NOTE. In the seven years since I first published this post about global warming, I have since changed my mind. I believe the decisions we make about our use of energy and fossil fuels affects our planet. The levels of CO2 in our atmosphere affect global temperatures. Rather than delete this post, I have decided to leave it here in the interests of transparency, and to admit that in 2009 I got it wrong. Besides, the un-professional actions of a few academics does not change the science.
Neil. May 2016.
At first I wasn’t sure.
Were humans really heating the planet up through carbon emissions?
I thought perhaps the best thing was to play it safe. Slap a tax on CO2 emissions, and hopefully the planet would be better off.
I have now decided I am a skeptic of Anthropogenic Global Warming. I am not convinced that human activity is increasing the temperature of the planet.
Furthermore I am disgusted at the level of obfuscation and political spin that has crept into the “science” behind this issue as is evidenced by the Email Archives of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia. The scientific process must be an open, peer reviewed process where political spin has nothing to do with the process, where criticism is welcomed and openly debated, and where the data is made available in its entity without editing for all to see. The email archives I allude to show that this has not been happening.
I passionately believe we must reduce pollution and other environmental damage. We must preserve wilderness and bio-diversity. We must put a check on unmitigated development and land clearing. We must develop cleaner and greener ways of producing energy.
But, I don’t think that the government’s plan to impose a new tax on Carbon Dioxide will achieve any of this.
The skeptic in me thinks:
1. The government has borrowed and spent more than was prudent as part of a knee-jerk, poorly targeted stimulus package to try and stem the affects of the Global Financial Crisis.
2. The government needs more money.
3. The tax behind the Emissions Trading Scheme is money for jam – an easy way to raise money, by scaring people into believing that if we don’t pay more tax, the planet is doomed.
4. The government would happily participate in a misinformation campaign to secure future tax revenue.
I will be happy to be proven wrong.