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How ExxonMobil Funded Global Warming Skeptics
Erik Moeller writes "According to a report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, oil company ExxonMobil 'has funneled nearly $16 million between 1998 and 2005 to a network of 43 advocacy organizations that seek to confuse the public on global warming science.' The report compares the tactics employed by the oil giant to those used by the tobacco industry in previous decades, and identifies key individuals who have worked on both campaigns. Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?"
Big business lobbies to protect its interests!
All the flames that are about to be posted...
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
why don't the tobacco companies merge with the oil companies then if they're so similar. Then you just know eventually someone will make a careless mistake and BOOM! That'll kill two very evil birds with one stone :-)
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
...and I have been for years. Where do I sign up to get my check from Exxon?
ExxonMobil's Response to a Report by the Union of Concerned Scientists ExxonMobil believes the Union of Concerned Scientists' paper is deeply offensive and wrong. ExxonMobil engages in public policy discussions by encouraging serious inquiry, analysis, the sharing of information and transparency. Our support of scientific research on climate change is made public on our web site and it includes more than 40 peer reviewed papers authored by ExxonMobil scientists, and our participation on the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and numerous related scientific bodies. While there is more to learn on climate science, what is clear today is that greenhouse gas emissions are one of the factors that contribute to climate change, and that the use of fossil fuels is a major source of these emissions. With regard to contributions that ExxonMobil provides to various public policy organizations, our support is transparent and appears on our web site. The support extends to a fairly broad array of organizations that research significant domestic and foreign policy issues and promote discussion on issues of direct relevance to the company. These groups range from the Brookings Institution to the American Enterprise Institute and from the Council on Foreign Relations to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. As these organizations are independent of their corporate sponsors and are tax-exempt, we don't control their views and messages, and they do not speak on our behalf. In many cases and with respect to the full range of policy positions taken by these organizations, we find some of them persuasive and enlightening, and some not. We annually review our support of tax-exempt organizations and make appropriate adjustments. In addition, we publish the complete list of such organizations on our web site - and we update this list once per year. Supporting scientific and public policy research leads to better informed and more open discussion of options to address such a serious, global issue as climate change. http://www.exxonmobil.com/Corporate/Newsroom/NewsR eleases/corp_nr_mr_climate.asp
They provide me with an income. I'm happy with them. But this doesn't I agree with all their policies. I just fix their computers!
Future ruler of a small Asian-Pacific island
The UCS, which has it's own agenda and pushes it at every opportunity, is upset because someone on the opposite side wants their view heard as well? To bad.
The UCS no more wants open debate over issues than any other special interest - they want to frame all discussion so their viewpoint prevails; since only +they+ have the right answer.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Honest question, I promise. Claiming the conclusion is "scientific" would seem to imply that scientists have been able to make accurate, statistically signfiicant predictions of climate change, given existing C02 etc. emission measurements. That's *future* predictions, not curve-fitting the past. To rule out chance, you'd probably need over 20 years of data.
What kind of models even fit on computers 20 years ago?
I don't doubt that GW predictions follow from current scientific knowledge, but for those predictions to be "science", don't they need to have experienced statistically significant validation already?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
because the "Union of Concerned Scientists" sounds really non-biased.
I'm willing to accept that bias. Until we find Earth v2.0, we should be much more careful with Earth v1.0.
Blar.
When will the "Union of Concerned Scientists" change their name to "Union of Liberal Scientists"? It should have been their name from day one.
$16 million over a 7 year period is nothing, especially for a company that regularly posts profits in the $30 billion dollar range. And none of this matters unless someone actually reports on the "findings" and "analysis" of ExxonMobile's "specialists." If anything, the media is responsible for creating the image of some debate about global warming (even though a huge scientific consensus exists).
I must thank you, ExxonMobil for your efforts and obvious lack of understanding of the scientific debate. In science, every attempt to disprove a fact confirmed theory just strengthens it.
So, I'd rather look at it from a different point of view: would there be the degree of certainty we have about global warming if it weren't for these jackasses? (no offense, John Knoxville!)
All research funding comes from somewhere. Where did the money for research that supports global warming come from? I'm sure that none of it came from companies with an interest in convincing people that global warming is real. Call me a cynic, but I think EVERYTHING needs to be taken with a grain of salt.
"O'Connor, smash the window." "Why me, Bigboote?" "It might be boobie-trapped!" "Oh!"<smash> -Buckaroo Banzai
They have. Slowdown of the North Atlantic Current, increases in global average temperatures, melting of glaciers, raising of ocean levels (and no, they were not expected to be in the multiple yard levels) have all been inline with the median models.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
No matter how much money the "oil industry" or any industry throws at "scientists" it is no match for the government and their endless reams of paper, printing presses, and authoritarian control.
Government sponsored funding will have us thinking what is "right" in no time at all. And I suspect what is right is anything that will convince us that government is the only solution to our problems, and if there are no problems, then government will tell us that as well.
As long as we keep private industry away from research, we'll all be ok. Lets not mention the fact that refusing to buy oil won't land me in jail... unlike refusing to pay taxes.
This is the perfect example of sheep under care of wolves.
...makes sense since they both make a fuss over tar.
When someone can accurately predict what tomorrow's forecast is going to be, then maybe I'll considering listening to what either side has to say.
It doesn't matter who has been paying money to attack global warming.
That's because the conservatives say global warming is a hoax, and they are always right about everything, and so we can be 100% sure it really is a hoax.
I mean, look how right they were about things would turn out in Iraq.
Rush Limbaugh told me that the only reason that it's not snowing in winter anymore in the northern sections of the U.S. is because of the number of cows we farm and the carbon moronoxide they expude from their butts. Cow farts != global warming folks! And besides, even if global warming is happening (which it isn't) there's a lot of benefits: The southern U.S. will become a tropical paradise. The mid U.S. will be able to produce different crops. And even the Canadians will benefit in that they won't have those savage winters anymore. Any concerns about coastal areas flooding can be put to rest as the army corp of engineers will be able to build very efficient and effective dams and breakwalls for most normal situations. Besides, floodwaters can easily be pumped out back to the ocean to lower the local water level. So stop all this worrying. There is no global warming. Rush told me so and I believe him. Megadittos!!!
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
I was hoping I wouldn't have to see another article about whose experts are more biased than others. Now I get to watch whole flames erupt over completely pointless issues.
Can we not get back to the fundamental problem of figuring out what path Global Warming is going to take, it's impact and how we are should deal with it? All this crap is just wasted air.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
It's too bad that you got a mod or two as "troll" instead of "funny", but that itself should have been expected because you're absolutely correct with respect to what's about to happen. The inflammatory (no pun intended) nature of the article summary itself just begs for the whole damned thing to be marked as "troll" or "flamebait".
Look, the whole idea that any company or organization would attempt to skew any studies to their own viewpoint is universal. Enviornmentalists are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Corporations are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Skeptics are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Conspiracy theorists are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Anyone with any kind of agenda is always looking to make surveys/studies support his viewpoint. But in this case it's "big oil" { insert doom-and-gloom music here }, so therefore their attempts to skew results are somehow more evil than other groups doing it? What a complete and utter crock.
The question of "Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?" is infuriating by itself. Hell, yes there would be a controversy for numerous reasons that have been stated time and time and time again, not the least of which is that without indisputable proof, which I still don't believe we have, there will always be room for skepticism. Honestly, the whole notion that skepticism is unhealthy, as that last line suggests, is an abhorrent idea in itself.
Yeah, yeah, mod me down for actually contesting a Slashdot article and for being somewhat of a global warming skeptic. I have karma to burn, but that doesn't make what I've said any less valid.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
And the predictions that those would happen were on record as being the scientific consensus before they happened, and the predictions that have gone on record were right far more often than they were wrong (i.e., no John Edward), and this happened frequently enough to be statistically significant?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?
Yes. I'm one of them and for good reason. Ice cores and incomplete and inaccurate data only going back ~125 years, of which only 50% is probably usable, can only tell us so much. There is so much to learn about how the weather patterns on the Earth operate.
The average American is confused enough as it is.
Look, it's simple: all of the authorities and powers-that-be could have been in total agreement for the last 2 decades, warning people about global warming in every available media outlet and it wouldn't have mattered because Joe Sixpack doesn't give a shit. And politicians won't force people to do the right thing, because that doesn't get you elected.
Unless it unavoidably and directly impacts the price of beer or his ability to watch his favorite TV show, Joe wouldn't care if his SUV ran on mulched babies. "Scrubs" has it right: people are bastard-coated bastards with bastard filling. And global warming is Somebody Else's Problem.
Insisting on "correct" English is like saying that there is only one, definitive recipe for chili.
are as pure as the wind driven snow. BOTH sides have lied IMO. Somewhere between the two, you'll find the truth. "Technically" global warming does exist, but, the output from the sun has increased in the past decade or more. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you increase the temperature of the oven, the food gets warm. I remember when I was in high school back in the 70's, everyone was worried about global cooling. I remember winters were BRUTALLY cold. If people can get the sky is falling mentality out of their heads and think, maybe we can figure all of this out without shouting down each other ;)
the problem doesn't lie with Exxon-Mobil, it lies with the whole corporate structure in general. If they don't defend their bottom line, they can get sued by shareholders (Look at how Dodge got their startup capital). Don't hate the playa, hate the game.
moeller@scireview.de
Global warming shouldn't even enter into it. The whole "global warming debate" is a smokescreen blown from both sides to avoid asking the really tricky, really pertinent questions, namely: "Global warming aside, is spewing fossil fuel byproducts into the atmosphere bad for the environment in general?" (Yes.) "Is a complete and total reliance on nonrenewable fossil fuels and pigheadedly refusing to look into alternative energy sources because they aren't where the money is a bad plan?" (Yes.) "What are our next steps?" (We don't know.) So people bitch and moan about global warming because it's a nice, round cornered, warm and fuzzy topic that any idiot can get his head around, as opposed to the intricate economic and political machinations behind the energy (read: fossil fuel) trade as a whole. It's just like hippies whining about recycling saving trees when the real issue is so much more complex than that. They just ignore the rest of it because it doesn't make a good tagline and it's harder for the average public-school-educated-Joe to understand. And things that the average public-school-educated-Joe has a hard time understanding make him change the channel, which is bad for support and bad for business.
This is a great article for those people whose neurons are not already connected to the mainstream media and Al Gore's frontal lobe:
.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008220
Oh, and it is written by the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT so we may surmise he knows a tad bit more about climate change than Gore.
Environmentalist groups lobby to protect their interests!
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
The current observations are largely inline with the median projections of the IPCC. See http://www.ipcc.ch/pub/online.htm/ for the full shebang.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Actually, you can do a valid scientific test if the predictions aren't the material you derived the hypothesized relationship from, whether or not the measurements are of events from the past. Otherwise, all of paleontology would be non-scientific.
Because the scientific communty would still shun any scientist that questions the present assumptions. Now take away funding from those voices that dare to question and we would has even less understanding than we have today.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
Your comment would be a lot more persuasive (and useful) if you said exactly what this agenda is supposed to be and actually provided some facts to back up your claim.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
When Exxon is attacked by the application of what's LARGELY junk science (the *man-made* global warming part), what do you expect them to do?
