By the way, the original 2001 paper on climate change referred to in the article...
...Can be found here. The quote from the Post article:
Although controversy surrounds research on global warming, a panel of the National Academy of Sciences concluded in June 2001 that it is a real problem caused at least in part by man-made pollution building up in the atmosphere and trapping heat like a blanket. At present rates, the trend could well have a "serious adverse" impact on the climate by the end of the century, the panel said.
If one bothers to read past the summary, or read it at all, you find that scientists are far from any kind of complete understanding of how the climate works, or whether or not human activities are a major climate driver, and their primary recommendations are a LOT more research ($$$).
Note Figure 1, and this excerpt from Page 25:
THE EFFECT OF HUMAN ACTIVITIES
Because of the large and still uncertain level of natural variability inherent in the climate record and the uncertainties
in the time histories of the various forcing agents (and particularly aerosols), a causal linkage between the buildup
of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the observed climate changes during the 20th century cannot be unequivocally established. The fact that the magnitude of the observed warming is large in comparison to natural variability as simulated in climate models is suggestive of such a linkage, but it does not constitute proof of one because the model simulations could be deficient in natural variability on the decadal to century time scale. The warming that has been estimated to have occurred in response to the buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is somewhat greater than the observed warming.
