The Great Grist Battle of 2013

This has been a great week for anthropogenic global warming skeptics, like yours truly. The long period without global warming, 17 years and counting, is taking a toll on alarmists, and they are starting to ratchet down predictions of catastrophic warming to much lower, although still ridiculous, levels. Some were summarily cut in half, from 9° Fahrenheit by 2100 to 4.5°F. The decelerating rate of sea level rise, measured decreasing from 3 millimeters per year (12 inches per century) to half that, also makes it hard to support the “expert” projections for over five feet by 2100. To reach five feet by 2100, the rate of rise would have to suddenly increase by 11.3 times its present value and be sustained at that level for 88 years. Such an increase has not been seen even during the 30°F warming at the end of the Younger Dryas 12,000 to 8,000 years ago, when sea level rose an average of 4.5 feet per century and there were huge ice caps at low altitudes all over the Northern Hemisphere to melt. 

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I have especially enjoyed a two-week exchange of comments to an article in Grist Magazine: "How to respond to people who say the cold weather disproves global warming." As soon as I read the article I got excited, because while the author wrote with a  superior, condescending tone, his science didn't even meet middle-school standards. However, that didn't stop him from having many defenders amongst the Grist readership, who tend to be both leftist and climate alarmist. Grist comments luminaries such as "frflyer", J4zonian", and "TomSparc" leaped upon each of my comments with cut-and-paste commentary from alarmist websites such as "SkepticalScience" and "RealClimate", while exhibiting ignorance of climate history and basic physics while demonstrating poor reading comprehension. In my own comments I refuted theirs while always trying to support my points with charts and graphs. I had a huge advantage in that regard, since my research has led me to the many available to serious natural climate change students, and so few for alarmists. Understandable, because it's hard to chart baloney.

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This odd comment, which struck me as their defiant surrender to my tireless scientific rebuttals and an appeal to alarmist religious Gaia fervor, was posted by "J4zonian" and seemed to end my Grist battle: “Fellow Grist readers: We have responded. We've disproven every post this person has made, pointed out lies or errors and (he) has proved (himself) impervious to facts, reason, knowledge and science. (He) continues to post deceptive cherry-picked denialist nonsense devoid of context and when refuted simply moves on to other lies. (He) is comitting (sic) what will certainly come to be known as a crime against humanity and even more serious, Gaia. (He) and (his) sock puppets or fellow dupes and shills have zero credibility here. I'm not really concerned about others here believing the nonsense; more about (his) well-being.

Climate Catastrophe is real, happening, and human-caused. Unless we take massive, rapid action in the next 10-20 years at the very most it will destroy civilization, very likely cause the extinction of humans along with millions of other species and could possibly end all life on Earth by killing Gaia, the cooperative system of all life on Earth that regulates the conditions it needs to survive.

We must switch now to efficiency, solar, wind, low-meat local organic permaculture and reforest the world while equalizing our incomes and impacts, globally at a comfortablem (sic) sufficient level for all. This would still lead to a drastically reduced impact for humanity as a whole and would allow us to survive long enough to reduce population (the work of centuries) and heal psychologically.”

My reaction to this ringing manifesto began: "Gristers of the World, Unite!" Throughout my comments I reviewed the natural climate change history during many distant and recent periods, showing cycles of regular cooling and warming that have marched evenly through the past 900,000 years, and six cycles of cooling and diminishing warming during the past 10,000 years. I used charts of temperatures, sea level rise, hurricane and tornado frequency and strength, wildfire trends showing we are experiencing the lowest for 3,000 years, glacier retreat, agricultural productivity for warmer weather and higher CO2, and a lot more. Many of their response began by noting that I was dumb, idiotic, a fool, bent upon the destruction of humanity, and on the payroll of oil companies. If I was being paid by Big Oil, I wonder why they would want me to exterminate their customers, and I also wonder where are they sending my checks?

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To my embattled Grist opponents, please heed the words of Mark Twain: “Never argue with a fool, onlookers may not be able to tell the difference.”