but to me the evidence is not conclusive.
I don't disagree that CO2 causes warming but I do to the extent that it has caused warming in the latter part of the 20th Century. I would say it's < 0.1 degrees of the 0.6 up until 2007. The IPCC doesn't claim that CO2 caused the warming of the early part of the 20th Century and have not, as yet, given a definitive reason for it. I think the climate model are far too sensitive to CO2 (actually the theoretical feedback effects of CO2 creating more water vapour not the direct warming effects of CO2 on its own). They currently have no evidence to suggest that CO2 should be the driver of climate change except that they can create computer models with highly sensitive CO2 forcing which can model short term past temperature. I think the point needs to be made here that there is a difference between being able to create a simulation that agrees with the past to one that is actually accurate and can predict future climate.
You say "To be sure, scientists test other reasonable hypotheses and NONE of them can account for the current warming". Therefore CO2 wins by default?!?
That was my point, they provide proof by eliminating options they can think of but what about climate theories that they haven't thought of? And to be honest I don't think the IPCC has seriously investigated the potential of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation I would argue this is actually a much greater forcer of the world's temperature as can be seen by it's switch in 2008 which has lowered temperatures recently and will continue to do so for the next 30 years.
I also disagree that ONLY stratospheric cooling is what the models predict. If you look at the IPCC AR4 Working Group 1 Section 9.2.1 graph f) they give a picture of the what they would expect the sum total of all warming/cooling effects (solar forcing, CO2, volcanoes, ozone, aerosols etc.) should look like weighted by their assumed forcings. Graph c) is the CO2 signature, fingerprint call it what you will. It includes the stratospheric cooling AND the tropical troposphere hot spot. The problem is that observations don't match the theoretical output. Therefore EITHER their expected warming pattern for CO2 is wrong OR the observations are wrong OR the theory is wrong. I don't see any other option. I don't see how you can ignore part of their expected signature and still claim the signature is valid.
Look I'm not against developing renewable technology I just don't think we should be afraid of CO2.
Read my whole comment
Submitted by mole333 on 4 November 2008 - 7:52am.
No I did not say CO2 wins by default. It wins because it fits the physics, it is the elephant in the room that has been reaching unprecedented amounts (nothing else has changed by that much), and it wins because stratospheric cooling is the unique prediction of CO2 caused warming (other predictions are shared by other forms of cooling). The tropical hot spot is predicted by other models of warming as well and, as I pointed out in my comment, really is there over the time spans expected, though it smooths out at longer time spans. The quote I gave was from a scientist in the field. There is a tropical hot spot, it just tends to get, if I understand it correctly, hidden in the noise over long time spans. And, again, it is NOT the thing that distinguishes different causes of warming since it is a feature of other hypothetical causes as well. It is the stratospheric cooling that is unique to CO2 caused warming. So its existence is not explainable by other causes.
Some things I am happy to agree to disagree. But science doesn't work that way. I know because I am a scientist. Now I will emphasize that I am not a climate scientist, but I am a scientist so I know the scientific method and I have been following the literature for some 15 or more years. I also happen to be married to a climate scientist. Anthropogenic climate change is not a controversial theory among scientists. Some ASPECTS are--like the breakdown of the North Atlantic current and a localized ice age in that region which Hollywood made so well known but is really not well accepted by scientists. I used to consider the concept of tipping points controversial, but there are several possible tipping points that really do seem real (e.g. the release of stored methane, another greenhouse gas, from the permafrost which is now, for the first time since humans evovled, melting).
You can read more at Scientists and Engineers for America, at the Union of Concerned Scientists, and at Real Climate (the site where the actual climate scientists go to discuss things). There really is a scientific consensus based on the overwhelming data. I know. I talk to the actual scientists.
Right...
Submitted by Steve (not verified) on 6 November 2008 - 7:05am.
Hey mole333,
Obviously you are passionate about this and I can respect that. I used to feel the same way you did; until a couple of years ago when I started researching it more thoroughly.
The reason I feel so strongly about this is because I feel like I and many others have been manipulated by the IPCC. There are many good "green" initiatives out there but I feel they are being swamped by this issue because it's deemed most important. What if they're wrong and we've wasted all this money we could have used in, say, ensuring the survival of those gentle giants the Mountain Gorillas or help in develop Africa so that we can raise their standard of living. 50 Billion US dollars have been spent so far on the IPCC.
