The institution of the Catholic Church is often unpopular with liberals for its position on issues like family planning, but it can also be a force for social progress.
In particular, the first thing I noticed from this Gallup survey on attitudes toward global warming is that the percentage of persons who think global warming is manmade appears to be much higher in predominately Catholic nations than in Protestant ones:
Countries are classified based on their majority religion as according to adherents.com, with an assist from InfoPlease in ambiguous cases. In majority-Catholic nations, on average, 65 percent of adults believe that global warming is manmade, versus 47 percent in Protestant ones (the figure for the United States, which has a Protestant majority, is 49 percent). Countries with an Orthodox majority are somewhere in the middle, as are those where a majority is Christian, but neither Catholic or Protestant theologies predominate. Buddhist countries also seem more inclined toward environmental protection; Islamic ones appear less so.
It can't be said for certain that religion itself is the cause of these differences, because we haven't controlled for other sorts of variables. For instance, there is some tendency for Catholic countries to be concentrated in warmer-weather latitudes, where people might naturally have more reason to be concerned about planetary warming. Still, the differences generally seem to hold even within particular regions; in (Catholic) Ireland for instance, 66 percent believe global warming is the result of human activity, versus 48 percent for the (Protestant) United Kingdom.
Poling in the United States, meanwhile, has suggested that Catholics are considerably more concerned about climate change than evangelical Protestants, although not more than mainline or black Protestant denominations, and less so than Jewish or atheist voters.
The Vatican, for its part, has generally been quite sympathetic toward concerns about climate change. Its adherents could be the swing votes in determining whether policies like cap-and-trade move forward, both in the United States and around the world.
4.22.2009
The Pope and the Planet
@ 5:14 PM
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Speaking as a Catholic, I think at least as far as christian religions are concerned, can be the least fundamentalist in terms of issues like creationsism, that catholics are more willing to accept a human role in the development of the planet.
Nate, you should look at the literacy rates of those countries.
i feel that it has more to do with your opinion on global warming than your religion.
It doesn't seem like this study controls for income or education level, and I wouldn't be surprised if richer or more educated nations are more concerned about climate change independent of religion.
A lot of this comes down to the fact that in spite of some infamous episodes (e.g. Galileo), the Catholic Church has regularly been a strong sponsor of scientific inquiry, even if it does limit the scope of its support as a result of overriding moral and ethical considerations.
That graph is beyond horrific. It goes from 50% to 65% rather than 0-100% - talk about exaggerating data. Yeesh.
Boy, those graphs are really horrible. Sorry.
Considering that Protestant nations are far and beyond the most wealthy, it seems that wealth is actually inversely related to support of scientific evidence.
Interesting information, for sure, but I would agree with most that there is a TON of other factors that might be more important than religion.
What would be a more interesting analysis with this data would be a multiple linear regression with all the data tossed in, and see which are the big 3 or 4 that fall out as major factors.
Nate, I thought you were better than this.
Take India for example. 40% people are illiterate. And less than 5% can speak English. Less than 10% might have even heard about the Global Warming debate. But I am sure, among these educated Indians, Global Warming deniers would be FAR FAR FAR less than the US educated(among them Fox News adherents.)
The "Religion-Global warming" poll you speak of is utterly flawed.
What people are saying about education level not being controlled for make sense, but that makes the protestants look even worse, because predominantly protestant countries are typically very highly educated - to the same degree as predominantly catholic countries. They're definitely on average much more educated than predominantly Muslim countries, yet they TIE!!!! So if you controlled for education, the protestants would be BY FAR the most "ostrich-like" religion in the world, far worse than Islam, for example.
And that's really amazing!
Those were misleading graphics for the casual observer. The differences between your different groups ranged from 45% to 65%, but you portrayed them on a range that mapped that to about 40%-70%, thus amplifying the perceived differences in these groups.
I'm a fan of your site, but think that graphic was bogus. Did you just copy and paste from Gallup?
I don't get why global warming is considered the litmus test for whether someone cares or is knowledgeable about the environment. There is some evidence that people are causing warming, but most people don't have the expertise to tell legit evidence from bullshit, and there's plenty of silliness being spewed on all sides. This is just another case of people holding an opinion "against big business/oil barons/them rich folk" or "against big government/SF libruls/them damn hippies" and choosing who to believe based on that.
The evidence that through chemical pollution we're damaging our water supply is so clear and obvious that the polluters don't even try to deny it -- they are left arguing over whose pipes the stuff drained from. Whether it's new chemicals that we haven't even tried to determine safe levels of yet, or it's plain old chicken manure. Marine species near cities are suffering from high rates of disease and mortality from chemicals that are undeniably there for human reasons. Why not ask about that instead?
Global warming is a litmus test for the belief in science, but the true scientist studies the outcomes from the global warming, and studies the truth underlying the claim.
A "true believer" buys the global argument, and risks his reputation as a blogger and author on things he has not studied...
