Is It Getting Hot in Here?

Or is that only in Calgary? :-)

Here's kind of what I was talking about in my first post about struggling to determine who to believe:

Global warming skeptics have regularly put forth the theory the comparative warmth of cities via the "urban heat island effect" -- whereby metropolitan areas register considerably higher temperatures than their surroundings -- has skewed the global temperature record. For instance, at JunkScience.com, a website founded by Steven Milloy, who has claimed that global warming represents "flawed science," a September 12, 2004, article suggested that the urban heat island effect "create[s] the illusion of 'global warming.'

Meanwhile, NASA says...

A NASA official said researchers have calculated that 2005 produced the highest annual average surface temperature worldwide since they began keeping records in the late 1800s.

James Hansen, of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said they can't be 100 percent certain of last year's record warmth because they had to estimate temperatures at the Arctic. However, Hansen said he's "reasonably confident" that last year was the warmest year.
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Earth is now the warmest it's been in 10,000 years.

Ah. So who do you believe?

I think my strategy with this one is to err on the side of caution. If I'm wrong that Global warming is real, what's the worst that could happen? I'd look like an idiot. Big deal. Not the first or last time. In fact, if I stopped doing it, I think I'd miss it in a weird kind of way...