Man-made climate change is here.

Climate change is a reality we can no longer ignore. We see the impacts in our everyday lives, from extreme superstorms, to heat waves, to massive wildfires and droughts. But climate denial, bankrolled by Dirty Energy companies and justified by pseudoscience, persists.

Reality Drop, inspired by Skeptical Science, is a library of science-based rebuttals to climate change deniers.

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Showing 39 myths:

• #1: There is no greenhouse effect

  Deniers say: The greenhouse effect is just a theory; it hasn’t been proven by real-world data.
  Science says: Two centuries of scientific research tell us the greenhouse effect is real.
  Without the greenhouse effect generated by our atmosphere, heat from the sun would be quickly lost to space and the Earth would be an icy ball. Nearly 200 years of scientific research — including direct observations of the greenhouse effect in action — back up this reality. But although we do need the greenhouse effect, we certainly don’t need to make it stronger by pumping carbon pollution into the air. The more carbon we put into the atmosphere, the more heat we trap and the hotter it gets. And around the world, we’re already starting to see the negative effects of a greenhouse effect on steroids.
• #2: Greenhouse effect defies physics

  Deniers say: The idea that the greenhouse effect can warm the planet contradicts the laws of physics.
  Science says: Physics disproves climate change? Try again.
  The greenhouse effect is perfectly consistent with the laws of physics, and that includes the second law of thermodynamics. Simply put, this law tells us if we put a hot thing next to a cold thing, heat will flow out of the hot thing and into the cold thing. Deniers look at this rule and ask, “If the atmosphere is cooler than the surface of the Earth, how can it be responsible for warming the Earth?” It’s a nice try, until you consider the fact that it’s the hot sun that warms the planet initially. Sunlight comes in and the Earth radiates heat outwards, to cooler outer space — just as the laws of physics suggest. Greenhouse gases trap some of the heat and redirect it back toward the planet’s surface.
• #21: It’s the urban heat island

  Deniers say: Temperature measurement usually takes place in cities, which retain more heat than rural areas.
  Science says: Even when you account for the urban heat island effect, it's clear that the Earth is getting warmer.
  Temperature records from around the world — from weather stations in both urban and rural areas, and from weather balloons and satellites — tell us the world is warming. The “urban heat island effect” is a real phenomenon. Cities, with their abundance of black roofs and asphalt parking lots, tend to absorb more sunlight and radiate more heat than the surrounding countryside. But scientists take this effect into account when they process temperature data. When the readings from all rural and urban stations are taken together and adjusted for the urban heat island effect, it’s clear global average temperatures are increasing.
• #38: The hockey stick is broken

  Deniers say: Michael Mann’s 'hockey stick' graph is statistical nonsense, and scientists haven’t been able to replicate it.
  Science says: The hockey stick graph has been confirmed again and again. There's also plenty of other evidence to show us the Earth is warming.
  The famous “hockey stick” study and graph told us that the 20th century has been the warmest of at least the past 1,000 years. This conclusion was based on tree rings, ice cores, coral and other records as proxies for temperature. Since the hockey stick was published in 1999, several independent studies have found the same thing. The hockey stick study has been analyzed and upheld. In addition to this graph, there are multiple confirming lines of evidence that tell us man-made climate change is a reality.
• #40: 1934 was the hottest year on record in the U.S.

  Deniers say: How can we be getting warmer when the hottest year on record in America was eight decades ago?
  Science says: 2012 was by far the hottest year on record in America’s Lower 48.
  In the contiguous United States, the record wasn’t even close. 2012 was the warmest year on record, and 1 degree Fahrenheit warmer than the previous record in 1998. 1934 comes in fourth.
  
  But here's what matters the most: One year only gives us a snapshot in time, not a long-term trend. There’s also no reason to expect the temperature trends in the U.S. — which only makes up 2% of the planet’s surface — to perfectly track the average temperature of the planet. Globally, 2010 was tied with 2005 for the hottest year on record, and 1934 didn’t even make the top 60. Nine of the ten hottest years on record have occurred since the year 2000.
• #41: It cooled mid-century

