Sadly, while Bill is right, you can't ignore the facts forever, it's already been shown that they can ignore the facts long enough to make solving the problems nearly impossible.

He might be able to prove that global climate is changing, but he can't prove that anyone can do anything about it. Until then, the gov't will take your money until they can come with the next fucking crisis.

They would do much better if they responded to the skeptics in the scientific literature. Short of that, "OMG Climate Change!" will get exactly zero traction in terms of pragmatic solutions and remain a political football for the foreseeable future.

Yeah, except it's not "OMG Climate Change!", it's "OMG, Idiots and Liars!"
Skeptics simply don't (or can't) read scientific literature, that's why they're still skeptic.
Removing the disingenuous and the politically quasi-educated from the discussion is the only way to gain 'traction'.

Sorry, but yes he has proven that anyone can do something about it.
Because it's caused mostly by individual people's actions, we can stop adding to the problem.
Individuals are really the ONLY one's doing anything about it in the US so far.
You denier people are ridiculous, first there's no problem, then there may be, but it's not caused by people, then there is a problem caused by people, but there's no solution. Just leave the grown up table and go back to the kids where your position can at least get ear time. The adults are working on actually solving problems and you aren't helping.

Why don't you tell it to the significant number of scientists who don't believe it? Huh? Go ahead, take your best shot.

If they don't all believe it, why should I?

What an idiot. Yes, the temps have been up for a while. Just like we've had mini-ice ages and mini-bumps throughout history. Look at geology reports (oh, wait, he's only a mechanical engineer.) Nothing new here, folks. Yes, we're pumping out carbon dioxide. So did volcanos in the distant past. So what? We've got a lot of buffer called the ocean. Lastly, Dr. Nye, two coincident facts don't show causality. Oh, you wear a bow-tie, you must be smart. See? Classic example of two facts that are coincident but not related. Except for the you're being smart part. That part isn't true. Michael Crichton had it right in State of Fear.

Yeah and when emissions from volcanoes (among other things) got out of control:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian%E2%80%93Triassic_extinction_event

The oceans aren't going to save us and, if anything, might be affected the most by increased CO2 in the atmosphere: http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/co2/story/What+is+Ocean+Acidification%3F.

I really don't see why it is such a bad idea to attempt to reduce harmful emissions around the globe - it can only benefit us in the long run and we have the technology to do so. But it will cost big dollars that citizens and, in particular, corporations are unwilling to part with. If we continue the way we are though, in another 100-200 years it might be too late.

you mean the 3 out of 97 that don't believe?

good luck with that. Great plan you have there. I'm sure you could go beat up the 97 cuz you're such a tough guy.

so angry...so stupid

@A-Winston @lantern53

Have you ever heard of the Dunning-Kruger effect?

I'll simplify it for you - those who are not well educated in a subject greatly overestimate their ability at the subject, because they don't know all of the things that they don't know.

Those who are better educated in a subject greatly underestimate their ability at the subject, because they know how complicated it is.

Now you two don't know about science, and that's ok - that's not an insult and i don't want any of this to be insulting. But it is meant to be a reminder that you are talking about one of if not the most technical and complicated abstract subjects that we as a species pursue. If you don't even understand the "scientific method" (a distinct term) and how the "scientific community" (another distinct term) works and comes to consensus, how can you possibly hope to decipher fact (science) from fiction (propaganda)?

I keep having to post this, but i'll do it again. The scientific community is made up of all kinds of people such as university lecturers and students (yes, your kids might be part of the community), amateur scientists, people at research institutions.... anyone who cares enough to approach things methodically and systematically, anyone interested in finding out as much as we possibly can about everything we can. Real science does not get paid based on results - the funding is provided for the research and the research finds whatever it finds. You can't lie about science, because other anal bastards (far worse than me) are just waiting to find something wrong with it and pillory it. That's how the scientific community works, it's like internet comments only worse. You can't get away with doing bad science for long.

