Global warming
Science, lies, and stolen emails
As this is a blog about medicine, I haven’t written much about global warming. Moreover, until a few months ago, I was a bit of a skeptic about the science behind global warming. My skepticism was centered on a few key points that I didn’t feel had been adequately addressed:
Of course, my feelings on global warming would demolish my bona fides to be skeptical about alternative medicine and other pseudoscience. However, I thought the true global warming deniers (and even more so, those who deny the human cause of global warming) were true pseudoscientists, so I decided to study it myself, learning as much as I could about the subject. As I did, my skepticism faded. I found out that the Medieval Warm Period wasn’t as warm as I presumed, and that there is little global evidence that it was actually warmer then compared to today. In fact, regional differences in temperature can be large. I guess it goes back to correlation vs. causation. I was being pseudoscientific in my early thinking about global warming.
Actually, my discomfort with the much of what I was hearing from global warming deniers was similar to what I read from the anti-vaccination crowd. Each of the climate change denier’s pseudoscience is easily debunked. Read More...
- First, I was unconvinced that current temperatures exceeded that of the Medieval Warm Period, a period of warm climate in the North Atlantic from about 800 to 1300. During this time, the weather was warm enough for the Vikings to colonize Greenland and to support a settlement in Newfoundland.
- Second, California glaciers (yes California has numerous glaciers), like Palisade Glaciers in the Sierra Nevada mountain ranges were only about 700 years old, so obviously (to me), it’s colder today than it was before these glaciers formed.
- Third, the earth is just so complicated, it might take hundreds if not thousands of years of data to see any real trends.
Of course, my feelings on global warming would demolish my bona fides to be skeptical about alternative medicine and other pseudoscience. However, I thought the true global warming deniers (and even more so, those who deny the human cause of global warming) were true pseudoscientists, so I decided to study it myself, learning as much as I could about the subject. As I did, my skepticism faded. I found out that the Medieval Warm Period wasn’t as warm as I presumed, and that there is little global evidence that it was actually warmer then compared to today. In fact, regional differences in temperature can be large. I guess it goes back to correlation vs. causation. I was being pseudoscientific in my early thinking about global warming.
Actually, my discomfort with the much of what I was hearing from global warming deniers was similar to what I read from the anti-vaccination crowd. Each of the climate change denier’s pseudoscience is easily debunked. Read More...