This is a continuation of a remarkable thread that has now received 10,000 comments running to well over a million words. Unfortunately its size has become a problem and this is the reason for the move.
The history of the New Statesman thread goes back to December 2007 when Dr David Whitehouse wrote a very influential article for that publication posing the question Has Global Warming Stopped? Later, Mark Lynas, the magazine’s environment correspondent, wrote a furious reply, Has Global Warming Really Stopped?
By the time the New Statesman closed the blogs associated with these articles they had received just over 3000 comments, many from people who had become regular contributors to a wide-ranging discussion of the evidence for anthropogenic climate change, its implications for public policy and the economy. At that stage I provided a new home for the discussion at Harmless Sky.
Comments are now closed on the old thread. If you want to refer to comments there then it is easy to do so by left-clicking on the comment number, selecting ‘Copy Link Location’ and then setting up a link in the normal way.
Here’s to the next 10,000 comments.
Useful links:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
The original Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs thread is here with 10,000 comments.
More on Judith Curry:
Recent quotes would indicate that the quote below (from 2009) may be past its “sell by” date . Judith Curry quotes do seem to have rather a short shelf life so I probably should have used it earlier :-)
“I staunchly support the IPCC, but when [chairman] Rajendra Pachauri comes out making all these really strong policy statements, such as the developed world has to cut back its energy use… and stop putting ice cubes in their water, and other crazy stuff… I don’t like that. These guys should pick people who don’t want to be advocates and will shut their mouths about advocating for policies. Otherwise, we don’t look credible.”
Its not an uncommon position for many scientists to take. Basically, what she is saying is that even though climate scientists may themselves understand the need to seriously curtail CO2 and other GHG emissions, nevertheless that’s a policy issue, and scientists shouldn’t get involved. I can see the argument, but I’m not sure about the ethics of it, and I’m sure I could find another quote somewhere from Judith Curry from sometime around 2006 or 2007 which would very much support that argument.
However, I’m not sure if even my cat would touch something that old!
Sorry should be ” which would very much not support that argument” in penultimate paragraph above.
Peter 2525
Matt Ridley had a perfectly respectable academic career.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Ridley
I suggest the one who should be behind bars reading up about financial management and climate change is Gordon (50 days to save the world) Brown who removed the regulations that enabled a variety of banks to stay within the rules whilst lending more than they should to individuals and Government.
tonyb
I didn’t realise that Gordon Brown was able to deregulate the US banks too. I suppose every country which has been adversely affected by the GFC does blame whoever was in charge at the time, and when derugulation occurred. In the US it would have been Bush or Clinton. In the UK it would have been started under Mrs Thatchers government and continued under Tony Blair. However, it was the bankers themselves who pushed for deregulation. People like Matt Ridley. They can’t have it both ways – having been given what they asked for they can’t then duck their responsibility.
Yes, Matt Ridley was a good zoologist and wrote a couple of good books on Evolutionary theory . Just quite how that qualified him for a career in the financial sector, I’m not quite sure. Maybe he just happened to go the right school.
However, now he’s turned his attention to climate science he’s behaving like a creationist. He starts with a conclusion, and works his way backwards through the science – cherry picking the bits he likes and ignores the rest.
Peter 2529
Northern Rock was the first bank to go caused by very lax regulation combined with a low interest rate policy which in the UK was de linked from inflation by removing housing costs from the equation, thereby fuelling the housing and credit boom.
Matt Ridley was not the architect of the scheme, merely one of the tools of the system set up to create an illusionary boom.
Matt seemed Ok when you thought he was on your side but once he turned colours all of a sudden he’s a right wing bigot.
I’m surprised his couple of good books on evolution weren’t denying it, as surely all us extreme right wing types ( AGW sceptics) also believe in creationism according to your version of our politics and beliefs.
tonyb
PeterM
I can only advise you to READ the posts and articles cited here BEFORE you arrive at conclusions.
