Alarmists Say Global Climate Change a Catastrophe but Litany of Failed Predictions Says Otherwise
Let’s see: by 2014, the polar ice cap was supposed to disappear, according to former U.S. vice-president, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Oscar winner Al Gore. He was speaking at the Copenhagen Global Climate Conference (COP15).
But, there’s more. Throughout his post-VP career as a global climate change evangelist, Al Gore has told us that the Statue of Liberty would be shoulders-deep in the New York Harbor. Venice should be underwater by now, and camels should be roaming in the mountain valleys of France.
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Indeed, actual predictions were far more interesting than those scenarios. Some of the man-made global climate change—or man-made global warming (MMGW)—proponents warned that snow would no longer exist, and that all the ice would vanish from the Arctic. (Source: “Top 5 failed ‘snow free’ and ‘ice free’ predictions,” The Daily Caller, March 4, 2014.)
While the winter of 2016 was mild due to a strong El-Nino—a well-known phenomenon—the winters of 2014 and 2015 were especially cold. In 2014, winter storms brought 141-year record cold temperatures in the Baltimore-Washington, D.C. metro area. (Source: Ibid)
Many MMGW proponents are prompt to blame unusual storms and weather events on global climate change, yet they are also ready to claim that exceptionally cold and snowy winters does not negate global warming. (Source: Ibid.)
The New York Times featured an editorial warning that there would a shortage of snow so dire as to prevent the hosting of Winter Olympics. (Source: “The End of Snow,” The New York Times, February 7, 2014).
Of all the chilling global warming predictions, that is the one that should freeze us in our collective boots.
The one about the end of snow turns out to be a favorite among climate alarmists. In 2000, some scientists in the U.K. said that snow would become “a very rare and exciting event.” Dr. David Viner from the University of East Anglia, the very same at the heart of the Climategate scandal, pushed that narrative. (Source: “Climategate 2.0: New E-Mails Rock The Global Warming Debate,” Forbes, November 23, 2011.)
He said “children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” (Source: The New York Times, op cit.).
That would make for a nice song to the tune of “I Wanna Know What Love Is.” Imagine Viner’s surprise, years later, to discover that the BBC reported that Scottish mountains were at their snowiest since 1945. (Source: Forbes, op cit.)
What of Global Climate Change and the Arctic?
As for the Arctic and the ice-free predictions, those are among the most contentious. Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen reported both having crossed the Northwest Passage in 1903–1906 solely by ship. That means the ice had melted; this was before the days of modern icebreakers. Yet, as late as 2009, the Arctic pack ice blocked normal ships from using the passage.
There have been recent periods of more navigable conditions, but clearly the historical record shows that such variation is normal. Instead, the alarmists insist on the “ice-free” Arctic. It’s a major point they bring up to prove that man is overcooking the planet.
“Some of the models suggest that there is a 75 percent chance that the entire north polar ice cap, during some of the summer months, could be completely ice-free within the next five to seven years,” said Gore in 2008. (Source: Forbes, op cit.)
Yet, in 2013, Arctic sea ice coverage had increased by 50 percent from 2012 levels. (Source: “Arctic ice ‘grew by a third’ after cool summer in 2013,” BBC, July 21, 2015.)
Meanwhile, in 2014, Antarctic ice increased to record highs.
Rather than prove that there is man-made global warming or climate change, an honest analysis tells us: we simply don’t know. There is much more uncertainty among mankind’s behaviors and the consequences for the global climate.
Much Hot Air about Global Climate Change
There are inconsistencies, errors, and fanciful hypotheses. Many scientists, pundits, and—increasingly—politicians want to introduce carbon taxes to combat “global climate change.” There are those who have financial gains to make: the “alternative” and “renewable” energy industry.
Yet it was only four or three decades ago that the latest fad for apocalyptic environmentalists was to warn us of the dangers of global cooling and the coming ice age. They were right about one thing: global cooling would be far worse than global warming for humans. Science magazine (December 10, 1976) warned of “extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation.”
Several studies show that the increase of the damage caused by extreme weather events (tornadoes, hurricanes and the like) in the last few years are due to the increasing urbanization of the affected areas. In areas where, a century ago, there were no houses, a storm would have occurred without causing deaths and injuries.
Today, however, the climate experts want us to blame the effect of human activities on the climate. But the socio-economic issues that arise, which are probably within its competence, are serious. This should give all of us pause. Science is not done by “consensus.”
On November 4 of this year, the climate agreement signed at the end of the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris has come into effect. The purpose of the agreement is to limit the rise in average global temperatures to less than two degrees Celsius over the pre-industrial age, but with a further commitment to not exceed 1.5 degrees.
Global Climate Change Agreements Are Reached as if Climate Science Dealt in Realm of Absolute Certainty
That’s what the shrill militants in Hollywood want us to believe. Among these are Arnold Schwarzenegger and Leonardo DiCaprio, who recently starred in Before the Flood, a documentary on global warming. Its broadcast premiere was on October 30 on the National Geographic channel.
On one side, it’s reasonable that, if only as a precaution, scientists study the climate. Alchemists after all wanted to convert copper into gold. They were deluded, but they created the instruments and basics that led to modern chemistry. (Alchemy comes from the Arabic for “chemistry.”)
The study of global warming or climate change might lead to new discoveries about the weather. Irrational is to pay too much attention to supporters of absolute certainties. Soon, when the climate alarmists’ predictions fail to match reality, the media will tell us how the measures to reduce CO2 emissions worked. They will praise the alarmists for having saved us.
If that sounds vaguely familiar, it’s because the trick has worked before in all millennium catastrophic events from the Middle Ages to now. A thousand years ago, plagues and other natural disasters and phenomena were attributed to God. He was punishing us for misbehaving.
In the 2000s, we like to blame mankind. This time, instead of the plague or the “Black Death,” it’s global climate change. Does anyone remember Y2K, the Ozone Layer, Acid Rain? Computer programmers at great benefit to themselves fixed the Y2K problem that never was. The Ozone Layer chatter stopped after DuPont’s Freon was banned. Was it responsible? We’ll never know.
