Well, the new report is out from the IPCC, the Indefatigable Predictors of Climate Catastrophe. It’s our last-chance must act now warning of upcoming Thermageddon … I think we’re up to Last Chance Warning Number Thirty-Seven or something like that.
And the UNFCCC, the United Nations Foundation for Collecting Climate Cash, point out that the IPCC report is full of all kinds of dire warnings like the following:
The IPCC’s special report clearly states that the world has already warmed by 1ºC due to human activity. As a result, climate change is already affecting people, ecosystems and livelihoods across the globe, with impacts such as floods or droughts disproportionately affecting the poorest and most vulnerable. Some of the most affected areas are small islands, megacities, coastal regions and high mountain ranges.
Their new push is that shooting for 2°C of warming is not alarmist enough, it’s sooo last week, so now they’re aiming for a maximum warming of 1.5°C … in passing, let me note the hubris in thinking that we can actually control the temperature of the planet to the nearest half-degree. But I digress.
All of this, of course, is justified on the basis that warming hurts the “poorest and most vulnerable”. I mean, what more noble cause can there be than keeping the poorest and most vulnerable from further harm?
In that respect, let me offer up a couple of graphs. For your first graph, here’s the Berkeley Earth estimate of the change in temperature since 1850.
Now, we can argue about the details, and the warming may not be as great as shown. But clearly, the earth has steadily warmed, in fits and starts, over the last century or so.
And for your second graph, here’s Max Roser’s look at the change in the number of people living in extreme poverty around the planet during that time.
Now, looking at those two graphs, can anyone tell me with a straight face that increasing global temperatures harm “the poorest and most vulnerable”???
It gets worse. The majority of the warming to date has occurred in the extratropics, in winter, at night … I don’t think too many people in Vladivostok or New York City will be hard hit if the winter nights average a couple of degrees warmer. Which is OK, because in general, excess cold kills more people than excess heat.
And having spent a couple of nights sleeping out on a New York City sidewalk, with my pants and shirt stuffed with newspaper and my hands burrowed into my pockets, I can assure you from painful experience that I wouldn’t have minded a bit more warmth …
So the next time someone starts up with the usual garbage about how we have to stop using fossil fuels to save the poor from a slight warming in 50 years … point them to these graphs and ask them …
If warming is so bad for the poor, how come the world has steadily warmed over the last century and the lives of the poor have steadily gotten better?
Here, we’re having the last days of summer. Me, I’m a tropical boy, I don’t like the cold weather … but a crisp fall day is just about heaven …
And finally, if you’re interested in more than climate science, let me invite you to join the discussions at my blog, or to follow me on Twitter,@WEschenbach.
Best regards to everyone,
w.
PS—When you comment, please quote the exact words you are referring to, so we can all be clear what you are discussing.
And the dataset for the temperature graph was fake data that used 2 different datasets that have no business being combined. So even with a fake dataset, the alarmists have a very weak case that they are helping the world’s poor. Well done Willis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
“Fake data”?
“Two different datasets”?
Alan, thanks for the “well done”, but I have no clue what those two claims are about …
w.
You don’t even need to bring climate into the discussion. To reduce poverty we clearly need to keep doing what we have been doing.
Rob, I do need to bring in climate, because the whole thrust of the IPCC report is the claim that a slight warming will wreak havoc on the poor.
The other reason we need to bring in climate is that we do need to keep doing what we’re doing, which is using fossil fuels to lift the world out of poverty … and the alarmists want to stop that.
Best to you,
w.
I agree. there are huge coal reserves in Africa (Tanzania for instance ) that could be used to expand local economies. The people would be better off like the Indians and Chinese – and they would no longer have to make the dangerous crossing from Libya to Italy.
robert stevenson
I agree with everything said about using fossil fuels to lift the developing world from poverty but what puzzles me is why, when the west managed to capitalise on coal, the African nations didn’t.
Africa has watched almost 200 years of western development, by simply digging up coal, yet the entire continent has largely stagnated other than where Colonialism functioned. Even then, the likes of Mugabe cut Zimbabwe’s commercial throat by kicking out white farmers.
And despite the international aid poured into the country 120,000,000 people are expected to die in developing countries over the coming 32 years of smoke inhalation related conditions from burning cow dung and wood for cooking and heating (not all in Africa of course) WHO figures.
