I've been seriously engaged with climate change since 1992, and it seems to me that as a society we've entered into a strange place concerning the truth about climate change. It's as if we entered a "fun house" at one of those traveling carnivals, where curved mirrors distort our bodies and faces into strange shapes. Some of us seem to be camping out in the fun house, ready to accept what we see in its curved mirrors as the truth about climate change. Others of us seem content to live at the carnival -- eating junk food, playing games in hopes of winning a cheap stuffed animal, riding the rides, banging into others in the bumper cars. Every now and then we think about leaving, but carnival barkers badger us, even intimidate us, into staying. As the cheap thrills wear off we know that we should get back to reality -- we see it past the carnival gates -- but for now we stay. "Let's go back to the bumper cars one more time! How about another fried Twinkie?"
Here's the bottom line, which I will explore more fully in a follow-up post: No Christian or person of good will can stay in the carnival of climate denial. The love from God in our hearts -- love for Him and for others -- will help us face the truth. Indeed, it is incompatible with climate denial and climate inaction. But as is true with our whole lives, we must let His love transform us so we can accept the truth about climate change and our need to act.
At the carnival of climate denial, barkers and hucksters abound. Perhaps the loudest and most insistent and intimidating is Rush Limbaugh.
When Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts, had the temerity recently to buck what Mr. Limbaugh deems as party orthodoxy (i.e., climate denial), here's what Mr. Limbaugh had to say:
LIMBAUGH: Bye-bye, nomination. Bye-bye nomination. Another one down. We're in the midst here of discovering that this is all a hoax. The last year has established that the whole premise of manmade global warming is a hoax, and we still have presidential candidates who want to buy into it!
Mr. Limbaugh is an obvious target to be described as a barker at the carnival of climate denial.
But there are others at the carnival, legitimate scientists from impressive places like MIT and Harvard and Princeton who are also climate denialists. In addition, some of the legitimate scientists at the carnival include self-professed Christians -- decent men from all appearances. All of this lends credence to remaining within the gates of the carnival.
Yet outside the gates of climate denial and its fun house of curved mirrors, the truth about climate change continues to reveal itself to anyone who allows the love of God to give them "eyes to see." This includes reports and warnings from the most respected scientific bodies from the U.S. and around the world, as well as more and more extreme weather events.
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is the nation's premiere scientific body, established to advise the government on what science has to say about important decisions our elected officials need to make. Over the past year the NAS has issued a series of major reports on climate change, beginning with one published in May 2010 on the science. The report regards both climate change and that human activities are the primary cause as "settled facts" (p. 17). It states:
"Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for -- and in many cases is already affecting -- a broad range of human and natural systems" (p. 21).
It warns: "The ultimate magnitude of climate change and the severity of its impacts depend strongly on the actions that human societies take to respond to these risks" (p. 22).
These scientific conclusions may be new to you. You may have seen news accounts that suggest there is still a debate going on in the scientific community. Those inside the gates at the carnival of climate denial want to convince you that a real debate still rages, that the science isn't settled.
The truth is this: a consensus on these conclusions was reached over a decade ago by scientific experts from here in the U.S. and around the world. Those who say otherwise are deceiving themselves and you.
The final report (May 2011) in the recent NAS series on climate change concerns both the need for action and suggestions on the way forward. Here is how they summarize the need for action now:
• The faster that greenhouse gas emissions are reduced, the lower the risks; and the less pressure there is to make steeper and potentially more expensive reductions later. • Investments currently being made in energy-related infrastructure and equipment will lock in emissions commitments for decades to come. Enacting relevant policies now will provide crucial guidance for those investment decisions. • The risks of continuing "business as usual" are greater than the risks associated with strong efforts to limit and adapt to climate change. Policy changes can potentially be reversed or scaled back if needed, whereas many adverse changes in the climate system would be difficult or impossible to "undo."
So, here's the truth: invest now, or pay much more later. Invest now, or risk harmful, systemic and essentially irreversible changes.