I am very frustrated by the Global Warming Deniers. Burning fossil fuels releases C02. C02 is a greenhouse gas and traps heat in the atmosphere. The end. The science is very well understood. Global warming is, after all, why Venus is so much hotter than Mercury even though it is farther away from the Sun. In every scientific field, there will be a few who disagree with the mainstream but when the consequences of doing nothing are so high, we can not take the risk.
That survey throws those who say GW is both man and environment caused among deniers.
I presume that´s why high-educated protestant nations have such poor numbers.
"Poling in the United States..." Is it even legal to pole people in the US? Sounds like it could be painful.
I really don't like Nate's chart this time. It makes differences of of only a couple percent look at lot more significant than they are. In my opinion, either a 0 to 100 or a 0 to 70 scale, using uniformly colored (dark) bars would make the chart significantly better.
Nate, you should take the *weighted average*(as per population) of the countries of same religion, instead of the lazy simple average, if you wish to make a more credible statement. And for more credibility weigh it further with the percentage of the majority religion in the country. And even further with the percentage of the target people of the second part of the Gallup survey on which you rely on(i.e. those who knew "something" or a "great deal" about global warming.)
You got the tools to run the numbers, it must be child's play to you. just do it!
Yeah, this seems sloppy, regardless of the graphic.
Just for starters, Gallup said: "13 of the top 20 countries where more people believe global warming is a result of human activities are in Latin America."
This raises obvious questions about the relationship between Catholicism and geography on this point, and merely pointing at Ireland does not begin to adequately address them.
Looking at the Gallup poll again, I have a different interpretation. Opinions about whether global warming is human-caused via the burning of fossil fuel seems to be strongly correlated with how economically dependent a nation is on global warming-causing activities. For example, the oil producing nations of the Middle East, Nigeria, Russia, and Norway are low on the list. Nations which use a lot of oil or coal (USA, UK, etc...) are also pretty low. Nations which produce highly energy-efficient cars and other goods (South Korea, Japan) are at the top. So perhaps we're seeing a psychological effect where people are just taking up opinions beneficial to themselves.
I regretfully have to agree with those above who complain that the graph is misleading (and unlabeled!) and that the analysis is oversimplified. I do not dispute your thesis, but this is pretty poor proof.
Yeah; sorry to pile on, but this is the least convincing article I've read in a year's worth of obsessively reading this great site.
The misleading graph was the first thing that hit me upside the face. Bummer.
What strikes me is that the religions that have free-will of humans as a major tenant go with the man-made global warming. The religions that have pre-destination as a major tenant go with the 'what-me-worry?' attitude. Totally expected, on my part.
Wolf of A, it's not so simple as greenhouse gases trapping heat in the atmosphere. If it were, we'd have a much greater problem than the evidence suggests. Moreover, the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere is tiny, dwarfed by the presence of the most prevalent greenhouse gas, water vapor.
One of the dirty little secrets of climate science is that physicists are unable to replicate the earth's atmosphere in the lab, and unable to demonstrate the theoretical heat trapping mechanism. As such, scientists are reduced to interpolating based on known thermodynamics concepts. Except the models err.
The climate mechanism is much more complex than Al gore and crew would like to admit. The science is still very infantile, so premature action, in fact, is likely worse than no action at all.
I agree we should be attempting to minimize known pollutants. But it is not at all clear that CO2 falls into that category, despite the EPA bleatings. CO2 is an inert gas, and is more likely beneficial to humanity all in all than harmful.
I'm happy to see my fellow atheists come down on the side of science and reason on this issue. Sometimes I look at atheist-heavy Digg and wonder, have the warming denialists suckered the atheists too? Butt Digg is also a libertarian-heavy site, and those people are caught up in their own particular religion.
The Vatican, for its part, has generally been quite sympathetic toward concerns about climate change.
That may be true for the current Vatican thought on the subject at hand (global climate change), but the Vatican can, and does, dramatically swing directions, depending who has their hands on the Vatican's powers.
For example, Pope Gregory XVI (February 2, 1831 - June 1, 1846), was considered a strong reactionary, opposing all aspects of modernism and liberalism whether they were in matters of religion, philosophy or politics. In fact, he banned railroads within his region of authority (the Papal States) because he regarded them as a dangerous invention of modernity. The French called railroads 'chemin de fer' (iron road), but the Pope called them 'chemins d'enfer' (ways of hell). On the other hand, he released from prison those who were considered 'revolutionaries', including those who were fighting for an Italian Republic.
His immediate successor, Pope Pius IX (June 16, 1846 - February 7, 1878), fought with all the might he could muster against the formation of the Italian Republic, including jailing those who advocated for an Italian Republic, but he did allow railroads to be built within the Papal States prior to their absorption into the Italian Republic.
