We have already seen that there is big money sponsoring climate denial. This page is about the specific myths being pushed on a confused public.
On this page
- Ever hear the one about how “It’s been cooling since 1998!”
- Isn’t global warming just a hoax started by Al Gore?
- Best myth-tracker sites I know
- It’s a Greenie conspiracy to keep Africa poor!
1. Ever hear the one about how “It’s been cooling since 1998!”
The peer-reviewed climate science have addressed the following collection of misinformation, half-truths, and outright lies! So ask yourself if you’ve heard any of the following, and if interested, click on the link for a glance at some of what the real climate science is saying.
• Human CO2 emissions are too tiny to matter
• We can’t do anything about climate change
• The ‘hockey stick’ graph has been proven wrong
• Chaotic systems are not predictable
• We can’t trust computer models of climate
• They predicted global cooling in the 1970s
• It’s been far warmer in the past, what’s the big deal?
• It’s too cold where I live – warming will be great
• Global warming is down to the Sun, not humans
• It’s all down to cosmic rays
• CO2 isn’t the most important greenhouse gas
• The lower atmosphere is cooling, not warming
• Antarctica is getting cooler, not warmer, disproving global warming
• The cooling after 1940 shows CO2 does not cause warming
• It was warmer during the Medieval period, with vineyards in England
• We are simply recovering from the Little Ice Age
• Warming will cause an ice age in Europe
• Ice cores show CO2 increases lag behind temperature rises, disproving the link to global warming
• Ice cores show CO2 rising as temperatures fell
• Mars and Pluto are warming too
• Many leading scientists question climate change
• Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming
• Higher CO2 levels will boost plant growth and food production
• Polar bear numbers are increasing
New Scientist lists the top myths pushed by the deniers in “Climate change, a guide for the perplexed”. — May 2007
2. Isn’t global warming just a hoax started by Al Gore? This is one of my favourite myths!
Al Gore didn’t invent climate change — people need to ! I don’t know how this myth has any credibility with anyone, anywhere, when 5 minutes on wikipedia should convince them otherwise. From the global warming wiki:
It was proposed by Joseph Fourier in 1824 and was first investigated quantitatively by Svante Arrhenius in 1896.[32] The question in terms of global warming is how the strength of the presumed greenhouse effect changes when human activity increases the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
As for it being ‘popularlised’ by Al Gore, check out this science show by the General Electric Company in 1956! Their ‘Excursions in science’ show is played from an original Vinyl recording from over half a century ago.
(Note: this video also demonstrates how the Gulf Stream turned north 3 million years ago, and how the warm water moving north counter-intuitively caused the Northern ice age!)
Try the Bell Telephone Company science show from 1958.
This short video shows animation of tourists studying underwater Miami through glass-bottomed boats!
A conspiracy by Al Gore? Pffffft, pull the other one, it plays jingle bells!
3. Best myth-tracker sites I know:
Climatecrocks.com/overview/ — very nicely presented Youtube videos
Skepticalscience.com — very readable
Realclimate.org — by real climatologists, more technical!
4. It’s a Greenie conspiracy to keep Africa poor!
The Global Warming Swindle portrayed the argument that there is a conspiracy from the West to stop Africa developing. Apparently Global warming was whipped up to stop Africa using her oil, coal and gas. Also, by mandating more expensive renewable energy, the climate community are also (apparently) keeping development out of reach of most African nations. They can’t afford to go green! Apparently it’s about keeping African’s poor and maybe — it has been suggested — is a way of keeping their numbers under control! (Now just how paranoid and frenzied would you have to be to believe the world’s climate scientists are in on that kind of conspiracy!)
But wait, there’s more! Now it seems climate change is a conspiracy to construct a Communist World Government that is going to redistribute OUR tax dollars to the poorer nations to help them cope.
So which is it? Is global warming about too little or too much money to Africa? Once someone rants against the peer-reviewed consensus, irrational conspiracy theories are never far away. More details here on my older post, Lord Monckton warns of a Communist World Government!
Eclipse Now 