Top Level
CX
Adaptation
Your warming evidence is in the context of Biblical level floods, monstrous wildfires, mass biod
extinction events, and resource wars --- What does the plan do to adapt to that?
Strat
T!!!
China CP & SOI
Warming DA
Case
Science Diplomacy
scientific diplomacy lay in the third category, namely the use of science as a channel of international diplomacy, either as a way
of helping to forge consensus on contentious issues, or as a catalyst for peace in situations of conflict. On the first of these,
some pointed to recent climate change negotiations, and in particular the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, as a good example, of the way that the scientific community can provide a strong rationale for joint international
action. But others referred to the failure of the Copenhagen climate summit last December to come up with a
meaningful agreement on action as a demonstration of the limitations of this way of thinking. It was argued that this failure
had been partly due to a misplaced belief that scientific consensus would be sufficient to
generate a commitment to collective action, without taking into account the political
impact that scientific ideas would have. Another example that received considerable attention was the current
construction of a synchrotron facility SESAME in Jordan, a project that is already is bringing together researchers in a range of
scientific disciplines from various countries in the Middle East (including Israel, Egypt and Palestine, as well as both Greece and
Turkey). The promoters of SESAME hope that as with the building of CERN 60 years ago, and its operation as a research centre
involving, for example, physicists from both Russia and the United States SESAME will become a symbol of what regional
collaboration can achieve. In that sense, it would become what one participant described as a beacon of hope for the region.
But others cautioned that, however successful SESAME may turn out to be in purely scientific terms, its potential impact on the
used in this way; those who did so could come over as patronising, appearing unaware of political realities. Similarly, those who
hold science in esteem as a practice committed to promoting the causes of peace and development were reminded of the need
to take into account how advances
scientific cooperation
can become a precursor for political collaboration is less evident. For example, despite hopes
that the Middle East synchrotron would help bring peace to the region, several countries have
been reluctant to support it until the Palestine problem is resolved. Indeed, one speaker at the London
meeting (organised by the UK's Royal Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science) even suggested
that the
contentious area discussed at the meeting was how science diplomacy can frame
developed countries' efforts to help build scientific capacity in the developing world. There is
little to quarrel with in collaborative efforts that are put forward with a genuine desire for
partnership. Indeed, partnership whether between individuals, institutions or countries is the new buzzword in the
"science for development" community. But true partnership requires transparent relations between
partners who are prepared to meet as equals. And that goes against diplomats' implicit role:
to promote and defend their own countries' interests. John Beddington, the British government's chief
scientific adviser, may have been a bit harsh when he told the meeting that a diplomat is someone who is "sent abroad to lie for
his country". But he touched a raw nerve. Worlds apart yet co-dependent The truth is that science and politics make an uneasy
alliance. Both need the other. Politicians need science to achieve their goals, whether social, economic or unfortunately
military; scientists need political support to fund their research. But they also occupy different universes. Politics is, at root,
about exercising power by one means or another. Science is or should be about pursuing robust knowledge that can be
put to useful purposes. A strategy for promoting science diplomacy that respects these differences deserves support.
Particularly so if it focuses on ways to leverage political and financial backing for science's more humanitarian goals, such as
tackling climate change or reducing world poverty. But a commitment to science diplomacy that ignores the differences
acting for example as if science can substitute politics (or perhaps more worryingly, vice versa), is dangerous. The
Obama
administration's commitment to "soft power" is already faltering. It faces challenges ranging
from North Korea's nuclear weapons test to domestic opposition to limits on oil
consumption. A taste of reality may be no bad thing.
last time that the United States made a sustained effort to use science
diplomacy to build international partnerships), the concept was marred by ties to propaganda campaigns
and intelligence operations. The idea was that foreign elites who adopted the values of science objectivity,
internationalism, the free exchange of information would be more receptive to American overtures more generally. This
assumption drove most US science diplomacy throughout the Cold War. When government sponsorship was explicit ("overt"),
neither intelligence gathering nor pro-American reporting would have come as a surprise: anyone
agreeing to participate in a US government-sponsored scientific meeting, circa 1962, probably knew what they were getting into.
Things got much murkier when the foreign policy establishment turned to groups of private
citizens as ambassadors for science. An oddity of the history of American diplomacy is that the United States
routinely conducted its Cold War cultural campaigns through arms-length arrangements. In a few
cases, the groups engaged in so-called "private diplomacy" really were unaffiliated, but more often than not
organisations touting their "independent" work on behalf of the US government received help, usually with financial support
channeled through fake philanthropic foundations. The pass-through strategy was common in US international
activities from approximately 1948 until 1967, when an article in Ramparts magazine uncovered the CIA's covert funding of the
National Student Association (a youth organisation), and caused a major foreign policy scandal. Science turned out to be a
particularly good fit for this sort of arm's-length operation. All attempts at private diplomacy offered benefits of economy and
plausible deniability, but private
Asia Foundation (now known to be a CIA pass-through) for its international programmes. Like many
of the private
organisations that received at least part of their funding through the CIA, the BSCS also received support
from legitimate philanthropic organisations, including the Rockefeller Foundation and US government agencies, including the
National Science Foundation. Nor is it entirely clear whether the BSCS's leaders were aware of the true source of Asia Foundation
funds: Arnold Grobman, the BSCS's long-time executive director, denied any knowledge of such links in an interview with me a few
months before his death, in the fall of 2011. In any case, between 1961 and 1967, the BSCS and its overseas affiliates received 10s
of thousands of dollars from the Asia Foundation to underwrite the adaptation and translation of biology textbooks in Taiwan,
Thailand, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong and other nations on the Chinese perimeter. From the historical evidence, the BSCS's overseas
adaptation offices don't appear to be cover for something nefarious: they really did focus on biology curriculum reform, especially
textbook translation. The only thing sketchy about these offices was that their support came from a different source than their local
participants (and possibly even their American partners) believed. And that's the problem. Covers can be blown. When the Asia
Foundation's board of trustees acknowledged their ties to the CIA in 1967 (in an attempt to pre-empt yet another damaging story in
Ramparts), the BSCS's entire overseas operation came under suspicion. Indian authorities, for instance, briefly threatened to kick out
any group that received funding from the Asia Foundation; it took the BSCS years to re-establish trust with the foreign ministers of
education who had previously embraced their work. A
operations are threatening to derail genuinely helpful, hopeful activities that might
The state department's insistence on calling its
science envoys "private citizens", too, is cause for concern. Since the science envoys are
obviously doing the state department's work, why not call them "officials" and avoid the potential for confusion?
otherwise go a long way toward building international goodwill.
The US has been there before. This time, science diplomacy is worth doing right.
Alt Causes --- Their 1AC evidence talks about failures to follow treaties and
domestic attitudes about the environment
new budget represents a healthy boost over 2013 spending levels, which were depressed by
will receive $7.17 billion, an increase of 4.2%,
for example, and NASAs science programs will get $5.15 billion, a 7.7% jump. DOEs Office of Science enjoys a
the sequesters 5% bite. The National Science Foundation (NSF)
9.7% increase, to $5.07 billion, and DOEs Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy gets an 11.2% boost to $280 million. The
National Institutes of Standards and Technology will see its budget grow 10.4%, to $850 million.
Except for NASA, those agencies were all part of a 2006 initiative launched by the Bush administration to increase funding for the
physical sciences. Congress formalized the idea in a 2007 law, the America COMPETES Act. Although agencies never received the
generous funding called for by COMPETES, which has recently expired after being reauthorized in 2010, its message appears to have
survived: The physical sciences need to be strengthened to help the U.S. economy remain strong. President Barack Obama has
continued that theme in his budget requests, including a bid last spring for large increases at several agencies (see table).
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has created a
Center for Science Diplomacy that has focused on scientific communication with countries where
the U.S. Government does not have diplomatic relations.(5) The AAAS has engaged with North Korea and Cuba,
and was among the first to engage with Burma. Both the AAAS and the NAS have engaged with
Iran; in fact, the NAS has been conducting workshops and exchanges with the Iranian scientific community for over a decade.
important advisers to their governments.
Science cannot break down all the barriers, but when a window of opportunity emerges in governmental relations, the existing
scientific contacts can be a great asset, as was the case for U.S. relations with both China and Russia. The U.S. State Department has
always encouraged our nongovernmental scientific organizations to maintain contact and communications with scientists in
countries where diplomatic relations do not exist. Private
Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation is another example of utilizing science to solve health problems
facing developing countries, and has directed enormous resources and expertise at these issues.
The foundation has provided support for a decade to the NAS and Institute of Medicine to help science academies in Africa to
become more important advisers to their governments on health issues. Foundations
served this role well. The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, which was established by the German federal
government, is an excellent example of an organization pursuing science diplomacy through collaborations in
fundamental science and engineering. The many Humboldtians around the world are an important scientific network
as well as a bridge between Germany and other countries. Research universities are very international and
build linkages between countries. The international collaborations are not only those initiated by individual faculty, but
also strategic engagements made by university leaders and partly financed via university funds. It is hard to keep track of all the
international engagements that our major research universities are undertaking. American multinational
corporations
also contribute to science diplomacy. An interesting example is the program that Intel created to help reform
engineering education in Vietnam. Intel built its largest chip assembly and test facility in the world outside of Ho Chi Minh City, and
subsequently found that Vietnamese engineers and technicians that it hired needed additional skills. Intel partnered with Arizona
State University -- with support from USAID, Vietnamese ministries, and other companies -- to create the multiyear and multimillion
dollar Higher Engineering Education Alliance Program to strengthen engineering education in Vietnam. These international
engagements by our universities and companies have been a great asset for the U.S. in building
positive relationships with countries around the world. And it is important to remember that one of the greatest
benefits for the U.S. innovation ecosystem from international engagement of our universities and companies has been attracting
many of the best and brightest from around the world for graduate education and research and for creating and working in
innovative American technology companies.
The US government's international development agency is stepping up its focus on science and technology
with a key appointment intended to enhance the agency's programmes in the Middle East and bolster the
Obama administration's push for science diplomacy. Alex Dehgan was appointed USAID's
science and technology advisor last month (11 March). The agency described him in a statement as
"the focal point for implementing the Administrator's vision to restore science and technology
to its rightful place within USAID". An agency spokeswoman said that Dehgan will work closely with USAID's senior counselor
and director of innovation, Maura O'Neill, and will help shape development strategies, as well as create "novel science-based
cooperation among scientists and engineers, to achieve broader political objectives. Dehgan, a conservation biologist and an
attorney in international law, has worked for the US State Department in Afghanistan, Iraq and the Middle East. He also has
experience working on large-scale conservation projects in the non-governmental sector. The appointment is "very encouraging",
said Caroline Wagner, author of The New Invisible College: Science for Development. "Dehgan
US science diplomacy. "There is a lot of interest and experience that's being brought to this issue." Al Teich, director of
science and policy programmes at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), said that the
appointment of Dehgan who has worked as an AAAS fellow, helping to set up an electronic library of scientific journals in
Iraq shows that science diplomacy is "an idea whose time has come".
Energy Grids
Our high-tech world seems to have easily weathered a solar storm that didn't quite live up to its
advance billing. "It looks to me like it's over," NASA solar physicist David Hathaway said late
Thursday afternoon, after noticing a drop in a key magnetic reading. But when the storm finally arrived
around 6 a.m. ET Thursday, after traveling at 2.7 million mph, it was more a magnetic breeze than a
gale. The power stayed on. So did GPS and satellites. Astronomers say the sun has been
relatively quiet for some time. And this storm, forecast to be strong and ending up minor, still may
seem fiercer because Earth has been lulled by several years of weak solar activity.
years. The 1859 event destroyed much of the worlds newly installed telegraph network, as its equipment succumbed to an
electromagnetic surge as well as treating people living in the tropics to a spectacular display of auroral lights normally seen only in
polar regions. Our message is: Dont panic but do prepare, added Professor Cannon. Another
superstorm will
happen one day and we need to be ready for it. The academys experts regard the most cataclysmic scare stories
about the likely impact of a superstorm as exaggerated, because some action has already
been taken to harden infrastructure in the UK and worldwide. For example, National Grid has
protected its transformers against power surges and voltage fluctuations since 1989, when the worst
solar storm of the 20th century knocked out two transformers. Chris Train, the grids operations director, said a Carrington-type
superstorm might cause local blackouts for a few hours, with a dozen transformers taken out
of service, but there would not be a sustained nationwide blackout. Satellites are particularly vulnerable
to electrically charged particles and radiation from the sun. Our best engineering judgment...is that up to 10 per cent of satellites
could experience temporary outages lasting hours to days as a result of the extreme event, the report said. But many satellites
would be weakened by the experience and would therefore have to be replaced sooner than their designers had expected. A
particularly serious impact of a solar superstorm would be the likely loss of all global satellite navigation signals, from the US GPS
system and Europes new Galileo system, for one to three days. These provide not only navigation but also timing for many
communications systems. The current UK mobile communications network is much less vulnerable than those in many other
countries including the US, the study found, because it does not depend on satellite time signals. However the new 4G mobile
system may be vulnerable because it does require synchronisation through satellite signals, Prof Cannon said.
