North Star Writers Group

NASA stirred the heated waters (no pun intended) of the global warming debate this week when it made minor modifications to its record of average annual temperatures in the U.S. since 2000. The revision accounted for a 0.15 degree (Celsius) difference between the reported data of average temps for the past six years and the actual temperatures. This discrepancy resulted from NASA scientists incorrectly assuming that the data since 2000 had been adjusted for factors that change over time when it had not, as well as other errors Canadian blogger Stephen McIntyre brought to NASA’s attention through an email earlier this month.

Because the original numbers happened to be slightly higher than the revised numbers, global warming skeptics seized on the edit as proof that climate change dangers have been exaggerated and that the faulty data should cause mistrust of any climate data released by NASA. Rush Limbaugh predictably opined, “We have proof of man-made global warming. Man-made global warming is inside NASA. The man-made global warming is in the scientific community with false data.”

However, according to Jim Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the shift is insignificant in terms of its effect on global warming. This, too, was offered as proof by conservative conspiracy theorists in the blogosphere that Hansen was facilitating the liberal agenda of global warming by downplaying the mistake and consequent edits.

Although a climatologist I am not, I can see the holes in the argument that NASA’s data adjustment should turn the whole global warming movement on its head. For one, global climate – not weather, as these temperatures more accurately reflect – is a vast, complicated sum of many factors, not just the average temperature in one country occupying part of the planet (the United States) over a span of just six years.

Additionally, critics are proclaiming that these discoveries discount that 1998 was the hottest year on record in the United States, as 1934 now becomes the winner, thereby challenging the theory that our planet is hotter than ever, specifically because of us. However, according to an article in the Washington Post, 1998 was never officially proclaimed to be the hottest, just that, statistically, its temperatures ranked as high as notoriously hot 1934. Regardless, the data shift affected only the temperature readings taken after the year 2000, anyway. So, again, these findings do not reflect a major shift in the way we need to think about global warming.

It’s almost as if those on both sides of the debate are keeping a climate-change tally. Al Gore won the Emmy – score one for the believers! NASA screwed up – score one for the skeptics! As a believer myself, even I find it silly when proponents of climate change theory smugly present scientific data that confirms their belief, as if they want climate change to be real.

No one should really want our planet to be on the verge of meltdown, even if it means they can rub it the faces of skeptics. And those who believe global warming exists, and therefore acutely understands the disaster that will accompany it, should be more elated than those on the other side when they find data that contradicts that global warming is in fact a pressing problem.

By the same token, however, opponents of climate-crisis action should think before accusing those who insist climate change is real of promoting a “liberal agenda.” What agenda would that be exactly? That we want to undergo significant overhauls to the way we live our lives – the fuels we use, the vehicles we drive – just for the heck of it? No one believes that combating global warming on a large scale will be easy or cheap, or that if we are successful, the benefits will be reserved for liberals. So why would liberals specifically want to tackle those challenges if not for the greater good of humankind?

Opponents should also understand that if presented with reliable, indisputable data that confirms global warming has been hyped to mythic proportions, respectable climatologists, scientists and environmentalists alike would likely accept that data and rejoice, not find ways to twist the findings to confirm their beliefs. Sure, pride is an issue, but in this case, those who see beyond the ideological struggle behind the debate likely want to be proven wrong.

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