Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t Richard – James Lovelock, inventor of the Gaia hypothesis which underpins much of modern environmentalism, now thinks global warming is a religion. He also points out Singapore, one of the warmest cities in the world, is also one of the most desirable places to live.
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What has changed dramatically, however, is his position on climate change. He now says: “Anyone who tries to predict more than five to 10 years is a bit of an idiot, because so many things can change unexpectedly.” But isn’t that exactly what he did last time we met? “I know,” he grins teasingly. “But I’ve grown up a bit since then.”
Lovelock now believes that “CO2 is going up, but nowhere near as fast as they thought it would. The computer models just weren’t reliable. In fact,” he goes on breezily, “I’m not sure the whole thing isn’t crazy, this climate change. You’ve only got to look at Singapore. It’s two-and-a-half times higher than the worst-case scenario for climate change, and it’s one of the most desirable cities in the world to live in.”
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But there is a third explanation for why he has shifted his position again, and nowadays feels “laid back about climate change”. All things being equal – “and it’s only got to take one sizable volcano to erupt and all the models, everything else, is right off the board”
Lovelock maintains that, unlike most environmentalists, he is a rigorous empiricist, but it is manifestly clear that he enjoys maddening the green movement. “Well, it’s a religion, really, you see. It’s totally unscientific.”
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Lovelock also points out that the rise of robots will completely invalidate concerns about people becoming “heat stressed” performing manual labour. As an IT specialist I have to say completely agree with him on this. Just as smart phones have evolved from huge bricks into intricate computerised assistants, so will the clunky automated vacuum cleaners and other automated appliances of today rapidly evolve into machines which take care of daily housework, and other manual tasks.
What I find most remarkable is that The Guardian is giving airtime to this climate heresy. Perhaps they are testing the water, to see how readers react.
After all, it is obvious to anyone remotely objective that the green religion is dying. It won’t take too many more South Australia style renewable energy disasters to completely finish what remains of the credibility of the green movement.
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Lovelock is responsible for destroying the lives and environments of rural communities in Ireland UK and elsewhere leaving them financially ruined in some cases trying to fight wind farms. Does he realize how many lives he has ruined ?
If he truly repents now he needs to come out and call a stop to the whole thing.
“Lovelock is responsible for destroying the lives and environments of rural communities in Ireland UK and elsewhere leaving them financially ruined in some cases trying to fight wind farms. Does he realize how many lives he has ruined ?”
Citation required. Why do you think your assertions can just be taken for granted?
“Lovelock is responsible for destroying the lives and environments of rural communities in Ireland UK and elsewhere leaving them financially ruined in some cases trying to fight wind farms.”
Lovelock and his daughter have both for many years been outspoken critics of wind farms and supporters of those campaigning against them. If it’s not too much trouble, try putting “Lovelock + wind power” into a search engine, reading some of what it finds and coming back here to correct your misinformation. I disagree with many of Lovelock’s views but his take on wind power is as correct as it has been consistent.
If you care to read the planning reports in Ireland and UK, you will see that climate change is the ultimate justification for wind farms.
“If you care to read the planning reports in Ireland and UK, you will see that climate change is the ultimate justification for wind farms.”
When, some years back, I was researching the environmental impact of wind power, I read a deal more planning reports, EIAs, policy documents etc etc than I cared to wrt projects in Ireland and the UK both. I even wrote, inter alia, a paper on and produced a short film of the notorious Derrybrien site near Galway.
Unsurprisingly, I’m therefore aware of wind power’s purported justification but I’m equally aware of the need to check facts before commenting in a public forum. Whatever Lovelock may or may not be responsible for, he’s not to blame for the spread of wind power. Historically, that responsibility lies in large measure with the wider “environmental” movement that lobbied on behalf of the industry and with the politicians who promoted the AGW hypothesis. Lovelock has consistently argued against wind power. On your logic, Sir Humphry Davy is to blame for mustard gas.
