Consensus

OPS-14 Consensus is unfortunately a very dangerous word in the field of science. As Einstein has famously said (paraphrased), it only takes one person to prove him wrong. There have been many examples of incorrect “consensus” throughout recent history. Eugenics, continental drift and Galileo quickly come to mind. “Global Warming” rebranded as “Climate Change” and going through another rebranding as “Climate Catastrophe/Crisis/Emergency” is just another in the long line of doomsday prophecies that will not ever come to pass (at least not based on our hand). I actually do believe we are headed towards a Climate Catastrophe within the next decade, but it won’t be from warming a century from now. The crisis will be here within a few years as we move deeper into a forecasted “Grand Solar Minimum”. The food shortages associated with cold weather losses (shorter growing seasons, extreme rain, hail and snow, along with increased cloud cover cooling the planet) will potentially be devastating (mass starvation, civil strife, epidemics, etc.). The magnitude of the temperature drop is certainly open for debate. Hopefully there has been some “significant” warming due to CO2. Every 0.1 ºC of CO2 warming is 0.1 ºC of relief from the depths a GSM could take us. More comments ahead.

That is significant, since a 2 ºC global temperature drop would wipe out agricultural production in Canada, most of Europe, Russia and China (i.e.: most of the northern hemisphere north of latitude 45º). The only place global temperatures rise to dangerous levels is in computer models. Computer models that have been programmed to essentially ignore any forcing other than CO2 (refer back to OPS-13 for the IPCC forcing diagram or go to the IPCC site directly). The GIGO (Garbage In, Garbage Out) principle of computer modeling is very visible in the field of Climate Science. Although, as I recently heard, it’s been taken a step further (Garbage In, Gospel Out). The models literally assume that the only forcing that can move the climate is CO2, with a natural water feedback loop that multiplies the CO2 effect by a fudge (my word) factor of 3.5 (neither of which have been proven). CO2 and the water feedback have not been a primary driver climate in the historical record on any statistically significant time scale. No empirical data means the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) theory is just that a theory.

The consensus in Cook’s words “that human activity is very likely causing most of the current GW” is actually a lot closer to zero than it is to 97% (as shown in the attachment). How you phrase the consensus is important (but still not necessary) since any consensus can still be wrong!!!