“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.†— Upton Sinclair
Peter Ferrara, a contributor to Forbes magazine, tells us “To the Horror of Global Warming Alarmists, Global Cooling Is Here.” It must have just arrived last week, since 2012 was the hottest year on record in the continental U.S. and the 9th hottest year globally. But good to know the cooling is here just in time for summer!
Unfortunately, Ferrara is not a scientist of any sort, and his argument is based mostly on a historical record showing a cycle of Little Ice Ages, plus a couple of quotes from official-sounding sources suggesting we’re about to enter another Little Ice Age. Unfortunately for us, there is an overwhelmingly strong consensus among actual climate scientists that the earth getting hotter, and the increase in heat is at least partly the result of human activity. I’m not seeing any widespread horror among actual scientists about global cooling, or any evidence that there is any cooling.
we’re about to enter another Little Ice Age
Man, I wish. This whole menopause thing has been a nightmare.
Not that the gang at Forbes was ever very smart, but clearly this science stuff has them flummoxed.
LOL! Yeah, but sometimes it can’t get cold enough. I remember waiting on a train platform in bone-chilling cold, temperature in the teens, bundled up in a down coat with multiple layers of sweaters. Then a hot flash hit and I couldn’t get the coat and sweaters off fast enough. So I’m standing there in 13 whatever degree cold in just a blouse and pants, and I was still too hot. All that nonsense does go away, though, eventually.
Why is it that I suspect I’ll see some feckin’ eedjit Teabaggers wearing parka’s, gloves, snow-goggles, and snow-shoes, at this years 4th of July picnics, and on summer beaches, just to prove this moronic point?
And I’m sure I’ll see at least one, “Brrr… Itz kold! Go bak 2 Kenya, so u kan stay warm, Niger!!!”
That’s exactly the same mentality these imbeciles displayed earlier, when the new energy-saving light-bulb bill, passed when W was still President, and signed by him, went into effect, and the yet-to-become Teabaggers, all ran out to buy the least efficient incandescent light-bulbs they could find, and proudly announced that they would leave them on in, and around, their homes – days, AND nights!
Dear Reich-wingers, you don’t have to keep proving that you’re soul-less moronic sociopathic losers – we already know that!
All that nonsense does go away, though, eventually.
Good to know! In the meantime, I’ll keep wringing my hair out onto my shoes. Ugh.
It’s not only financial interest that prevents people from understanding something. Their financial interests are only a starting point. People have huge emotional ties to the things they believe, even when they present them as rational beliefs.
It’s interesting to me that the whole subject of denialism itself – the way it works – is being focused on and taken apart. See 97% Global Warming Consensus Meets Resistance from Scientific Denialism. Excerpt:
Indeed, nearly ever form of wingnut argumentation on any subject can fall into one or more of these categories.
Yes, the hot flashes do go away. They go away just the way the came. One day you are thinking when was the last time I had a hot flash? Mine started at 54 and before 60 were gone. Of course, every woman is different.
I’ve always loved the Sinclair quote. Then one day someone reminded me that Sinclair had been a socialist. I thought “so is Bernie Sanders and that doesn’t mean someone is anti-democratic (little ‘d’)”. That went a long way to inform me of how many think. Because people could vote for what others consider socialism many who consider themselves true patriots and, more than most, freedom lovers would attempt to prevent democratic outcomes. If this mush-minded, collective, cognitive environment were to prevail we’d be a hair’s breadth away from total anarchy.
I suppose most people reason adversarially so that in their view nothing wise or even correct could come from one designated a bad or unworthy person. It’s far easier to base ones acceptance or rejection of ideas on whose they are rather than working through them rationally. At work I’ve noticed that those who are overwhlemed or under duress tend to seal themselves off from that which might open subjects to question…so much that it is impossible to separate an assertion’s factuality from who uttered it.
Moonbat, good article. There have been marketing studies on how to see these longer lasting light bulbs. Whenever “environmentally friendly” or anything to that effect is included on the packaging sales drop with conservatives.
As long as media won’t risk alienating paying customers and someone will profit from ignorance none of these instruments of delusion will be questioned.
