The first being a group of 'scientist' that claimed that because we had done such a good job cleaning up the air that it was actually causing more global warming. I couldn't find the article that I had read, but to me they just seemed like a bunch of quack alarmists.

It wasn't done by "quacks", and it's not nearly one group. An international study published in 2005 in Science is probably what got it on the news, but the general idea has been followed for decades. Link to abstract

There's no question that increased particulate matter in the upper atmosphere reflects more sunlight, reducing the amount that would otherwise be converted to warmth. The amount of sunlight hitting the ground has ticked up in recent years thanks to worldwide improvements in reducing this kind of air pollution, in part due to acid rain concerns. That's a very easy measurement to make, and its a reversal of what was measured in previous decades.

Particulates are a separate phenomenon from carbon dioxide, but when you consider them together the implication is that the warming we've measured over the last several decades may have been mitigated by the particulates, and we may be in somewhat worse shape that you'd otherwise think from the temperature records.

On the positive side, both the drop in particulate counts and the progress made with respect to ozone are good examples that if we set sensible policies and do a little work, these are all fixable problems. You occasionally hear people moan that there's nothing we can do about global warming anyway, but it's simply not the truth.

Farm crops are more reflective than trees so they absorb less heat. I'm pretty sure most enviromentalist would have a cow if somebody suggested that we deforest large areas so we could plant more reflective plants.

There's probably smarter ways to address this than mass deforestation. Converting waste space (especially in urban areas) back to green space has a lot of benefits, however, and it's often not very expensive.

I'm a bit skeptical of the things Lindzen says because he does get his money from Exxon. I would be curious how he would be accepted in the scientific community if he didn't get any money from Exxon. What do you think Valg?

I think more people would listen if he was publishing his "proof" in peer-reviewed primary literature. But he's not-- his recent publications are all on other topics, and he very conspicuously keeps his "global warming isn't harmful" stuff to things like book chapters and seminars, which don't undergo review.

I can find you a Nobel Prize winner (Kary Mullis) who believes in alien abductions. (He also believes HIV doesn't cause AIDS, CFCs don't harm the ozone layer, and that global warming isn't real, fwiw. His book is bizarre, and I once saw him give a talk where he switched over to nude photos "to make sure we were still paying attention".) Doesn't mean he can get it published in a journal.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com