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I'm not denying anything. I am saying that Suzuki and, just to follow those that have followed him up the Quirks and Quarks ladder, Jay Ingram and Bob MacDonald, use real science in their work every day. They question things constantly, look at the balance of evidence, then say what they say. They have successfully (in the non-money sense) managed to combine science and journalism.

If you want to shoot down what they say you'll have to do a hell of a lot better than some guy who scored some funding from an oil company and wrote a little (and highly disputed by reputable scientists) theory about sunspots that has not passed serious peer review.

   

Figures you would try to deny sunspot theory, despite the obvious and irrefutable evidence, in favour of a government agenda, which has as much to do with money as any oil interests. I guess because the governments and their flunky scientists can't legislate the sun, they will deny it has any effect. Typical.

Face it - the sun is god (though you say there is no god). This place exists because of the sun and it will die because of the sun. The sun drives the engine of the atmosphere - it is the single biggest factor, by far, affecting the climate. As you always say, look it up for yourself. Though I'm sure you will deny it until your dieing day because it doesn't fit in well with your pre-conceived "down with oil" agenda. Typical.

   

Ah, but nobody denies the sunspot theory, just the claims made about the total impact of its effects. Nobody who is not connected to the oil industry in some way has been able to take the data and make it work. They've gotten it to show minor changes and to affect trends, but not to cause the kind of climate change that we've been seeing. It is a minor factor in climate change, not a cause of what is happening.

The sunspot theory has failed outside peer review because to make it work completely you have to toss out a bunch of data.

   

Right.

There is no sense in trying to reason with anybody who reduces every argument down to a "connection to the oil industry". That is the only argument you have against anything you don't agree with.

Following your method of reductionism to this single argument, people who are against abortion must have ties to the oil industry because they want more customers to drive bigger cars and buy more gas, right?

And people who are against same sex marriage must have ties to the oil industry because they want everyone to be straight and pump out lots of kids to grow up to drive bigger cars and buy more gas, right?

And so on, and so on.....

Not everything is a conspiracy connected to the oil industry.

[This message was sponsored by the oil industry.]

   

The Calgary Herald published four letters to the editor today, I think all from from climatologists, which refuted Tim Ball's piece.

What we are seeing in this issue is healthy debate in a "not fully understood" area of science. I believe that there is general consensus of the following:

- The Earth's climate is getting warmer.
- It is doing so at a relatively rapid pace, compared to historic climate change patterns.
- Part of this is due to natural causes, potentially (not necessarily) including the level of sun spot activity.
- Human's are causing relatively rapid changes to the composition of the atmosphere.
- These changes are also partially responsible for the change in climate.

What is unclear is the relative impact that natural causes are vs. human-caused effects.

We need to address the problem as soon as we can to mitigate and minimize the human-impact to climate change. This requires us to change our behaviour on a global scale. Canada, acting alone, will have virtually no impact on this issue.

We have a global treaty. It is flawed. But it is the only global treaty we have. It is very unfortunate that, for largely protectionist reasons, the U.S. has pulled out of this treaty. As a result, the potential impact of the treaty is very much reduced. However, it's the best we have.

So, unless someone else comes forward with a new treaty proposal and a process by which the nations of the world can be brought into this treaty, should we not work towards the success of the tool that we have to address this area of concern?

   

Find me a scientist or two or three without a connection to the oil industry that unreservedly supports Ball's theories, Third Eye.

   

First you must define "connection" to the oil industry, and then prove that the science is flawed even if there is a "connection". In general, I believe that the oil industry seeks out scientists who already have theories that back up what they want to hear. Governments on the other hand will hire scientists and then pay them to tell them what they want to hear.


At any rate, I am sure there are a few (thousand) on this list:

Anti Global Warming Petition

Then there is Lloyd D. Keigwin, a researcher from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution:

Keigwin 1

Keigwin 2

Then there is the guy mentioned in the original post of this thread, Dr Tim Patterson:

Tim Patterson

This guy has his doubts about the conclusions reached by Mann et al.:

Stephen McIntyre

More:

David Legates

Professor David Bellamy

Ice ages have come and gone for millennia in the absence of greenhouse gases being produced by human industrial activity.

And of course I can't leave out Bjørn Lomborg:

Link

(So he gives speeches to the oil industry. They hire him because the conclusions he reached before they hired him, support their views.)


The list could go on and on. In a court of law there would be plenty of reasonable doubt to prevent finding humanity guilty of global warming and sentencing them to the Kyoto accord.

Now you find me a scientist or two or three without a "connection" to a government trough or environmental left-wing extremist group, that unreservedly supports the Kyoto treaty, Rev_Blair.

   

Just because it is "the best we have" doesn't mean we should run into this whole thing blind. There is a good chance the whole thing might be futile, and that we might actually do more harm than good. Why would you want to take such a risk on something that is, by your own admission, flawed?

   

Run some searches on those names Third Eye put up folks. The oil industry, or groups connected to it, keeps showing up as supplying funds or being a customer (past, present, or potential). Funny how that keeps on turning up.

   

While I did not read all of the theories of Thirdeye's post.( as some were just writer's reviews of a scientists theory.) I did read the two that I felt had some credentials behind them.

Tim Patterson is still conducting research and as of yet has not posted a conclusion. I find it interesting that he is conducting research into the affects of climate on fishstocks.

Bjorn Lomborg, did not go into enough details about what he generated into his computer models. Was a burgeoning human population taken into account? Was deforestation to bring in more cattle ) livestock in general)ranches taken into account ? I did agree with one thing he said, by solving problems in the third world we will go along way to solving enviromental issues. As I read it , he focused mainly on car emissions. As I interpret what he says...Kyoto does not go far enough to curtail global warming.

It is difficult to get the world to agree on minimal reductions or cutbacks of any kind. You need a place to start otherwise nothing happens. Then it will be too late.

   

Yeah, funny.

Don't forget to run checks on all 18,000 names here:

Anti Kyoto Petition

Who these people are hired by and/or funded by proves nothing. That you would single-handedly discredit potentially valid science because of your singular hatred shows the true extent of your bias.

Blaming everthing on oil is your easy way out of addressing my request:

Now you find me a scientist or two or three without a "connection" to a government trough or environmental left-wing extremist group, that unreservedly supports the Kyoto treaty, Rev_Blair.

After all, a scientist may be as easily corruptible, if not more so, when funded by, or connected to, government and driven by ideology.

   

Interesting ...Why did they call it The Anti Global Warning petition. Scientists are busy people tied up into their research. Is there the possibility that people signed it thinking it might be say...against global warming? I don't know, I'm just asking.

   

By all means, run the searches on as many names as you want from either side of the argument.

Here is a page with some interesting information about Frederick Seitz, the author of Third Eye's petition. The page itself is a little over the top, but the facts, connections and the links are valid.

   

Here is another article from Reuters.

reuters

The longer we wait to act...the less likely we will be able to solve the problem.

   

Wow, that guy looks like quite the a**hole. All that tobacco stuff is pointless anyways, since there is only one equation to sum it all up: smokers = stupid.

Anyways, his past actions do not necessarily invalidate his position on, or the science involved with, this particular issue. Only facts pertinent to the phenomena being studied can do that. Attacking the person, no matter how discreditble they seem, will not advance any scientific argument or study.

   

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