Global warming - Is it for real?

[BabelFish42]

Saw a recent news article about a study done by a private team of scientists. According to them there is only real proof of Global Warming in the 1980s and since then it has stayed fairly level, until recently when it has started to drop.

I'm curious, who were the scientists?

They also made a good point, which is: If you are a scientist saying Global Warming is real and you suddenly changed you mind, due to finding out the truth then you would be out of a job, as most of there scientific time is spent on trying to prove Global Warming is real.

Er... no. Scientists are constantly making discoveries that contradict the ideas of other scientists and even their own ideas. It's what we do. If we find evidence that goes against something we used to believe, we publish it. The more controversial and revolutionary, the better - so long as you have solid evidence to back it up. Disproving a widely-accepted scientific theory will get you famous, not fired.

[Snoopy]

They also made a good point, which is: If you are a scientist saying Global Warming is real and you suddenly changed you mind, due to finding out the truth then you would be out of a job, as most of there scientific time is spent on trying to prove Global Warming is real.

Er... no. Scientists are constantly making discoveries that contradict the ideas of other scientists and even their own ideas. It's what we do. If we find evidence that goes against something we used to believe, we publish it. The more controversial and revolutionary, the better - so long as you have solid evidence to back it up. Disproving a widely-accepted scientific theory will get you famous, not fired.

Sigh... if only that were actually the case. The sad truth is that there is no such thing as a true "scientist," according to your definition. “The more controversial and revolutionary, the better"... that's a laugh. Tenured professors have gotten fired for publishing their own PEER REVIEWED research, because the research didn't agree with what the university wanted to publish. Academics are constantly referred to by themselves and others as "intellectual prostitutes," and they are to a great degree. Academics (and everyone else in science, for that matter) have the ultimate goal of maintaining their funding source, and if that means covering up a bit of controversial results in order to do so, most of them are willing to do it. This isn't a new thing, by the way... read up on the history of the agreed upon value for the charge of a single electron.

That's not to say that science is completely without merit; obviously there's a lot of good that comes out of the scientific community. But you also can't swallow whatever someone tells you just because they have the letters "PhD" after their name. You always have to be aware of where the funding comes from. And in the case of man-made global warming, the big money wants it to be true, so there is cause for significant skepticism.

[BabelFish42]

Sigh... if only that were actually the case. The sad truth is that there is no such thing as a true "scientist," according to your definition. “The more controversial and revolutionary, the better"... that's a laugh. Tenured professors have gotten fired for publishing their own PEER REVIEWED research, because the research didn't agree with what the university wanted to publish.

Like who? I believe you, I'm just curious.

Academics are constantly referred to by themselves and others as "intellectual prostitutes," and they are to a great degree. Academics (and everyone else in science, for that matter) have the ultimate goal of maintaining their funding source, and if that means covering up a bit of controversial results in order to do so, most of them are willing to do it. This isn't a new thing, by the way... read up on the history of the agreed upon value for the charge of a single electron.

I did. I don't think I found whatever it was you were referring to. I read about the controversy between Millikan and Ehrenhaft, but I didn't see anything about someone covering up controversial results. Care to elaborate?

But there are plenty of other scientific scandals that I am familiar with. Like Piltdown Man. For anyone who doesn't know, Piltdown Man was supposedly the fossilized remains of early hominid that provided the missing evolutionary link between apes and humans. Turns out the whole think was a fake. But guess who proved it was a fake? Other scientists. That is the beauty of the scientific community. Scientists are some of the biggest skeptics in the world. We question each other's results. We call bs when we see it. We demand you tell us exactly how you did your experiment, so we can reproduce it and see if we get the same results. And at the end of the day, the person with the most convincing evidence wins, politics be damned.

I'm not that naive. I know science isn't perfect, people do have their pet theories that they want to protect, and there are always going to be some politics involved. Scientists are just human beings, after all. But at the end of the day, I have more faith in the scientific method and the scientific community than just about anything else, because there is so much skepticism and so much emphasis on backing up your claims with good, solid evidence.

That's not to say that science is completely without merit; obviously there's a lot of good that comes out of the scientific community. But you also can't swallow whatever someone tells you just because they have the letters "PhD" after their name.

Of course not. That's why I'd be extremely skeptical if it was just one lone scientist warning us about climate change. But that's not the case at all with global warming. It's the opposite. The majority of scientists agree that this is a serious issue, whereas the ones arguing that it's not are a tiny minority.

The fact that those "global-warming-is-a-hoax" scientists exist proves nothing. There will always be a few people arguing against mainstream opinion. To this day, there are people trying to argue that AIDS and the Holocaust are nothing but hoaxes. Again, it all comes down to the question, how good is your evidence?

I'm a biologist, not a climatologist. This isn't my area of expertise, but I do know something about it, because I studied it for a year. Based on what I read, I concluded that some of the claims and warnings about climate change have been exaggerated. I don't have a lot of faith in the IPCC, for example, because they always seem to take the worst possible outcome, from a range of predicted outcomes, and then present that as absolute fact. They're an alarmist group, in my opinion. I also think a lot of our understandings about climatology are still kind of shaky; we're talking about processes that take place over centuries and millennia, but we've only been studying this stuff for a few decades. There's a lot we still don't know.

That being said, I also think we have cause to be uneasy. Global climates are changing. How much of that is due to human activity? Hard to tell for certain, but it seems very likely we are having some impact. I think we need to be cautious. This is not something we want to screw up. Climate systems are very complicated things, and if we screw them up, we might never be able to repair them.

