Canada Convinces Commonwealth To Do Nothing About Global Warming
After a round of talks this week amongst the 52 Commonwealth nations, member states have agreed to do nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The so-called "Lake Victoria Commonwealth Climate Change Plan" points out the seriousness of the earth warming but recommends no targets or time-lines for tackling greenhouse gas reduction.
In other words, they recognize that global warming will cause mass hardship for most species on the planet, yet as world leaders they are not willing to actually do anything.
Prior to the talks this week, most of the member states were in agreement that binding targets and clear timelines were necessary in any new climate plan. However, the sole holdout in the agreement moving forward was the right-wing Canadian government under the direction of Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
In the past Canada's Harper has described the Kyoto Protocol as "a socialist scheme that will destroy jobs." This despite polls in Canada showing the number one concern for Canadians being the environment and in particular, climate change.
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Understanding science
Given how much work needs to be done to deal with global warming and Peak Oil, I don't know whether it's worthy spending so much of even "free" blog time debating climate change deniers like Gary.
What is striking about climate deniers is their failure to explain why the most thorough, ongoing review of the climate issue, the IPCC process, has reached more and more alarming conclusions over the years, culminating in the most recent report this fall. The uncertainties of the first IPPC report have been slowly falling away as more and more data come in. Does this mean that we now completely understand what is happening with climate change and greenhouse gases?
Absolutely not. There are undoubtedly many surprises yet to come.
But given that the most rigorous scientific review shows that the problem is worse than we thought it was a decade ago, it then becomes incumbent on political leaders to act in such a way as to mitigate the threat. Failure to do otherwise is a crime against humanity. As the IPCC is warming, unless global warming is slowed, hundreds of millions of human beings will be affected negatively, with the impact falling most heavily on the poor, those most unable to help themselves mitigate the damage.
Thanks, Richard
for re-centring the discussion. A much better use of our time would be to convey our outrage to our ventriloquist of a Prime Minister and his current dummy/Environment Minister before the conference in Bali. A Globe & Mail poll yesterday got nearly 13,000 responses, 60% of whom disapprove of Harper's stance on global warming. Given the loose cannons & reactionary whack jobs who regularly post comments to their stories on AGW, I think it's safe to say the G&M readership reflects the full range of opinion on the subject, which gives the poll greater credibility than it might otherwise have. The Canadian people as a whole are mortified at being represented on the world stage by this denialist.
Harper's position is SO outrageous, I am left wondering whether he is doing it to force Dion's hand to bring down the government and force an election. If Dion doesn't move a vote of no-confidence, Harper can claim he's a hypocrite. On the other hand, if Dion seizes the day, it just might backfire on Harper. Look what's just happened in Australia. The fact that the PM has also been hinting that Canada would "step out of the background" in the case of a US war with Iran is also a wild miscalculation of public opinion. If an election were called, it might not be the cakewalk Harper expects.
Forgive me if I am overly optimistic that this could be the beginning of the end for "Steve". I can dream, can't I?
This is absolutely
This is absolutely appalling. What Harper has done is the most retrograde and flies in the face of the science. He has rejected science which is about as airtight as the existence of gravity.
Enough is enough. The Conservative government must fall and lose the election that follows. They have damaged Canada's reputation with respect to climate change.
p.s. This is not coming from a "true lefty", of which Gary refers. There are a couple of good things the Conservatives have done. However, the bad outweighs the good. Therefore, their government must fall.
Actually Harper is relying
Actually Harper is relying on real science as oposed to the psudo science of notbars like Gore.
Like I said. Do some research.
AGW does not stand real scientific scrutiny. It is a Socialist scam.
Period.
Real science
Are you referring to these "pseudo scientists"?
http://www.logicalscience.com/consensus/consensus.htm
Concensus is by definition
Concensus is by definition psudo science.
You have just shown that you know nothing about science
Why don't you come up with something original? Everything you have posted on this thread is the regurgitated nonsense from a host of pseudo (note the spelling) science sites. What part of the science of AGW do you not understand? I would be glad to help you understand some of the things which you seem to be confused about.
Do you understand how CO2 is a green house gas? Are you convinced that CO2 is a green house gas?
Are you convinced that CO2 is increasing? Do you know how we know that fossil carbon is accumulating in the atmosphere? Do you realize that models are designed using the basic chemical and physical properties of CO2 and other gases? Do you realize that models are actually used to predict and have a good success rate?
These are some of the elementary questions that the real scientists have answered over the past 100 or so years, yes green house gas theory is that old.
