This week Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg began her journey to the United States for the United Nations Climate Conference. While this young girl believes that the planet is headed for an ecological catastrophe, this type of eco-pessimism is not new.
30 years Julian Simon published his article in Science magazine: “Resources, Population, Environment: An Oversupply of False Bad News.”
Juxtapose this with The Limits to Growth and the Silent Spring, each over 40 years old, and try to really see which has turned out to be more accurate.
FromThe Limits to Growth: “Will this be the world that your grandchildren will thank you for? A world where industrial production has sunk to zero. Where population has suffered a catastrophic decline. Where the air, sea, and land are polluted beyond redemption. Where civilization is a distant memory. This is the world that the computer forecasts.”
As Simon noted, the models are just that, and they have turned out to be not that accurate. In many cases, just the opposite of what the eco-pessimists proposed.
It was Simon’s contention that eco-pessimists ignore history, misunderstand finiteness, thinks statically, has a vested interest in doom and is complacent about human innovation.
Almost everything we read about the environment now is ignoring the poor track record of eco-pessimists–this should produce some skepticism about global warming claims today.
The reality is, it’s hard to find actual data – and not models that show either unprecedented change or change is that is anywhere close to causing real harm.
Returning to Simon’s argument that “Incredible as it may seem at first, the term ‘finite’ is not only inappropriate but downright misleading in the context of natural resources…Because we find new lodes, invent better production methods and discover new substitutes, the ultimate constraint upon our capacity to enjoy unlimited raw materials at acceptable prices is knowledge.”
Simon is talking about human engineering and creativity, and in an argument that seems odd, renewable resources such as whales, pine forests, bison are the ones that tend to run out.
Humans are the only creatures that use fossil fuels. Because of this, we are not competing or stealing resources from other animals. When the energy source is hydro, wind, timber or crops, you are directly competing for resources with other creatures. The use of bio-energy, whether in the form of timber or ethanol competes with wildlife for land, or wood or food.
Simon’s argument is based on history. In the past, we relied on the biosphere (crops and wood), then we discovered that there was something under the ground that actually works better, and doesn’t rob from the surface of the planet and the creatures that inhabit it.
That is the industrial revolution.
Simon’s view is dynamic, and not static. The economy, culture, and prices cause the substitution of resources.
While it was argued several years ago that malaria would drastically increase as the world got warmer, it actually has disappeared from North America, Russia, and Europe and gone down in South America, Asia, and Africa. This downtick is not because mosquitos dislike warmer weather. This is due to people moving inside, controlling standing water, and the use of chemicals and malaria medications. Design, engineering, and creativity are the forces of change.
Human beings are dynamic, not static. We adapt, that’s what we do.
Simon was also critical of the environmental movement and the scientific community. He understood that they are competitive free markets in which there is intense competition for donations, grants, and subsidies. The so-called Green movement generates billions of dollars annually, basically by scaring people. If they said that climate change is a very slow, gentle process that takes hundreds of years to affect anything, I doubt the donations would be as generous.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s October 2018 report says that we need to cut global carbon emissions in half in ten years to have any hope of staving off a climate crisis that would existentially threaten human society. Seriously? And this is based on what?
In July, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez introduced a resolution asking Congress to declare that global warming is an emergency demanding a massive mobilization of resources to protect the U.S. economy, society and national security.
This, of course, has nothing to do with climate change. This is about the distribution of wealth, power, and enhanced government control. The IPCC report declared that preventing runaway global warming will require “far-reaching transitions in energy, land … and industrial systems” for which there is “no documented historic precedent.” Oxford University climate scientist and report author Myles Allen explained, “It’s telling us we need to … turn the world economy on a dime.” The IPCC says that to make this turn happen, there needs to be a carefully planned and democratically administered emergency program for ecological reconstruction. None of this is reconcilable with capitalism’s imperatives of profit maximization and growth, as well as private ownership of the means of production. In other words: The system must change to beat climate change.
When hearing climate change mentioned, what they really mean is a transition to socialism. People like Sanders and AOC, and 70% of the Democratic party are using fear about climate change as a means destabilize the economy and to force what they dementedly call social justice. However, they never offer any real data or historical precedents to back up their wailing.
