Global warming fallacies

[Guest TrueMetis]

We've talked about it a bit but let's actually start listing them. Of the top of my head the ones I've heard are.

CO2 is natural (So are CO and SO2 no one says they aren't a problem)

CO2 is not a pollutant (Same as above)

CO2 is plant food

The 70's ice age scare

Climategate

It was cold yesterday

Start listing them folks.

[TimG]

We've talked about it a bit but let's actually start listing them.

Who decided you are entitled to decide what constitutes a 'fallacy'.

1) CO2 is not a pollutant

By describing CO2 as "pollution" alarmists are seeking to manipulate the average person who generally associates pollution with things like toxic waste or smog. This association is dishonest and skeptics are correct to point out that CO2 is not pollution as most people understand it.

2) CO2 is plant food

This is true. Nothing wrong with that.

3) The 70's ice age scare

Again, there is nothing wrong with pointing out that we have been through the "environmental doom is nye" cycle before. The onus on the alarmists to provide compelling evidence that this round of doom mongering is different. Denying that doom mongering has occurred in the past makes alarmists a lot less credible.

4) Climategate

What does this mean? Climategate demonstrated that leading climate scientists are not neutral parties and actively seek to suppress views that they disagree with and twist their results in order to better support the CAGW narrative. It may not have proven that they are wrong but it does show that they are not particularily trustworthy people.

5) It was cold yesterday

Cuts both ways. Alarmists deserve to have the snow and ice shoved in their faces as long as alarmists jump on things like Russian heatwaves and Pakistan floods as 'evidence of climate change'.

Edited December 19, 2010 by TimG

[Moonlight Graham]

Who decided you are entitled to decide what constitutes a 'fallacy'.

1) CO2 is not a pollutant

By describing CO2 as "pollution" alarmists are seeking to manipulate the average person who generally associates pollution with things like toxic waste or smog. This association is dishonest and skeptics are correct to point out that CO2 is not pollution as most people understand it.

2) CO2 is plant food

This is true. Nothing wrong with that.

3) The 70's ice age scare

Again, there is nothing wrong with pointing out that we have been through the "environmental doom is nye" cycle before. The onus on the alarmists to provide compelling evidence that this round of doom mongering is different. Denying that doom mongering has occurred in the past makes alarmists a lot less credible.

4) Climategate

What does this mean? Climategate demonstrated that leading climate scientists are not neutral parties and actively seek to suppress views that they disagree with and twist their results in order to better support the CAGW narrative. It may not have proven that they are wrong but it does show that they are not particularily trustworthy people.

5) It was cold yesterday

Cuts both ways. Alarmists deserve to have the snow and ice shoved in their faces as long as alarmists jump on things like Russian heatwaves and Pakistan floods as 'evidence of climate change'.

I agree with all of this. This thread = FAIL.

[wyly]

I agree with all of this. This thread = FAIL.

then to be very honest you know less then timG...

[wyly]

-it's the sun

-mars is warming

-the climates changed before

-CO2 lags temp

-it's cosmic rays

-urban heat island effect

-it's volcano's

-the oregon petition

-it a conspiracy started by Margret Thacher, al gore and david suzuki...

_"it's a socialist plot to steal our money"-S Harper

Edited December 19, 2010 by wyly

[bush_cheney2004]

- Himalayan glaciers will soon disappear

- Polar bears will soon be extinct

- CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas

- Global warming will cause more hurricanes

[Moonlight Graham]

then to be very honest you know less then timG...

disprove the things Tim said then, oh wise one.

[TimG]

-it's the sun

-the climates changed before

-it's cosmic rays

-urban heat island effect

Again, the only fallacy here is the claim that CO2 is known to have caused most of the recent warming. This has not been shown. The link to CO2 has only been inferred with climate models which are only able to factor in things which can be quantified. This means factors which are poorly understood (sun, clouds, oceans, UHI, et. al.) act as wildcards and undermine any claims of certainty when it comes to the magnitude of the CO2 effect. It is quite possible that CO2 will end up as a minor factor once we have the decades of data that will be required to determine the true magnitude of these other effects.

-the oregon petition

I don't understand why alarmists obsess so much about this. For years alarmists ran around screaming about how 99% of scientists (most of whom have no expertise in climate) support the CAGW narrative. This petition demonstrated that the alarmist claim is largely false since there are large number of people with scientific credentials (even after accounting for the sabotage attempts by alarmists) dispute the CAGW narrative. It would be reasonable to argue that one does not do science by taking a vote but the problem here are the alarmists who thought they could bully people into doing what they demand with a bogus appeal to authority.

_"it's a socialist plot to steal our money"-S Harper

We have a situtation where eco activists around the world pushing policies which we know will do nothing to reduce emissions yet they will do a lot to take wealth from the middle class in rich countries and send it to poor countries. There are only two possibilities:

1) The activists are complete idiots for supporting policies that cannot possibly work;

2) The activists care more about redistributing money than reducing CO2.

I am perfectly happy with choosing 1) but I can understand why many people suspect a secret agenda is at work when the publically stated reasons are completely irrational.

Edited December 19, 2010 by TimG

[Guest TrueMetis]

disprove the things Tim said then, oh wise one.

Very well.

Who decided you are entitled to decide what constitutes a 'fallacy'.

1) CO2 is not a pollutant

By describing CO2 as "pollution" alarmists are seeking to manipulate the average person who generally associates pollution with things like toxic waste or smog. This association is dishonest and skeptics are correct to point out that CO2 is not pollution as most people understand it.

Look up the definition of pollutant online, from the free online dictionary.

A substance or condition that contaminates air, water, or soil. Pollutants can be artificial substances, such as pesticides and PCBs, or naturally occurring substances, such as oil or carbon dioxide, that occur in harmful concentrations in a given environment. Heat transmitted to natural waterways through warm-water discharge from power plants and uncontained radioactivity from nuclear wastes are also considered pollutants.

Pollution has never been confined to just toxic waste or smog, hence light pollution.

My link

2) CO2 is plant food

This is true. Nothing wrong with that.

Plenty wrong with it, since the point of this one is more CO2 is good for plants. I've showed this to be wrong multiple times. CO2 decreases crop yields, makes pesticides and herbicides less effective, increases pest growth, makes crops less nutritious meaning you have to eat more, but may increase the speed of plant growth.

3) The 70's ice age scare

Again, there is nothing wrong with pointing out that we have been through the "environmental doom is nye" cycle before. The onus on the alarmists to provide compelling evidence that this round of doom mongering is different. Denying that doom mongering has occurred in the past makes alarmists a lot less credible.

Not by scientists though in the 70's the consensus was warming, 7 papers saying cooling and 44 predicting warming the only sources saying cooling was media outlets. Oddly enough though many media outlets said warming yet those ones were ignored or in a few cases someone lied about what they said.

4) Climategate

What does this mean? Climategate demonstrated that leading climate scientists are not neutral parties and actively seek to suppress views that they disagree with and twist their results in order to better support the CAGW narrative. It may not have proven that they are wrong but it does show that they are not particularily trustworthy people.

You debunk this one yourself you admit that none of it has been proven. There is no proof that they suppressed anyone or they twist their results. It did prove they threw out data when they shouldn't have but since there are other data sets it doesn't prove they are wrong. This is just short of global conspiracy BS.

5) It was cold yesterday

Cuts both ways. Alarmists deserve to have the snow and ice shoved in their faces as long as alarmists jump on things like Russian heatwaves and Pakistan floods as 'evidence of climate change'.

This I agree with, but "alarmists" rarely use these arguments your side does all the time.

Edited December 19, 2010 by TrueMetis

[eyeball]

Global warming fallacies?

Two off the top of my mind; that all the alarmists are on one side of the issue and that the economy will up and die the moment we do anything about global warming.

Nobody but nobody can doom-say better than the economic doom is nigh alarmists.

[TimG]

Look up the definition of pollutant online, from the free online dictionary.

I am using the meaning that is understood by most people. i.e. pollution is something like toxic waste or smog. Dictionary definitions are irrelevant when having public discussions. The generally understood meaning is what is important.

z've showed this to be wrong multiple times. CO2 decreases crop yields, makes pesticides and herbicides less effective, increases pest growth, makes crops less nutritious meaning you have to eat more, but may increase the speed of plant growth.

Yet greenhouse operators deliberately enrich the atomosphere with CO2.

http://homeharvest.com/carbondioxideenrichment.htm

By adding CO2 to the atmosphere around the plant, a 40% crop increase was achieved. Whereas previous crops averaged 22 heads per basket, lettuce grown in the increased CO2 atmosphere (550 ppm) averaged 16 heads of better quality per basket.

Sorry, studies that assume that farmers cannot change how and what they grow are not that useful when it comes to predicting the *net* effect of CO2 on agriculture (i.e. it is not enough to show that some bad effects under some conditions can occur - it is the sum of effects good and bad that matter).

Not by scientists though in the 70's the consensus was warming

So what? People during the 70s have heard the 'sky is falling meme' before.

