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Please offer an example of a reputable scientist critical of AGW, who is not funded by fossil fuel companies.

I'm sure not all of these guys are funded by fossil fuels companies:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/

Pick one.

Now, answer my question:
Show me a single government funded study that concluded the less government intervention is required? Why would AGW be any different?

Prove to me human produced CO2 can't affect weather the way naturally occurring CO2 does?

Neither affects the weather. Increases in CO2 generally follow increases in global temperature. Increased sun activity is what causes global temperature increases, not greenhouse gases.

Here's one page to get you started: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

You will find other interesting stuff on this website, that many if not most on Slashdot would disagree with.

Yes like trying to cure cancer by a change in diet as an example of pseudoscience perpetuated by this website...

You will find other interesting stuff on this website, that many if not most on Slashdot would disagree with.

I completely disagree with their paper on deamidation of proteins! Proteins were given to us by God and if he had intended them to be deamidified, he'd have deamidificated them Himself! We must stop these blasphemous acts by those who would play "god"!

...You can prove anything when you're allowed to select the peers reviewing....

Here is an article that would have likely been rejected by those who have control over the peer review process:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

You will find other interesting stuff on this website, that many if not most on Slashdot would disagree with.

"the worldwide scientific community" is not unified on this issue, however. Just go here http://www.oism.org/pproject/ to see a petition signed by 31,000 scientists who don't believe everything asserted about global warming. Ask the founder of the weather channel what he thinks.

My point was that politicians have agendas and if a particular hot issue suits them, they will use all of their manipulative ways to push it to their advantage. That is absolutely my personal opinion of Al Gore. Do you think he cares if millions of middle americans can no longer afford to drive to work? No - because he's already got his. The fact that he doesn't care how much energy his mansion wastes is proof that he doesn't care about the environment. His defense is that he has enough cash to buy carbon emissions credits (or whatever they're called). It is a case of the wealthy and powerful making the rules and the rest of us suffering for it.

Here's another graph which shows the upward trend in global temperature since the late 1800s; that period is the clearly upward-sloped line on the right. The other graphs in the series are also very informative. These graphs are from the paper Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide.

Here's another graph which shows the upward trend in global temperature since the late 1800s; that period is the clearly upward-sloped line on the right. The other graphs in the series are also very informative. These graphs are from the paper Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide.

Not sure if these are scientists: Avery/... some other guy I forgot the name of

News article about MIT scientists with evidence against human-induced global warming

Dr. Ball, I think his name is.

Of course, I have heard scientists say that all real scientists believe it and don't dispute it.

Peer reviewed stuff on here...

Planting trees in cold climates would increase warming not decrease or slow it.

Hmmm... hadn't thought of that. Are tundra areas typically covered with snow most of the time?

It depends on where the tundra is I guess. Arizona has tundra, approximately five square kilometers of alpine tundra exist above 3,500 meters on Mt. Humphreys in the San Francisco Peaks, yet I somehow don't think it's covered with snow most of the tyme.

I just had a look in wikipedia and a lot of the examples were more rocky than snowy, and also with grasses and small plants.

Also check the Google image search results for tundra biome. I may be wrong but I wouldn't think the rocks would adsorb as much heat as trees and the grass and small plants don't have the mass a tree does.

It also depends on how much difference a few trees would make to the albedo of the earth at that latitube vs the lower carbon footprint of the data center (due to less cooling requirements)

Actually the heat generated in the server rooms could be used to heat the rest of the buildings.

and the carbon that the trees themselves are sucking out of the air.

The effects o CO2 levels on tree growth appears to be varied, some research is showing some trees grow slower in CO2 rich environs while others show some plants grow faster. Poison Ivy is one of the plants that grows faster, ready to be itchier and have more rashes?

SO the amount in the air goes up.

      And plants everywhere are happy. There are studies that show that increased atmospheric CO2 is sequestered more quickly by plants. After all, if you eat more burgers you're bound to get fat. Feed the plants more CO2 (while avoiding toxic levels), and they will find a way to use it.

Because that is exactly what they are told.... over and over and over again. Many scientists, geologists and meteorologists disagree.

What, five of them?

We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.

This petition has been signed by over 19,000 American scientists.

Also, JunkScience.com is offering $125,000.00 to anyone who can PROVE that humans are causing catastrophic global warming.

Those are the ones that don't get grants and do get fired. No wonder they don't speak out.

Ah yes, it's the great conspiracy. So tell me, when Republicans controlled the White House and both Houses of Congress, were these same scientists being denied federal grants? It seems to me that it's the Conservatives complaining about the silencing of critics, but they were being silenced by officials of an all-Republican run government.

