posted March 23, 2006 03:47 PM              

they don't change...

they do not evolve and grow...

posted March 23, 2006 05:57 PM            

I noticed the reconstructed findings in the chart Harpyr posted too. Also that an attempt was made to make the results appear even more dramatic by omitting the smoothing factor in the 2004 temperature result.

Most serious scientists would establish a mean and then plot deviations from the mean...which would be more significant. Particularly if those deviations were tracking to one side of the mean and trending further from the mean over time.

posted March 23, 2006 09:02 PM            

You know what? I don't have time to go seeking all over the internet for information to post here when you aren't ever going to take it seriously anyway. You'd much rather tow the oil company line and I'm sure you'll never change so I'm just not going to bother.

That first graph clearly showed that temperatures did not peak in 1940, nor are they flat or 'declining slightly' as you stated in one of your questions.

I honestly wonder why I bother conversing with you on matters pertaining to the environment. You think you've got me pegged into some little enviro delusional freak role and you do a pretty good job representing everything I loathe about religiously capitalist, obliviously nihlistic libertarians who care about nothing but promoting an economy of unlimited growth while ignoring the fact that we live on a planet of limited resources.

posted March 23, 2006 09:48 PM              

Approaching the Point of No Return

Global Warming Pact Takes Effect

More Lying Environmentalist Wackos

posted March 23, 2006 10:22 PM            

Global annual lower tropospheric temperatures as measured by satellite MSU between latitudes 83 N and 83 S (17, 18) plotted as deviations from the 1979 value. The trend line of these experimental measurements is compared with the corresponding trend line predicted by International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) computer climate models (14). Not only has the global warming hypothesis failed the experimental test; it is theoretically flawed as well. It can reasonably be argued that cooling from negative physical and biological feedbacks to GHGs will nullify the initial temperature rise (26, 30).

Global radiosonde balloon temperature (light line) (15) and global satellite MSU temperature (dark line) (17,18) from figures 5 and 6 plotted with 6-month smoothing. Both sets of data are graphed as deviations from their respective means for 1979 to 1996. The 1979 to 1996 slopes of the trend lines are minus 0.060 ºC per decade for balloon and minus 0.045 for satellite. Since 1979, lower-tropospheric temperature measurements have also been made by means of microwave sounding units (MSUs) on orbiting satellites (16). Figure 6 shows the average global tropospheric satellite measurements (17,18) the most reliable measurements, and the most relevant to the question of climate change.

posted March 23, 2006 10:23 PM            

Satellite Microwave Sounding Unit, MSU, measurements of global lower tropospheric temperatures between latitudes 83 N and 83 S from 1979 to 1997 (17,18). Temperatures are monthly averages and are graphed as deviations from the mean temperature for 1979 to 1996. Linear trend line for 1979 to 1997 is shown. The slope of this line is minus 0.047 ºC per decade. This record of measurements began in 1979.

**Note the high temperature spike about 1940. Note also that it's cooler now than it was then.
Annual mean surface temperatures in the contiguous United States between 1895 and 1997, as compiled by the National Climate Data Center (12). Horizontal line is the 103-year mean. The trend line for this 103-year period has a slope of 0.022 ºC per decade or 0.22 ºC per century. The trend line for 1940 to 1997 has a slope of 0.008 ºC per decade or 0.08 ºC per century.

This is from an 8 page paper, too long to post here but you can view the entire findings here.
http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

Yeah, our favorite pastime is sitting around trying to dream up novel ways to kill every thing on planet Earth.

posted March 23, 2006 11:00 PM              

quote:

---

Yeah, our favorite pastime is sitting around trying to dream up novel ways to kill every thing on planet Earth.-jwhop

---

what a fitting quote jwhop...do you smoke cigarettes?

Frederick Seitz was once credible and famous. He was once President of the National Academy of Sciences, an organization which has repudiated Seitz's counterfeit NAS anti-Kyoto petition fraud. The reason that RJ Reynolds tobacco company bought Seitz was that his reputation was worth the money they agreed to spend.