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
I wrote this letter to my representatives in Congress. I want people to know the younger generation (my generation) cares about environmental issues and is not a bunch of slackers. Please tell me what you think:
Dear Congress,
My name is Daniel Knickelbein and I am 17 year-old high school student from Oak Park, Illinois. I guess you could call me an “environmentalist,” based on the fact that I believe that global warming is a serious threat to mankind and I believe in the conservation of natural lands and resources in their purest form. But I don’t think I can be labeled as a crazy left-winger because, well, who doesn’t like clean water, or land available for fishing or hiking, or restoring natural forests to their original beauty.
The reason I am writing this letter is because I believe that starting TODAY, the United States Congress must act to pass serious climate change legislation, and must also recognize that we must conserve the few natural lands we still have left in this country.
The science on global warming is unmistakable. When 97 percent of climatologists in this country believe that global warming is man-made and will have serious effects on our world, we must act to do something about that. It is unfathomable to me how some of you in Congress can not address this issue, while you sit and bicker about party ideals.
For those who say that addressing climate change and global warming will hurt the economy, you must think again. As many economists and scientists point out, a “green” economy is an investment in the future, sort of like beginning to tackle the large deficit that has been passed down by many presidents. Now some of you skeptics will say that I am an affluent suburban teenager who has no idea what it is like to experience financial hardship that you say will be cause by tackling global warming. Please think again. My father was a chemist employed at his dream job for 20 years, but when the recession hit, his lab was forced to fire him because of lack of funding. While I am currently by no means poor, my father’s misfortune has left our family in a somewhat difficult situation.
Now, we have any opportunity to help millions of other Americans like my father. If our country (you guys and girls in Congress) decide to invest in my future with green technologies, my father might be able to work again. And yes investing in renewable energy and green technology is MY future. Long after all 535 of you are gone, I would like to live in a safe and prosperous planet, not a planet where I have to worry about where I find my next meal, or my next glass of water. If we continue to allow global warming to go unchecked, that scenario is not exactly science fiction, it could and very well may become reality.
So today, on the 39th Earth Day, I ask every single member of Congress to consider their priorities as some of the most powerful people in the United States. Do you wish to leave your children and grandchildren in a safe and prosperous world? Should we leave them in a place that is dangerous and unhealthy? Should we allow the few remaining natural lands to be destroyed for a profit? These are questions that I hope you will consider when voting on a climate change bill. The only thing I ask of all of you is to please read my letter, and to consider what I have said.
I also want to give thanks to every single one of you for the service you do for your country. I am very lucky to be able to live in a country where I can write this letter freely, and a country where I am able to express my opinions without afterthought.
Please consider what I have said in this letter.
Sincerely,
Daniel Knickelbein
Rudy,
The science of global warming is not at an "infantile" state. The physics of gases absorbing and emitting radiation has been known for about a century. And why ignore the overwhelming majority of scientists who actually work on the problem? Also, if there was no greenhouse effect at all, Earth would be an ice cube (well, maybe more like an ice sphere...).
Rudy said...
The science is still very infantile, so premature action, in fact, is likely worse than no action at all.
Let's see. The science of climate science is somewhere about 100 years old.
So that means the science really started to "get it's act together" about the same time that Albert Einstein published his special theory of relativity in 1905. You remember that theory, don't you? The one with E = mc2 as the formula?
Are you telling us that since a 100 year old science if 'infantile', and all kinds of incorrect conclusions will come out of using 'infantile' science, the science of relativity was not advanced enough to use it to develop an atomic bomb in 1945? You do remember that by then, that science was only about 40 years old, don't you?
You mean it couldn't have been atomic bombs that exploded above Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August, 1945? You do remember that by then, that science was only about 40 years old, don't you?
Holy Cow! I didn't know our history books were that far off!! Please tell us, oh high and mighty, know-it-all, Rudy, how could that be?
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
The most inconvenient truth of all may just turn out to be that global warming and the various metric components of the phenomenum, e.g. greenhouse gas measurements, carbon counts, etc are an inescabable mathematical function of human population growth.
That's if you are willing to factor in the non-green costs of going and remaining green, and are able to be objective about little things like livestock flatulence in agricultural nations, etc.
So it would not be all that surprising if future debates on the subject tend to take on an increasingly religious tone. Where you stand on population control may eventually dictate your position concerning what if anything should be done about global warming.
There are two concerns about climate science per se. First, The data sets are inconsistent, due to the relocation of weather measuring stations. A typical station relocation is from a central town park to the local airport...where the teperatures are recorded in the middle of acres of concrete and asphalt.
Second, the historical record shows that some of the "unprecedented" climate changes, particularly in the Arctic and Antarctic, were present in the early 1840's...relatively warm temperatures, little sea ice in many places. This was documented by US and British explorations.