The continent seems on a determined crash course of self destruction when the solutions are historically clear. If development means burning coal for electricity, then surely the solution is to start digging no matter how primitive the efforts. The UK started with children and pit ponies down mines which was wrong but effective. Doubtless by international treaties Africans aren’t allowed to do the same, which means there are disease riddled kids with no hope for the future.
Nor am I suggesting Africans should put children down mines but early 20th Century coal mining utilised simple machinery to access wealth and technology. Early coal fired power stations were hardly exercises in high tech. so what’s to stop say, Tanzanians accessing their coal reserves and building power stations, then moving that process into neighbouring nations.
As I understand it, rail was a cheap and effective means of transporting coal to neighbouring power stations in the UK. So why not use the same technology to expand an unsophisticated but effective coal fired energy revolution throughout the continent?
There seems to me to be two possible solutions to Africa’s woes. Either let them get on with doing what they can to lift themselves out of poverty and stop the conditional aid or promote Colonisation Mk. 2; have international aid agencies buy up vast areas of land and move in farmers and industrialists to develop the nation as they see fit.
Sure, it might start a 100 year armed struggle against Boko Haram, ISIS and tribalism but the continent has suffered 200 years of this anyway. I mean, it’s not like the USA didn’t go through the same thing, every great American city began as a village in recent recorded history and all of them developed to where they are now through a version of Colonisation.
Capital investment in coal fired power stations similar to India and China in Africa would go a long way to lift the people living there out of poverty. The supporters of the Paris agreement will not allow this however condemning them to a life or poverty, loss of life and pressure on Italy to take in more and more economic migrants.
Is it just a coincidence that the poorest countries in the world have the most corrupt governments?
My opinion, systemic governmental corruption is the leading cause of poverty.
“And despite the international aid poured into the country 120,000,000 people are expected to die in developing countries over the coming 32 years of smoke inhalation related conditions from burning cow dung and wood for cooking and heating (not all in Africa of course) WHO figures.”
Sorry, HotScot, this just reads like a justification for colonialism.
You cannot change life for indigenous people by giving them one piece of modern life. Leave them alone.
This philosophy is still valid 50 years later:
“A starship captain’s most solemn oath is that he will give his life, even his entire crew, rather than violate the Prime Directive.”
– James T. Kirk, 2268 (“The Omega Glory”)
The Prime Directive, also known as Starfleet General Order 1 or the Non-Interference Directive, was the embodiment of one of Starfleet’s most important ethical principles: noninterference with other cultures and civilizations. At its core was the philosophical concept that covered personnel should refrain from interfering in the natural, unassisted, development of societies, even if such interference was well-intentioned. The Prime Directive was viewed as so fundamental to Starfleet that officers swore to uphold the Prime Directive, even at the cost of their own life or the lives of their crew.’
The Nobel Prize 2018 winners in Economics, are Professors W.D. Nordhaus and P.M. Romer, for work on “climate change and innovation”. The announcement was carefully orchestrated to coincide with a publication of the latest catastrophic IPCC report. They use an “endogenous growth theory” which predicts technological innovations based on GDP. Somehow they did not predict fracking, but they argue for a carbon tax anyway.
I remember that Nobel Prize winners include Al Gore, Yasser Arafat, and Dr. Michael Mann (according to Dr. Mann).
GameCock
The trouble is before the 120 million die of smoke inhalation they will have produced 480 million offspring.
The low IQ poor wreak havoc upon themselves by over breeding.
Their behavior, their problem. Built that wall.
While I agree with this from the above comment “The other reason we need to bring in climate is that we do need to keep doing what we’re doing, which is using fossil fuels to lift the world out of poverty … and the alarmists want to stop that.” There is another way, a better technology that can give them electricity and industrial heat at a cost cheaper than coal. They can be powered out of poverty without the real pollution of coal. Many companies around the world are racing to be first to market. A perfect example is Thorcon Power, an American company working in Indonesia, helping them get the first commercialized molten salt nuclear reactor. A link if you have any interest. https://www.powermag.com/indonesia-considers-thorium-molten-salt-reactors/
You meen by spending 1 possible 2 trillion dollars a year on worthless rebewables and garbage climate initatives to strangle Western development…. which after all is where all of the aid money comes from?
Resource depletion.