Lie down and die?
No way.
They're going to TRY to explain that there is actually a DEBATE that needs to happen.
Are you against debate? Are you against getting to the TRUTH, no matter where it lies?
Or do you actually prefer being a sheeple, unable to think for yourself?
BWilde
Prediction and observation.
Currently, we're observing that the planet is warming up. That is a simple fact. No scientific dispute.
To this observation, you can match models, to explain why the warming occurs. That is the theory. No scientific dispute exist about the theory either, that the warming is caused by human activities, specifically because of the burning of fossil fuels.
No reasonable human being can argue about the observation and if you want to argue about the theory, to explain the reason of the warming, you need to satisfy the scientific scrutiny.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Honestly, I'm not a funded skeptic (although I wouldn't mind a few bucks for speaking my own piece) but some of the data collection methods (I'll attach a link when I get home, I can't find it here at work) for global warming have error ranges that pretty well invalidate the data. For example, there are instances of temperature data being derived by the date upon which grapes were harvested in a given year - it seems that science is being driven by politics and seeking the conclusions it wants to come to instead of the other way around. I don't doubt for a minute that the globe might be warming up, but nobody has really hard data that shows that it is truly due to greenhouse gas emissions. Honestly, if we really knew the answer, would there be *this* much debate? I'm all for going green, and hey, it might do some good, but science hasn't much shown either way an effective relationship. I could show you data that would just as easily say that global warming is due to my age.
Quiz: True or False -- On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your middle name?
Let's create "Society of Responsbile PC Users" or something in that sense. The more sofisticated name we can come up with, the better. Then we can publish whatever BS we want as long as it is attacking the evil corporations. We can then get away with murder. JAM
Will we see a breathless story detailing the hundreds of millions of dollars spent by governments around the world supporting global warming proponents? Or how the Clinton and Blair governments actively try and silence those who dissent(ed) from the orthodoxy? Would there be a controversy if said governments actually allowed a real debate in the agencies which have made it their mission to impose the Kyoto Protocol?
But right, I forgot, big business is inherently evil.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
First my bonafides - I'm a global warming skeptic - at least when it comes to mankind being the cause. I could accept that there is a general warming trend right now (Poles getting smaller seems to be a simple proof of the concept.)
However, proving that man is the cause is a whole different kettle of fish. Consider the following points - The Sun is the single largest contributor to the Earth's temperature, consequently variation in it's output is a first order effect. Oh -and did you know the Sun HAS changed it's output slightly in recent years?
Anyway - the fact that Exxon is spending money to get their point across is no more abnormal than UCS pointing out what Exxon is doing as part of THEIR actions to get UCS's point of view across.
No big deal in my mind.
Now -fill up my tank!
Have you compiled your kernel today??
What they call "confusing the public", I call practicing free speech. How condescending of the UCS to assume we simpletons can't sort out misinformation for ourselves.
Actually, you can do a valid scientific test if the predictions aren't the material you derived the hypothesized relationship from, whether or not the measurements are of events from the past.
True, however:
a) Because the scientist already knows the time history, he doesn't have to put his neck on the line; he can always add and remove factors he chooses to deem "significant", thus making it an exercise in curve-fitting.
b) The predictions came from one material (weather observations) and are of that material (weather observations).
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
The earth's axis wobbles slowly over thousands of years. The result is that the area near the poles exposed to sunlight during winter increases and decreases. This causes the polar ice caps to wax and wane. In the past, long before there were human beings on the planet, the arctic was a nice balmy 70 something F and most of North America was under water.
How much money has been spent by people who ignore that information and want to promote their cause? We need to limit the consumption of fossil fuels. Not because of mediocre science that asserts that they're causing global warming, but because when we run out we're screwed. Some people will survive, but lots of people will find living has become impossibly expensive because of high energy costs.
FWIW Exxon scientists were among the first to recognize that sea level has been rising and falling for as long as there is a rock record. They published this long before there was talk of global warming. If you know that sea level has been rising and falling over a ~600 ft range for billions of years it *might* make you sceptical that burning fossil fuels was causing the climate change that *appears* to be taking place.
The opinion of a medical scientist about global warming is just as irrelevant as the geophysicst's opinion about the causes of cancer. So if 98% of scientists who know nothing about the subject agree w/ the some journalist's story line, it means nothing more than they're humans and easily manipulated.
rhb
So, that's a "no" then.
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
About the billion or so spent by George Soros to fight every traditional or conservative cause out there. There is plenty of FUD from both sides. You just need to be smart enough to sift the BS for the few grains of truth.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
Yeah, we don't know much, but we can watch the signs2 9/1946227
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http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/
And these are just the articles recently on
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
However, the Max Planck Institute's own data on the sun's contribution to the Earth's temperature show that its periods of higher output do not coincide with recent rises in the Earth's temperature. They were the group to do the sun study, and they claim that the sun's output is not a significant contributing factor to global warming.
What is their agenda? I'm not that familiar with it, so I'm interested to know where they deviate from widely accepted science?
Another poster mentioned their global warming FAQ, but I read it and thought that most of what I read was pretty uncontroversial among qualified climate scientists (apart from a few counter-views, which almost always seem to be oil-funded).
Given that you assert UCS is a special interest, how do they profit from acceptance of their assertions? It's obvious how oil companies profit directly from the rejection of a theory of human-generated climate change.
I think you may have stumbled on the root cause - I commend you, sir!
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
I'm personally on the side of the science supporting global warming. But the truth is, skepticism is a healthy thing regardless of who funds it.
I think the skepticism and controversy has helped scientist secure more funding for their research into the issue. This, in turn, has helped them secure more proof supporting their stand. More funding and more research will help the truth distill faster. For something such as global warming that is time-critical, this is a good thing.
It sucks that there are those fighting to confuse the masses, but it just helps the truth clarify its arguments.
I'm a snowboarder you insensitive clod!
I should have known this was a troll. Do you even know what the IPCC is, and how those reports were created?
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
So much money! That $16 million, over 7 years, divided by 43 groups, comes to the amazingly huge sum of $53,000 per year per group. Why, with that king of money, they could probably pay the salary of 1 person!
My God! They could take over the world with an army like that!
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
'cos y'know, THAT spends!
idiot.
I've been a /. participant for ages, and really enjoyed the news and commentary about technology issues. But, in the last year or so this site has taken to posting a lot of political stories which have generally taken a large step to the left. This story is another example of such. There's no techno-centric value to this story, merely polemics. I enjoy political discourse, but I go to political blogs to do so. Please, kdawson et al., we don't need /. to become another Daily Kos or FreeRepublic.
Absolutely.
Regarding the effect of solar forcing, check out the wikipedia article. It's got good links to studies that have shown that solar forcing only accounts for about 25% of the recorded increase in global temperatures.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
I should have known you'd use intimidation. Do you even know what "statistically significant" means, and what it takes to rule out chance?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
But the question is this: How much is the change due to us (from 0-100%) or natural cycles (0-100%)? I don't think there were SUVs around during the last ice age so we know its not all us.
And further, should we be trying to counteract "mother nature" to provide a conistent climate?
I could show you data that would just as easily say that global warming is due to my age."
Quick! Someone kill this guy before he gets any older!
And you'll find some of the same people on the Bush presidential campaigns (and Bob Corker in TN). And some of the "think tanks" also get the bulk of their funding from Saudi Arabia. Think that's a coincidence? The oil companies hooked up with the Saudis and Bush.
Raise your hand when you think you spot a trend.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
"Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?"
...unless you are blindly following a political agenda without the background to understand the issue...
Funny how people encourage debate as long as it doesn't threaten their side. A global "global warming controversy" is a good thing, as well as the many other ideological struggles which allow our society to remain progressive. If you have strong backing arguments to your views you should not be worried when others question them.
"That'll kill two very evil birds with one stone"
you may be kidding around when you say that but what really scares me is there are people around here that believe "BIG OIL" is evil.
oil is what allows all of our current technology. ask a chemist what we'd have(or not have) without oil and the companies that provide it at a reasonable price. i for one really do welcome our big oil overlords with open loving arms.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Here is the wikipedia on Union of Concerned Scientists. They are basically ideological twins of Greenpeace - hard-line peace activists and hard-line environmentalist. All the standard left-wing stuff. The main difference between the two are their tactics - UCS cloaks itself in scientific respectability and issues whitepapers while Greenpeace pulls protest stunts to gain publicity. The other difference is that UCS tolerates nuclear energy while Greenpeace is totally opposed to it. UCS is based in the "People's Republic of Cambridge"
Wait, so you mean to tell me that maybe, just maybe, Exxon has a good reason to fund investigations that would otherwise go undone because of the irrational bias towards the catastrophic models of climate change? I'm stunned.
Look, privately funded science isn't automatically bad and twisted to prove a conclusion. Does it happen? Yes, of course it does, but it also happens in publicly funded research, and there's a lot less accountability there. That Exxon, or any oil company, has dumped money into disproving the high pitched hysterics of the climate fascists isn't nefarious in any way, it's their duty to their shareholders, and to the rest of us. Should we just blindly accept anyone's ideologically motivated declarations on the science of climate change, or should we, i dunno, do some experiments and try to arrive at real conclusions, based on empiricism and reason?
If this work were getting done by the "establishment" climate scientists, Exxon wouldn't have to kick start it itself. But establishment climate scientists _aren't_ doing the research on their own, and those who try are often run out of the field. As Italian climate scientists Alfonso Sutera and Antonio Speranza what happens when you question the global warming orthodoxy.
So there's no mistake, I'm open to the possibility that the alarmists are right, that the sky is falling, that human activity is the main cause of climate change, that the temperature is going to raise by a billion degrees tomorrow unless we all revert back to some pre-industrial anti-humanist cave society. I'm also open to the possiblity that there really isn't a problem, that everyone's freaking out about nothing, and that, in fact, dumping tons of pollution makes my skin softer and more huggable. The fact is, we don't have enough data either way to draw CONCLUSIONS yet. We can hypothesize, we can speculate, but we simply don't know enough to declare, in big red letters, THE END IS NEAR.
Unfortunately, that's what the alarmists are doing, and it's a disservice to the field and the world itself to declare that debate is over, no more discussion is allowed, and anyone who questions becomes verboten. It's stupid to pretend that somehow, climate scientists are the only pure, unbias thinkers in the world, and everyone else is a stooge of the Big Scary Mean Capitalist Oil companies.
The Royal Society recently issued a fairly unprecedented public warning to Exxon to stop perverting science in the name of $$$. I'm sure the UCS are a very worthy body, but the Royal Society are somewhat more prestigious and authoritative (what with having been founded by Newton, Boyle and Hooke, amongst others, being the oldest such learned body in the world, and still representing the elite (in a good way) of UK science. Exxon ("Esso" here in the UK) are still, as the Greenpeace campaign from 5 years ago pointed out, "#1 Global Warming Villain".
