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[bobf <bobford79 AT yahoo.com>]

Gerald , I just read through page 9.  It is a bit esoteric for m.  My wife , 
in my household, the scientific one.  But, I have been trying to read and 
learn on this subject for  a number of years.  I have cut and pasted (below) 
from his speech an issue which I think brings out the biggest point of 
skepticism from laynmen like me.  Please tell me what you think.  

My problem with this is that they are making educated guesses of the earth's 
temperature for the past sevral hundred years.  Let's say their guesses are 
absolutely correct.  How many hundreds of millions of years old is the earth? 
 That Al gore movie was a bad idea for given this issue credibility.  So much 
of it has been exposed as being wrong.  But, at the same time, I read 
recently, I believe in Scientifc American, that next summer, 'all ' of the 
Arctic icebergs will melt.  'All of them'.  If that happens, we will all 
become believers, if it doesn't it will sound like more fearmongering.

As a good steward, what do I do other than that which I have already done to 
conserve and protect resources?
And, once again, how are we so sure this isn't a "sun event" that happens 
every 100,000 years?

We have another list member named Jerry who really knows this stuff, but he 
has been having problems with his internet ability to post messages.  I meant 
to ask him these same questions once, but procrastinated..........

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"Change’s (IPCC) best estimates of the forcings — literally meaning how hard 
we’re pushing on the climate, positive in the heating direction, negative in 
the cooling direction — including increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide (by 
far the biggest factor); methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons 
(combined,slightly less impact); contributions from ozone, absorptive 
particles, some partially counteracting effects from reflective and 
cloud-forming particles, and a little bit of influence from landuse change. 
And what you see, very interestingly given the skeptics who still claim the 
sun is doing this, is that the best estimate of the warming influence of 
greenhouse gases and absorbing particles from 1750 to 2005 is about 30 times 
the best estimate of the warming influence"
of the estimated change and input from the sun over this period."


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--- On Sat, 12/20/08, Gerald Brittell <gabrittell AT gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Gerald Brittell <gabrittell AT gmail.com>
> Subject: [Homestead] Holdren on climate change
> To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
> Date: Saturday, December 20, 2008, 11:25 AM
> Here is a very informative speech given recently by John P.
> Holdren,
> Obamas's pick for top Science Adviser.  This is a
> remarkable choice given
> the past eight years. The speech, with charts,  is a great
> summary of
> present scientific thought on climate change.
> 
> http://www.ncseonline.org/Conference/Chafee08final.pdf
> 
> jerry b
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