By the mid-1840's, "normal" temperatures and sea ice conditions contributed to the death of all members of the Franklin Expedition (British) to the Arctic. Exceptionally cold winters and mild winters have been recorded in NOrth America from at least the mid-1700's to the present. In the 1970's during a drought in California, it was pointed out that recorded climate data for California dated back only 150 years. Analysis of tree growth over several centuries (possible because of the presence of the long-lived redwood and sequoia trees in CA) showed that was the longest continuous wet period for centuries. And, oddly enough, during this hot, dry period of several years, Northern CA got snow to sea level in the winter. Records show a temperature cooling in the middle ages, a "little ice age" ending in the 17th century. Also, a warming trend was recorded in England during the late 18th & early 19th centuries, followed by cooler decades.
Could you do a multivariate analysis with religion and oil? It looks like the major producers and consumers of oil (which I'd guess had majority Islam, majority Orthodox, and majority Protestant) are less likely to believe in global warming, which could underlie the religious correlation.
Looking at countries like Venezuela would probably make it clear what's driving this.
gbthrone said...
The data sets are inconsistent, due to the relocation of weather measuring stations. A typical station relocation is from a central town park to the local airport...where the teperatures are recorded in the middle of acres of concrete and asphalt.
Data sets of atmospheric gases and imputed temperatures derived from glacial ice are not the result of relocation of weather measuring stations.
Archeological evidence of plants in geographic ares, such as pollen, seeds, etc., are not the result of relocation of weather measuring stations.
Some (and I repeat SOME) weather stations formerly were located in 'town parks'. Not all, and in fact probably most, were not.
In Baltimore, the weather station was established on the roof of the Custom House in 1899. In 1950, the weather service moved Baltimore's station of record out of the city, and established Friendship Airport - now BWI Marshall - as the spot where official "Baltimore" weather data has ever since been gathered. From then until 1998, the 'official' temperatures were recorded at BWI, but the Custom House equipment was still maintained and reports gathered. The Custom House temperatures were a consistent 3-5 degrees HIGHER than the temperatures recorded at BWI.
In 1998, the weather service established a weather station near the Maryland Science Center in downtown Baltimore. It's only a few dozen feet from the Inner Harbor. It's in a park-like setting. It's not on the roof of a massive brick building.
Yet, the temperatures recorded at the Maryland Science Center are consistently 2-4 degrees WARMER than the temperatures recorded at BWI.
The history of the 'official' weather station in Washington, DC is similar - from downtown to National Airport, where the temperatures are lower than at the former site of the downtown location, and (although only about 40 miles south of BWI), temperatures consistently 2-4 degrees warmer than the temperatures recorded at BWI.
Dulles International Airport? Located about 20 miles west of DC, and about 45-50 miles west of BWI. One of the larger airports in the country, and the weather station at Dulles records temperatures lower than BWI, which records temperatures lower than downtown Baltimore. The temperatures recorded at Dulles are lower than the temperatures recorded at National Airport, which are lower than the previous downtown DC location of the weather station.
I think you will find this consistent with almost ALL locations in the US. The relocated weather stations record slightly lower temperatures than the former, in-town, location.
And yet, almost all weather stations that have been in the same location for 30 or more years, are now recording higher average temperatures than 30 or more years ago.
Your ASSumption bears no resemblance to the facts, gbthrone.
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
Trolls trolling trolls! MiM's on the attack again, throwing boulders from his glass house on the Eastern Shore.
It has to the the eastern Shore. That's why he's so "crabby", get it?
We're discussing this global warming poll, and several other environmental issues on my marine biology/conservation blog SouthernFriedScience.com
I'd be curious to see what you guys think of this:
http://southernfriedscience.com/2009/04/21/5-things-worse-for-the-planet-than-global-warming/#comment-1635
This might be the most pathetic apology for the holocaust-denying nazi-harboring, child-diddling, molester-protecting, anti-intellectual catholic church I've ever seen in my life.
The main difference is that Catholic morality is probably more about taking care of others whereas Protestant morality is about taking care of yourself :-)
Rudy-
I didn't know CO2 was an inert gas. I thought the inert gases were those that very rarely react with anything else because they have a full outer shell of electrons. You know, gases like Helium and Neon (which form no known compounds) and Argon, Krypton, Xenon, and Radon, which only have a few hundred known compounds, mostly with Flourine or Oxygen.
And yeah, I really recommend breathing in only CO2, great stuff!
Mike in Mary-land is right on this one. Global warming is occurring,the questions are:
1) Can we stop it? (No, go see the IPCC report done by the UN)
2) Do we fully understand the consequences (absolutely not, go see the Woods Hole report in the last string)
3) Do the models showing global warming account for other effects (not fully if at all in many cases - the models sure don't take into account a reduction in solar output and we have in the top 1% of solar activity and output for the last 100 years and that is not even taking into account the sunspot minimum we are experiencing)
Relax, the world will not end and Al Gore (I love him, I voted for him, He won in 2000) is one crappy scientist.
The southernfriedscience link is interesting, but terribly simplistic. To act as if global warming is not real is insane for any scientist to even discuss, but he is right that our understanding of the consequences and the sky is falling scenarios are overblown.
