Anthropogenic forcing debate
Dear editor: Jim Taylor’s opinion comments in the Feb. 17 edition of the Okanagan Weekend pointed to the public reaction to an early speech by Canada’s Governor General Julie Payette, as a good example of his concern that it has become wrong to be right.
As reported by Taylor, the Governor General apparently suggested that modern scientific knowledge should trump cherished religious beliefs that still guide the position of many people on important public issues.
The Governor General was right to include “anthropogenic forcing” (belief that human emissions of carbon dioxide is the principal force that is causing climate change on our planet) as a modern religion, because it has no greater basis in science than the superstitious fantasies of ancient religious faiths.
Surprisingly, the Governor General apparently believes that we should dismiss the skeptics of the anthropogenic forcing religion while we embrace the skeptics of the more ancient religions.
Taylor avoided this conflict by renaming anthropogenic forcing skeptics as global warming skeptics.
This shift in focus is the same tactic that has long been employed by the “Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change” (IPCC). That is, “relabel anthropogenic forcing skeptics as climate change skeptics and no further defence is needed” for the very simple reason that that there are no climate change skeptics.
Global warming is a scientifically established fact. It has been going on for about 15,000 years. No one is disputing these facts. What is being disputed, is what is actually driving the recent increase in this ongoing change. The vulgar press customarily aids and abets the IPCC in perpetrating this fraud.
As IPCC claims this thesis became more strident, 3,500 unaffiliated scientists signed a petition to the budget office of the U.S. Congress urging the legislators not to undertake damaging measures to curb CO2 emissions until there was a better understanding of the causes of accelerated climate change.
The IPCC soon followed-up with its own survey and reported that 95 per cent of the scientists consulted had expressed support for its anthropogenic forcing theory.
The fact that less than 100 persons had been included in its survey and that all were either IPCC employees, or had other contractual relations with the IPCC was not mentioned. No statistical professional would accept this as a meaningful survey.
The IPCC now points to a study that links human releases of CO2 that does not contain the radioactive Carbon 14 isotope with the dilution of this isotope in the atmosphere as proof that human releases are the primary driving force. This study has been completely debunked by a more recent study published in The Geologist, a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
I am not qualified to judge these scientific disputes. I do want to point out, however, that there are many legitimate scientists that are qualified to challenge the IPCC claims. These scientists deserve to be heard instead of being brushed off as deluded climate change skeptics.
In fact, they deserve to be honoured because any that dare to challenge the omnipotent IPCC risk their future careers. The very few who receive an invitation to speak are prevented from doing so by threats of violence from brain-washed students that don’t want to have their comfortable anthropogenic forcing religion questioned.
William Taylor Westbank