I know I can't "convince" you (which is why I said to agree to disagree) but I still think it's important to question the science, always, the debate should never be over. The science should stand up to rigor otherwise the theory is worthless.
So I would like to make some further points...
1. CO2 potentially fits the physics (if you assume it has a larger effect then seems plausible and only in the last 30 odd years) but that is not a proof and what about other possible theories? The IPCC doesn't seem to have much motivation to look into the others. You also make the claim that in the ice cores you can't make a determination that CO2 lags temperature by 800 years. Aren't you being a little disingenuous here? No one's claiming exactly 800 years all the time. However I would say you CAN show from the ice cores that CO2 lags temperature. If you assume that there are statistical errors in the data then shouldn't those errors be random and there should be no real correlation like we see. Otherwise you're assuming an offset error but I have not heard of any evidence to support that. Further there are periods in the Vostok ice core where temperature is falling while CO2 is still increasing, indicating to me that CO2 can't be the temperature driver.
2. What caused the temperature rise during the mid-holocene warm period (a period that was warmer than today) and specifically what was the cause of temperature increase from 1880 to 1940? The IPCC does not claim it is CO2. Also CO2 was increasing rapidly from 1940 to 1970s, even while the world was cooling. So we have both a positive and negative correlation between CO2 and temperature, it's not all one way.
3. The IPCC claims that ozone depletion could also cause stratospheric cooling so CO2 is not the only potential candidate and for the warming why couldn't you couple ozone depletion with changes in Pacific Decadal Oscillation, changes in sun activity and changes in cosmic ray flux (which would change cloud albedo). Couldn't that also be a explanation for the observed signature.
4. As a scientist you should agree that scientific consensus does not = fact. Otherwise we would still believe that the Earth is the center of the universe (c.f. Galileo vs Ptolemy) or that the planet's orbits were perfectly circular (c.f. Copernicus). Further there are many scientists that don't agree with the "consensus" what ever the consensus is supposed to be. People like Dr Richard Lindzen, Dr Roy Spencer, Dr John Christy, Dr Tim Ball or many of the scientists who singed petitions against the IPCC's findings. There are also scientists who left the IPCC in disgust over it's political interference in the science eg. Dr Chris Landsea.
5. How do you explain the infamous "Hockey Stick Graph" by Mann. et. al. It was included in the IPCC's Third assessment report and was used as "proof" that the current warming was man made. It was heavily criticized by the scientific community and subsequently removed in the AR4. Why wasn't it checked more thoroughly before it's inclusion and subsequent trumpeting as evidence? It seems to me the IPCC has an agenda to make the facts fit the theory rather than the other way around. There also seem to be an atmosphere of fear in the scientific community that if they speak out they will become targets. That's not the scientific way.
6. In terms of tipping points we could almost argue using the Anthropic principle that they almost certainly don't exist. If they did surely in times when we had 3x as much CO2 as now or 10x as much CO2 as now those tipping points would have been reached and these theoretical runaway scenarios would have acted out. Further the tipping points make little sense from the physical point of view as doubling the amount CO2 does not double it's theoretical radiative forcing. It's logarithmic in it's effects. In reality CO2 is most likely warming the planet as much as it is able to at the moment. The first 20 ppm of carbon dioxide has a greater temperature effect than the next 400 ppm.
Sincerely
Steve
Yeah...right
Submitted by mole333 on 6 November 2008 - 8:06am.
You have some factual errors here.
1. NO you can NOT tell on the time scales claimed that warming lags CO2 or CO2 lags warming. YOU are being disingenious. As my wife says, you cannot compare the relative rates based on paleodata. The error (scientists have to pay attention to this stuff) is too great in the paleo data. What you CAN do is show that they warming and CO2 rises always closely correlate, providing evidence right there for what physics tells us.
2. pre-1940 warming: there are two phases to this if you look at the data. First phase is relatively slow and minor. This early phase (pre-industrial revolution) is controversial. It is just on the edge of what can be explained in the models by natural factors, but it also correlates with an increase in deforestation, which will affect climate. But you don't even mention that phase.
