Summary: In the past few years, propaganda about climate change has disconnected from climate science and become toxic fear-mongering. This has contributed greatly to the gridlock in the public policy debate. Climate scientist Judith Curry explains this problem and points to a solution. Perhaps then rational policies will become possible.
We’re drowning in toxic propaganda from climate activists.
The toxic rhetoric of climate change
By Judith Curry.
Letter to me from a worried young adult in the UK.
“I have no idea if this is an accurate email of yours, but I just found it and thought I’d take a chance. My name is XXX. I’m 20 years old from the UK. I have been well, the only word to describe it is suffering as I genuinely have the fear that climate change is going to kill me and all my family, I’m not even kidding. It’s all I have thought about for the last 9 months every second of the day. It’s making me sick to my stomach, I’m not eating or sleeping and I’m getting panic attacks daily. It’s currently 1 am and I can’t sleep as I’m petrified.
“I’ve tried to do my own research, I’ve tried everything. I’m not stupid, I’m a pretty rational thinker but at this point sometimes I literally wish I wasn’t born, I’m just so miserable and petrified. I’ve recently made myself familiar with your work and would be so appreciative of any findings you can give me or hope or advice over email. I’m already vegetarian and I recycle everything so I’m really trying. Please help men anyway you can, I’m at my wits end here.”
JC’s response to the Extinction Rebellion.
We have been hearing increasingly shrill rhetoric from the Extinction Rebellion and other activists about the ‘existential threat’ of the ‘climate crisis’, ‘runaway climate chaos’, etc. In her book, No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference
“Around 2030 …we will be in a position where we set off an irreversible chain reaction beyond human control that will most likely lead to the end of our civilization as we know it. That is, unless in that time permanent and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society have taken place, including a reduction of our co2 emissions by at least 50%.”
{Editor’s note – Does anyone believe this was written by a 16-year-old high school drop-out? The Hemmingway ap says this is at a college junior writing level.}
From the Extinction Rebellion’s website: “It is understood that we are facing an unprecedented global emergency. We are in a life or death situation of our own making.”
It is more difficult to tune out similar statements from responsible individuals representing the United Nations. In her opening remarks for the UN Climate Change’s Conference this week in Madrid (COP25), Patricia Espinosa, its Executive Secretary, said (per their press release)…
“If we stay on our current trajectory, it’s estimated that global temperatures could more than double by the end of this century. This will have enormous negative consequences for humanity and threaten our existence on this planet. We need an immediate and urgent change in trajectory.”
Editor’s note: A double in temperature! That would be the apocalypse. Did the audience run screaming from the room, or did the bartender just cut her off?
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said …
“Climate change is no longer a long-term problem. We are confronted now with a global climate crisis. The point of no return is no longer over the horizon. It is in sight and hurtling towards us.”
So exactly what should we be worried about? Consider the following statistics:
- Over the past century, there has been a 99% decline in the death toll from natural disasters, during the same period that the global population quadrupled.
- While global economic losses from weather and climate disasters have been increasing, this is caused by increasing population and property in vulnerable locations. Global weather losses as a percent of global GDP have declined about 30% since 1990.
- While the IPCC has estimated that sea level could rise by 0.6 meters by 2100, recall that the Netherlands adapted to living below sea level 400 years ago.
- Crop yields continue to increase globally, surpassing what is needed to feed the world. Agricultural technology matters more than climate.
- The proportion of world population living in extreme poverty declined from 36% in 1990 to 10% in 2015.
While many people may be unaware of this good news, they do react to each weather or climate disaster in the news. Activist scientists and the media quickly seize upon each extreme weather event as having the fingerprints of manmade climate change – ignoring the analyses of more sober scientists showing periods of even more extreme weather in the first half of the 20th century, when fossil fuel emissions were much smaller.
So why are we so worried about climate change? The concern over climate change is not so much about the warming that has occurred over the past century. Rather, the concern is about what might happen in the 21st century as a result of increasing fossil fuel emissions. Emphasis on ‘might.’
Alarming press releases are issued about each new climate model projection that predicts future catastrophes from famine, mass migrations, catastrophic fires, etc. However, these alarming scenarios of the 21st century climate change require that, like the White Queen in Alice in Wonderland
The most alarming scenarios of 21st century climate change are associated with the RCP8.5 greenhouse gas concentration scenario. Often erroneously described as a ‘business as usual’ scenario, RCP8.5 assumes unrealistic trends long-term trends for population and a slowing of technological innovation. Even more unlikely is the assumption that the world will largely be powered by coal.
{Editor’s note: RCP8.5 is the worst-case scenario in AR5 and assumes inflections in those trends, and is either improbable or impossible (see here and here), but its propaganda value is high.}
In spite of the implausibility of this scenario, RCP8.5 is the favored scenario for publications based on climate model simulations. In short, RCP8.5 is a very useful recipe for cooking up scenarios alarming impacts from manmade climate change. Which are of course highlighted and then exaggerated by press releases and media reports.
