Climate Realists

EURweb.com ^ | March 19, 2009 | JOSEPH C. PHILLIPS

[Delacon]

 *Appearing at the recent “Ecnomics” conference sponsored by the Wall Street Journal, former vice president and anthropogenic global warming guru Al Gore had a rather telling exchange with Bjorn Lomborg. Lomborg, a former member of Greenpeace and author of the book the The Skeptical Environmentalist invited Gore to debate the science of man made global warming.  Gore declined the invitation insisting that it was “silly” to continue to debate the science.  This seemed a particularly odd response given the fact that science is by definition the act of questioning -- a constant effort to peel back more and more layers in order to gain an ever deeper understanding. For Gore, however, “The scientific community has gone through this chapter and verse.” And the science is settled.   In his words, "the debate is over."  Well, as my mother used to say, “talkin’ loud don’t make you right!” 
 
      The fact is that the science is far from settled and there is no consensus on anthropogenic global warming.  In fact, the debate is alive and well…at least for those willing to debate. 
 
      There are, in fact, more than 31,000 scientists – 9,000 of them with PhDs—that have signed a petition stating their unequivocal belief that the Kyoto protocol and similar proposals will “harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology and damage the health and welfare of mankind.”  The petition reads in part: “…There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the earth’s climate.”  There are also a growing number of former AGW believers that have studied the science and become climate realists.
 
      Last week, many of those signers joined about 800 other realists at the “International Conference on Climate Change” sponsored by the Heartland Institute.  In addition to an impressive list of speakers, there were many scientists, teachers and, well, just regular folks all of whom were up to date in the most current science as well as being conversant in the language of science and all of them concerned about the misuse of science for political gain.
 
      But as we have observed, truth is not determined by polls; it is determined through facts – facts ascertained through scientific inquiry and debate. 
 
      The problem is that the current debate (or non debate if you are Al Gore) on Anthropogenic Global Warming has little to do with science and everything to do with politics.
 
      During an exchange from the WSJ conference, Gore insisted that America is at a “political tipping point.”  In other words, the political wheels are already in motion to enact policy based not on scientific fact, but on an ideological agenda.
 
      No one narrative explains the willingness of global warming alarmists to distort facts and ignore or omit evidence that contradicts their theory of human-caused global warming. There is no one reason why alarmists attempt to bully climate realists with authoritative arguments – The IPCC declared it so it must be gospel – or simply refuse to engage contrary theories.  There is, however, one narrative that seems ever more likely especially in light of the increasing threat of nationalization of industry.  The narrative of social control through the rationing of energy begins to make plenty of sense.
 
      In the defense of Marxism, Colin Penfield says,"... the need for an equitable division of labor involving a planned economy... is the only real solution to the current problem of global warming.” What better way to extend political power than to take the very gas each of us exhales with every breath we take – the substance on which photosynthesis relies and label it a contaminant?  How better to consolidate power than to announce a planetary emergency based on computer models (as opposed to observed data)and then demand control of industry in order to forestall catastrophe?  What could be more perfect than to discover a new moral virtue in “saving the planet?”  And what could better explain the rush to enact policy that will cost trillions of dollars, and which by the alarmists own admission, will produce very little in the way of results but will bring the entire capitalist system to a screeching halt?
 
      Of course, there could be another reason, one as old as time itself.  In the immortal words of Indiana Jones, “fortune and glory, boy, fortune and glory.”
 
Joseph C. Phillips is the author of “He Talk Like A White Boy” available wherever books are sold.

[Delacon]

This guy showed up on my radar recently. He deserves a wider audience than EURweb IMHO.

 

In the defense of Marxism, Colin Penfield says,"... the need for an equitable division of labor involving a planned economy... is the only real solution to the current problem of global warming.” What better way to extend political power than to take the very gas each of us exhales with every breath we take – the substance on which photosynthesis relies and label it a contaminant?  How better to consolidate power than to announce a planetary emergency based on computer models (as opposed to observed data)and then demand control of industry in order to forestall catastrophe?  What could be more perfect than to discover a new moral virtue in “saving the planet?”  And what could better explain the rush to enact policy that will cost trillions of dollars, and which by the alarmists own admission, will produce very little in the way of results but will bring the entire capitalist system to a screeching halt?

 

 

[Delacon]

ping

[steelyourfaith]

Thanx !

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[xcamel]

FReepmail me to get on or off

Ping me if you find one I've missed.

---

[CedarDave]

Thanks for the ping.

Here's another story about Gore's refusal to debate or even give interviews on the subject:

But there is a twist. In 1988 Roger Revelle was having major second thoughts about whether carbon dioxide was a significant greenhouse gas. ... in 1991 he co-authored a report for the new science magazine Cosmos in which he expressed his strong doubts about global warming and urged more research before any remedial action was taken.

