Global Warming

I remember when I first heard the theory of global warming in the early 1990s I used to find it plausible. Nowadays, I go along with some of the suggested remedies such as recycling and saving energy/using less fossil fuels because these are good things to do in their own right.

However, I have become reluctant to go along with the theory itself - and it is a theory - because like so many others I can detect that there is an undercurrent of totalitarianism and a sense that I'm being manipulated. Here are some of the techniques I think are being used:

• change the terms of the debate so that criticism is pre-empted and excluded. This can be seen in the change from "global warming" to "climate change" so that no matter how the climate changes the proponents are always right.
• demonise your opponents. Can be seen in the use of terms like "climate change denier".
• use emotional blackmail. Can be seen, for instance, in the Spectator article where the mother says "this child's future is being destroyed".
• intimidate opponents into submission. In the Spectator article Plimer has trouble finding anybody who would publish the book.
• attracts fanatics. Totalitarianism always attracts fanatics who are emotionally immature and can't tolerate uncertainty or conflicting opinions or feelings.
• bears hallmarks of eschatology or apocalypticism. ie. actually religious, not scientific as claimed by its proponents.
• incompatible beliefs. People who believe in global warming often also believe in things that make global warming worse, such as immigration, which worsens the problem because immigrants tend to transport themselves, their families and friends backwards and forwards from their country of origin at regular intervals.
  
• some of the suggestions, such as burying CO2 or blocking out the sun just make me think of Thunderbirds or the kind of daft science fiction my uncle used to write.

I can't drive and rarely travel on aeroplanes so I don't personally feel particularly guilty about it I just wish these people would stop insulting my intelligence.

Global Warming