I'm real skeptical by nature and so when I first heard about it (late 90s/early 2000s?) I figured it was yet another attempt to tell us of a supposed threat that someone could protect us from, so we'd better vote for that someone, or else buy "special" products to...AHEM!...help us.
I did not, and do not, disqualify incoming information based on the source. Someone for whom I have no liking or respect can actually tell me something that is entirely accurate and verifiable. So I never viewed it as a "them vs us" issue.
I felt that I owed it to myself to find out more so I independently looked at charts of CO2 levels from ice core samples, Milankovich cycles, the underlying validity of the greenhouse effect (this was first identified and demonstrated in the early 1800s, long before current politicization). Based on long consideration I concluded that the effect would indeed be possible on a global scale, and that given the dispersion of sequestered carbon into its gaseous form, and the gradually increasing temperatures recorded since industrialization (very incomplete records of measurements of varying quality, but still...) it *looked* like this might be the cause of these putative increases.
Then comparing this conclusion that there appeared to be a warming trend that coincided with both increased current measurements of atmospheric greenhouse gases, including C02, also coinciding with industrial energy consumption increases with where in the Milankovich cycle we should be, which is a slight cooling trend, the increase in tempertures while in a predicted cooling trend seemed indicative of unexpected global warming.
The final decider was seeing with my own eyes the reduction of glacier sizes in the Cascade, within my lifetime, and old photos of various other glaciers from before my time, this convinced me that it is very likely we are into a warming trend, and that it is likely that human activity creates greenhouse gases that *overlay* any underlying natural fluctuation. from cycle, vulcanism, solar variartion. It is additive, not directly causal.
Anyway, that's where I am now.
I think that he idea that we can avoid the change is unrealistic, and I tend to pooh-pooh all those who are in a frenzy about avoidance. The best thing to talk about now is adaptation.
And you know the really grim thing that the panicked proponents of rapid change to non-carbon energy really seems to avoid? The very best way to reduce carbon-based energy consumption, fast, is a massive---and I mean BIG--reduction in the human population, tout suite.
So put that in your pipe and smoke it!
