From: Richard Loosemore (rpwl@lightlink.com)
Date: Fri Nov 25 2005 - 15:46:29 MST
Herb Martin wrote:
> Maybe there is a problem; maybe there isn't. Maybe
> human activity is staving off the expected (due in
> geological times) 'next Ice Age' but more likely human
> activity is having a small effect on natural swings of
> global temperatures.
>
> Before making up one's mind to the point of being
> "certain" and unwilling to consider additional facts it
> would do well to hear the explanations of Patrick J.
> Michaels.
>
> Michaels is a professor of environmental sciences at
> the University of Virginia, past president of the American
> Association of State Climatologists, past program chair
> for the Committee on Applied Climatology of the American
> Meteorological Society, contributing author and reviewer
> of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
> Change...
>
> Wait a minute! Isn't that the UN Panel you quoted as
> providing definite evidence and proof of your position?
>
> Maybe you should READ what Michaels has to say on this
> subject so that you can know the disagreements and
> understand how the actual findings are frequently
> misinterpreted by the press and others with a political
> axe to grind.
Let's read, instead, what the vast majority of other climate scientists
say about Michaels.
In 2003, Michaels threatened to sue a fellow scientist Peter Gleick,
after Gleick told The Star Press of Muncie, Indiana, that Michaels "is
one of a very small minority of nay-sayers who continue to dispute the
facts and science about climate change in the face of compelling,
overwhelming, and growing evidence. ... I consider that Michaels is to
the science of climate change like the Flat Earth Society is to the
science of planetary shape."
What happened to scientific discussion? Since when did a scientist sue
someone for disagreeing with him?
Harvard University professor John Holdren told the U.S. Senate
Republican Policy Committee, "Michaels is another of the handful of U.S.
climate-change contrarians, but lacks [MIT professor and fellow
contrarian] Richard Lindzen's scientific stature. He has published
little if anything of distinction in the professional literature, being
noted rather for his shrill op-ed pieces and indiscriminate
denunciations of virtually every finding of mainstream climate science."
He sounds like THE person to cite, doesn't he?
When the previous poster said "The ENTIRE scientific community" agrees
that global warming is real, he was exaggerating for effect, but the
magnitude of his statement was accurate: the vast majority of the
scientific community who understand the issues well enough DO agree.
The greatest threat to science today comes from ideological groups who
say the kind of thing that you just did: "Maybe there is a problem;
maybe there isn't." as if one or two contrarians (who have received
enormous amounts of money from industry groups) are equal in weight to
several hundred experts (who just draw a scientist's paltry salary) who
say the opposite.
Richard Loosemore.
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