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Climate change is fake [mod warning - controversial topic - enter at your own risk]

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CanalWalker

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There is no climate emergency

Prof Valentina Zharkova, of Northumbria University, alongside an international group of scientists including Prof Simon Shepherd, of Bradford University, Dr E Popova, of Moscow State University, and Dr Sergei Zharkov, of Hull University are saying that the climate change we see is due to the natural cycles in the sun, which they have modelled, and then correlated to historic global temperature.

its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases.

if you want climate change, look at the Uk's landforms. most UK valleys are glaciated, and there are large deposits of boulder clay - which is material deposited by glaciers. 10,000 years ago the UK was covered by 1 mile thick ice, and there were glaciers in S Italy and Greece. Thats recent in geological time. What caused those glaciers to melt? Cos it wasnt burning fossil fuels.

Seems our politicians prefer listening to a 16 year old girl than physicists.


here is an article about this - title


And the moon landings were faked and 7/11 was a CIA plot.
Politicians do listen to physicists and 99% of them agree with the 16 year old girl. Google IPPC.
 
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bb21

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Reminder that while everyone is entitled to their own opinion, please also note views may be robustly challenged and you may have to be prepared to justify your claims with impartial evidence. Robust challenges are hallmarks of a healthy and active debate.

Reports about such challenges will therefore be rejected in the context of forum moderation unless they break forum rules.
 
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Starmill

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Personally I'm just disappointed that we're still at the stage of having to convince the tiny percentage of people who remain unconvinced by the overwhelming mass of highly convincing evidence that has already been presented, that climate change is both real and also caused by human activity.

It'd be convenient if those weren't true. But they are. It's a difficult and painful reality, I acknowledge. But we are all better off for accepting the best evidence as it stands at the moment.
 

E100

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The evidence cited on solar forcing has been countered numerous times on the issue of cause and effect. Whilst there will always be the occasional paper to the contrary the overwhelming body of evidence is against this interpretation of the paper. I say interpretation as the paper doesn't actually say anything about the impact upon the future climate is, though many journalists have used this to attack climate science by extrapolating what is said...
 

edwin_m

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[Mod note - split from this thread]

There is no climate emergency

Prof Valentina Zharkova, of Northumbria University, alongside an international group of scientists including Prof Simon Shepherd, of Bradford University, Dr E Popova, of Moscow State University, and Dr Sergei Zharkov, of Hull University are saying that the climate change we see is due to the natural cycles in the sun, which they have modelled, and then correlated to historic global temperature.

its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases.

if you want climate change, look at the Uk's landforms. most UK valleys are glaciated, and there are large deposits of boulder clay - which is material deposited by glaciers. 10,000 years ago the UK was covered by 1 mile thick ice, and there were glaciers in S Italy and Greece. Thats recent in geological time. What caused those glaciers to melt? Cos it wasnt burning fossil fuels.

Seems our politicians prefer listening to a 16 year old girl than physicists.


here is an article about this - title
Here's my own conspiracy theory (that I just invented). Three of those four sound like they are Russian, so this is obviously another attempt by a foreign power to undermine British society. I note also that the link to the evidence has mysteriously disappeared.
 

mafeu

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If you say so.

I’ve always wondered why climate change hasn’t been used to justify higher taxes. E.g. significant increase on petrol duty that could be directed towards investment in public transport infrastructure, in turn driving motorists towards using improved greener transport links

[Mod note - split from this thread]

There is no climate emergency

Prof Valentina Zharkova, of Northumbria University, alongside an international group of scientists including Prof Simon Shepherd, of Bradford University, Dr E Popova, of Moscow State University, and Dr Sergei Zharkov, of Hull University are saying that the climate change we see is due to the natural cycles in the sun, which they have modelled, and then correlated to historic global temperature.

its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases.

if you want climate change, look at the Uk's landforms. most UK valleys are glaciated, and there are large deposits of boulder clay - which is material deposited by glaciers. 10,000 years ago the UK was covered by 1 mile thick ice, and there were glaciers in S Italy and Greece. Thats recent in geological time. What caused those glaciers to melt? Cos it wasnt burning fossil fuels.

