The Satanic Gases

Rating:
Summary: Human Caused?
Review: The Satanic Gases is a book that should be read by every none believer in global warming and by every global warming Kool-Aid drinker. The book shows that yes the earth has gotten warmer over the last hundred years. It also shows how people use every abnormal weather occurrence is blamed by global warming including El Niño which has happened for the past 5,000 years. Also how we blame blizzards, floods, draughts, warm temperatures cold temperatures, and anything that's not average.
This book is not an easy read and should be given time to read and digest. The book is well thought out and shows how only one side is ever presented, Especailly the coverage it gets during a hurricane or other natural disaster. It also shows how over the last 50 years hurricanes have decreased and tornados also. It also documents that CO2 levels were higher when the dinosaurs were alive and during the ice age. It also documents how temperatures have changed since the beginning of the world.
Finally he shows the exaggerations of politicians such as Al Gore who make ridicules statements that aren't always backed by science. Also the effects of treaties and protocols would have to prevent global warming and the economic effects they would have. Over all this is a great book on this topic.


Rating:
Summary: Caveat Emptor...
Review: "Who eats my bread dances to my tune." -- Old German Proverb

While I certainly wouldn't argue with the right of either of these authors to write what they like about global warming, I do believe readers should be aware of a few facts, in the interest of accuracy. So as not to engage in an ad hominen attack, I will only refer the potential readers to "The Heat is On," an expose of global warming skeptics, including the authors.

As for point-by-point critique of the book, there's not enough room on the Internet. Read "The Heat is On" (which also has a web site) or "The Change in the Weather."

Rating:
Summary: Climatologists examine the science of global warming.
Review: A potentially informative and constructive debate about the costs and benefits of global warming has been lost to "political dramatization," argue the authors of this book. Patrick J. Michaels and Robert C. Balling, Jr. trace the development of global warming, writing that politicians blame the latest thunderstorm, flood or change in the weather on global warming, and that global treaties, protocols and other policies are being signed and negotiated despite shoddy science. The authors find that government funding of research has corrupted the scientific process as scientists compete for funding in a politically charged environment. Total federal spending on global climate change research has ballooned from a few million dollars to $2.1 billion annually in the last 15 years.

The authors analyze the politics of global warming and provide a primer on the science. Acknowledging that industrial emissions of greenhouse gases have warmed the planet and will continue to do so over the next several decades, Michaels and Balling argue that future warming will be moderate and will have benign economic and ecological effects. They point out that the effects of climate change are already positively affecting mortality and agriculture, citing data that show the "greening" of the earth may be enhancing plant growth. The year 1998, during which the temperatures warmed as a result of El Niño, produced record agricultural output. The authors expect that the earth's average surface temperature will warm 0.65-0.75 C (1.17-1.35 F) by 2050, resulting in a decline in temperature-related mortality and a rise in crop yields that alone would feed one-quarter of today's world population.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: Another triumph of reason and science over stupidity and politics.

Rating:
Summary: An Evolving Mainstream?
Review: At the outset, I have been a global-warming-as-disaster agnostic. But I have followed the arguments for years and try to read everything that comes out, and I try (but maybe fail) to not "prejudge" if I know something about the authors etc...I also look at reviews with I hope an open mind.

That brings me to The Satanic Gases. The argument is really very simple: The planet warms, partially from human beings, but humans themselves cannot stop what they are doing and in fact have been adapting to this all along. But extreme scenarios get play from a political process that only funds our most lurid problems and a media that exists to sell media (surprise!). In fact, though, future warming is likely to be near the low end of the range, unless almost all scientific models are wrong to the core. This argument is made in very convincing fashion in this book.

What amazes me is that it seems you either agree with these guys, citing the obvious plethora of facts and figures in the book, or you disagree and attack personally. This itself bumps my review of this book up one star.

But, more important--and I hope I am not wrong here--it's beginning to look more and more like Michaels and Balling were in fact the correct prophets about the ultimate (non)-resolution of this issue. They have been screaming this from every available mountaintop (some supplied by industry, others from their University positions--major institutions like ASU and Virginia don't hand out Full Professor from cracker jack boxes) for years now.

