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The global warming controversy is a debate about what how society should respond to the trends in global air temperature observed since around 1880 (see Global warming). Most of the dispute concerns the direction and magnitude of the trend, and what has been causing it. Is the air getting too hot? What's causing it? What should people do about it?

The two main viewpoints held by advocates and partisans are:

1. pro-AGW: that global warming since 1880 is largely human-caused, i.e., anthropogenic (see Anthropogenic global warming); that this warming is harmful; and that humans should stop contributing to it
2. anti-AGW: that global warming since 1880 is largely naturally-caused; that it is benign and/or unstoppable; and that humans should ignore it or adapt to it.

The main argument on the pro-AGW side is:

• that there is strong consensus among climate scientists that warming observed over the past 50 years was caused primarily by anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases,
• that only a few scientists disagree,
• that warming will continue if emissions continue, and
• that consequences become increasingly serious as the amount of warming increases.

The main argument on the anti-AGW side is:

• that the temperature trend since 1880 is flat or only a minor increase
• that the cause of any warming which is occurring is either natural or unknown
• that any attempt to stop a warming trend by reducing emissions will be much more expensive than attempts to adapt to a mild warming

Outside the scientific community the consensus is disputed by some corporations, advocacy groups, politicians, and individuals (see global warming skeptics). Additionally, there is even greater controversy concerning what actions should be taken to mitigate or adapt to global warming.

This article focuses on the controversies surrounding global warming; for the basic scientific description of the theory, see global warming. For the political controversy, see Politics of global warming.

Supporters and opponents of the global warming theory

Organisations that have stated support of the current scientific opinion on climate change include:

• The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC);
• The national academies of science of the G8 countries and Brazil, the People's Republic of China and India ;
• The US National Academy of Sciences, both in its 2002 report to President George W. Bush, and in its latest publications;
• The American Meteorological Society ;
• The American Geophysical Union ;
• The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) ; and
• The Union of Concerned Scientists.

Some of the most prominent scientists who have expressed opposition include:

• Sallie Baliunas and Willie Soon, astrophysicists (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics);
• William M. Gray, tropical meteorologist (Colorado State University);
• Richard Lindzen, atmospheric dynamicist (Massachusetts Institute of Technology); and
• Frederick Seitz, solid-state physicist (former president of the National Academy of Sciences).

see full list

Prominent opponents from outside the scientific community include:

• David Bellamy, botanist and British environmental campaigner;
• Ann Coulter, American syndicated columnist;
• Michael Crichton, science-fiction novelist, author of the global-warming themed State of Fear;
• Andrey Illarionov, former economic advisor to Russian president Vladimir Putin;
• Ross McKitrick, economics professor;
• Kary Mullis, Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1993), biochemist and inventor of PCR, known for idiosyncratic and sometimes controversial views on topics unrelated to biochemistry; and
• Michael Savage, host of radio talk show The Savage Nation.

see full list

Organizations skeptical of global warming include:

• Competitive Enterprise Institute;
• Cooler Heads Coalition; and
• Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change.

see full list

Notable former skeptics include British entrepreneur Richard Branson, Pat Robertson, and Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

Controversy over the theory

The controversy comprises several separate issues relating to global warming.

1. Whether the climate is changing beyond natural variations in the historical temperature record.
2. Whether human/industrial activity is responsible for the change and if so, to what extent.
3. How large future changes will be.
4. What the consequences of climate change will be.

There is little debate on the existence of anthropogenic global warming among climate scientists (see Scientific opinion on climate change). In contrast, there is an ongoing debate about global warming theories in the popular media and on a policy level. Questions include whether there is a scientific consensus on the existence of global warming and in particular whether there is sufficient evidence to justify action to attempt to ameliorate its effects. Those who believe that such a consensus exists express a wide range of opinions: some merely recognize the validity of the observed increases in temperature, while others support measures such as the Kyoto Protocol, which are intended to have some future climate effects and eventually lead to further measures. Still others believe that environmental damage will be so severe that immediate steps must be taken to reduce CO₂ emissions, even if the immediate economic costs of doing so are substantial. An example of the latter is the Sierra Club, which has sued the U.S. government over failure to raise automobile fuel efficiency standards, and thereby decrease carbon-dioxide emissions.

Critics express varied opinions concerning the cause of global warming. A few (e.g., Template:Split link) deny that the Earth has warmed significantly. A more common position is that the earth has warmed, but the primary cause of global warming has not yet been ascertained (e.g., Template:Split link, Template:Split link, Template:Split link). Others attribute global warming to natural variation (Template:Split link, Template:Split link, Carter), ocean currents (Template:Split link), solar activity (Shaviv, Veizer), cosmic rays (Svensmark), or unknown natural causes (Leroux). (see quotes)

The remainder of this section documents some of the arguments for and against the theory of global warming.