Most people in scientific research do not have a lot of money, do you understand that? I can tell you right now - i contribute to scientific papers and such, so that makes me part of the scientific community. I'm just a post-grad student living on a student loan and doing something that i enjoy. My lecturers make a living, but they are not well-off by any means. We also suffer tax when politicians take our evidence and twist it in front of our faces. And we're left standing here, exasperated, wondering why you'd listen to non-experts over experts. If your doctor said you had diabetes, you wouldn't ask a politician to confirm it? If you want a scientific opinion, consult the scientific community.

I would love you to ask yourself the following question; "What do i really know about the scientific community and the scientific method?" Because if you took half an hour one day to go to an accredited university and ask the science department about how science works, how consensus is formed, and what makes good scientific practice, you'd be able to rid yourselves of these myths that somehow all scientists (i.e. average people, doing scientific research for the sake of science) are in some kind of club or gang or being paid to say that humans are causing climate devastation. The reason the majority of people say that is because the science speaks for itself and is not open to interpretation. The facts are facts.

Are you really thinking this through?

I want to show you one final thing, and it comes from the wikipedia page on Scientific method (which i recommend you read to avail yourself about which you speak, please don't speak from ignorance).

"The chief characteristic which distinguishes the scientific method from other methods of acquiring knowledge is that scientists seek to let reality speak for itself, supporting a theory when a theory's predictions are confirmed and challenging a theory when its predictions prove false."

The science speaks for itself, and i recommend you start listening to real scientists. Why prefer the opinion of a few individuals who are either flawed in their scientific reasoning or flat out being paid to lie? The scientific community is in full agreement.

Edit: Sorry for the long post, but you're talking about something you don't understand and it exasperates me. You wouldn't come here and talk about the details of internal medicine, but you're quite happy to tell a scientist, to his face, that he doesn't know science.

@Trancecoach - they respond in literature all the time. A scientist's response is to prove it, scientifically. They do, and are, all the time. But most people do not understand science and those that do still find scientific papers daunting and difficult to follow. People like the two i mentioned above, they don't have a hope in hell of understanding the source of the information, and they sadly look to the wrong people to explain it to them.

@A-Winston @lantern53

Here is another fantastic wikipedia article that i highly recommend you read closely.

Note that not a single scientific institution is in any doubt about the points made on that page about climate change. The last group that rejected any of the points (the American Association of Petroleum Geologists no less; one of the most biased-looking on the page and in clear opposition to the consensus) had to, in 2007, accept that the evidence was making them look foolish, and took a "non-committal" stance... whatever that means. A very unscientific conclusion to make - the conclusion should state what the results stated and most importantly be free of opinion. For example you'd get roasted alive for writing "95% probability, so it's quite likely!" in a university science report - italicised bit is clearly an opinion, and is scientifically meaningless.

Read the bit about consensus. Read the bit about peer reviewed research being conducted by lecturers and students at universities around the world.

I'm genuinely trying to help you understand how scientific consensus works, please give this a look. If you're worried about wikipedia you can check the citations, i've given it a look and the sources look reliable, and you can let me know if you've got any doubts about any and i'll take a look for you and discuss it with you in private if you like. Genuinely want to help if i can.

Please don't call them skeptics. They're not. Skepicism is the questioning of ideas or beliefs until presented with evidence that supports them, and it's a Good Thing(tm).

With climate change, there is overwhelming evidence to show that it's real, it's happening now and it's man made.

The people that don't accept it aren't skpetics, they're in denial. We don't call creationists "evolution skeptics", don't give AGW deniers a more elevated position.

Oh, and @A-Winston, you won't believe Nye because he's "only a mechanical engineer" (ignoring the 97% of actual climate scientists that agree with him) but you're perfectly happy to believe an author (someone who makes up stories for a living!) and whose book is full of

flawed or misleading presentations of Global Warming science exist in the book, including those on Arctic sea ice thinning, correction of land-based temperature measurements for the urban heat island effect, satellite vs. ground-based measurements of Earth's warming, and controversies over sea level rise estimates

Climate change deniers are cavemen

...bye bye Neanderthals, enjoy playing with your guns.

