Every day you read how the “climate crisis” is real, and rapidly getting worse. Humans burning fossil fuels to support out-of-control consumerism have brought the earth to the brink of disaster. Droughts, floods, hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes, and plagues of every sort are proliferating. Of course, you are feeling all the natural human reactions: fear, dread, not to mention overwhelming guilt at your own role in causing the crisis through the grave sin of enjoying your life. In short, you have entered the state known to the experts as “climate anxiety.”
The New York Times, as usual, was way out front on this issue. Back in July 2021 they published a long piece by Molly Peterson with the headline “How to Calm Your Climate Anxiety.” Subheadline: “Between wildfires, heat waves and hurricanes, we’re all feeling nervous about the future. But stewing or ignoring the problem won’t ease your burden.” Yes, if you are a writer for the New York Times you fully expect that among the readership it is accurate to say that “we’re all” feeling the climate anxiety. How could we not? Kindly, Molly, tell us how bad it is. Excerpts:
Evidence that climate change threatens mental health is mounting, according to a recent report from Imperial College London’s Institute of Global Health Innovation. Higher temperatures are tied to depressive language and higher suicide rates. Fires, hurricanes and heat waves carry the risk of trauma and depression. . . . Young people especially report feeling debilitated by climate anxiety and being frustrated by older generations. “They try to understand, but they don’t,” said 16-year-old Adah Crandall, a climate and anti-freeway activist in Portland, Oregon. “I am scared for my future because of the inaction of adults in the past.”
But, as that Times headline concedes, “stewing and ignoring the problem” won’t ease your excruciating angst. You’re looking for real solutions here. You want to “do something.” Fortunately for you, a whole new mini-profession of psychologists has sprung up to advise you.
I recently learned about this subject in connection with my upcoming college reunion (50th — ouch!). The college was Yale — I know, one of the looniest institutions on the planet. One of my classmates got wind that they were planning some kind of panel on climate change, and he suggested me for the occasion. But it turned out that the organizers (surprise!) had something different in mind. Another one of our classmates, a guy named Mick Smyer, is one of these psychologists specializing in the “climate anxiety” game, and they have turned the panel over to him. Here is a link to some information about Smyer. It appears that Smyer is going to offer his services to help us all “cope.”
The hypothesis here that you are required to believe to participate in the game is that there is a climate crisis and the cause is human CO2 emissions. If you believe that, one would think you might be concerned, for example, that China has permitted some 47 GW of new coal-fired power plant capacity for construction this year alone. At the emissions rate given by our EIA for coal-fired power plants of 2.23 pounds of CO2 per kWh, that would mean that China’s new coal power plants just this year are going to be emitting around 460 million tons of CO2 annually once they are up and running.
Against that, what does Dr. Smyer suggest to ameliorate your “climate anxiety”? My classmate who had proposed me for the panel did some digging into Smyer’s prior pronouncements, and came up with a list of proposed actions that he suggests you can take, along with supposed CO2 emissions savings from each. Here are some of my favorites (figures in parentheses are supposed annual CO2 emissions reductions in tons):
- Replace the air filters on your air conditioning system regularly (0.30). Well, at least he’s not proposing to get rid of air conditioning entirely. That would be beyond the pale.
- Composting (0.31). I’m not sure exactly how that’s supposed to work here in Manhattan.
- Buy fresh food one time more per week (buying all your food from local sources saves up to 100 tons per year) (100). I find that estimate of a 100 tone annual CO2 emission reduction highly dubious, but put that aside. Has Smyer noticed that around this part of the country we go a full six months per year (about November to April) without any local fresh fruits or vegetables of any kind? And then there are things like coffee, oranges, avocados, rice, etc., etc., that are just not grown around here. I guess it’s back to carrots, turnips and potatoes in the root cellar.
- Recycle (1.40). Aren’t we all doing that already under mandatory government edict?
- Move to a smaller home (2.70). Now we’re getting to the heart of the matter — voluntary poverty. I’ll bet you could save even more by going into a monastery.
- And here’s my personal favorite: Turning water off while brushing teeth can save 0.05 tons per year. That will really put those ChiComs in their place! Unfortunately, as I understand it, here in Manhattan the water system up to six stories works by pure gravity and without electricity.
