Originally posted by traderonwallst
Only climatologists are allowed to comment on Global warming? what the hell is that all about?

Geologists are just as qualified to comment on what you perceive to be global warming. They study the earth!!!!!

Global warming is about climate, so what's the big surprise? The study of climate, past, present and future is called 'climatology'.

I think there are some geologists who would be considered experienced enough to be considered experts, yes. But they would be working in general areas of climatology, for example, paleoclimatology. Climate science is a cross-disciplinary subject, so physics, geology, earth sciences etc would be somewhat relevant, but this doesn't indicate expertise just by having a degree in, for example, geology. Michael Mann was originally a physics graduate, but he studied paleoclimatology post-grad/post-doc.

However, Motl is not an expert in anything to do with climatology, if I wanted to know about string theory, I might go to him. What about a computer modeller of virology - is he an expert in the relevant area? Lobohm & Milne are economists. Leyland & Wojick are energy consultants. Thoenes is a chemical engineer. Evans is a computer/electrical engineer. Essenhigh is a mechanical engineer. I could go on, but I can't be @rsed.

A geography lecturer is not a climatologist either, and Tim Ball suggests he was, why is he saying otherwise? Reid Bryson is an interesting character, he was one proponent of global cooling in the 1970s - sure you'd like that, heh.

Scientists work in very particular areas. You wouldn't ask a urologist to do brain surgery would you? I'm a psychologist, but I don't consider myself an expert on psychosis or CBT. I study a very particular area of psychology, and I claim expertise only in this area. Same applies to other scientists.

So, you and makeitso are completely missing half of my point. Some of these people are inflating their credentials - 100 'prominent scientists'? Like Lord Lawson? He's a politician. Courtney has just lied about his credentials, he doesn't have a PhD, he works for coal industry interests.

And, as I said, which you both ignored, they are putting their names to BS science. So I doubt their sincerity on this issue.

So, people on this list are BSing their credentials. Some of them would not be considered prominent at all. Some have probably never done a bit of science since leaving university. Others were never scientists. Many more haven't been involved in science for a while. And to round it off, they are putting their names to BS science.

In sum, normal procedure for the denial industry.

[edit on 15-12-2007 by melatonin]

Originally posted by makeitso
do have Phd's, impressive credentials, and the background that gives the letter credibility.

However, that would just be an argument from authority.

Some of the claims in the letter are very questionable. For example, this is just wrong:

Consistent with this, and despite computer projections of temperature rises, there has been no net global warming since 1998

There has, both the hadley and NASA-GISS data show a net warming trend. So we have an supposed list of 'prominent scientists' who are putting their name to misleading claims.





Thus, using only the data from 1998 (which is bad science in itself - a big cherrypick from an anomalous year), we still have net warming.

That is not a good sign for the credibility of this group of 'prominent scientists'

Although, I think the confusion (the collective noun for this group of retired scientists) of emeritus professors can be forgiven, if Kuhn was right about one thing, it's that paradigm shifts are hard for the old boys.

[edit on 15-12-2007 by melatonin]

Originally posted by iunderstand
Yes, the temperatures on other planets in our solar system are heating up as well, so why isn't anyone publicly acknowledging that fact ???

Because to do so would blow their weak explaination of carbon emissions being the cause of it !

Not really. There are other planets that appear to be warming. Mars and Pluto are probably the most definite. Mars can be readily explained by dust storms altering the planets albedo, Pluto is a bit more mysterious.

Until someone can show that GHGs are not GHGs, then they will have a warming impact, it's very basic physics.

The real cause is the return of planet x (a brown dwarf star) into our solar system and heat generated by it, an addition to, our own sun.

There it is. The REAL truth.

The REAL truth, huh? Thanks for that...

Despite the mass of real doubt that keeps on coming to light, I still see the die-hard AGW proponents trotting out the same al bore/ipcc/politically motivated and tired arguments.

The validity of the theory is under constant bombardment, and I consider that a good thing.

I've been saying this ever since I joined ATS - AGW is a political exercise: a scared populace is an easily controlled populace.

How long before we see "emergency" measures being brought in to "tackle climate change" - we're already being taxed, and this is just the next step.

I can guarantee that people are making REAL money out of this - al bore is just one of them.

Another couple of years, and we'll start to see travel restrictions, energy consumption restrictions and maybe even restrictions on personal freedoms.

Personally, I am not a fan of the culture of conspicuous consumption that has been prevalent in western society for a long time, but neither am I a fan of political power being taken to ever higher levels and the restrictions of individual freedoms that naturally follow.

"THEY" can't tell us the truth for many reasons, the foremost of which are;
They wouldn't make as much money
Fear is a great motivator
Control is the key
They need something to take peoples minds off the REAL issues.


Before anybody asks - "THEY" are the people we elected and the people who are principally responsible for the huge propaganda machine which is now in motion.


[edit on 5/1/2008 by budski]

This is the kind of information deserving of a Nobel prize. Al Gore, David Suzuki and the entire staff at IPCC can kiss a duck IMHO. They are nothing but a bunch of scammers that stand to make billions off the carbon credit trading sytem (scam).

Good post, get more of this information out there to counter the BS before it's too late!

Our research demonstrates that the ongoing rise of atmospheric CO2 has only a minor influence on climate change.

This statement sounds like a reasoned scientific conclusion to data, and I can accept that.

We must conclude, therefore, that attempts to control CO2 emissions are ineffective and pointless — but very costly.

This statement sounds like political and/or corporate rhetoric, and it being the last point made, raises a really, really big red flag in my mind, as to the potential biases of the scientists involved. In other words, that's not a scientific statement, and shouldn't have been added, so I gotta wonder why it was.

If it were a socio-political study, or an economic study, then fine. But it isn't.

I smell the rot of pre-paid propaganda...

Originally posted by DarkSide

If the sun is also behind it, THEN WE HAVE ANOTHER BIG REASON TO STOP BURNING OIL.

Great point. If there are factors other than just GHGs causing climate shift -- something outside the scope of Earth and presumably outside our control -- then we need to kick butt right now to eliminate the causes that we *can* control, or we're totally screwed.

The undercurrent of this studies argument seems to be, "We can't control the sun, so why bother doing anything?"

It's defeatist.

Personally I noticed the global warming happening extremely fast compared to decades ago! Something interesting came up when I was researching HAARP! It is a military own "research" facility in Alaska. The representative of the facility claim they're using frequencies to push the atmosphere higher. But they don't really know the cause and effect of billions of volt of focused frequency! One thought I had was that it is VERY plausible that they can simply put holes in our Ozone by doing this!

"report that observed patterns of temperature changes ("fingerprints") over the last 30 years disagree with what greenhouse models predict and can better be explained by natural factors, such as solar variability."

Is that 30 WHOLE years? wow... that's really freakin definitive. im glad that they study this really well.. LMAO

propaganda from the oil companies.

why is it one year of la nina and everyones brain freezes?

global warming is real.
we are effecting it.
every single warming period (in history that we can see) has been based around super high levels of CO2. every single one...