Broadside Opinion

Alan Moore, Broadside Contributor

I have been a graduate student at George Mason University for only a few short weeks but I have already heard more about the “indisputable fact” that global warming is caused by man more times than I ever heard as an undergraduate, and I’m not even studying the natural sciences.

It does not take someone majoring in the natural sciences to understand faulty research and it is irresponsible to ignore the growing objection to the reasoning behind theories on man-caused climate change.

This global warming hysteria has infiltrated our campus and it is time to expose it for what it truly is: laughable, at best.

The first issue that is always lobbied hard for by global warming proponents is the notion of the sea levels rising to unsustainable levels because the polar ice caps will melt.

First, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes states that the rising sea levels may in fact be cyclical and there is no evidence that man contributes to these rising sea levels.

Second, the melting of glaciers is countered by the formation of glaciers in other parts of the world, although you never read about it in the news.

Third, if all the ice melted in, say, Greenland, it would not cause radical shifts in the sea levels.

After all, Greenland was once fertile for farming. If the melting of ice could cause the land in the world to be covered by water, then where did it come from in the first place?

Water is not created or destroyed; it evaporates and returns to the atmosphere, and water never has filled the entire earth like some Kevin Costner eco-radical paradise.

Don’t take my word for it. Try an experiment to see what would happen if the ice caps melt. Take a glass, fill it with ice then fill it with water to the very top.

Let it sit out and as it warms, see if any water is spilled. What you’ll find is that due to displacement, the water level will remain the same; do not be deterred by the utter simplicity of the experiment, any scientist will tell you that displacement is true for any level of water.

The next falsehood that global warming proponents champion regards increased carbon dioxide levels. First, CO2 is not a pollutant and is not harmful.

We breathe out CO2 everyday and plants absorb it to create oxygen. In fact, the more CO2 in the atmosphere, the more plants and trees thrive and the more life- sustaining oxygen there is in the world.
What is wrong with that?

Pardon the pun, but this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the so-called science behind man-caused global warming.

Take a moment to visit www.petitionproject.org to see a petition signed by over 31,000 scientists, 9,000 of whom hold Ph.D.s, which states, “There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.

Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.”

The notion that man caused global warming is indisputable? Malarkey.

So why do some people in the academic community wag their finger about this global warming hysteria to their students and the rest of the world?

Well, there has always been this alarmist subculture in our society that is convinced that the world needs saving, and that they are the only people who can save it.

Twenty years ago we were all going to be devastated by acid rain; before that it was global cooling (ironic, eh?). There is always some devastating event or plague that will end us all unless drastic action is taken immediately.

I’ve been told of my impending doom more times than I can remember about things like swine flu, avian flu, Ebola virus, the end of the Mayan calendar, floods, droughts, the decline of honeybees, bubonic plague, and SARS, and I’ve miraculously survived to this point.

The reality is that if anyone tells you that global warming is caused by man and is indisputable when there is so much contradictory evidence out there, be respectful and do your own research.

Make up your own mind, but don’t accept everything you hear just because your professor might control your grade. I encourage you to start your research by looking into what the founder of the Weather Channel, John Coleman, has to say on the subject; it will be enlightening and entertaining, to say the least.