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[[Image:Composite antarctic NASA.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A composite map of [[Antarctica]] showing areas of greatest warming in red, other colors indicate cooling. The Wilkins Ice Shelf lies off the peninsula in the top left corner, and shows extensive warming. Overall, Antarctica shows more cooling than warming, especially in the east, the area to the right.]]
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'''Global warming''', scientifically speaking, is a worldwide increase in atmospheric temperature. What's really interesting is what causes it: i.e., is it more due to natural causes or man-made activity (see [[Global warming theory]]). This type of [[climate change]] is seen as a period of increases in global temperature, which is alternating with periods of [[global cooling]], and is a natural occurrence as part of an interval [[warming trend]] which has occurred multiple times throughout [[Earth|Earth's]] geological history.<ref>"After any given warming phase begins, thousands of years later the cyclical [[Milankovitch]] decrease in the sun's heat kicks in. The warming stops, reverses and an [[ice age]] ensues." [http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn06092007.html Counterpunch], June 2007</ref>  [[Liberal]] claims of global warming led to the resignation in October 2010 by Professor Hal Lewis from The American Physical Society because of "the [[global warming]] scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. '''It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist'''."<ref>http://thegwpf.org/ipcc-news/1670-hal-lewis-my-resignation-from-the-american-physical-society.html</ref>
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Many political activists use the term '''"global warming"''' to refer the [[anthropogenic global warming theory]] (AGW), which asserts that human activity such as spewing "[[greenhouse gases]]" is causing more temperature increase than all natural causes combined. The AGW theory is supported by left-leaning political parties, as well as a majority of sovereign states, national agencies, and an intergovernmental panel (see [[IPCC]]). The reality is that there is no global crisis, despite dire warning by the UN's [[Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]] (IPCC). Predictions made by [[climate model]]s publicized by the IPCC have not come to pass, and the climate has shown a mild cooling since 1995.<ref>http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-7715-Portland-Civil-Rights-Examiner~y2009m8d18-Carbon-Dioxide-irrelevant-in-climate-debate-says-MIT-Scientist</ref>
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In November 2009, emails were disclosed that demonstrated wrongful manipulation and concealment of data by scientists who have insisted that there is dangerous man-made global warming. Prior to [[ClimateGate]], both the Republican and Democratic party Platforms in 2008 suggested that global warming is happening, that it is caused by human activity, and that it should be counteracted. For example, in 2007, the Republican presidential candidate Senator [[John McCain]] called global warming "an issue we can no longer afford to ignore".<ref>[http://www.ontheissues.org/domestic/John_McCain_Environment.htm]</ref>
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The idea of dangerous anthropogenic (man-made) global warming (AGW) is promoted by liberals and socialists seeking greater government control over the production and use of energy, which is a substantial percentage of the economy. In economic terms, they would like to 'internalize' the 'externality,' which is to say that they think that producers of emissions should be directly connected to the consequences of those emissions, leading syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer to warn of an impending ''Environmental Shakedown''.<ref>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/printpage/?url=http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/12/11/copenhagen_shakedown.html</ref> The unsuccessful Democratic candidate for President in 2000, [[Al Gore]], won a [[Nobel Prize]] in 2007 for claiming that there is a dangerous man-made global warming that threatens the world.  Neither he nor his supporters admit that a rapid cooling in temperatures is being observed.
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Numerous scientists, especially those outside of university faculties, have been critical of anthropogenic global warming, but their general lack of comparative credentials has led to agreement that, among authorities in scientific disciplines, there is a "[[scientific consensus]]" supporting their theory for greater government control. Global warming skeptics question whether there is a financial incentive for supporting research.<ref>[http://www.seattlepi.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=t&refer=http://www.seattlepi.com/opinion/336889_climatepolicy26.html Pual Chesser,
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''Be wary of climate policy development'', Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Act. 25, 2007]</ref> Global warming skeptics charge that on most college campuses criticism of it is silenced or censored, and provide evidence of scientists skeptical of AGW being repressed.<ref>http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/1782/</ref><ref>http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=102031</ref>
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Temperatures have been decreasing rapidly throughout this decade (as of 2009).  Historically, natural periods of global warming and global cooling have alternated, and not long ago liberals were demanding more government control to combat an alleged cooling in temperatures, with some scientists warning of a possible ice age.<ref>''Science: Another Ice Age?'' Time magazine, Monday, Jun. 24, 1974</ref>