I give this book 4.5 stars (rounded to 5)as a result. More evidence: A few months ago Nova/Frontline had a global warming show in which the entire second hour was devoted (without credit) to precisely Michaels' and Balling's proposition: you can't stop it, and you can't even slow it much, so why try? The July Atlantic Monthly is even more telling. A huge piece by Daniel Sarewitz and Roger Pielke concludes 1)The science will never adequately support policy, and 2) We can't do much about it anyway, and 3) We have adapted if we have enough money, so maybe we ought to help poor countries with infrastructure. Pielke was a Democratic staffer for the late (of Southern California) congressman Brown's Science committee.

Hey, those are the same arguments Michaels and Balling make in Satanic Gases, only based upon mountains of data.

It's rare to see (what I used to think) were caterwauling naysayers turn out right, but I am very close to moving off the agnostic fence as a result of The Satanic Gases. It probably doesn't hurt that the book is very well written--I have seen in local papers several Op-Eds by Michaels and he is a very hot, entertaining writer for a scientist, almost like the "Anti-Sagan".

Rating:
Summary: An Evolving Mainstream?
Review: At the outset, I have been a global-warming-as-disaster agnostic. But I have followed the arguments for years and try to read everything that comes out, and I try (but maybe fail) to not "prejudge" if I know something about the authors etc...I also look at reviews with I hope an open mind.

That brings me to The Satanic Gases. The argument is really very simple: The planet warms, partially from human beings, but humans themselves cannot stop what they are doing and in fact have been adapting to this all along. But extreme scenarios get play from a political process that only funds our most lurid problems and a media that exists to sell media (surprise!). In fact, though, future warming is likely to be near the low end of the range, unless almost all scientific models are wrong to the core. This argument is made in very convincing fashion in this book.

What amazes me is that it seems you either agree with these guys, citing the obvious plethora of facts and figures in the book, or you disagree and attack personally. This itself bumps my review of this book up one star.

But, more important--and I hope I am not wrong here--it's beginning to look more and more like Michaels and Balling were in fact the correct prophets about the ultimate (non)-resolution of this issue. They have been screaming this from every available mountaintop (some supplied by industry, others from their University positions--major institutions like ASU and Virginia don't hand out Full Professor from cracker jack boxes) for years now.

I give this book 4.5 stars (rounded to 5)as a result. More evidence: A few months ago Nova/Frontline had a global warming show in which the entire second hour was devoted (without credit) to precisely Michaels' and Balling's proposition: you can't stop it, and you can't even slow it much, so why try? The July Atlantic Monthly is even more telling. A huge piece by Daniel Sarewitz and Roger Pielke concludes 1)The science will never adequately support policy, and 2) We can't do much about it anyway, and 3) We have adapted if we have enough money, so maybe we ought to help poor countries with infrastructure. Pielke was a Democratic staffer for the late (of Southern California) congressman Brown's Science committee.

Hey, those are the same arguments Michaels and Balling make in Satanic Gases, only based upon mountains of data.

It's rare to see (what I used to think) were caterwauling naysayers turn out right, but I am very close to moving off the agnostic fence as a result of The Satanic Gases. It probably doesn't hurt that the book is very well written--I have seen in local papers several Op-Eds by Michaels and he is a very hot, entertaining writer for a scientist, almost like the "Anti-Sagan".

Rating:
Summary: Focuses on minutiae not the big picture
Review: Firstly, let me say I did enjoy this book. I am a huge skeptic of the Kyoto Protocol but not only because of the reasons outlined in this book! Geologic history indicates that the world has been warming up more or less since the glaciers retreated 10,000 years ago. The geologic record over the last 500 million years would also suggest that we are in a 'cold period' and there is no time where the earth has a static temperature - it gets hotter and colder over the centuries and eons and in the past, it has generally been hotter. Stating that the temperature in 1900 was 'average' and then getting angry with ourselves when the world rises above or below this 'average' is very short-sighted...

This book dissects a lot of the myths and contadictions that have sprung up over the last decade concerning global warming and its impact - higher deaths, more extreme weather conditions, decreased crop yields, excessively rising sea levels etc. It also briefly discusses the impact of government intervention to try and slow down global warming (e.g. the disintegrating Kyoto Protocol).

However, I was a bit disappointed that the authors didn't step back from the microscopic analysis of papers to paint in the 'big picture' and allow the reader to gain a more coherant overview of why there are many skeptical scientists out there! In fact, from the evidence presented in this book, I am greatly reassured that global warming, despite its name, is clearly not a global phenomenon which is going to have much impact on any country except the US...

The authors focus on small and large descrepencies in papers that have been released over the last 2-3 decades - largely by the US - and comments made by ignorant but influential people - also from the US. Well, thats fine - thats what has created the hysteria over global warming in the first place. But, surely the name 'global warming' implies it should have a global impact?! By the final chapters of the book, this over-emphasis on dissecting the smaller details make one feel too much emphasis has been placed on discreding models and little on the reasons why any scientists felt they ought to question the models to begin with. But, there is a lot of evidence beyond the dissection of small scale climate modelling which could be reassuring - and more interesting - to explain why anyone would want to put global warming in perspective in the first place!

I also felt the book could have been better fleshed out by touching on why we are in this predicament of depending on fossil fuel in the first place. However, as the authors correctly note, where we will be in terms of technology and use of power in 100 years time is at this time, completly unknown. We could all be tapping into quantum energy for all I know! In the end, one can only be reassured (and not by the authors) we are burning through 440 million years of the Earth generating fossil fuels for us in a few short centuries - we will be forced to examine alternative and comparative sources of energy sometime in the next 100 years if not sooner.

In the end, this book is a dry but interesting critique of all the climate modelling and posturing made by the US government in an attempt to rally the world behind a cause. It is very scientific, but arguments are developed logically and explained in a clear fashion that anyone wanting to gain a more balanced point of view about the hysteria surrounding global warming, will be satisfied with this book.

Rating:
Summary: An important contribution to climatology studies.
Review: Global warming is the topic of a discussion by two climatologists who present an alternative viewpoint to dire predictions: that human activities will probably lie within manageable bounds. A refreshingly different perspective, The Satanic Gases will fuel debates.

Rating:
Summary: Hot air collides with cold science!
Review: I have eagerly awaited Patrick Michaels' book.

I am very actively involved in the debate on climate change. My specialty is human health.

I can say without reservation that in my field, the overwhelming majority of my colleagues are apalled by the nonesense that has been written about the impact of global warming on human health--asthma, mosquito-borne diseases, and all the rest.

Problem is, we all have priorities. Few of us can justify the time to counter this Orwellian gobbledgook. So the field is left uncontested.

On the other hand, there are people out there who have garnered large funding from government and private interests in order to foster this phoney paradigm. It is in their interests to maintain its momentum, with or without the truth.

The result is that the public are being fed with colossal quantities of pseudo-science, much of it expertly packaged and convincing to honest pepole.

Michaels, of course, has his own angle on all of this. Frankly, I would have wished that he had steered clear of the politics. The substance of his book is erudite and well presented. In my opinion, his account would have been much more persuasive if he had he stuck to his highly readable style and avoided all mention of the politicoes.

Ah well! Whatever the packaging, the substance of this book is solid science. I will value it for its bibliographic references and its logic, not for the other stuff.

[Sadly, perhaps, in this age of mis-information, we may have to adapt this sort of style to compete with the propagandists].

So, I give it 4 stars, and recommend Satanic Gases to anyone who wants to know a bit more about this hot topic.

Rating:
Summary: The Satanic Gases
Review: I have just finished scanning he book and reading the overview. Because this book has been released to make a timely political impact on the upcomming presidential election I wanted to advance a quick impression. The book is honestly portrayed as a product of the conservative Cato Institute and makes no bones about its political leanings. It is written by two otherwise qualified scientists and stocked with much accurate data. The simplistic logic applied to that data and the grossly incomplete and myopic conclusions it produces are breathtaking. They appear to be over simplified blandishments designed to do nothing more than soothe the layman's concerns and win votes. Yes, the authors admit, the earth is warming and probably directly because of man's influence but this they portray as a benefit for all mankind. They glibly point out that because no scientist at the turn of the last century could have predicted what life would be like in the year 2000 they are compelled to limit their climate projections to the span of 50 years when natural C02 levels will have only doubled and the global temperature may have only modestly increased. Heck, they point out, we can all live with that. They conveniently neglect to consider the effects of a trippling or quadruppling of CO2 levels in the following 50 years because as we all know there is no point in thinking past 2050. They also conveniently fail to mention the possibility of the magnifying effects of a positive atmospheric feedback system. This book presents data selectively, without the circumspect objectively that characterizes valid scientific discourse. It has been bought and paid for by powerful interests that have a transparent economic and political agenda. The authors advice on Global Warming? "Get over it". They should be ashamed to call themselves scientists.