The sun is
approaching the maximum of its 11-year activity cycle this year. But, perhaps surprisingly, that
does not increase the risk of a superstorm. A superstorm is essentially a random event, said
Prof Cannon. If anything, the most intense solar storms like Carrington tend to occur when the suns activity is falling away again
toward a minimum.
to radio. One visible consequence of space weather are the spectacular aurora borealis and
aurora australis, the Northern and Southern Lights, which display in an oval shape around the
planet's poles. The very same CMEs on the Sun's surface can interrupt infrastructure is what
causes the green, blue and occasionally red lights as super-charged electrons hits the Earth's
upper atmosphere about 60 miles up and collide with other molecules, emitting light. In fact,
upon hearing the phrase Coronal Mass Ejection, some astronomers immediately leave for the
Arctic Circle to view the resulting aurora. That's the good news; if a Solar Super-storm kicks-off
and the billions of tonnes of solar particles it spews is headed our way, we do get between one
to three days' warning of its arrival.
has a plan to battle these blackouts with blackouts. If transformers are offline at the time the
storm hits they will not be affected, so the trick is to figure out where and when a storm is
going to hit before it reaches the atmosphere. To do that, NASA's SOHO and two STEREO
spacecraft identify a coronal mass ejection (CME) heading toward earth and create a 3-D image
of it, allowing researchers to characterize its strength and determine when it will hit. Depending
on the intensity of the CME, the trip from sun to Earth can take 24-48 hours. NASA would track the CME across the
sky, with the pivotal moment coming about 30 minutes prior to impact when the storm comes
screaming past the ACE spacecraft, something like 930,000 miles from Earth. Sensors aboard
ACE gather more data on the storm's speed, magnetic field, and density that is fed into
computer models at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. With less than 30 minutes until
impact, NASA's models calculate the places most likely to be impacted with dangerous GIC
and utilities are notified so they can pull their grids offline. This will cause a blackout in the
region, but only a temporary one. When the storm ends, the grids come back online and life
goes on.
The U.S. Army demonstrated a proof of concept for a smart grid that could support tactical operations, this
summer at its integrated capabilities testbed at Fort Dix, N.J. The U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command's
communications-electronics RD& E Center, or CERDEC, powered portions of a Tactical Operations Center and used the event to
gather data and lessons learned that would help inform/support Department of Defense efforts to develop
a
solution that will reduce the number of generators needed, prevent overloads and grid collapse
while reducing the number of generators needed, manpower requirements for grid operation and fuel
consumption by 25 percent. Microgrid systems are currently the only solution that allows the incorporation of
multiple technologies, such as renewables and energy storage systems, to supplement traditional power generation techniques,
DeJong explained. "This
1NC Econ
No chance of war from economic decline---best and most recent data
Daniel W. Drezner 12, Professor, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, October 2012, The Irony of
Global Economic Governance: The System Worked, http://www.globaleconomicgovernance.org/wp-content/uploads/IRColloquium-MT12-Week-5_The-Irony-of-Global-Economic-Governance.pdf
The final outcome addresses a dog that hasnt barked: the effect of the Great Recession on crossborder conflict and violence. During the initial stages of the crisis, multiple analysts asserted that the financial
crisis would lead states to increase their use of force as a tool for staying in power.37 Whether through greater
internal repression, diversionary wars, arms races, or a ratcheting up of great power conflict , there were
genuine concerns that the global economic downturn would lead to an increase in conflict. Violence in the Middle East, border
disputes in the South China Sea, and even the disruptions of the Occupy movement fuel impressions of surge in global public
disorder. The aggregate
data suggests otherwise , however. The Institute for Economics and Peace has constructed a
Global Peace Index annually since 2007. A key conclusion they draw from the 2012 report is that The average level of
peacefulness in 2012 is approximately the same as it was in 2007.38 Interstate violence in particular has
declined since the start of the financial crisis as have military expenditures in most sampled countries.
Other studies confirm that the Great Recession has not triggered any increase in violent conflict ; the
secular decline in violence that started with the end of the Cold War has not been reversed.39 Rogers Brubaker concludes, the
crisis has not to date generated the surge in protectionist nationalism or ethnic exclusion that might
have been expected.40 None of these data suggest that the global economy is operating swimmingly. Growth remains
unbalanced and fragile, and has clearly slowed in 2012. Transnational capital flows remain depressed compared to pre-crisis levels,
primarily due to a drying up of cross-border interbank lending in Europe. Currency volatility remains an ongoing concern. Compared
to the aftermath of other postwar recessions, growth in output, investment, and employment in the developed world have all
lagged behind. But the Great Recession is not like other postwar recessions in either scope or kind; expecting a standard V-shaped
recovery was unreasonable. One financial analyst characterized the post-2008 global economy as in a state of contained
depression.41 The key word is contained, however. Given
2NC Econ
Extend No Impact We control the best and most recent empirics
- Analysts disprove diversionary wars and great power conflict
- Violence in 2012 is the same as 2007
- The Great Recession empirically denies the impact
- No Nationalism or Ethnic exclusion has resulted
Thats Drezner
Global economic governance institutions guarantee resiliency
Daniel W. Drezner 12, Professor, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, October 2012, The Irony of
Global Economic Governance: The System Worked, http://www.globaleconomicgovernance.org/wp-content/uploads/IRColloquium-MT12-Week-5_The-Irony-of-Global-Economic-Governance.pdf
Prior to 2008, numerous foreign policy analysts had predicted a looming crisis in global economic
governance. Analysts only reinforced this perception since the financial crisis, declaring that we live in a G-Zero world. This
paper takes a closer look at the global response to the financial crisis. It reveals a more optimistic
picture . Despite initial shocks that were actually more severe than the 1929 financial crisis, global
economic governance structures responded quickly and robustly. Whether one measures results by economic
outcomes, policy outputs, or institutional flexibility, global economic governance has displayed surprising
resiliency since 2008. Multilateral economic institutions performed well in crisis situations to
reinforce open economic policies, especially in contrast to the 1930s. While there are areas where governance has
either faltered or failed, on the whole, the system has worked. Misperceptions about global economic governance
persist because the Great Recession has disproportionately affected the core economies and because the efficiency of past periods
of global economic governance has been badly overestimated. Why the system has worked better than expected remains an open
question. The rest of this paper explores the possible role that the distribution of power, the robustness of international regimes,
and the resilience of economic ideas might have played.
According to the diversionary theory of war, the cause of some militarized conflicts is not a clash of salient
interests between countries, but rather problematic domestic circumstances. Under conditions such as economic
adversity or political unrest, the countrys leader may attempt to generate a foreign policy crisis in
order both to divert domestic discontent and bolster their political fortunes through a rally
around the flag effect (Russett 1990). Yet, despite the wide-ranging popularity of this idea and some
evidence of U.S. diversionary behavior (e.g., DeRouen 1995, 2000; Fordham 1998a, 1998b; Hess and Orphanides 1995; James
and Hristolouas 1994; James and Oneal 1991; Ostrom and Job 1986), after
empirical support for the theory remains elusive (e.g., Gelpi 1997; Gowa; 1998; Leeds and Davis 1997; Levy
1998; Lian and Oneal 1993; Meernik and Waterman 1996). This has prompted one scholar to conclude that seldom has so
much common sense in theory found so little support in practice (James 1987, 22), a view reflected in the more
recent research (e.g., Chiozza and Goemans 2003, 2004; Meernick 2004; Moore and Lanoue 2003; Oneal and Tir 2006). I argue
that this puzzling lack of support could be addressed by considering the possibility that the embattled leader may anticipate
achieving their diversionary aims specifically through the initiation of territorial conflict2a phenomenon I call territorial
diversion.
No escalation
Robert Jervis 11, Professor in the Department of Political Science and School of International
and Public Affairs at Columbia University, December 2011, Force in Our Times, Survival, Vol.
25, No. 4, p. 403-425
Even if war is still seen as evil, the security community could be dissolved if severe conflicts of
interest were to arise. Could the more peaceful world generate new interests that would bring
the members of the community into sharp disputes? 45 A zero-sum sense of status would be
one example, perhaps linked to a steep rise in nationalism. More likely would be a worsening of
the current economic difficulties, which could itself produce greater nationalism, undermine
democracy and bring back old-fashioned beggar-my-neighbor economic policies. While these
dangers are real, it is hard to believe that the conflicts could be great enough to lead the
members of the community to contemplate fighting each other. It is not so much that
economic interdependence has proceeded to the point where it could not be reversed states
that were more internally interdependent than anything seen internationally have fought
bloody civil wars. Rather it is that even if the more extreme versions of free trade and
economic liberalism become discredited , it is hard to see how without building on a
preexisting high level of political conflict leaders and mass opinion would come to believe that
their countries could prosper by impoverishing or even attacking others. Is it possible that
problems will not only become severe, but that people will entertain the thought that they have
to be solved by war? While a pessimist could note that this argument does not appear as
outlandish as it did before the financial crisis, an optimist could reply (correctly, in my view)
that the very fact that we have seen such a sharp economic down-turn without anyone
suggesting that force of arms is the solution shows that even if bad times bring about greater
economic conflict , it will not make war thinkable.
in a 29-page Justice Department report meant to highlight, through dozens of examples, the
importance of the controversial USA Patriot Act, which he claimed had aided agents tracking the
alleged cyber terrorists' email. "The hacked computer ... controlled the life support systems for
the South Pole Station that housed 50 scientists 'wintering over' during the South Pole's most
dangerous season," reads the Justice Department report. "Due in part to the quick response
allowed by [the USA Patriot Act], FBI agents were able to close the case quickly with the
suspects' arrest before any harm was done to the South Pole Research Station." Memo: 'No
Critical System Corrupted' When Newsweek examined the Justice report last month, the NSF
disputed the role the USA Patriot Act played in the Romanian investigation. But spokesman
Peter West says the Foundation will not otherwise not comment on the South Pole intrusion.
Justice Department spokesman Mark Corallo didn't return a phone call inquiring about the
description of events in the Justice report. But an internal assessment of the attack by NSF
senior staff, intended to explain the intrusion to the NSF's inspector general and obtained by
SecurityFocus under the Freedom of Information Act, appears at odds with the Justice
Department's version. For starters, by the time the suspects were arrested, the compromised
system had already been secured -- the arrests were apparently not responsible for preventing
harm to the station. And as described in the memo, released as a partially-redacted draft, the
incident was something less than a cyber terror attack to begin with, and prompted a measured
response from network administrators. "Given the fact that no financial records or systems were
compromised, no safety or loss of life was threatened, and no critical system corrupted" by the
Romanian hackers, "we need to balance legitimate security needs with the legitimate needs of
our scientists at the Pole," the memo reads. The assessment noted that, at the time of the
Romanian intrusion, the South Pole's network was less secure than other NSF sites "purposely
to allow for our scientists at this remotest of locations to exchange data under difficult
circumstances." Indeed, the station was no stranger to hack attacks when the would-be
extortionists struck. Other documents show that less than two months earlier the NSF's
security team was plunged into a similar fire drill when a computer intruder named
"PoizonB0x" penetrated the primary and backup data acquisition servers for a radio telescope
at the station called the Degree Angular Scale Interferometer (DASI), which measures properties
of the cosmic microwave background radiation -- the afterglow of the Big Bang. The intruder,
rated a prolific website defacer by tracking site Zone-H, used his moment of cosmic access to
erect a webpage on the servers proclaiming, "I love my angel Laura." Many of these systems
are connected to the internet and run on commonly understood operating systems using wellknown, standard communications protocols. In many cases, access to these systems is not
controlled as tightly as expected given their potential impact on life and safety.
Adaptation
1NC Navy
Budget cuts destroy readiness, aff gets no solvency
Ron Ault 13, Executive Assistant to the President for Metal Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Navy
Budget Cuts Sinking Americas Military Readiness, Feb 15 2013,
http://www.metaltrades.org/index.cfm?zone=/unionactive/view_blog_post.cfm&blogID=1390&
postID=6618
While many in Washington are focused on the rapidly-approaching March 1st sequestration deadline, few seem to be paying much attention to the
massive cuts that will go into effect this week across our military cuts that will have an equally
devastating impact on our economy and security. As the result of the continuing resolution (CR) that was agreed upon in the final
hours of 2012, a deal that averted the so-called fiscal cliff, the U.S. Navy was forced to accept $6.3 billion in cuts for the remainder of the forces Fiscal
Year 2013 (FY13) budget. If sequestration goes into effect, that number could grow to $10 billion. As the representative of 80,000 workers employed
at U.S. shipyards and naval bases workers who take great pride in the role they play in supporting our military I would like to shed some light on the
severity and senselessness of the Navy budget cuts and implore the 113th Congress to take prudent and expeditious action to avoid further Defense
spending cuts in FY13. Lawmakers
2NC Navy
Budget Cuts --- Destroys all Naval Power
Ron Ault 13 --- West 07 doesnt assume the sequester in 2012
1. Ships and Carriers
Massive budget cuts into the ship maintenance and the navy breaks down
carriers destroyers submarines and other navy vessels from failure of critical
repair which significantly disrupted our military access --- Means even if the
data is collected there is no Naval Power to back up the assault.
