“The Day After Tomorrow,” a summer movie dramatizing the catastrophic effects of global warming, may have finally made its way into Moscow theaters. The clue, of course, is Russia’s recent ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, which calls for a significant reduction in global carbon dioxide production.

The problem the treaty proposes to solve is the phenomenon known as the greenhouse effect, or global warming. The theory goes something like this: An increased concentration of carbon dioxide causes the atmosphere to trap heat and turn the Earth into a huge greenhouse; eventually, this heat will melt the ice caps, raising ocean levels and causing, among other things, mass flooding, severe weather, and, if Hollywood is to be believed, a new ice age that will transform the world into a giant snowball.

Aside from its potential for an increased worldwide interest in ice hockey, the scenario I have described is not an inviting one (unless you really, really like hockey). Fortunately, for those of us who are poor ice skaters, the warnings about the coming catastrophe of global warming contain at least as much drama as a Hollywood production.

Before I explain why, let us journey back in time to the late 1980s. In those days, I remember sitting in school watching videos about the impending doom of acid rain and ozone depletion. My classmates and I learned, to our horror and at the taxpayers’ expense, that human pollution would kill all of the fish in the lakes and would eventually create such a void in the southern ozone layer that kangaroos would begin to spontaneously combust.

Returning again to the present, my question is: “What ever happened to the acid rain and ozone problems?” The last time I checked, fish are still swimming happily, and, from personal investigation in Australia, I can say that kangaroos remain combustion-free. Upon further investigation, I have discovered that I was duped in grade school. For example, a $600 million study found in 1990 that the acid rain problem was essentially a hoax based on little scientific data and less scientific reasoning. In 2005, we no longer hear about the “dangers” of acid rain.

But we do hear about the “dangers” of global warming. In fact, a U.N. diplomat once claimed that “global warming is the primary risk to the human future.” Contrary to these dire warnings, however, the case for global warming is highly suspect. Ironically, as recently as the 1970s, the alarm was being sounded about the dangers of global cooling. Many of those who warned of global cooling 30 years ago are the same who warn of global warming today, a fact that should be cause for some wariness of their claims. Yet the media, it seems, is no more concerned about history than it is about sound science.

It is not reported in the media that 18,000 scientists have signed a petition stating that they see no compelling scientific evidence for global warming. Nor is it mentioned that the Earth has natural warming and cooling cycles, or even considered that higher global temperatures could actually be beneficial. Scientists have noted that an average increase in temperature of a few degrees could boost global agricultural output tremendously. The complete list of information contradicting the global warming scare is much too long to list here.

That global warming is actually occurring is highly disputed. That it is caused by humans is even more uncertain. That it constitutes a real threat to mankind is essentially a guess at this stage. That the United States should sign an economically damaging treaty in order to combat this “threat” should be easily dismissed.

With Social Security, much of the public is unmoved by simple financial figures and unhurried about a problem 40 years distant. Ironically, many uncritically accept global warming, a theory predicting consequences hundreds of years into the future based on barely understood data, as plausible and a cause for immediate action.

Rather than blindly setting out to slay a mythical dragon, it is necessary to first establish whether that dragon exists, then whether it constitutes an actual threat. It is time for the world to take a good hard look at the “science” behind global warming.