Over the past several decades, as scientific evidence for global warming has mounted, the debate has entered the public arena. Some leading political figures have taken up the issue, such as former U.S. presidential candidate Al Gore, author of Earth in the Balance, and narrator of the film An Inconvenient Truth. In U.S. politics, global warming is often a partisan political issue. Republicans generally (though not universally) oppose action against a threat that they regard as unproved, while Democrats tend to support actions that they believe will reduce global warming and its effects. Recently, the balance has begun to shift, and bipartisan measures have been introduced.

Global warming is an even more central and sustained issue for the European Union. Both 'global warming' and the more politically neutral 'climate change' were listed as political buzzwords or catch phrases in 2005. However, in Europe, the global-warming theory has gained wider acceptance than in many other parts of the world, most notably the United States.

Kevin E. Trenberth provides evidence for the controversy that occurs when science meets the political arena:

The SPM was approved line by line by governments. . . .The argument here is that the scientists determine what can said, but the governments determine how it can best be said. Negotiations occur over wording to ensure accuracy, balance, clarity of message, and relevance to understanding and policy. The IPCC process is dependent on the good will of the participants in producing a balanced assessment. However, in Shanghai, it appeared that there were attempts to blunt, and perhaps obfuscate, the messages in the report, most notably by Saudi Arabia. This led to very protracted debates over wording on even bland and what should be uncontroversial text... The most contentious paragraph in the IPCC (2001) SPM was the concluding one on attribution. After much debate, the following was carefully crafted: "In the light of new evidence, and taking into account the remaining uncertainties, most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse-gas concentrations."

Debate over the existence of a consensus

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Outside the scientific community, the proportion of scientists who support or oppose any of the global warming theories is a matter of controversy in its own right. Environmental groups, many governmental reports, and the non-U.S. media often claim virtually unanimous support for the global-warming theory from the scientific community. While some opponents maintain the opposite, that the majority of scientists either consider global warming "unproved" or dismiss it altogether, other opponents decry the dangers of consensus science (a view expressed by author Michael Crichton in a lecture given to Caltech in 2003), and still others maintain that opponents of the theory have been stifled or driven underground.

A 2004 essay by Naomi Oreskes (B.Sc. in Mining Geology; Ph.D. in Geological Research and History of Science) in the journal Science (Oreskes, 2004) reported a survey of abstracts of peer-reviewed papers related to global climate change in the ISI database. Oreskes stated that of the 928 abstracts analyzed, "none contradicted" the view of the major scientific organizations that "the evidence for human modification of climate is compelling." Benny Peiser claimed to have found flaws in her work, writing

Oreskes, a professor of history, claims to have analyzed 928 abstracts on global climate change, of which 75% either explicitly or implicitly accept the view that most of the recent warming trend is man-made. When I checked the same set of abstracts , I discovered that just over a dozen explicitly endorse the "consensus," while the vast majority of abstracts does not mention anthropogenic global warming. (National Post, 17 May 2005)

In order to include only "hard science" papers rather than opinion pieces or editorials, Oreskes excluded the Social Sciences Citation Index and the Arts & Humanities Citation Index and set the search to include only Articles, while Peiser searched for All document types in all indexes, and the interpretation of the remaining parts of his attempted refutation is further disputed. In a later op-ed piece in Canada's National Post, Peiser makes no further reference to his review, instead asserting that

An unbiased analysis of the peer-reviewed literature on global warming will find hundreds of papers (many of them written by the world’s leading experts in the field) that have raised serious reservations and outright rejection of the concept of a "scientific consensus on climate change." The truth is, there is no such thing. .

Peiser however no longer disputes that there is a scientific consensus:

an overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human impact. However, this majority consensus is far from unanimous

Timothy Ball asserts that those who oppose the "consensus" have gone underground: "No doubt passive acceptance yields less stress, fewer personal attacks and makes career progress easier. What I have experienced in my personal life during the last years makes me understand why most people choose not to speak out; job security and fear of reprisals. Even in University, where free speech and challenge to prevailing wisdoms are supposedly encouraged, academics remain silent."(Canada Free Press, February 5, 2007)

A 2006 op-ed by Richard Lindzen in The Wall Street Journal challenged the claim that scientific consensus had been reached on the issue, and listed the Science journal study as well as other sources, including the IPCC and NAS reports, as part of "a persistent effort to suggest . . .that the theoretically expected contribution from additional carbon dioxide has actually been detected." Lindzen wrote