  Deniers say: From 1945 to 1975, the planet cooled. What happened to global warming?
  Science says: In the middle of the 20th century, the global climate cooled over the short term. Carbon dioxide pollution is warming our planet over the long term.
  Over the last 130 years, global temperatures have increased due to carbon pollution from the burning of dirty energy like oil and coal. It’s true though that around the middle of the last century, the temperature record shows a short-term cooling trend. Generally, the trend has been attributed to an increase in sulfur pollution, which rapidly forms tiny particles in the air known as "aerosols" that reflect incoming solar energy back into space. The surge in sulfur dioxide pollution was mostly due to industrial activities that picked up after World War II, as well as several volcanic eruptions in the early 1960s. We’ve come a long way since then to limit sulfur pollution, since it’s bad for our health and causes acid rain. Even today though, we still emit some. And even today, sulfur pollution is masking some of the warming caused by carbon pollution from dirty energy. None of this changes the fact that the Earth is steadily warming and carbon pollution is the primary cause.
• #42: It's not happening

  Deniers say: Climate change isn't happening at all. If you think the world is getting warmer, then I'd love to see you prove it.
  Science says: Scientists have known about global warming for decades. It's real. So let's move on to what we can do about it.
  There is overwhelming evidence that our climate is warming due to pollution from human activities. That's the conclusion reached by 97 percent of top climate scientists and every major National Academy of Science in the world. When we burn dirty fossil fuels like oil and coal, and when we cut down forests that store carbon, we pollute our atmosphere and warm our planet. This is not controversial: It's a reality we've understood for decades. And we’re starting to feel the effects now. Nine of the ten hottest years on record have occurred since the year 2000. Extreme weather events like heat waves, heavy rains and drought are becoming more common and more severe. Coastal communities all over the world are preparing for the impacts of sea level rise. The debate over the basic science of climate change is over. So let's move on to a much more productive discussion on what we can do about it.
• #43: U.S. weather stations are unreliable

  Deniers say: The weather stations that monitor temperature in the U.S. are placed in unreliable locations.
  Science says: There is plenty of evidence to show us the Earth is warming, including carefully tested weather stations.
  Unfortunately, not every temperature monitoring station in the U.S. is located in the best place. Some stations are located too close to paved surfaces, buildings or other artificial sources of heat. So it’s reasonable to ask: Can U.S. thermometers that show “warming” be trusted? Yes, it turns out. Sites in ideal and less-than ideal locations report nearly identical trends. The lesson here? You can’t tell how good a thermometer is just by looking at it. You have to actually examine the data it collects in the context of a larger network of stations. And monitoring stations and temperature records aside, there are many other ways we can tell the planet is warming. Glaciers are melting, Arctic sea ice is declining, and the oceans are warming up. Multiple lines of evidence show us that climate change is happening and humans are the cause.
• #44: The troposphere isn’t warming

  Deniers say: If you look at the upper regions of the atmosphere, you'll find it isn't warming.
  Science says: Satellite evidence clearly shows the lower atmosphere is warming.
  Data from several independent satellites show the troposphere (the part of the atmosphere in which we live) is warming. This trend is one of many lines of evidence that the Earth is warming because humans are putting carbon pollution into the atmosphere. The argument should really end here, but let’s talk for a second about why, back in the 90s, it appeared as though the tropospheric warming trend wasn’t very pronounced. It turns out the methodologies scientists used decades ago to compile and interpret the data weren’t perfect. As techniques improved, it became clear that the troposphere was warming — a fact that is consistent with basic physics.
• #45: It hasn't warmed since 1998

  Deniers say: So 1998 was a warm year, but since then, global warming has stopped.
  Science says: 2005 was hotter than 1998, and the ten hottest years on record have occurred in the last 15 years.
  As our climate changes, some years will be warmer than others. Yes, 1998 was unusually warm (partly it because was a strong El Niño year). But overall, 2005 and 2010 ⎯ which were tied for the warmest years on record, globally ⎯ were both hotter, and the 10 hottest years on record have all happened since 1998. Scientists have observed rising temperatures, rising sea levels, melting glaciers, melting Arctic sea ice, and increased humidity over the last several decades. The full range of available data since 1880 conclusively shows the world is warming. And we can expect that trend to continue as long as humans send carbon pollution into the atmosphere.
• #46: It's cooling