The great scientists on this thread do understand that the first contaminant that killed most of the existing life on the planet earth at the time of the gas' creation was OXYGEN! That whole oxygen as a contaminant theory has worked out pretty well for mammals (e.g., humans):
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/10/061017085135.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/03/060322140017.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070829143713.htm
Bradford,
Solar variation/flux over the past 30+ years has been essentially flat and does *not* explain the warming over those years what so ever. That has been well shown in the peer-reviewed science. Check realclimate.org and search on solar influences.
dsalkovi-
I didn't say it did. Can you people read?
I said that the models assume that stasis will continue and it won't. We have no idea what causes sunspots, and little ability to predict what the sun will do thus to act as if it will remain static forever when it never has in the past in tantamount to scientific insanity.
That is what I said, got it now?
That southernfiredscience link has a few fried brains posting on it. NOT VERY GOOD!
dsalkovi-
Here you go, read up on solar output:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation
Note how we are at a solar activity high over the last 100 years:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Carbon14_with_activity_labels.svg
...but you guys are SURE that high output from the sun has nothing to do with global warming? It sure has a better correlation and alot better science behind it than Nate's post above!
As a non Catholic who went to a Catholic University (don't ask), I have to say I was quite surprised as to how much Catholics seem to hold opinions that would be considered in line with the American left, with the VERY BIG (to them) exceptions of birth control and abortion.
After 4 years of immersion in southern Catholic culture, I can say I was quite impressed with the willingness of many who held deep religious convictions to avoid the fundamentalist anti-science reflex.
I don't think the US Catholic population gets enough credit for their consistency on issues. They have and respect Catholic scholars, who believe they do God's work by doing science, exploring his Universe. And even on issues like abortion, they differ from the American right in generally being against the death penalty as well, with a general over-arching stance against killing. Even issues like war are issues of stringent debate over what is just, in the defense of life.
I'm no Catholic, but I feel confident in saying that it weren't for the Democratic Party's stance on abortion and contraceptives, many Catholics would be the rock hard foundation for the party. (And even then, some are.)
Daniel Knickelbein:
What a great letter. I'm glad that the future includes people like you.
Bradford:
Nobody's every claimed that solar activity had no effect on climate. (It's bizarre in the extreme to simply assert this without actually reading the scientific literature. How could such a basic, simple error make it through the peer-review process, over and over again?
The climate models all include solar activity, and they conclude that it cannot account for the global temperature rise.
Daniel-
Kudos on your terrific letter.
(I don't know if a typo in your post is in the letter you are sendin,but if so,change "Now,we have any opportunity" to "Now we have an opportunity".)
Go get 'em,Tiger!
That is a great letter Daniel.
Matt - I am old. It is astounding how the climate models have shifted from a solar driven planet to one that is now not driven by energy inputs from the sun, but instead by how that energy escapes, or does not, back into space.
The shift is climate science over the last decade is, well, astounding.
As for the data, I would agree that the change in solar inputs alone does not account for the warming, the warming is real, but that does not mean that the sun will not move back to more normal solar outputs and that will not reduce the rate ofd rise or stop it altogether.
Completely off topic, but here is the cool science article of the day - THIS is why it is so hard to map the genes for quantitative traits:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090420103549.htm
With so many people ignorant to the dramatic negative effect human beings are having on the planet, who cares which particular version of mankind's greatest fairy tale they subscribe to?
Matt-
Just for calrity - I am not saying the sun is the cause of global warming alone, I am saying it helped and I am also saying that the sun is much more likely to drop significantly in output than to remain the same or increase in output (simply based on the sun returning to its norm) and that probable change is MOST CERTAINLY NOT accounted for in the IPCC model or others. That says nothing of the simplistic models that do not account for the rapid changes the planet has experienced in the past (see Woods Hole paper linked yesterday), etc.
-Bradford
To say we don't know how sunspots are formed is rather quite ignorant. No, we don't know precisely how they occur. But we do know that they are part of a "spatiotemporal magnetic process" that occurs over the whole sun and are the "visible counterparts of magnetic flux tubes".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cycle#History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunspots#Physics
This whole thing about solar output is crazy. It just doesn't change that much. That last three sunspot cycles recorded an average change in output of .01%.
Since the Maunder Minimum, we've approximated the increase in solar output to be .1 to .6% (those models you like to bash use .25%).
How much lower was output during the Maunder Minimum? It's tracked by C-14, but this chart is interesting:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Carbon14_with_activity_labels.svg
How long till we hit that low? Will we hit that low? As a bad guess, it's 150 years from peak to trough.
The most the sun could contribute to global warming is 50% of the temperature increase we've witnessed according to Scafetta and West. Which means the other 50%? That's us, and that's something we can do something about.
Sange-
You are the ignorant...
We know what suspots look like, and we understand they have something to do with magentism. That is really about all we know, and we certainly cannot predict them. Go read SOHO pages.
