As I understand it, man is causing 'global warming' by burning, either fully or partially, vast quantities of hydrocarbons, mostly in the form of oil and coal, thus releasing large quantities of carbon dioxide and water vapor and some other stuff into the atmosphere. Again, as I understand it, these gases are 'greenhouse gases' in that they trap heat from the sun, not letting it radiate back into space and thus gradually raising the temperature of the atmosphere.
To make matters worse, not only is mankind releasing huge quantities of these gases into the atmosphere but he is also destroying large tracts of vegetation which is the mechanism by which these greenhouse gases are extracted from the atmosphere and locked back into solid form.
Do I have the basics right, so far?
If so then the inescapable implication is this; Long ago, when the oil and coal we are currently burning was turning into living plant life, the atmosphere of earth must have been much, much warmer than it currently is. And it must have been cooling more or less steadily, since the beginning of plant life, until man came on the scene and started messing up the whole thing by re-introducing all that carbon back into the atmosphere.
Does the available evidence show this?
I have been told that the earth has undergone several Ice ages. I cannot recall any explanation of why they each stopped. By all the mechanisms being used to blame man for global warming it would seem they should have gone on forever. Especially when you add in the extra reflectivity from all that snow.
Might not there be some justification for the concept that we might be staving off a new ice age by our fossil fuel consumption? That instead of causing gross global over heating, we are simply stopping the cooling trend.
Might it not be that given the rather large global temperature changes that have been clearly going on since way back before we were burning fossil fuels, the effect of man's activity on the atmosphere is likely to be essentially unnoticeable?
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"http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science/has-the-climate-changed-already.html
I must say that the evidence does not seem particularly impressive, in that all the statistics quoted are very short term. All the more so when you consider that the world has gone through several ice ages, large and small, and climate variation periods we know of in the last few thousand years when for example the middle east was a 'land flowing with milk and honey', grapes were common in England and Newfoundland, and corn routinely grew to ripeness in a New England summer.
Even this their conclusions below seem short term and tenuous at best.
Temperature increase. Global mean surface temperature has increased about 1.1°F (0.6°C) since the beginning of the 20th century, with night-time minimums increasing more than day-time maximums. While the warming record shows significant spatial and temporal variability, the global upward trend is unambiguous. Most of the warming in the 20th century occurred from about 1910 to 1945 and since 1976.
Warming trends compared. Twentieth century warming is likely to be the largest during any century over the past 1,000 years for the Northern hemisphere, with the 1990s the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year. The 10 warmest years since 1860 have all been recorded since 1980.
Source: IPCC (2001): Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis. Working Group I contribution to the Third Assessment Report.
Sad, isn't it?
Another point they never talk about is the trend in our nation toward more forests.
The farm crisis of the early eighties was the target of the Conservatio0n Reserve Program which diverted millions of acres of farmland into forests or grasslands. Alabama alone diverted over 300,000 acres. This program has undoubtedly increased the amount of CO2 used by plants.
Your logic is sound.