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There are some relevant facts that can be said with great certainty. There is ample archaeological evidence that the planet's average temp has always fluctuated. The climate has never been static. Another fact, which doesn't require a high school diploma to see and understand much less a PHD, is that planetary temps have remained within a range that allows life to flourish since life began here.

With those two facts in hand it borders on a level of stupid that needs to be hospitalized to say that a temp fluctuation of one or two degrees is something of evidential significance.

Regarding temperature change of a few degrees:

1. The AGW position was formerly the hockey stick position; that global temperature had been remarkably contrast for more than a thousand years prior to the industrial revolution. As you point out, this has been massively contradicted.

2. The problem with acknowledging that there is natural variation is clearly that this is a complex problem and nobody really knows. So, why is this such an urgent thing that countries are willing to sacrifice 30 percent of global GDP which, with the redistribution of the wealth part of Kyoto, forcing the people of the advanced economies of the world to bear the brunt of this reduction? It is because of the conjecture that global temperature is regulated by a stable equilibrium. That is, that once global temperature rises past a critical level, we will head to the state of Venus; and, conversely, if global temperature were to fall past a critical level, we would head to the state of Mars.

3. This conjecture cannot be proved true or false unless we conduct the experiment and the theoretical possibility that it true means we have to do whatever it takes, including population control, to avoid the experiment.

4. But, this is all hokum. Because this planet is populated by a rather intelligent and resourceful species, were we to notice the temperature spiraling upward, we would do whatever we had to to arrest the trend. Indeed, this is what we’ve been doing the past 30 years or so, since the alarmists shifted from being afraid of global cooling to being afraid of global warming. It is only because the rise of temperature has stopped, that the alarmist position has become something of an embarrassment. But, let’s do the thought experiment. What if global temperature had continued to rise these past 15 years? What if the Arctic ice pack had disappeared? What if the Himalaya became denuded of their snow caps?

5. As it is, I think if the AGW theory continued to appear to be true, the most efficient way to deal with it would be to build nuclear power plants (for electricity) and then piping the condensed steam inland so as to irrigate the vast deserts of the world (in Australia, southwestern U.S., Saudi Arabia and the Sahara) and plant trees to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. But, hey, what do I know?

Another fact, which doesn't require a high school diploma to see and understand much less a PHD, is that planetary temps have remained within a range that allows life to flourish since life began here.

Here are a couple more facts for you: 1) There is much less atmospheric CO2 than there was a billion years ago. The geologic record suggests that CO2 used to be in the percent range, not the current parts per million range.

2) Some scientists have predicted that life will go extinct as a result of CO2 disappearance within 100 million to billion years. (I have more details in my profile.)