CONCLUSIONS. To summarize, claims of link- ages between global warming and hurricane impacts are premature for three reasons. First, no connec- tion has been established between greenhouse gas emissions and the observed behavior of hurricanes (Houghton et al. 2001; Walsh 2004). Emanuel (2005) is suggestive of such a connection, but is by no means definitive. In the future, such a connection may be established [e.g., in the case of the observations of Emanuel (2005) or the projections of Knutson and Tuleya (2004)] or made in the context of other metrics of tropical cyclone intensity and duration that remain to be closely examined. Second, the peer-reviewed literature reflects that a scientific consensus exists that any future changes in hur- ricane intensities will likely be small in the context of observed variability (Knutson and Tuleya 2004; Henderson-Sellers et al. 1998), while the scientific problem of tropical cyclogenesis is so far from being solved that little can be said about possible changes in frequency. And third, under the assumptions of the IPCC, expected future damages to society of its projected changes in the behavior of hurricanes are dwarfed by the influence of its own projections of growing wealth and population (Pielke et al. 2000). While future research or experience may yet over- turn these conclusions, the state of the peer-reviewed knowledge today is such that there are good reasons to expect that any conclusive connection between global warming and hurricanes or their impacts will not be made in the near term. Yet, claims of such connections persist (cf. Epstein and McCarthy 2004; Eilperin 2005), particularly in support of a political agenda focused on greenhouse gas emissions reduction (e.g., Harvard Medical School 2004). But a great irony here is that invok- ing the modulation of future hurricanes to justify energy policies to mitigate climate change may prove counterproductive. Not only does this provide a great opening for criticism of the underlying scientific reasoning, it leads to advocacy of policies that simply will not be effective with respect to addressing future hurricane impacts. There are much, much better ways to deal with the threat of hurricanes than with energy policies (e.g., Pielke and Pielke 1997). There are also much, much better ways to justify climate mitigation policies than with hurricanes (e.g., Rayner 2004).
So if I'm wrong, then the paper you posted is wrong? So the paper is a few years old, so what. If the current thought has changed post one that shows that.
