More unknowns regarding climate change

The Mystery of Global Warming's Missing Heat
by Richard Harris

Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren't quite understanding what their robots are telling them.

The article also points out that there are a number of "natural thermostats" which aren't understood. Clouds, for instance. . .

. . . can either trap heat and turn up the temperature, or reflect sunlight and help cool the planet.

That can't be directly measured at the moment, however.

"Unfortunately, we don't have adequate tracking of clouds to determine exactly what role they've been playing during this period," Trenberth says.

Or any period, for that matter. As I've said before, climate is a complex system. There are many variables we don't know how to account for, and undoubtedly more that we aren't even aware of. None of these variables can be reliably included in the computer models which are being used as "evidence" of a global "crisis."