Bad day in Oklahoma

On 2006-03-06, Jay Honeck wrote:
Michael Crichton's excellent discourse on where the "science" of
environmentalism has led us.

Crichton is a fiction writer. I would accept the arguments of one
climatologist over the arguments of ten thousand Crichtons.

Crichton is a medical doctor, a very successful author (of both fiction and
non-fiction work), and one helluva a smart guy.

He's still not a climatologist, though. I agree about the computer
models by the way, the system is still too chaotic with many unknowns --
but that's not the point. Like it doesn't take a rocket scientist to
work out that turning the burner up under a pan of water will add energy
to the system, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out that
changing the composition of the Earth's atmosphere will cause climate
changes. There is ample evidence that humans have increased the
quantities of CO2 (amongst other gases) since we have good records of
atmospheric composition going back millenia.

It is not even up for debate that one of the properties of CO2 is that
it helps retain energy in the Earth's atmosphere (many gases, such as
CH4 - methane - have a greater effect). Increasing the concentration of
CO2 will increase the amount of energy that is retained by the Earth's
atmosphere as surely as night follows day, or as surely as increasing
the burner under a pan of water means more energy goes into the pan of
water. It isn't even up for debate that the concentration of CO2 has
increased particularly in the last century.

The specifics of what it will do to climate ARE still up for debate,
though. In my part of the world, the debate is whether it will result in
us opening a ski resort on Snaefell because of changes in the Gulf
stream, or whether we'll be growing oranges and olives in our back yards
(we already have palm trees).

--
Dylan Smith, Port St Mary, Isle of Man
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