The Theology of Climate Change

Issue 3 | 23 June 2009

Ian Plimer is a Professor of Mining Geology at The University of Adelaide and Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences at The University of Melbourne. He is the author of a number of books – the most recent being Heaven and Earth – Global Warming: The Missing Science which refutes many of the popular views on human involvement in climate change. Ian Plimer is a Fellow at a number of prominent institutions including the Geological Society of London, the Australiasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists. He is also a non-executive Director of three mining companies: Ivanhoe, CBH Resources and Kefi Minerals. On Tuesday 23 June 2009, Ian Plimer addressed The Sydney Institute before a capacity audience.

THE THEOLOGY OF CLIMATE CHANGE

IAN PLIMER

Climate always changes. It always has and always will. For more than 80 per cent of time the planet has been a warm wet greenhouse planet with no polar ice. Past temperate changes have been far greater and far more rapid than anything measured in modern times.  We humans can live on ice sheets, in mountains, in the tropics, in deserts and at sea level.  Past great climate changes have been driven by natural cyclical processes such as the position of our solar system in the universe, wobbles in the Earth’s orbit, changes in the sun, oscillations in the oceans and tidal changes. These processes have random inputs from sporadic events such as volcanoes and asteroidal impacts.

The proposition that climate should not change is absurd and can only be promoted if all history, archaeology, geology, astronomy and solar physics is ignored. We do this at our peril. If an extraordinary claim such as human-induced climate change is made, then extraordinary evidence must be given to support such a claim. Such evidence is yet to see the light of day.

Over the last 500 million years, there has been sequestering of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere into algal and coral reefs, shells, cements and precipitates. The atmospheric carbon dioxide content has been decreasing and, at times when vegetation thrived on Earth, both the atmospheric carbon dioxide and oxygen content of the atmosphere were far higher than at present.

Over the history of time, the greatest biomass on Earth has been bacteria and the only life on Earth that has made great changes to the atmosphere have been bacteria and photosynthetic organisms. Since the first photosynthetic bacteria on Earth some 2,500 million years ago, there has been a sequestering of carbon dioxide by life. Carbon dioxide is plant food and to state in public that carbon dioxide is a pollutant is a public advertisement of a lack of basic schoolchild science. Pollution kills, carbon dioxide leads to a thriving of life on Earth and increased biodiversity. Horticulturalists pump warm carbon dioxide into glasshouses to stimulate growth. This important gas is easy to demonise because it is colourless, odourless, tasteless and a small proportion derives from industry. The main greenhouse gas is actually water vapour.

There has been global cooling for the last 50 million years. Because South America separated from Antarctica some 37 million years ago, the circum-polar current resulted in the isolation of Antarctica and the development of the Antarctic ice sheet. Despite numerous events when it was far warmer than at present for millions of years, the Antarctic ice sheet did not melt. It was only after two coincidental events 2.67 million years ago, the joining of South America to North America and a supernoval eruption, that polar ice appeared in the Northern Hemisphere.

The polar ice sheets waxed and waned. Ice core drilling shows very smoothed patterns for gases that were originally trapped in snow. The diffusion of trapped atmospheric gases through ice may increase the uncertainty of ice studies, however, numerous studies show that after a cyclical temperature change, the atmospheric carbon dioxide content increases some 800 years later. Again, there is a disconnect between warming and its alleged origin and it is quite possible that some of the twentieth century increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide derives from the Medieval Warming 800 years ago.

The last great interglacial was between 128,000 and 116,000 years ago. Sea level was 7 metres higher than at present and atmospheric temperature was some 5ºC warmer. The ice sheets did not completely melt and humans thrived. During the latest glaciation, the Toba supervolcano eruption 74,000 years ago led to increased cold and humans very nearly became extinct. The zenith of the last glaciation was 18,000 years ago. Ice sheets extended to 38º north. Ice melting led to a sea level rise of about 1 cm per year, a figure far higher than the most exaggerated catastrophist model for human-induced global warming.

During the interglacial, there were a number of exceptionally cold snaps and temperature rose by as much as 20ºC in 15 years after one of these periods. We humans did not suffer, we thrived. Some 6,000 years ago, the sea level was 2 metre higher than at present and it was at least 3ºC warmer than now. Alternating cool and warm periods followed with desertification occurring in windy cool times. These cool times also led to the collapse of great civilisations.

The temperature and rate of temperature change in the Minoan, Roman and Medieval Warmings were greater than today. In the Roman Warming, olives were grown along the Rhine River and grapes were grown as far north as Hadrian’s Wall. The Roman Warming came to a sudden end with the eruption of Krakatoa (535 AD) and Rabaul (536 AD). Atmospheric aerosols from these volcanoes and a cometary tail (November 536 AD) resulted in cooling, acid rain, crop failures, famine, and attacks on the weakened population by the plague, warfare, change of empires and depopulation.