Seitz and Singer are tied together, and to tobacco by secret files wrenched from the tobacco conspirators file cabinets, but not every key document or cancelled check has been recovered and published so far. By 1990 Seitz disappears from tobacco company public connections, but SEPP is born. Neither SEPP nor Seitz has ever gone on public record as to the date of Seitz first involvement with SEPP, but Seitz has been board member and vice-president going back as far as public records still existing are available.

From public documentation we can demonstrate that SEPP (Science and Environmental Policy Project) was corrupt at inception, that it involved Seitz and Bruce N. Ames in various corrupt activities in its early history, that a pattern of corrupt behavior is publically established, and therefore appearances of corruption in other organizations associated with members of this crew are presumptively also actually corrupt.

Jerry Falwell & Moon
Convicted felon Sun Myung Moon has hosted "science conferences" with a hidden agenda for three decades. He spends the money so he can be photographed giving speeches to "important people", and increase his propaganda value to gullible followers who don't understand science yet fear and respect it.

Moon picked up S. Fred Singer at some unrecorded time in the past, probably at one of these mock-science gatherings. In 1990 we have recorded evidence that Singer is president and director of a Moon front organization named Washington Institute for Values in Public Policy, located in a Moonie owned office building.

Singer has claimed that the moonies loaned him offices for a year, and gave a charity grant of $10,000 startup money for SEPP. That is a lie. Singer was located in that building for three years, and He, Singer himself, gave SEPP whatever money they needed to operate that additional front organ. The Washington Institute has been very generous to "president" or "board members". Here is an IRS document showing one year that another Washington Institute president gave himself $142,708 salary, a Singer-sized salary. A pal of Singer's, Gerhard Stohrer applied for tobacco money on Washington Institute letterhead during Fred Singer's term as president of the front operation.

Seitz-Singer-Ames
Think Tank Fronts
A non-profit watchdog organization created an interactive database to illustrate the slippery schemes of ExxonMobil's criminal conspiracy to deceive about Global Warming in the same manner that the tobacco criminal conspiracy deceived and committed corporate serial murders. Seitz, Singer, and Ames all appear in the database as crooked scientists lying for money.

Sallie Baliunas and Willie Soon are the next generation in mass murder deceivers. Along with Fred Seitz they created a counterfeit package, crafted to deceive that it came from the National Academy of Sciences, with a petition worded to deceive about it's ultimate use, and issued it from an Oregon State University minor association called OISM. With Seitz's history in the aiding and abetting of corporate serial murders, it is not surprising to find him operating on behalf of global warming polluter mass murderers.

http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Seitz_Tobacco_Crimes.html

posted March 23, 2006 11:23 PM            

Guilt by association eh?

Listen up Petron, there are more than 17,000 real scientists who signed the statement which basically says the IPCC modeling methods are flawed and there is no objective data pointing to atmospheric CO2 levels causing global warming. Are you suggesting all those scientists work for or have been bought by oil companies?

In fact Petron, surface warming and ocean warming cause a rise in atmospheric CO2 levels.

That makes sense Petron since the oceans are gigantic CO2 sinks which absorb CO2 when they're colder and release CO2 when they warm and there is ocean warming, especially in the northern regions.

posted March 24, 2006 12:10 AM              

wow jwhop....so then you probly still deny that cigarette smoking is bad for your health too??

now thats extremism.....

quote:

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Now, what were early humans doing 25,000 years ago that caused the sudden warming cycle which ended the last ice age?*

---

are you saying that we're in an ice age, so its ok if we make the temperature skyrocket??

quote:

---

*What were humans doing in 1200AD which set off the "little ice age" and sent temperatures spiraling downward for the next 700 years?*

---

what does this have to do with global warming??.....are you saing that its ok for humans to wreck the environment just because natural effects have occurred in the past?

quote:

---

*Why is it that temperatures are cooler now than they were between 1000AD and 1200AD and why have temperatures declined from a peak occurring about 1940?*

---

are you ignoring harpyrs charts and the articles which have already been posted here in gu?