Everything I needed to know about life, I learnt from Blake's Seven
With the Tabacco industry, their deliberate lying was the basis for most of the succesful lawsuits against them. It would be worth holding Exxon and anybody who has invested in or worked for them liable for global warming. That might be educational for them. They would cease to exist as a company. It would definitely be news.
However, proving that man is the cause is a whole different kettle of fish. Consider the following points - The Sun is the single largest contributor to the Earth's temperature, consequently variation in it's output is a first order effect. Oh -and did you know the Sun HAS changed it's output slightly in recent years?
Really? That is amazing! You had better immediately contact the IPCC and major groups studying and modelling climate change, because you alone have realised that the the sun has changed its output, and they, of course, haven't. Your unique insight into climate change could change everything! I mean, surely these people who have been studying climate (some of them for decades) could never have realised that the output of the sun could change, could they?
That was sarcasm, by the way.
ExxonMobil will spend almost up to the amount they stand to lose in revenue in order to fund lobbyists and counter arguments to science which influences policy. For example, if they still to lose $16 million due to regulations which would be caused by a consensus on global warming, they will spend nearly $16 million dollars to discredit global warming.
Nobody is breaking any laws, in fact they're required to do this as a public corporation. If you don't like it, change the laws.
From the other, more pressing issues that we should be dealing with. For example:
I could go on...
Anyway, Global Warming fanatics always bring up the negative aspects that it could produce, but not necessarily that it will. Indeed, anyone who is going to make 100 or 1000 year predictions on a few decades of data is foolish. We simply don't know. Regardless, does anyone ever bring up the possible benefits of global warming?
And these are just a few. The real question shouldn't be "is GW happening?", but, "Is it a bad thing?". It could be that preventing global warming would leave us with a worldwide shortage of food a few centuries from now. How are you going to feed 10 billion people?
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Yes it is accounted for by the recent slightly warmer temperatures! So instead of thinking that man kind is the main reason, we should just understand that we will be entering a period of time when the sun is just warmer. Even the UN recently recognized this and that man kind is responsible for a very small portion of "Global Warming". What are we going to do, place a huge sun shade between us and the sun? That would be crazy! What we need to do is figure out how to mitigate the damages that we expect the hotter sun to produce, and move on from there. We also need to stop paying attention to the wild fear mongering that that the wacky "Global Warming" prophets of doom keep preaching, for their own benefit. Just follow and watch how much money is being spent by and for these false prophets!
----SofK---
Do you know how to read? Go educate yourself. I even provided the link for you. Come back when you have something useful to contribute. Like, what's the difference between satellite measurements and buoy measurements of ocean surface temperatures, and what's the cause of them? It's a good start. You'll even find out that statistically significant is not what you think it means.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
And while you are playing golf millions of people are suffering and dying from drought..
(a) I'd rather be skiing
(b) Try golfing when it's 100F and humid as hell for the 50th consecutive day in summer. Anything above 80F makes me feel like I'm gonna die and sweat like a pig.
(c) Try golfing when your golf course is underwater.
-b.
I am not an atmospheric physicist, but if a huge group of atmospheric physicists started telling me that I should be worried about global warming, I would probably get worried. Assuming that they are impartial scientists of course. The problem one has to worry about is, are they pushing an agenda? I am less inclined to believe 'scientists' funded by groups with vested interests in the results, even decent scientists can be unconsciously influenced by the funding, and less scrupulous scientists have no problems taking money to say whatever someone wants. I remember 'scientists' paid for by tobacco companies telling us that smoking wasn't bad. I'm pretty sure there is universal consensus regarding the health effects of cigarettes now. If you don't believe that the study's are impartial (or as impartial as humanly possible), then you should try and disprove them. I am just willing to trust that the people who are supposed to know this stuff actually know what they are talking about. Do you trust your doctor to correctly diagnose you?
... of how gas-powered wood chipper companies and giant "Yurt" manufacturers secretly fund Sierra Club's magazine!
We will have earned it.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
This is the best treatment of Hansen's 1998 predictions that I have seen. It discusses Hansen's forecasts of emissions and temperature back in '88 (this was testimony before Congress; Pat Michaels and Michael Crichton have since lied quite bluntly about this testimony only by talking about scenario A, which is not relevant given actual CO2 emissions).
The verdict: Not perfect, but pretty damn good.
Simple Unexpected Concrete Credible Emotional Stories
In the land of the free where the goverment is run by an oil millionaire, Global Warming Skeptics doesn't need funding.. The goverment provides enough skeptic reports.
This is one of the problems of society we face. Our forefathers faced slavery, absolutism, war and others, we are facing litigation and the question of which status corporations should have.
A corporation is in many ways worse than an insane king. For one, you can't wait for it to die of old age. Two, it the king at least could only be in one place at the same time. He had limited resources. Once he started distributing responsibilities, you could hope to change the bureaucracy instead.
However, we face the same problem those French Revolution peasants did: First, we have to realize that we are the people, that corporations live and die by our decree. That if we are united, there's nothing they can do except maybe cause some casualties.
We've got to realize that before they've taken all the power away from us. As long as elections are bought and manipulated and full of fraud and bullshit, but at least it's still we who vote and the manipulations can't bend a clear majority.
And we've got to realize that "we" means all the lazy, stupid, couch-potato, daily-soap-watching, beer-drinking idiots, too.
The last is why I don't have much hope.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Where's the article about the tree huggers funding pro global warming research? Since it's functionaly identical everyone should be up in arms about that too.
I find being offended by me offensive.
Lake Mendota, in Madison, WI, usually freezes over around December 28th. It hasn't frozen yet. In fact, there isn't any ice on it at all.
http://www.madison.com/wsj/mad/top/index.php?ntid
Here's some commentary (pdf) from Hansen himself. He readily admits the sensitivity of temperature to CO2 of the 1988 model was too high, because we've learned stuff since them. Gee, a scientist makes a pretty good prediction nearly 20 years ago, and readily acknowledges the limitations of that prediction? Why again do some people argue that Hansen not credible?
Simple Unexpected Concrete Credible Emotional Stories
It shouldn't matter who's funding the reseach - the research should be evaluated based on the data collected and the conclusions reached. If a study raises valid questions about current climate models, it shouldn't be discredited based on the funding paper trail. (how much research into global warming is being supported by environmentalist organizations?) The "concerned scientists" should welcome contrarian research: climate models need to be thoroughly examined from all angles, especially since major policy decisions are going to be made based on their predictions.
Precisely, but we must add one little caveat; the UCS doesn't want public debate on the scientific consensus. This is because the scientific consensus was arrived at through the scientific method, and is dependent on the available evidence. There is no room for public debate, if you discover that the scientific consensus is incorrect then you must provide scientifically valid evidence. Should this evidence be scientifically verified then the consensus must be reevaluated.
Anyone have a problem with the scientific method???
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
On a personal note: The thing that confuses me is why so many people are so willing to be used as tools in a disinformation campaign.
As a final note: shame on all those moderators who keep modding comments 'insightful' simply because they question global warming. Have you read the moderator guidelines?
So both the Royal Society and UCS are saying that Exxon is deliberately confusing the issue to make an extra buck and you still support them? Your a stock holder arent you? They arent saying that Exxon is doing alternate research, Exxon is not even attempting to hire outside researchers to back up their claims to give themselves some credibility. They are releasing FUD plain and simple. What is it going to take to make you believe that global warming is an issue that needs to be addressed, watching your children die of melanoma? I personally would like to find a solution before things like that start happening.
Follow the money.
It's been the mantra for ages. Corporations spend money on anything that may be beneficial to them so it's hardly surprising that they fund their own research. However, rather than looking at where the corporations are spending their money, it might help to look at WHY they are spending this money.
Oil extraction (not just consumption) produces greenhouse gases. Oil extraction from oil sands is particularly difficult and burns a lot of energy, producing a lot of carbon dioxide. If governments start taxing CO2 production or any equivalent scheme (environmental damage tax, etc), the oil industries are going to be hit at both ends of their financials - once in production and once again in sales. It's going to dent those profit margins. Of course, that means that the oil price will rise again but that too is not necessarily beneficial to the Oil companies. As oil prices rise, competing energy technologies that are currently too expensive become more reasonable. The real nightmare for the Oil companies is to become a minor player compared to other technologies, be it solar, wind or nuclear. So they'll spend any amount of money to ensure that governments hesitate as long as possible because fundamentally, the status quo supports their dominance in the energy markets.
Cheers,
Toby Haynes
Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
Are you insane? Sure, you'll gain arable land in the arctic - at the expense of the flooding of coastlines all over the world, possibly killing hundreds of thousands to millions of people and displacing millions more. You'll decrease heating expenses - and spread the various lethal contagious infections more prevalent in warmer climes to larger parts of the world. If lower fuel costs traveling from Russia to Canada sounds like a good tradeoff for San Diego, LA, and San Francisco beneath the water and a malaria epidemic in northern Georgia, there may be something wrong with your brain.
If that was in jest, I sincerely apologize.
If only they'd used the $16 million to recruit more pirates, they'd have done a lot more to reduce Global Warming. More pirates = Less Global Warming. I thought everyone knew that by now! We simply have to have more pirates.
And more cowbell would be nice too.
What if the Hokey Pokey really is what it's all about?
Livestock methane - which has higher AGW impact than C02 due to longevity - is a large component of yearly greenhouse emissions, as reported here
If there were skeptics, on ANY topic, who is going to FUND them except if you have a stake in it? For any viewpoint in any issue, ONLY the people that stand to lose if the issue goes the other way will fund research supporting them. Thus saying that big oil is funding most of the research that contradicts "prevailing opinion" makes 100% sense. Do you actually expect the Sierra Club to fund a study who's goal is skepticism?
This comes from confusing cause & effect. The studies don't come out a certain way because the group funding them dictates that it should, but only because the only ones LOOKING for an opposite outcome are those with something to lose. A very slight difference, but it's still critical to understanding it. The first is straight-out lying. The 2nd can happen with the most honest of intentions. I'm not saying that's the case here, but to dismiss it automatically as the 1st just means your mind is made up without even looking at what evidence may exist.
No matter how many times journalists, think tank writers, corporate shills, politicians, and other non-scientists say so, there isn't any real debate among scientists - at least not about the basic ideas, sure there is debate over the fine points. But the public doesn't get their science through primary literature. They get it through the aforementioned groups. Some members of these non-scientific groups intentionally distort findings, cherry pick facts, mis-represent what scientists say, over-emphasize discrepancies, under-emphasize agreements, and abuse their direct access to communicate to the public. All in all, they present a picture that scientists are not in agreement - which is false.
Whether or not they are correct, the scientists are in consensus about global warming. But they need a noisy PR machine to make that consensus known when other non-scientists with so much direct public access claim otherwise.
2007-1974 = 33, not 20.
--MarkusQ
What else is new?
We should consider pushing for new legislation that would make companies liable for any harm caused by "position paper" scientists.
If we view government as a tool to protect the citizen from harm (not all do), then it follows that Gov't should enourage behaviours which improve the lives of citizens, and discourage behaviours that harm citizens. Shaping science and opinion away from truth for the purposes of profit is a serious mal-adaption, which harms everyone. We should institute legislation which enables individuals in society to sue for harm caused either (a) as a direct result of reliance on a scientific claim funded with a policy goal (b) as a direct result of use of a product produced by the company, which would have been avoided if the company had not funded policy-guided science.
Burden of proof for the plaintiff should be high to discourage abuse, but the penalties should be a set percentage of the companies net value (so that no company could afford to risk this harm).
In order to prove their case, a plaintiff would have to produce a writing (electronic or paper) which demonstrates that the purpose of the study was to support a policy goal, and not to research the true state of the issue.
Thoughts?
While this may seem like a waste of time.. every law started with some idea kicked around by a couple folks somewhere.
-GiH
1. Form a Union of Concerned Scientists
2. Scare everyone into believing that Global Warming is an imminent threat to Society As We Know It
3. Convince the government to give them lots of money to fund more studies
4. ???
5. Profit!
Ok, the environmentalists are right. I have finally found the proof.
Open Source Alternatives
Way to use argument from authority! How indeed can any of us question climate experts? They're EXPERTS for Pete's sake. They've been doing this for years! That'll shut down debate. But if not, don't forget argument from concensus ("Everyone believes it") or if necessary, implied insults ("Only an idiot would question the experts. You're not an *idiot*, are you?")
Subway sponsors the American Heart Association and in return, Subway's food is now endorsed by the AHA as heart healthy. I hope to see the USC bring Jared and his cronies down!
Insightful argumentation instead of more whatever-side-bashing.
"...we are facing litigation and the question of which status corporations should have".
Very, very well said. Cuts right to the core issue.
I'll bet you'd put "fiat money" up there near the top of our problems, too.
BWilde
Way to use argument from authority! How indeed can any of us question climate experts? They're EXPERTS for Pete's sake. They've been doing this for years! That'll shut down debate. But if not, don't forget argument from concensus ("Everyone believes it") or if necessary, implied insults ("Only an idiot would question the experts. You're not an *idiot*, are you?")
g .html
Where your superb and eloquent attempt to argue back falls down is that what I posted is not an argument from authority, it is an argument from fact. Climate scientists have, of course, known about solar radiation changes, and have been incorporating them into their models and predictions:
http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce/Dec03ScienceMeetin
"The meeting was devoted to our understanding of the physical processes that connect the Sun's radiation and its variability to our terrestrial environment, including the processes involved with climate and ozone response to solar radiative forcing and the mechanisms that cause solar activity and radiation variations."
I would not say this is a case of an idiot questioning the experts, it a case of someone who is ignorant of current climate science questioning the experts, or at least someone too lazy to do a quick google search which would reveal they are wrong.
And, it is a good rule of thumb that, in general, when some random poster on a forum questions the experts, they are almost always wrong.
It does not matter much what path humans take in the years to come. Even the most agressive greenhouse gas emission reduction are a spit in the bucket. The Koyoto treaty calls for reduction in emission down to a 1990 level, and this excludes the developing world like China and India.
The emission in 1990 was already resulting in historical CO2 levels in the air.
The differece will only be wether the global changes happens in a few hundre years or a few thousand years. The big extinctions in the past has taken hundreds of thousands of years, so there is little chance evolution will be up to the task of coping with the changes.
On a geological time scale, it is a flash disaster either way.
At any rate, we will see a human made catastrophy that will easily kill of 90% of all species. Not only due to CO2, but also habitat destruction and resource consumption.
Only way to avoid this would be something like making earth a stoneage zoological garden supporting a few hundred million people tops. The rest must have to build an industrial complex on the moon or mars or something.
Anyone that has fermented grape juice to make wine knows this. The yeast cells multiply to consume all resources, and in the end die of global(vat) pollution(alcohol) of their own making.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
Oh my! The sky is falling. The earth will get 1 degree C warmer in the next ten years. At that rate the libs and Iran will have killed us all anyway before melanoma forms on my ear. As for the objective folks at greenpeace, Don't make me laugh. There is nothing objective about them and they are every bit as biased as Exxon Mobil. And every bit as much a corporation interested in preserving their business as Exxon Mobil. When the "scientists" have to make a warm period of time that took place essentially disappear to make their "man-made global warming" claims appear legitimate you know they are biased. Most global warming skeptics are not disputing warming at all but the radical claim that my car and cow farts are causing it. Greenpeace Out.
Hell, they even hired some of the same scientist...
The word "skeptic" comes from a Greek work, "skepsis", which refers to looking at something and examining it. Skepticism is that the person from Missouri does when they say "show me".
A skeptic isn't a denier. A denier says the scientests are making it all up to curry favor with government grant issuers, you know, the rabid environmentalist Bush administration. A skeptic asks how big the error bars are on the temperature measurements and finds http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature_record. A skeptic asks how a huge computer model of a system which is incompletely defined can ever be validated (and finds annoyingly little in the popular literature). A skeptic asks whether increased solar output could account for the changes and finds out that nights are getting warmer and the upper atmosphere is getting colder, both of which point to heat getting trapped in the lower atmosphere.
A skeptic refuses to be rushed into policy choices. A skeptic asks the question Bjorn Lomborg has been exploring, whether it's better to mitigate the results of climate change than to uproot the foundations of the world economy trying to prevent it.
Skepticism clarifies issues, astroturf campaigns and phony think tanks obscure issues.
We should make science as public as possible. Allowing scientific discoveries to be monopolized by a single company is amoral.
Corporations in the US have such a sweet-heart deal with the government, I think we can ask them to share their discoveries with the rest of us.
Blar.
"Many enviros are simply Marxists that found a willing home.
They're "watermelons": green on the outside, red on the inside."
Wow! So much prejudice and commonplaceness in just 2 sentences. Congratulations.
Anything against the Jews or the old good blacks?
:(){
Look at it this way: Bill Clinton, in the eleventh hour of his presidency, buried the Kyoto treaty--and admission from Kyoto supporters suggest the reduction of CO2 may only slow global warming by the tiniest fraction of a degree. So assuming everyone was on the same page--that is, assuming we all knew that Global Warming was a fact, and further assuming we all knew that Global Warming was entirely caused by human activities--the real political battle over control of how (or if) we can solve this problem would be under way.
The fact that opponents to the idea that Global Warming is real or is as big a problem as presented--and those who believe in Global Warming but who believe it is not entirely (or largly) mankind's fault--have received funding from the oil companies does not take away from the fact that "solving" the problem of manmade Global Warming is a big political undertaking. And anything that is this big political undertaking will inevitably be a big political mess involving trillions of dollars and lots of opportunities for lying, cheating and stealing. (To think otherwise is to think all of our politicians are as pure and clean as the wind-driven snow. Hah!)
I mean, even though we now have proved the Tobacco Companies falsified clear evidence and used tactics to falsify scientific evidence--evidence that has a much more solid basis in double-blind studies on smokers than Global Warmings evidence of computer models and tree ring studies--we still haven't solved the problem of smoking. People still smoke like chimineys, and the evil Tobacco Companies are still selling cigarettes like crazy.
So even though we have reached a solid consensus that smoking kills you and it's all the fault of the Tobacco Companies--they are still in business. And a good friend of mine died of lung cancer at the age of 41 just last year, caused by smoking.
See, this is what confuses me. It's all CO2/global warming one day and all Peak Oil(tm) the next. So if we're running out of oil, what's the problem? And if we want a biomass economy, isn't the extra CO2 and longer growing season a plus? And as for your wine analogy, the yeast doesn't die, it goes dormant mostly because it ran out of food. If the yeast actually poisoned itself, it would have long since gone extinct, but it hasn't. There's yeast everywhere. It tends to escape and find new food sources to live off of.
Jotok, in my opinion there is a big mistake here. The story is not about global warming. It is about manipulation of the media. See this comment: Not just oil companies: Bush administration, too.
Seriously, who is paying the global warming proponents??
It is not theoretical at all. Let's look at the US, where this battle is still being fought. The Environmentalists are Lobbyists. Why do lobbyists do anything?
They want the government to legislate in a way that they approve of. This legislation grows the size of the government, which increases the scope of the government, which increases the potential power of lobbyists in the US. This increased power means more people will donate to their organizations to effect change, perceiving correctly that these institutions are getting better at meeting their desires (which are motivated by an indescribable quantity of different motivations).
In this regard, the environmentalist movement in Washington D.C. is no different from Big Oil, Big Tobacco, or any other institution that can organize such large sums of money. Further, we have green movement demagogues telling us they have lied and distorted the facts to push their agenda. When Big Tobacco finally admitted this, they were forced to pay for a campaign to close them down. But when green groups do it, we just say they're thinking of the greater good.
On the international scene, one need only look at the Kyoto Treaty to see there are numerous biases and agendas in it. If it were truly concerned with reducing emissions, it would not exclude China, who's output of various pollutants is skyrocketing. In comparison, heavy burdens are put on the United States, who's emissions increases have been decreasing yearly, despite a healthy population and industrial increase every year. There are many possible explanations for this, but none of them have environmental reasons.
Personally, I think that we can prove Global Warming, and we know that increased CO2 emissions accelerate the effect. That's enough to say we need to cut emissions and work on alternative fuels. But that isn't enough to castrate ourselves in the world market (which hurts everyone) in a frantic, guilt ridden attempt to comply with people who are clearly using this crisis to their own advantage. The US is more than capable of self-regulating at least as well as any other nation in the world, and unlike many others we will do so without a world organization forcing us to (we already are in many states).
Slashdot. It's Not For Common Sense
I think the comparison to Big Tobacco's "science" is very apropos. Well into the - what, eighties? nineties? - there were scientists testifying that there was no link between tobacco and cancer. Science shouldn't have an agenda. If evidence is found that takes you in a new direction - you follow that evidence. I'd like to see a source for claims such as,
I think that the answer lies somewhere in the middle. It has been scientifically proven that: A. The polar ice caps on MARS are melting. B. Temperature has only raised 1 in the past 100 years on Earth. C. The sun is burning hotter While these facts alone do not exonerate human involvement in the phenomenon known as "global warming" - conclusions reached by scientists which ignore these unfortunate points are less science and more ideological positions reached by desires and junk science just as much as conclusions reached by ideologues who benefit from deregulation. Anyone who blindly trumpets global warming and plays Chicken Little over the events on Earth is not interested in science. I am pretty sure that if every single piece of ice on the ice caps on the planet melted, the rise in sea water would be negligible... of course this is based on a small scale of a piece of ice in a glass of water. It would seem that the solid ice does more to raise sea levels. Then again - I'm just asking questions which global alarmists seem unwilling to answer. I don't question the motives of people who want to see a better planet. As a Conservative - I have an interest in a healthy environment and I deplore companies who dump waste and ruin the wetlands/woodlands in which I hunt/fish/etc. That isn't the issue at all. We all have an interest in a healthy planet. What we don't have an interest in is alarmist anti-capitalist forces attempting to undermine the economy with half-measures that do nothing to combat emissions.
