In my recent quest to discover why people feel the need to fight so hard against the idea that humanity might be causing the globe to warm, I’ve started looking at everything I can find that illuminates skeptic science.  If you missed this profile of the physicist Freeman Dyson in the New York Times, check it out now.  Dyson, I would say, is the most highly respected scientist to publicly come out against global warming.

His point (in a tiny and simplified nutshell)?  There really isn’t a lot of proof of global warming beyond a series of simulations and models.  If you don’t buy their prognosticating power, you’re left considering the fact that we don’t know, for sure, the exact ratio between temperature and human interaction.

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I’m not the first to note this, but it is really remarkable that CNN, a formerly respected former news network, stoops to this egregious low.

Mike Brune of the Rainforest Action Network does an admirable job of keeping his dignity, not committing any felonies no matter how justified, and calling him on his bull.

If, in the unlikely event that I am ever asked to do a similar interview, my only request will be that I be within smirk-smacking distance.

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Global Warming has its upside
At a minimum, the altered weather patterns of global warming play havoc with agriculture.

Among winemakers it is accepted that the relatively predictable pattern of annual average temperatures in the world’s primary wine-producing regions has changed.

The last 10 vintages in Germany, for example, are warmer than in any decade on record. But how long have such records been kept? Germany’s detailed vintage descriptions go back to the mid-1300s.

Yet to the delight of some global warming naysayers, previously cool vineyard regions are finding that climate change can offer good news. Where once only two or three German vintages each decade saw ripe grapes, now nearly every vintage has been riper.

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Myth: These same climate scientists predicted a coming ice age in the 70’s. They were wrong then, so why should we trust them now?

Fact: No, they didn’t. The situation in the 70’s was very different from our current situation. There was no scientific consensus on climate change. There was no international body of scientists looking into the matter, no global effort to deal with climate change, and no daily news articles on the subject. There were maybe a couple of magazine articles, a book, and some sporadic newspaper articles.

Today, by contrast, we have the IPCC, an organization of the world’s top climate scientists and its four reports, the latest of which claims with 90% certainty that anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are primarily responsible for our current warming. We also have other scientific bodies that agree with this assessment, such as the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Should one ask for a scientific paper from that time period that makes such a claim, one would certainly be left empty-handed. The most common example used is an article that was published in Newsweek in 1975, titled “The Cooling World”, which provides an excellent example of the sensationalist reporting that existed within some media reports.

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Fact: No, they didn’t. The situation in the 70’s was very different from our current situation. There was no scientific consensus on climate change. There was no international body of scientists looking into the matter, no global effort to deal with climate change, and no daily news articles on the subject. There were maybe a couple of magazine articles, a book, and some sporadic newspaper articles.

Today, by contrast, we have the IPCC, an organization of the world’s top climate scientists and its four reports, the latest of which claims with 90% certainty that anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are primarily responsible for our current warming. We also have other scientific bodies that agree with this assessment, such as the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Should one ask for a scientific paper from that time period that makes such a claim, one would certainly be left empty-handed. The most common example used is an article that was published in Newsweek in 1975, titled "The Cooling World", which provides an excellent example of the sensationalist reporting that existed within some media reports.

The situation was also different because the state of climate science was such that there was not enough research to be able to make these supposed predictions with any certainty. A 1975 National Academy of Sciences report stated as much, saying "…we do not have a good quantitative understanding of our climate machine and what determines its course. Without the fundamental understanding, it does not seem possible to predict climate…". Climate science was in its infancy. There wasn’t yet enough data or research available on which to base such a prediction, and scientists were well aware of that fact. Scientists’ current statements on the future of our climate are based on decades of research and massive amounts of data that has been collected over that time.

Also, as the climate scientists at RealClimate have pointed out, we know that climate scientists could not have made such predictions based on the scientific information that was available at the time:

Firstly, there was a trend of cooling from the 40’s to the 70’s (although that needs to be qualified, as hemispheric or global temperature datasets were only just beginning to be assembled then). But people were well aware that extrapolating such a short trend was a mistake (Mason, 1976) . Secondly, it was becoming clear that ice ages followed a regular pattern and that interglacials (such as we are now in) were much shorter that the full glacial periods in between. Somehow this seems to have morphed (perhaps more in the popular mind than elsewhere) into the idea that the next ice age was predicatable and imminent. Thirdly, there were concerns about the relative magnitudes of aerosol forcing (cooling) and CO2 forcing (warming), although this latter strand seems to have been short lived. - RealClimate

This argument, like many other skeptical arguments, is simply an ad hominem attack. Rather than addressing the merits of the science behind anthropogenic global warming, it attempts to discredit climate scientists in general based on arguments and statements they never made. Such arguments hold about as much merit as recent attacks against Al Gore and claims that previous high levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere were caused by dinosaur farts. If there were any valid points to be made by skeptics, this would not be one of them.