*******

Tue Jan 24, 2006
By Deborah Zabarenko
2005 was warmest year on record: NASA

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Last year was the warmest recorded on Earth's surface, and it was unusually hot in the Arctic, U.S. space agency NASA said on Tuesday.

All five of the hottest years since modern record-keeping began in the 1890s occurred within the last decade, according to analysis by NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

In descending order, the years with the highest global average annual temperatures were 2005, 1998, 2002, 2003 and 2004, NASA said in a statement.

"It's fair to say that it probably is the warmest since we have modern meteorological records," said Drew Shindell of the NASA institute in New York City.

"Using indirect measurements that go back farther, I think it's even fair to say that it's the warmest in the last several thousand years."

Shindell, in line with the view held by most scientists, attributed the rise to emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and ozone, with the burning of fossil fuels being the primary source.

The 21st century could see global temperature increases of 6 to 10 degrees F (3 to 5 degrees C), Shindell said.

"That will really bring us up to the warmest temperatures the world has experienced probably in the last million years," he said.

http://www.thewe.cc/contents/more/archive2005/december/2005_hottest_year_on_record _north.htm

******

quote:

---

*Why is it that CO2 emissions have skyrocketed...starting in about 1979 and ascending on a steep line, while temperatures are actually flat or declining slightly?*

---

temperatures are declining slightly???? do you see why i consider your questions completely illegitimate??

the temperature rise will follow behind the rise in co2.....so why dont we pump as much into the atmosphere as we can and find out later???

HEY EVERYBODY!!!! ITS POSSIBLE THAT A SUPER VOLCANOE COULD ERUPT AT ANY MOMENT AND CAUSE AN EXTINCTION LEVEL EVENT!!!! SO WHY NOT JUST WRECK THE ENVIRONMENT OURSELVES FIRST??

posted March 24, 2006 10:49 AM              

It's going toscare people and it's stupid..

How many of you are walking around in Fear..because of this BS..you are reading..
go within..tap into GOD..
if you are afraid..then you do not know truth,
we must work on OurSelves first..you can't help anyone..if you can't help yourSelf..
so we have a bunch of non-GOD people telling you the worst..and you believe them..hmmmm

well..that would be the dark and stupid non-God herd..the blind following the blind..

posted March 24, 2006 11:59 AM              

Or maybe lets just keep paving over/cutting down all that plant life that just LOVES all the CO2 that we keep exhaling and burning so that when the RAPTURE comes it wont matter anyhow...as long as JESUS comes that is the important part...

Cause the earth is just here for us to RAPE and POLLUTE and PILLAGE anyhow thats what it says in the BIBLE according to Ann Coulter...

I mean who CARES if my children's grandchildren wont have clean water/air to use as long as I get my share right? OR Huge multi-million/billion dollar corporations can keep making a profit no matter what the cost is to the planet.

See it's not that making a profit is BAD...its that there are finite resources available on this planet and we live in a closed system. If we ruin it, that's it folks....finite, game over, the end.

posted March 24, 2006 01:27 PM            

That is my primary focus right now and it's only from time to time that I take action with regard to spreading the word where I can that we need to radically change our way of relating with the world and eachother if we are going to survive in the long run. That's why I come here and argue from time to time- because even if I don't change JW or Pidaua's thinking, then maybe atleast there are lurkers reading this who can see the truth for themselves above all the rhetoric justifying a destructive way life.

posted March 24, 2006 03:22 PM              

Beautiful!

quote:

---

the most important action I can take for myself, my family and my communities of people, plant and animal, is to learn the skills that will be needed to survive in a post-oil era. Building connections with others who are similarly motivated and doing what we can to heal and renew the small pieces of mother earth that we come in contact with in our daily lives while making choices that help protect other people and places far away- like buying organic and free trade and second hand clothes, etc.

---

Thank you for stating so eloquently that which needs to be done. It echoes my own values and thoughts.