I linked to the C-14 chart up the chain. It is irrelevant if we reach the Maunder minimum of sunspot activity, it is more than enough to have the sun simply return to normal from the last three sunspot cycles which have been HIGHER than normal. Thus you admit that your maodel uses an INCREASE in solar output when a decrease is likely and your model doesn't even contemplate what is happening now, where we seem to be reaching a deep solar minimum of sunspots and output.
Bad guess? I am not the modeler claiming I knowi it all, I have the much easier job of saying the emperor has no clothes.
I would love a debate where we actually talked about the science in a sane and rational fashion, but that seems beyond the "sky is falling" crowd and the Al Gore funded climate scientists.
Sunspot numbers and solar output have been higher than the norm lately, why not mopdel them returning to normal or what we have now which seems even lower than that. Of course we don't KNOW what is going to happen with sunspots because we DON'T UNDERSTAND THEM.
All I am asking for is some sane debate and some truth about the models. Global warming is real, but if I read the IPCC report and look at BRIC country output and look at the models, I come to the conclusion that the models are worst case and if they come true we can't stop it anyway.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sunspots_11000_years.svg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sunspot_Numbers.png
Oh, and yes, I agree that the drop in solar output will be in the 0.2-0.4% range - but that is enough to matter A WHOLE LOT! That is the problem. Even if the drop is 0.25%, that means your model is off by 0.5% in solar inputs!!!!!!
You know, there are things we can fix, and things we cannot fix.
We can fix Global Warming by reducing our carbon emissions.
We cannot fix sunspots.
Lets focus on what we can fix.
There are literally billions of potential catastrophes facing planet Earth, from nuclear weapons to stray asteroids, from volcanic eruptions to the Republican Party.
Nuclear weapons we can stop. republicans we can stop. Sunspots, stray comets, and Mount Toba-style eruptions? The first two only in Hollywood, the last one we can merely get out of the way of and hope for the best.
Global Warming, however is not some external force like sunspots over which we cannot exert control. We're the ones doing the warming, and we can stop it if we want to.
I want to. Lets just stop.
What this finding says is that Catholic theology and culture is much more nuanced than the secular left likes to believe. Catholic theology and spirituality on social and ecological teachings has great depth and commitment to it. The teachings of the medieval Catholic mystic, Hildegard of Bingen are a primary source in eco-feminism. Current Catholic writers and teachers like Miriam Theresa Winter, and Thomas Berry give a profound and sophisticated view of eco-spirituality and justice. It is knee jerk secular thinking to simply associate the Vatican with everything in Catholic spirituality and culture.
Al Dimond, 22 April 6:30 pm:
True, GW is probably not the best litmus test for scientific literacy. It has a heavy economic implication, so the financial threat tends to over-ride the technical issues.
Bradford, 22 April 6:40 pm:
There are probably more true believers on the AGW-denying side. They spout half-understood (but completely wrong) arguments that they’ve picked up in the right-wing media and websites.
Wolf of Aquarius, 22 April 7:09:
Good point about the correlation between oil production and denial of AGW. An especially interesting comparison would be between Norway and Sweden: These two countries are historically and culturally very close, but I don’t think Sweden is so tied into oil.
Rudy, 22 April 7:42 pm:
- “% of CO2 is small”: It’s true that there is a lot more water vapor than CO2; but it also true that the 15-micron infrared band is hardly affected by water vapor, but IS absorbed by CO2. That is the reason that CO2 is important. The other point is that the radiative forcing (the imbalance between incoming and outgoing radiant energy, which is 0 when the planet is in steady-state) due to CO2 is increased by 3.7 Watts/m^2 for every doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration. So what is important is not the absolute value of CO2 concentration but the fact that this concentration has already increased 35% over the past 150 years – an astonishingly quick rate of increase.
- “Can’t reproduce atmospheric effect in lab”: That’s because the greenhouse effect depends on the fact that the temperature at the top of the atmosphere is lower than the temperature at the ground level. This is governed by the adiabatic lapse rate, about 10 degrees-C per kilometer. Yes, it’s going to be hard to build a lab big enough to show that, just as it’s hard to build a lab that can reproduce the workings of the Sun. But in both cases, the basic physics is pretty well understood, because you can check and cross-check other aspects of the physics.
- “Science is immature”: The science has been studied for over 100 years, and is fully consistent with everything we know about quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, gas dynamics, radiative transfer theory, etc., etc. The arguments propounded by AGW-denying websites don’t even come close. They are even inconsistent among each other. If atmospheric science is poorly understood, you should also worry about the science behind computers. Watch out! Maybe your PC will bite you!
