Discussion > The Moral and Intellectual Poverty of Climate Alarm
Have you noted Phil's great love of purple (or blue) prose? Quotes from other sources appear in most of his posts and are so highlighted in order to distinguish them from his own content.
Is this an affectation or what?
AK
"Is this an affectation or what?
Jun 29, 2020 at 9:27 AM AK"
The International Phil Clarke Collective has multiple personalities and associated styles. It depends on the subject, Earth's different time zones and internet availability of click and select standardised statements.
golf charlie
Phil Clarke
Phil has nothing to contribute
AK
AK, possibly an intercontinental Zoom video conferencing glitch. These things never happened before Global Warming.
golf charlie
I have long thought that there is no such thing as an admirable climate alarmist, and I still do. One of the prominent ones has seen what a dishonest, nasty and harmful thing it all is and has presumed to apologise for it on behalf of 'environmentalists everywhere'. He has also written a book which might go a bit further to atone for the harm he and his like have done for decades. Let us hope so, and let us wish it a wide readership if it really is on the side of the angels:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/29/schellenberger-on-behalf-of-environmentalists-i-apologize-for-the-climate-scare/
He can never undo all that harm, but at least he is distancing himself from it on moral and intellectual grounds, and he may yet contribute a great deal to reducing future damage.
John Shade
Not exactly new and not exactly a Damascean Conversion is it?
Schellenberg may have been a prominent environmentalist at one point, but then he co-founded The Breakthrough Institute, which almost invented the concept of alternative facts.
Phil Clarke
oh dear, heresy in eco-land ....
The zealots get really agitated about that don't they?
fred
Page 29
Industry and conservative lobbyists prevent action on global warming proposals by framing their attacks around an issue of far greater salience for the American people: jobs. The industry opposition claims that action on global warming will cost billions of dollars and millions of jobs. They repeat this claim, ad nauseum, through bogus studies, advertisements, lobbying, public relations, and alliance building among businesses and labor unions. The environmental leaders we interviewed tended to reinforce the industry position by respondingto it, in typical literal fashion, rather than attack industry for opposing proposals that will create millions of good new jobs. In a written statement, Pew’s Josh Reichert said, “Ultimately, the labor movement in this country needs to become positively engaged in efforts to address climate change. They need to recognize that, if done properly, reducing greenhouse gases will not be detrimental to labor. On the contrary, it will spawn industries and create jobs that we don’t have now.”The unspoken assumptions here are a) the problem, or “root cause,” is “greenhouse gases”, b) labor must accept the environmental movement’s framing of the problem as greenhouse gases, and c) it’s the responsibility of labor to get with the program on global warming. The problem is that environmental leaders have persuaded themselves that it’s their job to worry about “environmental” problems and that it’s the labor movement’s job to worry about “labor” problems. If there’s overlap, they say, great. But we should never ever forget who we really are.“Global warming is an apt example of why environmentalists must break out of their ghetto,” said Lance Lindblom, President and CEO of the Nathan Cummings Foundation. “Our opponents use our inability to form effective alliances to drive a wedge through our potential coalition. Some of this is a cultural problem. Environmentalists think, ‘You’re talking to me about your job — I’m talking about saving the world!’ Developing new energy industries will clearly help working families and increase national security, but there’s still no intuition that all of these are consistent concerns.”The tendency to put the environment into an airtight container away from the concerns of others is at the heart of the environmental movement’s defensiveness on economic issues. Our defensiveness on the economy elevates the frame that action on global warming will kill jobs and raise electricity bills. The notion that environmentalists should answer industry charges instead of attacking those very industries for blocking investment into the good new jobs of the future is yet another symptom of literal-scleroris. Answering charges with the literal “truth” is a bit like responding to the Republican “Swift Boats
clipe
I'm not detecting much 'agitation'. After all the 'heresy' is a bunch of half-truths, straw men and non-sequiturs.
EG Adapting to life below sea level made the Netherlands rich not poor
Ah, so Bangladesh has a prosperous future ahead. Nothing to worry about. Good to know.
