Edmund Storms wrote: > While all you say very well Nick is true and reasonable. Nevertheless > the basic issue is not addressed. The basic issue is that burning > fossil fuels is harmful for several important reasons, only one of which > is global warming. Therefore, we should make every effort to phase out > this source of energy. This will not be done unless the public can > understand the reason. The most easily understood reason is the effect > on the climate. Therefore, what is the point of fighting this argument > no matter how distorted its presentation might be? Besides, the > debunkers might be wrong, a fact that would not become obvious until it > is too late.
This is not quite correct. Rather, it will *never* "become obvious" that the debunkers were wrong -- or at any rate, it will never become obvious to the debunkers. We need merely look at the history of the debate to see this. Decades ago I started seeing mention of global warming. The "debunking" argument then was to deny that it would happen. Later, as modeling got better and the awareness of CO2 generation spread, the argument was that it wouldn't have much effect. For "evidence" the debunkers pointed to the fact that the Earth wasn't getting much warmer, according to then-current measurements. Each string of exceptionally cold years (which do occur, of course) would result in once again hearing that global warming was hokum, because it obviously wasn't happening after all. Oh, yes, and here's another classic argument which found currency back around 1980: Greenhouses don't actually get warm because they retain heat through IR reflection by the glass; most of their warming just comes from the fact that they're an enclosed space. Therefore any argument which uses the term "greenhouse gas" is wrong too. Frequently one would also hear the old argument that "people used to say there was an ice age coming, so the current claim that things are going to warm up is wrong, too". That's still occasionally quoted on Vortex, come to think of it. And when the warming became clearly measurable, the argument was that it was insignificant -- Lindzen's reference to "the small amount of warming that has occurred" is classic. Finally we are in the position where only blind people who never listen to the radio can deny that things are getting hotter. And finally, the argument against GW ... has MUTATED!! Now, the argument goes something like this: "It's a COINCIDENCE that you AGW true-believers said all along that things were going to warm up if we kept burning fossil fuels, and now things are warming up. Things are warming up for unrelated reasons which *just* *happened* to come along at the moment in history when climate modeling predicted AGW would start happening. It's a COINCIDENCE that we're burning ever increasing quantities of fossil fuels and thoughtful individuals predicted this result years in advance; your predictions are all still worthless" So, when the Arctic Ocean is free of ice and the last polar bear is stuffed and placed in a museum, it will *STILL* not be "obvious" that humans had any effect at all on the climate: The apparent connection will be written off as coincidence, and the models dismissed as "fallacious", and the additional carbon dioxide and methane dumped into the atmosphere by humans dismissed as "insignificant" (never mind the amount, 0.4% was insignificant, so 35% must be insignificant too, and presumably 75% will be just as "insignificant"). Ed, you cannot convince a "true believer" of anything which is contrary to his faith. > Is it not wise and prudent to use every argument that can > be found to get people to support alternate energy, including climate > change? In contrast, I would expect people who get financial benefit > from the fossil fuel industry to fight any argument for eliminating the > use of oil and coal. Consequently, it is easy to see where the > self-interest lies by the argument each person uses. > > Ed
