State of Fear

I read the book a few days ago. I heard Crichton was speaking against the reality of Global Warming. I didn't like that, and read the book with a prejudiced mind. I'm surprised by a lot of what it has to say.

I am a pro-conservation kind of fellow. I reuse paper, minimize water usage etc. I can't call my life eco-friendly, but I do a bit here and there to be less wasteful. I used to believe strongly in Global Warming and even now I have a feeling that something's happening to the climate. The last few years have been hot, and the monsoons have behaved differently.

Now I'm not so sure about global warming. It may be happening, it may not be, I wouldn't know. The alarming thing, which Crichton has shown, is the manner in which Global Warming has been promoted/supported by sections of the scientific community and environmentalists. While State of Fear hasn't really dispelled my fears of climate change ahead, it has shaken my faith in environmentalists, who seem to have spread incomplete information.

Did you think that the polar ice caps are going to melt becasue of us? That the sea level is rising? That more CO2 means more temperature? That warmer climates will promote disease? That we need to and are competent enough to preserve forests? That the temperatures in a city are governed by many local factors and not solely dependant on the regional climate? Look for a report titled "Nine Lies about Global Warming" released by the Lavoisier Group.

The Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change released a report for policy makers around Feb 2007.

The things I noted about the report:

They state clearly (in a footnote, by the way) that according to the IPCC, climate change refers to the changes due to natural as well as human activities, not just direct or indirectly human activities, which was the old convention. I think this is because it has become hard to isolate climate change due to man, but they won't tell you that in a hurry.

The report gives pictures of the map of the world with regions coloured depending on the likely rise in temperature. At a minimum the arctic would be 4 degrees warmer by 2090, and at worst 7 degrees. The interesting thing to note is that the two maps are very similar, only that regions coloured 2 degrees previously are now coloured 4 and so on. When scientists predict that 2 degrees can trigger huge climate changes, how can I accept that the difference in the two projections is only the magnitude of temperature change? Completely new patterns should emerge, two different regions marked orange need not both become red. For God's sake, the atmosphere is not a linear model!! I know this much at least. My point is that the projection doesn't seem to be based on any realistic model of the Earth's climate, so how can it be presented as reliable data?

I still believe that we should cut down on greenhouse gas emissions. We are definitely modifying the composition of the air, and the atmosphere being chaotic, we cannot predict what the outcome will be. It may become hard to live in, it may not change much. It may bring drastic changes to Europe and S. America, but not really affect Indonesia. Who knows?

I also believe that people who use lies to pursue an agenda, should not be allowed to get away with it. Some environmentalists are not your average NatGeo scientist in khadis out in the middle of some desert. They are globe-trotters who ensure that they are paid well. Very little of the money that such NGOs receive is used in useful activities. A large chunk is spent maintaining the NGO, never mind its activities.

Many of us cannot do much to change the way the world works. However, some of us may lend support to various causes. I feel we should choose our causes from a position of knowledge, and not based on hype and propaganda.

I'd also recommend we take a relook at how we collect our information. The existing media have time and again proven to be sensationalist, trivial and inaccurate.

Who knows, the threat of global warming may be real and our climate is about to change for the worse. But find out for yourself.