{Editor’s note – See some of the many papers and news stories misrepresenting RCP8.5, and this analysis showing RCP8.5’s political utility. Also see “The Incredible Story Of How Climate Change Became Apocalyptic” by Roger Pielke Jr. (U CO-Boulder).}
Apart from the issue of how much greenhouse gases might increase, there is a great deal of uncertainty about much the planet will warm in response to a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide – referred to as ‘equilibrium climate sensitivity’ (ECS). The IPCC 5th Assessment Report (AR5, 2013) provided a range between 1 and 6oC, with a ‘likely’ range between 1.5 and 4.5oC.
In the years since the AR5, the uncertainty has grown. The latest climate model results – prepared for the forthcoming IPCC 6th Assessment Report – shows that a majority of the climate models are producing values of ECS exceeding 5oC. The addition of poorly understood additional processes into the models has increased confusion and uncertainty. At the same time, refined efforts to determine values of the equilibrium climate sensitivity from the historical data record obtain values of ECS about 1.6oC, with a range from 1.05 to 2.7oC.
With this massive range of uncertainty in the values of equilibrium climate sensitivity, the lowest value among the climate models is 2.3oC, with few models having values below 3oC. Hence the lower end of the range of ECS is not covered by the climate models, resulting in temperature projections for the 21st century that are biased high, with a smaller range relative to the range of uncertainty in ECS.
{For more about this, see Curry’s post “What’s the worst case for climate sensitivity?“}
With regards to sea level rise, recent U.S. national assessment reports have included a worst-case sea level rise scenario for the 21st century of 2.5 m. Extreme estimates of sea level rise rely on RCP8.5 and climate model simulations that are on average running too hot relative to the uncertainty range of ECS. The most extreme scenarios of 21st century sea level rise are based on speculative and poorly understood physical processes that are hypothesized to accelerate the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. However, recent research indicates that these processes are very unlikely to influence sea level rise in the 21st century. To date, in most of the locations that are most vulnerable to sea level rise, local sinking from geological processes and land use has dominated over sea level rise from global warming.
{See her paper – Sea level rise: what’s the worst case? – and her summary of conflicting recent research: Sea level rise whiplash.}
To further complicate climate model projections for the 21st century, the climate models focus only on manmade climate change – they make no attempt to predict natural climate variations from the sun’s output, volcanic eruptions and long-term variations in ocean circulation patterns. We have no idea how natural climate variability will play out in the 21st century, and whether or not natural variability will dominate over manmade warming.
We still don’t have a realistic assessment of how a warmer climate will impact us and whether it is ‘dangerous.’ We don’t have a good understanding of how warming will influence future extreme weather events. Land use and exploitation by humans is a far bigger issue than climate change for species extinction and ecosystem health.
“The time for debate has ended. Action is urgently needed.”
— Marcia McNutt (former director of the US Geological Survey, then editor-in-Chief of Science magazine, now President of the NAS) in “The beyond-two-degree inferno“, an editorial in Science, 3 July 2015.
“The science is settled even if political opinion is not.”
— Chuck Todd as host of “Meet the Press” on 30 December 2018.
We have been told that the science of climate change is ‘settled’. However, in climate science there has been a tension between the drive towards a scientific ‘consensus’ to support policymaking, versus exploratory research that pushes forward the knowledge frontier. Climate science is characterized by a rapidly evolving knowledge base and disagreement among experts. Predictions of 21st century climate change are characterized by deep uncertainty.
As noted in a recent paper co-authored by Dr. Tim Palmer of Oxford (“The scientific challenge of understanding and estimating climate change” in PNAS),
“What we find more difficult to talk about is our deep dissatisfaction with the ability of our models to inform society about the pace of warming, how this warming plays out regionally, and what it implies for the likelihood of surprises. …Unfortunately, {climate scientists} circling the wagons leads to false impressions about the source of our confidence and about our ability to meet the scientific challenges posed by a world that we know is warming globally.”
We have not only oversimplified the problem of climate change, but we have also oversimplified its ‘solution’. Even if you accept the climate model projections and that warming is dangerous, there is disagreement among experts regarding whether a rapid acceleration away from fossil fuels is the appropriate policy response. In any event, rapidly reducing emissions from fossil fuels to ameliorate the adverse impacts of extreme weather events in the near term increasingly looks like magical thinking.
Climate change – both manmade and natural – is a chronic problem that will require continued management over the coming centuries.
We have been told that climate change is an ‘existential crisis.’ However, based upon our current assessment of the science, the climate threat is not an existential one, even in its most alarming hypothetical incarnations. However, the perception of manmade climate change as a near-term apocalypse and has narrowed the policy options that we’re willing to consider. The perceived ‘urgency’ of drastically reducing fossil fuel emissions is forcing us to make near term decisions that may be suboptimal for the longer term. Further, the monomaniacal focus on the elimination of fossil fuel emissions distracts our attention from the primary causes of many of our problems that we might have more success in addressing in the near term.