As absurd as Dr. Smyer’s proposals may appear, he has nothing on Ms. Peterson of the New York Times. For her article, she tracked down something called the Good Grief Network:
The nonprofit Good Grief Network offers support for climate distress through a 10-step process, introduced at weekly meetings that culminate with a commitment to “reinvest in meaningful efforts.” . . . “We don’t see any single approach as a silver bullet” against climate anxiety and inaction, said Sarah Jornsay-Silverberg, the Good Grief Network’s executive director. Instead, the goal is to do things, small or large, that mean something to you, and reflect the internal shift in your outlook.
So what’s an example of a concrete step? Here’s what one subject of the article did:
Using noncombustible materials and sustainable defensible space, they have rebuilt. And next to their new home, they planted a flowering tipu tree, which can spread a canopy of shade within just a few years. “The idea was, we’re not going to be defeated by this thing,” he said.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
The best way to relieve climate anxiety is by learning the truth.
Start by reading the recent books by Obama Science adviser Stephen Koonin, environmental activist Michael Schellenberger, and economist Bjorn Lomborg.
Add some blogs. First this one: WUWT, then Dr. Roy Spencer, the scientist who has run NASA’s satellite based atmospheric temperature monitoring for 20+ years, Dr. Judith Curry former Chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Georgia Tech, and Jim Steele retired Director of the Sierra Nevada Field Campus of San Francisco State University.
Walter, that’s phenomenal. I’m trying to recall the last time someone in government actually recommended serious education, but nothing is coming to me.
oddly none of Dr. Smyer’s suggestions have anything to do with psychology …
“Move to a smaller home ”
That’s ok if , like Al Gore, De Vaprio etc, you have several to choose from !
Some alarmist stuff is just so ridiculous it doesn’t need to be ridiculed. As here.
“Climate anxiety”, hey?
GET.A.LIFE.
is my advice to sufferers.
I suggest that all the loonies should be sent this link to Willis Eschenbach’s very accurate post on WUWT where he listed all their so called “Climate Emergencies” and then supplied the REAL world DATA.
But I’m sure nearly all of these fantasists would prefer their fantasy world of BS and NONSENSE FOREVER.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/25/wheres-the-emergency/
Just as of yore:
keep calm and carry on.
I have not heard anyone in real life worry about climate change.
“Evidence that climate change threatens mental health is mounting”
Nope. Climate change alarmism threatens mental health.
The threat to mental health from efforts to accept “evidence” of Climate Whatever is mounting.
The good old “it makes polar bears forget how to swim!!1” thing alone required some serious brain warping, and it wasn’t the end…
‘Imagine you are trapped naked and alone in a stone box with no windows, no doors, and no light, how do you get out?’
Easy, you stop imagining!
There, I solved global warming.
Just don’t tell it to Elon Musk. ;]
my senior year at yale (72 ) i lived in a house on the beach at east haven . we were struck by a strong coastal storm that year which flooded our neighborhood and destroyed many vehicles , including my housemates car . i believe that neighborhood is still there despite the inexorable scourge of rising seas , ever increasingly powerful storms , and catastrophic flooding brought on by the climate crisis emergency , that is , in the end , worse than we thought
Measured water vapor has been increasing from 34% to 178% more than possible from just planet warming (i.e. the result of all forcings and feedbacks). Where did the ‘extra’ WV come from? My work, which at Section 6 of https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com determined that about 90% comes from irrigation. This corroborates what Shiklomanov 1997 determined as mentioned by Doll in 2002 at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2001WR000355
NASA/RSS has decided to stop monthly reporting of average global WV (their last report is for Dec, 2021). I suspect that the Deep State has discovered that WV increase cannot have been caused by CO2 increase and therefore humanity’s contribution to warming cannot be from CO2 increase. Rather than admit that attempt by some politicians to control the rest of us by curtailing the use of fossil fuels is a colossal mistake they are simply censoring the evidence.
Tipuana Tipu trees – native to Brazil, they are best suited for zones 9-11 and thrive in warmer climates.
