Good perspective. Climate change affects all the people on Earth and will increasingly result in misery and starvation in many areas of the globe. ISIS makes themselves seem more frightful because they know how to do the shocking things that get them a lot of news coverage. I remember someone saying “Terrorism is the poor person’s nuclear bomb.”
The climate is always changing and we have been warming since the end of the last ice age.We’re still not back to the Medieval warm period levels yet. We took a serious setback during the Maunder Minimum and are slowly recovering. During the Medieval warm period the arctic was ice free – during the summers, at least. Polar bears survived just fine. The Chinese circumnavigated North and South America decades before Columbus blundered across the Atlantic and began enslaving the residents of the Caribbean. The sub-fleet of Captain (Commodore) Zhou Wen separated from the fleet of Admiral Zheng He and sailed north from the Caribbean to Greenland and then across the Arctic Ocean and through the Bearing Straits, then down past Japan and finally home to China, in 1423, a full 70 years before Columbus set sail. The fact few have heard of it smacks of Eurocentrism and racism. America’s public schools are now more of a political training regime than an educational service.
Instead of hand wringing and complaining over CO2, which has little to nothing to do with causing climate change, we should be working on ways to adapt to the new norms. After all, we’re not going to get China and Russia to be honest about emissions. Poor people the world over will tell us to go to hell if we try to restrict their economic growth. So instead of whining we need to get to work and deal with it.
First we have to actually predict what the changes are going to be. So far, the climate change alarmists have been shockingly wrong in their predictions. The validity of any scientific theory is the accuracy of the predictions you can make from said theory. To date, all the climate change alarmism theories have been extremely poor at predicting anything except the increase in funding to their cause when they yell.
Is the climate still warming? Dunno. Seems to have slowed or stopped and may be reversing itself. Phytoplankton have been enjoying the slightly higher CO2 levels and are exploding in numbers. Look to the sun first, however, as it is the best predictor of climate on earth. In fact, many Russian scientists (and Russian know quite a bit about snow and ice and cold) seem to believe we are heading for a significant cooling period.
Either way, the species has to adapt. After all, adapting is the one thing humans do best. We need to develop plans to move cities and populations if the oceans should rise significantly (unlikely in the lifetimes of our children or even their children). Oceans rose some several hundred feet at the end of the last ice age. We’re unlikely to see more than a slight rise in levels, still it’s good to have some sort of plan. We also need to develop better technology to deal with whatever the climate throws at us. We did this up to now by developing central heating and air conditioning and insulation. Simply painting the rooftops white in our cities, or making them green spaces with plants, can reflect or use a significant amount of solar energy and do much in lowering the heat sink effect of our cities.
Instead of whining and complaining about changes in human behavior which are bloody well NOT going to happen, we should be working on effective solutions to deal with whatever Mother Nature throws at us.
There’s no global warming and if there is we didn’t cause it and if we did we can’t fix it and natural cycles and the Chinese and ISIS and second amendment and… Did I miss anything?
It would be hard to pick the most asinine strip you’ve ever drawn, but this would get my personal vote. 150 people dead in Paris, 14 in California, and you really think the biggest threat we need to worry about is the possibility that the earth’s temperature might rise 2 degrees in the next 100 years based on some sketchy computer models set with possibly false date that even if true we probably couldn’t prevent anyway. But yeah, I’M the denier.
hawgowarIce core samples totally disagree with you, as do the “eurocentric” records of Anson’s unsuccessful attempt to find the Northwest Passage less that two centuries later. Froze up mighty fast. I would imagine the Vineland colony would have found wealth and fame had they discovered navigable water north of Ainse aux Meadow. Were the Scraelings attacking in kayaks? A large body of water does not freeze for Norse, melt for Chinese, and freeze for English that fast, or the Greenland ice sheet would already be gone in the two centuries of fossil-fed industrialization.
The tragic event of the nuclear power plant in Daichi Japan is also having a huge impact to the earth, starting with the Pacific Ocean. I listen on you tube to Dana Durford,a citizen of British Columbia, Canada. He was recently thrown in jail, probably for telling the truth about the near total destruction of both animal and plant life in the coastal waters of the Pacific.He made his living doing Scuba diving tours of places on the coast. The comparison photos and films are stark. They are not faked. No sea anemones, shellfish, and plankton. He has seen starving whales dying, and other underwater tragedies because of the many thoousands of tons of radioactive water coming from there every day.This is not global warming, but it was because of man’s disregard for nature in building/using radiation at all.
The toon is simply accurate, and it IS the effects of human actions on change that have created the threat. Changes taking place over two centuries, greater than changes occuring naturally over many millennia, are obvious, and dangerous. Man hasn’t built the Sierra Nevada, Himalayas, or turned Denver back into a sea bed, that took millions to billions of years, but our impacts on climate are just as dramatic.
You are misinterpreting and using a false comparison.The proper comparison is this: “Dog Bites Man” is not news, but “Man Bites Dog” is.The starting point for most of those papers is that AGW is happening, enough so that it is not necessary to state the obvious, as it is not necessary to state in every physics paper that gravity exists.Since it is the overwhelming consensus, and there are OTHER polls and studies that reinforce that number, and indeed some have higher percentages, it means that a scientist looking to establish a new fact would try to counter AGW. If someone could find data to contradict this massive collection of data and research, it would ricochet all about the scientific world. It hasn’t happened.Here’s another point of proof for you: scientific associations are making statements warning about AGW. Those associations are representing the view of their members. Even the American Association of Petroleum Geologists dropped their explicit opposition (they now take a noncommittal stance).Here’s a list, care of the Union of Concerned Scientists:http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/scientific-consensus-on.html#.VmRiZITHsow
You have misunderstood me again, and indeed are (deliberately?) misinterpreting what I said.Science does not rely on voting for truth, nor belief. What it does rely on is evidence. And the data are overwhelming. The consensus is note a vote; it is an agreement that all the data are pointing the same way.When you look at the Consensus Project, you will see that virtually every time AGW was mentioned it was in the affirmative — that is, nearly any peer-reviewed research paper that mentioned AGW found that they supported it. That was a lot of papers, and the overwhelming majority of papers that mentioned it at all. When the proportion is 97:3, that is overwhelming support. It means that if it is not mentioned IN THIS CONTEXT, it means that the prevailing view holds. That is fairly obvious to most people.I find it amusing that you cherry-picked my counter-example. Let me explain further, since I wasn’t clear.The evidence for AGW is so incredibly, overwhelmingly clear, that EVEN the Association of American Petroleum Geologists, a group whose livelihoods depends on the #1 creator of greenhouse gases in the world, has had to remove its denial and replace it with a noncommittal statement. If your mortal enemy says “okay, I guess you may be right,” that’s saying something. That’s evidence that EVERYONE agrees that global warming is occurring, and it is due to fossil fuels.What you ignored is that virtually every freaking scientific society in the world has already made a strong statement supporting the need for action on AGW. The AAPG is the last holdout, and even they have apparently decided to admit that reducing emissions is a worthy goal. Previously, they said no such thing.
chromosome Premium Member over 8 years ago
Good perspective. Climate change affects all the people on Earth and will increasingly result in misery and starvation in many areas of the globe. ISIS makes themselves seem more frightful because they know how to do the shocking things that get them a lot of news coverage. I remember someone saying “Terrorism is the poor person’s nuclear bomb.”
magicwalnut Premium Member over 8 years ago
….and folks think it’s ostriches who hide their heads in the sand….
manteo16nc over 8 years ago
Actually, ostriches don’t hide their heads in the sand. Thanks for the accurate science, Global Warming Witness.
dre7861 over 8 years ago
Good strip!
hawgowar over 8 years ago
The climate is always changing and we have been warming since the end of the last ice age.We’re still not back to the Medieval warm period levels yet. We took a serious setback during the Maunder Minimum and are slowly recovering. During the Medieval warm period the arctic was ice free – during the summers, at least. Polar bears survived just fine. The Chinese circumnavigated North and South America decades before Columbus blundered across the Atlantic and began enslaving the residents of the Caribbean. The sub-fleet of Captain (Commodore) Zhou Wen separated from the fleet of Admiral Zheng He and sailed north from the Caribbean to Greenland and then across the Arctic Ocean and through the Bearing Straits, then down past Japan and finally home to China, in 1423, a full 70 years before Columbus set sail. The fact few have heard of it smacks of Eurocentrism and racism. America’s public schools are now more of a political training regime than an educational service.
Instead of hand wringing and complaining over CO2, which has little to nothing to do with causing climate change, we should be working on ways to adapt to the new norms. After all, we’re not going to get China and Russia to be honest about emissions. Poor people the world over will tell us to go to hell if we try to restrict their economic growth. So instead of whining we need to get to work and deal with it.
First we have to actually predict what the changes are going to be. So far, the climate change alarmists have been shockingly wrong in their predictions. The validity of any scientific theory is the accuracy of the predictions you can make from said theory. To date, all the climate change alarmism theories have been extremely poor at predicting anything except the increase in funding to their cause when they yell.
Is the climate still warming? Dunno. Seems to have slowed or stopped and may be reversing itself. Phytoplankton have been enjoying the slightly higher CO2 levels and are exploding in numbers. Look to the sun first, however, as it is the best predictor of climate on earth. In fact, many Russian scientists (and Russian know quite a bit about snow and ice and cold) seem to believe we are heading for a significant cooling period.
Either way, the species has to adapt. After all, adapting is the one thing humans do best. We need to develop plans to move cities and populations if the oceans should rise significantly (unlikely in the lifetimes of our children or even their children). Oceans rose some several hundred feet at the end of the last ice age. We’re unlikely to see more than a slight rise in levels, still it’s good to have some sort of plan. We also need to develop better technology to deal with whatever the climate throws at us. We did this up to now by developing central heating and air conditioning and insulation. Simply painting the rooftops white in our cities, or making them green spaces with plants, can reflect or use a significant amount of solar energy and do much in lowering the heat sink effect of our cities.
Instead of whining and complaining about changes in human behavior which are bloody well NOT going to happen, we should be working on effective solutions to deal with whatever Mother Nature throws at us.
Kip W over 8 years ago
There’s no global warming and if there is we didn’t cause it and if we did we can’t fix it and natural cycles and the Chinese and ISIS and second amendment and… Did I miss anything?
pam Miner over 8 years ago
Good comment. We Know that lowering the tax lowers the revenue.
Merrie Soltis Premium Member over 8 years ago
It would be hard to pick the most asinine strip you’ve ever drawn, but this would get my personal vote. 150 people dead in Paris, 14 in California, and you really think the biggest threat we need to worry about is the possibility that the earth’s temperature might rise 2 degrees in the next 100 years based on some sketchy computer models set with possibly false date that even if true we probably couldn’t prevent anyway. But yeah, I’M the denier.
hippogriff over 8 years ago
hawgowarIce core samples totally disagree with you, as do the “eurocentric” records of Anson’s unsuccessful attempt to find the Northwest Passage less that two centuries later. Froze up mighty fast. I would imagine the Vineland colony would have found wealth and fame had they discovered navigable water north of Ainse aux Meadow. Were the Scraelings attacking in kayaks? A large body of water does not freeze for Norse, melt for Chinese, and freeze for English that fast, or the Greenland ice sheet would already be gone in the two centuries of fossil-fed industrialization.
pam Miner over 8 years ago
The tragic event of the nuclear power plant in Daichi Japan is also having a huge impact to the earth, starting with the Pacific Ocean. I listen on you tube to Dana Durford,a citizen of British Columbia, Canada. He was recently thrown in jail, probably for telling the truth about the near total destruction of both animal and plant life in the coastal waters of the Pacific.He made his living doing Scuba diving tours of places on the coast. The comparison photos and films are stark. They are not faked. No sea anemones, shellfish, and plankton. He has seen starving whales dying, and other underwater tragedies because of the many thoousands of tons of radioactive water coming from there every day.This is not global warming, but it was because of man’s disregard for nature in building/using radiation at all.
