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Roger Pielke Jr. on 30 Years in Climate Research

17 Jun 2024 | Webinar

10 comments on “Roger Pielke Jr. on 30 Years in Climate Research”

  1. I guess my main take away from this interview is that Roger Pielke's foundational view is that emissions of CO2 from burning fossil fuels is unnatural, so it much be bad for the planet, and since it might change the climate which he assumes would be bad, we have an obligation to reduce these emissions to zero. I don't think this is a strong argument for implementing costly and controlling regulations to achieve this objective. First, we don't know if higher CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is good or bad for the planet or climate. NASA has released images showing the earth has been getting greener presumably because the CO2 concentration has been rising. There really isn't much other evidence one way or the other. We know the earth has been getting steadily warmer since the end of the last ice age, but we really don't know how much of that can be attributed to higher CO2 in the atmosphere, if any. Finally, if we take the view that every change humans make to the planet and environment is a bad thing, the only rational solution would be to reduce the number of humans and technology advances that humans make. That's got to be a non-starter. We know that humans are very good at adapting to change and making the world and presumably the planet a better place over time. So, in my view, worrying less about CO2 emissions while continuing to reduce real unnatural pollution and innovating new solutions is the right path for us to take.

  2. I think Pielke has surrendered to the Globalist pressure. Clearly,if he had said what most of us believe( or we wouldn’t be here), he would have career problems. What he did not say was that CO 2 is proving exceptionally beneficial in Crop Yields,Desert retreat etc. he is in favour of decarbonisation,HE SAYS, but it’s easy for him to pay lip service to something he knows cannot happen because the Eastern Countries are going to increase their CO2 output drastically for the foreseeable future while blatantly lying about their intentions. He’d be better off talking about managing,if necessary,the higher CO2 levels of the inevitable future.

  3. Having followed Roger Pielke Sr, and how he was slandered and defamed out of the public square for sticking to the science, it is rather sad to see Roger Jr try to placate, unsuccessfully, the same people. Roger Jr still tosses out magical solutions like carbon capture. There is no carbon capture, beyond the existing narural geological and biological systems, that remotely work. He still accepts the false assertion that solar and wind are carbon free. He still believes CO2 is a net problem so significant that the world must destroy itself in homage to it. Yet his amazing analytical skills and work shows otherwise.

  4. Embarrassing discussion at many levels of consideration. Yet another milquetoast pundit trying to keep a corner of his seat at the table of climate confabulation under the "scientific" banner of why can't we all just get along. "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!"
    Even more apropos from Oz:
    "Why, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity. Every pusillanimous creature that crawls on the Earth or slinks through slimy seas has a brain. Back where I come from, we have universities, seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have. But they have one thing you haven't got: a diploma."

  5. Pielke skips neatly around the central question: Is CO2 a “greenhouse” gas? I say it isn’t and, in fact, the presence of CO2 in the atmosphere could, quite possibly, have the opposite effect by sending more red light into space than it sends, and “reflects”, back to the surface of the planet.

  6. You’ve, in a nutshell and in restrained language, hit the proverbial nail on the head! CO2 is an essential component of the atmosphere without which life disappears and, if the observations and research of scientists in the field is correct, has increased and decreased in concentration over millions of years, but never below the minimum required to sustain life on the planet. During all that time, life was sustained despite CO2 reaching levels far greater than we are experiencing now and, to my knowledge, there’s been no attempt to connect CO2 concentrations with extinctions. Climate change is not a hoax, however, the industry growing from it, certainly is! An expensive hoax, as well, in particular for the workers whose taxes are paying the hoaxers. As the professor sitting before the Che Guevara print on his wall in Pielke’s anecdote may have admitted, reluctantly, however, “…the issue is not the issue!”

  7. Actually, earth hasn’t been getting steadily warmer since the last glaciation period (we’re still in the ice age); it has been on a warming/cooling repeating cycle since the last glaciation, with the warmest temperatures early in this period and warm cycles getting steadily cooler, so far. Almost like this might be the end of this interglacial period, which is already about average in length. And without the carbon dioxide added during this interglacial period, both natural and returning fossilized atmospheric carbon dioxide through burning fossil fuels, the earth’s atmospheric CO2 level would likely fall below 150 ppm and end most life on earth during the next glaciation period. Seems like burning fossil fuels is our lowest risk choice, independent of wether the CO2 stops the next glaciation period or it simply prevents global extinction during a new glaciation period.

  8. I agree 100%. Reduce real pollution and degradation of the planet. How about banning high altitude jets spewing out chemicals that hang in the atmosphere and grow wider right before our lying eyes! It's all smoke and mirrors this climate change malarkey!

  9. I like that, "the issue is not the issue!" quote from Patrick's post. Several problems with the alarmist cohort's overzealous peals for immediate action lest we be catastrophically self-extincted, persist: The primary problem is their ignoring the invalidation of their primary hypothesis and hypotheses, refusing to accept that result. Next we have the incessant moving-of-goalposts coupled with non-sequitur conclusions. This is hugely frustrating. And as our dear Robson regularly points out, if almost every observed change is likely due to climate changes caused by human action, we just have an even worse pile of unfalsifiable hypotheses. Ugh. Then we have the whole line of reasoning Patrick's post outlines. It is a fact that CO2 concentrations were higher, even an order of magnitude higher than in the Holocene-up-through-now, and no hellish "tipping point" doomed the Earth to fireball-ness. Instead, we had incredibly robust growth of plant and animal life, and temperatures that most pensioners would appreciate. A warmer greener Earth with less deserts and climate zones far broader for crop growth just isn't anything "bad." Shrieking that there's a huge problem with people needing to move from one place to another over 100 years is just stupid. Which is the next failure or fallacy in their incessant yammering; we must take expensive and oppressive action now--or else! Another non-sequitur. It simply does not follow that we should thrash-and-trash our current infrastructure and accept punitive costs for poorer services now--financially it would clearly be better to amortize the cost of these sweeping changes over time--if such changes were even needed, (they're not,) or if they would actually work (they won't.) CO2 is factually, demonstrably, not a pollutant. Allowing it to be classified that way lets the idiotic yet powerful ever-more-power-seeking governments and their minions "regulate" all sorts of activity, causing far more harm than any possible good. Or they just play around distorting markets and industries to feel good about it--"Carbon credits? Excuse me, but that's just a scam. You can't be serious."
    Make me a bunch of nuclear power plants all over the planet, because if there were a problem, that would be part of a solution, and when you get done, come back and we'll run some numbers, at least that way we'll keep you busy and get something worthwhile out of it.

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