  Deniers say: The temperature trend is going down, especially over the last 15 years.
  Science says: Temperatures go up and down from year to year, but the Earth is warming over the long run.
  Temperature records from around the world clearly show that the Earth has been warming since 1880. Those who argue it's cooling are either confusing cold weather with climate, or are referencing data that measure only short-term changes in global surface temperatures. Natural climate patterns like El Niño or La Niña can make the average global temperature fluctuate from year to year; that's why the lines on a global temperature graph zigzag. It also helps explain why short periods of cooling can occur within longer-term periods of warming. When scientists look at the big picture, though, a clear trend emerges: The world is warming. Temperature records from thermometers aside though, this reality is confirmed by the fact that ice sheets are shrinking, Arctic sea ice is declining, and the oceans are getting warmer.
• #47: It's freaking cold

  Deniers say: Did you hear about the record cold snap? Where's the global warming now?
  Science says: Even with climate change, it still gets cold sometimes. But hot days are happening more often.
  Since 1950, hot days have become more common and cold days have become less common around the world. In the U.S., record-high temperatures are being set more than twice as often as record-cold temperatures. But the bottom line is this: “Less cold” doesn’t mean “never cold.” Cold days will happen less often as the world warms, but they won’t go away.
• #48: It’s snowing, not warming

  Deniers say: The idea that we’re warming the globe is debunked every time we have to bundle up and head outside to shovel away some climate change.
  Science says: Global warming means there's less snow overall. But it could also bring more extreme snowstorms.
  

Any time there’s a big snowstorm, someone scoffs, “Global warming?! Yeah, right!” There are a few problems with that. First: It confuses a short-term, local event with the long-term trend that the planet is getting warmer. But here’s another fact that might surprise you. Even though the total amount of snow has declined in parts of the world over recent decades, there have been an increasing number of very heavy storms. That’s because a warmer climate increases evaporation, drawing moisture both from the oceans and the land. When that increased atmospheric moisture feeds into a storm, it can make the storm really, really big. The result: less snow overall as temperatures increase, but more extreme snowstorms.
• #49: Spring isn’t arriving sooner

  Deniers say: How can we be warming? Spring gets here the same time every year.
  Science says: It's not your imagination: Spring is coming sooner than it used to.
  There is mounting evidence that as temperatures rise, winters are getting shorter and spring is coming sooner. For example, the peak spring runoff is happening more than 20 days earlier in rivers and streams across the American West. In the U.K., the average first flowering date of more than 400 plant species occurred earlier in the last 25 years than in any other period since 1760. Migratory birds are arriving earlier in their summer breeding grounds in Australia, Europe, Asia, and North America. This is known as “season creep.”
• #50: We're heading into an ice age

  Deniers say: Ice ages come every 11,500 years. The last ice age was 11,500 years ago. Do the math.
  Science says: Global warming is happening now. An ice age may or may not happen in thousands of years.
  The world is warming because of carbon pollution from fossil fuels like oil and coal. Without those human activities, the world would actually be COOLING slightly. Does that mean we’d be heading into an ice age? Maybe … in the next couple thousand years or so. Ice ages are triggered by natural forces like volcanoes and changes in the Earth’s orbit and tilt. But because the concentration of carbon dioxide is so much higher now than any time in nearly 1 million years, ice sheets are shrinking instead of growing. We need to focus on solving the climate crisis unfolding today, rather than worrying about an ice age thousands of years from now.
• #57: The Arctic was warmer in 1940

  Deniers say: In 1940, the Arctic experienced temperatures 3°C warmer than today.
  Science says: Arctic sea ice shrank to a record low in 2012, and second place was in 2007.
  Full temperature data sets from the Arctic reveal it is warmer today than in 1940. The claim that the Arctic was warmer at earlier points in the 20th century is based on cherry-picked temperature data from a few stations. In fact, the Arctic summers of 2005, 2007, 2010, and 2011 were warmer than any time in at least the last 600 years.
• #59: Arctic sea ice has recovered

  Deniers say: The data show that Arctic sea ice is back to normal.
  Science says: Arctic sea ice shrank to a record low in 2012, and second place was in 2007.
  The amount of sea ice in the Arctic cycles up and down from year to year. Despite these ups and downs, the amount of ice in the Arctic each summer has declined over the last half-century. Why? Because carbon pollution is warming the planet.
• #60: Arctic sea ice loss is matched by Antarctic sea ice gain