Seems our politicians prefer listening to a 16 year old girl than physicists.


here is an article about this - title
 

Bletchleyite

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I'll just drop a link here (it's a large image), but it's a nice (comic) visualisation of the average temperature of the earth since the last ice age: https://xkcd.com/1732/

That's a good visualisation.

One point that I think people on both sides miss is that climate change can of course be caused by more than one thing - both humans and naturally. The thing those who push the issue being natural miss is that it is still a problem. This being the case, even if it is natural we need to look for ways to reduce it, which might well mean that even the emissions of 1900 (say) are not acceptable - we have to go much lower.
 

Esker-pades

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I thought this was going to be a reasonable debate. Then I see this in the opening post:

"its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases."

Oh dear.
 

Mag_seven

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the climate change we see is due to the natural cycles in the sun, which they have modelled, and then correlated to historic global temperature.

Even of that is the case, that does not mean that human activity does not affect the climate.
 

WelshBluebird

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Just because someone is a professor, does not mean they are also experts and should be trusted about anything outside their field. Indeed there is a fairly well recognised pattern that the more specialised in one area someone becomes, the less knowledgeable in other areas they also become.

In this case, the cited professor is actually a professors of Mathematics and nothing at all to do with the climate, weather, chemistry, biology or anything that would indicate any expertise in climate science. Indeed by their own admission, their interests and expertise lie in Maths, applied Maths, Astronomy and Astrophysics. The only area that would have any relevance is the Astronomy and Astrophysics areas in terms of how the sun behaves, but that says literally nothing about how the atmosphere and Climate behave.

The idea that just because someone is an expert in something then they must also be an expert in all sorts of other things is a very dangerous one.
 

JohnMcL7

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I’m afraid those four learned individuals are in a very, very small minority of professors, doctors and the like on the subject of man made climate change. You can believe those four if you like, but I prefer to believe the thousands of others who have demonstrated otherwise.

There is no doubt that the planet is warming up, and has been for some time as a result of the earth’s orbit eccentricities and solar cycles. Hence the glaciers melting. However there is also no doubt that the rate of warming has accelerated significantly in the last 150 years or so, At a rate never before measured. And that time scale matches the increase in CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and that increase in greenhouse gases is down to us, I’m afraid.

You are of course correct and of all the explanations I've seen, I've always thought this xkcd image showing temperature and time shows just how drastic the change in heat is compared to previous natural warming and cooling:

https://xkcd.com/1732/
 

DarloRich

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[Mod note - split from this thread]

There is no climate emergency

Prof Valentina Zharkova, of Northumbria University, alongside an international group of scientists including Prof Simon Shepherd, of Bradford University, Dr E Popova, of Moscow State University, and Dr Sergei Zharkov, of Hull University are saying that the climate change we see is due to the natural cycles in the sun, which they have modelled, and then correlated to historic global temperature.

its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases.

if you want climate change, look at the Uk's landforms. most UK valleys are glaciated, and there are large deposits of boulder clay - which is material deposited by glaciers. 10,000 years ago the UK was covered by 1 mile thick ice, and there were glaciers in S Italy and Greece. Thats recent in geological time. What caused those glaciers to melt? Cos it wasnt burning fossil fuels.

Seems our politicians prefer listening to a 16 year old girl than physicists.


here is an article about this - title

Comedy gold. I wonder if you have actually read the paper

good to see a mod and his mate being childish. I thought this was an adult website for reasoned argument.

you haven't offered one...........................

1) reasoned argument requires the arguers to present their facts and be open to challenge about them. Show those graphs over a much shorter timespan and you’ll see the point.

2) this forum is open to all ages. Adult websites have rather a rather different content.

Quite.

I thought this was going to be a reasonable debate. Then I see this in the opening post:

"its a scam by academics, paid by governments, to make conclusions, which the government can then use to justify tax increases."

