Niki2410 wrote:Devil
There's no need to cut people dead so aggressively - this forum is meant to be for discussion not attititudes like "I'm far more informed and clever than you" just makes you seem arrogant. We are all entitled to our opinion and have heard and read enough information to have our own point of view.
'Opinion' and 'point of view' is not the same as scientific knowledge. If I expressed an opinion that the world is flat, would that carry any weight, as we all know it isn't?
Unfortunately, climate change has, for some reason, become an emotional subject, probably because extremists of both camps (e.g., Gore on one side and Durkin on the other) have put forward enough bullcrap to manure half the earth to a depth of 10 cm, without any substantiation, while the scientists remain moderate, comfortable that what they say is as near to the truth as it is possible to get. How do we know this is so? The substantiation is done through via a hefty peer-review process. What does this mean? It means that a scientist wishing to publish his findings has his paper critically scrutinised for accuracy by 3-8 equally qualified peers, often rivals, who point out any errors or ambiguities. The corrected paper is then re-reviewed, the whole process from submission to publication taking typically 18 months. If any peer-reviewer disagrees with any part, he is at liberty to publish the reason. The paper must be fully referenced. After publication, the journal publishes letters of any substantiated disagreement and the lead author is allowed to respond to this.
In the case of the full IPCC report due out next month, this will be the most fully peer-reviewed document ever published. Over 1,500 top scientists in all the disciplines involved have contributed to it as lead authors, secondary authors and peer-reviewers. It has taken 5 years of hard work by 3 main committees and numerous sub-committees plus co-ordinating groups to bring this into being.
Yes, there are scientists who do not agree with every word that is written. There are even some who deny that fossil fuel CO2 can change the climate. I can cite Claude Allègre, for example. He is a French geophysicist of a certain renown in his field (which has nothing to do with climate) but he has been politician (a minister for a couple of years, when his close friend Lionel Jospin was prime minister about a decade ago) for some 20 years. He toes his party line and has never published any peer-reviewed work on the subject, only ecopolitical articles in l'Express (a magazine like Newsweek).
What many scientists really want is to promote moderation, not extremism. You have no doubt heard that some persons have been talking about sea levels rising by 1, 5 or even 10 m this century. Do you know how much scientists have ascribed to such rises? They have calculated the average rise according to 6 scenarios from the decades 1980-1999 up to the decade 2090 to 2099. The absolute worst case scenario gives 0.26 to 0.59 m, much less than 1, even. The average calculated rise is about 0.3 m. This is not alarmist, is it? To further this notion of moderation, two Oxford scientists have published
"Making sense of the weather and climate", a few pages of sound common sense written for the general public, which I urge everyone to read.
OK, my professional involvement in atmospheric science for UNEP during many years does make me a lot more knowledgeable than Joe Public and I say this as fact, not to boast. I do not wish to sound "arrogant" but categorical statements of an extremist nature, in either direction, incenses me when they are made without any substantiation and you may always expect me to react as strongly if someone says that "Larnaca will be under a metre of water in 50 years" as if they say that "Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide", because both protagonists, without substantiation, would be defying the best scientific brains of this century.
I'm always willing to debate and explain, such as I did above, regarding the effect of algae. But don't expect me to take "sottises" lying down.
