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How ExxonMobil Funded Global Warming Skeptics
Posted by
Zonk
on Fri Jan 05, 2007 01:51 PM
from the gotta-keep-our-minds-open dept.
from the gotta-keep-our-minds-open dept.
Erik Moeller writes "According to a report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, oil company ExxonMobil 'has funneled nearly $16 million between 1998 and 2005 to a network of 43 advocacy organizations that seek to confuse the public on global warming science.' The report compares the tactics employed by the oil giant to those used by the tobacco industry in previous decades, and identifies key individuals who have worked on both campaigns. Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?"
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News: Scientists Offered Cash to Dispute Climate Study 668 comments
w1z4rd writes "According to an article in the Guardian, scientists and economists have been offered large bribes by a lobbying group funded by ExxonMobil. The offers were extended by the American Enterprise Institute group, which apparently has numerous ties to the Bush administration. Couched in terms of an offer to write 'dissenting papers' against the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, several scientists contacted for the article refused the offers on conflict of interest grounds."
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News at 10 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:4, Insightful)
But apparently it takes a bored IT guy on slashdot to correct an international consortium of climatologists.
Maybe you ought to take a course in the statistical analysis of experimental data, and when you have a grasp of how scientists analyze data to construct theories that explain observations, they often take many things into account, you can rejoin the discussion.
Or, the short version: THE FACT THAT THE SOLAR RADIATION HAS INCREASED HAS BEEN ACCOUNTED FOR.
Good day!
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that the solar radiation has increased has been accounted for and blamed on Americans driving SUVs and George Bush.
And blame the Chinese pollution problem on America too because they should all be in cold, damp, and dark huts with no jobs and no food to feed themselves. That is until they find that fish that grants wishes then we can all have rainbows and Skittles.
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a degree in physical oceanography, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that you are wrong on this as the deniers i the lies bought from them. The whole time I was in graduate school, I held the point of view that anthropogenic effects could not be separated from natural variability. While people didn't agree with me, I was never disparaged, and nobody even thought of trying to link my work to that. At the time, there were a lot of challenges to be made to important conclusions like Mann's, and modelling was much less well developed. There are still important uncertainties, but the open scientific process has worked, and it has confirmed the findings about anthropogenic climate change. I have been obligated to change my point of view by the increasing body of evidence here.
There is no controversy. There is no doubt. There are some claims which are not fully supported - e.g., how exactly anthropenic warming will affect hurricane formation is not clear, but the most of the basic physical mechanisms are pretty well undertand (if not the second order problems like interaction between wind shear and sea surface temperature), but when they are made and answered within the context of scientific debate (e.g. Kerry Emmanuel's paper), they have tended to confirm the magnitude of risks. Part of the reason scientists are pissed and have begun publishing reports like this is that they resent the endless meddling in the process by these oil-funded "think tanks".
The problem the denialists have is not bias, it is that they are trying to challenge an increasingly established body of science with loopier and loopier ideas. This is similiar to the small but active community of denialists who claim that cold fusion is being suppressed - they more evidence thatemerges against it, the more they turn to whiny claims of bias of crazy counterarguments. Trying to make improbable criticisms stick is never a good strategy for funding. Any responsible grant administrator will consider the question of, say, the meaning of correlation between atmospheric CO2 and temperature as an approximately closed question. There are of course caveats and valid criticisms to any particular paper using those correlations, but the basic science is considered fairly well established. It might be nice if there was so much funding just lying around that the correlation could be subjected to nearly endless testing, but it can't. It's had its day in scientific debate, and barring some truly innovative method or a new framework that raises new concerns, the question is settled. The denialists have provided none of this (barring Lindzen's loony IRIS theory), yet they continue to whine and moan about how their lack of good ideas and unwillingness to accepted results of good work is not in fact petty obstinacy (or more likely outright bought loyalty), but is some kind of noble keeper of the flame movement. That's self-flattering bullshit, and an insult to serious scientists everywhere. Climate science has a healthy scientific process - like anything else, it could probably use improvement in some areas. But to suggest that the whole field of climate science is fundamentally unsound is breathtakingly arrogant and small-minded.
So until you have something real to the conversation, do us the favor of keeping your unfounded slander in your mom's basement next to your teddy bear and anime girlfriend.
