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Environmental organizations, many governmental reports, and the non-U.S. media often state that there is virtually unanimous agreement in the scientific community in support of human-caused global warming, although there is less agreement on the specific consequences of this warming. Opponents either maintain that most scientists consider global warming "unproved," dismiss it altogether, or highlight the dangers of focusing on only one viewpoint in the context of unsettled science. Others maintain that either proponents or opponents have been stifled or driven underground.

Scientific opinion

Scientific consensus

Main article: Scientific opinion on climate change

The mainstream media in many countries attempt to convey the idea that the majority of climate scientists agree that global warming is primarily caused by human activities such as fossil fuel burning and deforestation. The conclusion that global warming is mainly caused by human activity and will continue if greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced has been endorsed by more than 75 scientific societies and academies of science, including all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Meteorological Society, the International Union for Quaternary Research, and the Joint Science Academies of the major industrialized and developing nations explicitly use the word "consensus" when referring to this conclusion.

A 2004 essay by Naomi Oreskes in the journal Science reported a survey of 928 abstracts of peer-reviewed papers related to global climate change in the ISI database. Oreskes claimed that "Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position. ... This analysis shows that scientists publishing in the peer-reviewed literature agree with IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences, and the public statements of their professional societies." Benny Peiser claimed to have found flaws in Oreskes' work, but his attempted refutation is disputed and has not been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Peiser later withdrew parts of his criticism, also commenting that "the 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."

A 2006 op-ed by Richard Lindzen in The Wall Street Journal challenged the claim that scientific consensus had been reached, and listed the Science journal study as well as other sources, including the IPCC and NAS reports, as part of "an intense effort to suggest that the theoretically expected contribution from additional carbon dioxide has actually been detected." Lindzen wrote in The Wall Street Journal on April 12, 2006,

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.

At least one survey of the scientific community has found the opposite problem—New Scientist notes that in surveys a much larger fraction of U.S. scientists consistently state that they are pressured by their employers or by U.S. government bodies to deny that global warming results from human activities or risk losing funding.

In response to claims of a consensus on global warming, some skeptics have compared the theory to a religion, to scientific support for the eugenics movement, and to discredited scientific theories such as phlogiston and miasma.

In 2008, Fergus Brown, Roger A. Pielke and James Annan submitted a paper titled "Is there agreement amongst climate scientists on the IPCC AR4 WG1?" It was rejected for publication by the American Geophysical Union (AGU) publication EOS and Nature Precedings. Pielke writes: “From this experience, it is clear that the AGU EOS and Nature Precedings Editors are using their positions to suppress evidence that there is more diversity of views on climate, and the human role in altering climate, than is represented in the narrowly focused 2007 IPCC report.”

A survey published in 2009 by Peter Doran and Maggie Zimmerman of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago of 3146 Earth Scientists found that 97% of active climatologists agree that human activity is causing global warming. A summary from the survey states that:

It seems that the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes."

Position statements

Several scientific organizations have issued position statements in which they explicitly used the term "consensus":

  • American Association for the Advancement of Science, 2006: "The conclusions in this statement reflect the scientific consensus represented by, for example, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and the Joint National Academies' statement."
  • US National Academy of Science: "In the judgment of most climate scientists, Earth’s warming in recent decades has been caused primarily by human activities that have increased the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. ... On climate change, have assessed consensus findings on the science..."
  • Joint Science Academies' statement, 2005: "We recognise the international scientific consensus of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."
  • Joint Science Academies' statement, 2001: "The work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) represents the consensus of the international scientific community on climate change science. We recognise IPCC as the world’s most reliable source of information on climate change and its causes, and we endorse its method of achieving this consensus."
  • American Meteorological Society, 2003: "The nature of science is such that there is rarely total agreement among scientists. Individual scientific statements and papers—the validity of some of which has yet to be assessed adequately—can be exploited in the policy debate and can leave the impression that the scientific community is sharply divided on issues where there is, in reality, a strong scientific consensus.... IPCC assessment reports are prepared at approximately five-year intervals by a large international group of experts who represent the broad range of expertise and perspectives relevant to the issues. The reports strive to reflect a consensus evaluation of the results of the full body of peer-reviewed research.... They provide an analysis of what is known and not known, the degree of consensus, and some indication of the degree of confidence that can be placed on the various statements and conclusions."
  • Network of African Science Academies: “A consensus, based on current evidence, now exists within the global scientific community that human activities are the main source of climate change and that the burning of fossil fuels is largely responsible for driving this change.”
  • International Union for Quaternary Research, 2008: "INQUA recognizes the international scientific consensus of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."
  • Australian Coral Reef Society, 2006: "There is almost total consensus among experts that the earth’s climate is changing as a result of the build-up of greenhouse gases.... There is broad scientific consensus that coral reefs are heavily affected by the activities of man and there are significant global influences that can make reefs more vulnerable such as global warming...."


