Global Climate Change

Regular readers of this page know that I firmly believe that overwhelming evidence supports the idea that human activity, primarily the burning of fossil fuels, is affecting Earth's climate. Data and sophisticated models convincingly show that increasing amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in Earth's atmosphere have already begun a process of global warming that, if unchecked, will lead to a 2–10 F increase in the average global temperature by the end of the century. If the increase is toward the upper end of this range, the impact will be catastrophic.

In this belief, I am very much in the mainstream of scientific thought. Among most scientists, in particular the atmospheric scientists who are the experts on the subject, global warming is a fact and a looming crisis. Not all scientists agree, however, including a goodly number of members of the American Chemical Society and readers of C&EN. Some of these readers take issue with C&EN's coverage of global warming; see, for example, the letter from Oswald R. Bergmann on page 4.

(An aside: C&EN's coverage of global warming would not be much different from what it is if I happened to agree with Dr. Bergmann. This Editor's Page would be different, but our reporting would not, because it is determined by the conferences we attend and the journal articles we read. Our reporting reflects the scientific consensus that global warming is real. The Science Insights by Senior Editor Bette Hileman that Dr. Bergmann strongly objects to in his letter was a report on a conference sponsored by Science magazine on the urgency of responding to global warming. None of the atmospheric scientists participating in the conference doubt that global warming is an urgent issue. It is emphatically not the responsibility of C&EN to find someone who disagrees that global warming is an urgent issue when reporting on such a conference.)

Recently, C&EN carried an exchange of letters on whether the magazine should use the phrase "global warming" or "global climate change" when writing about this phenomenon. John Stanks argued that "global climate change"played into the hands of the Bush Administration and others who want to minimize the potential threat of global warming. I have had an exchange of letters with Dr. Stanks on this subject, and his most recent letter on the subject also appears in this issue.

The letter from Dr. Stanks arrived right around the time an article appeared in the Dec. 19, 2004, New York Times titled "U.S. Waters Down Global Commitment to Curb Greenhouse Gases."The substance of the article was about the Administration's efforts to block pretty much any meaningful dialogue among nations on global climate change. Nothing really new there. What struck me, having just read Dr. Stanks's letter, was the final paragraph of the article, which reads: "Those sharply different perceptions led to a clash even over what language should be used in discussing disaster relief. Bush Administration emissaries opposed the use of the phrase 'climate change' ... in favor of 'climate variability,' a much more nebulous term." Calling "global warming" "climate variability" is to strip the phenomenon of any reality. Climate is variable, so we're simply talking about the status quo; there's nothing there to get worked up about or even to write a report on.

All politicians abuse language and statistics. It goes with the turf. But the Bush Administration is by far the most Orwellian in modern times in the way it tortures language to serve its political purposes. Listen to Administration officials when they refer to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It is never referred to by its full name, or even as a refuge; it is inevitably called the "Anwar." It's much more palatable to the public to despoil an "anwar" than a "wildlife refuge."

The examples are myriad: The "clear skies" initiative weakens air pollution regulations; "healthy forests" are clear-cut forests. Perhaps most insidious and most Orwellian, the "war on terror" is endless, without geographical boundary, and used to justify continued abrogation of the U.S. Constitution and international law.

C&EN will continue to use the phrase "climate change," because, although the phenomenon is driven by an increase in the average global temperature, the phenomenon manifests differently in different parts of the Earth. We will not, however, succumb to doublespeak.

Thanks for reading.

Views expressed on this page are those of the author and not necessarily those of ACS.