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‘Climate change is not a religion. Climate change is science’

By | July 26, 2011, 5:30 AM PDT

It bothers NBC News chief environmental affairs correspondent Anne Thompson when people ask: “Do you believe in climate change?”

On Tuesday, Thompson clears the air in a program called Changing Planet, which will be broadcast on The Weather Channel at 9 PM EST. This is the second show of a three-part series,  which focuses on why the United States is falling behind other countries in the area of clean energy developments.

SmartPlanet interviewed NBC News’ Anne Thomspon to find out her views on clean energy and climate change.

SmartPlanet: What concerns you most about energy and climate change?

AT: As a reporter, I think climate change is still a very confusing subject for the public to comprehend. I can’t tell you the number of times I have heard the question “do you believe in climate change?”

Climate change is not a religion. Climate change is science.

There is plenty of evidence that the earth is warming, that the chemistry of the oceans is changing, that growing zones in our country are creeping northward. The question is not “do you believe in climate change?” but “what, if anything, are we going to do about it?”

On energy, we talk a lot about “energy independence” but we are not doing much to get there. We import about half of the oil we use. There is talk about increasing domestic oil production but there appears to be a math problem.

The United States has only have three percent of the oil reserves and yet as a nation, we consume 22 percent of the world’s oil. So, if the U.S. is to become truly independent or significantly less dependent, we have to find other sources of homegrown energy.

SmartPlanet: What did you ask the panelists?

AT: I am involved because as the Chief Environmental Affairs Correspondent I cover the efforts to “green” America’s economy. Moderating a panel such as this one, gives me a chances to probe some of the issues I report on in stories for “NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams” or “Today.”

Among the topics we covered: can “green jobs” provide the kinds of wages and benefits that jobs in fossil fuel industries, such as coal and oil, do today?

Can “green jobs” help sustain the middle class?

How do you convince a seemingly reluctant nation that a transition to a “green” economy is necessary?

How can the pain of that transition, and the elimination of some jobs in certain businesses, be eased?

SmartPlanet: You did a series of videos with NBC Learn. Which one resonated most?

AT: What is endlessly fascinating about covering environmental issues is that they are so intertwined.

You can not talk about coral reefs without considering the impact of ocean acidification or rising ocean temperatures. The methane released in the melting permafrost is a greenhouse gas that contributes to melting glaciers. Melting glaciers are caused in part by black carbon.

The good news is that there is technology available to mitigate many of these problems. The question is do we have the political will? And I mean not just the United States, but the world.

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Boonsri Dickinson

About Boonsri Dickinson

Boonsri Dickinson was a contributing editor for SmartPlanet from 2010 to 2012.

Boonsri Dickinson

Boonsri Dickinson

Contributing Editor

Boonsri Dickinson is a freelance journalist based in San Francisco. She has written for Discover, The Huffington Post, Forbes, Nature Biotech, Technewsdaily.com, Techstartups.com and AOL. She's currently a reporter for Business Insider. She holds degrees from the University of Florida and the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Follow her on Twitter.

Boonsri Dickinson

Boonsri Dickinson

In the unlikely event that Boonsri has a professional or financial relationship with a company she writes about, it will be prominently disclosed.

She writes for SmartPlanet and is not an employee of CBS.

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+1 Vote
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Energy independence, reduced carbon and sustainability
Could we reach energy independence if we went whole hog on reduced meat/fowl/fish consumption, personal and regional wind and solar, bikes, trams and walking for local transportation and electric, bio diesel or hybrid electric/bio diesel trains and zeppelins for distance transportation? Yes, I am talking radical lifestyle changes, but maybe if we gave everyone a spandex jacket ....
Posted by eheath
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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And really...
if you want to know what is and isn't a science, shouldn't you got to someone with a Bachelor of Arts degree in American Studies?
Posted by jtdavies
26th Jul 2011
+4 Votes
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Yep
The most reputable person they could find to say such an asinine quote is one of the most unqualified to render a verdict. Climate change is NOT a science, it is a politicized, perverted form of *climate science*. Climate change *is* a religion as evidenced by the fact that it's often talked about in terms of whether or not someone "believes" in it. If it were science it would be discussed as fact. Climatologists who study *climate science* also study the changing of the climate...hence "climate change." This woman is a journalist, thus her expertise is not delivering the final say on scientific matters, but instead on reporting and interviewing. .
Posted by laughfactory
26th Jul 2011
-1 Votes
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And your own ignorant response tells us so much...
Like how you say climate science is a religion "because" it's always talked about in terms of "belief."

