File spoon-archives/marxism-international.archive/marxism-international_1997/marxism-international.9711, message 263


Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 00:41:02 -0800
From: Mark Jones <Jones_M-AT-netcomuk.co.uk>
Subject: Re: M-I: Global warming


James Heartfield says:

> it is impossible to estimate
> the impact of CO2 emmissions on temperature levels if you do not know
> the trend in global temperature.
>
This is wrong. The prediction that greenhouse gases will warm the atmosphere by
retaining solar energy did not derive from study of global temperature trends
but from knowledge of the formulae which govern black body radiation. When the
first predictions of global warming were made they, as a matter of fact, did not
coincide with observed trends. Like many social scientists who have read Kuhn
and half-understood Imre Lakatos, Heartfield does not understand much about the
way real science works. If he did he would know that these observed
discrepancies had no bearing at all on the theory underpinning the predictions,
namely quantum mechanics. To falsify that theory would entail something
different.

Massive amounts of money and a huge international research effort has gone into
researching global warming. It is silly to decry this effort, whose results have
been set out in various reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, the way that Heartfield does when he says:

> the
> findings of the IPCC have been heavily politicised, to the point where
> they are little more than a function of competing trade and governmental
> strategies.

That is, as a matter of demonstrablke fact, not the case. The findings of the IPCC
are subject to the peer review process which he elsewhere says is indispensable.

The form research into global warming has taken has been
to determine how the complexities in the global system impact open global
warming as a result of greenhouse gas emission. The fact that greenhouse gases
induce global warming is NOT in question, any more than the fact that the world
is spherical and not flat. No scientist has any doubts about quantum theory. If
Heartfield does then he is alone.

In various posting both I and Lou Proyect have summarised some of the more
salient research and the findings of eminent, reputable scientisist whose work
and reputation is not in doubt. The findings are conclusive and inarguable by
any sane person. They show that global warming is not merely a prediction of
quantum theory, but also an observable fact. Anyone doubting this needs a priest
or a psychiatrist, not a marxist discussion list.

In my own postings, which Heartfield ignores, I went to some lengths to detail
research into the tendencies and the counter-tendencies at play in global
atmospheric systems. Much of this research is readily available on the Net and
if Heartfield doubts my own summary of it he has an obvious remedy, and I should
be delighted to see him prove me or Proyect wrong, but he cannot and therefore
will not.

On all counts, in all of his assertions -- that there is no discernible global
warming, that there is no evidence linking severe weather events like ENSO
events with global warming, that deforestation has no bearing on the case, and
so on, Heartfield is not only wrong, he is demonstrably and ludicrously so. When
challenged his general tactics are to smear, to avoid the question, to squirm
and wriggle, to confuse the issue, to erect straw men and make ad hominem
attacks. It is not possible to seriously debate Heartfield who is obviously
operating to his own agenda and is not interested in the rules of debate or in
rational discourse.

Heartfield says, inter alia, that there is no evdience of deforestation in the
US. There is a sense in which he is right. In states like Virginia, land that 
was denuded of tree cover a century ago is now thickly planted with trees.

The reason is the extremely  simple one, which David Pimentel gives in his 1995
Kermit Olson lecture, which I posted, that Americnas do not use wood for fuel
any more. They use oil. The amount of energy released by the burning of fossil
hydrocarbons in the US exceeds the amount of energy trapped by photosynthesis by
all the vegetation growing in the US. This situation is radically unsustainable
for several reasons: firstly because of the well-known global-warming effects.
Secondly because of impending oil shortages. Thirdly because of many other
well-documented enviornmental impacts, some of which I hale also posted, al of
which Heartfield ignores.

Heartfield insistently asked his list of questions, and we answered them. Why
does he not answer questions put to him?

Does Heartfield agree that global warming is predicted by theory?
Does he believe that global warming, ie anthropogenic climate forcing, is
happening?
Does he agree with any present variant of the Climate Convention Treaty,
meaning, does he agree with any limitations on greenhouse gas emissions?
Can he produce any plausible scenario which can allow the 75 percent of
humankind which currently does not use fossil fuel energy and who live in the
so-called Third World, to enjoy a European or American standard of life, and if
so, using what mix of technologies?



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