Climate Craziness of the Week: Naomi Oreskes says climate change will kill your pets

oreskesAfter reading the transcript of her radio interview, I think she’s finally had her “jumped the shark” moment. From Andrew Bolt’s report in Australia, Oreskes sounds even more off the rails than the always wrong doomer Paul Ehrlich. Bolt writes:

Just how crazy are the world’s leading global warming alarmists? Tony Thomas investigates the strange case of Naomi Oreskes, and how the ABC’s Robyn “100 metres” Williams didn’t even blink an eye:

Global warming is going to “wipe out” every Australian man, woman and child, according to Naomi Oreskes, the much-quoted Professor of the History of Science at Harvard. Revered by catastropharians the world over, she was a guest on a recent edition of Robyn Williams’ Science Show on Radio National…

The glum forecast is in her latest book, The Collapse of Western Civilisation (co-author Erik Conway)…

What Oreskes predicts is that some people in northern inland regions of Europe, Asia and North America, plus some mountain people in South America, will survive the killer warming. These lucky ones are able to “regroup and rebuild. The human populations of Australia and Africa, of course, were wiped out,” she says, writing from a viewpoint some 400 years into the future…

But Oreskes forecasts something much worse than the death by climate for every Australian human.  She prophesises the climate deaths of puppies and kittens…

“The loss of pet cats and dogs garnered particular attention among wealthy Westerners, but what was anomalous in 2023 soon became the new normal. A shadow of ignorance and denial had fallen over people who considered themselves children of the Enlightenment.”…

Radio National’s Williams was delighted with Oreskes’ pet-panic strategy. He chimed in,

“Yes, not only because it’s an animal but it’s local. You see, one criticism of the scientists is they’re always talking about global things…And so if you are looking at your village, your animals, your fields, your park, your kids, and the scientists are talking about a small world that you know, than it makes a greater impact, doesn’t it…”

Oreskes starts The Science Show by reading from her book. Be afraid:

“By 2040, heatwaves and droughts were the norm… In wealthy countries, the most hurricane- and tornado-prone regions were gradually but steadily depopulated… Then, in the northern hemisphere summer of 2041, unprecedented heatwaves scorched the planet, destroying food crops around the globe. Panic ensued, with food riots in virtually every major city. Mass migration of undernourished and dehydrated individuals, coupled with explosive increases in insect populations, led to widespread outbreaks of typhus, cholera, dengue fever, yellow fever, and viral and retroviral agents never seen before… The European Union announced similar plans for voluntary northward relocation of eligible citizens from its southernmost regions to Scandinavia and the United Kingdom…”

The ever-credulous Williams, instead of asking Oreskes, “Mmm, you’re smoking something good?” merely observed that all of the above is “fairly shocking”…

Read more here

Get notified when a new post is published.
Subscribe today!
0 0 votes
Article Rating
187 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
SAMURAI
September 3, 2014 8:16 am

Naomi has an incredible gift to speak in a nasally whiney voice spoken in the key of F# screeching cat….
Computer models show that Naomi’s voice, over time and with sufficient decibel forcing, can actually cause dogs and perhaps even certain breeds of long-haired cats to spontaneously combust….

Betapug
September 3, 2014 8:31 am

The new movie of Oreskes “Merchants of Doubt” will be released internationally by Sony Pictures this fall.
From eBay founder Jeff Skoll’s social activist Participant Media, producers of “An Inconvenient Truth” (as well a host of more subtle framing and messaging films) it will,
“…lift(s) the curtain on a secretive group of highly charismatic, silver-tongued pundits-for-hire who present themselves in the media as scientific authorities – yet have the contrary aim of spreading maximum confusion about well-studied public threats ranging from toxic chemicals to pharmaceuticals to climate change.”
http://www.participantmedia.com/2014/08/sony-pictures-classics-acquires-worldwide-rights-merchants-doubt/
Big Lies with Big Bucks can get results.