  Deniers say: Where's your global warming now? Antarctica has been gaining ice for years.
  Science says: Antarctica is doing better than the Arctic, but if global warming continues, none of the world's ice is safe.
  Arctic sea ice is rapidly declining as the world warms. Since 1979, the extent of summer sea ice in the Arctic has declined by almost 1.2 million square miles. But Antarctic sea ice hasn't followed suit so far. In fact, there has been a slight gain in winter sea ice since 1979: about 0.2 million square miles. Why? Scientists aren't sure, but the ozone hole might be partly to blame. What we do know is that our planet is steadily warming due to pollution from dirty energy like oil and coal. At the current rate of warming, the Arctic could be nearly ice-free in the summer by 2035. And even in Antarctica, sea ice won't be around forever if the Earth keeps warming.
• #62: Antarctica is gaining ice

  Deniers say: Where's your global warming now? Antarctica has actually been gaining ice for years.
  Science says: There's a difference between sea ice and land ice. Antarctica's land ice, or glaciers, have been melting at an alarming rate.
  To understand what’s going on with the ice in Antarctica, it’s important to know the difference between sea ice and land ice. Sea ice is frozen, floating seawater, while land ice (called glaciers or ice sheets) is ice that has accumulated over time on land. Overall, the Antarctic sea ice has been stable (so far) — but that doesn’t contradict the evidence that our climate is warming. Meanwhile, the ice sheet that covers most of Antarctica has lost more than half a trillion tons of ice in recent years. When land ice melts, meltwater flows into the ocean, contributing to sea level rise. Antarctica's melting land ice poses a direct threat to the hundreds of millions of people living on islands and near coasts.
• #64: Greenland is gaining ice

  Deniers say: The thin ice on Greenland’s coast is melting. But so what? The thick ice at high altitudes is growing.
  Science says: Overall, Greenland is losing more than 200 billion tons of ice a year.
  Scientists around the world report that Greenland is losing ice overall, despite small ice gains at high altitudes. And what’s more, the losses have drastically accelerated in recent decades. Right now, Greenland is losing more than 200 billion tons of ice a year! The meltwater from Greenland’s ice sheet continues to contribute to global sea level rise. A rapidly warming climate isn't good news for Greenland or the rest of us.
• #67: Glaciers are growing

  Deniers say: We can't ignore the glaciers that are advancing and gaining ice.
  Science says: A few glaciers are advancing. Most are shrinking. Overall, they are losing 150 billion tons of ice a year.
  Make no mistake: Globally, glaciers are shrinking, losing about 150 billion tons of ice a year. And while climate deniers may try to confuse the issue by “cherry picking” data or focusing on short-term variations, the long-term trend is crystal clear. Most of the glaciers worldwide are receding at an accelerating rate. Sure, there are isolated cases of glaciers that haven’t melted or are gaining ice. But as with any climate-related data, it’s important to stay focused on the big picture. If a conclusion isn’t based on large-scale, long-term trends, you’re not getting the whole story.
• #81: Sea levels aren’t rising

  Deniers say: If you ignore a lot of suspicious and unreliable data, it's clear that global sea levels have remained stable.
  Science says: Whether you look at tide gauges or satellite data, sea levels are going up.
  Sea level rise is measured both by tide gauges from around the world and by satellite. These independent data sets tell a consistent story: that global sea levels are rising, despite slight variations up and down each year. The evidence is clear that sea levels will continue to rise as the world gets warmer because of man-made pollution.
• #84: The science isn't settled

  Deniers say: Some scientists believe in climate change, and some don't. It's a topic still up for debate.
  Science says: Climate change is real. Just ask 97% of the top climate scientists or any national science academy in the world.
  There is overwhelming evidence that our climate is warming due to pollution from human activities. That's the conclusion reached by 97% of the top climate scientists and every major National Academy of Science in the world. When we burn dirty fossil fuels like oil and coal, and when we cut down forests that store carbon, we pollute our atmosphere and warm our planet. This is not controversial: It's a reality we've understood for decades. Now here’s an experiment: Ask a good scientist what is known about a particular topic, and watch how quickly that scientist moves to what is unknown. Honesty about what is unknown is essential to sound science, and no entire field of science can ever be completely settled. But the basics of climate change ARE settled. In other words, there’s no dispute among the vast majority of climate scientists that our climate is warming, and that most of the recent warming is due to human activity.
• #85: There is no consensus

