Climate Contrarian Case Wilts as More Studies Confirm Warming Trends

By | April 5, 2012

  • April 5, 2012 at 10:06 am
    Herbert Winston says:
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    A professor I once had had a saying he used in about every lecture…

    “mother nature bats late”

    • April 5, 2012 at 1:50 pm
      Insurance Professional says:
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      ….last?

  • April 5, 2012 at 11:15 am
    mike says:
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    Being the first comment, please consider the fact that most skeptics commenting about global warming are either shills working for the companies that prosper from the lack of implementing measures to combat global warming or they are just too lazy to research or unable to comprehend the facts about global warming. When you disbelieve facts endorsed by 97% of accredited scientists, you disrupt the precious short time left before we pass the irreversible point. The arctic ice sheet is already considered beyond reversal, done deal. With the exposed new land, the arctic keeps warming til it is gone. The arctic helps cool the northern hemisphere.

    Just consider the sources of the skeptics.

    • April 5, 2012 at 2:39 pm
      Little Frog says:
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      On that point, why are the skeptics dismissed as “shills” but the scientists who are completely dependant on government funding are seen as independant and unbiased?
      Why does the discussion of sources of polution seldom, if ever, include the horrific contribution of China and the former Eastern-Bloc countries?
      What, prior to Americans with our refrigerators and SUVs, triggered Earth’s earlier warming trends and how is that not quantified in the discussion?
      As in any investigation, follow the money.

      • April 5, 2012 at 9:52 pm
        The Keystone Garter says:
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        My ears of corn are burning.
        I’d guess the scientists self-select their careers as the pursuit of truth while the skeptics are loyal to $$ is a lesser reason to trust scientists over skeptics. The main reason is the scientific method. The scientific process of publishing work openly and using experimental methods isn’t foolproof but is good. What exactly do the skeptics bring to the table. Heat physics is 19th century. Greenhouse gases were discovered 19th century. Heat physics is easy. Conduction, convection, radiation. They calculated 40GW of heat were radiating or being produced from vents in Enceladus. That’s all they have to do for Earth. It is addition and subtraction. Dumb Republicans need your Whitehouse burnt down again or something.

      • April 5, 2012 at 10:01 pm
        The Keystone Garter says:
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        The Eastern Bloc countries probably came under their Kyoto targets because of recession. China was given a Kyoto I mulligan as her growth was not projected. They should’ve stipulated if a country emits a lot more in between Treaties they should meet higher standards. I don’t recall the richest people in China denying science. I don’t see any dumb fat GOPers in China. Melting permafrost 50M yrs ago triggered a 5C warming. Melting CO2 12000 or so yrs ago triggered ice sheets over the Prairies and Canadian Shield to slide into the Atlantic Ocean, cutting off UK-Gulf ocean circulation, causing Southern Ocean current to circle and warm instead of circulating to northern hemisphere, causing a currently unknown (will be discovered by scientists within a decade) carbon release from Southern Ocean…enabling at least for a few more decades, Industrial Revolution. I got this by google news-ing “global warming” today. Overpaid American moron.

  • April 5, 2012 at 11:37 am
    Ben Helvensteijn says:
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    Reading the tea leaves in between all the reports out there, I do interpret them as validating the human factor as the cause for global warming. However, the skeptics aren’t even on board acknowledging that there is global warming, and I’m afraid they’ve got a better amplifier than environmentalists. This article unfortunately seems written to preach the choir rather than to convince any skeptic out there, i.e. it’s another soft-spoken message, relatively easy to dismiss since it just states that such and such has been proven as opposed to presenting\reiterating the evidence.

  • April 5, 2012 at 1:36 pm
    ned says:
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    Thanks, Mike for that pre-emptive ad hominem attack. I guess I’m a lazy shill who can’t comprehend what 97% of scientists endorse. BTW, 68.6% of statistics are made up on the spot, including that one and your 97%.

    I don’t dispute global temperature changes or even that recent trends have been upward. I just believe that it’s cyclical and if we are still on a warming trend, a cooling trend is coming soon.

    What I dispute is that mankind has any significant impact on the cycle. Where did that CO2 increase after the last ice age come from? I think 20,000 years ago was before the industrial revolution and the evil automobile. And why have there been similar temperature increases on other planets? Maybe it has something to do with the sun.

    In the 1970’s, weren’t we heading for an ice age? I guess we over-corrected and sent ourselves into this warming trend. So all we have to do is the opposite of what we did then, right?

    • April 5, 2012 at 1:57 pm
      Chip says:
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      Well said Ned the Shill. I too must be a shill that believes the weather is not impacted by man. I agree with you that before the Industrial revolution and when the world had 900 million people in 1800 vs 6 BILLION now (with all that exaust from cars, trucks, planes, cows etc.), the temperature was warmer before 1800. Explain that Mike. Oh, I know….it’s called global warming climate change that man created….makes sense to me. And one more thing, when we had a warmer than usual March, the weatherman said two words ‘jet stream’. Wonder how man moves that jet stream?

      • April 6, 2012 at 10:42 am
        Ben Helvensteijn says:
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        It’s funny you claim “the temperature was warmer before 1800”. That was just the tail end of the little ice age, meaning a warming period. In the larger scheme of things this period was a minor bump in the road, related to volcanic eruptions.

        If you really want to know what has been and is going on, I recommend studying up on the information before spewing any gut feelings. A quick read and easy to check source would be to Wikipedia, which on the whole tends to be more reliable than Encyclopedia Brittanica. For this topic go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature_record_of_the_past_1000_years

    • April 8, 2012 at 1:01 pm
      Joe says:
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      And if you’re wrong?

  • April 5, 2012 at 1:44 pm
    scott says:
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    Being duped by Carl Sagan et al about Nuclear Winter and to now
    know that whole campaign was created by our “friends” Putin and the KGB, The Diary of Comrade J, I can only gaze at China/India as the true Green enemies. Let’s legislate them.

    • April 6, 2012 at 3:16 pm
      NoiTall says:
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      Scott, I guess you’re really sad that we did not get that nuclear war after all.

  • April 5, 2012 at 2:32 pm
    reader says:
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    “Theory” of climate change
    “Almost certainly” responsible
    “Probably” causing
    “Possibly” more erratic
    Vast “uncertainties”
    Latest studies “suggest”
    Like any theory, climate change is based on “probabilities” and “observations”.
    …and yet the article concludes: On the contrary, the basics of climate change are now “understood” and serious doubt is left only in the minds of those who cultivate it.
    Those who cultivate it? Spare me, show us some “facts”. Until you do, global warming is nothing short of pure fiction.

    • April 5, 2012 at 3:50 pm
      SWFL Agent says:
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      I know nothing about the science of weather but I do watch the temperatures on the news. There is often a difference in temps for urban versus rural areas. The city is always warmer. More people, cars, heated buildings, etc. Why wouldn’t the climate change as the world population grows and has a more urban influence?

    • April 6, 2012 at 11:00 am
      Ben Helvensteijn says:
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      Like I’ve stated in my earlier comments, the author of this article stuck merely with reiterating conclusions stated by researchers, but left out reiterating the hard evidence for global warming and the strong indicators linking it all to human caused increases in CO2 in the air. For many millennia the world’s temperature had significant fluctuations while the CO2 remained between 180 and 290 ppm. Ore and ice core research has given these very long term records that show repeatable 8 °C swings that correlate with ≈ 90 ppm CO2 fluctuations. In all: Rather than anything else, the current world temperature is lagging behind the ‘recent’ CO2 change by ≈ 6.5 °C.

    • April 8, 2012 at 1:04 pm
      Joe says:
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      There is no “proof” in physical sciences. It’s all about probabilities and uncertainties. But if 97% of scientists said there’s an 80% chance an asteroid was headed towards earth, would you first reaction be, let’s do nothing?

      • April 9, 2012 at 12:00 pm
        ned says:
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        My knee-jerk reaction might be, “DO SOMETHING!” But then once I thought about it, I’d realize there really is nothing that could be done. No human action is going to change the course of that asteroid.

        What would you do – send Bruce Willis, Billy Bob Thornton and Ben Affleck into outer space to blow it up?

        BTW there is not a 97% scientific concensus about anthropogenic global warming.

  • April 5, 2012 at 2:45 pm
    Marty Disston says:
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    Allied World Assurance -AWAC- funds climate change deniers

    http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2012/0215/Documents-reveal-Koch-funded-group-s-plot-to-undermine-climate-science

  • April 5, 2012 at 3:42 pm
    the Don says:
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    We never learn till its too late…

  • April 5, 2012 at 10:01 pm
    Matt says:
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    Carbon-dioxide is a heat- trapping gas, and we keep digging up fossil fuels and burning them to create carbon dioxide. Eventually, that’s going to heat the planet. Its pretty simple, really. So why is it so hard to believe that the amount we’ve burned in the last 150 years is already causing warming? Because then we would have to change. Wake up.

    • April 6, 2012 at 10:44 am
      Anthrocite Al says:
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      So Matt, I assume that you have recycled your car and now bike to work (if you even have a job). I trust that you razed your house and now live in an unheated yurt. When you need to travel, you eschew flying and instead paddle a canoe along the country’s vast network of canals. And you plug your iPad and all your other electronic toys into a solar powered outlet to recharge them. You’re right – you do need to wake up.

      • April 7, 2012 at 12:46 am
        Matt says:
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        No, I live my life and go to work the normal way. I like using energy- it allows me to stay warm and go fast and travel far. It’s the energy production infrastructure thats got to change.

        I notice you didn’t comment on the substance of my comment. Co2 is a greenhouse gas and we keep making more of it every year. That can’t go on.

        You imply that we have to either abandon civilization or, what? Just hope for a breakthrough in cold fusion? Wait for aliens to rescue us? Hope that the biosphere can absorb more carbon than the whole human race can dig up and burn? If thats your solution thats some gutsy gamble you’re taking.. Like teaching yourself chemistry in your own bathwater-if you’re wrong you’re going to be sorry.

      • April 8, 2012 at 12:59 pm
        Joe says:
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        So your answer is either live in a hut or keep emitting hundreds of megatons of CO2 every year? Do nothing or do everything? Only one or the other? Al, that’s a false dichotomy and deters from debate.

  • April 5, 2012 at 10:51 pm
    Climatologist says:
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    The claim about funding advantage for climate change realists is aother liberal lie. The AGW inducstry has received over $11B over 1000 times that for any groupd or individual who is a climate realist. Exxon Model gave $100m to Stanford, BP $500m to UC Berkeley.Soros, Rokefeller, Hewlitt, Heinze, Pew Foundations and all the NGOS pump huge amounts of money to feed the big lie.

    All the papers mentioned are attempts to set the stage for the election and the next IPCC. Most of them have been already disproven. Global temperatures have declined for 15 years (well below the IPCC model forecast best case constant CO2 scenario), sea levels actually fell in recent years, everyone of the signatures of man made global warming in the climate models have failed.

    • April 6, 2012 at 9:00 pm
      Realist says:
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      One thing and one thing only. Go to your garage, turn on the car, with the door down. Is that safe? No. Why, if you know that is not safe, do you think it is absolutely safe to do the exact same thing in a much larger space with far more cars? Seriously, what is wrong with you people?

    • April 8, 2012 at 12:55 pm
      Joe says:
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      I hear cancer researchers are only in it for the money too.