Sorry, but Republicans do not rule the world.
From HERE:
Several years earlier, in a peer-reviewed article published by the Norwegian Polar Institute, Dr. Jaworowski criticized the methods by which CO2 levels were ascertained from ice cores, and cast doubt on the global-warming hypothesis. The institute's director, while agreeing to publish his article, also warned Dr. Jaworowski that "this is not the way one gets research projects." Once published, the institute came under fire, especially since the report soon sold out and was reprinted. Said one prominent critic, "this paper puts the Norsk Polarinstitutt in disrepute." Although none of the critics faulted Dr. Jaworowski's science, the institute nevertheless fired him to maintain its access to funding."

and HERE:
In a paper issued Jan. 3, 2007, UCS accuses ExxonMobil of funding "front groups" opposed to the climate-alarmist agenda of groups such as UCS and of former Vice President Al Gore. The company, said the UCS report, had distributed $16 million to 43 advocacy groups from 1998 to 2005 "to confuse the public on global-warming science."
Let's leave aside the fact that $16 million over eight years can't match the $2 billion that the federally funded Climate Change Science Program spends each year on global warming, or even the $4 million annual budget of just one of the many well-funded global-warming advocacy groups, Strategies for the Global Environment (the umbrella organization for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change). Moreover, the UCS document is hardly an investigative breakthrough. ExxonMobil itself publishes its philanthropic contributions to nonprofit organizations online.

And HERE is where the state climatologist in Oregon gets fired for questioning global warming:
In the face of evidence agreed upon by hundreds of climate scientists, George Taylor holds firm. He does not believe human activities are the main cause of global climate change.

Taylor also holds a unique title: State Climatologist...

So the governor wants to take that title from Taylor and make it a position that he would appoint.

Then there is THIS one where a scientist was fired for correcting bad data:
University of Washington climate scientist Mark Albright was dismissed on March 12 from his position as associate state climatologist, just weeks after exposing false claims of shrinking glaciers in the Cascade Mountains...
Cliff Mass, a professo

When do you think the climate has been this warm before?

Many times since mammals rose to dominance, at roughly 100,000 year intervals, give or take 20k. It happens when several solar temperature peak cycles converge. This current warming trend has been building for about 18,000 years, and several long periods of temporary cooling trends have occurred since humans started burning things.

As for "probably 2.2 to 5 degrees", hogwash. The latest models have even more variation, especially on the low end. The fact is nobody, especially you, has any idea what temperatures will be in 100 years. Some of the computer models predict cooling, in fact. And the computer models that are predicting the highest temperatures predicted rapid warming from 1979 to now, while the opposite is the case.

One thing we do know, for sure, though; warming precedes CO2 peaks, not trails them. Another thing we know for sure; temperatures have been falling since 1979, while global CO2 has been peaking. This makes sense if CO2 is trailing temperatures by more than 20 years, but not if it's leading them by less than that.

You may find this paper interesting: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

When do you think the climate has been this warm before?

Many times since mammals rose to dominance, at roughly 100,000 year intervals, give or take 20k. It happens when several solar temperature peak cycles converge. This current warming trend has been building for about 18,000 years, and several long periods of temporary cooling trends have occurred since humans started burning things.

As for "probably 2.2 to 5 degrees", hogwash. The latest models have even more variation, especially on the low end. The fact is nobody, especially you, has any idea what temperatures will be in 100 years. Some of the computer models predict cooling, in fact. And the computer models that are predicting the highest temperatures predicted rapid warming from 1979 to now, while the opposite is the case.

One thing we do know, for sure, though; warming precedes CO2 peaks, not trails them. Another thing we know for sure; temperatures have been falling since 1979, while global CO2 has been peaking. This makes sense if CO2 is trailing temperatures by more than 20 years, but not if it's leading them by less than that.

You may find this paper interesting: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

How so? The models presented by some AGW groups wildly overstate both the rise in sea level and the rise in temperature due to increased CO2. For example, the IPCC model for temperature predicted that from 1979 to 1998, temps would go up by 0.8 degree C; in fact, they FELL by 0.2 degrees. Here's a link:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm#Message53

Please note that this link is to a group that SUPPORTS the AGW hypothesis, even though they present evidence showing that the models fail to predict temperature DIRECTION, let alone the magnitude of change. Sorry, if your model predicts a rise of 8, when the actual experience is a fall of 2, I'd say your model is pretty much worthless. But then, I'm only an engineer; we're more concerned with what we see than what we want to prove.

