Comments on: In Case There Was Any Doubt That Johnny Hart is Dead…

By: Lola

Lola — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 14:37:23 +0000

Jack, while it’s true that humans have only been tracking global weather for a short time, the fact remains that the earth has been keeping very detailed records. Living and recently living tree rings go back for thousands of years. Sediment layers go back for millennia and contain very accurate information on climate. Of course, as you point out, it is absolutely impossible to have a double blind experiment with control subjects since we don’t have hundreds of earths to study. That doesn’t mean that we should sit back and ignore what information we have. If our ancestors had done that we’d all be sitting naked in dark caves, shivering, eating raw food and wondering what the heck is a blog.

By: LOL'd At Susan

LOL'd At Susan — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 08:11:35 +0000

I read that failblog too.

genius.

By: Jack

Jack — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 01:17:52 +0000

Then there’s always the great scientific problem of determining causality. Scientists in all disciplines deal with this to some extent; it is troublesome all the time in medicine, for example, to find out that “such and such causes cancer,” etc. To isolate “human activity/pollution” as a variable in some sort of scientific climate experiment is probably not even possible, since we only have one planet earth; the best that we can do is to make an educated inference about what is causing climate change. It is best left to climatologists to make definitive pronouncements, so I don’t argue about it one way or the other way with anyone, except to voice skepticism against those on both extremes of the argument. My understanding is that since we have only been taking scientifically accurate measures of the earth’s temperature for less than two hundred years, we can really only guess about what sort of natural temperature change cycles that the earth undergoes on the macro level (hundreds/thousands of years). There is still a lot we don’t know. I took a science course at the University I attend a few years ago (2006), and the instructor there was fairly liberal; he stated that we really can’t be certain what is causing climate change (and unlike Johnny Hart, he didn’t have a conservative axe to grind).

By: Frank

Frank — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 04:47:11 +0000

There is a lot I disagreed with Mr Hart about and the same holds true for Gov. Palin but I am more comfortable with their visions than those of of Mr. Trudeau and President-
elect Obama. Yes, we need to continue to clean up and preserve our envirionment but there appears to be as strong or better evidence for cooling and the cyclical nature of global temperatures. The problem with crusaders and jihadists is that they make world unlivable for the rest of us. I have a great deal of respect for President Carter as a well intentioned and good soul but I do regret having voted for him.

By: Hockey Baby-Mama

Hockey Baby-Mama — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 04:45:51 +0000

Wow, this particular strip sure danced on the grave of its creator!

By: Susan T-O

Susan T-O — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 03:44:20 +0000

Well, come on, it’s obvious–it’s that extra hour of sun we get every day during Daylight Saving that causes global warming (yes, I *am* joking here!!)

By: Mark in Boston

Mark in Boston — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 23:21:59 +0000

There are several points of view which get conflated.

1. The climate of the earth has never changed since God created it, and is not changing now. (Some belief systems require this to be taken as an axiom, because there are important principles that depend on it, like “God made the Earth expressly for us.”)

2. We have had ice ages in the past, but that’s all over. The climate of Earth has not changed significantly in human history. (Not supported by evidence.)

3. The climate of the earth is changing now, but otherwise has not changed in 10,000 years. (Also not supported by evidence; there was the “climactic optimum” of the Neolithic era and the “little ice age” 400 or so years ago.)

4. The climate is changing now but it is not our fault. (If so, we should not do anything because we should not interfere with nature.)

5. The climate is changing now and it is our fault. (If so, we have already interfered with nature.)

I personally believe we should escalate climate change by getting into as many wars as possible so as to fire a lot of missiles and set off a lot of bombs and fly a lot of planes.
Also we should drive a lot in big cars, and it looks like plenty of people on the roads agree with me.

By: Cidu Bill

Cidu Bill — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 19:50:23 +0000

Well yes and no, Jack: People have a tendency to believe what they want to believe, and many conservatives want to believe that a “problem” whose solution requires significant government regulation — which they oppose — is not in fact a problem.

By: Jack

Jack — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 19:41:34 +0000

It’s funny how something like global warming can be spun into a political issue, when it is really a scientific one. There is no inherent contradiction between being conservative and believing in global warming–it just so happens that most people who espouse the former have demeaned the latter; whether they are right or wrong is open to debate. Reasonable people (liberal or conservative) should be open to the evidence, wherever it leads. It is a basic tenet of the science that scientific conclusions should always be tested and re-tested by the scientific method, rather than being debated in an emotive, knee-jerk fashion (I am not accusing anyone in this forum of doing this; rather, I am speaking of the political rhetoric one sees about the topic in the mass media containing pronouncements by non-scientists regarding global warming).

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 16:45:02 +0000

Woody Guthrie wrote a nice song about it.