any role? I'm still plunking my guess at the human role in global warming somewhere less than 50% – I'll say maybe 30-40%?? The problem is, we'll never really know. So, wouldnt it be safer just to cut those darn greenhouse gases and move on? Wind, water, solar are clean, getting cheaper and COULD help the planet – why not take the chance and be helpful!!?? Next year I'm installing my own windmill, still attached to the grid to get a return on my investment when the meter goes backwards, doubling my insulation to cut my natural gas usage, and bought a cash for clunkers electric ford focus hybrid – going from 11mpg in my ford E350 van (circa 1993) to 45mpg should save thousands of gallons of gas per year and $$ in my pocket. Do your part people, it COULD save the earth, and if it doesnt it will save you $$ anyway and give you a good feeling about doing your part to help just a bit in our big wonderful world.

Thanks for the comments!

The post was made with regard to whether climate change (be it real or imagined) would be a real threat to America’s national security. I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that the droughts, floods, and massive geographic and topographical changes that would come as a result of climate change would affect our national security, both by drawing us into foreign conflicts and by affecting our own national defenses by weakening our infrastructure.

I suppose all of this does depend on a belief in the veracity of the threat posed by climate change, and our own agency in its onset. I can’t make the case any better than Al Gore/Thomas Friedman/T Boone Pickens, and it seems to me that if you aren’t convinced by the information that’s out there already, you don’t want to be convinced

The difficulty is that the issue is so vehemently split between political dogmas that no one is really willing to listen to the other side. Liberals tend to exaggerate the current dangers/effects of climate change (“It’s too late!”) and conservatives tend to downplay it (“It’s all a lie!”).

The term climate change has been used for decades but the term global warming gained popularity in the media because the climate change most of concern to the average person was about temperature. Climate change refers to all changes – temperature, precipitation amounts and intensities, snowfall amounts, average heating/cooling degree days, etc…
It is not a hoax, it is not a democratic assult on your freedoms, it is not a waste to continue to try to predict the consequences of continuing to put greenhouse gases into the environment.
First of all, weather is weather and the day to day variations in temperature and precipitation are large. The long term signal is buried deep in those day to day changes. Climate is the long term averaging of these day to day changes. I liken it to a river flowing. If you notice the flow of the river, at an instant a given volume of water may not be flowing straight downstream…it may be flowing slightly cross stream, it may flow upstream in an eddy, etc… This is weather. But I darn well know the water is going downstream on average. If I do something that by simple processes will warm the earth, I know on a long term average, it will cause a warming signal.
The NWS does track day to day weather and although there has been some cooling in the summer in July in west Michigan for example. But it is more than offset by winter time warming. Glaciers are shrinking and Al Gore didn't discover that, scientists did. Permafrost is melting all over the northern hemisphere, most of the warmest years on record included proxy records (use one measurement that is proportional to temperature such as oxygen isotope in ice cores, tree rings measurement, etc..) has occurred in recent decades. We have records now going back hundreds of thousands of years and we know we are in a pretty warm period and although we should be getting cooler on average, we are not. Globally, we are getting warmer. There is no doubt of that. If you really want to deny it, get educated in climate science, produce something worthy of publication in peer reviewed journals, and then you will convince me that you are smarter than the highly educated, data producing, scientists that are working in this field every day.
A homework problem in geophysical fluids courses or undergrad weather courses is to compute the surface temperature of the earth using a simple 1D radiative heat transfer model and this homework problem can be done by hand. Depending on which model (one layer, two layer, or n-layer model) you can get a good approximation. Computer models help determine the overall changes to temperature and precipitation for a 3D world with uneven land and oceans. Increase the concentration of CO2 and you get a warmer Earth. It really isn't that hard to understand the basic concept. CO2 is on the rise due to man's changes in land use and burning fossil fuels. CO2 doesn't transmit infrared radiation very well hence the more of it, the less IR is send into space and the warmer earth's surface temperature becomes.
Excess CO2 that doesn't go into the atmosphere can go into the ocean causing the observed increases in acidity that is going to be an issue in the coming decades.
What is the problem folks with attempting to mitigate this? Don't want to spend money now, fine. Spend more later. Afterall, it is just the money and life style changes of those living in the late 21st century and 22nd centuries that are going to be greatly impacted. Screw our kids and grandkids right? Our parents and grandparents and great grandparents caused our current problem with climate change. The difference is that they had no idea until recently that this was the fault of the modern industrial lifestyle. Now we know and we are irresponsible if we don't take action. Sorry gang, it might actually take money to fix. God knows those in denial aren't going to make the changes themselves and those with a vested interested in seeing this legislation fail certainly aren't going to change their ways.