  Deniers say: Thousands of scientists still don't believe in manmade climate change.
  Science says: Climate change is real. Just ask 97% of the top climate scientists or any national science academy in the world.
  Within the scientific community, there’s overwhelming consensus that man-made global warming is happening. According to a recent survey, 97 percent of top climate scientists (those with Ph.D.s who regularly publish the results of their research in peer-reviewed scientific journals) agree with that statement. And every major National Academy of Science in the world agrees that man-made climate change is happening and poses real threats. If 97 percent of doctors diagnosed you with a serious illness, would you ask the remaining 3 percent for their opinion before starting treatment? Of course not.
• #86: Oreskes consensus study was flawed

  Deniers say: Naomi Oreskes claimed that every scientific paper endorsed manmade climate change — but she was wrong.
  Science says: Virtually all the peer-reviewed climate research shows that climate change is a reality.
  In 2004, Professor Naomi Oreskes surveyed more than 900 peer-reviewed papers on global climate change published between 1993 and 2003. She found that zero papers rejected the consensus view that manmade climate change is occurring. 75% of the papers agreed with the consensus and 25% made no comment either way. Anthropologist Benny Peiser criticized the Oreskes survey and initially claimed he found 34 papers that rejected the consensus view. But a close inspection of those 34 papers found his criticism invalid. Peiser himself has said: “I do not think anyone is questioning that we are in a period of global warming. Neither do I doubt that the overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human impact.” Simply put, the facts support Oreskes.
• #87: The IPCC consensus is phony

  Deniers say: Only a few dozen so-called experts were behind the IPCC report.
  Science says: The IPCC publishes some of the world's most authoritative reports on climate change, which are checked, double-checked, and vetted by hundreds of scientists, and approved by governments around the world.
  There is overwhelming scientific evidence that the world is warming; humans are responsible for most of the warming over the last 60 years; the world will continue to warm as we continue to pollute the atmosphere; and on balance, global warming will have very negative impacts. Those were the conclusions in 2007 from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an international body that summarizes the most recent climate science research from around the world. The evidence behind these reports is truly robust. Climate change is happening now and humans are to blame.
• #88: Over 31,000 signed a petition rejecting climate science

  Deniers say: Tens of thousands of scientists signed a petition agreeing that there's no evidence of catastrophic climate change.
  Science says: Who should you trust about climate change? Climate experts? Or veterinarians and electrical engineers?
  97% of expert climate scientists agree that climate change is happening now and that humans are largely to blame. It turns out that very few of the 31,000+ people who signed the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine’s petition are climate experts. The signatories include only 9,029 scientists with Ph.D.s and only 39 who were trained specifically in climatology. The list includes veterinarians and more than 2,000 electrical engineers. That’s a little like asking a plumber to assess repair plans for your leaky roof.
• #89: Less than half of published scientists endorse global warming

  Deniers say: More than half of all scientific papers either reject global warming or are neutral on the subject.
  Science says: This isn't controversial: It's reality. 97% of the top climate scientists agree that climate change is real.
  Within the scientific community, there’s overwhelming consensus that man-made global warming is happening. According to a recent survey, 97% of top climate scientists (those with Ph.D.s who regularly publish the results of their research in peer-reviewed scientific journals) agree with that statement. And every major National Academy of Science in the world agrees that man-made climate change is happening and poses real threats. If 97% of doctors diagnosed you with a serious illness, would you ask the remaining 3% for their opinion before starting treatment? Of course not.
• #90: They changed the name from global warming to climate change

  Deniers say: After they gave up on the notion that global warming is real, they started calling it 'climate change' instead.
  Science says: You can call it global warming or climate change, but it's the biggest crisis humanity has ever faced.
  “Global warming” and “climate change,” while closely related and sometimes used interchangeably, technically refer to two different things. “Global warming” applies to the long-term trend of rising average global temperature. “Climate change” is a broader term that reflects the fact that carbon pollution does more than warm our planet. It is also changing rain and snow patterns and increasing the risk of intense storms and droughts. 

The term “climate change” has actually been around longer than “global warming." Gilbert Plass published the study “The Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climatic Change” in 1956! And although “global warming” seems to have first appeared in a 1957 newspaper editorial, the term is widely attributed to Wallace Broecker’s 1975 paper “Climatic Change: Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?” Don’t fall prey to the idea that the increased popular usage of “climate change” means global warming is no longer happening. Both climate change and global warming are still a reality.
• #91: An ice age was predicted in the 70s

