by Mark Whitney

Like climate itself, the discussion surrounding it has become as complex, coupled, and chaotic as the people discussing it.
It seems everyone has something to say on the subject informed or not, so it is only fitting that I should add to the clamor.
Others will provide the data and refined analysis, but it is first important to offer a reason that a person should consider what is offered.
Here I provide such an argument.

From my earliest memories, I have always been prone to taking things apart to see how they work. Sometimes I could even put them back together
and again they would function. Science is like that. How grand it is to take apart the world and look at all the moving parts, the structures,
the odd bits that seem to fit but whose purpose is obscure. Such practice would appear to be innocent enough, but like all things human it can be
turned to darker purpose.

The tool, the method of that pursuit is indeed simple in description--look, guess and test. The last step is the defining element of science,
and it is the one that if ignored or abused leads to confusion at best, and often to harm. It is the place where missteps and dark designs find their home.
Climate science is no exception and indeed is fertile ground for the best, and the worst aspirations of humanity.

For most of its existence man's relationship with climate, and its offspring weather has been one of struggle. It is no wonder then that understanding it
has been at the forefront of human endeavor. Fear and necessity are potent incentives toward that end and driven by them we have progressed through myth,
to religion, and finally, to science on the long path to understanding. Now as that goal seems tantalizingly close we find ourselves again in a place where
belief holds sway over knowledge, where dogma darkens the sky where once the light of open inquiry shone brightly. Now, the seed of understanding, the questioning
of what we think we know is threatened by the harsh barrier of authority. Thou shalt not question the Word, and the Word is Crisis!

It is axiomatic that nothing is more motive than crisis, and authority has long wielded it as a means to its increase. Where none exists, crisis must be
manufactured or authority loses its appearance of necessity. If everything is just fine one questions the need for authority, and that is the authoritarian's worst nightmare.
When science becomes authority it ceases to be a tool of reason and expansion of knowledge; it becomes one of limits. When it becomes a system of belief
it loses the one thing that sets it apart from all other exercises of thought. When it partners with power it becomes one of oppression.
What better partner could power find in this era than the illusion of scientific foundation?

Far from being a fragile construct, this planet is a remarkably resilient one. Early in my science education, it was insisted that life could have come about
and persisted only if the system as a whole was dominated by negative feedbacks, by emergent mechanisms that tended to moderate conditions and prevent
excursions to the extreme. If in fact the climate were so delicate that it was sensitive to minor perturbations such as small deviations in the concentration
of atmospheric gasses, we would not be here to discuss the nuances of it. There is, in fact, nothing particularly unusual going on with the climate system.
We have only begun to understand the complexities of climate and certainly do not know enough to make any grand pronouncements regarding its future trajectory,
but what we think we do know provides no foundation to insist upon the existence of imminent crisis.

Carbon dioxide is present in such a small concentration in the atmosphere, four one-hundredths of one percent, that it can be said that there is almost none.
If you had a cup with 10,000 molecules of air in it, four would be CO2. Much less and it would be insufficient to sustain life since the molecule is the source
of the building blocks of life itself. For most of the history of life the gas was far more abundant, and the planet has endured near starvation levels of the
necessary gas prior to the advent of the industrial age. All evidence suggests that our contribution to its availability is a net benefit to the biosphere.

An objective observer from only a century ago, nay half that, if transported suddenly to this time would find a climate paradise where the increasingly pampered
mass of humanity now whines about crisis. Never has Ma Nature been less the tyrant than now. Never have people been more shielded from Her wildest excesses.
Indeed, never before has any human considered themself a threat to Her! That is not to say that we should stride carelessly, unconcerned with the consequences
of our actions; but to think that with a minor gas, one small element of a large machine, we can so casually control one of the most powerful of Her domains
is rather like an ant crawling up an elephant's leg with intentions of violence.

It is also not to say that all those who espouse the idea do so with ill intent; good intention, however, all too often leads down a road all too familiar
to a place all too dreaded when power is its companion. In the climate arena it should be considered with suspicion that inquiry is not only discouraged but is
actively suppressed, ridiculed, and prohibited. Contrary evidence and data are ignored or dismissed without refutation but rather by attack on the source
or an appeal to an imagined consensus. One should always be wary of someone who insists on action and discourages careful consideration. That is the hallmark
of the charlatan. Skepticism is not denial. It is the healthy response to any profound claim. What we think we know is always a starting point, not an end product.

Any good theory in the practice of science welcomes doubt and withstands even the most concerted effort to prove it wrong. The proponents of the theory
of anthropogenic climate crisis engage in tortuous gymnastics to avoid such conflict. It is ever more apparent that the climate crisis theory cannot survive
reasoned debate and rigorous testing. It only lingers as a relic of emotion, as a belief akin to religious devotion.

At its heart, knowledge is an effort of the individual. It is said that we stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us. We walk the path of knowledge
holding each other's hand, but in the end, truth as we know it is a matter each must reach on their terms, in the place we truly are alone.
Do not let that place, your mind, be forced by fear, or by a need to conform, to belong. Do not surrender it to authority for authority's sake.
Let it be a place reached by asking yourself what you know. How does this thing work? And to ask it every day as if the question were new.