Re: [asa] John Houghton on AR4

Another great ad hominem. When faced with a careful analysis, all
Janice can do is impugn the witness.
But in this case Houghton's argument, although perhaps misunderstood
by Janice is real. Global warming has the potential to be quite
damaging.

Btw it seems that Janice is still repeating uncritically the following
even though her errors have been more than once corrected

<quote>

> Satellite and weather balloon measurements of atmospheric temperatures
> since the 1970s actually indicate slight cooling to no change. To the extent
> any significant warming may have occurred during the 20th century, most
> occurred before 1940, while most greenhouse gas emissions ( search) occurred
> after 1940 -- so there's no apparent cause-and-effect relationship.
</quote>

Sigh... Augustine should be rolling over in his grave.
On 3/4/07, Janice Matchett <janmatch@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> At 06:11 PM 3/4/2007, Rich Blinne wrote:
>
>
> Sir John Houghton is largely responsible for awakening evangelicals to the
> need for action on climate change.
> @ It's amazing he still has any credibility after he said that " human
> induced global warming is a weapon of mass destruction at least as dangerous
> as chemical, nuclear or biological weapons that kills more people than
> terrorism." ~ John Houghton Monday July 28, 2003
>
> Comment:
>
> "Get the butterfly net before you read this column. You won't want to waste
> any time afterward.
>
> "I have no hesitation in describing global warming as a weapon of mass
> destruction," said a British climate scientist this week.
>
> John Houghton, a former member of the United Nations' Intergovernmental
> Panel on Climate Change, wrote in a July 28 commentary in the British
> newspaper The Guardian that human-induced climate change is at least as
> dangerous as "chemical, nuclear or biological weapons, or indeed
> international terrorism."
> http://politics.guardian.co.uk/green/comment/0,9236,1007302,00.html
>
> Likening global warming to terrorism, Houghton wrote "this weapon knows no
> boundaries. It can strike anywhere in any form -- a heat wave in one place,
> a drought or a storm surge in another.
>
> "Nor is this a problem for the future. The 1990s were probably the warmest
> decade in the last 1,000 years … The U.S. mainland was struck by 562
> tornadoes in May," Houghton continued (no doubt hyperventilating).
>
> "Pre-monsoon temperatures this year in India reached a blistering 120
> degrees, 9 degrees above normal. Once this killer heat wave began to abate,
> 1,500 people lay dead -- half the number killed outright in the September 11
> attacks on the World Trade Center," he added.
>
> Houghton appeared to come up for a breath of sanity with the phrase, "While
> no one can ascribe a single weather event to climate change with any degree
> of certainty," he quickly submerged back into the depths of bizarre
> hyperbole, "the parallels between global climate change and global terrorism
> are becoming increasingly obvious."
>
> Well, the only obvious parallel is that global terrorists and the
> global-warming pushers both seek to accomplish their agendas by scaring the
> public.
>
> Houghton's assertion that the 1990s was the warmest decade in the last
> 1,000 years ( search) draws out the question, "Why was it so warm 1,000
> years ago?"
>
> Since there were no power plants, factories or automobiles back then, that
> warm period was obviously natural climate change ( search). So why should we
> leap to the conclusion that any 1990s warming is definitely manmade?
>
> Of course, it's not even clear that any measurable "global warming" has
> really occurred, much less that it's human-induced.
>
> Satellite and weather balloon measurements of atmospheric temperatures
> since the 1970s actually indicate slight cooling to no change. To the extent
> any significant warming may have occurred during the 20th century, most
> occurred before 1940, while most greenhouse gas emissions ( search) occurred
> after 1940 -- so there's no apparent cause-and-effect relationship.
>
> While it's possible that some human-induced warming may be occurring,
> Virginia state climatologist Pat Michaels ( search) once pointed out in a
> television debate with [C------] administration eco-czarina Carol Browner (
> search): "The fact of the matter is if you look at those temperature records
> that you keep on citing, you will see that almost all of the warming takes
> place in the absolute coldest, most miserable air masses in Siberia and
> northwestern North America … Great. We've warmed Siberia from minus 40 to
> minus 38. Big deal."
>
> If the 1990s were unusually warm, we don't know why. Neither do the
> global-warming pushers.
>
> There is no doubt that May was a big month for tornadoes -- 562 versus the
> prior monthly record of 399 reported for June 1992.
>
> But just because May 2003 was a record month for tornadoes does not mean
> that global warming was the cause.
>
> Houghton offered no explanation why it took more than a decade to break the
> previous record or why that record was broken by a whopping 41 percent.
> Surely the incremental nature of gradual climate change is not the
> explanation.
>
> Moreover, the number of tornadoes has been rising for the past 50 years --
> because of technology, not climate change. "As storm spotter and
> Doppler-radar ( search) networks improve and public awareness increases, the
> number of tornadoes is also rising," says the National Center for
> Atmospheric Research ( search), a research program managed by more than 60
> universities.
>
> "From 1953 to 1991, an average of 768 tornadoes were reported per year, but
> since 1990, records list over 1,000 tornadoes each year … Spring is tornado
> season, with about 50 percent for all reported tornadoes ( search) occurring
> from April through June," adds NCAR.
>
> Five hundred-plus tornadoes may be a record for a single month, but it's
> not so unusual after all.
>
> As to India's killer heat wave, it sounds like the Indians need more
> economic development so that they can afford better living conditions and
> better medical care.
>
> In contrast to India, temperatures hit 127 degrees in Palm Springs, Calif.,
> this year with no reported heat-related deaths. You figure out what the
> difference is.
>
> If there is a "weapon of mass destruction" associated with global warming,
> it's the global warmers themselves. Their preferred policy of energy
> regulation and restriction would reduce economic progress and development,
> especially in the third world.
>
> Since "wealth is health," it's easy to see who and what the real threat is.
>
> Global Warming Not a WMD
> http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,93466,00.html
> Friday , August 01, 2003 By Steven Milloy
>
> Steven Milloy is the publisher of JunkScience.com, an adjunct scholar at
> the Cato Institute and the author of Junk Science Judo: Self-defense Against
> Health Scares and Scams (Cato Institute, 2001).
>
>
>
>
>

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Received on Sun Mar 4 23:09:14 2007