|
|  |
|
|
|
| |
| Jan 21, 2010 6:51 am |
|
re: That Human Activity is a Significant Cause of Global Warming. |
Thomas Holford
| |
John Stephen Vietch sayeth:
> So, what do scientists say?
Well, we're making progress here . . . sort of.
> From Climate Progress we get.
How do we really know humans are causing global warming?*
http://climateprogress.org/2008/02/11/how-do-we-really-know-humans-are-causing-global-warming/
At least this guy STARTED by asking the relevent question. And then proceded to muddle the answer by posting reams of disorganized statements, links, opinions, etc. etc. which don't seem to focus on a coherent thesis.
It could be in there. I just can't tell. And I'm not going to wade through his filing cabinet to find out. I can just send him the contents of my filing cabinet and we can compute the masses of the respective filing cabinets and see who wins.
I would like to know what this guy believes to be the SEMINAL paper or argument or research finding that establishes that human activity causes global warming.
> Wikipedia:
Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, 2004.
Ugh. Wikipedia is junk. Throw it out.
It is well known that the wikipedia gatekeepers agressively monitor the global warming pages and exclude global warming skeptic postings. Wikipedia is very POLITICALLY CORRECT on global warming. Useless.
> "Human activities, primarily the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas), and secondarily the clearing of land, have increased the concentration of carbon dioxide, methane, and other heat-trapping ("greenhouse") gases in the atmosphere...
This is just a laundry list of things that theoretically might cause global warming. This is not evidence that they DO cause global warming.
Where is the experimental evidence that establishes an UNAMBIGUOUS, QUANTIFED chain of causality that demonstrates that these activities ACTUAULLY and CONSEQUENTIALLY do cause global warming?
If there is no such data, then it just "hand waving."
> There is international scientific consensus that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities."
This is where science and politics part company.
Science is based on experimentation and evidence. It doesn't matter how many people think or don't think something. The experimental evidence is determinative.
Consensus is a political concept. It is simply what a majority of people believe irrespective of the quality and adequacy of evidence.
Over the history of science the "consensus" of the moment has again and again been shown to be wrong.
There was at one time a consensus that Newton's laws of physics applied to everything in the universe. Einstein showed that the consensus was wrong.
I know that science-politicians like James Hansen, Michaeal Mann, AAAS, Scientific American, etc. etc. love the "consensus" argument because to seems so plausible to the ignorant masses of non-scientists.
But in the world of real science, scientists know that "consensus" does not validate the existence of scientific phenomena; experimentation does.
I am rather interested in what you can come up with as a concise, coherent statement of what evidence or findings the global warming enthusists believe is the foundation of their case. Everything I've heard of has, so far, seemed to be some combination of faulty theorizing combined with confirmation bias, bad data, inept application of scientific methods, and/or submission to irresistable temptations for scientific or political celebrity, or worse, greed.
T. Holford
Private Reply to Thomas Holford (new win) |
|
| |
|