The phase you mention correlates precisely with the industrial revolution. In other words, the period when humans STARTED pouring CO2 in the air. The rate is still not what it is today but in both cases the rate of CO2 increase correlates with the rate of warming and as the former increases the latter increases. As a scientist that kind of correlation is generally taken seriously. Add element A to a system, see effect B. Add more of A, see more of B. That is evidence. I think you might want to read up on the industrial revolution before claiming things about the 1880-1940 warming.
All scientists agree that radiation changes from the sun during the 1940's - 1970's period caused cooling (remember that is one of the other factors) and that based on those changes in solar output cooling should have been far more dramatic. In essence, you seem to feel climate is either all human or all natural. Of course, as any scientist will tell you, both happen. In this case a clear cause of the cooling is seen and a clear cause of the warming and when both are taken into account the actual temperature change is what would be expected. Please, read up on this stuff before making claims that already have been addressed. I even gave you links, including to one which is a forum where you can ask the actual scientists these kinds of questions. Instead you continue to argue based on outdated information or based on incomplete information.
3. I am less familiar with this than the rest so I will say I don't know what the relative contributions would be or whether the timing of the ozone depletion (which has a different time scale than CO2 increase) fits the timing of the cooling. What I can say is that the scientists studying these phenomena believe it is a fingerprint of CO2 based warming and they are well aware of ozone depletion (having predicted THAT as well against the same kind of blind denial you are showing now).
4. As a scientist I know that a consensus BASED ON MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF DATA and argued over for decades pretty much gives you a Theory that is fundamentally true. Usually, as in the case of the theories of evolution and gravity, modification is required as more data comes in, but the basic theory remains intact. And how do you explain that although there are hundreds of peer reviewed papers supporting anthropogenic global warming, there is NOT ONE SINGLE PAPER that has ever been published in a peer reviewed journal opposing it? As a scientist that tells me a great deal. NO ONE has been able to shoot a hole in the anthropogenic global warming theory in all the decades it has been argued. Which brings me to one point you make in your next talking point: climate of fear among scientists regarding dissent. This is absurd. The Bush administration and Republicans in Congress like Barton from Texas have put enormous pressure on climate researchers to oppose anthropogenic global warming. THEIR FUNDING has been repeatedly threatened and funding for global warming research has been cut. The government along with the petrofuel industry has EAGERLY funded anyone who gives even a squeak of dissent, and yet dispite this Republican interference into science, NOT ONE PUBLISHED PAPER in a peer reviewed journal (the gold standard in science) has ever come out opposing the basics of anthropogenic global warming. Details have been argued (as I pointed out elsewhere). But the basics that you are yammering about are not controversial in the slightest when you talk to scientists. DESPITE pressure from the Bush Administration and the Blind Denial Lobby funded by coal and oil industries.
5. I have no idea where you are claiming the Hockey Stick is in any way discredited or controversial. All I can say here is you are flat out wrong. The scientific community has tested it, tweaked it, analyzed it, argued about it...and to this very day agree that it is an acurate representation of the data. According to my wife and her co-workers, the Hockey Stick is still solidly accepted based on reams and reams of data and decades of study. So your claim here seems about as absurd as saying the anomalous orbit of Mercury (which led to Enstein's theories of gravity) is "infamous" and has been dropped.
6. Ummm...read up on Venus. Far higher CO2 and far higher global warming effect. Plus among the tipping points I mentioned was the release of methane...a DIFFERENT, even more potent global warming gas. Again, though as I said before the idea of tipping points is an aspect of this that remains controversial and which I have been skeptical of, your particular statement makes no sense. It is well known that higher levels of CO2 will continue to add to warming. Saturation will eventually happen...but that would happen only at levels and temperatures far beyond what is possible to sustain life and no one is suggesting that anthropogenic global warming will turn Earth into Venus. So, again, you seem to be arguing based on false or misconstrued information.
GET YOURSELF EDUCATED before you speak out. This has nothing to do with passion. This has to do with DATA and SCIENCE. You are arguing right wing, oil/coal industry talking points that often are just not true. The data is ample, well studied and not controversial: human generated CO2 is causing a large chunk of current warming and scientists believe we have to act or our economy will suffer greatly. That is not controversial and really hasn't been for about 10 years. Even Bush and McCain admit that! Why you are 10 years behind the curve, I don't know.
Latest Global Warming Denial Drivel
David Evans was spared. You let him off, fool! You should have Given him the coup de grace with the hockey stick graph!