Climate Change – A Format for Reasoned Dialogue

George Rebane

I am a skeptic about anthropogenic global warming (AGW) and all that is currently shoved under this all-encompassing umbrella.  True believers or, more correctly, post-enquiry adherents (PEAs) of AGW do not recognize the nuanced category of skeptics and lump us all together under the label “Deniers” – it keeps things manageably simple for them.  In one of the pieces that I posted on this issue, I expounded on the scientific notions of Occam’s razor and falsifiability.  The latter being a requirement of any proposition accepted as science.  If there is no way that what you propose can be shown to be false, then your proposition is not one of science but of faith/religion.

My friend James Currier, a smart and serious thinker, posted a comment to my piece in which he challenged me to defend my stance as a skeptic by presenting arguments in a manner that would allow my position to be falsified.  If the arguments upon which a person bases his skepticism can be shown to be false, then his position as a skeptic would be unreasonable, and, presumably, such a person of good will would seek another more defendable position even, perhaps, becoming an AGW proponent.  I have accepted my friend’s challenge and invite the reader to download the short paper 'Climate Change - A Format for Reasoned Dialogue'.

In this paper I bend over backwards to not use equations or complex diagrams so as to make it accessible to the broadest audience of intelligent readers.  Nevertheless, the issue of AGW is very complex and the paper will probably not be as broadly accessible as I had hoped.  For that all I can do is apologize, and leave it as an admitted weakness that I was not able to overcome.   

Comments

[Anna]

George, could you provide a clear, concise summary of the logic of your PDF, in just a couple of sentences, here on your blog? I looked at the PDF and the writing in it seemed almost Orwellian - so please have pity upon those who have difficulty following your reasoning?

...among them being:
* National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
* Environmental Protection Agency
* NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies
* American Geophysical Union
* American Institute of Physics
* National Center for Atmospheric Research
* American Meteorological Society
* State of the Canadian Cryosphere
* The Royal Society of the UK
* Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society
* Academia Brasiliera de Ciencias (Brazil)
* Royal Society of Canada
* Chinese Academy of Sciences
* Academie des Sciences (France)
* Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina (Germany)
* Indian National Science Academy
* Accademia dei Lincei (Italy)
* Science Council of Japan
* Russian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Society (United Kingdom)
* National Academy of Sciences (United States of America)
* Australian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and the Arts
* Caribbean Academy of Sciences
* Indonesian Academy of Sciences
* Royal Irish Academy
* Academy of Sciences Malaysia
* Academy Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand
* Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences

thanks -
Anna

[George Rebane]

The pdf takes the reader through a staged sequence of requirements that any climate change must satisfy to survive as an event of anthropogenic global warming that can beneficially and acceptably be modified by the worldwide community of nations. There is no evidence (all the cited organizations withstanding) that any of these requirements are met. For example, even something as seminal as the hyped build-up of the terrible greenhouse gas CO2 is not known as attested to by NASA scientists here. All the skeptics are ready to change their minds on the basis of scientific evidence the parameters of which I have repeatedly laid out. Continuing to call us "deniers" who don't accept that "the debate is over" confirms the stance of the PEAs.

gjr

[Anna Haynes]

> "even something as seminal as the hyped build-up of the terrible greenhouse gas CO2 is not known as attested to by NASA scientists here"

George, I believe you misread the article you've linked to ("Oh Where Oh Where Does the CO2 Go?") - it's about studying carbon sinks, and it doesn't say 'we don't know if CO2's building up in the atmosphere'. CO2 buildup is predicted, and is observed - and it's happening faster and worse than the scientific community expected.

The scariest thing is the lag time, for changing it - we've got about another degree C of warming already in the pipeline from what's already *in* the atmosphere, and another one from expected lifecycle of cars and coal plants, and we may already be beyond a safe atmospheric CO2 concentration due to runaway feedback effects with melting permafrost, marine clathrates, peat bogs etc. Our house is burning. We need massive technological investment and advances, to get us back on track, as Silicon Valley venture capitalist John Doerr points out. Adopting an ostrich mentality isn't going to take us where we need to go.

[Anna Haynes]

Also, re this -

> "All the skeptics are ready to change their minds on the basis of scientific evidence the parameters of which I have repeatedly laid out."

George, the great advantage of the web is that you only have to write something once, and from then on you can just provide a link to it. I confess I am but a lowly Harvard PhD, and still unclear on the parameters you say you've repeatedly laid out - could you please provide a link to the simplest, clearest explication that you've got? in a simple weblog post, not a PDF document? (readers can comment on the blog post, but can't do so on a PDF)

Anyone can obfuscate; what takes skill is laying things out clearly enough that they can easily be grasped.

Our house is burning.