- “CO2 more likely beneficial”: Not according to people who have examined the implications from increased CO2 in detail, for its implications for agriculture, biodiversity, ocean acidification. More and more real examples are seen, so it is no longer a “maybe this will happen”: scientists already see impaired shell growth in shellfish, in coral; birds migrating longer and longer distances (which is a severe danger to their survival); not only polar bears, but now walruses also under threat. And these are all things that will affect humanity: We depend on the planet, and big changes to the planet are a problem for us.
newyorker2874999, 22 April 10:25 pm:
The environmental impact of humanity is likely proportional to the population. But the coefficient can be adjusted by improvement of technology, and we don’t know any lower limit it has, or how fast it can be reduced.
WhySharksMatter, 22 April 12:35 pm:
Yes, all of these issues are important. That doesn’t mean that you abandon some in favor of others. The real point is that people have to take responsibility for the foreseeable consequences of our actions – all of them.
Bradford, 22 April 5:44 am:
- “Can we stop AGW?” Yes, we can limit the extent of global warming to 3 degrees-C; see the IPCC report. It takes cutting back on CO2 emissions.
- “Do we fully understand the consequences?” Do we fully understand the consequences of ANYTHING? No. Does that stop us from acting on the basis of the understanding we DO have? Not if we’re intelligent.
- “Do the models take into account other effects?” Yep, as much as people know about. By the way, solar luminosity has not varied by 1 part in 1000 over the past 20 years; that’s not significant. Models can only take into account what is expected; by definition, unexpected behavior is out of scope. Otherwise, shouldn’t all predictions about the future include the possibility that UFOs take over Australia tomorrow?
Sean, 23 April 6:14 am:
I guess the Catholic Church has always had a respect for learning and scholarship. As an outsider, I suspect that they will eventually change their minds about contraception: I don’t think the issue is really theological or moral, but tactical: They want more Catholics to be born. But I don’t think they will ever change their view on abortion.
Bradford, 23 April 7:48 am and following:
Counting on unpredictable behavior of the Sun to bail us out seems foolish. All you can do is to bracket the impact of different plausible behaviors; and that has been done in the IPCC models and scenarios.
Bradford-
You're last two messages don't make too much terrible sense.
Read what I wrote about the model again. Solar output is hypothesized to have increased by .1-.6% since the Maunder Minimum. The minimum is hardly what you can claim as normal (although the sun is in such minimums roughly a quarter of the time over the past 2000 years). So many models assume an increase of .25% since the minimum, not since the beginning of the last three cycles. Since we are coming off a maximum, and if the total output increased by .6%, then .25% is still a useful number. You say output could fall by .2-.4%, that is, fall .2-.4% from the maximum. If we take the greatest maximum (.6%), even your greatest predicted drop would put us into an increase of solar output of .2% or so compared to the last minimum. So models that assume a .25% increase are actually quite relevant, even more so since it will take a while to come out of the maximum (which you seemed to completely ignore the relevancy of). Historically that seems to take more than a century. So we'll hit your "normal" first (which would be what, the late 1800s/early 1900s?), and then if the minimum is as bad as the Maunder, we'll come to that decades later.
Besides, the last two cycles are not historical highs, though close. The highest cycles are 19, 21, and 22. 22 being the first of the last three cycles.
I still can't see how your math adds up (where you claim the model is off by .5% in solar input [did you mean output?]). You'll have to fill me in there.
Hugo Chavez handshake bump?
I read Rudy@7:42 pm 4/22 and felt compelled to respond immediately, my apologies if someone else has already said this in the comments I haven't read yet. Rudy says: "physicists are unable to replicate the earth's atmosphere in the lab, and unable to demonstrate the theoretical heat trapping mechanism." This is blatantly false. The heat-trapping or "greenhouse" physical characteristics of CO2 gas have been demonstrated in labs repeatedly for many, many years. I recommend to anyone interested Spencer Weart's "The Discovery of Global Warming" for the history of how that science has developed over the last century+. Rudy also gives a red herring regarding water vapor. It certainly is a powerful greenhouse gas, but as it remains fairly constant (well, actually increasing due to warming--warmer air holds more water, providing a positive feedback), it is far less important to current CHANGES than CO2, which has been increasing drastically due to human activity. Climate science has no "dirty little secrets," it's all on public display in the scientific journals and the IPCC reports.
True, the heat trapping properites of carbon dioxide (and even worse methane) are well knowm.
To the above-
I did say I would IPCC numbers for this discussion and they claim a 0.12% drop for the sun, when prior estimates were about twice that thus that is where I got the number. I don't have time now, but was looking through the IPCC and they do talk about a change since 1750, but I didn't find iot elsewhere. Do you folks really argue that sun's output is completely irrelevant?
We need a new thread, even I tire of this one!!!
What percentage of these people think that homosexuality and allowing the spread of 'sin' is causing global warming, much the same way that it caused 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina?
It's a fairly ambiguous question.
Bradford - why do you insist on turning posts about politics and polling into discussions of climate science? This post is about one thing: Nate's hypothesis that Catholics are more likely to believe in man-made global warming than non-Catholics and the data on which he bases his conclusion. This was a good discussion of methodologies until you came in here spouting irrelevancies. Please, don't turn every thread here into a debate about AGW.