Simon understood just how dangerous eco-pessimism is. There is an idea that the risk from increasing carbon dioxide calls for cutting emissions by 90 percent or we’re all going to die. But, cutting emissions by 90% might do more harm to the poor and the rain forest than anything the emissions themselves might do.
The idea that we can decarbonize the economy without severe ecological and economic harm, that we can shut down world trade without starving the poor, that we can grow organic crops for seven billion people without destroying the rain forest is a very dangerous proposition.
Simon understood how miserable this world still is for so many, and how much better we could make it. We need to stop being so fearful, need to keep inventing and developing new and more powerful technologies that can actually do what we need to keep getting better.
Organic tomatoes are not going to feed the world, genetically modified crops will. Wind and solar will never produce enough power, small nuclear will.
Simon believed the greenest thing we can do is innovate. The most sustainable thing we can do is change and adapt.
We need not fear the climate, only fear itself.
Paul Plante says
Posted elsewhere where this thread has been moved for further comment on Wed Aug 21, 2019 2:50 pm:
I have to chuckle as I read that last sentence in this screed (a long piece of writing, typically one regarded as tedious) from the Cape Charles Mirror above here, because as I was reading the article just a few minutes ago, in fact, there was a tornado warning for Fulton and Montgomery counties in upstate New York to the west of Albany, and the message from the National Weather Service was “take cover now!”
In other words, there is a very angry and powerful thunderstorm above your head, and if you have a lick of sense in your head, and let us face it, many don’t, you will indeed “fear the climate,” because the thunderstorm and the tornado are part of the climate you need to fear, and you will get yourself somewhere as safe as you can get yourself, so the storm doesn’t get you, instead.
So that last sentence in that editorial is irresponsible and ignorant, and arrogant, to boot, as we see from the Albany, New York Times Union article “Storm that slammed Malta was a microburst” by Amanda Fries on Monday, August 19, 2019, to wit:
Meteorologists confirmed Monday that a microburst is what caused trees to topple, some falling on cars and homes, in an area along the Northway in Malta on Sunday.
The National Weather Service confirmed the damage found between exits 11 and 12 on the Northway was from a microburst, a thunderstorm downdraft that impacts an area of less than 2.5 miles wide and has peak winds that last less than five minutes.
The storm struck the area around 6:35 p.m. Sunday, and covered Ruhle Road on the west and Route 9 on the east, according to the weather service.
Forecasters estimated winds reached 90 mph.
The worst of the damage was on the east side of the Northway in the Malta Gardens and Woodfield communities.
There were no injuries.
Microbursts produce straight-line winds, unlike tornadoes where winds rotate, but both can be damaging.
https://www.timesunion.com/news/article … o-18132172.
Ray Otton says
“I have to chuckle as I read that last sentence in this screed (a long piece of writing, typically one regarded as tedious)”
Trust me when I tell you that the rest of us are chuckling at your chuckling.
Or, to be even MORE succinct, pot calls kettle black.
Paul Plante says
Good morning to yourself, Mr. Otton, and a glorious morning it is up here in the climatic zone I reside in.
And I am glad that at your age, Mr. Otton, and with your disposition, that you are able to muster up the energy to chuckle at anything.
Keep it up, because being able to laugh when you are as old as yourself helps to keep you healthy.
And enjoy your friends who are sitting there chuckling with you and be thankful you have any to sit there and chuckle with you.
And exactly what is it that you are chuckling about?
Tornados touching down and destroying property that is not yours?
And while you try to figure that out, because it is not at all apparent from your post, please, have yourself a real glorious day!
A friend says
Paul,
So, you’re still assuming the readers of your “screed(s) (long piece of writing, typically one regarded as tedious)” need definitions of uncommon words–pity! I truly believe if you would edit your submissions to be more like bullet points, more readers would actually read what you have to say (admittedly, at times, sage advice) and benefit from your thoughts/wisdom.
Paul Plante says
HUH?
Oh, yes, good morning to you, as well, A friend.
And have yourself a glorious day, as well, and if you are going surfing, watch for those great white sharks – they bite, I’m told.