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:5, Informative)
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archi ves/climate_change/001030so_what_happened_at_.html [colorado.edu]
"..."
"I will grant that talking to the people I did at AGU represents a small fraction of all the attendees. I will grant that there is no way to know whether my averaging of attitudes in the climsci world, as sensed by talking with a few people over a few days, scales up to represent the true feelings of the collective. But I will tell you what I found, and what I felt, and whether you think it might represent the current attitude of climsci world is up to you."
"To sum the state of climsci world in one word, as I see it right now, it is this: tension."
"..."
"What I see is something that I am having a hard time labeling, but that I might call either a "hangover" or a "sophomore slump" or "buyers remorse." None fit perfectly, but perhaps the combination does. I speak for (my interpretation) of the collective: {We tried for years - decades - to get them to listen to us about climate change. To do that we had to ramp up our rhetoric. We had to figure out ways to tone down our natural skepticism (we are scientists, after all) in order to put on a united face. We knew it would mean pushing the science harder than it should be. We knew it would mean allowing the boundary-pushers on the "it's happening" side free reign while stifling the boundary-pushers on the other side. But knowing the science, we knew the stakes to humanity were high and that the opposition to the truth would be fierce, so we knew we had to dig in. But now they are listening. Now they do believe us. Now they say they're ready to take action. And now we're wondering if we didn't create a monster. We're wondering if they realize how uncertain our projections of future climate are. We wonder if we've oversold the science. We're wondering what happened to our community, that individuals caveat even the most minor questionings of barely-proven climate change evidence, lest they be tagged as "skeptics." We're wondering if we've let our alarm at the problem trickle to the public sphere, missing all the caveats in translation that we have internalized. And we're wondering if we've let some of our scientists take the science too far, promise too much knowledge, and promote more certainty in ourselves than is warranted.}"
"..."
"None of this is to say that the risk of climate change is being questioned or downplayed by our community; it's not. It is to say that I think some people feel that we've created a monster by limiting the ability of people in our community to question results that say "climate change is right here!" It is to say that a number of climsci people I heard from are not comfortable enough with the science to want our community to push to outsiders an idea that we have fully or even adequately bounded the risk. I heard from a few people a sentiment that we need to stop making assumptions and decisions for decision-makers; that we need to give decision-makers only the unvarnished truth with realistic bounds on our uncertainty, and trust that the decision-makers will know what to do with it. These feelings came of frustration that many of us are downplaying uncertainties for fear of not being listened to."
"..."
"I realize that many of you will disagree with the notion that we are overplaying our hand, or are not giving full voice to our uncertainties. I'm not sure the answer to this question myself. But I write all this because I sense a sea change in attitudes amongst climsci people that I know as good scientists without agendas. These are solid scientists, and some told me in no uncertain terms that we are not giving full voice to uncertainties; others implied as much. Therein lies the tension. Where we go from here
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:5, Informative)
As for real-world examples... it began long ago. For example, the primary author of "Sun, Weather, And Climate" (1978 NASA special publication), John R. Herman was subsequently shunned by his peers as, during the early 80s, the data from that book was used as a counter-point in the greenhouse gas debate.
Any solar observatory these days sees this. They either talk about other topics, or only publish data that fails to contradict the "facts" as accepted by the current consensus. Violating that has one observatory mentioned in the congressional floor debate record as, "an enemy of the planet," I kid you not.
There's also a great article about the modern implications of the "climate of fear [opinionjournal.com]" surrounding climate research, but of course, you can't listen to Richard Lindzen because he takes money from those people... but of course, that's self-perpetuating because anyone who speaks up in Lindzen's defense is branded with the same iron, and must seek funding elsewhere... which further invalidates their voice.
I'm not saying that CO2 doesn't cause babies to cry and angels to lose their wings, I'm just saying that there's no way to extract meaningful information from the "consensus" of a community that's scared for their jobs about saying the wrong thing. I would consider Bill Gates a national, even international hero if he invested a large chunk of the Gates Foundation money in funding the best research that tried to assail current climate theory on all fronts. Not because that theory is bad, but because I want to see the research done and done well, so that we really get to find out what the hell is going on on planet Earth.
