Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell - Dr. Roy Spencer - Climate Change & Open Lines
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In fact, before I knew that Dr. Spencer was going to be on this evening, I had a question for you concerning the environmental situation.
Kind of an overall question that I'm going to ask in open lines whenever we get to that, and we will.
But this was way, way too good an opportunity to pass up.
So at the last moment, Dr. Spencer became available and we grabbed him.
George, thank you for a nice night to fill in.
Hope you enjoy the time off, and good evening everybody.
Roy Spencer, Dr. Spencer, is a Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.
He has been Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
He directs research into the development and application of satellites' passive microwave remote sensing techniques for measuring global temperature, water vapor, and precipitation.
Dr. Spencer is the recipient of NASA's Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement and the American Meteorological Society's Special Award for his satellite-based temperature monitoring work.
He is the author of numerous scientific articles that have appeared in Science, Nature, Journal of Climate, Monthly Weather Review, Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, Journal of Climate and Applied Meteorology, Remote Sensing Reviews, Advances in Space Research, and Climate Change.
Dr. Spencer received his Ph.D.
in Meteorology from the University of Wisconsin in 1981.
1981 in a moment you will meet Dr. Spencer I've got a really nice long article here on the dust up
that dr.
Hansen just had and you all have heard about with dr. Hansen who's been warming about warning about global warming now
for In an alarming way for some time now
Not much to the displeasure, I might add, of NASA.
And so what an opportunity to have Dr. Spencer here.
Welcome, Doctor.
Hey Art, how are you doing?
I'm doing very well, thank you.
And I'm really appreciative of this opportunity to have you on.
You at one time worked for NASA, correct?
Yes, well I've been working with NASA either as a contractor or as a NASA employee for the last twenty years.
Fourteen of those years were as a NASA employee and then four years ago I resigned from NASA and took a position at the local university here, but I still do all the same work that I used to do when I was a NASA employee.
I'm sure you've followed very closely the problems Dr. Hansen has had recently.
Since you did work for NASA, perhaps you can sympathize with what he's been through?
Well, to some extent, but also I sympathize with NASA's side of this whole thing.
You see, federal employees are under quite a few rules that you have to abide by, and in fact, those rules are one of the reasons that I resigned from NASA.
Does that include talking to people like me?
You're allowed to, but you're supposed to go through channels, through management, chain, and make public affairs office.
Aware of what you're doing.
Right.
Get the material cleared, which is what I always had to do, especially if you're testifying for Congress, which Jim and I have both done, Jim Hansen and I. Right, okay, understandable, but if you have made requests and they've not been fully granted, or in a way that satisfies you, and you're not able to speak out, and the issue is so damn big, I mean, how do you weigh that out?
Well, I think, okay, on Jim's side, I would say that if I were in his position and believed as he does, I probably would have done exactly what he's doing.
When I worked for NASA, and the rules are still the same now, you are allowed to speak authoritatively as a NASA employee on the science that you study.
If you have opinions related to what The policy should be.
Right.
You have to make it very clear that you're saying those things as a private citizen and not as an expert.
And you take your chances when you do that anyway, I'm sure.
That's right.
Now, for a lot of years, Jim Hansen was able to basically not worry too much about NASA rules because the things he was saying were in line with what NASA wanted to hear or have told the Congress anyway.
I mean, let's face it.
Organizations like NASA and NOAA depend on Congress for a large part of their funding through these climate change appropriations bills, where they get a lot of money to build instruments, put them into space, study what's going on in the climate.
In other words, you know, there's a whole machinery going on in the federal government that's related to climate change.
Got it.
And the more you can make it look like These are important things to be done, the more money you can get, and the bigger your program grows.
So for a lot of years, Jim Hansen basically was singing the tune that NASA wanted him to sing anyway, even though they knew that he was sort of going off and sometimes ignoring, I think, you know, the channels that he was supposed to go through.
Now, it could be that what's happened lately is it may well have been, and I don't know, it may well have been that the administration came in and said, We want you to start forcing Jim to abide by these rules, which have always been in place.
But to him it feels like pressure, because now all of a sudden he's being asked to abide by rules that in the past you could just sort of, you know, get by with without worrying too much about them.
But like I said, if I believed as Jim does, You know, that it's as serious of a problem as he thinks global warming is, and I don't think it is.
And he believes that there are certain policy solutions that we can implement to fix the problem, which I don't think there are.
But I'm saying if I was in his position, I might well have done exactly what he's done.
He's got a lot of political power.
I mean, he's worked in this area since the 60s, or worked for NASA since, I think, the late 60s.
He's Mr. Climate Change as far as NASA's concerned.
He's a great scientist.
And like I said, if I was in his shoes, I may well have done exactly the same thing he did.
Well, there's a lot in what you just said to explore, but it's my understanding that some years ago, as a result of speaking out, there was some wrath that came down in the form of cut budgets in his department, and so he went through a pretty rough period because of that earlier, didn't he?
I had never heard that, so that would be news to me.
I see.
Alright, let's define what it is Dr. Hansen believes and then the difference in what you believe.
Okay, basically what Jim believes, I mean I hate to speak for him, but I always try to be able to present the other side as well as I can.
I think basically what Jim Hansen believes is that the current warm period we're in, the warming that we've seen in the last hundred years, can largely be explained Especially, let's say, since the 1940s, through both aerosols that have been produced by mankind through pollution, which causes a cooling, and then now we don't have so much aerosols anymore, but we have more and more carbon dioxide, which causes warming.
And Jim has put together a quantitative explanation for how the global temperature has changed in the last however many decades.
Um, that is based mostly on mankind.
I think it is one possible explanation.
I think that he's ignoring other possible explanations, which includes a combination of natural influences and mankind.
Okay, well, that's got to be possible, doesn't it, Doctor?
In other words, we all know that... In fact, I'm probably not phrasing this well enough.
He would probably object and say he does have natural influences in there, and he does.
What I'm saying is, he thinks that the warming effect of extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, he thinks that that is a larger effect than I think it is on global temperatures and on global climate.
Okay, but you would agree that he does believe that there are, obviously, there are natural cycles.
It's all very well documented with ice cores and everything.
Yes, he believes there's natural cycles.
He just thinks that this current, really warm period we're in right now, let's say the warming in the last 30 years, can all be explained by mankind.
And I think, in my view, until we understand all the natural cycles, we really can't say how much is due to mankind, but I'm willing to admit that, you know, at least, I would guess probably half, at least half of it, is due to mankind.
Oh, well that's still very significant.
I mean, if you take a natural cycle that might go to some point that we can't define right now, and then you enhance it by half with the addition of mankind, I mean, that's 50% of the process.
So you've got, if that's what you believe... Yeah, I'm willing to admit that there's a good chance that mankind is a significant part of the warmth that we're experiencing right now.
The big question is, well there's a number of big questions.
There sure are.
So what?
How much is it going to warm in the future?
What are we going to be using for fuels in 30 or 40 years with technological process?
And even, or progress, but even if we don't have any technological progress that can get us past fossil fuels in the next 50 years, what can we do about it anyway?
If you get into the policy And look at alternative fuels and the direction humanity is going especially the developing parts of the world like India and China.
I just don't see any way to keep from having this upward trend and increasing carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere.
I'm afraid I'm with you.
I've been to China and took the tour into Shenzhen and then on up into Canton and this was years ago doctor and it scared the hell out of me.
I passed 40 miles of factories on both sides of the road.
I mean it was unbelievable and that was years ago so.
Yeah well they're going through their industrial revolution that you know we went through right hundred years ago.
That's right.
It's very messy early on Because countries that go through this process aren't that concerned about pollution early on.
And then as they build wealth, they can start to afford to, you know, clean up after themselves more, which we've been doing for quite a while now.
And also now, you know, to the extent that we can transfer technology, the things that we've learned to the developing countries so that they can do things more cleanly than we did a hundred years ago.
That's a big benefit too, and that's one of the things I think that is part of Bush's plan, is it's sort of technology-based.
I had an opportunity to go to Bangkok once as well, and there, about 40% of the policemen who direct traffic in the street have lung disease.
Lung disease.
About 40% or better.
That's incredible.
And so, you know, many of these countries that you're talking about really are going to contribute very, very heavily.
And as you point out, we've become a little better.
I mean, California's a little cleaner.
Some of our lakes and our water is cleaned up a little bit.
And things are generally, I would say, admittedly better here.
But then you've got Eastern Europe.
You've got all of Asia, you've got all these emerging technological nations, and so I guess what we all want to know is, if you take that natural cycle and then you're 50% a man's hand, and you look at the possibilities, no, the probabilities, with climate modeling or whatever, do you and Dr. Hansen disagree on the On the probable outcome, the effects for mankind if we continue on the same path, which obviously you believe we will.
I think he believes that the climate system is more sensitive to extra CO2 than I believe it is.
Probably by, I'm guessing, but let's say maybe at least a factor of two.
And of course, then you've got people who think that there are these tipping points where, you know, the system is really sensitive beyond some point, and it warms uncontrollably.
I basically do not believe in that theory.
But then, you know, this is an area of science that we don't have perfect knowledge of, so it's almost like Anything is possible.
You're talking about a kind of a feedback loop?
Yes, that's exactly what it is.
It's feedback.
Because the direct warming from doubling of the CO2, and we will reach a point of doubled CO2 sometime late in this century.
That is compared to What the CO2 concentration was in the atmosphere, let's say, at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
Well, that's a big change for our atmosphere.
Doubling of anything is a big, big change.
Well, except that two times zero is still zero.
So it does make a difference how much there is, and there's very little carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
What my point was going to be is that when you double the CO2, we can compute that the amount of warming that results in is only about one degree Fahrenheit.
I mean, it would be fine to live with.
In fact, you know, history has shown us that warmer is better for humanity.
The question is how much it's going to warm, and that's where we get into the feedbacks that you were talking about.
And that's where all the debate is, is in the feedbacks.
Will the climate system respond in such a way that it amplifies that warming from the extra CO2, or where it sort of mitigates the warming?
And that's where there's a lot of uncertainty, and that's where all the arguments are.
All right, let's look at examples then.
One of the examples of feedback that they give is, if you look at the North Pole right now, and you look at it 40 years ago, it's frightening.
I mean, a lot of it's already gone, and there are now the Navy's plotting ways to navigate what's going to be an ocean after the ice is all gone.
The ice is sort of white and sort of reflects sunlight, right?
So as the ice melts, it's my understanding that the water, which is then dark, absorbs heat and the white doesn't reflect it anymore and so more melts and more and more and more.
Is that the feedback kind of thing we're talking about?
That's one of the positive feedbacks that's hypothesized to To amplify the warming.
Yes, that's the ice albedo feedback, and it operates exactly the way you said it.
Yes.
Is it likely to be correct?
Well, there's no doubt there is a positive feedback.
The question is, why has it warmed up there?
You see, there's... In the climate system, you've got... It's like a whole bunch of weights on springs.
You've got fluctuations up and down, back and forth.
You know, and they're all interacting in complicated, non-linear ways, but they're still constrained, like a weight on a spring.
You know, it will only go so far down, and then it pops back up, and then it pops up higher than its equilibrium position, and then it falls back down.
So what I'm saying is, you know, one of the theories is that the current warmth we're in is at least, you know, half due to natural cycles.
For instance, if you look at How the ice in the Arctic has changed in the last 40 years.
It tracks almost perfectly a large planetary scale northern hemispheric natural circulation shift that has also changed in the last 40 years.
That happens with or without mankind.
It's like the whole hurricane thing in the Atlantic.
Um, you know, it wasn't that all of a sudden there was a bunch of hurricanes on the Earth last year.
It was about a normal year.
It just is, there were hardly, you know, there were very few in the Pacific, and we had a whole bunch in the Atlantic.
It's a regional shift that we know happens.
It's been warned about for 20 years.
So again, we're getting back to this issue of how much of what we've seen is due to natural cycles versus mankind.
Alright, so Doctor, if I were to ask you why the temperature At the North Pole and even Alaska, for example, is disproportionately increasing compared to a lot of the rest of the world.
Your answer would be a natural cycle.
Well, I would say that we really don't know.
At this point, we really don't know how much of it is due to mankind versus natural cycles.
I agree that all the science stuff is interesting.
No, no, no.
I'm sorry, what I was asking about was the fact that it was so disproportionately higher there than it is, rising more than it is elsewhere.
Well, I would be surprised if it was equal everywhere.
In fact, if it was equal everywhere, I guess that would look to me more like global warming, uniform everywhere, whereas if it's more regional, you think of natural cycles, because You know, natural cycles typically, you know, they cause droughts one place and heat waves another place.
You know, you expect to see quite a bit of variability geographically.
So, to me, that doesn't tell me anything, really, about whether it's natural or man-made, just to say that it's so much more at the pole.
But I guess you're thinking about The feedback we were talking about, right?
