Climate Change Reality Or Myth?

climate-change-myth-or-reality

It’s a tough call. On the one hand, there was an editorial in the Observer last Sunday that proclaimed “Now No One Can Deny that the World is Getting Warmer

On the other hand, the Mail on Sunday, admittedly not a publication that has ever been accused of harbouring tree hugging tendencies in its newsroom, declared on the same day: “Global Warming Stopped 16 Years Ago, Met Office Report Reveals: Mail on Sunday Got it Right About Warming… So Who Are the ‘Deniers’ Now?

That two UK newspapers published on the same day can carry such contradictory stories on the same subject of such global importance illustrates the problems faced by those who seek to communicate the facts about climate change to both political leaders and the general public and expect them to take rational decisions based on those facts.

The Observer editorial concerns the publication, in draft form at present, of the US Government’s National Climate Assessment and Development Advisory Committee’s Climate Assessment Report.

The introduction to the report is presented in the form of a ‘Letter to the American People’ and the first sentences leave the reader in no doubt about what is to come:

“Climate change, once considered an issue for a distant future, has moved firmly into the present. This report of the National Climate Assessment and Development Advisory Committee concludes that the evidence for a changing climate has strengthened considerably since the last National Climate Assessment report, written in 2009. Many more impacts of human-caused climate change have now been observed.”

Climate Change Reality or Myth

The report extends to 1,146 pages of assessment compiled by a team of 240 scientists and will be subject to a review by the US National Academy of Sciences alongside the public consultation process before the final version is published later this year. There is no doubt that the content of the report is deeply disturbing but one thing that is really striking is the uncompromising, unequivocal way in which the report’s authors – representing some of the leading thinking in the field with access to the widest and deepest sets of data in existence – spell out their message: man-made climate change is real and it is affecting real people in the real world now.

It is hard to believe that this report has originated in the same country that recently held a Presidential election in which the issues that 240 leading scientists describe as presenting “a major challenge for society” barely received a mention from either of the candidates, including the one who is now responsible for leading the world’s largest economy’s response.

On the other hand, the Mail on Sunday appears to have reverted to the belief that climate change is a leftwing conspiracy designed to undermine Western capitalist society, or at least house prices in the Home Counties. More particularly, the paper has seized on the fact that a report by the UK Met Office appears to suggest that there has been a slowdown in the rate of increase in global average temperatures. The facts, inevitably, are not so clear cut: the Met Office’s new projections, generated by a new computer model that the agency itself heavily caveats, are that temperatures over the period 2012-16 will be 0.43 degrees C above the average for the period 1971-2000 as opposed to the previous prediction of 0.54 degrees. Hardly dramatic or conclusive, especially when one considers that the confidence ranges for the new and old predictions are 0.28-0.59 and 0.36-0.72 degrees respectively. In addition to the fact that an increase in temperatures above the previously forecast level is well within these parameters, the model compares future temperatures to a 30-year average that itself shows a significant warming trend compared to previous decades.

An overwhelming majority of respected scientific thinking agrees that anthropogenic (man-made) climate change is a reality and has done for quite some time but, to read the popular press, one could be forgiven for thinking that the issue is still in doubt and that there is no need for politicians to take difficult decisions or for people to make changes to their lifestyles.

One of the coalition government’s new, and much applauded, initiatives on taking office was to establish an independent Office for Budget Responsibility to ensure that economic forecasting and the collation and publishing of data regarding key economic indicators are kept separate from policy-making. Perhaps it is time for an independent Office for Climate Responsibility.

About the Author Peter Tyldesley

Peter Tyldesley is a Chartered Surveyor and former Director of Countryside & Land Management at the Brecon Beacons National Park Authority. He currently runs the Bradgate Park & Swithland Wood Charity, which owns and manages Bradgate Park in Leicestershire. As well as running the 500-hectare estate as a visitor attraction, the Charity’s aims include educating the public in the appreciation and care of the environment. Peter is a trained coach and mentor with a passion for re-connecting people with the natural world.

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4 comments
James Ferguson says January 26, 2013

Fundamental problem in this article is that the Sunday Mail is considered to be reporting news.

They do and will continue to publish anything that they consider will sell.

As a result of reading it the reader becomes ever less well informed and descends into a downward spiral of stupidity. The better for the Sunday Mail to spoonfeed them nonsense that they can burp up and dribble in social settings 🙂

Reply
    Mark Whitman says January 26, 2013

    Indeed, I think Peter’s point in the article is to illustrate the conflicting and confusing information pushed out by the media. One can only hope that the intellect of the general populace is high enough to see through the ‘dribble’. I’m not holding my breath.
    Stay in touch James. Kwiqly looks like a great proposition.
    Mark.

    Reply
Peter Tyldesley says January 26, 2013

I think my comment that the “Mail on Sunday appears to have reverted to the belief that climate change is a leftwing conspiracy designed to undermine Western capitalist society, or at least house prices in the Home Counties” gives a clue as to how I view their reliability as a source of information on these issues. The point I was trying to make is that, whilst at least 90% of reputable scientific opinion is in agreement on the issue of climate change, the UK press gives the impression that the issue is still undecided.

Reply
Richard Boothman says February 11, 2013

In the face of overwhelming evidence, it is a pity we still have to have this debate. As the previous commentators observed, the debate is more about the press and their desire to sell newspapers and online content to their chosen demographic than to report news.

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