Let me ask you this: if you did research that suggested that, for example, ground-cover water vapor from irrigation had a strong hand to play in surface warming (that's arm-waving, but it's an example for sake of argument), do you think that you would continue to get funding? Would you be called an "enemy of the planet?" Would you have to go looking to oil companies to support further research and pretty much guarantee that no one listened to you? What if some republican picked up your work and started waving it around, taking it out of context and saying that fossile fuel is as safe as houses because of what you said? Would the community circle around you and defend your reputation from such gross misuse of your work, or would you just find yourself too "controvercial" to continue to work in the field?
We know the answer to these questions because it's been played out for nearly 30 years. You would be asking Slashdot, "what's a good tech job?"
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Re:and the enviromentalist (Score:5, Insightful)
"both sides have lied", so the truth must be "somewhere in the middle?"
That's the logical fallacy that Fox News uses all the time.
A quick example should illustrate the fallacy:
Billy: There's a cake here!
Bobby: I want it!
Billy: Why don't we split it 50/50?
Bobby: No! mine!
Their Mom: I've heard both of your extreme viewpoints, so we'll need to compromise. Bobby gets 75%, Billy gets 25%.
Saying that both sides "have lied" and so "the truth is somewhere in between" somehow puts paid industry propagandists on the same credibility level as professional climate research scientists. (And does a great disservice to science, I think.) There is a fair amount of difference in the professional opinion of a corporate shill who is paid to spout the company line, and someone who has spent the majority of their life studying something.
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Re:News at 2am (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, for the environmentalist movement proper. But as you go up the hierarchy in any activist or political organization, the further removed people become from logic and open-mindedness, and instead become more involved in power and influence.
And I don't think you have to be an actual environmentalist to have an interest in the general welfare of a planet and its species. Despite what people think, corporate and political policy is not always at odds with the environment.
Re:News at 2am (Score:5, Insightful)
I would not agree.
That is a very charitable evaluation, but your conclusion doesn't make much sense. The Spanish Inquisition (bet you didn't expect that) would have claimed, quite sincerely, that their goal was the general welfare and spiritual well being of the planet and its inhabitants. All they required was absolute obedience and license to do pretty much anything they wanted. By your logic they would rank as one of the most trustworthy and wonderful organizations in history. Most of their victims would not agree. Good intentions do not automatically bring about good results.
So sre environmentalists the Spanish Inquisition, blessed with absolute knowledge of right and wrong and empowered to change the world and crush all dissent? No, of course not. But some of them sure seem to wish they were.
Is science done by people with alleged good intentions always right, and science paid for by people with a profit motive always suspect? No, obviously not. I don't care who pays for what. All that matters is whether the science is sound enough to stand up to scrutiny. A lot of climate science is really, really slipshod stuff rigged up to support foregone ideological conclusion. Regardless of whether you agree with the conclusions or not, that's not science.
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Re:News at 2am (Score:5, Insightful)
And you are qualified enough to make that judgement, how, exactly? Could you please cite some specific examples of peer reviewed literature that demonstrate your point and explain why you think they are slipshod stuff? Otherwise, you are just engaging in a logical fallacy known as wishful thinking.
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The real reason for global warming: (Score:5, Funny)
Clueless (or humorless) mods strike again (Score:4, Insightful)
Look, the whole idea that any company or organization would attempt to skew any studies to their own viewpoint is universal. Enviornmentalists are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Corporations are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Skeptics are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Conspiracy theorists are always looking to make surveys/studies support their viewpoint. Anyone with any kind of agenda is always looking to make surveys/studies support his viewpoint. But in this case it's "big oil" { insert doom-and-gloom music here }, so therefore their attempts to skew results are somehow more evil than other groups doing it? What a complete and utter crock.
The question of "Would a 'global warming controversy' exist without the millions of dollars spent by fossil fuel companies to discredit scientific conclusions?" is infuriating by itself. Hell, yes there would be a controversy for numerous reasons that have been stated time and time and time again, not the least of which is that without indisputable proof, which I still don't believe we have, there will always be room for skepticism. Honestly, the whole notion that skepticism is unhealthy, as that last line suggests, is an abhorrent idea in itself.
Yeah, yeah, mod me down for actually contesting a Slashdot article and for being somewhat of a global warming skeptic. I have karma to burn, but that doesn't make what I've said any less valid.