I look forward to your answers and any questions you may have which will allow you to see that the people you have been relying on in the past are just not being honest in what they are saying.
Ian Forrester
Hey .... Want to see
Hey .... Want to see somthing really entertaining?
Here is a site that lists all the things that Global Warming Causes.
Its histerical!
Seas get saltier, see get less salty. seas rise, seas lower. Even a shortage of Hookers in Europe.
there is no end to the sillyness......
Take peek.... I know you wanna!
Opps. Was laughing and
Opps. Was laughing and forgot to post the link.
http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm
Are you twelve years old,
Are you twelve years old, Gary?
early fifties actually. And
early fifties actually.
And yes I personally remember the comming Ice age.
This is such fun.
You sound like a certain guy
You sound like a certain guy who has been repeatedly debunked and has no peer-reviewed publishing history on the subject of the science of climate change, but still makes the odd speech for the Frontier Centre for Public Policy and the Fraser Institute and is a member of Not Really Science People.
God no... Just an IT admin
God no... Just an IT admin from Canada.
I just enjoy poking at AGW believers to what clever nonsence they can conjor up.
Since I am now convinced it is a scam I don,t take any of this seriously.
Seen it all before.
In a few years we will all laugh together. If we don,t destroy our economies first that is.
Have a good one and lighten up
Its all natueal.
excuse spelling... on phone pc at airport.
So you don't mind that your
So you don't mind that your comments make you look stupid?
You can lead a horse to water...
But you can't make him drink....especially when you're working with the wrong end of the horse...
I tend to believe that Gary is astroturfing...nobody can be that dense.
Its not original because AGW
Its not original because AGW is an old outdated theory based on flawed hypothises.
CO2 is a minor greenhouse gas yes. Water vapor is a major GHG.
CO2 is increasing. So what, it has done so many times in the past. To levels many times todays I might add.
Again, all old news.
Models however do NOT accurately predict the climate. Until they can account for clouds they are merely rough approximations. (very rough)
And yes AGW is over 100 years old. Infact the first "the wourld is ending from Global warming" story was written back in the 1890s. ( and again in the 1920s, and again in the late thirties, and again.......)
Old news indeed.
Why have you not answered my questions?
Gary, if you want to be taken seriously and not as a 12 year old (I think that is a bit older than you actually portray) then have a proper discussion and argument based on facts, not the verbal diarrhea you have found on those rightwingnut websites. You have not offered one shred of any proof for your statements, thus I assume you are not a scientist. As such, you should start following the science and not the political rhetoric emanating from those pseudo-science sites.
Are you unable to answer simple questions concerning the science of AGW or are you deliberately avoiding the answers? If it is the former, then please let us know and we will be willing to educate you on the finer points of climate science. If it is the latter, then crawl back under the rock you have spent the last 50 years or so (if we are to believe that you are not 12 or younger).
Ian Forrester
Ian.... Get real. This is a
Ian.... Get real.
This is a blog. there is no credible science here.
Anything I could post would be proclaimed to be:
Pseudo science, from a shill, Debunked by Realclimate (like they are some sort of authority) or what ever.
The bottom line is that you have no credible science to back the AGW theory. If you did it would no longer be a theory. And don't even attempt to claim you have some proof, there is none.
There are many theories that adequatley explane the small warming that occured last century. ONly sheer Hubris would decry that Man made Co2 caused it all.
When there is proof, I will believe. Until then, true scientific method demands skeptisism.
Well that ends the fun. No point in poking my stick any more.
Have a good one.
Nothing like an open mind
You definitely have an open mind. Too bad that your brain fell out when you opened it.
I suggest remedial courses in basic physics, chemistry and logic, then come back and we will see if you have improved.
Ian Forrester
Gary neglects to mention
that in the 100 years or so since the theory was first proposed, it has never gone away (like the 1970s new ice age scare did, for instance), but rather has become better documented, more widely studied, more understood, and above all more widely accepted among the scientific community. If anything, this shows its growing credibility and validity as a theory. You would think that if it had none, it would have died an ignominious death long ago under all of this intensive scrutiny.
Gore's science?
It's not Gore's science, it is the conclusion of massive amounts of research carried out by climate scientists around the world, going back decades. Where have you been doing your research? I suppose every national science institution and peer-reviewed journal is in on the scam as well?
Harper is standing all alone in the corner of a very large room full of people who also have access to the "real science", and they have all come to a starkly different conclusion. And BTW, so have most Canadians.