They did, however, help continute the "debate" on carbon dioxide's connection to rising global temperatures. CO2 may be necessary for life, but too much of it causes global warming. Really, it does! Look:

No, it isn't proof. Scientists don't often speak in the language of proof and absolute truths. With that said, the above variation of a graph developed and published in the journal Nature by J.R. Petit in 1999 shows a striking correlation between the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere and temperature over the last 450,000 years. The graph also shows that the earth does a lot of its own regulating of both CO2 and temperature, a truth that climate change and CO2 connection skeptics are all too eager to point out. Fair enough, but in that entire 450,000 year span, CO2 parts per million levels were never above 300. Today, atmospheric CO2 concentration has surpassed 380 ppm, and is climbing rapidly (think Al Gore riding the lift up to the top of the screen in An Inconvenient Truth).

Will the temperature line in the graph follow the CO2 line's lead? The earth hasn't needed this degree of self-regulation for at least 800,000 years. Worse still, we haven't yet experienced the full consequences of this astonishing carbon dioxide concentration.

It isn't just me and Al who say so. The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report confirmed the CO2 connection and the human responsibility for the dramatic increase in its atmospheric levels. They concluded (PDF):

Most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.

"Very likely" is defined as a greater than 90% probability. As summarized in the UK's Independent, the IPCC also reported:

The target for stabilising CO2 levels in the atmosphere which some scientists and politicians increasingly hope to aim for - an upper limit of 550 parts per million - would probably involve a rise of 3C, perhaps one as high as 4.5C, and almost certainly no lower than 1.5C, the report says.

But a 3C rise would bring about enormous damage to agriculture, weather patterns and ecosystems across the world with catastrophic effects on human society.

The figure of 550ppm represents a doubling of atmospheric CO2 compared with the level pertaining before the Industrial Revolution. The current CO2 level is about 382ppm, having risen from 315ppm 50 years ago, and is rising by more than 2ppm annually, with the rate increasing.

The IPCC, a collection of more than 2000 of the world's top climate scientists, concluded without reservation that climate change is happening, that humans are responsible, and that emitting billions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is one significant culprit. But can their findings really be trusted? The NRDC writes:

• Overall, the IPCC report will include work from more than 2,000 scientists appointed by more than 130 countries…

• The process is rigorous, based on open and transparent peer review.

• The Summary for Policymakers is reviewed line-by-line by scientists and government experts to ensure that it is a completely accurate reflection of the detailed scientific findings and that all comments have been fully considered.

• The IPCC brings fresh eyes to the issue — 75 percent of Fourth Assessment Report writers were not involved in the Third Assessment.

Now that we all agree that carbon dioxide is a major contributor to climate change, I know what your next question will be: "But what about the much discussed 'issue' of 'global warming' on SUV-free Mars?" Well, unless you're planning on buying a timeshare there, it's not much of an issue at all. More importantly, that globe isn't really warming, at least not in terms that have any parallel here on earth.

Some warming has been observed over the past 30 years, but it is largely confined to Mars's South Pole Cap region. To the extent that any truly "global" warming has occurred on Mars in recent years, it is a warming trend with decidedly unearthly roots. Mars's climate, unlike the earth's, is highly sensitive to immense dust storms. When these storms are active, the dust absorbs the sun's heat and warms the thin Martian atmosphere. When the storms aren't active, no such warming happens. Massive dust storms are not a cause of global warming or much of anything else on earth, making the comparison of the two planets' climate mechanisms crude at best and grossly misleading at worst.

Coming back to our little blue world, it is important to remember that carbon dioxide is not the only cause of global climate change. Other greenhouse gasses like nitrous oxide and methane are intense heat trappers as well, and their levels have also increased dramatically in the earth's atmosphere in the Industrial Age.

It's not just gasses, either. A variety of feedback loops also intensify warming trends. For instance, ice at the poles does our planet the great service of bouncing sunlight away from the surface and back out into space. When this ice melts, however, the (no longer white) water molecules absorb the sun's heat instead of radiating it away. The oceans warm. More ice melts. More heat is absorbed… Vicious, isn't it?

That viciousness is why we need to take immediate steps to curb carbon emissions and other climate change triggers. Mandatory carbon caps? Market-based carbon reduction incentives? Individual carbon taxes (while reducing personal income taxes)? I'm for it. All of it.

Now.

Temperature and CO2 image credit: Woods Hole Research Center

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