How muddy is the water in climate war? But there's not much time left for humanity. Climate | Global | Time

Since the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere this year, the record for the "hottest day in the world" has been broken one after another, with high temperatures of 40 ℃ gradually becoming the norm. As stated in the World Meteorological Organization's climate report, humanity is entering an unknown realm of destruction.

Many scenes in the disaster film seem to be unfolding. Human beings, who have been subjected to intense testing, have reached a critical point where they must face climate change head-on——

As early as 1988, American climatologist James Hansen exclaimed, "Climate change is happening, it's time we stopped talking nonsense."

In the field of climate research, there is a saying of "thirty year climate war".

On one side of this "war" are mainstream scientists worldwide who support the "global warming theory", and on the other side are mixed anti climate change groups, including oil companies, coal mining associations, media influencers, lobbying groups, etc.

Those anti climate change groups are constantly concocting and spreading anti climate science viewpoints——

"The global climate has not warmed", "it is natural rather than human activities that have caused global warming", "current warming is not worth mentioning in the history of the Earth", "global warming is caused by solar activity"... These views deeply affect global cognition, making global decision-making and action to address climate change hesitant.

They even successfully led the United States to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, ultimately resulting in a 30 year hiatus and delay in action to address climate change.

I can't help but feel that if it weren't for this long debate, everything would have been different. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as if the window to deal with global warming will not return to thirty years ago.

Climate change was originally a scientific issue, but the resulting response actions involve global energy transformation and policy adjustments, with stakeholders across various industries around the world.

The most effective way to deal with science is to use "scientists" to confront them.

Some vested interests sponsor and bribe so-called "scientists" to present various seemingly valid viewpoints, creating a false impression of "problematic scientist viewpoints" for the public and decision-makers, and then cooperate with other lobbying activities to make "pseudo science" full of various interest calculations outweigh "real science".

For example, at the 1996 American Geophysical Union, scientist Benjamin Sant, who conducted climate change attribution analysis, encountered resistance from renowned anti climate change activist Patrick Michaels at the venue. The former reveals the human factors that affect climate change and points out that with pollution control and the continuous surge of greenhouse gases, the magnitude and speed of global warming will continue to increase. But the latter accuses the above viewpoint of being completely wrong, accusing climate scientists of deceiving decision-makers and the public into believing that human activities are causing global warming, thereby imposing unnecessary restrictions on economic growth.

It is difficult to distinguish between Sant and Michaels as the true scientists studying climate change from a simple public observation perspective.

In fact, although Michael is a professor of environmental science research at the University of Virginia, he has long been in the tank of petrochemical groups. He accepts funding from coal companies and opposes the science of global warming on various occasions, believing that the scientific community's fuss is a means of obtaining research funding. But in reality, he himself has received a lot of funding from the petrochemical industry, with just over 265000 US dollars reported publicly.

Despite this environment, climate science still stubbornly moves forward and provides accurate predictions that have been proven today. But the information conveyed to the media and the public through disputes like the above is very dangerous:

Since the scientific community's understanding of global warming is not yet unified, and there is still inconsistency in the facts and causes of climate change, any action taken is hasty.

The public often dislikes following the rules and regulations, but prefers entertaining, conspiracy theories filled stories and explosive, sensational prophecies.

This is exactly the area that many opponents of the climate change theory excel in.

Although the vast majority of them do not have a background in meteorology, climate, or environment, or even have no scientific research experience or training in natural sciences, this does not hinder their influence. These people wrote books, participated in TV and radio programs, catered to the public taste, and harvested Internet traffic.

They are enthusiastic about packaging global warming as a shocking conspiracy, such as: "Global warming is a conspiracy of global scientists" and "scientists with ulterior motives artificially modify data"; Or when it comes to economic accounting, it can be said that "tackling global warming has stifled jobs" or "renewable energy is simply too expensive"; Or promote agnosticism, "there is no completely definite science", "scientists cannot predict the weather, let alone predict the climate for the next century"; Or play a tragic card, saying that climate change skeptics are today's Galileo and Bruno; Or claim that climate change is not a big deal, "humans have successfully experienced past climate change"

The dissemination of these viewpoints has actually formed a certain mimetic environment. Many people believe that the conclusions they draw from independent thinking actually stem from the subtle influence of anti climate change rhetoric.