But YOUR side, the DENIER side, is who framed the argument that way! The REST of us think of climate science as an, um, SCIENCE. You are the ONLY ones who think of it in terms of "belief!"

WE discuss it as the fact it is, while you insist on "believing" that it is bunk. So now you use your OWN disbelief as a reason for US to doubt the science of it? Are you for real, or did you just never learn how to argue logically?

"This woman is a journalist, thus her expertise is not delivering the final say on scientific matters, but instead on reporting and interviewing. . "

And the SCIENTISTS she's interviewed and is reporting on, ALL say that the science is real and urgent -- while you deny the whole thing because you don't "believe" it.
Posted by Lightning Joe
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
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Watch the BBC Documentary "The Great Global Warming Swindle" _then_ comment
Moderator/Author:

Speaking of getting facts straight, and what is or isn't science, please add a link in your original article and advise your readers to watch the BBC Documentary "The Great Global Warming Swindle", _then_ comment.

It's clear this whole idea that people are causing or at least contributing significantly to Global Warming, that it's bad, that we can and should do something about it, and that specifically people (via industrialization, burning fossil fuels to make electricity, etc.) are adding to Greenhouse Gases and that is part of the problem, is a political movement based on no scientific evidence whatsoever and that it is doing much harm (as in suffering and death) to poor people in underdeveloped regions, and is doing no observable good to anyone.

So let's stop wasting effort on this insanity, and instead devote such energies to something we can and should improve.

IHTH

Jim in MN
Posted by Jim-MN
29th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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The swindle about "The Great Global Warming Swindle"...
is "The Great Global Warming Swindle" itself.
Posted by riverat1
29th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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The term 'believe' should never be used by us falible humans
The term 'believe' is an absolute term. In all sincerity you shouldn't say " I believe such and such today and tomorrow as new information comes to you, say "Now I believe this instead".
If you do. You lose all credibility.
But journalists have no credibiliy anyway.

As a fallible humanbeing I always reserve the right to change my opinion as newer information filters in.

I never use the term "Believe"
Posted by TonyTrenton
Updated - 31st Jul 2011
0 Votes
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Religion
Blind belief that reducing carbon dioxide emissions will alter climate is a religion. As a scientist, I have seen data twisted for the hidden agenda of wealth redistribution (primarily to those doing the redistributing).
Posted by hdkinney@...
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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Convenient but untrue
We are all guilty of seeking confirmation bias in the data, but you will have one heck of a hard time finding any real evidence that anyone is seeing climate science as some backward, Rube Goldberg, ridiculous convoluted attempt at increasing socialism. Have you ever played chess? This kind of complex planning approach is hard to do even with that game. Trying to do it in the political sphere where there are far fewer rules and any "piece" in the game can make a huge number of possible moves. Too many things could go wrong for this to be a viable approach to socialism. I find it much easier to believe that the anti-climate science movement is a simple reaction by those with vested interests in hydrocarbon extraction, processing and sales. They feel directly threatened so they are reacting with all their might. The science is real, they are wrong, but they stand to lose lots of money, so they naturally fight back.
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
-1 Votes
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Chess, anyone?
Yeah... but it is really stinkin' easy to see that the "complex planning approach" is most definitely being applied when most of the pieces on the board are moving towards the same goal. Which they are.

By the by, there is no "anti-climate science movement." Those of us who disbelieve in man-made climate change do so for solid, scientific, and factual reasons. I have seen the inside of both arguments and while both of them are based on actual facts, only one side follows the facts to a truthful end. That would be the "climate change is a natural part of life and there is no evidence yet to say that we are the driving force behind it" people. On the other side we find: manipulated data, misrepresented data, arguments based on fear alone, improper data collection technique, fabricated evidence, fear-mongering, people with "vested interests" in the companies they say will save the planet, large amounts of hypocrisy, political manipulation, cover-ups, scandals, outright lies, and a massive tendency to ignore all historical data except that which supports their bias.

While some of this could be claimed for either side, you will not find such a collection for the "it's natural" crowd. Add to this the fact that the same people who brought us the "it's your fault" message in the first place have only provided solutions that have been statistically shown to not make a difference anyway, and this by steamroller.

There isn't a scientific leg to stand on. I was watching, Global Warming's skirt was lifted for just a second, it's a fake through and through.

