Written by Sir John Redwood
This article was first published in Sir John Redwood’s Diary, and we re-publish it here with their kind permission.
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Last week the EU’s effective political leader Mrs Merkel said she was worried by the big gap between the views of the establishment who see climate change as the gravest threat facing us and the climate sceptics who do not. She asked for a proper dialogue between the two sides, presumably to search out some common ground or a way of respecting each other’s positions,.
As someone who is lobbied strenuously by all sides, I remind the EU and governments that climate change scepticism is not a single doctrine or united group of dissenters against current policy. It is not traditional right or left, and may be motivated by many different considerations. So let us today consider some of the different forms of scepticism there is over this issue.
The first thing to grasp is most climate sceptics do not deny the underlying science which rightly asserts that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Nor do most deny that if nothing else changes and mankind pumps out a lot of extra CO2 average temperatures will rise.
Some sceptics, however, argue that current climate models do not capture the complexities of greenhouse gases. Natural CO2 exceeds manmade and that could vary in either direction. Volcanic activity can have a big impact on world climate. A view needs to be taken on the stability of various carbon sinks, including the oceans. Water vapour is a more common greenhouse gas than CO2 so models need to capture variations in water vapour concentrations. That also gets the forecaster into wind directions and cloud formation, which we see have daily big impacts on the weather and over time can affect the climate, if new trends and patterns emerge. These sceptics either say you cannot gauge temperature direction from simply measuring manmade CO2 or go further and argue other trends may be or are offsetting manmade CO2.
Some sceptics point out that the sun is the main source of warming the earth, and that there needs to be more information about solar activity rates, as the sun itself produces variable output over time as well as from night and day and the seasons.
Some sceptics are unconvinced that there has been a linear increase in average temperatures during the long period of industrialising since say 1820. They raise issues about historical records, and about how you actually calculate an average world temperature, as well as pointing to periods in the published records when temperatures did not rise.
Other sceptics accept the predictions that manmade CO2 will take temperatures higher whatever the other forces do. They ask whether it is not wiser and cheaper to spend money on adaptations where warming has adverse consequences rather than trying to wean China and the USA off fossil fuels in time to meet the needs of carbon reduction to head off the problem.
So I say to Mrs Merkel she needs to engage her experts and the EU in a new dialogue which examines these various strands of sceptic thinking and deals with them sensibly, rather than castigating anyone who asks questions. A lot of people are in the middle on this issue, seeking better information and guidance on the nature and scale of the threat. They are more likely to be persuaded by well-informed people with knowledge and balance than by angry politicians asserting you either accept their version or are some kind of denier of the truth.
That is the conference I would like to see.
It seems that the doubters are either not seen as worthy of response, or possibly they have been responded to in a way that is not seen by the public. Some of the deniers seem to have scientific credentials. Whether their claims are valid or not, I could not say, but they often claim that they are ignored instead of challenged.
The believers probably don’t want to give credence to what they see as trolls, but are they?
It’s a nice change to see at least one Member of Parliament is aware of the arguments with regard to the climate change issue and acknowledge the validity of the skeptical arguments. However, I believe Angela Merkel and other top political leaders are actually fully aware of the truth, but deny it because climate policy require global laws, ie. the prerequisite for the coming international order that denies the right of independent states to exist.
Well done Viv. If you hadn’t spotted it I would have mentioned it.
One of the chief disciples/activist of this climate alarmism, happens to be former President Barack Obama, who said coastal communities would be under 20 feet of water within decades has just bought 29 acres of beachfront property for $12 million (reduced by $3 million -wonder why?) on Martha’s Vineyard. To me that’s a $12 million banner with his own money that he doesn’t believe the BS alarmism he’s been shoveling with his mate Al gore.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obamas-mansion-marthas-vineyard/
I have checked on Google Earth, Barack Obama’s new home is at an elevation of between 0 the beach and 10 feet above sea level.
https://earth.google.com/web/@41.36079575,-70.54613905,3.34710465a,240.00364735d,35y,-0h,0t,0r
I know he – Barack Obama – was prez of USA, but where else did he get his $ millions? Anyone know ?
These days they go on the lecture circuit, spouting nonsense about Climate Alarmism, no doubt in his case, earning more per lecture than US president earns in a year.
We have many of our own home grown idiot past politicians as well.
I believe he was corrupt. A contributor to his election campaign was later awarded the contract to develop the software for his “Obama-care”. It failed shortly after implementation. Without going into the technicalities, the developers made fundamental errors worthy of a complete novice, demonstrating that they didn’t have any relevant experience nor had carried out any realistic testing.
I also wonder, without any evidence, if he somehow gained financially from his hopelessly unsound deal with the Iranians over their ongoing development of nuclear weapons…
I suspect the majority of politicians couldn’t hold down a real job in the private sector. They should be made to take an IQ test before treading a political path, far too many are given a leg up the ladder by their relatives or chums.
Yes well, it’s not just IQ though, it’s our education system so called, indoctrinating them now.
Why are so few politicians so sensible.
Politicians – hardly anybody who has worked for a living, includes countless barristers and their ilk, little or no scientists/engineers – and hence this elite have neither rubbed shoulders with real people nor lived in the real world. Are you really that surprised?