At the Wall Street Journal, Steven F. Hayward penned a great summary of the current state of the climate movement, telling us the CO2 climate change issue is quickly running out of oxygen.
Comparing the movement to earlier environmental movements, Hayward tells us that such movements can be broken down into 5 phases:
- Bring attention to the problem
- Euphoric enthusiasm to solve it
- Realization of the huge, painful costs
- Thus a decline of interest follows
- The issue moves to limbo…kept on life support
When it comes to climate change issue, today we find itself at stage 4, at least in Europe. In the USA it’s at about stage 5.
So it’s little wonder that climate scientists are frustrated, and openly lashing out in bursts of rhetorical aggression of the sort we discussed here when they get criticized.
Climate scientists losing relevance
Leading climate scientists, who once fancied themselves as the architects of a new society and as policy masterminds, are now realizing they are becoming irrelevant. A very bitter pill to swallow indeed.
Yesterday German scientists Dr. Sebastian Lüning and Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt commented (below) on NASA’s Gavin Schmidt’s and PIK’s Stefan Rahmstorf’s harsh reactions to the public criticism from sociologist and think-tank director Oliver Geden:
Stefan Rahmstorf loses his nerves at Twitter
Geden believes the job of policymaking needs to be left to policymakers, and not nerdy climate scientists in lab coats. Geden accused the activist climate scientists of “overconfidence bias”.
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Lüning and Vahrenholt comment at Die kalte Sonne on the reaction that ensued:
“Naturally that did not please the climate alarmists at all. Foremost they want to rescue the world and turn it inside out. God forbid the notion of having to return to their dark labs and having to carry out the tedious and dull work involving climate science.
The desire for power is strong, and people generally do not give it up so easily. Gavin Schmidt takes the stage. You know him: he’s the director of the NASA-GISS Institute and climate activist just like his predecessor.
He tweeted that climate scientists indeed could be politically active because, after all, they are constantly being asked for their opinions by decision-makers. Smart climatologists have long understood this (Schmidt’s tweet).
That was a cue for one of Schmidt’s best friend, namely Stefan Rahmstorf. He immediately took out the big stick to retaliate against the criticism aimed at his alarmist colleagues by Geden. He accused Geden of having much less contact with policymakers than he and his associates.
Rahmstorf has “discredited himself”
Moreover, he accused Geden of lacking academic credentials. Rahmstorf advised Geden to finally leave his climate colleagues alone and that they did not need his advice Tweet here.
That’s the Rahmstorf we love: unreceptive to criticism and who hits below the belt. No wonder that he is no longer allowed to write on the IPCC report.
With his very unbearable manner, he has completely discredited himself.
Geden coolly responded to Rahmstorf’s emotional outburst:
You want to make this personal, even if you haven’t been involved in the conversation? And my academic achievements aren’t good enough to criticize questionable factual claims? These are usually good enough to review articles on climate targets in Nature research journals…
plus: what exactly do you know about my direct contacts w/ policymakers? It’s my daily job since my institution (
@SWPBerlin) is funded by the Chancellery to advise (whole) government and parliament (not only enviro & research), I even worked at the top level of two ministries,therefore: I know not only what policymakers and politicians say when meeting ‘leading climate scientists’, but also what they say before and after those meetings, and what role (new) scientific knowledge plays in actual policymaking.’
Climate scientists “gone astray”
The above Twitter communication is a nice document confirming how the representatives of climate alarmism have gone astray. Obviously, there is no interest in a balanced professional discussion.
Research from inconvenient subjects should be stopped, policymakers should only listen to the alarmists.
The climate alarm bubble is gradually coming apart and we are seeing it live.”
Read more at No Tricks Zone
Hey Greenpeace want to end using Fossil Fuels then quit puttering all over the world in you Fossil Fueled Ships,Helicopters,Zodiacs with their gasoline Outboard motors and your grand exhualted high poohead needs to stay hope instead of hoping aboard their Leer or Gulfstream jet and flying all over the world leaving carbon footprint better then the Grand Canyon
The 5 phases is a good way to view the climate change movement. However, no one can say that the U.S. is at any particular phase. There are 50 states and large differences within most states. California can easily be said to be at stage 3, Realization of the huge, painful costs. Yet, I’m sure Texas is at stage 5, “The issue moves to limbo…kept on life support”
As time goes on I agree that the entire nation as a whole will move to stage five. People will tolerate huge painful costs with no benefits for a limited time.