Global Warming (part 1)

It has been a long and crazy weekend so I apologize for not getting this posted sooner. As of late, I can’t help but be amused at the fact that in the last several months, every major global warming protest has been postponed or drastically hindered by uncharacteristic snowstorms.  I know some say that unseasonably cold weather is also a sign of global warming, but I’ll leave that discussion for another time.  Personally, I believe in global warming, but I do not believe that it is caused by man.  The earth has gone through climate cycles for millions of years and it will continue to do so despite the effect that people think they have on it. 

First, carbon dioxide only accounts for 3.8 hundredths of one percent of the atmosphere by volume and approximately only 25% of that CO2 is from us. Nature accounts for the other 75%. While CO2 levels have only risen by 70 parts per million in the last 50 years, we are still talking about a number that is so small and insignificant that it is like an ant trying to stop a speeding car. The earth and its’ atmosphere is just too large for that tiny number to matter.

Secondly, lets take a look at the “founding fathers” of global warming; and no, it was not Al Gore.  Roger Revelle and Hans Suess were doing research for the Navy around the Pacific Atolls during the 1950s.  When work was coming up short, they wrote a paper suggesting that a rise in CO2 was damaging our ozone layer and creating global warming.  They urged congress for grants so they could perform more research and with the possible crisis in hand, they were gladly handed the money.  The two men continued to write papers and continued to get grant money to fund their research.  They could prove an increase in CO2, but they could never (and no one still has) prove that it was linked to global warming.  Today’s arguments of global warming are based on these men’s findings and research which were fueled by their desire to seek more grant money.  If there is no crisis, then there is no money. However, by the end of the 1980s and early 90s, Revelle changed his tune.  By this time he was retired and becoming more alarmed by which how people were taking “global warming.”  Revelle spoke with congressman and even published articles stating that his findings were inconclusive and that it woud take another 20 years to attempt to determine anything.  He claimed that there was no actual link between CO2 and global warming.  The man who conducted the studies and research that provides the foundation still today for global warming is now claiming that his work wasn’t entirely accurate. By the way, Al Gore studied under Revelle at Harvard in the 1960s and he called Revelle his mentor.  It is Revelle’s work that he uses for the basis of “An Inconvenient Truth.”  When recently confronted about Revelle disputing his on work, Al Gore simply shrugged it off by saying the man was old and senile, and didn’t know what he was talking about. 

Thirdly, there was a recent article published by Michael Reilly stating that global warming is on hold.  Scientists are now baffled by what they knew without a doubt was global warming. In the last 8 years, the earth hasn’t warmed at all; in fact, it may be cooling.  The article claims that scientist are realizing that they really don’t know how much of the CO2 is caused by humans and that it could be far less than what they thought.  In order to save face, their best guess is that global warming will “hibernate” for 30 years before it comes back.  Their theory is that there is a build-up of surplus heat that will be released after the “hibernation.”  Where exactly does this surplus of heat exist and who releases it?  Basically, the article admits that they have not clue about global warming because our climate is not reacting according to how they thought it would. 

Let me finish with this, it is my personal belief that as the human race, we have been entrusted with taking care of our environment. I believe that we should invest in cleaner energy as well as reducing waste and becoming “green.” I believe that we should and must become less dependent on oil and coal.  If that is the case, then what do I care about global warming?  The global warming “crisis” is a means to the end right?  Wrong. I don’t dispute the validity of global warming because I don’t care about the environment; I dispute the validity of it because this “crisis” is dangerous.  The end does not justify the means.  Stay tuned for part two on the dangers of buying into this man-made crisis.