My analysis breaks down the arguments into three camps.
1. We don't know if there is "on-going" global warming now or not. Direct global-wide atmospheric temperature measurement is not long term enough to confirm which way the climate is trending. In the life of the planet, the calibrated mercury thermometer has been around an insignificant amount of time (read that 100+ years versus multiple 1,000's of years). Scientists are using such things as tree rings and sediment to exstrapolate temperatures before the invention of the thermometer and it worldwide application. Computer models using this "short-term" data have been inconsistent, read that wrong in predicting future temperatures.
2. There is global warming and it is the normal progression our climate. Using the ice age compared to today's climate as the benchmark, that makes sense, or we would StILL be in an ice age. In this scenario, man did not and does not have impact on the climate. It's going to go where's it's going to go, we are just along for the ride.
3. There is global warming and it is due to human intervention, i.e. industrial age, alteration of vegetation (forests and farming). In this scenario, the notion is that man is causing the problem and therefore man can reverse the problem. Summary of this position, "Freeze or fry, the problem is always industrial capitalism, and the solution is always international socialism."
I'm in camp number 1 with a leaning toward number 2.
Note: The typical global warming supporter, claims scientists are in agreement. They are lying. First of all, all scientists are not created equal. The ONLY scientist's opinions that count about global warming are actual climatologists of which there aren't many and they aren't in agreement. Here's the definition of a climatologists so you can be educated.
Climatology is the study of climate, or past weather, and is a branch of the atmospheric sciences. In contrast to meteorology, which studies short term weather systems lasting up to a few weeks, climatology studies the frequency with which these weather systems occurred in the past. It studies the periodicity of weather events over years to millennia, as well as changes in long-term average weather patterns, in relation to atmospheric conditions. Climatologists, those who practice climatology, study both the nature of climates - local, regional or global - and the natural or human-induced factors that cause climates to change. Climatology considers the past and can help predict future climate change.
Phenomena of climatological interest include the atmospheric boundary layer, circulation patterns, heat transfer (radiative, convective and latent), interactions between the atmosphere and the oceans and land surface (particularly vegetation, land use and topography), and the chemical and physical composition of the atmosphere. Related disciplines include chemistry, ecology, geology, geophysics, glaciology, hydrology, oceanography, and volcanology.
Climatology is approached in a variety of ways. Paleoclimatology seeks to reconstruct past climates by examining records such as ice cores and tree rings (dendroclimatology). The study of contemporary climates incorporates meteorological data accumulated over many years, such as records of rainfall, temperature and atmospheric composition. Knowledge of the atmosphere and its dynamics is also embodied in models, either statistical or mathematical, which help by integrating different observations and testing how they fit together. Modeling is used for understanding past, present and potential future climates.
Climate research is made difficult by the large scale, long time periods, and complex processes which govern climate. It is generally accepted that climate is governed by differential equations based on physical laws, but what, exactly, are these equations, and what can be concluded from them, is still subject to debate. Climate is sometimes modeled as a stochastic process but this is generally accepted as an approximation to processes that are otherwise too complicated to analyze.
As to Al Gore's alleged "consensus of scientists" about global warming, this can only come from the person who invented the internet. There is no such thing as consensus in science, it is either proven or it is not. Consensus applies to politics, not science!!!!!!!!!