Paul Plante says
* Julian Lincoln Simon, an American professor of business administration at the University of Maryland and a Senior Fellow at the Cato who served as a longtime economics and business professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is dead and has been dead for 20 years;
* Julian Lincoln Simon was not an engineer, nor was he a scientist, nor did he have any technical or scientific training that would qualify him as any kind of expert on weather and climate;
* Julian Lincoln Simon wrote books and articles, mostly on economic subjects, not on climate or weather;
* Julian Lincoln Simon is best known for his work on population, natural resources, and immigration, not on climate or weather;
* Julian Lincoln Simon suffered for a long time from depression, which allowed him to work only a few productive hours in a day, which would severely limit his personal studies of climate and weather, which there is no evidence he ever conducted in the first place;
* Simon’s 1981 book The Ultimate Resource was a criticism of what was then the conventional wisdom on resource scarcity, not climate or weather;
* His 1984 book The Resourceful Earth was a criticism of the conventional wisdom on population growth and resource consumption, with nothing to do with climate or weather;
* Twenty-five (25) years ago, Simon was skeptical, in 1994, of claims that human activity caused global environmental damage, notably in relation to CFCs, ozone depletion and climate change, although he never produced a lick of evidence to support his skepticism;
* Simon dismissed concerns about lead pollution & IQ, (think Flint and Newark), DDT, PCBs, malathion, Agent Orange, asbestos, and the chemical contamination at Love Canal as mere “value judgement,” which makes him out to be either a sociopath or psychopath.
ERGO, the writings and maunderings of the long dead Julian Simon DO NOT support the
conclusion in the OP that “We need not fear the climate, only fear itself.”
Note: This is one of the worst takes ever posted to the Mirror, the only thing missing is some anti-Semitic tropes to go along with the rest of this…Oh yeah, and let’s trash him for his depression. It’s kind of scary, but Simon’s critics, the ones that he has proven wrong, said a lot of the same things. Not sure you want to be part of that group. What’s even more concerning, is that so much of this goes right past you…you criticize Simon for being an economist and not a climate scientist, but you miss the fact that his arguments are really economic. That’s like claiming Kant’s work on metaphysics is worthless because he’s not a theologian. You paste stuff from wikipedia, but I’m not sure you understand it. You act like Simon was in favor of polluting the earth, which was never the case. His point was, in the big picture, DDT, PCBs, malathion, Agent Orange, asbestos are not a big deal…we’ll figure something out, and we did. We’re still here, just like he said we would be, and we are thriving, living longer, healthier and more comfortably, using the best resources at our disposal to do so. Oh, and DDT, how many people died because we stopped using it?
Paul Plante says
For the record, not one but two tornados touched down and wrecked some havoc during that storm mentioned above, although from what I can understand, Cape Charles, with an entirely different climate than that which exists to the north of Cape Charles, didn’t even feel the slightest breeze from that same storm.
Go figure.
And for the record, “climate” is nothing more than the average course or condition of the weather at a place usually over a period of years as exhibited by temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation, so clearly, and really, this is very basic high school earth science, not rocket science, the earth, the ball spinning through space that we all occupy, in theory, at least, DOES NOT have a climate to change, and talking about the earth’s “climate” is nothing more than absurd crazy talk.
What the earth does have is climatic zones, either three, those being tropical, temperate, and polar, or possibly five, i.e., tropical around the Equator which are hot and humid; arid like you’d find in deserts; Mediterranean; temperate; continental; and polar, which does absolutely nothing to describe totally the climatic conditions you would find in any of those zones.
For example, Cape Charles, said to be more pleasant year-round than Pasadena, California or San Diego, is essentially surrounded by large bodies of water which control local MICRO-CLIMATES, which is what the earthy really has, a multitude of micr0-climates, not a “climate,” so its climate, and consequently, its temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation, are controlled by ocean currents, which are very slow to change, given the mass involved.
Not so, however, as one moves due west from Cape Charles far enough to get away from the effects of the ocean or Chesapeake Bay, which incidentally appears to have some of its own issues due to temperature, which is an element of climate, so that it is land, and not water affecting the climate, and consequently, temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation.
On land, you can have two locations within fifteen or twenty miles from each other with totally different “climates,” i.e. temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation, so this whole bidness of “modeling” the “earth’s climate” is a bunch of pure horse****.
Just as is saying that the activities of mankind have no effect on the earth’s “climate,” given there is no such thing in the first place.
Ray Otton says
So, no to the brevity suggestions?
Paul Plante says
No, Mr. Otton, I have no intention of becoming another mindless TWEETER on TWITTER, TWEETING out broken sentences, bafflegab and mindless gibberish in short bursts to a TWIBE of TWITTER-ites like our fearless leader does.
