10 reasons to reject global warming
Nick van der Leek’s comment on my climate change column got me to thinking. He says that the facts in my column, on the apparent inaccuracy of, unaccountability for and secrecy about the source data used by the global warming lobby, are just “details”. He says mentioning it in the media constitutes mere pedantry. He believes that articles like mine, which don’t pretend the debate is over, “confuse people even more”.
Unless he was referring to the inadequacy of the prose itself, my readers may take offence at this insult to their intelligence. So should his own readers. After all, he once told them:
If bloggers are to add any value to the internet in the near to medium term, and make any impact on the media machine, we need more credible writers, prepared to be who they are, write what is worth caring about, and being willing to back what they say.
I’ll let you be the judge of my credibility, but I am who I am, I write about what I believe is worth caring about, and I’m willing to back what I say — not only as a blogger, but even more so as a columnist. Yet he argues that my column did not add any value, because “the most obvious just gets left behind”. I missed what is “self-evident”, namely a fairly arbitrary factoid, worth more for an opportunistic bet than for serious discussion, from which one should reach a broad conclusion that in turn permits one to lecture people on their habits. They “ought to” change them, my correspondent says.
I have no doubt that — in addition to smoking, about which he rightly lectured me already — my other habits are indeed slothful, dissolute and iniquitous. I have no doubt he knows how we all should live. I have only the deepest respect, and indeed awe, for the cosmic enlightenment of greens and cyclists. However, even if he were a bona fide saint — not that I’m saying he isn’t, you understand — telling the rest of us how to live borders on petty fascism. Even if he’s right that “human beings may be largely responsible for climate change”.
My real point, however, is simply that he’s wrong. I’ve made a list, and counted the ways. Here’s why I don’t believe in global warming.
- I’m not convinced that “global warming” is even happening any more. Au contraire, I’m convinced “climate change” is a trivial truism, warming and cooling periods are to be expected, and the most recent three-decade warming trend appears to have stopped a decade ago.
- Even if it is happening, I’m not convinced that it is a crisis. Au contraire, I’m convinced the environment has survived equally warm or warmer periods in the past, and that warming has brought mixed blessings, with both benefits to take advantage of and drawbacks to which we must adapt (and have done).
- Even if it is a crisis, I’m not convinced human activity contributes significantly to climate change. Au contraire, I’m fairly sure our own contribution, if any, is pretty small, and that the climate is a chaotic natural system over which we have little, if any, control.
- Even if it does, I’m not convinced the environment is so fragile that it cannot easily recover. Au contraire, I’m convinced the environment is a robust, stable system that can and does recover even from significant damage.
- Even if it can’t, I’m not convinced CO2 causes climate change. Au contraire, I’m somewhat confident that global warming in fact causes higher CO2 concentrations.
- Even if it does, I’m not convinced we’re able to make significant changes to our carbon output. Au contraire, I’m convinced — and Europe’s dismal failure on Kyoto has shown — that even with the best intentions and government enforcement we can make only small, woefully insufficient adjustments at the margins.
- Even if we can, I’m not convinced that it will have a significant effect on climate change. Au contraire, I’m convinced even a drastic reduction in our CO2 emissions won’t halt whatever global warming is occurring.
- Even if it does, I’m not convinced we can afford it. Au contraire, I strongly suspect that significant cuts in carbon output will come at too high a price, especially for the developing world, and be too much of a drag on prosperity growth, especially for the world’s poor.
- Even if we can, I’m not convinced that’s the best way to invest scarce resources. Au contraire, I’m convinced that there are dozens of more immediate problems we could prioritise, with lower costs, higher benefits, faster returns, and more certainty of success.
- Even if it is, I’m not convinced that telling people what they “ought to do” has any place in a free world, or that government’s place is to enforce these moral virtues by legislative force. Au contraire, I’m convinced that’s fascism.
You’ll notice that each of these depends on accepting the previous point, and accepting the orthodox view on global warming requires that one accepts them all. Yet they’re all uncertain to some degree, which makes the chance that they’re all true vanishingly small.
Yet I’m told the debate is over, the science is settled. Really? I’m not at all convinced we understand anywhere near enough about any aspect of this to even begin to consider sensible public policy.