How so? The models presented by some AGW groups wildly overstate both the rise in sea level and the rise in temperature due to increased CO2. For example, the IPCC model for temperature predicted that from 1979 to 1998, temps would go up by 0.8 degree C; in fact, they FELL by 0.2 degrees. Here's a link:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm#Message53

Please note that this link is to a group that SUPPORTS the AGW hypothesis, even though they present evidence showing that the models fail to predict temperature DIRECTION, let alone the magnitude of change. Sorry, if your model predicts a rise of 8, when the actual experience is a fall of 2, I'd say your model is pretty much worthless. But then, I'm only an engineer; we're more concerned with what we see than what we want to prove.

If you don't believe him, all you have to do is to look back at ANY Slashdot article on global warming in the last 5 years to see an incredible amount of vitriol and hate directed at those like myself who are highly skeptical of "Global Warming" as a man-made phenomena.

We are called "Deniers", fools, idiots, trolls, tools, apologists for "big oil", ignorant, and any number of insults that you can imagine. Our intelligence is derided, our ability to research and think critically is questioned and our honesty is doubted.

and a scientific abstract that further explains their position here: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm
Their science is sound

oreover, Bazzaz's experiments involved carbon dioxide concentrations at levels 100% greater than those now existing in our atmosphere, whereas the greenhouse warming we are experiencing right now results from only a 20% increase in world carbon dioxide levels. Clearly, it is irresponsible to predict "benefits" from increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere when such "benefits" may only appear after we suffer the consequences of a five-fold increase over current anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases. Finally, Bazzaz found that different plant species vary dramatically in their response to increased carbon dioxide. Plants such as sugar cane and corn were not improved, but weeds were stimulated. There is not much real benefit in warming the planet by several degrees just so we can maybe make it easier for weeds to grow.

There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.

There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.

It would be really nice if you started to check your facts! H2O is a more effective absorber than CO2 is. It is found at concentrations many many times CO2. H2O will be anywhere from 0% to over 4%. That is up to 40,000 PPM compared to 370.

Note: Your 1st link is not found.

It does not take centuries for the CO2 to be absorbed. At most a little over a decade. Plants absorb CO2 from the Air. Water vapour condenses. Both gases move into and out of the atmosphere.

The idea of equilibrium is also misleading. CO2 has been present in the past at concentrations many times what it is now. Geologically speaking, CO2 is not correlated with climate change.

Where do you get the idea of a saturation point? CO2 levels in the Ordovician were 13x to 17x higher than now. There is no evidence this was past a saturation point. During the precambrian CO2 levels were 100's of times higher than now. Now, CO2 levels are actually very low.

Note the temperature of the earth before the Permian-Triassic extinction was about 10 degrees warmer than now. This increased ANOTHER 5 degrees during the event.

The artical you cited talks about a Calthrate gun. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothe sis This is not a CO2 gun.

Note the development of the Siberian Traps. This was a larger volcanic event than the Deccan Traps in India. It is possible the Deccan Traps were associated with the K-T extinction. Simailarly the Siberain Traps may have been responsible for the P-Tr extinction.

I'm having issues with the idea of a huge buildup of fungal detrital material. Fungi are inhibited by high CO2 levels. At even 1000 ppm we get huge morphological changes in many species. Plants will often do much better at these CO2 levels. Check this: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm But perhpas this does explain it. If the fungi are inhibited then they may well have consumed part of the detrital material but were unable to complete the process and hense ended up themselves becoming the detrital material. This would greatly impede the ability of plants to obtain nutrients since many if not most plants form mychorrizal relationships with fungi.

Suppose CO2 at the time got upwards of 5000 ppm. This would be about 14x the present levels (370 ppm). This is at a level which is dangerous. Its high enough to severely impede fungal growth. At 5% which is 50,000 ppm its lethal. So I see no reason to believe it ever reached into the 50,000 PPM range in the recent geological history and I sort of doubt it was much over a 1000 ppm if it even got up that high during the Pr-T extinction... but it is possible that the fossil record which shows the high percentage of fungal fossiles is providing evidence of how high the CO2 levels actually were.

Quote: "Figure 18: Young Eldarica pine trees were grown for 23 months under four CO2 concentrations and then cut down and weighed. Each point represents an individual tree (56). Weights of tree parts are as indicated.

Figure 18 summarizes the increased growth rates of young pine seedlings at four CO2 levels. Again, the response is remarkable, with an increase of 300 ppm more than tripling the rate of growth.

During the past 2 years, more than 17,100 basic and applied American scientists, two-thirds with advanced degrees, have signed the Global Warming Petition.

Signers of this petition so far include 2,660 physicists, geophysicists, climatologists, meteorologists, oceanographers, and environmental scientists (select this link for a listing of these individuals) who are especially well qualified to evaluate the effects of carbon dioxide on the Earth's atmosphere and climate.

Signers of this petition also include 5,017 scientists whose fields of specialization in chemistry, biochemistry, biology, and other life sciences (select this link for a listing of these individuals) make them especially well qualified to evaluate the effects of carbon dioxide upon the Earth's plant and animal life.