2. Undersea Dominance
Hugh Lessig 13, Daily Press, 9/12/13, U.S. Navy: Budget challenges threaten submarine
program, http://articles.dailypress.com/2013-09-12/news/dp-nws-forbes-submarine-hearing20130912_1_u-s-navy-submarines-missile
The U.S. military touts its submarine program as an unqualified success, yet the fleet is expected
to drop by nearly 30 percent in coming years and one Hampton Roads lawmaker wants to pull money from outside the
Navy's shipbuilding program to ease the pressure on one key program. Two Navy leaders on Thursday told a panel chaired
by Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Chesapeake, that more budget cuts would dull the edge of the submarine
program, where the U.S. enjoys a distinct advantage over other superpowers. Forbes chairs the House Armed
Service's subcommittee on sea power. About 2,300 jobs at Newport News Shipbuilding are tied to the U.S. submarine program. The
shipyard builds them in partnership with General Dynamics Electric Boat of Groton, Conn. The
types of nuclear-powered submarines. First are the smaller fast-attack submarines that fall primarily in two classes,
the older Los Angeles class and the newer Virginia class. Last week, the Navy commissioned the newest Virginia class sub at Naval
Station Norfolk. The second type are Ohio class ballistic missile submarines that roam the seas and provide a nuclear strike
capability. The third type is an offshoot of the second: When the Cold War ended, the U.S. converted four of those ballistic missile
submarines into guided-cruise missile submarines. All three types are scheduled
Breckenridge and Rear Adm. David C. Johnson. who testified before the Forbes panel.
new Quadrennial Review now underway at the Defense Department will likely result in a smaller
projected fleet size. Huge increases in current and projected national debt and the vulnerability
of the military budget to help offset it increase the chance that without compelling events the nations sea
services will experience additional and perhaps drastic reductions. National indebtedness will grow from its
current ratio of 40 per cent of GDP to 80 per cent of GDP in a decade. Servicing this will cripple the nations
ability to modernize and increase a powerful world-class fleet or drive us deeper into a yawning financial hole.
4. Understaffed Ships
Cropsey 10 - (Seth, The US Navy in Distress, Strategic Analysis Vol. 34 No. 1, January 2010, pgs
35-45, http://www.hudson.org/files/publications/Cropsey_US_Navy_In_Distress.pdf)
In February 2009, the Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser U.S.S. Port Royal ran aground about a half
mile south of the Honolulu airport. The Navys investigation found that the ships navigational
gear was broken and that the ships fathometer wasnt functioning. In simple terms the bridge
didnt know where the ship was. The investigation subsequently discovered that the commanding officer was
exhausted, sleep-deprived, and that sailors who were nominally assigned to stand watch against
such incidents were assigned elsewhere in the ship to cover manning shortages. Two months later the
Navys iron-willed Board of Inspection and Survey determined that problems with corrosion, steering, surface
ships firefighting systems, and anchoring were widespread throughout the Navy. Asked by Defense
News to comment on these findings five former commanding officers agreed that smaller crews, reduced budgets, and
fewer real-life training opportunities for over-worked crews were important causes for this
catalogue of affliction. Its hardly a surprise. The Navy reported last year that 11,300 sailors were supporting ground forces
in Iraq and Afghanistan. Reduced budgets, efforts to save money by cutting the size of crews, schemes
to take up the slack with shore services, and all manner of labor-saving devices parallel and reflect
the Navys increasingly distressed fortunes since the end of the Cold War. The US Navy has not been as small as it is today since the
administration of William Howard Taft when the Royal Navy filled the international role that Americas naval forces eventually
inherited and currently possess. As suggested by the past two decades of declining navy procurement, the rising cost of ships, hints
from the Pentagons Quadrennial Review now underway that previous goals for fleet size are open to question, and the publics
focus on the nations land wars in the Middle East, chances are that US naval shrinkage will continue.
The likelihood of a
much diminished navy coincides in time with every current prediction of large global strategic
change in the foreseeable future. Among National Intelligence Council estimates, Joint Operating Environment
forecasts, the Pentagons Office of Net Assessments studies, the UK Defence Ministrys Development, Concepts, and Doctrine
Centre as well as similar predictive efforts undertaken by French and German national security experts, there is a general consensus.
Wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan have sucked the oxygen out of any serious effort to understand the
connection between the large changes that strategic planners see in the future, Americans
expectations that they will retain their ability to wield global influence, the Navys role in
maintaining such influence, and the US fleets slow evanescence. No attempt to connect fleet shape and size
to the unfolding strategic environment exists as a referent for public debate. Indeed, civilian and military leadership
maintains in the face of growing demand for ships to defend against relatively low threats like
piracy as well as very dangerous ones like the possibility of smuggled WMD reaching our shores that capability rather than
number of ships is key to accurately measuring our naval power. With
United States on sea-borne transit for strategic resources and minerals, and the likelihood of more dislocations
such as continue from Somali piracy mean for the future of US national security?
research and development do not fare much better. While the Navy is to be commended on a getting some
research initiatives right -- such as breaking out a new account for Future Naval Capabilities focusing on advanced research and
prototypes, increasing funding for the Littoral Combat Ship, and increasing funding for the Marine Corps' Assault Vehicles -- many
of the Navy's RDT&E decisions do not appropriately resource the rhetorical emphasis on the
Pacific. The budget slices the Power Projection Applied Research account by nearly 15%,
affecting programs like precision strike and directed energy weapons. Similarly, Force Protection
Applied Research dropped by 27%, cutting innovation in anti-submarine warfare and hull
assurance. A 28% cut in Electromagnetic Systems Applied Research affects initiatives such as
electronic attack, surface-based anti-cruise and ballistic missile defenses, and the Surface Warfare
Improvement Program, or SEWIP, which uses electronic warfare to disarm incoming missiles. Other R&D cuts impact separate
initiatives on anti-submarine warfare, undersea weapons, cyber security, electronic warfare, sensing, SATCOM vulnerabilities, missile
defense countermeasures, S and X-band radar integration, and radar defenses against electronic attack. These programs form
important parts of the Navy's next-generation arsenal, especially when it comes to the Pentagon's evolving AirSea Battle concept.
They are exactly the type of programs the Pentagon should be protecting if it is serious about
emphasizing the unique challenges of the Asia-Pacific. The fact that R&D money declined for these particular
Navy programs is a disturbing sign for the overall coherence of the administration's budget. While the Navy received a $4 billion
increase in O&M funding from 2012, it could not come soon enough. The Navy
holds a Ph.D. from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, an M.A. in
International Relations from American University in Washington, D.C., and a B.A. in Political
Science from Boston College., American Grand Strategy and Sea Power,
https://cna.org/sites/default/files/research/American%20Grand%20Strategy%20and%20S
eapower%202011%20Conference%20Report%20CNA.pdf)
According to Dr. John Mueller, the United States has been and will continue to be
substantially free from threats that require a great deal of military preparedness. In his
view, there are no major threats to U.S. security, and there have been none since the end
of the Second World War. During the Cold War, the United States spent trillions of dollars
to deter a direct military threat that did not exist, since the Soviet Union had no intention
of launching an unprovoked attack on Europe or the United States. Despite the continued
absence of significant threats today, the United States is still engaged in a number of
conflicts in an effort to make the world look and act the way we want. In reality, however,
most modern security issues are not really military in nature; rather, they are policing and
diplomatic activities that do not require substantial U.S. military involvement. While
isolationism is not a viable policy, the United States does not need to use its military to
solve all of the problems in the world. 32 17 Dr. Mueller argued that the absence of war
among developed countries since 1945 is the greatest single development about war in
history. The end of the Cold War ushered in a New World Order, and from 1989 to 2000
the United States was engaged in what Dr. Mueller called policing wars. There was very
little domestic support for most of these ventures, however, because there was a strong
U.S. public aversion to nation building, a low tolerance for casualties, and a lack of concrete
political gains from success.
1NC Warming
No extinction from climate change
NIPCC 11 the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, an international
panel of nongovernment scientists and scholars, March 8, 2011, Surviving the Unprecedented
Climate Change of the IPCC, online:
http://www.nipccreport.org/articles/2011/mar/8mar2011a5.html
In a paper published in Systematics and Biodiversity, Willis et al. (2010) consider the IPCC (2007)
"predicted climatic changes for the next century" -- i.e., their contentions that "global
temperatures will increase by 2-4C and possibly beyond, sea levels will rise (~1 m 0.5 m), and
atmospheric CO2 will increase by up to 1000 ppm" -- noting that it is "widely suggested that the
magnitude and rate of these changes will result in many plants and animals going extinct," citing
studies that suggest that "within the next century, over 35% of some biota will have gone extinct
(Thomas et al., 2004; Solomon et al., 2007) and there will be extensive die-back of the tropical
rainforest due to climate change (e.g. Huntingford et al., 2008)." On the other hand, they
indicate that some biologists and climatologists have pointed out that "many of the predicted
increases in climate have happened before, in terms of both magnitude and rate of change (e.g.
Royer, 2008; Zachos et al., 2008), and yet biotic communities have remained remarkably
resilient (Mayle and Power, 2008) and in some cases thrived (Svenning and Condit, 2008)." But
they report that those who mention these things are often "placed in the 'climate-change
denier' category," although the purpose for pointing out these facts is simply to present "a
sound scientific basis for understanding biotic responses to the magnitudes and rates of climate
change predicted for the future through using the vast data resource that we can exploit in fossil
records." Going on to do just that, Willis et al. focus on "intervals in time in the fossil record
when atmospheric CO2 concentrations increased up to 1200 ppm, temperatures in mid- to highlatitudes increased by greater than 4C within 60 years, and sea levels rose by up to 3 m higher
than present," describing studies of past biotic responses that indicate "the scale and impact of
the magnitude and rate of such climate changes on biodiversity." And what emerges from those
studies, as they describe it, "is evidence for rapid community turnover, migrations, development
of novel ecosystems and thresholds from one stable ecosystem state to another." And, most
importantly in this regard, they report "there is very little evidence for broad-scale extinctions
due to a warming world." In concluding, the Norwegian, Swedish and UK researchers say that
"based on such evidence we urge some caution in assuming broad-scale extinctions of species
will occur due solely to climate changes of the magnitude and rate predicted for the next
century," reiterating that "the fossil record indicates remarkable biotic resilience to wide
amplitude fluctuations in climate."
2NC Warming
No risk of a warming impact two reasons why
First is mitigation new technology can mitigate the impacts of warming all of
their warrants are alarmist and misleading science and economics prove that
therell be mild consequences if any
Second is resiliency --- Biotic communities have been resilient or thrived --Broad scale extinction is massively overhyped --- The fossil record also supports
that claim
Thats NIPCC
No impact to climate change IPCC models do not account for critical negative
feedback models their evidence is garbage in and garbage out
Bast and Taylor 14 (Joseph and James, president and CEO of The Heartland Institute, a 29-year-old national nonprofit
research center located in Chicago, Illinois and has been recognized many times for his contributions to public policy research and
debate AND managing editor of Environment & Climate News, a national monthly publication devoted to sound science and freemarket environmentalism. He is also senior fellow for The Heartland Institute, focusing on energy and environment issues. Global
Warming: Not a Crisis, 2014, http://heartland.org/ideas/global-warming-not-crisis)//WL
The burning of fossil fuels to generate energy produces carbon dioxide (CO2), a greenhouse gas which, everything else being equal,
could lead to some warming of the global climate. Most scientists believe the Earth experienced a small rise in temperatures during
the second half of the twentieth century, but they are unsure how large a role human activities may have played. The important
questions from a public policy perspective are: How much of the warming is natural? How sure are we that it will continue? Would
continued warming be beneficial or harmful? The answers, in brief, are: Probably
of the worlds
most distinguished scientists believe climate processes are too poorly understood to support
calls for immediate action or predictions of catastrophic global warming (Solomon, 2008). The reason for
the consensus among environmentalists is simple: If AGW is true, then stopping or preventing it requires higher taxes, more income
redistribution, more wilderness preservation, more regulations on corporations, smart growth, subsidies for renewable energy,
and on and on. In other words, many of the policies already on the liberal political agenda. Liberals
have no reason to
look under the hood of the global warming scare, to see what the real science says. They believe in global
warming because they feel it justifies their ideological convictions (Hulme, 2009). Independents,
conservatives, and libertarians about 80 percent of the general population, according to surveys, but less than 20 percent of
journalists and academics dont want to go down the road to higher taxes and more regulations unless it is necessary. They open
the hood of the global warming scare and look at the real science. They study the issue and come to understand it. Based on that
understanding not ideological conviction or belief 60 percent of them conclude global warming is not a crisis. (Rasmussen 2012)
The Heartland Institute looked under the hood and concluded concern over the possibility of catastrophic global warming was
being manufactured to advance a political agenda. We then took upon ourselves the task of publicizing the scientific uncertainty
behind the global warming scare and documenting the high costs of reducing greenhouse gas emissions economic costs as well as
the loss of freedom. And now you know why an economic think tank is so prominent in a scientific debate. We do not do this to raise
money from oil companies or others with a stake in the issue oil companies never contributed more than 5 percent of our annual
budgets, and they give a trivial amount today. (See Reply to Our Critics for more about efforts to smear us with false claims about
our funding.) We
challenge claims that climate change is a crisis because our pursuit of the truth led
us to this position. Isnt There a Consensus? Science doesnt advance by consensus. A single scientist or study can
disprove a theory that is embraced by the vast majority of scientists. The search for a consensus
is actually part of what philosophers call post-normal science, which isnt really science at
all. Still, many people ask: What do scientists believe? Most surveys cited by those who claim there is a consensus ask questions
that are too vague to settle the matter. It is important to distinguish between the statement that global warming is a crisis and the
similar-sounding but very different statements that the climate is changing and that there is a human impact on climate. Climate
is always changing, and every scientist knows this. Our emissions and alterations of the
landscape are surely having impacts on climate, though they are often local or regional (like heat
islands) and small relative to natural variation. There is plenty of evidence that there is no
scientific consensus that climate change is man-made and dangerous (Bast and Spencer, 2014). The multivolume Climate Change Reconsidered series cites thousands of articles appearing in peer-reviewed journals that challenge the basic
underlying assumptions of AGW (Climate Change Reconsidered 2008, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2014). More than 30,000
scientists have signed a petition saying there is no threat that man-made global warming will
pose a threat to humanity or nature (Petition Project). Alarmists often cite an essay by Naomi Oreskes claiming to show
that virtually all articles about global warming in peer-reviewed journals support the so-called consensus. But a no-less-rigorous
study by Benny Peiser that attempted to replicate her results searched the abstracts of 1,117 scientific journal articles on global
climate change and found only 13 (1 percent) explicitly endorse the consensus view while 34 reject or cast doubt on the view that
human activity has been the main driver of warming over the past 50 years. A more recent search by Klaus-Martin Schulte of 928
scientific papers published from 2004 to February 2007 found fewer than half explicitly or implicitly endorse the so-called consensus
and only 7 percent do so explicitly (Schulte, 2008). A survey that is frequently cited as showing consensus actually proves just the
opposite. German scientists Dennis Bray and Hans von Storch have surveyed climate scientists three times, in 1996, 2003, and 2007
(Bray and von Storch, 2010). Their latest survey found most of these scientists say they believe global warming is man-made and is a
serious problem, but most of these same scientists do not believe climate science is sufficiently advanced to predict future climate
conditions. For two-thirds of the science questions asked, scientific opinion is deeply divided, and in half of those cases, most
scientists disagree with positions that are at the foundation of the alarmist case (Bast, 2011). On August 2, 2011, von Storch posted
the following comment on a blog: From our own observations of discussions among climate scientists we also find hardly consensus
[sic] on many other issues, ranging from changing hurricane statistics to the speed of melting Greenland and Antarctica, spreading of
diseases and causing mass migration and wars (von Storch, 2011). These are not minor issues. Extreme weather events, melting ice,
and the spread of disease are all major talking points for Al Gore and other alarmists in the climate debate. If there is no consensus
on these matters, then skeptics are right to ask why we should believe global warming is a crisis. Cognitive Dissonance? How
can scientists say they believe global warming is a problem, but at the same time not believe
there is sufficient scientific evidence to predict future climate conditions? Either this is hollow careerism
and ought to be subject to public criticism, or it is cognitive dissonance holding two contradictory ideas in
your mind at the same time. If the latter, it is probably caused by the complexity of the issue (we must trust the judgment
of scientists working in other fields to form opinions on subjects we are not ourselves expert about) and its close association with
social and economic agendas (we want to believe something is true even if our own research suggests it is not). This is not an
unreasonable claim or an attack on the integrity of working scientists. It is a standard theme in many books on the history of science,
dating back at least as far as Charles Mackays 1841 classic, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, and as
recently as Mike Hulmes 2009 tome, Why We Disagree About Climate Change. Hulme, not incidentally, is no skeptic: He contributes
to the alarmist IPCC reports and works at the University of East Anglia (home of the Climategate scandal). Even he admits that his
position is based on belief rather than scientific understanding and is inseparable from his partisan political beliefs. Bray and von
Storch, in an essay in 1999 reporting on the results of their first survey, remarked on how a willingness to make predictions and
recommendations about public policy that arent supported by actual science is a sign of post-normal science, or the willingness to
rely on consensus rather than actual scientific knowledge when the risks are perceived as being great (Bray and von Storch, 1999).
