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Koch Bros Study Finds Global Warming Is Real And Man-Made
bledri writes "The results of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature are in and Richard Muller, the study's director (formerly an AGW skeptic) declares, 'Call me a converted skeptic. Three years ago I identified problems in previous climate studies that, in my mind, threw doubt on the very existence of global warming. Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.'
The study was funded by the Folger Fund, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (created by Bill Gates), the Bowes Foundation, the Koch Foundation, and the Getty Foundation."
The Koch Brothers were among several funders, some of whom actually had decent motives. For example, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab are not partisan conservatives. And FICER (the Gates-funded organization) actively depends on global warming existing, because their whole raison d'etre is pushing geoengineering as a solution, which would obviously be unnecessary if there were no problem for geoengineering to solve.
In fact that's probably why the outcome was actually scientifically legit: it was a study by actual scientists with a fairly broad set of backers, done at a university rather than in the private sector.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Step one was to deny it was real. Now we are on step two: admit it is real but that it is too expensive for us to fight it. Step three is to build another mansion on higher ground and put in larger A/C units.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
AFAIK The Koch Foundation isn't the same as the Koch Brothers (the folks who donate to conservative political candidates.)
There are two Koch foundations, one founded by each of the infamous Koch Brothers. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that this Koch foundation was the same one that provides funding for Nova (or did at one time).
I'm a little curious as to why, in a list of 5 organizations that funded this study, the headline and OP singled out Koch. Hoping for additional impact that wouldn't be achieved by just saying "Climate Change Skeptic Changes Mind"?
a ten percentage increase in something that is not a big item in the average American budget ...
The problem with this logic is that America is only 5% of the world. All rich countries combined are less than 20%. Unless something actually makes economic sense, it is not going to be accepted by the other 80% (and judging by current trends, it probably won't be accepted by the richest 20% either).
The solution to AGW is not convincing people that they need to sacrifice and suffer for the common good. That won't work. Instead we need to do the R&D to come up with cost effective solutions that make economic sense even on a stand-alone-basis. We have already done that with wind power, CFLs, etc., and we need to do it for solar, electric vehicles, etc.
If you focus on "suffer and sacrifice", you are being counter-productive, because you just push more people into the denier camp.
If you didn't think the argument involved multiple parts, then you weren't paying attention. I find this to be one of the biggest problems with many self-proclaimed proponents of AGW is that they think if they prove something, then the argument is done, over, everything else follows logically and there can be no question. No, not at all. There are multiple stages to the argument.
The first is the claims of fact: That average surface temperature is increasing and that CO2 levels in the atmosphere are increasing. These are claims of facts about the world, things to be observed or measured. CO2 is pretty easy given the nature of gasses diffusing to uniform, temperature is quite a bit harder. However, it looks pretty solid that yes, temperature has been increasing. So that's step one, verify the facts behind the theory.
The next step is the central theory: That the primary or exclusive cause of the observed warming is the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere due to human emissions. Like all theories, it attempts to explain the connection between facts, how things relate. So that the facts are true does not automatically imply the theory is correct. That is the point of this (and other) studies. See if there are facts that would falsify this theory, or are there other theories that would fit the available facts better. So far, it does not seem so which means that this theory is probably correct.
This is not the end of the argument though. All you've done is shown why something is happening. That doesn't mean anything in and of itself. The next part of the argument is where things get more specious: The claim that this will be a bad thing for humanity as a whole. That's not a scientific theory, that's an over-arching claim, a judgement call. It is based on a number of theories and hypothesis out there. However to be accurate it needs to be backed up by theories with evidence that indicate that things will change in negative ways. Also you have to weigh just how positive and negative all the predicted changes will be. Anyone who pretends something is all positive or all negative is pushing an agenda and/or ignoring reality. Everything has a downside, a cost. The question is how does it weigh overall?
This is a discussion that doesn't seem to happen much. The "It will be a bad thing," seem to be parroted as dogma. You accept or you get shouted down. Any hypothesis that says something bad will happen is accepted as true, any hypothesis that says something good will happen is said to be false. Sorry, but it doesn't work that way.
Then, after you've shown it is a net negative overall, that it is something that would be better if it didn't happen, you get down to the policy of what to do about it. This is not science at all, there is no one right answer. It is a matter of deciding what we wish to do based off of costs, likelihood of success, other downsides and so on. "Just stop burning fossil fuels," isn't the "correct" answer. It is a possible course of action, but not the only one. Geoengineering solutions would be others. Still others would be not to try and change what is happening, but rather to change ourselves and prepare to deal with the changes since though this change may be human caused it is likely at some point another will happen that isn't and thus we may not be able to affect.
So if you are hoping for the magic moment of "All debate ends and everyone agrees with me," well sorry you aren't going to see it. As I alluded to, the big thing at this point would be to show that this change is going to be a net negative for humanity. That's complex, so no surprise it is hard. Even once that is in the bag, the question remains as to what to do. To that there will never be a final "correct" answer, only possibilities that eventually will need to be weighed and chosen from (including the possibility of doing nothing).
Gates, Koch, Getty and Bowes. That's a pretty diverse group. Either you don't trust anyone or that's about as close as you are going to get to a fair determination.
At some point, you might as well be abusive. Moon vs Earth temperatures is a good an example as any he could give. The difference between the two? Greenhouse effect. More Greenhouse leads to yet higher average temperatures.
The whole debate is not about who is right and who is wrong. It is about people fighting for their right to deny reality in exchange for clinging to their religious beliefs or a fat pay-cheque. There is no merit in that. No moral principle. The debate consists entirely on one side bringing up irrelevant and minor points and demanding that they be refuted in detail. This gives them time to come up with the next batch of irrelevant details
In some sense, the fact that this study was conducted was a huge gimmick: the outcome was obvious, and any scientist (yes even a physicist) who thinks he'll get better results than the guys from a field he's not from has a clearly overinflated ego.
At the end of the day, the Universe doesn`t give one single fuck about shills, Al Gore, pseudo-skeptics or any of this nonsense. If it`s happening (and the vast majority of researchers in fields related to climate says it is), then what precisely does your post mean.
This whole notion that it's sane to pose the question of AGW in terms of political affiliation or idea is beyond me. It fundamentally isn't a political question, so treating it like a political question is absolute moronic. Yes, there is a political dimension, but defining your position on it based on your political ideology is as inane and mad an activity as I can imagine.
The Universe does not give one tiny fuck about politics. Lightning will not bend towards or against you because your a Libertarian or a Conservative or a Liberal or whatever. The petty ideological beliefs of humans aren't even specks of dust on a neutron star.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
" The diversity of life has historically increased with warming".
Sure, but the same can be said of asteroid impacts; new studies have indicated that after as short as 10 million years, the biosphere has recovered and maybe even opened up a few new ecological niches by dislodging the old dominant species (bye bye dinosaurs!).
The problem is the word "short". On any human timescale, ten million years is a long time. In a few centuries which really is the blink of an eye in a geological sense, we'll be altering the climate substantially. For many species (millions?) it will be too fast for them to evolve.
So they'll die.
Global warming will NOT extinguish life on earth (well not unless we manage to cause a runaway greenhouse effect like Venus). It does have the potential of creating a less diverse world filled with crabgrass, cockroaches and rats and other generalist species (like us) that will take over. Our descendants for TENS OF THOUSANDS of generations may curse their selfish, short-sighted ancestors of the 21st century.
And Americans in particular.