And you have yourself a real nice day!
Chas Cornweller says
I can never truly rid myself of the bizarre feeling this rag imposes upon me whenever it overlaps two sagas of the same story as told from two differing vantage points. I am speaking of both Dead Zone in Bay Worst in Decades and The Danger and Fraud of Eco-Pessimism. Two very succinct and polar opposite presentations of the exact same fallibility of man. These facts as authored by the same writer only adds to its strangeness.
After carefully reading and re-reading “Danger and the Fraud of Eco-Pessimism” to fully comprehend and grasp the complete meaning the author was trying to convey, my take-away was this…We need not fear the climate, only fear itself. And I get it. The author is trying to say, enough of the fear-mongering and doomsday climate predictions. But, then the silence. Only the pectoral pounding of wailing of crashing economies, destruction of rain forests and penalties incurred by the poor due to emission reductions. Some sort of bleating about developing new and more powerful technologies that can actually do what we need to keep getting better…(Cough, cough – Solar, Wind, Wave Dyno-Thermic and Geothermal) The fact that two congress persons, who just happen to be pursuers of social justice, have come up with solutions, while the staid, old and entrenched Old Guard Party and their sidekicks have done absolutely nothing, and perhaps have exacerbated the problem; speaks volumes of our pursuit of integrity and stewardship towards this planet. And the take away from this article…do we need fear the climate? I seriously think so. But not because of what man has done/and can do (this track record is sufficient enough of itself), but of Mother Nature’s track record. Let’s take a look…
Fact: Nearly twelve thousand years ago (a blink of the eye in geological time) an event occurred that basically changed the landscape of North America and parts of Europe while violently ending the last great glacial period. Fact: Numerous species of mega-fauna disappeared within a time span of several decades/several hundred years (still open to debate – but the fact remains: they went extinct) along with Clovis Man (which heavily populated the North American continent for thousands of years and had a thriving society). Fact: Weather patterns drastically changed and fluctuated for several thousand years before stabilizing and beginning the slow warming of this planet. Fact: there have been several mini-ice ages since the last major “Quaternary glaciation” and its subsequent warming. And other weather patterns and natural disasters that this earth could visit upon us can be listed as tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes and extra-terrestrial death from the skies in the form of meteors, comets…etc. So, fear? Laughable, we could be extinguished from any quarter. Not to mention done in by ourselves in the way of all out global war.
No, I get what the author is saying. But its vanity speak. It’s not the truth. Regurgitation of another author, Julian Simon, who was not a scientist, to impose his myopic world view on the reader. The fact that Julian Simon was an economics professor only retards the objectivity of his ecological stance. We ALL know how hard the fossil fuel industry has fought to keep us in the dark on global weather change. We ALL know how hard they have fought to keep inexpensive and free energy (wind and solar being two) out of standard societal norms. We ALL know the damage to places on Earth (Gulf of Mexico, Bligh Reef, Alaska, the lower Eastern Shore in the late seventies – I could go on and on and on) fossil fuel has imposed upon us and will continue to cause. But, folks, like the author says, it’s about money. And god knows, when you mess with people’s money (especially the rich in these times of such lucrative pay-offs) well, then, you are messing with the wrong crowd. And as the author writes: “This, of course, has nothing to do with climate change. This is about the distribution of wealth, power, and enhanced government control.” Sounds a bit conspiratorial and albeit, fear mongering. But I am sure the Republicans and the moderate Democrats have a sure-fire plan to save us in the eleventh hour. Sure, they will. Any minute now.
Meanwhile, in another article the same author postulates the dying of areas of the Chesapeake Bay. A much shorter, more concise article denoting that the size of the dead-zone being the largest in several decades. But, not to fear. It’s only your backyard. So, what do we do? Argue some more? Wring our hands and wail to the skies? Write more puzzling and contradictory articles, books, short-stories? Blather on until the last weed dies and the last porpoise floats, belly up to the surface where a depleted ozone layer allows full on radiation and ultraviolet will radiate down upon its bloated carcass. If the Amazonian rainforests are any indication, maybe the book “Limits to Growth” is more of a lodestone to our future than the author gives credit to. We ALL know what we “need” to do. But we’re all entrenched in our own little worlds (and belief systems) and are too impotent to act. So, the debate continues.