Sadly, I have to agree that
Sadly, I have to agree that most Canadians have swallowed the scam hook line and sinker.
If only more of them would read a bit instead of just accepting what ever the CBC BBC and CNN feed them.
For a start, try following the money. You will find it leads directly to Gore, soon to be the richest ex-vice in history. All from suckers that willingly buy carbon credits.
Like Barnum said, there's one born every minute.
(every 30 seconds in Canada it would seem)
Actually,
what I've been reading is the science. I don't watch the news as a rule. And Gore was independently wealthy before he began doing his Inconvenient Truth lectures.
If you are interested in facts rather than conspiracy theories, and scientific research as opposed to hidden agendas, there is a wealth of material available. Peer-reviewed journals are a good place to start, and the web sites of climate scientists whose work is published in those journals rather than in the Canada Free Press. Then there are the national science academies of just about every developed country on the planet. Just a few ideas.
But Chrichton wrote a novel blah blah blah
No Femack, follow the money (but not fossil fuel industry money, the other money!) and you'll see it's just a communist plot schemed by a select few to make a lot of money! Them commies are clever -- Tyndall fudged his results 150 years ago to trick us into thinking that more greenhouse gases will increase the greenhouse effect. But follow the money and you'll see that Karl Marx teamed up with American politicians to pay Tyndall to change the properties of trace gases. It's clear to anyone whose mommy read "State of Fear" to them at bedtime.
My bad
What WAS I thinking????
Gary, back up your claims.
Gary, back up your claims. Show us what you have been reading; give us references and links.
OK... But you won't like
OK... But you won't like it!!
(if indeed you even look at any of it)
Start here:
http://www.fcpp.org/main/media_file_detail.php?StreamID=718
Then look at:
http://mysite.verizon.net/mhieb/WVFossils/PageMill_Images/image277.gif
Then read this:
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/
Then Review this:
http://www.norcalblogs.com/watts/weather_stations/
Then see why the Mann Hockey stick is an outright Fraud:
Here: http://www.john-daly.com/hockey/hockey.htm
And Here:http://climateaudit.org/
Then see that the MWP really was warmer than today:
http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/Index.jsp
Then review peer reviewed papers that you won't here about from the MSM here:
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs
Then keep up with new developments Here:
http://www.icecap.us/
and Here: http://antigreen.blogspot.com/
Then read a letter from:
An email from Roger Helmer [roger.helmer@europarl.europa.eu], Conservative Member of the European Parliament
You may be interested in the letter below which I sent today to the Environment Editor of the Daily Telegraph, Charles Clover:
Dear Charles,
I was surprised to read in your piece in the DT yesterday that "no politician from a British party would side with the flat-earthers" (in your charming phrase) in the climate debate. I am afraid you are wrong. I myself have been campaigning against climate alarmism for some time. Only in April I conducted a major and very successful conference presenting the case against global warming hysteria, here in the European parliament in Brussels. My key-note speaker was former Chancellor Lord Lawson of Blaby, who shares my view on the issue. I also took the issue to a packed fringe meeting at the Conservative Party Conference in October.
The evidence shows that climate drives CO2 levels, not vice versa. And as an erstwhile mathematician, I know that the climate forcing effect of atmospheric CO2 is not linear, and certainly not exponential (as hinted at in Al Gore's mendacious disaster movie). It is logarithmic. We are already well up the curve, and further increases in CO2 levels will have a marginal effect on climate.
In the eighteenth century William Herschel showed that sunspots drive the price of wheat. We can now explain this phenomenon -- sunspots lead to an increase in the Sun's magnetic field, which reduces the cosmic ray flux in our upper atmosphere and reduces cloud formation, leading to warmer weather, higher crop yields and lower grain prices. Yet now you describe those who recognise that the Sun drives climate as "flat-earthers".
You would do well to read your fellow columnist Jan Moir in today's paper. "I've yet to meet the person, politician or otherwise, who takes carbon emissions seriously". This is my experience. While organisations, companies, political parties and the media buy into climate alarmism at the official level, I am astonished by the large numbers of well-informed people who admit privately that it's nonsense. This is a scare like the Millennium Bug. We shall look back from the cold winters of the 2020s and be astonished at our gullibility.
To be fair, the Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph have given a good platform to the other side of the debate. But I am disappointed that you personally seem to see no need to report in a balanced way, but have chosen to act as a cheerleader for the alarmists.