Scientists who express beliefs about global warming that they cant support with real science are sharing opinions shaped by
ideology and trust. Their beliefs should be given no more weight than the beliefs of nonscientists. Natural or Man-Made? The
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an agency of the United Nations, claims the warming that has occurred since the
mid-twentieth century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations (IPCC, 2007).
Many climate scientists disagree with the IPCC on this key issue. As Idso and Singer wrote in 2009, The IPCC
does not apply generally accepted methodologies to determine what fraction of current
warming is natural, or how much is caused by the rise in greenhouse gases (GHG). A comparison of
fingerprints from best available observations with the results of state-of-the-art GHG models
leads to the conclusion that the (human-caused) GHG contribution is minor. This fingerprint evidence,
is clear from climate records that the Earth was warmer than it is now in recorded human
history, before man-made greenhouse gas emissions could have been the cause. We know enough
about how the Earths climate works to know that biological and physical processes remove CO2 from the
atmosphere at a faster rate when concentration levels are higher and release more heat into
space when temperatures rise. These feedback factors and radiative forcings are poorly modeled or missing
from the computer models that alarmists use to make their forecasts. The arguments are complex, but the debate over
natural versus man-made climate change is unquestionably still ongoing. The more we learn, the less likely it
becomes that human greenhouse gas emissions can explain more than a small amount of the
climate change we witness. How Much Warming? NASA satellite data recorded since 1979 allow us to
check the accuracy of claims that the past three decades have been warming at an alarming
rate. The data show a warming rate of 0.123 degrees C per decade. This is considerably less than
what land-based temperature stations report during the same time period, and which are relied
on by the IPCC (Christy, 2009). If the Earths temperature continues to rise at the rate of the past
three decades, the planet would see only 1.23 degrees C warming over the course of an entire
century. Most climate scientists, even skeptics, acknowledge that rising CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere would, all other
things held constant, cause some small amount of warming. Alarmists claim that small amount will trigger increases in the amount
of moisture in the atmosphere, which in turn will cause further warming. But other scientists
Hurricanes are likely to diminish, not increase, in frequency or severity (Spencer, 2008; Singer and Avery, 2008). Higher levels of CO2
have a well-documented fertilizing effect on plants and make them more drought-resistant. Warmer temperatures are also likely to
be accompanied by higher soil moisture levels and more frequent rain, leading to a greening of the Earth that is dramatically
different from the parched Earth scenario featured in many biased and agenda-driven documentary films (Idso, 1995). The current
best estimate is that, if left unaddressed, by 2060 global warming is likely to have a small (0.2 percent of GDP) positive effect on the
U.S. economy and a small (1 to 2 percent of GDP) negative effect on the global economy (Mendelsohn and Neumann, 1999). These
estimates are very small and speculative.
Recent studies by the Hadley Climate Research Center (UK), the Japan Meteorological Agency, the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of East Anglia (UK) and the University of Alabama Huntsville show
clearly that the rising trend of global average temperature stopped in 2000-2001. Further, NASA
data shows that warming in the southern hemisphere has stopped, and that ocean
temperatures also have stopped rising. The global average temperature had been rising until about 2000-2001. The
International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) and many scientists hypothesize rising temperatures were mostly caused by the
greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide (CO2), and they predicted further temperature increases after 2000. It was natural to assume
that CO2 was responsible for the rise, because CO2 molecules in the atmosphere tend to reflect back the infrared radiation to the
ground, preventing cooling (the greenhouse effect) and also because CO2 concentrations have been rapidly increasing since 1946.
But, this hypothesis on the cause of global warming is just one of several. Unfortunately, many
scientists appear to
forget that weather and climate also are controlled by nature, as we witness weather changes
every day and climate changes in longer terms. During the last several years, I have suggested that it is
important to identify the natural effects and subtract them from the temperature changes. Only
then can we be sure of the man-made contributions. This suggestion brought me the dubious honor of being
designated Alaskas most famous climate change skeptic. The stopping of the rise in global average temperature after 2000-2001
indicates that the hypothesis and prediction made by the IPCC need serious revision. I have been suggesting during the last several
years that there
are at least two natural components that cause long-term climate changes. The
first is the recovery (namely, warming) from the Little Ice Age, which occurred approximately 1800-1850. The
other is what we call the multi-decadal oscillation. In the recent past, this component had a positive gradient
(warming) from 1910 to 1940, a negative gradient (cooling many Fairbanksans remember the very cold winters in the 1960s) from
1940 to 1975, and then again a positive gradient (warming many Fairbanksans have enjoyed the comfortable winters of the last
few decades or so) from 1975 to about 2000. The multi-decadal
negative trend began at that time. The second component has a large amplitude and can overwhelm the first, and I
believe that this is the reason for the stopping of the temperature rise. Since CO2 has only a positive effect, the new
trend indicates that natural changes are greater than the CO2 effect, as I have stated during the last several
years. Future changes in global temperature depend on the combination of both the recovery from the Little Ice Age (positive) and
the multi-decadal oscillation (both positive and negative). We
The term global warming is commonly used by the media to mean anthropogenic global warming; that is, warming caused by
human activity. In this article, the writer has chosen to prefix global warming, where appropriate, by the terms anthropogenic or
humancaused in order to avoid confusion. We
records show unequivocally that past temperature increases have always preceded,
not followed, increases in CO2; i.e. the warming could potentially cause the CO2 increase, but
not the reverse. Studies (e.g. Petit et al. 1999) have shown that over the past 400 000 years of cyclical
variations, temperature rose from glacial values about 800 years before CO2 concentration
increased. A probable explanation is that solar warming, over a long period of time, causes the oceans to outgas CO2 , whereas
cooling results in more CO2 entering solution, as discussed by Stott et al. (2007). Averaged over a still longer period of geological
time, it has been shown (Shaviv and Veizer 2003) that there
serious mistakes in analysis were made by some scientists over the years. Perhaps the worst
of these (see Montford 2010 for a thorough discussion) was the publication of the Hockey Stick Curve (Fig. 1), a
1000-year record of past temperature which purported to show that The 20 th century is likely the warmest century in the
Northern Hemisphere, and the 1990s was the warmest decade, with 1998 as the warmest year in the last 1000 years (Mann et al.
1999). This conclusion was
adopted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its 2001 report and
also by Al Gore in the movie An Inconvenient Truth. Subsequently, Mann et al.s work has been challenged by
several scientists (though to be fair, it is also supported by some). For example, McIntyre and McKitrick (2003)
amended Manns graph, using all available data and better quality control (Fig. 1), and showed
that the 20 th century is not exceptionally warm when compared with that of the 15 th century.
However, the IPCC has continued to report a steady increase in global temperature in the face of
clear evidence that average temperature has remained roughly level globally, positive in the northern
hemisphere and negative in the southern hemisphere, since about 2002 (Archibald 2006; Fig. 2).
WHAT CAUSES WARMING? It is likely that the cyclical
the intensity of the Earths magnetic field (which deflects the charged particles that constitute
cosmic rays) and associated sun-spot maxima are correlated with historic periods of global
warming such as the Medieval Climate Optimum (Fig. 6), and typically occur mid-way between ice ages (Veizer 2005). Solar
magnetic minima have accompanied global cooling, such as occurred during the Little Ice Age between 1350 and 1850 A.D. A proxy
for sunspot activity prior to the start of telescope observations in 1610 can be reconstructed from the abundance of cosmogenic 10
Be in ice cores from Antarctica and Greenland (Miletsky et al. 2004).
Global temperature oscillations have been evident in both geologic and recent times, with periods varying from a few years (mostly
solar and lunar driven) up to 120 million years (galactic and orbital influences) (Plimer 2009). In addition, ocean
atmosphere
interactions are implicated in the control of some shorter-period climatic oscillations. For example,
McLean et al. (2009) have studied the El Nio Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a tropical Pacific oceanatmosphere phenomenon, and
compared the index of intensity (the Southern Oscillation Index, or SOI) with global tropospheric temperature anomalies (GTTA) for
the 19602009 period (Fig. 7). McLean et al. (2009) concluded that Change in SOI accounts for 72% of the variance in GTTA for the
29-year long record, and 68% for the 50-year record. They found the same or stronger correlation between SOI and mean global
temperature, in which SOI accounted for as much as 81% of the variance in the tropics (Fig. 8). A delay of 5 to 7 months was
deduced between the SOI maximum and the associated temperature anomaly. Volcanic influences on
temperature
are also evident (Figs. 7, 8), probably caused by the injection of sulphur dioxide into the
stratosphere, where it is converted into sulphate aerosols that reflect incoming solar radiation
(McLean et al. 2009). The GTTA nearly always falls in the year or two following major eruptions.
Both solar irradiation and oceanatmosphere oscillations have therefore been demonstrated to
have effects on global temperature of at least the same order of magnitude as the CO2
greenhouse gas hypothesis, and these alternative mechanisms are supported by welldocumented empirical data. Nevertheless, the CO2 hypothesis, the theoretical basis for which is being
increasingly challenged, remains the popular explanation for global warming in the public domain.
THE CONTROVERSY The
main factors that have led to heated scientific controversy regarding the cause of
the mild late 20 th century global warming can be summarized as follows: i) A surge of media coverage and
consequent public interest and anxiety, magnified by productions such as Al Gores An
Inconvenient Truth.
ii) Fear and concern on the part of environmentalists, who were already aware of many other harmful aspects of industrial,
commercial and other human activities. Environmentalists, including NGOs such as Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Fund,
exploited the open disagreements that existed among scientists as to the scale of the warming
and its impacts, disagreements that inevitably arose because climate science is complex and empirical data were in short
supply until recently.