GG

posted March 24, 2006 03:26 PM              

if not..you shouldn't be here posting..I have stated all the same things over and over again..on deaf ears and blind eyes..

posted March 24, 2006 03:54 PM              

Some people are not doing those things. Some do not want to consider the fact that in order for the human race to continue they may have to change the way they currently live, and to not live the party, spend, consume without end mindset. We do need to look inside ourselves and heal disease. We do need to be positive. We also need to reach out to each other and work together. We do need to be mindfull of for every action there is a reaction.

Have you ever broken a single strand of a spider's web? When you did, did you then notice how it all just fell apart...

As above so below.

posted March 24, 2006 06:13 PM            

THE ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING DOCTRINE
By Gerrit J. van der Lingen
THE ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING DOCTRINE
By Dr Gerrit J. van der Lingen
Published in Newsletter of the Geological Society of New Zealand, N0 138, November 2005: 60-64. http://www.nbr.co.nz/home/column_article.asp?id=14429&cid=18&cname=Opinion

Independent scientists

The major part of "Paleo Potpourri" in July's Newsletter was a diatribe against Michael Crichton and Bjørn Lomborg, two people who dared to criticise certain beliefs of environmentalists, especially the doctrine of AGW (Anthropogenic Global Warming). No scientific arguments mind you, just gratuitous name-calling and insults. Unfortunately, this is not uncommon in the debate on global warming.

I have been collecting some of the insults levelled at AGW sceptics: Cash-amplified flat-earth pseudo-scientists; the carbon cartel; villains; refuseniks lobby; polluters; a powerful and devious enemy; deniers; profligates; crank scientists. The list is endless. I remember the reaction of a Canadian scientist who dared to ask critical questions at a meeting on global warming. He was totally taken aback by the virulent reaction, "it was as if I was back in the Middle Ages and had denied the Virgin Birth". A common slur is also that all sceptics are in the pockets of the oil industry.

The global warming debate has left the realm of science a long time ago. It has become totally politicised. Any scientific criticism is not met with a scientific response, but with name-calling and a stepping up of the scare tactics. Some sceptics have even lost their jobs or are told to shut up or else. Many of the global-warming doomsayers seem to be obsessed with a longing for Apocalypse. A good New Zealand example was the acceptance speech of Peter Barrett, when he received the (well-earned) Marsden Medal. He predicted the extinction of the human race by the end of this century due to AGW. Sir David King, the science advisor to the British Government, has said that the threat of global warming is more serious that the threat of terrorism. I wonder if he would dare to repeat that in public after the recent London terrorist bomb attacks.

A favourite ploy by AGW alarmists is to repeat ad infinitum that the science about AGW has been settled and that there is consensus among scientists that it is happening and that it will have cataclysmic consequences for our planet. People using these consensus arguments forget that scientific truth is not determined by consensus. But apart from being unscientific, the consensus argument is also a myth. There are thousands of independent scientists who do not accept that the science behind Kyoto has been settled. "Independent" means not being dependent for one's livelihood on research funding from the public purse controlled by politicians for whom the AGW scare is a godsend. As Bob Carter recently told a Rotary group in Melbourne, each year between 3 and 4 billion dollars is being spent on climate research. Phil Maxwell makes the snide comment that "most of the Global-Warming Deniers are elder members of the scientific community desperately carrying on a rearguard action". It is indeed true that a large proportion of these independent scientists are retired people. They can afford to be independent.

Of those thousands of independent scientists, hundreds are active in giving lectures, writing books, articles and letters to the newspapers, debating the science and discovering many flaws in it. I know of many New Zealand scientists who are AGW sceptics. I won't mention the names of those who have not spoken out publicly, but I can mention those who have been active in public: Bob Carter, professor of geology in Townsville, Australia (originally from Otago University); Chris de Freitas, Associate Professor environmental sciences at Auckland University; Vincent Gray, retired chemist living in Wellington (who wrote a booklet "The Greenhouse Delusion", published in the UK); Augie Auer, the well-known meteorologist; and myself. Unfortunately, none of us is "in the pockets of the oil industry". Unfortunately, because I could do with some extra pocket money.

Scientific audits

In recent time, several people have started to carry out scientific audits of the science behind Kyoto. A good example is the audit of the "Hockey Stick" graph that forms one of the two major pillars for the conclusions in the "Summary for policy makers" in the 2001 Third Scientific Assessment Report of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It can be found five times in that publication and has been used extensively by politicians and GLOWDISC (GLObal Warming DIsaster SCenario) promoters. On this graph was based the conclusion that the climate has been stable over the last Millennium and that the 1990s was the warmest decade in a 1000 (later extended to 2000) years and that 1998 was the warmest year in that decade.

The Hockey Stick graph was first published by Mann, Bradley and Hughes in 1998 in Nature (vol. 392: 779-787). It is now generally referred to as "MBH98". Two Canadian statistical experts, McIntyre and McKitrick, set out to audit the Hockey Stick. They had great trouble getting the necessary information from Michael Mann. He put many obstacles in their path and even refused to release his computer code, saying that "giving them the algorithm would be giving in to the intimidation tactics that these people are engaged in" and that "if we allowed that sort of thing to stop us from progressing in science, that would be a very frightening world". He apparently was not willing to accept that one of the litmus tests of a scientific theory is its reproducibility. Anyhow, McIntyre and McKitrick found serious flaws and deliberate manipulation of data in the methods used by MBH98 to obtain their Hockey Stick. They even found that that the statistical methods used by MBH98 always produces a hockeystick-shaped graph, even when random numbers are used.

For those who want to acquaint themselves with this audit, details can be found here (http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=521). The MBH98 statistical methods have also been criticised by the German Professor Hans von Storch, co-author of the book "Statistical analysis in climate research" (Cambridge University Press). But Mann still refused to release his computer code. The story of the Hockeystick saga was then published in the Wall Street Journal (14th Feb 05). As a result of this, on 23d of June a committee of the US House of Representatives ordered Mann to release his code and to account for his activities in relation to the Hockeystick. The same requests were made to the Chairman of the IPCC (not surprisingly, the IPCC is in total denial), the Director of the National Science Foundation, and to the two co-authors of the Hockeystick paper, Bradley and Hughes. We now wait with baited breath for their answers.

The reason why the Hockey Stick is so important is the fact that it tries to do away with the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age (and further back with the Dark Ages Cold Period and the Roman Warm Period). Those natural climate fluctuations are an embarrassment to the hypothesis that mankind is mainly to blame for the present warming. In its first Scientific Assessment Report (1990), the IPCC still had a temperature graph showing the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age. It is now clear from the 2001 report that the IPCC has deliberately eliminated these natural climate fluctuations with sleight of hand.

The second pillar of the IPCC scientific assessment report is the analysis of world temperatures, mainly from land-based stations. On these analyses is based the statement that the global temperature has risen by 0.6 centigrade since the middle of the nineteenth century and that mankind is to blame. The main author of these analyses is Phil Jones (e.g. Jones and Briffa, 1992, The Holocene, vol 2: 165-179). These analyses have been strongly criticised, based mainly on the quality of some of the data, especially from third-world countries, and on the influence of the so-called "Urban Heat Island effect." The temperature of large cities with lots of tar seal and concrete can be as much as 5 deg-centigrades above normal. I remember a good anecdote about this. Some time ago, Paul Holmes ran a TV program about the temperature in Wellington. He interviewed the then-Mayor of Wellington, Mark Blumsky, who was concerned that the temperature, measured at Kelburn, showed Wellington in a bad light and was bad for tourism. He had noticed that it was generally much warmer in the inner city. He therefore had ordered the thermometer moved from Kelburn to the inner city.

Like in the MBH98 case, some independent scientists asked Jones for his basic data. He first said that "the data was on one of many diskettes at his office and he could not locate it without going to a lot of trouble." When Warwick Hughes (pers.com. Warwick is a geology graduate from Auckland working in Australia. His website is worth a visit) also asked for those data he got the reply: "We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it." No comment is necessary here.

