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Uninformed pollute global warming debate

This is what is known as an ad hominem attack.According to Webster’s dictionary, it is “an attack on an opponent’s character rather than by an answer to his contentions.”

“ . . . at the heart of the global warming movement is a deep-seated hatred towards democracy, capitalism and industry.” — Bill Greenwood column from Oct. 23.

This is what is known as an ad hominem attack.

According to Webster’s dictionary, it is “an attack on an opponent’s character rather than by an answer to his contentions.”

Greenwood is certainly upset. In fact, he is apparently incensed about the “hockey stick” graph, which was intended to show that global warming in the latter half of the 20th century was significantly greater than any natural warming in the previous 1,000 years.

However, Greenwood should have been more careful to limit his attack to the creators of the hockey stick graph, in particular three researchers by the names of Michael Mann, Raymond Bradley and Malcolm Hughes. Greenwood correctly noted that Mann et al were figuratively hauled before the U.S. National Research Council (at the behest of the U.S. Congress) to answer for their alleged crimes. According to the NRC, “Critics of the original papers have argued that the statistical methods were flawed, that the choice of data was biased, and that the data and procedures used were not shared so others could verify the work.”

So, in order to get at the truth, the NRC forced Mann et al to open their books. And they also looked at all of the other research on what the climate was like 1,000 years ago.

In fact, their resulting 140-page document (called Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years) has 18 pages of references to all of the other scientific work on the matter.

At the end of it all, Mann et al get a lesson in statistics, and their initial conclusion gets blunted somewhat, but the overall situation remains the same. In fact, in their summary, on P age 3, the NRC notes that “The basic conclusion of Mann et al was that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during at least the last 1,000 years.

This conclusion has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence that includes both additional large-scale surface temperature reconstructions and pronounced changes in a variety of local proxy indicators, such as melting on icecaps and the retreat of glaciers around the world, which in many cases appear to be unprecedented during at least the last 2,000 years.”

Another smaller report known as the Wegman Report came out a few weeks after the NRC report and gave Mann et al another tongue lashing. But far from “debunking” the climate change issue (as Greenwood asserts), it shifted concern from average global temperatures to the warming at the poles and called it “much more alarming”.

So given that both reports were entirely at odds with what Greenwood asserted them to be, I have to wonder if Greenwood had actually read them. Or did he simply copy and paste his nonsense off the blogosphere?

A simpler explanation might be that he just needs a new prescription for his glasses, since he repeats his claim about the “steady cooling trend since 1998”.

The graphs are there for anyone to see on either Wikipedia or the online version of Encyclopedia Britannica.

There is a slight plateau, likely due to the solar influences that both Greenwood and I have talked about in previous columns. But all the temperatures are still well above what they were in the 20th century, with 1998 being widely acknowledged as an anomaly due to an extraordinary El Nino.

As for the average global temperature for the 1st half of 2009 (which Greenwood conveniently cherry picks particular locations for), the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration pegs it at being the 5th warmest in 130 years of record taking.

So I’m led to wonder what causes Greenwood to constantly spread disinformation about climate change.

But I won’t wonder out loud. That could quickly devolve to ad hominem tactics, and I refuse to stoop to his level.

If he wants to stick to science, however, I would gladly debate him in public at the time and place of his choosing.

Evan Bedford is a local environmentalist. Direct comments, questions and suggestions to wyddfa23@telus.net