That Humans Are Causing Climate Change

My opponent has not made a single argument for his position or a refutation of my arguments. His entire argument in round 3 is a source war (when the debate revolves around the number of sources each debater can put forth). Not only does it not satisfy his burden of proof, it is no way to argue. In this argument, I will first consider his introductory points, then proceed to refute the relevant arguments he made from his first argument, and finally show how his source war does not prove his point, especially on scientific topics. My opponent has not shown how his arguments are relevant, as he hasn't addressed my arguments as to how they aren't relevant. Also, from the resolution and the arguments you have put forth, you have been arguing that humans have been a significant, if not the main cause of the modern global warming. I've been showing how they're not. Refutations Climate Models Climate models are far from perfect. In fact, they have consistently overestimated warming. "The computer models predict that the 20th century temperatures should have increased by 1.6 to 3.74 Celsius, while the actual observed 20th-century temperature increase was about 0.6 Celsius. A model that fails to history match is useless for predicting the future."[1] Here is a graph showing various climate model predictions to actual temperatures: "The IPCC models projected the global 17-year SST trend ending August 2011 at 0.15 C/decade, but the observed rise was only 0.02 C/decade... The quoted error on a single measurement is 0.05 C. The probability that the IPCC projections overstate the warming in greater than 90%." I could go on more about this, but since my opponent has provided no proof of the validity of climate models, this will suffice.[1] To conclude, here is a prediction made by a climate model: Built in cooling trend until at least 2024 Temperature Hadsst3 moving average anomaly 2035 - 0.15 Temperature Hadsst3 moving average anomaly 2100 " 0.5 General Conclusion " by 2100 all the 20th century temperature rise will have been reversed.[2] Why should we believe the models that predict excessive warming instead of models that predict a decrease in temperatures. Water Vapor Feedback Once again, the predictions to not match up with the observations. The feedback predicts relative humidity to remain constant so that the atmosphere can hold more water vapor with increased temperatures. However, humidity has actually fallen. This doesn't only negate the supposed positive feedback, but if the decrease is large enough, it may actually become a negative feedback. Here is a graph showing relative humidity over the last 60 years: "This shows that the actual water vapor content in the upper troposphere has declined by 13.7% (best fit line) from 1948 to 2012 at the 400 mb pressure level. The climate models predict that humidity will increase in the upper troposphere, but the data shows a large decrease; just where water vapor changes have the greatest effect on global temperatures."[1] Ocean Acidification Actually, claims of ocean acidification have been greatly exaggerated and misinterpreted. The mean drop in pH levels as a result of CO2 increases is around 0.3, but the sea can experience changes of almost 1.4 in as little as just a day. "On a monthly scale the pH varies by 0.024 to 1.430 pH units.""At Puerto Morelos (in Mexico"s easternmost state, on the Yucat"n Peninsula) the pH varied as much as 0.3 units per hour due to groundwater springs.""Even the more stable and vast open ocean is not a fixed pH all year round. Hofmann writes that 'Open-water areas (in the Southern Ocean) experience a strong seasonal shift in seawater pH (~0.3"0.5 units) between austral summer and winter.'"[3][4] This is the paper's hypothesis: "This natural variability has prompted the suggestion that an appropriate null hypothesis may be, until evidence is obtained to the contrary, that major biogeochemical processes in the oceans other than calcification will not be fundamentally different under future higher CO2/lower pH conditions"[3][4] The Consensus This argument has employed by pro in both his first argument as an argument, and in this round to support his position. However, both instances commit both a fallacy and a gross inaccuracy. First, the fallacy. Science does not work by consensus. The number of researchers or organizations has little bearing on whether what they believe is actually true. Michael Crichton has said, "Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus." My opponent has said that petroleum companies supporting climate change deniers is a conflict of interest, but so are governmental organizations, because legislators want them to provide information that will support the legislation will support. Politics in science hardly makes for objective conclusions.[1] Even so, the consensus doesn't even exist in the first place. Over 31,000 scientists (with at least a Bachelors' degree in relevant fields) have signed a petition saying that global warming is not anthropogenic. The Heartland Institute has conducted an international survey of 530 climate scientists in 2003. The survey asked if the current state of scientific knowledge is developed well enough to allow for a reasonable assessment of the effects of greenhouse gases. Two-thirds of the scientists surveyed (65.9 percent) disagreed with the statement, with nearly half (45.7 percent) scoring it with a 1 or 2, indicating strong disagreement. Only 10.9 percent scored it with a 6 or 7, indicating strong agreement. Most of the organizations my opponent lists are governmental, meaning that they have that conflict of interest I mentioned earlier.[5][6] The graphs my opponent provides are either irrelevant, are refuted by my argument against the consensus above, or show a rough correlation between CO2 and temperature that I have already shown to not exist. It is also relevant to note that the r^2 correlation between CO2 and temperature over the last century is only 0.44, which is considered poor.[7] Also, as for the other greenhouse gases, my opponent has not argued for them specifically, concentrating on CO2 in his arguments. Regardless, I will simply refer to my fourth argument in the last round on greenhouse gas absorption. Methane has an absorption band (at 8 micrometres) that largely overlaps with water vapor, so an increase in methane has little effect on temperature. In addition to methane, the wavelengths of light that nitrous oxide absorb largely overlap with that of water vapor, so an increase in nitrous oxide also has little effect on temperature. Those are the main greenhouse gases. I will address these more if my opponent considers them any more than he has.[1] Conclusion My opponent's entire argument in this round is a fallacious attempt to make his position seem valid when he can't refute the arguments I made in the first round. Again, science does not work by consensus, and even so, there really is no "consensus". Pro has never gotten near satisfying his BoP that humans are causing climate change. Sources [1]: http://www.friendsofscience.org... [2]: http://wattsupwiththat.com... [3]: http://www.plosone.org... [4]: http://wattsupwiththat.com... [5]: http://www.petitionproject.org... [6]: http://heartland.org... [7]: http://wattsupwiththat.com...