It is becoming clear that not only do many scientists dispute the asserted global warming crisis,
but these skeptical scientists may indeed form a scientific consensus. Dont look now, but maybe a
scientific consensus exists concerning global warming after all. Only 36 percent of geoscientists and engineers
believe that humans are creating a global warming crisis, according to a survey reported in the
peer-reviewed Organization Studies. By contrast, a strong majority of the 1,077 respondents
believe that nature is the primary cause of recent global warming and/or that future global
warming will not be a very serious problem. The survey results show geoscientists (also known as earth scientists)
and engineers hold similar views as meteorologists. Two recent surveys of meteorologists (summarized here and
here) revealed similar skepticism of alarmist global warming claims. According to the newly published
survey of geoscientists and engineers, merely 36 percent of respondents fit the Comply with Kyoto model. The scientists in this
group express the strong belief that climate change is happening, that it is not a normal cycle of nature, and humans are the main
or central cause. The authors of the survey report, however, note that the
comprising 17 percent of the respondents, diagnose climate change as both human- and naturally caused. Fatalists consider
climate change to be a smaller public risk with little impact on their personal life. They are
skeptical that the scientific debate is settled regarding the IPCC modeling. These scientists are likely to
ask, How can anyone take action if research is biased? The next largest group of scientists, comprising 10 percent of respondents,
fit the Economic Responsibility model. These scientists diagnose climate change as being natural or human caused. More than
any other group, they underscore that the
skeptical groups numerically blow away the 36 percent of scientists who believe
global warming is human caused and a serious concern. The next largest group of scientists, comprising 10
together, these four
percent of respondents, fit the Economic Responsibility model. These scientists diagnose climate change as being natural or
human caused. More than any other group, they underscore that the real cause of climate change is unknown as nature is forever
changing and uncontrollable. Similar to the nature is overwhelming adherents, they disagree that climate change poses any
significant public risk and see no impact on their personal life. They are also less likely to believe that the scientific debate is settled
and that the IPCC modeling is accurate. In their prognostic framing, they point to the harm the Kyoto Protocol and all regulation will
do to the economy. The final group of scientists, comprising 5 percent of the respondents, fit the Regulation Activists model.
These scientists diagnose climate change as being both human- and naturally caused, posing a moderate public risk, with only slight
impact on their personal life. Moreover, They are also skeptical with regard to the scientific debate being settled and are the most
indecisive whether IPCC modeling is accurate. Taken together, these four skeptical groups numerically blow away the 36 percent of
aspect of this new survey is that it reports on the beliefs of scientists themselves rather than bureaucrats who often publish alarmist
statements without polling their member scientists. We
scientists may indeed form a scientific consensus. Taken together, these four
skeptical groups numerically blow away the 36 percent of scientists who believe global warming
is human caused and a serious concern.
Global warming is absurd and has no impact empirics and flawed methods.
Deming 11 (David, geophysicist and associate professor at the University of Oklahoma, Why I deny Global Warming,
10/19/11; <http://www.lewrockwell.com/2011/10/david-deming/why-i-deny-global-warming/>)
Im a denier for several reasons. There
tendentious to the point of being fraudulent. Anyone who is an honest and competent scientist must be a denier.
Have you ever considered how difficult it is to take the temperature of the planet Earth? What temperature will you measure? The
air? The surface of the Earth absorbs more than twice as much incident heat from the Sun than the air. But if you measure the
temperature of the surface, what surface are you going to measure? The solid Earth or the oceans? There is twice as much water as
land on Earth. If you decide to measure water temperature, at what depth will you take the measurements? How will the time scale
on which the deep ocean mixes with the shallow affect your measurements? And how, pray tell, will you determine what the
average water temperature was for the South Pacific Ocean a hundred years ago? How will you combine air, land, and sea
temperature measurements? Even if you use only meteorological measurements of air temperature, how will you compensate for
changes in latitude, elevation, and land use? Determining
of the
temperature rise that has been inferred from the data is an artifact that reflects the growth of
urban heat islands. The denier is portrayed as a person who refuses to accept the plain evidence of his senses. But in fact it
is the alarmist who doesnt know what they are talking about. The temperature of the Earth and how it has varied over the past 150
years is poorly constrained. The person who thinks otherwise does so largely because they have no comprehension of the science.
Most of these people have never done science or thought about the inherent difficulties and uncertainties involved. And what is
global warming anyway? As long ago as the fifth century BC, Socrates pointed out that intelligible definitions are a necessary
precursor to meaningful discussions. The definition of the term global warming shifts with the context of the discussion. If you
deny global warming, then you have denied the existence of the greenhouse effect, a reproducible phenomenon that can be studied
analytically in the laboratory. But if you oppose political action, then global warming metamorphoses into a nightmarish and
speculative planetary catastrophe. Coastal cities sink beneath a rising sea, species suffer from wholesale extinctions, and green
pastures are turned into deserts of choking hot sand. In fact, so-called deniers are not deniers but skeptics. Skeptics do not deny
the existence of the greenhouse effect. Holding all other factors constant, the mean planetary air temperature ought to rise as the
atmosphere accumulates more anthropogenic CO2. Christopher Monckton recently reviewed the pertinent science and concluded
that a doubling of CO2 should result in a temperature increase of about 1 deg C. If this
also leads to cloud formation. Clouds have a cooling effect. At the current time, no one knows if the feedback
from water vapor will be positive or negative. Global warming predictions cannot be tested with
mathematical models. It is impossible to validate computer models of complex natural systems.
The only way to corroborate such models is to compare model predictions with what will
happen in a hundred years. And one such result by itself wont be significant because of the possible compounding effects
of other variables in the climate system. The experiment will have to repeated over several one-hundred year cycles. In other words,
of a smokestack emitting particulate matter? Even the cover of Al Gores movie, An Inconvenient Truth, shows a smokestack. Could
it be that its difficult to get people worked up about an invisible, odorless gas that is an integral component of the photosynthetic
cycle? A gas that is essential to most animal and plant life on Earth? A gas that is emitted by their own bodies through respiration?
So you have to deliberately mislead people by showing pictures of smoke to them. Showing one thing when youre talking about
another is fraud. If the case for global warming alarmism is so settled, so conclusive, so irrefutablewhy is it necessary to repeatedly
resort to fraud? A few years ago it was widely reported that the increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would
cause poison ivy to grow faster. But of course carbon
behind the scenes to suppress dissent? You doth protest too much. As described in my book, Science and Technology in World
History: The Ancient World and Classical Civilization, systematic science began with the invocation of naturalism by Greek
philosophers and Hippocratic physicians c. 600-400 BC. But the critical attitude adopted by the Greeks was as important as
naturalism. Students were not only allowed to criticize their teachers, but were encouraged to do so. From its beginnings in Greek
natural philosophy, science has been an idealistic and dispassionate search for truth. As Plato explained, anyone who could point out
a mistake shall carry off the palm, not as an enemy, but as a friend. This is one reason that scientists enjoy so much respect. The
public assumes that a scientists pursuit of truth is unencumbered by political agendas. But science does not come easy to men.
Science, George Sarton reminded us, is a joykiller. The proper conduct of science requires a high degree of intellectual discipline
and rigor. Scientists are supposed to use multiple working hypotheses and sort through these by the processes of corroboration and
falsification. The most valuable evidence is that which tends to falsify or disprove a theory. A scientist, by the very definition of his
activity, must be skeptical. A scientist engaged in a dispassionate search for truth elevates the critical he does not suppress it.
Knowledge begins with skepticism and ends with conceit. Finally, Im happy to be known as a denier because the label of denier
says nothing about me, but everything about the person making the charge. Scientific theories are never denied or believed, they
are only corroborated or falsified. Scientific knowledge, by its very nature, is provisional and subject to revision. The provisional
nature of scientific knowledge is a necessary consequence of the epistemological basis of science. Science is based on observation.
We never have all the data. As our body of data grows, our theories and ideas must necessarily evolve. Anyone who thinks scientific
knowledge is final and complete must necessarily endorse as a corollary the absurd proposition that the process of history has
stopped. A scientific theory cannot be denied. Only a belief can be denied. The person who uses the word denier thus reveals
that they hold global warming as a belief, not a scientific theory. Beliefs are the basis of revealed religion. Revelations cannot be
corroborated or studied in the laboratory, so religions are based on dogmatic beliefs conservatively held. Religions tend to be closed
systems of belief that reject criticism. But the sciences are open systems of knowledge that welcome criticism. Im a scientist, and
therefore I must happily confess to being a denier.
the science is settled on the issue of CO2 and climate. Let me put this
claim to rest with a simple one-letter proof that it is false. The letter is s, the one that changes model into
models. If the science were settled, there would be precisely one model, and it would be in agreement with measurements.
Alternatively, one may ask which one of the twenty-some models settled the science so that all the rest could be discarded along
with the research funds that have kept those models alive. We can take this further. Not
predicted the current cooling phase. If the science were settled, the model (singular) would have predicted it. Let me
next address the horror story that we are approaching (or have passed) a tipping point. Anybody
who has worked with amplifiers knows about tipping points. The output goes to the rail. Not only that, but
it stays there. Thats the official worry coming from the likes of James Hansen (of NASAGISS) and Al Gore. But therein lies the proof
that we
are nowhere near a tipping point. The earth, it seems, has seen times when the CO2
concentration was up to 8,000 ppm, and that did not lead to a tipping point. If it did, we would not be
here talking about it. In fact, seen on the long scale, the CO2 concentration in the present cycle of
glacials (ca. 200 ppm) and interglacials (ca. 300-400 ppm) is lower than it has been for the last
300 million years. Global-warming alarmists tell us that the rising CO2 concentration is (A) anthropogenic and (B) leading to
global warming. (A) CO2 concentration has risen and fallen in the past with no help from mankind.
The present rise began in the 1700s, long before humans could have made a meaningful
contribution. Alarmists have failed to ask, let alone answer, what the CO2 level would be today if we had never burned any
fuels. They simply assume that it would be the pre-industrial value. The solubility of CO2 in water decreases as water warms, and
increases as water cools. The
warming of the earth since the Little Ice Age has thus caused the oceans
to emit CO2 into the atmosphere. (B) The first principle of causality is that the cause has to come before the effect.
The historical record shows that climate changes precede CO2 changes. How, then, can one conclude
that CO2 is responsible for the current warming? Nobody doubts that CO2 has some greenhouse effect, and nobody doubts that
CO2 concentration is increasing. But what would we have to fear if CO2 and temperature actually increased? A
warmer world
is a better world. Look at weather-related death rates in winter and in summer, and the case is
overwhelming that warmer is better. The higher the CO2 levels, the more vibrant is the
biosphere, as numerous experiments in greenhouses have shown. But a quick trip to the museum can
make that case in spades. Those huge dinosaurs could not exist anywhere on the earth today because the land is not productive
enough. CO2
is plant food, pure and simple. CO2 is not pollution by any reasonable definition. A warmer world
begets more precipitation. All computer models predict a smaller temperature gradient
between the poles and the equator. Necessarily, this would mean fewer and less violent
storms. The melting point of ice is 0 C in Antarctica, just as it is everywhere else. The highest
recorded temperature at the South Pole is 14 C, and the lowest is 117 C. How, pray, will a
putative few degrees of warming melt all the ice and inundate Florida, as is claimed by the
warming alarmists? Consider the change in vocabulary that has occurred. The term global warming has given way to the
term climate change, because the former is not supported by the data. The latter term, climate change, admits of all kinds of illogical
attributions. If it warms up, thats climate change. If it cools down, ditto. Any change whatsoever can be said by alarmists to be proof
of climate change. In a way, we have been here before. Lord Kelvin proved that the earth could not possibly be as old as the
geologists said. He proved it using the conservation of energy. What he didnt know was that nuclear energy, not gravitation,
provides the internal heat of the sun and the earth. Similarly, the global-warming alarmists have proved that CO2 causes global
warming. Except when it doesnt. To put it fairly but bluntly, the global-warming alarmists have relied on a pathetic version of
science in which computer models take precedence over data, and numerical averages of computer outputs are believed to be able
to predict the future climate. It would be a travesty if the EPA were to countenance such nonsense.
No impact to warming
Stafford 3/11/2013 (James, 2013, interviewing Anthony Watts, 25-year broadcast meteorology veteran "Climate
Change without Catastrophe: Interview with Anthony Watts," http://oilprice.com/Interviews/Climate-Change-without-CatastropheInterview-with-Anthony-Watts.html)
Anthony Watts: The premise of the issue for proponents can be summed up very simply: You put CO2 in the atmosphere and it makes it warmer, thats
bad. The reality is that the Earths
climate system is far more complex than that: It isnt just a linear relationship between CO2 and
temperature, it is a dynamic ever-changing one, and climate is tremendously complex with hundreds of interactive variables and
feedbacks. Predicting an outcome of a chaotic system over the long term is a very, very big task, one
that weve really only scratched the surface of. Dr. Judith Curry of Georgia Tech describes it as a
wicked problem. But it is being popularly portrayed as a simple black-and-white problem and few really delve much beyond the headlines
and the calls for action to understand that it is really many shades of grey. Oilprice.com: As a former TV meteorologist and a developer of weather data
dissemination technology, can you tell us more about how your background lends to your pragmatic scepticism on climate change? Anthony Watts:
In TV, if I was wrong on the forecast, or the temperature reported was inaccurate, Id hear about it immediately. Viewers would complain. That
immediate feedback translates very quickly to making sure you get it right. With climate, the forecast is open-ended, and we have to wait years for
feedback, and so the skill level in forecasting often doesnt improve very much with time. Also, Ive
Skeptical Environmentalist. This resulted in Forecasting the Effects of Global Warming on Biodiversity published in 2007 BioScience.
