Climate and soil scientist Rose Abramoff at a Scientist Rebellion protest at the White House on April 6. Credit: Scientist Rebellion. Fair Use, Low resolution image to identify the subject

“Scientist Rebellion” Risking Arrest to Demand Climate Action

Essay by Eric Worrall

The scientists wear white lab coats, so observers can distinguish the scientists from the frothing green radicals.

Scientists Risk Arrest to Demand Climate Action

A growing international movement called Scientist Rebellion calls on world leaders to end the burning of fossil fuels

By Chelsea HarveyE&E News on April 11, 2022

Rose Abramoff drove from her home in Knoxville, Tenn., to the nation’s capital last week to chain herself to the White House fence.

The climate scientist was among seven demonstrators arrested on April 6 (and later released). Their motivation: the dire warning that time is swiftly running out to meet the world’s climate goals, as detailed in a major report last week from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Two days later, Abramoff was back — this time marching with a group of climate activists down I-395 at rush hour. The group was arrested again, but not before they’d stalled traffic on one of Washington’s busiest highways.

In both cases, their demands were clear: faster, stronger climate action from world governments and an end to the burning of fossil fuels.

“It was my first experience with civil disobedience for any reason,” said Abramoff, a climate scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, who emphasized that her activism is conducted on her own behalf and does not reflect the positions of her institution. She also spoke with E&E News only on her own behalf.

Scientist Rebellion estimates that a total of around 1,000 scientists in 25 countries participated in last week’s demonstrations, often wearing lab coats to identify themselves.

Read more: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/scientists-risk-arrest-to-demand-climate-action/

An old legal proverb states, “If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table.”.

Scientists chaining themselves to lamp posts and blocking roads in my opinion is pounding the table.

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April 12, 2022 6:04 pm

I wonder what would happen if they were simply ignored, and left chained to the fence?

Reply to  Brad
April 12, 2022 6:09 pm

Impossible, unfortunately. They only pick cities where they know leadership will instruct the police to protect and draw attention to them at all costs.

Pop Piasa
Reply to  Joe Gordon
April 12, 2022 6:28 pm

I guess that excludes anywhere close to Ukraine right now…

jeffery p
Reply to  Joe Gordon
April 13, 2022 8:03 am

Then they don’t have any moral courage, do they? People used to talk about the courage of their convictions. If there are not consequences then it’s all just for virtue signalling.

People who want to commit crimes in protest should be willing to accept the consequences. Period.

To be clear, a peaceful protest is not a crime and is protected free speech.

Reply to  jeffery p
April 13, 2022 8:51 am

“People used to talk about the courage of their convictions”

It’s because their “convictions” are fake virtue-signaling. Otherwise, they would be living up to the standards they want to impose, showing us an example of how to do it.

AGW is Not Science
Reply to  TonyG
April 13, 2022 10:00 am

Yes – when they’re living in caves chasing down their next meal with nothing but a stick they sharpened by rubbing it against a rock, wearing only the skins of previously caught dinners, smelling like the dinners they’re chasing, and they’re yelling their blather through nothing but their cupped hands, then they might have a scrap of credibility.

Reply to  TonyG
April 13, 2022 3:37 pm

Exactly. I went looking for lab coat materials. Polyester, polyethylene, Poly this and Poly that. Do you think they’d wear a plain old wrinkly cotton lab coat. Oh no, it might contaminate their experiments.

AGW is Not Science
Reply to  jeffery p
April 13, 2022 9:54 am

Yes – she should have WALKED to Washington DC from Tennessee. BOTH times. To AND from.

G Mawer
Reply to  jeffery p
April 13, 2022 1:28 pm

A true, honest scientist would not do this.

Reply to  Brad
April 12, 2022 7:26 pm

People would add zip ties to make sure.

Reply to  Brad
April 13, 2022 5:18 am

What I noticed was this bit…

The climate scientist was among seven demonstrators arrested on April 6 (and later released).

Do you think the January 6th protestors received the same consideration? Answer: No.

jeffery p
Reply to  Mumbles McGuirck
April 13, 2022 8:07 am

Some of the January 6 protestors crossed a line and fought with police or destroyed property. Those protestors should be charged. Let the prosecutions of BLM protestors act as a guide.

BTW- There was no insurrection.

Reply to  Brad
April 13, 2022 2:42 pm

Aren’t there already enough vultures in our Capitol area without having to feed them?

Reply to  Brad
April 13, 2022 5:33 pm

What would happen if they don’t wait for world leaders to eliminate petroleum fuels but move out of their homes and live in the forest or in a cave where they no longer use ANY form of petroleum fuels?