End of line.
Posted by artoo36
29th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
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check, mate
I love it when someone like you decides to speak for the entire group of anthropogenically influenced climate change deniers and say that the group disbelieves "for solid, scientific and factual reasons." Then you carry on your broad-sweeping generalization and depict those who are convinced that anthropogenically influences on the climate are real as deceptive buffoons on the take.

I daresay that your wild generalizations are true for individuals in both camps: there are folks in each camp objectively searching for the truth, and there are charlatans looking for an angle. But I have no interest in the latter folks in either camp, and if you just look at the former folks, who are looking carefully to objectively tease out the truth as best we know for the moment, I have no doubt that the great preponderance of those folks conclude that humans have impacted the planet's climate in such a way that the overall global temps are rising, the rain patterns are shifting, the ice is melting, the oceans are acidifying and rising, and there will be a high price indeed in coming generations to accommodate to these changes.

And that's not skirting the issue.
Posted by klassman6
30th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
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RE: Climate Change
Climate Change is obvious. The earth used to be much colder, i.e. during the last ice age. The earth also used to be warmer, e.g. tropical fossils is Arctic regions.

"man-made" global warming is purely political.
Posted by bb_apptix
26th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
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Tropical fossils
Tropical fossils in arctic regions have more to do with plate tectonics than they do with tropical conditions in the arctic.
Posted by riverat1
Updated - 26th Jul 2011
-1 Votes
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There are volcanoes above and below the oceans
Volcanos are pumping out enourmous amounts of heat and gasses. Our human foot pint is a a drop in the ocean by comparison. Even if we stopped all of our pollution. It would not make any difference to the natural warming tendency.
Posted by TonyTrenton
31st Jul 2011
+2 Votes
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Volcanoes are about 1% of human emissions
Educate yourself! In a normal year volcanoes emit about 1% of the CO2 that human missions do. Even such a large eruption as Pinatubo in 1991 only added about 0.2% to that. And the Sun puts more heat energy onto the surface of the Earth in 1 hour than all of the volcanoes together do in a year. Volcanoes are not an issue.
Posted by riverat1
1st Aug 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
If it acts like a duck is it a duck?
Climate change supporters act like it is a religion when they ignore the extensive science that legitimately disputes their claims and they distort legitimate science to make it look like it supports their argument.

Read the climate change reports issued this year and you will see an interesting trend. They are getting careful about not using the word FACT in their reports. "This is an opinion based on developed models" disclaimers now accompany all climate change reports. www.cal-adapt.org is typical of climate change websites that are loaded with disclaimers.

To have blind faith in something illogical is one step toward religion.
Posted by Hates Idiots
Updated - 26th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
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What evidence?
There are pieces of data that raise questions about some of the predictive models, but the overwhelming mass of data. And by overwhelming I mean enormous amounts of data.

There are people in the general public who do not fully understand the climate change issue and confuse local weather with global climate. There are others who jump on a single thread of information released by a lab or research facility (or, on the right, a propaganda firm). This is not good science, but these people are not climate scientists if scientists of any kind. The real climate scientists are in almost universal agreement about the fundamental changes happening to the climate.

I do not expect to change your mind as it is clearly already made up. I am eager for any data showing that climate change is not happening, but so far there hasn't been any. I too hate idiocy. I hate it in others and I hate it in myself. But I can only really control my own idiocy. I urge you to do the same.
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
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But does it quack?
Climate Change, HUMAN-CAUSED Climate Change, quacks.

There IS NO "extensive science" that doubts that Climate Change is real, OR that man has caused it. To "believe" otherwise is NOT based on logic, facts, or science.

And so bloody what, if they've slacked off on the word "fact?" They don't even NEED the word "fact," when ALL the models they use show the SAME THING -- just at different levels of certainty and extent. The word fact, in the case of computer modeling, is rife for criticism, which they rightly consider the bane of the message they MUST get through: that our climate is changing, and that WE are at fault for it.

But make no mistake: the models ARE driven with FACTS, and run on FACTUAL relationships between those FACTS.