Do you beleive that GW is a natural thing, or human?

I say this because I'm interested in the whole debate but yet find very little evidence to suggest that the Earth is behaving anythin other than naturally

We have just come out of a "little ice age", centred around the middle ages. The warming of the climate then allowed humans to spread. Eventually the Earth will find a balance and it will go cold again

Have a read of this. Sparked my interest:
http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

"Everyone sane realizes that global warming is happening"

Do you beleive that GW is a natural thing, or human? I say this because I'm interested in the whole debate but yet find very little evidence to suggest that the Earth is behaving anythin other than naturally... We have just come out of a "little ice age", centred around the middle ages. The warming of the climate then allowed humans to spread. Eventually the Earth will find a balance and it will go cold again.

Have a read of this. Sparked my interest:
http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

Frederick Seitz
Past President, National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A.
President Emeritus, Rockefeller University

http://www.oism.org/pproject/

During the past 2 years, more than 17,100 basic and applied American scientists, two-thirds with advanced degrees, have signed the Global Warming Petition.

ABSTRACT

A review of the research literature concerning the environmental consequences of increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide leads to the conclusion that increases during the 20th Century have produced no deleterious effects upon global weather, climate, or temperature. Increased carbon dioxide has, however, markedly increased plant growth rates. Predictions of harmful climatic effects due to future increases in minor greenhouse gases like CO2 are in error and do not conform to current experimental knowledge.

Summary

World leaders gathered in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997 to consider a world treaty restricting emissions of ''greenhouse gases,'' chiefly carbon dioxide (CO2), that are thought to cause ''global warming'' severe increases in Earth's atmospheric and surface temperatures, with disastrous environmental consequences. Predictions of global warming are based on computer climate modeling, a branch of science still in its infancy. The empirical evidence actual measurements of Earth's temperature shows no man-made warming trend. Indeed, over the past two decades, when CO2 levels have been at their highest, global average temperatures have actually cooled slightly.

To be sure, CO2 levels have increased substantially since the Industrial Revolution, and are expected to continue doing so. It is reasonable to believe that humans have been responsible for much of this increase. But the effect on the environment is likely to be benign. Greenhouse gases cause plant life, and the animal life that depends upon it, to thrive. What mankind is doing is liberating carbon from beneath the Earth's surface and putting it into the atmosphere, where it is available for conversion into living organisms.

No, there isn't a consensus among scientists. The above link is a petition signed by 17,000+ scientists who believe: There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.

This Summer I went to a little conference regarding this topic, hold by some Italian scientists (don't ask me the names, I don't remember them).. I'm not able to summarize the whole discussion in English, but the conclusion was something like this: Man is just just a little responsible about global warning; the big thing is that Earth has got it's own "big change of seasons" (i.e. a change every 300000 years) in which we have a succession of "glacial eras" and "non glacial eras". Hope it was clear enough.. A rapid Google search gives me this results: http://www.americanpolicy.org/un/thereisnoglobal.h tm, http://www.oism.org/oism/s32p31.htm and a interesting PDF doc: http://www.lavoisier.com.au/papers/articles/lav200 6forWeb.pdf

People who doubt global warming effects are along the lines of the CEOs of big tobacco

No they are not; some of them are trained scientists who are specialists in their fields. Believe it or not, not all scientists are on the anthopogenic climate change bandwagon. In making the statement you just made, you have insulted both the intelligence and professional integrity of a good number of respectable people.

Some of these include those signers here and here.

You may choose to disagree with their positions, but you cannot discount ALL of these tens of thousands of scientists as willfully misrepresenting the truth as they see it.

I believe the nuclear winter scnenario as you describe it has long been disproven.

Here are some links...

http://www.fortfreedom.org/s05.htm

http://www.oism.org/nwss/s73p912.htm

All they have are names and degrees. Just because someone has an advanced degree doesn't make them qualified. Unless you consider a dentist such as "Richmond D Norman, DDS" qualified. So where's your evidence that any of them are "qualified scientists and engineers?" Why doesn't the site list their specialties and/or job titles?

Very few dissenters? Here's a list of more than 17,000 dissenters most of whom are qualified scientists and engineers.

Mars.. Is... Leaving... Winter...

That's pretty amazing. Here all this time I thought that only half of a planet could be doing something like leaving winter, while the other half would have to be leaving summer. I bow in awe before your superior wisdom. It was the ellipses that convinced me - someone who isn't right couldn't use so many.

I had mistakenly believed that this trend had been supported by continued observation since first reported in the December 7, 2001 issue of the journal Science. However, Mars is leaving winter, so that doesn't matter. I'm glad that your punctuation set me straight.

