Global Warming: A CONvenient Lie

Global warming - what a load of crap.

Left-wing, militant environmentalists and their merry band of liars and creative, hyperbolic alarmists are subjective contrarians who disregard valid scientific data of anything inconsistent with their message of man-made global warming. And they are wrong.

Why? Simple - because they fail to include or acknowledge facts, figures, studies and historical environmental trends that have a far greater impact and influence on the current global condition than do we humans.

And it's not like this information is hidden. It's everywhere.

In March of this year the magazine of the American Mensa Society, The Mensa Bulletin (without endorsing or rejecting) published an article labeling the current theory of man-made global warming a case of "environmental McCarthyism."

Lately there are more and more global warming alarmists who are accusing individuals, organizations and governments of failing to be environmentally conscious and subsequently blaming them for the current perceived environmental crisis - much the way Senator Joe McCarthy haphazardly accused people of being communists ultimately ruining families, careers and lives before being revealed as a fraud reliant upon nothing more than hearsay, rumours, innuendo, bad information and lies.

Yet people are so thirsty to drink in the catastrophe that they readily accept this bad information as hard-and-fast indisputable fact. Hmmm... world leaders invade Iraq based upon bad information and we deride them for their decisions, yet a bloated ex-vice president floats up a book loaded with emotion and half-truths and we embrace him as the messiah of the environment. Interesting.

Anyway, these modern day McCarthy-esque environmentalists are selling their ideas to the world in spite of scientific data to the contrary that suggests an alternative explanation to their "the sky is falling" theory of man-made global warming. Not only do a lot of these environmentalists choose to ignore contrary arguments, they fail to include them as alternate possibilities - completely ignoring the scientific process they claim to use to support their arguments. And all for no other reason than to further their careers or make a name for themselves.

I think you all know where I stand on global warming, but if you don't then pay careful attention to the next sentence. I think it's a farcical notion of ridiculous proportion perpetrated by people who fail to consider an alternative explanation as to why our planet is the way it is. I mean come on; how reliable can the global warming argument be if it is supported by the Hockey Stick Diagram, eh?

Is the world getting warmer? Sure. But here’s a little news flash for you: it’s been warmer. It’s also been colder. And it’s also been warmer again. And it’s been colder again. And it’s been warmer again… (yawn)

Depending on who you choose to believe, there are statistics that tell us the mean temperature of the earth has gone up .8 of one degree to 1.8 degrees in the past 100 or so years… which a lot of scientists, geologists, paleontologists, archaeologists, etc… will tell you isn’t surprising or even significant to anyone other than a person running for political office or trying to sell a “green” item. The earth's temperature fluctuates.

And I agree - this fluctuation is not significant nor should it be troubling and here’s why.

Right now, today, at this very moment, we are in an interglacial period of the most recent ice age known in the United States as the Wisconsin Ice Age. In layman terms: we're in between glaciers. This is a fact that is indisputable. But regardless, we are actually and presently in an ice age.

You see, the earth over its billions of years of existence has seen a number of ice ages during which the polar ice shields have advanced and receded and as recently as 95,000 to 20,000 years ago the better half of North America as far south as St Louis, Missouri was covered by a sheet of ice 8,000 to 10,000 feet thick known as the Laurentide Ice Sheet. But where did the ice go?

Global warming. But wait a minute – global warming? 20,000 years ago? Really? Yeah – really. And guess what. One of these days the ice is going to come back and there is absolutely and positively nothing we can do about it. Sweet dreams.

Does the world heat up and cool down as a result of what we do? No. Period. End of story. The planet heats up and cools down as a result of what IT does. Some may call this line of reasoning “fatalistic” but actually if you understand that the earth will continually build itself and destroy itself, well that’s the amazing thing about our planet; so actually this line of reasoning is "realistic."

The earth is capable of amazing self-sustaining activity that will keep things in a relative state of geological continuity; and will do so in the presence of - and also in spite of - our best efforts to alter it one way or the other.

Do we really think we have the power to alter geological activities to such an extent that we can alter our planet and avoid the inevitable? Try changing the course of a lava flow. Try preventing tectonic activity that generates powerful tsunami. The hubris of man never ceases to amaze.

Human beings haven’t been around very long at all. And human beings haven’t been producing that much significant environmentally harmful waste for very long either. It’s estimated in some studies that of all the carbon dioxide in our atmosphere right now, man-made carbon dioxide accounts for no more than approximately 3% (three per cent) of the total amount. THREE per cent.

I'm no statistician, but I'd be willing to go out on a limb and say that if six billion people are responsible for three per cent of the carbon dioxide present in the atmosphere, that could hardly be called "statistically significant." Moving on.

If the planet is billions of years old - which it is - our negative impact on it is infinitesimal compared to the geological trends that have been going on for hundreds of thousands – if not millions and even billions – of years.

When did the industrial age begin - back in the 1800s, right? When did we start throwing exhaust into the air? Shortly thereafter? So are we to believe that 150 or 200 years of human impact is truly enough to effect a system that has been self-monitoring and self-correcting its environment for millions and billions of years, and has had numerous incidents of global warming and global cooling?

With the presence of the scientific data related to global environmental conditions, how do environmentalists explain the numerous periods of heating and cooling that took place BEFORE humans arrived on the scene? Simple - they get out their tap dance shoes and strike up the band and cast the spectre of our demise back on to fossil fuel emissions and other sorts of man-made pollutants. Because to cite anything else as a cause would mean relinquishing control and admitting to an alternate possibility - and they just can't do that.

The earth is a pretty resilient system and in spite of what people may think or say our best efforts to pollute and destroy the earth pale in comparison to everyday geological events doing just that. This is something that cannot be disputed - the documented history of human beings on this planet dictates that our impact is far less severe than the natural forces at play on our planet day after day for billions of years.

Does this make it right? No. Does it mean we shouldn't try to clean up the environment and lessen our impact? No. But not because the ice will melt and the seas will rise; that’s going to happen anyway. This planet has been (and will be) hotter and colder than it is now unless somehow and for some reason when we arrived the planet simply stopped being the planet it had been for billions of years. And current trends prove such is not the case.

Do we impact our environment? Sure – I’ll agree with this notion in my non-scientific way based solely on the fact that anytime you have six billion people off-gassing, polluting, dying, etc… there could be a by-product that could affect the environment. I'll grant that. But to somehow think that we alone have caused our current state and that we alone can alter a process that has been happening for billions of years is, in the words of our beloved British brethren, “bollocks.”

In spite of common sense, fact or scientific data, it seems nothing will stop global warming alarmists from pointing the finger of blame at certain governments or political figures and telling us they are responsible, and that the sky is falling, instead of looking at the problem from all sides and realizing that our presence – while maintaining an appearance of negative impact on the overall condition of this entire system – is, in actuality, nothing more than a minor inconvenience to our planet.

The impact our sun has had and continues to have on our planet with its constant bombardment of earth with radiation has a much greater impact on our planet than the man-made causes the media will scare you into believing will cause our untimely demise. And even today the earth is peppered with radiation, cosmic rays and other assorted space debris on a daily basis.

The environmentalists will tell you that the sun's impact is a result of man-made pollution eroding the atmosphere; but they will not tell you what natural causes have historically eroded the same atmosphere during periods of glacial advance and glacial retreat prior to the man-made hysteria known as "global warming."

Scientists will also explain to us how too much ice is just as dangerous to our precious atmosphere as is too little ice - which is why the earth is constantly shifting between the two extremes. Yet environmentalists will ignore this phenomenon which is responsible for trapping untold amounts of co2 in our atmosphere.