Well, to some degree, but I mean the fact that it is increasing at a faster rate there than, for example, here.
If we have one degree, they have about three or four.
It definitely warmed more towards the pole, yes it has.
How come?
Well, we don't know.
Some people think they know.
I guess someday, I've had this idea rolling around in my head, I think, Someday I'm gonna I'm gonna make Jim Hansen a bet like
maybe a thousand dollars Once again, dr. Ray Spencer
Doctor, how big a wager would you make that and what would be the terms if you could set it up?
Well, the thing I've been kicking around in my head is A bet of a thousand dollars on whether the year 2015 is warmer or colder than the year 2005 was.
Can't go too far out in the future because, you know, Jim's getting close to retirement.
I'm not as close as he is, but it won't be that much longer, you know.
So you're looking to enrich your retirement a little bit?
Oh, well, this is more just to, you know, point out that we can we scientists can predict all we want but
We really don't lose anything if we're wrong, you know?
Well, yeah, but we do.
Now... That's true.
Matt from Phoenix, I get these computer messages as we go along, really does ask a good question.
Why isn't it possible to construct some kind of lab test, some kind of smaller but on-scale environment to test the effects of CO2 emissions on our environment?
Or is there just nothing that's close enough?
Nothing that's close enough.
There's nowhere near In fact, I looked at a lab apparatus just to look at the infrared absorption by carbon dioxide just to show, you know, just to actually measure how much infrared absorption that's, you know, that's what a greenhouse gas does is it absorbs infrared or heat radiation.
Right.
And basically the effect you're looking for can't be measured really in the laboratory.
You have to have A distance like through the depth of the atmosphere in order to actually observe what's going on.
It's a very complex process.
The Earth is our only laboratory for this.
There's really nothing you can do in the lab to address this.
And it's too bad.
It's a one-of-a-kind of experiment that we're involved in now.
We don't have complete control over it, and that's one reason why there's so many uncertainties.
Well, we were once going to build a big collider down in Texas.
We didn't build it, but even if we built something gigantic that would try and produce... There's nothing you can do.
I know it's hard to believe.
It seems like there's something you could do.
All of the things involved, like the effect of water, I mean, the effects of water, both in terms of how it warms the climate and cools the climate, is just so profound.
And that means rain systems, and in order to build rain systems, they have to extend up through miles of the atmosphere.
Otherwise, they don't occur.
You can't do it on a smaller scale.
Well, I know you worked in the oceanic area a little bit, and so while we're on the subject of ocean currents, you know, there is this theory, actually it's a bit more than a theory now, that this current which warms Europe, or keeps Europe relatively temperate, is beginning to splinter and slow up.
Now again, this could of course be a natural cycle or something, but if it were to stop, Then I guess Europe would be about like Labrador.
Is that accurate or inaccurate?
Well, you know, if the current were to stop, yeah, there would be huge changes.
I'm one of the people that believes that that's simply not possible, partly because the fluid of the atmosphere and ocean is a gigantic heat engine, and one of the functions of this heat engine is to take excess energy that's built up in the tropics From the extra sunlight in the tropics, and transport it to the poles.
And as long as the Earth keeps turning, and as long as the tropics, you know, keep getting more sunlight than the poles, I just don't see any way to stop that.
Now that's not to say that there can't be changes in all of these currents, you know, all of the little smaller structures that are occurring, you know, like the Labrador Current.
Right.
You know, there's all these different currents that are part of the ocean circulation.
And those can meander and change on all kinds of timescales.
Weeks, months, years, even decades.
To what degree?
So it's entirely possible to have something drastic happen.
Okay.
But it's awfully hard to predict.
To what degree does your science with the atmosphere come together with the study of the ocean and those currents?
In other words, are the two intimately related or remotely related?
Ooh, that's a tough one.
Um, I would say more remotely related than intimately related.
The big difference between atmosphere and ocean is because the ocean has so much mass and the whole thing's a fluid, it has a huge amount of memory.
In other words, whatever heat it has in it, if it has some excess heat, it takes a long time to get rid of it.
And if it's a little cooler than normal, it takes a long time to warm it up because the depth of the ocean stores a huge amount of heat The depth of the atmosphere stores very little heat.
So, what the ocean does, it does on very long timescales, decades or centuries, whereas the atmosphere adjusts in a matter of days.
Uh-huh.
Well, we all watched this last hurricane season with some horror.
Some amazing things happened, actually, during that hurricane season, and I guess we're about to get into another one, but boy, oh boy, oh boy, I watched some of those hurricanes go from You know, tropical storms to Category 5 hurricanes in just like, I don't know, a couple of days or, yeah, two days I think I saw one.
Well, that's always happened.
You know, they're called rapid deepening cycles and rapid deepening cycles.
And, you know, the whole time I've been in this business, you know, 20 years or so, 25 years, that's been happening.
I think that one of the things that's lost about this hurricane season is the fact that the National Hurricane Center directors have been warning year after year.
It's true.
For about 15 or 20 years now that we were in a lull and that we're building up the coastlines, people keep moving to the coast, we keep building infrastructure there, and one of these days it's all going to change and these hurricanes are going to come back.
I don't think anybody could have predicted how dramatically they came back last year.
Is there any way to predict how long the cycle of back, as you put it, will or might remain?
All they can tell is, like, just from this past century, we really only have statistics for, let's say, the last hundred years.
So there's like two cycles in there of hurricane activity, two at the most, that are like 25, 35 years long.
So, all we can do is just sort of take a guess that, you know, there's probably this 20 to 40 year cycle and we're in the upswing of it now.
We're going to have higher than normal activity.
That doesn't mean we couldn't have a year with below normal activity.
Just that, you know, on average, year after year, we should be above normal now for quite a few years.
Well, if you were in front of the Senate testifying, and they were to ask you about the advisability of rebuilding New Orleans at the same location, and not getting the levees past the protection point where they failed in this last large hurricane, and you were to speak to them from a scientific point of view, what would you tell them?
You're saying if they just went ahead and rebuilt and just repaired the levees and kept the levees at the same height?
Yes, it's more or less my understanding that that's exactly the situation, and of course they're going to be bulldozing and rebuilding the Ninth Ward and, you know, most of the city, they're going to just rebuild it, but it's not protected to a point past which it already failed.
Well, let's see, I guess I would say that if they didn't change the levee system at all, that they may well be safe for another 20 or 30 years.
Or maybe it gets destroyed again in another one or two years.
You don't know.
But eventually it's going to happen again.
But they've known for years that this was a possibility.
In fact, just less than a year before this all happened, the Times-Picayune newspaper down there ran a series of articles which were almost like foretelling of the future.
Because all the things that they warned about, they talked to all the experts and weather and And how much New Orleans has sunk, and hurricane cycles and stuff, and the stuff they laid out in that series of newspaper articles, you know, of what could happen, you know, sounded like fear-mongering, and it's like a lot of it happened.
Turned out to be quite prophetic, Al.
Yeah.
Well, okay, back now to our climate.
Now, the difference between yourself and Dr. Hanson, clearly one of the differences is that you think there's not really a whole hell of a lot we can do about it.
Right.
On the policy side, I don't think there's much that we can do about it in the next 20 to 30 years.
All right.
Exactly, Doctor, what is that going to mean if you're right, and what will it mean if Dr. Hansen's right?
What will it mean?
Yes, sir.
In other words, in another 20 or 30 years, in what different way, for example, will we be living, if you're right, and how differently might we be living if Dr. Hansen's correct?
Okay, well, if I'm right, I think we're going to see some modest warming in the coming decades.
And I would hate to say anything beyond a few decades, because I don't think we know what energy source we're going to be using in 30 years.
But I would predict modest warming, little enough to where mankind is basically going to be able to adapt to it.
Although there will be negative effects in some areas.
You know, a net negative effect in some areas.
If Jim Hansen's right, it's going to just keep warming and, you know, in another 50 or 60 years, we're going to have some serious problems coping with the change in climate, with the rising sea levels.
You know, it's going to get to the point where some man-made structures along the coast, the low-lying areas, will have to be abandoned.
But, you know, this is something that's going to be occurring, even if it does happen, over a long period of time.
But not really.
I mean, you know, when you're talking about, say, I don't know, 40 or 50 years, that seems like a lot of time to a mortal man, because we don't last that long.
But in the wider, sort of, whole Earth-type picture, I mean, you think of things happening in tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of years... Oh yeah, there's no question that if this were to happen, if this does happen, if Jim Hansen is right, It is happening faster than the Earth has ever seen.
Let's say the Earth has ever seen it before.
I'm pretty skeptical of what we know has happened in the past.
I think we have a hard enough time trying to figure out how the heck the climate system works in the last 100 years, let alone figuring out what happened 10,000 years ago based on sediments in some remote part of the Earth.
Alright, well that brings on another question.
How good are ICE Corps in telling us what has happened in the past?
I don't trust them.
I think there's too many assumptions built into all that, but you can get an ICE Corps expert on here that'll tell you a totally different story.
And I'm not an ice core expert, so I'm probably not a good one to ask.
I suppose I would say it's as good as fingerprints or something.
Yeah, probably.
I mean, everyone likes to think that their area of science is, you know, pretty...
Pretty nailed down.
Well, they sure do.
They sure do.
We'll talk about that, too.
But why do you think ice cores don't tell the detailed story that the experts in that field believe?
I think it's possible that when you get down through the lower layers of the ice where these layers that they're measuring become very thin, I think it starts blurring the distinction between what they think is annual Layers.
Things laid down by season versus individual storms.
Right.
Which would really reduce the time scale of the events they find down there.
So, that's what has me skeptical.
Well, if they look back, I guess in ice cores, in certain places, they can see when something apparently hit the earth, an asteroid, and probably wiped out the dinosaurs.
Some scientists were most... Well, but that's all indirect dating, too.
I think the only thing we have good dates for is known volcanic eruptions in specific years.
You know, let's say a volcano back in 1532 or something, when we have historical records of what happened.
Otherwise, all you're doing is replacing One dating technique with another.
So the whole 65 million years thing, I don't trust a whole lot either.
How good are our current satellites in terms of helping us try and decide who's right about this climate thing?
I guess they're of large assistance, right?
Well, of course that's the area that I've worked in for the last 15 years, John Christie and I.
Did the first global temperature monitoring with the satellites, but that only goes back to 1979, so it's only like 26, 27 years, which is pretty short for a climate time scale.
Oh, yes.
It doesn't help too much.
What satellites really help us do, and this is with a bunch of different satellite instruments, is to understand processes on a global basis, because it's the only way we can get truly global measurements, and to understand the Earth, you really got to have global measurements.
Satellites are really the only way to do it, so they provide some really unique measurements.
They can't do what you can do from the ground, like they can't provide the detail that you can get from a weather balloon, but at least you got the measurements everywhere on the Earth.
So they really help us improve our understanding of how the climate system works.
I don't think they're that good at telling us how much it's warmed or not, partly because it's only 26 years.
As it is, you know, what the satellites are telling us now is roughly consistent with the surface thermometers.
That's a finding that's going to come out in the coming few months that you'll be hearing about in the news when it comes out.
No kidding?
Yeah.
So there's a bit of information not exactly public yet?
Right, right.
Yeah, it's, you know, for a long time there's been this issue that the Satellites have supposedly disagreed with the surface thermometer data.
Yes.
And the conclusion from a panel of people that are working on this, and I can't say too much, is basically going to back off on that quite a bit and say that... It is consistent.
Yeah, well, to within, you know, our ability to measure these things.
You know, there's errors in every kind of measurement, whether it's the surface thermometers or satellite data.
Within our ability to measure these things, you know, they're probably not inconsistent.
What was the argument, Doctor, of those who were arguing that there was an inconsistency between the two?
What were they trying to suggest?
Okay, the argument was that the way we understand the atmosphere to work on monthly or longer timescales over big areas, if the surface warms, the troposphere, the lowest part of the atmosphere, let's say the bottom 10 kilometers should warm at least that much.
In other words, the warming gets amplified with height in the atmosphere.
Right.
And what we were seeing was the opposite.
If we took the thermometer data and the satellite data at face value, it looked like the satellite was warming much less than the thermometer data.
We were the only ones for a long time, John and I, that did this global temperature monitoring.
It was a kind of thing that was too important for only to have one, have only one group work on it.
Sure.
So there's a group of researchers out in California that we know very well that have also worked on it.
And in the last, oh, eight years or so, they've found two errors in how we did adjustments on the satellite data.
And we've corrected for those errors.
They've come up with their corrections.
We both get answers that aren't too terribly different from each other and sufficiently close to To what the thermometers get to where you really can't say that there's any kind of stark disagreement between them that would suggest that we really don't understand the theory of how the warming at the surface should be amplified with height.
But I was never one to buy into that being a huge discrepancy in our knowledge anyway.
It was more people that were really into the, you know, finding whatever Yes, I've heard and had the argument made here on the air, so it is kind of big news that there is not really a discrepancy.
