Guest post by Ian Aitken
Some scientists (epitomized by Dr. Michael Mann) and environmentalists (epitomized by Sir David Attenborough) and climate change campaign groups (epitomized by Extinction Rebellion) hold the opinion that we are experiencing a global ‘climate change emergency’ (the term that seems to be supplanting the pleasingly alliterative ‘climate change crisis’), to the extent that lately cities/counties declaring a ‘climate change emergency’ has become the vogue. Indeed the British Parliament has just declared a national climate change emergency, the first country in the world to do so. However some scientists disagree, primarily arguing that whilst it is true that even modest warming creates some harm (such as coral bleaching) the 10C of post-industrial warming that has occurred has in all probability been net-beneficial for humans and the environment as a whole. So where does the truth lie? Are we really experiencing a climate change emergency?
In my Climate Change Misconceived earlier essay, that explored the dissonance in public understanding of the climate change issue, I contended that based on the best available science and empirical evidence post-industrial climate change (whether it be man-made or natural) apparently has not caused exceptional or accelerating rises in sea levels, has not caused an increase in the frequency or intensity of extreme weather events and has not caused accelerating global species extinctions. Similarly, whilst heat-related deaths have increased with the warming, cold-related deaths have fallen even more – so net-mortality has improved. Furthermore according to Dr. Indur Goklanky, science analyst for the US Department of the Interior, ‘Carbon dioxide fertilises plants, and emissions from fossil fuels have already had a hugely beneficial effect on crops, increasing yields by at least 10-15%.’ So it has apparently been net-beneficial for agriculture. Professor Richard Tol of Sussex University (after reviewing 14 different studies of the effects of future climate trends) concluded that global warming would likely be economically net-beneficial for the world up to 30C. So with only 10C of warming it certainly appears to have been economically net-beneficial to date. Against all this we have to set the effects of ocean warming and reduced alkalinity that have probably been net-harmful for marine life. Taken as a whole, the positive changes from post-industrial climate change appear to have outweighed the negative changes – and the negative changes (in particular rising sea levels) are apparently currently happening sufficiently slowly for us to adapt to them.
Now I’m profoundly conscious of the fact that the above ‘weighing of the scales’ is trite – and I’ve deliberately omitted referencing the dozens of studies that I could have supplied to support my contentions (because that would not be appropriate in a short essay). Nevertheless I think most scientists would agree that climate change results in both harms and benefits and with modest warming the latter may prevail. Perhaps if you only consider the harms, believe them to be potentially dangerous and to require urgent attention, then you can convince yourself that we are experiencing a climate change ‘emergency’. The syllogism of the climate change alarmists appears to be: climate change has potential dangers; climate change is happening now; therefore the climate change potential dangers require urgent (decarbonization) action. This isn’t the most convincing of logic because (quite apart from ignoring the benefits of climate change) the conclusion requires that we ignore the probabilities of the potential dangers coming to fruition. Furthermore even if the potential dangers did come to fruition it may not be socially, environmentally or economically sensible to take urgent (decarbonization) action to mitigate those dangers.
There is no doubt that the Industrial Revolution has had some seriously adverse effects on humanity and the environment, primarily through ocean, land and atmospheric pollution, deforestation, land degradation, urbanization and intensive farming (coupled with over-hunting and over-fishing); the point is that climate change, whilst a very convenient ‘universal scapegoat’, has not (certainly to date) been the prime culprit for all the negative ramifications of industrialization. Consequently looking at the evidence as a whole it is hard to see how climate change that so far has probably been net-beneficial for humans and the environment, that has lifted us out of the misery of the Little Ice Age that preceded it, with its droughts, crop failures, famines and epidemics, and has (not coincidentally) been accompanied by soaring wealth and life expectancy (according to the World Bank – World Development Indicators 2014) could reasonably, in the round, be described as an ‘emergency’; indeed quite the opposite. Conversely we know that fighting climate change has had seriously adverse consequences to date. As Matt Ridley puts it, ‘Building wind turbines, growing biofuels and substituting wood for coal in power stations — all policies designed explicitly to fight climate change — have had negligible effects on carbon dioxide emissions. But they have driven people into fuel poverty, made industries uncompetitive, driven up food prices, accelerated the destruction of forests, killed rare birds of prey, and divided communities… globally nearly 200,000 people are dying every year, because we are turning 5 per cent of the world’s grain crop into motor fuel instead of food: that pushes people into malnutrition and death’. So so far we have been effecting climate policies that have probably been net-harmful to humans and the environment in order to mitigate climate change effects that have probably been net-beneficial for humans and the environment (just in case they become net-harmful many decades in the future).
We know that climate change is happening – but the fact that climate change is happening (as it has for billions of years) does not in itself constitute an ‘emergency’ (or even necessarily a serious problem); global warming and climate change are not intrinsically bad things – few would want to return to the pre-industrial climates of the Little Ice Age. As the IPCC stated in their last Assessment Report, ‘Climate change may be beneficial for moderate climate change’. We are experiencing moderate climate change and it has indeed apparently been net-beneficial. In as much as a ‘climate change emergency’ could be said to exist today it is only in the virtual world of the most extreme projections of the climate change computer models – and you and I do not live in the virtual world (unless you believe that we are all living in The Matrix, in which case our climate models are climate simulations of simulated climates within a world simulation). It’s perfectly reasonable to speculate about the possibility of a climate change emergency many decades in the future – but there certainly does not appear to be one now.
So what of the future? Can we at least say that there will be a climate change emergency in the future even if there has not been one so far? A basic difficulty here is establishing how much warming constitutes an ‘emergency’. There is no ‘Goldilocks’ average surface temperature that is ‘just right’ for the Earth and beyond which we face an ‘emergency’. As Dr Gavin Schmidt, Director of the Goddard Space Institute, has said, ‘No particular absolute global temperature provides a risk to society’. In fact it is impossible to specify a threshold for global warming beyond which the climatic effects become net-harmful let alone a ‘catastrophe’ so imminent that it constitutes an ‘emergency’. As the IPCC put it in their latest Assessment Report: ‘Climate impacts [from global warming]… are geographically diverse and sector specific, and no objective threshold defines when dangerous interference is reached. Some changes may be delayed or irreversible, and some impacts could be beneficial. It is thus not possible to define a single critical objective threshold without value judgements and without assumptions on how to aggregate current and future costs and benefits.’ In plain English defining when global warming becomes an ‘emergency’ is at best a matter of opinion and at worst meaningless. Perhaps to an ardent environmentalist the potential loss of a single species of Amazonian tree frog due to global warming would be a global climate change ‘emergency’ – but I don’t think most of us would agree.