My point is this, we have been long enough playing at the guessing game and debating on climate change. Can we steer the global warming away from melting more icecaps and rising sea levels? Hardly. But we can prepare. An island in the Chesapeake Bay is currently deploring our present administration for a seawall. There have been substantial and intense discussions within the council chambers of numerous coastal cities about preventive flooding and sea level rise coming in the future years. Even the Navy has done studies and taken initial steps in regard to sea level rise. So, is it a fact? Of course, it is. Can we reverse it? We be foolish to think we can. But we’d be foolish not to prepare. And that, my friends, is what articles like these hinder. That’s my point.
By the way, “Silent Spring” by Rachel Carson was not only the catalyst for a serious environmental assessment of the animal population and the effect of DDT upon that population, it single handily brought about a layman’s understanding of the disastrous effects DDT had on the environment. Thus, awakening the general population to the dangers of DDT. The numerous Peregrine, Eagle, Osprey, and Pelican populations along your pristine shores are directly attributed to this book’s success and societies’ actions. The fact that it was true, and DDT WAS a silent killer carelessly introduced into our eco-system is but a historic footnote today. The lesson being heedful that truth and suspicion, hand in hand, can go a long way to uproot and discard that which is harmful. Misleading truths can eventually lead to dire consequences. You deserve better than this article presents.
Note: Oy vey, American reading skills have slipped further than we thought. The buffoonish criticism of Simon, that he is an economist and not a “climate scientist” totally misses the point–the article is about the economic impact of eco-pessimism and the damage it will do to future generations, which will be much worse than a few extra degrees celsius will ever do. So far, history is on Simon’s side. What is so disgusting is how gleefully these frightened liberal men want to damage the free market economy and plunge future generations into marginal lives. He sounds like the writer from the Economist that lamented that poor people were eating more meat and that was bad for the environment…how dare they find the sustenance they need to be healthy! Then, he stupidly attempts to conflate an article about the Bay’s dead zone, as if they are just different sides of the same coin. He calls dead zones dying parts of the bay. What? First, dead zones occur naturally when the water temperature rises, usually around 90 degrees Fahrenheit. This year was worse than usual due to a wet spring, and the runoff associated with it–lots of nitrogen and phosphorus fed that beast. When the water cools, they go away. The bottom line, as this guy says, is that the climate is going to do what it wants…it’s never static, it’s a dynamic system. The words stability or equilibrium should never be used when talking about the climate. This person talks about climate catastrophes and ice ages and blah, blah, blah…guess what? We’re still here. Life finds a way. The climate will change, that much is certain, and it contains no sweet spot just for humans. We can’t stop change, but we better be able to adapt to it. Either way, life will find a way. It may be different, but it will still be here.
Blue Hoss says
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6p1Ck0ab80
Publius Americanus says
Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, almost all Democrat policies and Rachel Carson.
A listing of the world’s greatest(by numbers) mass murderers.
Not necessarily in order.
Paul Plante says
Posted elsewhere on Sat Aug 31, 2019 3:44 pm:
And here, people, is where these types of discussions with hardcore science deniers like this Cape Charles Mirror editor, who may well be a speech writer for Trump, and this would go right on up to Donald Trump, himself, go spinning off into space, precisely because the science deniers are making their arguments that the activities of mankind have no effect whatsoever on weather based on the maunderings of an economist most people have never heard of who has been dead since 1998, and hence, is immune to peer review and the application of the “scientific method” to his various “pooh-poohings” to find out exactly what they are based on, besides something he felt deep in his “guts,” which may well have been gas or indigestion.
Which is ridiculous and absurd.
And yet, people, that is exactly what the situation is.
And that is pathetic, in the extreme.
And these are real people, the Cape Charles Mirror editor and Publius Americanus who wants us to believe that Rachel Carson, the author of “Silent Spring,” is a mass murderer because she wrote that book, not as a prediction of something, but about something that had already happened, the literal disappearance of birds seemingly overnight, which I experienced when I was young, and she got DDT banned as a result.
That absurd claim that Rachel Carson is a mass murderer for getting DDT banned was made on August 28, 2019 at 5:09 pm, just a few days ago now, so that is how long these crazy right-wing hysterias can remain around.
And all these fools who were born after the birds disappeared, like this Publius Americanus, claim that never happened, and she was making it all up, because they were born into a world with no birds, so they do not know the difference, and they are too ignorant and lazy to check their facts before they post them.
As to Malaria, it has been common for as long as there have been people.
I was in Viet Nam, and we had to take pills every day, because malaria was prevalent, and all the DDT in the world wasn’t going to kill it off, given the climate over there.
So, does malaria kill people?
Is it fatal, like these one claiming Rachel Carson is a mass murderer would have us believe?
That answer is no.
Can it kill people?
Yes, usually children.
The CDC tells us that P. falciparum is the type of malaria that is most likely to result in severe infections and if not promptly treated, may lead to death, so there are different types of malaria, and they are not all the same.
And globally, the World Health Organization estimates that in 2016, 216 million clinical cases of malaria occurred, and 445,000 people died of malaria, most of them children in Africa, so where these shriekers calling Rachel Carson a mass murderer have come up with the figure of millions of people in Africa getting killed by malaria eludes me.
But since they go by what they feel in their gut, they don’t need facts, which is what makes it absolutely impossible to have an intelligent discussion on this subject of “climate,” because their minds are closed, and what makes it serious is that we are talking not only about a newspaper editor in tiny Cape Charles, Virginia, a town mired in the past based on its location far off the beaten past, but the president of the United States of America and his so-called “science advisors,” as well.
And as a grandfather, I think that makes it worth my while to stand up in here and say, “wait a minute,” because it is apparent by all the sounds of silence emanating from the Cape Charles Mirror that there will be no challenge allowed in there.
And that takes us to an article in The Telegraph entitled “Nazis tried to halt Allies in Italy with malaria epidemic attack” by Hilary Clarke in Rome on 14 Feb. 2006, as follows:
The Nazis tried to halt the advance of British and American troops through Italy in the Second World War by unleashing malaria-carrying mosquitoes in what is believed to be the only biological warfare attack out in Europe, according to new research.
The plan was designed to hinder the Allied push from the south and to punish the Italian population for what the Germans saw as treachery after they switched sides and joined the Allied powers.
According to Prof Frank Snowden, a history professor at Yale University whose book The Conquest of Malaria in Italy draws on American archives and the diaries of Italian soldiers, the scheme was orchestrated in the autumn of 1943 by Erich Martini, a medical entomologist, Nazi Party member and friend of the SS commander Heinrich Himmler.
The Germans flooded the marshes that lay on the path into Rome from the south by reversing the pumps that drained them.
They then introduced millions of larvae of anopheles labranchiae, a species of malaria-carrying mosquito.
But British and American soldiers, who landed at Anzio just south of the marshes, survived the biological attack because they were given anti-malarial drugs.
The First British Infantry Division along with the British Commando Brigade landed at Anzio in January 1944.
But despite being holed up there in terrible conditions for weeks and huge casualties being suffered in battles with German troops, there are no records of a malaria epidemic.
Rates of the disease among the local Italian population returning from the fields soared, however.
Official malaria cases rose in the area from 1,217 in 1943 to 54,929 in 1944 in a population of 245,000.
Unofficial rates, Prof Snowden suggests, were much higher.
Benito Mussolini drained the Pontine Marshes, an area 30 miles south of Rome, during the 1930s, an act for which he is still lauded in Italy.
The use of biological weapons and causing “superfluous injury” to inhabitants broke international conventions on warfare and the Nazis were keen to hide what they were doing, Prof Snowden claims.
“In September 1943 the German army ordered the evacuation of all remaining civilians who lived within a radius of 10 kilometres from the shore” he writes in the book, published in Britain next month.
“This removal of the inhabitants from the war zone ensured there were no eye witnesses to German actions.”
Malaria remained rife in the area until 1950 when the marshes were drained again and the imported mosquito species died out.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldn … ttack.html
Paul Plante says
And let me say as a grandfather of young women who are being taught to think for themselves so as to not get caught up in the emotional hysteria being peddled by this 16-year old spoiled rich girl from Sweden who throws temper tantrums and is using emotional blackmail to force, yes, force, adults to do her bidding, that if this thread had stayed on Greta Thunberg and her hysteria, and her temper tantrums, and her emotional blackmail, especially, I would have given it a much more sympathetic reading, and I would have recommended it to the world.
I would have started with an AFP article entitled “CO2 row over climate activist Thunberg’s yacht trip to New York” on 18 August 2019, where we were provided as follows:
Thunberg has become a figurehead for climate action with her stark warnings of catastrophe if the world does not act now to cut carbon emissions and curb global warming.
She has received criticism and abuse for her uncompromising attitude, but shows little concern at how she might be received among climate change deniers in the United States.
“I will just ignore them because I’m only acting and communicating the science, and if they don’t like that, what have I got to do with that?” she said.
end quotes
A 16-year old girl from Sweden is “communicating the science?”
Oh, really, Greta, do tell.
So, Greta, where is it?
The science, I mean!
What “science” are you communicating Greta?
That the world will end in ten years if we do not all stop using fossil fuels right now?
But that is not “science” that she is communicating there, people – that is mindless hysteria and gibbering.
And Greta, you seriously would give yourself a whole lot more credibility in the eyes of ADULTS who are immune to your emotional blackmail spiel about how “if we really loved our children, we would be doing exactly what you tell us to do,” by giving us a lot more detail to support your stark warnings of catastrophe if the world does not act now to cut carbon emissions and curb global warming.
But what am I saying – she can’t do that, because she personally has no science to communicate, so stop the FRAUD, Greta, and stop scaring the children.
This grandfather does not appreciate it.
And Greta, I am not a science denier, which means I recognize bogus “science” like yours when I see it, so don’t try to write me off by labeling me as such, thank you very much, and welcome to America and have a nice stay in America where we are not so ignorant as to be swept away by your teenage hysteria.
Paul Plante says
And while we are on the subject of Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old Swedish “activist” who began holding solitary demonstrations outside the Swedish parliament last year, and who is now the star of her own movie filmed aboard her high-tech racing yacht Malizia II largely made of lightweight, high strength, CARBON FIBER material for a bit of necessary surrealism there, as she crossed the Atlantic Ocean from Sweden to New York City to “communicate the science,” an absurd concept in and of itself, given that true “science” is available and accessible to anyone and everyone who bothers to pull their heads out of their ***** learn something about what they are a part of, so as to be better able to adapt to changing times, because the world is dynamic, not static, so that it does not require a 16-year old girl from Sweden to “communicate” it as if we were all morons waiting for here to enlighten us, which takes us to a MARKETWATCH article entitled “Students around the world skip class to organize climate change protests” by Associated Press published March 15, 2019, where we have as follows from Greta, who appears to have some very serious psychological issues, as follows:
2:52 p.m. ET
Thunberg, who was recently nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, was cheered for her blunt message at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland this year, when she told government and business leaders: “I want you to panic.”
“I want you to feel the fear I feel every day.”
end quotes
And there is where it all goes south for me in a hurry with respect to Greta Thunberg, this weird concept that because she feels fear everyday, which is a sign she is suffering some mental derangement that can hopefully be cured with counseling and therapy as opposed to drugs, I and every other adult are supposed to “panic.”
I don’t know about anybody else out there, but I don’t do panic on demand because some 16-year old girl from Sweden feels fear every day, and I am surprised one that a 16 year-old girl in Sweden, an advanced nation, would have anything to feel fear about, and two, that a 16-year old girl would be ignorant enough to think that we should all feel panic because she is afraid.
If she feels fear everyday, and as a result, she wants us all to panic, i.e. feel sudden uncontrollable fear or anxiety accompanied by wildly unthinking behavior, with such synonyms as alarm, anxiety, nervousness, fear, fright, trepidation, dread, terror, horror, agitation, consternation, perturbation, dismay, disquiet, apprehension, apprehensiveness, then what she is communicating is not science, but plain old garden-variety hysteria, instead.
And as an adult who is a grandfather, I fail to see any benefit to anyone accruing from all the adults in America panicking because Greta Thunberg of Sweden feels irrational fear everyday that the world is going to end in ten years unless we all stop using carbon, immediately, including Greta Thunberg, and on that note, for all the children out there who want their parents to show their love to them by going totally carbon-free, simply throw away their car keys and go down to the basement and find the breaker box and throw the main switch to turn off all the power coming into the house, and if you use gas for heat and cooking, then shut it off where it enters the house, and if you have a gas grill, turn that off, as well, and that should be a good start, anyway.
And if you wonder then how you will eat and stay warm, ask Greta the science-communicator with all the answers, because I haven’t a clue!