Yet I’m being asked to accept all these things at face value, just so I can get down to the real business of telling my readers how they “ought to” change their filthy habits. Forgive me for believing that it is not the role of the media to moralise to readers about their behaviour, or to treat the “confused people” as sheep who can’t think for themselves but must be gently led along the path of righteousness.
Most importantly, I do not share the view that the media should parrot the activist public relations message of the global warming advocacy lobby, as it apparently does. I lie. I reject it with all the imperious scorn I can muster.
this is a wonderful piece Ivo :) even had me questioning the reality of global warming/ climate change for a second. nice one.
According to Reuters: Arctic sea ice is now at its lowest level ever. That’s Arctic ice 5 times the size of the United Kingdom has disappeared over the last 2 years. It has melted to the lowest level to date, ’shattering a record set in 2005′. The amount that has disappeared has doubled from what was recorded for the 2002 - 2005 period.
It’s probably hard to imagine that sitting in an airconditioned office.
It’s also easy to shrug and say: I wonder why that’s happening? - and then get into your car, inch along in a traffic jam like everyone else. What’s ice far away got to do with me her ein Rosebank? I mean, what’s wrong with this picture? Jacarandas in bloom. Nothing. So I’ll just turn on the radio and listen to Timbaland, on my way home. Nothing is happening - vroom vroom - and it’s got nothing to do with me - vroom - almost there.
thats a good one!..
@Sarah: Glad to hear it. Question it some more some day. :^)
@Nick: I never disputed anything about arctic ice, did I? Yet that is the only point you wish to make, along with some rash assumptions about my lifestyle and comprehension? For the record, I seldom sit in traffic jams, I don’t have an air-conditioned office, and I don’t listen to the radio much.
I said the arctic sea ice issue wasn’t worth discussing. The reason is that a short-term trend in point data is woefully insufficient, even as an illustrative example, from which to draw conclusions about long-term trends in large chaotic systems. Let alone to support costly public policy initiatives and imposing major changes in lifestyle on others.
However, I added that it’s worth a bet. Since you appear to believe that we and/or the earth are in deep trouble, what odds will you give me on an ice-free arctic at any time in 2015? 10-1? That’s only 40% per annum compounded. I’ve got R1000 that could use a safe, profitable investment like that.
let us know when you have pulled your head out of the sand!!!!hopefully there will still be some nice clean air left for you to breathe.
Regardless of whether we are faced with doom or not, we should be getting rid of our “filthy habits” anyway. Why does there have to be a world calamity in order for human beings to do the right thing, have respect for the planet and our existence? I’ll tell you why. Because we are human.
Its time for us to stop acting like humans and start becoming Super-Natural.
If we are indeed NOT faced with global warming, one day we will be, or perhaps worse. Maybe NOT in our life-time, but somethings gotta give sooner or later….and it will.
Why not instill good habits now, for ourselves, our children and other generations to come. In the case of a Global Natural Disaster, there is only prevention…..NO CURE!
Take your pic….
it’s more hard to compare the reason why realy the world dose not come up with one way of reducing the carbon emmissions. this could serve abeter way of reducing globle warming. govenments should do alot to see that the carbon emmissions are controld highly.industris also should do some thing to see that they can control the amount of pollution in the air and water bodis
@Dean: I’m sure there will be, thanks.
@Candice: I never said we shouldn’t do the right thing (though we may disagree on what constitutes “the right thing”), or shouldn’t have respect for the planet. I was brought up to respect and enjoy nature, and I do. But I don’t adopt all sorts of habits because someone tells me the world is going to end if I don’t.
I certainly oppose taxes, laws and regulations that, with the sole justification that it “helps prevent climate change” (or some such vague notion), forces people to do things, or pay for things, that are either insignificant, or unnecessary, or inefficient, or too expensive, or even counterproductive. There may be other justifications for such regulations (not littering or not dumping toxic waste in rivers are simple example), but climate change isn’t one of them.
The fact is, we’re not facing a global natural disaster. By most measures, the world’s problems are getting better, not worse. Particularly, by quality of life measures, the human condition is getting better. And when human quality of life is good, they are also in a better position to invest in the quality of the environment and husband its resources. And invariably, they do so.