"To work for libertarianism -- to oppose the growth of government and aid the liberation of the individual -- used to be
How can it be "current" climate science and also a fact? Either way, like it or not, your post was an argument from authority. Feel free to call it an "argument from fact" if it makes you feel better. I know the truth, because leading logicians said it was so.
And now playing the race card...
in this corner with a number of 17479724 and a reasonable number of funny and some informative posts: Bestiarosa!
(the crowd cheers).
Did not really see the prejudice myself.
In my experience a lot of enviros are marxists (and some murderous and destructive).
The description is a nice metaphor: They are faking being green so they can advance their true red agenda.
They really don't care about the environment at all. They just hate business, capitalism, and progress.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Global warming? This is most severe winter in the decade I have been in Colorado.
The only bright point is they've closed the office four days and schools six days.
How can it be "current" climate science and also a fact? Either way, like it or not, your post was an argument from authority. Feel free to call it an "argument from fact" if it makes you feel better. I know the truth, because leading logicians said it was so.
I am afraid your logic isn't that good.
What is a fact is that current climate science includes an understanding of the changes in solar radiation. It is also a fact that past climate science has also included this understanding.
You can use the term "argument from authority" all you want, but this is not the case. I am not saying that "climate scientists must be take solar radiation into account because they are experts" I am saying that climate scientists do take solar radiation into account because even the most cursory review of climate science publications shows that they have.
But if you prefer your own obscure logic to evidence, I guess that is up to you. If you want to keep arguing this, I would encourage it, as it shows what those who try and deny climate change resort to.
It is unfortunate that ExxonMobil does not understand this, and are more interested in the 'freedom' of buying and selling.
I guess the part of this argument that defies logic for me is the part where the pro-fossil fuel lobby, the conservative pundits, who reliably will come down on whatever side the rich guys do, the scientists who get paid by the oil companies (along with the mopes who listen to right-wing radio), and folks like some of the jackasses we hear from sometime, all try to deny the fact that *PAUSE* it's probably not a good idea to dump toxic shit into the atmosphere, ground and oceans and NOT EXPECT SOMETHING BAD TO HAPPEN.
It's like there's this big argument over whether the huge chunks of arctic ice that are melting and breaking off into the ocean are because of billions of cars and factories spewing poison into the air or because of, I don't know, SUNSPOT ACTIVITY. It's like the house is on fire, but the 7 year olds (oil companies and the other turds listed above) are blaming the 5 year olds (the Sun, the Trees, or Jehovah) for starting the fire, and while everybody watches in amazement at this exciting argument THE EFFING HOUSE BURNS DOWN.
Instead of all this abrogation of responsibility for ignoring the warning of environmentalists, and trying to blame someone, anyone, else, and instead of all the pseudo science about how its the fault of cow farts that the rising ocean temperatures are causing the ice shelf to break apart, wouldn't it be a little bit better if that energy was spent figuring on what we're going to do when the ocean levels and temperatures keep rising?
I really blame the lawyers for the oil companies for all of this because they're probably telling their bosses "if you admit that burning fossil fuels is screwing up the environment, then you're going to be held responsible and that means M.O.N.E.Y., so no matter what, blame it on something else. Deny, deny, deny."
OK, fine. But whilst all this finger pointing is going on, while the President has some bright boy with an Associates Degree from a community college in Communications telling Climatologists how they should edit their research, there is a reasonably large pile of dung heading for those rotor blades. Mightn't we take a look at that for a moment so maybe, just maybe we can GET OUT OUR UMBRELLAS for the coming shitstorm?
You are welcome on my lawn.
It's stupid we have to have a global meltdown before ppl realizes that there is a serious problem. It just goes to show how morality has declined to the point ppl will do just about anything for a buck, including painting a rosy picture when there is nothing but thorns. Why don't we hear from "religious leaders" on issues as important as this? I guess after martian luther king, they've learned their lesson.
In my experience a lot of enviros are marxists (and some murderous and destructive).
When you say that, how hard is it to keep a straight face?
"Old man yells at systemd"
The last few paragraphs of the UCS report have some problems:
Any economist can tell you that switching power generation sources will not affect employment on net balance. Furthermore, alternative energy sources certainly won't "save consumers money" because all the oil alternatives are modestly more expensive than oil itself.
It's that kind of nonsense which discredits UCS.
There is one way we could greatly reduce carbon emissions, virtually for free: by replacing coal-burning plants with nuclear plants. Unfortunately, the UCS (author of the report) has waged it's own absurd disinformation campaign against nuclear power, and in so doing has contributed to global warming much more than ExxonMobil ever could. If anything, ExxonMobil should take lessons from UCS about how to falsify scientific evidence, how to sow doubt where none exists, and how to contribute to global warming.
In their opposition to nuclear power, groups like UCS and greenpeace have contributed to global warming to an extent that ExxonMobil could never hope to achieve. As an example, France ignored groups like greenpeace and UCS, and went ahead with nuclear, and their C02 emissions per capita are now 85% lower than ours. Had greenpeace and UCS never existed in the first place, then we probably wouldn't be facing this global warming problem now.
I am not a constitutional lawyer (IANACL). But I think there's something in the constitution which forbids Congress from punishing Exxon for their spoken views. I don't see how Congress could pass a law declaring that some viewpoint is "unacceptable and must change." In fact, I doubt Congress could ban a point of view even if UCS believes it to be mistaken.
I also doubt that shareholders could be motivated to reform ExxonMobil.
That leaves consumers. Good luck!
...Of course, if we seek to reduce carbon emissions, the most economic and rational way to do so would be to grab the "low-hanging fruit" first; in other words, to reduce carbon emissions where they're completely unnecessary, like in power generation. The easiest way to do that is to reduce nuclear plant safety requirements (yes, REDUCE) and increase taxes on carbon emissions from coal-burning and gas-fired plants, until the aggregate risk is the same per unit of power for all power generation sources, but much lower than now. Doing so would make coal-burning completely uneconomic, causing coal-burning to cease.
By following that rational strategy, we would reduce carbon emissions in this country by almost 40% in the long run. And it would impose no additional expense on consumers, would greatly reduce risk, and would not require unspecified scientific breakthroughs to occur some time in the future.
But I won't hold my breath. We would never implement that solution. It would solve the problem of carbon emissions, pretty easily, because the problem of carbon emissions is easy to solve. But groups like UCS and greenpeace would never allow it. They're too caught up in promoting increased carbon emissions.
(btw, It's easy to see how reducing nuclear safety requirements would reduce the risk to consumers. Assume coal-burning causes 50,000 deaths per year (which it does) and additionally there's a .01 chance per year of catastrophic climate change leading to 10
Point taken. I'm afraid that after reading dozens of "don't argue with scientists" posts, I unfairly took it out on your argument. Which was, after all, only saying that the scientists do take the sun into account, not necessarily that they are right, per se.
I still do, however, have reservations about the word "fact" in ongoing scientific inquiry. Newton's gravity was a "fact" until Einstein (and, to be fair, Newton is still a good enough approximation for getting rovers to Mars.) So I don't see science as establishing "fact", but rather producing theories that are closer and closer appoximations of reality. As in the Standard Model of Quantum Physics, which has been confirmed to as high a degree of accuracy as we can muster, but still has those annoying unexplained constants that suggest there is a higher-order theory out there.
Or in other words, the "march of science" as opposed to the "we're all done of science".
But so as not to detract from my original intent: Mea Culpa. Mea Maxima Culpa.
incomplete and inaccurate data
Each day you see the sun rise, unless it's cloudy. Each day you see it set. The rest of the time, you don't see it. Now that's pretty incomplete. So tell me, how can you possibly assume it's the same sun you're seeing each day?
// This is not a sig.
Right, but in this case, the skeptics *are* the politically motivated.
As for funding, isn't the article in question about how Exxon funded the skeptics with $16 million?
we first call it consensus, and then label everyone who seeks alternate funding a lobbiest for big-oil and discredit their research as non-scientific propaganda.
If you get $16 million from big oil to write papers that go against the scientific consensus, then what are you?
I guess you don't exactly know what "scientific consensus" means. *Anyone*, regardless of funding, can criticize a scientific paper. When someone finds an objectionable item in a paper, he can write a rebuttal and propose further tests and alternate explanations. Scientists will analyze the criticism and, if it is a valid point, someone will perform the proposed tests or redo the analysis.
Thanks to Hollywood, we are used to seeing the word "mad" preppended to "scientist". Those guys aren't afraid of considering unusual ideas. When a consensus arises among them, you can be sure that a lot of unusual or unpopular ideas have been considered and discarded. Discarded not because they are unpopular, but because careful study has shown them to be false.
If what the USC *cough* reports *cough* is true, ExxonMobil just burned $16 million dollars up into the atmosphere. It's not a coincidence when global warming advocates scream the loudest during the summer. I wonder how much has been spent to spread the fear of global warming? It must be somewhere in the billions, collectively speaking.
I am concerned that the, for lack of a better phrase, "anti-global warming" people, bring up certain well phrased points in an effort to seem to make sense. Like, "disagree with the orthodoxy" or "challenging the consensus," and reasonable phrases like that.
Hey, I consider myself a scientist, and I seek out facts that disagree with my conclusions in an effort to understand more. That's what you do when you want to know the facts.
Don't be fooled, don't confuse the spew from these so called "think tanks" as science. Of course, it "sounds" scientifically viable on the surface, enough so that the vast majority of people who don't really know any better consider it valid. It isn't. It is carefully crafted hogwash.
Do not confuse these "think tanks" with institutions that seek knowledge, they have a corporate agenda, they don't study to understand the effects of something, they study the language and science used in an effort to produce something seeming plausible just long enough to stall any real action.
We do know that global warming and weather destabilization is taking place. This is a fact. The degree to which it is happening and the amount of reversibility are under debate.
I almost died of thirst in drought-stricken Africa yesterday. Could you send me that half-full glass?
// This is not a sig.
You don't know jack about science. Scientists get published precisely by questioning present assumptions. But the questions themselves have to be rigorous. Virtually every breakthrough in science was made by someone questioning present assumptions. We've had a long string of major and minor breakthroughs over the last several centuries. The global warming/climate change hypothesis was itself a major challenge to the present assumptions back in 1988, when the first major papers suggesting it got into the journals.
The assumption that Exxon favors - that humankind can't change the climate, because it's just too big for little us to make any difference about - was the prevailing assumption back before all the pioneering work in global warming/climate change was done. You cannot get published by challenging the notion that the world is spheroid by claiming that, no, it's flat. But if you could come up with a plausible model of how the apparent world is really a cross-section of a hyperdimensional whatnot, that's might well see print. Science goes forward, not back. Exxon is claiming the equivalent of that the world is flat.
Of course, it's always easy to sell the public on the old, previously-prevailing assumptions that science, with its constant practice of challenging assumptions, has moved beyond. The stuff is still latent in the cultural background. So there are a whole lot of people in the public who can be sold on the notions that the world is 4000 years old, flat, and not subject to human-triggered climate change. But that's public relations and ignorance, not science - and it's no failure of science to not take this sort of "challenge" seriously.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
In view of your post, I honestly apologise for my overtly sarcastic tone - I misjudged you.