YOUR position in contrast, is based not on facts, but on beliefs -- which as we know do not require any facts at all.
Posted by Lightning Joe
27th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
+ -
RE: Does it Quack
Most certainly the models are driven by "facts", unfortunately those "facts" are so very cherry-picked is what's amazing. The climate is changing and has always changed. The blind belief in the cherry picked data and the refusal to look at ALL of the data points is bordering on a religion. The idea that mankind can make this happen via CO2 is arrogance in my opinion. The amount of greenhouse gases that mankind puts out is a drop in the bucket compared to volcanic action daily. It's strictly a device for social engineering while making some money (follow the money..who is profiting from all of this?). The climate changes, baring cataclysmic volcanism, asteroid hits or massive nuclear exchanges -that's it.
Posted by GregGold
28th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
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Volcanic action! LOL!
In reality the amount of greenhouse gases that volcanoes around the world put out daily is a drop in the bucket compared to human emissions. In a normal year volcanoes emit about 1% of the amount of CO2 that humans do. The fact that you could get that fact so wrong tells me all I need to know about your knowledge on the subject.
Posted by riverat1
28th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
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Does it Quack
The way I see it from talking to people who are not persuaded that climate change is real and influenced by man, is that they have not objectively researched it. Or they have done almost no research at all. This website is clear and concise. Any question you may have is addressed here: http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php
Posted by seang2112
Updated - 31st Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
Moronic Verses
Excellent interview. There are those who reject who reject the theory of continental drift, the so-called "drift-reissters." Even in the face of of overwhelming evidence, they deny. This applies to some for the Holocaust as well. This list goes on. That climate change is "real" is a simple truism. So too is the fact that human impact on the warmng climate is accelerating the train as it rolls down the track to serious and expensive consequences we leave for our children. But this is where society butts heads with the monied interests in troglodyte U.S. politics, the thugs running China, the oligarchs in Russia, and so on. Those who learn science from Glenn Beck and Michelle Bachmann are unlikely to figure this out.
Posted by YourFavoriteMartian
26th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
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"Even in the face of overwhelming evidence"
There has been wide spread evidence of fraud among global warming scientists and still you hold it true.

The leader of the East Anglia cabal has admitted global temps have been flat lined for 10 years and still you believe

After losing court battles over disproved "facts" they have taken to putting "This is an opinion based on developed models" disclaimers on all of their reports yet you still believe.

Thank you. You made my point.
Posted by Hates Idiots
26th Jul 2011
-1 Votes
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There is not
There is absolutely not widespread evidence of fraud. This is untrue. There were a few fudging incidents--humans do that from time to time (ON ALL SIDES OF THE DEBATE), but the overwhelming data is quite conclusive. In fact, the greater source of data fudging and manipulation has consistently been by the hydrocarbon industry-funded anti-climate change groups. The temperature of the Earth is rising at a rate that will almost certainly cause unpredictable results. The Earth will be fine, but even if the predictive models disagree on the specifics, the general indications are that the economic impacts will likely be significant. None of us want to be on the wrong side of this situation. If it is being caused by something completely beyond our control, then so be it. But if it is something we could have controlled then... well we have an idiocy problem, don't we?
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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Your statements are fraud.
HI says: "The leader of the East Anglia cabal has admitted global temps have been flat lined for 10 years and still you believe"

Phil Jones, the "leader of the East Anglia cabal" says:
BBC: Do you agree that from 1995 to the present there has been no statistically-significant global warming

Phil Jones: Yes, but only just. I also calculated the trend for the period 1995 to 2009. This trend (0.12C per decade) is positive, but not significant at the 95% significance level. The positive trend is quite close to the significance level. Achieving statistical significance in scientific terms is much more likely for longer periods, and much less likely for shorter periods.

BBC: How confident are you that warming has taken place and that humans are mainly responsible?

Phil Jones: I'm 100% confident that the climate has warmed. As to the second question, I would go along with IPCC Chapter 9 - there's evidence that most of the warming since the 1950s is due to human activity.

Notice the discrepancy between your statement and Phil Jones' statement?

Please tell me what court battle has been lost causing climate scientists to add disclaimers? I've never heard of such a thing.
Posted by riverat1
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
0 Votes
+ -
Your "overwhelming evidence" is a figment of your imagination.
The East Anglia emails (we now think they may have been hacked by Murdock's group) have been REPEATEDLY shown to be without ANY bad science at all.

That YOU still don't know this, is evidence that you don't care to read what is right before your eyes. And your LIE that ANY "court battles" have been lost -- or even fought -- related to Climate Change, is a meme it is a charity to call false.