As in there won’t be enough oil for jet fuel for the elite to fly off to St Tropez or their Swiss chalet from Napa Valley if the unwashed masses use it all up in the next 100 years. And there won’t be enough diesel fuel for their Super-Yacht to usher themselves and their elitists friends around the Aegean Sea or the Caribbean… if the unwashed masses use it all up to cook their food or warm their houses. Or use it to grow food to feed the world.
Climate change is about socialism. A One World socialism, whereby society is two classes, the elites and the masses.
Picture Nicholas Maduro and his Chavez-nista cronies living large while the masses starve in Venezuela, an oil rich country, more oil than Saudi Arabia.
The Left failed with its Eugenics in 1920-1930’s as the Nazis ruined it for them by taking their Leftist philosophy to its logical conclusion. Climate Change is their new eugenics — the Left’s new Final Solution to the problem of who they see as undesirables.
This posting really should be put along side the recent one rubbishing the (humorous) claim that rising CO2 levels are effecting men’s testicles. Almost every comment pointing out the obvious flaws there would apply here. Only it would seem that rational thought and criticism goes out the window when commenting on an anti-global warming posting. Just like almost no-one noticed that the Mother Jones article was meant to be humorous.
For the record “correlation is not causation”. And it is also plausible that there would be even fewer people living in extreme poverty with the effects of global warming.
Percy what are effects of global warming?
The effect of CO2 being recycleds back into the atmosphere is to feed the plants which are starving for CO2. Multiply atmospheric CO2 by a factor of four, and you double the growth and size of most plants, especially trees. You also make them more drought tolerant. The result of this has been a huge increase in food production which is helping to reduce starvation.
http://www.co2science.org/education/reports/co2benefits/MonetaryBenefitsofRisingCO2onGlobalFoodProduction.pdf
It is not the effects of “global warming”. It is the effect of CO2 generation.
More Fossil Fuel = more CO2 = more prosperity.
After watching some of the (IPCC) presentation on the news last night, I had the feeling that these people don’t really even believe what they are saying anymore. But if it means bad news = a job and on-going funding and good news = no further funding and dismantling of the IPCC, I guess they will only say what they need to. What a perpetual gravy train they have made for themselves!
What is really sad was the sound of the collective breaths of the clueless, popular media being taken away and not an opposing view in sight.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it”
– Upton Sinclair
I recall the IPCC stating that the Global warming started from 1950 , as prior to that there was insufficient CO2 in the atmosphere to affect it.
After all we should expect the tiny .7C following hundreds of years of the Little Ice Age.
But now they are stating that humans have already caused 1 C. So where has this come from ?
MJE
Does the SPM and the Report actually say that ALL warming since 1850 (a massive 1 degree C) is anthropogenic, or is that an interpretation by the MSM and the shouting heads on TV? There has been about 1 deg C warming since 1850, but has it really all been human-caused? I tthink not.
I have the same question, hope someone more knowledgeable chimes in. As I recall it, the SPM comes out long before the WG1 that has the actual research papers. So there is no way to tell whether the underlying research actually supports the wild claims in the SPM.
It is easy to understand why they insist on calling all warming since 1750 “anthropogenic”. Otherwise their claims simply fall apart. You can see it even in the BEST graph that Willis used. The warming trend from 1900 to 1950 is indistinguishable from the trend from 1970 or so to 2000. But in the old IPCC WG1 from AR4 and before it clearly stated that the anthropogenic warming started in 1950, based on the Keeling curve of atmospheric CO2 observed at Mauna Loa. From the BEST graph again, using calibrated MK I eyeballs, that would only be around .5 degrees C. Even if you stupidly call it all anthropogenic when it is clearly identical to other recorded temperature rises that are obviously natural.
So where do they get the idea that there is nearly a whole degree of anthropogenic global warming since the 1800s? From land use changes in a tiny part of Europe? From burning coal in a tiny part of the UK? They love to call it the “industrial revolution” but it only affected a miniscule part of the world in the 1800s. Truth is, the use of fossil fuels completely wrecks their beloved Marxist theories of class warfare.
The Marxists need the suffering proletariat to justify their totalitarian vision of world domination. So naturally they are against fossil fuels, nuclear power, anything that eradicates poverty. It totally harshes their gig.
The SPM actually says that ALL the warming (±0.1°C) since 1890 is manmade and that natural variation has been negligible.
