Climate Change Deniers
Climate Change Deniers, also known as Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) Deniers, refers to individuals or groups who disagree with the global scientific consensus that emissions of man-made CO2 significantly enhance the natural atmospheric greenhouse effect. Often, their advocacy is funded by industry groups and corporations — sometimes disclosed, but more often not.
The use of the term "global warming skeptic" is falling into disuse.[1] According to Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists, "We don't call them skeptics, because they are not putting forward alternatives ideas and having them tested in peer review journals. They basically deny this problem."[2]
Contents
Evolution of Meaning
Originally denoted "climate change skeptics" or "anthropogenic (human-induced) global warming skeptics", the term referred to those who are as yet unconvinced by evidence that emissions of man-made CO2 significantly enhance the natural atmospheric greenhouse effect. But the accumulation of evidence led to a near-total scientific consensus,[3][4] making the word "skeptic" a misnomer and "a black eye on true skeptics".[5]
Since then the more accurate term denier has become universally used.
Climate Change Denial Arguments
Hundreds of arguments were made by deniers attempting to refute the scientific consensus on global warming.[6] All of these arguments have been refuted by climate scientists, as can be seen at sites such as SkepticalScience.com.
To summarise the situation, Clive Hamilton, in his book Scorcher, says that one can find the following arguments in the various papers promoted by climate change deniers:
- There is no evidence of global warming.
- If there is evidence of global warming, then it is not due to human activity.
- If global warming is occurring and it is due to human activity, then it is not going to be damaging.
- If global warming is occurring and it is due to human activity, and it is going to be damaging, then the costs of avoiding it are too high, so we should do nothing.
Prominent Climate Change Deniers
Individuals
A list of prominent climate change deniers includes:
- Alan Carlin
- Alan Moran
- Alan Oxley
- Alexander Cockburn
- Andrei Illarionov, chief economic adviser to Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin
- Andrew Montford
- Anthony Watts
- Arthur B. Robinson
- Aynsley Kellow
- Bill Gray
- Bjorn Lomborg
- Robert (Bob) Carter
- Bob Stallman
- Bruno Wiskel
- Cardinal Pell
- Carlo Stagnaro
- Chris Horner, the author of "Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming
- Christopher Monckton
- David Bellamy
- David Evans
- David Legates
- Dennis Avery
- Don Aitkin
- Donna Laframboise
- Douglas Carswell M.P.
- Fred Singer
- Frederick Seitz (deceased 2008)
- Freeman Dyson
- Garth Paltridge
- George Fox
- George Taylor,
- Glenn Beck, CNN TV Fox and Koch strategy group attendee
- Hans H. J. Labohm
- Ian Castles
- Ian Clark
- Ian Plimer
- Ivar Giaever
- James M. Inhofe
- Jan Veizer
- Jennifer Marohasy
- John H. Sununu
- John R. Christy
- Joseph D'Aleo
- Kiminori Itoh
- Len Walker
- Lord Lawson
- Luboš Motl
- Marlo Lewis, from the Competitive Enterprise Institute;
- Martin Cohen, and philosophical objections to the global warming theorists
- Martin Durkin
- Myron Ebell Director, Competitive Enterprise Institute's Center for Energy and Environment
- Patrick J. Michaels
- Patrick Moore
- Paul Driessen
- Peter R. Forster, Rt. Reverent, Bishop of Chester
- Philip Stott
- Ray Evans
- Reid Bryson
- Richard S. Lindzen
- Robert C. Balling of Arizona State University
- Robert Giegengack
- Roger Pielke Jr.
- Ross McKitrick
- Roy Spencer
- Sallie L. Baliunas
- Sammy Wilson
- Sherwood Idso
- Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen
- Stephen McIntyre
- Steve Goddard
- Stewart Franks
- Tim Ball
- Tim Patterson
- Tony Abbott
- Vaclav Klaus, Czech president
- Vincent Courtillot
- William Happer
- William Kininmonth
- Willie Soon
- Wolfgang Thüne
- Zbigniew Jaworowski
The Australian magazine, Business Insider, listed "The 10 Most Respected Global Warming Skeptics" in 2011.[7] They comprised Ian Plimer, Bjorn Lomborg, Myron Ebell, Kiminori Itoh, William Happer (born 1939), Patrick Michaels, Michael Crichton (deceased), Alan Carlin (born 1937) and Ivar Giaever (born 1929).