But there is a more sinister side to this feeding frenzy. Scientists who dissent from the alarmism have seen their grant funds disappear, their work derided, and themselves libeled as industry stooges, scientific hacks or worse. Consequently, lies about climate change gain credence even when they fly in the face of the science that supposedly is their basis. Wall Street Journal Wednesday, April 12, 2006

To support the claim of a lack of support, the website of prominent skeptic S. Fred Singer's Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP) lists four separate petitions:

• The 1992 "Statement by Atmospheric Scientists on Greenhouse Warming" ("...Such policy initiatives derive from highly uncertain scientific theories. They are based on the unsupported assumption that catastrophic global warming follows from the burning of fossil fuels and requires immediate action. We do not agree.")
• The "Heidelberg Appeal" (also from 1992)
• Singer's own "Leipzig Declaration on Global Climate Change" (1995 and 1997)
• The "Oregon Petition," which was circulated in 1998 by physicist Frederick Seitz.

According to former SEPP policy associate Candace Crandall (who was at the time S. Fred Singer's spouse), these petitions show that "the number of scientists refuting global warming is growing." Though the signatures are claimed to having been Independently verified no such verification party is referenced. The Oregon Petition is under scrutiny by some who have examined the petitions challenge that conclusion, pointing out that:

• The 1992 "Statement by Atmospheric Scientists" is more than a decade old and only has 46 signers.
• The Heidelberg Appeal makes no mention at all of climate or climate change, much less global warming.
• Most of the signers of the Leipzig Declarations are non-scientists or lack credentials in the specific field of climate research.
• Many of the signers of the Oregon Petition are also non-scientists or lack relevant scientific backgrounds

In April 2006, a group describing itself as "sixty scientists" signed an Open Letter to the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to ask that he revisit the science of global warming and "Open Kyoto to debate". As with the earlier statements, critics pointed out that many of the signatories were non-scientists or lacked relevant scientific backgrounds. For example, the group included David Wojick, a journalist, and Benny Peiser, a social anthropologist. More than half the signatories cited past or emeritus positions as their main appointments. Only two (Richard Lindzen and Roy Spencer) indicated current appointments in a university department or a recognized research institute in climate science. . One of the signatories has since publicly recanted, stating that his signature was obtained by deception regarding the content of the letter.

Global warming and carbon dioxide

One argument against anthropogenic global warming questions the contention that rising levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) correlate with—and thus have caused—global warming. Proponents of the view that greenhouse gases have caused recent global warming respond that correlation is not a significant part of the evidence. See attribution of recent climate change.

• Correlation does not imply causation. Indeed, studies of ice-age, temperature variations show carbon dioxide levels increasing after warming rather than before. , This assumes that current climate change can be expected to be similar to past climate change. While it is generally agreed that past (ice age) variations are mostly timed by astronomical forcing, the current variations, of whatever size, are claimed to be timed by anthropogenic releases of CO₂ (thus returning the argument to the importance of human CO₂ emissions).
• Between 1940 and 1970, global temperatures went down slightly, even though carbon-dioxide levels went up. This is largely attributed to the cooling effect of sulphate aerosols.
• The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is small, accounting for 0.0381% of the Earth's atmosphere.
• The Earth has been in an ice age with a much higher level of CO2. The Ordovician period of the Paleozoic era, the Earth was in an ice age with atmospheric CO2 estimated at 4400ppm (or .44% of the atmosphere). However, a recent study suggests the Ordovician period began with a reduction in CO2.

As noted above, climate models are only able to simulate the temperature record of the past century when GHG forcing is included, which some insist strongly points to the importance of GHGs, as does attribution of recent climate change.

Urban heat islands

Many skeptics question the accuracy of the temperature records on the basis of the "Urban heat island effect": if monitoring stations are located in more populated areas, then increased temperature readings there could be due to increased heat generated by cities, rather than a global temperature rise.

Others say that the records are consistent with the unaffected marine record; that there is no difference between the warmings observed in urban and rural areas; and that various studies have examined the records, finding no bias.

Global warming and solar activity

Another point of controversy is the correlation of temperature with solar variation. A 2004 study at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany concluded that "the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years" and although "the increased solar brightness over the past 20 years has not been enough to cause the observed climate changes", "the impact of more intense sunshine on the ozone layer and on cloud cover could be affecting the climate more than the sunlight itself". According to the Stanford Solar Center, at most 25% of recent global temperature variation can be attributed to solar irradiance. When the 11-year sun cycle is accounted for, there still remains a significant, 0.75°C increase in recorded global temperatures.

Is global warming beneficial or detrimental?

Many researchers predict disastrous consequences for a warming of 1.5 to 7°C, which the IPCC projects is likely within the 21st century unless strong, early mitigation measures are adopted.