I’ll stick with Ponderosa Pine, it will grow in zones 3 – 7. I’m in Zone 3 or 4.
And cut, split, and dried, it burns nicely in the wood stove.
I’m determined to drink more locally manufactured alcohol. That is all.
When I saw the rapid increase in temperatures up to 1999, I was worried. Then I noticed them fall off the plate, dropping 1 C in a year and a bit. Uh? Thought I, that isnt supposed to happen!
So I started looking into it. It was an ENSO, not CO2 that had caused the recent warming.
And I started to look into everything I heard said in the name of Climate, and it has all proved to be rank BS, all of it.
Wildfires. 100% natural, many plants need fire to reproduce.
Hurricanes. Stir the sea up so much they strip up to 1000 w/m out of the oceans and dump it to space.
Global humidity, not increasing at 7% / Kelvin.
Sea ice insulates the ocean.
Co2 making the planet greener.
Holocene Climatic Optimum, remember that, when the Sahara was green, because it was warmer?
Crop yields, cold deaths, greater biodiversity at the warm equator, etc etc etc, everything says that the planet, and life on it is getting better because of more CO2, not worse.
Thats how any anxiety I had disappeared, by looking at the facts. It is that simple.
“Thats how any anxiety I had disappeared, by looking at the facts. It is that simple.”
I agree.
If there was something that I thought was going to destroy my life, I would want to know every little detail about how that was going to happen. I wouldn’t depend on someone else’s word for it.
Fortunately for me, I was in on the ground floor of this climate change crisis propaganda and have seen it grow one lie at a time for decades.
And in all those decades not one shred of evidence has been produced showing that human CO2 is doing anything to cause a noticeable change in the Earth’s weather.
I’m skeptical of human-caused climate change for a reason.
The water vapor increase per degree K depends on temperature. It is calculated as the slope of the saturation vapor pressure vs temperature curve at a temperature divided by the saturation pressure at that temperature. The procedure is shown at Section 6 of http://globalclimatedrivers2.blogspot.com. The average for average surface temperature 15 °C is about 6.5%/K.
Oh I know the theory, Claussius Clapeyron. Yes, in theory the atmosphere can hold more water, but it isnt, all the global WV data sets do not show a consistent increase, they show variability.
It appears that you have been misled. No theory is involved. The saturation vapor pressure vs temperature is a property of water. The graph is constructed from precise measurements. The lower graph is constructed from the slope of the upper graph at a temperature divided by the pressure at that temperature. This is the exact %/K which varies with T. It is the basis for the approximate 7%/K used by Climate Science. The exact Clausius-Clapeyron equation relates volume change to enthalpy change with phase change at saturation. What is popularly called Clausius-Clapeyron in meteorology is an approximation. https://glossary.ametsoc.org/wiki/Clausius-clapeyron_equation
shutting the alarmists down for 10 yrs would be the best option
So they are still recruiting hypochondriacs to play make-believe, due to clearly insufficient amount of Tru Believers. That’s like scraping the bottom of a barrel… repeatedly.
Anxiety is not a mental illness but a natural response in certain situations. It should be the start of a process where we stand back and look at the issue that is causing the anxiety. We may notice that it is unfounded or that we can tackle what is underlying so it can serve a good purpose depending on our response to counter it.
However, that said, I could draw up a list of 100 top issues that could be a matter of real concern and perhaps cause anxiety but climate anxiety would not even feature – that is for the average citizen whose life revolves around working hard and supporting his or her family.
A tree described as “freely self-seeding”.
“Tipuana Tipu” is labeled an invasive in South Africa and may be labeled invasive in the future arid American West.
Why?
“Competes with and has the potential to replace indigenous species particularly along river banks. Because of its large size even a single tree could have a detrimental effect on a natural ecosystem. Trees along watercourses are likely to cause a significant reduction in stream flow.”
There are watercourses in the American West that are already drained by similar trees, e.g. cottonwoods.
Planted in urban areas, the roots seek out and damage water and sewer systems.
One source describes the tipu tree as:
In less than a year, tipu trees reseed, sprout from roots, suckers grow from the main tree and quite possibly easily root from broken stems.
Maybe the real desire of the counselors is to give their patients busy work to distract them?