The prudent thing is to act boldly now with "strong efforts." Waiting is the risky thing. Again, those who tell you otherwise are deceiving themselves and you. They want to keep you at the carnival of climate denial. But doing so is incompatible with the love of God.
Recent Extreme Weather
It's hard to not have noticed the extreme weather happening here in the U.S. and around the world. But to be clear from the outset, not all recent extreme weather events have been intensified by climate change. For example, preliminary scientific analysis suggests that the Russian heat wave of 2010 was a rare but natural occurrence. There is as of yet insufficient evidence to link climate change to supercharged tornadoes like the ones that ripped through Alabama and the Southeast in late April and that hit Joplin, Mo., on May 22.
Climate is weather over time, and climate change results in a change in weather patterns. It takes time for such changed patterns to emerge and for scientists to be able to then say that climate change has happened. So scientists usually focus on patterns, and not on whether climate change intensified a particular event.
But scientists have predicted what a warmer world looks like: more floods and droughts, more heat waves, more intense storms. Even a major (but nearly unknown) report in June 2008 from the Bush Administration affirmed that such climate-intensified weather patterns had been occurring in recent decades.
So what's been in the news lately? Let's see. Well, there's been...
Similar events are happening all around the world both this year and last, from the devastating floods in Pakistan to floods and drought and wildfires in Australia to drought in China impacting their wheat crop and thereby raising prices around the world.
The weather extremes and weather patterns are communicating to anyone with eyes to see what a warming world looks like. As a recent Newsweek cover story on the reality of climate change put it, "Batten down the hatches."
Climate Pollution in 2010
Even with the ill effects of a global recession still lingering, in 2010 global emissions of greenhouse gases from energy consumption were the highest ever at 30.6 gigatonnes (Gt), a 5 percent jump from the previous record year in 2008, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
This level of pollution and the rate of growth means we are nearly out of time. If we do not take serious, dramatic, society-altering steps to overcome global warming soon, then we may not be able to avoid tipping points that produce consequences far beyond the significant impacts I outline in my book, "Global Warming and the Risen LORD."
According to the IEA, to avoid these very dangerous tipping points, emissions must peak at 32 Gt. At our current rate we will reach that level sometime in the next two years. And 80 percent of such pollution is locked in, coming as it does from power plants and industries and vehicles already built and in use around the world.
Truth is, we're getting dangerously close to driving off a cliff in the clown car of climate denial. Scientists have posted signs with blinking lights warning there's a cliff ahead. They are essentially yelling, "Stop, stop! Reverse course!" But those with us in the clown car say "Cliff? What cliff? I don't see no cliff! Hit the gas! Yippee!"
The facts, the evidence, the findings are clear. The truth is plain to see for those who allow the love of God to give them eyes to see. It's well past time to hit the brakes and get out of the clown car and exit the gate at the carnival of climate denial. Time to be a grown-up.
The Rev. Jim Ball is author of 'Global Warming and the Risen LORD: Christian Discipleship and Climate Change.'
Rev. Fletcher Harper: God is My Rock: How the Earth Reveals the Divine
Climate change denial - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Psychology of Climate Change Denial | Wired Science | Wired.com
Geologists and Climate Change Denial | ThinkProgress
Climate change denial becomes harder to justify - The Washington Post
the new grid is being developed.
It will be both charged and used by consumers and alternative
energy producers. In many cases those will be on in the same.
So in 10 years when we no longer need coal, oil, or nuclear for
energy and are independant of them, Who will care what these
thought or did?
When Dr. Leaky was Discovering Lucy he did not ask the Pope
if he could do that or if he must deny that he did.
Scientific progress will go right on regardless of what fruitcakes think.
If man is causing global warming now , what caused the ice to melt and what's preventing that natural phenomena from reappearing ?
