Field Museum Responds to Michaels and Knappenberger

Published July 13, 2010

As a scientist working on climate change for the past 20-plus years, I can say without hesitation that most of what Ms. Debra Moskovits said in her July 4 global warming article is not “facts,” but merely assertions and half-truths.

Climate varies substantially not only from decade to decade, but also from century to century. This is why no scientist can show that the 100-150 years of temperature and rainfall data we have collected are closely linked to rising atmospheric carbon dioxide. Climate is certainly not ruled by atmospheric CO2, but by a combination of complex solar, cosmic, terrestrial, oceanic and atmospheric interactions.

The exaggerated claims about predominant greenhouse effects of CO2, as presented by Field Museum exhibits and Professor Raymond Pierrehumbert (the chosen climate expert on the exhibit’s board of advisors), are rooted merely in their own social and political belief systems. They completely fail to recognize the multi-decadal periods of warming and cooling that Earth has experienced since the Little Ice Age ended around 1850 – or the fact that average global temperatures have been stable or falling since 1995, despite steadily rising CO2 levels.

Sadly, the Field Museum exhibits will only provide false promises that CO2 emission cuts will bring “positive effects” – rather than recognizing the serious economic, employment, social and environmental costs of slashing hydrocarbon fuel use and switching to expensive, unreliable, land-intensive wind and solar power.

Moreover, these “actions” will not control planetary temperature or climate. Former Vice President Al Gore and Energy Secretary Steve Chu have refused to respond to my questions on these points. But museum visitors can get more balanced and honest information by reading  Professor Robert M. Carter new book,
Climate: the Counter Consensus
(http://www.stacey-international.co.uk/v1/site/product_rpt.asp?Catid=331&catname=%3E)

Willie Soon, Independent Scientist