You state about Matt Ridley:
Had you simply read the two items linked by TonyB (2489), you would not have made such a silly statement:
1. The open letter by David Mackay (the Chief Scientist at the UK Dept of Energy and Climate Change), stating his personal views on AGW
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/david-mackays-letter
2. Matt Ridley’s response and systematic deconstruction of MacKay’s logic
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/best-shot
Do yourself a favor and read both before shooting off a reply.
MacKay supports the IPCC view that current warming is “unprecedented” and that its rate is unusually “fast” (as compared to earlier warming periods).
He cites the Arctic sea ice retreat since 1979 as evidence, plus a strange chart put together by the Met Office showing average decadal temperatures since 1850 (rather than the conventional charts showing actual temperature readings with linear trends drawn in).
Finally, MacKay discusses the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity. Citing the physical observations on clouds by Roy Spencer, MacKay concedes that the CS could be only 1°C, but that it might also be 3° to 4°C. To support the latter estimate, MacKay cites the PETM event 55m years ago and an even more remote event during the Jurassic, 183m years ago.
Ridley’s response is very much to the point (as I summarized in 2505).
In no way does he “start with the conclusion” or “cherry-pick the bits he likes”, as you have claimed.
Instead, he addresses MacKay’s specific points in support of his premise of “unprecedented” and unusually “fast” warming head on, providing specific point by point evidence to demonstrate that MacKay’s logic is flawed, as I pointed out in 2505 and 2506.
Very briefly he states
a) Arctic sea ice records only go back to 1979, so do not demonstrate “unprecedented” or unusually “fast” warming; similar warming periods existed earlier this century and even earlier
b) Temperature records show earlier warming cycles, prior to significant CO2 emissions, which are indistinguishable from the latest cycle (which is being attributed to CO2), according to Phil Jones in a recent interview
c) As to the projected 3°C warming over the 21st century, Ridley points out that the first decade of the 21st century has shown no warming at all, casting doubt on the prediction
d) To MacKay’s statement that a 2°C temperature increase over 200 years is nothing to be blasé about, Ridley points out that it would have been foolish in 1810 to have worried about a 2°C rise by 2010
e) As for the 2xCO2 CS, Ridley points out that two paleo-climate reconstructions from 55m and 183m years ago are slim evidence; besides a recent study questions whether or not the PETM event was really caused by CO2.
f) As a final point, Ridley questions all the hysteria and hyperbole, which try to portray the AGW threat as one of the greatest and most urgent problems facing society today when, in fact, there is no sound scientific support for this alarm.
It is quite apparent, Peter, that you have not read (or possibly simply not understood) MacKay’s letter or Ridley’s response, or you would not have written such a silly statement.
My advice: read them both again, slowly, taking notes if necessary, before responding to this post.
Max
PeterM
Quoting old statements from Judith Curry (2526) does not change the fact that she stated openly last week:
Let’s leave it at that and not get into absurd “sell by date” discussions.
She may have gradually (or suddenly) had a rational change of mind on the “IPCC and its assessments”.
As we have seen recently, there have been others among both climate scientists and others, who have done exactly the same thing. This trend seems to be accelerating, following Climategate and the other revelations about IPCC errors, fabrications and exaggerations.
As one gains deeper knowledge about a specific subject it is only logical that one can rationally change one’s conclusions.
This is usually not true for religious belief, which is not based on rational thought.
Here simple logic and evidence usually won’t do. It takes a “significant emotional experience” or “revelation” to change religious “belief”.
It is my personal observation that some supporters of the “dangerous AGW” premise see this more as a quasi-religious “doomsday” belief involving “sin and retribution” and are therefore immune to empirical data which do not support their “belief” (much as a strict creationist cannot accept carbon dating evidence).
Of course, there is the other explanation (Thomas Kuhn) regarding “paradigms” among groups of scientists (also demonstrated by the Alfred Wegener example).