You debunk this one yourself you admit that none of it has been proven. There is no proof that they suppressed anyone or they twist their results. It did prove they threw out data when they shouldn't have but since there are other data sets it doesn't prove they are wrong. This is just short of global conspiracy BS.

So many strawmen, so little time...

First - try reading what I wrote instead of responding to imaginary talking points.

The fact is the emails show evidence that they tried to suppress views they did not like. Whether they succeeded or not is irrelevent. The attempt itself shows they are not honest brokers. Same goes for the "tricks" designed to hide the fact that their data is likely garbage. Climategate is not about science or conspiracy - it is about trust. The reaction of scientific institutions and CAGW crowd to climategate more or less proves they do not have much intellectual integrity and cannot be trusted to provide an unbaised assessment of our state of knowledge.

BTW - trying to dismiss a lack of trust as a 'conspiracy' simples demonstrates that you know nothing about the skeptical arguments that you think you can debunk.

This I agree with, but "alarmists" rarely use these arguments your side does all the time.

You are living in a fantasy land. A day does not go by without some alarmist attributing weather to climate change. Edited December 19, 2010 by TimG

[Guest TrueMetis]

You know what I'm not dealing with your intellectually dishonest crap again.

[lukin]

then to be very honest you know less then timG...

That's how banjo pickers spell "than".

[BubberMiley]

That's how banjo pickers spell "than".

Citing punctuation and grammar rules is how banjo pickers admit they can't win an argument.

[lukin]

Citing punctuation and grammar rules is how banjo pickers admit they can't win an argument.

Sorry, poor grammar(not typos) is a sign of a poor education. One shouldn't claim to be more intelligent than others if s/he doesn't have a solid handle on fourth grade English skills.

[Shady]

We've talked about it a bit but let's actually start listing them. Of the top of my head the ones I've heard are.

CO2 is natural (So are CO and SO2 no one says they aren't a problem)

CO2 is not a pollutant (Same as above)

CO2 is plant food

The 70's ice age scare

Climategate

It was cold yesterday

Start listing them folks.

You forgot hurricane Katrina. Oops, sorry, wrong side.

[Michael Hardner]

We've talked about it a bit but let's actually start listing them. Of the top of my head the ones I've heard are.

CO2 is natural (So are CO and SO2 no one says they aren't a problem)

CO2 is not a pollutant (Same as above)

CO2 is plant food

The 70's ice age scare

Climategate

It was cold yesterday

Start listing them folks.

Beat me to the punch ! GOOD SHOW TM !

[Michael Hardner]

- Himalayan glaciers will soon disappear

- Polar bears will soon be extinct

- CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas

- Global warming will cause more hurricanes

I`ll give you one more - the Maldives will be under water soon.

Fair`s fair. I know that several of these are bandied. Note the shorter list, though.

Also, number 3 here is neither here nor there, is it ?

[bush_cheney2004]

I`ll give you one more - the Maldives will be under water soon.

Fair`s fair. I know that several of these are bandied. Note the shorter list, though.

I only spent 30 seconds on the list....want more?

Also, number 3 here is neither here nor there, is it ?

Mostly not here compared to other "greenhouse gases".

[Michael Hardner]

Mostly not here compared to other "greenhouse gases".

But what is the implication of saying that ? It may be false to say that it`s more prevalent I suppose, but it`s not false to say that it has an effect on temperature.

[wyly]

-"Phil Jones says no global warming since 1995"

-"CO2 effect is saturated"

-"CO2 has a short residence time"

-"Pluto is warming"

-"It's aerosols"

-"It's El Nino"

-"2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory"

-"Scientists can't even predict weather"

-"Medieval Warm Period was warmer"

-"they used to call AGW now it's CC"

-"it's been getting cooler since 1998"

Edited December 19, 2010 by wyly

[Pliny]

You know what I'm not dealing with your intellectually dishonest crap again.

Than why don't you start a thread on intellectual dishonesty. Oh....I see you have already did that. The affect seems to be to have attracted all the intellectually dishonest people.

Don't take the grammar attack personally. Poor grammar is not a sign of not being intelligent. You may have had a poor grammar teacher or been educated in a public school, than again...???

[bush_cheney2004]

....It may be false to say that it`s more prevalent I suppose, but it`s not false to say that it has an effect on temperature.

So does my butane lighter.

[Michael Hardner]

So does my butane lighter.

Ok, let me tighten that up a bit... a *significant* effect.

[Pliny]

All scientists on the denier side are on the payroll of big oil.

All scientists on the AGW side are on the payroll of government or are on governmental panels themselves.