Climate Change and Food Supply

I'm well aware that global warming is happening, I just don't believe that it is nearly proven that humans are the cause. The scientific community is far from in full agreement (although dissent is suppressed, much like evolution).

A program aired on BBC's channel 4, The Great Global Warming Swindle, which presents the scientific case against human (and CO2) cause global warming.

"I just don't believe that it is nearly proven that humans are the cause."

To put it in starker terms, consider this "obvious" link:
It took billions of years to collect sunlight heat that is stored in oil and coal;
The billions-of-years heat collected is being mined, expended and released into the air in merely tens of decades;
This rapid short-term release of ancient stores of heat is causing climate heating;
HUMANS are mining the stored heat and releasing it. Not?

Question: "humans aren't the cause" of heat being dumped massively into the air? Isn't this an unreasonable denial of the obvious?

And over those billions of years, much of the earth's internal heat has been lost (the second law of thermodynamics). Indeed, as man is releasing all this energy, more of the earth's energy is lost.

Also, how do you account for the documented swings in temperature before man was capable of making a serious impact on the environment? IIRC, these primordial swings were much greater in magnitude that what we are talking about today, so what caused them?

The "obvious" only fits a narrow time frame, therefore is not a good model of climate changes in general. In mathematics this would be akin to finding that over a certain period the graph of x=y^2 is similar to that of x=y (both pass through (0,0) and (1,1)) but they are very dissimilar outside this range.

BTW, wasn't it proposed in the seventies (by scientists somewhat regarded as on the fringe) that more energy expenditure would prevent the impending Ice Age?

Within limits. Should we try to limit pollution? Sure. Should we prevent third world countries from developing because that would mean an increase in their pollution? No, their right to have electricity and running water out weighs the environmental concerns. Should we bind ourselves under an international treaty? No, even if we adopt all the measures of the treaty under national laws, our national sovereignty is threatened by too many treaties overriding our national laws.

Global treaties are just attempts to come together as a world community and attack a problem. Probably no issue more needs that approach than global warming. I am saddened to see you rule it out.

So much of what is asked for by global treaties can be (isn't always) good for the whole. I think that the Geneva Conventions are an example of global rules that were good for everyone and America used to see the sense of that.

You rule out global warming controls for the third world in the name of progress but China is a fine example of why infrastructure development and access to clean water ARE NOT mutually exclusive goals. In fact, China's ability to grow and create opportunity is being hindered by it's lack of clean air and clean water. Check out these two links:

http://www.enn.com/globe.html?id=1486 This is a Chinese environmental official saying that they just have to do better by the environment or it will limit their potential.

http://www.cfr.org/publication/7391/congressional_testimony.html This is 2004 testimony before congress on how China's progress has directly created environmental disaster that sooner or later must be reckoned with.

I would say a finer point is that the controls for the developing world need to be different than those for the developed world.

My husband visited China about 9 years ago now. He was appalled to see that much of the steel industry had been exported to China. We exported the industry to a country that essentially had no environmental controls. In the immediate sense, the costs to China have been immense. ANd while America can export the pollution, you cannot export the global impact. We all still suffer that.

You can cherry pick your stats and your experts but the real disagreements among scientists are not about whether there is a problem, it is more about the gravity and immediacy and how different causalities rank. Since the eco-system is a complex system, more than likely one causality is impacting but it is incredibly short sighted to discount man as a causality and not try to modify your own behavior. I like this quote from a NY Times article released at the time of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change from the article "World Scientists Near a Consensus on Warming" (January 30, 2007)
“We basically have three choices: mitigation, adaptation and suffering,” said John Holdren, the president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and an energy and climate expert at Harvard. “We’re going to do some of each. The question is what the mix is going to be. The more mitigation we do, the less adaptation will be required and the less suffering there will be.”

Sadly, it is a safe bet that a disproportionate share of the suffering will land on the poorest among us.

He's not the only one circulating a petition, and unlike his "do as i say, not as I do" approach, these people aren't just trying to create a scare: here is a scientific study that has gained the support of some 17,000 scientists.

The gentleman circulating the petition referenced here is a well known crackpot and veteran of many contrarian battles. He is a chemist, not a climatologist, and both the "scientific study" and the "petition" are well known frauds. Google the instigator, Dr. Arthur B. Robinson for all the fun details under the Sourcewatch entry. The shame of this is that the scientifically ignorant are easily drawn into the trap and they may have influence in helping to delay action on a very crucial problem.
Global Warming is not helpfully addressed by debate based on ignorance. Nor is it useful to get all warm and fuzzy about the environment.

Heartoday~ I think you might have misread (or misheard) Al Gore's invitation. You might have heard "scare", most of us others have heard "care".

"beware of wolves in dinosaur's clothing"

The looming ice age of the seventies has become the looming meltdown of the earth today. The scientific evidence is inconclusive at best. We know that the earth has gone through tropical ice ages long before the industrial revolution, and nature tends to be cyclic. Al Gore uses scare tactics to promote an agenda, one that he does not even live by, although he profits by it.

Heretoday,regardless of what you believe,regardless of what Al Gore believes,regardless of whether global warming is caused by human activity or animal flatulance,We can no longer take a chance on destroying or even damaging slightly the environment that we depend on. We need more oil like we need a hole in the head [I know it's a hackneyed saying ] Balanced ecology demands that we leave only footprints. Some years ago NCR had an article on a US sister who really preached ecology and the article also incorporated ideas she brought here from Sweden.I'd like to have the reprint.
I understand that the Irish government has initiated a program that establishes an energy footprint for every home. No home can be sold or rented without divulging this rating. The purpose is to protect people from extremes in utility billing. What would happen if the same system were developed here for autos? And if sales taxes and use taxes paid were tied to the results.

I agree we need to take better care of the environment then we have in the past, but I also think global warming is most likely a natural cycle that we have little impact on (remember the hole in the ozone layer?). I also think the desire to preserve the environment in the state in which we find it is flawed, as we know that the environment is constantly changing of its own accord (ie courses of rivers). Balanced ecology does not demand nothing but footprints, but that we replace what we use (for replaceable resources like forests), and use in moderation.

Here is a recent documentary presenting the evidence from my earlier link: Global Warming Swindle

A few years ago, as a museum curator of science, I mounted an exhibit displaying some very beautiful mineral crystals. The story told by the exhibit was one of geology. The intent was both esthetic and scientific. Using the beauty of the materials on display we were teaching science. To my astonishment and horror some new age crackpots in the community used the exhibit to promote their beliefs that crystals could cure cancer and other diseases. The impression was circulated that our exhibit was advancing the pseudo science of this superstitious belief system. The research director of a cancer institute informed me that she had sadly encountered the fatal effects of this crystal therapy and she helped us to add a message to the exhibit disavowing the validity of the crystal cure nonsense.

Now I see a similar pseudo science crowd climbing on a very shakey soapbox to preach their dangerous message. When they influence a member of Congress, who has a rather primative scientific background, to call the global warming crisis "the greatest fraud on mankind", we are looking at a disaster in the making.

If anyone calls this global warming message a "scare", I would agree fully! The projected consequences are very, very dire. In a nation like Bangladesh millions of people will be displaced merely by a small rise in sea level. The breadbaskets of the planet will be altered, tropical diseases will become endemic in temperate zones. A full list of the highly probable results boggles the mind.

Those who get a kick out of being contrarians (and I see a few on this site) seem able to sway the opinions of the uninformed who don't want to accept unpleasant and inconvenient truths anyway, but this is a victory that may have worldwide deadly consequences. They are playing a very dangerous game for all of us.