And finally, there is the enormous pressure coming from the tens of billions of dollars of taxpayer money floating around (and TonyN’s “convenient network”), plus the promise of even more obscene amounts of money in proposed carbon taxes.
But, as you see, despite these factors there are still those who look at the whole issue logically, skeptically and rationally, using the arguments from evidence as the basis for their conclusions.
And I would believe that Judith Curry is one of those.
Max
PeterM (2529)
The collapse of Lehman Bros started in the UK, where they had expanded because of the loose regulation here, so you could say that their failure was brought about by Uncle Joe Gordon.
It’s hard to know who did more damage, Brown or Blair…
“Uncle Joe Gordon”
That was supposed to be with ‘Joe’ struck out (reference as per Private Eye). Sorry – it looked all right in the preview!
James P,
Its not the first time that I’ve come across the quaint notion that somehow little old medium sized economy UK Pty Ltd is somehow responsible for the GFC. Relax. Stop feeling so guilty. You’re not really. London isn’t the centre of the universe any more. No-one expects England to be an international power house economically, any more than they expect England to win the world cup at football, cricket, rugby, rugby league or anything else, except, maybe Darts and Snooker. You’re good at those sort of games. Maybe that’s just an indication you spend too much time in the pub though!
If you look in Wiki little old UK hardly gets a mention for the causes of the GFC. But I’m sure Max will chip in with a comment that its all down to Willam Connolley who’s censored out any dissenting views. :-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932010
JamesP and PeterM
What caused the financial collapse (2529,2533)?
There were certainly many factors including human greed, but a principal one was the “easy money so everyone can become a homeowner” policy started under President Clinton and Fed chairman, Greenspan. Apparently a similar policy was being followed by the Blair government.
As one article at the time of the sub-prime crisis put it:
Blair, Brown, Clinton, Greenspan, Rubin, Bush, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Dodd, Frank, Lehman Brothers, Countrywide Financial, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, etc., etc.
There are lots of names implicated in the sub-prime crisis and its follow-up in the USA and elsewhere, but according to Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subprime_crisis_impact_timeline
During the early part of the Clinton administration Congress mandated that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac increase their purchases of mortgages for low-income and medium-income borrowers.
Over the years, Fannie and Freddie tripled its sub-prime mortgages to $90 billion per year and by early 2006 the total amount of sub-prime mortgages had reached $600 billion.
Bush continued Clinton’s easy money policy with billions of dollars of tax credits for new homeowners.
Cashing in on rapidly increasing home values and using cheap loans, speculation in real estate rose rapidly, but the housing bubble was beginning to collapse.
By early 2007 the value of sub-prime mortgages in the USA was estimated at $1.3 trillion.
Just two months after Rep. Barney Frank characterized the future prospects of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as “solid” going forward, the Federal government nationalized both in late 2008. At that point both owned or guaranteed about half of the $12 trillion mortgage market in the USA.
Bernanke and Paulson proposed $700 billion TARP, first of several “bailouts”.
Was the primary root cause “socialist intervention in the housing market”, “a good idea turned sour”, “poor oversight and controls”, “greed” on the part of bankers, investors, etc. – or was it a combination of the above?
I’d guess it was the latter.
Max
PeterM
I would agree with you when you write to JamesP that the UK is not the powerhouse it once was “when Britannia ruled the waves” (my quotation marks, not yours).
You wrote:
It is equally absurd to think that the UK can, by reducing its carbon emissions (through plopping up inefficient, ungainly and costly windmills all over the landscape and risking future blackouts) have any discernible impact on our planet’s climate, as the previous government there apparently believed.
Wouldn’t you agree?
Max
Max,
Capitalism has always had crises. I’m not an economist but I’d say Keynes’s analysis of how the system works, and occasionally doesn’t work, has historically been the most successful.
Keynes’s arguments lost ground in the 80’s and many of the moves to deregulation in the financial sector to which James P refers started then. In the UK under Mrs T and in the US under Ronald Reagan. The thinking was that regulation was bad for the economy and by removing it the market would take care of itself. And, incidentally, regulation doesn’t mean that Governments guarantee all losses.