That's going to sort of rip away the underpinnings of one argument, yes?
Conclusion is, and I don't want to go any farther than just saying that it's not going to be that, oh, we still have this huge discrepancy.
It's not going to be like that.
It's going to have a more resolved flavor to it when it all finally comes out.
We're going to break here at the top of the hour, and I'd like to hold you over just a little bit if I could.
I'm getting a lot of really good information here, so hang tight.
Okay.
Good morning. I'm I'm Art Bell for George Norrie.
Let me quote Dr. Hanson briefly.
These models reveal a miserable situation at present, referring to the climate, but a dire one in the years ahead.
In his December speech to the Geophysical Union, he noted that carbon dioxide emissions are now Quote, surging well above, end quote, the point where damage to the planet might be limited.
Speaking to a reporter from the Washington Post, he put it bluntly, having raised the Earth's temperature one degree Fahrenheit in the past three years, three decades, I'm sorry, we're facing another increase of four degrees over the next century.
That would imply changes, listen carefully, that constitute practically a different planet.
The technical terms for those changes include drought, famine, pestilence, and flood.
It's not something we can adapt to, he continued.
We can't let it go another ten years like this.
Does that sound like Dr. Hansen?
Well, it doesn't sound like what it used to sound like.
It sounds like the way he sounds these days, yes.
Yeah, he's on a mission.
What is it, Dr. Spencer, do you think that convinced Dr. Hansen that it was this dire?
I think when he finally put together a model explanation that basically highlights carbon dioxide as the prime, if not the only reason we've warmed In the last 50 to 100 years.
So, as I mentioned before, he's come up with a theoretical explanation, which I think is one possible explanation for the current warmth, and also based on these feedbacks.
Remember, we discussed feedback.
Of course.
He assumes there are certain positive feedbacks going on in the climate system, and then, you know, you run these models out into the future to see how much it's going to warm.
You know, depending on what you put in for the feedback, you can get warming from anywhere from 2 degrees Fahrenheit to, you know, 12 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of this century.
It's a huge range.
Well, let's talk about feedbacks a little bit.
I mentioned the one with the water melting at the North Pole.
What other possible feedbacks would be considered in that kind of modeling, Doctor?
Okay, the most important feedback in the climate system is the positive water vapor feedback, which we're all, in a sense, familiar with.
That the warmer it gets, the more water is evaporated from the surface.
Sure.
And water vapor is the main greenhouse gas in the atmosphere.
About 90% of our greenhouse effect is due to water vapor, not carbon dioxide.
It's self-regulating by precipitation.
And that's the one thing that climate modelers don't tell you about.
They say, well, we know that If it warms, there's gotta be more water vapor evaporating into the atmosphere.
Well, yeah, but that's only half the story.
The amount of water vapor evaporating into the atmosphere isn't what determines how much water vapor is in the atmosphere.
It's the balance between that and how much is constantly being taken out by precipitation.
If we didn't have precipitation systems, in a matter of days, the atmosphere would be filled up with fog.
You know, everywhere, globally.
Sure.
Wow.
It would be a fog-enveloped planet.
And that doesn't happen.
And that's because precipitation systems are constantly removing water vapor through precipitation processes.
Well, we really don't know hardly anything about how these precipitation systems behave as the atmosphere warms.
Except that we do know, at least qualitatively, that precipitation systems in the tropics are more efficient at removing water from the atmosphere than at high latitudes.
So this is one of the feedbacks that I think is overstated in climate models, is this positive water vapor feedback effect.
Okay.
And it's, in a way, it's hard to separate any of these feedbacks from each other because they're all interrelated.
It's like you can't talk about just one of them without getting into the other.
So, you know, clouds?
Clouds, on the average, cool the climate.
But we really don't have a good feeling for how they're going to change with warming.
Are they going to change in such a way to screen out some sunlight and cancel out some of the warming, keeping the Earth more at a constant temperature?
Or will they change in such a way, with a positive feedback, to amplify the warming?
And for that, climate models are kind of all over the map of what they predict for clouds, because we really don't understand clouds at all.
So, do you think that he objectively believes that this climate model that we're talking about, the one that has him speaking out like this, obviously he must have quite a bit of faith in it for some reason.
Yes.
Yeah, he does.
Why?
Well, I mean this is common with all scientists.
People that work in their own specific field with how they've approached the problem, with the models and tools that they have built, you know, we're all parochial.
We all like to believe that we've got the best one.
Sure.
And he's worked on this a long time and put a lot of work into his model.
So I can completely understand him believing it.
And in fact, his may be the best model out of the 20 or so models that are run around the world.
You know, to tackle this problem.
Well, is there any objective evidence that it is the best?
I've seen it referred to as the best by some.
Is that likely?
Well, I don't know how you would say best.
You know, the trouble is that we've had some up and down temperature fluctuations in the last hundred years.
Just a few.
They can be explained in probably an infinite number of ways, but Since we really don't know the natural variability, what we do is we use the tools that we have, which is basically increasing carbon dioxide, changes in aerosols, either man-made aerosols or volcanic aerosols, and a few other processes that we think we understand.
And if you put them together in a certain way, you can pretty much explain what's happened in the last hundred years, globally, for the global average temperature fluctuations.
Now, Is that really what caused it?
We don't know.
You know, you come up with one possible explanation, but the system, the climate system, I think, is so complex, I don't have a whole lot of faith that that is what's going on.
And even if it is, it could be that in the future, once we warm up a certain amount more, that some unknown feedback kicks in and brings us back toward equilibrium.
I think that there's just a lot of uncertainty.
Well, I've heard it say, Mother Nature doesn't get angry, she gets even.
That's a cute phrase, but I think, for the most part, the climate system is pretty darn resilient.
Well, it kind of referred to what you said, though.
It really means there's no actual intelligence saying, look, I've got to correct this.
A system, as you put it, of feedback that once something is out of balance in one way, I guess the climate finds a way to reverse that process.
Yes, right.
That's my belief.
Getting even.
That's what the getting even part is.
I guess we can all hope that's true, although I don't know what Mother Nature might do to restore that balance.
From our perspective, I suppose that could be not a happy situation.
Yeah, who knows, but what we do know is that no matter where you live on this earth, you have to deal with certain weather hazards.
Okay, you know, whether it's typhoons, hurricanes, winter storms, floods, droughts, they all happen.
Now maybe they will get somewhat worse with global warming, but the point is, is that we have to deal with them anyway.
It's kind of like this whole thing about the hurricanes hitting The Gulf Coast last year.
Yes.
You know, so many people think, well, they want to blame global warming for the whole thing.
Well, I'm sorry.
Category 4 and 5 hurricanes have always occurred.
They always will occur.
They're going to hit land occasionally.
Maybe they'll get worse with global warming.
Maybe they won't.
But I could see that maybe they will.
You still have to be prepared for a Category 4 or 5 hurricane, because they're going to hit with or without the help of mankind.
I'm sure you're correct, but I recall watching who I thought was a very good meteorologist on CNN, though somewhat temperamental, but very good.
And he was just astounded at the rapid pressure drop.
In fact, down at one point to a pressure that had never been measured Before, and how quickly it got there.
He was just shaking his head going, Oh my God.
And it's aimed, you know, right at this warm water ahead of it and so forth and so on.
And, uh, yeah, well, that's, that's happened.
That, that typically happens more in the Pacific.
There's been, you know, that's where the, the biggest hurricanes and of course they're called typhoons there, uh, have occurred, you know, with those rapid pressure drops and the lowest pressures ever recorded.
But remember, It hasn't been that many years that they've been flying into these things and measuring these pressures.
I think we really don't know how many tropical storms there were before, let's say, around 1970, when we were starting to get more routine satellite data.
Because it's a big ocean out there.
Sure is.
I've been through many a typhoon on Okinawa, and yes, they get to be very large.
Of course, they have a lot more ocean to cross.
Before they strike, and so if the conditions are right, they can get absolutely ridiculously violent.
Yeah, well that's also typically a warmer ocean.
The Western Pacific is typically warmer than the Western Atlantic.
Is it fair to characterize hurricanes and typhoons as the Earth's air conditioner?
In other words, they convert warm ocean water and toss it into the atmosphere, in essence, and it's kind of a cooling process?
It's basically one of the modes By which the excess heat that builds up at the surface of the Earth is transported away from the surface and up into the atmosphere, where that excess energy can then be lost to outer space in the form of heat radiation.
So yeah, it's like part of the air conditioning process, like you said, if you want to put it in those terms.
It's one of the modes by which the atmosphere moves heat away from the surface and keeps the surface of the Earth at a habitable temperature for us.
If it weren't for weather, the effects of weather, and water vapor, especially water vapor evaporating from the surface, the average surface temperature over the whole Earth, averaged over the whole Earth, poles, and to the tropics, the average would be about 135 to 140 degrees Fahrenheit.
Wow!
But because of the effects of water and weather systems, We have what we currently have, which is like about 55 degrees Fahrenheit average.
So weather is very, very important to our survival.
Yeah, so you gotta have hurricanes.
Yes, well, I guess some people... It's not nice when they hit you.
Yeah, they're not.
And some people, Doctor, would say, well, that's why we're having these really horrible hurricanes, because it is warmer, and so the air conditioner is cranked up harder.
But of course, you would say, Nonsense!
Well, I would say, okay, so mankind has made it warmer in the Atlantic, but not in the Pacific, because, you know, they're below normal for typhoons.
Again, we know that there's been these cycles, these natural cycles, in the general circulation of the atmosphere, that changes not just the temperature, but the wind shear conditions.
It takes more than warm sea surface temperatures to build a hurricane, otherwise they'd have hurricanes In the Arabian Sea and the Mediterranean Sea and other areas where there aren't ever any hurricanes because the wind shear conditions aren't right.
So it just was, you know, last year everything came together perfect.
If you want to put it that way.
This story from the Boston Globe ends this way.
It says, you can argue with Hansen if you want, but you better bring along a pretty big data set with you.
He's been right so far.
Now, is that fair to say?
Yeah, I think he's been predicting increasing Uh, sort of, you know, increasing temperatures for the last 10 years.
That, you know, each, on average, each year was probably going to be warmer than the previous one.
Right.
Which is sort of borne out.
But when you're, even if there are just natural climate fluctuations going on, these things have a long time scale.
In other words, once you get into a warm period, you're going to be warm for years on end.
So it's a pretty easy bet to say we're going to stay above normal for a while.
But yeah, it's risky business to predict climate, and he's so far probably done a better job than anybody.
Alright, you have worked a little bit with passive microwave remote sensing techniques.
There's somebody with an idea.
You know, when you talk about energy, I mean, even our president came out recently and said we're addicted to oil.
We certainly are.
There are all kinds of ideas out there about how to collect and transport energy.
And one of the wilder ones, but maybe not too wild, you might want to comment.
is to put solar collection in space and then microwave what's collected back to Earth.
Yeah, and I know there's people working on that.
There's two major problems.
One is the extra expense of putting that solar collector into orbit.
Right.
To get an extra, you know, whatever, maybe an extra fifty percent amount of sunlight On average, falling on the solar collector.
I mean, it takes a lot of money to put stuff into space.
So there's that issue, is how much it costs to put a big solar collector up there to begin with.
Now, to beam the energy down, you would have to have such a huge microwave antenna to make a very narrow beam.
Yes.
It would have to be very tightly controlled to come down in one spot.
Otherwise, you're going to start frying your neighbors.
Well, I brought this subject up to people who are advocates of this, and they say, don't worry.
It's got an absolute fail-safe mechanism.
It's got a feedback that says, look, if it's not being received, stop immediately.
Yeah, well, the... Nothing can go wrong.
Yeah.
Okay, well, I will predict quite firmly that we will never have that technology.
Oh, really?
And you base that on what?
The expense to get it there?
The expense and the danger.
Maybe they can get around the danger, but they can't get around the expense.
Maybe someday they'll put up some test thing that only covers a few hundred square yards or something like that of collector area.
You need to have huge areas covered to get any amount of energy.
The amount of sunlight falling on a square foot of area, even out in outer space, isn't that big.
You've got to have huge areas of collectors to make a dent in our energy needs.
I just attended an annual briefing by ExxonMobil, and this is done by all of the petroleum companies, where they predict where they think energy use is going to go in the next 25 years, what countries are going to be growing in their needs, And where that energy is going to come from.
Basically, petroleum and coal are the two major things.
The renewables are going to be increasing rapidly, like solar and wind, but they're going to be increasing rapidly from very small percentages to only somewhat bigger percentages.
It's just going to take a long time before they can cut into the market of the demand, especially with, like I said before, India.
In China.
It's at the point now where the developing countries right now are producing as much CO2 as the developed countries are.
Wow.
And they are going to rapidly surpass us in the coming years.
Two cars in every garage.
In Shanghai and, you know, wherever.