Study up a bit and you will find the answers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwX3khBnI4s
More than ten years ago there were claims of a consensus regarding the conclusions derived from the best climate models of the time. There has been significant progress in the meanwhile, including another ten years of data. The quality of the data continues to improve. A proper discussion of the more recent data would be much more interesting (and useful) than what Rev. Bell includes in his article -- including the reasons for the NAS opinion he quotes.
National and international science academies and scientific societies have assessed the current scientific opinion, in particular on recent global warming. These assessments have largely followed or endorsed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) position of January 2001 which states:
No scientific body of national or international standing has maintained a dissenting opinion...
The U.S. Global Change Research Program reported in June, 2009[9] that:
In 2004, the intergovernmental Arctic Council and the non-governmental International Arctic Science Committee released the synthesis report of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment:
Climate conditions in the past provide evidence that rising atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are associated with rising global temperatures. Human activities, primarily the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas), and secondarily the clearing of land, have increased the concentration of carbon dioxide, methane, and other heat-trapping ("greenhouse") gases in the atmosphere...
There is international scientific consensus that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change
....Linda Whetstone and her brother Michael, the trustees present at the private meeting, are the children of Sir Anthony Fisher who was an ideological disciple and former student of the father of neoliberalism, Friedrich Hayek. Fisher senior masterminded the global network of neoliberal think tanks, including setting up more than 150 organisations himself."
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/climate-change-sceptic-think-tank-shuts-down-2300529.html
Vote for the progressive Caucus folks in the primaries. That's out only hope, to avoid world wide violent collapse.
You pay a lot of attention to non-scientists spouting off about scientific matters if you truly believe what you wrote.
The costs to cleanup increasing disasters from extreme weather events will increase this decade. The American public is playing a deadly game of Russian Roulette. By the time events begin to spin out of control it will be far too late to do anything. In fact it already is. The Special interests' their power and money have done their job- we can only pray that we are not next under grim reaper of Climate change.
It is not just about climate change but hostility to science.
At the end of the day, many religious people feel threatened by science and rather than update their thinking they become deniers.
It's a conspiracy, a hoax, immoral, they say.
Or like Michele Bachmann was quoted as saying:
"I support intelligent design," Bachmann told reporters following her speech at the conference, CNN reports. "What I support is putting all science on the table and then letting students decide. I don't think it's a good idea for government to come down on one side of scientific issue or another, when there is reasonable doubt on both sides."
Doesn't that sound fair?
Let's vote on it.
Charlie
However, the bible being the word of God is perfect and infallible. Therefore students do not get to render an opinion.
Science, on the other hand...
Charlie
You first.
Scary, isn't it? In which a democracy of opinion becomes a tyrrany of "facts".
A few books I have read recently are worth checking out:
Climate Change Denial: Heads in the Sand
Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming
and
Climate Cover-Up: The Crusade to Deny Global Warming
I won't bother to mention books and studies that support the recognition of change. Although I just started Why We Disagree About Climate Change: Understanding Controversy, Inaction and Opportunity and it looks excellent. Perhaps the one worth starting with.
The thing is clear: there is definitely a problem here on planet Earth.
The actual science is pretty clear. But so many americans truly do not understand how science works. They tend to interpret relatively minor disagreements about some minor observation as an indictment of the entire scope of science. They tend to choose to believe in some scientists who are funded by the corporations contributing to the pollution.
The problem of climate change is there in our face. We can no longer ignore it. It does not have to mean the destruction of industrialized first world nations. YET. But suppose the science is 100% correct. And suppose we wait just a little too long? Who is willing to risk the lives of the future generations? Our grandchildren and their grandchildren?
I'm not going to expound my beliefs on climate change here, now, because I'm tired of trying to do it in a sound bite of 250 words or less. But, I have a challenge for all you people who think the Sun has little to do with the climate: Spend 72 hours outside in the same clothes, no shelter, no sleeping bag or blankets, no campfire, no creature comforts other than food and water. Better yet, spend more than one season outside, tent, sleeping bag and change of clothes permitted, then we can chat.
peace
By the way, gravity causes climate change.
