The deniers like Steve Fielding would say climate change can’t be real. (An ultra-conservative “becoming” a climate-change skeptic — who saw THAT coming?!)
After all, to take a simplistic view, if the planet were starting to heat up, we’d be seeing record low rainfall…
Melbourne has recorded its driest first six months of the year ever. — ABC, Jun 2009
…and there’d be record summer temperatures, both around the world…
Austin hit another record temperature Friday for the fourth day in a row. The weather sensors … registered 105 degrees. — CBS 42, Austin, Texas, USA, Jun 2009
June 2009 was the sunniest June in Victoria weather history. After bursting in with a trio of all-time temperature records on the second, third and fourth (the temperatures those days were 30.4, 31.3 and 30.9 degrees Celsius), the month kept on logging hours of sunshine. — Victoria Times Colonist, Victoria, BC, Canada, Jul 2009
…and here…
Melbourne has recorded its hottest day since records were first kept in the 1850s, when the temperature reached 46.4 just after 3pm. — TVNZ/AAP, Feb 2009
…with devastating consequences…
The Black Saturday bushfires, which erupted Feb. 7, killed up to 173 people and destroyed 2,000 homes in Australiaâs worst bushfire disaster. — Bloomberg, Jul 2009
Maybe, Steve, if you close your eyes and block your ears, you can keep pretending nothing’s happening.
17 replies on “It can’t be real”
For those who continue to believe we aren’t impacting the earth in a negative manner, I’ll plainly say you’re idiots. When I see this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming and read this “The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concludes that increasing greenhouse gas concentrations resulting from human activity such as fossil fuel burning and deforestation are responsible for most of the observed temperature increase since the middle of the 20th century.[” For some reason I tend to believe scientists rather than ultra conservative crackpots. For some strange reason, I wonder why. …
I find it amazing that someone can believe in God with no scientific proof yet faced with insurmountable scientific proof of climate change is a global warming denier. Long live the Flying Spaghetti Monster!
Well, there you have it. Inconclusive proof, eh? Oh wait, what’s that? The June 2009 trend is in (http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/uahncdc.lt) and the anomaly is +0.01 C for the last 30 years. So, yeah… inconclusive proof of GW. Yup. Oh, and hate to be the one to break this news to you, but the IPCC is largely made up of politicians, not scientists. LOL.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2009/07/uah-june-2009-anomaly-near-zero.html
You’re right, that’s a very simplistic view.
Just goes to show what a lack of science education does in helping peoples ignorance. Plus he seems to – like the others – assume that climate change results in everywhere being effected in exactly the same way at exactly the same time.
(And fall back on the “oh it’s rained, ‘glboal warming’ must be false” misconceptions)
Have a look at the summary of the very first IPCC report back in 1990 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_First_Assessment_Report and in the 19 years since then we have done nothing to try and reduce the problem. Very scary.
[Please note that I have added extra blank lines to Andrew’s comment to make it more readable. I have not changed any text. -Daniel]
I’ve taken some time from ironing my white robes and pointed hood while preparing my swastika flag for a Nuremberg-style rally to make a rebuttal of sorts.
Seriously now, Daniel, I wish to be respectful here, as I wish to have an open discourse, and I hope you do not take my comments as being hateful, as I do not always agree with you, but on many other things I do. As a conservative, I do object in the manner that you dismiss Steve Fielding as an “ultra-conservative”- does that mean you are an ultra-liberal? Why is it liberals are always espousing the notion of freedom of speech for all, except for the people who disagree with them? The fact that you also demean Fielding by calling him a “denier”, just because he questions the science behind the current theory of man-made climate change shows that you do not seem to be as willing to be open to all possibilities. Surely we are above name calling, aren’t we?
You cite one of the reasons that man-made global warming is absolute because the temperature on Black Saturday was 46.4C, which beat the previous high of Black Friday (13/1/1939) of 45.6C. So in other words, we had similar weather 70 years ago, just BEFORE the major industrialization of World War 2, which many people behind the Global Warming theory claim started it all.
You choose to use very selective information to highlight your point about warming, ironic that you choose to do so today, as THIS very morning was one of the coldest mornings in years, as those at Federation Square for the Michael Jackson funeral telecast can attest to:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25750435-2862,00.html
http://www.theage.com.au/national/frosty-night-as-melbourne-suburbs-drop-below-zero-20090708-dc7p.html
As human output of CO2 has steadily increased , the accepted theory is that temperature should rise with it- in other words, it shouldn’t be getting colder, should it? And to those who will use the explanation that Global Warming (or Climate Change, lose track with that! ) causes these cold snaps, do you realise how silly and desperate you sound?
And to Toria, the IPCC is not a scientific body, rather a political body. But fair enough though, maybe we should listen to the scientists, such as Al Gore, maybe!? Or how about Weather Channel founder John Coleman, famed astrophysicist Freeman Dyson, or botanist Dr. David Bellamy.