We were particularly concerned by the cavalier attitude to model validations in the Thomas paper, and the
field in general: Of the modeling papers we have reviewed, only a few were validated. Commonly, these
papers simply correlate present distribution of species with climate variables, then replot the climate for
the future from a climate model and, finally, use one-to-one mapping to replot the future distribution of
the species, without any validation using independent data. Although some are clear about some of their
assumptions (mainly equilibrium assumptions), readers who are not experts in modeling can easily misinterpret the
results as valid and validated. For example, Hitz and Smith (2004) discuss many possible effects of global warming on the basis of
a review of modeling papers, and in this kind of analysis the unvalidated assumptions of models would most likely be ignored. The
paper observed that few
mass extinctions have been seen over recent rapid climate changes, suggesting
something must be wrong with the models to get such high rates of extinctions. They speculated that
species may survive in refugia, suitable habitats below the spatial scale of the models. Another example of an
unvalidated assumptions that could bias results in the direction of extinctions, was described in chapter 7 of my book Niche
Modeling. When climate change shifts a species niche over a landscape (dashed to solid circle) the response of that species can be
described in three ways: dispersing to the new range (migration), local extirpation (intersection), or expansion (union). Given the
probability of extinction is correlated with range size, there will either be no change, an increase (intersection), or decrease (union)
in extinctions depending on the dispersal type. Thomas et al. failed to consider range expansion (union), a behavior that
predominates in many groups. Consequently, the methodology was inherently biased towards extinctions. One of the many errors
in this work was a failure to evaluate the impact of such assumptions. The prevailing view now, according to Stephen Williams,
coauthor of the Thomas paper and Director for the Center for Tropical Biodiversity and Climate Change, and author of such classics
as Climate change in Australian tropical rainforests: an impending environmental catastrophe, may be here. Many unknowns
remain in projecting extinctions, and the values provided in Thomas et al. (2004) should not be taken as precise predictions.
Despite these uncertainties, Thomas et al. (2004) believe that the consistent overall conclusions across analyses establish that
anthropogenic climate warming at least ranks alongside other recognized threats to global biodiversity. So how precise are the
figures? Williams suggests we should just trust the beliefs of Thomas et al. an approach referred to disparagingly in the
forecasting literature as a judgmental forecast rather than a scientific forecast (Green & Armstrong 2007). These simple models
gloss over numerous problems in validating extinction models, including the propensity of so-called
extinct species quite often reappear. Usually they are small, hard to find and no-one is really looking for
them.
scientists Gerard Roe and Marcia Baker turned for insight to the distinctly neater world of
mathematics. Last year, they published an analysis in the journal Science arguing that climate models
were skewed in the direction of underestimating the warming effect of carbon. The report reasoned
that carbon emissions have the potential to trigger many changes that amplify the warming effectwater absorbs more sunlight than ice,
humidity traps more heat, and so onbut few that would mitigate it. The odds, they figure, are about one in three that temperatures will rise by
4.5 degrees C (the top of the IPCC's range), but there's
1,000 years. Even if world leaders somehow managed to persuade everybody to stop driving cars and heating their
homesbringing carbon emissions down to zero immediatelythe Earth would continue to
warm for centuries. The effect of rising temperatures on rainfall patterns is also irreversible, says Solomon.
Parts of the world that tend to be dry (Mexico, north Africa, southern Europe and the western parts of Australia and the United States) will
continue to get drier, while wet areas (the South Pacific islands, the horn of Africa) will keep getting wetter .
View any evidence from the IPCC with skepticismno actual evidence or
authors listed
Paterson 11 (Norman R., Professional Engineer and Consulting Geophysicist, PhD in
Geophysics from University of Toronto, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Global Warming:
A Critique of the Anthropogenic Model and its Consequences, Geoscience Canada, Vol 38, No
1, March, Ebsco)
iii) The IPCC was formed in 1988 by two organizations of the United Nations, the World Meteorological Organization and the United
Nations Environment Programme, to assess...the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding
the scientific basis of risk of humaninduced climate change (http://www.ipcc.ch/meetings//se ssion21/doc18.pdf). IPCCs
mandate appears to take for granted that man is responsible for at least a significant part of the
current global warming. Because of its political nature, the number of subscribing countries
(currently 130), and the fact that it carries out no research of its own, defining a scientifically
meaningful IPCC consensus has become an almost impossible task. Nevertheless, IPCC has faithfully
followed its guidelines in each of its four Assessment Reports, concluding in its fourth report (IPCC 2007) that Most of the global
average warming over the past 50 years is very likely due to anthropogenic GHG increases and it is likely that there is a discernible
human-induced warming averaged over each continent (except Antarctica). (authors italics). Hidden behind this bold statement
are many dissenting opinions by scientists whose views do not appear in the reports. In fact, it
natural climate cycles have already turned from warming to cooling, global
temperatures have already been declining for more than 10 years, and global temperatures will continue
to decline for another two decades or more. That is one of the most interesting conclusions to come out of the seventh International Climate Change
That is because
Conference sponsored by the Heartland Institute, held last week in Chicago. I attended, and served as one of the speakers, talking about The Economic Implications of High Cost
serious natural science, contrary to the self-interested political science you hear from
government financed global warming alarmists seeking to justify widely expanded regulatory and taxation powers for government bodies, or
government body wannabees, such as the United Nations. See for yourself, as the conference speeches are online. What you will see are calm,
dispassionate presentations by serious, pedigreed scientists discussing and explaining reams of data. In sharp
contrast to these climate realists, the climate alarmists have long admitted that they cannot defend their theory
that humans are causing catastrophic global warming in public debate. With the conference presentations online, lets see if the
Energy. The conference featured
alarmists really do have any response. The Heartland Institute has effectively become the international headquarters of the climate realists, an analog to the UNs
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It has achieved that status through these international climate conferences, and the publication of its Climate Change
Reconsidered volumes, produced in conjunction with the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC). Those Climate Change Reconsidered volumes are an
equivalently thorough scientific rebuttal to the irregular Assessment Reports of the UNs IPCC. You can ask any advocate of human caused catastrophic global warming what
20th century
temperature record, and you will find that its up and down pattern does not follow the industrial
revolutions upward march of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), which is the supposed central culprit for man caused global warming (and has been
much, much higher in the past). It follows instead the up and down pattern of naturally caused climate
cycles. For example, temperatures dropped steadily from the late 1940s to the late 1970s. The popular press was even
talking about a coming ice age. Ice ages have cyclically occurred roughly every 10,000 years, with a new one actually due around now. In the late 1970s, the natural
their response is to Climate Change Reconsidered. If they have none, they are not qualified to discuss the issue intelligently. Check out the
cycles turned warm and temperatures rose until the late 1990s, a trend that political and economic interests have tried to milk
mercilessly to their advantage. The incorruptible satellite measured global atmospheric temperatures show less warming during this period than the heavily manipulated land
and it was warm from the late 1970s to the late 1990s, similar to the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). In 2000, the UNs IPCC predicted that global temperatures would
rise by 1 degree Celsius by 2010. Was that based on climate science, or political science to scare the public into accepting costly anti-industrial regulations and taxes? Don
Easterbrook, Professor Emeritus of Geology at Western Washington University, knew the answer. He publicly
predicted in 2000 that global temperatures would decline by 2010. He made that prediction because he knew the PDO had turned
cold in 1999, something the political scientists at the UNs IPCC did not know or did not think significant. Well, the results are in, and the winner
is.Don Easterbrook. Easterbrook also spoke at the Heartland conference, with a presentation entitled Are Forecasts of a 20-Year Cooling Trend Credible? Watch
that online and you will see how scientists are supposed to talk: cool, rational, logical analysis of the data, and full explanation of it. All I ever see from the
global warming alarmists, by contrast, is political public relations, personal attacks, ad hominem arguments,
and name calling, combined with admissions that they cant defend their views in public debate. Easterbrook
shows that by 2010 the 2000 prediction of the IPCC was wrong by well over a degree, and the gap
was widening. Thats a big miss for a forecast just 10 years away, when the same folks expect us to take seriously their predictions for 100 years in the future.
Howard Hayden, Professor of Physics Emeritus at the University of Connecticut showed in his presentation at the conference that based on the historical record a doubling of
CO2 could be expected to produce a 2 degree C temperature increase. Such a doubling would take most of this century, and the temperature impact of increased concentrations
seen during a period known as the Dalton Minimum from 1790 to 1830, which saw temperature readings decline by 2 degrees in a 20 year period, and the noted Year Without A
Summer in 1816 (which may have had other contributing short term causes). Even worse was the period known as the Maunder Minimum from 1645 to 1715, which saw only
about 50 sunspots during one 30 year period within the cycle, compared to a typical 40,000 to 50,000 sunspots during such periods in modern times. The Maunder Minimum
coincided with the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, which the earth suffered from about 1350 to 1850. The Maunder Minimum saw sharply reduced agricultural output, and
the late 1940s to late 1970s? Or will the paucity of sunspots drive us all the way down to the Dalton Minimum, or even the Maunder Minimum? He says it is impossible to know
now. But based on experience, he will probably know before the UN and its politicized IPCC.
Tech and adaptive advances prevent all climate impacts---warming wont cause
war
Singer et al 2011 Dr. S. Fred Research Fellow at The Independent Institute, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences
at the University of Virginia, President of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, a Fellow of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, and a Member of the International Academy of Astronautics; Robert M. Carter, Research Professor at
James Cook University (Queensland) and the University of Adelaide (South Australia), palaeontologist, stratigrapher, marine
geologist and environmental scientist with more than thirty years professional experience; and Craig D. Idso, founder and chairman
of the board of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, member of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, American Geophysical Union, American Meteorological Society, Arizona-Nevada Academy of Sciences, and
Association of American Geographers, et al, 2011, Climate Change Reconsidered: 2011 Interim Report, online:
http://www.nipccreport.org/reports/2011/pdf/FrontMatter.pdf)
reveal dramatic improvement during the twentieth century, notwithstanding the historic increase in
atmospheric CO2 concentrations. The magnitude of the impacts of climate change on human well-being depends on
society's adaptability (adaptive capacity), which is determined by, among other things, the wealth and
human resources society can access in order to obtain, install, operate, and maintain technologies necessary to cope
with or take advantage of climate change impacts. The IPCC systematically underestimates
adaptive capacity by failing to take into account the greater wealth and technological advances
that will be present at the time for which impacts are to be estimated. Even accepting the IPCC's and
Stern Review's worst-case scenarios, and assuming a compounded annual growth rate of per-capita GDP of only 0.7 percent,
reveals that net GDP per capita in developing countries in 2100 would be double the 2006 level of
the U.S. and triple that level in 2200. Thus, even developing countries' future ability to cope with
climate change would be much better than that of the U.S. today. The IPCC's embrace of biofuels as a way
to reduce greenhouse gas emissions was premature, as many researchers have found "even the best biofuels have the potential to
damage the poor, the climate, and biodiversity" (Delucchi, 2010). Biofuel production consumes nearly as much energy as it
generates, competes with food crops and wildlife for land, and is unlikely to ever meet more than a small fraction of the world's
demand for fuels. The
notion that global warming might cause war and social unrest is not only wrong, but
even backwards - that is, global cooling has led to wars and social unrest in the past, whereas global
warming has coincided with periods of peace, prosperity, and social stability.
DA --- Mitigation
Adaptation is impossible in a world of massive warming
Visser 13(Nick Visser, writer for The Huffington Post, Climate Change Worse Than We Thought, Likely To Be 'Catastrophic
Rather Than Simply Dangerous' 12/31/13, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/31/climate-change-worse_n_4523828.html)
King
Climate change may be far worse than scientists thought, causing global temperatures to rise by at least 4
degrees Celsius by 2100, or about 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit, according to a new study. The study, published in the journal Nature,
takes a fresh look at clouds' effect on the planet, according to a report by The Guardian. The research
But adaptation crowds out mitigation strategies --- Thats key to prevent
warming.
Sterman 13 (John, Director of the MIT System Dynamics Group at the MIT Sloan School of
Management with an AB in engineering and environmental systems from Dartmouth and a PhD
in system dynamics from MIT, Adaptation or Mitigation? Lessons from abolition in the Battle
Over Climate Policy, Climate Progress, 07/05/13,
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/07/05/2258731/adaptation-or-mitigation-lessons-fromabolition-in-the-battle-over-climate-policy/) Chen
mitigation is futile. Since Sandy the focus has been on updating flood
maps and building sea walls. But sea walls are the Maginot line of climate change. Sea walls wont help with
ocean acidification, water shortage, drought, more and more dangerous wildfires, declines in
agricultural output, and the many other impacts of climate change, not to mention the climate
refugees and risks of war in regions those impacts create. However, when we point out that theres no
adapting to the changes in the climate we are facing if we dont cut emissions dramatically, some adaptation advocates say, yes,
but if we can convene people around adaptation, theyll soon see its limitations and will end up strongly advocating mitigation as
part of their local adaptation plan. Im deeply skeptical. It is more likely that the
consume all the resources, energy and attention around climate change, so mitigation wont
be considered, or become an afterthought. New York City just released its $20 billion climate
resilience plan. The plan focuses on adaptation, and pays no attention to reducing the
greenhouse gas emissions that create the need for adaptation in the first place. Nearly 50 mayors and
other local leaders just signed on to the new Resilient Communities for America Agreement (RC4A), pledging to invest in adaptation
and urging state and federal leaders to support our local resilience initiatives and to take meaningful steps to build resilience and
security throughout the nation. There are potential synergies between adaptation and mitigation, and these should be exploited.
For example, the RC4A recognizes that
actions to reduce
emissions are profitable today, with ready to go, off the shelf technologies. If fossil fuel prices reflected
the true costs of the emissions they create then even more technologies for mitigation would be cost effective today.