Oh dear.

Pure kippernomics
 
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E100

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Just because someone is a professor, does not mean they are also experts and should be trusted about anything outside their field. Indeed there is a fairly well recognised pattern that the more specialised in one area someone becomes, the less knowledgeable in other areas they also become.

In this case, the cited professor is actually a professors of Mathematics and nothing at all to do with the climate, weather, chemistry, biology or anything that would indicate any expertise in climate science. Indeed by their own admission, their interests and expertise lie in Maths, applied Maths, Astronomy and Astrophysics. The only area that would have any relevance is the Astronomy and Astrophysics areas in terms of how the sun behaves, but that says literally nothing about how the atmosphere and Climate behave.

The idea that just because someone is an expert in something then they must also be an expert in all sorts of other things is a very dangerous one.

Please note my above post that OP point is largely hogwash. From someone who, whilst I wouldn't claim to be an expert, did study some climate science at a masters level, mathematicians do play a crucial role in climate science, so would at least want to defend their honour in this field. I think you could be on to a good point that we should expect at least one of the authors to be more of peer-reviewed expert in climate science if they were making such a claim. From what I have seen, the paper has actually been grossly misinterpreted by the OP and media and was hijacked by climate skeptics and doesn't directly claim what the OP claims the paper does. The only claim actually made was that 'based on observed statistics and in turn used to build a model it is anticipated that sunspot activity will decrease' with no mention of climate in the paper, let alone the impact upon climate change science. Just another example of fake news...
 

EM2

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I'm reminded of this cartoon:
climate_create_a_better_world_for_nothing.jpg

Banner reads CLIMATE SUMMIT
Screen reads
  • ENERGY INDEPENDENCE
  • PRESERVE RAINFORESTS
  • SUSTAINABILITY
  • GREEN JOBS
  • LIVABLE (sic) CITIES
  • RENEWABLES
  • CLEAN WATER, AIR
  • HEALTHY CHILDREN
  • etc. etc.
An audience member shouts 'What if it's a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?'
 

NoMorePacers

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To be honest, although I am aware that climate change is happening, and I do think that we should act to make our planet better (and being able to breathe cleaner air is nice as well), I do feel it has been a tiny bit exaggerated by people (I doubt that the Earth is going to die in 10 years). Also it doesn’t help that the timescale for when we “need to save the planet” keeps changing. I’ve seen it go from 12 years, to less than 10 years, to something like 5 years in about a month.

Although it’s worth pointing out that there are plenty of both climate fanatics and climate deniers who are insufferable pricks. As with pretty much everything.
 

433N

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Also, you missed a bit off the end of the CO2 graph. Unfortunately my forum competence doesn’t stretch to inserting pictures (and hell I’ve tried to work it out), so you’ll have to make do with the second graph on this link.

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/carbon-dioxide/

Quite. CO2 is now over 400 ppm whereas maximum scale is 300 ppm on the graphs shown ... i.e. we are now off scale by 30%.

You have to remember that to publish, as these 4 are, you have to say something new - although quite what there is left to say about climatic variations with the solar cycle is beyond me. Do we have a link to the original article ? (Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be able to cope). Strangely Prof Valentina Zharkova does not cite it as one of her key publications nor as one of her ''Research Themes and Scholarly Interests" (and I can't be bothered to look out everyone else)
 

cactustwirly

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check out the climate changes over the Quaternary. They have been massive. then tell me the change in the last 150 years is significant. And explain the massive warming that must have ended the ice advances. Ice advances, the evidence I have seen today in Kefalonia.

here is temperature,CO2 (Can you do subscripts on here?) and dust over the last 450 million years. And you are telling me the change since 1870 is significant?

iu

Those graphs are completely meaningless without context
 

ainsworth74

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I'm reminded of this cartoon:

