Variability of the Earth’s climate - Ice Ages and Interglacials: Measurements, Interpretation, and Models - page 28

with energy to run the industrialized world if CO 2 emissions must be cut as
dramatically as alarmists claim.
(2) A significant number of climatologists have adopted an ''alarmist'' view in which
they believe that continuation of business-as-usual energy policies in the 21st
century will be disastrous to humankind. Many of them have voiced this view-
point via the Internet, meetings, and media. Furthermore, this bias has crept into
scientific publications published in peer review journals. A smaller number of
climatologists have been skeptical of the certainty expressed by alarmists. Liberal
politicians have been swayed by alarmists into enacting severe constraints on
future CO 2 emissions. These constraints require that by such-and-such a future
year, we must emit considerably less CO 2 . It is not clear that these constraints can
be met technically or financially. Indeed, the benchmark used by several govern-
ments is an 80% reduction in CO 2 emissions by 2050—a goal that almost
certainly cannot and will not be met. Conservative politicians tend to lean toward
the skeptical view. 1
(3) Quite a few prominent climatologists in their zeal to save the world from
overheating (and possibly to secure more funding for climate research) have
engaged in unprofessional activities in an attempt to exclude skeptics from
science publications. They have also manipulated data to exaggerate the threat
of rising CO 2 and they have presented their results in a biased and one-sided
manner. Some have prevented others from checking their results by holding their
data in secret. In many cases, they have drawn conclusions from sparse and noisy
data, yet made bold claims of certainty in their conclusions. The exposure of
these shenanigans has hurt their credibility in some quarters; nevertheless, science
questions remain regarding the impact of rising CO 2 .
(4) Under the auspices of the United Nations, the Inter-government Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC) has been co-opted by alarmists regarding the effect of CO 2 on
climate, and they have widely promulgated the belief that ''the debate is over''
regarding the impact of rising CO 2 , yet considerable uncertainty remains in all
the issues.
Characterizing the Earth's climate is not a simple matter. The common
approach taken by contemporary climatologists is to characterize the complex
climate of the Earth using a single global average temperature (T G ) of the Earth's
surface. During the past 120 years, direct temperature measurements have been
made over a network of stations on land, and at sea via buckets or intakes on
ships. Climatologists have attempted to average these to estimate T G . However,
there are limitations to such procedures that are discussed in detail in Rapp
(2008). Nevertheless, we can state with some confidence that the Earth has
warmed on average, roughly 0.7 C over the past 120 years, albeit not continuously
1 Governments have not been clear whether this means an 80% reduction from present
emission levels or an 80% reduction from that expected on the basis of a business-as-usual
scenario. If, as seems likely, it is an 80% reduction from present levels, that is equivalent to
approximately an 88% reduction from a business-as-usual scenario.