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Last Bastion For Climate Dissenters Crumbling
Layzej writes "The New York Times reports: 'For decades, a small group of scientific dissenters has been trying to shoot holes in the prevailing science of climate change, offering one reason after another why the outlook simply must be wrong.' Initially they claimed that weather stations exaggerated the warming trend. This was disproven by satellite data which shows a similar warming trend. Next, solar activity was blamed for much of the warming. This looked like a promising theory until the '80s, when solar output started to diverge from global temperatures. Now, climate contrarians are convinced that changes in cloud cover will largely mitigate the warming caused by increased CO2. The New York Times examines how even this last bastion for dissenters is crumbling. Over the past few years, Several papers have shown that rather than being a mitigating factor, changes in cloud cover due to warming may actually enhance further warming."
Very few people disagree with the premise that the climate is warming.
Untrue -- that's a VERY recent (in the last year or two) change because the made up science people were using against warming was becoming unsupportable *even to the political base they were trying to influence*. To the tactics were changed from "its not warming" to "its not us doing it".
Where the disagreement is, is if that warming is a natural part of earths long term weather patterns and how much effect CO2 is having on speeding up the process.
No, among working climatologists, there's no disagreement. In fact, among anyone who has even a cursory understanding of thermodynamics, there's no disagreement. The tiny percentage of "climatologists" you see who publish papers suggesting otherwise are doing it because controversy will get you published, and its a publish-or-perish industry. And there's a LOT of money being paid to people who aren't otherwise being successful in the field to continue publishing bad science.
Also, they question the results of the warming... predicted increased hurricane strength and frequency have not come about as we'd expected.
Don't use the word "we" if you're not someone who holds a degree in climatology.
The only optimism I have is in that the one thing scientists have a proven track record of if being absolutely lousy at predicting the weather.
So, no degree in climatology. Climatologists don't have anything to do with predicting the weather -- those are meteorologists. People in either field know that. (And people in either field also know the current global climate models predict an increase in energy in the weather systems which produces strong, not greater numbers, of storms -- on average. Someone trained in climatology knows what "on average" means relative to the work a meteorologist does, too.)
Am I the only one who fails to see the massive logic fail in that statement? If methane only lasts for 9-15 years, how is more effective at trapping heat over a 100 year period?
Yes, you are the only one who sees a massive logic fail because you are taking the statement at face value instead of trying to educate yourself about what they are talking about. I hope you were being facetious, but just in case: Atmospheric methane is oxidized in the atmosphere to produce carbon dioxide and water. FTA: "The 100-year global warming potential of methane is 25, i.e. over a 100-year period, it traps 25 times more heat per mass unit than carbon dioxide."
It is interesting to note that the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide may have been as much as 20 times higher as it is today at points in Earth's geologic past. Of course, you wouldn't want to live there :)
Sometimes people compare today's warming with the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum.
False. Consensus is part of science. That's because Consensus is achieved through science, and consensus can change with the appropriated evidence.
As Tim Minchin so eloquently and accurately said:
"Science adjusts it's beliefs based on what's observed
Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhGuXCuDb1U
You are the one using religion for your opinion.
Also, Look up Appeal to authority. hint: it doesn't apply
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority
Forms:
The strength of this argument depends upon two factors:
The authority is a legitimate expert on the subject.
A consensus exists among legitimate experts on the matter under discussion.
These conditions may also simply be incorporated into the structure of the argument itself, in which case the form may look like this:
X holds that A is true
X is a legitimate expert on the subject.
The consensus of experts agrees with X.
Therefore, there's a presumption that A is true.
I highly recommend reading 'Introduction to Critical Reasoning' and 'Introduction to Logic' before churning out logical fallacy accusation. You look like a fool.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on