And... Solar... Irradiance... Is... In... DECLINE

Or increasing, but nevermind that. Still, Pluto continues warming despite moving away from the sun for over 10 years now, and is anticipated to continue warming for at least the next decade as it moves yet farther away. It's almost as if, even on a planet with such thin atmosphere, the climatic effects of irradiance don't - and aren't expected to - turn on a dime. Crazy. Happily for you, I guess the Earth's can. I feel so foolish now.

The name Greenland was an exercise in marketing. Erik the Red had been banished from Iceland (for murder) and wanted to attract settlers to an otherwise inhospitable land.

Certainly, all the Norse trading vessels that visited Greenland wouldn't bring back any news to contradict such a claim if it were false. It's not as if news travelled by sail in those days, right?

The norse settlements subsisted mainly on sheep in the early years. We know they hunted cold-weather animals by goods they traded (like walrus tusks), and even that they had to hunt different areas by season, so Greenland clearly wasn't another African veldt. It must have been temperate enough then for a settlement to graze a sizable herd though, and yet today archaeologists have to chip their artifacts out of permafrost.

They lived mainly on fish later, before they disappeared - this suggests to me that, for whatever reason, the sheep thing wasn't working out very well by then. If memory serves, they weren't doing so hot with the farming then either. It's speculation, but not exactly wild, that climate shift had made herding and farming unsustainable.

Read just an article or two on archeology in Greenland. Hit up Google, and pick something from a source that looks reputable to you. There's plenty of support for climate change during the span of Norse settlement.

The scientists who study this stuff, who know this stuff, and who are highly educated about this stuff,

Uh-oh... an appeal to "the experts", and such an effort to establish their authority too. That never smacks of an independant conclusion.

have pretty much unanimously concluded that the current spate of climate change is primarily due to human activity.

Wow, such a consensus? Well, unanimous except for these 17,000 quacks and hacks, I suppose you mean. But gee, if all of the experts say that I'm wrong... hey, wait a minute! Didn't the experts also all agree that the earth was flat, the universe orbited the earth, and the sun was a fiery chariot? And that the 1970's marked the dawn of a new ice age, the barbary lion was extinct and giant squid didn't really exist. Medical science 'pretty much unanimously concluded' that there was no such thing as female orgasm until the last half of the 20th century - and a female is a lot easier to collect data on than a planet. How could it all have been wrong? I don't understand - they all agreed! Isn't reality imposed by a democratic body of scientists?

Incidentally, being that you seem fond of mythology, this huckleberry might hol

The parent poster, little-known Slashdot user UnxMully, tried to beguile unsuspecting readers into believe that the experiment originated at the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine, both by posting a quote about the OISM and ignoring the fact that TFA not only clearly states that the experiment is being conducted at the Oregon Health & Science University, specifically at the Oregon National Primate Research Center, but was even *originally published on the OHSU website*.

The parent post is a clear example of failing to RTFA or even its headline on Slashdot. The post was not based on a review of the article, nor was its poster expert in the various institutions with the words "Oregon" and "Science" in their names. In fact, the only criterion for creating the parent post was the ability to type. The post should not resurface in a renewed attempt to undermine reading comprehension.

I'd rather trust the Iraqi minister of propaganda than the Slashdot user UnxMully.

Thank you for the supportive comment on the book, I agree wholeheartedly.

What Crichton did, in my view, was to bring up some reasonable objections that any reasonably intelligent non-scientists person looking at the raw data and methods might bring up. For example.. "So, most raw temperature measurements are actually 'corrected' for the heat-island effects due to all the concrete and asphalt use around cities to find the 'true' temperature? ..oh, really? And most temperature readings have traditionally been taken around cities. And who decides what these altertion factors are now, versus how much/how quickly they shifted for various different cities in the world over the last 50 years? Oh, different researchers choose their own factors.. you don't say? That's interesting. And while melting in some places, the Antarctic ice sheet is overall actually growing, not shrinking? Hmmm. I was given the opposite impression by some people."

Crichton included a long bibliography of scientific studies done--he directly quotes and draws upon hundreds of published scientific papers. Things peer reviewed and published in periodicals like Science, Nature, Technology Review, Geology, Journal of Climate, Journal of Animal Ecology, etc. He quotes Harvard professors and Nobel prize winners who doubt the theory.

Heck for that matter, see the 20,000 PhD's and trained scientists who recently signed a petition from the National Academy of Sciences officially casting doubt on global warming: http://www.oism.org/pproject/. The petition states: "There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate."

Crichton is a experienced researcher for science subjects, I don't think this can be denied. He is mainly calling out a warning against consensus science for disputed theories like secondhand smoke, global warning, and nuclear winter.