I'm sure that's what they want.
I mean, the rest of the world basically wants what we've got, and we all know what we went through, from an industrial point of view, to get here.
So, yeah, they want it too, and why shouldn't they?
Yeah.
So, it comes down to, I guess, a matter of who's right.
There's one other thing I want to ask you about.
We're at a break point.
Can you afford to stay a few more moments?
Sure.
Okay.
Not fret, open lines coming up directly after this segment with Dr. Spencer.
Just way too good an opportunity not to take advantage of.
And by the way, Dr. Spencer, you have a website, don't you?
Yeah, I've got a few.
I guess the two that I enjoy the most these days.
One is called EcoInquirer.com, which is sort of an environmental satire website.
All the stories there, they're faux news stories on environmental topics, and it's up to the people reading them to see whether they're true or not.
I'll give you a hint.
I made them all up, but people can't tell half the time which ones are made up.
And then also weatherstreet.com is a nice forecasting site that me and another guy put together.
It doesn't have all those Flashin' ads and stuff that bug you so much on the Big Weather website.
So those are the two.
EcoInquirer.com and WeatherStreet.com.
WeatherStreet.com.
Well, they'll take a lot of hits now, so I hope you're ready.
Yeah, please don't bring down the servers, though.
We have brought down some of the best, Doctor.
Oh, I'll bet you have.
We have.
Now, there is this project up in Alaska called HAARP.
It's a very interesting project, and perhaps you can't even comment on this, but what they're doing is transmitting ultimately a billion watts of effective radiated power, or more, from an antenna array that is large on the ground, and then by the time it hits the ionosphere, it's designed to be a pinpoint.
In other words, opposite of what most antennas are.
Most antennas start out as a very narrow beam and become Very wide and very dispersed.
HAARP is going to put this incredible amount of energy, they've already begun doing it, into a sort of a pinpoint location in the ionosphere.
And it got so interesting a few weeks ago that there was an auroral display going on above the facility in Alaska.
And they turned this thing on and they actually saw these sparkly, this whole sparkle show that went on above them as they began to affect the ionosphere.
And there are all kinds of stated goals for this project, like locating underground tunnels and bunkers, radio propagation research, and then there are some more shadowy goals, because the government now has gotten hold of this project.
DARPA, I believe, actually.
And I guess what I'm working up to here is, A, do you know about this project?
B, what effect could it conceivably have on the atmosphere?
Let's start there.
Okay, well, I've certainly heard of HAARP.
Yes.
I have never read the details.
I don't have the level of knowledge you have, but I will say that from a physics standpoint, we basically don't have to worry about anything going on in the ionosphere when we do climate forecasting, weather forecasting, explaining how the climate system works right now.
In other words, it's like the ionosphere is totally disconnected from weather.
Even the stratosphere, which is the next layer up from where we live, has relatively little influence.
And you're talking about way above that.
Also, considering the amount of energy that's involved, a single small thunderstorm is like a small Nuclear warhead going off, like a 20 kiloton at least.
You've got thousands of these going on all the time around the world.
Basically, the amount of energy that's involved in weather processes is so huge, I don't think we could alter weather if we tried to.
With a bunch of nuclear weapons.
Well, you know... Even forgetting the mess we would have in terms of radioactive fallout.
Oh, well, sure.
But that was actually going to be my next question.
I think it's the Army that has a website up that says they'll own the weather in another 50 years or something.
That's probably somewhat optimistic, but do you think any sort of control will ever be possible?
And if so, how would it or how might it be achieved?
I very much doubt it because of the amount of energy required to change anything.
Now, the only reason why I won't say that with 100% certainty is we know that these weather systems are non-linear in their behavior.
In other words, a weather system could be just on the verge of turning into a huge storm or dissipating into nothingness.
Exactly.
And if somebody could identify A system, you know, in the right stage where you didn't know which way it was going to go, if you put enough energy in there in the right places, with, and all I can think of is nuclear weapons, which you wouldn't want to do, it might be possible to nudge it in one direction.
So that's the only reason why I'm willing to admit that yes, you might be able to do something in the future.
But to make it do what you want it to do?
I don't know.
Okay.
And that leads me to another question.
Whether it's HAARP or whether it's an attempt to control the weather or anything else that science does, how comfortable are you with the oversight and the ethics?
I've seen scientists do some pretty strange things.
It's kind of like when you get down to the very end and you're ready to push the button, do you press it or not?
And more times, you know, the scientists, without thinking about Well, they don't give me any buttons to push at work, so I don't get to do that fun stuff.
But you see the basis of my question.
Yeah, I see what you're saying.
Well, there's no question that... Well, okay, in a general sense, I will say that Probably just about any technology that we've developed can be used for good or evil.
Oh, yes.
So, you know, there's always moral decisions involved.
That's my belief.
Okay.
Yeah, I mean... So, in a sense, I guess I'm agreeing with you.
All right.
On the culture, the climate at NASA, you know... For the most part, NASA is a very open organization, okay?
They want to foster knowledge.
They want to fund, you know, the finding, the discovery of knowledge.
Yes.
They're probably a little more in the direction of, we need to save the Earth, but at the same time we need to save our jobs, so let's keep doing climate research.
But for the most part, you know, they're very open, and I never had any overt pressure when I was at NASA about what I could and couldn't do.
About the most it went was when I would testify in Congress.
They would just remind me that I'm there to give my expert testimony and what I'm expert in.
Because when you testify in Congress on global warming, inevitably a congressman or a senator is going to ask you, what would you do if you were me about policy change?
You know, because they don't know what to do.
And I don't blame them.
I'm glad I'm not in their position in trying to decide what to do.
And so NASA would advise you to say, I'm sorry Senator, policy's not my field.
Yeah, yeah.
So I dodged the question and then all the Senators laugh at me because I sound like a politician.
That's one of the reasons why I left NASA.
I didn't want to feel like a politician.
I see.
So that is a pressure of a kind though, isn't it?
It is, but I could understand their position, that I'm only speaking on what I'm an expert in, and so I played that game.
It was their rules, that's fine with me, but then I decided to leave.
Now, Jim Hansen is still there, but he has political power.
I mean, he's done more than anybody probably in the world in terms of bringing global warming into the consciousness of humanity.
You know, it started with him testifying for Al Gore back in 88 or 89, whatever it was.
And he's a very good scientist.
So he could take the risk.
I mean, they wouldn't be able to fire him without a huge political backlash.
Oh, that would be bad.
Oh yeah.
So he's, you know, he's safe.
It could be that they mishandled How the whole thing was handled afterwards, I don't know.
I had a guest on who said, look, it was nothing more than some NASA admin person with a bit of irrational exuberance in protection of, I don't know, whatever, that resulted in the whole dust-up with Dr. Hanson.
That sounds like the most plausible explanation to me, based on my experience with NASA.
You think he will now even further increase the strident tone that he's had lately?
He's had a pretty strident tone lately.
It's hard for me to imagine it getting more severe than it is now.
But who knows?
He's on a mission.
He's trying to save the world.
I understand what he's What he's trying to do.
Well, there has to be some percentage of chance that he is right.
That's true, there is.
And if he is right... I have no idea what that percentage is, though.
Well, right.
But if he is right, then, of course, the world is in some degree of fairly serious trouble.
And raising his voice to that degree, you said it earlier, you'd probably have done the same thing if you believed as he did.
Yeah, I think I would.
I think I would step out there and take the chance like he did, yes.
Since you're not testifying now before Congress, you really could answer that question here if you wish to.
Well, no, actually I can, because now that I've, you know, given testimony, now since I'm a university employee, you know, university people, as you can tell from the news lately, get to say whatever they want to, right?
Yeah, sure.
Huh?
Absolutely, yes.
Just whisper it in my ear.
Oh.
No, I have definite feelings about policy.
And that is, let's see if I can put it in a nutshell.
In order to solve this energy problem, to where we have energy sources that don't produce a lot of carbon dioxide, it is going to take research and development.
It is going to take technological advancement.
Which countries of the world can afford that?
It's the countries that have built enough wealth to where we can invest the money into that.
Now, my feeling of current legislation about restricting CO2 production, those things are going to hardly put a dent in the problem.
But they are going to hurt the economy, and therefore hurt our ability to do research and development to finally solve these problems about how we're going to Solve our energy needs in the next 50 to 100 years.
Isn't that, though, kind of a negative feedback situation?
In other words, the size of the problem is so gigantic that, from your point of view, what we're doing right now is just virtually insignificant in moving toward solving it.
We aren't going to solve it until we develop energy technologies that are much cleaner.
For instance, there are a couple of coal-fired power plants that are working Now I think one is in Texas, one is in North Dakota, that removes most of the carbon dioxide during the burning of coal.
It's called a clean coal technology, and then they just pump the carbon dioxide back into the ground.
So that's one possibility.
And then you've heard about hydrogen, and that technology is actually farther out than I think most people realize.
There are too many technical problems with it.
Not the least of which is, you know, where do you get the hydrogen?
It doesn't occur naturally.
You have to make it.
And that takes energy.
Well, isn't that true of most of these?
In other words, even solar panels in mass take energy to produce.
It's almost always going to take energy, it seems like.
Well, now, not for solar panels.
I mean, virtually all the energy you're getting, you're not having to put energy into the system.
Whereas hydrogen, You know, you have to put, for all the energy that you're going to get out of the hydrogen, you have to put in to create it in the first place.
The President was touting for a time, and I guess still is, that the hydrogen economy, he calls it, you feel it's not in the short term anyway?
No, I don't think it is.
I'm not sure what the President's motivation in all this.
What I fear is that he's trying to Placate too many constituencies at one time.
Because I feel like some of the stuff he's said lately about future energy is exaggerated or overly optimistic.
That's from what I hear from my sources in the energy industry.
Right.
There are those who believe that we are at peak oil, perhaps now.
So, we're going to need something and we're going to need it pretty soon.
If you were able to formulate policy right now, how much urgency would you put into alternative energies?
And money.
It's a multi-billion dollar program already for the U.S.
I don't know enough about policy to know whether it's enough.
I'm not knowledgeable enough to give you an answer to that.
And does it deserve, do you think it might deserve something along the lines of a Manhattan-style project to make fast changes, or is that just not realistic?
Well, I think that makes a certain amount of sense, yes.
Aha.
Alright, have you written, you've done a lot of writing for a lot of journals, very prestigious journals, do you write about this sort of thing?
On policy, just in generalities, one technology that I've been real interested in, and which is apparently they're going to start construction of it in Australia soon, is called a solar chimney or solar tower.
Yes.
Where basically you build a big transparent canopy over the ground that covers several square miles.
Uh-huh.
It's usually in the desert where it's hot and sunny.
So basically that heat, or the solar heating that occurs underneath that panel on the ground can't escape the way it normally does during the day with convective motions in the atmosphere constantly taking the heat away from the ground.
It's trapped under that canopy.
It all goes towards the central tower and up a chimney.
And then the turbines are in the chimney, so it's like a self-contained... Wow!
Um, circulation every day.
In fact, it continues at night because the ground is still warm.
Uh, and generates, uh, the design they're working on in Australia is hundreds of megawatts.
No kidding?
Yeah, and I think it's a pretty cool design.
That's actually kind of exciting, and I've never heard of that before.
Yeah, it's called the solar tower or solar chimney design.
You can do a search on the internet about it.
Okay.
And, uh, I think it has promise.
They claim that it's, it's, they think it's getting cost competitive with coal-fired power plants.
Uh, not quite there, but then they actually haven't built a big one yet, built a big one yet.
They built a very small one in Spain years ago that operated for about like five years and only generated like 50 kilowatts.
I live in the state of Nevada, where we have lots and lots of sun, and we also have lots and lots of government land.
About 90% of my state is government land, so it would seem to me that would be a place where government could take the lead and actually do something.
And I've been trying to get an answer from the Department of Energy, and from what I can tell, they are not even researching this this technology in the united states the government isn't
and i don't understand why
i haven't been able to get an answer from anybody about why they're not well
there is an answer to that somewhere Yeah.
Yeah, you're right.
There's an answer.
I just don't know it.
Well, I think a lot of us do, and I think perhaps at one level you probably have a pretty good idea.
Listen, you've been great, Dr. Spencer.
Absolutely great, and I would hope to have you on again sometime.
As we, you know, get a little further down the road and events warranted, I'd love to have you on again.
Okay, Art.
Dr. Spencer, thank you and good night.
Thank you.
There you have it, folks.
Stories like the Boston Globe story entitled, Too Hot to Handle.
Recent efforts to censor Jim Hansen, NASA's top climate scientist, are only the latest.
As his message grows more urgent, we ignore him at our peril.
That's the headline.
Tomorrow night we'll get to the story.
Or this from ABC News.
Could global warming become a runaway Train.
A runaway train.
Or from Science Daily, the Antarctic ice sheet is losing mass.
Very serious mass.
