It took the Vatican 376 years to recognize the obvious correctness of the science regarding the heliocentric model of the solar system. Now, the Vatican has actually funded a study to inquire about the validity of climate science. Even the uber-anti-science Catholic church now accepts climate science.

Is there anyone left willing to put themselves as more anti-science than the Vatican?

Yes, that last is a bit targeted. I'll wait 'til you-know-who responds before naming the person I'm thinking of.

Seriously though, the evidence is in. How long must we wait to act on this? How long will we deny this? How many people, especially the poor who cannot take action to mitigate the effects on themselves and their families and who were not the main cause the problem, must die before we do something? How many floods? How many hurricanes? How many droughts? How many tornadoes? How much sea level rise? What will it take to convince us?

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g10NglmvY5S--196nMSfug79L3BQ?docId=e80362e575554118aa3fabbc3f725c8e

The gloves are off. This is cagematch. Let the debate get hot. It's better than when the planet does.

Scott--you really have thrown open the gate of Hell to combine Climate Science with Religion.  Why is it getting hotter?===because god wants it that way.  Nuff said.  What can we do to make it colder again?===Pray and tithe my son.

Heh, heh.  Yes, looking "up" to Catholics is a pretty low blow.

I'm thinking of four people now.  Haven't seen any of them post to the Cage Match though.

Yes, I'm certain you meant me in particular.  When I have more than 1/2 hour, I'll throw out some things for you to read, and I'll wait for you to read it all (or as much as you want to) and we'll just go on from there.  This reminds me of Germans leaving the Roman Catholic Church in droves in 2010 for unsupported reports of systematic sexual abuse of minors and attempted cover-ups.  Pope Benedict XVI’s homeland wrestled with that since he gave few believable answers.  Maybe the church will blame it all on global warming, just as Al Gore rips people off with uses it to pump up the sales of carbon credits.

I'll take the "global warming is an unsupported bunch of non-scientific scare tactics with very little supporting data and is sure lining the pockets of a few" position.  Gird your grid for a big one¹.


1. The Firesign Theater Theater, "We're All Bozos On This Bus"

Yes, I'm certain you meant me in particular.  When I have more than 1/2 hour, I'll throw out some things for you to read, and I'll wait for you to read it all (or as much as you want to) and we'll just go on from there. 

Ding ding ding ding!!! We have a winner. Yes KD. I was hoping to get you on this thread. I've been waiting and wanting to read your articles that dispute anthropogenic climate change. I've read so much extremely well substantiated data in support of it. Maybe it's just that my google results are being filtered to show only AGW positive results. http://cagematch.dvorak.org/index.php/topic,9993.0.html

I've also witnessed a lot of the results first hand as I go around the world in search of wildlife and am told again and again that this species or that is moving away from the poles or up the mountain. Up the mountain is worse since there is, by definition, an upper bound to the migration. When the mountain top is not high enough, species die.

In particular, I would love to see the paper that shows carbon by percentage of the atmosphere rather than by parts per million and how it claims such a radically different amount of increase just by using different units. Seems to me there would be an easy conversion from parts per million to percentage of atmosphere and that the percentage increase would be the same when expressed either way. In fact, for percentage of atmosphere, wouldn't one simply divide PPM by 1,000,000 and then multiply by 100 (resulting in dividing by 10,000)? Wouldn't that put CO2 at 0.00383% of the atmosphere now versus 0.00280% at the start of the industrial revolution and 0.00220% at the dawn of agriculture (which is sometimes cited as the start of the anthropocene era)? What am I missing here?

This reminds me of Germans leaving the Roman Catholic Church in droves in 2010 for unsupported reports of systematic sexual abuse of minors and attempted cover-ups.  Pope Benedict XVI’s homeland wrestled with that since he gave few believable answers.  Maybe the church will blame it all on global warming, just as Al Gore rips people off with uses it to pump up the sales of carbon credits.

Global warming does make people hotter, but not in that way. And, prepubescent is, by definition, not sexy. So, while this is rather humorous, I think we can let this particular tangent die, much as I love tangents.

And, we should probably decide now, since I brought up the Vatican, whether we're going to suspend Godwin's Law on this thread. Given the history of this particular pope, I'm going with yes. Anyone see a reason to leave Godwin's Law in effect for this thread? I see good reason to suspend it.

I'll take the "global warming is an unsupported bunch of non-scientific scare tactics with very little supporting data and is sure lining the pockets of a few" position.

Well, there are tens of thousands of peer reviewed papers with tons of data, so I think a more effective tack would be to present contradictory evidence. Else, I will have to assume you're just burying your head in your sofa cushions going "lalalalalalalalalalalalalala I can't hear you lalalalalalalalalala....."

Its KD huh?  On this affirmation, its too easy to say I can remember that as KD posts so little at DU, so I missed it.

I started as a believer, then became agnostic, and am now a believer once again.  That process was all more about following the quality of the arguments made pro and con on the subject.  Finally, the issue becomes what do you believe when you don't have the personal knowledge/expertise yourself to opine with any authority?

My travels in person and in the literature also tell me that AGW is with us.  You see it mentioned too often while unrelated subjects are the actual topic.  How to resolve it all?  I went with the constant rise in sea levels as a net/net/net proxy for all the conflicting "evidence" such as snow mass shrinking at he North Pole but growing in the South and "Its the worse winter we have every had...." and other idiots that can't tell the difference between WEATHER and CLIMATE (like everything important in life----its DEFINITIONAL!!!---ha, ha!).......etc.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level

Also, there is not one credible hypothetical as to what negates the warming effect of all the co2 that gets pumped into the atmosphere.  Not one.