All of the criticisms I have heard or read in response to the book (including in this posting) are ad homenim attacks on Crichton. This actually indeed does strengthen his case because of the suspiciously weak retorts to his claims. I have never seen any sort of direct refutation on the facts and merits of his claim. Critics simply offer up "you can trust me, he's a nothing but a hack"... honestly this isn't what it takes to dissuade me of a factual claim, especially when that claim has the ring of truth to it. I would like to hear someone directly counter his scientific claims. Nobody is denying that the data has to get massaged in various way in order to come to the given conclusion.

Obviously a scientists needs to admit that they do not know everything. But the same token, they need to take a realistic view on the uncertainty. Due to the potential consequences, it seems that scientists have taken an excusatory view on shaky methods used in the research and uncertainty levels attached to conclusions.

The majority needs sound, unchallengeable science to back up counterclaims, not raw data that massaged in to place to support a popular claim. Poor science can get popular and be touted as truth. Scientific reality isn't established through majority rule, and it seems the world hasn't learned that yet.

Oh - and Darwin was right, too - except in your case.

Here's a fun fact that you can look up yourself. 60% of the observed warming trend occured before 1940... i.e, before we released 80% of the CO2 into the air.
Here's another one, global temperatures are in *lock step* with solar sun spot cycles.

Here's one last one. Doom mongering spells research grants for government scientists.

As for the peer reviewed research:
http://www.oism.org/oism/s32p686.htm

link to source of this quote

The case for global warming is solid and backed up by the figures.

True; temperatures have been rising for 300 years or so.

The case for the mechanics of greenhouse effects is also solid.

Largely true; we know that CO2 and water vapor in the atmosphere hold in heat, and that water vapor holds in much more. We also know that this effect is critical for keeping our planet from freezing solid.

We also know that increasing CO2 levels have a minor impact as a greenhouse gas, but may cause a domino effect: the small addition of heat from CO2 might cause more water vapor to stay in the atmosphere, which could have a large heating effect. But it's also possible that a counter-balancing mechanism would kick in to prevent this. The latter seems likely, since we know there have been periods in history with much higher CO2 levels than today, but without runaway global warming.

The case that CO2 levels are higher in the atmosphere today than they were 50 years ago is also solid.

True, and the rate seems to be increasing as well. From 1900 to 1940 CO2 levels rose around 18%, and from 1940 to 2000 they rose around 80%.

However, most of the warming that occured between 1900 and 2000 occurred before 1950. It seems that rising CO2 levels follow warmings, rather than preceed them. This suggests that the higher temperatures are causing the higher CO2 levels, rather than the other way around.

The case that human activity is resulting in a greater amount of CO2 being added to the atmosphere than would otherwise happen would appear to be self-evident - we're taking carbon stocks that would otherwise lie under the ground and we're literally burning them up, and we're replacing natural carbon sinks with deserts of tarmac and concrete.

Not really true. Sure, we're taking carbon out of the ground and releasing it into the atmosphere, but only 2/3 of it seems to stay there; reabsorption occurs, and may be able to hold more than we know. Furthermore, our contribution may be insignificant compared to what the earth is releasing. As I stated above, CO2 increases seem to be caused by higher temperatures (perhaps released from warmer oceans) and that contribution might be much more than we release.

We're not really replacing the carbon sinks either. In some areas we might be, but it's a fact that the forests in the United States, and probably much of the rest of the world, are growing in size, largely due to the higher amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Pine trees grow up to three times faster at today's CO2 levels than at the levels in 1900, and all other plants grow faster too (anywhere from 10% to 300%, depending on species and conditions.) This could very well be the 'counter-balance' mechanism that prevents runaway global warming; higher CO2 levels cause the vegetative carbon sinks to grow more plentiful.

For more on all of this, watch this seminar from the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine.

Here's another plausible expanation, from the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine. The gist is that long term measurements of solar activity (going back thousands of years) show that the sun's output varies in cycles, and that those cycles coorelate very closely with average temperature measurements over the same period.

This seems much more plausible to me, since it explains global warming and cooling that we know occurred well before the industrial revolution.

You said: "That's under simulated conditions. This is not a study saying, "OMFG TEH USIANS ARE TEH PULLUT3RZ! THEY R KILING TEH PLANET!!!!!1111" It describes what could happen were CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere to increase by 1% annually. I don't know whether this is actually the current trend.
I'd also like to point out that carbon dioxide emissions should not be confused with traditional pollutants, such as carbon monoxide (CO) and surphur dioxide (SO2). The irony is that continued advances in catalyst technology used in ULEV vehicles is eliminating these poisons, only to produce more water and, you guessed it, carbon dioxide. Of course, the answer is to increase efficiency of internal combustion engines until they can be eliminated by a more efficient technology"

In these two conflicting reports, the CO2 concentrations is shown to increase from about 310 ppm to 360 ppm from year 1960 to 2000. About a 0.4% increase per year. Of course the rate of increase is increasing so the current value is higher than 0.4% increase per year; therefore, the 1% increase per year figure is certainly possible. The two reports cited are but an example of several reports trying to understand the connection of CO2 to future surface temperatures. I think you will have to take all these reports into mind before coming to a conclusion on whether the current trend of CO2 increase will affect hurricanes.

