Dan's Outside

American Geophysical Union on global warming

The 28-member council of the American Geophysical Union, representing 41,000 members, including some 10,000 experts on the planet’s atmosphere and changing climate, issued the following statement after the organization met in San Francisco last week: “Scientific evidence strongly indicates that natural influences cannot explain the rapid increase in global near-surface temperatures observed in the second half of the 20th century.” One council member described as a cautious supporter of the statement told a reporter: “It is scientifically inconceivable that after changing forests into cities, turning millions of acres into farmland, putting massive quantities of soot and dust into the atmosphere and sending quantities of greenhouse gases into the air, that the natural course of climate change hasn’t been increased in the past century.” [Seen at the Daily Scoop]

Another report from the AGU conference speaks about earlier relationships between human civilization and climate.
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December 18, 2003 - Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary