Archive for February, 2024

Published by paulmacrae on 02 Feb 2024

Is CO2 the ‘control knob’ of temperature, as orthodox climate science teaches? Answer: no

Over recent and deep geological time, when temperature and carbon dioxide are correlated, temperature is the ‘control knob’ of CO2, not vice-versa

By Paul MacRae, Feb. 2, 2024

The basic theory underlying orthodox climate science is that the global temperature is highly sensitive to changes in carbon-dioxide levels. This is sometimes called the “control-knob” theory.1 If CO2 increases, so does temperature. If CO2 falls, so does temperature, more or less in lock-step—CO2 is the “control knob” of temperature.

And since we are in a “warming” world, and because CO2 levels are also going up—in other words, because temperature and CO2 levels appear to be correlated—orthodox climate science accepts that they are correlated—in fact, strongly correlated, as we’ll see. To stop this apparently dangerous warming, then, the climate scientist’s solution is to turn the “control knob” of carbon dioxide down by restricting carbon emissions in various ways, including phasing out CO2-emitting fossil fuels, thereby stifling economic growth and activity.

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  1. Andrew A. Lacis et al., “Atmospheric CO2: Principal Control Knob Governing Earth’s Temperature.” Science, Oct. 15, 2010, pp. 356-359. Available online but often behind a pay wall, although there are repostings on some public websites. For a summary of Lacis’s paper see https://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2010/11/03/guest-post-co2-the-thermostat-that-controls-earth%e2%80%99s-temperature-by-andy-lacis/. ↩

Climate realism

Published by paulmacrae on 01 Feb 2024

Neo-Malthusian pessimism, not ‘science’, is behind claims of a ‘climate crisis’

With a bit of research, Victoria radio host could educate local listeners on the follies of the Liberal government’s ‘anti-growth’ policies

By Paul MacRae, January 28, 2024

A local Victoria, B.C., radio talk-show host had some doubts about a recent caller’s argument that Canadian Maurice Strong was behind the environmental-crisis movement and, by implication, behind the “climate crisis” movement as well.

In other words, the caller was suggesting that these movements are not based on solid “science,” as we’re told, but on an anti-growth ideology rooted in Strong’s “neo-Malthusian” thinking—the view that modern civilization cannot survive affluence and will soon run out of resources, although this view has been largely disproved by facts. For example, in his 1968 book The Population Bomb, neo-Malthusian biologist Paul Ehrlich predicted:

The battle to feed humanity is over. In the 1970s the world will undergo famines—hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate.1.

Needless to say (since billions of us are still here and being fed), Ehrlich’s prediction, and all his other predictions of doom, have been totally discredited.

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  1. Ehrlich, The Population Bomb. New York: Ballantine Books, 1969 (1968), p. 11 ↩

Climate realism