I was recently invited to join a group of independent scientists in the Netherlands under the leadership of Professor Arthur Rörsch of Leiden University, which is preparing a submission to the Dutch Parliament asking for an independent scientific audit of the advice given to the government that made them decide to sign the Kyoto Protocol. It is high time that a similar request is made to the New Zealand government. I doubt if the Royal Society could fulfill that role, as it seems to have accepted the scientific validity of the AGW doctrine. It has become clear in recent weeks that the government's Kyoto sales pitch that it could make hundreds of millions of dollars from carbon credits has been phony and that the New Zealand public will now have to spend more than a billion dollars in buying credits. An audit is sorely needed but don't hold your breath that this will happen.

"Adolf" Lomborg

Phil Maxwell calls Bjørn Lomborg (author of the book "The Skeptical Environmentalist - measuring the real state of the world" - Cambridge University Press) "the darling of anti-environmentalists everywhere." The vilification of Lomborg is a long and sad saga. Lomborg is a statistician and an environmentalist. He was even a member of Greenpeace. However, when he started to collect material to counter arguments by the American economist Julian Simon, who had criticised many of the exaggerated claims by environmentalists, he found that Simon was right on many points. This led to his much-maligned book. The irony is that he based much of his book on official reports and statistics by international organisations such as the World Bank, Food and Agricultural Organisation, World Health Organisation, and many other United Nations organisations. It is also ironic that he accepts that man-made greenhouse gases contribute to global warming.

But his main criticism is that the Kyoto Protocol will have negligible effects on climate change and that the estimated cost of implementing Kyoto, 150 billion dollars per year(!), would be much better spent in providing clean water and sanitation to the third world. But by analysing many of the exaggerated claims of environmentalists and finding them to be often incorrect, he upset their profitable eco apple carts. Environmental extremists attacked him with all the weapons at their disposal, no holds barred. He has even been called the "Antichrist" and Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the IPCC, compared him with Adolf Hitler.

CO2 not a pollutant

Talking about "polluting industries," Phil Maxwell is also perpetuating the myth that carbon dioxide is a pollutant. It does not matter how often independent scientists point out that CO2 is not a pollutant but a plant fertilizer and an essential ingredient for life on earth, they keep repeating this mantra. Hundreds of experiments with plants growing in an atmosphere with double the present level of CO2 have shown an increase in productivity of between 20 and 50 percent (references to these studies can be found on the excellent co2science website). Increased plant growth due to increased CO2 levels have been noted already in many areas.

2005 - the Year of the Great Awakening

I have been writing the occasional email newsletter, titled "Global Warming and Cooling." In Newsletter No 7 (June 2003) I wrote that the year 2005 would be "The Year of the Great Awakening." This was based on the Kyoto Protocol itself. In Article 3, paragraph 2, it states: "Each party included in Annex I [these are the developed countries who ratified the Protocol and who together account for 55% of all greenhouse emissions. Developing countries are exempt] shall, by 2005, have made demonstrable progress in achieving its commitments under this protocol" Well, we know by now that New Zealand will default. Emissions have risen more than 22 percent since 1990 (The Press, 12 July 2005). But other signatories to the Kyoto Protocol are not doing much better. The European Union has been one of the most enthusiastic supporters of the Kyoto Protocol and has been very scathing of the US for not signing Kyoto. However, emissions in Europe have risen by 16.4 per cent since 1990, while the US increase was 16.7 percent. Canada increased its emissions by 23.6 percent, and Japan 18.9 percent. Sobering figures.

Article 3, paragraph 9 states that subsequent Kyoto commitments (after 2012) have to be considered "at least seven years before the end of the first commitment period." That will be 2005 as well. As we know from last December's COP10 meeting [2004] in Buenos Aires, participating countries could not agree on any emission reductions after 2012. Future Kyoto targets will have to include developing countries. But countries like China and India, who are quickly developing into major greenhouse-gas emitters, made it clear that they would not jeopardise their growing economies by any restrictive Kyoto agreements. But the biggest blow came from Italy, which declared that it would not sign up to any new agreements after 2012.