That would be a small start:
Then remember the words of Maurice Strong, the Canadian archetect of the Kyoto Potocol:
"Isn't the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn't it our responsibility to bring that about?"
and the words of a former Canadian Environment Minister:
"No matter if the science is all phony, there are collateral environmental benefits...climate change provides the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality in the world" Christine Stewart
Enough for now....
That's a carefully selected
That's a carefully selected list of sites there. You've obviously done your homework.
Unfortunately, I don't see a lot of (if any) real science in these sites. The arguments put forward in this list of sites have been refuted elsewhere by *real* climate scientists, not Senate aides or think tank denizens. There are plenty of links on DeSmog you can follow.
So why don't you show us some real peer-reviewed research. I didn't come across anything new in James Inhofe's blog, just the usual pseudo-science.
Perhaps that's because the science supports AGW?
;)
Gary, thanks for your hard
Gary, thanks for your hard work in providiing all those links. I did look quickly at some such as CO2 Science which has Craig D. Idso as Chairman. I'm sorry, but those sources are not very credible. For the real science, try
http://www.realclimate.org/
and the links there, as well as the links here at DeSmogBlog. And the IPCC report which is by real scientists.
Oh yes, and the Maurice Strong quote was about him speculating about a scenario for a novel, duwing an interview with Daniel Wood in 1990 for West Magazine. We talked about it here a few months ago.
Realclimate.org is real
Realclimate.org is real science?
That is Michael Mann's site.
Those guys still defend the Hockey stick for goodness sake.
Credible? matter of opinion.
Good grief, Gary!!!
That hockey stick business is SO OLD! Where have you been? We are WAY beyond that now. I think you have some catching up to do. Come back when you've done the reading.
Actually not. Realclimate
Actually not. Realclimate is even now trying to defend the Fraud of the HS. ClimateAudit and CO2 Science are showing daily research that completely disproves it.
I mention it because it is one of the main pillers of AGW.
Without the HS, much of the theory is meaningless.It is Still very current.
BTW, Have a look at the NOAA and NASA temp charts for the last 10 years. You will notice that the warming has leveled off. Hmmmmmm.
As for the sites I offered being credible? It seems that the AGW definition of credible is "if it agrees with AGW it is, If it dissagrees, it is not".
With that critera, you might as well join the green party. your mind is closed.
What I am finding
at RealClimate is a lot of articles that neatly pick apart claims from various sources that the "hockey stick" is flawed. Having checked the sources, I conclude that they don't stand up to the critique, and certainly don't "completely disprove it."
As for the NOAA and NASA temperature charts, raw data (out of context) for one country that occupies about 6.5% of the total area of the earth is no way to prove or disprove anything about GLOBAL warming.
As for the credibility of the sites you offer, I prefer to go to the source (see my post below 2007-11-25 @ 17:59, "Actually . . .").
I conclude the oposite! so
I conclude the oposite! so what?
Of course you will look at the same charts and see impending disaster. I see a mild natural warming that has ended and started into a cooling.
I prefer my sites to yours. Surprise surprise.
You are proclaiming just like Realclimate. They print an opinion and proclaim it to be fact and you believe it.
I don't.
But do keep believing, I am sure it makes you feel good to be "Saving the Planet" LOL.
have a good one.
Hey Gary. None of the
Hey Gary. None of the "science" which you cite has passed peer-review. It's all pseudo-science from 21st Century Science and Technology and Energy and Environment, which are not recognized as peer-review journals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/21st_Century_Science_and_Technology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_and_Environment
Do yourself a favour and read the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report. It is the largest peer-reviewed scientific study in human history.
Sorry to be short. On my
Sorry to be short. On my phone at airport.
I rest my case. All you can do is attempt to discredit. Ie: Don't agree=pseudo science.
I don't trust IPCC, being ivvestigated for fraud. Not credible. Political body with clear agenda.
Realclimate= clear agenda. Just opinions.
Bottom line = GW is clearly natural and pretty much done. Time will verify.
Have good one
Fraud??
Sorry, pal. Even if you are waiting for a plane you are going to have to be more specific.
And you STILL can't claim that the majority of the sites you listed have any claim to scientific validity. They are blogs run not by climate scientists but by persons not in the field AT ALL. If you are going to claim that there is plenty of science to back your claim that GW is natural, then the sites that you cite to support your position should be run by people who are SCIENTISTS. That seems to me a no-brainer. It's perfectly valid, if you set these people up as "experts," for me to point out that they are NO SUCH THING. Go ahead and rest your case. I say there's no case to answer.
