I was going to blog about something else this week, but Thomas Friedman's article in the Tribune this morning set me off. It is not because I believe, like Rick Perry and Michelle Bauchmann, that climate change is a hoax. But if you wish to prove man caused global warming by pointing to the weather, you are in a losing battle.
Floods and droughts happen. Hot spells and cold spells continue. Blizzards and Hurricanes plaugue our lives. El Nino and La Nina continue to fight in the Pacific. All of this happened before the industrial age, and will continue to happen in the future. It is a mistake to use weather to prove global warming. In fact, since one can not even predict the weather next weekend, one certainly can not predict how global warming will affect the lives of my yet to be born grandchildren. But Global Warming is not hoax.
So here is the truth that no one else politically-motivated will admit. 1) The Earth is getting warmer. 2) Greenhouse gases are accumulating faster than natural processes can rid them for us. 3) Some of this has been caused by human processes, but not all of it. Probably not even the majority of it. 4) Other pollutants, particulate pollutants, are blocking sunlight and cooling the planet, providing some counter to the warming effect of greenhouse gasses. 5) Geological evidence supports two facts. First, that the Earth has been warmer than it is today. Second, the planet has been cooler than it is today. 6) The sun varies in it's warmth output. 7) The planet wobbles like a top, which effects the climate. 7) The orbit of the plan around the sun also varies.
There are many things which effect the climate on the planet. Some of them are caused by humans and some are not. Is the path that we would need to take to remove all human costs of global warming worth the costs?
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