The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 367ppm. 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 conferences about “greenhouse gas control technologies” had been happening since the early 1990s.
The specific context was that this was the first one after the Kyoto Protocol was “agreed” the previous December. It now looked like rich countries were going to have to something to reduce their emissions. Therefore, a bit more attention was being paid to various
What I think we can learn from this is that the promises of capture/reducing greenhouse gas emissions have been spilling from engineers’ mouths for decades. Proven at scale technologies that capture meaningful amounts of carbon dioxide? Not so much…
What happened next – the conferences kept happening. CCS has gone through periodic periods of rise and fall since then. The only really steady trend is in the Keeling Curve, which measures the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. And guess what, that’s starting to point up more. Happy days.
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.
For years there have been doomsday predictions that burning of fossil fuels might bring about a climatic catastrophe. According to the most alarming theories, fossil fuels release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere where it acts as a greenhouse, blocking the escape of heat into space and thus warming the Earth’s surface. The ice caps could melt, sea levels could rise, agriculture could be disrupted and vast coastal areas might be inundated.
The chief weakness in such theories has been lack of evidence that the greenhouse effect is actually occurring. Though carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been increasing, temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere have been falling over the last 30 years. But now seven scientists from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration claim to have found evidence that, on a global basis, carbon dioxide has already been warming the Earth for a century. They predict it will produce ”unprecedented” warming in the next century.
Their study finds that the warming predicted by various computer models of the greenhouse effect is consistent with worldwide temperature readings since 1880 – and with observations from Venus and Mars. That gave them confidence that the effect is real and that the models can predict it. Other scientists will challenge their assumptions, methods and conclusions. Some actually believe that the greenhouse effect would be beneficial to world agriculture. Conclusive observations may not be available for decades. But it is significant that a respected team of scientists has now joined the group warning of possible catastrophe.
What, if anything, should be done? The nation seems to be turning to the worst possible fuels in terms of carbon dioxide. It is depending less on solar and nuclear power, which emit no carbon dioxide at all. And among the fossil fuels, it is shifting from natural gas and oil, which emit little carbon dioxide, to coal and synthetic fuels, which emit much more.
The greenhouse effect is still too uncertain to warrant total alteration of energy policy. But this latest study offers fair warning; that such a change may yet be required is no longer unimaginable.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 340ppm. 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 the New York Times, and other papers, had been reporting on carbon dioxide build-up, quite intermittently, since the 1950s.
The specific context was that the Reagan administration was busy attacking science. The New York Times’ science correspondent, Walter Sullivan, had talked to James Hansen, which ended up costing some funding. See this 2007 interview with Hansenhttps://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/hotpolitics/interviews/hansen.html.
Why do you think that your testimony in particular was sensitive in the [Reagan] administration, so much so that OMB would want to shade what you were saying?
Well, I think the reason it was sensitive was the fact that it got attention. In 1981 the paper that we wrote in Science — that predicted that the world would be getting warmer over the 1980s and that by the year 2000 you begin to see loss of sea ice and eventually you have opening of the fabled Northwest Passage — that article was reported on the front page of The New York Times by Walter Sullivan. As a result, we lost our funding from the Department of Energy, because, in that administration, they simply did not want that sort of attention to this problem, because it has big implications for fossil fuel industry.
What I think we can learn from this is that we knew enough and we didn’t act. We can stick that on our tombstone.
What happened next – it would be 1988 before politicians would have to start to pretend to give a damn.
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.
Twenty-five years ago, on this day, August 28th, 2000, private interests reject the public good – colour me amazed.
MELBOURNE, Aug 28 (Reuters) – Victorian power generators said on Monday they would not sign a government agreement aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions because it contained draconian penalties.
Loy Yang Power spokesman Richard Elkington said generators had agreed to voluntarily achieve best-practice efficiency standards that would cut emissions, but the proposed Australian Greenhouse Office document contained a range of penalties.
“The most obvious one was that if we didn’t meet the targets we would recognise the right of government to regulate the operation of the power plant,” he said.
