Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate - Science ...

calculate large temperature increases, i.e., showhigh values of ‘climate sensitivity’? The mostlikely explanation is that models ignore thenegative feedbacks that occur in the realatmosphere. New observations reported fromsatellites suggest it is the distribution of watervapor that could produce such strong negativefeedbacks.! If current warming is not due to increasinggreenhouse gases, what are the natural causesthat might be responsible for both warming andcooling episodes – as so amply demonstrated inthe historic, pre-industrial climate record?Empirical evidence suggests very strongly thatthe main cause of warming and cooling on adecadal scale derives from solar activity via itsmodulation of cosmic rays that in turn affectatmospheric cloudiness. According to publishedresearch, cosmic-ray variations are alsoresponsible for major climate changes observedin the paleo-record going back 500 millionyears.! The third question concerns the effects ofmodest warming. A major scare associated witha putative future warming is a rapid rise in sealevel, but even the IPCC has been scaling backits estimates. We show here that there will belittle if any acceleration, and therefore noadditional increase in the rate of ongoing sealevelrise. This holds true even if there is adecades-long warming, whether natural ormanmade.! Other effects of a putative increase intemperature and carbon dioxide are likely to bebenign, promoting not only the growth of cropsand forests but also benefiting human health.Ocean acidification is not judged to be aproblem, as indicated by available data. Afterall, CO 2 levels have been up to 20 times thepresent value during the Phanerozoic Period,the past 500 million years. During this timeEarth’s climate has been remarkably stable,with no ‘run-away’ greenhouse effects –indicating strong negative feedbacks.! If, for whatever reason, a modest warming wereto occur – even one that matches temperaturesseen during the Medieval Warm Period ofaround 1100 AD or the much larger onesrecorded during the Holocene ClimateOptimum of some 6,000 years ago – the impactwould not be damaging but would probably be,on the whole, beneficial. [Lamb 1982, andFigure 26]! Policy Implications! Our findings, if sustained, point to naturalcauses and a moderate warming trend withbeneficial effects for humanity and wildlife.This has obvious policy implications: Schemesproposed for controlling CO 2 emissions,including the Kyoto Protocol, proposals in theU.S. for federal and state actions, and proposalsfor a successor international treaty to Kyoto, areunnecessary, would be ineffective ifimplemented, and would waste resources thatcan better be applied to genuine societalproblems [Singer, Revelle and Starr 1991;Lomborg 2007].! Even if a substantial part of global warmingwere due to greenhouse gases – and it is not –any control efforts currently contemplatedwould give only feeble results. For example, theKyoto Protocol – even if punctiliously observedby all participating nations – would decreasecalculated future temperatures by only 0.02degrees C by 2050 [re-calculated from Parry etal. 1998], an undetectable amount.To sum up: This NIPCC report falsifies theprincipal IPCC conclusion that the reportedwarming (since 1979) is very likely caused by thehuman emission of greenhouse gases. In otherwords, increasing carbon dioxide is notresponsible for current warming. Policiesadopted and called for in the name of ‘fightingglobal warming’ are unnecessary.It is regrettable that the public debate overclimate change, fueled by the errors andexaggerations contained in the reports of the IPCC,has strayed so far from scientific truth. It is anembarrassment to science that hype has replacedreason in the global debate over so important anissue.28