Lead by example I would say why not them.

Pop Piasa
April 12, 2022 6:11 pm

Perhaps “Scientologists’ Rebellion” might be a more succinct headline?

ResourceGuy
Reply to  Pop Piasa
April 13, 2022 6:20 am

+100

April 12, 2022 6:11 pm

Scientists pounding the table.
________________________

Good one !

Tom Halla
April 12, 2022 6:16 pm

Failure to take their blocking traffic seriously only encourages them. Actually charging them with a misdemeanor might change their tactics.

william Johnston
Reply to  Tom Halla
April 13, 2022 5:22 am

Provided they are convicted and sentenced.

Richard Page
Reply to  william Johnston
April 13, 2022 12:01 pm

Don’t US State Police have powers to fine or caution someone for a minor offence without going through the courts?

Chuck - now retired in Texas
Reply to  Richard Page
April 14, 2022 2:57 pm

In the US, State Police can issue a civil citation which you sign, not as a plea of guilt, but rather a promise to appear before the applicable court. If you give them reason, you can be arrested, which means you will at least see a probate judge. The police also have the discretion to issue a warning citation (no Judge involvement) or even just a talking to.

Ron Long
April 12, 2022 6:22 pm

Rose “drove” from Knoxville to Washington D.C.? No other details but it sure wasn’t in an electric stop-and-go car. What a worthless hypocrite.

Reply to  Ron Long
April 12, 2022 6:23 pm

Great point!

Mike Lowe
Reply to  Ron Long
April 12, 2022 10:15 pm

….and an unscientific one!

Reply to  Ron Long
April 12, 2022 10:27 pm

1000 mile round trip, twice in a week by car

Not up to Emma Thompson standards yet

Dan Sudlik
Reply to  Ron Long
April 13, 2022 7:46 am

I don’t know, maybe it was a pedal car so she could prove her environmental bones 🤣. Sarc needed?

paul courtney
Reply to  Ron Long
April 13, 2022 7:58 am

Mr. Long: What, private jet being refurbished?

Richard Page
Reply to  paul courtney
April 13, 2022 12:04 pm

Some of these individuals belong to a ‘no fly’ movement, where they virtue signal to all in the vicinity that they refuse to fly for ‘climate’ and then drive everywhere. Sad, pathetic idiots with empty lives.

April 12, 2022 6:22 pm

A Consensus of nonsense in lab coats is still nonsense…

Stuart Hamish
Reply to  Dave Stephens
April 12, 2022 9:21 pm

A consensus of nonsense in white lab coats indeed …..Rose Abramoff and the ‘Scientists Rebellion” movement must hate being reminded they are not the heirs of the Suffragettes or the Civil Rights campaigners but rather the Marxist pseudoscience of Trofim Lysenko…

AGW is Not Science
Reply to  Dave Stephens
April 13, 2022 10:02 am

No less, probably a lab coat made of a fabric brought to you by…fossil fuels.

Pop Piasa
April 12, 2022 6:35 pm

It seems to me from pictures of Mike that wearing your scientist hat might cause hair loss. I guess the lab coats remediate that.

CD in Wisconsin
April 12, 2022 6:41 pm

“The climate scientist was among seven demonstrators arrested on April 6 (and later released). Their motivation: the dire warning that time is swiftly running out to meet the world’s climate goals…”

How long have been running out of time now? Ten, fifteen, twenty years? It’s amazing how much time we have when we’re running out of it. Happens a lot in the movies too.

H.R.
Reply to  CD in Wisconsin
April 12, 2022 7:00 pm

Wait, what?!? You mean I’m not dead yet, CD?

Whew! That’s a bit of good news.

Walter Sobchak
Reply to  CD in Wisconsin
April 12, 2022 7:41 pm

Closer to thirty five years.

Reply to  CD in Wisconsin
April 13, 2022 3:03 am

This has been going on since the 1970’s, when ‘new ice age’ was the fashion. That’s about 50 years.

OweninGA
Reply to  SasjaL
April 13, 2022 4:49 am

Or the 1920’s when “The arctic is melting and all the fisheries will collapse” nonsense from the NY Times. (Do they ever get anything right?)

Disputin
Reply to  OweninGA
April 13, 2022 7:12 am

No

John Endicott
Reply to  OweninGA
April 13, 2022 8:12 am

How do you know something is not true? you read about it in the NY Times

Reply to  CD in Wisconsin
April 14, 2022 1:49 am

In 1896 the first disaster calls were issued by climate “scientists”.

