The document Global Warming – Climate Chaos: The Twelve-step Science Consensus was developed to provide climate skeptics with an opportunity to identify exactly with which components of the scientific consensus they disagree. This represents a set of my replies to the responses of a climate skeptic who identified his opinions (in italics) in relation to the 12 steps. My responses are in plain text. A.J

Replying to a Climate Skeptic Twelve Step Response:
Alan Journet

The following, (in italics) represent the responses of a climate skeptic to the Twelve point summary of the current climate science consensus in the above-linked document

Thanks!  I will clarify that by including the following ideas: Since gases in the atmosphere other than carbon dioxide each have their own potential to cause warming, known as the radiation forcing, the Global Warming Potential (also known as the Carbon dioxide equivalent) of other gases was assessed by comparing the warming induced by a specified mass of the other gases with the same mass of carbon dioxide.  The U.S. Energy Information Agency lists the percentage of these as follows:

• Carbon dioxide (CO₂)—80%
• Methane (CH₄)—11%
• Nitrous oxide (N₂O)—6%
• Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs)—3%

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, not surprisingly, has been assessing ocean temperature trends for decades. Data from which the ten hottest years on record come are the data for global temperature compiled by the various agencies and organizations around the world which have collected and compiled such data.  Figure on p. 11 of my L&H response depicts data from several sources.  A clearer depiction of the NASA data can be found here.  As you can see, the ‘record’ extends back to 1880 and shows that the majority of the warming has occurred since the 1980s.  NASA depicts temperature trend extending 800,000 years from where it can be seen that we are now warmer than we have been for 100,000 years.  Incidentally, it is worth noting that we are currently in what is called an IceHouse phase if we look back hundreds of millions of years of Earth’s temperature. This has fluctuated some 40°F (25°C) between HotHouse and IceHosue phases. The explanations for these fluctuation include tectonic plate drift as it influenced ocean currents, atmospheric composition, and the Milankovitch Cycle(s) discussed in my response to L&H. L&H, of course, also include a chart such as this and use it to counter the false strawman claim they consistently argue against that climate scientists claim atmospheric carbon dioxide is the only factor affecting our planetary temperature.  It seems from your response here that you have fallen into the trap of thinking climate scientists attribute all historic temperature changes to carbon dioxide (or even greenhouse gases).  This is certainly not the case, especially for the geologic time scale where, as mentioned above, paleoclimatologists acknowledge ocean currents affected by continental plate shifts, the Milankovitch cycle(s) as well as the array of atmospheric gases.  The entire discussion of geologic temperature fluctuations and atmospheric carbon dioxide is a total red herring.

The history of the temperature of Greenland is interesting.  First, it must be acknowledged that no climate scientist has ever argued (to my knowledge at least) that the entire planet has exhibited a parallel warming/cooling pattern throughout geologic and recent history. Global trends have always been affected regionally by local phenomena. A discussion of Greenland can be found here.

I can appreciate that those who do not operate on a daily basis in the scientific arena find the notion of parts per million and parts per billions very small and insignificant

I suspect the doubts derive from a lack of appreciation of how very small concentrations of substances can have profound effects.  For example, a concentration of less than 1 part per billion of dioxin can have huge negative health effects while, on a positive note, the concentration of fluoride in drinking water recommended to reduce tooth cavity risk is measured in only parts per billion.  

Meanwhile, in terms of the impact of ppm greenhouse gases on global temperature, I note that Lindzen and Happer in the critical diatribe critical of the climate consensus actually accept this influence.  For example, the Figure on p. 9 suggests that the first 100 ppm of carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere would cause nearly 1.2°C warming, while additional increments would continue to cause a temperature increase though at a reducing rate with each additional increment.  Despite the fact that there is no justification for this so-called ‘saturation’ concept outside the Lindzen and Happer sphere, this indicates they accept that greenhouse gases cause warming. Then, on p. 11, L&H accept that without greenhouse gases warming our planet, the global temperature would be 16°F (-9°C). Since the pre-industrial global temperature was around 13.7°C, this means that L&H accept that 285 ppm CO₂  caused a warming of some 23°C. This means they must accept that the waring rate for the first 100 ppm CO₂ was some 23/285 *100 or about 8°C, substantially greater than the 1.2°C they depict in the Figure on p. 9.

Thus, despite their claiming a ‘saturation effect’ with increasing CO₂ concentration, it is absolutely unclear exactly what L&H consider to be the warming effect of CO₂. In any event, these climate consensus deniers certainly accept that CO₂ has the capacity to warm the planet in the ppm range.

I have heard the claim that current warming results from our still emerging from the last ice age many times. However, this simply does not conform either to the available data or our understanding of what drives the glacial/interglacial cycles.