Very quickly.
The World Meteorological Organization said it has seen unprecedented signs pointing to a looming La Nina.
I didn't bring that up before.
A phenomena that originates off the western coast of South America and can disrupt weather patterns in many parts of the globe.
And they say That this is the fastest developing in all of our record keeping.
And then I've got something on the magna, beneath Yellowstone.
I've got all kinds of stories here for you, but in view of the time constraints, we'll go to open lines here in just a moment.
One note, if you would like to email me, I would like to give you my email address.
It is one of two, artbell at mindspring.com.
That's A-R-T-B-E-L-L at Minespring.com or Artbell at A-O-L.com.
The Minespring address is the primary, and then AOL is secondary.
But either way, Artbell at Minespring.com or Artbell at AOL.com.
Guarantee I will read your email.
I cannot guarantee I will respond, although these days I'm responding to many more.
Open lines, coming up next.
Well alright.
you Let's, uh, oh, there is one thing, and that is that since we've done all this tonight, I had a question for you that I wanted to ask, um, really, I really wanted to ask tonight before I even knew I was going to have an opportunity to interview Dr. Spencer.
And the question is simple.
It's very simple question with all that's happening out there right now.
With the documented global warming that we have, with the poles just dilapidating beneath us, or at the poles, with the storms that we've had recently, with the ocean current problems that we're beginning to discover, with the new diseases that are popping up.
In other words, you can go well beyond just the climate.
With all of this going on, something I chose some years ago to call the quickening, my question to all of you is, where do you think all this is leading, and when?
Let me repeat that.
Where do you think all of this is leading?
And particularly, when?
And then I also thought, in the next couple of hours, should we get them?
There is a very large body of, a very large group of people out there who believe that we are being visited now by aliens.
That we're being visited from, and it's a perfectly reasonable Conjecture, I think.
With all that it is out there, all we know is out there, surely we are being watched.
And perhaps we're being watched from a very close point of view, not just in space or streaking across the atmosphere as we've seen so many vehicles do at speeds that we can't possibly obtain.
So, I think there's a pretty good chance they are here.
A very good chance, actually.
And perhaps they walk among us.
So, any aliens who would like to take the opportunity to, I don't know, admit it and have a talk with us, you're going to certainly be welcome.
So that sort of sets it up.
That's where I want to go.
West of the Rockies, you're the first to go wherever it is you're going.
Hi.
Hello, Art.
Hello.
Where are you calling from?
Portland, Oregon.
Station KEX.
Oh, the monster at KEX, yes.
Love the show, but I have to take issue with Dr. Spencer.
I am a meteorologist.
I was an undergraduate student at Oregon State University back in the 70s, and everything I learned back then about radiation physics contradicts what these people are saying today, and nobody can answer my questions whenever I ask them.
And instead of asking questions, why don't you try and define what you say is contradictory or you feel they're wrong about and you know about?
Well, first of all, I'm not going to argue that climate change doesn't occur.
It does.
The issue I have with Spencer is he's blaming carbon dioxide.
And what I learned back in the 70s, Uh, is that the quantum physics derived from the great physics, uh, people back then, which still exist and are the greatest today, come from Albert Einstein, Max Planck, all the people that derived the radiation physics we use in atmospheric science.
Well, you know, quantum physics, sir, is just, uh, it's sort of an imaginary almost science.
We're not even really there yet.
Well, I'll just explain briefly what, try to make this as simple as I can.
Alright.
Carbon dioxide, when we take a look at the radiation, and we talk about absorption of radiation coming out from the earth, coming in from the sun, carbon dioxide is inferior to water vapor, and what we learned back in the 70s was there is no way they could ever overcome the radiative effects of water vapor.
Because it's black-body radiation is out around 14 microns, and water vapor is down around 6 to 4.
Well, Dr. Spencer did talk quite a bit about water vapor, actually.
Well, then I must have missed that part of the conversation.
However, I gathered from him that we have to do something about CO2 emissions, and I disagree with that because water vapor in the atmosphere is 100 times more in concentration, even more than a hundred times in
carbon dioxide, and the radiation physics
between 14 and 6 would dictate that water vapor absorbs far more than carbon dioxide, and
carbon dioxide could never exceed it unless you were choking on it.
Well, you missed that part.
I mean, he really did cover that.
Well, alright, with what you believe, then try and answer my question with all that's happening.
And there is a lot happening, by any measure.
I mean, it's now undeniable.
Where do you think this is all leading, and when?
Well, I wish I could answer the question.
There's so much that we don't know about what goes on in the atmosphere and from the sun.
All of these things are very complex interactions, but there's a lot of other people that have come forth since the theories about CO2 that offer more plausible explanations than he did, and I'm referring to the latest studies that deal with cosmic rays.
A different radiative output from the sun.
All these things are very likely culprits to climate change.
Well, I agree.
Look, I don't disagree with you.
I'm curious how strongly you feel that there's a profound change underway.
Well, I'm not convinced that it's profound because a lot of the people that are climate scientists, including our own here in Oregon, are Disagreeing with some of the assessments about how rapidly things are changing.
There's still arguments about this.
Yes.
I can't really say, well, I know that things are going one way or the other in an absolute sort of way.
I can say, and will say, that climate change is real.
It does occur, and there were points on the Earth's past that I showed that there were extremes that occurred even worse than we have now, but the main question is that all of us, I think, haven't answered is what really causes all of this?
And I don't think we have the answer to that.
If you go back several thousand years in the Earth's climate to the medieval period, for example, Greenland was completely free of ice at that time, and the Vikings migrated from Europe and were able to habitat on the On that part of the Earth for many years before the climate change and they all froze to death.
Right.
And that was before the Industrial Revolution where we were all worried about the CO2 thing.
Alright, I think I've clearly got it.
Thank you very much.
Now here's what I think, and this is only my opinion.
It is no more than the opinion of a talk show host.
That's all it is.
I think that whether you want to blame it on man or you want to blame it on natural cycles, and both are possible, That we are headed for a profound change.
A big change.
And I think soon.
And I can feel it in every bone in my body.
I felt it coming for years.
And I can feel it literally in every bone in my body.
A profound change.
And a big one.
I think is on the way.
But again, that is only the opinion of a talk show host.
Probably worth that and 10 cents or 20 or 30, whatever, 50 cents for a cup of coffee these days.
I don't know.
First time caller on the line, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hey Art.
Hello.
Hey, since you just mentioned that, I moved out to New Mexico about five years ago.
And I was able to talk to some Indians out there.
Yes?
And they actually taught me a little bit about earth changes.
Yes.
Well, I too have chatted with the Hopi elders, for example, and what they have to say makes what I've even said I feel in my bones almost nothing.
I mean, they really see it coming.
April 12th.
2012 was the date that I was told.
Regardless of whether that happened or was going to happen or not.
Well, what is it you were told would happen on that date?
Basically that the polarity of the Earth would shift on that date.
I see.
The magnetic polarity.
I see.
Well, that could come and do one of many things.
I mean, it could be as innocuous as, well, the compass suddenly points south instead of north.
It could be that innocuous and nothing more would occur.
And then others believe that entire continents would shift their locations.
Now, of course, there is evidence to point to the fact that entire continents have done that before.
If you take the land masses of the world, and you push them all together, like puzzle pieces, they pretty much fit together real well.
Telling us that at one time, they were one, and they're puzzle pieces now.
So, who knows?
Wildcard Line, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Good morning, Art.
Nice to hear your voice again.
Thank you.
Yeah, great catch yet tonight.
There's nothing more important topic than our environment.
I believe that is true now.
It is the most important topic.
How do you feel about it?
You know, the question of where do you think all of this is leading and when?
Yeah, good question.
What I feel is that you have a lot of people who have done a lot of research, a lot of people working for the government, and all of them have the same thing in common.
They're all gagged.
Okay?
Now, a lot of them can't talk about it.
Now, if it was a good thing and we're safe, they'd be talking.
But they're all gagged, so that tells me there's something really wrong.
Well, they do seem to be gagged.
I mean, if you listened carefully to Dr. Spencer, in between words and the way he said things when he talked about, in quotes, the rules, yeah.
I mean, yeah.
You know, they're to some degree gagged.
I guess they can say the science unless their particular science points to something too dire, and then shouldn't talk about it.
Exactly.
And from what I can see, I've been looking at maps for many years on the internet, and I've looked at the polar caps and looked at how the whitening of the so-called hole in the ozone is widening.
It is so large right now.
It is so huge.
Ultraviolet radiation from the sun is what's melting the polar caps.
And it is so large right now, it's being classified.
They wouldn't even let you see the new images of how large these holes are now.
Yeah, I can tell you this, sir.
I talk to people on a regular basis in New Zealand, and particularly in Australia, and there, you know, this is just not widely known by the American people, but there, By law.
By law.
The children have to wear things, you know, hats, something to cover their head.
In other words, the radiation is so severe right now that by law they have to wear something to cover their heads.
Because that kind of unchecked radiation causes cancer.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Good morning, Rick from Kennybrook, Maine.
Yes, sir.
I, for one, agree with you that there's going to be some kind of a change.
How profound it will be, I'm sure, is up for debate.
Oh, it is.
You've talked to Richard Hoagland, Ed Dames, people like that over the past two espouses.
It's not just Richard and Ed, sir, but almost every psychic, almost every intuitive, almost everybody agrees that something really, really major is coming.
It's damn near universal.
I'll answer your question you posed to us quickly, then I'll pose one to you if I could.
I live in Kennebunk and I worked here for many years, and when I first moved to town in 1988, or a coastal town, high tide was so far back that there was still dune grass growing in certain areas on the beach, and you could go there and play in the dune grass.
Yes, sir.
Just in the last 18 years, That high tide is now all the way up to the seawall, and at high tide in the summertime when the tourists are on the beach, there's no room for them anymore.
See, you're not supposed to notice that stuff.
Tourists paying the money, they sure know it.
But my question to you is, what have you done to help your family and your personal situation to prepare for something like that?
You know, of course, you only share what you feel comfortable with sharing in a public audience, but...
What are you doing to actually get ready for something like that?
Alright, I will answer a part of it anyway.
I have done things.
I've done a lot of things.
I live in an area which is kind of out and away from it all, as it were.
I have solar and wind power here that supplies my energy needs.
I have taken certain precautions with respect to... how to put this...
With respect to, um, sustaining a period of time in isolation if need be.
And I won't really go into it any further than that, but I think you can, your imagination can take it from there.
So the answer is, I have made some preparations.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hi, you're going to have to yell at me, you're not too loud.
Okay, this is Lori from Portland, Oregon.
Yes, Lori.
Hi, I've been emailing you, but this is the first time I got to talk to you.
I'd also like to say that in my bones, I'm not a scientist or anything like that.
Right.
I feel, for a long time, years, something's coming.
I just feel it in the atmosphere.
It's just there.
You just feel it, just like you said.
I couldn't agree more.
It's so strong that when I feel something this strongly, I'm usually always right.
Yeah, that's right.
I would agree with you.
It is unknowing.
It's just kind of unknowing and it's very strong in this area so I don't think any of us should be surprised when something really radical occurs.
Last year during the hurricane season we had a taste of it.
Here it comes again and I'd be willing to wager that it's going to be a rough one again.
I agree.
But that's still not what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about A much larger climate type event.
Some big change in the world.
I just can feel it.
Yeah, like it's going to be drastic.
And I don't think we're going to be able to handle it unless the powers that be get a grip on what they're doing.
And I do believe that carbon monoxide, sorry, but I believe it, all the stuff we're making, Our oceans, our water, the atmosphere, and then to go to your aliens.
I do believe we've been visited for probably eons.
I wonder how they... I believe in the Indians.
I wonder how they regard us.
I don't know.
I think, my belief is that we're just the We're an insignificant part of this universe.
i agree with that listen to me when i say that i feel a uh... in every
bone in my body there's a profound change coming I'm...
Um, that's no... I claim no psychic intuition.
I don't claim any of that.
I just... I'm very rarely wrong about these kinds of things when I feel them this strongly and for this long.
Almost inevitably I'm correct.
Now, maybe it'll turn out and I hope that I'm wrong.
I really hope I'm wrong because I don't want the world shaken in a way that it perhaps can't recover from.
I don't want that.
I just feel it coming.
And I guess the need to share it with you all.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hello, Art.
Hi.
Art, this is Lewis in Colorado, and I wanted to ask you about the picture on your webcam.
Is that an old picture of Abydos, or did you get a new cat?
That's an old picture of Abydos.
That sure is cute.
You know, I've got five.
In fact, they're ramming their little heads against my door as we speak.
And I really have a conundrum here because if I let them in, they go behind my console and probably throw me off the air, ripping and chewing and running on wires.
And if I don't let them in, all I hear is bang, bang, bang, bang, trying to get in.
They don't understand that every now and then I have to disappear in a room and work.
