Guest Essay by Eric Worrall
Piers Sellers is a NASA climate scientist with Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer. His dying wish is that we should listen to his concerns about CO2 – but with the greatest respect, he is not saying anything new.
Cancer and Climate Change
I’M a climate scientist who has just been told I have Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.
This diagnosis puts me in an interesting position. I’ve spent much of my professional life thinking about the science of climate change, which is best viewed through a multidecadal lens. At some level I was sure that, even at my present age of 60, I would live to see the most critical part of the problem, and its possible solutions, play out in my lifetime. Now that my personal horizon has been steeply foreshortened, I was forced to decide how to spend my remaining time. Was continuing to think about climate change worth the bother?
…
Last year may also be seen in hindsight as the year of the Death of Denial. Globally speaking, most policy makers now trust the scientific evidence and predictions, even as they grapple with ways to respond to the problem. And most Americans — 70 percent, according to a recent Monmouth University poll — believe that the climate is changing. So perhaps now we can move on to the really hard part of this whole business.
…
As for me, I’ve no complaints. I’m very grateful for the experiences I’ve had on this planet. As an astronaut I spacewalked 220 miles above the Earth. Floating alongside the International Space Station, I watched hurricanes cartwheel across oceans, the Amazon snake its way to the sea through a brilliant green carpet of forest, and gigantic nighttime thunderstorms flash and flare for hundreds of miles along the Equator. From this God’s-eye-view, I saw how fragile and infinitely precious the Earth is. I’m hopeful for its future.
And so, I’m going to work tomorrow.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/17/opinion/sunday/cancer-and-climate-change.html
As someone who has also been at death’s door, when my appendix ruptured two years ago, I have the deepest sympathy with Pier’s condition. Its horrible to look at your loved ones, and know that this might be the last time you see them.
However, it is disturbing that Sellers would attempt to use his dire personal health issues as an appeal to emotion, to promote his views about climate change. Science is supposed to be about reason, logic and evidence, not desperate appeals for sympathy. To me, Sellers’ attempt to conflate empathy for his condition, with an appeal for climate action, betrays the weakness of his science, and is symptomatic of the utter fanaticism which I believe lies at the heart of the climate craze.
When I was in hospital, I wasn’t thinking about the subject of my next climate post. I had other things on my mind.
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I agree with you saying, although I feel sorry for Seller’s condition. Indeed, climate change is pure science, is about data, facts and events and not about…. feelings. And, last but not least, sometimes (probably not in this case), there’s a long way to understand climate, as shown here: http://oceansgovernclimate.com/the-long-way-to-understand-climate/.
While the medical issue is sad, those of us past a certain age have seen a lot of sad things. In this case, I guess the man’s care is being paid for and the survivors will not be destitute and end up homeless. Counseling will be available, if needed.
Meanwhile, many millions (billions?) of folks are being denied (or there is the attempt to deny) basic services that carbon based energy can facilitate. Look for reports by Indur M. Goklany or Bjørn Lomborg for elaboration of this issue.
Climatism is a sort of cancer of humanity.
Irony.
I’ve also had cancer. I certainly didn’t use it to sell anything.
Sellers real illness is mental – Munchausen syndrome
I too have been through a life threatening situation involving my appendix. I ignored abdominal pain that progressively got worse over a two week period, then it got a little better and I thought that I was on the road to recovery. Actually my appendix had ruptured and was spilling nasty stuff into my abdominal cavity. A few days later after I developed a fever and started changing colors I ended up in the hospital with a severe infection. The doctors gave my wife and I a bleak prognosis which I admit to still not taking as seriously as I should have. But I have to admit that it seemed an opportune moment to make numerous promises to my maker if I was lucky enough to be granted more time in this world.
Piers Sellers facing a similar dilemma probably has most likely made some promises to the entity he feels is his maker. There is no doubt that many Warmists have a religious component to their belief system and this is how I would expect them to react. It is human nature and predictable. When his time to move into the great beyond comes I wish him the best.
0. ICRP: International Commission on Radiological Protection
1. Real-time radiation exposure is computed as an effective dose rate, which is a body-average over the radiative-sensitive organs and tissues, in units of microsievert per hour (uSv/hr). Annual or flight accumulated effective dose is reported in units of millisievert (mSv; Note: 1 mSv = 1000 uSv).
