Editor,
This is a response to George Weiss’s letter parroting Tom Osborne’s views in his column “When Ideology Trumps Facts”. Any skepticism of global warming whatsoever and you are branded a right wing heretic, lacking sophistication, critical thinking, and knowledge. You are labeled the deeply derogatory term “denier.” Name-calling to denigrate and silence opposing views does not add credibility to the debate. It’s a similar tactic to being called a racist if you disagree with Obama policies. Gentlemen, the debate should stick to science, not pejorative name calling. I guess when the science isn’t working, try ridicule and intimidation!
I’m not skeptical of global warming alarmists because of any political ideology. I do not deny facts. I do not deny that E=mc2, gravity or Newton’s Laws of Motion. I am skeptical because the original global warming predictions were proven false by the evidence. The hypothesis had to be restated from “global warming” to “climate change”.
Actually, I am a firm believer in climate change. It happens every day. It’s been happening since the Earth was formed and will continue long after the last piece of coal is burned. Large scale climate change occurs with ice age cycles and affected civilizations throughout history. It will continue to do so.
Einstein and Galileo were objective scientists, uninfluenced by religion or politics, unlike most climate scientists today tainted by political funding. Einstein and Galileo would not believe a failed hypothesis and join the sheeple, blindly believing claims of 97% consensus. They would research the methodology behind the claims and find the “97% consensus” paper written by John Cook and used by the IPCC, governments, media and other alarmists, was seriously flawed. The paper reviewed 11,944 climate papers. The true scientific results: only .3% of the papers explicitly said man caused most of the warming since 1950. Zero said it was dangerous.
Shocker, I believe carbon emissions may cause warming, but only negligibly and nothing to be alarmed about.
I also agree with most goals of the global warming alarmists, but for reasons other than catastrophic global warming. I’m concerned about environmental pollution of our water and air, and the fact that we need to develop alternative sustainable energy sources before we run out of our limited supply of fossil fuels.
The gentlemen could find some common ground instead of name calling and dismissing people as ideologues. Those tactics merely reflect an intellectually weak argument.
Stephen Tygh, Laguna Beach
The letter contains the usual deniers’ slogans, but as per usual is strictly part of their “alternate reality”. The letter appeals to deniers’ ideology, but is disconnected from the evidence that exists in the real world.
There are two different sides to Global Warming.
1) There are the deniers who are “”Ignorant,” “Out of Touch,” “Crazy””
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/07/poll-young-voters-climate-lcv
2) And then there is our best scientific knowledge.
For anyone who is willing to understand evidence, the case is settled.
The following organizations provide evidence that:
A) Global Warming / Climate Change is real.
B) Human activities are by far the largest causative agent.
C) Global Warming / Climate Change is a continuing, ongoing phenomenon.
NASA
“Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.”
http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus
American Meteorological Society
“It is clear from extensive scientific evidence that the dominant cause of the rapid change in climate of the past half century is human-induced increases in the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2)”
http://www.ametsoc.org/policy/2012climatechange.html
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
“Report: Human activity fuels global warming”
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/climate.html
California Institute of Technology
“How We Know Global Warming is Real”
“The science behind human-induced climate change”
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~tapio/papers/skeptic_2008.pdf
Stanford University
“A large body of scientific information indicates that global climate change is unequivocal, almost certainly is caused mostly by human activities, is already causing significant harm, and as it continues, holds great risks for our future.”
https://pangea.stanford.edu/programs/outreach/climatechange/
Columbia University
“The Greenhouse Effect and Global Warming”
“With higher CO2 concentrations come expectations of a stronger greenhouse effect and therefore warmer global temperatures.”
http://www.columbia.edu/~vjd1/greenhouse.htm
Oh, and by the way, that 97% has been updated. It’s now up to 99.98%.
“10,883 out of 10,885 scientific articles agree: Global warming is happening, and humans are to blame”
http://www.salon.com/2014/03/25/10853_out_of_10855_scientists_agree_man_made_global_warming_is_happening/
Wouldn’t it be nice if Global Warming Deniers followed what the scientists say instead of fabricating their own stories?
Mr. Bill,
None of your links show proof of Anthropogenic Global Warming. A Denier could list an equally long list of links. Your own link to the 99.98% claim just adds fodder for the Deniers with its lie. All the review showed was that 2 papers explicitly reject AGW. The study was not about finding out the percentage of scientists that believed AGW. Always look at the methodology of the study. The Author of the study stated the following: “Many people seem to assume that my question was, “What percentage of scientists accept anthropogenic global warming [AGW]?” But that was not my question. Rather it was, “What fraction of peer-reviewed scientific papers reject AGW and what evidence do they present?” In other words, is there a scientific case against anthropogenic global warming?”
I am neither a Denier nor an Alarmist. I am Agnostic on the issue until the science is clear. I simply don’t accept lies being touted as science. But as I stated in this article there is much room for common ground on the issue.
[…] This is in response to Stephen Tygh’s letter entitled “Global Warming Skeptics Find Common Ground” […]