And our environmentalists would have you believe that humans are responsible for global warming, but how many of you have heard global warming alarmists speak of the following scenarios - also causes of global warming? Atmospheric composition (the concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and other gases caused by the movement of continents and volcanism); changes in the earth's orbit around the Sun known as Milankovitch cycles (and possibly the Sun's orbit around the galaxy); the motion of tectonic plates resulting in changes in the relative location and amount of continental and oceanic crust on the earth's surface which could affect wind and ocean currents; variations in solar output (the sun's radiation/heat output increases 10% every one billion years); the orbital dynamics of the earth-moon system; and the impact of relatively large meteorites, and volcanism including eruptions of super-volcanoes.

Regardless of how environmentally conscious any or all of us are, the earth will do what the earth will do.

Robert Frost during his inauguration address for President John F. Kennedy said, “We were the land’s before the land was ours.” And this is as true today as it was in the 1960s; and as true as it ever has been or ever will be during and in the history of this planet.

For while we like to believe that we are in fact in control of our planet, there is no denying that this earth – in all its splendor – will burn out (or freeze over – perhaps both) and life forms will suffer or be blotted from existence as a result - again.

Some environmentalists will point to the extinction of a number of species as the symptom that we humans are destroying the planet without telling you that each day dozens of species of plants and animals disappear from the earth without so much as a footnote in a scientific journal. Dozens each day. Is this a result of man-made global warming? No. It's been going on since well before humans arrived. It's what the earth does.

We need to realize two ideas, and here they are: we don't own the planet - it owns us and; we don't control the planet - it controls us.

There truly are only two results of blaming humans for the current condition: 1) a sense of thinking that we can alter or change the inevitable that somehow we have caused and; 2) a prettier and cleaner earth to live in.

Am I an environmentalist? No. What I am is someone who has a healthy and reasonable respect for the environment simply for the fact that I hold out hope that we can achieve number two without regard for the falsehood that we will ever truly validate number one.

Fundamentally I have no problem with environmentalists. If you want to keep the planet clean, then let's keep it clean. I fully support that effort. But don't lie to me and tell me that littering, driving a car, drilling for oil, etc... is somehow going to hasten, slow or stop a geological process that has been happening for billions of years because that simply is NOT true!

The problem I do have with environmentalists is that they exhibit a nearly wholesale rejection of any science or history that does not support their argument of man-made global warming because they cannot accept the fact that global warming may NOT be our fault!

Me? I'll accept the notion that six billion people affect the planet; and I'll also accept the notion that six billion people CANNOT control the planet... but six billion people ought to at least be able to keep the planet tidy.

Does man-made global warming exist? I don't know - from what I've read I know enough to know that it's going to take a lot more scientific data for me to believe it does. There's too much propaganda with too many holes.

I mean really - just a few hundred years ago the most intelligent scientific minds and religious leaders alive told us the world was the center of the universe - and flat. Now the trend is "going green" and everything we do causes the earth to get warmer. Whatever...

There's no denying our climate is changing, but what is arguable is WHY it's changing. The vox populi will tell you that we're causing the earth to heat up when in actuality there is no definitive proof that man-made global warming is the cause of our climatological ills any more than naturally occurring events; especially if naturally occurring events that have a direct causal relationship to the planet's climate are being largely ignored.

So who do you believe? It certainly isn't the people with the hippest catch phrase, the coolest T-shirts, the grooviest bumper stickers, the most sympathetic argument or the fattest ex-US vice president spokesman.

I say before you make a decision on what to believe you should at the very least make yourself available to the possibility that not everything you're hearing from the environmental mafia is true and should be tempered with historical trends and solid, unambiguous and unbiased scientific data obtained through prudent execution of the scientific model. Then - fully armed with information from both sides make a responsible and educated decision on this (or any) issue.

So, Happy Earth Day! Plant a tree, pick up some trash, walk to work, turn off a light… do whatever you have to do not because it will save the planet (because it won’t) but because it makes the planet a prettier place to live and it's the right thing to do... nothing more.

