4 climate myths you’ll hear this week {image alert}

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http://grist.org/climate-energy/4-climate-myths-youll-hear-this-week/

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Your uncle, yelling at you about how global warming has stopped

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Myth 1: Global warming has stopped. Perhaps the most prominent attack on climate science right now centers on the claim that global warming is “slowing down,” sometimes followed by insinuations that scientists don’t understand why this is happening, or even that they have tried to cover it up. On occasion, this attack gets stretched into the assertion that global warming has stopped entirely over the past decade and a half, or even is just plain “over.” Possibly the strongest articulation yet of the meme came from Republican Rep. David McKinley (W.Va.), who said last week that there has been “almost no increase in temperature” in the last 40 years.
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***SNIP

Myth 2: Arctic sea ice is recovering. One of the most dramatic indicators of global warming was last summer’s record low in the extent of Arctic sea ice — a drop that was 18 percent below the previous low in 2007. Since nothing about global warming suggests that you break a new record every successive year, it’s not surprising that the Arctic sea ice melt was less dramatic this year. This year’s seasonal low in ice extent was merely the sixth-lowest level on record.
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***SNIP

Myth 3: Growing Antarctic ice undermines global warming concerns. Lately skeptics have also been drawing attention Antarctic sea ice, which just hit a 35-year record high. Rush Limbaugh actually appears to have gotten confused over this, claiming recently on his show that Arctic ice was at a record extent, before correcting himself and realizing that he meant Antarctica — the place with, you know, the penguins rather the polar bears.
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Visualization of Antarctic temperature changes.

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Myth 4: Global warming won’t be a big deal; it might even be good for you. As usual, there are more- and less-nuanced climate skeptics. Among the former, one of the most popular arguments is that global warming won’t be as bad as previously thought.