@Geoffrey: The world has come up with plenty ways to reduce emissions, actually. Industry is much, much cleaner than it was 50 or 100 or 200 years ago. London, the capital of the Industrial Revolution, has cleaner air today than it has had for 400 years. And this started improving long, long before government passed regulations against air pollution. It started improving because the industrial revolution was a success, and people weren’t grinding out a living in relative poverty anymore. The same will happen with countries that are industrialising and developing today. I’d be surprised if any ever get quite as dirty as London once was, but I’m sure they’ll get clean again.
However, be careful not to confuse pollution with carbon emissions. They’re not the same thing. CO2 is what plants need in order to produce oxygen. It’s not pollution.
That said, nobody likes pollution, and even just marketing that you’re producing pollution-free or low-emission products will give you an edge. By contrast, if people find out you’re dumping arsenic in their drinking water, I can guarantee you’ll be out of business in no time. People and other companies just won’t buy your products anymore. But let people choose.
When governments get involved, they at best raise the cost of production for everyone. Should the poor in Africa develop so they can afford more and better food, more and better housing, more and better healthcare or education or clothing, or should they be denied those choices because the government first wants to prevent pollution? Should malaria be fought, decent sanitation be provided, and AIDS be defeated, or should Africa regulate its businesses to maybe prevent maybe degree of warming maybe a hundred years from now? Should Africa’s businesses first grow prosperous so they can produce the goods the population wants, and create the jobs the population needs, or should they be taxed and regulated by government, all in an effort to curb carbon emissions, which may not even solve a problem that may not even exist?
A sane voice in the wilderness. In the seventies Scientist had the world convinced we were heading for an ice age. Nice work if you can get it scaremongering and making theories sound like facts.
Over 100 world-wide scientists agree that global-warming is by 90% likeliness caused by mankind, will lead to devastating changes in the world and CAN be partly avoided. They agree on this despite all uncertainties of the complex system, and despite the fact that scientific research is often largely funded by industries.
Yet, you say that you are “not convinced”, that errors occur in the hundreds of papers of research material, that London’s air has become cleaner all by itself, that CO2 is something that plants need in order to live. That over 100 years ago, a scientist has published a report about global cooling.
That global warming has happened before. (If the police found proof of arson, would you be “not convinced” but argue that fire has existed before mankind did?)
How could such egoism, such reluctance to adjust one’s life-style, help my children survive?
@dripab: If you actually go read where that 90% figure comes from, you’ll notice that it’s from the IPCC summary for policy makers, a summary that was written by politicians for other politicians, not by 100 scientists.
The scientists didn’t use the 90% figure, they only said likely to very likely, which in probability terms means it’s anywhere between 66% and 90%. The biased folk that selected the 90% figure didn’t go about it very scientifically.
Furthermore, they said it’s likely to very likely that humans are the primary driver of global warming, not the sole driver and no figures on how much of a driver we are and whether the impact is even significant. The summary for the policy makers also goes as far as painting 7 extreme examples of disaster and destruction if the climate changes significantly, but only two of these examples are of things humans would be responsible for. The technical details also show that fossil fuels is not even the major part of our cause as a driver, deforestation and simply the scale of agriculture we implement to sustain our population is a much bigger contributor.
If you have this emotional attitude of ‘if you don’t start inconveniencing yourself, you are hurting my children’ then how about finding effective ways to change your own ways first? Make changes that really makes a difference in your carbon output instead of happy-feely stuff like recycling or 30 year tree offset schemes outside of tropical locations, which feels nice but actually do nothing or simply make things worse. If you do it right, we might follow.
“Most of the observed increase in global average
temperatures since the mid-20th century is very
likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic
greenhouse gas concentrations. […] Footnote: very
likely > 90%”
- IPCC, 2007: Summary for Policymakers, p. 10 (http://www.proclim.ch/products/IPCC07/en/AR4WG1_Print_SPM.pdf)
This survey was drafted by the scientists listed on p. 1, belonging to Working Group 1 of the IPCC. Governments all over the world have acknowledged the IPCC’s surveys (not WRITTEN them!).
This survey also clearly emphasizes on p. 10 that the 66 % figure from 2001 (which you are using) is outdated.
Join me and stop jeopardizing our descendants lives! I cant make it alone.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change
Seems basically every panel of scientists happens to disagree with you.
They do? Wow. I never thought of going to an authoritative source like Wikipedia, so I was completely unaware of this, sorry.