And that's kinda where I've landed on the whole thing really. Climate change is definitely happening and it's probably being influenced either to a greater or lesser extent by human activity. But, from my point of view, even if I were to come down on the side of human activity playing a very small role on climate change why not take the measures described that would attempt to limit the damage? Because just as that cartoon suggests those goals are surely huge positives so who cares if it turns out the science is wrong!? For instance why not try and move towards better public transport and wider adoptions of electric vehicles? Even if the emissions from mass car ownership aren't causing climate change they're still at least harming peoples health and at worst killing them (or shortening their life expectancy). So reducing car ownership and transitioning to electric vehicles is surely still a positive worth striving for?
 

rdeez

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I honestly can't believe that in 2019 this is even a topic of debate, it really is absurd. The evidence is overwhelming. A handful of scientists suggesting otherwise is the climate equivalent of flat earthers.

More than that, even if you are a climate sceptic, many of the solutions to climate change are also solutions to the other big problems facing our planet - we're cutting down rainforests at an alarming rate, and as well as being important carbon sinks, rainforests are also host to thousands of unique species of life and plants.

Fossil fuels aren't just bad for the environment, they're also finite resources, so alternatives are needed regardless. If we stop using them for non-essential purposes sooner (generating electricity, filling our cars) we'll have longer to keep using them for applications where alternatives are hard to come by.

Emissions from vehicles and industry are causing real health issues in our cities, putting people at risk of respiratory conditions and cancers. We need to cut them down to save lives and healthcare expenses, never mind the planet as a whole.

Deny that we're causing climate change if you want to, but we still need to take action for many other reasons.
 

Royston Vasey

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The climate is changing. The rate of that is relatively fast but far from unprecedented. The chances are we’ve probably had something to do with some part of that.

But that said, I do wonder if in a couple of hundred years our contemporary science is considered/proven to be as defective as we now see, say, the treatment of various ailments with leeches for “bad blood”.

We must never consider contemporary science to be the pinnacle and ultimate understanding of anything, because it’s never been the case through human development and there is no reason to believe it’s the case now. And I am a scientist.

But it’s our best guess right now, which is all science ever is, based on sound evidence and experiment.
 

rdeez

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But that said, I do wonder if in a couple of hundred years our contemporary science is considered/proven to be as defective as we now see, say, the treatment of various ailments with leeches for “bad blood”.

That's a non-argument. Leeches in medicine were never based on science. They didn't conduct decades of measurements and surveys, didn't have their work peer reviewed, etc.
 

edwin_m

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In fact leeches (farmed in sterile conditions) are still used in some fields of modern medicine.
 

mac

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I do think that there's a lot of unanswered questions concerning all this, first it was global warming until we had a couple of cold winters then it became climate change, who is paying all the people who say it's due to humans? I agree something is happening 50 years ago I worked on a farm and needed wet weather gear on most days in the winter as far as I remember it's rained 1 day this year, but then nobody will say why the ice melted 10000 years ago when man didn't have anything to do with it. We get told people are dying due to pollution but how many would die from having no heating. We get told our cars are killing us but my diesel has exhausts just as clean as the day I bought it 3 years ago where 10 years ago they wasn't.
 

nlogax

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first it was global warming until we had a couple of cold winters then it became climate change

Both terms are valid, but subtly different.

Global warming = average global temperature rising due to increased greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere
Climate change = the change of climate patterns and events (storms, droughts, etc) over time

In the throes of climate change, local weather systems and patterns may become more extreme - again, over time. It's a common mistake to tie in a cold winter as 'proof that global warming doesn't exist / is a hoax'. Look at the historical trends. Exactly how often are you seeing those cold winters now?
 

Royston Vasey

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That's a non-argument. Leeches in medicine were never based on science. They didn't conduct decades of measurements and surveys, didn't have their work peer reviewed, etc.
You’re picking on the wrong part of the argument. Understanding of science has never stopped evolving and never will. A lot can change and be discovered in centuries based on better understanding and better experimentation. I’m not a climate change denier, but I’m a rational scientist. It would be silly to assume we already understand everything about our vast planet and its mechanisms.
 
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