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> In the 1970s, global cooling was the "scientific fact". No, there was much more uncertainty in the 70s, but the idea that global cooling was even a moderatel

> In the 1970s, global cooling was the "scientific fact". No, there was much more uncertainty in the 70s, but the idea that global cooling was even a moderately dominant idea was a narrative constructed largely in the 2000s. https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/89/9/2008bams2370_1.xml https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/89/9/2008bam...

pdonis 5y ago
> there was much more uncertainty in the 70s Tell that to all the people that were talking about the next Ice Age coming. They seemed pretty confident. However, even if we accept "much more uncertainty in the 70s", you're agreeing with me that the post I was responding to, which said that global warming was accepted as "scientific fact" back then, was wrong.
- teawrecks 5y ago
  You're falling prey to yet another disinformation tactic: "Is it warming or is it cooling? Make up your mind science!" The consensus was/is/always has been that humans are impacting the climate by burning fossil fuels. What has always been uncertain is what impact this would have on the environment/animals/humans long term. Will it heat everyone up? Will it trigger an ice age? Didn't matter, everyone agreed that more information was needed and we had to take action UNTIL a lot of money went into dovetailing that uncertainty into doubt about the whole thing. And here we are still arguing at square one 30 years later.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    > The consensus was/is/always has been that humans are impacting the climate Yes, to the extent there has been a consensus about human activities in general, it is that those activities do have significant effects on the climate. > by burning fossil fuels No, that hasn't always been a consensus. The human activity with the largest impact on the climate is land use: in the past 10,000 years or so we have significantly changed the surface reflectivity properties of the planet by converting land from forest to farms and cities (and now paved roads and skyscrapers and many other things). It's still not clear that the impact of fossil fuel burning is of comparable magnitude. But it's a lot easier politically to demonize people for burning fossil fuels than for farming and building cities. So that's what gets all the attention. > everyone agreed that more information was needed Yes, there has always been broad agreement on that. > and we had to take action No, there has not been broad agreement on that. There is certainly not broad agreement that, if we are going to spend trillions of dollars to do something, it should be on browbeating people into not burning fossil fuels. It would make much more sense to spend that money on (a) bringing more people out of poverty, and (b) beefing up our infrastructure. Those things will benefit everyone no matter what happens with the climate--and will also put us in a much better position to adapt to whatever climate change does happen. And in a situation where our information is incomplete and we don't have a good understanding of the overall system (the climate), it's much better to take an action that will benefit you whatever happens, than to place a huge bet on an action that will only be beneficial if one particular theory about what is happening turns out to be right.

pdonis 5y ago

> there was much more uncertainty in the 70s Tell that to all the people that were talking about the next Ice Age coming. They seemed pretty confident. However, even if we accept "much more uncertainty in the 70s", you're agreeing with me that the post I was responding to, which said that global warming was accepted as "scientific fact" back then, was wrong.

teawrecks 5y ago
You're falling prey to yet another disinformation tactic: "Is it warming or is it cooling? Make up your mind science!" The consensus was/is/always has been that humans are impacting the climate by burning fossil fuels. What has always been uncertain is what impact this would have on the environment/animals/humans long term. Will it heat everyone up? Will it trigger an ice age? Didn't matter, everyone agreed that more information was needed and we had to take action UNTIL a lot of money went into dovetailing that uncertainty into doubt about the whole thing. And here we are still arguing at square one 30 years later.
- pdonis 5y ago
  > The consensus was/is/always has been that humans are impacting the climate Yes, to the extent there has been a consensus about human activities in general, it is that those activities do have significant effects on the climate. > by burning fossil fuels No, that hasn't always been a consensus. The human activity with the largest impact on the climate is land use: in the past 10,000 years or so we have significantly changed the surface reflectivity properties of the planet by converting land from forest to farms and cities (and now paved roads and skyscrapers and many other things). It's still not clear that the impact of fossil fuel burning is of comparable magnitude. But it's a lot easier politically to demonize people for burning fossil fuels than for farming and building cities. So that's what gets all the attention. > everyone agreed that more information was needed Yes, there has always been broad agreement on that. > and we had to take action No, there has not been broad agreement on that. There is certainly not broad agreement that, if we are going to spend trillions of dollars to do something, it should be on browbeating people into not burning fossil fuels. It would make much more sense to spend that money on (a) bringing more people out of poverty, and (b) beefing up our infrastructure. Those things will benefit everyone no matter what happens with the climate--and will also put us in a much better position to adapt to whatever climate change does happen. And in a situation where our information is incomplete and we don't have a good understanding of the overall system (the climate), it's much better to take an action that will benefit you whatever happens, than to place a huge bet on an action that will only be beneficial if one particular theory about what is happening turns out to be right.