From section 1.2.1.3 ‘Total versus human–induced warming and warming rates’
This is not unreasonable if you think that the manmade warming is unrelated to CO2 emissions. It’s basically the IPCC trying to switch to UHI and land use change without anybody noticing.
Let them back out slowly. They are beaten. There’s no need to shame them too.
There is EVERY need to shame them! Unless they are shamed they may feel it necessary to make the same type of errors -and lack of review – all over again. If they are shamed enough they might quit it.
I love the concept that the “poorest and most vulnerable” biggest problem is climate change, usually the biggest issue is them getting shot at. The World development report from the World Bank has long stated that the primary cause of poverty is violence, the second is usually lack of education and everything else comes a distant third.
The developed world has lost the appetite for getting involved in local wars it neither understands nor has any interest in the outcome of. It would be usually interested in the education aspect but often funds destined for education just get diverted in buying more weapons or take by a few via corruption. So only the lunatic green left would think you can solve the issue without resolving the big issues.
However since they are so sure they can fix it with cash, lets sign up all the green nutters up a UN army and send them into Syria, Afghanistan and the like with buckets of cash. The buckets of cash are a drop in the ocean compared to what they want us to spend and so it’s a win win because we all know exactly how that would end and the world would be a better place.
Another comment lost to spam. WP filters probably didn’t like some of my words relating to WW2 Germany.
Throw in a graph from crop yields, it just keeps going up too.
Of course they dropped from 2 C to 1.5 C because it is looking like we might never get to 2 C. Mind you their ‘we already warned 1C is a cherrypick of the last el nino driven temperature.
Re: Berkeley Earth estimate of the change in temperature since 1850 — restating the obvious.
The apparent warming 1910 – 1945 can have very little to do with human CO2 emissions.
The warming 1980 – 2000 can be at least partly attributed to the decreasing cloud cover over the tropics that are mostly relatively low albedo oceans.
The Pacific Ocean at the equator takes up about 50% of the Earth’s circumference.
And in 1850 the earth was still in the cold, tail end of the Little Ice Age. A miserable few hundred years that earth is slowly and naturally recovering from.
If warming of 1.5 C since the latter part of the 19th century is claimed to be about to wreak untold damage and destroy civilisation as we know it then how come mankind and civilisation flourished so strongly during the Medieval, Roman and earlier Warm Periods when temperatures were 1-2 C Hotter than currently?
Ignored by IPCC and MSM – that needs to be pointed out at every opportunity.
So by extrapolating both charts we could completely wipe out extreme poverty by 2030 with less than 0.2 degrees of additional warming. That’s got to be worthwhile, I’ll throw another lump of coal on the fire.
“The IPCC’s special report clearly states that the world has already warmed by 1ºC due to human activity. As a result, climate change is already affecting people, ecosystems and livelihoods across the globe, with impacts such as floods or droughts disproportionately affecting the poorest and most vulnerable. Some of the most affected areas are small islands, megacities, coastal regions and high mountain ranges.”
The above statement is simply .FALSE. – anyone who wrote it is a liar and anyone who believes it is a fool.
Increasing atmospheric CO2 is NOT causing wilder weather and is NOT causing dangerous global warming.
The net impact of increasing atmospheric CO2 will at most be slight warming, which will be net beneficial to humankind and the environment, and large increases in plant and crop yields, which will be hugely beneficial.
As stated above:
“The World development report from the World Bank has long stated that the primary cause of poverty is violence, the second is usually lack of education and everything else comes a distant third.”
I fully agree that violence is the biggest problem, and this is obviously true in sub-Saharan Africa and to a lesser degree in southeast Asia. We could stop this violence if we really wanted to – just identify the head perpetrators of this violence and put a large bounty on their heads – terminate them with prejudice.
Lack of education could be number 2, but I think that lack of cheap, abundant, reliable energy may be even more important. The Greens have deliberately held back the poorest people in the world with their false opposition to energy. Cheap, abundant, reliable energy is the lifeblood of society – it IS that simple.
The position of the greens against energy is the same as their effective banning of DDT from 1972 to 2002 – both resulted in tens of millions of needless deaths, especially among children under 5, and enormous human suffering. Greens are the great killers of our age – that fact is incontrovertible. I suggest that they belong in jail.