Common sense strategies to reduce vulnerability to extreme weather events, improve environmental quality, develop better energy technologies and increase access to grid electricity, improve agricultural and land use practices, and better manage water resources can pave the way for a more prosperous and secure future. Each of these solutions is ‘no regrets’ – supporting climate change mitigation while improving human well being. These strategies avoid the political gridlock surrounding the current policies and avoid costly policies that will have minimal near-term impacts on the climate. And finally, these strategies don’t require agreement about the risks of uncontrolled greenhouse gas emissions.
{For more about this approach see “Dealing with complexity and extreme events using a bottom-up, resource-based vulnerability perspective” by Roger Pielke Sr. el al. in Extreme Events and Natural Hazards: The Complexity Perspective
We don’t know how the climate of the 21st century will evolve, and we will undoubtedly be surprised. Given this uncertainty, precise emissions targets and deadlines are scientifically meaningless. We can avoid much of the political gridlock by implementing common sense, no-regrets strategies that improve energy technologies, lift people out of poverty and make them more resilient to extreme weather events.
The extreme rhetoric of the Extinction Rebellion and other activists is making political agreement on climate change policies more difficult. Exaggerating the dangers beyond credibility makes it difficult to take climate change seriously. On the other hand, the extremely alarmist rhetoric has frightened the bejesus out of children and young adults.
JC’s message to children and young adults.
Don’t believe the hype that you are hearing from Extinction Rebellion and the like. Rather than going on strike or just worrying, take the time to learn something about the science of climate change. The IPCC reports are a good place to start. For a critical perspective on the IPCC, Climate Etc. is a good resource.
Climate change – manmade and/or natural – along with extreme weather events, provide reasons for concern. However, the rhetoric and politics of climate change have become absolutely toxic and nonsensical.
In the meantime, live your best life. Trying where you can to lessen your impact on the planet is a worthwhile thing to do. Societal prosperity is the best insurance policy that we have for reducing our vulnerability to the vagaries of weather and climate.
JC’s message to Extinction Rebellion and other doomsters
Not only do you know nothing about climate change, but you also appear to know nothing of history. You are your own worst enemy – you are triggering a global backlash against doing anything sensible about protecting our environment or reducing our vulnerability to extreme weather. You are making young people miserable, who haven’t yet experienced enough of life to place this nonsense in context.
Originally published at Climate Etc. on 14 December 2019.
Reposted under its Creative Commons license.
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More toxic fear-mongering
- The Big Heat: Earth on the Brink
- The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming
- Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?
- Plus endless articles in the media, such as “Planet Earth Is Doomed. How Do I Go On?” by Liza Featherstone at The Nation.
Slowly, more people are beginning to speak out about this misuse of climate science. For example, see “Promoters of Climate Anxiety” by Cliff Mass (professor of Atmospheric Sciences at U Washington), “Why Climate Advocates Need To Stop Hyping Extreme Weather” by Roger Pielke Jr. (U CO-Boulder), and “If You’re Worried About Climate Change, Don’t Misrepresent Climate Science” by Nicholas Grossman (Asst Prof of Pol Sci, U Illinois at Urbana-Champaign). But too few. The alarmists dominate the media, and speak more loudly and confidently.
Other posts in this series
After 30 years of failed climate politics, let’s try science! – A proposal that can break the policy gridlock.
The guilty ones preventing good policy about climate change – Understanding the problem (it’s not what you think) points to the solution.
About Judith Curry
Judith Curry retired as a Professor of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. She is now President and co-owner of Climate Forecast Applications Network (CFAN). Prior to joining the faculty at Georgia Tech, she served on the faculties of the University of Colorado, Penn State University and Purdue University.
She has served on the NASA Advisory Council Earth Science Subcommittee, the DOE Biological and Environmental Science Advisory Committee, the National Academies Climate Research Committee, and Space Studies Board, and the NOAA Climate Working Group.
She is a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Geophysical Union. Her views on climate change are best summarized by her Congressional testimony: Policy Relevant Climate Issues in Context, April 2013.
Follow Dr. Curry on Twitter at @curryja. Learn about her firm, CFAN, at their website.
For More Information
Ideas! For your holiday shopping, see my recommended books and films at Amazon. Also, see a story about our future: “Ultra Violence: Tales from Venus.”
If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. For more information about this vital issue see the keys to understanding climate change. Also, see all posts about uncertainties in climate science, about Judith Curry, and especially these …
- Focusing on worst-case climate futures doesn’t work. It shouldn’t work.
- The IPCC gives us good news about climate change, but we don’t listen.
- Roger Pielke Jr.: the politics of unlikely climate scenarios.
- Is climate change an existential threat to humanity?
- Another climate scientist speaks out against the hysteria.
Activists don’t want you to read these books
Some unexpected good news about polar bears: The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened
To learn more about the state of climate change see The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters & Climate Change