Isn't there some way you can kind of cat-proof things in the control room to where I don't mean to laugh, but if you've ever seen the wires that are going back and forth, even if something goes wrong, even I have a very difficult time tracing it out.
It's not documented, it's been built up over many years with changes here and changes there, so the answer to your question is, No way, Jose.
Okay.
No, you can't cat-proof things, thank you very much.
A friend of mine's got a website called thecatsdidit.com, I think.
He calls it that, thecatsdidit.com.
And you know, things have been disappearing.
Serious disappearances have occurred here at my house.
Little things, some of them not so little, some of them absolutely annoying, and once they have disappeared, once a little cat mouth has carried whatever it is away, baby, you don't see it again.
Now, I have no idea where these things might be going.
Landed lost, for all I know, but somewhere there's a collection of stuff that these cats have taken away, and I'm going to find it one day, or not.
On the international line, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hello, Art.
It's Oscar.
I am the son of Satan, and I have some very interesting news for you tonight, Art.
You are the son of Satan?
That's correct, Art.
Why are you whispering?
Art, this is my voice.
I'm not human.
That's your natural voice?
I'm not human.
You're a demon?
I'm a demon.
Well, if you're gonna do a demon, then do a demon the right way, brother.
There, you got a demon.
Art, do not mock Satan.
I wouldn't mock Satan.
I never mocked Satan.
I'm mocking you.
You, buddy, I'm mocking you.
You need to do something like this so you can sound like the real McCoy.
Art, I need to tell you who my latest victim's going to be.
And who now?
I've also told Mr. George Norrie that I'm going to possess Elvis Presley.
He's alive and with his protection in the Midwest, Art.
Huh.
Have you been taking anything for this?
No.
The king is alive, and I want you to know that.
I also want to tell you another important thing.
He's deader than a doornail.
Art, he's not deader than a doornail.
He's alive.
No, he's dead.
I want to tell you one other thing, Art.
What?
A portion of hell is located beneath Yellowstone, in the fiery, molten lava that is building up.
Something that's going to erupt very soon, Art, causing Yellowstone to go up in smoke.
And let me tell you something.
If you keep this up, you're going to hurt yourself.
Do you understand?
You're going to hurt yourself.
I can already hear your voice beginning to break.
Art.
Don't.
I want you to know.
You gotta do better than that, brother.
You gotta do better than that.
First time caller line, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hi, Art.
It's John and Art.
How are you doing this morning?
I'm ripping right along, buddy.
I am a first-time caller, obviously.
I'm on the first-time caller line.
I drive a lot at night and listen to you, and I'm always entertained.
But I wanted to call tonight because I listened to your guest tonight.
Oh, yes.
And I wanted to commend you on an excellent guest.
Thank you.
This guy talks the language of science, which a lot of people who do what he does do not, which is one thing I wanted to talk about.
I don't have a background in climatology, I do have a background in physics, and so I can speak the scientific method.
Alright.
And a lot of what is being put out regarding global warming and climate change does not speak the language of science and does not follow scientific method.
You think, what, that it is political?
Well, ultimately, yes.
If I were to say to you, I could take three months' worth of data three months worth of data and project 12 million
and extrapolate theories about 12 million years worth of climate cycle. Yeah. That would be utterly ridiculous.
But we have less, well roughly a hundred years of meaningful
climatological data.
That's true.
In a four and a half billion year old planet.
That's true, but sir, you know, that one can tip either way.
I mean, you're absolutely right.
We have less than a hundred years of good accurate measurements, but that could either mean that we could have a gigantic change and we wouldn't know why from anything historical at all, or it could mean the exact opposite, that there's no change coming at all and we're all blowing smoke with these models.
It could go either way.
Well, either way, obviously we're in a warming cycle.
You can't question that.
It has been getting warmer, you know, incrementally for the last decade or so.
Well, there were a lot of people questioning that, sir.
I think they've pretty much packed up and gone home on that one.
The conclusions that you could scientifically draw from that are almost nil, other than to say, yes, we're warming, and that's about all you can say.
You can extrapolate, if we continue to warm this way, what would happen.
But where I get upset is when they start trying to project causes and putting out things.
I mean, a couple of your callers have touched on certain things.
We're in a heightened time of solar flare activity.
We know that we're in a period of time where we've measured the Earth's magnetic field has been weakening incrementally.
Actually, sir, actually, we're at a solar minimum right now.
Right, right.
Almost at this very moment, we're at a solar minimum in terms of the 11-year cycle.
At this very moment, but over the last decade.
Well, there have been some... There have been some very, very unusual events on the Sun.
Now, you may recall we had what some scientists believe was an X-48 flare.
Now that's beyond the ability, way beyond the ability of our satellites even to measure.
So they were guessing at how big that was.
Now, if a flare like that ...were to be Earth-directed.
Oh, my God.
What would have... what would have... Oh, it could be absolutely catastrophic.
Yeah.
But the point... the point I'm trying to make is when... when somebody comes out and says, oh, it's because people are driving SUVs.
That... there is absolutely no valid scientific way to make that projection.
To make a projection like that, you step outside of hard science into political motivation.
Well, I'd say if you're driving an SUV, you're forking out a pretty penny for fuel these days.
Well, that's a fact.
Yeah, that is a fact.
I wanted to share, I don't know if you remember or even noticed it, but about a month, it was a month or two after 9-11, there was an article in the USA Today that just made me absolutely shake my head and inside say, you know what, science is dead.
There was an article in the USA Today where some... and this guy had a string of letters after his name, he was touted, I don't remember his exact name, but he was touted as a major climatologist, you know, scientist.
Yes.
And he wrote an article stating that they took data on the two days following 9-11 where basically all airplanes were grounded in the country.
And he said that those two days after 9-11, the Temperature for those days was a degree below the average for those same two days of the year over the last two decades.
That's fascinating.
It doesn't exactly make sense to me.
I would have thought, with the number of contrails, and there was a satellite picture taken not long ago of the southeast U.S.
and it showed the contrails.
I mean, they were laid down, sir, in such A tight grid that it had to be reflecting a high percentage of the sunlight that otherwise would have hit the earth.
I mean it was actually that serious.
Satellite photographs.
So you would think the opposite that if there's cloud cover where there would not normally be, that would actually, it would cool, right?
He claimed that because the temperature was one degree higher than the average temperature over the last two decades on those same two days of the year, That that was absolute proof that the emissions from airplanes were causing global warming.
Okay, well thank you very much.
I've got it.
You know, they're causing something.
They have to be causing something.
Even if they're not chemtrails, if they're contrails, even as contrails, if you looked at this photograph from above the southeast U.S., there's no way you could not conclude that a lot of sunlight that otherwise would have reached Earth was not reaching that part of the Earth.
Now, does that have consequences?
I don't know.
But I would think so.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air.
Hi.
Hi, Art.
My name is Kaluum.
I'm calling from Manitoba on PGOB.
Yes, sir.
Interesting documentary I'm doing right now.
I'm basically focusing on some pretty key topics to try to explain the very feeling you're feeling in your bones, which to me... I'm going to try to break down a couple things.
I want to make a quick comment on the political Aspects of what IPCC is doing as you know is the intergovernmental policy on climate control and when I started this documentary research Slow me down off if at all.
I'm going too fast on things When I initially started researching this as a skeptic in a background in science I started looking for proof or not proof and what I started seeing is that for example with the IPCC recent Documents that came out that issued pretty much statistics on the global trends, and they dubbed it the Hockey Stick Effect.
I don't know if you're familiar with that, but... No, I'm not.
Essentially what it showed was, and they, it was almost like one of, you know, the sense that you get from this type of documentation is it was almost like a pharmaceutical drug being pushed through the doors.
Because I could tell you the people, scientists, and the, and we're talking PhDs, some of the first, for example, in climatology and PhDs in Canada, That we're on panels, and we're talking global panels of climatology experts, some of which who just happen to have issues with these documents and papers and statistics and simulated models that, of course, you know, you've got to take into account there's fudge factors, there's errors... Yeah, what was their conclusion?
Their conclusion in the hockey stick effect... Oh, you're talking about the scientists that... This group.
...had verbatim against it?
Well, coincidentally, if you want to ever smell a biased policy going into control,
where you would smell it is that the scientists that had verbatim that was anti-thesis to
the documents being pushed were not even put in the paper.
So that's a little heads up.
Now, I just want to move on to what the bones thing is all about.
Because when I first started this documentary research, it just, my mouth dropped several
times I can tell you during the research because I had to really summon up the bottom line
academic of what this all means.
Okay, we've done it a lot of times, so... Yeah, so what it all came down to is people ask, what does this really have to do with me?
Sure, the climate's changing, blah, blah, blah, but why are your bones feeling the way they are?
Why are people getting revived?
The question becomes one that interrelates into the human frequency, which is now being almost covert in its Okay, let me tie this directly in.
time data feed.
Oh, okay.
All right.
That's interesting.
That's a Schumann resonance is what you're talking about, frequency, right?
Okay, let me tie this directly in.
All right, you better do it real quick.
Okay, we've got coronal mass ejections affecting the solar wind, affecting ionosphere, affecting
electromagnetic capacitance effect that directly interfaces through the work of Michael Persinger
from Laurentian University and ongoing studies, neurological behavior is totally
directly interrelated. So to say that by affecting ionosphere you don't affect
climate, you don't affect like the behavioral circumstances that people operate.
You think that's all wrong? Okay, I've got it. So that's the bone effect that he's
talking about and I think that could well be absolutely correct.
We all have, I believe, some magnetite in our brains.
We all have some magnetite in our brains.
And would we be affected by something as basic as a shift in the human frequency?
Do you think we would be, that we would collectively kind of have this impending feeling of, you know, something big about to happen, and specifically to do with the climate?
Yeah, I do agree with that.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hi.
Good morning, Art.
Good morning.
Jeffrey from Nashville.
Yes, sir.
Listen, I would be an amateur meteorologist, and I've been studying a lot of A lot of theories in the area.
But I have to say that a portion of the global warming is from factories and automobiles and airplanes.
Then another position of it is actually coming from natural earth.
We have gone through a standard warm cycle and we're getting warmer and warmer.
As we get to a point, on the highest point of the warming cycle, Like you put warm water in a, well, ice tray in a freezer to cause it to freeze?
Yes.
Same effect.
We're going to go into a next, a very cooling cycle.
Here in the South, we've had very unusual, uh, very unusual winter.
We've had a rollercoaster winter effect.
So, one, several days of 70 degrees, then we get dropped, dropped down to about 20 degrees.
Right.
Then go back up again.
So, therefore, uh, we're, we're gonna start to see a, or change by
uh... state what twenty fifteen twenty fourteen in that area
you're gonna start to see the uh... cycle start change over a warm cycle
the recall cycle and we have any answer the when part of my question uh... how
how severe do you think it will become on the warm side we are aware of where
we are going to see we're actually going to see ice
far south as or real
mhm that that certainly will change uh... many patterns including what can
grow and a lot more Wouldn't it?
That certainly would be a profound change.
So that really is a question we're asking tonight.
All of this taken into consideration, the ocean currents, the changes in our atmosphere, clearly the changes in our weather, where do you think it's all leading?
And when do you think that it's going to get there?
West of the Rockies, you're on the air, good morning.
Hi Art, how are you doing?
I'm doing alright, sir.
Welcome.
Are you in Sacramento calling?
Yes.
You know, I just wanted to kind of throw my two cents in the conversation here.
Yeah.
You know, are the earth changes in effect?
Sure.
Is man causing all of it?
I have to say, at the very least, you have to think that what we're doing has got to be at least a little bit detrimental.
When you look at all the other environmental factors that are in place... Isn't that reasonable to conclude?
Sure!
I mean, man certainly has spread over a very great deal of the habitable planet, and man is doing what man does, you know?
And when you look at all the other issues that we're concerned with in our day and age, with politics and our economies, wouldn't it make sense to stop using fossil fuels?
You know, upgrade to newer, less polluting technology.
Yes, it would make sense to me, however... People argue that, you know, the economics will fall apart and this and that.
Yeah, but those people are right.
True, true, but if we incrementally start, at least, to move that direction a little quicker than we're doing now, I think there has to be somewhere we can manage that without You know, everything falling apart economically and so forth.
I think our next president is going to have to have a comprehensive, real energy policy in place.
I think that our next president absolutely cannot escape that fact.
Never been on this program before, to the best of my knowledge, and so here you go, a physician A leading expert on near-death experience, and at that, a physician.
So, he did a documentary, I think, called The Day I Died, and it's his first book, and anytime we can get an expert in this area, boy, I'm all for it.
After all, those are the big questions, right?
Once more, open lines, anything you want to do is totally fair game.
First time caller line, you're on the air, top of the morning.
Morning Art.
Hi.
Fabulous to be on the show, I want to thank you very much for taking my call.
I have a comment for a lot of the listeners who are doubtful about the reasons behind the climate change.
