http://news.yahoo.com/skeptic-finds-now-agrees-global-warming-real-142616605.html
Skeptic finds he now agrees global warming is real
AP
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SETH BORENSTEIN - AP Science Writer | AP
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<http://news.yahoo.com/photos/>
WASHINGTON (AP) — A prominent physicist and skeptic of global
warming spent two years trying to find out if mainstream climate
scientists were wrong. In the end, he determined they were right:
Temperatures really are rising rapidly.
The study of the world's surface temperatures by Richard Mullerwas
partially bankrolled by a foundation connected to global warming
deniers. He pursued long-held skeptic theories in analyzing the data. He
was spurred to action because of "Climategate," a British scandal
involving hacked emails of scientists.
Yet he found that the land is 1.6 degrees warmer than in the 1950s.
Those numbers from Muller, who works at the University of California,
Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, match those by the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.
He said he went even further back, studying readings from Benjamin
Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. His ultimate finding of a warming world,
to be presented at a conference Monday, is no different from what
mainstream climate scientists have been saying for decades.
What's different, and why everyone from opinion columnists to "The Daily
Show" is paying attention is who is behind the study.
One-quarter of the $600,000 to do the research came from the Charles
Koch Foundation, whose founder is a major funder of skeptic groups and
the tea party. The Koch brothers, Charles and David, run a large
privately held company involved in oil and other industries, producing
sizable greenhouse gas emissions.
Muller's research team carefully examined two chief criticisms by
skeptics. One is that weather stations are unreliable; the other is that
cities, which create heat islands, were skewing the temperature analysis.
"The skeptics raised valid points and everybody should have been a
skeptic two years ago," Muller said in a telephone interview. "And now
we have confidence that the temperature rise that had previously been
reported had been done without bias."
Muller said that he came into the study "with a proper skepticism,"
something scientists "should always have. I was somewhat bothered by the
fact that there was not enough skepticism" before.
There is no reason now to be a skeptic about steadily increasing
temperatures, Muller wrote recently in The Wall Street Journal's
editorial pages, a place friendly to skeptics. Muller did not address in
his research the cause of global warming. The overwhelming majority of
climate scientists say it's man-made from the burning of fossil fuels
such as coal and oil. Nor did his study look at ocean warming, future
warming and how much of a threat to mankind climate change might be.
Still, Muller said it makes sense to reduce the carbon dioxide created
by fossil fuels.
"Greenhouse gases could have a disastrous impact on the world," he said.
Still, he contends that threat is not as proven as the Nobel
Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says it is.
On Monday, Muller was taking his results — four separate papers that are
not yet published or peer-reviewed, but will be, he says — to a
conference in Santa Fe, N.M., expected to include many prominent
skeptics as well as mainstream scientists.
"Of course he'll be welcome," said Petr Chylek of Los Alamos National
Lab, a noted skeptic and the conference organizer. "The purpose of our
conference is to bring people with different views on climate together,
so they can talk and clarify things."
Shawn Lawrence Otto, author of the book "Fool Me Twice" that criticizes
science skeptics, said Muller should expect to be harshly treated by
global warming deniers. "Now he's considered a traitor. For the skeptic
community, this isn't about data or fact. It's about team sports. He's
been traded to the Indians. He's playing for the wrong team now."
Muller's study found that skeptics' concerns about poor weather station
quality didn't skew the results of his analysis because temperature
increases rose similarly in reliable and unreliable weather stations. He
also found that while there is an urban heat island effect making cities
warmer, rural areas, which are more abundant, are warming, too.
Among many climate scientists, the reaction was somewhat of a yawn.
"After lots of work he found exactly what was already known and accepted
in the climate community," said Jerry North, a Texas A&M University
atmospheric sciences professor who headed a National Academy of Sciences
climate science review in 2006. "I am hoping their study will have a
positive impact. But some folks will never change."
Chris Field, a Carnegie Institution scientist who is chief author of an
upcoming intergovernmental climate change report, said Muller's study
"may help the world's citizens focus less on whether climate change is
real and more on smart options for addressing it."
Some of the most noted scientific skeptics are no longer saying the
world isn't warming. Instead, they question how much of it is man-made,
view it as less a threat and argue it's too expensive to do something
about, Otto said.
Skeptical MIT scientist Richard Lindzen said it is a fact and nothing
new that global average temperatures have been rising since 1950, as
Muller shows. "It's hard to see how any serious scientist (skeptical,
denier or believer — frequently depending on the exact question) will
view it otherwise," he wrote in an email.
In a brief email statement, the Koch Foundation noted that Muller's team
didn't examine ocean temperature or the cause of warming and said it
will continue to fund such research. "The project is ongoing and
entering peer review, and we're proud to support this strong,
transparent research," said foundation spokeswoman Tonya Mullins.
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