I fully agree that argument from authority is, of itself, a poor argument. The problem is how to know when an argument from someone who is not an authority is valid? Arguing with scientists is a very good approach, usually because good scientists will argue back in a friendly way.
Climate science is certainly not about certainty, the problem is that the range of probabilities is troubling.
Anyway, I apologise for a harsh post.
Clearly slashdot is dying. You leave first, we'll all be right behind you.
I'll just use my special getting high powers one more time...
for people posting on slashdot that there is no anthropological climate change.
Confuse the public? Discredit science? Define the debate via perjorative choices of terms. Exxon might be raising legitimate concerns, or funding valid research. The global warming phenomenom is literally as complex as the atmosphere, but most people seem content to oversimplify and sensationalize it.
This is not a self-referential sig.
I never said anything alarmist, I never said the world is going to end, I never even said that I believe or dont believe the global warming theorys. What I did say was that 2 very prestigious scientific organizations, have identified Exxon as a leader in the anti global warming camp and they are spreading mis-information about it. These arent a bunch of "leftists?" (I take you are an american conservative), they are well respected organizations (by both conservative and liberal scientists) in the scientific community (at least the Royal Society is, not sure if the NCS has been bought by the current admin yet, but I dont think so). If what Exxon was doing was scientific and had any credibility they wouldnt have even said anything.
I also asked you a question. Again, what will it take for you to admit that there may be a problem and it has to be taken seriously and investigated? When it is too late to do anything about it? Remember it is a majority of the scientific community claiming that global warming is a major contributor to the climate changes we have been expieriencing and that community is comprised of both conservative and liberal scientists. But it is just wrong to turn this into a liberal/conservative thing (both sides use it to push their agendas), it affects us all equally.
After reading some of the responses, I come away amazed at how many people get their politics from a poorly written science fiction novel. A pyramid of chumps that get fed a slurry of entertainment and spin to be vomited out on cue.
Yes. There's an evil conspiracy of scientists and ecofreaks that are dead set against you eating eagle burgers while driving your Hummer with your feet.
Hmmm. Scientific process vs the profit motive of a company. Which has a better history of integrity? Tough call.
"First you get the Linux, then you get the power, THEN you get the women"
If anyone ever worked for the government you know you don't get funding for a project unless you have a problem. The longest and most expensive projects I've worked on were "studying" some problem without ever having to prove you are right or proving your solutions work. It is the nature of governments.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Environmental extremists are extremely bad for the real environmental reform.
L EARN_Cat=Extremism&LEARN_SubCat=Extremism_in_Ameri ca&xpicked=4&item=eco
So there was no smile on my face because I was dead serious.
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4780
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=13367
http://www.fff.org/comment/com0512c.asp
http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/Ecoterrorism.asp?
During the past two decades, radical environmental and animal rights groups have claimed responsibility for hundreds of crimes and acts of terrorism, including arson, bombings, vandalism and harassment, causing more than $100 million in damage. While some activists have been captured, ecoterror cells - small and loosely affiliated - are extremely difficult to identify and most attacks remain unsolved.
http://www.cdfe.org/conference.htm
Washington (CNSNews.com) - As concerns about eco-terrorism mount on Capitol Hill, there is more finger-pointing aimed at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which admits to having provided financial support to a group allegedly connected to the terrorism.
But while PETA acknowledges that some of its money has in the past gone to the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), and to the legal defense funds for several Animal Liberation Front (ALF) members, the organization denies that any of its money "goes toward illegal activities."
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
That's funny. 'Red agenda'. You must be stuck in the 60s, Mr. McCarth... ehm... Maxo-Texas. Hello! This is 2007 and Communism is long dead. /is/ commonplaceness. It's just like saying the Jews are subverting the order of the Reich or whatever Nazi propaganda bullshit.
Saying environmentalists 'hate business, capitalism, and progress'
Most environmentalists simply don't accept the current model of business and of "progress" and they propose a new model. On the other hand, I've seen too many times the much praised capitalism foraging wars in the name of profit and speculating on pain and suffering, e.g. the tobacco industry, the big pharmas, the weapon industry, the big oil companies. It is too easy forget people are suffering as a result of business when cash flows in.
:(){
The little bit of the article that I read sounded more like whining to me.
Environmentalists are upset that ExxonMobil is funding the other side of their argument. Exxon is breeding "uncertainty" after environmentalists spent their money trying to present only one side of the issue. Now someone shows up with the other side and they want to cry foul.
Dirty hippies, grow up.
Perhaps someone needs to write a press release about "Wacko tree-huggers fund Global Warming fanatics."
Huge amounts of land are locked up by the snowy owl.
It's been observed in 2nd and 3rd growth forest.
Hmm maybe it doesn't need old growth forest to live.
enviro answer: snowy owl is protected and since observed in 2nd and 3rd growth forests you should be blocked from recutting those down too.
Enviro's are dominated by extremists. They have some good ideas but they ignore the fundamental problem
Too many people.
Nothing they say or do matters as long as the population keeps going up.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
The report compares the tactics employed by the oil giant to those used by the tobacco industry in previous decades, and identifies key individuals who have worked on both campaigns.
This calls up an old thought. Back when fast food restaurants first started banning indoor smoking, I was having a smoke outside after eating. There was a woman in a SUV waiting in the drive-through line. The SUV wasn't in very good repair judging by the amount of smoke it was producing. The woman yelled out to me, telling me how bad smoking was. All I could do is roll my eyes and shrug.
I've often wondered since then, when will the oil companies get sued for all of the damage they do? I don't remember ever being told that it's unsafe to breath the air outside due to smokers. The smog from cars on the other hand...
Request a Linux Shockwave player here: http://www.macromedia.com/support/email/wishform/
I didn't see that anywhere in the article. As far as I can tell, you've invented it. The rest of your post is full of similar inventions and outright paranoia about some kind of scientific conspiracy. This article is about the dirty tactics used by ExxonMobil to discredit Global Warming. It is not about new research they've funded or scientific papers they've published. Take your holy war against the scientific community elsewhere.
"They are releasing FUD plain and simple. What is it going to take to make you believe that global warming is an issue that needs to be addressed, watching your children die of melanoma?"
I believe that qualifies as alarmist, even though I have no children myself. Clearly, the implication there is "FIX GLOBAL WARMING OR DIE". If you're NOT a member of the GW alarmist camp, I apologize for my assumption, but that's what it seems like from what you wrote.
. As for the 2 organizations that label Exxon as a "mis-informer", from the article, these are their objections:
I'm sorry, but if I had a nickel for every time since the early 80's that some climatologist has declared his evidence to be "indisputable", and was then proven wrong a decade later, I'd be a rich man. Julian Bond wrote some really interesting stuff in this area. Plus, more importantly, isn't science ABOUT doubting supposedly indisputable evidence? Tell the quantum physics guys that they're jerks for doubting what "Everyone knows". Now, the article doesn't say exactly which "indisputable" facts that Exxon dared to question, so I can't evaluate those on the merits.
-
funded an array of front organizations to create the appearance of a broad platform for a tight-knit group of vocal climate change contrarians who misrepresent peer-reviewed scientific findings
Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of climate skeptics left in academia, because they've all been chased out. It's not just the Italians I listed in my previous post. Henk Tennekes, a Dutch (I think) meteorologist and head of the Royal Dutch Meteorological Society, Aksel Winn-Nielsen, former director of the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization, and plenty of other have also been shut down by the global warming alarmist establishment. Is it any wonder then that companies with an interest in the matter would fund research going the other way? The fact is, climate skeptics are almost routinely ignored by the alarmist camp because, well, they ask questions about crazy things like data. It's not Exxon's fault, it's the scientific communities fault for being so rigid in the face of what I thought defined their field: the search for truth.- attempted to portray its opposition to action as a positive quest for "sound science" rather than business self-interest
As opposed to all the other groups that have a chip in the global warming game that are so pure and chaste and free from ideological rigor? Look, it doesn't matter what their motivation is. If they're right, they're right. That's the whole science thing there. Even if their desire is to prove that burning African babies to power their sprinkler systems, if they're _right_, and the climate debate really ISN'T settled, then their actions are still correct, and we shouldn't dismiss the possibility simply because having the alarmists be wrong would be to their profit. Actually, if the alarmists are wrong, that benefits all of our pocketbooks, but that's a different story.-
* used its access to the Bush administration to block federal policies and shape government communications on global warming
That's called lobbying. Everyone does it, because hte government has its damn fingers in everything. Hardly out of the ordinary, or nefarious in any way.Re: my political persuasion. I'm American, but not a conservative. Libertarian, if you have to buttonhole me.
I answered your original question in my first reply. "I will believe that global warming is an issue that we need to address when there's data to prove that there is, not a bunch of discarded and disproven hockey stick models, empirically false predictions, and hysterics. When the skeptics are given a chance to, I dunno, do some research and crunch some numbers of their own, and then those theories are compared to the alarmist theories in a rational, scientific manner, and THEN the alarmists show to be right, I'll worry."
You don't think tobacco execs are stupid enough to smoke? They saw the real test results!
Ooops, did I just say that out loud?
Did you even bother to read my post, Snarky McGee? Yes, you're right, the article does NOT say what I said. Nor did I claim that the article said what I said. See, I do this thing, it's called reading. I do it a lot, and helps me to learn things, and then go on to form my own opinions on matters, depending on how compelling one side or another is. Then, after I've learned, and I go and run my mouth about it, which is what produced that sentence. I wasn't writing a book report, I was making a point.
If you have any evidence of my "inventions" and "paranoia", please present it. As far as I can tell, my post is pretty rational, and hardly a tinfoilhatpartytime. And I am hardly on a "holy war" against the scientific community. I'm arguing FOR science, real science, not science molded to fit a political agenda, which is what the alarmists are doing every time they refuse to consider the possibility that maybe they're wrong. I mean, for fuck's sake, the Earth is a huge, chaotic system. It's pure hubris to say that OMFG WE UNDESTAND EVERT1NG BOUT IT SO STOP UR CARS. I want there to be research, on all sides of the argument, because that;s how you figure out what the truth really is.
Next time I post, though, I'll be sure to just re-hash the claims made in the article I'm responding to, because clearly, intelligent debate stems from high school summary papers.
Look, those people who went to the Antarctic to get ice core samples didn't go there to prove anything. They went there because they wanted ice core samples. They showed the data. It showed trends. It showed that CO2 hasn't been as high as it is today for the past 300,000 years. If it had shown that CO2 was higher in the past than today, then they would have published that data, and it would have formed a solid basis for refuting the claim that humans are contributing unnatural levels of CO2 to the atmosphere. However that was not the case.
And that's regardless of whether the people who did that study believed in anthropogenic global warming or not! Science doesn't work that way. A scientist may have a belief, but their science demands evidence.
Famous example: Michelson and Morely set out to prove the existence of the luminiferous aether. They conducted their experiment and got... nothing. They tried it again and got... nothing. They tried it at high altitudes. They tried it at low altitudes. They tried it in the southern hemisphere and the north. They hypothesized aether-dragging effects and tried to account for them and got... nothing. No matter what they did they got nothing, and that's the result they reported, and no matter whether they still believed in it or not they could not draw a scientific conclusion that it existed. They didn't have to go LOOKING for the conclusion opposite of their own, it came to them through normal scientific rigor.