So what about the maximum 20C warming (above pre-industrial levels) target in the Paris Climate Accord? If we exceed that then would that be an ‘emergency’? Professor Roger Pielke Jr. explained in 2017 that this target ‘is an arbitrary round number that was politically convenient. So it became a sort of scientific truth. However, it has little scientific basis but is a hard political reality.’ As Mark Maslin puts it in Climate Change – A Very Short Introduction, ‘It should always be remembered that this is a political number, as the definition of what is dangerous climate change is a societal rather than a scientific decision.’ Despite this, the New Scientist (in October 2015) declared that such warming would be ‘catastrophic’, which, given that we have already experienced 10C of warming, means that we only have another 10C to go before we hit ‘catastrophe’. In fact because the global average surface temperature varies dramatically throughout each year (about 3.80C) every year (around July) we already experience global average surface temperatures far in excess of the 20C goal – without apparent catastrophic (or, indeed, noticeable) effect. And (because warming varies by geographical region) Europe has actually already experienced about 20C of warming over the last 150 years, without any ‘climate change catastrophe’ happening. As Michael Hart puts it, in Hubris: The Troubling Science, Economics and Politics of Climate Change, ‘The warming of the atmosphere by a degree or two over the course of a century presents no significant direct harm and in many ways may be beneficial… historically periods of warming have been beneficial to humans, flora and fauna alike. If the GHG hypothesis [the IPCC’s theory] is correct, its principal effect will be at higher latitudes at night and in winter, i.e. in reducing heat loss to the upper atmosphere and out into space. Warmer winters and warmer nights will generally extend growing seasons and increase harvests.’ So the idea that just one further degree of global warming would be a ‘catastrophe’ or an ‘emergency’ appears to be profoundly misconceived. Yet we are now being told that just half a degree of further warming would be catastrophic, an assertion that appears ridiculous (taking any reasonable interpretation of the word ‘catastrophic’). Based on paleoclimatology estimates 50 million years ago the Earth was about 80C warmer than it is now (and 500 million years ago up to 140C warmer) and no ‘tipping point’ into ‘climate catastrophe’ occurred. Perhaps when alarmists describe even half a degree of warming as ‘catastrophic’ they are doing so primarily for rhetorical purposes in order to create an impression of urgency and alarm in policymakers and help justify the almost inevitable global recession/depression that would result from the societal-transformational policies designed to limit warming to half a degree.
Take, for instance, Extinction Rebellion’s interestingly-named The Truth tab on their web site. This is devoted to the most extreme, highly improbable, projections of climate models, none of which are associated with a mere half a degree of warming. Yet here they imply that even half a degree of global warming would be ‘utterly catastrophic’, that ‘a mass extinction event… is underway’ and that we only have until 2030 to avoid such a catastrophe. In support of these claims they provide a link to the IPCC’s SR15 report; yet this report says little more than that climate risks will be higher if we experience one degree of further global warming than if we experience a half a degree of further global warming – which is not particularly contentious and obviously not remotely equivalent to any hyperbolic claim of ‘catastrophe’ or ‘mass extinction’, neither of which terms appear anywhere in the report. In fact the closest the report comes to these terms is where it states, ‘species loss and extinction are projected to be lower at 1.50C of global warming compared to 20C’. Furthermore the fact that a change has downsides does not necessarily mean that it will be net-harmful and does not necessarily mean that it makes economic sense to take action to avoid that change. Based on the climate economics Nordhaus DICE Model if we adopted a global climate policy of limiting warming to the half a degree target humanity would be $14 trillion poorer compared to doing nothing at all about climate change. To try to get $14 trillion into some kind of perspective it is about 500 times more than was spent on all the Apollo missions to the moon between 1960 and 1972 (at the time the most expensive scientific project of all time). This can reasonably be described as ‘serious money’ that might better be spent on relieving known and pressing global problems, such as poverty, hunger and disease than on decarbonization. So even if we accept that the risks of climate change are higher at a degree of warming compared with a half a degree of warming that does not necessarily mean that it would be wise (or even cost-effective) to try to avoid such warming through urgent global decarbonization. Saying (in effect) that we must urgently, radically decarbonize the world in order to reduce adverse climate impacts, however small and however easily we might adapt to them (and whatever the human and environmental costs and impacts of decarbonization) is obviously highly questionable (to put it charitably).
A key question here is how we define a ‘climate change emergency’. Clearly if ‘runaway global warming’ were about to occur then that would constitute an ‘emergency’. This is global warming sufficient to induce out-of-control amplifying feedbacks (i.e. passing a tipping point into irreversible global warming, such as is thought by some to have happened on Venus). But even the IPCC admit that ‘a runaway greenhouse effect—analogous to [that of] Venus—appears to have virtually no chance of being induced by man-made activities.’ For anything that could reasonably be called a ‘climate change emergency’ to even potentially occur (for example, the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet or the failure of the Gulf Stream or vast methane release from melting permafrost) would require the worst possible case scenarios of carbon dioxide emissions (that would be virtually impossible to occur) and worst possible case values for climate sensitivity (several times their most likely value based on the best available empirical studies to date). Even the IPCC describe such climate disruptions as ‘very unlikely’ or ‘exceptionally unlikely’. So a ‘climate change emergency’ many decades from now is not absolutely impossible – but it appears extremely improbable. Probably the greatest real risk from climate change in the foreseeable future is sea level rise and the IPCC say that sea levels could rise 10 centimeters more with one degree of further global warming compared with half a degree. But even if it happened would that really constitute a global ‘climate change emergency’? If you live on the south Florida coast and the sea was previously lapping your garden but now is lapping your front door then it might well be an ‘emergency’ for you – but not surely a global ‘emergency’. Even if we were to call this a global emergency there is very little we can do about it (other than adapt).
Climate change has been happening for the 4.5 billion years of the Earth’s life and will continue to change into the future (at least for the next 5 billion years, at which time we will experience some extreme global warming as the dying sun turns into a Red Giant and vaporises the Earth); there is nothing to be done about that (unless you want to face the huge risks of geoengineering the climate). Furthermore it is generally believed that there is about 0.60C of global warming ‘in the pipeline’ from past carbon dioxide emissions. So unless currently non-viable and unproved technologies (like Carbon Capture and Sequestration) remove these emissions a half a degree of future warming is inevitable (even if we stopped all global carbon dioxide emissions overnight). So thanks to this half degree of warming is the sixth mass extinction event now inevitable, as Extinction Rebellion claim? It would appear that the alarmists are claiming that almost any change in the Earth’s climate, even a relatively trivial half a degree of warming, constitutes an existential emergency. Here we are getting into the realms of the ridiculous, if not surreal. If by a ‘climate change emergency’ we actually mean serious climate disruption then claims that we are experiencing a climate change emergency today appear tenuous in the extreme (if not absurd). Claims that there could, possibly be a climate change emergency in the future are perfectly reasonable – but the idea that such an emergency will occur if we don’t urgently, radically globally decarbonize appear tenuous in the extreme (if not absurd).
Climate alarmism is an intellectual, and a moral meltdown, as well. It is based on pseudoscience, and politically created and driven. It has become a religious phenomenon, fooling Children and people who cannot check the sources and make the analysis required. This is the real catastrophic emergency!
Agree Rolf. The real emergency is the hysterical reaction now embedded in the political scene. Meanwhile the climate will plod on as it always has. – No problem.
This proud movement is known as Gretinism.
“another surreal catastrophic emergency!”
I have seen it referred to as #science as opposed to actual science. Social media science is all the rage amongst the kids it fits neatly into a Tweet with a #science stuck on the end for #authenticity.
The real crisis is in the corruption of science and the “97%” of scientists in all fields who remain conspicuously silent about this.
BTW the essay is more of book. Sorry, I no longer have the time nor attention span for such articles.
More paragraph breaks would help. A professional (paid) blogger once advised me to use paragraphs limited to 5 or 6 lines, to ease eye-fatigue caused by the ever-present background light. Also, if the reader steps away or is otherwise interrupted, shorter paragraphs facilitate the resumption of reading.
Many, many times I see one-sentence “paragraphs” – even in “news” stories on-line.
Brevity is the soul of wit.
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief: your noble son [CAGW] is mad.
— William Shakespeare
Great article, but a lot of pixels to say basically: It’s time we push back against the loons. Decisively!
Emergency?
Unequivocally no.
There is not the slightest evidence of any concerning trends. Temperature as seen by the satellites and corroborated by balloon data shows no real trend for about 2 decades. The only change is that CO2 is rising and that is undoubtedly being extremely beneficial.
If you understand the temperature record, you will see that the planet is extremely insensitive to warming in an inter-glacial and as such it is extremely unlikely that even if humanity tried through our best endeavours, that we could ever make the temperature of the climate rise noticeable.
In contrast, the temperature record does show increased sensitivity when going between an interglacial and glacial and/or back. As such, the most extreme climate scenario that is realistic is that of relatively sudden and significant global cooling. And – more through cock up that good management – that is now less likely than it was in the 1970s (when sun-light reflecting pollution from SO2 and nuclear winter were serious concerns).
So, on a scale of 1 to 10, my level of concern is around about 2 … which is less to do with the climate and more to do with the crazy nut-cases that might just find some way of doing something really stupid to “save the climate” and that has the remote possibility of triggering a new ice-age … but seriously … the cultists are so inept I doubt even if they set out to destroy the planet, that they’d be able to do it.
Mike Haseler (Scottish Sceptic)
There are two things I cite to anyone who expresses an interest in climate science (including yesterday, the extraordinarily inquisitive and bright 14 year old son of my neighbour).
1. No one in the history of mankind has demonstrated by empirical means (and for the avoidance of doubt I explain that as a guy standing in the middle of a field with measuring equipment) that atmospheric CO2 causes the planet to warm, far less the ~0.0012% of the planets atmosphere man is responsible for.
2. The ONLY observable manifestation of increased atmospheric CO2 on the planet is that in 35 years of satellite observations, the planet has greened by 14%. According to one of the NASA scientists conducting the research, that’s equivalent to two continents the size of mainland USA. They also carefully screened out growth affected by man in any way. In other words, this is virgin growth over which man has no influence.
Apply those two simple tests to any supposed climate alarmist science and they immediately fall flat on their face.
Sea level rise? Apart from it continuing at between 1mm and 3mm per year (location dependent) for hundreds of years, frankly, so what? Even if it doubled, or trebled, it would take decades for any meaningful effect to be felt and, worst case scenario, the people desperate to live on the coast would be forced to move inland, many only a few hundred metres.
And as explained by Dr. Moore at the recent Congressional hearing in the US; during the last ice age atmospheric CO2 fell to 180 ppm, only 30 ppm away from when all meaningful plant life dies and humankind becomes extinct. If humans are in any meaningful way responsible for raising atmospheric CO2 levels (bearing in mind it has no meaningful or detectable effect on the planets temperature) that can only be a good thing as, whilst the future may be uncertain, we are 100% certain that the alternative is far, far worse.
And I implore the sceptical scientific community to present their arguments in this simple way so people like me (largely uneducated) can understand and articulate arguments they struggle to interpret at a scientific level.
The reason climate alarmists have been so successful in their attempts to promote their faith is that they give the general public sound bites (factual or otherwise – 97% anyone?) they can easily remember and parrot.
We should be doing the same.
Hotscot, did you manage to persuade your neighbour’s son with that very good explanation? I hope so.
Harry
No need to persuade him. I explained it and he was onto it immediately.
I simply want the governments of the world to duplicate (truthfully everybody knows there was no vote originally) the vote that proclaimed a 97% consensus.
Let us first have a public forum on who should be qualified to have a vote. Then publish a public record of the qualified registered voters on the internet.
Then hold an actual vote and see if there are more than 97 actual scientists, let alone 97%, that will vote that we have an extinction level climate crisis on our hands. But whatever their number we will ‘Most Likely’ (one of the psuedo-scientists favorite qualifier) not have a consensus. And of particular note people like Bill Nye the science guy (as well as 97% of the jabbering class) will not show up on the registry of qualified voters.
It would be very useful if the skeptical scientific community could supply short but easily understood counters to the alarmist propaganda. The alarmists and most of the MSM use sound bites, misinformation and extreme climate scenarios to influence people. The skeptical community should have short, referenced rebuttals on hand that can be deployed by the non scientists. For example when alarmists scream catastrophic sea level rise then there should be a simple paragraph rebuttal available to copy and paste. You are not going to convince joe public with in depth scientific argument however using the alarmists own sources, e.g. IPCC, against them would work.
Surprisingly, the UN IPCC summary for policymakers can be used to defuse the arguments. The first section of this document summarizes the global average increase between 1951 and 2012 at 0.12 ± 0.02ºC per decade, and if you look at the latter years, 1998-2012, it shows 0.05 ± 0.1ºC per decade. In other words, we don’t see the dreaded runaway temperatures, a change of 1.2ºC per century, dropping to 0.5ºC per century when CO2 emissions are at the highest.
Even the EPA data under its indicators of climate change a measure of ocean pH dropping from an alkaline 8.10 to a still alkaline 8.05 well within seasonal variations in pH and I would presume, though not shown, within the error bars of measurements.
HotScot, whilst it is true that no one has demonstrated a link between CO2 and temperature and that “link” clearly does not exist in the ice-age cycle (where we get suddenly and large-scale changes in temperature without change in CO2) and on the longer scale the two are clearly not linked … so yes, whilst there is not the slightest proof of a link from the climate record, … there is good scientific reason to believe that a doubling of CO2 will cause between 0.6C (from credible sources) to 1.2C (for a 5x arrested eco-nutter used by the IPCC) rise in temperature.
That is the ONLY actual science the whole idiotic climate CULT is based on … indeed the climate cultists are so embarrassed by that science that, whilst they always claim what they say is “based on science”, you will never hear them openly mention this actual science. For example, I believe this figure has been in two IPCC reports … the first as a footnote in an obscure section which I managed to find, the other I was told existed but I never found it.
If the climate cult were science, then as every scientist would tell you, this sole scientific basis would be screaming from every IPCC report. Real scientists don’t hide the only science they “have” … real scientist aren’t embarrassed by the science.
If there’s a ‘Climate Change Emergency’ it’s that we may be entering a new Little Ice Age right now with much of the US still struggling to get its crops planted (‘worst year ever’ for planting, according to some people). Which is nothing to do with CO2, and it’s hard to tax the sun, so governments have no interest in doing anything about it.
All your many arguments are eminently sane. But the psychological problem with human beings who are suffering from “group-think” is that is that sweet reason will never have the slightest impact on them. Most humans are like that – it is a fact of life. We just have to ignore them – seriously arguing with them is just a waste of CO2. And it doesn’t really matter. There is an awful lot of money being wasted because of all their shenanigans – but, hey, who cares. Society is so rich now that we can afford it. In a few years time some little boy will cry out “But he has got nothing on!” (like in the Emperor’s New Clothes) – and the world will come to its senses. And it would not surprise me if the IPCC itself finally calls a halt to the panic.
In my country we have today had thousands of schoolchildren out on “strike”, claiming “climate emergency”. Even 4 year old kindergarten kids went on strike, for heaven’s sake. I think that the ridiculousness of it all will also finally dawn on some.
Quite correct. I suspect many parrot the climate disaster meme out of fear they will be mocked by their peers if they don’t. They will not voice their doubt unless they value the respect of a skeptic more than the approval of their friends.
The best we can hope for is to plant doubt in their minds so they will be less likely to protest when skeptics begin winning the debate.
jtom: “[…] when skeptics begin winning the debate.”
What debate?
The last debate was years ago and the CAGWers got trounced. Lesson learned? Never debate the skeptics. Call them ‘deniers’ and keep on predicting doom, but never debate.
I’ll be happy to be shown to be wrong. Can anyone point me to any significant public debates in the last 5-6-7 years?
@ H.R. – May 25, 2019 at 10:48 am
Right you are, …… H.R
For the past several years I’ve been telling the folks on this site (WUWT) that the Public Schools are nurturing (teaching) far, far, far more individuals (students) each and every year to be avid believers, promoters and supporters in/of the “junk science” of CO2 causing Anthropogenic Global Warming Climate Change (CAGWCC) ……. that it is IMPOSSIBLE for the learned scientists and deniers/skeptics of said “junk science” to re-nurture/re-educate said students, ….. given the fact that the “funded intere$t” persons/groups and the liberal “money-grubbing” News Media are doing their best to exacerbate a “bad” situation because it is highly profitable for them to be doing so.
If the per se, ….. learned scientists and deniers/skeptics …… cannot get the teaching, instructing and/or brainwashing of “junk science” and “political correctness” out of the US Public School System, …. then it matters not-a-twit if anything else is done or not. The “wackos” will keep “winning” their quest for everyone “losing”.
The learned scientists and deniers/skeptics have to launch “attacks” against their County Board of Education members, …… their School Superintendent ……. and all other School Administrators, …… demanding that the content of the “teaching curriculum” be changed by eliminating all “junk science” and “political correctness” that is now being “force-fed” to all students and their teachers.
To do anything else is simply a waste of time and energy.
The election of “School Board Members” is far more important than the election of the Congress or the POTUS.
Cheers
AndyE,
“And it would not surprise me if the IPCC itself finally calls a halt to the panic.”
I beg to differ: The IPCC would just turn around, as an emblematic political body they are, and claim that CAGC (Cooling) is the new men-made menace; while the 4-year-old kids would go on strike again…
You forget that all the panic and alarm come from the IPCC summary. This is supposed to be the interpretation of the main IPCC report because it is not expected ordinary folks have the intelligence to draw sensible conclusions from the main report, so full of statistical percentage possibilities. But the summary is really just a political statement, hammered out behind closed doors by the world’s governments. THERE is the political body – not the IPCC scientists.
Who do you think is the master in a situation like in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice as it looks to me right now?
A good essay, filled with eloquent summaries of reasons why the alarm over CO2 has been hyperbolic and unjustified. We are a long way from this being a widely-held view amongst the chatterati, but calm and reasonable articles like this one can help us move in that direction. Well done, Ian Aitken!
A very sensible summary. I don’t understand the current sudden panic, otherwise sensible people seem to completely have misunderstood the recent UN report and honestly believe that there is a “climate catastrophe” unfolding already.
@ Espen – May 25, 2019 at 3:13 am
Well “DUH” the same thing occurred nigh on to 42 years ago, only back then it was the …. “cancer causing ‘cigarette smoke’ catastrophe”, …….. to wit:
So, …… yesteryear, …. cigarette smoke was the “cash-cow” that was the chosen “fear factor” for gaining “cultural/mental control” of the populace.
And, ….. present day, …. CAGW climate change is the “cash-cow” that is the chosen “fear factor” for gaining additional “cultural/mental control” of the populace.
A population of miseducated “gullible” lemmings, ….. the same as sheeple, …. will do whatever they are told to do.
The tiny-brained Klimate Kluckers just keep on clucking louder and louder in hopes of persuading other potential KK’s to join them, and to keep those in their ranks from deserting. Thus we have the continual inflation of the rhetoric. There is absolutely nothing “wrong” with the climate, and the really funny part is that even if there were, other than adapt which is what we’ve always done, there is not a single thing we could do that would make a difference because we, despite the loud cluckings of the KK’s aren’t causing it. It is the ultimate hubris of man, and the ultimate stupidity to think that he can, or should even try to change the climate.
The amazing thing is not how much the temperature has risen but how stable it is one part in 273 when we are tasked with + or – one mph on our cruise control or + or – one degree on our thermostat. What a bunch of hogwash
I think climate moderation is a better description of what has happened to our climate recently. It may even be partly human caused. Otherwise the change is so insignificant as to be negligible.Sit back with a beer and enjoy the warm days. There are too damn few of them in my locality.
I knew global warming/climate change statements were wrong from the first time I heard them, because of the comprehensive science education I received in the 1950’s in public elementary school in Louisiana. Back then, Louisiana was rated 48th out of 48 states in quality of public school education. This always leads me to a question: If my education was so ‘bad’ what were the rest of you studying??
DocWat – May 25, 2019 at 3:52 am
I agree, DocWat, ……. what were the rest of them studying??
Because, like you, …. I ALSO received my comprehensive science education in the 1950’s era Public Schools as a poor, young Hillbilly student living in a “coal town” in central West Virginia.
If we were living with our current level of technology and civilisation during the last iceage and we were using fossil fuels at the same rate and the temperature started to rise would we have a climate emergency?
son of mulder
Very good comparison and one that should be used more to open the public’s eyes. 90% (at least) of the public are not scientists so trying to persuade them with science is useless.
There is a ‘Climate Industry Emergency’ – despite the increasingly vociferous and screeching few and the virtue signalling politicians, the population as a whole are not interested except that they do not want any more windmills or high tension cables across unspoiled countryside. The subsidies for electric cars and renewables are all being reduced or removed. Those more interested have noted that China and India are getting a pass and that the ‘cure’ for the ‘climate emergency’ seems to be higher taxation.
At the same time the weather is not cooperating as the recent snows from Denver to Zugspitze is showing. There are even scientists not repressed by the academia and the media in Russia for example that are forecasting cold.
If you are someone in the ‘climate industry’ an academic getting $millions in grants for anything climate related, what is happening now is most definitely an emergency – if the politicians cotton on that they have been had, and worse that the populace can see that they have been scammed, then climate science and renewables will lose their funding overnight. That loss of face and funding is an extreme emergency; expect more screeching.
I am thinking the more-deascriptive term is ‘Climate Emergency Industry’.
I find your reference to science in China, India and Russia most interesting. We here in the Western world forget that, actually, these days we are in the minority when it comes to scientific acumen. Certainly China and Russia can now claim equal proficiency in achieved science. We stupidly assume that what we declare in the sphere of science (and climate) must be correct. Well it just ain’t so. And I bet that in neither China, Russia or India do kindergarten kids go on “strike” to combat climate change. We are watching the decline of the strength of Western science, which up until now has led the world.. Sensible, rational science from (particularly) China will lead the way to the world’s future (no matter how much President Trump fumes or sputters).
In my previous comment about my education, I should have used the phrase “these climate nuts” in place of “you”. On the same theme, I taught Science in Kansas a few years back. At the end of the year I was horrified to count up the terms I had taught: 200. I was even more disconcerted to learn that my students vastly out performed the other science students in a state administered standardized test the next year.
A couple of points to the nice article.
“So thanks to this half degree of warming is the sixth mass extinction event now inevitable, as Extinction Rebellion claim?”
Strange that in the Amazon jungle, where it is hot and humid, has many more species than you will find in Alaska. So, Extinction Rebellions, any proof that hotter will result in less species?
“arguing that whilst it is true that even modest warming creates some harm (such as coral bleaching)”
Not sure that is the case anyway:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/08/17/remember-when-they-told-us-coral-bleaching-was-a-sure-result-of-recent-man-made-global-warming-never-mind/
Well written essay that provides an easily understood position quite rationally.
Now it needs to be shortened by about 80% and the remaining sentences reduced to 10 – 12 words in length. It should probably have all the main statements of fact bolded. We could all share it on our personal Facebook pages where it can be safely ignored by the alarmist maniacs who will then ask us why we want to destroy the future for our children.
I was under the impression that they have been saying it was an emergency for more than twenty years now, and will probably be saying the same thing in another twenty years. The main problem is that they ran out of words to make the claim so they just scream it louder and louder.
The green blob has been proclaiming imminent doom since at least the early 1960’s, with Carson’s “Silent Spring”, so it is over 50 years. It is just the cause that will kill us all off that varies, from pesticides to all industrial chemicals to population growth to resource exhaustion to nuclear winter to CO2 caused global cooling to CO2 caused global warming.
There will always be something they need to save us from.
I do not see proof in their actions that the Climate Activists believe in the possibility of “catastrophe”…BECAUSE…I do not see or hear of any plan to force or assist Asia in reducing emissions.
Asia is accelerating by multiples…not fractions, their CO2 emissions. Asia’s annual emissions increases are greater than Canada’s total emissions.
Where is the desperate push for escalating atomic power development worldwide…to the extent of GIVING China, India, and Southeast Asia about 500 Nuclear plants THIS DECADE. If “we are all going to die”…then Asia must comply. Might even have to nuke them into compliance lest we ALL perish.
The alternative to imposing nuclear power onto all of Asia is CATASTROPHE to us all (including the asians) or death and deprivation to millions in the developing world from insufficient enough energy supplies SINCE THEY WOULD HAVE TO GIVE UP COAL PLANTS….or die anyway from climate catastrophe.
THAT DESPERATE PUSH to “nuclearize” Asia IS NOT HAPPENING AND WILL NEVER HAPPEN because this Climate crisis is not about the climate. It’s all a “Trojan Elephant” to insinuate a socialist tyranny onto the masses.
Doesn’t take a Sherlock Holmes to see through this terrible charade.
Warmer and free is good…cold and socialist tyranny is bad.
“Are We Experiencing a Climate Change Emergency?”
NO !
We have emergency in logical and scientific thinking !
Greta has a new book out
Last week theTimes previewed it “Greta Thunberg’s speeches to be rushed out as a book”
25 May TheTimes has a review of said book
“Greta Thunberg’s book No One Is Too Small To Make A Difference— ‘I want you to panic’ is out now.”
It’s a double review with Bill McK’s
It’s paywalled.. I have an account
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/falter-by-bill-mckibben-no-one-is-too-small-to-make-a-difference-by-greta-thunberg-0j8gvh602
\\ 80 postcard-size pages, obviously meant to be picked up at the till, with a crusading niece or nephew in mind. //
‘Bills book is double doom the book is split half Climate & half AI
though he writes on the latter vaguely.
He blames the evils of capitalism for them both’
“Reading McKibben helps one to make sense of the populist tone of the resurgent environmental movement. Where once environmentalists took to the comment pages of The Guardian to nag shoppers into buying organic, now they take to the streets to demand the overthrow of the planet-killers. “
There’s a reason The Guardian now subsists on donations. And McKibben is a wall-eyed loon preaching to his congregation of like minds–lucratively.
It’ll never outsell “The Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy” , emblazoned with the words in a friendly typeface, “Don’t panic”
Very good comment Ian Aitken, indeed there is no emergency as we understand it.
But in the twisted world of “I FEEL”, their logic is very different.
President Trump,his election and open distain for “The Science” of consensus and appeal to authority, was soon followed by more voter rejection of the “Great Cause” in other localities.
Without the USA cowtowing to the hysteria it falls apart.
The “Redistributers of wealth” almost pulled off what can only be called the biggest scam in history.
It seemed unstoppable,promoted by every Bureau and government agency imaginable, unchallengible in “polite society”.
Now their prize has been snatched away by those miserable people who they dismissed, the tax paying citizen.
It is an emergency at Parasite Central,the Cult is crumbling,the over taxed voter snarling,not mumbling.
Their Tax on Air is being rejected and themselves cast out of their comfortable niches, now being identified as the useless freeloaders they truly are.
Damn Right it is an emergency to Gang Green,most of them have never held a real job.
In Prague, Czech Republic, the District 7 declared a climate emergency. District 8 offered to accommodate climate refugees from District 7.
http://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/29492-praha-se-nachazi-ve-stavu-klimaticke-nouze
It seems to me that we do indeed have a “long term” climate emergency, actually more like a challenge instead. Eventually all those AGW folks are going to have to face up to the fact that their dire warnings are a 180 degree opposite position. The planet is in the opening phase of the next prolonged cold spell(Glaciation Phase), and there is nothing we can do about it. But in the meantime, this Grand Solar Minimum we have begun entering is the alarm bell that should awaken those who are concerned about our long-term tenure.
As the saying goes, “Its the Sun Stupid! Not the Co2.”
” Furthermore it is generally believed that there is about 0.60C of global warming ‘in the pipeline’ from past carbon dioxide emissions. ”
In this otherwise excellent review this “generally believed” point should have been refuted as erroneous and therefore irrelevant to any “climate emergency”.
Another thought to consider in discussion of a “climate emergency” is coming to an agreement on the definition of “climate”and then requiring the construction of an emergency to maintain that definition. It is hard for me to envision how a slight change in an annual average of global averages that cannot be shown to be affected by changes in CO2 let alone a minor addition to the natural flux of CO2 could ever become an emergency.
The latest ‘climate emergency’ hysteria is borne more out of fear that alarmist voices aren’t being heard, as despite their caterwauling nothing of significance is happening that can be remotely attributed to an actual emergency.
Meanwhile China, India and the RoW drive emissions ever higher, so even if alarmists claims are true – and they’re not, the policies being rolled out will have (literally) no effect whatsoever on either emissions or temperatures.
So as usual it’s much ado about nothing.
“whilst heat-related deaths have increased with the warming”
For the US the 1930’s were far worse because of the warm driven drought. Events like the European 2003 summer heatwave are driven by periods of much higher solar wind temperature and have nothing to do with global warming, they are drivers of climate change, and occur at specific heliocentric Jovian configurations.
The prime claim made by Roger Hallam co-founder of Extinction Rebellion is that the UK will suffer mass starvation within ten years due to a ‘climate breakdown’. When I raised the point with him on his facebook page, that the zero carbon by 2025 that they are demanding would guarantee mass starvation, I was promptly blocked.
Extinction Rebellion’s third demand is for a citizens assembly for climate justice. Sounds like a great idea, we could have special committees and put people like Hallam in the dock and publicly examine his claims.
Correction.. because of the warm *AMO phase* driven drought..
Not surprising. They are cowards and bullies.
More people worldwide die from cold than heat. As a very simple example, in the UK there have been around 1million extra winter deaths since this scam started. In contrast, the only year when there was an increase in death rates in the summer was 2003 and that was 2300.
The same is true in all countries including India. Humans evolved in Africa, we are out of our comfort zone in most of the world, and it’s no surprise that cold is the biggest killer.
“I think most scientists would agree that climate change results in both harms and benefits …”
I challenge the author to compile a list of the people harmed by roughly 1 degree C. of warming in the past 138 years.
I’m in my 22nd year of reading climate science as a hobby, and 5th year of publishing a climate science blog (URL below), and I have yet to identify any bad news from the actual, past, mild, intermittent, global warming.
In fact I would say the past 150 years were the most prosperous and healthy 150 years for humans, ever.
So please explain who has been hurt by actual climate change (not the people hurt by misguided, expensive attempts to slow climate change, which is a long list of victims, or wild guess computer game predictions, please).
http://www.elOnionBloggle.Blogspot.com
Richard, have a look at this site –
http://www.use-due-diligence-on-climate.org/
We now have an ’emergency’ because the communists errr… Globalists are losing support around the world… They need to make their move to gain total control soon, so are ramping up the propoganda machine to frighten people into supporting their power play…
A nice little war in the mideast, started of course by the ‘evil’ anti-globalist Trump, will be just what they need to get the sheeple to finally turn over all their freedoms in the name of ‘saving the planet’….
I have been a lurker for years both here and on SkS. I have but one conclusion: you, the frequent posters and guest essayists, need to write and submit papers refuting the most basic “facts” touted daily in the press. In my mind those supposed facts include but are not limited to 1) climate change is the cause of increasing extreme weather events that are increasingly costly to mankind 2) sea levels are rising faster than they were in the last century 3) rising global average temperatures will result in diminished crop yields and the new hot topic 4) climate change is and will increasingly cause mass extinctions.
Each of these “facts” are frequently bandied about in the press, but not one has a shred of scientific evidence to support them as facts and in reality the facts show the exact opposite, but . . . and here’s the dilemma . . . no one is attacking these with the climatologist’s favorite weapon: the scientific paper.
There are so many intelligent and well educated individuals on the side of skepticism, and I believe most would accept that the Earth is warming faster than before, and man made CO2 is playing a part, but the real question is: why should we care? So far rising temperatures and increased CO2 have been net beneficial and speculation that this trend will reverse is not science. Why are so few able or willing to write scientific papers to show this?
Popular websites and speaking in front of Congress will not turn the tide so long as the activists such as Mann and Schmidt can continue to claim the high ground under the guise of “settled science”.
The media exaggerate claims made in papers. The papers themselves are often rather measured and reasonably full of caveats. They are looking for a very subtle signal in noise and some are true believers. People like Mann appear to have started out as believers but now KNOWS the theory is not panning out. But he is willing to ignore data that disconfirms the theory to sell the hypothesis he needs.
The publishers know this. The publishers are not going to question it. They are not going to offer anything for review to people that would reasonably challenge it if the claim is contentious. They circle the wagons.
You want to refute BS written by 1000’s of parrots? Good luck.
“Even if we were to call this [sea level rise] a global emergency there is very little we can do about it (other than adapt).”
Fascinating essay, but why the fatalism in this sentence? We know lots about how ice sheets break and how meltwater can enter the seas. It doesn’t seem outlandish that we could put this knowledge to use and make the proverbial ‘stitch in time’.
As long as we can identify weak spots in the ice sheets there are a variety of ways we could create artificially colder microclimates there, thus slowing or stopping the loss of ice. Even a very basic thing like towing icebergs to the edge of an at-risk ice sheet would surely cool the microclimate there and hinder new iceberg calving.
We attempt to manage so many other types of landscape — why not ice sheets too?
[????? .mod]
Why all the question marks, Mod, out of interest? Surely it’s not that outlandish to suggest that interventions at the ice sheet may be able to slow their melting. It seems to me that if we can predict how and where ice fractures or melts then we can do something about it. But perhaps you can set me right.
There is no way you could stop an ice sheet from calving. We do not have the technology for anything like that.
Better technology is always being developed, but I don’t think it is controversial to note that (just to take my basic example) ice tends to lower the temperature of surrounding water, and that icebergs near ice sheets can protect them from powerful waves.
Icebergs are routinely towed away from Arctic oil rigs; I can’t see a reason why they couldn’t be towed to particular places we would like to be cooler, instead of being allowed to float off into warmer waters.
Also, surface melt can run off into particular channels depending on the lay of the land. Putting something across the bed of the watercourse and super-chilling it in order to slow the flow as desired does not seem beyond us.
I’d be very surprised if the task of making cold water somewhat colder foxes science entirely.
Some of us aren’t missing the point here. The cooling phase has begun. Ice is growing North and South. We don’t need to worry about ice calving etc. so won’t get distracted by thoughts of how to solve a non-existent problem. And when the next warming phase begins, if there is another one before the next ice age, hopefully those with knowledge will ignore it knowing it will be followed by the next cooling phase. The tide goes out, the tide comes in . . . in out, in out . . .
“therefore the climate change potential dangers require urgent (decarbonization) action. This isn’t the most convincing of logic because (quite apart from ignoring the benefits of climate change) the conclusion requires that we ignore the probabilities of the potential dangers coming to fruition.”
I don’t fear Climate Change.
I fear Climate Change “remedies.”
Those are far more detrimental than an increasing trace gas increase and a few degrees warming.
Climate Change is ruse hiding global Socialism and abetted by China’s desire to dominate Asia with imperialism that 1.3 Billion population requires to sustain itself.
‘I contended that based on the best available science and empirical evidence post-industrial climate change (whether it be man-made or natural) apparently has not caused exceptional or accelerating rises in sea levels, has not caused an increase in the frequency or intensity of extreme weather events and has not caused accelerating global species extinctions.’
You never define ‘climate change.’ In the above, it is meaningless. You have adopted the language of the rogue climate scientist. Global mean temperature is measurable, at least theoretically. Climate change isn’t measurable, it isn’t even definable.
Definition of emergency: A serious, unexpected, and often dangerous situation requiring immediate action.
Ok, so some governments have declared a climate emergency.
Recommended immediate actions for those governments:
Ban all non-essential flying to holiday destinations.
Introduce restrictions on car, bus and truck use.
Reduce by 50% the use of international shipping.
What’s that you say? Those restrictions would create a new emergency – economic destruction.
Well, make up your mind – what emergency did you want actioned?
I see that the London police want to prosecute the Extinction Rebellion activists who were arrested during the recent contretemps.
May I suggest that any found guilty are sentenced to 6 months in a Beijing summer followed by 6 months in cabin during a Canadian winter.
According to a report from the Centre for Research of the Epidemiology of Disasters, from 1998-2017 there were 1.4 million deaths cause by natural disasters on earth. About 747,000(56%) were caused by geophysical events such as earthquakes and volcanoes. Geophysical events are not influenced by CO2 levels in the atmosphere and can’t be counted as part of a climate change emergency.
The remaining 653,000 deaths were caused by meteorological, climatological and hydrological events. These include floods, storms, waves, droughts, wildfires, etc. For simplicity, assume half of these deaths are due to the climate change emergency. I picked half because the IPCC is routinely quoted as attributing half of global warming since 1950 to anthropogenic causes. This is about 327,000 or 16,300 deaths per year that are potentially associated with a climate change emergency.
According to the World Health organization there were 56.9 million deaths worldwide in 2016. The approximately 16,300 deaths/year from the climate change emergency is about 0.3% and not even close to being in the top 30 causes of death.
It’s unfortunate that instead of focusing on the many causes of death that are preventable or curable so much focus is placed on the “sky is falling” scenarios of a climate change emergency.
I aways find it intriguing the “climate has always changed so what’s the problem,” argument (usually by skeptics who don’t really understand the science, or choose not to.)
It’s like saying, “people have always died of measles so why bother immunising our kids?”
Yes climate has always changed… but always it’s because something forces it. Sometimes it’s the sun, sometimes the orbit and sometimes CO2. At the moment it looks like it’s our CO2 causing the warming. In fact it is almost certain (to be at the very least partly). Will it be disastrous? We cannot be totally sure. But we can’t be sure our child will die of measles either if we don’t give them the shot…. but we know their chances increase without the shot. And that’s how I see the current situation. Reduce the cause and you will likely (but not certainly) reduce the risk. Seems sensible to be prudent.
“In fact it is almost certain (to be at the very least partly).”
Rofl
PhilJ
I think you find the creator of this website agrees with me that at the very least part of the warming can be attributed to mans burning of fossil fuels. Bit rude of you to come here and write “Rofl.”
I don’t think there is any reason to assume CO2 is doing anything. The GSMT does not accurately remove UHI effects and the normalization they have done over the years has resulted in a really corrupt picture of what is going on. We are 20 years into the “pause” is you remove the effects of El Nino events. I think its more likely that this past 150 years has been the result of normal longer term fluctuations. The claims that the little ice age were caused by human depopulation or land use changes associated with colonization is absurd and implies a climate sensitivity that would have been catastrophic by now.
If the hypothesis was right – the response would already be in and we would be 4 C hotter right now. If the hypothesis was correct Hansen would have been right and New York would be under water right now.
I think people accept this hypothesis without really digging into its plausibility.
It will depend on the relative costs of immunisation and supposed prevention. It could prevent measels outbreaks if everyone kept away from everyone else, but is not practical.
It is estimated that 240,000 people are injured by lightning each year, of which 6,000 died.
We don’t suggest that everyone walks round in a Faraday cage all the time, but follow sensible and cheap precautions such as not standing beside a tree during a thunderstorm, using lightning conductors on tall buildings etc.
As far as global warming is concerned the efficient use of energy seems more useful than wrecking the economy.
Then we will not have the resources to do anything, let alone pay billions to others.
The climate has always changed NATURALLY – so seeing climate change is not abnormal.
That’s why we rub it in – because the only way climate cultists can fabricate their “emergency” is to deny climate change – to literally become “climate change deniers”.
So saying “the climate changes naturally” is just a polite way of reminder the nutters that they are the deniers.
“That’s why we rub it in – because the only way climate cultists can fabricate their “emergency” is to deny climate change – to literally become “climate change deniers”.”
Name me a single climate scientist who says climate does not change?
From Dictionary.com
climate[ klahy-mit
noun
the composite or generally prevailing weather conditions of a region, as temperature, air pressure, humidity, precipitation, sunshine, cloudiness, and winds, throughout the year, averaged over a series of years.
In the past hundred years, which region has experienced a permanent change in classification?
As is easily appreciated, EARTH does not have a global “climate”, any more than it has a global currency or a global language. Read the definition. How could an entire planet have a climate?
The nonsense term selected when “global warming” was obviously in fact cooling, is completely meaningless, unless we are concerned periods of millions of years.
Jail overcrowding with greens would be useful about now.
We have a saying in German: “Wenn die Katze aus dem Haus ist, tanzen die Mäuse auf dem Tisch.” It’s a bit like when the cats away, the mice play. That’s what’s happening here. There seem to be quite a number of people that have nothing to worry about so they need a bit, bad monster they can be afraid of. Current generations live the most exalted, most worry-free lives ever. And so they must do their utmost to destroy this prosperity which has so far provided the basis for such debauchery. Its human nature. But this development carries the seed for a solution. Once economic pain as a result of an unfounded scare becomes truly painful to bear, voters will swing the pendulum. And that’s happening now too.
Re. Andy, M<ay 25th. Says it all. Its not the IPCC directly, but the
political representatives of other countries, mainly I think those of the
called 3rd World, who actually write the report.
So why do the Western countries politicians appear to accept theses very
political documents , or is it because they are happy to use them to frighten
their own people.
In fact I think that the IPCC is toning down their alarming reports, possibly
to survive as the political tide is slowly turning against them.
Anyway if we truly had a real climate emergency, then the Western
countries would insist on the likes of in particular India and China to stop
putting so much CO2 into the atmosphere. Even to the use of military force
if it was true. , but as we all know it is not.
MJE VK5ELL
“However some scientists disagree, primarily arguing that whilst it is true that even modest warming creates some harm (such as coral bleaching) …” I stopped reading at this point in the first paragraph.
This statement is fundamentally untrue. Coral bleaching coincides with the presence of blocking high pressure cells that produce low sea levels which, in turn, expose corals to extreme levels of solar UV radiation! The UV damage can extend to a depth of more than 10 metres in calm, clear water.
Coal mining (or even the prospect of coal mining) plays no part in the bleaching process.
According to ice core records, the last millennium 1000AD – 2000AD has been the coldest millennium of our current Holocene interglacial. This point is more fully illustrated with ice core records on a millennial basis back to the Eemian period here:
https://edmhdotme.wordpress.com/holocene-context-for-catastrophic-anthropogenic-global-warming/
Our current, warm, congenial Holocene interglacial, although cooler than the previous Eemian interglacial 120,000 years ago, has been the enabler of mankind’s civilisation for the last 10,000 years, spanning from mankind’s earliest farming to recent technology.
Viewing the current Holocene interglacial on a millennial basis is realistic. But, driven by the need to continually support the Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming thesis / religion, some Climate scientists and Climate alarmists examine the temperature record at too fine a scale, weather event by weather event, month by month, or year by year.
Each of the notable high points in the current 11,000 year Holocene temperature record, (Holocene Climate Optimum – Minoan – Roman – Medieval – Modern), have been progressively colder than the previous high point.
The ice core record from Greenland for its first 7-8000 years, the early Holocene, shows, virtually flat temperatures overall, including its early high point known as the “climate optimum”. But the more recent Holocene, since a “tipping point” at around 1000BC, 3000 years ago, temperature has fallen at about 20 times its earlier rate.
The Holocene interglacial is already 10 – 11,000 years old and judging from the length of previous interglacial periods, the Holocene epoch should be drawing to its close: in this century, the next century or this millennium.
The slight and beneficial warming at the end of the 20th century to a Modern high point has been transmuted by Climate alarmists into the “the Great Man-made Global Warming Catastrophe”.
The recent warming since the end of the Little Ice Age has been wholly beneficial when compared to the devastating impacts arising from the relatively minor cooling of the Little Ice Age, which included:
• decolonisation of Greenland
• Black death
• French revolution promoted by crop failures and famine
• the failures of the Inca and Angkor Wat civilisations
• etc., etc.
As global temperatures, after a short spurt at the end of the last century, are showing stagnation or cooling over the last twenty years, the world should now fear the real and detrimental effects of cooling, rather than being hysterical about limited, beneficial or probably now non-existent further warming.
Warmer times are times of success and prosperity for man-kind and for the biosphere. During the Roman period the climate was warmer and wetter such that the Northern Sahara was the breadbasket of the Roman empire.
But the coming end of the present Holocene interglacial will eventually again result in a mile-high ice sheet over much of the Northern hemisphere.
As the Holocene epoch is already about 11,000 years old, the reversion to a true ice age is becoming overdue.
That reversion to real Ice Age conditions will be the true climate catastrophe.
With the present reducing Solar activity, significantly reduced temperatures, at least to the level of another Little Ice Age are predicted quite soon, later in this century.
Whether the present impending cooling will really lead on to a new glacial ice age or not is still in question.
EDMH, Many thanks for your historical and clarifying perspective on climate change. Let us hope that the coming glacial period will be later than usual.