So what we have here is a "religious" debate where qualified scientists who have spent their lives studying a subject have their confirmed and reviewed results negated by the ignorance and doubt of unqualified sheepherders or stargazers.

I wonder how many of the articles KD will provide will be blog posts by completely unqualified people, or the outliers/unqualified near scientists with an axe to grind or a pay check to cash?

Bring it on.

Edit--and I anticipates KD's other "error"---conflating the misuse of AGW to negate its truth==ie, Algore pushing AGW in order to make millions on Carbon Credits.  Those who think Carbon Credits are not the way to go (I agree its not as far as I know the various systems--too artificial and subject to corruption, did I mention Algore?) and so to defeat the Carbon Credits they CONFLATE various issues as wind up negating AGW which is a totally unrelated subject.  Tangential, but unrelated.  Its like saying cancer doesn't exist because too many frauds want to sell almond pit cures.  Almond pits don't cure cancer, cancer exists nonetheless.

KD--this is Scotts thread, but you do have allies on your side.  Skeptic and Guyver are both deniers.  They aren't posting at DU right now.  I wonder if they would enjoy a personal email invite?  Perhaps wait and see what you produce the first round or two?  MikeN also appears to be close to the subject, he has the lingo/some facts down for sure.

Move pass the AGW is valid piece to what the conclusion are if you take that as a given. I think that part is more fertile grounds my self. Here is a link to a real world effect of AGW according to National Geographic.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/05/bangladesh/belt-text

Is this the future or is this just a local phenomenon? telling the future isn't a science but on this issue everyone is certain about what the future holds...tough sell in my opinion if some one is arguing for a large change in my way of life.

KD--this is Scotts thread, but you do have allies on your side.  Skeptic and Guyver are both deniers.  They aren't posting at DU right now.  I wonder if they would enjoy a personal email invite?  Perhaps wait and see what you produce the first round or two?  MikeN also appears to be close to the subject, he has the lingo/some facts down for sure.

Oh please! I prey to the great unicorn (or any other non-existent being) that MikeN never finds his way here. He's as tenacious as I am while being deliberately and willfully ignorant of the facts. Let's not insult KD by putting him in that crowd! The gloves are off, indeed. But unearned sucker punches are not my style. It's bad enough I compared him unfavorably with the Vatican in the hopes of getting a rise out of him. I think he'll see that for what it is though, a challenge, not an outright insult of his intelligence.

Move pass the AGW is valid piece to what the conclusion are if you take that as a given. I think that part is more fertile grounds my self. Here is a link to a real world effect of AGW according to National Geographic.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/05/bangladesh/belt-text

Is this the future or is this just a local phenomenon? telling the future isn't a science but on this issue everyone is certain about what the future holds...tough sell in my opinion if some one is arguing for a large change in my way of life.

I'm having trouble parsing this into a coherent opinion on your part. Are you stating that if a scientist predicts that our sun will go nova (not supernova) in 4.5 billion years that the scientist is full of shit? What about if a scientist claims that our galaxy will merge with andromeda?

How about less certain things? If a doctor were to tell you that your cholesterol is 300 putting you at high risk of a heart attack, would you do something about it even if it meant large changes in your way of life? How about if it were as certain as very high blood pressure? Where would you draw the line?

I have diabetes. If a doctor were to tell me that there are small blood vessels in my eyes that might burst and blind me, I would probably get the laser therapy to zap them, even if it impacted my lifestyle.

Well, the doctor is saying that the earth has a horrible fever. Should we follow the course of treatment or wait and see what happens when it's left untreated?

Nice try at obscuring the point. Stick to AGW and see if the certainty is the same instead of the equvilency bs or do you think that some ones cholestrol is the same issue with the same level of study and coorelation of effect? The link I put in is a real world issue does it prove the AGW predictions or does it show that those effects are not as robust as predicted?

Scott--I didn't mean to pollute this thread by referencing MikeN.  You do crack me up--I have had the same reaction to Micky from time to time but still give him the benefit of a diminishing doubt.  You must have had more contact than myself although I didn't notice it.  Yes, a strange duck.  Very mechanical.  Can't tell if he is lying or a spam bot half the time, but "sometimes" he makes a point or two.  Well, I will not invite anyone here.  Its your thread.

Kvolk--your link to a National Geographic article that sites Bangladesh is predicted to be underwater years from now is completely irrelevant to the issue of providing evidence for or against GW or even AGW.  Please post back you understand that, or the "proof" that you think the glossy travel magazine contains, or please go away.

bobbo the only thing I "understand" is I am not interested in your rhertoric. please be quiet.

Kvolk==sadly that may be true.  Your article from Nat Geo had NOTHING to say on point regarding AGW.  Thats worse than saying nothing.

and yet you still talk....

Nice try at obscuring the point. Stick to AGW and see if the certainty is the same instead of the equvilency bs or do you think that some ones cholestrol is the same issue with the same level of study and coorelation of effect? The link I put in is a real world issue does it prove the AGW predictions or does it show that those effects are not as robust as predicted?

No. I think the link between cholesterol and heart disease is less obvious, less certain, and less well proven than the link between CO2 and climate change. The point was that you would probably take action, even if it meant a significant impact on your life, to lower your cholesterol if told that it were very high.