Another great source from ChaosEngine's link. This actually has a drop down menu that allows you to select any part of the scientific report, or a simplified summary for non-technical people.

There is an absolute wealth of clear and hard scientific information in there. If you find a problem with any of the science then i highly recommend you write your own paper about the problem and submit to have it peer reviewed. I think it would be a great lesson for @A-Winston and @lantern53 both to go through the peer review process and see how easy/hard it is to submit incorrect science. And also to see how bad science is treated - not with insults, or rage like the internet community, but with simple facts and evidence like a professional community.

So there are 97 "scientists" that say unequivocally the sky is falling and you are buying it.

How many Climate Scientists are there in the world? Surly more than 100. What about the other 200 - 300 scientists? Do they agree?
This Carbon dioxide you claim to be the doom of man, how can you differentiate between man made and naturally made?

If you really care about this then ride a bicycle and eat only locally grown food and cut you electricity. Go live "3rd world" and leave reasonable men knowledge in peace.

I'm all for cutting fossil fuel and going "greener" but it has to be cost effective.

Who is going to buy a Chevy Volt at 60K when you can get a gas car for 30K.
Oh wait the Chevy volt was a financial disaster because it cost too much.

What happens when the coal fired electric plants stop producing electricity due to government "green" requirements that they can't meet and you electric bill goes up 30%? are you cool with that?


I think it will take 50 more years to get to cost effective "green" technologies.
Until then keep strong in your 3rd world hut..

I'll invite you over to my electric air conditioned house. I'll even pick you you in a gas power car.. Heck Ill even let you take a warm shower and do you laundry in that electric thing called a washer.




@lantern53

Don't post angry bro. Your spelling and grammar get even worse when you do.

Oh, and don't call me Surly!

Go back to school Bob. There's this little concept called percentages that you particularly need to learn.

Oh Bob. It's better to remain silent and let people think you an idiot than to open your mouth and prove it.
97% is not the same thing as 97. Also, the correct number is really closer to 99.9% of all published climatologists, if not higher. Those who know, know. Those who believe don't know jack.
There are many ways to differentiate human produced CO2 from naturally occurring CO2, and therefore prove the rise is due to man. This has been done repeatedly and conclusively. The simplest way is to simply look at the graph of the rise and compare it to our use of fossil fuels, they are exactly the same curve at exactly the same time, with exactly the same dips and bumps. It's certainly not the only method, but is a simple to understand one.
It's ridiculous to state that to live 'green' you must live as if in a 3rd world country. That is simply BS stated by unreasonable men without any knowledge (and usually with a financial incentive to be anti-green/pro-fossil fuel).
It's also ridiculously ignorant to state that being 'green' is not cost effective. As someone who has had a solar system for 7+ years, I can tell you it's paid for itself already (with an estimated 13 more years before needing serious upkeep), has kept me away from the 40-50% rate raises that have happened to others in that time, it heats my house, my shower, and my hot tub and keeps the lights, TV, washer/drier, dishwasher, and fridge on when the grid goes down. It's not at all the expensive, powerless, sacrifice forcing technology you seem to think it is. It saves money even in the short term, and significant amounts in the long term AND has many other benefits. You've been listening to the wrong people about this issue, people who either totally don't know what they're talking about or are bold faced liars. I speak from actual experience.
Cost effective 'green' technologies have existed for well over a decade. You are simply wrong about your estimations.

"It will wreck our economy"

Sound familiar? Any AGW denier ever uttered that line and when asked "how", they have no clue?

Let me introduce you the institution behind it: Freedom Partners. Check who is behind that. Follow the money, who has most to lose. Then try to think a tactic that will keep you floating in dollars the longest. Yup, it is to teach all your followers to keep repeating the same catchphrase..