By the way, in doing so, they turned scientific belief on its head, guaranteed their own position in the history books, and opened the doors for other explanations, the one that passed scientific muster being Einsteins's.
You don't fund scepticism. You fund science. You conduct experiments. The result of that experiment is your scientific evidence, whether it supports your theory or refutes it. That's the way science works.
The enemies of Democracy are
A clear majority of scientists believe that global warming is largely caused by human activity. However, the extent of global warming in the past, and especially in the future, is very far from certain. In the last century, temperatures rose 1.1 +/- 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit - that's a huge margin of error, illustrative of the uncertainty involved in climatology. The current climate models predict a rise of between 2 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit in the next century. Again, a massive level of uncertainty. For this reason, I believe that research from the skeptical viewpoint can be very useful, even if the source of funding is Big Oil. By attempting to poke holes in the current climate models, these scientists may well point out ways to improve the models and make them more robust/accurate. As long as the Exxon-funded research is held to the same scientific standards as all other research, it can do no harm to climate science. Of course, the effect on public understanding of the issues may be more damaging, but it's the job of every individual to critically analyze the information he/she has access to; and if legitimate journals refuse to publish a paper then it is probably fundamentally flawed.
> Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?"
Bush. Republicans. USA.
But then again it is about money, isn't it?
Now, for another hotly debated topic: Iraq...
I find it ironic when a conservative poster simply cannot restrain him/herself from using emotional terminology like, "Whine".
That is, anything which doesn't agree with the conservative ideology is automatically subjected to ridicule even at the basic level of word choice.
The only other subset of society which does this on a regular basis is that of the grade-school kid. The ironic part? --Where the poster tells the "Dirty" hippies to grow up.
-FL
We should solve this global warming business in a civil manner. The warming predictions are based on finite element analysis for the entire planet. (Finite element analysis uses a computer model of sufficiently small pieces to model a greater system.) Since computer models include the entire Earth for the next hundred years, we can simply check the climate model predictions against what really happens a year from now. If the computer models accurately predict the tempurature within a tenth of a degree and the precipitaion within a millimeter for a couple hundred random cities then we will know that the alarmists are really on to something. Otherwise they should shut up until someone teaches them that using a computer to model the weather for the entire planet for the next hundred years is like trying to dig the Chunnel with a wooden spoon.
You humans must be pretty conceited to believe that you have changed the global climate with mere automobiles. A single volcanic eruption can often spew enough greenhouse gases to equate that of all automobiles driven in a single year. Come on, let's face it. The media runs the show, the media is making a killing on alarmist programming that foretells the end of the world, and we are eating it up. Example: Top shows involving end-of-world scenarios include....Dante's Peak, Armageddon, Independence Day, An Inconvenient Truth, etc., etc. All are fiction, all are tapping into our fascination with destruction, and all are making big bank at the box office. You crazy liberals -p
Tell the people in Denver all about global warming!!!! They should be very receptive to this BS. They are currently under several feet of snow. They're expecting more snow tonight.
Actually $16 million over 7 years can buy a lot of influence. Ask any elected Republican offical. In fact, the DOJ will be doing a lot of that in courtrooms around the country over the next few years. And yes, some Democrates will also be in trouble, but they will be a very few compaired to the Republican who will be indicted and then convicted.
It's on their right to finance reasearch on topics of their interest. Provided all other things keep working, I see no harm in it. Please note that there's plenty of evidence that fossil fuels are increasing global temperatures, solid and convincing evidence. But as far as I've seen there's still a lot of competing theories about how it's working. And if we don't know how things work exactly, it could (even if it's not very probable) that what we most scientist are seeing right now could prove not to be correct. It could even happen that maybe we are seeing a natural cicle, or that some other effect would trigger a counter-effect. I don't know how this could be, but who else, at this present moment, can be 100% sure? On another side, the current theories can only benefit from being challenged, as this would contribute to show their flaws and direct reasearch into their weakest points, thus, making the current theories more solid. If they prove unable to withstand the attack, well, heck! we then need better theories! As long as the scientists funded by oil industries fully disclose this relationship I see no problems with it.
Your ad could be here!
First off, the environmental movement is no more dominated by extremists than an other movement, and probably much less so than, say, the extreme Christian Right has dominated conservative politics in recent years. Sure, you'll find extremists everywhere, but the best thing to do is ignore the fringes and focus on the solutions to common problems that are put forth by these groups.
I don't think any rational environmentalist would argue that too many people is not the primary cause of much strife across the globe. The question is how to deal with the problems that arise from overpopulation. You could use government to artificially impose restrictions on the number of children born, as China has, but of course that only works in the countries where such policies are implemented, and that comes with myriad ethical issues. So, baring that option, the only choice is to attempt to reduce our environmental "footprint" significantly. No one claims that this is an easy task, but it may be well worth the short term costs in order to prevent much more significant problems down the road.
And, ultimately, no rational environmentalist would say that business, capitalism, and progress are the problem. The problem arises from narrow-minded interests that are focused on short term, individual profit rather than long term, collective well being and true progress towards a more functional and balanced way of living on this planet. It all comes down to personal responsibility toward the common good.
are self-incented to find climate change - it ensures more funding. 30 years ago, they were finding "global cooling." Now they're finding "global warming." Climate change pays if you're a climate scientist, especially if you can make a plausible connection to manmade influence. There's no money or career path in static or naturally changing climate.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
So does loaded language in the OP such as "that seek to confuse the public on global warming science" and "Would a 'global warming controversy' exist..." bother you as well? Seems to me there's some subtle but obvious condescension and ridicule there, and it isn't exactly what I'd call "conservative".
3000+ comments meta-modded. 0 mod points awarded.
Lesson for other meta-suckers: Don't believe the hype!
Any sane person knows nothing is going to be done about the overpopulation problem.
We will take it right up to edge or past the edge.
50 years tops it is going to be completely unbearable or we will have had a billion dead to some war or disease or both.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
This all 'controversy' confuses me. I live in finland and there is no controversy whatsoever. The global warming is quite clear and simple issue. It seems that those millions of dollars are directed especially to the US. Which explains why the controversy exists only where the oil indrusty is willing to spend its money.
Ps. Pardon for my grammar. Only way to survive finnish winter is to drink humongous amounts of alcohol.
I'm willing to bet the side opposing ExxonMobil has kicked in a few bucks too.
You are confusing "peace activism" with pacifism. There is a big difference between a pacifist (for instance the Amish) saying "all killing is wrong, so I won't bear arms" and a peace activist wearing a Che t-shirt while demonstrating against "imperialist war and globalist exploitation". Those are two very different ideas. One is a moral stand, the other is a political stand thinly masquerading as a moral stand.
t =type . Read their web-pages yourself. You'll see that they go far far beyond pacifism to over-the-edge left-wing advocacy. These two example groups are fairly typical of the overall movement. You'll notice groups like this don't protest against all war, just "imperialist" wars. For instance, I've yet to see a "peace" group protest against the wars waged by Columbia's FARC or the Philippines New People's Army (both leftist groups), even though both conflicts are over 30 years old, are still on-going, and have killed tens of thousands. Their "peace" activism is very selective. They are much more against "our side" fighting, than being against fighting in general.
As an example, take the "United for Justice with Peace" (www.justicewithpeace.org), which is a leading "peace" activism group in the Washington, DC area. Or another similarly named "United for Peace" http://unitedforpeace.org/article.php?type=66&lis
So when I say, that UCS and Greenpeace are tied to the left with its "peace" and environmental agendas, you can take it to the bank. These are not a bunch of pacifists, they are people with a political agenda beyond pacifism.
No, because the article went on to illustrate deliberate intent to inject falsely represented data into the discussion. ie., To "Confuse" the issue. Thus it is easy enough to see that the claim was not so much emotional as it was simply accurate.
"Would a 'global warming controversy' exist..."
This phrase has no emotional content whatsoever. There is a controversy. It's subject is global warming. How is that problematic or leading? --Compare that to, "Whining".
-FL
According to Michael Sheridan in a recent article in the Australian "The Chinese plan to build no fewer than 500 new coal-fired power stations, adding to some 2,000, most of them unmodernised, that spew smoke, carbon dioxide, and sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere". "..... there are 21,000 coal mines in the country and coal output has doubled in the last five years. China's Shanxi province produces more coal than Britain, Russia, and Germany combined". I know this is a shock for Americans (especially liberal ones), but you guys will soon no longer be the cause of the planet going to hell (if it indeed is). Truth is the investigation of the root causes of global warming has moved from scientific investigation to a kind of religious cult - people like Lomborg attempting to simply clarify the discussion are villified and even investigated for not using 'proper scientific method'. Almost a modern version of the inquisition where even questioning the received wisdom is viewed as scientific blasphemy.
Combining Several Low Gradient Heat Source Power Generation Ideas
How do I know that global warming exists? Easy - I look out the window. I live in the Chicago area - where I've basically lived my entire life. 30 years ago it was BELOW ZERO during the winter. We had SNOW. Fucken ball shriviling COLD. So cold it froze the tears on your eyelashes. Wind chill factors that made husky malamute dogs cry. Virtually entire species of bugs died off because of the cold.
What do we have now? Between 40 and 60 degrees in the middle of winter. Rain. very little to no snow. I have fucken tulips coming up in JANUARY.
Summer used to be rain in the spring. heavy rain in the summer. 80-90 degrees. Now? Almost no rain in the spring. drought all summer long. 90-105 degrees. 10^500 swarms of chineese lady bugs flying all over the damn place. Box elder bugs that won't die off because it never gets cold enough....
This is some scary shit people. And it's gotta stop...
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/96/tpxerror.html [ nasa.gov]
"Measurements of global sea-level rise from a U.S. instrument in space likely will be revised downward because of a recently discovered error in the data-processing software, mission scientists said. Initial indications are that sea-level measurements from the U.S. altimeter aboard the U.S.-French TOPEX/Poseidon satellite likely will agree more closely with Earth-based tide gauges, as well as with the French altimeter on the satellite. Preliminary findings from TOPEX/Poseidon data..., indicated the Earth's sea surface was rising ... more than 5 millimeters per year. Data collected from December 1992 to April 1996 have been updated and suggest that the new sea level rise estimate will be revised to 1 to 3 millimeters per year."
The recent speculation that man is causing global warming and that sea levels will suddenly rise is the result of flawed computer models and flawed satellite data...and journalists and politicians being unprofessional. Let me review a few details at you.
In 2001, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, convened by the United Nations, said: "No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected."
Professor Nils-Axel Morner, head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics Department at Stockholm University and past president of the INQUA Commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution, "Observational data obtained by our international team of experts shows conclusively that the sea level is not rising." "In the last 5000 years, global mean sea level has been dominated by the redistribution of water masses over the globe. In the last 300 years, sea level has been oscillation close to the present with peak rates in the period 1890-1930. Between 1930 and 1950, sea fell. The late 20th century lack any sign of acceleration. Satellite altimetry indicates virtually no changes in the last decade. Therefore, observationally based predictions of future sea level in the year 2100 will give a value of +10±10 cm (or +5±15 cm)."
