StuMyers said:
That's not really what I'm seeing. I'm seeing a pretty standard scientific consensus.
I've attended lectures by Jim Hansen on a few occiasions, and he doesn't seem to fit the 'prophet of doom' description.
And the er... ad-hominem irony wasn't lost.
Perhaps from the knowledge you gleaned at these lectures you might be able to throw some light on the following?
The current average temperature rise of .13 C per decade is the same now as it was in 1910 when reliable records began.
The extra humidity through extra water vapor (the major greenhouse gas) has so far proven beneficial with the Sahara desert having shrunk by 300,000 Km2 in the past 20 years.
The rate of increase in sea levels has remained fairly constant for the past 80 years and it is known that sea levels have been rising for 1000s of years. To be precise studies have shown that sea level rise (SLR) between 1920-1945 was 2.03 mm p.a. whereas between 1946 - 2003 SLR has been 1.45 mm p.a. so the rate of SLR is actually decreasing not increasing as the GW models predicted.
The total ice mass of the Earth has increased over the past 30 years with the ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland gaining 2" between 1993 - 2003 thus reversing a 6000 year old trend whereby the ice sheets steadily melted..
The Arctic was actually warmer by 1 C between 1925 and 1935 than it is today.
There has been no nett change in global average rainfall for the past 100 years.
There has been a steady decrease in hurricanes since 1970. In fact Dr. Landsea, a UN author, resigned when his lead author on a political platform announced (that is lied) that hurricanes had become more frequent.
The temperatures the UN uses to calculate average global temperatures are obtained from readings taken near expanding towns and cities which makes the data victim to the heat island effect which is potentially serious as it is possible that the Earth is actually cooling not warming.
In some places during the middle-ages the average temperatures were 3 C higher than they are today. In fact the available records from the time which are incomplete suggest this increase applied globally.
During the Cambrian period CO2 levels were 7000 ppm compared to 350 ppm today and yet average global temperatures were lower then than now.
The mean global temperature of this the current interglacial period is 2C less than previous interglacial periods whilst CO2 content is 100 ppm higher.
Oh and finally the IPCC which is being touted as this international body of independent scientists who cannot be disputed is actually comprised of UN member states government appointees. Many of these are not scientists at all but civil servants and even a substantial number of lawyers and accountants!
I note they have quietly backpedalled on their prior claims that global warming would lead to an increase in the number and intensity of hurricanes when the actual data proved to be in diametric opposition to their forecasts, just as they also backpeddled hugely (30% reduction)on their estimate of human contribution to GW.
So man-made global warming problem? What Problem?
And as for the motive for this scaremongering;
Scientists are savvy, political creatures. Here they are looking at a project which will deliver enormous funding for them for many years to come and so of course they are only too happy to do a bit of Bush like fear mongering to secure their funding.
Then you have those 'green' scientists who have their own indirectly related environmental agendae who again are only too happy to jump aboard the global warming bandwagon as a means to an end.
And of course the 'not so green' scientists who work in competing fields such as nuclear energy who again have a strongly vested interest in attacking the competition.
Finally you have the politicians who have now achieved their ultimate goal. They can now tax the very air you breathe.
Just as you don't need to be a professional politician to argue against gov't political policies so you don't need to be a scientist to recognise scientific bull****.
You're smart not to get to enamored to a specific subfield, IMO. Where you end up is almost never where you begin. I started in HE-nuclear and somehow ended up in structural biology. Go figure.