Foreword: A More Persuasive Truth by David Bennett Laing
Notes for the Reader
Climate Is Never “Settled,” and Neither Is Science
1. How I Came to Wonder About Climate Change
Living More Safely With Earthquakes
Living More Safely With Volcanic Eruptions
Living More Safely With Climate
Discovering a More Likely Cause of Global Warming
2. Could Climate Change Science Be Mistaken?
Adapting to Change
What Is Science?
Is There a Role of Belief in Science?
Scientists and Politicians Have Worked Well Together
Where Am I Coming From?
Where Are You and I Going?
3. Why Did Global Temperatures Stop Increasing in 1998?
The Stark Divergence Between Increasing Concentration of Carbon Dioxide and Invariant Temperature
Rationalizing the Role of Natural Variations in Climate
The Ozone Depletion Theory of Global Warming
4. Do We Really Understand Thermal Energy?
What Is Light?
What Is an Electromagnetic Field
What Is Energy?
What Is Thermal Energy?
What Is Radiation?
What Is Temperature?
Why Is Thermal Energy Equal to Frequency Times a Constant?
A Problem With Spectral Radiance Used in Planck’s Law
Energy Is Clearly Observed to Increase With Increasing Frequency of Oscillation
Why Can’t Thermal Energy Propagate as Waves?
Why Can’t Thermal Energy Propagate as Photons?
Potential Radiant Temperature and the Amplitude of Oscillation
Thermal Energy Is a Spectrum of Frequencies
5. How Does the Atmosphere Protect Earth From Sun’s “Hottest” Radiation?
How Does the Upper Atmosphere Absorb the Highest Energy Solar Radiation?
How Does Oxygen Absorb Solar Radiation?
How Does the Ozone Layer Protect Earth from Sun’s “Hottest” Radiation?
What Is the Primary Radiative Surface of the Earth System?
6. How Do Minute Amounts of Ozone Control Climate?
What Is the Ozone-Oxygen Cycle?
How Is Ozone Distributed by Latitude and Season?
Depletion of Ozone by CFC Gases
The Polar Jet Stream and the Polar Vortex
How Minute Amounts of Ozone Help Control Weather
7. How Do Temperatures Change With Ozone Depletion?
The Antarctic Ozone Hole
8. How Can Volcanoes Both Cool and Warm Earth?
How Do Explosive Volcanic Eruptions Cool Earth?
How Do Effusive Volcanic Eruptions Warm Earth?
How Do the Properties of Explosive and Effusive Volcanic Eruptions Compare?
How Does Volcanism Deplete Ozone?
How Common Is Abrupt Climate Change?
Why Does Ozone Peak in the Year in Which Volcanoes Erupt?
Summary of How Volcanic Eruptions Cool and Warm Earth
9. How Do Volcanic Eruptions Affect Weather?
What Is the Link Between Ozone and Weather?
Warming and Drought in Toronto During 2012 and 2013
What Caused the “Weird” Weather of 2014 and 2015?
10. Why Does the Greenhouse Effect Not Appear to be Correct?
Can Radiation From a Thermal Body Actually Warm the Same Body?
Does the Greenhouse Effect Slow the Rate of Cooling of Earth?
Does the Greenhouse Effect Violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics?
Is Sufficient Energy Absorbed by Greenhouse Gases to Cause Global Warming?
Do Concentrations of Carbon Dioxide Increase Before Temperatures Increase?
Are Increases in Temperature and Concentrations of Carbon Dioxide Contemporaneous throughout Geologic Time?
Other Problems With the Greenhouse Effect
11. What Are Some Other Implications of Light Being a Continuum of Frequency?
Energy Equals Frequency Times a Constant
So What Is a Quantum?
What Is Quantum Entanglement?
What Is Dark Energy?
What Is Dark Matter?
Is the Universe Expanding?
What Is Gravity?
12. How Could Science Have Been So Far Off the Mark?
The Critical Importance of Observations
Fundamental Questions in Physics
The Role of the IPCC
The Importance of Critical Questioning and Replication
13. Where Do We Go From Here?
World Population and the Escalating Need for Resources
Increased Need for Understanding
Climate Disaster Is Never Far Away
Listen to the Earth
2009 Geologic Time Scale