No surprise to me
Of course you prefer your sites to mine. They reassure you and let you carry on in denial. But I suspect that you don't know how to read those charts (neither do I -- I rely on the people who interpret the data in the correct scientific context AND in combination with the GLOBAL record). And as I said, they represent only 6.5% of the total surface area of the earth.
I am not proclaiming anything, and RealClimate doesn't print "opinions," they post the results and conclusions of their first-hand, primary scientific research that has been reviewed by a board of peers (climate scientists)before publication. Carries a bit more weight than op-ed pieces in the popular press.
Now, let's go through that list of web sites, shall we?
1. Dennis T. Avery, co-author of Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years, has published no peer-reviewed research on climate change. Fred Singer, the other author, has actually published a fair number (45) peer-reviewed articles on climate change. However, his objectivity has been called into question due to his connections first with the tobacco lobby and then with Exxon. He is also linked to the Oregon Petition and the "Leipzig Declaration" scams, which suggests to me that he has only a passing acquaintance with the concept of Truth.
2. Nice graph. Pretty colours, no source cited. The main page was last updated in October 2007, but the graphs and data are all reproduced from reports published during the 1990s (in one case, the 1980s!), and the most recent from 2001 -- all wildly out of date. The quotations are all plucked from the work of known climate change skeptics, but the site has been assembled by Monte Hieb (chief engineer for the West Virginia Office of Miner’s Safety) and Harrison Hieb. They are NOT climate scientists.
3. World climate report looks pretty good.
4. Anthony Watts is Chief Meteorologist for KPAY-AM radio, and although his photographs of data collection stations is interesting, the issue of station location has been discussed at length, and such things as variations due to urban heat islands and other variables are routinely taken into account when analyzing the data.
5. John L. Daly (The `Hockey Stick':A New Low in Climate Science) was not a climate scientist -- not even close. He was a high school economics and electronics teacher with no training in climate science.
6. ClimateAudit is run by Stephen McIntyre, a former mining executive whose education was in the areas of mathematics (UofT), and philosophy, politics and economics (Oxford) -- it is a blog run by a climate science skeptic with no background in climatology.
7. The Project Overview of the MWP Project states its purpose is to ultimately provide sufficient real-world evidence to convince most rational people that the Medieval Warm Period was: (1) global in extent, (2) at least as warm as, but likely even warmer than, the Current Warm Period, and (3) of a duration significantly longer than that of the Current Warm Period to date. Sounds to me as though they have made up their minds before the data is in.
8. I won't even bother to comment on anything posted by Marc Morano on a page titled "The Inhofe EPW Press Blog." If you don't know why, you need to do a lot more reading.
9. Which brings us to IceCap. Been there. I don't have time or space to go through all of the issues I have with their list of experts and the quality of their work.
10. The antigreen blogspot is run by a retired psychology & sociology teacher with no background in climate science. I pulled this from another part of his site: It's the shared hatred of the rest of us that unites Islamists and the Left. Yep. I'm really likely to take this guy seriously . . .
So, Gary -- I've gone to every site you've listed. I see nothing convincing, and very little science. I'll stick with the peer-reviewed journals, the real climate scientists, and continue to follow the science, thanks.
The scientists who write
The scientists who write articles for Realclimate have been studying climate science for many years. You don't become a scientist by visiting a few internet sites, Gary. You have to spend a long time at it, building your knowledge, discussing and arguing, and publishing your work where your peers can read it and point out any errors.
The difference is that they know what they are talking about. The junky websites you reference cast serious doubt on your judgment and knowledge of climate science.
You Know.... The only thing
You Know....
The only thing I hoped to accomplish by posting all those links, was to show that there is a lot happening in the world that you will never see in the MSM. Some of it is Bull, a lot of it is very good science.
AGW believers will generally dismiss all of it out of hand. Even if you do, at least if you are exposed to it, you can say you are informed. If you never look, all you can say is that you believe.
Kind of like Creation Science in many ways.
None of this is important in any way however since what will be WILL BE; like it or not.
keep reading and
have a great day.
If you read it you will see
If you read it you will see that they are discussing the science, not indulging in political posturing or conspiracy thinking.
Then go outside and look at the world around you. Ask older people how the weather now is different than it used to be. The Arctic ice is melting more, animal, plant and insect species are moving north as it gets warmer. In North America we are getting drier summers and more rain in winter when we don't need it for crops. These things are happening, and not because of some conspiracy.