The Antarctic Ice Sheet is getting Thicker.....

There are global warming disbelievers here on newsvine, some of them quite well informed, and they tend to be sincere. It's made me realise that when you have a question which is at all complex, and a misinformation campaign advocates one position, then however unsupportable that position is, you can by picking out the things you want to believe and not looking objectively, come to believe Alice's 6 impossible things before breakfast. The more scientifically minded of the anti-evolutionists do the same thing.

That wasn't well put, but what I mean is that good hearted people can have a little blindness and end up supporting some really untenable positions. I saw the same thing with my communist friends in the 80s.

I am one of those disbelievers Djehuty. I dont believe we understand nearly enough about this to make a decision. One thing I am sure of I am not worried about CO2 as plants and animals will soak this up. I am extremely concerned about the frozen methane sinks at the bottom of our oceans. These could have a catastrophic effect on climate. The thickening of Antarctic Ice is well documented and really takes over 200 years to become a noticeable effect.

It's not sensible to debate this in detail in the comments of someone else's column, but what I might do is write something which lays out the case as clearly as possible and then we can take it from there. I'm very unproductive at the moment, though, because it's school holidays so the kids are home all day.

People are welcome to their opinion. My problem is not with what the people believe, it's with how they come to believe what they do. These media sources are swaying public opinion by knowingly and willingly spreading lies about the existence and nature of global warming.

How many thousands of uninformed citizens have been swayed into believing Global warming isn't happening because of Rush Limbaugh and the CEI group? Those same citizens are partially responsible for setting domestic policy from the voting booth.

KyleN - good post. I specifically liked your comment that said:

The most conclusive studies have pointed to a raise in global temperatures, what they haven't been able to determine is what portion of that raise is due to humans and what part would have happened anyway.

THis is the crux of the debate and yet "global warming" is used as the cause of people's actions. People need to understand that the earth is never constant, it is always in a cycle one way or the other. Constant state of change. One example, the moon is moving further away from the earth and this has an effect on the tides and weather over long periods of time. There are multiple other examples of natural events that impact this cycle other than humans and I think everyone should keep this in mind as they debate this issue.

For example, what if we learned (or theorized) that WE were the cause of the moon orbiting further from the earth? I think we would see a frenzy of these debates all over again with people quoting scientist that tell of all the terrible things that is going to happen to our earth because the moon is flying into space. However, we know we are not the cause - so we hear nothing about it and believe everything that WE don't impact is constant and perfect. It's not, the earth is in a constant change and bad things will eventually happen because it's just the way of nature & life. What does all this have to do with anything? My point is that the earth has a multitude of changes going on that we have nothing to do with - an increase in warming is probably one of them, but if it's not it can probably handle it okay considering some of the other things the earth has had to deal with.

The other bit of information that people need to understand is that we have only been keeping records of weather temperatures for what amounts to a blip on the time line of the earth. Therefore, we have NO data to say whether we should be warming faster or slower...no records of the previous warming cycles that lead to the ice ages (notice that this is plural).

So, in the end - our earth is warming. We call that global warming. The question is whether we, people, are altering what would have been a "normal" cycle. There are some who believe the earth has been through a lot over it's 5 billion year life and the damage we have done in the last 200 years (industrial age) amounts to a blip or speck to the earth. They believe we are a little too into ourselves to think we can change the cycle of the earth. Then there are others who believe that our pollution and cars is an unnatural and unaccounted for change in the cycle and we would be foolish to think we don't have an impact. Homo Sapiens more than any other animal has dug, burnt, chopped, and squeezed the earth's resources.

Personally, I do not know the answer and I can't believe anyone who claims to know the correct answer. I do know that we (people) have done damage to the earth - acid rain, rain forest depletion, pollution, etc. and we (people) should do everything we can to reverse this damage and prevent more damage in the future. If this slows down our warming cycle, then great - if not, then that's okay too, we can't think things are always going to be 72 degrees here on earth. Our children and their children will need science and technology to learn how to cope with these changes the earth will throw at us.

I stopped counting at 1.

I don't think there's much question in the scientific community of the truth of global warming. In the industry funded think tank world, otoh, it's another matter.

I agree that opinion in the scientific community converges on the acuality of global warming, but the think-tank world is the one that influences policy, unfortunately.

So from the point of view of policy, the value of controlling global warming should not be in doubt. But the people who oppose it are the same ones who see nothing wrong in exploding their national debt, and worsening its fiscal position.

They believe in a God who somehow replenishes mismanaged resources (like the environment).

Sadly, you're pretty much right here, Oluseye.