So sayith: ALLAN MACRAE – October 8, 2018 at 11:32 pm
So, …. iffen an increasing atmospheric CO2 ……. will cause a slight warming of surface temperatures, ……. would not large increases in plant and crop yields ……. be more than enough to cancel out the afore claimed “slight warming of surface temperatures”?
Does not photosynthesis require solar energy to produce plant biomass?
Note my above words:
“AT MOST”
Aren’t statistics wonderful things?
It certainly looks as if there are less poor people around – though presenting things in percentage terms can hide absolute figures. But of course the graph does not say WHY.
Maybe the definition of poverty changed during that time period? Or maybe it didn’t change, but the world did, and so poverty diminished due to inflation…? Perhaps we simply went out and killed all the poor people?
Skepticism when faced with graphs showing correlation is now inbuilt to any reader her, I’m afraid… 🙂
The majority of the warming to date has occurred in the extratropics, in winter, at night
In the tropics, day time and summers not so much,
The IPCC also tells us that in a warmer world there will be more evaporation, water vapour, and more precipitation.
And then were are continually shown images of cracked dry earth under a blazing sun with skulls of dead cattle thrown in for good measure.
Thanks for the down to earth post.
“Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious” – George Orwell.
And the Synod of the Church of England is disinvesting in fossil fuels. They don’t care for the poor. But we knew that.
The Church of England has divested from God and is a mere left wing pressure group, with undeserved charity status!
Brilliant Willis. I’m going to use that chart about declining poverty. Seems to me that the world is doing very nicely at its current temperatures (except for some very cold areas) and people are prospering. Yet we are supposed to believe that a further 0.5 degrees of warming will be catastrophic? Pull the other one.
Climate models project robust differences in regional climate characteristics between present-day and global warming of 1.5°C, and between 1.5°C and 2°C. These differences include increases in: mean temperature in most land and ocean regions (high confidence), hot extremes in most inhabited regions (high confidence),heavy precipitation in several regions (medium confidence), and the probability of drought and precipitation deficits in some regions (medium confidence). And I thought extremes were weather.😢
In model pathways with no or limited overshoot of 1.5°C, global net anthropogenic CO2 emissions decline by about 45% from 2010 levels by 2030. Pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C with no or limited overshoot would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure (including transport and buildings), and industrial systems. So stop what you are doing and switch 45% of everything off now. 👍
Interestingly, on the IPCC’s website there are five chapters each with 200-300 references, produced by an army of listed authors, but they are listed as Final Government Drafts with a warning on each page ”Do Not Cite Quote or Distribute”. <The science is settled because we have published our report. Read, but do not point out our errors.
” … So the next time someone starts up with the usual garbage about how we have to stop using fossil fuels to save the poor from a slight warming in 50 years … point them to these graphs and ask them … If warming is so bad for the poor, how come the world has steadily warmed over the last century and the lives of the poor have steadily gotten better? … ”
—
A horse that won’t drink still won’t drink when you hold the bucket to its gob.
I heard a Journo (SkyNews) today, a guy on the skeptic side, say this in retort to the latest IPCC baa-ing.
“… Is rising CO2 ‘bad’ for the planet? Yes! Clearly it is, but …”
He did not however list any of the multitude of way in which anything arguably enviro-‘bad’, is easily negated by the many more and copious enviro-‘good’ that CO2 does to the planet,
Disappointing, but that horse ain’t gonna be drinking if that’s the retort the public gets from the counter-voice.
If you want to INCREASE poverty increase the cost of energy. The most expensive energy is that which is unavailable.
We could have done with a third graph showing the inverse correlation between energy use and poverty.
Whatever your view, sceptical or otherwise, the nuclear option, stares us in the face.
Willis, surely the most fundamental thing about the report is that its calling for, in round numbers, cutting emissions in half by 2030, or else? That is, from 37 billion tons a year, to roughly 19 billion.
This in a context where China is increasing from current emissions of 10 billion+. The signatories to the Paris Agreement who actually signed up to tonnage reductions probably amount in total to not much over 15 – 20 billion, and they did not agree to eliminate, only to reduce. And they are not even meeting their fairly modest reduction targets.
The most important thing about this document is that what it advocates is never going to happen. We will see the usual media, Guardian, Washington Post, NY Times, BBC, proclaiming absolute necessity, total disaster, and blaming Trump for leaving Paris and destroying civilization.
But its not Trump. America only accounts for 5 billion of the 37 billion, and under Paris only was going to knock a couple of billion off. And that was going to be done mainly by creative accounting, offsets of various kinds not actual emission reduction in tons.
The lesson from this report is that we have an unequivocal prediction of disaster from conditions that are just about certain to happen. So I think we can say that by 2030 the argument will be over one way or the other. Emissions will be at least 40-45 billion tons, maybe more, with all the increases coming from China etc.
And either a disaster will be visible, or it will not be.
Its worth sticking around for. Lay in some popcorn and a few tinnies. It will be worth watching.
There is no correlation between man-made fossil fuel CO2 emissions and global temperature ( warming/cooling).
“The IPCC’s special report clearly states that the world has already warmed by 1ºC due to human activity. As a result, climate change is already affecting people, ecosystems and livelihoods across the globe, with impacts such as floods or droughts disproportionately affecting the poorest and most vulnerable. Some of the most affected areas are small islands, megacities, coastal regions and high mountain ranges.” — The recent UN-led Multidimentional Poverty Index (MPI) showed that 271 million Indians moved out of poverty between 2005-06 to 2015-16, with the country’s poverty rate falling from 55% to 28%.
Electricity —Nearly 89% (26.3 crore) of the country’s households have access to electricity. But the rural-urban divide remains, with about 1 out of 6 village households still without electricity compared to 99% coverage for urban households.
Tap water — Over last 4 years, tap water connections increased by 26 percentage points against 12 percentage points during 2011-2014. Rural clusters are the most deprived when it comes to tap water with only 11%-21% households with acess to tap water whereas in the least developed urban clusters, more than 60% households have water connections.
Toilets — 38% of households have no toilets while 27% have toilets without running water. Only 35% households have both. There was a 14% increase in households with a toilet between 2014 and 2018 as compared to 7% increase between 2011 and 2014. Toilet coverage grew by 19% between 2014 and 2018 in rural as compared to 2% in urban areas.
LPG Connections — 79% of urban households use LPG or cooking fuel. But among rural households, 57% depend on firewood. There was a 27% increase in LPG coverage between 2014-2018 as against a 12% growth between 2011-2014.
This data was from: A study commissioned to Price by the Economic Advisory Counsil to the Prime Minister. This report tried to show greater achievement the present rulers years forgetting the fact that the basic infrastructure was developed prior to that period.
Dr. S. Jeevananda Reddy
“Now, looking at those two graphs, can anyone tell me with a straight face that increasing global temperatures harm “the poorest and most vulnerable”???”
“If warming is so bad for the poor, how come the world has steadily warmed over the last century and the lives of the poor have steadily gotten better?
I would suggest that is a logical fallacy.
There is more than one variable concerned.
Not just weather/climate.
In fact it seems that doesn’t even figure (not mentioned in Roser’s book)
How about ( eg ):
Education.
Health
Political freedom and civil liberties
Population growth (feeding opportunities for economic growth – world trade)
Infrastructure improvement.
Max Roser also says in his book….
“And it is also clear that humanity’s impact on the environment is at a level that is not sustainable and is endangering the biosphere and climate on which we depend. We urgently need to reduce our impact.
And of course a changing climate will impact the most poor and vulnerable.
Just that measures of extreme poverty change will not show it.
But don’t you contradict your own premise? Why doesn’t the same logic apply to your argument?
If Eschenbach commits a logical fallacy by identifying warming as the sole factor benefiting the poorest among us, why is it that your argument is valid when you identify warming as being the sole factor of harm to the poor?
“why is it that your argument is valid when you identify warming as being the sole factor of harm to the poor?”
I don’t “identify warming” as being the sole factor of harm to the poor.
I didn’t say anything about what causes harm to the poor.
I gave a list of factors that alleviate poverty.
My “There is more than one variable concerned”, pertained to that .
My last sentence (in my OP) is merely stating the obvious.
“I didn’t say anything about what causes harm to the poor.”
I must’ve misunderstood. Then when you said the following, you meant that the “impact” of the changing climate will continue to be a beneficial impact?
“And of course a changing climate will impact the most poor and vulnerable.
Just that measures of extreme poverty change will not show it.”
