- We shouldn’t be able to guess but we did. Last week we mentioned this study about how climate change was going to demolish umpteen lovely heritage sites from the Forth Bridge to basically whatever you admire near you, and guessed that the “scenarios” involved “relied on RCP8.5 or something”. Well, thanks to the folks who created it, who may regret responding so promptly to a media inquiry, we now know that all the horrible disasters were based on… RCP8.5. If only something would demolish it, and wash away its disreputable fragments.
- A Canadian newspaper notes that the leader of the formerly fringe British Columbia Conservative party now surging in the polls, was kicked out of the Liberal caucus in 2022 “over tweets that said carbon dioxide was not causing climate change, a stance significantly at odds with the scientific consensus”. As we noted at the time, what he actually did was retweet Patrick Moore’s post saying that Australia hadn’t warmed in 10 years and coral cover was soaring, both true statements, to which Moore added “The case for CO2 being the control knob of global temperature gets weaker every day.” That Rustad paid attention to actual data, was willing to share it publicly, got booted from an establishment political party for doing so, and has had his public statements constantly misrepresented by the once-mainstream press might help explain why he’s now winning with the public.
- The New York Times runs a guest essay “How Should We Mourn the End of Summer?” and we’re confused. Day after day, feature after feature, the Times howls that summer has become mind-bogglingly, life-threateningly hot because of our carbon sins. Now they’re sad it’s over. Of course they introduce it with a ritual genuflexion and pious gesture “Climate change has made it a hot one for many of us, but still”. Yeah. Still. As in it was nice while it lasted and now it’s going to get cold again which won’t be as nice.
- Credit where due: Euronews.green offers “Tips on flight-free travel across Europe from a woman who won a race from London to Istanbul”. Which sure beats tips on flight-free travel from elitists flying about to deliver them. Especially since the winner, Eleanor Parker, managed to cover that distance in just 57 hours using only public transit and the ankle express.
- Canada’s Green Party, underwater in the polls and something of a cult of lack of personality, rushes to judgement over a police shooting, with perpetual leader Elizabeth May saying “The high number of deaths in shootings involving Indigenous people by the RCMP is alarming and underscores the deep-seated systemic racism within our policing institutions” while unknown convict deputy leader “Rainbow Eyes” decolonizing that “This is a core fault in the colonial system of domination that is now more alarmingly coming into light.” Why does green always end up red?
- If coral could talk… would it scream for help? Paul Homewood (h/t Friends of Science) notes a study out of Fiji that actually shows that water temperatures in that part of the Pacific were at least as high 600 years ago as today. In fact the data seem to show the dreaded Medieval Warm Period warmer than today, then the Little Ice Age. Of course the authors stir in some climate panic for good grant measure and splice in an unrelated data set for the very recent past. As Homewood says, “We should also ignore that black line, showing current SSTs – splicing of data in this way is a strict no-no in any statistical analysis.” But a yes-yes in current climate science, where the verdict precedes the trial, pre-empts it or overturns it.
- It’s a plot: Scientific Activism emails that “Fossil fuel industry representatives are infiltrating science curriculum decision making in many states.” The hook being that while the good guys just wanted students neutrally and scientifically to “describe efforts to mitigate climate change”, a sinister “in-house attorney for Shell Oil Company” successfully argued that they be forced instead to “describe the carbon cycle”. Imagine being forced to do science instead of activism in science class. It’s an outrage.
- According to the Associated Press, “As the Earth sizzled through a summer with four of the hottest days ever measured, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have starkly different visions on how to address a changing climate while ensuring a reliable energy supply. But neither has provided many details on how they would get there.” So there’s really not much to say about it, is there? And yet they say it, at great length. Including that Biden’s pause on new LNG export terminals “aligned the Democratic president with environmentalists who fear the recent increase in LNG exports is locking in potentially catastrophic planet-warming emissions even as Biden has pledged to cut climate pollution in half by 2030.” So vote for Harris, the clueless good person, over Trump the clueless orange climate demon.
- What is this “nature”? News stories and opinion columns, even ones at odds with much of climate orthodoxy, i.e. in this particular case an editorial in favour of Canadian oil and gas, routinely say things like Canada only accounts for “1.5 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions” when they mean human-made emissions. The natural cycle remains far and away the most important source of CO2 and so if it is in flux for any reason, say warming oceans degassing carbon dioxide, it doesn’t just dwarf what all Canadians emit but what all Americans, all Chinese or all of humanity does.
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Tidbits
11 Sep 2024 | News Roundup
When political parties get involved in climate change they do so because there are votes to be had in it. Whereas “vote for us and we’ll reduce taxes” might be a good election slogan, it does commit your party to some measurable result. “Vote for us or the world is doomed” is a lot safer because it only commits you to the world not being doomed – “see, the world is still here – aren’t we clever”.
When I was a student, one of our group used to wear a bright green hat because, as he said, it kept the elephants away. It obviously worked because there were never any elephants around him.
"in current climate science, where the verdict precedes the trial"
This is nothing new. As the Queen of Hearts said in Alice in Wonderland; "Sentence first - verdict afterwards".
Which does lead one to suspect that many of the high priests of climate alarmism got their ideas from the same book.
I don't know.Trump was leading in many polls before last night's debate.But he went on silly rants,while Harris avoided her "word salads" she is so well-known for.Hate to say it,but she looked good,Trump did not.Pains me,because if she wins,it will be the Green Transition on steroids,even more open door southern border for millions of illegal migrants and all the social ills that it has brought for the last 4 years.Brace yourselves.
Why does green always end up red? Freedom is their enemy because their zeal justifies the necessity of coercion and unlike your garden variety tyrannies justifying it for the "common good", it is for the good of the implied omniscience of the "environment", a surrogate of a pantheistic deity.
Not sure if you've covered this already, but the BBC have been scaremongering again. Ironically, this time it's with science that the article admits is dodgy:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PY9VCNNJwx0&pp=ygUSb2NraGFtcyBzaGF2ZXIgYmJj
No wonder there's a generation of people suffering from climate anxiety.