When even there has been a great communal investment in better technology infrastructure, the economy has had a tremendous boost. Railroad, electric grid, internet. Renewable energy is just a another on that line. Burning something, destroying it to get energy is finite resource. Renewables are basically infinite. Person who sells firewood is not going to like your electric heater even when it means half of the village will not die next winter. Company that sells oil will not like infinite energy source they are not in control of even if it means half of us die. They and their kids won't be affected but you will.

"It will wreck our economy"

If something, it will boost your economy. Greatly. It is already in motion in most EU countries, Germany is at 33%. Norway is at 99%. Where i live, in Finland, we are at 25% even when half of the year most of our hydro-electric is not functional. Have ANY of those countries seen any negative, economy destroying effects? No? They all have actually benefited from them? No way, bloody communists propaganda.. Lies lies, lallaalaaa, i believe in Koch.

"It will wreck our economy"

The people behind that line of words has been behind every major block in the way of creating green energy. The will raise the cost so high it is impossible, they will lobby until it's too complicated to change anything. THEY are wrecking your economy. THEY are stopping innovation. THEY are wrecking our whole mfcking planet and you are worried about your electric bill or not having two hot showers per day.

"I have nothing against green energy but i'm not going to do anything for it."

That is you.

There are times that it is almost easier to believe that Bob's a truly amazing progressive troll trying to make conservatives look stupid, than to believe that he could actually be as ignorant as he appears.

always bet on stupid

"OMG global warming!"

nope... not worth the time.

The sky is falling, Chicken Poodoo!

Still having trouble with that whole data vs anecdote concept, eh?

Oh no! Internet Tough Guy is angry! watch out everyone!

He's using puns everyone....PUNS!!!!

This is what happens when you have such a small sample size, you have to overcompensate. I bet Lantern53 drives a really fast sports car and revs the engine a lot....to overcompensate for his small sample size.

@ChaosEngine @Trancecoach

The bottle experiment - as far as i can find - has never been cited as experimental evidence of global warming because it's a simplistic demonstration for laymen. It's been cited only twice since 2010 (in 2012, 2014) by papers that offer up alternative gases that better represent the earth's atmosphere to be used in future demonstrations - it doesn't form any part of the scientific debate. The paper is just a criticism of a demonstration.

The paper is correct - the demonstration doesn't reflect reality. But that doesn't in any way form a basis to discredit the science of climate change - it discredits the gas-in-a-bottle demonstration. In Britain, I've never seen that demonstration live or recorded, and there will be many scientists across the world that also haven't seen it. We haven't been using it, and we're convinced. So in truth, especially with the number of references and type of references that the paper got, it is not part of the scientific investigation into climate change, and to use it as such is to completely misunderstand the discussion. The funny thing is (which the article doesn't mention) is that the paper is called "Climate change in a shoebox: Right result, wrong physics". Sadly i can't access the paper using my subscriptions to actually read it and see if it even mentions the large scale system - Earth.

@lantern53 - Did you take the time to read my comment or the sources i linked? I'm really open to discuss them with you, why you think they're not worth believing. I don't think you're doing yourself any favours though; a scientist is offering to explain things to you and taking time to write friendly and helpful (hopefully?) comments and you'd rather bait someone.

Exactly.. It's one tiny, irrelevant anecdote about a demonstration that wasn't even designed as experimental proof against the mountains of data that support AGW.

@dannym3141, I understand that you are "stepping out of the debate," but, for your edification, I'll respond here... And, for the record, I am not "funded" by Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Solar, or Big Green. Nor am I a professor of climate or environmental science at a State University (and don't have a political agenda around this issue other than to help promote sound reasoning and critical thinking). I do, however, hold a doctorate and can read the scientific literature critically. So, in response to what climate change "believers" say, it's worth noting that no one is actually taking the temperature of the seas. They simply see sea levels rising and say "global warming," but how do they know? It's a model they came up with. But far from certain, just a theory. Like Antarctica melting, but then someone finds out that it's due to volcanic activity underneath, and so on.