  • April 6, 2012 at 11:22 am
    Ben Helvensteijn says:
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    Seems to me there’s an orchestrated effort to shout out the science in this comments section. Heartland at work again?

    Meet you all for a swim at the Northpole 20 years from now.

    • April 6, 2012 at 11:40 am
      Bituminous Bill says:
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      Ben:

      What size tinfoil hat do you wear? Any black helicopters hovering over your house today?

      • April 6, 2012 at 3:29 pm
        Ben Helvensteijn says:
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        The only tinfoil hatters I know are the uninformed amongst the Republican representatives in Congress.

        I’ll reiterate my invite for a swim at the Northpole in twenty years, and maybe the implication of that will at long last sink in.

        Changing vegetation and animal migration patterns are very much non-political, and it only agrees with a warming globe. There’s no dispute on human made global warming any longer, it is established fact.

        • April 6, 2012 at 5:04 pm
          Chip says:
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          An established ‘fact’? Maybe in your wikipedia mind. You have no answer for the ‘fact’ that it was warmer before the industrial revolution AND colder. What about the Newsweek article you read in the 1970’s about the coming ICE AGE? I know you just can’t remember that article. The global climate change (aka global warming) scam is another liberal’s idea (AlGore) to tax the US into the abyss. Too bad your man Obama will not be elected to enable this scam to continue. Go drive your prius using wind power. Oh, I forgot, the wind won’t blow hard enough to supply your home or power your car.

          • April 6, 2012 at 7:16 pm
            Bob says:
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            As someone who is against the general concept of global warming, and who has a brother who has quite the educational background in the topic here allow me to state the following:

            There’s a reason they changed the wording from “Global Warming” to “Climate Change”. We do impact environmental bubbles to have climate changes. This could be warmer, more rain, less rain, or colder. But we do. Depending on the location or severity of the change this could cause a temporary drought, or for rain to not fall at all in locations where it once did. The planet does cycle rain systems as is, which is why you have places which were once lush as deserts currently. But humans can speed that process up. It could be bad, it depends on what change we make happen and where. In the U.S. and modern countries the shift would be easy to manage. In somewhere like a 3rd world country it would not. You will note that most studies on “climate chage” emphasize 3rd world countries.

          • April 7, 2012 at 12:20 am
            Ben Helvensteijn says:
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            Here are the requested fact sheets:
            http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png
            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

            The first one shows that a long time ago earth was warmer than today. The second link shows the current rate of temperature increase is out of control and for all I can see (and so can you) unprecedented.

          • April 9, 2012 at 12:25 pm
            Bob says:
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            Chip:

            The discern comment was for Ben’s stupidity. Not you Chip. The other one was for you regarding my brother. Climate change effects are universally agreed on. We do impact climate in environmental bubbles.

          • April 9, 2012 at 12:32 pm
            Bob says:
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            Chip:

            Also, I forgot to state I don’t listen to Al Gore. Al Gore is an idiot. I don’t follow his studies, especially since he started the Global warming hogwash.

            Assuming who I listen to is not a good way of talking with someone you intend on swaying toward your side. You should find from my comments I’m a Republican based on my comment to Ben, and should be able to know that I don’t like global warming studies specifically since they really were manipulative studies, and I don’t like democrats specifically because they manipulated those to their advantage. When it comes to climate changes however, we do impact climate changes. We should be conservative if we’re going to be a part of the conservative party, and start to have mainstream conservatives fix that image. I can tell you are conservative but you’re sounding pretty polarized and on a rail road track one way type of thought system. It gives us a bad name. Try and work on it.

        • April 6, 2012 at 7:25 pm
          Bob says:
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          There is plenty of debate on human made global warming. Climate change effects is a different story. The fact that you can’t dicern the two shows you are just as bad as the person you are debating against. As a side comment: Republicans are not the only uninformed people in congress. I could show you videos of a democrat who talked about his fear of Hawaii flipping over due to population increases, and I could show you CBO studies presented by republicans that you have not even heard of regarding pay inequality, and republican efforts to minimize pay inequality, or a deal to bring all of $1 trillion in off shore revenues back to America which they made and Obama and democrats took off the table simply because it meant taxing the firms less, and they didn’t want to prove that lower taxes had benefits.

          Republicans are not uninformed. Democrats have no clue about most the studies I could show you from republicans. Of the two, democrats are less informed of republican beliefs because they are damn near impossible to find online. Democrat beliefs are easy. If I told you what to look for with the CBO republican studies you would find maybe 2-3 articles total on the entire web covering it. If I told you to look up the debt deal, you would find over 50 regarding democrat and supposed republican plans, but you wouldn’t see the CBO studies linked to the REAL republican plans for the debt plan (including the one regarding pay inequality). This shows something. Your side of the aisle is not informed about the republican side.

          • April 6, 2012 at 8:04 pm
            Chip says:
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            Oh, I can dicern the two ‘theory’s’ because that is all that ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming’ are…theories. The Climate Change and global warming scam is real. If the climate change hero Algore is so certain of all his ‘facts’, why won’t he debate any scientist that disagrees with him? You know the answer. Why did Algore’s ‘carbon credit’ scam fall apart and fail to earn him millions of dollars? You know the answer. If you want to see the only debate that shows the scam of global warming/climate change, see http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9082151

            the above is a link that has highlights of the only serious debate in years. youtube has 10 segments. listen, watch and learn.

    • April 6, 2012 at 5:13 pm
      Chip says:
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      I found a great link from one of your climate scam heros, Dick Durbin.

      He thinks that buying hybrid cars will help stop tornado’s. Wow, now that is the best laugh I have had in years!!! How is that VOLT selling Dick?

      http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/04/06/durbin_on_spending_to_fight_global_warming_its_your_money_or_your_life.html

    • April 6, 2012 at 6:25 pm
      Anthrocite Al says:
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      Well, you caught me Ben. I am paid large sums by nefarious right-wing organizations to spend my entire day trolling comment threads and stifling liberal commentary. Part of that vast right-wing conspiracy, you know. Then again, maybe a majority of visitors to this site simply disagree with your point of view and vote accordingly. Ever think of that? Of course not – bloviators like you are incapable of such introspection.

  • April 7, 2012 at 12:26 am
    Ben Helvensteijn says:
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    BTW: It’s spelled “discern”.

    • April 8, 2012 at 5:52 pm
      Chip says:
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      Oh, I can spell. And I can also spell S C A M. I can’t wait for the Climate Gate Trial. The Scam will be exposed for you to see and learn. How about the ‘hockey stick’ graph that has been discussed in the climate gate emails. Why won’t UVA release all of Mann’s emails? Nothing to hide? When this goes to trial and ALL the emails are released, we shall see what they say and whether or not there is a cover up regarding the climate report that your hero Algore used to sell to the public and his investors. see http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/04/climategate_heads_to_court.html

    • April 9, 2012 at 12:38 pm
      Bob says:
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      Side comment to Ben:

      I work with Engineers, one of the smartest breeds in the world.

      There is not one Engineer who does not in the heat of his conceptualization mess up his spelling. Not one. The reason is that his conceptualization and theory processing overpower his spelling processing when he is heated. Mocking or pointing out someone’s spelling is not a method of proving or disproving a point.

  • April 9, 2012 at 2:43 pm
    Whatever says:
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    As a pilot and self proclaimed aviation expert…..I have always found that it is better to err on the side of caution and it is ALWAYS better to be safe than sorry (for my lifes sake). I would say that humans impact on climate change should be treated in the same way……I will do what I can to make sure that my children and grandchildren have a decent place to live regardless of climate change being a myth or not. Seems like such a basic and simple idea and seems silly that people would pick such a subject to argue about. Is ignoring the issue regardless of how you feel about it the right thing to do??



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