Is Global Warming Always Bad?
by Patrick J. Michaels
Patrick J. Michaels is senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute and author of Meltdown: The Predictable Distortion of Global Warming by Scientists, Politicians, and the Media (2004).
Have you ever read anything good about global warming? Why is all the news always bad?
Objectively speaking, any environmental change should have both positive benefits and negative effects. For example, theory predicts and observations confirm that human-induced warming takes place primarily in winter, lengthening the growing season. Satellite measurements now show that the planet is greener than it was before it warmed. There are literally thousands of experiments reported in the scientific literature demonstrating that higher atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations -- cause by human activity -- dramatically increase food production. So why do we only hear one side about global warming?
Perhaps because there's little incentive for scientists to do anything but emphasize the negative and the destructive. Alarming news often leads to government funding, funding generates research, and research is the key to scientists' professional advancement. Good news threatens that arrangement.
Patrick J. Michaels is senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute and author of Meltdown: The Predictable Distortion of Global Warming by Scientists, Politicians, and the Media (2004).
More by Patrick J. Michaels
This is the reality that all scientists confront: every issue, be it global warming, cancer or AIDS, competes with other issues for a limited amount of government research funding. And, here in Washington, no one ever received a major research grant by stating that his or her particular issue might not be such a problem after all.
A recent story is typical. Two American scientists, Thomas Knutson and Robert Tuleya, published an academic paper forecasting an increase in the power of hurricanes...