Somewhere, Edward Tufte is weeping at the fact that that graph was published by a reputable organization.
The simple problem with Obama's cap and trade and other schemes to reduce green house gases is that he can only make these things happen in the USA. China, India and Brazil, along with host of other nations in the developing world are not inclined to do anything about the problem. They are too busy growing their economies and trying to expand prosperity for their people to worry about the speculative ills of CO2 gasses.
Obama, on the other hand, has the arrogance and malevolence to vainly try and reduce US output of these green house gases without caring that he will lower our standard of living and further destroy the competitiveness of our industry on a global basis, leading to fewer jobs and less income for our people while we choke on the fumes wafting over the Pacific from Asia.
Madness!
PeteKent01 (follow me on twitter)
Catholics should know that Pope Benedict has spoken against the global warming hoax. “Fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering,” he said. "It is important for assessments in this regard to be carried out prudently, in dialogue with experts and people of wisdom, uninhibited by ideological pressure to draw hasty conclusions," he said. Using the global warming hoax, Obama plans to impose Cap and Trade, which “would be the equivalent of an atomic bomb directed at the U.S. economy—all without any scientific justification,” says internationally famed climatologist Dr. S. Fred Singer. Cap and Trade will increase taxes; increase the cost of energy; force many companies to close; and multiply unemployment, poverty and despair. As Catholics, we must fight the global warming/Cap-and-Trade scam that is threatening our future and the future of our children.
Antonio33 said...
Catholics should know that Pope Benedict has spoken against the global warming hoax.
He did?
When?
Maybe you see him denying AGW in this statement?:
"We need to care for the environment: it has been entrusted to men and women to be protected and cultivated with responsible freedom, with the good of all as a constant guiding criterion. Human beings, obviously, are of supreme worth vis-à-vis creation as a whole. Respecting the environment does not mean considering material or animal nature more important than man. Rather, it means not selfishly considering nature to be at the complete disposal of our own interests, for future generations also have the right to reap its benefits and to exhibit towards nature the same responsible freedom that we claim for ourselves."
Maybe you need to expand your research beyond the first one or two pages of Google? Because you can find a discussion of the so-called AGW denial by Pope Benedict at:
http://www.nhne.org/news/NewsArticlesArchive/tabid/400/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/4020/Popes-Global-Warming-Comments-Misconstrued.aspx
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
Point of clarification: I am not Catholic, therefore I am not backing up Pope Rat's comments because of religion.
Richard-
I actually agree with you, if only Nate would use his skills for good. This post spun a few data points to support a political position - which is not better when Nate or Boehner do it.
It is clearly not "politics done right" it is instead "politics done to shitty Fox News average"
Mike in Trollyland strikes again, this time to troll the pope!
It's hard to tell which has the pointier head!
Statler,
If you got some basic facts correct, your comments might be a bit more considered as having any basis of consideration.
Point: You apparently have no clue as to the geographic location of Maryland's Eastern Shore. You also show a willing total and complete lack of knowledge knowledge of the Chesapeake Bay blue crabbing industry, where the crabs are harvested, and where the crabs are consumed.
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
BTW, Statler, you still haven't responded with an analysis of what was done correctly, and what was done wrong in the Baehr v. Lewin case in Hawaii.
Scared to admit that some of strategy you promote ('Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.') does not always work? Just an admission, without great detail, would show that you have some intellectual honesty. Lack of that admission indicates that you just might be in the class of little shrub, who couldn't think of even one thing that he had done wrong during his Presidency.
Remember folks, no matter how trollish he gets, don't feed Mike in Trollyland!
D
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Statler: Mike is not a troll. I don't always agree with him or like the way he phrases things, but he is posting relevant opinions and backing them up with facts. You often make good points yourself, when you're not focused on attacking Mike. I think both of you need to cool it.
Bradford: I don't think this is the best analysis, either, but the fact remains that this is not the place to argue AGW science.
Sorry Dick, A troll with friends does not a troll cease to be. Until he apologizes, I'll be following him all over this board to post troll alerts warning people not to feed him.
I am not sure what is so controversial about this finding. Catholics believe that human beings are stewards of the planet... it is their duty and responsibility to care for the Earth. This has been the Church's official position since the debate on global warming has begun (so far as I can recall).
I also believe people are getting their facts distorted as to where the debate on Global Warming should be taking place. People who argue that recent temperature deviations are not occurring and/or are not significant are quite mistaken. The debate is to what extent are human actions affecting the climate. Science has not come to a conclusive finding as to what amount of the variance in global warming can be ascribed to man made causes.
Full disclosure: I am a Catholic and I believe man made actions are, at least in part, causing temperature deviations from past norms.
Whoever wrote the troll remover script for GreaseMonkey (I'm sorry, I cannot remember who), thanks again for making this a better place to visit. SNW is my latest addition.
Worst. Graph. Ever.
Where'd you get it? Fox News?
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