Thursday, March 31, 2016

Falling Seas and Red Queens

Science operates by making testable predictions. If those predictions don't come to pass the theory which generates them begins to teeter. Too many unfulfilled predictions and the theory is considered to be falsified and is discarded. Proponents of the theory of global warming have made at least two predictions which, according to some scientific observers, have failed to bear fruit.

The first prediction, made back in the 1990s, was that global temperatures would continue to rise sharply and catastrophically if nothing were done to limit greenhouse gasses. Since then nothing much has been done to limit those emissions but nevertheless the average global temperature hasn't shown any significant change in about 17 years.

The second prediction was that sea levels would rise throughout this century. Well, the century isn't over, of course, but so far it doesn't look good for that prediction either. According to a pair of charts at Real Science, sea levels at Atlantic City, NJ and Manhattan, NY have both been dropping since at least 2009.

This doesn't mean that global warming isn't going to be a long-term trend - it may be - but it does show that the science on this is far from "settled". It also shows that the calls from some quarters to punish, prosecute, and persecute those who are skeptical of the claims of the global warming proponents by firing them from their jobs or even throwing them in prison are not only the sort of thing one expects to hear in fascist dictatorships but are also based on an inexcusable attempt to make science serve a left-wing ideology.

These people, who would shut down dissent by force and intimidation, who demand that people be punished for disagreeing with the conclusions that global warming proponents infer from the data, remind one of the fatuous and cruel Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland demanding that anyone who displeases her have their heads cut off: