Quoted from a recent Rasmussen Report on a survey among "likely US voters":
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 60% of Likely U.S. Voters think it’s at least somewhat likely that the level of activity on the sun ... has an impact on the long-term heating and cooling of the earth’s atmosphere. Just 22% feel that it’s unlikely solar activity influences the atmosphere’s long-term temperature.
These findings include 29% who say it’s Very Likely that solar activity has a long-term impact impacts and only six percent (6%) who believe it’s Not At All Likely. Seventeen percent (17%) are not sure.
Still, 44% of voters thinks human activity has a bigger impact on the long-term heating and cooling of the Earth’s atmosphere than solar activity does. Thirty-seven percent (37%) disagree and believe solar activity has a greater impact. Eighteen percent (18%) are not sure.
I was surprised to read that there seem to be just two positions - it is either the sun or GHG; no space for other causes, including internal variability. I had believed that the "skeptics" in the US were only able to persuade large parts of the public that the GHG-explanation of the warming is false or a "hoax", but it seems that they have achieved more, namely that many accept "the sun" as a better explanation.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
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8 comments:
It means word of my Venus/Earth comparison is getting out:
Venus: No Greenhouse Effect
I strongly recommend reading also the comments following the article, especially my replies. This analysis reveals the scientific incompetence at the very heart of the current consensus, and is definitive for any real progress in climate science now (and of course ruinous for the current political movement against "greenhouse gases", and especially carbon dioxide as a "pollutant", all of which is simply denied by the true facts).
The questions were:
2* How likely is it that the level of activity on the Sun - including solar flares and sunspots - has an impact on the long-term heating and cooling of the earth’s atmosphere?
3* What has a bigger impact on the long-term heating and cooling of the earth’s atmosphere—human activity or solar activity?
So no mention of any other causes such as natural variation. These are awkward questions and I am not sure how I would answer. What would your answers be, Hans?
My answers would be:
a) likely, yes: likely that sun has an impact
b) human action is bigger: elevated GHGs has a bigger impact than solar activity (within the present time window 1900-2200)
Hans
*2) The question is very diffuse (i.e. what means longterm here, incl. orbital forcing, young faint sun paradoxon etc). Therefore I would answer that is very likely (as it is not quantified, how much).
*3 dito Hans #3
What is the general knowledge of people about the mechanisms of how the sun might impact climate? And where does this knowledge come from?
Freddy, the questions may not be perfect, but the question is how lay people would understand them - and I guess they would understand them well. Maybe somebody could test the question by asking lay people what they think they would be asked?
Hans
Thats true. If you don't know too much about solar physics, the question is probably quite easy.
Maybe somebody could test the question by asking lay people what they think they would be asked?
Maybe multiple choice would work!
The answer to #3 is obviously the sun. The question doesn't ask about changes (from some ill-defined concept of 'normal'). The sun's influence on heating and cooling the earth is obviously greater than any other factor.
Stupid, poorly worded question. Interesting how many people answered something different than the question actually asked.
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