Is Global Warming a “Crock of S*%t?”

I need a coke!

On that period’s causes there is no scientific agreement even today, although many possible causes have been mentioned; among them are lower solar activity, known as the Maunder Minimum, and increased volcanic activity, shielding the planet from solar radiation. But it should be noted that there is even less agreement on what caused the warming period from 1850 to 1950.
Do Something, Even If It’s Disastrous?

And so today we are being warned and exhorted that, unless serious measures are taken to reverse our contributions to greenhouse gases, humans have put the planet on an unsustainable course for potential crises right up to extinction. The irony is that, on the news, there is little agreement on what’s caused massive shifts in the earth’s temperatures over the past millennium, but complete agreement on what will happen in the future if we don’t act fast.

Business and industry legitimately worry that if Draconian measures are put in place, everyone will suffer the consequent complete disruption to world economies. Certainly the concept of using cap and trade to raise energy prices to the point that it forces conservation has huge potential and many opportunities for fraud if not outright theft—and it would not actually reduce any country’s emissions.

Der Spiegel, Dan Rather Reports, and The New York Times have all done articles on how this finance-driven concept “to save the planet” has already proved to have many serious deficiencies while billions of dollars exchange hands.

The real question is this: Why—when so many climatologists, meteorologists, and scientists today have come out and questioned not whether the climate is changing, but whether that change is primarily man-made—are the media claiming consensus and elected officials demanding action now? The proposed changes to our economic structure could easily upset and disrupt vast populations far more than another degree of warming, but the call for quick action continues.
A Species Able to Adapt

Seventy thousand years ago our race nearly went extinct, with only a few thousand homo sapiens alive at the time. Since that time the planet has undergone long periods when the climate changed dramatically, including the last major Ice Age, which peaked approximately 20,000 years ago. We have seen huge shifts in the weather, plagues, wars, floods, and centuries when crop failures were the norm—and today there are 6 billion of us on the planet. Apparently we are not that fragile.

But after two centuries in which technology and science were key to creating our modern world, we’ve put the quest for honest, open, and rigorous science on the back burner, because widely publicized and aired “pundits” blame the advancement of science and technology for putting the planet in danger.

Things on the planet are warmer than they used to be, just as in the 1970s things were colder than they once were. The industrial revolution and greenhouse gases were rising in both of these periods, so the spirit of impartial scientific inquiry demands that one look for other factors that may have changed in the equation.

That is not denying things are different from the way they once were. No. The people being labeled deniers are simply asking why the nearly 15% of respected scientists who don’t agree with this climate hypothesis can’t be heard or are quickly dismissed as quacks.
Weaknesses in Computer Modeling

Nor should one suggest we continue with lifestyles that are far more wasteful of energy than we need to be. Wasted energy is wasted money, so business logic should demand regular improvements in net energy use.

In the end, maybe the climate change evangelists are right and mankind is the reason the planet is warming. But if you read enough articles on the subject over a long enough period, you find that the factual weather data do not always line up with the scientific pronouncements that are being sold to us. For one thing, computer modeling is not all that accurate, nor do those machines have any more logic than what is programmed into them. In simplest terms, anyone who can program a relational database knows you can alter the code to where 2 + 2 = 4.25. The computer spits it out, but it’s not true. Now extrapolate that out to where one is programming all of the factors known for weather, present, past, and future, and you understand the complexity is so great that no output from those programs can mean anything. It’s called GIGO: garbage in, garbage out.

Now, are you willing to bet the world’s economies on that logic? If you are, you are putting more lives in danger than global warming has. For many, the scientific contrarians actually have the better argument. We should test their theories, too, and see if their science holds up any better than today’s so-called consensus.

Note: Ed Wallace has never been involved with or accepted any compensation from any industry involved in energy.

(This is the first of a multipart series of columns on global warming.)

Ed Wallace is a recipient of the the Gerald R. Loeb Award for business journalism, given by the G. and R. Loeb Foundation, and is a member of the American Historical Society. His column leads the Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s “Sunday Drive” section. He reviews new cars every Friday morning at 7:15 on Fox Four’s Good Day, contributes articles to BusinessWeek Online, and hosts the top-rated talk show Wheels Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on 570 KLIF.

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