Lloydl333 over 8 years ago
A money making Hoax! Gore is a crook just like his Dad was. Follow the money….Don’t be a lemming.
Dtroutma over 8 years ago
The toon is simply accurate, and it IS the effects of human actions on change that have created the threat. Changes taking place over two centuries, greater than changes occuring naturally over many millennia, are obvious, and dangerous. Man hasn’t built the Sierra Nevada, Himalayas, or turned Denver back into a sea bed, that took millions to billions of years, but our impacts on climate are just as dramatic.
kaffekup over 8 years ago
Nonsense. Scientists simply have too much money, the rich have none. :-)
kaffekup over 8 years ago
And I’ve reviewed all the comments and can’t see where you’ve contributed anything to the discussion other than attacking Hiram.
Motivemagus over 8 years ago
You are misinterpreting and using a false comparison.The proper comparison is this: “Dog Bites Man” is not news, but “Man Bites Dog” is.The starting point for most of those papers is that AGW is happening, enough so that it is not necessary to state the obvious, as it is not necessary to state in every physics paper that gravity exists.Since it is the overwhelming consensus, and there are OTHER polls and studies that reinforce that number, and indeed some have higher percentages, it means that a scientist looking to establish a new fact would try to counter AGW. If someone could find data to contradict this massive collection of data and research, it would ricochet all about the scientific world. It hasn’t happened.Here’s another point of proof for you: scientific associations are making statements warning about AGW. Those associations are representing the view of their members. Even the American Association of Petroleum Geologists dropped their explicit opposition (they now take a noncommittal stance).Here’s a list, care of the Union of Concerned Scientists:http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/scientific-consensus-on.html#.VmRiZITHsow
lonecat over 8 years ago
Do I detect some levity?
Motivemagus over 8 years ago
You have misunderstood me again, and indeed are (deliberately?) misinterpreting what I said.Science does not rely on voting for truth, nor belief. What it does rely on is evidence. And the data are overwhelming. The consensus is note a vote; it is an agreement that all the data are pointing the same way.When you look at the Consensus Project, you will see that virtually every time AGW was mentioned it was in the affirmative — that is, nearly any peer-reviewed research paper that mentioned AGW found that they supported it. That was a lot of papers, and the overwhelming majority of papers that mentioned it at all. When the proportion is 97:3, that is overwhelming support. It means that if it is not mentioned IN THIS CONTEXT, it means that the prevailing view holds. That is fairly obvious to most people.I find it amusing that you cherry-picked my counter-example. Let me explain further, since I wasn’t clear.The evidence for AGW is so incredibly, overwhelmingly clear, that EVEN the Association of American Petroleum Geologists, a group whose livelihoods depends on the #1 creator of greenhouse gases in the world, has had to remove its denial and replace it with a noncommittal statement. If your mortal enemy says “okay, I guess you may be right,” that’s saying something. That’s evidence that EVERYONE agrees that global warming is occurring, and it is due to fossil fuels.What you ignored is that virtually every freaking scientific society in the world has already made a strong statement supporting the need for action on AGW. The AAPG is the last holdout, and even they have apparently decided to admit that reducing emissions is a worthy goal. Previously, they said no such thing.
OmqR-IV.0 over 8 years ago
& lonecat
Should I rotfl or rotcl?
lonecat over 8 years ago
It’s amazing what you can do when you become enlightened.