Originally posted by TransformX
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Originally posted by Dr MordridBasically, yes but because the chemistry was concrete and you could reproduce it in the lab.
Hee hee, you fell right into it! When M & S published their paper, it was a pure hypothesis, based on some lab experiments. There was no, zero, zilch proof in 1974, not even sufficient to justify calling it a theory. In reality, most scientists even classed it as piffle. Further research upgraded it to a more plausible theory by 1978 and, for once, the USA applied the precautionary principle in that year by being the first to ban CFC propellants in most aerosol cans, even though there was still no proof, in the lab or in the atmosphere. Even by 1987, when the Montreal Protocol was signed and several years after Joe Farman discovered the so-called "ozone-hole", the atmospheric scientists were still about evenly divided between CFCs and natural phenomena being the cause. It was not until September 1988 that NASA actually provided the irrefutable proof by the analysis of samples taken from the Antarctic vortex at very high altitudes, using a modified U2 plane. Even then, the hardest naysayers persisted in their errors for another 5 or 6 years. Within 1 week of the publication of the NASA results, DuPont turned their coat from "we shall do nothing about restricting the manufacture of CFCs other than what is forced upon us" to "we shall do everything in our power to help protect the ozone layer" (my paraphrases, not direct quotes).
So your "concrete chemistry" did not exist in those days. M & S hypothesised that it could happen, that is all. Happily, some other scientists did their own mathematical modelling and concurred with the original findings and none of them predicted the Antarctic spring ozone depletion. Joe Farman's work (his first findings were in 1979, but he didn't publish until 5 years later for cautious reasons) was the first measured phenomena supporting the M & S theory.
So, you apparently accepted ozone depletion as real long before there was scientific proof and when it was considered implausible by many scientists. Yet you do not accept global climate change for real with much stronger evidence available. This does not appear very logical. Why? I suspect I know the reason and it is closely tied up with your political beliefs and your fear of the future, not scientific reasoning.
Have you read Sir James Lovelock's The Revenge of Gaia? I find he is a little extremist, as he has based it on the worst case scenarii, but, at least, it offers a view of one of the world's greatest scientific thinkers alive today. The BBC held a radio debate with Lovelock and several of the UK's scientists working in the field, along with Lord Oxburgh, former chairman of Shell to provide some controversy. A few of the views presented can be heard at http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/sear...=all&edition=iBrian (the devil incarnate)
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