Facepalm.
Phil Clarke
Quotes from other sources appear in most of his posts and are so highlighted in order to distinguish them from his own content.
Is this an affectation or what?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockquote_element
Phil Clarke
But Phil is your 11.13am really supposed to address the question? If so it's a failure, and I have no wish to emulate your affectations.
AK
EG Adapting to life below sea level made the Netherlands rich not poor[sic]Ah, so Bangladesh has a prosperous future ahead.
And apples are not at all like oranges, Mr Clarke. 🤦♀️
Radical Rodent
Jul 2, 2020 at 1:31 PM Radical Rodent
I now have visions of Medieval Dutchmen during a typical warm period, wearing clogs and digging into the seabed with an air supply fed by windmill driven pumps.
By the time Breugel turned up, the weather had cooled a bit.
https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/winter-through-bruegel-s-eyes-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium/EgJy23r1GuwWIg?hl=en
golf charlie
Gwen: 😂🤣😂
I’m trying to find where that sentence comes from: is it a quote, or did Mr Clarke constructed it himself? As you point out, it does conjure up an absurd picture, with Dutchmen in weighted clogs behind ploughs pulled by oxen wearing snorkels (or, perhaps, replaced by sea-cows… or even sea-horses?), preparing the sea-bed for more tulips – aquamarine, of course.
Radical Rodent
". but then he co-founded The Breakthrough Institute, which almost invented the concept of alternative facts.
Jul 1, 2020 at 7:05 PM Phil Clarke"
How are the IPCC coping with Mann, his Hockey Stick and devoted Hockey Teamsters?
Will the Hockey Stick reappear in the next IPCC Report?
golf charlie
clipe
clipe
Looks like I am the only one who bothered to read the article you linked, John.
Shame.
Phil Clarke
If Michael Shellenberger was ever what would be regarded as a climate activist and ever an environmentalist, as is commonly understood, it doesn’t seem like it was recently. Apologising on behalf of environmentalists, for the climate scare, would then seem a rather bizarre thing to do. On the other hand, it’s very clever. It certainly gets the media’s attention. It also seems to make some people think that – if Shellenberger is changing his mind – maybe the climate scare is overblown.Not many seem to be actually considering whether or not he really is a reformed climate activist. Essentially, he’s managed to undermine a movement he’s trying to challenge, by apologising on their behalf, while also getting lots of coverage for his book.
Although this all seems rather cynical, and disingenuous, you do have to give Shellenberger credit for his ability to get media attention.
If this wasn’t such a serious topic, it might even be quite funny.
ATTP
Phil Clarke
Jul 7, 2020 at 9:52 PM Phil Clarke
Michael Shellenberger is correct and no one is disputing his arguments.
golf charlie
Quite so, golf charlie. When faced with reality, switch the emphasis to personalities, motives, and reputations. That seems to be the tactics of the climate alarm zealots. The ATTP quote kindly provided by Phil provides an illustration of this.
Meanwhile more illustrations of the turpitude of such people:
http://climaterealism.com/2020/07/climate-activists-step-up-calls-for-imprisoning-climate-realists/
https://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2020/07/06/how-climate-trickery-infiltrated-the-agu/
And, by way of consolation in the face of these dreadful people, a good new cartoon from Josh:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/08/hump-day-hilarity-the-climate-red-pill/
John Shade
Michael Shellenberger is correct and no one is disputing his arguments.
Only in the Bishop Hill evidence-denying alternate reality. Back on Planet Earth his 'arguments' have been comprehensively shredded.
Phil Clarke
clipe
Phil, that's all more deflection technique. As is:
"And yet you are silent on the bankrolling of Tim Ball by the principal investor in Cambridge Analytica.
Very odd."
Read the name of the thread:
"The Moral and Intellectual Poverty of Climate Alarm"
It isn't a thread about Tim Ball. As it happens, like you, I have grave doubts about him, and am happy to say so here. I don't understand why you don't share my grave doubts about Michael Mann's litigious behaviour, those who fund him to do it, and their motives.