I think its pretty obvious from most studies that rapid deforestation, massive livestock populations, and industrialization have pretty much been the cause of the CO2 and methane increases over the past 200 years. If there is a connection between our pollutants and global temperatures and events like hurricanes or if it is sufficiently probable then it is logical to impose some kinds of restrictions on the above mentioned pollutant emissions. Currently, there are no absolutely conclusive reports one way or the other so it is a view of opinion which studies you agree are more probable in being correct. I tend to agree with the global warming hypothesis but I am still going to monitor the other literature to see if it will change my opinion.

The skeptics are made of straw: just a dwindling, ragtag band of malcontents? Is 17,000 a "very, very small" number? Not that I give Internet polls much credence, but I think you're underestimating the unbelievers. Bjørn Lomborg's book wouldn't have created such a stir, if skepticism were as discredited as you contend.

While there may be nearly 18,000 signatures on The Oregon Petition, they're not all scientists. It's been pointed out that some of the signatories are Geri Haliwell of the Spice Girls, TV Personalities, newscasters, and the obligatory dead people. This page has some details:
http://www.transport2000.org.uk/activistbriefings/ ClimateChange.htm
If you prefer a source that doesn't have the word "activist" in its title (it puts people off for some reason) You can try:
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_environment/global_wa rming/page.cfm?pageID=498

Now, the Oregon Institute claims that the bogus names were inserted by "enviro-pranksters", but if the petition is open to such "pranking" you have to wonder about the validity of the petition as a whole.

Beyond this, you also have to look at the Oregon Institute for Science and Medicine, http://www.oism.org which is the group that originate the petition. Their faculty has absolutely nobody who has specialized in studying environmental issues or climate issues. Instead, you have electrical engineers, surgeons, and chemists. Nothing wrong with that, but when they say one thing, and the specialists in the field say another, I'd prefer to trust the specialists.

We can also look at the other publications of the OISM, including their handbook "Nuclear War Survival Skills", and the "Fighting Chance Civil Defense" series.. things all originated by their founder, and supported and sold solely by their society. Now, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with any of this stuff, but looking at it and you see a group that has a very solid 1980s or early 1990s mindset - a mindset that saw environmentalism as a "radical" issue.

For the same sort of take on the group, but with much more detail, you can check out these folks:
http://www.prwatch.org/improp/oism.html

Now, because global warming has been so politicized, it's impossible to find a source that doesn't appear to have bias one way or the other. Of course, perhaps the bias is because one side is right, but that's difficult to tell for us laymen.

My choice then, is to side with the people who say that we should be taking steps to prevent a cataclysm, just in case they're right. Kind of like putting on seat-belts.. I may think that I'll never be in an accident, but that doesn't help me much if I wind up getting thrown through my windshield.

I'll leave it to others to explain the politics (leftist) and religion (gaia) behind the environmentalist scam.

"The fact is humans tolerate a certain amount of radiation. Regarding Plutonium being poisonous do you know Caffeine is more poisonous than Plutonium? Think about it next time you have a cup of Coffee or drink Jolt."

Whoa, I just went to do some googling to prove you stupid but all I could come up with are this, this, and this. These give the LD50 data for both of these substances. LD50 means the lethal dose that kills 50% of a given population within 30 days (given in milligrams of substance per kilogram of body mass).

Caffeine has an LD50 of 57-260 mg/kg, while plutonium has an LD50 similar to that of pantothenic acid which is up to 10 g/kg (if taken orally) or 820 mg/kg (if injected). Caffeine is clearly more toxic than plutonium according to this! I still don't quite believe this, so can someone come up with better numbers or a good reason why this isn't the case?

The science behind climactic change is beyond any serious dispute.

Sure it is... and the indisputable proof of that is the way that you will dismiss any evidence of serious dispute (like, say, this) as frivolous. Makes a nice pretty circle... and it's all kosher since you are a self-proclaimed scientific authority, too, right?

Wonder how accurate this is.

Where is the evidence, sir? I have seen none whatsoever. None. Zippo. I've seen lots of correlations, suggestions, and political BS. But absolutely no scientific evidence that proves this conclusively.

If you'd be so kind as to present me with a link then I will be happy to join "your side."