At that point Mr. Gore pronounced Revelle as senile and refused to debate global warming. He continues to refuse to debate today. Many offers of 10s of thousands of dollars have been made such a debate. Today Gore sequestered the media at this event and set forth rules, no questions, no interviews.
Roger Revelle & Al Gore: Coleman's Video Report, 3/6/09 [history of CO2 "global warming"]

[Delacon]

Thanks for the link CD.

[Mr_Moonlight]

For Gore, however, “The scientific community has gone through this chapter and verse.” And the science is settled

Algore's first computer programming code (as written in Basic on a Timex/Sinclair 1000):

10 PRINT "Hello World. You are getting too hot beyond the tipping point"
20 GOTO 10

[Delacon]

LOL. Took me down memory lane. I did my first programming (in Basic) on an Atari 400 though.

[bigred44]

I could just cry. That undersea volcano near Tonga just wiped out the world’s carbon emissions savings for the last year.

Bummer, dude. And I was trying so hard all year to breathe slower and make fewer movements, just to reduce my daily breathing CO2 output from 2.5 to 2 lb/day.

Will Mother Nature never give us a break? When all the billions we spend on reducing our carbon footprint can be wiped out in a few hours!?

[neverdem]

thanks, bfl

[5by5]

This is incorrect though the edits on the video clips might make it hard to appreciate what Lomborg was talking about.

Lomborg was NOT challenging Gore to debate the science of AGW. He was challenging Gore to debate the policy of spending trillions of dollars on eliminating CO2 when much more can be accomplished in the world by spending much smaller amounts on mitigating the impacts and spending the money on other liberal causes that will supposedly improve the prospeccts of our fellow humans (AIDS, disease control, birth control, etc).

In his book “Cool It!” Lomborg accepts AGW completely. He then debunks polar bear extinction, how a warmer climate will kill millions of people (it will likely save for lives from avoiding a greater number of lives lost in cold temperatures than will die in the heat). Because of this he is sometimes lumped in with AGW skeptics and deniers but he is actually a supporter—just one willing to ask embarassing questions.

Gore attempted to turn the question into a request of “debating the science” because he wished to avoid the Lomborg’s request to debate the policy of wasting money on CO2 caps/credits/trading/taxes/etc.

That said, Gore is, in addition to being wrong on policy, also wrong on the science. And he’s a chicken on debating both science and policy.

[Delacon]

I wish I could buck you up dude but it turns out that Ma Earth is also pumping more oil into the oceans than any drilling or shipping does. In fact off shore drilling has been found to reduce oceanic oil seepage. Ma Earth seems to not give a damn what we do.

[Mr_Moonlight]

The sad part is that Algore *still* insists to this day that his TS/1000 programming code is the most profound, deep, and revolutionary code in the entire history of the Universe!

What a Kook!

/laughs

[Delacon]

Correction: The US is better at not filling the oceans with oil than everyone else but Ma Earth is still numero uno at pumping it out at 48 percent of all oil in the oceans. But don’t forget she’s been doing it since way before the pyramids. We are only a spec in the history of Ma Earth. So again, Ma Earth doesn’t give a damn what we do. She shrugs us off. Thank God.
http://tomnelson.blogspot.com/2008/07/oil-seepage-from-ocean-floor-accounts.html

[bigred44]

We are of one mind, my friend. Yet there are still teachers out there saying that with a limited number of dinosaurs, our oil supply must be running out. I wonder if they ever teach that oil is from diatoms, not dinosaurs.

Or were there just lots of dumb dinosaurs hanging out in the Gulf of Mexico, Sahara Desert, and other dinosaur meeting places?

I get a kick out of Marathon and Valero gasoline commercials that still advertise producing more gasoline for us consumers. So retro and politically incorrect. Don’t they get it? Liberals and MSM don’t want more gasoline out there.

[Delacon]

Its called a FOSSIL FUEL. IE all the fuel we have comes from previously living things that sucked carbon from the air or ate things that did X million years ago. Not even most of the previously living things are what we burn now. Just a bunch of them. A small percentage of the previously living things managed to group themselves into pools of coal, oil and methane. We’ll never be able to find and use all the carbon that was released into the atomosphere(at one time it was up to 13% and now its at .03%) and release it back. This is such a hoax.

[SuziQ]

The problem is that the current debate (or non debate if you are Al Gore) on Anthropogenic Global Warming has little to do with science and everything to do with politics.

Exactly, that's why AlGore thinks it's settled, because, according to the politicians, it is.