2. ICRP recommended annual limit for occupationally exposed radiation workers (including aircrew) is less than 20 mSv. If the predicted exposure is less than 1/3 of this limit, the safety signal color will be green – indicating minimal radiation exposure. If the predicted exposure is between 1/3-2/3 of the ICRP recommended limit, the safety signal color will be yellow – indicating that close tracking of individual radiation exposure is advised. If the predicted exposure is greater than 2/3 the recommended limit, the safety signal color will be red – indicating exposure to maximum recommended limit is possible.
3. ICRP recommended annual limit for public sector radiation exposure is less than 1 mSv. If the predicted exposure is less than 1/3 of this limit, the safety signal color will be green – indicating minimal radiation exposure. If the predicted exposure is between 1/3-2/3 of the ICRP recommended limit, the safety signal color will be yellow – indicating that close tracking of individual radiation exposure is advised. If the predicted exposure is greater than 2/3 the recommended limit, the safety signal color will be red – indicating exposure to maximum recommended limit is possible.
4. ICRP recommended limit for prenatal radiation exposure is less than 1 mSv annually and less than 0.5 mSv in any one month during pregnancy. The signal indicator color is based on the 0.5 mSv limit. If the predicted exposure is less than 1/3 of this limit, the safety signal color will be green – indicating minimal radiation exposure. If the predicted exposure is between 1/3-2/3 of the ICRP recommended limit, the safety signal color will be yellow indicating that close tracking of individual radiation exposure is advised. If the predicted exposure is greater than 2/3 the recommended limit, the safety signal color will be red – indicating exposure to maximum recommended limit is possible.
5. The predicted aircrew exposure is based on the current NAIRAS modeled exposure rate multiplied by the maximum annual flight hours for pilots, which is 1000 hrs. If an aircrew member, for example, expects to fly only 600 hrs per year, then multiply the NAIRAS predicted radiation exposure by 6/10. If an aircrew member expects to fly 800 hrs per year, then multiply the predicted radiation exposure by 8/10, and so on.
6. The predicted public and prenatal exposure for the representative high-latitude flights is based on the current NAIRAS modeled exposure rate multiplied by the average flight time.
http://sol.spacenvironment.net/raps_ops/current_files/rtimg/dose.11km.png
http://sol.spacenvironment.net/raps_ops/current_files/rtimg/dose.15km.png
Very sad that this man is dying of cancer at such a young age, it’s also sad that a false fear narrative like cAGW is what this dying man is clinging to, how did it come to a sorry story like this?
Can someone please remove Eric Worrall from Internet?
Trolls like you are a much more deserving target !!
Eric,
There is, in my opinion, a larger dimension of which we’re all a part; an energy of which we, and the universe are a part. The ancients recorded a raw form of this energy as it appeared to them in their skies; chiseling what they saw onto their petroglyphs, and painting it onto rock.
The images are the same worldwide.
This documentary lays out the theory behind what the ancients saw.
Symbols of an Alien Sky (Full Documentary) – YouTube
Researchers now are pushing forth new findings and research and theories that turn on an electrical, energy-based universe that will further lead from whence we came, IMO. What’s known so far is that we did not evolve or crawl up out of a primordial soup. Dr. Hugh Ross, scientist and founder of “Reasons to Believe” and other scientists, have established this point numerous times; often in calm, direct debate with atheists and evolutionists alike on stages before packed, hostile houses in places like Berkley. Dr. Ross and his colleagues use, as the basis of their arguments, mathematical probabilities and accepted, acknowledged, current principles on which science is based; facts the opposition could neither counter nor explain in open debate which is, there had to be a designer.
So if not the soup, from whence? It is my belief this question is just now coming into view; the findings of which will displace established “facts” as a growing focus on an electric universe sharpens. In so doing, humanity will further see they’ve been lied to—a process already begun by the Internet—by a tiny handful of deceptive keepers of the keys (call them a collective Oz behind a curtain); individuals so wadded in wealth, greed, and avarice they feel entitled and qualified to judge what’s best for humanity; individuals without heart, soul, or conscience; who start, and profit from, chaos, revolution, and war; who direct history; who tell the world we’re over-crowded when, by 2050, replacing ourselves may be humanities biggest concern; who keep Tesla’s and hydrogen-to-energy research locked away in vaults.
Global warming is one of their lies. What the Paris Climate conference was about was establishing a predetermined Global Warming tax on all nations paid directly to the UN (owned by Oz) to fund a foundational financial trough of bureaucrats to administer their unelected world government with themselves in charge. CO2-caused global warming—easy to proffer when you control the world’s MSM; which Oz does—was their strawman, scarecrow, Trojan horse.