  Deniers say: The same scientists that raise the alarm about global warming were predicting an ice age more than 30 years ago.
  Science says: The climate crisis is happening now. An ice age may or may not happen in thousands of years.
  The scientific evidence is clear: Climate change is happening now and human beings are to blame. In the 1960s and 70s, scientists knew that human activities were changing the Earth’s climate. But which factors would have a bigger effect? Global warming pollution, like carbon dioxide? Or pollution with a cooling effect, like the particles that make up haze? And would human activities override the natural factors that affect our planet’s climate? By the end of the 1970s, most scientists were coming to the conclusion that the world would indeed warm because of carbon pollution. This consensus grew even stronger over time: Today, 97% of climate scientists with Ph.D.s who are actively publishing in their field agree that humans are warming our climate.
• #92: Deniers are like Galileo

  Deniers say: Galileo was also a skeptic — eventually he was shown to be more correct than the establishment trying to shout him down.
  Science says: Climate scientists use evidence and logic. Climate deniers use ideology and politics. So which one is more like Galileo?
  Galileo used scientific evidence to prove the Earth revolved around the sun, and not the other way around, even though his idea went against the common thinking and religious ideology of his time. So who is more like Galileo: climate scientists, or people who deny the reality of climate change? Climate scientists are using the evidence-based rules of science to arrive at their conclusions. Deniers are using politics and ideology. Climate scientists are fighting against an age-old perception that humans can’t affect the climate. Deniers are trying to reinforce that out-of-date idea. Climate scientists are being dragged into court when their conclusions are unpopular or inconvenient. Deniers are doing the dragging. So who is more like Galileo? You be the judge.
• #93: Climategate suggests conspiracy

  Deniers say: The East Anglia emails show that global warming is a fraud based upon falsified data and conspiracy.
  Science says: A few stolen emails taken out of context don't make climate change any less of a reality.
  Here’s the thing. When something gets taken out of context, there’s an excellent chance it’ll be misinterpreted. And that’s exactly what happened with the emails that were stolen from the University of East Anglia in late 2009. After the emails were stolen and published online, a number of independent investigators examined the conduct of the scientists who wrote the emails. Ultimately, they concluded that nothing they said or did affected our understanding of climate science. There’s an overwhelming amount of evidence that man-made global warming is happening now. Focusing on a few emails that were taken out of context doesn’t make climate change any less of a reality.
• #94: East Anglia tampered with data

  Deniers say: East Anglia scientists manipulated data in an effort to defend their global warming agenda.
  Science says: Several impartial reviews found the East Anglia scientists did nothing wrong.
  In late 2009, private emails were stolen from climate scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU). Deniers took select quotes from the emails out of context to claim that scientists fooled with temperature data. But they didn't. One independent review of the emails went back to primary data sources and was able to replicate CRU’s analysis of global temperature trends. Scientists who wrote the emails did withhold some data from their critics. They were wary about cooperating with people they didn’t trust. But that doesn’t lead to the conclusion that the data were tampered with. The data — and the scientific conduct of the scientists — held up under several independent reviews.
• #95: Phil Jones said no global warming since 1995

  Deniers say: Scientist Phil Jones came right out and said there has been no warming over the last 15 years.
  Science says: The ten hottest years on record have all occurred since 1998.
  There is overwhelming evidence that humans are warming the climate by burning dirty energy like coal. Phil Jones, former director of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, has never claimed that global warming isn’t happening. It's true that some years are warmer than others, and 1998 was an unusually warm year (partly because of a particularly strong El Niño event). But overall, 2005 and 2010 were both hotter, and they tied for the hottest year on record. The ten hottest years on record have all occurred since 1998, and we can expect the world to get progressively warmer as long as humans pollute the atmosphere.
• #96: Trenberth emails revealed hoax

  Deniers say: Emails from scientist Kevin Trenberth reveal that global warming is a hoax.
  Science says: Deniers took this email out of context. Kevin Trenberth has consistently said that manmade climate change is real.
  If you read Dr. Kevin Trenberth’s peer-reviewed papers or listen to him give a presentation, you learn something about him pretty quickly. He is convinced that the planet is warming because of human activities. But he is also really, really bothered by how few satellites we have to collect important climate data. Dr. Trenberth meant as much when he sent a private email to other scientists about not being able to “account for the lack of warming.” That quote became famous when his email was stolen with more than 1,000 others during so-called Climategate in 2009. But the out-of-context quote from the email doesn’t accurately portray Trenberth’s views: that humans are warming the planet, but we don’t have all the tools we need to know exactly how much extra heat is being stored in the oceans.
• #97: Scientists tried to "hide the decline"

  Deniers say: Secret emails from East Anglia prove that temperatures are going down, and scientists want to hide the decline from us.
  Science says: "Hide the decline" doesn't mean what you think it means. 

