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Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in "CO2 Famine" - Increase "Will Be Good For Mankind"
Inhofe EPW Press Blog ^ | February 25, 2009 | Marc Morano

Posted on 02/25/2009 3:01:49 PM PST by EPW Comm Team

Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in "CO2 Famine" - Increase "Will Be Good For Mankind" Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Posted By Marc Morano – 5:05 PM ET - Marc_Morano@EPW.Senate.Gov

Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in ‘CO2 Famine’

‘The increase of CO2 is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind’

‘Children should not be force-fed propaganda, masquerading as science’

Weblink to Report:

Washington, DC — Award-winning Princeton University Physicist Dr. Will Happer declared man-made global warming fears “mistaken” and noted that the Earth was currently in a “CO2 famine now.” Happer, who has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers, made his remarks during today’s Environment and Public Works Full Committee Hearing entitled “Update on the Latest Global Warming Science.”

“Many people don’t realize that over geological time, we’re really in a CO2 famine now. Almost never has CO2 levels been as low as it has been in the Holocene (geologic epoch) – 280 (parts per million - ppm) – that’s unheard of. Most of the time [CO2 levels] have been at least 1000 (ppm) and it’s been quite higher than that,” Happer told the Senate Committee. To read Happer’s complete opening statement click here: [Also: See 'Consensus' in Collapse: Japanese scientists make 'dramatic break' with UN hypothesis of man-made warming! (UK Register) & $ave the Planet? 'Four climate lobbyists for every member of Congress' – Number of Lobbyists Up 300% & The Year of the Man-made Global Warming Skeptic ]

“Earth was just fine in those times,” Happer added. “The oceans were fine, plants grew, animals grew fine. So it’s baffling to me that we’re so frightened of getting nowhere close to where we started,” Happer explained. Happer also noted that “the number of [skeptical scientists] with the courage to speak out is growing” and he warned “children should not be force-fed propaganda, masquerading as science.” [In December, Happer requested to be added to the groundbreaking U.S. Senate Minority Report Update: More Than 650 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims ]

Happer was pressed by the Committee on whether rising CO2 fears are valid. “I don’t think the laws of nature or physics and chemistry has changed in 80 million years. 80 million years ago the Earth was a very prosperous palace and there is no reason to suddenly think it will become bad now,” Happer added. Happer is a professor in the Department of Physics at Princeton University and former Director of Energy Research at the Department of Energy from 1990 to 1993, has published over 200 scientific papers, and is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the National Academy of Sciences. Happer was reportedly fired by former Vice President Al Gore in 1993 for failing to adhere to Gore’s scientific views.

“I believe that the increase of CO2 is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind,” Happer told the Committee. “What about the frightening consequences of increasing levels of CO2 that we keep hearing about? In a word, they are wildly exaggerated, just as the purported benefits of prohibition were wildly exaggerated,” he explained. “At least 90% of greenhouse warming is due to water vapor and clouds. Carbon dioxide is a bit player,” he added. “But the climate is warming and CO2 is increasing. Doesn’t this prove that CO2 is causing global warming through the greenhouse effect? No, the current warming period began about 1800 at the end of the little ice age, long before there was an appreciable increase of CO2. There have been similar and even larger warmings several times in the 10,000 years since the end of the last ice age. These earlier warmings clearly had nothing to do with the combustion of fossil fuels. The current warming also seems to be due mostly to natural causes, not to increasing levels of carbon dioxide. Over the past ten years there has been no global warming, and in fact a slight cooling. This is not at all what was predicted by the IPCC models,” Happer testified. [Note: See: An abundance of peer-reviewed studies continue to debunk rising CO2 fears ]

“The existence of climate variability in the past has long been an embarrassment to those who claim that all climate change is due to man and that man can control it. When I was a schoolboy, my textbooks on earth science showed a prominent ‘medieval warm period’ at the time the Vikings settled Greenland, followed by a vicious ‘little ice age’ that drove them out. So I was very surprised when I first saw the celebrated ‘hockey stick curve,’ in the Third Assessment Report of the IPCC. I could hardly believe my eyes. Both the little ice age and the Medieval Warm Period were gone, and the newly revised temperature of the world since the year 1000 had suddenly become absolutely flat until the last hundred years when it shot up like the blade on a hockey stick. This was far from an obscure detail, and the hockey stick was trumpeted around the world as evidence that the end was near. We now know that the hockey stick has nothing to do with reality but was the result of incorrect handling of proxy temperature records and incorrect statistical analysis. There really was a little ice age and there really was a medieval warm period that was as warm or warmer than today,” Happer continued.

“The whole hockey-stick episode reminds me of the motto of Orwell’s Ministry of Information in the novel 1984: ‘He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future.’ The IPCC has made no serious attempt to model the natural variations of the earth’s temperature in the past. Whatever caused these large past variations, it was not due to people burning coal and oil. If you can’t model the past, where you know the answer pretty well, how can you model the future?” he stated.