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In 2008 86 evangelical pastors, including Rev. Dr.[[Rick Warren]] signed a statement titled "Climate Change: An Evangelical Call to Action", which called on Christians to acknowledge the moral importance of action to counteract man - made climate change. the statement includes specific support for market - based CO2 reductions such as a cap - and  - trade program.<ref>[http://christiansandclimate.org/]</ref> In contrast, a group of evangelical scholars, comprised of scientists, economists and theologians, contend that the liberal view of pending catastrophe caused by climate change is  misleading and/or exaggerated.<ref>[http://www.christianpost.com/article/20091204/evangelicals-push-back-against-climate-change-hoax/pageall.html ''Evangelicals Push Back Against Global Warming Doom'',  Dec. 04 2009, christianpost.com]</ref>
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==Presence of CO2==
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One of the primary concerns of Global Warming research is the increased presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Original claims stated that the increase in carbon dioxide - which is a greenhouse gas - were caused primarily through the burning of [[fossil fuels]], and that such increases were the foremost cause of global temperatures rising. However, recent research has shown that the average global temperature and carbon dioxide do have a relationship, but that the relationship is the other way around. Global temperature changes precede changes in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, leading to the increasing belief amongst the skeptical science community that global temperatures are causing carbion dioxide to increase in the atmosphere. <ref> [http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-lags-temperature.htm]</ref>
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The most obvious way that this would occur would be through the evaporation of ocean water. The oceans are the single largest storage unit for carbon dioxide gas on the planet, containing about 93% of the Earth's carbon dioxide. <ref> [http://www.waterencyclopedia.com/Bi-Ca/Carbon-Dioxide-in-the-Ocean-and-Atmosphere.html] </ref> As temperatures rise, ocean water evaporates, causing the dissolved carbon dioxide gas to enter the atmosphere, and begin trapping radiation from the sun. Scientists now believe that this cycle causes a sort of chain effect, where increased temperature causes more carbon dioxide to enter the atmosphere, which in turn causes more temperature rise. However, this discredits the idea that human contributions to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are significant enough to affect global climate change.
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It is also noteworthy to point out that carbon dioxide, while not as abundant in the atmosphere, has a more significant effect on global warming than water vapor does. Carbon dioxide cannot form clouds, as water vapor does. When water vapor forms clouds, those clouds actually block some of the sun's radiation from reaching the Earth, causing water vapor to both contribute positively and negatively to global temperature rise. Carbon dioxide can only act as a greenhouse gas, causing the above mentioned cyclic effect.
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==The Modern Warm Period==
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The Average [[Earth]] surface air temperature has risen about 1° F since 1970.
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<ref>Hansen's group at the Goddard Institute wrote, "Global warming is now 0.6&nbsp;°C [1.0&nbsp;°F] in the past three decades and 0.8&nbsp;°C [1.4&nbsp;°F] in the past century." http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2005/</ref> Studies have ruled out the possibility that errors in the measurements and sampling significantly affect the temperature trends detected over the past century. This accounts for spatial errors in the sampling and thus also incorporates errors associated with the urban-heating effect. According to Karl et al. (1993) ''"Results imply that the errors associated with century-scale trends of temperature are probably an order of magnitude smaller than the observed global warming of nearly 0.5°C per 100 years since the late nineteenth century"'' <ref>http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1994JCli....7.1144K Karl et al. (1993) 'Global and Hemispheric Temperature Trends: Uncertainties Related to Inadequate Spatial Sampling' in Journal of Climate, 7(7); 1144 - 1168</ref>
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According to temperature reconstruction made within an [[Old Earth]] paradigm, there have been many cycles of naturally-caused global warming and cooling over many millions of years (see [[climate cycles]]). Some scientists, including [[Richard Lindzen]] of [[MIT]], [[Sallie Baliunas]] of [[Harvard]] and [[Fred Singer]] (independent), say that the recent warming could be part of another natural cycle or random fluctuations in the atmosphere. However, many scientists also think that human activities were most likely the cause of the the planet's recent warming.
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== Sun Spots ==
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Sunspot activity may be a primary factor in climate fluctuations, according to Willie Soon, a researcher affiliated with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and the Harvard College Observatory. '''“The sun is a great driving force to climate change.”''' Soon said that there have been much greater temperature fluctuations due to sunspots in the past and that proponents of global warming need to consider the effects of sunspot activity on global temperatures. Brian Farrell, a Harvard meteorology professor,  acknowledged a connection between sunspot activity and temperatures on the Earth, “A strong correlation between the amount of radioactive carbon and temperature from ice cores has shown that solar activity can affect temperature." <ref>[http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/42006/181/ Harvard astrophysicist: Sunspot activity correlates to global climate change] TGDaily.com, April 10, 2009</ref>
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==Politicization of the Issue==
   
