Category: Climate Change

Dr Moore on Climate Change

Bengalis Speaking Hindi

Bengalis have a wicked sense of humor — especially when it involves poking fun at themselves. I speak as if I wasn’t a Bengali myself. Truth is that I was born and brought up outside Bengal; so I can’t claim to be a true blue Bengali.

My siblings and I speak Hindi quite well. Our relatives in Bengal did make fun of our broken Bengali infected with Hindi words. Well, in turn we found their attempted Hindi to be hilarious. Continue reading “Bengalis Speaking Hindi”

Demented 80-year Olds

Among the major modern threats that humanity faces is arguably the one related to climate. It’s not global warming or even the nebulous climate change; it’s the hysteria that is being deliberately induced by the myopic, greedy, power-hungry politicians and their cronies.

Not climate change but rather the climate hysteria is dangerous and can even lead to global unrest that could be disastrous to the poor and the vulnerable around the world. Continue reading “Demented 80-year Olds”

Freeman Dyson on Climate

Freeman Dyson (1923 – 2020), was one of the greatest minds of the 20th century. He delighted in being a self-professed heretic. One of his heretical positions was on climate change. It’s a pity that more people are familiar with a hysterical Swedish teenager’s views on climate change than with Prof Dyson’s.

This is so because the teenager is photogenic and her claims, though utterly devoid of any rational support, makes for sensational headlines that the mainstream media relentlessly pushes on a public that is given to paranoia and panic.

Most of us, yours truly included, do not have the ability to do primary research and reach our own conclusions on matters that are of interest to us. We have to rely on others. It is up to us, then, to choose which domain expert we trust. Climate change: should we trust an emotion-driven teenager who couldn’t possibly know much about anything; or should we rely on a sober, super-intelligent scientific researcher and mathematician who has spent decades studying important matters, including climate change? Greta or Freeman? The choice isn’t that hard. Continue reading “Freeman Dyson on Climate”

Climate Change

Of the many challenges that the world is facing, climate change is the biggest and the baddest in my opinion. It has the potential to cause tremendous long-term damage and affect the most number of people.

It could be several orders of magnitude worse than the Chinese Covid19 pandemic, although they have one thing in common: the policy response to the Chinese virus imposed the terrible cost, not the disease itself. The policy response to the climate hysteria could end up destroying billions of lives. This is not hyperbole. Continue reading “Climate Change”

How to Think about Climate Change

Last week I posted a poll about climate change. Around 40 people voted. Here are the results as of right now:

Given such a low number of respondents, very little can be concluded about how concerned people are about climate change and what they expect the government to do. But it is still a bit worrisome that half a dozen people responded that they are “seriously concerned” and that they want the government to take dramatic action.

The problem I think that a Swedish teenager who is given to hysterical harangues gets more media attention — and therefore influences public opinion more heavily — than the reasoned, data-driven, sober writings and presentations of experts who have spent decades more time studying climate change than the teenager has been alive. Continue reading “How to Think about Climate Change”

Climate Change

Click image to embiggen.

I don’t believe that climate change does not matter at all. It does matter but it is not a yes-no question. It is a matter of trade-offs. The question is: how much does it matter relative to other things that deserve our attention?

Disease, hunger, armed conflict, the Religion of Peace — these global problems demand a systemic response today more than anything that is likely to be a problem in 100 years. How much will it cost to address those pressing problems of today, and how do those costs stack up against the cost of climate change mitigation efforts? Continue reading “Climate Change”

Goodbye, Prof Freeman Dyson

I was saddened, though not surprised, to learn that Prof Freeman Dyson passed away on Friday in Princeton NJ at the age of 96. I admired him immensely for his intellectual might, bravery and honesty. Thanks to the internet, I have had the great pleasure of gaining from his intelligence, his humanity, his wide-ranging interests, his unconventional ideas.

I agree with all his viewpoints that I came to know about, particularly about climate change. Like him, I believe that the problem is neither urgent nor the most important. Humanity faces many problems, has the capacity to do something about some of them, and some of them are worth allocating resources to now. But climate change isn’t in that set. Continue reading “Goodbye, Prof Freeman Dyson”

The Earth is Doomed because of Climate Change

Regarding effective propaganda, it is hard to improve upon what was written long years ago.

“But the most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly and with unflagging attention. It must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over. Here, as so often in this world, persistence is the first and most important requirement for success.”

The author? Herr Adolf Hitler. The book was Mein Kampf (My Struggle), the autobiographical manifesto of the Nazi leader published in 1925 and 1926. One of the biggest contemporary pernicious lies that is being repeated — and therefore believed by the public — is about climate change and the imminent global  catastrophe that is certain to follow if costly steps are not immediately taken. Continue reading “The Earth is Doomed because of Climate Change”