When sceptics get sceptic about scepticism.

Oh, here's one Trash.

He did it for the cocktail parties! Dem lefties!

better to err on the side of caution?

Granted, they claim they'll be uploading their papers on Sunday, so we can take a look at the facts then.

Eh, will make for lots of spittle and vitriol in the usual places, but I really can't give a shit about the arguments regarding global warming. Well, that's not exactly true, but it isn't a very interesting thing to follow. Without proper knowledge of the scientific fundamentals underlying it, and no experience with the mathematical modeling of environmental systems, all I can really do is play the argument from authority kind of game. Oh wait...this describes upwards of 90% of people. Just add some smug partisan posturing.

My own brand of smug dickishness aside, I would like to see a lot of steps taken to better protect the environment, things that would do us good irregardless of the truth regarding climate change, but the majority of suggestions put forth are either impossible or naive idiocy, and pushed forward with the doomsday threat of global warming (easy to see why a lot of people rush to try and debunk it to try and nip bad policy in the bud). And it's these horrible policy proposals that tend to turn people away from environmentalism in general. Things like the Kyoto Treaty creating "pollution havens" due to bureaucracy, idiocy like permit trading, or poorly framed regulation drilling local economies hard. And then there's that good ol' split in the "green" movement that happened around the 90's, where any crimethinkers were purged, leaving the movement a bunch of Panglossian hippies with hardly any ability to create sensible proposals. Or even better are the "not in my backyard" types, especially those dicks on the Vineyard and Cape Cod who love the idea of windmills...just not next to their precious ocean views. Fuckers.

The mere fact that anybody EVER listened to a guy who was funded by the petrochemical Industry alone is so

http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2012/08/climate-wars-beware-trojan-horse.html

Rats and ships

not unusual at all and not only on this field. After all, who employs most of them?

Science has nothing whatsoever to do with consensus. It has to do with empirical testing to hypotheses. The problem is that it does not end here, since a lot of correlation which comes from such empirical tests is not necessarily reasonably causal.

The problem a lot of people in the field raise is that the physics to explain the cause is deficient and its results should be seen with suspicion. There is no doubt in my mind that:

1) Pollution occurs by fossil fuel use
2) Pollution is harmful to my being and decreases the quality of life
3) Natural resources should be used efficiently
4) Alternative fuels that are efficient e.g. Nuclear energy are good for all of us.

In this regard, without the threat of AGW propaganda I would support shifting to greener fuels. But if someone is misusing the channels of science for any reason that smack of politics, then I would oppose it as being against the spirit of science.

This is where the criticism of AGW lies centrally: Most of their predictive strategy is based on Climate models which are ridiculously insufficient to predict outcomes from any set of data we here possess (Which we in fact don't; the hockey stick raw data was trashed 10? years back).

Just read this: http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02148/RSL-HouseOfCommons_2148505a.pdf

Just read it, he makes some very good points, and whether he was "debunked" on different points in the past does not factor into it.

Science is predictive. If you create a model which gives you the datapoints we've seen since 1900 you've done nothing but create a fictional narrative. There will be no model of global warming, ie enough proof to form any kind of consensus, that can predict future datapoints accurately because, of the things we DO know it depends on, one important one is cloud formation (laughably, some clouds increase the effect, others decrease it) and which we can't even accurately predict a week in advance. Until a few months ago, nobody was really sure why bubbles in Guinness stout glasses sometimes went downwards, and you think that believers in AGW have figured out a vastly more complex system? Funny, this kind of magical thinking is probably more widespread in Western society than your baby-blood-Caesars-cure-AIDS shit is in Africa, and is in some ways more sadly pathetic. At least that is borne of desperation, and not some fascistic desire to impose ones arbitrary beliefs on others.

The point has merit though. One of the major reasons why there's so much politicking and tug of war over the "scientific consensus" regarding global warming, is that the underlying science is quite flimsy. The predictive models can at best "strongly suggest" that certain things may happen. It's quite obvious that there are strong interest groups out to prove it's not going to happen, but being greedy jew cunts doesn't necessarily make them completely wrong.

The question is really, is it believable enough to spend billions of dollars on measures that might not even prevent it ultimately. I think it is, but I don't see people who don't as unreasonable. It's not a simple, clear-cut problem.

Well it is a clear cut problem because if it continues the world's population will suffer horrendously. The real question is only partially whether man is responsible and by extension can he do anything to prevent it? Personally I think man is at least partially responsible but even if he wasn't we ARE going to have to figure out how to get more out of less and how to eventually convert from fossil fuels if for no other reason than efficiency being a driving factor with exponentially growing population rates.

So, those who say man is not responsible for this may have a point but it is beside the real issue of whether we should be doing things to make our ecological 'footprint' less intrusive. The obvious result if we don't is a massive population fighting over finite resources.

I say the answer is in expansion into a resource rich great beyond. Sadly, that seems to great a leap for rank and file derpsters.

I like Muller so I believe in GW more now

You don't have to believe in global warming to realize we need to better utilize our planet. The fact is, with rising population and no alternative place to live this planet (with finite resources) is going to have to sustain a lot more people and in short order. That fact alone means we are better off learning conservation and alternate energy use.

I guess. 99% of my skepticism about global warming is/was not ideological or emotional in that way; it was because clearly retarded people would argue for it based on their deep beliefs using 100% sentimental dogshit argument by condescension. My chimp-sensors went off. However, I am also too lazy to try to learn more than the ultra-basics of climate simulation which is where all the important questions about GW are. So this leaves me in an unconvinced, "skeptical" position. I respect Muller from other sources (physics) and I know he probably does care enough and is capable of doing it.

I'm actually at least a little skeptical not that global warming is occouring but that we (humans) are entirely or even largely responsible for it. But whether it exists or not (to me) doesn't change the fact that we have a growing environmental factor (more humans using more area of the Earth for increasing undustrial usages) that cannot be argued with. Furthermore, whoever comes up with the solutions to these problems is going to be on the ground floor of the next gold rush because something we all want makes you rich. Something we all need makes you inconcievably wealthy.

All that aside, if we don't do something and pretty soon the next few generations are going to go from bad to much much worse.

When I say GW there I mean anthropogenic global warming