H. D. Hoese
April 12, 2022 6:41 pm

In delving the clutter of what one might think was a reasonable journal, a curious citation led to this. Ehrlich, P.R. and A. H. Ehrlich, A.H. 2008. Nature’s Economy and the Human Economy. Environmental and Resource Economics.39: 9–16 (2008).  https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-007-9177-5 From the abstract.

“Scientists have much of the information necessary for making those decisions, so the biggest problem is in the purview of social scientists. They must help to determine how best to move society from knowledge to action.” Science with advocacy is a oxymoron, promoted by morons?

H.R.
Reply to  H. D. Hoese
April 12, 2022 7:03 pm

Oxymorons or Ubermorons?

[Thinking]

Pffft! No need to get fancy when plain ol’ morons will suffice.

Scissor
Reply to  H. D. Hoese
April 12, 2022 8:42 pm

Freedom for every individual to decide for themselves is not enough. They must force others to succumb to their will.

OweninGA
Reply to  Scissor
April 13, 2022 4:53 am

That is the progressive way. You will be ruled by your intellectual superiors and you will like the Utopia that results.

(Most of those who claim to be “intellectual superiors” are more like “idiot savants”, or blind men describing an elephant. They may be bright in one exceedingly narrow field, but can’t see the larger interworkings of the universe.)

THOMAS ENGLERT
April 12, 2022 6:52 pm

Rose is a climate scientist, but knows nothing of Earth’s climate history apparently.

Barry James
Reply to  THOMAS ENGLERT
April 12, 2022 8:32 pm

The “science” she studied obviously didn’t include physics or geology. Possibly gender studies where opinions trump biology?

Reply to  THOMAS ENGLERT
April 12, 2022 8:50 pm

She’s listed as a climate and soil scientist. I think that means she’s a soil scientist but because she’s an activist and climate believer she then qualifies as a “climate scientist”.

Half my original BSc joint honours was Soil Science. Don’t think the climate ayatollah’s will let me use the “climate scientist” title though. That’s reserved for activists.

Stuart Hamish
Reply to  ThinkingScientist
April 12, 2022 9:27 pm

So much of climate science is soiled science

Reply to  Stuart Hamish
April 12, 2022 10:29 pm

very good

Geoff Sherrington
Reply to  ThinkingScientist
April 12, 2022 11:15 pm

Thinking Scientist,
Soil scientists who believe that a great advance in atmospheric CO2 reduction will come from making more carbon-rich soils might find interest in this recent publication –
Photosynthetic limits on carbon sequestration in croplands by H Henry Janzen et al https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoderma.2022.115810
From their Abstract, “Here, we take a different approach, recognizing that photosynthesis, the source of C input to soil, represents the most fundamental constraint to C sequestration.”
Geoff S

MARTIN BRUMBY
Reply to  Geoff Sherrington
April 13, 2022 1:25 am

When I was a youth, studying for a B.Eng in Civil and Structural Engineering, one of my key textbooks was “Soil Mechanics” by Terzaghi & Peck. And had to learn a heap of other new discoveries, put them to good use in five decades as a Chartered Engineer.

They never inflicted this Climare Breakdown bollox on me, other than by shutting down the Coal Industry.

Perhaps if I’d been a “Scientist” rather than an Engineer, I’d have realised that the UK really doesn’t need indigenous, reliable, affordable energy and could have spent my life protesting and even got a nice white coat from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

After all, Jim Hansen had a pretty good life working for NASA.

Alan the Brit
Reply to  MARTIN BRUMBY
April 13, 2022 4:36 am

Great book, & so was Blythe & Defratis’ Geology for Engineers!!!

Alan the Brit
Reply to  ThinkingScientist
April 13, 2022 4:34 am

What on God’s Earth is a “climate believer”? I always tell peeps who question my non-“climate believing”, that the Earth has several climates that have always varied over the last 4.5 billion years or so, we know that Antarctica, used to be a tropical climate before it slid down south because of the fossilised tropical leaves discovered there, etc. & that the Sahara Desert was once lush & green. We know from geology studies that the Arctic has been ice free on several occasions in the past. The education systems around the world are truly appalling these days with young people being brainwashed into thinking the Earth’s climate(s) never change!!!

Rick C
Reply to  THOMAS ENGLERT
April 12, 2022 9:10 pm

Pretty much all the actual scientists I know (and I know quite a few) don’t refer to themselves as scientists. Physicist, astronomer, zoologist, chemist, biologist, meteorologist, climatologist, etc. yes. Medical doctors and engineers also don’t call themselves scientists. Only social and pseudo scientists and apparently activist biochemists use the term to describe their profession.

Reply to  Rick C
April 13, 2022 12:33 am

Real scientists also don’t virtue-signal while wearing labcoats in public.