Furthermore, then you disagree with Roser when you cite him as identifying (at least) global warming as the sole factor of non-beneficial impacts to humanity overall (which would include the poor, obviously)?
“Max Roser also says in his book….
“And it is also clear that humanity’s impact on the environment is at a level that is not sustainable and is endangering the biosphere and climate on which we depend. We urgently need to reduce our impact.”
Yes you seem to have misunderstood sy.
Simply, I wanted to point out that Roser’s graphs quoted by Willis could not show a correlation of changing climate to continued reduction of extreme poverty (however that may be measured).
That the things I listed (among others) have a much greater impact.
And that it is obvious that a changing climate would impact the poor greatest.
And it doesn’t involve warmer nights in New York making it more comfortable for rough sleepers.
“then you disagree with Roser when you cite him as identifying (at least) global warming as the sole factor of non-beneficial impacts to humanity overall ”
I’m sorry, I don’t think that Roser identified warming as the “sole” impact and I certainly didn’t intend to do that – and yes, I disagree if he did.
Hope that’s clearer.
I think I’m with you now.
If the warming cited by Eschenbach isn’t helpful to the poor as you’ve argued, then neither is it harmful to the poor because of the all the other factors you’ve suggested that make climate change pretty much a non-issue with regard to warming, e.g., “the things I listed (among others) have a much greater impact.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t think that Roser identified warming as the “sole” impact and I certainly didn’t intend to do that – and yes, I disagree if he did.”
Well I didn’t read the book, but if your quote is correct then I’m not sure what else Roser finds detrimental to human existence than climate change. If our environmental impact is “unsustainable,” i.e., “endangering the biosphere and climate on which depend,” to me that presupposes temperature as the main factor in the equation. After all, it’s rising temperature CAGW proponents cite, temperature the models attempt to predict, temperature that’s the main argument for many of the catastrophic predictions (crop failure, yields, nutritional value, SLR, tornadoes, hurricanes, rain, drought, men’s shrinking testicles, etc.).
Since for you temperature isn’t the problem when it comes to climate change, what, if anything, is?
Professor of Climate Impacts, University of Exeter & Met Office Hadley Centre. Posted on Twitter:
‘ That the report shows that we now risk being stuck between a rock and a hard place if we don’t take the right courses of action. Crucially, the report discusses pathways that aim to limit warming to 1.5C without making poor and disadvantaged people worse off.’
Seems such a funny statement to make as the poor and and disadvantaged have generally benefitted over the last few decades when this apparent warming has happened.
When I enquired who the poor and disadvantaged were in this reference he didn’t seem to know and suggested I search the report and associated studies to find the detail myself which makes me think that this is a generalised statement issued from a political collective rather than a scientific body.
How can this be passed as Science?
The cards are stacked against the sceptics but at least history is on our side. It clearly shows that when the climate warms mankind prospers e.g. the Medieval and Roman periods. It’s when the world gets colder that mankind suffers. Many of the great civilisations died during cold periods, often due to drought.
I’ve been interested in human wellbeing indexes. The only useful one I’ve found so far is from the OECD. Unfortunately it only starts in 1820 but – surprise, surprise – it shows human wellbeing constantly increasing decade after decade, despite the terrors of global warming. As Willis points out, if global warming / climate change is so awful, why has human wellbeing increased so much?
So far I haven’t found any useful wellbeing indexes that go further back in time – if anyone knows of them, please let me know. I would be *very* interested in wellbeing studies that go back thousands of years, for the obvious reason.
I did find a study based on the analysis of ancient bones, which gives an indication of height. The authors did mention climate change. Curiously, in England there was less correlation with the climate (the Dark Ages and Little Ice Age), but there was more correlation in Europe.
Chris
So, is “life on earth” no longer at stake, and climate change will mostly just affect the poor? I have a feeling that wealth transfers to poor people living in tropical climates will spend it on air conditioning. If we’re still at risk of flooding the Statue of Liberty up to her armpits then can we afford to increase energy use like that?
But if helping poor people and protecting them from climate change is the objective, insisting on technologies that make electricity expensive are counter-productive. That means more people die.
Headline in today’s El Tiempo, Bogota, Colombia
La Humanidad tiene 12 anos para evitar cambio drastico del clima – Humanity has 12 years in order to avoid drastic climate change
I suppose this is typical of ‘newspapers’ worldwide…
Again? How nice to give us a reprieve.