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Re:Clueless (or humorless) mods strike again (Score:5, Insightful)
Face it, there is very little to be gained by believing in global warming. No money, no fame, no honors, no women. In fact, there is much to be lost. There are billions to be gained by opposing belief in it. Even if one cannot make money off of opposing belief in global warming, at the very least, one doesn't actually have to do anything. Those who really believes in global warming will feel compelled to alter their behavior.
Skepticism is the lazy person's default position. I think for most global warming skeptics, the desire not to do anything different came first, and the skepticism was reached through a chain leading from "I don't want to have to do anything" back to "this is why I don't have to do anything."
Nothing any moderators could do to you could possibly make what you have to say any less valid.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If you think that almost all the scientists from an entire branch of science everywhere across the world can be made to intentionally lie in order to get grants, what reason do you have to think that science is right about anything at all? Sounds like you're less of a climate-change skeptic than a science sk
Re:Clueless (or humorless) mods strike again (Score:5, Insightful)
As for the 'controversy' on global warming. That's a US thing. It has been understood in the rest of the world for quite some time that (a) global warming is real, and that (b) we're contributing majorly to it. Discussions on the Exxon points has been non-existent here in Europe. Guess where Exxon has spent his 'educational' dollars? Yes, to the gullable.
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Who else is going to fund it though? (Score:5, Insightful)
This comes from confusing cause & effect. The studies don't come out a certain way because the group funding them dictates that it should, but only because the only ones LOOKING for an opposite outcome are those with something to lose. A very slight difference, but it's still critical to understanding it. The first is straight-out lying. The 2nd can happen with the most honest of intentions. I'm not saying that's the case here, but to dismiss it automatically as the 1st just means your mind is made up without even looking at what evidence may exist.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course there would still be controversy and debate about global warming without the oil companies
How to be a skeptic (Score:5, Insightful)
A skeptic isn't a denier. A denier says the scientests are making it all up to curry favor with government grant issuers, you know, the rabid environmentalist Bush administration. A skeptic asks how big the error bars are on the temperature measurements and finds http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature_record [wikipedia.org]. A skeptic asks how a huge computer model of a system which is incompletely defined can ever be validated (and finds annoyingly little in the popular literature). A skeptic asks whether increased solar output could account for the changes and finds out that nights are getting warmer and the upper atmosphere is getting colder, both of which point to heat getting trapped in the lower atmosphere.
A skeptic refuses to be rushed into policy choices. A skeptic asks the question Bjorn Lomborg has been exploring, whether it's better to mitigate the results of climate change than to uproot the foundations of the world economy trying to prevent it.
Skepticism clarifies issues, astroturf campaigns and phony think tanks obscure issues.
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I've got an idea (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm a global warming skeptic... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I'm a global warming skeptic... (Score:4, Insightful)
I think this is a report that is trying to link some sort of monies to conspiracies and agendas. $15M spread across 42 (to remove the one high example they use) organizations over 8 years = $45K a year on average. Its a lot to an individual but hardly enough to fund "access to the Bush administration to block federal policies and shape government communications on global warming".
Further, I see froth but no substance - no irrefutible proof saying that Exxon doesnt mind global warning or that it doesnt exist, or even that they dont care. The best I can see is that a group that recieved money "touted a book". Incidently, they use this as "an example" because the group recieved $600K - far above the average amount given, so its hardly a typical example.
This is clearly a biased report hoping to use allegations and bend them into truth. I am a sceptic but in the sense that I dont think anyone has a grasp on whats really going on, whats normal, and how much us humans have played a part in any change that has happened. I'm a skeptic when anyone tells me they have all the answers.
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Official Reply By XOM (Score:5, Informative)
In perspective (Score:5, Insightful)
What Global Warming? (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
>snowing in winter anymore in the northern sections of the
>U.S. [...]
Since you believe that "it's not snowing in winter anymore",
can I have your snowblower? You're not going to need it
anymore, right?
Don't need to hire "experts" to confuse people (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, it's simple: all of the authorities and powers-that-be could have been in total agreement for the last 2 decades, warning people about global warming in every available media outlet and it wouldn't have mattered because Joe Sixpack doesn't give a shit. And politicians won't force people to do the right thing, because that doesn't get you elected.