In other words the choice was Laissez faire capitalism vs Managed Capaitalism. And governments the world over chose the former.
Yes politicians in all countries are involved in various social housing schemes of one sort or another. There is often nothing wrong with them as such, but at least everyone should understand how they work so that they can discussed and debated as part of the normal democratic process. But I would say it was fair to say that the sub-prime loan system in the USA was totally incomprehensible to 99.9% of the population, and that would have included politicians and even, as it turned out, people in the banking sector who were actually working it!.
Yes the political right would like to blame the GFC on socialism. But the arguments are a bit thin to say the least. Agree with it or not – at least the concepts involved in socialism are understandable.
PeterM
In support of Keynesian economic theory you write
True, but so has socialism, as a matter of fact (5-year pans that never materialize until the entire system collapses under its own weight).
Chinese socialism has only begun to flourish after it switched away from collective socialist dogma to allow individual capitalism.
And whether Keynes’ approach is right or that of the so-called “Austrian school”, is a bit too far off-topic here. It appears that Obama’s (Keynesian) program of printing money to get out of debt is not having much success, at any rate.
But back to the current crisis: I wouldn’t put the blame on the latest financial crash on laissez-faire economics of either Reagan or Thatcher; that would be stretching hsitory a bit too far to be credible.
The underlying root cause of the sub-prime mortgage disaster in the USA and the resulting global financial crash was an extended period of government-edicted “easy money” starting under President Clinton in a well-meant attempt to ease up on mortgage restrictions such as “red lining” in order to give the least affluent members of society a chance to become homeowners.
The sub-prime mortgage program worked. Statistics showed that home ownership among lower income minority groups increased dramatically, with many individuals getting 100% mortgages (or even, in some cases, “cash back” mortgages).
This is a great scheme, as long as housing values are increasing (as they were).
But then the s*** hit the fan and the housing bubble burst. As one newspaper put it
Sure, greedy bankers, relaxing the provisions of the Glass-Steagall Act on separation of commercial and investment banking, “repackaging” junk mortgages into non-transparent “products” and “derivatives”, lousy internal and external controls, etc. all also played a role (and there have been many op-eds out there on all this).
But I have personally concluded (as have several economists) that the underlying root cause was a nice, socialistic program to help the disadvantaged, which turned sour.
Max
Chinese capitalism is quite different from Western capitalism. Its more a State capitalism, with many enterprises owned by the State, the Party, or even the PLA, rather than a privately based capitalism, although individual or private ownership is an increasing proportion of the total . As such, it is highly managed, and whatever the rights and wrongs of such a system, I don’t think we’ll see the sort of crisis there that the western world is stuck in at the moment.
Having said that, and successful though it might be, it is still capitalism. There will be increasing tensions and instead of the usual tensions between the owners of capital and labor, we’ll probably see a three way struggle with the addition of the CPC who’ll have their own and probably different priorities to the other two groups.
Yes, allowing “least affluent members of society a chance to become homeowners” is a good principle if they are offered a fair deal. Certainly there should be laws to prevent racial and maybe sexual discrimination in lending practices. However, it doesn’t help less affluent groups if they are then fleeced with much higher than normal interest rates and if lending agreements are allowed to be full of fine print details designed to trap borrowers into long term bad financial deals. That’s not removing the discrimination and neither it does it remove the exploitation.
All the evidence suggests that when they are given access to credit on the same terms as anyone else, the “less affluent” are no worse a credit risk than anyone else either.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcredit
PeterM
Thanks for your wisdom on Chinese capitalism. Having lived there for a couple of years, I can agree with you that it is highly managed, but not that it is completely immune from “the sort of crisis there that the western world is stuck in at the moment” (since it is highly dependent on the health of the “western world”).