In peace and love Eric, God is with you.
…WTF ????
Well, at least you got the Agenda 21 part right, so only half a WTF !! LOL
Polar bears, the end of snow, and now dying astronauts. What’s next in the appeal to emotion game from these anti-science ideologues.
I’m sorry for your dreadful situation, Peter, but your appeal is utterly unconvincing.
a sanctimonious appeal to authority – where authority derives from dying
alarmists will relish his statement – skeptics will – well – be skeptical – which is what it deserves
No, in logic it’s a straight up appeal to emotion, which is the logical fallacy argumentum ad passiones not Argumentum ad Verecundiam or appeal to authority.
I think he threw in a few of those other ones too.
RD –
technically – according to the categories laid out on fallacies – you are correct – i merely pointed out that behind Piers’ appeal to emotions is an attempt to claim an expertise that should be heeded – but dying doesn’t make him an expert
But, but…he has a model of a model that tells him the models are right !! So his model must right…right ?
BE…. GGGRRRrrrrr……..
V’Ger?
Too much Star Trek ?? LOL
@Crispin: I found some figures for CO2 from various sources at
http://www.biomassenergycentre.org.uk/portal/page?_pageid=75,163182&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
I have some trouble believing, because much trouble understanding, those figures.
For example, biodiesel is said to be 338 g/mile “on combustion” but 60 g/mile “life cycle equivalent GHG”; the only way I can make sense of that is “extra”. What I’d like to know is TOTAL CO2 per MJ (energy) or km (transport). Since you make a strong claim about biomass vs coal, can you point me to better, or at least more comprehensible, figures?
I think there are better reasons to be critical of chopping down forests to burn as fuel for electricity than a comparison of the carbon dioxide produced vs coal.
Hell, it has not been that long since they outlawed paper bags to save trees, even though they use mostly mills dust and scraps.
And paper use in general was seen by the green hawks as basically sinful, as if trees should never be touched.
And these criticisms were not 100% ridiculous, just overdone.
Worrying about “carbon” emissions is ridiculous, given the alternatives, and the fact that they are even stronger against such clean sources as hydro and nuclear.
Lets use the wood for it’s God given purpose…to make furniture and houses.
They’re grown as a crop for paper, etc. “Recycle your breadcrumbs! Save the wheat!” makes as much sense as paper recycling, e.g. But it’s widely admired as good environmentalism!
The chemical conversion of an HC fuel to CO2 & H2O is a strict chemical equation as is Btu/kJ content. So for any fuel one can calculate E15 g/Gt/Pg CO2 per Btu or kJ.
Giga tonne = E9 tonne = E9 * E3 kg = E9 * E3 * E3 g = E15 g = Peta g
Next there is efficiency of application. Need to know Btu /mile or Btu/MWh to calculate E15/Ptg CO2/mile or MWh.
A combined cycle power plant has an efficiency of around 60% and on NG produces about 750 lb CO2/MWh. A typical Rankine steam electric plant has an efficiency of about 35% and produces about 2,200 lb CO2/MWh using coal and about 1,200 lb/MWh using NG.
338 g/mile is 100% efficiency. 60 g/mile considers cycle efficiency. 60/338 = .178 or about 17.8% efficiency for the life cycle equivalent. I wouldn’t do it this way, but my goal is not obfuscation.
PgC * 3.67 = PgCO2 * 0.1291 = ppmv atmospheric CO2
He could have chosen to spend his final times with dignity. Instead he chose to be a schill for climate imperialism.
Sadly the attitude from the man made global warming crowd has been that all medical research should stop so we can ‘save the planet for unborn great, great grand children’. Last week Obama made a pledge to ‘end cancer’. I can see that Sellers is trying to bring his pet cause to the forefront of attention and try to take away that medical research cash as to add it to the 83 trillion dollar “climate fund”.
Sadly I wish this man made global warming crowd would leave us all alone and let us cure cancer and other maladies. Please stop taking away cash from all other sciences!
As Ren suggests, space time is fraught with some long-term peril for astronauts. They are outside of the Earth’s protective atmosphere. If one were to believe in the greenhouse effect, a question might be whether it actually offers some prophylaxis to people on the planet’s surface from ionizing radiation. According to Wikipedia, Mr. Sellers logged some 35 days of space time, including numerous space walks. The acute effects of cosmic radiation on astronauts is well known, and using wrist bands they keep track of its effective dose in units called milliSieverts. The stochastic effects are less well-known.
