Isn't AGW just a guess?

Question

How can anyone believe people who tell you what the future is going to be like, no matter how many letters they have after their name?

Look at their track record

After 2005, we were told that there would be more and stronger hurricanes. There were fewer and not anywhere near the strength that 2005 brought

We were told that the melting polar ice cap would cause a "positive feedback" that would cause the world to accelerate warming. Now we have record cold and snows.

We were told that SARS and Avian Flu would cause pandemics because of global warming. No one has heard about these diseases in 5 years

We were told that the droughts in the southeast US were caused by man's pollution. Not the drought threat is reduced, the reservoirs are filling, and people can water their lawns again

Not one doom and gloom prediction these doom and gloom harbingers have foretold has come true. They have a perfect record - 0%

Shouldn't they get one thing right before we believe them?

Answer 1

Just look at how they prove global warming,

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?requ...

  They use a data set that is 8 years old they dont take into account that most of the sensors used are less than .5 degrees accurate, they add data to fill in spots, and most of all they say the planet is hotter by .04 degrees.

  How can you read something smaller than what the equipment measures?

    Here is a prediction that you can count on

  March 31st I retire after 20 years in the Navy,

  April 1st. I will be looking for a job!

Answer 2

Nope.  It's based on solid science.

What you seem to not understand is that predicting long term climate is vastly easier than predicting short term weather, which fluctuates a lot.

This situation is very common in science.  For example, it is impossible to predict when an individual radioactive atom will decay, but easy to say when one-half of them will.

Answer 3

It's called a theory.

I also have a theory. Jello has no clue. That's why he's here on Y/A instead of publishing research papers in a scientific journal. Please, do us all a favor and go teach the ignorant PhD's at NASA, National Academy of Sciences, American Geophysical Union,  and every other respected science organization around the world a lesson.

Answer 4

It Is All B.S. There is no such thing as Global warming it is just a stunt to get consumers to buy products they normally wouldn't have. the truth is this was all started by G.E. they had a big thing about it on Sat. TV the U.S. government is launching an investigation on it soon. the fact is the earth's overall temperature is dropping

Answer 5

Dr Jello you are soooo right all these things that were predicted way way back in 2005 (3 whole years ago) that would start to happen over then next 50 -100 years.

Suddenly I have a vision of a small child in the back of a car saying 'are we there yet'! over and over!

I find it quite funny in the first lines of your question, you say we shouldn't "believe people who tell you what the future is going to be like, no matter how many letters they have after their name?" and yet only a few days ago you were pushing the Russian scientists theory about the sun cooling in 50 years in an effort to disprove GW and he is little more than a caretaker of a derilict building! and the only evidence for his theory involves a crystal ball

Answer 6

Scientists do their best to make forecasts of impending problems and precautions needed, it is part of the work they do and in part what society pays them for.  However if you look at the stated positions of the major scientific organisations you will find that they do not venture into the territory of the examples you quote (which in any event are untrue for Europe where we have just had a rare large hurricane force storm, a mild winter, outbreaks of Avian Flu are still of concern as far as jumping the species barrier).  The world's major scientific bodies are as one that man's activities are causing global warming, mainly due to emissions of CO2, and that action needs to be taken to control these emissions.

Answer 7

I truly believe that many of the global warming advocates are sincere in their beliefs.  The problem is that they have been using flawed temperature data in their studies.

Until the data problems are corrected, there will continue to be no credible science.

Answer 8

No, it's a theory.  They use the theory to guide development of models, from which come predictions.  A lot of those predictions are very accurate (e.g., polar amplification, ice ages caused by Milankovitch Cycles, Snowball Earth).  

Have the skeptic models been more accurate?  I can't find any skeptic predictions, maybe you could tell us.

Answer 9

For true believers it's not a guess or a science, but a self evident truth.  It comes from the heart and not the head.  The evil corporations are guilty of poisoning the environment and no amount of objective science is going to get in the way of people believing that.

Answer 10

I think the elephant in the room isn't the totality of their wrong predictions but the fact that all of the few correct predictions, such as worsening drought in eastern Africa and the American Southwest, are in line with what happened during the Medieval Warm Period.

And that's why they "had to get rid of" the Medieval Warm Period.

But you can't "get rid of" something that already happened.

Answer 11

No, the measured increases are confirmed from multiple data sources:

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2...

The loss of polar ice was an issue that made 2007 surprisingly warm (tied for second warmest year) in spite of the strong La Nina cooling influence.  Look for that to be a particularly strong influence angain in 2009 or 2010 when El Nino returns.

We don't have record cold and snows globally, and you're talking about a weather event, not a long term climate trend.

About hurricanes, your point about 2005 is correct:

"There were fewer and not anywhere near the strength that 2005 brought."

The year 2005 globally was the hottest year on record, so it's not surprising that in that one year there were more category 5 hurrcanes than in most prior decades.

I don't know about the Southeast US, but the Rockies and the Sierras are documented as affected by global warming, and Lake Mead behind Hoover Dam is halfway to becoming unusable (in the 2014 to 2021 timeframe).

I don't beleive that anyone said that SARS and Avian Flu would cause pandemics because of global warming.  I think you're making that up.

So you'd have to ignore the 2007 temperature, represent one season of cold weather as climate, cherry-pick local drought data (from one weather season), ignore the correlation between 2005 temps and 2005 hurricanes, and try to connect SARS with global warming to make the claim that somehow you were making a point about global warming.