And also, why is the heat then staying in the water and not going into the atmosphere? So, they then have to come up with a theory on top of the other theory... So the heat is supposedly being stored deep below where the sensors cannot detect it. Great. And this is happening because...some other theory or another that can't be proven either. And then they have to somehow come up with a theory as to how they know that the deep sea warming is due to human activity and not to other causes. I'm not denying that any of this happens, just expressing skepticism, meaning that no one really knows for sure. That folks would "bet the house on it" does not serve as any proof, at all.

The discussion on the sift pivots from "global warming" to vilifying skeptics, not about the original skepticism discussed, that there is catastrophic man-caused global warming going on. Three issues yet to be proven beyond skepticism: 1) that there is global warming; 2) that it is caused by human activity; 3) that it's a big problem.

When I ask about one, they dance around to another one of these points, rather than responding. And all they have in response to the research is the IPCC "report" on which all their science is based. And most if not all published "believers" say that the heat "may be hiding" in the deep ocean, not that they "certainly know it is" like they seem to claim.

They don't have knowledge that the scientists who are actively working on this do not have, do they? It's like the IRS saying, "My computer crashed." The IPCC says, "The ocean ate my global warming!"

Here are some links worth reading:

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304636404577291352882984274

And, from a different rebuttal: "Referring to the 17 year ‘pause,’ the IPCC allows for two possibilities: that the sensitivity of the climate to increasing greenhouse gases is less than models project and that the heat added by increasing CO2 is ‘hiding’ in the deep ocean. Both possibilities contradict alarming claims."

Here's the entire piece from emeritus Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at MIT, Dr. Richard Lindzen: http://www.thegwpf.org/richard-lindzen-understanding-ipcc-climate-assessment/

And take your pick from all of the short pieces listed here: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/08/is-gores-missing-heat-really-hiding-in-the-deep-ocean/

And http://joannenova.com.au/2013/09/ipcc-in-denial-just-so-excuses-use-mystery-ocean-heat-to-hide-their-failure/

"Just where the heat is and how much there is seems to depend on who is doing the modeling. The U.S. National Oceanographic Data Center ARGO data shows a slight rise in global ocean heat content, while the British Met Office, presumably using the same data shows a slight decline in global ocean heat content."

http://www.arizonadailyindependent.com/2013/10/03/the-ocean-ate-my-global-warming-part-2/#sthash.idQttama.dpuf

Dr. Lindzen had this to say about the IPCC report: "I think that the latest IPCC report has truly sunk to a level of hilarious incoherence. They are proclaiming increased confidence in their models as the discrepancies between their models and observations increase."

http://www.arizonadailyindependent.com/2013/10/01/the-ocean-ate-my-global-warming-part-1/#sthash.oMO3oy6X.dpuf

So just as "believers" can ask "Why believe Heartland [financier for much of the NPCC], but not the IPCC," I can just as easily ask "Why should I believe you and not Richard Lindzen?"

"CCR-II cites more than 1,000 peer-reviewed scientific papers to show that the IPCC has ignored or misinterpreted much of the research that challenges the need for carbon dioxide controls."

And from the same author's series:

"Human carbon dioxide emissions are 3% to 5% of total carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere, and about 98% of all carbon dioxide emissions are reabsorbed through the carbon cycle.

http://www.eia.gov/oiaf/1605/archive/gg04rpt/pdf/tbl3.pdf

"Using data from the Department of Energy and the IPCC we can calculate the impact of our carbon dioxide emissions. The results of that calculation shows that if we stopped all U.S. emissions it could theoretically prevent a temperature rise of 0.003 C per year. If every country totally stopped human emissions, we might forestall 0.01 C of warming."

http://www.arizonadailyindependent.com/2013/08/01/climate-change-in-perspective/#sthash.Dboz3dC5.dpuf

Again, I have asked, repeatedly, where's the evidence of human impact on global warming? "Consensus" is not evidence. I ask for evidence and instead I get statements about the consensus that global warming happening. These are two different issues.