Other researchers feel that up to 1.5°C of warming would increase crop yields and stabilize weather. Many of these doubt a larger warming is likely. In response, some note that the belief in beneficial effects and doubt of extreme warming should be independent if these conclusions were in fact neutrally derived from scientific research.

Other assertions

Listed here are some of the assertions made by both supporters and opponents of global warming theory not discussed above. Assertions are included solely because they have been made by one side or the other, without comment on their scientific validity or lack thereof.

Assertions by supporters of the global warming theory

Supporters of the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis assert that:

• The fact that carbon dioxide absorbs and emits IR radiation has been known for over a century.
• Gas bubbles trapped in ice cores give us a detailed record of atmospheric chemistry and temperature back more than eight hundred thousand years, with the temperature record confirmed by other geologic evidence. This record shows a correlation between atmospheric carbon dioxide and temperature.
• The recent rise in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is greater than any in hundreds of thousands of years and this is human-caused, as shown by the isotopic signature of CO₂ from fossil fuels.
• The historical temperature record shows a rise of 0.4–0.8 °C over the last 100 years.
• The current warmth is unusual in the past 1000 years (see Temperature record of the past 1000 years).
• Climate-change, attribution studies, using both models and observations, find that the warming of the last 50 years is likely caused by human activity; natural variability (including solar variation) alone cannot explain the recent change.
• Climate models can reproduce the observed trend only when greenhouse gas forcing is included.
• The IPCC reports correctly summarize the state of climate science.
• Humankind is performing a great geophysical experiment, and if it turns out badly—however that is defined—we cannot undo it. We cannot even abruptly turn it off. Too many of the things we are doing now have long-term ramifications for centuries to come.
• Climate models predict more warming, and other climactic effects (sea level rise; more frequent and severe storms; drought and heat waves; spread of tropical diseases; etc.) in the future.
• The current warming trend will accelerate when melting ice exposes more dark sea and land that will reflect less sunlight; and when the tundra thaws and releases large quantities of trapped greenhouse gases.
• Atlantic, hurricane trends have been recently linked to climate change.
• The Precautionary principle requires that action should be taken now to prevent or mitigate warming.

Proponents of the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis tend to support the IPCC position, and thus represent the scientific consensus (though with considerable differences over details, and especially over what action should be taken).

Assertions by opponents of the global warming theory

Some of the assertions made in opposition to the global warming theory include:

• IPCC draws firm conclusions unjustified by the science, especially given the acknowledged weakness of cloud physics in the climate models.
• Correlation does not imply causation, so just because temperatures have risen overall since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution doesn't necessarily mean that Industrialisation has caused the change in temperature.
• Some global warming studies, including the influential "Hockey Stick" study by Mann, have been shown to contain errors, shoddy methods and manipulated data sets and have not been reproduced.
• Using "consensus" as evidence is an appeal to the majority argument rather than scientific discussion. Some have proposed that, because the issue has become so politicized, climatologists who disagree with the consensus may be afraid to speak out for fear of losing their positions or funding.
• Climate models will not be able to predict the future climate until they can predict solar and volcanic activity, changes in sea temperature and changes to cosmic ray levels that make the low level clouds that cool the earth.
• Water vapor, not CO₂, is the primary greenhouse gas. Depending on the referenced source, water vapor and water droplets account for 36-70% of the greenhouse effect, while CO₂ accounts for 9-26%.
• Climate science cannot make definitive predictions yet, since the computer models used to make these predictions are still evolving and do not yet take into account recently discovered feedback mechanisms.
• Global warming is largely a result of reduced low-altitude cloud cover from reduced Galactic cosmic rays (GCRs). It is similar in concept to the Wilson cloud chamber, however, on a global scale, where earth's atmosphere acts as the cloud chamber.
• The concern about global warming is analogous to the concern about global cooling in the 1970s. The concern about global cooling was unnecessarily alarmist. The concern about global warming is equally alarmist.
• Many opponents also point to the Medieval warm period, which lasted from the 10th to the 14th century, and which indicated an above-average temperature for at least Western Europe, and possibly the whole Earth. This period was followed by the Little Ice Age, which lasted until the 19th century, when the Earth began to heat up again.
• Satellite temperature records show less warming than surface land and sea records.
• The relationship between historic temperatures and CO₂ levels, based on ice-core samples, shows that carbon dioxide increases have always followed a rise in temperature rather than the other way around.
• The suggestion that climatic changes equal or even more severe than those on Earth are also happening on other planets within this solar system. these include Mars, Jupiter, Pluto and Triton, which one of Neptune's moons.

Opponents tend to define themselves in terms of opposition to the IPCC position. They generally believe that climate science is not yet able to provide us with solid answers to all of the major questions about global climate. Opponents often characterize supporters' arguments as alarmist and premature, emphasizing what they perceive as the lack of scientific evidence supporting global-warming scenarios.

Many opponents also say that, if global warming is real and man-made, no action need be taken now, because:

• Future scientific advances or engineering projects will remedy the problem before it becomes serious, and do it for less money.
• A small amount of global warming would be benign or even beneficial, as increased carbon dioxide would benefit plant life, thus potentially becoming profitable for agriculture world-wide.
• There is a distinct correlation between GDP growth and greenhouse-gas emissions. If this correlation is assumed to be a causation, a cutback in emissions might lead to a decrease in the rate of GDP growth .

Funding of opponents

Some global warming skeptics have links to the fossil-fuels industry. For example, Patrick J. Michaels and Frederick Seitz have both been linked to the George C. Marshall Institute--Michaels as a "visiting scientist" and Seitz as "Chairman Emeritus.". The Institute has received grants from ExxonMobil, and from petroleum-related organizations such as the Sarah Scaife Foundation and the Carthage Foundation. The amounts of the grants from Exxon to George C Marshall Institute totaled $630,000 from 1998 to 2004, with the 2003 being the biggest year at $170,000.

Richard Lindzen was similarly attacked as being a well-paid mouthpiece for the fossil fuel industry. In 1995 Harper's article, Ross Gelbspan claimed that Lindzen charged "oil and coal interests $2,500 a day for his consulting services", to which Lindzen responded: "Actually, he misspoke on that. I charged them that for lecture fees the two times I've given lectures. And it wasn't oil. But who lectures for free? And what would they ask me to consult on?. . . To make it sound as if somebody is consulting and a tool of the oil industry when they've given a couple lectures? And charged a fee? And a small fee at that, compared to most of the environmentalists who speak for them? What's that about?" '

Similarly, the Competitive Enterprise Institute has received several large grants from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, the Sarah Scaife Foundation, and from ExxonMobil.The CEI website lists both S. Fred Singer and Robert Balling as "experts," while Ross McKitrick headed up a CEI project called the Cooler Heads Coalition. Many observers are critical of these connections, suggesting that they pose a conflict of interest. .

Scientists, critical of some aspects of the discussion and their donors, dispute the validity of this guilt by association argument. These same critics are, themselves, part of government, state-college, and university systems; the scientific organizations listed in the proponents section; or some mix. Most have been considered skeptics, or at least somewhat skeptical, of certain points since long before the funding was provided. For example, according to the Forbes story listed above, The Intermountain Rural Electric Association of Sedalia, CO (IREA) funded Patrick Michaels because according to its GM "'We cannot allow the discussion to be monopolized by the alarmists,'" and said that, although he "...believes global warming is real, just not as big a problem as scientists claim, he acknowledged this is a special-interest issue. He said the bigger concern is his 130,000 customers, who want to keep rates low, so coal-dependent utilities need to prevent any taxes or programs that penalize fossil fuel use." In that same article, Donald Kennedy of Science, said that " 'skeptics such as Michaels are lobbyists more than researchers' "; and that " 'I don't think it's unethical any more than most lobbying is unethical,' "; and that " ...donations to skeptics amounts to 'trying to get a political message across.' " This tends to further refine the entire dispute as being one of a political nature.

Other criticisms of funding are made by groups known to be in direct opposition to either corporations in general or energy ones in particular, such as the Mother Jones criticism of ExxonMobil donating to groups such as the American Council for Capital Formation. Such groups complain that the ACCF presented an appendix that focused only on the uncertainties of a 2001 NAS report when the ACCF testified in front of the U.S. Senate. Mother Jones’ complaint seems to be only that, although the ACCF usually focuses on economic critiques of policies, this time they wrote something one-sided about the science involved in the debate to support their economic position on the Kyoto Protocol. Doing that, according to Mother Jones, puts them in the skeptic camp.

Similarly, before starting JunkScience.com, Steven Milloy belonged to an organization called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC), which was paid by tobacco companies to cast doubt on studies about the dangers of secondhand smoke. Most of the authors of these editorials, their websites, or the publications themselves are almost universally extremely critical of the role of industry and government in environmental matters, and focus almost entirely on negative aspects of the debate .

On February 2, 2007, The Guardian stated that the AEI, which it described as "an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration", had sent letters (PDF of letter) to scientists in the UK and the US, offering $10,000 plus travel expenses and other incidental payments in return for essays that "thoughtfully explore the limitations of climate model outputs", with regard to the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Supporters of the AEI defended the move as a routine call for papers, while opponents decried it as "buying opinion".