Perhaps there have been some records kept on the incidence of cancer among astronauts.
NASA’s own “Fact Sheet” on the subject is here: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/spacenews/factsheets/pdfs/radiation.pdf
Condolences and best wishes to Mr. Sellers and his family.
The radiation is particularly strong if the solar activity decreases.
http://oi63.tinypic.com/r0xlar.jpg
When astronomers worked long like my parents, on high mountains, various cancers were the result. It is even worse with astronauts.
http://sol.spacenvironment.net/raps_ops/current_files/globeView.html
Keen sense of the obvious. What is present below 10k and not present above 10k? What is present both below and above 10k in the same concentration in PPM? Answer to Q1=H2O, answer to Q2=CO2. Funny how temperature follows H2O exactly, and doesn’t follow CO2 at all.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rgGRw3GZqN0/VnBiqxSngtI/AAAAAAAAAgE/Qb_cVR0At9I/s640/RATPAC-A%2BTemperature%2BTrends%2Bby%2BAltitude.png
Brandon Gates,
wrt “I’ve long-since lost count of how many times someone has called me “alarmist”, “warmunist”, “idiot”, “delusional” and a litany of other things …”
Before you lost count, how high did you get? Why would you want to keep track anyway … is it like a badge of honor or something?
DonM,
I stopped counting after it became apparent that the site policy against personal insults doesn’t generally apply to visitors here who have opposing views, and especially not against lying fraudulent climate hoaxers. OTOH, I’ve gotten off a few of my own here and not been banned. Warned once and put into the penalty box once. [shrug] Anthony’s blog, Anthony’s discretion. As I think it should be.
You didn’t reply directly, but per your response it appears that you actually did keep a count …. Wow!
“You didn’t reply directly, but per your response it appears that you actually did keep a count …. Wow!”
Be skeptical DonM. Don’t just take his word for that. Ask him what he actually “counted” specifically. Did he only count direct insults at him personally? Or did he count insinuations too? Or attacks on his arguments?
It’s one thing to say “You are an idiot” to someone-and another to call their arguments “idiotic”. It’s one thing to say ‘”That is stupid”, and another to say “You are stupid”. Words matter, and so do intentions.
BGs posts here demonstrate that he likes to make assumptions about what other people meant or were trying to do, rather than focusing on their actual statements. He reads between the lines a lot. Says things based on his own perceptions whether they can be proven correct or not. That is just a fact. So when he says that he counted them, if you want actual clarity on that statement, you’ll have to ask him very direct questions.
Gates is usually johnny-on-the-spot with his long replies. I wonder what happened?
Re: astronauts, I hope Sellers finds a miracle cure. But as far as the DAGW scare goes, he’s simply wrong. And he’s not even in the consensus.
This is from eli’s site, but captures the view of real scientists:
“Having read the article Eli takes away the same feeling that one of the writers to the Times, nick fras did. An amazing piece, wise, terrifically eloquent, modest and momentus.
I have never read anything that captures so well the joys, privileges and responsibilities of being a scientist.”
As a scientist, I agree.
As a scientist, I agree.
Honest scientists are skeptical of every conjecture. They’re skeptics first and foremost. I guess they didn’t teach you that part of the job.
A lab coat and a BS Degree do not a scientist make.
From a very selfish perspective, I wish that Mr. Sellers would/could be around to see the end of the climate hysteria; I wish everyone could.
Mr. Sellers said “And most Americans — 70 percent, according to a recent Monmouth University poll — believe that the climate is changing ….” Is he saying this to mislead or is he just ignorant; If the poll is accurate and 30% of the population think the climate does not change then we have a lot of stupid people answering to such polls. (My guess the people answering the poll question knew the pollsters were trying to slant the outcome, so the respondents lied in their answer). In any event, if the poll is correct and 70% of the population think the climate is changing, what does that have to do with the general public coming around to the CAGW point of view.
I don’t think that Mr. Sellers is all that ignorant.
There are polls taken and worded and designed to find out what people actually think.
Then there are the polls taken and worded and designed for a press release.
During an election year politicians pay attention to the former but they pay for the latter.
What do either have to do with genuine science?
PS Kudos to WUWT for airing his dying wish. And kudos to the commenters here for pointing out that a person’s dying wish doesn’t change the facts.
If the World goes to Hell in a hand basket, CO2 won’t be the cause.
The wicker of the basket will be more robust. Thanks to atmospheric CO2 increase.