The Anthropogenic Global Warming hypothesis is summarized by Warren Meyer as follows:
- The world has been warming for a century, and this warming is beyond any cyclical variation we have seen over the last 1000 or more years, and beyond the range of what we might expect from natural climate variations.
- Almost all of the warming in the second half of the 20th century, perhaps a half a degree Celsius, is due to man-made greenhouse gases, particularly CO2
- In the next 100 years, CO2 produced by man will cause a lot more warming, from as low as three degrees C to as high as 8 or 10 degrees C.
- Positive feedbacks in the climate, like increased humidity, will act to triple the warming from CO2, leading to these higher forecasts and perhaps even a tipping point into climactic disaster
- The bad effects of warming greatly outweigh the positive effects, and we are already seeing the front end of these bad effects today (polar bears dying, glaciers melting, etc.)
- These bad effects, or even a small risk of them, easily justify massive intervention today in reducing economic activity and greenhouse gas production [1]
Meyer wrote:
- AGW is sometimes called a secular religion. Because it is religion, not science, that burns skeptics at the stake. [2]