I think people give humans too much credit for its ability to affect the climate. First, I am yet to see a completely definitive reason for ice ages: is it due to Milankovich cycles, or a combination of things? Second, whatever the cause, I’m extremely skeptical that man can do anything about it, unless he really wants to mess up the environment.
There is a book coming out called Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change, that talks about cosmic rays and the suns magnetic fields as the primary cause of this century’s global warming. Ever since I started digging for a more sensible explanation for GW, the sunspot cycle has always occured to me as the most meaningful piece of evidence. Who knows, this could be the nail in the coffin? I fully expect a lot of heated discussions about this, and I’m sure the authors are going to undergo unfair and unprofessional treatment. That’s truly unfortunate, since the best science comes from evaluating ALL possible theories with professionalism and neutrality.
Antarctic ice is another big area of debate that I believe will become clearer over time. While calving of ice off of its shores has occurred at a higher rate, thermometers inland show colder temperatures. In 2009, hopefully the second attempt in putting up CyroSat (CyroSat 1’s launcher crashed) which will measure the thickness of the ice with high accuracy.
DrChaos, I’m very much impressed with your ability to cover the GW topic, but I also do get the impression that you’re trying to overwhelm the audience with science-talk as a means for validation, either consciously or subconsciously. Most things in science actually do have simple explanations–feedbacks, forcings, and the arcane physics of atmospheric CO2 might help in a more accurate model of climate, but I suspect the longer-term cycles ultimately must have extra-terrestial causes. The impact of man-made CO2 has been dutifully argued by AGW skeptics as negligible. But I’m content with it being a continued topic of debate–but I do think it’s distracting resources from the ultimate resolution of the puzzle.
Hmmm, what else. Oh yes, I think this issue of CO2-induced GW is to many just a proxy for the ongoing battle against burning fossil fuels, hence the heightened vitriol. I’m for reduction in pollutants (including CFC’s), but I think people are ultimately better off with impartiality and cold-objectivity (no pun intended) in science, which is most lacking in climate science. This is so that real workable solutions can be obtained, regardless of the social agendas going into characterizing the problems.
I hope that this IPCC fiasco falls flat on its face for the sake of separating science from politics. It’s a extremely toxic combination that (in my skeptic opinion) is causing the wrong steps to be made. Its attitude that “the science is settled” is insulting to scientists who oppose. This is not unlike what happened to Galileo when it came to characterizations of the solar system.
My view of AGW in no way unique, so continuing character attacks upon me and calling me ignorant needs to come to a rest. Those who think the majority of scientists is in agreement in AGW (either sincerely, or just joining in on the lie) need to look again and start reading the views from the other side. Not only is consensus science bad science, but in the case of AGW, the consensus is illusory anyway: it is a result of cherry-picking, unequal research funding allocation, intimidation, and fear of skeptic climatologists from speaking up (just look at the treatment of people like me in this thread). Furthermore, there is sufficient evidence of data tampering and misrepresentation within the works of IPCC that would make most scientists cringe. I believe that scientific results that are tainted should be thrown away and completely started over by someone else.
My final question that I find worth asking, if at least rhetorical: if AGW is obviously true, then why isn’t the IPCC acting with the same routine scientific integrity expected of any science body? In science, results are supposed to speak for themselves.