Funding of global warming theorists

In a speech on September 28, 2006, US Senator Jim Inhofe claimed that "The global warming alarmists and their friends in the media have attempted to smear scientists who dare question the premise of man-made catastrophic global warming, and as a result some scientists have seen their reputations and research funding dry up." He also characterized the Weather Channel as promoting global warming alarmism for financial gain, saying "We all know the Weather Channel would like to have people afraid all the time."

James Spann, a television meteorologist and global warming skeptic, has made similar claims:

“Billions of dollars of grant money is flowing into the pockets of those on the man-made global warming bandwagon … Nothing wrong with making money at all. But when money becomes the motivation for a scientific conclusion, then we have a problem. For many, global warming is a big cash grab.”

Kevin E. Trenberth has received $5.575 million ($6.804 million in constant 2005 dollars) in grant funding for the 17 projects which he was Primary Investigator. Projects were conducted from 1978 to the present and the funding agencies were National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation, National Center for Atmospheric Research and NASA. All 17 projects were related to atmospheric observations, global water cycles, short-term climate fluctuations, climate modeling and global drought in 1988.

Betting over global warming

A number of scientists have proposed bets with global warming skeptics concerning whether future temperatures will increase. With the exception of two Russian physicists betting $10,000 that the average global temperature during 2012-2017 would be lower than during 1998-2003, all other skeptics have either refused to bet on terms that pay out before the year 2100, have refused all bets, or, like Richard Lindzen, have only accepted odds that indicate temperatures that are much more likely to increase rather than to decrease.

Political pressure on scientists

Climate scientist Dr. James E. Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the man who is credited by many with the introduction of the global-warming theory to the public in Congressional testimony in 1988, claimed in a widely cited New York Times article in 2006 that his superiors at the agency were trying to "censor" information "going out to the public". NASA denied this, saying that it was merely requiring that scientists make a distinction between personal, and official government, views in interviews conducted as part of work done at the agency. Several scientists working at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have made similar complaints; once again, government officials said they were enforcing longstanding policies requiring government scientists to clearly identify personal opinions as such when participating in public interviews and forums. The BBC's long-running current affairs series Panorama recently investigated the issue, and was told that "scientific reports about global warming have been systematically changed and suppressed."

Mike Hulme, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Research, wrote how increasing use of pejorative terms like 'catastrophic', 'chaotic' and 'irreversible', had altered the public discourse around climate change: "This discourse is now characterised by phrases such as 'climate change is worse than we thought', that we are approaching 'irreversible tipping in the Earth's climate', and that we are 'at the point of no return'. I have found myself increasingly chastised by climate change campaigners when my public statements and lectures on climate change have not satisfied their thirst for environmental drama and exaggerated rhetoric."

According to an Associated Press release of 30 January 2007 :

“Climate scientists at seven government agencies say they have been subjected to political pressure aimed at downplaying the threat of global warming.

"The groups presented a survey that shows two in five of the 279 climate scientists who responded to a questionnaire complained that some of their scientific papers had been edited in a way that changed their meaning. Nearly half of the 279 said in response to another question that at some point they had been told to delete reference to "global warming" or "climate change" from a report.”

Critics however claim that the survey was itself unscientific .

Controversy about responses to global warming

Even among those who agree that global warming is real, there are further controversial issues, which include:

1. How to respond to climate change.
2. Whether decisions require less uncertainty.

Much of the discussion centers on the effect of emissions of carbon dioxide related to human activity, ranging from burning of fossil fuels, to industrial activity (see above). But this argument alone would be confined to the scientific press. The point that leads to major controversy—because it could have significant economic impacts—is whether action (usually, restrictions on the use of fossil fuels to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions) should be taken now, or in the near future; and whether those restrictions would have any meaningful effect on global temperature.

Due to the economic ramifications of such restrictions, there are those who feel strongly that, even if global warming is caused solely by the burning of fossil fuels, restricting their use would have more damaging effects on the world economy than the increases in global temperature. Conversely, others feel strongly that early action to reduce emissions would help avoid much greater economic costs later, and would reduce the risk of catastrophic, irreversible change.

One response to global warming is to shift some of the tax burden from income of consumers, to the fossil-fuel industry. If introduced gradually, the overall effect on an economy is likely to be minimal; in the long term, such policy would be beneficial, as the life of existing gas- and oil-reserves would be extended (delaying price increases due to supply shortages).