Heaven forbid Senator Fielding should take the time to actually question the evidence, as next month the Senate will vote on a bill which will tax energy use, without providing any real alternatives ( believe me, wind and solar will NEVER replace coal in terms of energy supply, but nuclear power will, cleanly, as France proves, but who cares about facts there right!? ), and as a result, will drive jobs in the energy and metals industries offshore, and for all those who claim “green jobs” will be created- many of them will be government bureaucrats employed to enforce these regulations!
To finish this topic, I would like you all to refer to a Time Magazine article from June 24, 1974, which talks about the then theory of CO2 causing GLOBAL COOLING:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944914,00.html
Goes to show how theories change over time! It also talks about solar activity, which is, in my humble opinion, the more likely cause of climate change, but I’m sure we’ll agree to disagree on that.
That’s enough out of me, and I know I’m going to be demonised and compared to a Holocaust denier, and all the other smears used against skeptics, but I felt I should offer a defense, as we are not evil fascists, just people with a differing opinion, who feel that replacing all our incandescent light bulbs with fluorescent lights (which contain mercury, poisonous for the environment, I believe!?) will not save the planet.
Thankyou Daniel, for providing me with a forum in which I could express my opinions, which I know you disagree with, as I feel there should be more open discussion on all sides, as the debate is NOT over!
On a lighter note Daniel, you never expressed your opinion on the last Star Trek movie- will you post a column on it in the future, as I would like to hear your opinion of it! I thought it was great, but I’ll leave my opinion for a possible future post. Thankyou.
A few points…
Dave, the question of faith and scientific evidence is an interesting one, which I intend to blog about one of these days.
Lex, yes, I always look for impartial opinions on climate change from conservative physicists, especially ones who try and reference communism in a post about climate. What’s so special about thirty years, anyway?
Andrew, thanks for the thoughtful, witty and extensive comment.
– Am I an ultra-liberal? I don’t know. I’d like to think I defy categorisation! Fielding is to the right of the mainstream conservative parties in Australia. To my mind that makes him an ultra-conservative.
– I didn’t actually mention man-made global warming. That requires another level of debate. Perhaps I implied it by mentioning Fielding, but that wasn’t intentional.
– Yep, it was selective examples. This morning’s weather was cold, but is anybody anywhere claiming it’s some kind of record? “Coldest in years” doesn’t really mean anything.
– Sure, Coleman, Dyson, Bellamy and no doubt others are questioning it. But the counter to that is something someone pointed me to on Wikipedia (the usual caveats about using Wikipedia apply): The finding that the climate has warmed in recent decades and that this warming is likely attributable to human influence has been endorsed by every national science academy that has issued a statement on climate change, including the science academies of all of the major industrialized countries. At present, no scientific body of national or international standing has issued a dissenting statement.
– Yeah I forgot to blog about the Star Trek movie. Thanks for the reminder!
Nice research and Links Daniel but really, anyone can find information anywhere to support their theory. It would take me 5 mins online to compile news headlines that totally contradict what you just posted. As Phillip said, a very simplistic view.
You asked, “What’s so special about thirty years, anyway?” You should ask your fellow GW theorists because that is the number of years they use to show the current warming trend (if they went back further than 30 years the trend would actually be cooling and we can’t have that). Since you like the anecdotal evidence to support your GW theory, how about this: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/weather/chi-wx-weathersummary0701jul01,0,5116700.story ?
Sorry if I came off sounding like a ranty bitch. I didn’t mean to. Just bothers me, indeed that we are definitely seeing something “odd”. Sticking our heads in the sand, fingers in our ears, and saying lalalala, nothing is happening isn’t going to help us.
Just a quick follow up ( I really mean it!!). The way it is generally defined amongst us, being conservative means wanting smaller government (ie. less intrusion), lower taxes, less spending, believer in the free markets, strong national defense, traditional values and self-reliance! A simplistic view, yes! Does that mean an ultra-conservative is really tight with money? You might be right!!!
I did a post about this issue here http://toriauru.blogspot.com/2009/07/our-weather-and-its-oddness.html
The effects of global warning not only spread over the australia but also the whole world.
Andrew, those sound more libertarian values than conservative. Mostly.
Re global warming, aka climate change, etc. There’s a lot of talk about it, but there seems to be little action at a personal level. How many tonnes of CO2 have you emitted, compared to the same time last year? 20% less, which seems to be what the people want the country to do? Probably not, after all, it is easier to buy ‘indulgences’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indulgence
I second Andrew here — if climate change skeptics pick out local examples of low temperatures then the credulists leap on their backs with cries of ‘bias!’ and ‘unrepresentative!’, but when credulists do exactly the same thing everyone nods their heads wisely and says ‘Just so’ and ‘Exactly’.
I will concede, if you like, that the northern hemisphere MAY be warming; but if the southern hemisphere is warming then someone forgot to tell Antarctica, where the sea ice cover is roughly the same as it was in 1979:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.south.jpg
And the overall planet? Just about flat since 2000:
http://rankexploits.com/musings/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/recenttrends.jpg
— look for the heavy purple line.
I think regardless of whether you “believe” in global warming or climate change, you can’t deny that being more environmentally conscious, and making decisions based on things other than being cheap and convenient is important…
Certainly the concept of GW is a political one, and trying to find an impartial “authority” on the subject is impossible.