by Jimmy Nightingale

Created on: April 01, 2009   Last Updated: December 07, 2009

I wish it were. Sadly, the vast weight of scientific opinion points to it being very real. It is about as close to a certainty as you can get in science.

So how can I be so sure? After all, I have no qualifications in any field remotely related to climate science. I do what I've learned works very well for acquiring an understanding of an area beyond my current sphere of knowledge. I read voraciously and actively question everything I am told. Most importantly, I look to the experts. If the overwhelming weight of expert opinion supports a particular position, there is a very strong chance that it is the correct position. Yes, there have been occasions where the experts can be wrong, although I can't think of anything in the last 20-30 years that falls into this category, but if you are a betting person, it is safer to go with the odds.

The simple fact is that every scientific organisation of national or international standing supports the view that global warming is real. The Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released in 2007 summarises the peer-reviewed literature on the subject and concludes that the globe is warming and at a rate that is unprecedented in human experience. The IPCC and the major scientific organisations around the world go beyond this to point the finger at human activity as the dominant cause of the anomalous warming since about 1850.

And herein lies the problem. I think that most people would have no difficulty accepted the physical basis for global warming if it wasn't in part directly related to our behaviour. There is a cognitive dissonance between accepting that the globe is warming, that it is a real problem and will create problems for future generations and acceptance that we are to blame and that some change of behaviour will be necessary to deal with the problem. Some people handle this by refusing to believe that there is a problem and rationalise their beliefs using whatever crumb of scientific knowledge they can find. You don't need to search very far to find blog sites claiming to debunk the current scientific understanding.

Others look at the problem from a purely monetary perspective or have some unshakeable faith that technological advances will come to the rescue. Neither of these views makes any sense. The Stern Review and a number of other reviews have adopted a risk management approach. The total cost of deal with global warming now is a very small proportion of GDP growth,

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