Because at the end of the day, doing the right thing is far more important than living with the delusion that the earth we live upon has any care or concern for us - and that we as humans can do anything to prevent it from swallowing us at a moment's notice.

Comments

[Al Kayholic]

So, what are you saying?

I need a drink.

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DRINK UP - THE SKY IS FALLING. - rtm

[Fernandez]

Sorry Cayblogger, you are the one that is not taking scientific studies into account. I challenge you to find one environmentalist (or environmentally responsible people) worth their weight who will say that global warming isn't a naturally occurring event. This statement alone trumps your entire article. What the environmentalists are saying is that we are speeding up the process (scientifically a very significant possibility) and that there are unknown consequences to these actions. It is the same argument for animal and plant species that have, for billions of years, been able to evolve to 'naturally occurring' change. There are numerous examples where the earth and its wildlife cannot cope with the current rate of change (all kinds of anthropogenic activities are the cause - loss of habitat, pollution, CLIMATE CHANGE, etc). I suggest you go back to the drawing board with your "research" as there is plenty out there for your reference.

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SORRY MATE, BUT WHEN THE UNITED NATIONS REJECTS TWO MAJOR THEORIES ALLEGEDLY SUPPORTING THE NOTION OF MAN-MADE GLOBAL WARMING I HAVE TO DEFER TO THEIR SCIENCE.

FURTHER, TO THAT THE HISTORICAL CYCLES OF WARMING AND COOLING AND THE FACT REMAINS THAT THERE STILL REMAINS NO IRREFUTABLE DATA THAT CONFIRMS THE NOTION THAT WE ARE SPEEDING OR SLOWING WARMING OR COOLING.

ALSO, THERE IS NO SCIENTIFIC DATA THAT IRREFUTABLY SUPPORTS THE NOTION THAT WE AFECT THE EXTINCTION OF DOZENS OF SPECIES OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS ON A DAILY BASIS.

ENVIRONMENTALISTS CAN AND WILL SAY ANYTHING TO FURTHER THEIR CAUSE; BUT HAVE AN ENVIRONMENTALIST EXPLAIN TO YOU HOW THE HISTORICAL CYCLE OF COOLING AND HEATING THE EARTH HAS EXPERIENCED OVER THE PAST SEVERAL BILLION YEARS DIFFERS FROM TODAY AND THEY'LL BLAME HUMANS... BUT WHERE WERE WE DURING ALL OF THE OTHER TIMES THE ICE MELTED AND FROZE?

FINALLY - IF YOU'LL RE-READ MY POST I DO NOT DENY THE IMPACT HUMANS HAVE ON THEIR ENVIRONMENT. I DENY THE EXTENT AND I DENY THE EMOTION-BASED PHILOSOPHY ENVIRONMENTALISTS AND BLOATED POLITICIANS USE TO SELL THEIR CONCEPTS. - rtm

[John]

Finally a voice of reason re "Global Warming". When Al Gore shows visions of New york city 10 feet under water you have to know this Man-made Global Warming hysteria is contrived horse scheisser.

I hear discussions about "If the entire Greenland or Antarctic Ice Sheet melted", Man that makes my blood boil. In whose lifetime, maybe when Chimpanzees evolve enough to do calculus?

How in the WORLD can the poles melt when the areas are pitched in darkness 6 months of the year and its 60 below zero. Man I am no climatologist, but water FREEZES when the air temperature falls below zero degrees centigrade. How the hell could the poles get warm enough in the WINTER when the sun never comes up? THE POLES AIN'T GONNA MELT. Contrary to what Charlatans like Al Gore would have you believe, but we won't be drinking mudslides in our beach gear in Antarctica anytime soon.

Like you, I think mankind has much further to fear from another ICE AGE in the future.

This is eerily familiar the hysteria about AIDs in the 80's and 90's that it was gonna kill all of us.

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EVENTUALLY COOLER HEADS WILL PREVAIL... - rtm