Journalist Peter Hadfield (aka Potholer54) has a new video out on climate change issues. Peter takes his usual effective approach of imploring people to not rely solely on blogs for information. You have to actually read the published scientific literature, which is a proposition even Skeptical Science adheres to. (Authors at SkS are expected to cite references for their claims and we hope our readers take the time to follow through and check those sources.)
It's interesting that Peter is taking on the "in our lifetimes" aspect of climate change, because this is an issue I've often noticed that many people don't grasp. There are far too many people out there who somehow erroneously came to believe that all the predictions in Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth were going to happen in a few years.
One of the most deeply complex aspects of climate change is cross generational responsibility. There are definitely impacts that we are already seeing, and we there are more impacts that we are going to see in the coming decades. But the worst is being saved for those who follow us. Our children and grandchildren.
Peter takes the time to carefully walk us through several aspects of climate change – ice melt, sea level rise, crop production, precipitation and feedbacks – with his engaging wit. And, with appropriate balance, he doesn't hesitate to address errors related to extreme climate impacts that are not scientifically supportable.
Peter also introduces us to a fantastic new meme that I think we should all consider adopting. He notes the often used "C" concatenated to AGW, saying we can't actually measure how "catastrophic" something is. We can, though, measure how expensive something is, and so maybe the better acronym would be EAGW.
As usual, Potholer gives us another well spent 18 minutes of video addressing climate change in an even handed manner.
Posted by Rob Honeycutt on Thursday, 17 April, 2014
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