Hey Andy,
I'm close to your thinking on this being a big crock, but unfortunately having looked at it for a few days, theres just too much data out there for me to parse and truly understand it on my own. There are natural cycles and equilibriums, and there are human caused changes to the environment. The existence of a natural cycle doesn't preclude a man made cause to current warming trends. So unfortunately to me, while the whole thing smells wrong, I don't feel I have enough an understanding of those cycles and balances to go against 2,500 PHDs who say "we're 90% sure".
To your point about consensus not being science, I definitely agree. But since I cant do the science myself I have to trust the consensus opinion of scientists. I can't do relativistic physics experiments, but I trust in that physics because people trained to do good science have done it and peer reviewed their tested theories. Also - Lacking a testbed climate you can't test out scientific hypothesis. So while consensus isn't good science, its the best we have if we want any predictive ability on our climate without having a spare planet to experiment around with.
All that said I still feel in my heart that this is bunk. I'm remembering back to the original "safe our forests" eco-movement, where we preventing logging and boosted fire protection over our national forests in order to "preserve the balance". What we learned was that it was a horrible idea to prevent forest fires, because they were part of the cycle of life, and by delaying them we caused them to burn hotter and do more damage than had we just ignored it. This smells awfully similar in that regards. The concept that nature is or was ever at perfect balance and equilibrium, or that mankind is personally charged with keeping it that way seems bogus.
Bottom line for me: I don't like it, but if my best and brightest scientists are telling me that I am changing the climate for the worse, and I have the ability to correct it and thereby improve quality of life substantially down the road because of it, I feel like I have to listen.
Take Care.
I'm close to your thinking on this being a big crock, but unfortunately having looked at it for a few days, theres just too much data out there for me to parse and truly understand it on my own. There are natural cycles and equilibriums, and there are human caused changes to the environment. The existence of a natural cycle doesn't preclude a man made cause to current warming trends. So unfortunately to me, while the whole thing smells wrong, I don't feel I have enough an understanding of those cycles and balances to go against 2,500 PHDs who say "we're 90% sure".
To your point about consensus not being science, I definitely agree. But since I cant do the science myself I have to trust the consensus opinion of scientists. I can't do relativistic physics experiments, but I trust in that physics because people trained to do good science have done it and peer reviewed their tested theories. Also - Lacking a testbed climate you can't test out scientific hypothesis. So while consensus isn't good science, its the best we have if we want any predictive ability on our climate without having a spare planet to experiment around with.
All that said I still feel in my heart that this is bunk. I'm remembering back to the original "safe our forests" eco-movement, where we preventing logging and boosted fire protection over our national forests in order to "preserve the balance". What we learned was that it was a horrible idea to prevent forest fires, because they were part of the cycle of life, and by delaying them we caused them to burn hotter and do more damage than had we just ignored it. This smells awfully similar in that regards. The concept that nature is or was ever at perfect balance and equilibrium, or that mankind is personally charged with keeping it that way seems bogus.
Bottom line for me: I don't like it, but if my best and brightest scientists are telling me that I am changing the climate for the worse, and I have the ability to correct it and thereby improve quality of life substantially down the road because of it, I feel like I have to listen.
Take Care.