Considerations

World politics, marketing leads, and financial help from throughout the globe

Considerations header image 2

Global Warming

December 17th, 2009 · 8 Comments · Business, Conservative Pundits, Economics, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Politics, Science, Technology

climate changeStewart Brand classifies the viewpoints on climate change into four groups: denialists, skeptics, warners, and calamatists. I fall somewhere between the second and third:

SKEPTICS This group is most interested in the limitations of climate science so far: they like to examine in detail the contradictions and shortcomings in climate data and models, and they are wary about any “consensus” in science. To the skeptics’ discomfort, their arguments are frequently quoted by the denialists.

In this mode, Roger Pielke, a climate scientist at the University of Colorado, argues that the scenarios presented by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are overstated and underpredictive. Another prominent skeptic is the physicist Freeman Dyson, who wrote in 2007: “I am opposing the holy brotherhood of climate model experts and the crowd of deluded citizens who believe the numbers predicted by the computer models .... I have studied the climate models and I know what they can do. The models solve the equations of fluid dynamics, and they do a very good job of describing the fluid motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. They do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry and the biology of fields and farms and forests.”

WARNERS These are the climatologists who see the trends in climate headed toward planetary disaster, and they blame human production of greenhouse gases as the primary culprit. Leaders in this category are the scientists James Hansen, Stephen Schneider and James Lovelock. (This is the group that most persuades me and whose views I promote.)

“If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted,” Mr. Hansen wrote as the lead author of an influential 2008 paper, then the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would have to be reduced from 395 parts per million to “at most 350 p.p.m.”

When I see charts like the one posted above, it seems clear that both sunspot activity and increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere can affect global temperature. But, paradoxically, the recognizable correlations occur at different times. Between 1910 and 1960, the temperature rise paralleled that of increasing sunspots. However, the increased temperatures from 1960 to 2000 corresponded to the rise in CO2.

The core question, then, is: Which variable has a great effect? (If there are any statistics experts out there, I wonder whether a measurement of the rates of change corresponding to temperature would reveal that either sunspots or carbon dioxide have a greater correlation to global temperature.) If it is sunspot activity, then humanity can do nothing, and the entire issue is a non-starter. If it is CO2, then the world can do something to prevent some global warming.

Regardless, it is always a good idea to decrease the level of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere simply because pollution is unhealthy. However, the only way to make a drastic difference would be for the world to revert to pre-Industrial Revolution lifestyles. So, a balance needs to be struck until so-called sources of "green" energy are developed: How can the world reduce CO2 levels without suffering economic harm?

Now Available: E-Book download: "Let­ters from Israel: An Amer­i­can journalist’s adven­tures in the Holy Land."

VN:F [1.9.3_1094]
Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Share/Bookmark

Related posts:

  1. Global-Warming Deniers
  2. Global Warming and Sports
  3. A Global Currency?
  4. Finance and Security
  5. Japanese Culture

Tags: ········

8 Comments so far ↓

  • Jeff

    Sunspots? Really? Absurd. Cor­re­la­tion does not equal causation.

    Also, CO2 is not the only thing to worry about, or even the worst green­house gas. It is, how­ever, used as a con­ve­nient equiv­a­lency measure.

    I for one, don’t buy into the idea that con­ser­va­tion need be eco­nom­i­cally harm­ful. I think that’s an idea dreamt up by Karl Rove and other neo­cons.  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Mike

    Regard­less, it is always a good idea to decrease the level of carbon-dioxide in the atmos­phere sim­ply because pol­lu­tion is unhealthy. ”

    I wouldn’t really call CO2 an unhealthy pol­lu­tant, at least not at the con­cen­tra­tions we are talk­ing about here.

    We aren’t going to change our habits quickly enough to stop global warm­ing if the CO2 mod­els are cor­rect. China is ramp­ing up their CO2 emissions.

    I wish the focus of the debate would be more on how we will need to adapt our soci­ety to the warmer world and not reduc­ing CO2 emis­sions.  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Sam Scott

    Mike, the changes will (would?) indeed be inter­est­ing. For exam­ple, the vast, empty spaces of north­ern Canada would likely become arable farm­land — mak­ing that coun­try the new “bread­bas­ket of the world.”  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Sam Scott

    Mike, I always think of Ban­ga­lore, India, when I talk about air pol­lu­tion. You could barely breathe because of all the exhaust from the cars and auto-rickshaws. Decreas­ing that would always be good.  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Jeff

    Sam, your inabil­ity to breathe in India was due to par­tic­u­lates and car­bon monox­ide, not CO2.

    Mike, I think you’re prob­a­bly right about the pace of change, but I think the focus is where it’s at because if we don’t, we’ll end up like Venus, and it won’t really mat­ter how much mit­i­ga­tion we’ve done.  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Mike

    We won’t end up like Venus. We are burn­ing fos­sile fuels — dead plant and ani­mal mat­ter that has been locked up in the ground for mil­lions of years, so all we would end up doing is unlock­ing the cli­mate back to where things were before all those plants and ani­mals existed.  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Jeff

    Includ­ing us…  (Quote)

    VA:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)
  • Sam Scott

    Good point, Jeff.  (Quote)

    VN:F [1.9.3_1094]
    Rating: 0 (from 0 votes)

Leave a Comment

Get Adobe Flash playerPlugin by wpburn.com wordpress themes