Kyoto Protocol

The Kyoto protocol is the most prominent, international agreement on climate change, and is also highly controversial. Some argue that it goes too far in restricting emissions of greenhouse gases; others argue that the cuts in emissions it would introduce are far too small. Another area of controversy is the fact that India and China, the world's two most populous countries, both ratified the protocol but are not required to reduce carbon emissions under the present agreement. Furthermore, it has also been argued that it would cause more damage to the economy of the US than to those of other countries, thus providing an unfair economic advantage to some countries. Additionally, the high costs of decreasing emissions may cause significant production to move to countries that are not covered under the treaty, such as India and China. As these countries are less energy efficient, this could cause additional carbon emissions. In 1998, U.S. Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia wrote Resolution S. 98 that opposed ratification of the Kyoto treaty, and in turn the U.S. Senate voted 95 to 0 against the treaty.

The only major developed nations which have not signed the Kyoto protocol are the USA and Australia. However on 30 November 2006 The Hon Greg Hunt MP Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage for Australia said: "First, climate change is both real and soluble. The deniers are wrong: that is, those who argue there is insufficient evidence. The doomsayers are also wrong: that is, those who argue that we are coming to an unavoidable and catastrophic end." . The New York Times reports that in the US the Congress elected in 2006 is serious about legislation to impose mandatory controls on carbon dioxide emissions that most smokestack industries have long opposed. . The countries with no official position on Kyoto are mainly African countries with underdeveloped scientific infrastructure or oil producing countries.

Global warming litigation

Several lawsuits have been filed over global warming. For example, Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency (case 05-1120 pending before the United States Supreme Court), was filed to force the Federal Government to regulate greenhouse gasses under the Clean Air Act. A similar approach was taken by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer who filed a lawsuit (California v. General Motors Corp.) to force car manufacturers to reduce vehicles' emissions of carbon dioxide. A third case, Comer v. Murphy Oil, was filed by Gerald Maples, a trial attorney in Mississippi, in an effort to force fossil fuel and chemical companies to pay for damages caused by global warming.

Public perceptions

Public perceptions about the global-warming theory were slow to evolve, but have moved substantially in recent decades. A Taylor- Nelson-Sofres poll reported by ABC News in 2006 reported that 85 percent of Americans believed in 2006 that global warming "probably is occurring," as opposed to 80 percent who believed so in 1998. Less than 40 percent were "very sure" of it, however. In 1998, 31 percent of the public said global warming was "extremely important" or "very important" to them, personally; in 2006, 49 percent said so.

According to a report on August 16, 2006 by Dr. David Suzuki of the David Suzuki Foundation, the general public has a poor understanding of global warming. This is despite recent publicity through different means, including the film An Inconvenient Truth. One problem is a confusion between global warming and ozone depletion. (See Relationship to ozone depletion in the article on global warming.)

On July 20, 2006 , Dr. David Suzuki commented that public opinion on climate change and the film was being deliberately twisted by an expensive campaign of public relations. However, James Hoggan, the president of James Hoggan and Associates, a large public relations firm, attempts to correct public perception about the issue in his blog at http://www.desmogblog.com/.

See also

• Global cooling
• Scientific skepticism
• Environmental skepticism

References

1. Safe Climate Act of 2006. Summary of the Bill
2. The Top Politically inCorrect Words for 2006: Macaca, Global Warming Denier, Herstory and Flip Chart Top Annual List
3. More in Europe worry about climate than in U.S., poll shows
5. The IPCC Assessment of Global Warming 2001
8. "Although no cause for alarm rests on this issue, there has been an intense effort to claim that the theoretically expected contribution from additional carbon dioxide has actually been detected. Given that we do not understand the natural internal variability of climate change, this task is currently impossible. Nevertheless there has been a persistent effort to suggest otherwise, and with surprising impact."
9. Deep ice tells long climate story, by Jonathan Amos, BBC, 4 September 2006
10. Vostok Ice Core Data
11. New Research in Science Shows Highest CO2 Levels In 650,000 Years, by Daniel B. Kane, 28 November 2005
12. Simulated annual global mean surface temperature
13. Global Warming is Happening, by Kevin Trenberth, National Center for Atmospheric Research
14. Romm, Joseph, Hell and High Water: Global Warming, Morrow, 2007
18. Constant dollars were figured using the end year of the projects which understates the inflationary adjustments since funding is usually disbursed either entirely at the beginning or in lump sums front loaded. This understating is exaggerated for longer projects. Using the ending dates when computing constant dollars for Trenberth's climate research funding totaled $6,804,862 compared with $7,955,621 when using the starting dates which would be more accurate starting dates.
22. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1552092,00.html
23. http://www.longbets.org/180
24. http://www.reason.com/rb/rb060805.shtml
25. BBC Panorama: Bush's climate of fear
26. BBC: Chaotic world of climate truth