And Warming isnt inevitable its immediately reversible and there is no time
lag
Desjardins 13 (Clea, member of Concordia university Media Relations Department, academic writer, citing Damon
Matthews; associate professor of the Department of Geography, Planning and Environment at Concordia University, PhD, Member
of the Global Environmental and Climate Change Center, Global Warming: Irreversible but Not Inevitable,
http://www.concordia.ca/now/what-we-do/research/20130402/global-warming-irreversible-but-not-inevitable.php)
Carbon dioxide emission cuts will immediately affect the rate of future global warming
Concordia and MIT researchers show Montreal, April 2, 2013 There is a persistent misconception among
both scientists and the public that there is a delay between emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2)
and the climates response to those emissions. This misconception has led policy makers to argue that CO2
emission cuts implemented now will not affect the climate system for many decades. This erroneous line of
argument makes the climate problem seem more intractable than it actually is, say Concordia
Universitys Damon Matthews and MITs Susan Solomon in a recent Science article. The researchers show that immediate
decreases in CO2 emissions would in fact result in an immediate decrease in the rate of
climate warming. Explains Matthews, professor in the Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, If we
can successfully decrease CO2 emissions in the near future, this change will be felt by the
climate system when the emissions reductions are implemented not in several decades."
The potential for a quick climate response to prompt cuts in CO2 emissions opens up the
possibility that the climate benefits of emissions reductions would occur on the same
timescale as the political decisions themselves. In their paper, Matthews and Solomon, Ellen Swallow
Richards professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Science, show that the onus for slowing the rate of
global warming falls squarely on current efforts at reducing CO2 emissions, and the resulting
future emissions that we produce. This means that there are critical implications for the equity of carbon emission
choices currently being discussed internationally. Total emissions from developing countries may soon exceed those from
developed nations. But developed countries are expected to maintain a far higher per-capita contribution to present and
possible future warming. This disparity
degradation also
reduces the availability of ecosystem goods and services for human populations (Nkem et al, 2010;
Tobey et al., 2010; 4.4.3; 6.4.1; (very high confidence). For example, degradation of coastal wetlands and coral reef systems may
reduce their capacity to buffer coastal systems from the effects of tropical cyclones (Das and Vincent, 2009; Tobey et al., 2010;
Gedan et al., 2011; Keryn et al., 2011; Box CC-EA). Similarly,
Economic Constraints --- Warming decks all major of the sectors of the economy
--- Causes instability
IPCC 14 (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, A scientific intergovernmental body
under control of the UN with the aims of assessing human-induced climate change and
reviewing options for adaptation and mitigation, Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation,
and Vulnerability, IPCC, http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/) Chen
The AR4 concluded that adaptive capacity is influenced by the entitlements of actors to
economic resources and by larger macro-level driving forces such as economic development and
trends in globalization (Adger et al., 2007). More recent literature continues to identify
economic constraints associated with adaptation. However, such constraints are often
associated with the financing of discrete adaptation options (e.g., Matasci et al., 2013; Islam et
al., 2014). This chapter draws a distinction between such financial constraints (16.3.2.5) and
economic constraints, which are associated with broader macroeconomic considerations. Longterm trends in economic development as well as short-term dynamics in economic systems can
have a significant influence on the capacity of actors to adapt to climate change (very high
confidence) (16.3.1.1). Multiple authors, for example, discuss the concept of double exposure
where actors are subjected to stresses associated with climate change as well as those
associated with economic disruptions such as the recent global financial crisis or other stresses
(Leichenko et al., 2010; Silva et al., 2010; Leichenko, 2012; Jeffers, 2013; McKune and Silva,
2013). Similarly, Kiem and Austin (2013) argue that prevailing economic conditions have an
important influence on the capacity of Australian farmers to cope with drought. The implications
of economic constraints vary among different sectors that have differential vulnerability to
climate change. Economies that are disproportionately comprised of climate-sensitive sectors
such as agriculture, forestry and fisheries, may be particularly vulnerable to the effects of
climate change and may encounter greater constraints on their capacity to adapt (very high
confidence). Such economies occur disproportionately in the developing world (Thornton et al.,
2008; Allison et al., 2009; Feng et al., 2010; F ssel, 2010), although multiple studies have
explored climate-sensitive regional economies in developed nations as well (Edwards et al.,
2009; Aaheim et al., 2012; Leichenko et al., 2010; Kiem and Austin, 2013). Poverty and
development deficits that are linked to economic conditions also exist in urban areas (8.1.3;
8.3.2.1). While economic development and diversification are generally seen as factors that can
ameliorate resource deficits (20.2.1.2; 20.3.2), certain economic enterprises can constrain
adaptation. For example, the AR4 noted that activities such as shrimp farming and conversion of
coastal mangroves, while profitable in an economic sense, can exacerbate vulnerability to sealevel rise (Agrawala et al., 2005 in Adger et al., 2007). More recent studies have demonstrated
that economic development and urbanization of hazardous landscapes may increase human
exposure to extreme weather events and climate change resulting in greater economic losses
and risks to public health and safety (Baldassare et al., 2010; IPCC, 2012; Preston, 2013).
Economic development also can put pressure on natural resources and ecosystems that can
constrain their capacity to adapt (Titus et al., 2009; Sydneysmith et al., 2010; 16.3.2.3; 20.3.2).
The extent to which economic development creates opportunities or constrains adaptation is
dependent on the development pathway (17.4.3; 20.6). Low resource-intensive economic
growth can enhance adaptive capacity while minimizing externalities of development that can
increase vulnerability of human and natural systems (20.6).
adaptation. Communities adapt, and then stay flexible to adapt the way they adapt. Many climate models look out to a future
thats too far away for us to imagine, said Mazmanian. Instead, we ought to be thinking a few decades out. And then rethinking the
rules again, and again, as the science and future gets clearer.
message that
greenhouse gases must be reduced was clear. "We give very relevant guidance on the total amount of carbon that
can't be emitted to stay to 1.5 or 2C. We are not on the path that would lead us to respect that warming target [which has been
agreed by world governments]." He said: "Continued emissions of greenhouse
warming and changes in all components of the climate system. Limiting climate change will
require substantial and sustained reductions of greenhouse gas emissions." Though governments around
the world have agreed to curb emissions, and at numerous international meetings have reaffirmed their commitment to holding
warming to below 2C by the end of the century, greenhouse gas concentrations are still rising at record rates. Rajendra Pachauri,
chair of the IPCC, said it was for governments to take action based on the science produced by the panel, consisting of thousands of
pages of detail, drawing on the work of more than 800 scientists and hundreds of scientific papers. The scientists also put paid to
claims that global warming has "stopped" because global temperatures in the past 15 years have not continued the strong upward
march of the preceding years, which is a key argument put forward by sceptics to cast doubt on climate science. But the IPCC said
the longer term trends were clear: "Each of the last three decades has been successively warmer
at the Earth's surface than any preceding decade since 1850 in the northern hemisphere [the earliest date for
reliable temperature records for the whole hemisphere]." The past 15 years were not such an unusual case, said Stocker. "People
always pick 1998 but [that was] a very special year, because a strong El Nio made it unusually hot, and since then there have been
some medium-sized volcanic eruptions that have cooled the climate." But he said that further research was needed on the role of
the oceans, which are thought to have absorbed more than 90% of the warming so far. The
research has become ever clearer. Now, scientists say they are certain
that "warming in the climate system is unequivocal and since 1950 many changes have been
observed throughout the climate system that are unprecedented over decades to millennia." That
warning, from such a sober body, hemmed in by the need to submit every statement to extraordinary
levels of scrutiny, is the starkest yet. "Heatwaves are very likely to occur more frequently and last longer. As the earth
warms, we expect to see currently wet regions receiving more rainfall, and dry regions receiving less, although there will be
exceptions," Stocker said. Qin Dahe, also co-chair of the working group, said: "As the ocean warm, and glaciers and ice sheets
reduce, global mean sea level will continue to rise, but at a faster rate than we have experienced over the past 40 years." Prof David
Mackay, chief scientific adviser to the Department of Energy and Climate Change, said: "The far-reaching consequences of this
warming are becoming understood, although some uncertainties remain. The most
And Adaptation Causes Mindset Shift --- Its fatalistic and guts emission
solutions
Skuce 13 (Andy, A geophysical consultant living in British Columbia. He has a BSc in geology
from Sheffield University and an MSc in geophysics from the University of Leeds. His work
experience includes a period at the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh and work for a variety
of oil companies based in Calgary, Vienna and Quito, Global Warming: Not Reversible, but
Stoppable, Skeptical Science, 04/19/13, http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-notreversible-but-stoppable.html) Chen
The second question reveals a different kind of misunderstanding: many mistakenly
paper in Science Magazine (2013, paywalled but freely accessible here, scroll down to "Publications, 2013") by Damon Matthews
and Susan Solomon: Irreversible Does Not Mean Unavoidable. Since the Industrial Revolution, CO2 from our burning of fossil fuels
has been building up in the atmosphere. The concentration of CO2 is now approaching 400 parts per million (ppm), up from 280
ppm prior to 1800. If
we were to stop all emissions immediately, the CO2 concentration would also
start to decline immediately, with some of the gas continuing to be absorbed into the oceans
and smaller amounts being taken up by carbon sinks on land. According to the models of the
carbon cycle, the level of CO2 (the red line in Figure 1A) would have dropped to about 340 ppm
by 2300, approximately the same level as it was in 1980. In the next 300 years, therefore, nature will have
recouped the last 30 years of our emissions.
We Can Solve Climate Change After about 25 years of discussing climate change, the global stage is finally set to
seriously address what we have to do to reduce our footprint. This is hugely important. Taking action is required if we
want to leave the planet in good shape for our children and grandchildren. Most of the people on Earth think that this
is important. Almost all of the countries that represent these people are in the process of saying that they agree that something
must be done. There have been lots of meetings and discussions up to this point. Copenhagen this December will be another one
these important meetings, and many discussions, and actions will need to follow. Our global climate is extremely important to every
one of us. There is agreement that we all need to act, but questions surround what it will cost. Reducing Emissions... and Costs
There are several ways that we can reduce our carbon footprint. They are typically referred to in
categories like efficiency and changes in generation. Efficiency is a way to reduce the use of
energy to do the same thing. There are lots of ways to improve efficiencies. Changing a light
bulb to a more efficient one is a good example of this, but don't think only technology can make us more efficient.
There are very simple things like turning out that light when it is not used that have no capital cost and great return on investment.
There are also non-carbon sources of energy generation that can be used to power a new green
economy. Proof it Can Be Done... and with Great ROI! In the release of our 2008 Sustainability Report we
document achieving an 80% reduction in carbon emissions from our global headquarters at a
net cost savings! We did this in just nine years. E & E's headquarters is the oldest existing LEED Platinum building
in the world. This means two things. One, at 22 years old, we are among the longest-running green office buildings in the world.
Two, we built one of the better buildings environmentally and were still able to reduce our footprint by 80%...(and save a couple
hundred thousand dollars in the process). Since we started with a good building, our reduction was arguably more difficult than
most buildings. This is huge. The discussion of the economics of reducing our global carbon footprint has been largely theoretical.
Real data has been lacking, and there
If there ever was a problem thats hard to solve, its climate change. Its a complex challenge requiring
more expertise than any one person can possessin-depth knowledge of the physics of the upper atmosphere, a firm grasp on the
economics of technological innovation, and a thorough understanding of the psychology of human behavior change. Whats more,
top-down approaches that have been tried for decadeslike efforts to pass national legislation and to negotiate international
agreementswhile important, havent yet produced the kind of change scientists say is needed to avert climate changes potential
consequences. But theres at least one reason for optimism. We now
are actively involved in the Climate CoLab.) Anyone is allowed to contribute. In the same way that FoldIt opened up the chemists
laboratory, the
Climate CoLab opens up the elite conference rooms and meeting halls where
climate strategies are developed today. To move beyond relying solely on experts, scientists,
and politicians to develop solutions, weve broken down the complex issue of climate change
into focused sub-problems and invited a global community to tackle each of the sub-problems
and then put the puzzle back together again into a global strategy. Anyone is allowed to contribute. No
matter who a person is or where they come from, they can contribute ideas and have them reviewed by an
international community of thousands of peopleincluding world-renowned experts from
organizations like NASA, the World Bank, and the Union of Concerned Scientists, and leading
universities like MIT, Stanford, and Columbia. Over the past three years, the Climate CoLab
community has grown dramatically, and it now has over 10,000 members from more than 100
countries. Members include business people, researchers, scientists, officials at nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), policymakers, students and concerned citizens, as well as
dozens of the worlds leading experts on climate science, policy, clean tech, investing, and more.
Together, the community has submitted and evaluated over 400 proposals on a wide variety of
topics ranging from eating vegetarian diets to adapting to sea level rise to shifting public attitudes about climate change.
Climate change reversible in squo current tech and knowledge allow for
greater energy efficiency.
Sanders 7 (Bernie, An American politician and the junior United States Senator from Vermont.