Thank you. You made MY point.
Posted by Lightning Joe
27th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
Religion
That the East Anglia emails prove climate scientists are frauds is a matter of faith among the "no such thing as global warming" crowd. I think their claiming that climate science is religion is projection. Their belief about it is a matter of faith so the other side must be doing that to.
Posted by riverat1
27th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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Yeah...
Of course I don't really expect sense from them. Their unwillingness to take any scientist's word for it, BUT the blinking crazies who tell it as they WANT to hear it, puts them far outside of my trust zone.

And I'm sure they WON'T go and look up the results of those reviews -- NOT because they are afraid they might be proven wrong in their opinion that the emails "exposed the fraud that is climate science," but simply because they think they already know we are wrong.

They'll go to their graves, in a warming world, "knowing" that Global Warming is a hoax.
Posted by Lightning Joe
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
Climate Change is Science
Yes, climate change is science. Man's impact on climate change however, is NOT. Call is religion if you want, but warming has been occuring since the peak of the last ice age and the temperature has been measurably warmer for the last three thousand years. That's science.
Now, for man's impact: Are we speeding it up? Maybe, but it doesn't make much difference. Why? Because as we warm up, just like boiling water, the warmer it gets the faster it gets warm.
Rather than spend a fortune (many times over) trying to fight mother nature, better to spend your money figuring out how we are going to survive in a much warmer climate!
Good luck. Your going to need it if you think you can stop or even slow down warming significantly.
Posted by guilmette@...
26th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
+ -
Re: Warming since the last ice age.
Actually after the end of the last glaciation temperatures hit a peak during the Holocene Optimum about 8,000 years ago and has been slowly cooling since then ... until recently.

What makes you think that the warmer boiling water gets the faster it gets warm? Boiling water remains at the temperature that water boils at. The only way to change the rate it's boiling is to change the energy input. As the temperature of something gets closer to the temperature that is being input to it the rate of heat transfer slows down.
Posted by riverat1
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
+ -
Um... no.
The earth was cooling until the last 150 years or so, when we started filling up the atmosphere with carbon compounds . It appears that we are throwing off the atmospheric balance of gasses . Spewing tons of crap into the atmosphere and expecting no consequences (either globally or locally) is really quite stupid. Mother Nature will win.
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
Um.. what?
I do not know what junk science you are reading to give you that information, but the earth was hot between 900 ad and 1300 ad. Historic records and climate data indicates it may have been as much as 7 degrees F warmer than today. Then the earth went through a little thing called the Little Ice age until the late 1700???s.

So technically we have been coming out of an ice age for over 150 years. The Northwest Passage was successfully navigated multiple times in the early 20th century and again in the mid 20th century as the Artic Ice retreated farther than is it today. So what is all the panic about?

According to disgraced Climate Gate scientists admissions over altered data, global temps have been effectively flat lined for over 10 years, which some scientists think is the cooling period predicted for the early 21st century back in the 1980s.

You seemed to have forgotten that.
Posted by Hates Idiots
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
0 Votes
+ -
Um... Um...
HI,

Boy, I want some of what you've been smoking.

There is no way the Earth was 7F warmer during the Medieval Warm Period than it is today. At best it might have been about as warm as it is today in some places.

The Little Ice Age is in no way related to a true Ice Age. The only way the Northwest Passage was successfully navigated before the past decade was over multiple years with ice hardened ships or perhaps with a purpose built ice breaker. Can you find otherwise?

I already answered your quip about flatlined temperatures with a direct quote from Phil Jones, your "disgraced climategate scientist", above. You really need to give up on such and easily discredited meme.

What will you be saying in 10 years when despite a drop in solar activity the global temperature continues to rise? If that happens will you be honest enough to admit you were wrong?
Posted by riverat1
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
Poor Environmental Science
There's been a lot of piss-poor science done in the name of the environment. The one that comes to mind is CFC's and the ozone layer. CFC's are heavy, very heavy. No one ever managed to find a convincing mechanism to get them to the ozone layer. On the other hand, there were very convincing mechanisms that said that Dow's patents were running out and, rather than a host of generic versions, Dow had a whole series of replacements that were less oxone unfriendly, and it had new patents on.

The whole global warming thing is 200 years of partial data applied to what appears to be a 11000 year cycle. It appears that we are going through a period of minimal sunspots, and there was a mini ice age the last time that happened. Are we keeping us out of that by our "Global Warming"?