“I keep hearing about the ‘pollutant CO2,’ or about ‘poisoning the atmosphere’ with CO2, or about minimizing our ‘carbon footprint.’ This brings to mind another Orwellian pronouncement that is worth pondering: ‘But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.’ CO2 is not a pollutant and it is not a poison and we should not corrupt the English language by depriving ‘pollutant’ and ‘poison’ of their original meaning. Our exhaled breath contains about 4% CO2. That is 40,000 parts per million, or about 100 times the current atmospheric concentration. CO2 is absolutely essential for life on earth. Commercial greenhouse operators often use CO2 as a fertilizer to improve the health and growth rate of their plants. Plants, and our own primate ancestors evolved when the levels of atmospheric CO2 were about 1000 ppm, a level that we will probably not reach by burning fossil fuels, and far above our current level of about 380 ppm. We try to keep CO2 levels in our U.S. Navy submarines no higher than 8,000 parts per million, about 20 time current atmospheric levels. Few adverse effects are observed at even higher levels.”

More selected Happer excerpts:

“I do not think there is a consensus about an impending climate crisis. I personally certainly don’t believe we are facing a crisis unless we create one for ourselves, as Benjamin Rush did by bleeding his patients. Many others, wiser than I am, share my view. The number of those with the courage to speak out is growing. There may be an illusion of consensus. Like the temperance movement one hundred years ago the climate-catastrophe movement has enlisted the mass media, the leadership of scientific societies, the trustees of charitable foundations, and many other influential people to their cause. Just as editorials used to fulminate about the slippery path to hell behind the tavern door, hysterical op-ed’s lecture us today about the impending end of the planet and the need to stop climate change with bold political action. Many distinguished scientific journals now have editors who further the agenda of climate-change alarmism. Research papers with scientific findings contrary to the dogma of climate calamity are rejected by reviewers, many of whom fear that their research funding will be cut if any doubt is cast on the coming climate catastrophe. Speaking of the Romans, then invading Scotland in the year 83, the great Scottish chieftain Calgacus is quoted as saying “They make a desert and call it peace.” If you have the power to stifle dissent, you can indeed create the illusion of peace or consensus. The Romans have made impressive inroads into climate science. Certainly, it is a bit unnerving to read statements of Dr. James Hansen in the Congressional Record that climate skeptics are guilty of “high crimes against humanity and nature.”

Even elementary school teachers and writers of children’s books are enlisted to terrify our children and to promote the idea of impending climate doom. Having observed the education of many children, including my own, I am not sure how effective the effort will be. Many children seem to do just the opposite of what they are taught. Nevertheless, children should not be force-fed propaganda, masquerading as science. Many of you may know that in 2007 a British Court ruled that if Al Gore’s book, “An Inconvenient Truth,” was used in public schools, the children had to be told of eleven particularly troubling inaccuracies. You can easily find a list of the inaccuracies on the internet, but I will mention one. The court ruled that it was not possible to attribute hurricane Katrina to CO2. Indeed, had we taken a few of the many billions of dollars we have been spending on climate change research and propaganda and fixed the dykes and pumps around the New Orleans, most of the damage from Hurricane Katrina could have been avoided.

To read complete opening statement click here:

#

Prominent Scientist Fired By Gore Says Warming Alarm ‘Mistaken’

U.S. Senate Minority Report Update: More Than 650 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims

# # #


TOPICS: Politics; Science
KEYWORDS: climatechange; globalwarming

1 posted on 02/25/2009 3:01:49 PM PST by EPW Comm Team
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To: EPW Comm Team

hoo ha

no Nobel prize for this guy
No govt funding for his research either


2 posted on 02/25/2009 3:07:12 PM PST by silverleaf (Freedom's just another word for "nothing left to lose")
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To: EPW Comm Team

Thanks. My 5th grade daughter is working on a poster-board presentation outlining the case against anthropogenic global warming. One more scientist’s name to google search and review his materials.


3 posted on 02/25/2009 3:09:35 PM PST by 21twelve
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To: EPW Comm Team

I’ll patiently await AndyJackson’s reply.


4 posted on 02/25/2009 3:12:11 PM PST by lefty-lie-spy (Stay metal. For the Horde \m/("_")\m/)
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To: 21twelve

Check Out Fred Singer
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/warming/debate/singer.html
http://www.nationalcenter.org/KyotoSingerTestimony2000.html


5 posted on 02/25/2009 3:12:35 PM PST by silverleaf (Freedom's just another word for "nothing left to lose")
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To: EPW Comm Team
we’re really in a CO2 famine now

Still Bush's fault.

6 posted on 02/25/2009 3:19:40 PM PST by bgill
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To: 21twelve

You appear to be a VERY wise parent, too.

