Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2466 in Books
• Published on: 2009-05-01
• Binding: Hardcover
• 360 pages

Customer Reviews

Plimer sets out a convincing but self-evidently controversial argument
Ian Plimer has had a distinguished career in academia, presently holding the position of Professor of Mining Geology at the University of Adelaide and Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne, where he was Professor and Head from 1991-2005.

At almost 500 pages (and 2311 footnotes), Plimer takes the reader through a geological and environmental history of the planet. His recounting of geological history is linked closely to human societal trends, where he makes the close link between climate and the relative successes and failures of human society. He asserts that periods when the climate was "warm" were ultimately positive for societies, with colder periods linked to population declines, wars and, in some cases, extinction of whole civilisations.

Plimer argues that climate change is not occurring, or at least that any climate change that is occurring is not directly attributable to man. He argues that the climate today is in fact "cooler" than in more recent periods, such as the times when the Roman Empire was emerging and was at its cultural and economic peak.

Plimer sets out a convincing but self-evidently controversial argument, attacking declarations about carbon pollution and carbon dioxide emissions, the evidence presented in the UN's IPCC reports and the questionable benefits of emission-trading and carbon reductions systems. His argument centres on climate being far more sophisticated and complex than some have asserted. He argues that looking at atmospheric climate alone, without proper consideration of the entire environmental system, is flawed.

A serious person's guide to the sceptic case on AGW

For those who wish to obtain an introduction to the sceptical case regarding the assertion that humans are responsible for global warming, there are available short books written in a racy/journalistic style. One such (which I would recommend) is An Appeal to Reason: a Cool Look at Global Warming by Nigel Lawson.

Professor Plimer's book falls into a somewhat different category. What his book does is to fulfil the requirement of the intelligent layman for an up-to-date, authoritative and comprehensive account of the case for doubting the purported phenomenon of anthropogenic global warming (AGW).

In that almost all politicians and most elements of the media, such as the BBC, now speak of AGW as though it was an incontrovertible fact which no rational person would even contemplate questioning, the book is of marked value in demonstrating, in a manner readily accessible to the layman, that the science of AGW is anything but finally settled.

The book commences with a 20-page introduction followed by a chapter on the history of the Earth's climate, including detailed accounts of the Roman Warming, the Medieval Warming and the Little Ice Age. Next comes the main scientific "meat" of the book, this being set forth in five chapters (totaling 334 pages) which are respectively entitled The Sun, The Earth, Ice, Water and Air. If you are more at home with racy or journalistic offerings, these chapters may not be for you. If though, you wish to obtain somewhat more than a fleeting understanding of the current state of man's knowledge of the workings of the planet's climate system, then Professor Plimer's work will be of definite assistance to you.

The book concludes with a chapter entitled Et Moi which treats of the political aspects and the religiosity of the AGW movement. For those not acquainted with the genesis and development of the AGW movement or with the nature of the clashes between the believers and the sceptics, this final chapter will prove, I suspect, to be an eye-opener.

Disappointingly impaired by editorial failings
I am a lay (that is scientifically uneducated) reader, with an inclination against the thesis of anthropogenic forcing--less pretentiously "global warming". (My reasons: I don't like the spectacle of rich folks pulling up the ladder of economic progress against those a generation or so behind them). I expected to find arguments in "Heaven and Earth" to support my leanings and I did, but I was also alarmed by the book's weaknesses which have made it easy to dismiss.

We see this by examining how much the author succeeds in making his arguments against the three bases upon which we might accept the thesis of anthropogenic forcing: theory, evidence and modelling.

As to theory, the author restates Freeman Dyson's telling point that carbon dioxide, so far from being a poison is a plant food: that's why we introduce it into greenhouses at 2½ times atmospheric concentrations. (Though mind you, greenhouses are hotter than most of us would wish to tolerate.) He also draws our attention to the complexities bearing upon terrestrial temperature, among them variation in solar orbits and radiation, the chemistry of ice, ocean currents, the variety of greenhouse gasses entering the atmosphere in the natural course of things and much else. Unfortunately, his argument is so discursive and repetitive as to give the "and another thing" impression of someone uncertain of the quality of his own material. It may simply be that he needed a tougher editor, but it leaves the thoughtful reader with an uneasy feeling, particularly as most--like me--will not be competent to test the science or have the time or inclination to check the 2311 references.

This takes us to evidence, where the author reminds us of the uncertainty arising out of the recent record, in particular the medieval, Roman and Minoan warming periods, which occurred without any contribution from anthropogenic carbon dioxide; and of the inconvenient truth that temperatures have been falling for the last decade. This is good stuff and Professor Plimer could have gone further by reminding us that many climate evangelists have abandoned "global warming" for the infinitely slippery "climate change". The author also dwells on geological warmings and coolings, principally to remind us that life survived such episodes, and leading us to some more or less irrelevant material about extinctions. These miss the point as presumably we would prefer to avoid disruption well before we get to extinction. Finally, Professor Plimer introduces some decidedly eccentric comments which seem to argue that the helium/hydrogen model of solar composition is mistaken. (Yes, I did say I'm not a scientist, but I think that even I would have caught it if such a central astrophysical theory had been seriously challenged.) I can't see how this bears upon the book's core argument and I could really have done without remarks so much smacking of bats in the belfry.

As to modelling, the author has some knock-about fun with Michael Mann's ludicrous "hockey stick" graph. As it happens, modelling is something I know a bit about (I was trained as an economist and worked for many years as a securities analyst), so I am correspondingly sceptical about arguments based on them, particularly given the simplifications made by the modellers concerned and their well-documented reluctance to make their calculations and assumptions known to third parties. Indeed, in private conversation with climate modellers, they have shared their unhappiness with the extravagant claims of some of their number. But on the other hand, Professor Plimer himself uses a graph that has been discredited, as omitting data from the last 20 years. This is either dirty pool or just lazy.

There is quite a lot of ad hominem material, some of it very interesting, for example the analysis of the tiny number of actual IPCC authors, but ultimately these are irrelevant to the rights and wrongs of the argument. I agree unreservedly with the author's characterisation of global warming as a latter-day religion for those disenchanted with the modern world. But his tone is often at least as intemperate as those he criticises. To conclude, I get the feeling that inside "Heaven and Earth", there is another better book, possibly more than one, in which Professor Plimer gets himself a decent editor so that his arguments can be made more effectively; and the one or two egregious failings are corrected. I would like to read that book and the debate very much needs it.