Heartland Institute's list

On April 29, 2008, environmental journalist Richard Littlemore revealed that a list of "500 Scientists with Documented Doubts of Man-Made Global Warming Scares" propagated by the Heartland Institute included at least 45 scientists who neither knew of their inclusion as "coauthors" of the article, nor agreed with its contents. Many of the scientists asked the Heartland Institute to remove their names from the list; for instance, Gregory Cutter from the Old Dominion University was reported by Littlemore as saying,

I have no doubts ..the recent changes in global climate are man-induced. I insist that you immediately remove my name from this list since I did not give you permission to put it there.

However, the Heartland Institute refused to remove any names from the list. In a statement on May 5, 2008, Institute CEO Joseph Bast said that the title of the September 14, 2007 news release announcing the list had been changed to "500 Scientists Whose Research Contradicts Man-Made Global Warming Scares." In the same statement, Bast also charged that the outraged scientists:

...have crossed the line between scientific research and policy advocacy. They lend their credibility to politicians and advocacy groups who call for higher taxes and more government regulations to “save the world” from catastrophic warming ... and not coincidentally, to fund more climate research. They are embarrassed—as they should be—to see their names in a list of scientists whose peer-reviewed published work suggests the modern warming might be due to a natural 1,500-year climate cycle.

Bast also stated that:

The point should be obvious: There is no scientific consensus that global warming is a crisis.

Petitions

In 1997, the “World Scientists Call For Action” petition was presented to world leaders meeting to negotiate the Kyoto Protocol. The declaration asserted, “A broad consensus among the world's climatologists is that there is now ‘a discernible human influence on global climate.’" It urged governments to make “legally binding commitments to reduce industrial nations' emissions of heat-trapping gases”, and called global warming “one of the most serious threats to the planet and to future generations.” The petition was conceived by the Union of Concerned Scientists as a follow up to their 1992 World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, and was signed by “more than 1,500 of the world's most distinguished senior scientists, including the majority of Nobel laureates in science”

To support his claim of a lack of consensus, the website of prominent skeptic Fred Singer's Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP) lists four petitions. According to SEPP, these petitions show that "the number of scientists refuting global warming is growing." The petitions are:

  • The 1992 "Statement by Atmospheric Scientists on Greenhouse Warming," signed by 47 scientists, claims "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), signed by over 4000 scientists including 72 Nobel Prize winners. This appeal makes no mention of climate change or any other specific environmental issue, but is essentially a plea for policy based on "scientific criteria and not on irrational preconceptions".
  • Singer's "Leipzig Declaration on Global Climate Change" (1995 and 1997). Critics point out that most of the signatories lack credentials in the specific field of climate research or even physical science in general. Followup interviews found at least twelve signers who denied having signed the Declaration or had never heard of it.
  • The "Oregon Petition", self-signed and unverified by third party, was started in 1998 by physicist Frederick Seitz, past president of the United States National Academy of Sciences. The identical petition card was circulated again in late 2007 and Arthur B. Robinson presented the petition of 31,000 claimed signatories in Washington DC on May 19, 2008. Critics point out that many of the signatories of the petition lack a background in climate-related sciences and that the petition itself mentions only "catastrophic heating" and not the broader issue of global warming. The petition's website claims that all of the 31,000 signatories are qualified scientists with "technical training suitable for the evaluation of the relevant research data." However, anyone with a degree was entitled to sign the list and this would therefore include many who are not qualified to evaluate the complex data and modelling involved.

Open Letters

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. In response shortly afterward another open letter to Prime Minister Harper endorsing the IPCC report and calling for action on climate change was prepared by Gordon McBean and signed by 90 Canadian climate scientists initially, plus 30 more who endorsed it after its release.

In October 2009, the leaders of 18 US scientific societies and organizations sent an open letter to members of the United States Senate stating, "Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver." The letter goes on to warn of predicted impacts on the United States such as sea level rise and increases in extreme weather events, water scarcity, heat waves, wildfires, and the disturbance of biological systems. It then advocates for a dramatic reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases. There remains however no empirical evidence for their claims that greenhouse gases drive dangerous climate change.

The letter was signed by the Presidents or Executive Directors of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Chemical Society, American Geophysical Union, American Institute of Biological Sciences, American Meteorological Society, American Society of Agronomy, American Society of Plant Biologists, American Statistical Association, Association of Ecosystem Research Centers, Botanical Society of America, Crop Science Society of America, Ecological Society of America, Natural Science Collections Alliance, Organization of Biological Field Stations, Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Society of Systematic Biologists, Soil Science Society of America, and the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research.

References

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