Climate Catastrophe! Do you *really* believe it?
How the latest IPCC report makes me question the meaning of 'belief'
Is it a ‘live as though it were real’ kind of believe? Or just a ‘shake your fist as though it were real’ kind of believe?
The latest IPCC report has arrived. Actually, it was pretty good!
Accompanying this ‘AR6’ report have been, predictably, no end of hard hitting headlines. Droughts, wildfires, flooding, running out of time… you know the rest.
But do you really believe such catastrophic climate claims?
I don’t really believe it.
And given what I consider to be an appropriate definition of ‘believe’ in the context of such important questions, here I argue that neither do most people, *really* believe.
What does it mean to ‘believe’?
We use the word somewhat interchangeably, from holding a loosely held opinions to the having the hardest of convictions. Our standards of evidence for determining belief vary from person to person, topic to topic, and across time.
In other words, it’s complicated!
However, for matters of such consequence as catastrophic climate change, I do consider that a higher criteria of what constitutes belief should be met rather than if say talking about whether one ‘believes’ it will rain at the weekend.
The stakes are so much higher, both in terms of whether the belief is ‘true’, but perhaps more importantly, whether we are making significant policy decisions off the back of mistaken belief.
To those who claim to believe in an impending climate disaster, I would ask again, do you *really* believe it?
Is it a ‘live as though it were real’ kind of believe? Or just a ‘shake your fist as though it were real’ kind of believe?
The former is a very difficult bar to attain, of course. But so be it. If you espouse belief in claims of such importance, you must surely also be prepared to try to live up to your convictions.
Actions speak louder than words
Nothing seems to do the climate change movement more harm, in my opinion, than the hypocritical actions of the those who espouse claims of impending climate doom.
We have seen the recent case of John Kerry arriving at Barrack Obama’s lavish birthday party celebrations on a private jet. In Obama you will find one of the world’s most staunch political advocates of the ‘climate emergency’, during his presidency even setting up a website to ‘name and shame’ those who went against his preferred narrative. The jet-setting Kerry was Obama’s former special climate envoy.
The recent G7 meeting in Cornwall, with climate change high on the agenda, saw Prime Minister Johnson arriving by private jet. The distance from London to Cornwall is only some 250 miles!
Each year (well, in normal times) we see countless members of the world’s elite - from business leaders, royalty, to Hollywood A-listers, pop stars and leading politicians - stepping down from their private jets to attend the lavishness of the annual Davos circus to discuss, among other things, the latest human-caused catastrophes and how we plebs might live better, more ‘sustainable’ lives.
At least Greta Thunberg perhaps recognized this hypocrisy and decided to sail across the Atlantic to attend a world leaders meeting rather than fly.
Although, I never quite saw the logic in Greta’s trans-Atlantic sailing trip; presumably the plane would have taken off whether she was on it or not, with EXACTLY the same amount of fuel being sacrificed at the alter of eco-doom to get her there.
Real consequences
So, do you really believe in climate doom? Do you live out your convictions?
Do you forgo meat because of climate change? Have you traded in your diesel car for an EV or better still for a season train ticket? Have you stopped taking national and international holidays and business trips? Have you purged your shopping habits of plastic products? Do you only buy locally produced goods? Do you boycott all products and cut relationships with those that don’t follow this recipe?
No, I didn’t think so.
And neither do I.
But that is precisely why I hesitate to use the word ‘believe’ in the context of such extraordinary claims.
These claims have very real consequences. The amount of belief you can bestow on ideas is not infinite. We all have limited cognitive and intellectual bandwidth. Therefore, I suggest you spend your finite beliefs wisely! Before you declare your belief in matters of such high consequence, be sure. Research. Question.
Don’t simply outsource all of your thinking to others on matters of such high importance. Have the courage to withhold claims of belief if things don’t seem to make sense.
The idea of a climate catastrophe, and the impositions and solutions being proposed to fight it, have significant consequences on how we live our lives. If you claim to believe it, you’d better be sure you *really* believe it.
Thanks for reading!
-Tristan
It is interesting to note that the largest Fires recorded on planet Earth was recorded in the 80s, this single fact pushes any google search to present only largest fires of 21st century when searching 'largest fires on earth' - it does not fit the narrative that in a 1950 and 1987 there was each a fire that together destroyed approximately 18 million hectares of land. I don't think these fires were due to climate change.... The closest thing in the 21st century is the Russian wildfires which managed a meagre 200,00 hectares. My guess is we could find bigger floods, bigger droughts in the past - the difference is there are more affected humans - it still strikes me that many many rich people who preach about climate change and the impending doom of rising seas own and live in properties on sea fronts and believe in the concept of the 'selective rising of oceans' :)
Exactly ..