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Mark Steyn: What's so hot about fickle science?
Chicago Sun Times ^ | February 4, 2007 | Mark Steyn

Posted on 02/04/2007 4:48:09 AM PST by Tom D.

What's so Hot About Fickle Science?

February 4, 2007

BY MARK STEYN Sun-Times Columnist

From the "Environmental News Network": "Science Is Solid on Climate Change, Congress Told." "The science is solid," says Louise Frechette, deputy secretary-general of the United Nations.

"The science is solid," says Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

"The science is really solid," says TV meteorologist Heidi Cullen. "The science is very solid."

And at that point, on "Larry King Live" last week, Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric science at MIT, remarked: "Heidi says the science is solid and I can't criticize her because she never says what science she's talking about."

Indeed. If the science is so solid, maybe they could drag it out to the Arctic for the poor polar bears to live on now that the ice is melting faster than a coed's heart at an Al Gore lecture.

Alas, the science isn't so solid. In the '70s, it was predicting a new ice age. Then it switched to global warming. Now it prefers "climate change." If it's hot, that's a sign of "climate change." If it's cold, that's a sign of "climate change." If it's 53 with sunny periods and light showers, you need to grab an overnight bag and get outta there right now because "climate change" is accelerating out of control.

The silliest argument is the anecdotal one: "You only have to look outside your window to see that climate change is happening." Outside my window in northern New England last week, it was minus 20 Fahrenheit. Very cold. Must be the old climate change kicking in, right? After all, December was very mild. Which was itself a sign of climate change. A few years ago, the little old lady who served as my town's historian for many decades combed over the farmers' diaries from two centuries ago that various neighbors had donated to her: From the daily records of 15 Januarys, she concluded that three were what we'd now regard as classic New Hampshire winters, ideal for lumbering or winter sports; eight had January thaws, and four had no snow at all. This was in the pre-industrial 18th century.

Today, faced with eight thaws and four entirely snowless Januarys, we'd all be running around shrieking that the great Gaia is displeased. Wake up and smell the CO2, people! We need to toss another virgin into the volcano. A virgin SUV, that is. Brand-new model, straight off the assembly line, cupholders never been used. And as the upholstery howls in agony, we natives will stand around chanting along with High Priestess Natalie Cole's classic recording: ''Unsustainable, that's what you are.''

As we say in the north country, if you don't like the weather, wait five minutes. And if you don't like the global weather, wait three decades. For the last century or so, the planet has gone through very teensy-weensy warming trends followed by very teensy-weensy cooling trends followed by very teensy-weensy warming trends, every 30 years or so. And, even when we're in a pattern of "global warming" or "global cooling," the phenomenon is not universally observed -- i.e., it's not "global," or even very local. In the Antarctic, the small Palmer peninsula has got a little warmer but the main continent is colder. Up north, the western Arctic's a little warmer but the eastern Arctic's colder. So, if you're an eastern polar bear, you're in clover -- metaphorically, I hasten to add. If you're a western polar bear, you'll be in clover literally in a year or two, according to Al Gore.

And, if you really don't like the global weather, wait half-a-millennium. A thousand years ago, the Arctic was warmer than it is now. Circa 982, Erik the Red and a bunch of other Vikings landed in Greenland and thought, "Wow! This land really is green! Who knew?" So they started farming it, and were living it up for a couple of centuries. Then the Little Ice Age showed up, and they all died. A terrible warning to us all about "unsustainable development": If a few hundred Vikings doing a little light hunter-gathering can totally unbalance the environment, imagine the havoc John Edwards' new house must be wreaking.

The question is whether what's happening now is just the natural give and take of the planet, as Erik the Red and my town's early settlers understood it. Or whether it's something so unprecedented that we need to divert vast resources to a transnational elite bureaucracy so that they can do their best to cripple the global economy and deny much of the developing world access to the healthier and longer lives that capitalism brings. To the eco-chondriacs that's a no-brainer. As Mark Fenn of the Worldwide Fund for Nature says in the new documentary ''Mine Your Own Business'':

''In Madagascar, the indicators of quality of life are not housing. They're not nutrition, specifically. They're not health in a lot of cases. It's not education. A lot of children in Fort Dauphin do not go to school because the parents don't consider that to be important. . . . People have no jobs, but if I could put you with a family and you could count how many times in a day that that family smiles. Then I put you with a family well off, in New York or London, and you count how many times people smile. . . . You tell me who is rich and who is poor."

Well, if smiles are the measure of quality of life, I'm Bill Gates; I'm laughing my head off. Male life expectancy in Madagascar is 52.5 years. But Mark Fenn is right: Those l'il malnourished villagers sure look awful cute dancing up and down when the big environmentalist activist flies in to shoot the fund-raising video.

