Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Skeptical Inquirer Conclusion on Global Warming

I know, it seems pretty random but it's such a great ending to a good piece they had a bit back that I feel I need to reference point. Also, I've been slacking on my blogging.

No scientist to date has made a strong case (i.e., one supported by a large number of his colleagues who publish in the refereed journals) for any observation(s) or mechanism(s) that can explain the current rapid global-warming trend by invoking natural causes. Arguments for solar forcing, for forcing by internal modes of the climate system (natural processes that operate within the Earth system itself), and for the urban heat-island effect, have either failed to offer hard evidence or have been completely discredited. Nor do Earth's long-duration, quasi-periodic, dynamical motions explain the current rapid temperature rise.
In contrast, global warming forced by a growing atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, is based on sound science that refers to a mechanism that is well understood and universally accepted by the scientific community. Models that incorporate this and many other known processes support this conclusion, and the models themselves, while still in need of improvement, are becoming increasingly reliable for making global predictions.
The probability is extremely high that human-generated greenhouse gases, with carbon dioxide as the major offender are the primary cause of well-documented global warming and climate change today.

3 comments:

lrbinfrisco said...

The argument that because no other single theory hat explains the recent global temperature increase has found widespread accpetance in the scientific community means that anthropogenic global warming is true does not appear to follow scientific logical deduction to me. All this appears to mean is that the mechanisms for global and regional climate change are poorly understood by our current science. Without arbitrary assumptions and deletions of significant but poorly understood factors of the climate, AGW does not come close to matching the data we do have. Scients are equally impaired in explaining past global climate changes other than the apparent general consensus that they were natural instead of anthropogenic. It appears that science just doesn't understand enough to be really sure what has caused any global climate changes either now or in the past.

Tatarize said...

The point is the theory predicts the data we are getting and the data we are getting is not explained by any other theory. While the latter point alone is certainly not not enough, considering the former makes the support remarkably sound.

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