Couldn't the sun just as well be the biggest factor in play here? It seems to have been acting up lately just as temperatures in a lot of areas on the globe (not all) have been increasing and breaking records. Maybe a more appropriate term to describe what is starting to take place is "Sun Warming"?

[edit on 30-7-2010 by SinkingSun]

[edit on 30-7-2010 by SinkingSun]

I don’t think many people are disputing a slight temperature increase. They are disputing whether it is man-made, or natural; and whether it is a fact of science or a product of speculation that the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere is causing it.

What gets me is that of all the poisons and rubbish released into the atmosphere by humans, TPTB have to pick on the only compound we release which is actually beneficial to the world.

Carbon dioxide is essential for the perpetuation of life. If the atmosphere were to become depleted of CO2, plants could not grow, and the animals that fed on the plants would starve.

Animals and plants are complementary to each other in that animals breathe carbon dioxide out, and plants breath it in. But if animals were the only source of co2 life would become less abundant over time, because other processes, such as rain, quickly remove co2 from the atmosphere and convert it into forms not usable by life.

Luckily, or maybe by divine plan, volcanoes release large quantities of co2 that constantly replenish atmospheric co2 and allow life to continue.

Plants can breath in co2 faster than animals can breath it out, so in the absence of a volcano, the concentration of co2 in the atmosphere is naturally low. Since the beginning of the industrial era we have resurrected vast quantities of long-gone life by putting their carbon back into living circulation. The reason why the amount of co2 in the atmosphere has only risen by a minute quantity as a result is that co2 is constantly being removed from the atmosphere, mostly to the inorganic world, but some also to the living world, increasing the total biomass of the Earth.

Humans have considerably increased their biomass since the beginning of the industrial era. Human population has increased from a billion to more than six billion. Ironically, much of the carbon that is 20% b.w. of you, me, and everyone else was once fossil fuel that was converted to carbon dioxide, taken up by crop plants, and eaten by us.

If we stopped burning fossil fuel the atmosphere would quickly become depleted of co2, and this might have grave repercussions in agriculture and attempting to feed the 6000000000+ people that now inhabit the globe.

The co2 causes global warming argument is ridiculous, because the most potent greenhouse gas of all, water vapour, exists in the atmosphere in vastly greater quantities, and always has.
A minute increase in a trace greenhouse gas is not going to modify the large greenhouse effects already produced by water vapour.

Does anyone here realise the stupidity in comparing two different curves by simply looking at them?

If you're going to try to find a correlation, it has to be done in a STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT manner, otherwise it means nothing. This is common knowledge for ALL scientists. No one promoting denial ever mentions significance levels.

Another gripe: anyone who claims that there are equal numbers of scientists in both for and against the CC theory are clearly not scientists, and probably don't even know any. The debate in the scientific community revolves largely around predicted impacts and probabilities.

Out of about 20,000 people at my university, I know of about 3 people who do not believe in climate change. Yes, 3.

Finally, I would just like to add that posting online news sources is inadequate when trying to present scientific debate. It introduces a lot of bias into the topic. Get the source material or you will be reading someone elses interpretation or agenda.

Heres my take on climate change:
1. We are facing serious changes that will affect the quality of life of all people on the planet.
2. People know that this is coming and are trying to make a profit.
3. People that are currently in big business want to keep profiting, so they are actively distorting public perception.
4. People are believing the propoganda, and helping big business screw the planet and everyone over by propogating this drivel.

Just because people are trying to take advantage of a situation, does not mean that it is based on lies. This leap of logic seems to be common.

@mirage

It is about global mean temperatures, and extremes in both hot and cold temperatures. Global warming is not a very useful term, it just confuses people when there are extreme cold weather events.

All of the literature makes this distinction abundantly clear. News websites however do not.

It is part of the distortion.

@GovtFlu

I study climate change and related issues at a postgraduate level. I have never heard people talking about Al Gore during my studies. Hes just a guy that picked the material up and ran with it. I couldn't give a rats arse about Al Gore.

@aethron

I think you were in the yes men? That line about perpetuating life comes straight from an oil industry advertising campaign. If we didn't burn fossil fuels then the atmosphere would become depleted of CO2? LOL! Ever hear of the carbon cycle? Where did all the CO2 come from previous to human civilisation?

[edit on 31-7-2010 by seenitall]

If global means the entire solar system, then yes. There are changes to all the planets in our solar system. There is even changes to the moons of these planets. Its not related to the activities of human beings.



[edit on 31-7-2010 by Copernicus]