Climate Change Conspiracy: Two Videos and an Email Exchange

Colleague Bruce Thomson (shown here with a Kazakh colleague, Olga Buzzov) from the University of New Mexico, one of the smartest guys I know, sent me this exchange between one of his friends and himself.  It involves global warming, and in particular, two videos.

Bruce's friend:

In case you guys have not seen the CBC documentary or the second more dramatic program on the disagreement of actual science and 
top climatologists with the current climate change scam, I attach the two 
links.  I thought these programs were very good and was relieved that 
real scientists are collecting real data and FINALLY speaking out 
against the politicians, United Nations, and Wall Street banker 
interests in the promotion of the false conclusions about climate 
change.

Maybe Al Gore will be sorry he ever "invented" the internet! 
Because of the internet, I believe that the climate change scam will 
crumble in the light of the work that is going on now to show that the 
real scientific community is not on board at all.  Unbelievable to me 
that this thing could have such a following of well intentioned but 
unquestioning people.

The pdf attachment [unavailable] is all about Al's motives, as if we can
 ever know or care what the true reasons are for the guy, but it is 
interesting to me that it is much of the same Wall Street gang that is 
currently looting our accounts.

During the Depression, people learned to carry their billfolds in 
their front pocket so they would not be pick-pocketed.  Now I see why!

Enjoy and let me know what you think.

I have been upset about this topic for some time and I really like 
seeing the scientific community trying to correct this junk science.

Bruce's Reply:

I watched one of the videos and part of the other and, though they're well done, I don't agree.  There's an awful lot of evidence supporting the climate change hypothesis in widely diverse fields by a lot of very smart, careful, and most importantly, independent and very ethical scientists.  Their data come from atmospheric science, paleontology, biology, glaciology, meteorology, all kinds of earth observations and other fields.   I find it impossible to believe that there's a conspiracy of this magnitude to create this scenario.  There's too much agreement between too many disparate fields of studies.

In my experience, the naysayers/disbelievers pick at the margins.  They'll find tidbits of contradictory evidence and extrapolate from this to the conclusion that the whole climate change hypothesis is wrong.  Certainly the globe has been warmer and colder than today, but the rate of change of temperature, of ice sheet melting & glacial retreat, of changes in biomes & species extinction, of changes in weather patterns, arctic warming, and of CO2 levels in the last 100 years is unprecedented.  Both the first and second derivatives are positive and much greater than at any time in the past.

Lastly,  I see very little downside in working to minimize CO2 emissions regardless of whether climate change is occurring.  Maybe there's a slight impact on global economies, but that's a tiny blip on the curve.  On the positive side, accepting the climate change hypothesis leads to energy conservation and that can only be a good thing - it'll preserve our fossil fuel resources a bit longer and encourage us to develop alternative energy sources.  Accepting the hypothesis spurs a lot of good science and development of new technologies.  Maybe it'll force us to start living more sustainable lives.  And there's a lot of international cooperation as countries work together to develop the science, technologies, and policies to meet the problem.

But the downside risks of ignoring the hypothesis are enormous.  Drought.  Sea level rise.  Spread of tropical diseases.  Extreme weather phenomena.  Scariest of all might be the inertia of the whole thing.  A climate guy here said that if we reduced CO2 emissions to 1950 levels it would likely take 100 years or longer to re-establish 1950 atmospheric CO2 levels, if that would even be possible; there are feedback loops such as ice cap melting that may make the impacts irreversible.

So the videos are provocative.  And we should all watch 'em, but watch them critically.  And don't let them change public policies related to conservation and sustainability.  But my opinion won't change till I see agreement by many people from many fields published in refereed journals - not videos for the general public.

Check out my earlier posts on Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), the "ostrich syndrome",  and another global warming skeptic.

I love massive conspiracy theories, whether they deal with climate change, world financial domination, evolution, or whatever strikes your fancy. Makes life a lot simpler when you believe that "hidden forces" or members of some secret society are controlling things, and you are just a helpless pawn. You don't really have to think much.

Regarding global conspiracies by scientists: anyone who believes this doesn't know science or scientists. Global conspiracies require the acquiescence of large numbers of people. So you're going to get a huge number of scientists from disparate fields to toe the line? Uh-huh. Dream on, friend. Go to a meeting of one of the mainstream scientific societies and see what tranpsires.  

Slick videos are great, but what counts is the cauldron that is the refereed scientific literature.  

Oh, yeah - I'm with Bruce.

"In fact, one thing that I have noticed . . . is that all of these conspiracy theories depend on the perpetrators being endlessly clever. I think you'll find the facts also work if you assume everyone is endlessly stupid." -- Unknown

Comments

[Bhaskaran]

Yeah, it's true that people were unnecessarily put into scare by data that was presented by Al Gore.

Many have lost money. Slowly people will realise when there is no any much change.

Maybe but there will be some changes and some truth in Al Gore.

[Tim Clear]

Hi Mike (and Bruce)

There are some problems with "climate science" the way it is. First off, it's a Tower of Babel. Most climate scientists and most of their followers are very weak in astrophysics, and therefore confuse astrology and astronomy. There is a big problem confusing the solar magnetic field with solar output. The solar magnetic field modulates galactic cosmic rays, the only ones strong enough to make it far enough into Earth's atmosphere to affect cloud and C14 formation. Svensmark and Shaviv show the mechanism, which correlates with global temperature in the past. There is a lot of information at www.dsri.dk/~hsv/.

So what, you say? CO2 levels correlate with temperature in the past as well? That's the most common logic flaw in this whole discussion, the one people like Al Gore don't get. The temperature changes happen *before* the CO2 changes by about 800 years - the apparent median time for ocean circulation to resurface. The logic flaw is that a cause cannot trail an effect. Supposedly informed people who still claim there is some proof in the record of CO2 causing climate change are apparently unable to recognize this logic flaw and as such are giving science itself a bad name.

You say Climate Scientists are honest, open, critical, etc.? I agree, for the most part. However, there are glory (and research dollar) seekers out there who are quite, shall we say, intellectually inbred. There is a peer reviewed study out on the statistical connection between a few of them who falsely represent themselves to be independent - it was done by a guy named Wegman. That bunch even has recently manufactured data which purports to show Antarctica is actually warming - they manufactured it because there is no such actual data.

I'm not saying that changing CO2 has no effect on global climate - indeed it must, as theoretical studies show. However, the fact there is no shown causation in the past leads one (or should lead one) to question the relative magnitude of that effect. It may not be measurable, because all other things are not equal. CO2 causation fans ignore that fact. In fact, GCM's are so weak they do not even calculate convection in the atmosphere. Then we have black carbon settling on Arctic snow and ice, changes in flora caused by the increase in their food supply (aka CO2 - the one fact that cancels out all alarmism), and most importantly after all the CO2 spewed into the atmosphere, using the only objective measure of global temperature, satellites, Earth has been cooling this century.

Neither am I saying we should not concentrate on developing alternative sources of energy - indeed we must. However, to link that need to climate change is intellectually bankrupt, with what we know now. We need another (real)Manhattan Project, one to develop alternate energy sources. However, to do that by force will in fact hobble the economy, as energy is an important part of industry.

The declining temperature record of this century shows that no matter what else we know or don't know, we do know this is not an emergency.