Jim Torson wrote: > Hmmm... Does this mean that the skeptics are right when they > claim there are a lot of climate scientists who doubt AGW but > who are afraid to speak up about it? > > How widespread is this view? What are they afraid of? > Should we begin to doubt the claims of scientific consensus?
I doubt that there are many who doubt the broad consensus as expressed by points 1-3 in RC: <http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/just-what-is-this-consensus-anyway/> although the "indeed accelerate" in pt 3 is very much predicated on expectations of what is going to happen in the future wrt emissions. With slightly more precision, I would say that there is broad consensus that the GCMs will give fairly good predictions of future temperature trends on the broadest scales when given realistic forcing on the multidecadal time scale. Which means, more GHGs means more warmth almost everywhere, especially northern latitudes and over land. That still leaves lots of room for disagreement over the edges of "consensus" and what we can say with credibility about future climate changes (and their consequences) in detail. I would agree that there is probably is a bit of pressure on people to not say things that are too easily taken as critical of alarming results. Eg, there were apparently some people who were not prepared to go on the record for the BBC's "Overselling climate change" program. But perhaps this is more of an interpersonal thing (not wishing to criticise a colleague) than any widespread silencing of the sceptics in particular. James --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Global Change ("globalchange") newsgroup. Global Change is a public, moderated venue for discussion of science, technology, economics and policy dimensions of global environmental change. Posts will be admitted to the list if and only if any moderator finds the submission to be constructive and/or interesting, on topic, and not gratuitously rude. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/globalchange -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