The Medieval Warming commenced with a very active sun. Between 900 and 1300 AD, it was warmer, times were prosperous and generational wealth was used to build the great cathedrals, monasteries and universities of Europe. The Vikings colonised Newfoundland and called it Vinland. No grapes could survive the cool climate of Newfoundland today. In the Medieval Warming, wheat, barley, sheep and cattle were grown in Greenland. This shows that atmospheric temperatures were at least 5ºC warmer than at present.

A lazy sun in 1280 AD led to the Little Ice Age. It took 23 years to change from the Medieval Warming to the Little Ice Age. There was crop failure, starvation and murderous food refugees roamed Europe. The stressed population suffered the plague in 1347 AD, there was massive depopulation and it took Europe 250 years to again reach the population that existed in the Medieval Warming. It was especially cold in periods when the sun was lazy and it was during these periods that there were revolutions, starvation, ice-fairs on rivers, paintings of cold storm weather, increased cloudiness and paintings of frosts, thick snow and bitterly cold landscapes.

The Little Ice Age ended about 1850. Since the end of the Little Ice Age, the world has warmed at the same rate from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998. The four major climate centres in the world all show that atmospheric temperature has been decreasing in the twenty-first century despite a measured increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. The climate models show that temperature should have been increasing in the twenty-first century. This disconnect shows that there is little relationship between carbon dioxide and temperature and that models of very complex chaotic natural systems should be viewed with great caution. There has been a decrease in global temperature in the twenty-first century yet we are perpetually warned of dangerous global warming.

If such warmings took place in the historical past, why is a warming from 1976 to 1998 now due to human activity? These natural changes are far greater than any changes measured in the twentieth and twenty-first century yet modern natural climate changes are touted as “dangerous climate change”. Those who argue that human emissions of carbon dioxide change climate must demonstrate that changes observed today are not natural. This has not been done.

Both the sea and the land rise and fall and it is extraordinarily difficult to measure current sea level changes and much easier to measure past changes. Scandinavia was covered by 5 km of ice which started to melt 14,000 years ago. As a result, Scandinavia has rebounded and has risen by up to 340 m. Surveyed coastal properties in Finland are now inland and one can now walk some 7 m above the Gulf of Bothnia to the 12^th Century Castle of Turku, constructed on an island.  Scotland is also rising. Other geological processes produce relative sea level changes.

The Roman Port of Efeses is now 15 km inland and 7 metres above sea level and the ancient city of Lydia is now some 4 metres below sea level. Tuvulu is located where the floor of the Pacific Ocean is deepening and relative sea level at the Maldives has fallen 20 cm since the 1970s. The tidal measuring station at Port Adelaide shows a relative sea level rise of 2.3 mm per year as a result of sinking of the measuring station.

The planet’s ice sheets are dynamic. If ice did not melt, then the planet would be covered in a permanent ice sheet. Ice on Greenland is increasing, as is Arctic sea ice whereas ice in East Antarctica is increasing and ice on West Antarctica is decreasing. Antarctic sea ice is increasing. Beneath the Antarctic ice sheet are active volcanoes with associated high temperature gas vents and hot springs. The last great eruptions were in Roman times. Records of mountain glaciers in Europe show multiple events of ice advance and retreat over the last 4,000 years and the retreat of the Fürtwangler Glacier on Mount Kilimanjaro probably results from changing land use and resultant decrease in humidity.

In the past, there have been six major ice ages. These have occurred when Earth was bombarded with cosmic radiation. Two of these show that there was ice at sea level and at the equator and five of these ice ages occurred when the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere was up to 1,000 times greater than now. The proposition that a high atmospheric carbon dioxide content creates global warming, “tipping points” and unstoppable global warming is incommensurate with the past. The largest of these ice ages had ice at sea level at the equator, there was no continental shelf and sea level must have fallen at least 600 metres.

An interglacial sea level rise of at least 600 metres was associated with a sea surface temperature rise to at least 40ºC. Bacterial life thrived and sequestered huge amounts of carbon ?dioxide into algal reefs, sediments and precipitates. The next great glaciation (and sea level fall) was followed by another great sea level rise, thriving of bacterial life and sequestration of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. This ice age, the Neoproterozoic, was the greatest and most rapid climate change that has ever occurred on Earth.

The origin of this ice age with at least two substantial interglacials is not understood. If we cannot understand the biggest climate change that planet Earth has ever experienced, then we need to be most circumspect about slight changes in modern climate.

We have had attacks by an ascientific media on Senator Fielding because he actually has the temerity to ask questions and does not accept the media spin. The ABC, especially Robyn Williams’ Science Show, has taken it upon itself to be the protector of truth,  promoter of government spin and has wheeled in a depleted army of alleged ?experts critical of an alternative valid scientific view based on published science yet does not allow the alternative view air time. Science is married to evidence and dissent yet the ABC Science Show now does the government’s policy promotion. ABC journalists with no science training attempt to demolish scientific conclusions using science.

