[Gregstrom]

I suspect that it's a little difficult to detect meaningful trends over less than perhaps a 50-year span, and so my feeling is that all these pro/anti GW fanatics wrangling over the last 10 years of data aren't really saying anything useful.

It seems to me that extremists on both sides of the debate are using bad science to back their arguments at times, and that both sides have at times appeared to treat ethics as being less important than putting their message across. As a result I don't really think it's worth my time taking either side of the debate seriously.

That said, I have concerns over carbon emissions. After all, we've put out enough CO2 to measurably change the composition of the atmosphere. In the absence of any certain knowledge of what the effects of this on the planet will be, it seems sensible to try and limit emissions. I'd rather have the history books saying it was all a fuss about nothing than detailing how chances to avert future problems were wasted.

NB: I don't pretend to know what sort of changes altering atmospheric CO2 levels could actually cause. For all I know, they could be positive. But... not too long ago, no-one thought that halon fire extinguishers and CFC aerosol cans could alter the environment.