Loyal Achates demonstrates a fairly typical illiberal kneejerk reaction on global warming. It is easy to cast aside conservative skepticism as a convenient alliance which allows for patriot Americans to keep burning fossil fuels in their Hummers and Jet-skis. Still, if the conservatives can be blamed for ignoble motivation, the science is, contrary to Gore's hysteria, quite on the side of the political right. This from the Canada. Eh.
Professor Bob Carter of the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University, in Australia gives what, for many Canadians, is a surprising assessment: "Gore's circumstantial arguments are so weak that they are pathetic. It is simply incredible that they, and his film, are commanding public attention."
But surely Carter is merely part of what most people regard as a tiny cadre of "climate change skeptics" who disagree with the "vast majority of scientists" Gore cites?
No; Carter is one of hundreds of highly qualified non-governmental, non-industry, non-lobby group climate experts who contest the hypothesis that human emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) are causing significant global climate change. "Climate experts" is the operative term here. Why? Because what Gore's "majority of scientists" think is immaterial when only a very small fraction of them actually work in the climate field.
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Here is a small sample of the side of the debate we almost never hear:
Appearing before the Commons Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development last year, Carleton University paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years." Patterson asked the committee, "On the basis of this evidence, how could anyone still believe that the recent relatively small increase in CO2 levels would be the major cause of the past century's modest warming?"
In April sixty of the world's leading experts in the field asked Prime Minister Harper to order a thorough public review of the science of climate change, something that has never happened in Canada. Considering what's at stake - either the end of civilization, if you believe Gore, or a waste of billions of dollars, if you believe his opponents - it seems like a reasonable request.
There we go, infusing logic into the debate yet again. If we aren't shaking in our boots about how the evils of Western civilization have imperiled the rest of the world, how will our leaders be able to eliminate liberty under the guise of saving the planet--and the children of course? I guess we'll just have to keep wprrying about the terrorists. Isn't it interesting how both sides of the political aisle are so terribly and perpetually frightened?
1 comment:
"...It is easy to cast aside conservative skepticism as a convenient alliance which allows for patriot Americans to keep burning fossil fuels in their Hummers and Jet-skis."
The point of science is to try and discard, or test for all bias, political and otherwise, so as to determine what is actually going on. It is easy to cast aside 'conservative skepticism' whatever that is in this case, because often these dissenters are obviously uninterested in assessing the science.
Nevertheless, ultra-liberal, atheist, left-winger that I am, I believe the arguments for human causation of global warming are much weaker than is now generally accepted. Of course, policy makers cannot wait on scientific certainty, can they? Perhaps it's not a good idea to do such an experiment with the planet, perhaps it doesn't much matter. That's the SCIENTIFIC question. The ethics of it are a different thing.
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