A dumbed down media that can be understood by most will never have the patience or persistence to pick through public discourse enough to expose 1-5 for what they are. What we badly need just doesn’t sell.
Interesting. You offer no scientific evidence to prove anthropogenic global warming, you discount thousands of years of history during the Holocene of shifting climate, and cite a study that has already been destroyed in multiple ways.
So, can all you Believers tell us how you yourselves have abandoned use of fossil fuels?
(BTW, I’m not buying into the premise that a Little Ice Age is approaching until it occurs.
Neither did Farrara. However, I linked to a page that presents the scientific argument for me. Here is the link again —
http://www.wunderground.com/resources/climate/928.asp?MR=1
The study you say has been destroyed was not destroyed at all. See reference to “Manufactured Doubt Industry.”
1) Cherry picking;
2) Fake experts;
3) Misrepresentation and logical fallacies;
4) Impossible expectations of what research can deliver; and
5) Conspiracy theories.
Teach can’t read.
Teach, you pompous blithering ignoramus, first: 97% of scientists who deal with the climate, believe that the planet is warming, and it’s because of human activity – the remaining 3% are most probably shills for the fossil fuel companies. And the scientists you refer back to, come from that camp.
Second, it’s not like you’ll wake up one morning going, “Brrr… It’s a wee bit nippy out there. I think we just started that Little Ice Age, I’ve heard talked about!” If we do, indeed, have a Little Ice Age, you probably won’t be around to notice the changes indicating that it’s here, and neither will I. That, like global warming, will take some time.
And third, even if human’s aren’t the direct cause, you can’t deny that we’re at a level of CO2 not seen on this planet since we were still apes, millions of years before civilization. So, whether or not we’re the cause, why not make some efforts to control CO2 before it reaches levels not seen since T-Rex roamed the Earth, the worlds ultimate Conservative carnivore.
Or, do you know another planet we could go to, if this one becomes too hot for us to handle?
joan,
Never mind the one about our children, we now have proof that when we ask the question, ” is our Teach’s learning?”, the answer is, “NO!”
You offer no scientific evidence to prove anthropogenic global warming
Others have done so elsewhere, it’s not the point of the article.
…you discount thousands of years of history during the Holocene of shifting climate
Others, in concluding AGW, certainly accept how climate has varied over geologic time. It’s nothing new. We’re the side that believes in science, remember? Knowing the geologic/climatic record comes with this.
So, can all you Believers tell us how you yourselves have abandoned use of fossil fuels?
Does it matter? It’s not easy for most to shift away from fossil fuels – they’re such a part of modern civilization. But we can certainly support government policies that have that effect, and certainly fight the regressives who are only trying to preserve their incomes streams that have the effect of making the problem worse.
Teach: I’m curious. Can you, in your own words, give a brief and accurate summary of the basic theory of how human activity is changing the climate? I bet you can’t.
This latest round of denialism was inspired by a report (accepted by most climatologists) that the rate of warming in the atmosphere has slowed down slightly over the past decade. Good news, right? No, because the same report also shows that the rate of warming of the ocean has sped up greatly. It seems that the ocean is taking up much of the atmospheric heat, and this is responsible for the rapid melting of the floating ice cap in the Arctic Ocean.
Of course, denialists immediately seized on this report as proof that the world is cooling. They see what they want to see.
Re: Stephen Stralka – Although your comment wasn’t directed at me, yes, I certainly could sum up how global warming works, but not in 10 words or less, and I see no reason why I should. If you don’t understand the problem, may I suggest as a good starting point that you go on Youtube and watch Al Gore’s famous (and much vilified by denialists) movie “An Inconvenient Truth.” Gore is not a climatologist, but he is a good speaker and did a fine job of explaining the issue and the evidence supporting it.
Paraquat: No, my point was that William Teach up there almost certainly doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I have a very strong suspicion that he doesn’t understand the science he’s rejecting, so I wanted to see if I was right. I think I have a reasonably good understanding of the science myself.
Sorry Stephen, I think I misunderstood your comment.
I don’t have a car. That is what I do regarding fossil fuels.
