350 Words Climate Change
Climate change advocates believe they have overwhelming evidence that human activity, especially when it comes to burning fossil fuels, is overwhelming. The question is: is the evidence overwhelming?
The earth has gone through many climatic changes in its 4.5 billion year existence. Human activity on a scale that may affect the climate, has only occurred since the mid 1800s. Let’s put together some questions about the claim that unless human fossil fuel energy consumption is drastically reduced, human beings will be solely responsible for the change, which will be devastating to all life.
The issue I want to consider is that the public is being presented with oversimplified or simply misleading information from all-sides other the climate change controversy.
One question to ask is what are the built-in assumptions of the models they are using? Prior assumptions will skew the “evidence” towards the outcome that is desired. How do you determine how biased a climate model is?
Another question to ask is have these models taken into account the all the information that is needed for a sound result? For example, the Sun waxes and wanes in the amount of energy that it releases and that hits the earth. This can, along with other natural phenomena, cause climatic changes—see for example the little ice age that occurred between 1300 and 1850. As the entry in Wikipedia notes:
“Several causes have been proposed: cyclical lows in solar radiation, heightened volcanic activity, changes in the ocean circulation, variations in Earth’s orbit and axial tilt (orbital forcing), inherent variability in global climate, and decreases in the human population (such as from the Black Death and the epidemics emerging in the Americas upon European contact.”
Also, do the models take into account chemical and physical processes, such as those occurring in the cryosphere and biosphere?
We obviously do not have expertise to judge the finer points of the scientific endeavor. However, that does not mean that we cannot sort out when we are being misled.
Take your position on climate change, whatever it may be. Explain in 350 to 750 words why you have come down on the side you are now on? What was the evidence that persuaded you? How do you know that the evidence was true and unbiased?
