Global Warming: A Very Short Introduction

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I'll start this review by an admission: I am a global warming skeptic. To be a skeptic does not mean that I am unwilling to be persuaded by good arguments and well presented facts. To the contrary, as a scientist I am trained to be skeptical all the time and yet be willing to go out of my way to see all sides to a reasonable argument and if proven wrong to accept what the arguments establish. With that attitude in mind I have approached this little book as well: so far I have not been persuaded with most arguments on behalf of global warming proponents, and the recent spate of scandals that revealed some big holes in their arguments has only reinforced my skepticism. Nonetheless, I wanted to see what the experts in the field have to say about global warming, and I figured out this book would be as good of a starting point as they come. And if this is indeed a definitive introduction to the subject, then I am afraid that my previous skepticism will remain largely intact. The very opening of the book is extremely unpromising. The author in no uncertain terms says in the preface what Global Warming in his opinion is all about: redistribution of wealth and resources from the wealthy western industrial powers to the underdeveloped third world countries. I have never seen as a tendentious opening of a book about what really should be a scientific topic. It puts most of the scientific consideration herein in question. It takes 40 pages before we even get to the science behind global warming, which is almost a quarter of the entire book. This part of the book is actually the most interesting and certainly worth reading. It presents some interesting science behind climate and how it has changed over time. It describes the state-of-the art measuring and theoretical work that is ongoing in the field of climatology. Any science buff out there will certainly appreciate these chapters. Even so, there are several sleights