IGM: The Great Climate Change Debate

Inter-Galactic Memo
To: All Personnel
Fr: W. Leavitt
Re: The Great Climate Change Debate
9-15-2010
Link: http://rps3.com/Pages/Burt_Rutan_on_Climate_Change.htm

I suppose I’ve written a dozen pieces on this topic by now. And today I feel vindicated. A good friend sent me a link to a website put up by Burt Rutan. I could write an IGM just about Burt—he’s one of my heroes. Burt is an aeronautical engineer and a living legend. If I were given to hyperbole—and I am—I would say that in the last 30 or 40 years he has been responsible for more true innovation in the aviation industry than all the giant conglomerates combined. You know those vertical tips at the end of nearly every wing in the commercial airline industry? Burt Rutan. Space Ship One—the first private vehicle to take a human into space? Burt Rutan. He is a genius of the first order, and a maverick—probably why I like him so much. Burt decided to look into the whole “Global Warming-Climate Change” issue from the viewpoint of an aeronautical engineer as opposed to a scientist. Why?

My focus is on an Engineering Approach – where
data are critical and there are consequences for
being wrong; not the Scientist approach – where a
theory is the product and it can be right or wrong
without repercussions.

In other words, airplane designers are held to incredibly high, rigorous standards because when they are wrong, people die. The engineers and pilots rely heavily on accurate meteorological and climate data, which inform their designs and innovations. They must have good data.
So Burt decided to study the contentious issue for himself. I have looked at about 10% of the site so far, and it is blowing me away. Why? Because everything I have been saying for years—all the way back to the Ozone Scare of the 70’s—from a completely common-sense standpoint, using very little research—turns out to be true. And this guy did his homework. His research is comprehensive and thorough. He is brutally honest and frank while remaining professional and polite. And he does not equivocate. He interprets the data from the viewpoint of an engineer, whose life—and the lives of millions of others (and that is literally true) depends on his being right.
I am putting the link in this IGM, and I sincerely hope you at least go to it and scan the information. It is chock-full of graphs and raw data, but he explains it all simply and informally. Anyone still in the Human-Caused Climate-Change camp, or anyone with lingering doubts, absolutely needs to review this information. You owe it to yourselves.
When you get to the site you will be given two choices; a PDF version, and a PowerPoint version. I clicked on the PDF version and read it. It looks like this: Adobe pdf version - 3.7 megabytes
It will take a while, so don’t hurry. I haven’t tried it yet, but the PowerPoint version might be fun. it is vitally important that as many people as possible see this information. Pass it on if you feel like it.
At the end of this memo is a very brief synopsis of his conclusions. But we need to read the critique itself to understand why he makes these observations, comes to these conclusions, and makes these recommendations. The countries of the world—including our own—are about to bankrupt the planet, permanently cripple the global economy, and increase the death-rate and poverty exponentially, based on spurious data and self-serving agendas. It is vital that we prevent this from happening, and being informed is how we do it. We’ve all heard about the 2,500 scientists who signed the petition claiming global warming is a real, immediate, and relevant threat. How many of us have heard about the 31,000 scientists who signed a petition espousing the opposite point of view? You will find that in this report.
Who are we going to believe? That’s what it comes down to. For myself, I choose the world-class, brilliant engineer/innovator over the room-temperature IQ, career politician tobacco farmer.

By Burt Rutan:

Observations
• The only “evidence” that humans cause global warming comes from computer models. The creator of the model can make it show whatever he wants, by adjusting parameters.
• Man has not demonstrated an ability to change global temperatures, nor to forecast future climate conditions.
• It would be desirable to have more atmospheric CO2 than present, to increase crop yields and forest growth. This would save tens of millions of lives next century.
• The warming experienced in the last century and the warming expected in the next, did not and will not cause a net increase in extinctions or weather calamities.
• We do not know the important stuff - what causes the dangerous drop into the major ice ages or what causes the cyclic return to the brief interglacial warm periods.
• Is the debate over? "It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.”
Conclusions
• The CAGW agenda is supported with deceptively altered science. In spite of recent, human-caused atmospheric CO2 increases, there is nothing out of the ordinary happening with our climate.
• Climate Change is real. The earth has been naturally warming since the “Little Ice Age”, with cooling cycles.
• Fossil fuel use adds a small % to an important trace gas, that is not only beneficial, but is the essence of life itself.
• We cannot burn fossil fuels to prevent the next ice age; the greenhouse gas effect is far too weak for that.
• Current fuels will become naturally constrained by cost as they become scarce. Government taxes are not required.
• If Man, in the future, achieves a capability to change global temperatures, he will likely use that technology to warm the planet, not to cool it.
• Manmade global warming is over. It existed only in the minds of grant-seeking scientists and academics, ratings-obsessed media and opportunistic eco/political-activists.

Recommendations
• Recognize that, in terms of cost and human lives, the Government efforts to constrain use and increase the cost of energy are orders of magnitude more important than the certification of a new airliner.
• We cannot assure airline public safety by using a computer model to predict airline safety; we must do extensive testing under real conditions and pay attention to all the results.
• Require an engineering task as rigid as the certification of an airliner. Apply that task to the “theory of climate modification by man”. Mandate that “engineering certification” be done before governments can impose taxes, fees or regulations to constrain our use of any product to fuel our energy needs.
• Engineers do listen to scientists and use their work to help them plan the testing/validation needed to complete their certification goals. However, using scientists to direct airliner certification, would be as disastrous as scientists proposing theories to direct National or World energy policy.

Link: http://rps3.com/Pages/Burt_Rutan_on_Climate_Change.htm