There is overwhelming scientific evidence of man-made global warming.
  In late 2009, private emails were stolen from climate scientists at the University of East Anglia. Climate deniers pored over hundreds of pages of emails and seized on a few remarks they took out of context in a fruitless attempt to prove that climate change isn't real. One of these was scientist Phil Jones' use of the phrase "hide the decline." In context, the statement relates to Jones’ research on changes in global temperature. Although data from weather stations show that temperatures have risen since the second half of the 20th century, tree ring data in the northern latitudes show a decline. For this reason, it is widely acknowledged by scientists that tree-ring data are not reliable after 1960, and therefore should not be used for temperature reconstructions after that date. Jones no doubt chose his words poorly in referring to this fact. But several independent and thorough reviews of the stolen emails found Jones and other scientists did not have any scientific or ethical lapses.
• #98: Scientists withheld data

  Deniers say: Scientists at East Anglia wanted to prevent their data from being made available to the public.
  Science says: Several impartial reviews found the East Anglia scientists did nothing wrong.
  In late 2009, private emails were stolen from climate scientists at the University of East Anglia. Deniers pounced on a few remarks in the emails that appeared to suggest scientists had withheld documents the public had sought under a freedom of information request. So what really happened? It’s true that the scientists at times denied these requests for documents. However, an independent review of the stolen emails found that a flurry of requests were made in just a matter of days — a sign that the requests were made in an orchestrated attempt to overwhelm small research units with limited resources like East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit. Believing the requesters were not acting in good faith, researchers were wary about sharing their data with people they didn’t trust. The important thing is that their data held up. The facts remain the same. And those facts support the scientific conclusion that climate change is happening and human beings are to blame.
• #99: Peer review was corrupted

  Deniers say: East Anglia scientists blocked articles from publication if they conflicted with their worldview.
  Science says: Several impartial reviews found the East Anglia scientists did nothing wrong.
  When a scientist submits a study to a journal, other experts review the study for quality, clarity and credibility. The peer review process and the high standards it helps maintain is part of what makes science unique. But when scientists’ stolen emails were published online in 2009, climate deniers took them out of context. Using a few select quotes from the emails, deniers accused some climate scientists of pressuring journals to reject papers that didn’t mesh with their worldviews. But these out-of-context quotes don't mesh with the facts. Multiple independent investigations have cleared the scientists of wrongdoing. One investigation in particular found the “rigour and honesty” of the scientists was “not in doubt.”
• #110: The IPCC's Fifth Assessment Report admits the planet is barely warming

  Deniers say: The planet isn’t warming, and even the IPCC now admits it.
  Science says: Global warming hasn’t stopped. It’s just slowing down over a speed bump, before it likely picks up speed again.
  Many indicators tell us the earth is still warming, and surface air temperature is just one of them.
  
  Surface air temperatures don’t rise or fall at constant rates. When you plot them on a graph, the rising line doesn’t look like a railing (straight), but more like the stairs themselves (with intermittent landings where things flatten out between steps and then go up again).
  
  The second important thing to remember is that real scientists don’t look at short periods of time to evaluate what is and isn’t happening to the planet. Why? Because when you arbitrarily pick start and end dates within 10 or even 20 years, there’s just not enough data to give an accurate picture and it’s easy to skew the results. That’s why scientists prefer to rely on sustained, long-term trends over several decades.
  
  It’s a fact that the first decade of the 21st century was the hottest decade on record. At the same time, the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report does note that between 1998—2012, temperatures rose at a slightly slower rate than the longer-term rate seen since the mid-20th century.
  
  Why? Scientists suggest it could be because oceans have absorbed a lot of the heat that would otherwise have stayed in the atmosphere.
  
  But can the oceans retain this absorbed heat forever? No.
  
  Other possible reasons for the slower rate of surface warming include temporary cooling influences like a solar minimum (a low point in the sun’s activity), and the effect of natural and man-made aerosols, which block some of the sun’s radiation from reaching the earth. With such cooling influences, the fact that we have NOT cooled in the last decade is actually a strong sign that global warming continues unabated.
  
  To sum up, global warming hasn’t stopped. It’s just going over a little speed bump!