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‘Geological history does not support CO2’s importance’–Just not true

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: Over the last 600 million years, there hasn't been much correlation between temperatures and CO2 levels. Clearly CO2 is not a climate driver.

Answer: While there are poorly understood ancient climates and controversial climate changes in earth's long geological history, there are no clear contradictions to greenhouse theory to be found.

Livestock’s long shadow

The NYT has an editorial today about the UNFAO's new report on the environmental degradation caused by increasing numbers of livestock. Money factoid: More greenhouse gases are produced by livestock than the entire global transportation sector.

‘CO2 doesn’t lead, it lags’–Turns out CO2 rise is both a cause and an effect of warming

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: In glacial-interglacial cycles, CO2 concentration lags behind temperature by centuries. Clearly, CO2 does not cause temperatures to rise; temperatures cause CO2 to rise.

Answer: When viewed coarsely, historical CO2 levels and temperature show a tight correlation. However, a closer examination of the CH4, CO2, and temperature fluctuations recorded in the Antarctic ice core records reveals that, yes, temperature moved first.

Nevertheless, it is misleading to say that temperature rose and then, hundreds of years later, CO2 rose. These warming periods lasted for 5,000 to 10,000 years (the cooling periods lasted more like 100,000 years!), so for the majority of that time (90% and more), temperature and CO2 rose together. This remarkably detailed archive of climatological evidence clearly allows for CO2 acting as a cause for rising temperatures, while also revealing it can be an effect of them.

What do the climate scientists think?

No Se Nada had an interesting post last week claiming climate scientists are starting to worry that they've oversold climate change:

What I see is something that I am having a hard time labeling, but that I might call either a "hangover" or a "sophomore slump" or "buyers remorse." None fit perfectly, but perhaps the combination does. I speak for (my interpretation) of the collective: {We tried for years - decades - to get them to listen to us about climate change. To do that we had to ramp up our rhetoric. We had to figure out ways to tone down our natural skepticism (we are scientists, after all) in order to put on a united face. We knew it would mean pushing the science harder than it should be. We knew it would mean allowing the boundary-pushers on the "it's happening" side free reign while stifling the boundary-pushers on the other side. But knowing the science, we knew the stakes to humanity were high and that the opposition to the truth would be fierce, so we knew we had to dig in. But now they are listening. Now they do believe us. Now they say they're ready to take action. And now we're wondering if we didn't create a monster. We're wondering if they realize how uncertain our projections of future climate are. We wonder if we've oversold the science. We're wondering what happened to our community, that individuals caveat even the most minor questionings of barely-proven climate change evidence, lest they be tagged as "skeptics." We're wondering if we've let our alarm at the problem trickle to the public sphere, missing all the caveats in translation that we have internalized. And we're wondering if we've let some of our scientists take the science too far, promise too much knowledge, and promote more certainty in ourselves than is warranted.}

I was also at the AGU meeting, and here's my take:

There is no proof in science, but there are mountains of evidence

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: Correlation is not proof of causation. There is no proof that CO2 is the cause of current warming.

Answer: There is no "proof" in science -- that is a property of mathematics. In science, what matters is the balance of evidence, and theories that can explain that evidence. Where possible, scientists make predictions and design experiments to confirm, modify, or contradict their theories, and must modify these theories as new information comes in.

Robert Novak thinks poor industry is getting beat up

I'm in D.C. for the holidays, so I have the pleasure of reading the Washington Post in its entirety, instead of just sporadic links.

I can report back to the rest of the U.S.: rest easy. You are not missing much.

Robert Novak rings in some Christmas cheer with an op-ed, "Losing it to to the greens."

Apparently, thanks to "environmentalists' well-financed propaganda operation," there are supporters for carbon legislation in even the Bush administration, and industry is "utterly helpless" and "utterly clueless as to how to respond."

So unfair, with all the cards stacked up against industry that way. Tell you what, Mr. Novak, environmentalists are nothing if not fair -- and what the hell, it's Christmas -- so here's what we'll do.

We'll swap budgets with your industry pals.

Yes, I know, it seems almost suicidally generous, but we wouldn't want to win unfairly. We'll take Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Utility, and Big Auto's dough, and you and your friends can laugh all the way to the bank on Sierra Club's famous riches. I'll even throw in Vote Solar's private island as a personal gesture of apology.

Say bye-bye

Check this out.

The population of mountain gorillas is so low now that the next human disease they catch may wipe them out. This is probably how most of the megafauna extinctions happened. A warming climate pushed a species into small pockets with low populations. Then people arrived with their novel diseases that finished it off. TB has been found in the bones of mammoths -- the same disease that may finish off the last mountain gorillas.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I read stories on the destruction of our biodiversity reluctantly and with a groan because it is so depressing, enhanced by a feeling of total helplessness. I may post soon on a brainstorm session to try to flush out novel ideas to stop this -- with help from commenters and a poll or two.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all the Gristmill readers who celebrate it. To those who celebrate proximate holidays, merry ... those. And to those who celebrate nothing at all, well, here's hoping you make it through the season with your sanity intact.

Now I'm off to play with my kids' new StompRocket.

Water vapor is indeed a powerful greenhouse gas, but there is plenty of room for CO2 to play a role

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: H2O accounts for 95% of the greenhouse effect; CO2 is insignificant.

Answer: According to the scientific literature and climate experts, CO2 contributes anywhere from 9% to 30% to the overall greenhouse effect. The 95% number does not appear to come from any scientific source, though it gets tossed around a lot.

Everybody does it

Thanks to Andrew for bringing up science politicization, something I've been meaning to talk about for a while. This was originally a comment on his post, but it got too long so I'm putting it up here.

It seems to me that discussions of science politicization run together two distinct issues.