Sixteen scientists took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal Friday to argue that there is “no compelling scientific argument” for “drastic actions on global warming.”
According to the group, made up of scientists from around the world, while there has been a concerted campaign to incite concern and action to stop climate change, the science is not coming together in a fashion that would warrant economy-stifling changes.
“The lack of warming for more than a decade—indeed, the smaller-than-predicted warming over the 22 years since the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) began issuing projections—suggests that computer models have greatly exaggerated how much warming additional CO2 can cause,” they wrote. “Faced with this embarrassment, those promoting alarm have shifted their drumbeat from warming to weather extremes, to enable anything unusual that happens in our chaotic climate to be ascribed to CO2.”
In these scientists’ opinion, Carbon Dioxide is not a pollutant, but rather a key necessity for life — spurring the growth of plant life.
The group further condemned the climate of fear that has acted to trample dissenting view points of the “global warming is a crisis” message.
“Although the number of publicly dissenting scientists is growing, many young scientists furtively say that while they also have serious doubts about the global-warming message, they are afraid to speak up for fear of not being promoted—or worse,” they wrote.
So why is the scientific community so intent on stoking fear over global warming, when the science is not jibing with their conclusions? According to the Wall Street Journal Sixteen, it all boils down to money.
“Alarmism over climate is of great benefit to many, providing government funding for academic research and a reason for government bureaucracies to grow,” they wrote. “Alarmism also offers an excuse for governments to raise taxes, taxpayer-funded subsidies for businesses that understand how to work the political system, and a lure for big donations to charitable foundations promising to save the planet. Lysenko and his team lived very well, and they fiercely defended their dogma and the privileges it brought them.”
The scientists conclude by urging candidates for public office to buck the trend and look at global warming claims with a skeptical eye.
“There is no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to “decarbonize” the world’s economy,” they wrote. “Even if one accepts the inflated climate forecasts of the IPCC, aggressive greenhouse-gas control policies are not justified economically.”
The article was signed by Claude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris; J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting; Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University; Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society; Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences; William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton; Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.; William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology; Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT; James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University; Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences; Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne; Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator; Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service; Antonino Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.