There are a lot of pet theories out there, and these are fueled by popular perception. Scientists with popular theories get the research funding, so sclentists tend to have popular theories. If data starts coming in that refutes your position, look into the history of science. The current crop of scientists pretty much has to die off before the new theories are accepted. Neils Borh never did accept Quantum Theory. People are making some pretty grandiose but profitable claims on some very thin evidence.

Please don't think these people are dishonest. They believe what they say. They just can't accept that they might be wrong.
Posted by metaphysician
26th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
Um, maybe you should go back to school... and study logic...
First you say there is no way for CFCs to get into the upper air to affect the ozone layer, and then you say that Dow had "more ozone-friendly" compounds ready. So Dow "made" the scientists rise up about CFCs? Which is it? Either the CFC DID affect the ozone, or they didn't. And if they didn't, then there IS NO SUCH CATEGORY as "more ozone-friendly."

Then you bring sunspot cycles into it (sigh). Sunspot cycles have been considered in EVERY model the climate scientists now run -- they DON'T HAVE ANY RELATION to Global Warming at all, beyond telling us that if we DIDN'T have such massive amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere, we would even now be in a COOLING PHASE. In point of fact, therefore, the sunspot data CONTRADICTS your premise.

If "sunspots" are the "new theories" you are talking about, I hate to tell you: we do fully understand sunspot's "effects" on the climate, and they have NOTHING to tell us about the current situation.

"They just can't accept that they might be wrong."

No, that is YOUR problem. REAL scientists CAN accept that they might be wrong. In fact they spend MOST of their time, considering ways in which they might be wrong. That means that when they CAN'T make any of those ways stick, WE can be very sure about their final conclusions.
Posted by Lightning Joe
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
-1 Votes
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Media Science is Opinion!
I live in southern California, this year my pomegranates, plums, peaches, apricots, and newly bloomed Iris all froze from a late spring snow. This must be one of those unpleasant anomalies that "media science" ignores when trying to boost Dupont, Monsanto, or some other slimeballpolicy organization that pulls it's puppet strings.
Posted by Theophile
26th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
A perfect example
...of how people confuse weather for climate. Also an example of how people are ignorant of industries & corporations promoting public resistance to a response to climate change.
Posted by hoodedswan
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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Real Science is a constant reevaluation of what is known
A real scientist reads ALL the information about climate change and not pick and choose. There is a lot of scientific studies that contradict man-made climate change. Some scientists, the biggest names especially, have been known to conspire to hide contradictory opinions. Additionally, science is only 'fact' until new science proves the old incorrect or innacurate.
Posted by htimsxela
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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There really aren't actually
There really aren't many reputable, repeatable or well constructed studies that undermine the core evidence in support of the theory that changes in atmospheric gas composition affect the amount of energy comes to and escapes from the Earth. This is like having a debate with creationists or people believe the moon landing was a hoax.

There are some studies that raise questions about some of the assumptions, but the core theory remains fairly robust. There are, however, many right-wing petrochemical industry-supported claims floating around to the contrary, but any diligent research into the matter indicates that there is mostly no "there" there.
Posted by technology@...
Updated - 27th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
Um...
And the "constant reevaluation" of the concept of human-caused climate change has consistently shown that the problem is even worse than we used to think.

And don't go throwing out blanket accusations, here.

You DON'T HAVE any reasons at all, to think that data or results have been falsified, or that the science is there to feed any egos. All the examinations of the process of the science have shown that, unlike the Korean multi-cloned dogs, or the lies about the effects of vaccinating our kids, Climate Science is and has been done by upright, honest scientists.

Sure, science is always evaluating itself. But that is no reason to doubt the results of responsibly-done science in the present instance.
Posted by Lightning Joe
27th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
Mankind does not know.
Is climate change real or not? Mankind does not know for sure as science will prophesies theories which will be discussed, refuted, debated ad infinitum. Meanwhile nothing gets done. Our actions should be based on the "what if I am wrong" theory.
If we follow a modified our lives because we say yes, climate change is real, and we are wrong, would our action have caused more harm than good? NO! In fact the benefits to our planet would be immense.
If however we continue on our merry way because the deniers get their way, changing nothing, and we are wrong, the damage would be irreversible and almost likely lead to the extinction to a large number of animals, including man.
7 billions people live on this planet and the carbon sinks we need to survive are fast diminishing. How much forest does the planet need to generate the oxygen 7 billion people driving cars, emitting carbon require? No research has been done into that. Yet we argue that it is/is not man made. It seems Nero has returned.
As this is my Planet too, I have given no one permission to cause harm to any part of it. Live in harmony with it because we do not control it, we are at it's mercy.
Posted by dbc Design
26th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
Well Said!
If we are wrong, we end up with more efficient machines that cost less to operate, produce less crap for us to breathe. If we are right, well, I hope we aren't right.
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
+ -
Not me!
Talk to the conservatives...*THEY* are the ones who wrap themselves in their god!
Posted by tech_ed@...
26th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
+ -
She trots out the tired old canards...
...that exposes her agenda as political instead of scientific.