Unless it unavoidably and directly impacts the price of beer or his ability to watch his favorite TV show, Joe wouldn't care if his SUV ran on mulched babies. "Scrubs" has it right: people are bastard-coated bastards with bastard filling. And global warming is Somebody Else's Problem.
Re:Don't need to hire "experts" to confuse people (Score:4, Insightful)
* The outlook on Nuclear (fission) power is far less negative. The fear of possible nuclear meltdown is far less than of guaranteed climate change.
* More people are becoming concerned with energy efficiency: Compact Flourescent light bulbs being pushed at Wall-Mart and on TV, Hybrid Vehicles, etc. People are looking to cut financial burdens by reducing their energy costs. Some (like CF bulbs) can have a significant impact with little extra cost. Same thing with insulating homes for cheaper heating and air conditioning. More energy efficiency=less carbon in this economy.
* The people who are more educated (managers, engineers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, accountants, etc.) are becoming more convinced and concerned with global warming, and aren't "joe sixpack." In other words: Joe sixpack may not care, but his boss does. You don't need Joe Sixpack to care nearly as much as you need his boss to care.
So his boss does things that force Joe Sixpack to change his behavior, both on the worksite and as a consumer. (More efficient/environmentally friendly policies & practices at work, and produces more environmentally friendly products)
Huge vehicles aren't without cost. Eventually, Joe then gets burned by high gas prices, and low mileage, and sells his SUV because he can't afford it. I've seen it happen a lot in the past two years. I see people I never expected to do the environmental thing change their behavior and opinions.
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Re:Don't need to hire "experts" to confuse people (Score:4, Insightful)
The mechanisms that drive Capitalism never choose "the right thing", they always favor "the profitable thing". Sometimes "the right thing" and "the profitable thing" are "the same thing" but that is often not the case. The fact is the exploitation of fossil fuels did in fact drive some enormous advances in standard of living, technological progress, economic well being, and the entire structure of modern society is completely dependent on them at the moment. A few forward thinking people figured out the dangers of releasing all that sequestered CO2 back in to the atmosphere a long time ago, in particular Joseph Fourier(also the genius behind the Fourier Transform) and Svante Arrhenius, but most people didn't worry about it until now because the earth was so big and the profits so good. When we started we weren't burning a billion tons of coal a year.
Energy is essential to industrialized and information age living, its not easy to produce cheaply and on large scale, so you can't exactly fault the people who created our massive dependence on fossil fuels for doing what they did, and most of them saw enormous potential for benefit, and profit so they reaped it. That is just the way Capitalism works. We decimated most whale species because they were also a great and profitable source of energy in their day in the form of whale oil. The right thing was probably not to wipe out the oceans whales, but the profitable thing for a while said go for it.
To rant against whalers, big Tobacco or Big Oil is kind of howling at the moon. You are really just ranting at the unfortunate down side of Capitalism, and for better or worst it is the economic system almost our entire world is using now. Unless you opt for some kind of Socialism where government planners benevolently pick "the right thing" over "the profitable thing" you are going to have profit obsessed people do some really horrible things to each other and the earth as a whole. That is the way the system is designed. So far precedent indicates Socialist government planners are equally bad when it comes to doing "the right thing".
It is an interesting mental exercise to think about the pros and cons of global warming. The fact is our planet has had much warmer periods than the current one and it survived, and there were periods when much of that CO2 sequestered in fossil fuels was in fact in our atmosphere. Its not entirely bad that much of the Northern Hemisphere doesn't have the bitterly cold winters that were so common not very many years ago, and that vast new regions at the poles are now going to finally come out of the last ice age and become habitable.
The obvious problem is that, thanks to human ingenuity and excessive population growth, we are probably going to precipitate these changes much faster than either humans, or most animal and plant species can cope, and the consequences to all species will probably be dire. There is a little problem that we've built so much of our society at sea level. It seemed like a good idea at the time, and thanks to our short sightedness due to our short life spans and brief recorded history, we didn't realize that sea level has always fluctuated through the earth's history. If you are building cities to last, the current sea level and islands like Manhattan are actually not a good choice. Perhaps the native Americans who sold Manhattan island to the Europeans had a longer view of things and realized it really wasn't worth much, and sure wasn't a good place to build a town, much less a city.
This raises another interesting puzzle in economics. If global warming does happen and sea levels rise the economic consequences will be devastating because vast quantities of capital will go underwater. At some point burning fossil fuels will cease to be the profitable thing, at least for everything at sea level,
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Global Warming Doesn't Even Enter Into It (Score:4, Insightful)
No there would not be a controversy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
WOW! (Score:5, Insightful)
My God! They could take over the world with an army like that!
Not only, but also (Score:5, Informative)
GW is just a distraction... (Score:3, Insightful)
From the other, more pressing issues that we should be dealing with. For example:
I could go on...
Anyway, Global Warming fanatics always bring up the negative aspects that it could produce, but not necessarily that it will. Indeed, anyone who is going to make 100 or 1000 year predictions on a few decades of data is foolish. We simply don't know. Regardless, does anyone ever bring up the possible benefits of global warming?
And these are just a few. The real question shouldn't be "is GW happening?", but, "Is it a bad thing?". It could be that preventing global warming would leave us with a worldwide shortage of food a few centuries from now. How are you going to feed 10 billion people?
Re:GW is just a distraction... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, very frequently, as you would know if you followed the issue at all.
The problem is that fast-paced environmental change is always a short-to-medium-term massive economic negative. That is, if we woke up tomorrow and the world was 5 C warmer with no rising sea levels or any other long-term negative consequences, the immediate result would be a world-wide recession the like of which has never been seen.
This is because human economies are highly optimized for things just as they are now. We are extremely adaptable creatures and we have adapted to our current circumstances. Our adpative strategies are almost always incredibly short-sighted and amazingly inflexible, because that is how we squeeze the last drop of cash out of the economy. We build major cities on top of known faults because there hasn't been an earthquake in a while. We build major cities on flood plains or below sea level and then claim "no one could have predicted this" when they wind up under water. We build huge amounts of infrastructure on the basis that nothing is ever going to change, and then pretend to be shocked and outraged when it does.
So the thing about global climate change is not that "the weather is going to get worse everywhere", as I once heard it put. It is that we are inflexibly adapted to the climate as it is now, and therefore change as such will cost money. Depending the scope and scale of the change, it could cost lots and lots of money--enough to drive economic growth to zero or below world-wide.
People who make a big deal about climate change because they are worried about the polar bears are idiots. The polar bears survived the Younger Dryas, amongst other things. They have a good chance of surviving this. What does has a less good chance of surviving is the global economy, and the global civilization that depends on it.
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Greens funding fanatics (Score:5, Insightful)
Wasted Money (Score:3, Funny)
And more cowbell would be nice too.
here is the proof (Score:3, Funny)
Biased for protecting our only environment? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:UCS - definitely unbiased (Score:5, Insightful)
That said... Exxon has every right to honestly defend itself, but if they have indeed created front groups or are knowingly spreading misinformation they should be properly scorned.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:UCS - definitely unbiased (Score:5, Funny)
Hear hear. I'm sick and tired of hearing what scientists think about global warming: it's about time that we heard from the oil companies.
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biased how exactly? (Score:3, Informative)
What is their agenda? I'm not that familiar with it, so I'm interested to know where they deviate from widely accepted science?
Another poster mentioned their global warming FAQ [ucsusa.org], but I read it and thought that most of what I read was pretty uncontroversial among qualified climate scientists (apart from a few counter-views, which almost always seem to be oil-funded).
Given that you assert UCS is a special interest, how do they profit from acceptance of their assertions? It's obvious how oil companies profi
Re:How can a global warming conclusion be scientif (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Absolutely.
Regarding the effect of solar forcing, check out the wikipedia article. It's got good links to studies that have shown that solar forcing only accounts for about 25% of the recorded increase in global temperatures.
Re:How can a global warming conclusion be scientif (Score:3, Insightful)
Currently, we're observing that the planet is warming up. That is a simple fact. No scientific dispute.
To this observation, you can match models, to explain why the warming occurs. That is the theory. No scientific dispute exist about the theory either, that the warming is caused by human activities, specifically because of the burning of fossil fuels.
No reasonable human being can argue about the observation and if you want to argue about the theory, to explain the reason of
Re:How can a global warming conclusion be scientif (Score:5, Informative)
The verdict: Not perfect, but pretty damn good.
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