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Treating carbon dioxide as a pollutant is a serious error that cannot alter climate change.
A recent letter (July 1) expressed concerns about "cap and trade" legislation. Another (July 6) expressed support for the idea of "cap and trade." Neither letter mentioned scientific evidence.
Simultaneously, The Times also published a column written by a spokesman for the Environmental Defense Fund that strongly supported both the idea of "cap and trade" and its basis in "science." That column contained serious errors regarding the state of science today.
As you probably know, the globe has not warmed for the past decade, which is why the mantra now is "climate change" not "global warming." Yet General Circulation Models of the earth's climate have always projected a continuous increase in temperature.
Earth's recent cooling is exactly opposite to what the models projected. Something besides CO2 is causing climate change. In fact, the earth today is not much different than it was 2,000 years ago, when Nero burned Rome and CO2 levels were about 280 parts per million.
You likely also know that carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. The recent Supreme Court decision (Massachusetts v. EPA, April 2, 2007) allowing CO2 to be classified as a pollutant is nonsense on steroids. Carbon dioxide is a fertilizer. Commercial greenhouses increase plant yields by up to 50 percent by increasing their internal CO2 concentrations. The plants grow faster, too. Compare those real greenhouses with the earth's ambient air concentration of CO2, now about 380 ppm.
Over the past few decades, CO2 has increased about 10 percent, from about 350 ppm to about 380 ppm. That means plant production also has increased. Farm yields also have increased worldwide, if enough water and fertilizers are available.
Recent research also has shown that global warming causes an increase in CO2. This is logical. Oceans dissolve CO2, and cooler water dissolves more CO2. Open two Coke cans, one cold and one warm, to confirm that.
The earth has been warm for 10,000 years, since the last ice age ended. The oceans are now warming up a little, releasing a little CO2. This has been a natural part of earth's climate for a very long time, millions of years.
Confident statements about controlling climate by "cap and trade" amount to either arrogance or bullying. They have "computer games," as two German physicists noted, but they have no data.
Skeptics, on the other hand, have lots of data showing that climate change is caused by something else (sun, sunspots, solar wind, earth's tilt and wobble, clouds, volcanoes, etc.), not CO2. Check out icecap.us, search for Arno Arrak and follow the link.
He explains with good graphics what on earth is going on. He destroys the CO2 myth using real data.
It will make your day. Pass it on. Tell your senators.
WT "Ted" Hinds
Gainesville
America is mostly Christian, yet tolerant of other faiths
Trevor Thomas wants America to be a Christian nation. He argues that America is a Christian nation. I am a Christian who disagrees.
Thomas argues by repeated appeals to authority, a mode of argument that probably reached its high point in the 13th century and has been somewhat out of fashion since the Enlightenment. What he does not do is clearly define what a Christian nation is. Is it a place where Christianity is the state religion, where the holy books of other faiths are forbidden, and where it might be dangerous to practice a faith other than Christianity? If that is your definition, then America is not, thank God, a Christian nation.
Is it a place where most of the citizens are Christians? By that definition, America might be called a Christian nation although "predominately Christian" would be more accurate.
America was founded on ethical principles that are common to Christianity, but are not lacking in any of the higher religions. For example, Jews are not only tolerated, they are welcomed in America. No enlightened Christian believes that Jews are going to hell for their non-adherence to Christian doctrine and should be converted at the point of a sword.
We don't need a Christian version of the Taliban here.
Robert D. Milledge
Flowery Branch