Intentional Disinformation About Climate

Why are so many honest, well-meaning people so confused about Global Warming?

"Over the course of the 1990s climate change has come to be accepted as one of the biggest, most complex scientific and political challenges the world has ever faced. The issue is not amenable to simple solutions, and it is likely to be a pressing issue for the next century and beyond. The topic has a history spanning more than a century of scientific interest and research. The science has rapidly intensified over recent decades to build into a sound and expanding body of observational data and analytical experience. The global scientific community has coalesced under the auspices of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) "an independent, intergovernmental scientific body" to offer scientific advice to the world's governments." Union of Concerned Scientists

"This advice of the scientific community has been systematically challenged by a number of vested interests, including some who fear a threat to the continued use of fossil fuels to power industrial development. These interests have exploited the intrinsic uncertainties of science to raise doubts as to the reality of climate change in the eyes of the public and the US Congress, effectively deflecting any US governmental action to mitigate climatic trends. Because there is ample room for disagreement in science, scientifically qualified skeptics have been included in the IPCC assessments. So, while the IPCC is not the only source of information, nor are its findings immutable, its reports do represent an extraordinary consensus not easily dismissed." (ibid)

"...Sea levels are rising. Coastlines are shrinking. We've seen record drought, spreading famine, and storms that are growing stronger with each passing hurricane season." - (Professor Walter Moss, Eastern Mich U - HNN)

"Congressman Harry Waxman held a famous series of Congressional hearings in 1994 in which the CEOs of the four major tobacco companies were subpoenaed to testify before Waxman's committee about the cover-up and lies of Big Tobacco. All four CEOs - from RJ Reynolds, Phillip Morris, Brown & Williamson and Lollilard - steadfastly refused to budge an inch under withering questioning from Waxman and other congressmen that they knew cigarettes were addictive and were killing people. They all four claimed they did not believe this." - (Corporate Greed)

"The public was outraged. It was a major public relations debacle for Big Tobacco. Within months, a perjury investigation was initiated by the Department of Justice. All four CEOs were eventually fired. Ultimately, the Department of Justice claimed it didn’t have enough evidence to prosecute for perjury because the four CEOs testified under oath they believed tobacco did not addict people nor cause cancer. They had crafted their answers very carefully, obviously with help from attorneys. Because they had used the word believe, they could not be prosecuted for perjury." - (Corporate Lies)

Because just like the tobacco industry knew for 30 years, or more, before the public became convinced of it, cigarettes were killing people. The tobacco lobby and the "Ozone is a Hoax" crowd and the "Climate Change Deniers" crowd and the "Evolution Deniers" (Creationists) all sow disinformation and for the unsuspecting masses, those who are ignorant of the science, (in a country where science illiteracy is at an all time high) it is easier to believe false science, the disinformation, than it is to understand the real science because real science is complex and may not be intuitive. They believe what is false in spite of the overwhelming support of scientists that climate change is real and humans are causing much of it, that the planet cannot self-heal itself when humans inflict so much damage, just as these special interests and those they funded denied first that tobacco caused cancer and then that second hand smoke caused cancer. And the deniers also refused to believe that CFCs were responsible for a loss of the protective shield from ozone, and the lobbied against coal processing plants saying it does not cause acid rain which raises the acid in rivers and lakes and kills acquatic animals, as we all know it does just as we also know that you can't really clean up coal and make it safe (someone tell that to President Obama, who thinks it can); and that creationism is not scientific and cannot be tested and therefore must not be taught in schools as part of the science curriculum.

Industry giants which benefit from the doubt they sow, persistently throw money at some renegade scientists who help them sell their fake arguments. These rogue scientists are not experts in the area of study they purport to know so much about nor have they done research nor do they ever cite credible peer-reviewed research. They just go on doing the bidding of special interests because they're often being well compensated for it and those who aren't, who legitimately question the science are in a very small, small minority who haven't done the climate modeling or haven't done any research in atmospheric physics.

Global Warming Contrarians

"Global warming deniers downplay and distort the evidence of climate change, and they demand policies that allow these industries to continue polluting, as well as attempt to undercut existing anti-pollution legislation." (ibid)

While no science is ever finished, this science is very clear and convincing to the vast majority of climate scientists. The consensus is unanimous by the real science community, those who work in those fields and others as well. For them it is settled science. Anthropogenic behavior is a very real problem and the crux of the trend in rising temperatures, acidification of the oceans and rising sea levels.

Many of the climate change deniers are convinced this is a conspiracy, a hoax perpetrated by grant seeking/maintaining scientists or by Al Gore and a liberals. It is a silly claim. It is a stupid claim. But, they have managed to convince a majority of Americans they are right. Where before almost 60-70% of the American public thought global warming was predominantly a result of human activities, that figure now is 50-60 percent. They have done their job well. Scientists have failed to convince the public that the facts favor global warming and current trend of rising temperature is being caused by increased use of fossil fuels.

