Rik wrote:Does anyone really deny that increased CO2 increases temperature?
I don't know any climate sceptics who think like that. It is a scientific fact that CO2 raises overall global temperatures (although local differences have also been recorded). It is also, as the Earth's own geological record shows beyond all doubt, the case that runaway CO2 can lead to calamitous results. Again, I have never read or heard a sceptical voice that takes issue with any of that. Nobody I consider a sceptic has ever doubted that mankind's activities on this planet contribute to overall CO2 emissions. That's also an unavoidable known fact.
So the issue is never about 'climate change', as media has it. Climate change happens. It always has, always will. It's happening right now.
The issue sceptics have is the with the notion of 'Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming'. That's not the same as 'climate change', but the media insist on reporting CAGW as 'climate change' perhaps because they're lazy, or perhaps because they're deliberately misinforming. Sadly, many respected scientists and academics, eager to promote their alarmist agendas, also play this game of semantics, in the full knowledge that they will never be called-out on their falsehood.
Doubting 'climate change' is a redundant gesture. Likewise, the fact mankind contributes a very negligible amount of CO2 into the Earth's atmosphere. We know these things. What we don't know - and the IPCC would be first to admit this (and have, often) - is where the incontrovertible evidence is for 'catastrophic' man-made climate change actually is, if anywhere at all. Some think it's in the clouds, some think it's in the oceans, some think it's in the sun and some think it's in the cosmic rays. And some really don't think it's anything to worry about at all.
So far, nobody - anywhere, ever - has come up with the smoking gun on that one. But the way the CAGW bandwagon's rolling you'd be forgiven for thinking otherwise. It's a common enough misconception.