You always have to be aware of where the funding comes from. And in the case of man-made global warming, the big money wants it to be true, so there is cause for significant skepticism.

Okay, now this is an argument I've never understood. There's a ton of big money in fossil fuels and cars and steaks and other things that, according to global warming theorists, are bad for our planet. There is no big money is bicycles and vegetarianism and clean energy and recycling and supporting local farmers. So why on earth would big money want to promote the idea of global warming? Seems to me the financial incentives mostly work in the other direction.

P.S. If you reply, it's probably going to take me a while to respond. School starting again means I have no free time. But I'll get back to you eventually.

[BSerAkafanofblake]

Actually since their pollination helps make fruit for us the loss of honeybees would be WORSE then global warming.
And if you do not believe me I suggest you watch the PBS Nature episode "silence of the bees" you can watch all of the episode on their website.

[BabelFish42]

Actually since their pollination helps make fruit for us the loss of honeybees would be WORSE then global warming.
And if you do not believe me I suggest you watch the PBS Nature episode "silence of the bees" you can watch all of the episode on their website.

Um. What does this have to do with global warming? Yes, colony collapse disorder is a bad thing. But bees aren't responsible for pollinating crops like wheat and rice and potatoes, which are the main staples of the human diet, so I think we'd survive just fine without them. Of course, we don't want honeybees to disappear, because what they do is very important. I just don't think you can equate the threat posed by the loss of honeybees to the threat posed by global warming. Big enough changes in global climate systems would lead to a lot of suffering and loss of human life; disappearance of honeybees would not.

[BSerAkafanofblake]

Actually since their pollination helps make fruit for us the loss of honeybees would be WORSE then global warming.
And if you do not believe me I suggest you watch the PBS Nature episode "silence of the bees" you can watch all of the episode on their website.[/? Yes, colony collapse disorder is a bad thing. But bees aren't responsible for pollinating crops like wheat and rice and potatoes, which are the main staples of the human diet, so I think we'd survive just fine without them. Of course, we don't want honeybees to disappear, because what they do is very important. I just don't think you can equate the threat posed by the loss of honeybees to the threat posed by global warming. Big enough changes in global climate systems would lead to a lot of suffering and loss of human life; disappearance of honeybees would not.

Try telling that to someone with constaption (sp?) problems that needs the fiber.
Like me.
Edit- I need to work on using the quote button.

[MahaSMB]

You always have to be aware of where the funding comes from. And in the case of man-made global warming, the big money wants it to be true, so there is cause for significant skepticism.

Oh how I wish this were true.

So much.

We wouldn't have fracking companies paying families off that they've poisoned to relocate and sign a gag order for them and their children to never ever tell others how much they've ruined their lives. Just so this company can make money. The families have no choice, however, but to agree to these contracts (which somehow get passed by judges that are put in place to protect citizens like these) or live with a multitude of health problems (among other things).

We'd also have newer exciting technologies that change and improve the way we travel compared to air planes, cars and railroads (any of you heard about Elon Musk's Hyperloop plan) etc which have barely changed in DECADES.

We would have likely have put humans on Mars by now due to increased fuel efficiency and a faster rate of improving all sorts of tech (if you improve one commonly used technology, there's a rippling effect).

But we've seen none of these changes because most of the people with the most money (and power) are doing almost everything they can to make sure that current sources of fuel remain high use. Else they won't be able to afford that private jet or two.

To these people the status quo must be preserved at all costs.

[sarge2.0]

Yes. That the globes temperature is warming is a fact. It has been observed from readings all over the globe and the side effects of said warming have also been observed. The question is: how much is human made warming? From the evidence I've seen at least some. Will all the warming be purely human made? no.
The earth goes through cycles of warming and cooling. If something causes a little warming the planet causes a feedback loop which boosts that warming. Cooling works the same way. These cycles have been seen in the past from natural events. The differences this time are that the initial push came from humans and that the changes are a lot faster.
on the issue of why people are slow to adopt 'green technologies' there is some truth to the big money argument. Many companies make a good living from what we have now. The major issue though is that current green technologies are not able to compete well with fossil fuels: solar, wind and wave are too erratic to provide stable base power and geothermal and hydro power are too location based. Nuclear is a good solution but that also causes a lot of long term problems. So part is that the big companies don't want things to change so they can make money, part is that if they did there isn't much reward for a big risk investing in new tech that could solve some of the problems green energy has.

[GERALD710]

Those who say Global Warming is not real need to visit Africa and do some research. While it is true that Climate change is a natural process, it takes place so slowly that humans are not supposed to notice any significant climatic changes in their lifetime.
Now.In My less than 25 years, I have seen severe droughts lasting years followed by a year of near continuous rainfall that wrecked the infrastructure in my home country.Then the rainy season shifted by a month and September,a month when the sun is overhead at the equator(Kenya is right on the Equator) has become part of the Cold season.
This year we saw the widest swings in temperature we have ever seen.First places like Nakuru and Nairobi had temperatures reached 30 degrees, places where it never exceeds 24 degrees celsius.
Then we had snow,Yes,actual friggin snow in the middle of the hot season in Kinangop,less than a degree from the equator just after the heat wave. When was the last time you heard of snow in the tropics???Thats like Miami having a blizzard on the 4th of July.
We have lived through enough to know Climate change is real!!!
Americans should to.May I remind you of Hurricaine Sandy and last year's polar Vortex that covered the entire continent???

[Duckymonkey179]

It's definitely not something that should be ignored. It should be looked at as a very serious issue.