The global-warming news flow took an unexpected turn yesterday. A
spate of headlines brimming with harmony and accord started popping out
of the woodwork.
(I hear you quipsters out there: Does the Internet even have
woodwork? Does Google News? I do not care. Thatīs immaterial, a topic
for another day. Hang with me here, people.)
"Study
finds consensus on global warming." "Global
warming differences resolved." "Study
reconciles differing data on warming." And on and on.
Weird, I thought. Scientists agreeing on something -- anything --
having to do with climate change. If that doesnīt constitute a
climate change, what does?
The relevant study was issued Tuesday by the U.S. Climate Change
Science Program. You can read the report
here, and its accompanying press release
here. A caveat, though: Especially in regard to the
former, drink a cup of coffee first. Or two. Iced, preferably.
Caffeinated, definitely.
The study purportedly resolves a longstanding scientific dispute
regarding global average temperature increases at the earthīs surface as
compared with global average temperature increases at higher levels in
the atmosphere. The money quote: "Discrepancies between the data sets
and the models have been reduced, and our understanding of observed
climate changes and their causes have increased. The evidence continues
to support a substantial human impact on global temperature increases.
This should constitute a valuable source of information for
policymakers."
So at last the scientists agree that the ground and the sky are
heating up together. And that we humans -- with our cars, houses,
machines, factories (all of which, letīs be honest, we deem
indispensable, as essential to our lives as food, water and air) -- are
responsible for a substantial portion of that balmy trend.
Does this concurrence of opinion, this sudden thaw, lead anywhere?
That depends, obviously, on the aforementioned policymakers. On how
they read this "valuable source of information" being laid before them.
And what they read into it. And what they do, or donīt do, about it.
And what we, their bosses, do about that.
Postscript: From Jay Leno on NBCīs Tonight Show last Friday:
"Arnold Schwarzenegger is blaming man for global warming. And today Al
Gore agreed with him. Thatīs so typical. Two cyborgs blaming the
humans."