Willis:
Climate Change is extremely simple, and has two components:
1. Natural recovery from the Little Ice Age cooling: Approx. .05 deg. C/decade
2. The amount of anthropogenic SO2 aerosols in the atmosphere: Approx. .02 deg. C. of temperature change for each net Megaton of change in global SO2 aerosol emissions.
Superimposed upon this are the effects of volcanic SO2 emissions, which lead to the formation of La Ninas (on average, 15 months after a VEI4 or higher eruption), and El Ninos on average,about 2 years after an eruption).
Since circa 1975, all of the anomalous warming that has occurred has been due to the environmental movement’s reduction in SO2 aerosol emissions. CO2 has had no climatic effect.
Apart from continued natural recovery from the LIA cooling, future temperature changes will be governed solely by the amount of anthropogenic and volcanic SO2 aerosols in the atmosphere.
Anthropogenic emissions can be adjusted, but we are at the mercy of random volcanic emissions.
Willis:
I am somewhat amazed that you have exhibited no objection to my explanation of Climate Change, implying that you are in full agreement (as someone with your intelligence should be!)
My post was a simple”broad brush” explanation–further details, if you are interested, can be viewed at the pre-print site “https://www.Osf.io/bycj4/”
Burl:
I am somewhat amazed that you think I read everything everyone writes.
And now that you’ve falsely claimed that my lack of response to whatever you might have written is somehow equivalent to agreeing with something I haven’t read … you can be sure I’ll never read it.
Well played …
w.
Willis:
Yes, I had assumed that you at least skimmed or read all posts.
You have soundly criticized all of my other posts, and a lack of response this time led me to believe that you had finally found no area of disagreement.
(I was actually hoping that you might point out some flaw which I could, hopefully. address, to strengthen my conclusions).
Burl, I do try to read all posts. Still human, though, and I might not see some.
If you’d like some reply to your post, how about you just ASK rather than assuming that silence mean agreement.
OK, hang on … here’s your post:
Burl Henry October 9, 2018 at 6:20 am Edit
Willis:
“Extremely simple”? It’s one of the most complex systems we’ve every tried to model.
Sorry, but this is totally unsupported. Where is your analysis to bear out these curious claims? They might be true, but without a rigorous analysis, it’s just words …
You have not established if either of these is true.
Anybody, including you, who thinks that they can predict the future evolution of the climate is blowing smoke.
I’ve written maybe ten posts demonstrating using, you know, evidence, that the effect of volcanoes is local and short-lived. You’re just making unsupported, unverified, unanalyzed claims.
OK, I’ve pointed out the flaws in your post … can I go now?
w.
That second graph demonstrates conclusively that warming has killed off most of the poor people! From90% to 10% that’s 90% of the poor GONE! Oh! The humanity!
should anyone need it
What hurts the “poorest” are the absurd policies enforced by deluded governments, not the slight increase in temperatures.
A) Just which climate model(s) provided proof that the poorest are affected by climate, at all!?
Meaning that the IPCC’s claim about the poorest being harmed is all alarmism with zero science or economy tracking.
B) Where are those “most vulnerable” defined and identified explicitly!?
It appears that the IPCC used emotional laden words that have zero meaning when discussing climate.
Once again, alarmism is the primary product of the IPCC and UNFCCC, not science and certainly not climate or atmosphere analysis.
* – After years of claiming climate refugees by the millions will be caused by increasing CO₂, the IPCC and alarmists have found none. Nor are any of their favorite alarmist claims occurring; e.g. my testicles are unchanged by CO₂. Though I could increase my beer intake to verify the lack of impact; but I require a couple million dollars for research costs.
* The islands are not sinking below the seas.
* The seas are not rising beyond miniscule amounts.
* Arctic ice is not vanishing.
* Antarctic ice is not melting, except for a few small areas where volcanoes and warm ocean water meet the ice.
* Rainfall is not increasing.
* Floods are not increasing.
* Storms are not increasing, in number or ferocity.
* Droughts are not more common and certainly not as long as historical records indicate.
* Oceans have barely warmed in certain areas. Leaving vast quantities of ocean water slightly above 0.0°C.
* Seasons still occur for all parts of Earth.
etc. etc.
Excellent article Willis!