Global temperature since the depth of the last ice age is depicted below:

This reveals clearly that the global temperature rose from about 17,000 years ago to maybe 8,000 then levelled off for several thousand years. Had we not emerged from that ice age by 8,000 years ago, the temperature would have continued to rise.  Instead, that isn’t what the record reveals; warming ceased and then any reoccurred to any substantial degree until the last few decades.  These data themselves negate the claim that “we’re still warming from emerging from the ice age.”

In addition, again as I pointed out in my L&H response, our understanding of the Milankovitch Cycle(s) indicates that they inform us that we should be descending into another ice age, a process that started several thousand years ago.

“Humanity is sitting on a time bomb.  If the vast majority of the world’s scientists are right, we have just ten years to avert a major catastrophe that could send out entire planet’s climate system into a tail-spin of epic destruction involving extreme weather, floods, droughts, epidemics and killer heat waves beyond anything we have ever experienced – a catastrophe of our own making.” – – Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth

Now as a bonus here are a few more quotes from the billionaires, megalomaniacs, control freaks whom I suspect are using “climate change as a cudgel to herd us into their New World Order of under one billion people.

In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill.”- Club of Rome, The First Global Revolution.

“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” Maurice Strong, founder of the UN Environment Programme

 “A massive campaign must be launched to de-develop the United States. De-development means bringing our economic system into line with the realities of ecology and the world resource situation.” – – Paul Ehrlich, Professor of Population Studies

 “The only hope for the world is to make sure there is not another United States. We can’t let other countries have the same number of cars, the amount of industrialization, we have in the US. We have to stop these Third World countries right where they are.”- Michael Oppenheimer, Environmental Defense Fund

“We need to get some broad based support, to capture the public’s imagination… So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements and make little mention of any doubts… Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest.” – – Stephen Schneider, Stanford Professor of Climatology, lead author of many IPCC reports 

 “Unless we announce disasters no one will listen.” – – Sir John Houghton, first chairman of IPCC

 “It doesn’t matter what is true, it only matters what people believe is true.” – – Paul Watson, co-founder of Greenpeace

 “We’ve got to ride this global warming issue.  Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing in terms of economic and environmental policy.” Timothy Wirth, President of the UN Foundation

 “No matter if the science of global warming is all phony, climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.”-Christine Stewart, fmr Canadian Minister of the Environment

“A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal.” Ted Turner, founder of CNN and major UN donor

 “… the resultant ideal sustainable population is hence more than 500 million but less than one billion.”  Club of Rome, Goals for Mankind

I infer you haven’t yet looked at my response to Lindzen and Happer.  Like many climate science consensus skeptics/deniers, they make the same claim that the models do not accurately project what happens.  Potentially of all the claims climate consensus skeptics make, this is the easiest to debunk, simply by comparing model projections with what actually happens (i.e., actually observed data). When we do this, as I discussed, the models prove either quite accurate or more likely to underestimate the severity of outcomes (e.g., arctic ice melt) than overestimate them.

As far as I can judge, there are two possible reasons someone would make this claim:

• They know better and are simply spreading disinformation, which is where I suspect Lindzen and Happer are, or
• They simply are not familiar with the data (i.e., are uninformed), don’t know any better, and are simply repeating what they have read or heard without checking that claim’s veracity. I grant that those who have not spent much time in the climate science literature may not know quite how to begin to check such claims, but those of us who are familiar with the literature find this claim among the easiest to debunk since it has been debunked time and again.

I share your skepticism about the apparent interests of major corporations to rule over the people in a plutocracy.  However, I am somewhat bemused by your willingness to accept the claims of the fossil fuel executives who have, as I pointed out in my L&H response, over-ruled their own scientists going back to the 1950s and promoted a campaign of disinformation to convince the public that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases pose no threat. As noted in that response, in relation to the fossil fuel corporate disinformation campaign: “The history is discussed by Merner et al. (2025) who point out that the American Petroleum Institute develop a campaign roadmap in 1998 that stated “Victory will be achieved when . . . average citizens ‘understand’ (recognize) uncertainties in climate science….” Lindzen and Happer are merely cogs in this insidious campaign wheel.”

By promoting the fossil fuel corporate hoax that seeks to undermine climate science in the public mind, you are serving as an agent (willingly or un-knowingly) of their corporate effort to profit at the expense of you, me and all life on the planet.  I urge you to apply your skepticism to the source of this disinformation campaign rather than the scientists who are simply seeking to understand the problem and its dimensions and guide humanity towards a trajectory that would avert the disaster our current trajectory suggests we will achieve.