The human effect on global warming is significant.

I am glad to have an opponent who is actually knowledgeable on the subject. =========== Contention 1 =========== "So does CO2 even matter? Apparently not. If anything, the higher temperature later causes higher CO2 levels, NOT the other way around. " My opponent has touched on something very important here. It is partially true that in general, CO2 lags behind temperature. But that does not make CO2 unimportant. CO2 is still a source of potential warming due to the greenhouse effect. In natural cycles, warming cycles usually take about 5000 years. For the first 800 years, temperature leads CO2. For the final 4200 years, temperature and CO2 are closely correlated. So all that is clear here is that for the first 800 years, temperature is the leading force. The predicted cause of this is that a cycle in earth's orbit caused the first 800 years of warming. This led to a rise in CO2 levels as oceans warmed and released CO2. This CO2 amplified the warming effect, and as more CO2 was released, the earth continued warming. This positive feedback is responsible for the other 4200 years of warming. =========== Contention 2 =========== My first part stands unrefuted. My opponent appears to agree with the importance of scientific societies. II: "Really. .. out of 928 papers searched, none were found? What kind of search was this? " Not a comprehensive one, obviously. It was meant as an illustration of the vast majority of scientists in support of AGW. A. Exact source, please. This is a quote from a newspaper article. Newspaper articles are not for the purpose of science; they are designed for entertainment. They have a tendency to exaggerate and warp reality to make things look more interesting and controversial. More to the point, this newspaper has no evidence. As for "THEY HAVE BEEN CENSURED, EXCORIATED AND LABELED AS LACKEYS FOR THE OIL COMPANIES", some climatologists are "lackeys for the oil companies", while considerably many others are not. There are simply a lot MORE climatologists in support of AGW than not. B. The Oregon Petition states "There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. " This is a highly exaggerated version of global warming. Global warming is not the implication that there will be "catastrophic heating". According to Merriam-Webster, global warming is "an increase in the earth's atmospheric and oceanic temperatures widely predicted to occur due to an increase in the greenhouse effect resulting especially from pollution". The Oregon Petition was an attempt at misrepresentation. The article it was attached to was disguised as a reprint of a peer-reviewed article entitled "Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide". It used out-of-date information and, according to Raymond Pierrehumbart, an atmospheric scientist, was filled with "half-truths". [3] Even so, 17800 scientists is not so many. [5] has a list of scientific societies supporting AGW, which represents hundreds of thousands of scientists. I have not counted, but I would guess that my own list represents at least 100,000 scientists. The AAAS alone has over 42,000. C: Source please. I cannot say much about this. D: I may be misunderstanding this point, but it seems negligible. "her" For the record, I am male. "We are here to debate whether or not AGW is happening, not the solutions of its effects. " You're right. Sorry about that. I had written that argument a while ago, and I just pasted it in here without thinking about it much. However, since it is irrelevant, I ask that the voters discard it. "Now, with my last 2,772 characters, I shall present a one new contention of my own. " Is that 2772 after typing "last ", after typing "2772", or after finishing that sentence? ======= Rebuttal ======= "We have documented shortcomings of surface data, affected by urban heat islands and by poor distribution of land based observing centers. " Surface data is not infallible. But it is better than my opponent is giving it credit for. The effect of urban heat islands is negligible on the readings of surface thermometers [6]. Even so, NASA GISS tries to account for potential biases [9]. "[Satellites] have not shown any warming trends since 1998. " This is patently untrue. My opponent is engaging in dishonest behavior by making this claim (either that or he has never looked at a temperature graph), and this should be taken into account when voting on conduct. I ask the voters to look at [7]. They may notice that, although temperature was hottest in 1998, temperature on average is still on the rise. During 1998, a large El Niï¿½o caused a short and intense warming. Even though it was hotter then than it is now, this does not mean that global warming has stopped. The past five or ten years have been much hotter than the previous five or ten years, and the next five or ten years will likely be even hotter. For an even better illustration, look at [11] (a). The long-term trend is significant warming. "'NASA has acknowledged is accidentally inflated its official record of surface temperatures in the US beginning with the year 2000. They now show 1998 falling to second place behind 1934 as the warmest year, followed by 1921, 2006, 1931, 1999, and 1953. '" a) These records are only in the US. To get an accurate picture, the entire globe must be surveyed. A more reliable picture of world temperature can be found at [10]. b) The warm years during the 1930s in the US were caused by the dust bowl. When American farmers did not properly rotate their crops, soil became useless and dry. This kicked up a huge amount of dust, trapping heat in the atmosphere. So this warming cannot be attributed to natural causes. "Surface temperature is not measured globally but rather haphazardly, wherever measuring stations have already been placed. " Stations are not exactly haphazard. They are placed all around the globe. Maybe they aren't very evenly distributed, but if not, it's not very difficult to account for biases. "The Urban Heat Island Effect Artificially Inflates Data. " In addition to what I've already stated on this topic, take a look at [11]. If the UHI effect is prominent, then (b) should show distortions in more urbanized areas (Japan, US, Europe, etc. as seen in [12]). But it doesn't. We can conclude that the UHI effect has a negligible effect. "It doesn't matter, because the temperature of" My opponent's sentence was cut off. I presume there was a character limit. I hope that my opponent will continue this paragraph in round 2, in addition to his rebuttals to my points. [1] . http://www.realclimate.org... [2] . http://en.wikipedia.org... [3] . http://www.sciencemag.org... [4] . http://en.wikipedia.org... [5] . http://en.wikipedia.org... [6] . http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov... [7] . http://data.giss.nasa.gov... [8] youtube. .com//watch? v=y15UGhhRd6M&feature=channel_page [9] . http://data.giss.nasa.gov... [10] . http://upload.wikimedia.org... [11] . http://data.giss.nasa.gov... [12] . http://www.grist.org... [13] . http://en.wikipedia.org...