Best wishes!!!


7 posted on 02/25/2009 3:22:22 PM PST by fishtank (RINOs: Stuck inside of the GOP like spackle or paste. (We need a cleansing.))
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To: EPW Comm Team; Genesis defender; proud_yank; FrPR; enough_idiocy; Desdemona; rdl6989; ...
 




Beam me to Planet Gore !

8 posted on 02/25/2009 3:25:54 PM PST by steelyourfaith (How many face lifts were required before the Speaker began speaking from her anal orifice?)
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To: fishtank

I’m a geophysicist, while not the “whole earth” type, still know enough about it (and geology) to know that the earth changes over time. And with no help from us.

I think a large part of why people get sucked into it is their humanistic viewpoint of the world. Man is all powerful, and we have the power to hurt - or save - the earth. One would think that a relatively small event such as Hurricane Katrina would show the fallacy of that.


9 posted on 02/25/2009 3:35:24 PM PST by 21twelve
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To: EPW Comm Team
Scientist Tells Congress: Earth in "CO2 Famine" - Increase "Will Be Good For Mankind"

These silly scientists just don't get it. More important than what's good for mankind, the global warming fraud is great for the government.

It allows huge new taxes and fees, along with totalitarian control of every aspect of our lives. After all, if you control what's good for the "environment" you have dominion over everything in universe.

10 posted on 02/25/2009 3:57:09 PM PST by RJL
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To: EPW Comm Team

Heretic! Burn him at the Stake!

Pray for America


11 posted on 02/25/2009 4:19:08 PM PST by bray (Welcome to the USSA!)
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To: 21twelve

Sounds interesting! My son came home with an assignment to do an informational poster on.... Bill Clinton.... oh how hard did I have to check myself from putting a Monica Pic on that thing.... omg... so I guided my son to his fund raising for Katrina victims... LOL


12 posted on 02/25/2009 4:31:20 PM PST by Danae (Amerikan Unity My Ass)
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To: EPW Comm Team
Indeed, had we taken a few of the many billions of dollars we have been spending on climate change research and propaganda and fixed the dykes and pumps around the New Orleans, most of the damage from Hurricane Katrina could have been avoided.

Indeed! File this under Government Fraud and Waste.

13 posted on 02/25/2009 6:01:55 PM PST by TigersEye (This is the age of the death of reason.)
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To: 21twelve
Thanks. My 5th grade daughter is working on a poster-board presentation outlining the case against anthropogenic global warming. One more scientist’s name to google search and review his materials.

If she will do some research on photosynthesis in plants she will learn that plants are carbon starved. In fact some plants developed a new mechanism to cope with low c02 levels.
14 posted on 02/25/2009 6:31:46 PM PST by PeterPrinciple ( Seeking the truth here folks.)
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To: PeterPrinciple

Thanks for the comment on plants. Found this searching for more info. FYI and self-ping: here’s a site that seems to be FULL of various articles, etc.

http://www.co2science.org/index.php


15 posted on 02/25/2009 9:35:16 PM PST by 21twelve
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To: EPW Comm Team

“Straw Man” arguments (false or misleading representations of your opponents’ views), and “Red Herring” arguments (raising an issue that is irrelevant and distracting from the matter under debate) seem to comprise the bulk of right wing analysis of issues in these intellectually impoverished times. Thus, the litany of Straw Men and Red Herrings arguments in Happer’s testimony provides a hint that his viewpoints are based on politics, not on science. Sure enough... The scientific arguments he makes are mostly irrelevant, if not wrong. Moreover, he reveals no understanding of the scientific evidence that anthropogenic CO2 has caused recent warming, and doesn’t even attempt to disprove this theory, other than by innuendo. Indeed, Haffer has no professional qualifications in this field. Rather, he uses the status of his position as physics professor at Princeton to promote his biased political views. Shame on Happer. Embarrassment for Princeton.
Haffer’s statements about CO2 are fundamentally irrelevant. Beyond this, he also indulges in paranoic rants and ad hominem attacks against fellow scientists.
Anyone unable to recognize the Red Herrings and Straw Men needs some fundamental education on climate change... starting with an OPEN MIND. (One clue, by the way, is that we’re living in the Holocene not the Cretaceous. It’s interesting that CO2 levels were higher in the Cretaceous... but the relevance of this would be....???? What?) I realize that there are legions of politically-motivated zealots running around claiming to understand climate science better than climate scientists do.... Stunning arrogance! But a professor at Princeton?
Nothing less than shameful.


16 posted on 02/27/2009 11:34:15 AM PST by ImACoalMan (Stamp out Straw Men; Gill-net the Red Herring)
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To: EPW Comm Team

HISTORICAL BTTT!


17 posted on 02/27/2009 12:29:36 PM PST by Pagey (B. Hussein Obama has no experience running anything, except his pedestrian mouth.)
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