New IPCC chief: stop with the apocalypse talk

(AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

There is a huge generational divide in America on the issue of climate change.

The overly woke, excessively propagandized youth are scared to death, most people are somewhat concerned and skeptical of the most apocalyptic predictions, and then there are those of us who have rightly concluded that modern environmentalism is like a watermelon: green on the outside, but red on the inside. It is just another attempt to sneak in communism, just as the “Inflation Reduction Act” was really the Green New Deal.

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The new head of the IPCC is a global warming alarmist, but even he has realized that the overly propagandized are not actually helping the cause of reducing greenhouse gases, and he is calling for people to cool it. (Dad joke!)

Even though I disagree with him, I kinda like this guy. The idea that having a rational discussion about policy matters is, while kinda shocking in the modern West, actually a pretty good idea.

Doom-mongers do more harm than good, the United Nations’ new climate change chief has said.

Prof Jim Skea, the newly elected head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), warned that apocalyptic messaging merely “paralyses” the public and fails to motivate them to protect the planet.

It comes amid a growing backlash to activists such as Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil, who have disrupted events from Wimbledon to Pride parades.

The Scottish physicist also said that the world warming 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, to which the 2015 Paris Agreement pledged to limit global temperature rises, was “not an existential threat to humanity”.

His comments come days after he began leading the IPCC, the largest international research collaboration in the world with 195 members, having written the UN body’s 2018 special report on 1.5C global warming.

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How refreshing, especially since the idea that the globe warming by 1.5 degrees C is so obviously not an existential threat to humanity that uttering those words makes you look almost as stupid as John Kerry, or perhaps worse, Joe Biden. Beege’s nickname POTATUS is definitely apt (damn her for being more clever than I!).

I know plenty of rational people who take global warming seriously, including some very smart people. I am perfectly happy, even relieved, to have rational discussions with them about the evidence for and against, and what the potential ramifications of a warming of the planet from any cause might be.

But the perversion of science and the artificially-generated hysteria is too much to bear, both because it is destructive and it is infuriatingly annoying. In a just world, we could just bitch slap the idiots who are panicking.

“If you constantly communicate the message that we are all doomed to extinction, then that paralyses people and prevents them from taking the necessary steps to get a grip on climate change,” he said.

In another interview with the German news magazine Der Spiegel, he admitted that “we don’t know exactly when” the world would warm by 1.5C, an “incredibly symbolic” target, but that individual years could exceed it “as early as this decade”.

‘World won’t end’

He added: “Nevertheless, we should not despair and fall into a state of shock when the world exceeds 1.5 degrees.

“Every action we take to mitigate climate change helps. Climate protection is always cheaper and protects people from the dramatic consequences of global warming. This is all the more true if we have exceeded the Paris climate target.

“The world won’t end if it gets more than 1.5 degrees warmer. However, it will be a more dangerous world. Countries will struggle with many problems, there will be social tensions.

“And yet this is not an existential threat to humanity. Even with 1.5 degrees of warming, we will not die out.”

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Well duh. The entire history of civilization has taken place in a warming world. Agriculture, cities, technology, and everything we associate with living a truly human life arose as the glaciers melted not that long ago. The Americas weren’t even inhabited by human beings until the glaciers began melting about 15,000 years ago. Sea levels were 450 FEET lower than today–England was connected to Europe, and the English Channel was dug by a major flood caused by sea level rise.

Nobody is predicting anything like that in our future, and all the evidence we actually have from history is that warm periods are better for humanity than cooler ones. It’s not even close.

My skepticism toward anthropogenic global warming theories began in the late 80s when it was a much less prominent speculation, and it was precisely the hyperbole that got me to take a deep dive into the science. It was so glaringly obvious that the “scientists” predicting doom was no more credible than Paul Ehrlich that I quit trusting a single one of them.

Now it is true that even pathological liars sometimes tell the truth, so I keep up with the science and do my best to sort the wheat from the chaff, but as long as the apocalyptic predictions are pumped out the credibility of those spouting them deservedly is zero with me.

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A little-known fact about the IPCC is that there is often real science buried in the rhetoric–most of what you read in the media is pushed by politicians and not scientists, and the “summary for policymakers” is written by political negotiators and not scientists. It’s the same with most policy papers–there can be lots of useful data buried in a report, but the summary is usually a deceptive spin, sometimes directly contradicted within the report.

Real scientists are careful with their “predictions” and analysis, and anybody who isn’t is likely a political scientist.

We’ll see how this guy turns out, but he is starting in a far better position than the people who have been pushing the propaganda at us for years.

He is likely to disappoint, but I have my fingers crossed.

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Ed Morrissey 10:00 PM | November 20, 2024
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