Our ABC has embraced irrational beliefs; it is not possible to reason someone out of a belief system that they entered without reasoning and the way to build a business, media or scientific career now seems to be to join the human-induced global warming bandwagon. Journalists have become smitten with self-righteous trendy ideological causes and promote these causes by cut-and-paste journalism using no knowledge, analysis or criticism.

ABC television such as The 7.30 Report and Lateline give fawning interviews to the ideologues that suggest that there is dangerous climate change and, if any person with an alternative view is lucky enough to get airtime, then there is an orchestrated character assassination. To suggest that the Emperor has no clothes or to remind people of King Canute is now a sin and there are many who fear questioning the popular paradigm.

Great institutions such as the ABC, CSIRO, some professional societies and academies and some universities have become politicised. Dispassionate independent fearless advice from government departments now no longer seems possible. I never thought I would see the day when the only balance on a matter of science derives from commercial radio. The Australian presents a diversity of opinions and all other major capital city newspapers appear to promote a doom-and-gloom scenario.

Criticism of my book Heaven + Earth: Global Warming – The Missing Science has been savage because there are a large number of supporters of human- induced global warming who have carved out a niche by frightening us witless about climate change and who would be unemployable outside taxpayer-funded climate institutes. Many critics have not read my book and obtain their information from blogs. The total politicisation of science, as demonstrated by the use of consensus and “the science is settled”, has been easy because of the dumbing down of the education system, the fear of criticism and analysis and instant information.

In the mining industry, any public statement must be in accord with legal and scientific requirements (the JORC code) in order to protect investors. The signoff must be made by a senior professional accredited by a professional organisation and all material used must be transparent, available and have undergone the rigours of a due diligence. Economic decisions regarding emissions trading are many orders of magnitude higher yet there has been no transparent due diligence. There has been no scientific due diligence and the only source of information derives from a political body, the IPCC. If such decisions were made in the corporate arena, then ASIC would be very busy.

The global warming movement has not shown that emissions trading legislation will do anything to change the global climate and has opened up opportunity for unregulated opaque trading of thin air across jurisdictional boundaries. Such trading will require huge bureaucracies and will make a fortune for bankers, brokers, economists and governments. These are the same folk who brought us toxic derivatives and now want to impose a guilt tax on thin air. This taxed substance is the element that allows us to live on this planet.

The futility of environmental symbolism is breathtaking. About one billion people turned off their lights during Earth Hour in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere. It takes only 6 seconds of Chinese carbon dioxide emissions to cancel out the Earth Hour carbon dioxide emission reductions. Those of us in the first world countries can not stop 5 billion people burning cheap accessible carbon, if there is an 80 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by the USA, about 1,000 new nuclear power stations need to be constructed before 2020 to replace the lost energy and such symbolism will only stop a global temperature increase of 0.07ºC by 2050. Australia is even more exposed, as there is no base load power alternative to coal-fired electricity generation.

I argue that the global warming movement is an ascientific urban religious fundamentalist movement detached from the environment. Adherents uncritically ?accept information from the web, Wikipedia and blog sites, they have lost contact with nature and have little knowledge of integrated interdisciplinary science. In science, I am in awe of Nature, religion inspires awe of God and worship through music, language and symbols. Religion allows us to cope with disappointment and failure. The new environmental religion is vacuous, in awe of nothing and has no intellectual foundation.

There is a consensus of opinion, despite the fact that science does not operate using consensus and that no scientific breakthrough has ever been made by consensus. This consensus is reinforced by commercial interests, constant repetition of the mantra, research grants, subsidies, politicians looking for votes, international travel to vital Earth-changing conferences, proliferation of costly reports and investigations with predetermined conclusions, fame and fortune for journalists seeking headlines warning of an impending catastrophe, clamorous demonstrations and preaching of unchallenged gospel.

This movement has the elements of failed European socialism and Christianity, imposes guilt on the community, creates a fear of damnation, demands appeasement by selling indulgences to the faithful, ignores any contrary information, demonises dissenters, has its holy book (the IPCC Report) which adherents have neither read nor have the knowledge to understand, breed gurus whose mantras can not be challenged and insist on unqualified claims to bring happiness but only to true believers. The most dangerous aspect of this new fundamentalist religion is that it ignores history. Religious faith is so strong, blind and unreasoning that it allows adherents to just totally blissfully ignore any contrary information.

This new fundamentalist religion cannot answer simple questions. What is the right temperature for the Earth? What is the right carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere? How should enormous economic pain be imposed? Why is carbon dioxide increasing yet temperature is decreasing? Why have models not been run backwards to replicate what we know? Why have major Earth processes been omitted from models? Who will be prevented from flying, driving or living a comfortable life? Who will be prevented from espousing an alternative view? What will we be allowed to think? Signs of these totalitarian elements are already appearing.

In English law (Nicholson v Grainger plc and others; ET2203367/08; 18th March 2009), a belief in human induced global warming is now legally no different from a religious belief.

It is indeed a dark day for religion.