Guest Column
Straight Facts On Climate Change
T
he Jewish News previously fea-
tured a guest column challenging
the scientific consensus about our
planet's changing climate ("What Is Settled
Science?" June 26, page 43, by Irving
Ginsberg, Ph.D., a retired chief scientist
for the U.S. Department of Energy Remote
Sensing Laboratory in Las Vegas.) Here
are the facts from a meteorologist.
The author began by saying climate
change is basically the flavor of the day,
and that 40 years ago, all the talk was
about global cooling. Here's the fact: a
now-famous 1977 Time magazine cover
story (appearing as a result of some harsh
winters) suggested that Earth was head-
ing into a phase of cooling. This got the
public thinking that maybe we were, but
many climate scientists knew this wasn't
the case.
The author also challenged the widely
cited figure that 97 percent of the world's
climate scientists form a consensus about
the planet's warming and its proximate
cause.
I have had the unique privilege of
knowing and interviewing some of the
world's most eminent climate scientists,
both through a six-year chairmanship of
the American Meteorological Society's
Committee on the Station Scientist as well
as through travel to Europe (most recently,
this past April I was in Paris to interview
two prominent climate scientists, and two
years ago I was in Geneva, where I inter-
viewed the Secretary General of the World
Meteorological Organization, a specialized
agency of the United Nations).
I have asked countless scientists over
the past 25 years about the scientific con-
sensus on this subject, and I can tell you
without any reservation whatsoever that
the vast majority of the world's climate
scientists agree that our planet is warming
and that the proximate cause is human
activity.
If you are old enough to remember
when medical studies linking smoking
to various diseases and medical condi-
tions started coming out, you may recall
there were a number of doctors who
disagreed. (Some of the most
prominent ones, by the way,
were being paid by cigarette
companies!) Over time, an
overwhelming balance of
medical evidence proved that
smoking did indeed lead to
these conditions.
Are there scientists who dis-
agree about our planet's warm-
ing? Of course there are. Could
the number of climate scien-
tists who agree be different
than 97 percent? Possibly. But
the same 2013 paper that the author ref-
erenced says in no uncertain terms that,
of all research papers appearing in peer-
reviewed scientific journals that expressed
a position on human-caused global warm-
ing, 97.1 percent agreed about the human
impact. It's way too much of a coincidence
that this 97.1 percent figure is the same
as the 97 percent figure cited in the 2009
paper that he criticizes.
In fact, the 2013 paper goes on to say
that "Our analysis indicates that the num-
ber of papers rejecting the consensus on
(human-caused climate change) is a van-
ishingly small proportion of the published
research"
Next, the author tried to minimize the
importance of carbon dioxide and other
greenhouse gases by saying that they are
such a small percentage of the composi-
tion of our atmosphere.
Ask any scientist if humans have
changed the composition of Earth's
atmosphere, and the answer is a resound-
ing yes. Ice core data supplies us with a
detailed record of our planet's atmospheric
composition going back at least 800,000
years. If you look at every
single graph or chart showing
atmospheric composition over
the past 800,000 years, you
see an exponential increase in
greenhouse gases starting with
the industrial revolution in the
1880s and continuing through
the present.
It is also documented fact
that atmospheric levels of
carbon dioxide are well above
the highest level ever recorded
in those 800,000 years (and
continuing to rise). Basic thermodynam-
ics show that significantly changing the
amount of greenhouse gases in a planet's
atmosphere causes a change in its average
temperature.
By the way, if you don't believe that such
a small amount of gases in our atmosphere
can change Earth's temperature, think
about how little pepper you need to add
to an omelet to add significant flavor. The
potency of those little bits of pepper is like
the potency of carbon dioxide, methane
and nitrous oxide in our atmosphere.
Next, the author challenged the climate
models themselves, saying that things
like clouds are difficult to program into
the models (he also neglected to mention
atmospheric aerosols, which are also dif-
ficult to model). The author is correct in
stating that the models are not perfect.
However, what the author either did not
know or preferred not to tell you is that
the climate scientists have made great
progress in climate model research. Some
of the more recent models have actually
done quite well in tests with past data
seeing if they can "predict" the warming
that has already occurred in the past 100
years. If a model can successfully replicate
the past 100 years, then it has some pre-
dictive value for the future.
Climate scientists are working hard to
untangle the complicated web of climate
prediction, and most of them do not
have an agenda, except to find answers.
Politicians argue about the policy rami-
fications of our warming climate as they
should (that's their job), but there is a big
difference between science and politics.
What you need to know is that, as
much as the politicians disagree about
this, climate scientists worldwide are
mostly in agreement that our planet is
warming, and that the proximate cause is
human activity.
The American Meteorological Society
recently published an outstanding state-
ment about climate change as a public and
policy issue, which includes the latest sci-
ence. Read it at http://bit.ly/UxDLCB .
❑
Paul H. Gross, C.C.M., of Farmington Hills is a
Certified Consulting Meteorologist who has
been a meteorologist at WDIV-TV for the past
31 years. He is a court-qualified expert in
meteorology. He also is co-president of Temple
Kol Ami in West Bloomfield. The opinions
expressed here are the author's own.
Editorial
Tunnels Of Terror Must Be Eradicated
W
hile Jews everywhere were
about to gather for Rosh
Hashanah, Hamas was
going to tunnel terrorists into Israel to
kill and kidnap as many Israelis as pos-
sible. It would have been a resounding
show of carnage and contempt, with
Jews as the central target.
Thank God Israeli security forces,
acting on information gleaned in inter-
rogations of captured Hamas fighters,
foiled the mega-attack. Hamas puts
no value on human life as evidenced
by deploying its own people as human
shields against Israeli air strikes in
the latest border war.
In the dead of night on or near
Sept. 24, Hamas plotted to move ter-
rorists through the 31 tunnels discov-
ered by the Israeli Defense Forces in
late July. The terrorists then would
have infiltrated six southern Israeli
communities, all sparsely populated
and lightly guarded. Tunnels were
stocked with tranquilizers, handcuffs,
ropes and other items useful in sub-
duing civilians and detaining soldiers.
Heavily armed terrorists would
have pressed on until capturing or
killing their quarry or until they had
been cut down. Islamists consider it
"martyrdom" for Allah, or high honor,
if they die while seeking to murder or
maim "infidels" — in this case, Jews.
Islamists are fundamentalist political
terrorists as opposed to Muslims who
practice Islam the religion.
Discovery of the Rosh Hashanah
plot reinforced in the minds of Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
and his Security Cabinet, their previ-
ous wavering aside, that they can't
accept a complete cease-fire until
Hamas' destructive tunnel network
leading from the Hamas-controlled
Gaza Strip into Israel is destroyed.
They now understand the gravity of
the conflict and what Israeli journal-
ist Caroline Glick described as "the
imperative of winning — however
defined."
A battle stoppage should not pre-
empt Israel from cutting off under-
ground passage for Hamas terror-
mongers.
For Israel, the high number of civil-
ian deaths from its sky strikes in Gaza
population hubs remains a public rela-
tions nightmare. Complicating a quick
resolution is the strategy of Hamas
urging Gazans to stand their ground,
certainly to exact world sympathy as
the death toll mounts, rather than flee
even as Israel pre-announces aerial
targets.
Addressing the troubling number of
civilian casualties, however, shouldn't
keep Israel's high command from
seeking to blow up or seal Hamas'
tunnels.
Trench warfare has its roots in
medieval times; it gained prominence
during World War I. Each Hamas tun-
nel costs upwards of $1 million to
build — money not spent on food, shel-
ter, hospitals or schools.
❑
August 7 • 2014
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