It'd be easier if you'd just read the peer reviewed literature. Science is not having the discussion you guys think they're having. Is the consensus 100%? of course not, it never is, but the numbers are getting scary and absurd for the few deniers out there trying to push up hill. It's equally easy to follow the money. Oil companies and the hired think tanks perpetrate a uniform and tight message. Obfuscate, confuse, and distract. That's what they do. This isn't rocket science, it's not even climate science. Just follow the money. Lots of old saws popping up, predictably, yes, 30 years ago, LIFE magazine and other media outlets stirred up public interest in global cooling. I think it even became the story for a few bad TV movies. It was a media driven story without backing in any meaningful way from science ....not the way current theories enjoy widespread and deep support from NASA, JPL, IPCC, and 20 out of 20 National Science academies. Interesting eyenorth suggests scientists who predicted the warming pause are now being vilified. I've read several articles on that topic and haven't noticed any pitchforks and torches. Further, there isn't much out there regarding ANYONE predicting a climate pause, there are scientists who observed a pause and then reported it as an observation. Not quite the same thing.

@onion, I'm not familiar with Lewadosky, but I have a problem when psychologists start telling us what the think about climate change or similarly, when oil company shills start telling us what to think. Can't we just go with mainstream scientists that work, unencumbered, in the field of climatology? Is that really too much to ask? Get rid of the Lewandowsys, the Kochs, the exxons, we might actually get somewhere.

Just 90 companies caused two-thirds of man-made global warming emissions Chevron, Exxon and BP among companies most responsible for climate change since dawn of industrial age

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/20/90-companies-man-made-global-warming-emissions-climate-change

Which companies caused global warming? A new paper shows which companies extracted the carbon-based fuels that have caused climate change. (Interactive chart)

http://static.guim.co.uk/interactivestore/2013/11/20/1384965790607/557603/index.html

Folks here might also ask themselves how, if the consensus is really political, not scientific, who exactly is perpetrating the hoax and who benefits from it?

Conspiracy paranoia seems more the domain of a small group of climate alarmists. Just do a google search of 'Koch climate denial'. Or read Michael Mann tweets.

Obama's policies are not modest. The USA has already wasted half a billion on subsidies to Solyndra. It looks set to triple that with Ivanpah. More seriously, the extra cost of fuel seriously hurts those living on the margin whose disposable income and purchasing power have already been rocked by the Great Financial Crash.

In the UK, the situation is even worse. The Climate Change Act of 2008 will add huge amounts to our bills, enrich a handful of wealthy landowners like the PM's father-in-law, do nothing to reduce CO2 emissions, do nothing to stimulate genuine innovation in the energy market, and lead to power blackouts.

I think anyone who describes these changes as moderate is not in touch with those many people living in fuel poverty. I think it's a massive vote-loser - Tom Steyer's $65m (an amount way more than the Kochs donated to Heartland) funding climate activism for the mid-terms probably did the democrats more harm than good.

Obama's policies are not modest. The USA has already wasted half a billion on subsidies to Solyndra.

Which is nothing, compared to years of oil, gas and nuclear power subsidies, which are in the tens of trillions. If we paid the true cost of these fuels, alternative technologies would be far more appealing and competitive. And if there was a real concern for "fuel poverty", it would be easy enough to reduce the burden of higher energy costs on the poor. But the only truly aggressive attempt to help the poor pay their fuel bills in the U.S. is thanks to Venezuela, which offers subsidies to poor Americans. Indeed, the global warming deniers in the U.S. congress have moved to cut fuel subsidies to the poor.

The Koch Brothers spend hundreds of millions every election cycle -- Tom Steyer is a drop in the bucket.

I can't speak to the UK situation, but we hear similar apocalyptic claims made in the U.S. -- huge bills, blackouts, massive unemployment, all to follow. But business interests always make these claims. Any infringement on their blessed freedom to pollute and pursue profit is the end of civilization as we know it. Oil companies insisted for years that getting the lead out of gasoline would end life in America as we know it. How many times are we expected to fall for this song and dance? Talk about hysteria.....

Did I actually read that we should listen to scientists whom are unencumbered? Perhaps there is a world somewhere called Utopia where scientist and researchers work unencumbered, here in the real world, good luck with that.

Hopefully, that will change with the new tech coming on stream (thorium as well as small nuclear power plants).

Well, it won't happen any time soon.

Under the carbon pricing scheme, oil and gas prices will be forced higher by government diktat in order to make wind more price competitive.

No. It is same to say that father will get knife and cut his stomach out because he wants to slightly reduce his fat level.

Horrible global warming in UK

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2015/09/23/uk-weather-trends/

LOL. At least all main media and each and every wide distributed documentary film I saw on topic all have climate things copied from some book, even words and horrors are all same.

From my POV - any climate change, if it exist does, not matter much compared to really important things that are much closer.

'Just read the peer reviewed literature'

What did you think of the two dozen peer-reviewed papers published in the last year on the influence of the sun on the climate?

Problem with climate change and rising sea levels is that it is social problem not scientific problem. We need more flexibility in shelter- smarter technology and better usage of resources.

Frankly survivalism should marry with hightech and we should be ok. Many advancements are very useful for survivalism.

Reality is Stone Age didn't end because of new inventions. It ended because there was no choice- something happened and stone age man had to adapt. This is evolution at finest. Adapt or perish.

So brianl - did you read it (as you claimed in that rather broad statement) or didn't you?

The broad consensus is that human-caused CO2 emissions contribute to global warming. Where there is no consensus is over the magnitude of this effect, and whether it will lead to catastrophic global warming.

The Cook (2013) paper, that most recently generated the 97% consensus headline, claims that the consensus is that most warming after 1950 is man-made. However the methodology employed contradicts the headline claim. There are papers he designated as supporting the 'man-made CO2 >50% warming after 1950' claim that specifically reject any quantifiable attribution of anthropogenic CO2 to global warming.

There is a more detailed survey of climate scientists here:

http://ncse.com/files/pub/polls/2010--Perspectives_of_Climate_Scientists_Concerning_Climate_Science_&Climate_Change.pdf

Interestingly, they have little faith in the ability of climate models to accurately model temperature out to 10 years, let alone 50 years. They believe the impacts of global warming will affect other parts of the World but not where they live. Despite this uncertainty, around 82% are convinced that most or near future climate change will be the result of anthropogenic causes. I would call this cognitive dissonance. Around 95% of respondents were funded by Government/ public university - maybe this explains that contradiction. If they stop producing papers 'proving' human CO2 will cause catastrophe, their funding will dry up.

You mention public policy. There is no consensus as to whether adaptation or mitigation are the best public policy approaches in this survey. Certainly the policy of closing down energy producers like coal in Europe and replacing them with heavily subsidised windmills is bananas.

This paper was 5 years ago. Since then, there has been acknowledgment of a pause in global warming by many including the most recent IPCC. By satellite measurements, that pause is over 18 years now, and ready to go off to University and get laid. I wonder how the respondents would reply today.

Finally consensus is no substitute for science anyway.