External links

Politics

• Paul D. Thacker "Environmental Science & Technology, 31 August 2005, "How the Wall Street Journal and Rep. Barton celebrated a global warming skeptic"
• Ode to Kyoto: The energy industry's stealth campaign to confuse the public and stop Kyoto — Broadcast 23 January 2004 on PBS' NOW with Bill Moyers (RealVideo format).
• Environmental Defence - Global Warming Skeptics: A Primer — How ExxonMobil funds scientists and media pundits to "de-bunk" the science of climate change
• Greenpeace: Industry And The Climate Debate
• What planet are you on, Mr Bush? (and do you care, Mr Blair?)
• "Skeptics get a journal" by Paul D. Thacker, Environmental Science & Technology
• Misusing figures about global warming in testimony to the United States Congress
• The Cosmos Myth: An Insidious Masterpiece. The Real Truth about the Revelle-Gore Story — by Justin Lancaster, with related affidavits and sworn deposition of S. Fred Singer
• The Economics of Climate Change Volume I: Report House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs (PDF)
• Speech by Senator James Inhofe, former Chairman, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee
• CNN Anchor cites Hollywood movie to defend science reporting
• Ad hoc committee report on the ‘Hockey Stick’ Global Climate Reconstruction - a report to U.S. Congress on flaws and problems with Mann's "HockeyStick" analysis and conclusions.
• Exxonsecrets - how Exxonmobil funds the climate change skeptics
• An online magazine discussing public relations controversies associated with global warming.
• "Weather Channel Climate Expert Calls for Decertifying Global Warming Skeptics" — by Marc Morano reacting to Heidi Cullen
• AntiEcohype: Climate Critical Commentaries

Science

• A Public Debate on the Science of Global Warming: Dr. James E. Hansen and Dr. Patrick J. Michaels, November 20, 1998.
• The Global Warming Debate: Fundamental differences in opinion about climate change.
• Friends of Science: Providing Insight into Climate Science
• CO₂ or Solar? A discussion about the evidence for anthropogenic warming and the possible role of solar activity increase.
• Roger Pielke, Jr., Daniel Sarewitz (2002). "Wanted: Scientific Leadership on Climate". Issues in Science and Technology. 19 (2): 27–30.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• ClimateAudit: statistical criticism of "hockey stick" climate history reconstructions
• False Claims by McIntyre and McKitrick regarding the Mann et al. (1998) reconstruction: Contains links to several sources disputing the McIntyre and McKitrick critique of Michael Mann's famous graph.
• National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration article, September 2006 Global temperatures 4th warmest on record/local U.S. temperatures 0.7 degrees F below 20th century average.
• TCS Daily Article by Roy Spencer: principal research scientist for University of Alabama in Huntsville and previous Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama questions cloud model accuracy.
• London Daily Telegraph. The truth about global warming - it's the Sun that's to blame
• PrisonPlanet.com SUV's On Jupiter? - Are humans responsible for climate change on the outer reaches of the solar system, or is it the sun?

Printed media

• Eilperin, Juliet (August 4 2006, page A3). "More Frequent Heat Waves Linked to Global Warming: U.S. and European Researchers Call Long Hot Spells Likely". Washington, DC, USA: The Washington Post. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)- Report on findings presented at an international conference on climate science at Gawatt, Switzerland the week of July 21 - 28, 2006.
• News Services (July 28 2006, page A8). "Global-Warming Skeptic Funded by Coal Utilities". Washington in Brief. Washington, DC, USA: The Washington Post. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)- Brief article stating that prominent human-caused global warming skeptic, Patrick J. Michaels, received $150,000 in funding from the Intermountain Rural Electric Association.
• Struck, Doug (July 29 2006, page A1 & A12). "On the Roof of Peru, Omens in the Ice: Retreat of Once-Mighty Glacier Signals Water Crisis, Mirroring Worldwide Trend". Washington, DC, USA: The Washington Post. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)- Newspaper article reporting on decrease in size of glaciers worldwide and resulting shortage of water.
• Singer, S. Fred (October 28 2006). Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years. USA: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. 978-0742551176. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); External link in |title= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: year (link) Editorial review from Science Daily: "Singer and Avery present in popular language supported by in-depth scientific evidence the compelling concept that global temperatures have been rising mostly or entirely because of a natural cycle. Unstoppable Global Warming explains why we're warming, why it's not very dangerous, and why we can't stop it anyway."
• Lee, Dixie R. (April 1994). Environmental Overkill: Whatever Happened to Common Sense?. USA: Perennial. 978-0060975982. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help); External link in |title= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: year (link)- "...challenges the environmental prophets of doom and gloom with penetrating searing truth. Environmental Overkill is a bright light that exposes the fraud and deceit being perpetrated against an unknowing public." -- Rush Limbaugh

• Articles with unsourced statements from January 2007
• Climate change assessment and attribution
• Debates
• Denialism
• Global warming skeptics
• Environmental skepticism