But it is silly to claim that the US sub-prime mortgage meltdown was caused by “less affluent groups” being “fleeced with much higher than normal interest rates” and because “lending agreements are allowed to be full of fine print details designed to trap borrowers into long term bad financial deals”.
A government edict to loosen the requirements for mortgages for the “less affluent” sounds like a noble thing, but giving 100% (or “cash back”) mortgages (as was done to ensure that the “less affluent” could buy their own homes) was a scheme that could only work if house values continued to increase.
The “noble” government edict to provide “easy money” to the “less affluent” was the root cause of the problem – not the lenders, who followed the edict (of course, with the objective of “making a buck”) or the borrowers who saw a chance to have their own home without having to make any down payment (which they would have been unable to do).
If and when a government issues such an edict, it must take the full responsibility for any unforeseen consequences that may arise (in this case, giving a full guarantee for the sub-prime mortgages should there be a default).
Obviously, this was not done,and the rest is history.
BTW, this all has nothing to do with your Wiki example of (mostly privately funded) “microcredit” schemes in poorer countries, which appear to be quite successful.
Max
PeterM
I realise that, but it wasn’t my point. Lehman’s collapse was precipitated here (thanks to our government’s ‘light touch’ regulation) and brought down the rest of the company when a US bale-out scheme collapsed. Our Northern Rock bank had gone down a year earlier, so we could reasonably be regarded as the first domino.
I don’t feel guilty, though, I assure you!
So, if the banks ask governments for deregulation, making the argument that world financial conditions have changed, regulations are no longer needed and are an impediment to the free market, it’s the still the government’s fault for agreeing, when it turns out that perhaps the regulations weren’t such a bad thing after all and everything has gone pear shaped?
Well yes maybe there is some truth it that. In a way I would have expected that the UK Labour leadership should have understood when they were in government what they certainly would have understood in their more radical youth. Maybe they’d just forgotten!
Peter #2543
The quest for market deregulation in the UK began in 1994 with the Labour Govt trying to make itself city friendly when it was out of power. It gave the bank of England independence in its first week in office (1997) and swept away a raft of regulations put there for a purpose by Margaret Thatcher.
It replaced them with a much lighter touch divided amongst two weak regulating bodies whose brief did not require them to coordinate their activities, but to act ‘independently’ against a background of supporting unrealistically low interest rates. This, predictably, fuelled an illusory boom built on cheap credit.
This enabled the Govt to borrow money on the cheap for their own pet projects but also encouraged the population to believe that money would always be cheap. (‘No more boom and bust’)
When interest rates are low the Anglo Saxon world buys property which causes a bubble.
The context-getting back on topic briefly-is that this easy money was used to fuel such things as the belief that Britain could decarbonise rapidly. That legal requirement costs us some £20 billion a year in subsidies etc and has made many households fall into fuel poverty as our energy costs are so high.
Couple this with such things as the increase in our contributions to the EU, which now costs us us around £10 billion a year nett, and a large part of our deficit and debt can start to be seen.
tonyb
Sadly 10 Billion or 20 Billion is just “chicken feed” compared with the real indebtedness, which is virtually irrecoverable. This is a truly dire situation.
Please watch the Videos at the Fraudulent Climate website, especially the ones on the Zbigniew Brzezinski & Henry Kissinger Page.
Particularly these two near the top of that page.
The Looting of America’s Trillions – Catherine Austin Fitts
Britain’s Trillion Pound Horror Story – Martin Durkin (Channel 4)
Then see these three videos on video wall #3 at the same website.
Lord Monckton Special (Oct 2010) – Scientific Misconduct Needed to Push NWO Objective
David Icke: The N.W.O. Network – A Spider’s Web of Interconnected Secret Societies
Lou Dobbs – A Journey to The Truth (2006 – 2010) – About Climate, the UN, & the N.W.O.
! The Fraudulent Climate of Hokum Science !