OweninGA
Reply to  Rick C
April 13, 2022 4:57 am

I don’t know, our biology department changed its name to “Biological Sciences”. I think it coincided with an influx of ecology degreed climate me too’s.

jeffery p
Reply to  Rick C
April 13, 2022 8:11 am

Does a political science major count? Seems to have the same scientific foundations a climate science.

n.n
April 12, 2022 6:55 pm

Climate Cargo Cult

April 12, 2022 6:55 pm

WUWT – the climate chatroom.

Rud Istvan
April 12, 2022 6:55 pm

The further climate nutters go, the easier their ridicule and the more skeptics win.
As here.

Alexy Scherbakoff
April 12, 2022 7:19 pm

Climate night soil scientist.

Pop Piasa
Reply to  Alexy Scherbakoff
April 12, 2022 7:40 pm

On the other hand, sleeping in a lab coat might trigger experimental nocturnal behavior that might get me arrested.

MARTIN BRUMBY
Reply to  Alexy Scherbakoff
April 13, 2022 1:27 am

Comment of the month.
+100

LdB
April 12, 2022 7:20 pm

WOW an organization of a whole 1000 across 25 countries … massive voting number there then that had to be listened too 🙂

I could get more than that to a BBQ by offering a free sausage and egg.

Allan MacRae
April 12, 2022 7:27 pm

These people are not true scientists – if they were, they would know better than to promote the Global Warming (“CAGW”) decades-old scam.

They are really Climate Fraudsters – we know it, and they know it.

Now, Earth is cooling, even as CO2 emissions and total atmospheric CO2 continue to increase – another strong disproof of the CAGW hypothesis.

Prepare for a cold, late Spring.

PORTLAND LOGS ITS FIRST MEASURABLE APRIL SNOW; HISTORIC BLIZZARDS TO PUMMEL THE NORTHERN U.S.; + SUNSPOTS FADE
April 12, 2022 Cap Allon
Northern states are under blizzard warnings this week as forecasters warn that the “storm of the century” could unfold across the region.

Scissor
Reply to  Allan MacRae
April 12, 2022 8:49 pm

Our weather warmup in Colorado is behind by a couple of weeks. The high tomorrow in Boulder will be at least 20F below normal, but weather is highly variable here.

Carlo, Monte
Reply to  Scissor
April 13, 2022 9:20 am

16F low this morning at Broomfield airplort.

Reply to  Allan MacRae
April 12, 2022 8:58 pm

We had snow flurries today in Puget sound. Local temp dropped 6 degrees in about 15 minutes, crazy stuff. We are on Kitsap Peninsula, in the shadow of the Olympics.

Reply to  Brad
April 12, 2022 9:17 pm

If the weather is doing crazy stuff I think it’s climate weirding

MARTIN BRUMBY
Reply to  ThinkingScientist
April 13, 2022 1:32 am

Ah! But it isn’t enough to be doing crazy stuff.

It must be unprecedented crazy stuff.

And that means crazy stuff it hasn’t often done in the 21st Century.

Must be “Scientific”, you know!

Kevin R.
Reply to  Brad
April 13, 2022 5:46 pm

Over here east of Lake Washington cold with hail showers.

Reply to  Allan MacRae
April 12, 2022 9:59 pm

Headline:Energy bills: Denbigh venue cancels winter weddings due to costs.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-61083942

And this is Wales, on the receiving end of the Atlantic Conveyor, surely dredging up some of the ‘heat hiding in the ocean’

Reply to  Allan MacRae
April 13, 2022 12:37 am

Unfortunately, the Climatistas have cooling covered – it’s now “extreme weather” caused by CO2.

I predict this will gradually replace the Warming narrative in the next few years.

April 12, 2022 7:35 pm

All I can say, is that are too many f—‘n idiots.

Rocketscientist
Reply to  co2isnotevil
April 12, 2022 7:47 pm

It’s the downside of making the world safe for stupid children. They grow up to be stupid adults.

David S
Reply to  co2isnotevil
April 12, 2022 7:58 pm

Unfortunately idiots is one thing we ain’t running out of!

Scissor
Reply to  David S
April 12, 2022 9:01 pm

I’m at a major science institute (hundreds of scientists) and we had our first significant in-person (hybrid) presentation today and about a dozen people showed up. I don’t know how many attended online. This is the first time in over 24 months that I’ve seen more than a few of my colleagues at the same time. In normal times, there would have been close to 100 attendees.

The lights are on, HVAC is on, fume hoods are running full bore but few are using them.