Of course some scientists disagree with me. Some may be truly convinced of impending calamity (as are most prophets of doom). For most, however, it’s simply that their jobs depend on toeing the orthodox line. A huge business has grown up around climate science — a business that simply didn’t exist 20 years ago. Thousands of researchers, activists, organisers, public relations people, analysts, and indeed climate scientists would be out of work if there wasn’t a serious climate crisis. (And these people have the gall to accuse skeptics of “vested interests”.)
Listing just a collection of alarmists doesn’t a consensus make, either. It ignores substantial numbers of scientist who disagree, who reject parts or all of the alarmist myth, and some who have gone so far as to sue to get their names removed from IPCC reports.
Even if there was a scientific consensus, that’s a contradiction in terms. Science is not about consensus, it’s about proof. It’s about evidence, not conjecture about the future based on flakey models that can’t even account for the past.
Appealing to consensus is not science. It’s not evidence. It’s not even a very convincing argument. Almost all scientific progress has come from people who rejected the old orthodoxy, even if it cost them their patron’s funding or their church’s blessing.
Finally, my reasons above are largely political policy arguments, not points of science. So whether some scientists disagree is neither here nor there.
Accusing the majority of the world’s scientists of lying for their own benefit is impudent, arrogant and ridiculous. Unless you have more reliable scientific data than your personal scientific doubts, I suggest you apologize to the world of respectable scientists that you just insulted.
It’s not at all ridiculous. I’ve heard several admit it, on record. Besides, the first argument against global warming skeptics is always that they’re oil-company funded, is it not? I’m just pointing out that there are equal, if not stronger, vested interests on the other side.
As for scientific data, I have seen plenty that is unexplained by the orthodox theories, and plenty that flat-out contradicts it, and I have seen a lot of mere speculation and alarmism in the global warming literature. Again, I’ve heard scientists refuse to publicly correct errors, refuse to disclose data or methods, and even publicly admit exaggeration to scare people into noticing their work, because that’s what they need to get funding.
But I will apologise for daring to have an opinion that blasphemes against your eco-faith. I’m sorry. I know it’s arrogant and insulting of me to reject your high priests and your Earth Mother.
Exactly, the IPCC is all corrupt and all the corrupt governments who acknowledged every phrase of their survey (including the US, China,…) were paid by the Earth Mother lobby. VERY convincing!
Your doubts regarding human responsibility for global warming has already been added all up by the IPCC… to “less than 10%”! But then you come along stating cockily “Excuse me, but I have MY OWN opinion!”. And the terms you use (”your eco-faith, your high priests, your Earth Mother”), they are oozing with your abhorrent ignorance.
Obviously, you DON’T WANT to admit the truth. Sadly, the global future is influenced by such “own opinions” of beings like you.
There, there. Feel better now?
I think we’ve established that you don’t agree, and I did apologise for daring to have an opinion.
You can stop calling me names now. You know, hate the sin, love the sinner, all that stuff?
@dripab: If you want a rational debate, please don’t misquote the IPCC summary for policy makers as if it’s coming from the scientists. It’s not, it’s put together line by line by a process of negotiation and consensus with government bureaucrats from all the representative countries. If you want a scientific debate for ammunition for guilt trips, rather quote the technical scientific data of the report, or if you’re lazy there is actually an independent summary for policy makers available that was done by actual scientists.
More importantly, if you have a heart, don’t support changes that will give governments more power to destroy the future of your children in the name of a political fad about climate, especially if you are unable to distinguish between climate science and politics.
Kriek, as I told you before, the IPCC summary is coming from the scientists named on its first page and has been approved by the IPCC member states’ governments.
If you could elaborate on why all of those member states governments (even China, US) had an interest in exaggerating - instead of trivializing - the summary, then maybe your doubts would be somewhat more comprehensible.
@dripab: I refer you to http://www.ipcc.ch/press/factsheet2.htm
There isn’t a politician with aspirations to get elected, or to stay in power, or an environmental minister or a member of their staff who is not singing the global warming tune at the moment. Exaggerating the message is certainly in their own best interest, it wasn’t the case a decade ago, but it certainly is now. It allows the IPCC lead authors to have top jobs in their field until the next report, it allows the politicians to attract votes because it’s a popular issue and also allow them to introduce arbitrary taxes in the name of this issue.