Non-human factors can effect global climate, therefore human factors never will be able to. Do you see how silly the argument is? There's a huge difference between "A can affect B" and "A and only A can affect B".

No, it's not that we can't. We probably do. Everything affects everything. But there is no evidence that we have anything more than a miniscule affect on global warming. The combined output of CO2 from natural sources and just plain simple water vapor is orders of magnitude more important than what we produce as humans.

The scientists say there's global warming.

Which scientists? The IPCC? That was mostly signed by environmentalists and politicians. There was a whopping 1 climate scientist that signed it. On the other hand, this petition, signed by over 15,000 scientists suggests otherwise.

So please be careful when you say scientists that there's global warming. The vast majority either say there isn't, or that there isn't any evidence of it.

Most of the scientists that say there is conclusive proof of human-caused global warming are mostly those that depend on it for their funding.

What exactly do you think happens to all the CO2 and other pollutants we pump into the atmosphere? They just disappear?

Uh, yes. Just ask your neighborhood tree or plant what they like to eat. They'll tell you they like water (which there will be more of if the earth warms and there is more evaporation) and CO2 (which apparently we're poisoning the atmosphere with).

So, yes, thanks to the plants CO2 does disappear.

Well we see one effect already in acid rain (or do you think that's a myth, too?)

No, that's not a myth. But it's not caused by the same chemicals that supposedly cause global warming.

Again, proof that humanity can indeed cause large-scale adverse climate change.

Acid rain is not usually large-scale. It usually affects a specific area downwind of the source of the pollution. A contaminating factory in Detroit isn't going to cause acid rain in Europe... THAT would be large-scale climate change, so to speak.

We're pumping billions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere - which is a closed system .

Now, it's perfectly logical to draw a correlation between the two.

Um, no. There are many other factors influencing climate.

The Kyoto Petition was signed by 2,500 scientists. Only a few were involved in actual climatology. Most were social scientists and gov't functionaries.

However, another petition urging congress to reject the treaty, was signed by 15,000 scientists!

Here is a good page explaining global warming and it's relation to CO2 emissions: here I will talk about the results of this study later, so read it.

But by the time we WILL have reference, we'll all be dead if we are the cause. Therefore the only logical course of action is to stop.

What do you mean we will all be dead!? 3,000 years ago things were vastly warmer than they are today. CO2 isn't even one of the main causes of the greenhouse effect. It just happens to have more of a greenhouse effect than other gases. Just use your head. The reason the earth is warming is because we are still coming out of the little ice age 300 years ago!!!
We're still below the temperature levels of the middle ages and way below the levels of ancient times. The global warming article I referred you to has an excellent graph showing the average temperatures for the last 3000 years. The earth warms and cools all the time. This new global warming is just us entering into an average temperature period. It's nothing to be worried about.

If you look at the global ocean temp. graph for the past 3,000 years, we seem to be going through a slow rise in temperature right now. Compare that to the dramatic up an down of several degrees between 1000 and 500 B.C.

In our warming since the Little Ice Age, we had a dramatic increase of a little less than a degree between 1600 and 1700, before there was a lot of CO2 emissions. It has been a gradual rise since then. We aren't even up to the average historical ocean temperature yet.

There is no credible evidence linking C02 emissions to global warming. It is just another warming and cooling cycle. Please, before you flame me, look at the article I linked to. It contains valuable information about the subject historically.

I believe there is a short-term temperature drop due to the dust in the air which blocks the sun. But that does not mean the volcano hasn't emitted massive amounts of greenhouse gasses. It has. Plenty.

In fact, it just goes to show that clouds (in this case volcanic dust) has much more affect on climate than greenhouse gasses.

So, actually, your very response has strengthened the anti-global warming cause by admitting that the greenhouse gasses emitted by a volcano, though much greater than that emitted by humans, is apparently of no consequence when compared with clouds.

I agree with that.

PS why should I blind believe you over 'the greenies'? No doubt you have an agenda to, yet you seem to think you are the only one who knows theirs

Actually, I wouldn't want you to blindly believe me. I would just hope that I would provoke you to truly STUDY the whole issue rather than listening to one side or the other. I am not a climate scientist and, unlike many greenies, I don't pretend to be one.

I will, however, defer to the 17,000 scientists who have signed the above petition that states that global warming does NOT appear to be linked to human activity.

But the truth of the matter is, the vast, VAST majority of the world's scientists overwhelmingly agree that Global Warming is very real and poses a significant threat to our ecosystem and our way of life.

The "vast, VAST majority" of the world's scientists apparently were pretty upset that somebody was speaking for them, which is probably a reason that a rather large number of them signed this petition. I suppose the thousands of PhD's listed there all work for oil companies?