The big irony is the fact that economic growth and reducing greenhouse-gas emissions are incompatible. This was also the big contradiction of the recent G8 conference in Gleneagles. Tony Blair had set two major items on its agenda: reducing poverty in Africa and tackling global warming. But as we can see from China and India, reducing poverty has to be accompanied by an increase in energy generation and thus an increase in emissions, unless all generation comes from nuclear power. And that would be anathema to environmentalists. New Zealand's economy is growing and the demand for electricity is growing by about 3 percent per year. Whatever the hype, wind power will only be able to make a small dent in that demand. The Green Party is against new hydro power, against coal-fired power stations, and against nuclear power. Implementing their agenda will inevitably result in brown-outs and black-outs.

It is obvious that full implementation of the Kyoto Protocol would require a stop to any economic growth and the draconian plans for further drastic reductions in emissions (up to 60 to 80 percent for CO2) would require a substantial contraction of economies.

Even some politicians are waking up. Just before the G8 conference, on July 6, the Select Committee on Economics of the House of Lords in Britain released a report titled "The Economics of Climate Change." The report is highly critical of the British Government for not having carried out a proper costing of the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. It is also highly critical of the policies and actions of the IPCC. It urges the government to take a different approach to climate change in the future than the one followed for the Kyoto Protocol and to emphasise adaptation to climate change rather than dubious emission controls. The full 86-page report can be found here

Geologists as independent scientists

It is clear that the politicising of climate science has resulted in an abandoning of good scientific practice and ethics. Any critical scientific discussion of the science behind the AGW doctrine is shouted down, ridiculed or ostracised. But fortunately there are sufficient independent scientists who keep the flame of good scientific practice burning, although not much of this is reaching the general public. As explained above, there are groups who are now carrying out proper scientific audits and are looking into alternative theories to the one-eyed IPCC hypothesis. More studies are coming out about the role of the sun in climate change and several groups are revisiting the theory of greenhouse gases, especially the role of carbon dioxide, which was first formulated by the Swedish scientist Arrhenius in the nineteenth century.

Geologist can play an important role in these independent assessments. Geologic history tells us how climate has changed naturally at all time scales, from the two "snow-ball earth" periods in the Precambrian, through the ice ages in the Ordovician and Carboniferous-Permian, to the Cretaceous warm period, to the ice-age period we are living in now, and from the 1500-year climate fluctuations in the Holocene through the century-scale fluctuations in the past millennia (of which the present "Modern Warm Period" is one), to the climate effects of the 11-year sunspot cycles. Glaciologists can tell the AGW alarmists that the retreat of some glaciers is not due to AGW. They can point out that many glaciers have been retreating since the Little Ice Age, while others have been static or are advancing. They can point out that many glaciers started to retreat already in the eighteenth century, long before any increase in man-made greenhouse gases. For instance, the Franz Josef Glacier [South Island, New Zealand] started to retreat in 1750 and has had several advances since then as well, the last one starting in 1996. Another example is the large Gangotri Glacier in the Himalayas, which has been retreating since 1780.

Sea-level rise caused by man-made greenhouse gas emissions is another favourite scare topic of AGW alarmists. But geologists know that sea level has risen by 120 metres since the last ice age. They also know that there have been fluctuations in the Holocene. About 6000 years ago the sea level in this part of the world was about two metres higher than it is now. It went down after that and has been rising again for quite some time. It is also known that the rate of sea level change has not been accelerating since the middle of the nineteenth century, notwithstanding an increase in atmospheric CO2. A real nail in the coffin of alarmism was the report on sea-level change in the Maldives by a group of INQUA scientists under the leadership of the INQUA president Professor Nils-Axel Mörner (Global and Planetary Change, vol 40: 177-182, 2004). The Maldives in the Indian Ocean has been a favourite scare subject of AGW alarmists. They tell us that this island group is about to disappear under the ocean waves due to our profligate energy lifestyle. But Mörner et al. found that sea level in the Maldives had been falling in the last 30 years.

We geologists can help to steer climate science away from the ideological hype and straight-jacket and return it to its proper functioning.
http://www.sepp.org/NewSEPP/GW-vdLingen.htm