History is full of arguments about the worthiness of facts. Skeptics often don’t know any better. Sometimes they refuse to listen. Other times they are fed misinformation or outright lies that convince them of a certain argument. Unfortunately, thanks to the wealth of information available from modern technology, we have to also compete with a wealth of incorrect facts.
Here are some of the more popular arguments given by skeptics of climate change and the science to demonstrate why they are incorrect:
“The climate has changed before.” This is a fact. But the rate of change we are currently experiencing is unprecedented. Our climate has changed. There is a direct correlation between the temperature and amount of carbon in the atmosphere.
“There is no consensus on climate.” Is 97% not close enough to a consensus? Over 97% of scientists agree that man-made climate change is real. Over 97% of articles about climate change find that global warming is real and largely caused by humans. 3% of contrarian studies either cannot be replicated or contain errors.
Eat 97% of a someone’s sandwich and see if they think you have completely ruined their lunch.
“Current models are unreliable.” Models are not forecasting; they are built to estimate trends rather than events. Using a large amount of data (interactions between our atmosphere, oceans, land surface, ice and our sun) averaged over a long period (30 years) we can predict climate trends. How do we test the data for accuracy? A process called hindcasting tests the models against past data. These simulations could only be accurate with addition of CO2 caused by anthropogenic activities.
“Animals and plants can adapt.” Animals and plants may not be helpless when facing climate change. They can migrate to cooler climates, adapt to a warmer environment or evolve as a species. There are records showing these methods for survival in the past. But most researchers understand that climate change is happening too fast for many species to keep up.
It’s like running the New York Marathon with one day of training.
“Cold weather disproves global warming.” Weather is not climate. Weather is a short-term event. Climate trends are long-term. In the last 50 years, the ratio of record high temperatures to record low temperatures has doubled.
Look at waves breaking on a beach and tell me if the tide is coming in or out?
“Extreme weather isn’t caused by global warming.” This is one of the hardest arguments to prove as scientists need to look at the longest period of trends and observational records are rare. But we do know that with Global Warming the evaporation rate increases. The warmer atmosphere can hold more water and a rise in sea surface temperature changes the atmospheric circulation and precipitation.
Would you rather I throw a dry or wet sponge at your face?
“The Greenhouse Effect is mostly caused by water vapor.” Water vapor contributes anywhere from one to two thirds to the greenhouse effect. But water vapor is a function of temperature. It doesn’t force our climate. An abundance of H20 in the air gets rained out. A dryer atmosphere quickly changes through evaporation from the large ocean the earth’s surface is covered in.
“Mars is warming” This theory involves a 22 year period of time between comparisons on Mars. While it would be incorrect to use this as a basis for a trend of planet wide warming, the “evidence” of the warming is from 2 photos taken (in 1977 and 1999). The earlier photo shows a brighter planet than the latter. Unfortunately this has since been debunked as the older photo was taken after a dust storm that settled brighter dust on the surface.
You can’t paint yellow stripes on a fly and call it a bee.
“The 2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory.” Heat will not spontaneously flow from a material of lower temperature to material at higher temperature. But the argument completely disregards the fact that the sun is warming the earth and that heat is being trapped by the greenhouse gases.
Why do we wear more clothes in winter? To slow down the heat loss from our bodies. The extra greenhouse gases in our atmosphere are more layers of clothing for our earth.
There are a lot of skeptics who push incorrect facts, so arming yourself with the science should help your argument. But prepared for resistance. Sometimes people just want to disagree for the sake of it.