Global warming
 
Global warming
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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From Conservapedia, the stupid encyclopedia
For scientific and political disputes, see Global warming controversy, Scientific opinion on climate change and Public opinion on climate change.
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For past climate change see Paleoclimatology and Geologic temperature record. For the Sonny Rollins album see Global Warming (album).
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The term global warming was probably first used in its modern sense on 8 August 1975 in a science paper by Wally Broecker in the journal Science called "Are we on the brink of a pronounced global warming?".[136][137][138] Broecker's choice of words was new and represented a significant recognition that the climate was warming; previously the phrasing used by scientists was "inadvertent climate modification," because while it was recognized humans could change the climate, no one was sure which direction it was going.[139] The National Academy of Sciences first used global warming in a 1979 paper called the Charney Report, it said: "if carbon dioxide continues to increase, [we find] no reason to doubt that climate changes will result and no reason to believe that these changes will be negligible."[140] The report made a distinction between referring to surface temperature changes as global warming, while referring to other changes caused by increased CO2 as climate change.[139]
 
The term global warming was probably first used in its modern sense on 8 August 1975 in a science paper by Wally Broecker in the journal Science called "Are we on the brink of a pronounced global warming?".[136][137][138] Broecker's choice of words was new and represented a significant recognition that the climate was warming; previously the phrasing used by scientists was "inadvertent climate modification," because while it was recognized humans could change the climate, no one was sure which direction it was going.[139] The National Academy of Sciences first used global warming in a 1979 paper called the Charney Report, it said: "if carbon dioxide continues to increase, [we find] no reason to doubt that climate changes will result and no reason to believe that these changes will be negligible."[140] The report made a distinction between referring to surface temperature changes as global warming, while referring to other changes caused by increased CO2 as climate change.[139]
 
Global warming became more widely popular after 1988 when NASA scientist James Hansen used the term in a testimony to Congress.[139] He said: "global warming has reached a level such that we can ascribe with a high degree of confidence a cause and effect relationship between the greenhouse effect and the observed warming."[141] His testimony was widely reported and afterward global warming was commonly used by the press and in public discourse.[139]
 
Global warming became more widely popular after 1988 when NASA scientist James Hansen used the term in a testimony to Congress.[139] He said: "global warming has reached a level such that we can ascribe with a high degree of confidence a cause and effect relationship between the greenhouse effect and the observed warming."[141] His testimony was widely reported and afterward global warming was commonly used by the press and in public discourse.[139]
   
{{Climategate scandal}}
 
{{Climategate scandal}}
  
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