"Although Earth’s atmosphere does have a “greenhouse effect” and carbon dioxide does have a limited hypothetical capacity to warm the atmosphere, there is no physical evidence showing that human carbon dioxide emissions actually produce any significant warming."

Or Roger Pielke, Sr: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/09/20/pielke-sr-on-that-hide-and-seek-ocean-heat/

Or Lennart Bengtsoon (good interview): "Yes, the scientific report does this but, at least in my view, not critically enough. It does not bring up the large difference between observational results and model simulations. I have full respect for the scientific work behind the IPCC reports but I do not appreciate the need for consensus. It is important, and I will say essential, that society and the political community is also made aware of areas where consensus does not exist. To aim for a simplistic course of action in an area that is as complex and as incompletely understood as the climate system does not make sense at all in my opinion."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/meteorologist-lennart-bengtsson-joins-climate-skeptic-think-tank-a-968856.html

Bengtsson: "I have always been a skeptic and I believe this is what most scientists really are."

What Michael Crichton said about "consensus": "Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science, consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus."

Will Happer on the irrelevancy of more CO2 now: "The earth's climate really is strongly affected by the greenhouse effect, although the physics is not the same as that which makes real, glassed-in greenhouses work. Without greenhouse warming, the earth would be much too cold to sustain its current abundance of life. However, at least 90% of greenhouse warming is due to water vapor and clouds. Carbon dioxide is a bit player. There is little argument in the scientific community that a direct effect of doubling the CO2 concentration will be a small increase of the earth's temperature -- on the order of one degree. Additional increments of CO2 will cause relatively less direct warming because we already have so much CO2 in the atmosphere that it has blocked most of the infrared radiation that it can. It is like putting an additional ski hat on your head when you already have a nice warm one below it, but your are only wearing a windbreaker. To really get warmer, you need to add a warmer jacket. The IPCC thinks that this extra jacket is water vapor and clouds."

Ivar Giaever, not a climate scientist per se, but a notable scientist and also a skeptic challenging "consensus": http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/8786565/War-of-words-over-global-warming-as-Nobel-laureate-resigns-in-protest.html

Even prominent IPCC scientists are skeptics, even within the IPCC there is not agreement: http://www.climatedepot.com/2013/08/21/un-scientists-who-have-turned-on-unipcc-man-made-climate-fears-a-climate-depot-flashback-report/

And for your research, it may be worth checking out: http://www.amazon.com/The-Skeptical-Environmentalist-Measuring-State/dp/0521010683

Can someone flag that as spam?

@Trancecoach holding a doctorate doesn't make you capable of understanding the scientific literature. If you held a bachelor's degree in one of the three sciences you'd stand a lot better chance of being able to understand the literature than someone who had a doctorate in say Art History. I would actually refer back to the Dunning Kruger effect and suggest that holding an unrelated qualification might lead you to overestimate your abilities.

And for someone who says that they *are* capable of understanding the scientific literature (and therefore the scientific method and approach), you dismiss "scientific consensus" as not being "scientific evidence". I don't understand what you mean here, but i think that's because you don't understand what scientific proof is.

I think it's a fundamental mistake that you're making. Scientists propose theories. Those theories that most accurately describe the situation and are most rigourously investigated are the ones that are accepted as being the case, and when things are found that are not correct, adjustments are made to the theory or other theories are proposed. There is never ever, ever.... EVER.. absolute evidence of anything in the way in which you request it, and that's your fundamental error, and stems from you not understanding the scientific method.

