#222 Jimmah

Actually, you’re sounding a bit unhinged.

#223 Jimmah

Tha argument for AGW is very clear. Temperatures have risen sharply over the last few decades, and this cannot be explained by changes in solar output. Something else is responsible (the anti-AGW crowd are not even curious as to what it might be) and computer models that allow for the impact of CO2 on temperature DO match observations.

1) The idea that A is NOT causing B is NOT proof that B is caused by C. That’s called a “false dichotomy”. This is not a case where only two things could possibly be the cause. The real cause might even be something that is completely unknown right now.

2) Temperatures correlated with CO2 only for a relatively short time period (something like 1975-2000, IIRC). Before that, there was the cooling scare, where CO2 went up, but temperature went down. If CO2 were the driving factor, you wouldn’t have to cherry-pick that one interval of time. Further, as Galroc mentions, correlation is no guarantee of causality.

3) I don’t think it’s true that the anti-alarmist crowd is uninterested in the cause of the 1degF (or is it 2?) of warming. That being said, they recognize that it is within normal natural variation, and not going to cause any of the things the crazy alarmists claim. In contrast, the alarmist crowd seems COMPLETELY uninterested in the cause, inasmuch as they cling to a theory that is not supported by the evidence.

4) Your claim that “computer models that allow for the impact of CO2 on temperature DO match observations” is factually challenged to such an extent that you’re embarrasing yourself. NONE of the models correctly predicted the last ten years, much less the cooling period that even some alarmists admit is currently starting. I’m guessing that the “observations” you’re referring to were in the past, and possibly tinkered with, Hansen-style.

Even if you ignore the aberration of 1998, the more believable satellite data shows that warming ground to a halt this decade, and may be heading down at this point. The alarmists are the “deniers”.

5) The claims that the Sun cannot be responsible are inherently hypocritical. While the alarmist crowd clings to climate models that have positive-feedback mechanisms in them that magnify the direct effect that CO2 allegedly has, they ignore that solar radiation has an effect on the atmosphere that has a magnifying effect of its own.