OFF: UK's premier green awareness festival under threat from police and local council.

[Paul Mather]

On 14 Aug 2009, at 5:59 PM, Jonathan Jarrett wrote:

> 	I have to admit that as a medievalist the emphasis on `carbon' is  
> slightly more aggravating even than it is to me as a thinking human  
> being. There is *bugger-all* evidence that carbon dioxide levels in  
> the atmosphere affect the Earth's temparature.

At which point I have to say this: stick to being a medievalist, Jon.   
Either that, or read up just a little on the chemistry of atmospheric  
science.

(Or, perhaps you meant to say, "There is bugger-all evidence I'm  
prepared to accept."  That's quite a big difference.)

> the temparature in the Northern Hemisphere at least was higher in  
> the twelfth century than it is now (when Greenland was green, or at  
> least greener) without carbon levels being as high

Like I said, you should read a bit more.  There are numerous, easy- 
accessible sources that debunk these arguments.  How about what the  
American Geophysical Union think about your medievalist concerns: http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/prrl/prrl0319.html 
.  (And, the AGU had such a lack of consensus they decided to publish  
a formal position on the human impacts on climate: http://www.agu.org/outreach/science_policy/positions/climate_change2008.shtml 
; just like many other learned societies and leading science journals.)

> 	Bottom line: if it's making a difference it's not distinguishable  
> from outside phenomena. And we don't understand the outside  
> phenomena well enough to model them so there's no decent way to  
> tell. And if I were in my proper sceptic mode I'd start pointing out  
> how many weather stations are in areas that have seen substantial  
> urban development since the 1950s or on airports that have naturally  
> seen a big increase in traffic the last twenty years and ask just  
> how good you think the evidence for temparature increase really *is*.

You do know that weather stations aren't the only way to measure  
temperatures, don't you?  (I was funded for a while by the NASA/ 
Langley Atmospheric Sciences Data Center and one of the things that  
stuck with me was the variety of kit ["instruments"] they use and the  
difficulties this poses for long-term archival storage [metadata  
design; file formats; etc.].)

> But I don't need to because there's a perfectly good crisis going on  
> anyway, from which the whole carbon schtick is doing a really good  
> job of distracting people. 'It's not us: it's carbon dioxide. If we  
> plant enough trees on someone else's country we can balance it all  
> out and keep the good life', or such seems to be the anaesthetic idea.
>
> 	So why the emphasis? Because it's an *easy scapegoat*. You can buy  
> a carbon offset for your transatlantic flight and feel as if you're  
> not doing any damage. But the flight is spouting a bunch of other  
> things into the atmosphere that are much nastier for things under it  
> and in it than CO2, and when the flight is using up more fossil fuel  
> that we can't replace and generally doing its small bit to take us  
> to peak oil and beyond before we've done anything to meet what  
> happens to civilisation then. "Carbon" is not the villain here, it's  
> unthinking soundbite junkies who want to pay their way out of  
> lifestyle change. I realise you good people are probably mostly or  
> fully aware of this but that means I can rant and someone may hear  
> it with sympathy rather than tagging me as an irrational climate  
> change denier. I'm an environmentalist *anthropogenic*
> climate change sceptic dammit.

I suppose skeptic sounds nicer and more fearless and romantic than  
denier.  I agree with you about the pollution; peak oil; over-reliance  
on fossil fuels (especially oil) with no urgent transition plan in  
sight to an alternative energy policy; conscience salving via  
offsetting; and a lack of use of renewables.  But, I think you're  
plain batshit crazy on the earlier stuff.  (I calls 'em like I sees  
'em.) :-)

Cheers,

Paul.

e-mail: paul at gromit.dlib.vt.edu

"Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring production
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