Anyway, that’s besides the point. Read the technical details of the report or get a scientist to help you read it. Read the independent summaries and analysis by scientists who are not making a living off the IPCC or the global warming scare. Read the work of statisticians who work hard to reverse engineer the data and graphs used in the reports to find out what is kept secret and obscured. You’ll see the difference between that and the summary for policy makers, and then we won’t have to argue about where the bias in the report is coming from.
If you blindly stick to a single political summary then I don’t think we’re going to have a rational debate here, just a political one.
Thanks, Kriek, for correcting yourself. Now you know that the 90%-probability comes from scientists and was approved by the governments.
Thank you also for writing that those governments exaggerated the message because it is a popular issue, allows them to introduce taxes and allows the IPCC authors to have top jobs. Looking at this “reasoning”, anyone can clearly see whereabout you’re coming from.
@dripab: Sorry, you’re wrong and you’re twisting my statements. The 90% number did not come from the scientists and I won’t make any such claim. It’s specified nowhere in the details of the report outside of the summary for policy makers, not even in the technical summary. I have gone into some depth as to why the policy maker summary is wrong and how the wording was picked by the politicians and how much it disagrees with the technical data in the rest of the report.
However, thanks for recognising my statement on where I believe the incentive and bias lies with politicians and environmental scientists on this issue. I know we disagree on this, but we’ll see how this unfolds over the coming years.
Dripab, it is even more unfortunate that your opinions also influence the “global future”, and that influence is for the worst. If you had the courage of your own convictions and would just examine the data for a change you would soon see that the “consensus” opinion on the degree of certainty on past climate is woefully mistaken.
Why is it so necessary to deliberately not enquire on the provenance of data that seems to support your pre-formed opinion, why ? Can you accept that:
1. The “Hockey Stick” is broken, that it was fraudulently concocted and presented. The authors knew before publishing that their results rested on a single set of data from the SW USA that are not a temperature proxy, but an artifact of (probably) strip bark growth forms.
2. That almost every other paleoclimate reconstruction published since 1999 either uses the same fake proxies, or worse, actually uses the MBH PC1 data. Two that don’t use other cherry picked data instead. As investigations continue to be made into the data used in such studies, even more doubts surface.
Tell me, if the consensus is so right, why is it necessary to so misrepresent that evidence. Why is it necessary to attempt to prevent people investigating your data and studies ? Surely, if they are robust, they will stand up to any reasonable investigation. Attempts to conceal always result from malpractice, either inadvertant or deliberate.
But I challenge you Dripab, investigate thoroughly the paleoclimate story. Don’t just go to Realclimate and believe the spin, actually dive into the data and the statistics if you can. Anything less and you are relying merely on an augment from authority, and authority you won’t challenge.
If Steve McIntyre is correct, excluding only the strip-bark bristle-cone pine data, which is known to be inconsistent with full-bark and other proxy data, from the hockey stick, makes the medieval warm period reappear. Now considering that it was Michael Mann’s stated intention to make the medieval warm period disappear from the chart, is the inclusion of this data at all surprising?
How interesting. Dripab’s gone all quiet.
The fact that debate is being stifled and Climate Change is now an industry is proof if proof were needed that things are not as they would have us believe.
Other things to consider are:-
1)After WW2 industrial production increased and so did CO2…but the temperature went in the other direction.
2)Climate models are having worse case scenarios put in them..but evidently no allowance can be made for cloud cover.
3) Although there is de-forestation in parts of South America the overall picture on trees is encouraging as last years report stated. We are in fact into the early stages of re-forestation once the global situation is looked at more closely. Huge forests in Eastern Europe give a more balanced outook.
4) However the real “lungs of the world” are the grasses…not the rainforests, which are relatively new.
5) CO2 follows temp increases…it is not the other way around.
6) A High Court judge recently stated that although Al Gore’s film could be shown in our schools it had to be pointed out to pupils that “it was his view”…and he found up to nine factual errors.
7) Live Earth concerts would have created a large Carbon Footprint…a fact apparently lost on the sanctimonious half-wits that performed and attended the gigs.
8) Al Gore travels the world telling us not to do the same and apparently has three houses. His power supplier has stated his electricity bill is twenty times the average.