Sir H.Davey was an inventor. Lovelock created a religion. Adherents to a religion can justify any action under the banner of Gaia. I was once told by one greenie that there will have to be trade offs i.e. you can damage one part of the environment in order to save the planet.
“I was once told by one greenie that there will have to be trade offs i.e. you can damage one part of the environment in order to save the planet.”
And I think that’s as authoritative as Fabo can manage. Don’t give up your day job Fabo. I suspect you will never manage to be scientific or rational.
Do you agree with the greenie or you dont understand how quotes work ?
He seems to have a penchant for saying both things which are eminently sensible, along with things that are cuckoo, like “The most sensible energy solution would be to cover 100 sq miles of the Sahara in solar panels.“
But the important thing is that he has turned against the greenies, which should make them hopping mad.
Any day the greenines are hopping mad about something is a good day.
“Any day the greenines are hopping mad about something is a good day.”
Might even be Good for the Planet if we can harness the energy of them hopping 🙂
I just don’t think there is anything great about someone that, at age 95 or so, finally discovers a new way of thinking. Most people, at least from my own observations, are able to drop the rosy-colored glasses and switch from heart-felt belief systems to empirical thinking around age 30. He could not have been that ignorant of the world around him for that length of time unless he was just too enamored with his own renown.
Good summary
I met James Lovelock at a lecture he gave down here a few years back… He said then that his biggest worry was that not only are we applying a significant forcing to the homeostatic system he calls Gaia, but we are systematically destroying the mechanisms of homeostasis themselves, through deforestation, soil loss and marine pollution, which would normally correct it. That seemed – and still seems – to me to be a much bigger issue, and I don’t understand why he thinks that has gone away.
But maybe (as in the second half of the interview) he thinks the whole thing is trumped (ahem) by the existential threat of AI Singularity, so it’s all irrelevant. To which one might add the parallel (and related) threat of nuclear annihilation… I wish I could manage his cheerful insouciance.
James Lovelock, 2006: “…and before this century is over billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable.”
http://www.jameslovelock.org/page10.html
Now being wrong about one thing doesn’t mean you’re wrong about all things, and people can indeed grow out of stupidity, but I would still take with a grain of salt anything said by someone who was so gullible (or dishonest) in the past about such monumentally wrong ideas.
“I’ve grown up a bit since then.”
Unfortunately, we don’t really have time to wait for all the other zealots to ‘grow out of it’. Because all the true believers are hard at work destroying our economy, energy, security, liberty, and sovereignty.
Oh so true
And they will blame someone else for all of it.
Yes Lovelock the robots will take over the world by the end of the century. James Cameron predicted that in 1984. Hasta la vista baby!
Since childhood, I thought that there is no way to discount the earth being an intelligent entity, any more than one cell in your body (if it could ‘think’) could discount the existence of an entity as complex as you.
I have still never heard a convincing argument against this.
Greg writes: “Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis was nothing to do with a deity or religion, it was a scientific hypothesis that the biosphere could be regarded as a large complex super organism, in a similar way to regarding and ant colony as one organism rather than thousands of ants.
That is a perfectly valid idea.”
Indeed, it is even a demonstrably correct idea, even at the most basic level of the composition of the earth’s atmosphere, which only allows animals to survive because plants first colonized the biosphere utilizing Co2 and producing Oxygen. Life is not a zero sum struggle for survival. Commensualism and symbiosis are essential and integral aspects of evolution. If you climb up a large and old Redwood, you will find whole micro-ecosystems sustained in the canopy — insects, plants, bacteria, all thriving with the Redwood without harming it. In a similar manner, human life is impossible without the synergism of friendly bacteria that inhabit our bodies and assist in digestion and metabolism.
The “Robinson Caruso” mentality of many rugged individualism, which believes that life is always and only about zero sum competition, is endangering the health and safety of the planet. Lovelock is a brilliant and honest scientist and should be celebrated for publicly modifying his previous opinions about global warming.