We have a lot of scientific consensus about gravity, but we do not have "scientific evidence" in the way you describe it. The evidence is ALL of the science that is done, ALL of the experiments ALL of the conclusions, positive and negative, and the consensus of the scientific community is reached and refined based on that research and ongoing research. There is no one document anywhere that constitutes "proof" that gravity is how we think it is. Not even all of the documents do that. They merely indicate to us what is most likely to be happening according to all of the knowledge and ingenuity that we've built up over the years.

I don't appreciate the scatter gun method you've used by posting all those links. You said in your latest post here that people try to confuse the issue by redirecting your request for "evidence" - the type that doesn't exist - towards other issues that you deem contentious. Yet you have almost drowned me in what appears to be about 15 different links to pages that seem to show singular examples of individuals that deny climate change. (Again, there are so many, and so many quotes, and no actual specification of what you are disagreeing with me about, that i can't rightly assess any of them.)

My point here is twofold - 1) don't try to be confusing like you accuse your opponents of, i.e. throwing as many links as possible to extend the argument to other points and 2) if that isn't what you were doing, could you perhaps condense your 15 links and selected quotes into a smaller point; that point being what it is about my previous posts you disagreed with?

Here are my points for you, simplified:
1) Scientific consensus does not mean "THIS IS HOW THINGS ARE" - it means that, on balance, according to everything we know and the opinions of those that are in the know, this is how we think things are until we know better.
2) There is no such thing as "scientific evidence" in the way you use the term; the only absolute proof is the one Descartes spoke about; the only thing you can know for sure is that your consciousness exists.
3) It is very easy to be misled by articles such as the one you linked from "the libertarian republic" website. This is also true of the last link you recommended for my research; you used that book to support your opposition to my assertion that human-caused climate change is not a matter of debate in the scientific community. Yet the same author was involved in the Copenhagen Consensus which lists as 6th most worthy of investigation (for the benefit and future of mankind), i quote; "R&D to Increase Yield Enhancements, to decrease hunger, fight biodiversity destruction, and lessen the effects of climate change"

I think that out of courtesy you should select one link which backs up whatever it is that you wish to refute, because it's not a good use of my time to have to go through each individual link, find out what you disagree with me about, and then spend time looking into it.

So, we disagree on one of the following:
1) The scientific consensus is that human-caused climate change is real, and that consensus represents the best of our current understanding as a species.
2) "Proof" in the sense you use it doesn't exist, the correct term is scientific evidence. The more evidence and the more convincing it is, the more firm the belief in a theory.
3) The article you linked from the libertarian website was unfairly representing its argument in relation to the paper it was referring to.

Please let me know. Remember - nothing is "beyond scepticism" in your words. I am sceptical about everything, including gravity, which i have an incredible amount of evidence for. However i am still sceptical about our understanding of it - i am always looking for differences. That doesn't mean that our understanding isn't the best one we have, and we should use it for our own advantage and safety.

I also note that you seem loathe to have a proper discussion with me. Our discussion could have been either about the scientific method or about the article you linked, but to throw all these links at me makes me feel you're unwilling or incapable of challenging your own opinion based on evidence. You don't even refer to the assessments of the article that i offered; you immediately discarded the article from your argument and linked me to other people that may or may not be misrepresenting the argument.

My doctorate is in psychology -- a social science, which includes coursework in epistemology. I am also the executive director of a peer reviewed psychology Journal which incorporates quantitative, qualitative, and mixed method methodologies.

If science was driven purely by consensus, than the upending of long-held scientific understanding (as achieved by the likes of Galileo, or Darwin, or Einstein -- who, incidentally, upended some theories about how something as "self-evident" as gravity works -- in more notable ways and by lesser known scientists in still significant ways) would never come about. Science is not practiced by "votes," whereby the majority determines what theories are most accurate. Rather, evidence (whether it be rationally deduced, rationally induced, empirically demonstrated, or hermeneutically interpreted) serves as the basis for scientific progress, whether the majority of scientists agree with it or not.

(Climate change, itself, is rationally deduced, since empirical models of the earth are so difficult if not impossible to design, let alone run controlled trials.)

