The Global Warming Debate

[refill]

Hey Jason,

I have to say the term "alarmist" is pejorative; it implies irrationality. A better term would be pragmatists. "Skeptics" on the other hand implies rationality and is complimentary; maybe they could be could denialists (but that would be pejorative--and it's not a word).

In any case, this debate seems to come down to who you believe. Wikipedia has a nice survey of opinions of various organizations and individuals (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_...e_change). When assessing whether to believe someone or not, you have to ask a) what are their creds., and b) if they have other factors influencing their expressed opinions. I have seen a few apparently credentialed scientists opinions stating humans have insignificant impact, and many un-credentialed scientists/engineers (such as Rutan--not a climate scientist) who have expressed this as well--but no organized research. But I have seen many more, and more credentialed scientist take the opposite position. Moreover, there are many organized studies that support this.

My position is that most people agree the earth is warming, so the question is, is the man-made part of that significant? Most/all of the credible (not funded by oil, e.g.) organizations/studies seem to take no opinion or an opinion of "yes" on this question. I don't see any taking a position of "no". Therefore, given the possible consequences (accelerated melting of ice caps, more severe hurricanes, flooding, etc.) of continued increased warming, prudence would direct us to take action to curb this.

I think this topic has become a religion by some on both sides, but prudence dictates you take action to curb greenhouse emissions. I happen to be swayed by the studies, organizations and individual scientists who believe there is an impact over the individuals (I am not aware of any credible studies--just opinions of other studies) who say there is not.