Eric
Reply to  Betapug
September 3, 2014 8:43 am

Will the movie rehash this scene from Ghostbusters?
Dr. Peter Venkman: This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.
Mayor: What do you mean, “biblical”?
Dr Ray Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly.
Dr Ray Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling!
Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes…
Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave!
Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together… mass hysteria!
Mayor: All right, all right! I get the point!

Betapug
Reply to  Eric
September 3, 2014 2:10 pm

I want to see who plays “silver- tongued- pundit-for-hire”, Anthony Watts.

HGW xx/7
September 3, 2014 8:35 am

A list? Let’s!
*She doesn’t hold a science degree.
*She speaks down to others in a condescending tone dripping with arrogance.
*She is welcomed on national radio programs and her words go unquestioned.
*She fictionally writes from the distant future about events she says will happen in the nearer future. (This has become a popular refuge of alarmists as of late, no?)
Yes, this someone the environmentalists hold in high regard. This is the type of “authority” whom we are unworthy to debate or question. This is the class of vile scum who is happily granted a TED talk.
This is the enemy.

Jeff-FL
Reply to  HGW xx/7
September 3, 2014 10:35 am

‘*She doesn’t hold a science degree.’
According to her Wikipedia bio she does hold a B.Sc. degree from Imperial College, London in … wait for it … Mining Geology. 🙂

Bruce Cobb
September 3, 2014 8:36 am

[snip -over the top -uncalled for -mod]

DirkH
Reply to  Bruce Cobb
September 3, 2014 10:44 am

[snip -over the top -uncalled for -mod]

DirkH
Reply to  DirkH
September 3, 2014 10:49 am

[snip -over the top -uncalled for -mod]

dipchip
September 3, 2014 8:37 am

[snip -over the top -uncalled for -mod]

Steve Oregon
September 3, 2014 8:38 am

The crazies must be crushed. Figuratively speaking of course.
Why can’t this help?
CO2 cools atmosphere
from: http://www.naturalnews.com/040448_solar_radiation_global_warming_debunked.html
How does it relate to this
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/03/22/whole-lotta-watts-added-to-the-atmosphere/
http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Martin_Mlynczak
In Oregon propaganda pandemonium is getting near criminal.
Look at this………
http://www.ktvz.com/news/study-climate-change-warming-northwest/27838688
Study: Climate change warming Northwest
Researchers say rate of human-caused change increasing
CORVALLIS, Ore. –
A new study co authored by an Oregon State University researcher says the annual mean temperature in the Pacific Northwest has warmed by about 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit since the early 20th century – a gradual warming trend that has been accelerating over the past 3-4 decades and is attributed to human causes.
The study is one of the first to isolate the role of greenhouse gases associated with regional warming, the authors say. It was published in a recent issue of the Journal of Climate, a publication of the American Meteorological Society.
“Just a 1.3-degree increase has lengthened the ‘freeze-free’ season by 2-3 weeks and is equivalent to moving the snowline 600 feet up the mountain,” Mote added. “At the rate the temperature is increasing, the next 1.3-degree bump will happen much more quickly.”
“Climate is a bit like a symphony where different factors like El Niño, solar variability, volcanic eruptions and manmade greenhouse emissions all represent different instruments,” Abatzoglou said. “At regional scales like in the Northwest, years or decades can be dominated by natural climate variability, thereby muffling or compounding the tones of human-induced warming.
“Once you silence the influence of natural factors,” he said, “the signal of warming due to human causes is clear – and it is only getting louder.”
The researchers also explored but were unable to find any link between warming in the Northwest over the past century and solar variability.
A major concern, the authors say, is that the warming seems to be increasing.
“Climate is complex and you can get significant variations from year to year,” Mote said. “You have to step back and look at the big picture of what is happening over time. Clearly the Northwest, like much of the world, is experiencing a warming pattern that isn’t likely to change and, in fact, is accelerating.

Steve in SC
September 3, 2014 8:50 am

Bless her heart. That child should not be around any clocks. Time would stop.

September 3, 2014 9:03 am

” a professor of the history of science” – how do I get a sweet boondoggle gig like that?

