Chuck

Sorry can't help but respond. You are confusing climate and weather. The
unfortunate thing about this is that we talk of global warming and this
is misleading. The experts don't use this term, they talk of climate
change. Hence the international body studying this is called the
International Panel on Climate Change. This means that radiation forcing
at any given time at a particular part of the earth may be positive and
negative at another part, but the average may be higher. These
unofficial studies, and the official ones, average the temperature over
the whole earth and, whereas Nov and Dec may be the coldest months where
you are, they may be the warmest in Oz or Peru.

Yes, we are having an unusual cold snap in the Med area just now. Here,
in Cyprus, we are currently at 9°C below the seasonal average but this
is a weather condition, not climate. We do have accurate temperature
records going back about 120 years and a moving average curve clearly
demonstrates a mean temperature increase over the 20th century of about
1.8°C and, more catastrophic, a rainfall decrease of about 100 mm in a
country which was never rich on water resources. This is climate change.
I'm not saying that this is anthropogenic, although there is every
chance that this may be the case. The curves fit in beautifully with the
measured increases of CO2 and CH4, but this is not necessarily the
cause, although there is a strong probability.

The problem is that, if we wait for a 100% certain scientific proof that
climate change is anthropogenic and we do nothing about it in the
meanwhile, it will be too late - the quality of life will become
intolerable.

Apart from that, we must cut fossil fuel emissions anyway. They are
costing us too much in pulmonary and other disease, world wide. Here we
have a definite cause and effect, with known mechanisms. Just consider
the incidence of lung cancers (even among rural non-smokers), emphysema,
asthma etc. Even more, the HIS is also seriously affected.
Pollution-induced disease is causing more world hardship and is already
costing us twice as much as AIDS. This is costing the world community
much more than reducing the causes to 1950 levels of pollution would.
Can we afford not to do so, before our medical insurance invoices
skyrocket to Mars? This argument alone should convince the nosayers who
are waiting to be fried or drowned before doing anything. And we don't
have to wait for the proof.

Brian