No, There was a debate, but it's over. Scientists resisted the idea for decades, until sufficient evidence and research showed it to be true. The debate you say isn't happening has, in fact, already happened.
If someone comes up with a viable explanation for what's going on, the debate will re-open. That's how science works.
"The volcano in Iceland put out more CO2 in a few days than humankind ever has throughout it's existence."
A stupefyingly false myth. It's not even close. Human-emitted CO2 dwarfs volcanic CO2. In an average year, well over a hundred times more CO2 is emitted by human activites than by all the world's volcanoes combined. The flights grounded by the Icelandic volcano ALONE would have emitted more CO2 than the volcano did.
You CANNOT make a rational judgment of climate science if the "facts" you're working with are utterly wrong.
"Water vapor is a much more powerful greenhouse gas"
Everyone knows that. But water vapor is entirely dependent on the noncondensing greenhouse gases like CO2.
"CO2 is not at historicalÂly high levels"
Nobody says it is.
"for all you people who think the Sun has little to do with the climate"
Nobody says that, either.
But it has little to do with the strong warming trend of the last 35 years or so, since it has changed very little over that period.
Co2 from volcanoes is less than emitted by humans burning fossil fuel, about 1% of what humans emit.
http://www.grist.org/article/volcanoes-emit-more-co2-than-humans
" Thus, not only does volcanic CO2 not dwarf that of human activity, it actually comprises less than 1 percent of that value."
http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/volcanowatch/2007/07_02_15.html
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=earthtalks-volcanoes-or-humans
At this point, profits to be made better be done soon. The window of opportunity is closing- as is the climate of the past.
.
Follow the money.
Or read the science, look at the data and observations- such as sea ice melt and other observable factors. Facts your ilk prefer to ignore to preserve an unsustainable economy.
That doesn't make all those little green niche profiteers any better than war profiteers during WW II. They sell bad theory. They sell bad products. They sell bad subsidy programs. Frankly, and this isn't an attack on Rev Ball, the clergy is just as suspect when embracing a specific implementation in order to make themselves relevant. We've seen some embarrassments with now once embraced and now debunked solutions in the Green Movement.
The clergy can play important roles in issue education: the minute they embrace a specific tax credit or regulatory scheme then the clergy gets too politically entangled in a field where science is for sale. It's much like Health Care: it's one thing for the clergy to support universal care and to oppose abortion funding; it's another thing entirely to support the details of a specific univeral care implementation and start with the WWJD mantra and lobby for specific program subsidies designed to benefit Humana in health care or GE or UTC in green product credits.
Cap and Trade has potential as a regulatory solution but isn't the only proposal and certainly not a WWJD litmus issue anymore than ethanol subsidies are.
Yes I expect GM made a profit in WW II when it produced tanks and planes but those things won the war. How does it compare to the profits of Prescott Bush who worked with the enemy?
Similarly, if Al Gore makes a profit from green products how is that wrong when compared to the destructive oil profits of George W Bush (Prescott Bush's grandson)?
I will agree with you that both WWII and WWIII (Climate Change) have been wars of propaganda. And this time the voices of reason appear to be losing. But that happened in first couple years of WWII as well. Once people realize what's at stake they get sober pretty quick.
source http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar
Funny when you lay it out like that. What has Limbaugh ever done, anyway?
What caused that to melt ? - God ?
These cycles are called Milankovitch Cycles after the guy who figured it all out. The warm peak of the current cycle was about 6000 years ago. So that means we should be in a gradual cooling trend with another ice age due to start in about 10,000 years. Remember the talk about an ice age in the 70's? Time magazine forgot to mention the part about that ice age not starting for 10,000 years, but then they were trying to sell magazines.
But now, instead of a gradual cooling, we are seeing a sharp rise in temperatures. Multiple lines of evidence prove that it is caused by extra CO2 in the atmosphere.