9) Gordon Brown made a pointless one day trip to Israel two years ago…Blair told him to re-fuel at Tel Aviv and get back to Westminster for an evening vote on the NHS (political expediency before a days wasted aviation fuel, wasted air pollution and two fingers up to the Middle Eats Peace Process). Protected by his friends in the media, Brown waited two months before procalaiming that “Climate Change was an ethical matter”…pass the sick bucket.
10)After being lectured about the holidays we take, Blair flew to Florida for Christmas last year.
11)Cameron bikes to work…with his staff following behind in a car. He apparently still has a holiday home in Tuscany.
Nice to see our politicians setting an example.
12) Cheap flight taking the working classes are endangering the climate. Ryan Air and Easy Jet particularly singled out.
It appears that they have the most up to date fleet and are causing less air pollution than the more traditional national carriers. Any way from my expierience most working class people go on charter flights with airlines such as Monarch,Air 2000 and Britannia.
Suspect you will find the Cameron’s of this world use Easy Jet when heading for their Italian retreats.
13) After 9/11 no flight over USA for a few days..and temp went up not down, as more sunlight got through. Vapour trails most likley behaving like volcanic ash and filtering heat and light out.
The fact is ther is a lot of conflicting reports and data…but the attitude of those who should be setting an example speaks volumes in it’s hypocrisy.
If however we are going to hell in a handcart over CO2 emmisions we should heae the wise words of Michael Portillo…”If the technolgy that mankind is using is causing a problem, then change the technology”.
Precisley Michael.
Just where are we with the introduction of the new generation of nuclear power stations? …how many meetings have the government had with the car companys over re-developing the internal combusuion engine?…and where are we with taking the new high speed Eurostar train lines up and accross mainland Britain?
I could go on and probably will!
PS..What type of climate are you trying to create?
are you a scientist?
Good thing you have a blog so you can discuss topics you know nothing about. You clearly weren’t educated in science in school so I’m guessing this is a combination of AM Radio bullshit, gut feelings, internet research and whatever else you thought would make you feel good.
You are stupid.
No, no, I’m not a scientist; I’m stupid, as anonymous@coward.com so elaborately explains.
Actually, I’m not a scientist. I’m a journalist. I get paid for discussing topics I know nothing about. I was educated in science in school, but by dint of hard work and perseverance I’ve overcome this handicap and acquired for myself a more classical education that includes the major philosophers, history and economics. And having studied both computer science and applied mathematics, I’m not in mute awe of the prophetic power of computer models of chaotic fluid dynamics systems.
It’s up to you to make up your mind in each point. If any of the points above holds true, my underlying argument holds. Simple probability says that if, on each point, it’s a tossup whether I’m mistaken, the chance that I’m wrong on all ten is one in a thousand. I’ll bet on that. But then, I’m stupid that way.
Ivo, I can’t say whether I agree or disagree with your views on climate change and global warming as I myself am still wading through the vast leagues of (mis)information on the subject.
There is, however, an argument that was recently brought to my attention which examines the cost and consequence of inaction versus the cost and consequence of action, and it does make a hell of a lot of sense, even if it is only the opinion of a high school science teacher.
Check it here. If anything, the short time spent watching it will at least enable you to further prepare your own arguments for or against the angle detailed in the video clips. I’d be interested to hear your views.
Either way, right now I’m just a happy fence-sitter.
It’s worth considering, yes, but the speculative risks of speculative futures aren’t in themselves cause for concrete, expensive action. That’s the logical self-contradiction of the precautionary principle: it considers the risk of acting, but not the risk of not acting. It logically precludes its own application.
[…] guess none of his leftist buddies ever told him that there are several good reasons to reject global warming […]
ok, i like how you say your opion but realy the ice caps are melting more than ever and polar bears are dying. yes global warming is just a climate change BUT it is the biggest one we have had yet. and well if you want to live get your head out of the clouds. we may not die but we will be affected dramatically not only us but animals and wildlife…so realy if you would pay attention to what is going on in the world maby you wouldn’t be so stupid and think that global warmig is just not happening…
Sorry, but I’m afraid you’re wrong. The Arctic ice caps area shows a steady long-term decline, but the Antarctic sea ice area shows a slight increase. The Arctic had a hot summer, yes, but ice levels are right back where they were a year ago. Most notably, global sea ice level, which did look fairly low in the last two or three years, bounced right back recently, and is currently slightly above its historical average trend line. Total sea ice has been pretty near stable over the long term. By “long-term”, I mean only the last 30 years, because we didn’t measure these things before then. You might be able to claim “more than at any time since 1979″, but you can’t claim “more than ever”. Thirty years is a blink of an eye, in terms of geology and climate cycles.