"The data does not support any sea-level rise at all. ... There is no evidence, over the last century, that suggests there will be an acceleration in sea level" -- Wolfgang Scherer, the director of Australia's National Tidal Facility at Flinder's University in Adelaide.
In 1050, during the Medieval Warm Period, sea level was 25 centimeters higher than in 1650, during the Little Ice Age. Since 1650, sea level has been steadily rising at a rate of 1.8 mm per year.
Over the last 3,000 years, there have been at least 5 periods of "global warming". The Medieval Warm Period was from 800 AD to 1400 AD. It ended around 600 years ago. This was followed by the Little Ice Age that started 500 years ago and ended just over 100 years ago. Not surprisingly, Greenland just harvested its first barley in 600 years. Barley and grapes for wine were major crops in Greenland until 1400 AD.
Don't forget to understand the influence of the Maunder minimum and thermal haline.
Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, global average temperatures did not increase between 1998 and 2005. Yes, there was a period of warming between 1970 and 1998 - but there was also a similar period of warming between 1918 and 1940, well before the greatest phase of world industrialisation, and that cooling occurred between 1940 and 1964, at precisely the time that human emissions were increasing at their greatest rate. Of the 1.5 F in warming the planet experienced over the last 150 years, two-thirds of that increase occurred between 1850 and 1940.
The 1 degree increase in global temperature over the past century is nothing unusual. For example, the Medieval Warm Period, from A.D. 1000 to 1400, was warmer than
If you're mad at energy corps ripping you off, lying to you, paying/bribing others to lie to you or to rip you off, why not fight them directly?
Join the Union of Concerned Scientists, and fight with the good guys against the bad guys. It's much more fulfilling than just bitching on Slashdot, which only consumes power which pays the energy corps to rip you off and lie to you. And drains you of the fight that could be taken right to them.
--
make install -not war
We're discussing a story about specific evidence of Exxon paying to fake "science" to undermine legitimate science indicating climate change. Where is the evidence that "environmentalists have lied"?
You try the "everyone's a liar" trick without evidence, but then you decide that manmade global warming is fake, because you've decided that solar output is to blame. Based on your less-than-rocket science remembering something about "global cooling" from high school 30 years ago, compared against the conclusions by many actual climate science experts.
You 70s "skeptics" also tried to stop us from keeping CFC aerosols from destroying the ozone layer, but we kept your lies and denial down long enough to do a lot of fixing. You demand we do not "shout down each other", but you say that the problem is that thinking is stopped by the "sky is falling mentality". You are a hypocrite, a Greenhouse denial projector.
You have destroyed any possible credibility with your clumsy denials, and should stop shouting baseless nonsense while serious people try to figure out how to undo the damage you have been doing since the Eisenhower era.
--
make install -not war
The burden of proof lies upon the skeptic to disprove unfalsifiable claims.
Falsifiability is an important concept in the philosophy of science that amounts to the apparently paradoxical idea that a proposition or theory cannot be scientific if it does not admit consideration of the possibility of its being false.
ExxonMobil moneys (along with much more from other sources i suspect) has been effectively used to suppress the green movements fight against global warming due to the use of fossil fuels.
9 605551/m/7321092461 ), which might not even be biodiesel. It is difficult to buy biodiesel which has been made to adequate standards with good quality control and making it yourself (it's a bit like homebrew) does entail fire risks. In the UK biodiesel is heavily taxed and in fact has just had a 'green tax' increase of 1.25p per litre9 605551/m/6761043771). Our farmers need work and could produce much biodiesel if these taxes where removed.
On a local level in the UK the bullshit related to global warming is intense, we see the Irish and US airlines (BA is not to bad, well maybe!) picked on by a UK government minister in the recent news. However airlines contribute approximately 3% to global CO2 emissions (double that due to the high level at which they are released as a factor of safety) while transport and power generation contribute 50%. Cars are without doubt an area where huge CO2 cuts can be made.
Many unmodified cars can run on biodiesel which is a fuel which recycles CO2 from the Earths atmosphere. Hence it does not release 'fossil fuel CO2' which was stored underground millions of years ago. But biodiesel is totally discredited in the eyes of the public. Motor mechanics pass comments like 'don't use that shit' on the basis of passed experience with poorly made fuel (see link http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/44
(see link http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/44
Biodiesel is not an answer to all are energy problems, however used as part of a well constructed energy policy it can be of great help in sustaining the future of humanity.
ExxonMobil and other oil companies are responsible for much of the corruption at all levels in our world.
I am, if not a climate scientist yet, working with physical oceanography and studying the stuff (http://www.fimr.fi). There really seems to be a consensus about the "political side". There is an overwhelming agreement on the importance of reducing pollution. We're living with lots of uncertainties, but remember that how uncertain the scientific prediction might be, it's still the best prediction we have. And the stakes are quite high for a gamble.
I'm not a climate scientist but I follow the feild closely and I have noticed there are a lot of people withing the "Consensus" on global warming who are really starting to worry about how political this issue has become and how bad science is not being challenged. There are lots of scientists who see unrealistic models, that are fed with incomplete or incorrectly gathered data, and are built off of flawed assumptions make predictions which are not plausable get attention from the mainstream press and worry about what will happen to the field when these predictions don't even come close to being met; the fear is that these bad-models will destroy all respect that the general public has for the field.
You must understand that scientists are mostly interested in their own work, not discrediting others'. Furthermore, in a complex problem like global climate trends, it's not clear which assumptions are good and which aren't. We're dealing with lots and lots of simplifications and assumptions some of which are known to introduce certain errors, and we're ignoring some known phenomena thought to be insignificant.
All data scientists have or will ever have is incomplete. Do you have an idea how many weather stations exist? How often they produce a good measurement? We've got 510 million square kilometers on this planet, and a good many significant kilometers of atmosphere on top of it. Only to store the complete state of the Earth climate in a good resolution would take several harddisks. The problem itself is unsolvable and we'll always need an approximation. That said, AFAIK, there are no permanent weather stations in the whole of the Arctic. We get satellite pictures, we get measurements from ships and airplanes, scientific trips etc but satellites don't see things like air temperature, and measurements are scarce.
That said, our models that are fed incomplete data and use many inaccurate assumptions and simplifications do produce a useful weather forecast for up to a week ahead. And that's the most useful and best forecast we have.
All right, the last day of any weather forecast is not too reliable, so how will a global climate forecast for a hundred years will be? Real scientists have studied this problem too. Incomplete data? Well, let's run the model a hundred times, each time starting with different input data, and see what range of results we get. Bad assumptions? Do the same thing, varying your uncertain assumptions a bit. Other errors? Run a simulation, and then run exactly the same simulation with some more CO2.
Models based on sound physical principles seem to agree about the correlation of CO2 and temperature. One of the largest uncertainties in the climate models is actually how much CO2 the humanity manages to spew out during the next 100 years. Talk about uncertain predictions here!
All that said, the climate change probably isn't as catastrophic as the media wants to think. Maybe it gets hotter, sea levels rise and so on. The north pole will probably get ice-free summers in 50-100 years (albedo goes down, Earth sucks in even more heat). Living in the north it's probably getting better for me. Heck, we're living the warmest winter ever recorded right here in Helsinki, and one could say that it's somewhat pleasant too :). Then again, I like the natural equilibrium of things here on Earth and dislike changing it. Maybe that's the ideological question if you want to find one.
It's unfortunate that this sort of thing happens, but also inevitable. And even if they weren't paying people to agree with them, they could still use good old-fashioned charismatic persuasion.
The problem is that public opinion is shapable at all. I don't care how it is done; I care that it is do-able. The very premise of Freedom of Speech is that wacko ideas are not truly harmful or threatening; peoples' intelligence will make good use of good information while also ignoring (or ridiculing) the bullshit.
But we know that's not really true, don't we?
So what do you do about it? Establish a Ministry of Truth and use force to keep the ideosphere clean? Or just live with the consequences that people really can be manipulated by persuasive bullshitters? The first idea is horrific, the second is depressing.
Or you can work with the second idea, accepting that people can be manipulated, but fight. Become one of the persuaders. Let "Truth" be a battlefield where victory goes to the strongest. That's pretty appealing if you happen to be the kind of person who can win that battle, but if you're not a good communicator, then it's going to really grate against your ideals.
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Wow, you came pretty close to invoking Hitler!
If you had, the debate would be completely over.
Got anything better than ad-hominem attacks?
Go ahead, your turn....
BWilde
Not really.... it's progenitor, a little thing called Marxism, lives on....
It has never worked, and can't work, because it's completely contrary to human nature: The will to improve your life using property you own.
It is always imposed on people, usually with deadly results.
Check into this guy named Joe Stalin, and how many people he "had" to kill to get his ideas adopted.
BWilde
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
So what if they are spending money against global warming. They have every right to spend money to rebuke crazy theories such as man causing global warming. The so call cause of Global warming is not fact it is only a theory that is being use by those for financial gain. The earth has been warming since the ice age. The less ice, the faster it will melt - that is fact. It does not need the help of man to melt.
If you believe man is causing global warming then what caused the ice age to end? There was global warming back then otherwise the ice age would have lasted a whole lot longer.
Yes, I do believe in global warming but I do not believe that man is causing it. Its just a cycle of nature.
Let's take some things into consideration first. It's gona be a rough estimate however.
...
Large part of China are steppe and mountains.
Most of Chinese population is concentrated on the shore line.
Chineese army is largest in the world.
Russia has the second largest arsenal of Nuclear and biological weapons.
temperature goes up by 5-10C
1)illigal chineese immigrants in russia (who already live there) declare independence from the evil capitalistic traitor state in the name of global revolution with the help of special social services from motherland. Revolution is neutralised "with least amount of force necessary" after which number of chineese in russia drops to 0.
2) China ovwerwhelms Russian forces, claims whatever "fertile" land that's not flooded in north russia (check altitude maps) in the name of social revolution and bright future.
3) future becomes bright as russia launches it's remaining nuclear and biological arsenal at everyone in the world. Some of missiles suprisingly do get "from the blue and into the black" and may be even hit their targets.
4) most of worlds population is dead due to radiation poisoning, unknown deseases and starvation.
5) nuclear winter
6) Global warming is canceled out
n) Profit!
Well, have you?
.... we're all done here.
Even if you were 100% right in your views, I'd hate to live in a world where people like you were in control. You sure reverted to ranting and foaming pretty quickly. Hmmmm...
Also, My ancestors bravely protected the Jews in Holland before and during WWII, and my grandson is black.
So... it makes me wonder who the real racist is here...
You, buddy, are a coward, since you're obviously devoid of *real* ideas.
So why don't you go back to picking on your little sister and torturing the cat?
BWilde.
I'm a global warming skeptic, both in terms of cause and effects. Please send me a check or money order for 1 meelion dollars, or I may suddenly reverse my position!
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere