Climate Change – a Personal Perspective

Without going into a definition of the words, it is a topic on which most people have an opinion, but concurrently do not seem to be able to express their own position: we tend to adopt existing dogma and are mostly swayed by crowd sentiment as opposed to rational analysis. This is particularly true of politicians at all three levels of our government, with the Federal Liberals leading the way.

Dogma

The currently “accepted” or dominant attitude is one that was originally promoted in 2007 and even earlier, but really caught on with the release of the docudrama featuring U.S. ex-Vice President Al Gore, titled “An Inconvenient Truth”. The influence of that propaganda masterpiece, with the central theme that climate change (called “Global Warming” at the time) is principally anthropogenic, has been profound; to the point where it is impacting our standard of living and particularly that in developing countries. However, all the predictions of imminent doom have proved to be based on hysteria or short term profit rather than rational judgement or fact. The prophets of doom have managed to take the disappointment of their shortfall in their stride simply by kicking the target date of our demise ahead as each prediction failed fulfilment. Alarmism has been with us about as long as man has achieved sufficient leisure to think about it: Thomas Malthus (1766 – 1834) predicted the impending demise of mankind due to overpopulation, and Professor Paul Ehrlich (age – 90) at Stanford University has enjoyed an entire career beating the same drum.

"The Science is Settled"

This is a recurring theme of climate alarmism, and its finality is unassailable. The statement is obviously absurd, since science is an evolutionary process, much like any other academic field, and permanently subject to change by virtue of discovery and progress. The very idea is an oxymoron, as science is the antithesis of religion: we believe what we cannot understand, but we know what we observe. Alarmism fundamentally requires belief as opposed to investigation and observation.

Acceptance and Denial

Alarmism's detractors are labeled denialists, who have something to gain by not accepting the "science” and being appropriately alarmed. While I would not try to determine a general or universal approach to this issue, I believe most geoscientists are sufficiently aware of the geologic record to realize that climate change is real, but certainly not new, and not anthropogenically caused or controlled. Climate change is a long-term function of many controlling variables, which has a history as old as the planet, and will continue long after our species has disappeared. While the current anthropogenic component may be larger than in the past, it is still miniscule in relative terms, as compared to volcanic activity, ocean currents, earth's rotation, sunspots, and other natural phenomena which we can never hope to influence, let alone control.

Hypocrisy

The Green mantra underlying climate alarmism is based on the typical elitist attitude of “do as I say, not as I do” best exemplified by the unprecedented accumulation of private jets at Glasgow airport (overflowing to Edinburgh for lack of space) in support of COP 26. The apex of ignorance/arrogance is difficult to determine because of the stiff competition, but the prize should probably be split three ways between the Canadian Prime Minister, with the largest aircraft, Prince Charles, who blew in from Rome – using “sustainable fuel”, and Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who had to fly back early for an engagement in London but burned “partly sustainable fuel”, whatever that may be.