Alan Robertson
Reply to  John The Cube
September 3, 2014 10:18 am

To be considered as the perfect candidate, one should:
1st: Honestly assess one’s reputation and circumstance, as being somewhat solitary among any number of likewise meretriciously mendacious college professors, spouting the party line, indistinguishable from the rest of the herd.
2nd: Desire to increase one’s standing in the world, from that of lowly harridan, to enriched demimonde.
3rd: Consider the elite money and power behind the scenes, which has promulgated this whole notion that mankind isthe problem of the world.
4th: Apply for the position at Harvard.

timspence10
September 3, 2014 9:06 am

That woman has some serious problems

Laurie
September 3, 2014 9:08 am

No . . . Just needs a “global replace” of “warming” with “time” . . . then it all makes sense.

September 3, 2014 9:08 am

I finally figured it out. Like many things the answer was fairly obvious from the get-go, which is probably why it took me so long. Liberals are conservatives that get stuck in puberty.

September 3, 2014 9:25 am

she does it because stupid people who follow her will buy her book.
Like AGore, AlSharpton, and JJackson, they are using fear and emotion in a hustle for money and fame. Naomi and her ilk are, on one hand, to be rejected in their words, and on the other pitied for being stupid.

September 3, 2014 9:53 am

There will be an interesting history lesson soon about how Academia squandered its reputation for excellence it buit over hundreds of years only to have institutions like Harvard made into laughing stocks by the lunatics it employs. I don’t mean lunatic in the figurative sense. This teacher (?!) has zero logical sense or understanding of how the world works. She seems incapable of simple observation and simple comparative skills. A child has more sense and most border collies I have met seem to be more skilled at observing the world around them.
The higher education bubble is crashing and it can’t happen soon enough. Time to end the waste and drag on every one else’s productivity. There are simply too many other pressing problems to maintain this legion of parasites.
rant off/

Laurie
Reply to  daviditron
September 3, 2014 10:33 am

JIM
September 3, 2014 10:08 am

Second try. All of the personal attacks really just demean the credibility of the posters and make ” Watts up with that ” look bad. Particularly the comments on Oreskes appearance. It really smacks of sexism too. How many of you pile on Monckton because he has graves disease and his eyes bulge? Maybe we should make fun of Anthony our host because he has hearing loss? This is a classic logical fallacy- ad hominem. Look it up. Shame on you. Some day all of us are going to get sick and die. If we are lucky we get to get old first. Naomi’s arguments are bad enough that we can dump on them- not how she looks.
the old scold

Alberta Slim
Reply to  JIM
September 3, 2014 10:27 am

Right you Jim………………

Alberta Slim
Reply to  Alberta Slim
September 3, 2014 10:28 am

Sorry… Right you are. Jim

NikFromNYC
Reply to  Anthony Watts
September 3, 2014 11:27 am

You conflate relevant repulsion towards an ugly scowl with sexism, allowing political correctness to reign free instead of be healthily scoffed at. Shaming your regulars is spineless cowardice based on fear of the very poseurs who have declared war on you and in all of us.

JIM
Reply to  Anthony Watts
September 3, 2014 11:28 am

Thank you Anthony. You run a first class blog!

JIM
Reply to  Anthony Watts
September 3, 2014 11:40 am

NikfromNYC it is not PC. To make an argument you don’t start by saying someone is ugly or stupid. You say their ideas are ugly or stupid.. There is a big and fundamental difference. If you demean someone’s argument because of their sex, “she is an ugly woman” that is sexism

Reply to  Anthony Watts
September 3, 2014 4:35 pm

I agree with Slim, Jim and Anthony.

n.n
September 3, 2014 10:33 am

So, anthropogenic climate change is planned abortion of pets, and children too? You do realize that a human life evolves from conception to natural, accidental, or premeditated death (e.g. elective abortion), right?

dp
September 3, 2014 10:39 am

Just how crazy are the world’s leading global warming alarmists?
I’m not a doctor but I know batshit crazy when I see it. Like JIM above I don’t approve of and disassociate my self from comments about the ditz’s appearance.