Alright.
And my comment is thus, why are we even arguing about it?
If there's even a five to ten percent chance that Human activities have contributed to this.
People need to understand that we're playing in a serious endgame here, and the people in control, the politicians and the corporate men at the top of the ladder, they understand this, and we need to understand this.
I agree with you.
It's a hell of an endgame.
And it's really time for us to start finding ways to protect ourselves.
And it's really sad when you consider that most of the research institutions and a lot of the scientists, they're having to skew the results in the favor of those who actually And sir, for the same reason, they will not speak out.
and so they're having to put out false data.
There's a lot of propaganda going back and forth about this, and I really think it's time for the communities to step up
and really decide to take the initiative, take things back in their own direction.
And, sir, for the same reason, they will not speak out.
They can't speak out.
There are certain guidelines, and they just can't speak out.
I mean, look, you know, you've got to think of this as men with well-established careers and families and children probably in college and expenses and... Hey, look, I understand.
Don't you?
I absolutely understand.
There are noble virtues In taking care of your family, feeding your family, but again, if you have something to say, something that the American people and the people of the world need to know about, you have that responsibility, not just to yourself and to your ability to sleep at night, but to your species.
When we're talking about things so fundamentally important to the existence of human species, it's... I know.
Again, I have to put it right up there and say, I'm sorry, guys, but you're failing yourself.
Well, look, I know, but once again, it's easy for you to say.
And it's easy for you to call for responsible, moral behavior, but my God, if you've got a family, you've got an established career, you know, where do your loyalties lie?
Well, my answer would be with your family.
I think your loyalties belong with your family, and I know that's not the right answer, but it is the answer.
It's just the way the world works, that's all.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello, Art?
Yes.
All right, thanks for taking my call.
Certainly.
I'm so glad to hear that you're still on the air.
I've listened to you for a couple of years, and it is an awesome privilege to be on your show.
Thank you.
Well, I have a couple of things to say.
The first thing is, if you take a look at the stars at night, and you look up there in the universe, Yes.
And if you're an intelligent human being, you would know that the universe has millions of planets.
I do know.
And, you know, if there's one planet in the universe with life on it, which is Earth, there's got to be at least a hundred other planets out there in the universe without a life on it.
No argument from me.
Well, when I was 14 years old, I was abducted with two of my friends in Portland, Oregon, in the woods.
And I am now 28 years old, and I have seen a hypnotherapist a couple times, and I can't begin to describe what happened or what I experienced.
Why not?
Well, because it would be really hard to put it in emotional, human terms.
I mean, I could explain a little bit of it, but they gave us a couple warnings.
So it wasn't just you?
No, it was me and two of my friends that were abducted.
Alright, and they gave us warnings.
So you were abducted and you received warnings.
Which were?
One of them was about our water source.
Our water supply is going to be contaminated.
It would be very wise for us to start storing water that is drinkable now.
Because there's more than one war going on.
We are fighting ourselves, humans against humans.
But there's other things out here to take our resources.
What do you think would happen if a third of the world's water became contaminated?
Oh, a third of the world's water could become contaminated and all life would die.
And the other warning, sir?
Another one is we need to be enlightened and stop killing our own race.
We are humans and regardless of what country you come from or what color your skin is, we live on the same planet.
And it would be really wise for us not to destroy ourselves, which is kind of simplistic, but for some reason we have a hard time doing it.
That's true, isn't it?
Alright, alright, thank you very much.
He really is right about that, isn't he?
It seems very simplistic and, duh, right?
Don't destroy yourself.
And yet we have constructed weapons We're fully capable of doing the job, it's my understanding, many, many times over.
So, you know, you'd be bombing the ashes.
It means we absolutely have the ability to destroy ourselves.
And he's right, it seems basic, doesn't it?
Two intelligent life in the universe don't kill each other?
Don't kill each other.
I believe the United States leads the pack of arms manufacturers and sellers, right?
Aren't we about ahead of that list?
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
The light of the body is the eye.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, you know, I guess what I love about that song is you can, or I can anyway, and I think a lot of people can, look into a person's eyes and literally look into their soul.
I've heard that.
Well, it seems true.
Some people, they just seem to seem evil, and others, they just seem to have a better personality.
Yeah, and I can feel it.
Like, two seconds being in a person's presence, I know... Well, anyway.
I read Deuteronomy Chapter 28, and if you look around and see what's happening in this country, I think that has something to do with what is happening in this country and what could happen as far as when it's going to happen.
I'm not sure.
End days, sir?
I beg your pardon?
End days?
Yeah, I've heard of that.
Now, regarding the one caller, and I don't know what to make of the caller, but as far as what he said about Yellowstone National Park and hell, I didn't quite get all that.
What did he say about Yellowstone National Park and hell?
That there was some hell down below.
Well, there is a sort of hell down below it, possibly.
There's magma moving around, and if you get mixed up with magma, you'll think you're in hell.
Well, that makes sense to me, because the Bible ...that the direction of hell is below us, it's under our feet.
And there was one preacher that I heard that preached either a message or a series of messages on volcanoes being air vents of hell.
Ha ha, being air vents of hell, huh?
Well, I mean, look... Well, they kind of bring hell, don't they?
Hey, listen to that one recording that you have that you play over and over again.
Well, I haven't played it in a very long time, actually.
It makes sense to me.
Uh, that there's really hell down there?
Well, I don't know.
I'll tell you this.
This recording is backed up by a... I'm trying to remember, I believe... Yes, it was Reuters News.
Reuters News carried the story.
A good, legitimate news service carried the story.
And it was about a hole drilled in Siberia.
Now, there are those who say this is contemporary urban legend and A long time ago I received what I consider to be an authentic recording.
They drilled down miles into the earth.
The story on Reuters said that they lowered microphones, they were hearing noises, they lowered microphones into this very, very, very deep hole that they created in the ground.
And then heard what you're about to hear and when they did they, well you can imagine, Packed up that whole and they took, actually I think they just took off running and gave up the project.
uh... that's the story anyway such as it is and these are the sounds
can you imagine lowering a microphone and hearing this
and Thank you.
That's the original recording.
That's horrible stuff.
I mean, it's hard to even imagine.
It's easier to say, haha, that's an urban legend or something.
But that was forwarded to me by a good source a long time ago.
A lot of times when we did this, we'd put up the Reuters story for you, but we'll not do that this time.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hi.
Art?
Yes.
Hey, this is Tom from Springfield, Oregon.
Hey, Tom.
Um, first of all, I've been listening to you for quite a long time, and really, really enjoy your show.
It's awesome.
Thank you.
But I wanted to say, you know, I was raised a Christian and everything, and I think us as humans are arrogant to believe that we have any effect on this planet whatsoever.
I'm sure this planet has turned over and over and over so many times uh... without uh... even being here
and at the same time i i i also say that uh...
uh... who i i believe that were care takers of the planet and that we should
take care of it but i don't think
that uh...
there is a very many christians have the view that everything here is for our
use That God put everything here for our use.
Don't worry about it.
There'll be plenty of oil.
Don't worry about it.
There'll be plenty of species of this and that.
I don't believe that.
I believe that we need to take care of our resources and stuff like that.
But, you know, as far as this global warming and stuff, I don't really believe that it's real.
Well, I believe that maybe there's something happening, that there's changes and stuff, but I don't believe that we're affecting it.
I believe that this is the Earth's natural...
I mean, look through... Wait a minute, wait a minute.
The Earth does have natural changes.
Yeah.
But, I mean, clearly, if you were to look down on the Earth from space, which they do with satellites, and you see all the lights on at night, you know the Earth is damn well very inhabited.
I mean, very inhabited.
Yes.
And for us not to have an effect seems to me to be impossible.
Well, yeah, maybe a small effect, but I don't think that we're having a big effect like the big global warming thing.
I mean, think how long this planet was here before we showed up, and I'm sure there was global warming happening then through natural changes of the Earth, and for us, you know, What would it take for you, sir?
I mean, if you were to look down and the water was halfway up to your knee, would you say, um, well, gee, maybe I was wrong.
I mean, what would it take?
Uh, you know, I think it's probably, um, you know, I know, I mean, you believe in God, right?
I do.
Okay.
And I'm sure that you've read the Bible and you've read Revelation, and it tells you how things are going to come to pass and everything.
Maybe we have a small part in that, but also I think that this is the natural path of things according to the Bible.
Okay, well, I've got it.
End times.
Well, maybe.
I believe an awful lot in this silly free will thing, you know, that man does have free will and collectively we can begin to change our minds about something if we're presented with enough evidence and that we might avert what otherwise might be our last days.
How about that?
International Line, you're on the air.
Hello?
Hello?
Yes, sir.
Yeah, you had a gentleman earlier in the program refer to The year 2012?
April?
Y'all?
There are major changes coming.
Around that time, the Bible says... Is that the Bible, or is that the Mayan calendar?
The Bible says that nobody knows the date at which the Earth will end.
Well, okay, there you are then.
A second coming will happen.
Up to this point, it has been revealed.
Go to chapters in the New Testament, Matthew, Mark.
Okay.
Well, you don't have to quote all that.
It does say that no man shall know, so there's your point.
No man shall know.
So it's not 2012.
The Bible doesn't say that.
The Bible says no one's going to know.
However, if you look around the world at you right now and everything that's going on, there can be a knowing.
Believe me, there can be a knowing.
Just do a little research into what's going on and see if it doesn't produce a knowing in you.
First time caller on the line, you're on the air.
Hi.
Hi, Art.
Yes.
It's an honor to be on the show.
Glad to have you.
I wanted to ask you about something you mentioned probably two or three weeks ago.
I don't remember what show it was on, but you had mentioned a study done a few years ago where people, I think, were under hypnosis, given quarters to hold their hands.
And they were given the suggestion that the quarters were red hot and they actually received burn marks.
Oh, that's right.
Yes.
Oh, yes.
And after the show, I went home and I googled it every way I could think of and I could not find anything on it.
I was hoping maybe you could give me some background on that.
I can tell you that hypnotists can clearly make people think they're experiencing that.
And I know that our brains are capable of directing things like marks on our body and other physical manifestations because of the strength of what the brain is concentrating on.
So, I mean, all of that is true.
What right words to insert in Google to get the needed result?
I can't help you with it all.
I definitely agree with you.
I was just hoping to have something to tell people.
No, look, there it is.
It really happened.
There are many, many more examples, sir, of people that have had, for example, religious claimed phenomena.
You know, marks on the body that originate with some faith, belief, even bleeding.
I mean, all of these things have happened.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air.
Hi.
Hello?
Hello?
Yes, sir.
How are you doing this evening, Mr. Bell?
All right.
I'm doing all right.
I've just had a couple of comments, really.
A couple things have been on my mind lately.
Far away.
Oh, you keep hearing a lot in the media about global warming, it's the end of the world, that sort of thing.
Well, I don't know how many are saying it's the end of the world.
Some are saying it will certainly be a different world.
Well, you know, the anticipation, the feeling that something's going to happen.
Yes.
Well, I think somebody told me that the Mayan calendar ends in 2012.
Something like that, yeah.
Well, my calendar ends in December of this year.
That'll be it then.
For you.
I mean, everybody else who's got a longer calendar, they'll go on.
on the field by the recall over a go but anyway um...
well i do love couple callers ago i'm a bit of a lap or i'm not sure they're
saying that humans have no impact on uh... environment Yeah, that's what he said.
Minimal impact, anyway.
That's right.
Well, I'm sure that there was some sort of, some degree of global warming in the past without human interaction.
But, I mean, right now, at the rate we're burning hydrocarbons, you know, fossil fuels... Here's a real question.
If we're entering a cycle of warmer times, and then you throw on top of that Man's newly acquired emissions.
But then you've got something more.
First time caller line, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Good morning.
I'm actually calling from the small Piece of hell that the son of Satan called about.
Calling from there.
Yes.
Actually calling from hell?
No, Lubbock, Texas.
And I do believe that my future mother-in-law is an alien.
All right.
Because she is really weird.
So you're intentionally involving yourself with one?
Yes, sir.
Um, me and my girlfriend just recently got y'all's String Link membership and she is big into Bigfoot and UFOs and I downloaded the David Key at their interview for her and I was wondering if there's anything that you could recommend that would be better than that for UFOs and Area 51 and anything better than the Robert Morgan interview The Bigfoot Hunter interview, I believe.
I think that the Bugs interview was tops.
I mean, it doesn't get any better than that.
You've heard the Bugs?
I heard the Bugs, and I wanted to know if that was true.
So do I. My impression, sir, from having talked to Bugs was, yeah, you bet it was true.
Absolutely true.
And if I'd been that man, I would have made the same final choice at the behest, you recall, of his wife.
She said, no you don't, buddy.
You know, I can see what trouble lies ahead, so no you don't.
And it's like you have to respect that.
Wildcard Line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hi.