Before serving in the Senate, he represented Vermont's at-large district in the United States
House of Representatives and served as mayor of Burlington. He does not belong to a political
party. He graduated from the University of Chicago in 1964 with a Bachelor of Arts in political
science, Global Warming Is Reversible, The Nation, 11/27/07,
http://www.thenation.com/article/global-warming-reversible#) Chen
Scientists now tell us that the crisis of global warming is even worse than their earlier
projections. Daily front-page headlines of environmental disasters give an inkling of what we can expect in the future, multiplied
many times over: droughts, floods, severe weather disturbances, loss of drinking water and farmland and conflicts over declining
natural resources. Yet
Sustainable energies such as wind, solar and geothermal have tremendous potential and often
cost no more than fossil fuels (and, in some cases, even less). Increased production and research
should cause sustainable energy prices to decline steeply in the future. Wind power is the
fastest growing source of new energy in the world and in the United States, but we have barely begun
to tap its potential. Denmark, for example, generates 20 percent of its electricity from wind. We should be supporting wind energy
not only through the creation of large wind farms in the appropriate areas but through the use of small, inexpensive wind turbines
available today that can be used in homes and farms throughout rural America. These
Off Case
T - Land
1NC T - Land
Interpretation: The Earths oceans are the five oceans
Spellman and Price-Bayer 12 (Frank R. Spellman, Consult for U.S. Dept of Justice on Accident
Cases, author, Joni Price-Bayer is a speech language pathologist with Norfolk Public Schools. She
has degrees in both English and education and is a professional member of the American
Speech-Language Health Association, The Handbook of Nature, page 192, accessed 7/8/14)
Earths oceans Atlantic, Pacific, Arctic, Indian, and Southern are the storehouses of Earths
saline water. Oceans cover about 71% of Earths surface. Average depth of Earths oceans is about 3,800 m, with the greatest
ocean depth recorded at 11,036 m in the Mariana Trench. At the present time, the oceans contain a volume of about 1.35 billion
cubic kilometers (96.5% of Earths total water supply), but the volume fluctuates with the growth and melting of glacial ice.
definition of the Southern Ocean is given in the following paragraph and further
spring 2000 decision by the
International Hydrographic Organization delimited a fifth world ocean from the southern
portions of the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, and Pacific Ocean. The new ocean extends from
the coast of Antarctica north to 60 degrees south latitude which coincides with the Antarctic Treaty Limit. The
information can be found via the URL link after the definition. Background: A
Southern Ocean is now the fourth-largest of the world's five oceans (after the Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean and Indian Ocean but
larger than the Arctic Ocean).
Standards
1. Effect T --- Unlimits the topic, justify unpredictable number of affs --- Makes T
a question of solvency which mixes burdens
2. Extra T --- The aff can claim unfair advantages and generate offense we cant
have research on --- That key to clash and education
3. Ground --- We dont have our ocean links to our DAs and Ks, and our Land
CPs
Voter for Fairness and Education
Their interpretation has zero bright line for whats topical or not theres no
way to determine whats part of an ecosystem or not thats predictable
Prefer the most precise definitions Antarctic Convergence is a term that is
impossible to define precisely
Pidwirny 13 , Prof. of Physical Geography at Univ. of British Columbia, 2013 (Michael, PhD
Simon Fraser Univ., 5/13 http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/156187)
Some oceanographers tend to prefer the Antarctic Convergence, or the boundary between
water masses and currents of the oceans to the north (Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans), as
the northern limit of the Southern Ocean. While the Antarctic Convergence is approximately at
the latitude of 60south, it moves seasonally and thus provides challenges as a useful boundary
to chartographers and others.
Their interpretation links to all of our offense --- Its a horrible vision for the
topic
While there is only one global ocean, the vast body of water that covers 71 percent of the Earth is geographically divided into
distinct named regions. The boundaries between these regions have evolved over time for a variety of historical, cultural,
geographical, and scientific reasons. Historically, there are four named oceans: the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic. However,
most countriesincluding the United Statesnow recognize the Southern (Antarctic) as the fifth ocean. The Pacific, Atlantic, and
Indian are known as the three major oceans. The
T Development
T Infrastructure
Interpretation: Development includes transportation, communication, fresh
water conversion, mineral extraction, food production and research activities
Lipp 60, [James E, member of the National Academy of Sciences Panel on New Devices for
Exploring the Oceans, FRONTIERS IN OCEANIC RESEARCH HEARINGS HOUSE COMMITTEE ON
SCIENCE AND ASTRONAUTICS,
http://archive.org/stream/frontiersinocean00unit/frontiersinocean00unit_djvu.txt] Wilary
I should like to
subdivide the field of ocean development into half a dozen parts and handle each
very briefly. These are ; naval weapons, underwater transportation and communication, fresh
water conversion, mining or chemical extraction of minerals, food production, and finally
research activities.
Topicality vs Antarctica
1NC
1NC Shell
Interpretation of determines the substance constituting something of
the Earths oceans means the development must be OF THE OCEAN
Oxford Dictionary http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/of
of /v/ preposition 6. indicating the relationship between a verb and an indirect object with a verb expressing a mental state.
"they must be persuaded of the severity of the problem" expressing a cause. "he died of cancer" 7. indicating the material
or substance constituting something. "the house was built of bricks"
body of land around the S. Pole; a plateau covered by a great ice cap &
mountain peaks area ab 5,500,000 square miles (14,300,000 square kilometers), divided into West Antarctica (including
Antarctic Peninsula) &East Antarctica by Transantarctic Mountains
Voting issuea. Limits- Allowing any aff that develops the land OR the ocean makes the
topic infinite and justifies literally any aff which makes this already
massive topic unmanageable
b. Predictability- they shift the focus away from ocean debates to land
development debates which kills predictable clash
c. Ground- we dont get access to any of our ocean specific disads or
counterplans
d. Effects T- ocean development isnt an effect of the plan- the plan creates
infrastructure on land which allows for exploration- Anything can affect
ocean policy- reject the team
2NC
Overview
Our interpretation is that they have to develop the ocean, not the land - Prefer
our interpretation- it allows them to read ANY affs that explore or develop the
ocean- they justify developing cyber and physical infrastructure on any
continent, the entire TI topic because TI is infrastructure near an ocean and
more.
AT: We meet
No you dont- the plan text says you develop physical and cyber infrastructure
in Antarctica- thats distinct from developing the ocean
Topical version of the aff is- The United States federal government should
increase its exploration of the Southern Ocean- if theyre right that developing
infrastructure is a prerequisite then that would likely be an effect of the plansolves their offense and advantage ground.
third way is perhaps the best for considering the entire Antarctic as an ecosystem - this is to use the
Antarctic Convergence as the defining line. The Antarctic Convergence occurs in the ocean surrounding
Antarctica and is where very cold (low salinity) Antarctic water, flowing away from the continent and constantly cooled by the
ice on the continent, meets with the southernmost parts of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans. The Antarctic water is denser,
because it is so cold, and sinks, creeping north across the ocean bottoms. South of this convergence not only is the ocean water
colder but the air is distinctly colder and drier than north of the convergence. Most of the life forms found in Antarctica depend on
the ocean within the Antarctic Convergence so using this as a definition for Antarctica encompasses the entire physical area that is
important for the complex ecosystem that is found there. The convergence moves north during the Antarctic winter, and south in
the Antarctic summer - in response to the freezing and thawing of the sea ice. This Convergence is a biological barrier to organisms
both in the ocean and the air because of the big temperature difference.
AT: Reasonability
Reasonability makes no sense in the context of their aff- developing the land
isn't a reasonable interpretation of OCEAN development/exploration
Competing interps good race to the top to find the best interpretation for
both teams forces the aff to prove that their standards and vision of the topic is
good thats necessary to in depth discussion about what we should be able to
debate allowed and the only way to start at an equal starting point.
Ocean
The ocean isn't land. lol
Dictionary.com No data (Dictionary.com, Ocean,
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ocean)
Ocean the vast body of salt water that covers almost three fourths of the earth's surface.
Antarctica Interps
Interpretation: Antarctic is a body of land
Merriam Webster No Date (Merriam webster, Antarctica, http://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/antarctica)
Definition of ANTARCTICA
body of land around the S. Pole; a plateau covered by a great ice cap &
mountain peaks area ab 5,500,000 square miles (14,300,000 square kilometers), divided into West Antarctica (including
Antarctic Peninsula) &East Antarctica by Transantarctic Mountains
Antarctica is a continent
The Free Earth Dictionary No Date (The free earth dictionary, Antarctica,
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Antarctica)
Antarctica Continent lying chiefly within the Antarctic Circle and asymmetrically centered on the South Pole.
Some 95 percent of Antarctica is covered by an icecap averaging 1.6 km (1 mi) in thickness. The region was first
explored in the early1800s, and although there are no permanent settlements, many countries have made territorial claims. The
Antarctic Treaty of 1959, signed by 12 nations, prohibited military operations on the continent and provided for the interchange of
scientific data.
Antarctic is a continent
The Free Earth Dictionary No Date (The free earth dictionary, Antarctica,
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Antarctica)
Antarctica The continent surrounding the South Pole: almost entirely covered by an ice sheet. ab. 5,000,000
sq. mi. (12,950,000 sq. km). Also called Antarctic Continent.
standards
Competing Interpretations
Competing Interpretations means that the Aff must prove that they meet the
best relative interpretation in the debate in order to prove that theyre topical.
Especially on this broad of a topic, the burden should be on the Affirmative to
prove that theyre topical.
Holding the Aff to a higher standard creates the best model for debate if we
prove a relatively better interpretation exists, there is no logical reason to allow
the Aff to meet a worse one.
program can produce large numbers of underrepresented minority students who excel and remain in
STEM fields. Competition from other fields. Mark Loveland, Education Programs Coordinator at the National Academy of
Sciences Koshland Science Museum, remarked that surveys demonstrate that professional careers other than basic science or
ocean sciences such as law, medicine and businessdo a better job recruiting and promoting minorities and women into
their careers, and offer more compelling economic and other tangible benefits. Mr. Loveland asked Dr. Vergun what might
attract a bright, eager, competent minority or female student to pursue a career in academic research
or sciences, especially in the ocean sciences, versus more lucrative fields. Dr. Vergun responded by saying what
makes the difference is someone who cares and an exciting, engaging experience that opens
opportunities in a world about which students have no idea. Our students rarely hear anything about
the marine sciences until college, and most colleges and universities dont have marine science undergraduate degree
programs.
Breadth Good
Broad and interdisciplinary ocean education is key
Watson-Wright 12
(Wendy, Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO, Ocean in Focus:
Science and Education for Sustainable Development, in: Copejans, E. et al. (Ed.) (2012). First
conference on ocean literacy in Europe: Book of abstracts. Bruges, Belgium, 12 October
2012. VLIZ Special Publication, 60: pp. 14)
The United Nations declared 2005-2014 the decade of Education for Sustainable
Development (ESD). ESD provides a coherent and holistic vision of the role and
purpose of education within our fragile, fast changing world. For UNESCO and its
Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), ESD is the best framework for addressing
environmental challenges by systematically engaging with the three foundations of sustainable
development - the environmental, social and economic pillars - as well as by highlighting the
scientific, cultural and ethical dimensions. ESD offers not only an overarching frame of reference
but also an approach that is enriched by the contributions of many other disciplines.
Precision Good
Definitional precision is a precondition for effective policymaking.
Resnick 1 Evan Resnick, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at Columbia University,
holds an M.Phil. in Political Science and an M.A. in Political Science from Columbia
University, 2001 (Defining engagement, Journal of International Affairs, Volume 54, Issue
2, Spring, Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via ABI/INFORM Complete)
Limits Good
And limits are key to educational and competitive debate broad topics force
endless hours of research thats impossible to maintain with a life outside of
debate.
Rowland 84 ~ Robert C., Baylor University, Topic Selection in Debate, American
Forensics in Perspective, Ed. Parson
The first major problem identified by the work group as relating to topic selection is the
decline in participation in the National Debate Tournament (NDT) policy debate. As Boman
notes: There is a growing dissatisfaction with academic debate that utilizes a policy
proposition. Programs which are oriented toward debating the national policy debate
proposition, so-called NDT programs, are diminishing in scope and size.4 This decline in
policy debate is tied, many in the work group believe, to excessively broad topics. The most
obvious characteristic of some recent policy debate topics is extreme breath. A resolution
calling for regulation of land use literally and figuratively covers a lot of ground. Naitonal
debate topics have not always been so broad. Before the late 1960s the topic often specified
a particular policy change.5 The move from narrow to broad topics has had, according to
some, the effect of limiting the number of students who participate in policy debate. First,
the breadth of the topics has all but destroyed novice debate. Paul Gaske argues that
because the stock issues of policy debate are clearly defined, it is superior to value debate as
a means of introducing students to the debate process.6 Despite this advantage of policy
debate, Gaske belives that NDT debate is not the best vehicle for teaching beginners. The
problem is that broad policy topics terrify novice debaters, especially those who lack high
school debate experience. They are unable to cope with the breadth of the topic and
experience negophobia,7 the fear of debating negative. As a consequence, the educational
advantages associated with teaching novices through policy debate are lost: Yet all of these
benefits fly out the window as rookies in their formative stage quickly experience
humiliation at being caugh without evidence or substantive awareness of the issues that
confront them at a tournament.8 The ultimate result is that fewer novices participate in
NDT, thus lessening the educational value of the activity and limiting the number of
debaters or eventually participate in more advanced divisions of policy debate. In addition
to noting the effect on novices, participants argued that broad topics also discourage
experienced debaters from continued participation in policy debate. Here, the claim is that
it takes so much times and effort to be competitive on a broad topic that students who
are concerned with doing more than just debate are forced out of the activity.9 Gaske
notes, that broad topics discourage participation because of insufficient time to do
requisite research.10 The final effect may be that entire programs either cease functioning
or shift to value debate as a way to avoid unreasonable research burdens. Boman supports
this point: It is this expanding necessity of evidence, and thereby research, which has
created a competitive imbalance between institutions that participate in academic
debate.11 In this view, it is the competitive imbalance resulting from the use of broad
topics that has led some small schools to cancel their programs.