For detailed charts, visit the University of Illinois Polar Research Group’s page.
Polar bears aren’t dying. Sorry. That’s more media sensationalism, supported only by Al Gore’s fevered imagination (and dishonest use of photographs that don’t belong to him). A recent audit finds no evidence in scientific studies that this is the case (link in PDF). The Inuit around Hudson Bay are saying more need to be hunted, because their population is increasing. Most tellingly, however, is this chart, which shows the status of the 20 known polar bear population:
As for this change in climate being the biggest one we’ve had yet, well, it was warmer in the 1930s, it was warmer during the Medieval Warm Period, and much colder during the Little Ice Age. Moreover, global warming appears to have stopped in 1998. Most temperature records focus only on the northern hemisphere, because the southern hemisphere won’t play along with northern hemisphere hysteria. I’d provide links for this paragraph, but I must run. Perhaps a link (PDF) that says there are reasons to believe we’ve been wrong about how we work out global average temperatures in the first place, will suffice.
1) Would you risk the Earth for your carefree lifestyle?
2) I’m pretty sure you’ve seen heavily industrialized areas before (such as Beijing)…I promise you that that smog was not there before we humans got around to letting out excess carbon all the time. How do you propose cleaning up our mess? By sitting around watching TV all day? (Not that I’m saying that’s what you do, but you get my drift.)
Both questions involve fallacies of various kinds, so I’ll address them in some detail.
1) I’m not risking anything. Rejecting global warming orthodoxy — and a government-imposed “solution” to the “crisis” — doesn’t constitute a “carefree lifestyle”. It simply means a different view of the environment, and a different view on how to solve environmental problems. I don’t believe that the Earth is being risked. The Earth will be just fine. The environment has proven to be a pretty robust system, with a tendency to return to equilibrium, rather than a fragile system in which equilibrium is easily disturbed for good. Besides which, there’s risk in anything, whether it’s planting a field of wheat, drilling a borehole shaft, building a house, taking a job, crossing the road. There’s also risk in not doing any of those things.
Surely one doesn’t go around asking people, “Would you risk your life to cross the road? Is it really worth your life to get to the other side?” Surely one doesn’t advocate laws that restrict road crossing only to people who can demonstrate that they have no alternative, have paid their road-crossing tax, have undertaken at their own cost a documented study of traffic conditions in the area so their road-crossing has the minimum possible impact, and undertake not to cross the road more than three times a day?
2) Environmental pollution and global warming orthodoxy are not the same thing. Saying that carbon emissions cause smog is not the same as saying they cause global warming. Smog can be tolerated, dissipated, or minimised. Global warming, by contrast, is supposedly an irreversible catastrophe making life on Earth hard or impossible.
Not believing that global warming is a catastrophic crisis, or rejecting a government-imposed tax-and-regulate approach to it, does not mean one favours pollution, slash-and-burn agriculture, or not caring about the environment. There’s a difference between opposing modern environmentalism and opposing a healthy, sustainable environment or sensible nature conservation.
If I said the war on drugs isn’t working, would you ask me whether I favour mainlining kids on heroin? If I said I’m opposed to banning alcohol, would you ask me whether I want to die of cirrhosis of the liver and heart disease? Would you ask how I propose to deal with drunken bar fights and marital violence while alcohol remains legal? This question on pollution is just as absurd. The “drift” is irrelevant, and does not address any of the reasons why I claimed I don’t believe the orthodox dogma about global warming, its causes, and its solutions.
But let me address pollution, since it often comes up as a convenient way to change the subject from arguments about climate change. Pollution is something that people won’t tolerate when they can afford not to tolerate it. Look around the world: pollution is inversely correlated with prosperity. The richer people get, the less pollution they are willing to accept, and the more they care about the environment. They can’t get prosperous without some measure of pollution or environmental damage, but they also can’t get prosperous without giving some care to the sustainability of their economic growth. This is why the best way to ensure both health and prosperity, to ensure both economic growth and environmental sustainability, is to grant private property rights that ensure people will consider their land and environmental resources as assets to be wisely exploited for long-term gain.
London is a classic example. During the Industrial Revolution, Londeners bore the burden of air and water pollution, in return for remarkable economic development. Today, London’s air is cleaner than it has been at any time in the last four centuries, the streets are no longer covered in ankle-deep manure, starvation and plague are unheard of, and the average citizen lives three times as long and many times as well. Pollution was a temporary cost, which is not tolerated in a prosperous, successful society. In fact, the pollution peak came 120 years ago. It was since then, the most prosperous time of all, which saw the introduction of the fossil-fuel-burning motor vehicle, in which the majority of historic smog was eliminated.
It is also instructive to note that the most filthy industrial areas of all have been in regions where governments run industrial production on behalf of the people, instead of companies producing for private profit. Examples are common in former Soviet regions, for example — and indeed in China, to a considerable extent. Where there aren’t any property rights, or people are not free to wield power over their government or industrial organisations, that’s where things go badly wrong. That’s where people are unable to take care of their own wellbeing, and where people with no stake in society and the environment get to mismanage it however they please. To this day, the most serious environmental problems occur in regions where there aren’t any private property rights, and the tragedy of the commons is the rule. Think fishing, logging, hunting, for example.
So in short:
1) Irrelevant question, because both assumptions — that the Earth is at risk, or that the alternative to global warmism is a “carefree lifestyle” — are false.
2) I propose that people get rich enough to sit around watching TV all day. That way, they won’t tolerate pollution, will want a healthy environment, and can afford to invest in cleaner, more sustainable environmental resources.
I lived in London for four years in the early 1970s and by the end of every day the collar of my shirt was filthy(despite my morning shower). In my colonial innocence I even asked why some classical revival buildings had been painted black.
When I returned for a two-year stint at the end of the 1990s the buildings I thought were black had been cleaned to their original white limestone, my collars were almost clean at the end of the day and certainly were no worse than they had been in Cape Town.
Yet, on my second visit. everyone moaned on and on about pollution and global warming.
Go figure.
Bjorn Lomborg’s book, The Skeptical Environmentalist (2001) has a wonderful graph of London air pollution. From very low levels in the late 16th century, it reached heights in the Victorian age that would terrify today’s population. Sulphur dioxide levels were twenty times higher by 1850, and smoke was ten times worse. Since then, pollution levels have dropped precipitously, to below where the graph started. Today’s London has Renaissance air.
Hi Ivo,
Excellent work, well done. I think that the penny is dropping with ordinary people slowly but surely, and the internet a valuable medium accelerating the process. Many scientists have lamented that the global warming frenzy is a circus, and although there has been criticism on the BBC´s ¨The Great Global Warming Swindle¨, it is a good starter for Dick & Jane to start re-thinking the whole matter.
The penny is dropping that Global Warming is a con….ookaayyyy. I guess it’s fine then that, with oil prices unexpectedly err…going up… we can turn to coal. Quite convenient wouldn’t you say. I mean if we don’t have to worry about climate change, or food, then it’s perfect - we can just substitute to coal which is more polluting, but it doesn’t matter because the world hasn’t been affected by climate change, by resources starting to become affgected (which is what climate change does) and what we are doing isn’t changing the climate, so let’s do these things even more because - magically - there is no result. Action - no reaction.
Amazing psychology. Let’s pat ourselves on the back because we’re so very clever, and we haven’t done anything to degrade our environment. Everything is perfectly normal right. Because change is perfectly normal. Your blog is going to provide a lot of evidence for how come we did so well, because we knew we were so clever. And we knew everything would just keep going perfectly because it’s all a perfect pattern. And then it turned out that we were…right…right?
Sarcasm is not an argument, pollution is not the same as climate change, and making smart cost-benefit decisions is not stupidly doing nothing. But yes, our impact on the climate is small, at worst, and our ability to change it is even smaller. So I’d rather the poor get richer, so they can afford the modern buildings and other adaptations that save lives in the rich world. We’ve been adapting successfully to climate and weather phenomena forever. Why ditch a winning recipe now and sacrifice growth and prosperity to try to control the weather instead? Seems daft to me, and it seems especially dismissive of the poor. Guess they don’t count in your saintly calculus.