Am I on the air?
Well, that's the best guess.
You have no idea what a fantastic honor this is.
I've been listening to you since the early 90s and calling from Ottawa.
Did you know that you are blacked out in Ottawa?
No.
Yeah.
What do you mean blacked out?
There used to be a station playing the show, but it was Taken off the air, and as far as I know... Oh yeah, those things do happen.
Well, it's an interesting story, because I actually have worked in radio in this town for a long time, and the story that came to me, I worked for the company that had the same station that played it, and according to an unnamed executive, there was a broadcast on, and a politician's wife had insomnia and stayed up and listened to it, and it happened to be a certain Art Bell, Broadcasting an interview with a witch by the name of Vandal.
Who?
Vandal?
No.
You've never... I've interviewed witches, but no one with that name.
Oh, I thought that was the name.
But it was a witch interview, and you were doing it, and it so shocked this person that apparently the husband went...
To the CRTC, the Canadian Radio-Television Commission, and blacked it out of this nation's capital.
Oh my God!
Yes.
Could it be true?
It is.
But I've been reading... Closer and closer, I am censored in a major Canadian city.
It's shocking.
Tell me it ain't true.
I'm sorry.
And I'm such a fan, I have to go out at night and walk the dog and listen to it on Northern American stations in order to be able to hear you.
Well, eventually we will prevail.
I hope.
But my reason for calling is I've been trying to get something through to you for years, all these years.
This is the first time I've ever gotten through.
And do you know a comedy troupe from San Francisco by the name of Firesign Theater?
Well, of course.
Of course you do.
Do you know their release, Everything You Know Is Wrong?
Yes.
From 1974.
All right.
Have you heard that?
I've heard of it, yeah.
Well, you should listen to it again because it predicts you.
It's about a lone broadcaster working out of the desert, who is operating his studio by himself, trying to turn the world on to the reality of paranormal phenomena.
Including UFOs, native wisdom... And what year was this?
1974.
And there's a Yuri Geller-type character, and it ends... Alright, I'm gonna have to hear it.
Can you send me... I can.
I would love and be honored to send it to you.
Alright.
Did you get my email address?
Um, yes.
I've sent it to you before, in fact.
Alright, well then, rock on.
Get it to me.
It predicts me, huh?
It predicts me.
Well, if it did it on that date, that indeed would have been a prediction.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hey, this is Justin in Tulsa.
Yes, sir.
Thanks for taking my call.
Sure.
I just want to tell you how I believed about the global warming and the earth effects.
I believe our fate is the sun.
I believe all the pollution and all the countries in South America who aren't really regulated with all their pollution and all that stuff, and our country and the way we pollute.
I just feel that the ozone is, of course, it's all gone and they don't want to let us know about it.
I mean, it's going to be gone totally.
Well, it certainly is going.
And I believe all it's going to take is one of those flares to come off the sun and slam into us or get real close to us.
And then that's it.
Well, you know, I don't know if that's it, but it could certainly be almost it.
It could be really bad.
Yeah.
And I have no idea how all the extraterrestrials fit into this, but if you ask my wife, she says she married one about six years ago.
Well, did she?
No.
No, I'm afraid not.
I don't know what to say about my mom and dad and all those people.
I think they might be, but no, I'm sure I'm not.
Well, what does she think you are?
Oh, just like the other guy said he was talking about.
I'm just plain weird.
She thinks I listen to your show.
I'm just plain weird.
Yeah, I guess some who listen are a little strange.
But I enjoy the show and you guys do a great job.
I appreciate the comments, thank you.
Well, what we try and do on this program is stuff that other people won't do.
Well, that's why we get in trouble.
You know, like with the Canadian station or whatever it was and then there was something else about some political comment and probably got us taken off somewhere else.
You know, but that's Our job, our job is to walk on the edge, and when you walk on the edge, you're gonna tick people off every now and then.
That's all there is to it.
You get them angry.
That's life.
Doesn't mean we yank back from the edge.
We will continue to cover whatever needs or we feel needs to be covered, you know, without regard to the consequences.
Most of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello, Trey.
Hi.
It's been a long time listening to you.
It's an honor to finally get to speak with you.
Glad you're here, sir.
Where are you?
I'm in Salt Lake City.
Okay.
Back when I first started listening to you, you were complaining about the endless rain on the drive in your Geo Metro to K-Don to do your show.
That's right.
At the time, you mentioned that that's no way to run a desert.
That's right.
I believe it was the last solar minimum we had when the rains come.
And they seem to go in cycles like this all the time.
Well, I've long correlated solar activity, in my mind, with earthquake activity.
But that's just been me.
I've kind of watched that.
So we all come up with our little favorites.
Yeah, there's good evidence for that.
In fact, there's a book done by a fellow called Manic Sun.
And, uh, he, um, uses the evidence from SOHO satellite, which a lot of scientists ignore today, but, uh, strong evidence for it controlling our weather.
Oh, yeah.
You know, the sun being the, mostly the cosmic radiation.
Well, it doesn't make sense.
After all, the sun is the major, um, radiation we receive on Earth.
Period.
Billions of kilowatts every day.
If it wasn't for the sun, we'd have no heat at all.
Yeah.
Let alone global warming.
Which, by the way, It's a fact global warming exists because only 10,000 years ago this whole planet was covered with ice.
We had an ice age.
So we've been warming up ever since.
It's taken a long time and another couple thousand years this place might be in the Garden of Eden.
It might be warm enough to even be that.
Well it might or it might be in runaway Climate change.
And that would be my vote.
I think that we're getting close to, and I realize that I buy into some of the, you know, fringier theories, although it's not as fringe as it was, I buy into this feedback thing.
To me it makes sense.
That it feeds upon itself.
Come on, think about it.
If the top, what, 8th, 7th, 6th of the world is ice, whatever it is, It reflects, it's white, it reflects the heat from the sun, and therefore it is not absorbed.
When that ice begins a melting cycle, that cycle has to feed, has to feed on itself.
As the ice becomes no longer white and becomes water, it's dark, it then absorbs heat.
So you've got a lot more heat going into the earth, going into the water, and remember the water is the major A conduit for carrying these different temperature currents about the globe, right?
Anyway, it feeds on itself.
It's a feedback cycle.
It's what we were talking about with Dr. Spencer.
So, the more it happens, the more it happens.
The more ice melts, the more heat can be absorbed, and the least amount of heat or a lesser amount of heat will be reflected.
Duh!
International Line, you're on the air.
Hello.
Having you on the line is like, geez, what do I want to talk about with the New World Order?
I definitely agree, though, that the humans' role in crushing the Earth, we're definitely playing a role in raping the land.
Like, come on, how could we not?
But my biggest beef, I guess, in life, really, in everything, in all of my existence, seems to be this Christian nation that I'm stuck in.
And just, my comment is, like, the book is dead.
Hopefully the next time we come around, we can lose all the religious aspects of it and focus a little more on the land.
What do you think would happen in our world?
What different kind of world we would have, sir, if we had no religion?
Paradise!
Paradise, for starters!
Little things like respecting a tree, maybe not eating meat.
People are eating meat four or five times a week.
I just think so much comes with it.
It's here for us.
It's normal to eat meat.
No, it's not.
Well, I mean... It's really not.
Well, there's many different things.
It's very unhealthy.
Is it organic meat that you're eating?
You're talking about an inch thick New York steak here.
You know, just delicious.
Absolutely on the grill.
I mean, how can you not?
I've been a meat eater for 24 years, so I've definitely...
I like it.
I've ate, like, I'm not throwing stones now, but it's just a matter of opening it up.
Charcoal broiled New York steak.
I mean, the aroma just wafting up from that.
Have you ever had a veggie patty?
Uh, never.
Have you ever tried soy?
Probably never.
Yeah, soy, I've had soy, and it's, um, I don't know, at best gritty and kind of, mmm.
Oh, then you haven't had somebody cook it up right for you?
Well, I guess.
Yeah, well, anyway, I just, a lot of people, you know, calling him with their Christian aspect, and it just seems, like when I look around, so much of what is going on now seems to be, definitely has a religious aspect to it.
Well, I mean, do you really believe that it's unchristian, you know, to eat me?
Well, that's just starters.
That's going, another thing is, like, You could say, like, to gay rights, like, gays don't have the right to be married.
Well, what's the marriage definition of Christianity?
What, there wasn't marriage before that?
Like, there's many different things that come with it.
I mean, we're a Christian nation, period.
You can see the influence all over the place, and if you travel outside the U.S., you can really see it.
I bet, yeah.
I was stuck in a Catholic household for many, many years, so I've I've had that side of it and seen so much of it that by the time I came out I was like, get me the farthest thing away from it right now, and I'm working towards that someday.
day hopefully i'll just be out in a mountain tending my crops.
I almost hit the button.
Alright, thanks for calling out, take care.
Well, you know, I guess it's fair to say that religions have contributed more to wars than
anything else.
More of the wars have been about, it seems like, religion, differences in basic faith and ideology.
Yeah.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good morning.
Hi, Art, University of Washington Chemistry Midterm had a bonus question.
They said, is hell exothermic, giving off heat, or endothermic, absorbing heat?
Yeah, this comes straight off the internet, sir.
I've read it.
Oh, you read that?
Yes.
Oh my God.
It's urban legend, I think.
Is that an urban legend?
And so when this guy sleeps with his girlfriend, he finds that hell really did freeze over?
Yeah, I appreciate it.
Thank you.
It's getting difficult, isn't it, on the internet to separate urban legend from fact?
Very difficult.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hello.
Hello.
Hi.
Is it me?
Well, it sounds like you, but we can't know for sure.
It's someone else.
Well, you could be possessed.
Drudge called you the beloved Art Bale.
Drudge called me the beloved?
Drudge called you the beloved Art Bale.
When did he do that?
Early in January.
Wow.
And that you are.
I owe you my life.
Well, I would rather be, uh, the beloved Art Bell than a legend.
That's what everybody's... You're no legend, no.
Thank you.
I owe you my life.
Eleven years ago, I'm a retired university professor.
Eleven years ago, I went blind, suddenly, in the Houston airport.
Thank God I was with a relative who got me home.
I'm in the Rio Grande Valley.
You suddenly went blind?
I had glaucoma, but it, it, boom, like that.
I knew I had glaucoma, of course.
Well, she got me home, and that night I was considering suicide.
I thought glaucoma was a slowly emerging... It was.
I had it creeping through for five or six years.
And it just, like, caught up with you one night?
Well, and then my sight was getting worse and worse and dimmer, but I could still read a little.
I could still drive a little.
Boom.
It went.
Boom.
I got home that night.
I was considering suicide.
And for some reason, I reached out and turned on the radio in the dark.
And this voice came on.
It was you.
I didn't know your program at all.
And the voice said, Oh, I wouldn't do that.
Hmm.
It just happened to be you talking.
Well, that was either a miracle or it was the thousand monkeys syndrome.
I just said that and maybe you wanted to hear it.
And so you decided not to off yourself.
That's good.
You know, maybe it was your brain just picking my words out and applying them to your pending situation.
First time caller line, you're on the air.
Hello.
How are you, Art?
Okay.
Hey, it's nice to talk to you.
Good to have you.
What's up?
Well, I really don't have a lot of time.
I can see we're running out of time, so I can't really get into my story, but... Well, you can give me a capsule version.
Well, I walked into a 1850 to 1890 house.
The fire department was giving a fundraiser.
Yes, sir.
Walkin' through and takin' some pictures of my daughter and takin' pictures of the house, because it was really nice.
And, um, I, uh, when I brought him home and downloaded it on my computer, um, I found some pretty astonishing things.
And, uh, they're really nice.
And I'll try to send them to you guys later.
More like what?
Um, I took a picture there.
They had a, uh, cross that was, that this, um, lady that owned the house, um, had made this cross.
Out of flowers for her husband when he passed away.
He was a doctor.
And so I took a picture of it.
And?
And when it came up on the screen, when I downloaded it, in each corner in the upper right, upper left, bottom left, bottom right of the cross, there were different things.
In the bottom right, there was like a anchor, a big ship anchor.
Yes.
And on the left side, it looked like a girl with flowers in her hand, bowing down, kind of sulking.
Now, do you think that really was, or do you think it was your brain, uh, finding?
No, I'm serious.
Finding form in our brain wants to make sense out of things.
Whether it's a cloud pattern or whatever it is, we want to make sense out of it.
So sometimes we can see things.
Or was it clearly that?
It was clearly that.
Very distinct.
Very.
There's no looking and staring and trying to make something out of it.
It was very distinct.
In the upper right, or upper left, there's some kind of animal.
And I think in the upper right, there was like a face.
They're very clear.
Tomorrow night's guest is going to talk about death.
He's going to talk about NDEs, and it's a doctor.
It's a doctor, so... There was a doctor, just not to cut you off, but the husband that had passed away, that had this house built, was a doctor.