If "global warming" is real and if man is responsible, why then do so many "experts" need to rely on obviously fraudulent data? The famous "hockey stick" graph showed the planet's climate history as basically one long bungalow with the Empire State Building tacked on the end. Completely false. In evaluating industrial impact, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change used GDP estimates based on exchange rates rather than purchasing power: As a result, they assume by the year 2100 that not only South Africans but also North Koreans will have a higher per capita income than Americans. That's why the climate-change computer models look scary. That's how "solid" the science is: It's predicated on the North Korean economy overtaking the United States.

Could happen. Who knows?

But that's the point: Who knows? You could take every dime spent by every government and NGO and eco-group to investigate "climate change" and spend it on Internet porn instead, and it wouldn't make the slightest difference to what the climate will be in 2050.

However, it would make a dramatic difference to the lifestyle of the "climate change" jet set. Which is why, even before latest new IPCC doomsday scenario was released, the Associated Press was running stories like: "New Climate Report Too Rosy, Experts Say." The AP's "science writer" warns that even this "dire report" is the "sugarcoated version." It's insufficiently hysterical, in every sense.

© Mark Steyn 2007


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: globalwarming; marksteyn
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To: Tom D.
It is only 150-200 years since the 'Little Ice Age' ended. Of course it's getting warmer !

I'll start taking it seriusly when Babs turns in the keys to her jet.


BUMP

21 posted on 02/04/2007 6:15:41 AM PST by capitalist229 (Get Democrats out of our pockets and Republicans out of our bedrooms.)
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To: Tom D.

It was -21 degrees without wind chill in Pine City, MN, this morning. Yes, we had a mild December and most of January, however, September and October were some of the coolest on recored.


22 posted on 02/04/2007 6:30:28 AM PST by Puckster
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To: KeepUSfree
"these people knew that the sacrifices actually did nothing to appease the Gods either - but it sure helped them keep hold of their power-base."

Like good ole Al-pocaylpto Gore!
23 posted on 02/04/2007 6:33:07 AM PST by dblshot
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To: Tom D.
If anything, we should be taking steps to hasten Global Warming. After all, it is inoculation against Nuclear Winter and some states are surely taking steps to make that a reality.
24 posted on 02/04/2007 6:33:35 AM PST by NonValueAdded (Pelosi, the call was for Comity, not Comedy. But thanks for the laughs. StarKisses, NVA.)
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To: capitalist229

I like his term, eco-chondriacs.


25 posted on 02/04/2007 6:34:07 AM PST by ClaireSolt (Have you have gotten mixed up in a mish-masher?)
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To: Temple Owl

ping


26 posted on 02/04/2007 6:34:10 AM PST by Tribune7 (A bleeding heart does nothing but ruin the carpet.)
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To: arthurus
I don't think W is taking it seriously despite some bromides from his office.

Worse are the captains of industry that seem to be buckling. I can't figure their angle, since a Kyoto type agreement would tend to cripple our economy....unless they think US taxpayers can foot the bill to clean up something they'd have to pay for later.

27 posted on 02/04/2007 6:37:57 AM PST by chiller (Old Media is not yet dead. Turn them off and they will die. For the sake of sanity.)
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To: libertylover

There is, you just have to look for it. The "Mainstream Media" certainly isn't going to tell you about it.

Here:

Global Warming: A Chilling Perspective

28 posted on 02/04/2007 6:41:13 AM PST by StACase
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To: Tom D.

Bookmarked for later reading.


29 posted on 02/04/2007 6:43:07 AM PST by Reaganesque
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To: Tom D.
So does this mean that Mark won't be voting for Algore to get the Oscar or the Nobel? Just askin'.


30 posted on 02/04/2007 6:50:34 AM PST by COUNTrecount
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To: Tom D.

It's mighty cold in my house!


31 posted on 02/04/2007 6:51:08 AM PST by Tax-chick ("It is my life's labor to bring Christ to souls and souls to Christ through word and example.")
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To: Tom D.
As I understand things...the earth's annual inclination, is responsible for the seasonal changes that we, in the higher latitudes, experience....in turn, the moon's position, relative to earth, moderates the inclination, if the moon wasn't in the precise position, that it is presently, the earth would experience greater or less than the 23.45 degrees of inclination, and as a result, the seasonal temperature variation would be greater, or less, dependent on weather the inclination angle increased or decreased....if the angle increased, the northern latitudes, would experience longer, and warmer summers, followed by longer and colder winters....conversely, if the angle decreased, then it would result in long winters, and virtually no summer.....

