Global Warming & Climate Change Myths
Here is a summary of global warming and climate change myths, sorted by recent popularity vs what science says. Click the response for a more detailed response. You can also view them sorted by taxonomy, by popularity, in a print-friendly version, with short URLs or with fixed numbers you can use for permanent references.
| Climate Myth | vs | What the Science Says | ||
| 1 | "Climate's changed before" | Climate reacts to whatever forces it to change at the time; humans are now the dominant forcing. |  |
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| 2 | "It's the sun" | In the last 35 years of global warming, sun and climate have been going in opposite directions |
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| 3 | "It's not bad" | Negative impacts of global warming on agriculture, health & environment far outweigh any positives. | |
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| 4 | "There is no consensus" | 97% of climate experts agree humans are causing global warming. |
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| 5 | "It's cooling" | The last decade 2000-2009 was the hottest on record. | |
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| 6 | "Models are unreliable" | Models successfully reproduce temperatures since 1900 globally, by land, in the air and the ocean. | |
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| 7 | "Temp record is unreliable" | The warming trend is the same in rural and urban areas, measured by thermometers and satellites. | |
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| 8 | "Animals and plants can adapt" | Global warming will cause mass extinctions of species that cannot adapt on short time scales. | |
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| 9 | "It hasn't warmed since 1998" | For global records, 2010 is the hottest year on record, tied with 2005. | |
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| 10 | "Antarctica is gaining ice" | Satellites measure Antarctica losing land ice at an accelerating rate. | |
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| 11 | "Ice age predicted in the 70s" | The vast majority of climate papers in the 1970s predicted warming. | |
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| 12 | "CO2 lags temperature" | CO2 didn't initiate warming from past ice ages but it did amplify the warming. | |
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| 13 | "Climate sensitivity is low" | Net positive feedback is confirmed by many different lines of evidence. | |
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| 14 | "We're heading into an ice age" | Worry about global warming impacts in the next 100 years, not an ice age in over 10,000 years. | |
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| 15 | "Ocean acidification isn't serious" | Ocean acidification threatens entire marine food chains. | |
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| 16 | "Hockey stick is broken" | Recent studies agree that recent global temperatures are unprecedented in the last 1000 years. | |
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| 17 | "Climategate CRU emails suggest conspiracy" | A number of investigations have cleared scientists of any wrongdoing in the media-hyped email incident. | |
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| 18 | "Hurricanes aren't linked to global warming" | There is increasing evidence that hurricanes are getting stronger due to global warming. | |
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| 19 | "Al Gore got it wrong" | Al Gore's book is quite accurate, and far more accurate than contrarian books. |
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| 20 | "Glaciers are growing" | Most glaciers are retreating, posing a serious problem for millions who rely on glaciers for water. | |
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| 21 | "It's cosmic rays" | Cosmic rays show no trend over the last 30 years & have had little impact on recent global warming. | |
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| 22 | "1934 - hottest year on record" | 1934 was one of the hottest years in the US, not globally. | |
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| 23 | "It's freaking cold!" | A local cold day has nothing to do with the long-term trend of increasing global temperatures. | |
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| 24 | "Extreme weather isn't caused by global warming" | Extreme weather events are being made more frequent and worse by global warming. | |
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| 25 | "Sea level rise is exaggerated" | A variety of different measurements find steadily rising sea levels over the past century. | |
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| 26 | "It's Urban Heat Island effect" | Urban and rural regions show the same warming trend. | |
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| 27 | "Medieval Warm Period was warmer" | Globally averaged temperature now is higher than global temperature in medieval times. | |
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| 28 | "Mars is warming" | Mars is not warming globally. | |
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| 29 | "Arctic icemelt is a natural cycle" | Thick arctic sea ice is undergoing a rapid retreat. | |
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| 30 | "Increasing CO2 has little to no effect" | The strong CO2 effect has been observed by many different measurements. | |
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| 31 | "Oceans are cooling" | The most recent ocean measurements show consistent warming. | |
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| 32 | "It's a 1500 year cycle" | Ancient natural cycles are irrelevant for attributing recent global warming to humans. | |
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| 33 | "Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions" | The natural cycle adds and removes CO2 to keep a balance; humans add extra CO2 without removing any. | |
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| 34 | "IPCC is alarmist" | Numerous papers have documented how IPCC predictions are more likely to underestimate the climate response. |
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| 35 | "Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas" | Rising CO2 increases atmospheric water vapor, which makes global warming much worse. |
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| 36 | "Polar bear numbers are increasing" | Polar bears are in danger of extinction as well as many other species. | |
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| 37 | "CO2 limits will harm the economy" | The benefits of a price on carbon outweigh the costs several times over. |
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| 38 | "It's not happening" | There are many lines of evidence indicating global warming is unequivocal. |
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| 39 | "Greenland was green" | Other parts of the earth got colder when Greenland got warmer. | |
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| 40 | "Greenland is gaining ice" | Greenland on the whole is losing ice, as confirmed by satellite measurement. | |
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| 41 | "CO2 is not a pollutant" | Through its impacts on the climate, CO2 presents a danger to public health and welfare, and thus qualifies as an air pollutant |
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| 42 | "CO2 is plant food" | The effects of enhanced CO2 on terrestrial plants are variable and complex and dependent on numerous factors |
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