She repeatedly goes into the tired old refrain of "The United States has only have three percent of the oil reserves and yet as a nation, we consume 22 percent of the worlds oil. So, if the U.S. is to become truly independent or significantly less dependent, we have to find other sources of homegrown energy."

And then:

"The United States has only have three percent of the oil reserves and yet as a nation, we consume 22 percent of the worlds oil. So, if the U.S. is to become truly independent or significantly less dependent, we have to find other sources of homegrown energy.

Not only is it incorrect, (The US has nearly as much oil reserves as Saudi Arabia; it's just that most of it has been deemed "off limits" by Washington) it's tired rhetoric straight out of the liberal talking-points from 20 years ago. What does that have to do with "climate change" and science? That's economics and politics.

Then we get into the "green jobs" nonsense. The whole "green jobs" thing has worked out very well for NBC's parent, GE, which now pays ZERO taxes due to all of the "green" credits that have been granted by Congress.

There's very little science here. This is propaganda, pure and simple. NBC has destroyed what was left of Weather Channel. I rarely watch anymore.
Posted by JohnMcGrew@...
Updated - 26th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
Just like you ...
trot out your tired old canards.

It doesn't really matter how much petroleum is left in the ground. We can't afford to keep burning it and adding it to the CO2 in the atmosphere. It's more valuable for things other than fuel anyway.
Posted by riverat1
26th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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But what does that have to do with "science"...
...which is supposedly what she's all about?

And come on, even you are usually above mere flippant ad hominem. Not even you can defend this nonsense intelligently.

Call it "religion". Call it "politics". But there was absolutely no science in this article, and I doubt there will be much in her program either.
Posted by JohnMcGrew@...
Updated - 26th Jul 2011
+3 Votes
+ -
But there IS responsible reporting ABOUT science...
This science reporter is aghast at the way we hold science in a "belief" frame that lets us "decide" whether to accept it or not, NOT based on the quality of the science, but on how what the science reveals jives with our other beliefs -- NONE of which have ANYTHING to do with actual science.

And she is right: that is NO way to evaluate science. Beliefs may be right or wrong, but science is based on experiment and responsible modeling -- both of which are telling us (if we would only listen) that we have a BIG problem, that is getting even bigger as time goes by.
Posted by Lightning Joe
27th Jul 2011
0 Votes
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These arguments are not about "science"...
...but are built upon an appeal to authority, which, of course, makes it more like "religion" than "science".
Posted by JohnMcGrew@...
28th Jul 2011
+2 Votes
+ -
To get it out of the ground...
will be costly and very damaging. We are acting like heroine addicts trying to find every last bit of space to stick our needle now that the easy spots have all been scarred up. All the "safe" extraction techniques now being touted are so ridiculous that they remind me of the kinds of sick excuses and rationalizations addicts make to justify not changing their ways.
Posted by technology@...
27th Jul 2011
+1 Vote
+ -
Problem of attribution...
The problem with the debate on climate change is on the attribution.

That climate is changing is a fact. It was always changing even before the Industrial Revolution. The question, therefore, is whether humanity has altered the direction and pattern of the changes in climate? The corollary question is, which human activity?

The debate started when some scientists began claiming that the climate is being changed by human generated CO2 emissions. That is to claim that 350 to 400 ppm of CO2 can cause the temperature of the 999,600 ppm of nitrogen, oxygen and other elements in the atmosphere to rise. This is the problem! It is simply unbelievable in scientific terms. Heat transfer and thermodynamics are proven scientific principles that cannot accommodate the claim of CO2 caused climate change in the magnitude indicated. This is where science is being made into a religion. It takes a leap of faith to believe that 400 ppm of CO2 can heat up the 999,600 of other elements in the atmosphere.
Posted by Gabriel Atega
26th Jul 2011
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