There is an unconfirmed story that goes like this: after Einstein was born and proposed the theory of relativity, 100 "scientists" joined forces to oppose it. When Einstein found out, he laughed and said, "If I am wrong, I don't need 100 people to join forces. It's enough for one person to prove me wrong.".

In fact, if global warming is false, there is no need for 100 facts and viewpoints, just one is enough.

The reason why the climate war has been delayed for thirty years is largely because the water here has been stirred up, causing countries to hesitate when taking resolute measures against global warming, ultimately leading to delayed action.

It must be admitted that these operations have been very successful. Regardless of whether other political forces are involved, the ultimate result is that the United States has done nothing to address climate change and has twice withdrawn from global cooperation to address climate change.

The first time was in 2001, when the newly elected Bush administration refused to approve the Kyoto Protocol under the pretext of "reducing greenhouse gas emissions will affect US economic development" and "developing countries should also bear the obligation to reduce and limit greenhouse gas emissions", and believed that "the scientific basis for global warming is not conclusive".

The second time was in 2017, when the newly elected Trump administration announced its withdrawal from the Paris Agreement signed in 2015. The reason is that the agreement puts the United States at a disadvantage, but benefits other countries.

In addition to shaking the will of developed countries and influencing the direction of public opinion, it is also the thinking of some organizations and institutions to interfere with the cognition of developing countries and make them oppose international agreements.

For example, promoting that "global warming is a conspiracy of developed countries such as the United States to contain developing countries" has made developing countries remain wary of international cooperation and agreements, making international agreements and cooperation difficult.

Compared to the tangible impacts already generated by climate change, such narrow controversies are both bitter and helpless.

Leaving aside grand propositions related to the future of human society, yet so persistent in the struggle for various selfish interests, it is both cruel and sad

Facts teach people best.

Facts can educate people the most.

In June 2021, the western region of North America experienced a scorching fire, entering the most severe drought period in the past 1200 years. The highest temperature in the central city of Litton, British Columbia, Canada reached 49.6 ° C, causing wildfires to burn; In July 2022, Western Europe experienced continuous high fever and the most severe drought in 500 years. In the summer of 2022, China's vast areas from North China to the Yangtze River Basin, East China, and South China experienced the strongest heat process since 1961, with the highest temperature in Chongqing even reaching 45 ℃.

Under extreme high temperatures, the arguments made by anti climate change proponents that "global warming is fake" and "the magnitude of global warming is not significant" have been refuted.

Many people suddenly realize that for anti climate change advocates, anti climate change is just a business.

Thanks to technological progress, anti climate change advocates are gradually being abandoned by financiers. In the past decade, with the large-scale development of solar and wind energy, the cost of clean energy has significantly decreased, even lower than traditional thermal power generation. In this context, it is clearly not cost-effective for petrochemical companies to reinvest in thermal power generation. Although petrochemical giants have been questioned for adopting a "denial" and "procrastination" attitude in addressing climate change, this does not prevent them from transitioning to new energy.

The script has changed, putting the disruptors who have been opposing climate change along the way with the giants in an awkward position.

However, this is not difficult for them. They are even better at coping with this transformation than the public who listens to them, and have already boarded the fast train of global carbon neutrality, driving on the highways of low-carbon technology.

In October 2021, two scientists studying climate change, Shulang Makoto and Klaus Hasselman, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.

It seems that science ultimately defeated anti science, but this is hardly a victory, at most it can only be considered a disastrous victory.

The smoke of the climate war will finally dissipate. With the support of science, the world is firmly on the road to carbon neutrality, but who is responsible for the lost 30 years? Who is responsible for the loss of life and property suffered in the past and in the future due to extreme weather?

The smoke of climate war will eventually dissipate. With the support of science, the world is firmly walking on the path of carbon neutrality. However, who can be responsible for the lost 30 years? Who should be held accountable for the loss of life and property suffered by extreme weather in the past and future?

Never forget the past, the teacher of the future.

Being caught up in conflicting interests among different factions will only delay valuable time; The so-called optimal choice made by individuals constrained by their immediate interests often leads to a prisoner's dilemma for humanity as a whole.

The high temperature of grilling tells everyone in the closest way possible: the apocalyptic scenes in disaster films are not far from us.

By 2030, it is the window period for us to cope with global warming, and once this window is closed, it will not open.