You are actually going a long way to make my point that those who are "believers" in climate change are missing the value and indeed necessity for ongoing skepticism in the scientific literature (rather than the name-calling and vilification that constitutes much of the "OMG! Climate Change!" discourse of late). That point, along with illuminating some of the citations I linked to above, is the purpose of my comment -- and not to argue (or name-call or "debate" as many on the sift waste their time doing).

I do concur that the manner in which I posted the links may not have been "fair," and so I apologize for that, but the content of the links themselves raise significant questions as to the unilateral "belief" in "OMG! [andropogenic] Climate Change!" I encourage anyone who is seriously interested in the scientific basis for skepticism around such a belief, to consider reviewing the literature cited in those links before arriving at an incontrovertible conclusion.

But in light of your request for a single link, I recommend you visit the NPCC's website and perhaps attend, specifically, to their literature about temperature changes (PDF), which I believe serve as valid refutations of the literature upon which the climate change "believers" tend to base their adrenal-freakouts.

@Trancecoach - respectfully leaving this discussion based on the following:

"You are actually going a long way to make my point that those who are "believers" in climate change are missing the value and indeed necessity for ongoing skepticism"

I don't understand how you can say that after i was the person that investigated the source of the first link you gave out. You hadn't even bothered to look into it, so i did, and you can say with a straight face that i'm a "believer" who has lost his scepticism?

You didn't even check completely through the second lot of links you posted, because the one i did check (on YOUR ultimate recommendation) ended up being written by a guy who saw climate change as one of mankind's top 10 problems. You've shown yourself twice now to be using sources that you haven't even fucking looked at, evidenced by a half hour investigation by me! You didn't even put a half hour into it!?

I remain open to evidence that climate change is not a man-made concern, or that it is not a concern. I'm not going to sit here and relay exactly how each of us think the scientific community works. You can read how it works on the scientific method and scientific consensus pages i linked earlier, anyone can. It's not open for debate; there is an overwhelming majority of scientific evidence in favour and there is not enough and not significant enough scientific evidence against. It isn't a coincidence that ~99% of the research points in one direction, and it isn't some conspiracy.... that isn't how science works. It's not perfect, a lot of shit science gets through because it's so hard to read and so relatively few people want to trawl through shite, but that's why it's better to look at the consensus - what is the AVERAGE opinion of ALL the clever people? It's a community that i consider incorruptible - because even if you paid off 10 research centres, there's still millions of individual scientists, individual institutions, so many people dedicated to keeping it pure because we know that's the only way we get the most from it. And ... the science and maths speaks for itself, the models are not "just models" as the moron associated with your latest link says. They are the best representations we have and they do represent parts of physical reality, and by using carefully considered techniques we can extract information about things. The alternative is to consult a Ouija board!?

By the way, nice 240 page pdf document for me to refer to. I didn't ask for a single link, i asked for a single point about which we were in disagreement... usually papers are cited to reinforce a point. You don't just cite something and go "there you go, read all of that, whatever you see that agrees with me; that's what i'm talking about!"

Scientists: Don't freak out about Ebola.
Everyone: *Panic!*

Scientists: Freak out about climate change.
Everyone: LOL! Pass me some coal.

found on http://www.iflscience.com via @vemmkaff on Twitter

@newtboy @ChaosEngine

From the WSJ:

"The U.N. no longer claims that there will be dangerous or rapid climate change in the next two decades. Last September, between the second and final draft of its fifth assessment report, the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change quietly downgraded the warming it expected in the 30 years following 1995, to about 0.5 degrees Celsius from 0.7 (or, in Fahrenheit, to about 0.9 degrees, from 1.3).

"Even that is likely to be too high. The climate-research establishment has finally admitted openly what skeptic scientists have been saying for nearly a decade: Global warming has stopped since shortly before this century began."

The usual to get around paywall.

Bill Nye, the bloviating low-information "climate guy" not taken seriously by any meteorologist.