Groups
Climate change denying organizations include:
- Australian APEC Study Centre
- Competitive Enterprise Institute (US) [1]
- Doctors for Disaster Preparedness
- Exxon-Funded Skeptics
- Friends of Science (Canada)
- George C. Marshall Institute (US)
- Global Warming Policy Foundation (UK)
- Heartland Institute (US)
- Institute of Economic Affairs (UK)
- Institute of Public Affairs (Australia)
- International Climate Science Coalition (NZ)
- International Policy Network (UK)
- Lavoisier Group (Australia)
- NZ Center for Policy Research (NZ) [2]
- Natural Resources Stewardship Project (NSRP) (Canada)
- New Zealand Climate Change Coalition (NZ) [3]
- New Zealand Climate Science Coalition
- Scientific Alliance (UK)
- The United Kingdom House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs
Articles and Resources
Related SourceWatch articles
- Climate Change
- Heartland Institute/International Conference on Climate Change (2009)
- Researching global warming skeptics
- SourceWatch:Project:Creating Articles on Sponsors and Speakers at The 2008 International Conference on Climate Change
- Climategate
External Articles
External Links
- Wikipedia, "Global Warming Skepticism"
- Usenet, alt.global-warming discussion
- Greenpeace, "How ExxonMobil Funds the Climate Change Skeptics"
- Union of Concerned Scientists "Smoke, Mirrors & Hot Air: How ExxonMobil Uses Big Tobacco’s Tactics to Manufacture Uncertainty on Climate Science"
- Environmental Defense Fund, "Global Warming Skeptics: A Primer: For All But a Few Climate Scientists, the Debate Is Over. Guess Who's Paying the Doubters?", June 2, 2004.
- Conal Walsh, "'Denial lobby' turns up the heat: The vocal minority sceptical of the threat of global warming are now targeting the UK," Observer, March 6, 2005.
- Chris Mooney, "Some Like It Hot," Mother Jones, May/June 2005: "Forty public policy groups have this in common: They seek to undermine the scientific consensus that humans are causing the earth to overheat. And they all get money from ExxonMobil.
- David Adam, "Climate change sceptics bet $10,000 on cooler world: Russian pair challenge UK expert over global warming", Guardian (UK), August 19, 2005.
- Andrew C. Revkin, "Panelist Who Dissents on Climate Change Quits," New York Times, August 23, 2005.
- Antonio Regalado, "Global-Warming Skeptics Under Fire: Two New Papers Question Results Used to Challenge Influential Climate Study", Wall Street Journal, October 26, 2005; Page B3. (Sub req'd).
- Barrie Pittock, "In global warming war, may market forces be with you", The Age, January 14, 2006.
- Stefan Rahmstorf, "The Climate Skeptics, Weather catastrophes and climate change The state of science, Munich Re, undated. (Stefan is a member of the IPCC, he disputes the arguements of climate skeptics in this article.)
- Joel Achenbach, "The Tempest: As evidence mounts that humans are causing dangerous changes in Earth's climate, a handful of skeptics are providing some serious blowback", The Washington Post Magazine, May 28, 2006.
- John Stossel, Opinion: "Kyoto's advocates are full of hot air," Manchester Union-Leader, July 9, 2006.
- Polly Toynbee, "The climate-change deniers have now gone nuclear: When the rightwing tradition of bad science comes onside, it's time to look seriously at other energy technologies", The Guardian, July 18, 2006.
- Paul D. Thacker, "Climate skeptics in Europe? Mostly missing in action", Society of Environment Journalists, Summer 2006.
- George Monbiot, "Pundits who contest climate change should tell us who is paying them: Covert lobbying, in the UK as well as the US, has severely set back efforts to combat the world's biggest problem", Guardian (UK), September 26, 2006.
- Where I Stand, Public figures who believe humans should not act to stop global warming - whereIstand.com
- Coby Beck's Blog, How to Talk to a Global Warming Sceptic (endorsed by RealClimate.org)
- Steven Milloy, "Must-See Global Warming TV," FOX News, March 19, 2007.
- Media Matters for America, "Beck's global warming special dominated by industry-funded 'experts,' serial misinformers," May 3, 2007.
- George Monbiot, "Too much at stake to let climate-change sceptics bluff the world", Sydney Morning Herald, May 24, 2007.
- Sharon Begley, "The Truth About Denial," Newsweek, August 13, 2007.
- David McKnight, "The climate change smokescreen", Sydney Morning Herald, August 2, 2008.
- John P. Holdren, "Convincing Climate Change Skeptics", Op-ed, Boston Globe, August 4, 2008.
- John P. Holdren, "'Climate-Change Skeptics Revisited", Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, August 5, 2008.
- Harrison Schmitt and William Happer, "In Defense of Carbon Dioxide", Op-ed, Wall Street Journal, May 8, 2013.
References
- ↑ James Hrynyshyn (2011-11-04). FTL neutrinos and climate change deniers (or why I call the latter PSEUDOskeptics) : Class M. ?. Retrieved on 2011-11-05.
- ↑ Jean-Louis Santini (September 2013). UN climate report will not sway US deniers. AFP. Retrieved on 2013-09-22.
- ↑ John Cook (2010-06-26). Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming. skepticalscience.com. Retrieved on 2011-04-04.
- ↑ John Cook (2010-06-22). How many climate scientists are climate skeptics?. skepticalscience.com. Retrieved on 2011-04-04.
- ↑ Daniel Loxton (2009-12-22). What, If Anything, Can Skeptics Say About Science?. Skepticblog. Retrieved on 2011-04-04.
- ↑ Coby Beck. How to Talk to a Climate Skeptic. grist.org. Retrieved on 2011-06-22.
- ↑ Business Insider The 10 Most-Respected Global Warming Skeptics accessed June 22, 2011.