I know of several administrative assistants’ offices where flexiglass shields were installed in front of their work stations and at least in one case, that admin has only come into the office once in two years. They took down the shields a couple of weeks ago.

Walter Sobchak
April 12, 2022 7:39 pm

They were threatening to go on strike. Go ahead, make my day.

Reply to  Walter Sobchak
April 12, 2022 10:31 pm

Would anyone notice?

Art
April 12, 2022 8:31 pm

How ironic, “Rose Abramoff drove from her house in Knoxville, Tenn.” I guess fossils fuels should only be used for fossil fuel demonstrations. I might become a believer to their cause, or to their sincerity, if they walked or began using horses to get to their demonstrations.

Scissor
Reply to  Art
April 12, 2022 9:05 pm

She could have ridden a bicycle in 6 or so days.

Stuart Hamish
Reply to  Art
April 12, 2022 9:29 pm

Didn’t take a bus or train with the hoi polloi

Tony Taylor
April 12, 2022 8:32 pm

An old legal proverb states, “If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table.”.

Excellent.

Scissor
Reply to  Tony Taylor
April 12, 2022 9:06 pm

If you have Al Gore on your side, pound your…

April 12, 2022 8:44 pm

Quick search

PhD in Biology: Ecology, Behavior and Evolution, Boston University 2015 Certificate in Biogeochemistry, Boston University
2009 BA in Biology, Amherst College
2009 BA in Theater and Dance, Amherst College

Since the Scientologists mercilessly attack credentials, I see no “climate scientist” listed here?

A BA in theater and Dance is kind of useful in climate Scientology though.

I feel sorry for her, incapable of processing information

Reply to  Pat from kerbob
April 12, 2022 8:56 pm

Should’ve stuck with Theater and Dance although, just a guess, she was crap at those too.

Mike Lowe
Reply to  Pat from kerbob
April 12, 2022 10:21 pm

Similar qualifications to Trudeau, then!

Art
Reply to  Mike Lowe
April 13, 2022 7:46 am

Trudeau’s credentials are such that in the real world, the only positions he could have held were that of office boy or mail clerk. What else could you offer someone with only an Art’s degree and no work experience other than part-time drama teacher.

MARTIN BRUMBY
Reply to  Pat from kerbob
April 13, 2022 1:44 am

Reminds me of the British Climate Genius, ‘fast fingers’ Bob Ward, with his PhD in Paleopiezometry (failed).

Good enough for a cushy number working for Jeremy Grantham’s Institute at Imperial College, where all the best Computer Modelling fraudsters are based. No doubt supports Grantham’s Hedge Fund positions on CO2 scams (and oil!) just fine.

Louis Hunt
April 12, 2022 8:48 pm

While they’re chained to a fence, the media should ask them if they have given up all fossil fuels in their own lives to set the example for the rest of us. Driving to the White House from Tennessee must have taken a lot of fossil fuels, even if she drove an EV. Why do these true believers expect the rest of us to go first?

Disputin
Reply to  Louis Hunt
April 13, 2022 2:39 am

“…they have given up all fossil fuels in their own lives to set the example for the rest of us.

If they say “yes”, explain that you can’t cut them loose because oxy-acetylene and angle grinders are both fossil fuel powered.

April 12, 2022 8:56 pm

People in the Scientist Rebellion, including Rose Abramoff, are not scientists. They’re methodological hacks.

They know their way around the lab, they can analyze data within their operative paradigm and they can publish results. But that’s the limit for them.

A unique prediction from theory and its test is the essence of science. But this critical interplay is lost on them. They have embraced an ill-founded inference and treat it as verified physical theory. Methodological hackery.

Earth to Scientist Rebellion and Rose Abramoff: radiation physics is not a valid theory of climate.

Known rapid response channels violate the assumption of ceteris paribus that is at the center of the assertion that CO₂ emissions will ineluctably cause the climate to warm.

You don’t know that you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t understand accuracy. Methodological hacks. Not scientists.

Louis Hunt
April 12, 2022 9:00 pm

We should demand that a complete environmental impact study on the effects of replacing fossil fuels with “green” energy be performed before fossil fuels can be banned. How many years do they have to perform such studies when a new oil pipeline is being planned? And then they cancel the pipeline anyway. If climate scientists were required to provide an honest estimate for how many people would die when fossil fuels are no longer available, their support would dwindle to near zero.

April 12, 2022 9:02 pm

You can’t teach a climate screamer about reality, because their salary requires them to not understand it. Millions of them are going to get blown away when their jobs disappear. I hear Starbucks is hiring.

Disputin
Reply to  Brad
April 13, 2022 2:41 am

Would you buy a cup of coffee from them?

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