Laser measurements of the distance between the earth and our moon indicate that Moon, is slowly moving away from earth; as the distance increases, the stabilizing influence of the Moon on earth's annual inclination, will decline, and this decline will result in greater weather fluctuations here on earth
32 posted on 02/04/2007 6:52:40 AM PST by thinking
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To: Tom D.
"And, if you really don't like the global weather, wait half-a-millennium."

Nuff said.

Now we're off to the beach...
Gotta take advantage of this beautiful Southern Cali 80 degree weather before Al Bore predicts a "Global Freeze!" LMAO

GO COLTS!
33 posted on 02/04/2007 6:57:53 AM PST by kellynla (Freedom of speech makes it easier to spot the idiots! Semper Fi!)
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To: Tom D.

bttt


34 posted on 02/04/2007 6:58:05 AM PST by Beowulf
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To: chiller

The "captains of industry" foresee regulation of greenhouse gas emissions to create barriers to entry for potential competitors. These enormous transnational mega-corporations tend to use their leverage in the deeply corrupt corridors of power to quash competition against their oligopoly. The government might forbid any new carbon dioxide emissions unless the proposed new emitter finds a way to eliminate some offsetting existing emissions, paying whatsoever the existing companies demand. In a more extreme version, the oligopolists profit immensely because the regulation creates insatiable scarcity of their product, enabling them to raise prices without worrying about the potential of competitors or new supply.


35 posted on 02/04/2007 7:09:25 AM PST by dufekin (media-Democrat-terrorist complex: espionage, sedition, propaganda, treason, and surrender)
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To: Tom D.
Kinda makes you long for the days when Y2K occupied the minds--Oops!--of the mindless "do-gooders".

This is the crux of the matter:

"The question is whether...we need to divert vast resources to a transnational elite bureaucracy so that they can do their best to cripple the global economy and deny much of the developing world access to the healthier and longer lives that capitalism brings."
Yes.

My wife and I owned a large tract of gorgeous, pristine wilderness, teeming with wildlife.

We wanted to keep it in its pristine beauty, permitted no hunting or fishing. We loved the animals. We loved the forest.

We're both vegetarians. We also recycle faithfully, are very conscious of avoiding environmental pollution.

The elite "Environmentalist" bureaucracy got into the act. They wouldn't leave us alone. We fought them for years. I told them that if they didn't leave us alone, we would have to sell the property, and the only person who would buy it would be a developer.

They didn't care. The bureaurocrats wanted CONTROL! They wanted POWER!

We sold it to a group of developers. They razed the forest.

I don't blame them.

The entire blame rests solely on the bureaucrats and the "Environmentalists" who delivered POWER and CONTROL to them!

The wilderness is now destroyed. The forest has been clear cut. The wildlife has been dispersed.

A lovely housing development has replaced the gorgeous, pristine wilderness, teeming with wildlife.

On the bright side, we made lots of money!

However, I said to my wife: "Here we are with all this money, and we are hearbroken." I have still not recovered from my grief over this. I wonder what happened to the animals.

This tale is completely true. It is also a parable. This is what elite "Environmentalists" and bureaucrats will do to the world if we are foolish enough to allow them to seize sufficient POWER and CONTROL.

36 posted on 02/04/2007 7:26:20 AM PST by Savage Beast ("Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly.")
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To: dufekin

Yesterday I worked out that we could invite everybody in the world, all 6.5 billion, to RI (approx 2,000 sq miles) to sit and watch the Super Bowl!! Think about it. Makes you wonder exactly how big a problem we are or could possibly be.

This was posted on Drudge:
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=156df7e6-d490-41c9-8b1f-106fef8763c6&k=0

Seems as though the Sun may be behind these temperature fluctuations - cosmic rays and all that. What we need to do is start countering all these messages about man-made climate change with observable facts. Otherwise we are in danger of falling into the giant maw of UN control of our economy and, ergo, our lives.


37 posted on 02/04/2007 7:32:27 AM PST by bjc (Check the data!!)
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To: Tom D.

Bump


38 posted on 02/04/2007 7:38:08 AM PST by nuconvert ([there's a lot of bad people in the pistachio business] (...but his head is so tiny...))
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To: KeepUSfree

I love this graphic. Can you provide the source?


39 posted on 02/04/2007 7:40:00 AM PST by bjc (Check the data!!)
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To: Tom D.
Well, if smiles are the measure of quality of life, I'm Bill Gates; I'm laughing my head off.

And why is Bono asking Americans to be taxed to send money to them, yet sending none of his own?

40 posted on 02/04/2007 7:45:28 AM PST by Moonman62 (The issue of whether cheap labor makes America great should have been settled by the Civil War.)
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