:(
PeterM
As an outsider (like yourself), I’d suggest that the demise of the Labour government in the UK was not caused by its failure to “understand when they were in government what they certainly would have understood in their more radical youth” (i.e. to offer an even more left-of-center course), but rather its inability to listen what the broad spectrum of the voting public wanted (including, among other things, a rejection of its madness on “climate hysteria”).
But maybe a UK-based blogger here can give us two “outsiders” more insight on this.
Max
PeterM
In your #69 you question the statements (from the” REPEAL THE ACT! Campaign to Repeal Climate Change Act 2008” cited by blogger Fay Kelly-Tuncay in post 63):
You wrote that these statements can be “dismissed” as coming from “a bunch of nutters”.
So I called your bluff and asked you to provide such “scientific evidence”.
So far you are avoiding such a discussion of the “scientific evidence” and are side-tracking to strawman discussions on English Law, instead.
Makes you look like the “nutter”, Peter. Is that what you want?
Max
Max
Back to David Mackay and his spat with Matt Ridley. I had forgotten that I had written about David Mackay before, when he first became Chief Scientist of the UK.
If you hop over here you will see a review of David Mackays new book by someone called ED (in the comments section)
http://diggingintheclay.wordpress.com/2010/11/06/two-wrongs-only-go-so-far/#comment-563
Immediately after that I have linked to my own article where I mention David Mackay when he became Chief Scientist.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/10/19/crossing-the-rubicon-an-advert-to-change-hearts-and-minds/#comments
The first reference to him is as follows;
“Item 28. It can be seen that the highly alarmist viewpoint detailed here echoes the recent comments about ‘thermo dynamic crimes’*.
(Note: *The increasingly frenetic tone of the climate debate in the UK can be seen in this comment from David Mackay that was made public just before the first airing of the advert.)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6860181.ece
“Setting fire to chemicals like gas should be made a thermodynamic crime,” he said. “If people want heat they should be forced to get it from heat pumps. That would be a sensible piece of legislation.”
(Note; the advert referred to was the scare mongering one that TonyN write an article about here)
As I remarked to Ed, it really worries me that someone can call for carbon rationing and proclaim that even burning gas is a crime, as it has echoes of James Hansen. I don’t want my Chief Scientists to speak in those terms and my respect for his integrity and balance diminished immediately.
The author of the blog is a British scientist Verity Jones, who prefers to remain incognito as her coming out as a sceptic will affect the Govt contracts she gets. She was formerly an enthusiastic AGW proponent but then started researching the subject and, like many of us, decided the evidence for AGW was so contradictory and thin that she became a sceptic. Lessons here for Peter but he refuses to listen.
Verity describes how she got into blogging in “A year of blogging” currently the latest thread at digging in the clay.
tonyb
On the unfair and inaccurate comments about “REPEAL THE ACT!” group re: IPCC abolition and no evidence for CAGW being “unnecessarily risky”.
Please note I have not claimed no warming at all, but “there is no evidence for dangerous AGW”, there is a big difference. Computer projections are not empirical evidence. On this point I am attacking the alarmist claims of the IPCC and their computer projections. The warming prior to 1998 was modest and within the range of natural variability, so really nothing to be alarmed about and I am sure you are aware the long-term trend indicates cooling that will cancel out the warming which we had experienced up until 1998. Also remember the words of Phil Jones “We have had no statistical warming for the last 15 years”.
Abolition of the IPCC is justified for the following reasons:
The IPCC is not interested in science it is politically inspired to deliver the “scientific” evidence for carbon trading. The IPCC is only interested to find links between human emissions of CO2 and global warming. It is not interested in the natural causes of warming or cooling in the atmosphere. Without carbon trading the need for the IPCC will wither away. Repeal the Act would argue to replace the IPCC with a task force to deal with natural hazards. Promoting adaptive strategies rather than mitigation of Co2 , which is pointless – weather happens.
