Don't Fret About Global Warming
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by Charley Reese http://www.lewrockwell.com
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Global warming means it will get hotter or colder, drier or wetter, stormier or calmer. One of the people at a recent conference on global warming made just such an asinine statement. Talk about covering your bases – if we have weather, it's because of global warming.
About the only fact in this global-warming brouhaha is that the planet has warmed up about 1 degree in the past century. Keep in mind that in the past the planet has gotten much warmer and much colder during times when humans were too few to make any difference. So-called greenhouse gases are not the only factor that can cause Earth to warm or cool. Volcanic eruptions can put enough particulate matter into the atmosphere to cause a cooling, and there are variations in the radiation from the sun.
Carbon dioxide is a natural component of the atmosphere. Animals breathe it out and plants "breathe" it in, a good example of a partnership, because while our respiration produces carbon dioxide, the photosynthesis of the plants absorbs carbon dioxide and produces oxygen, which we need.
The fact that there is carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in our atmosphere makes our planet livable. If they were absent, then at night the earth would lose all of its heat and temperatures would plummet. So some greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are good and necessary.
The global-warming dispute has arisen over the question of how much is good and how much is bad. Frankly, scientists don't know. All of the projected stuff you hear is based on computer models of the atmosphere, and the atmosphere is far too complex, with too many variables, to be reduced accurately to a computer spreadsheet. What you really have are the computers making guesses and the scientists making guesses based on the computers' guesses. And don't forget GIGO. Computers are not intelligent and cannot think. Garbage in, garbage out.
Be skeptical, too, when you read that some scientist studying an ice core can tell you what the planet's weather was 600,000 years ago. He is projecting beyond his evidence. His ice core can only tell him what was going on in that particular, small spot.
There are currently about 330 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. You might think of it as having $330 compared with $1 million. It doesn't seem to me like enough to cause trouble, but I'm no scientist, and even the scientists are in disagreement.
The unfortunate thing is that global warming – which is, after all, a theory – has taken on, like evolution, the characteristics of religious dogma. The true believers cast the doubters as heretics to be scoffed at and scorned. The nonbelievers suggest the believers are naïve, misguided or venal (after grants that only go to believers in global warming).
I personally don't care one way or the other. If the planet wants to get warmer, it's OK with me. It's OK with me, though slightly less OK, if the planet wants to get colder. As for hurricanes, droughts, floods, blizzards and such stuff, we have all that anyway, always have had them and presumably always will. As for projected catastrophes 100 years out based on guesses that are based on guesses, I couldn't care less.
My street smarts, which are the only kind I have, tell me that no one can predict next year, much less 100 years into the future. Sometimes meteorologists with all of their satellites cannot even accurately predict the weather for two days out.
I'm not worried about industrial production because the oil will run out and the industrial machine will slow down considerably. Of all the things a person can worry about, global warming should be close to the 100 mark on his list. And don't forget, of course, that regardless of climate change, we are all mortal and will eventually go to another place whether in rain or shine, heat or cold. God was good to us. He did not give us the job of saving or preserving the universe. Smart God. Most people have all they can handle dealing with their family and their own yard.
December 31, 2005
Charley Reese [send him mail] has been a journalist for 49 years.
© 2005 by King Features Syndicate, Inc.
Global Warming Was No Hoax in 2005
The atmosphere now holds more than one-third more carbon dioxide than it did before the time of the Industrial Revolution, the discovery of electricity, and the inventions of the internal combustion engine, the automobile and air flight, which are linked with global warming via the burning of fossil fuels which release billions of tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere every year.
The consumption of energy in the form of fossil fuel combustion is the largest single contributor to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions in the United States and the world.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported that 2005 was the second warmest year on record, making the first 5 years of this century the hottest 5-year period ever recorded. NASA's Goddard Institute projected that 2005 will surpass even the strong El Nino year 1998 as the hottest year globally since reliable global temperature records started being kept in 1880.
Warming has accelerated planet-wide and globally averaged temperatures are now increasing at a rate exceeding 0.3 degrees Fahrenheit per decade. "The observed rapid warming thus gives urgency to discussions about how to slow greenhouse gas emissions," the NASA researchers said.
The WMO reported that in the Arctic Sea, where average winter temperatures have risen as much as 7 degrees Fahrenheit over 50 years, the ice cap this summer was 20 percent smaller than the 1979-2004 average.
Oceanographers reported this month that the Atlantic Ocean currents that carry warm water to northern Europe have slowed, suggesting that freshwater from the melting northern ice caps and glaciers may be causing the slow down.
In Central and North America, catastrophic storms like Hurricanes Katrina and Stan took weather extremes to new levels in 2005. Hurricane Wilma was the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the region; hurricane Katrina the most destructive.
Eastern and south-eastern regions of Europe suffered both torrential rains and flooding, which also affected Bangladesh, China, New Zealand and Guyana in South America, among other areas.
In southern Africa, on the heels of four years of devastating drought, the average temperature from July 2004 to July 2005 was the warmest on record, more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit above the latest 40-year average,
In the southwest Pacific, rising seas are forcing hundreds of islanders to abandon vulnerable coastal homes for higher ground.
Ninety-seven per cent of Australia experienced above average temperatures in 2005. According to Australian National University climate change expert Will Steffen:
"It's a no-brainer if you're a scientist that if you put more of these (gases) in the atmosphere you're going to warm the surface.".
http://www.thesundaymail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,17590816%2...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051217/ap_on_sc/warming_impact
See also:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ClimateArchive/
http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/ClimateArchiveDiscussion
The Author
The author is a US "Libertarian" - a follower of an odd philosophy which glorifies selfishness over all other values - so of course he gets national syndication.
The author also appears to proudly proclaim out his ignorance of the science behind the subject (FYI - the ice core data does provide a global average temperature record through O2 isotope analysis) - He even repeats that typical stupid-scientifically illeterate american "just a theory" crap!. Well, the building he is sitting in stays up based only on various physical "theories"!
He also proudly proclaims his desire to not learn a thing about the topic.
What an idiot!
It would be nice to beleive we are not responsible, but...
The God that didn't give us the job of preserving the earth has no problems with making people kill their own children, wiping out entire cities and sending plagues. why should we trust him on this one Charley?
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