Steve Oregon
September 3, 2014 10:44 am

While I couldn’t care less about her looks Naomi is Exhibit A in demonstrating we are in an unprecedented era of dumb and dishonest humans in countless positions of academia, governance and policy influence which should have maintained some resistance to such saturation.
History will ultimately judge this era in unfavorable light it deserves.

mwhite
September 3, 2014 10:47 am

Seems domestic cats have an ancestral line that goes back to the deserts of the middle east.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/06/070628-cat-ancestor.html

GeneDoc
September 3, 2014 11:04 am

It’s really difficult to understand how people like Dr. Oreskes get a platform. She began with a well-received book http://www.amazon.com/The-Rejection-Continental-Drift-American/dp/0195117336 that traced the long path to acceptance of Wegener’s continental drift theory. You’d think she’d recognize a similar suppression of alternative skeptical views in the current AGW debate, but instead she’s become a run-of-the-mill anti-corporatist (anti-tobacco, anti-fossil fuels, anti-chemistry). She can’t or won’t recognize the same enormous vested interests in AGW that she uncovered in the Wegener story. Sad, really. Shameful, Harvard, but I’ll bet Scripps/UCSD was happy to see her go.

hunter
September 3, 2014 11:33 am

She is edging into a delusional break with reality. What she outlined is a fairly well used b-movie / SF story plot.
Good authors know to always beware of their literary devces beocming confused with reality. Naomi, on the other hand, seems to embrace this blending. In the long past ’60’s, the sign of an acid head getting in trouble was when they started speaking back to their hallucinations. Naomi seems well beyond that stage.

catweazle666
September 3, 2014 12:17 pm

Mad as a box of frogs.

September 3, 2014 12:17 pm

Amazon needs to sell Dr. Oreskes’ latest book as half of a two-pack, bundled with Dr. Hansen’s famous similarly futuristic eco-thriller, Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity. At discount pricing of course.
http://www.amazon.com/Storms-My-Grandchildren-Catastrophe-Humanity/dp/1608195023
According to the listing, this paperback release has a bonus:

In his Q&A with Bill McKibben featured in the paperback edition of Storms of My Grandchildren, Dr. James Hansen, the world’s leading climatologist, shows that exactly contrary to the impression the public has received, the science of climate change has become even clearer and sharper since the hardcover was released.

I’m glad to hear he finally got over his innate shyness and reticence as he had avoided conflict over these important issues throughout his career:

In Storms of My Grandchildren, Hansen speaks out for the first time with the full truth about global warming: The planet is hurtling even more rapidly than previously acknowledged to a climatic point of no return.

It had such excellent reviews:
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2010/01/nasas_prophet_will_give_you_nightmares.html

I started reading James Hansen’s new book, Storms of My Grandchildren, at the edge of a vanishing Arctic. I sat on a bare brown Greenland hillside listening to the ferocious crack and crash of the dying glaciers in the distance. As I watched the corpse of the ice sheet float by, broken into a thousand icebergs, it seemed the right place to begin the leading NASA scientist’s explanation for what I was seeing.

Powerful stuff. Clearly Dr. Naomi Oreskes’ The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future deserves to be bundled with Dr. Hansen’s opus, they so wonderfully complement each other.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Collapse-Western-Civilization-Future/dp/023116954X
I wonder if Amazon could be persuaded to do a gift set. I may again have a relative facing a long battle with a terminal illness wondering what is the point of fighting the inevitable, who may appreciate some good reading material.

Jaakko Kateenkorva
September 3, 2014 12:20 pm

“The European Union announced similar plans for voluntary northward relocation of eligible citizens from its southernmost regions to Scandinavia and the United Kingdom…”
Oreskes gives a new meaning to ‘imperfect’ and ‘past progressive’ and that’s not limited to the grammatical conjugation in her prognostication.

DirkH
September 3, 2014 12:28 pm

I just looked around
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naomi_Oreskes
and they say
“Oreskes worked on scientific methods, in particular model validation in the Earth sciences.”
So she should be the first person to say, the climate models fail for 17 year in a row now; they’re false or worthless.
But she doesn’t. Now ain’t that funny. I don’t think it is incompetence.