The IPCC is guilty of: a) overt cheating via the culling of weather stations located in the coolest locations b) manipulating the peer-review process by excluding sceptics papers, c) wrongly siting the thermometers in urban areas such as airports, air-conditioning units subject to the Urban Heat Island effect. d) fraudulent rewriting of climate history by removing the Medieval Warming Period from the record. The temperature rise during this period is thought to be the major cause of the rising Co2 levels. e) publishing grey literature as peer- reviewed science, f) collating the Assessment Reports in such a way as to conceal the impact of contradictory science, g)using computer models which have failed h)not admitting to errors i)not reporting the uncertainties in the science in the Summary for Policymakers.
Surely this is enough reasons for the IPCC to be abolished, and for the Climate Change Act 2008 to be repealed. Don’t forget the decarbonisation of our economy will cost us taxpayers £720 billion! We need a grass roots movement to TAKE BACK POWER!
[TonyN: I think that you are confusing something that I said elsewhere with Max’s comment #67, which was entirely supportive of your manifesto.]
Fay Kelly-Tuncay
I agree with everything you have written (81).
There is no empirical scientific evidence to support the premise that AGW has been the principal cause of recent warming or represents a serious potential threat.
Sure, the thermometers (with all their warts and blemishes) have told us that it warmed over the past 160 years. This occurred in roughly 30-year warming cycles followed by roughly 30-year cycles of slight cooling, all resembling a sine curve, with an amplitude of ±0.2C and a total cycle time of around 60 years all on a tilted axis that shows a long-term warming trend of a bit more than 0.04C per decade.
And Phil Jones tells us that there is no statistical difference between the late 19th century and early 20th century warming cycles (when there was essentially no human CO2) and the late 20th century warming cycle (which is being used by IPCC to demonstrate that AGW is a threat).
And atmospheric CO2 has risen since Mauna Loa measurements started in 1958.
And humans have been emitting CO2 through fossil fuel combustion, deforestation, cement production, etc.
But the correlation between atmospheric CO2 and temperature is not statistically robust. In fact, statistically speaking, it is a “random walk”. And, without statistically robust “correlation”, the argument for “causation” is weak or non-existent.
There are much closer correlations between temperature and solar activity or natural oscillations in ocean currents (PDO, ENSO, etc.) than there are with CO2.
Since the end of 2000 our atmosphere has cooled (both at the surface and in the troposphere). Since ARGO measurements replaced the old expendable and inaccurate XBT devices in 2003, the upper ocean temperature has also cooled. The latent heat in net melting ice or added net evaporation is too small to make a difference, so our planet has cooled, despite record increase of CO2.
One climate scientist (Kevin Trenberth) has called this cooling a “travesty”, and has suggested that the missing energy may be going “to space” with “clouds acting as a natural thermostat”.
The UK Met Office tells us that the recent cooling has been caused by “natural variability” (i.e. “natural forcing factors” such as the sun, ocean currents, clouds, etc.), which have overwhelmed the greenhouse effect from added atmospheric CO2.
This belies the claims by IPCC that “natural forcing” of our climate has been insignificant as compared to anthropogenic forcing (primarily from CO2). An “overwhelming” natural impact over the past decade does not check with essentially no impact over the past 250 years (as IPCC has claimed).
Recent physical observations from satellites (on the impact of clouds – Spencer et al. – and our planet’s overall energy balance – Lindzen & Choi) show us that the “climate sensitivity” of doubling CO2 is actually below 1°C (rather than 3 to 4 times this amount, as assumed by all the climate models cited by IPCC).
So everything points into the direction you have stated when you wrote
The facts on the ground (plus in the air and ocean) support your viewpoint 100%.
Based on this evidence against the scientific validity of “dangerous AGW” premise, I agree that your Climate Act should be repealed (since it is based on flawed “science” and would have disastrous consequences for the UK without changing global temperature by even 0.01°C over the next 100 years).
I also agree with your critique of IPCC and would support your suggestion of scrapping this body, but that is another story.
And, yes, you definitely do:
Lots of success with your efforts.
Max