On the fence about global warming? Me too, and who wouldn’t be, given the voluminous amount of material published by disbelievers of what Al Gore termed his ‘inconvenient truth’. However, like Al Gore or not, if you look at the scientific data on global warming, presented from numerous angles by scientists without bias, it’s hard not to be afraid. Very afraid.
Jay Taylor recently interviewed two people with serious credentials in the scientific community to get to the bottom of global warming. CEO.CA was turned on to the interview by Brent Cook, a highly respected exploration geologist, well known for his sometimes surprising candor, and a great guy. Brent was one of Jay’s guests, and the other was Naomi Oreskes, who is a ‘historian of science’. Naomi’s credentials are too numerous to list; suffice it to say she is Stanford PHD, teaches at Harvard, has authored books and papers on climate change, and is a TED speaker.
Taylor’s interview was very interesting. After listening to it I came away with the following conclusions:
Global warming is a fact, and there is a mountain of scientific evidence to support it
All the scientific data shows that since the 60’s there’s been a consistent warming trend, and although the increase in the global temperature is minuscule, it will have powerful consequences.
Greenhouse gas emissions are a big contributor to global warming
There is overwhelming scientific data (much of it from NASA) that CO2 emissions (aka greenhouse gas emissions) are up 40% since the industrial revolution. Scientists know that levels of CO2 emissions and global temperatures track. Whether one precedes the other is irrelevant.
The naysayers of global warming are cherry pickers
The subject of global warming is one of great debate; believers and non-believers are often philosophically entrenched, rather than scientifically influenced. Oreskes says global warming is a ‘bad news’ story that people don’t want to believe, so they look hard for evidence to dispute it. They ‘cherry pick’ bits and pieces of data to support their case.
The only data that should be considered relevant to the discussion of global warming is scientific data, published in ‘peer review’ journals.
If you’re simply searching the internet for information about global warming, you’re making a mistake, according to Oreskes. Scientific research published in ‘peer review’ journals is heavily scrutinized by the scientific community. The ‘peer review’ process weeds out what real from what is not. And if you look at scientific data there is NO argument that global warming is real, and it’s being largely driven by greenhouse gases.
Our friend Brent Cook agrees. He’s an objective thinker who has seen first hand an increase in explorable ground opened up by receding ice sheets. He agrees that all too often people’s opinion of global warming is just that: opinion.
Source: Jay Taylor Media
Interesting article. Couple of points. First. Yes earth is warming. Yes CO2 levels rising. But what other factors could be causing the warming. Scientists know the earth has gone through many warming and cooling episodes. They don’t know cause for all of them. There are many theories. Second. What should we do about it. Even if we accept is is due to man-made carbon emissions, and that this poses an immediate threat–do we go back to pre-industrial times, destroy our power generating facilities and put our industry at disadvantage to nations in Europe and Asia that will not similarly stop using coal. Even Germany is going back to coal because it does not like nuclear waste. Thirdly, peer review can mean a lot, but it does not mean as much as it used to, especially concerning a charged issue like this.
Al Gore has called our Canadian oil sands an open sewer! He is against modern, environmentally friendly resource development. Gore is a complete hypocrite demanding we live lesser lives than him. As for the global warming nonsense in your article there has been no increase in 19 years. There are too many other facts that refute the left wing angle here. Socialism has now morphed into environmentalism. Very surprised to see this anti-Canadian article in ceo.ca.
Not sure if he was right about the entire North Pole being ice free by 2013. This prediction garnered many headlines in 2008. Record ice increase last year in the arctic.
Carbon Engineering with Harvard Scientist PhD David Keith have a handle on CO2 or Carbon Capture, it’s working and will be part of the solution going forward. Take your science from Scientists not Politicians, scientists have to be peer reviewed, politicians do not. What is happening in space and nearby planets is also happening here on earth, this has occurred before and it’s a solar system cycle that has occurred before. Ice core samples from Antarctica tell us what occurred in the past, much of the propaganda on climate change is driven for reasons not related to saving the earth but posturing power and political agendas. Transitioning off Hydrocarbons isn’t going to be easy, isn’t going to be financially possible for decades, isn’t going to be politically possible for a variety of reasons. We have spent $300B on renewables without a single meaningful reduction in GHGs according to David Keith, we are releasing 30x the amount of carbon the earth and atmosphere can handle naturally per year. The StudentEnergy.Org group is addressing the transition problem at campuses around the globe since its not going to be 60 year olds who solve this problem it will be 20 something’s who create solutions in 10 years when they inherit decision making roles in energy companies. Gore had his day and he made his fortune pitching his ideas, but the world isn’t better off from his film as much as folks like to think about the ideas in them, the whole planet still runs on a majority percentage of hydrocarbon production due to the energy density packed in the molecules of oil. Seimens is one of the most responsible companies who was early to put its money where it’s mouth is, largely the most sustainable company on earth by metrics that matter. People want their dividends, their lattes, their vacations on beaches, and the west has a lifestyle dependent on cheap HCs which ain’t gonna change anytime soon. We are all energy illiterate in this part of the world, it’s us that needs to wake up, we are the only ones with the education, resources and cash to solve this. So lets get started, but lets be practical about it.
So in the billions of years on earth (and I am not disagreeing with you here just making an observation), our earth just happens to be warming at the same time as we first started polluting after the industrial revolution? Just a big coincidence?
Very clever CEO.ca, recycling articles written 15 years ago, confirming that global warming is real and deniers are denying qualified and respected science. Oh, wait, this article was written in 2014?! This article is written as if these are new ideas and we are getting the scoop for the first time! Is that really the starting point here? “Let’s revisit the idea that polluting our planet may have some negative implications, and we may have to change the way we’re doing things”. Gosh, wouldn’t it have been great if we had done that a decade ago, when you first heard about it (late in the game, natch), but refused to acknowledge it or do anything about it? As Gore taught us, it is an “inconvenient truth”.