Fifty nine years ago, on this day, December 11th, 1966,
Peter Finley (presumably Times?) reviewing Science and Survival.
Reprinted in Sydney Morning Herald 11 December 1966
https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=LqEpAAAAIBAJ&sjid=7-cDAAAAIBAJ&pg=1390%2C4487624
And he cites examples to show that it is.
“We are burning fuel at such a rate that by AD2000 the amount of extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may be sufficient to raise the temperature of the earth to the point that the Antarctic ice cap begins to melt.
Carbon dioxide has a “greenhouse” effect – allowing sunlight to reach the earth’s surface but limiting the reradiation of heat to space.
Each ton of wood, coal, petrol or natural gas burned sends several tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Between 1860 and 1960, the burning of fuels added 14 per cent extra carbon dioxide to our air – which had remained stable for centuries.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 321ppm. As of 2025, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context was that from the 1950s newspaper articles, and some books about the weather/future etc had been mentioning carbon dioxide build-up.
The specific context was that Barry Commoner’s book had come out in mid-1966 and been approvingly reviewed in UK papers. This above is a reprint in the Sydney Morning Herald of a review in The Times.
What I think we can learn from this – it’s almost sixty years, isn’t it?
What happened next
A similar review was published in 1967 in the Canberra Times. LINK
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
References
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Also on this day:
December 11, 1975 – German scientist gives stark climate warning in Melbourne
December 11, 1979 – conference on “Environmental Effects of utilising more coal” in London