Debunking Misinformation About Stolen Climate Emails
in the "Climategate" Manufactured Controversy

"The manufactured controversy over emails stolen from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit has generated a lot more heat than light. The email content being quoted does not indicate that climate data and research have been compromised. Most importantly, nothing in the content of these stolen emails has any impact on our overall understanding that human activities are driving dangerous levels of global warming. Media reports and contrarian claims that they do are inaccurate." Union of Concerned Scientists

Investigations Clear Scientists of Wrongdoing

"Six official investigations have cleared scientists of accusations of wrongdoing. A three-part Penn State University cleared scientist Michael Mann of wrongdoing. Two reviews commissioned by the University of East Anglia"supported the honesty and integrity of scientists in the Climatic Research Unit." A UK Parliament report concluded that the emails have no bearing on our understanding of climate science and that claims against UEA scientists are misleading. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Inspector General's office concluded there was no evidence of wrongdoing on behalf of their employees. The National Science Foundation's Inspector General's office concluded, "Lacking any direct evidence of research misconduct...we are closing this investigation with no further action." Other agencies and media outlets have investigated the substance of the emails." (ibid)

The Environmental Protection Agency, in response to petitions against action to curb heat-trapping emissions, dismissed attacks on the science rooted in the stolen emails. Factcheck.org debunked claims that the emails put the conclusions of climate science into question. Politifact.com rated claims that the emails falsify climate science as "false." An Associated Press review of the emails found that they "don't undercut the vast body of evidence showing the world is warming because of man-made greenhouse gas emissions." (ibid)

Why so few believe human causes of climate change are due to a myriad of reasons. The economic collapse which takes center stage and has affected so many personally and if not directly their concern that it will. There are a lot of urgent issues today and something which isn't happening fast enough for them to realize it is or affects other regions of the planet and they don't see it directly and when it does they don't relate it to the overall trend of rising temperature.

Global Warming Skeptic Organizations

"Founded in 1989 by 46 corporations and trade associations representing all major elements of US industry, the GCC presents itself as a "voice for business in the global warming debate." The group funded several flawed studies on the economics of the cost of mitigating climate change, which formed the basis of their 1997/1998 multi-million dollar advertising campaign against the Kyoto Protocol. The GCC began to unravel in 1997 when British Petroleum withdrew its membership. Since then many other corporations have followed BP s lead and left the coalition. This exodus reached a fevered pitch in the early months of 2000 when DaimlerChrysler, Texaco and General Motors all announced their exodus from the GCC. Since these desertions, the GCC restructured and remains a powerful and well-funded force focused on obstructing meaningful efforts to mitigate climate change." (ibid)

Industry funded denial advocacy by the same industries funding the conservative think tanks that promulgate climate science disinformation and specific localized weather events, like heavy snows in winter doesn't convince climate change deniers that it is getting warmer, even though heavy snows are a consequence of greater moisture in the atmosphere and factors which are influenced by temperature. But when you see the opposite occurring from what your are told is happening, you tend not to believe the truth about our overuse of fossil fuels and its correlation with global warming. Less believe in global warming than should in spite of reduced opposition from right wing media spin and corporate funders and it is increasingly more evident that temperatures and sea levels are going to continue to rise. It may already be too late to stop global warming.

Some of the skeptics will claim that thermal maximums have occurred in the past and they cite the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), almost 56 million years ago, which was a result of massive greenhouse gases in the troposphere. This is a wrong comparison because the current rate of carbon dioxide being released is 10 times faster than it was then and cannot be explained if you remove the human equation.

They claim the earth is self-healing, but at this rate of increase, the earth is not able to heal and we won't adapt. What we have is increased feedback, and a subsequent speeding up of cause and effect. The example of the last thermal maximum is not an appropriate analogy for what is happening now. What is happening now is unprecedented. The rise during this what would be a glacial period when the planet should be cooling and there have been lower solar activity - is unprecedented.

The Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum had a duration of approximately 170,000 years. It caused the Earths mean temperature to rise an average 5 degrees C (9 degrees F). We don't know exactly what caused this event but there is the theory that is most accepted by scientists that the cause was fire, methane and volcanic activity. Temperatures rose and methane was released via gas hydrates from deep ocean sediments oxidizing into carbon dioxide. This increase in greenhouse gas caused more warming and more methane was released into the atmosphere.

Let it be a warming we should not ignore. The research would indicate that this accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum would be less than the amount of carbon dioxide released by fossil fuels we are now burning. Another-words we are releasing more carbon than may have caused the warming which happened during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.

Geologists examined cores of sediment from the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. Their research indicated that the warming during that thermal maximum was gradual whereas our rate of warming now is 10 times faster.

"Our findings suggest that humankind may be causing atmospheric carbon dioxide to increase at rates never previously seen on Earth, which would suggest that current temperatures will potentially rise much faster than they did during the PETM," explains Dr. Ian Harding, a senior lecturer the University of Southamptons National Oceanography Centre.

We need to start connecting the dots to the extreme weather events which are happening with increased frequency, i.e. floods, heat waves, droughts and storms - and the man made pollution which is altering the climate to where it will become unlivable. We will not be able to adapt to these extreme changes. We're not extremophiles like some bacteria. Many will not survive and we will take with us other species which also will not be able to adapt.

Hank Roth

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