Climate Change Scepticism

Well, it's a night for arguments. Dave asked me to justify my climate change scepticism, and especially blogging against. Take my arguments as you wish. But don't try and stop me from blogging about something - that really gets my goat up.

Here is my position on climate change. Yes, the temperature appears to be rising a little at the moment - 0.74 degrees over the 20th century I believe. And human activity certainly appears to be contributing. But I make the following points -

1. The temperature of the world has always risen and fallen, over the entire history of the planet. No-one knows what the temperature will be in 2050, we don't know what other factors will affect the temperature cycle.

2. We don't know how much man-made factors are affecting the rise in temperature, and how much can be attributed to natural factors. Is it 20% anthropogenic? 80%?

3. Even if we were to determine that anthropogenic factors were the majority cause, I am very, very skeptical of our ability to change anything.

Part of the reason I believe in "small government" is because I think the government can only achieve so much. Believers in "big government", I suppose, believe the government can achieve anything so long as they have the resources. From my observation, governments can't even get the trains to run on time - let alone engineer the entire earth's climate cycle.

Now, add into this conflicting politics on the issue. Everyone says they are committed to combating climate change, but China is busily building a new coal power station every 11 days and India is not far behind. And many African nations are on the cusp of serious industrialisation. When this happens, they are gonna produce SO MUCH CO2, it will make your head spin.

That is, if the greenies are right about climate change, the planet is screwed.

I also make the following observation about how the argument is handled by the green element -

1. Skeptics (like myself) really are portrayed as heretics. I really feel the pressure from some sources (like Dave) to try and stop me writing my opinions. There is a desire to silence dissent.

2. The immediate effects of global warming are judged on a "heads I win, tails you lose" system. A year ago, things were hot in Sydney and we hadn't had much rain, and the greens nodded gravely and said, "It's global warming". This year we are in the middle of the wettest, mildest Summer I can remember, and the greens say, "That's irrelevant, it's just the weather."

So no - I'm not getting my knickers in a knot over climate change. I know it's cool and trendy at the moment, but that will wear off. The irony is that I hate pollution and I love clean energy. I also love efficiencies, and I'm all in favour of super-efficient cars etc. But not because I fear the bogey-man of climate change...