Artic Ice Melting, Species Extinction, Droughts and Disaster- Don’t believe it. There is no need to fear a warmer world.
Over the past few years we have witnessed a tsunami of alarmism regarding global warming. This alarmist hysteria exaggerates entirely the actual mild warming trend that is occurring. It also distorts the true state of general conditions on Earth and depresses the public consciousness with unnecessary fear and anxiety. It ignores the historical reality that shifts from colder periods to warmer periods have been positive experiences for life on Earth. On what basis do alarmists assume the current world climate is optimum and a warmer Earth is worse?
Paleo-climate records note that for much of Earth’s history the world has been ice free
(even at the poles) and the climate much warmer. Fossilized remains of dinosaurs have been found on the North Slope of Alaska and the tree stumps of tropical forests have been found in the Arctic. A warmer climate is therefore normal and natural for Earth. A warmer Earth is more optimal for life than the cool period that we are suffering through today. This cooler period that we are in now is abnormal and sub-optimal (see graphs of long term climate records at http://www.lakepowell.net/sciencecenter/paleoclimate.htm
).
And what exactly is there to fear with a warmer climate? Fred Singer and Dennis Avery in Unstoppable Global Warming show that colder periods have brought more severe storminess, more disease, more natural disasters, more cold-related deaths and worse crop failures. Warmer periods bring the opposite with more climate stability (less storminess due in part to less transfer of energy from tropics to northern latitudes), less disease and disaster, less death, and better crop conditions, among many other positives. Life is always better when Earth is warmer. We ought to be grateful and celebrate the current warming trend which may not last long, according to various scientists.
And the current warming is mild (only some 0.6 degrees Centigrade over the past century- a trend similar to the rate of warming over the previous two centuries). This current warming is actually part of a return trend to normal warmer conditions from the abnormal cold of the Little Ice Age of 1350 AD to 1850 AD. It is part of a natural trend toward more normal conditions for Earth and is therefore no cause for alarm.
The computer models that predict a much higher warming are notoriously unreliable and over-exaggerate the contribution of CO2 to warming. Other scientists note that CO2 has no proven relationship to warming as CO2 increases have historically followed increases in temperature instead of the other way around.
Also, significant new research shows that solar radiation and cosmic rays play the dominant role in warming climate (see the CCNet archives and The Chilling Stars by
Henrik Svensmark and Nigel Calder. Basically, the following occurs- cosmic rays energize upper atmosphere particles around which cloud droplets form which then increases cloud cover which then cools the Earth. Solar radiation blows this cosmic influence away and less cloud cover forms which then warms the Earth).Warming and cooling trends are natural cycles influenced by the above factors and these cycles have long characterized Earth’s history.
The best way to deal with these factors over which we have no influence is to adapt.
There is nothing we can currently do to change the sun’s solar output or to prevent cosmic rays from creating cloud cover. Efforts at mitigation are simply a waste of money and time. And to adapt properly we will need to increase wealth creation by encouraging

economic growth and development. It is foolish to be proposing measures to slow economic growth at this time (i.e. Kyoto-like measures to restrain energy use).
It is becoming more evident that contemporary climate alarmists are ideologically driven and generally in a state of denial about the overall improving conditions on Earth. They are simply the latest devotees of the apocalyptic religions that originated with the earliest humans. These current devotees, betraying a socialist orientation, are driven by a perverse hatred of the free enterprise system of economics, and like all apocalyptic mongers in the past, they harbor a ruinous sense of guilt over human success and progress. Many of them appear convinced that humanity is evil and in the process of destroying the Earth.
Driven by such perverse ideas, environmentalist alarmists are bent on ruining the great party of life. Julian Simon was right to state that the actual conditions on Earth should lead humanity to throw a party to outdo all parties. He said, “We ought to sing, dance and be merry… but instead we see gloomy faces. They (the doomsters) are spoilsports and they have (negative) effects…don’t let them spoil our merry day” (p.408, The Ultimate
Resource). He also noted that environmental doomsterism undermined public morale and weakened the spirit of adventurous enterprise. It effectively sought to stop human progress.
In the face of this dispiriting alarmism we need to remind ourselves of what humanity has accomplished in just the past century. We have more than doubled the average human lifespan- an achievement rightly called the greatest human achievement ever (see Julian
Simon’s The Ultimate Resource). We have diminished child mortality significantly, even in the poorest parts of the globe (See Indur Goklany’s The Improving State of the World).
We have decreased poverty from almost a universal condition to only some 18% of the human race and this unacceptable level of suffering is still dropping (See Bjorn
Lomberg’s The Skeptical Environmentalist). We have increased prosperity and the quality of life for most people including the poorest whose incomes have risen fourfold over the past 40 years. The poorest people also benefit from health advances in wealthier countries and have seen their life-spans increased in advance of income increases (from the spread of medical discoveries). And we have seen violence and force decrease drastically (see A History of Force by James Payne or Constant Battles by Stephen
LeBlanc). The decrease in violence can be related to the historical increase in prosperity
(see Constant Battles by Stephen LeBlanc).
We have also cleaned up our environments; saving species from extinction, cleaning air and water, and conserving large tracts of wilderness for future generations (see Greg
Easterbrook’s A Moment On The Earth).
Look at any major trend on Earth and you will find reason to hope and celebrate. Sure, there are historical aberrations to these long term trends but the aberrations tend to be short-term and do not define the improving nature of the overall trends. Neither do geographical exceptions define the overall. All the evidence points to the fact that conditions on Earth, and life in general, are getting better over time.
Environmental alarmism and its doomsday scenarios need to be countered with this overwhelming evidence of the true state of the world. This will introduce some sanity back into the global warming debate and slow the tsunami of fear-mongering that is currently depressing public consciousness. We have every reason to celebrate human achievement and the true state of the world today.

And let’s counter the insanity of terror-mongering over CO2 by remembering that CO2 is not a poison to be removed from the atmosphere but is a nutrient essential to all life. The increase of CO2 in the atmosphere means more plant growth and increased plant health
(more resilience to such things as droughts- see Unstoppable Global Warming by Singer and Avery). Lets also remember that our human contribution to CO2 in the atmosphere is so tiny that meteorologist Dr. Martin Hertzberg says it amounts to the equivalent of only
“a few farts in a hurricane”. Nothing to panic over.
In the distant past CO2 levels were much higher (more than 10 times what they are today) and yet Earth remained colder than it is today.
The fear-mongering over CO2 emissions is entirely distorting of the role of CO2 in life and its impact on the world. This fear-mongering could also potentially undermine human progress in that it creates an unnecessary sense of guilt over the use of energy and coercively pressures people to cut back their use of energy (via the environmental agenda to employ centralized state intervention and regulation to prohibit energy use). This could slow economic growth as people are constrained from fully engaging more economic activity and consumption which are perfectly natural and healthy elements of human progress. We should not feel guilty in the least about increased economic growth and development. As Indur Goklany shows (The Improving State of the World), economic growth and development make it possible for everyone to live better lives on a cleaner planet.
We also need to remind the media to do a more responsible job of presenting the global warming research from all sides in order to balance the endless reporting of apocalyptic hysteria that is based on flawed computer modeling. It is irresponsible in the extreme to distort the true state of the world and to relentlessly traumatize public consciousness with this apocalyptic hysteria.
Wendell Krossa wkrossa@shaw.ca
See also www.thehumanspirit.net