I travel all over Florida in my job, and it never fails to amaze me how many petrol fired vehicles are on the roads, especially in Miami-Dade, Ft.Lauderdale, Orlando, Tampa Bay, and Jacksonville.That’s JUST Florida. Factor in our nation’s large cities and THEN factor in the BRICS and even the 3rd world. The carbon foot print is beyond comprehension. And it’s GROWING daily.
We have to look at our planet and atmosphere as an aquarium, there is a tipping point where things will get out of balance. I sure Teach has had an aquarium get out of balance at least once in his life; the result is a stinky mess and dead fish.
As far as the “hot Flash” thing goes, I’ve awakened naked and freezing more than once because my “partner” was a flashin’.I share your pain.
There may be some space weather science to this cooling argument, because there is no doubt the sun has entered a less active phase.
Here’s an extremely simplified explanation of how it works.
The sun outputs two kinds of energy. The first is electromagnetic radiation of every frequency, we see this radiation in myriad ways including cloud formation. The second (less obvious) type is the solar wind, composed of energetic protons and electrons. We see the solar wind as the charged particles interact with the magnetic core of the earth creating aurora borealis.
The sun’s total radiation is nearly constant, never varying more than one percent, but the solar wind is highly variable in both speed and intensity.
Every other star in the universe is also creating the same types of space weather, this is called CBR (cosmic background radiation).
The solar wind blocks approximately 70 percent of the CBR beyond the orbit of Mars. Well, at least it did. The period between 1940 and 2000 was an unusually active period for the sun, and in the last decade the sun has entered a less active and more normal phase.
What does this mean for the earth? In the short run, not much. In the long run, very much.
What happens is as the solar wind weakens, just a little more of the CBR reaches earth. This CBR microwave radiation energizes water vapor in the upper atmosphere, allowing the vapor to reach higher altitudes, and remain there longer, while reflecting the sun’s energy back into space. Every day the sky becomes a slightly deeper shade of blue, and a tiny bit less of the sun’s energy reaches the earth’s surface. In a day, a month, or a year, this does not amount to much, but the sun cycle has been weak for over a decade now.
Solar prediction is a very imprecise science, but the next 11-year solar cycle is predicted to be even weaker than this one. The sun is not expected to go into a strong phase for at least a few more 11-year cycles.
Of course some people take this to mean the only solution is to continue poisoning our air as fast as we can.
Hope that sanity prevails.
Theodor Landscheidt was the most accurate solar weather predictor that ever lived.
http://www.landscheidt.info
Even if true, this may do little but slow global warming, not reverse it. The earlier “Little Ice Ages” did not happen in the age of fossil fuel energy.
OT – ‘And, another nut bites the dust!”
Michele Bachmann doing her part to “help save and protect our great nation.”
She ain’t running for her reelection for her House seat in 2014.
Oh, the Comedy God’s can’t possibly be kind enough to us mere mortals, and have her take on Al Franken for his US Senate seat, can they?
That them thar, would be some PUUUUUUUUUUUUURE COMEDY GOLD!!!!!
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/bachmann-says-she-wont-seek-re-election
I’m sorry if I mislead you, when I said my previous comment was ‘Off-Topic.”
I forgot that the title of maha’s post, was “Delusion and Denial” – so it was FULLY ON-TOPIC.
My apologies.
Bachmann is going to be inducted into the wingnut Hall of Fame. Glad to she her go.. It’s sorta like the United States is getting a good enema. Her departure won’t detoxify politics, but it will aid in diminishing one particularly nasty strain of political antics.
What will Michele do now? My money’s on either Amway or Mary Kay.
Or those scam-old-people reverse mortgage ads like Fred Thompson does.
I must say that Bachmann had the good taste to leave before she was pushed. Sarah P had no such sense. Mary Kay, fer sure.
I’d put my money on her working with Marcus to develop a cure for homosexuality.. Whatever she does you can be certain she’ll be completely unbridled…She’ll make Glenn Beck look tame. She’s going to go full nutso.
BigPhil: The Cosmic Background Radiation is not from stars, it’s the radiation left over from the Big Bang (specifically when the Big Bang became transparent to radiation approximately 380,000 years after the Big Bang). 13-plus-billion years later, the CBR has cooled down to about 3 degrees above absolute zero. I haven’t heard any mention of it having an effect on climate, although someone can correct me if I’m wrong.