“If it is a voluntary agreement, let’s have some words that reflect that without the appearance of draconianism.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 369ppm. 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 the Federal Government in Australia, led by John Howard, was profoundly uninterested in driving down emissions, or in anyway inconveniencing their rich mates. But they still had to have some pretend schemes, to keep green-minded voters in marginal electorates confused and (com)pliant. So, voluntary schemes. But of course, if these contained even the HINT of enforcement, fines/penalties etc, this would piss off the knuckledraggers, especially the ones hooked on brown coal…
What I think we can learn from this – kayfabe comes with costs. Not everyone is always willing to go along with pretend schemes.
What happened next – the brown coal kept getting burnt, the companies that owned the power stations kept making money. The emissions kept climbing.
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.
Fifty-five years ago, on this day, August 27th, 1970, there was a big public meeting in Sydney, with the Great and the Good and green hoi polloi. Read this account, from Hansard, and weep.
Senator MULVIHILL: New South Wales
“I suppose that one of the most effective testimonials that could be directed to the Committee was given at a public meeting held at the Sydney Town Hall at 8 p.m. on 27 August under the chairmanship of Sir Garfield Barwick, Chief Justice of the High Court and Chairman of the Australian Conservation Foundation. This was a very representative gathering and it adopted a 5-point recommendation which endorsed the recommendations of the Senate Select Committee on Water Pollution. As a matter of fact the recommendation went further and asked for the establishment of a national environmental council. Our Committee looked beyond the area which could be dealt with by a national water commission, but I think it will be seen that the recommendation which came from this public meeting in Sydney virtually endorses the contents of our report. With the concurrence of honourable senators I incorporate that recommendation in Hansard.
That this representative meeting of citizens, held at the Sydney Town Hall on August 27th, 1970, endorses the view that –
Water pollution is only part of the broader problem of the pollution which is threatening our environment.
It therefore also endorses the recommendations of the Senate Select Committee on Water pollution that “the prevention and abatement of pollution requires a comprehensive approach involving land use planning, sociological and ecological assessments, and the approach of specialist water pollution technology”, and agrees with that Committee that such a comprehensive approach to the problem should be the objective of all levels of Government.
That the Water Pollution Bill in its present form is only a piecemeal approach to the problem of environmental pollution in this State, and for this reason is of the opinion that the Bill should be withdrawn, and that the initiation of effective measures to control Water Pollution should become the responsibility of the proposed single pollution authority to be established by the State Government.
i. That the proposed Pollution Control Authority should be vested with executive powers to ensure effective control of all forms of pollution, the policing of all regulations, and the prosecution of offenders,
The powers and resources to undertake a continuous programme of research and education on environmental problems.
This representative meeting also believes that in the interest of the environment, and the co-ordination of the activities of all the States in the field of pollution, a National Environment Council should be established by the Commonwealth Government.
Most of the States have attempted to introduce some type of legislation. Our Committee was particularly interested in some of the experiments in the United States and Canada by some of the regional authorities. I know that each State has its own particular problems but, speaking for myself, I was tremendously impressed with the way in which the Swan River Conservation Board had gone about its activities in Western Australia. I can say of metropolitan Sydney that people in local government, and particularly those in an organisation known as the Sydney HarbourParramatta River Anti-Pollution Committee, which represents 16 riverside and harbourside councils, are tremendously impressed with the appendix to our report which dealt with the Swan River Conservation Board.
One lesson which we have learnt and which we must apply to any future government activity, particularly in the field of pollution but also in so many other areas, is that we must be able to feel that the various tiers of government are making some contribution. Possibly all of us, although we are members of the Commonwealth Parliament, realise that the day has gone when the Commonwealth can issue directions from Canberra about what the States shall do. We must have this teamwork of the 3-tier system, and it is for that reason that we indicated that regional authorities also should become involved in this problem. I have never been one who has. held the Utopian concept that the Commonwealth can always pay the piper. I think the contrary is the case. If the Commonwealth is going to make sizeable amounts of finance available to combat various facets of water pollution it should lay down water standards. That is what the Committee had in mind in framing all its recommendations. When we talk to people like Alderman Parkinson, who is the Mayor of Mosman, and Alderman Wild, the Mayor of Parramatta – I instance these 2 gentlemen as extremely efficient mayors who are already concerned in problems of water pollution – we find that they want to be able to help but that they realise that the resources to help are beyond the means of their respective councils. This brings me to a consideration of all the things which are set out in our report and other facets with which….
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 325ppm. 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 there had been an “environmental turn” in 1969 – people waking up to water pollution, air pollution and other forms of pollution.
What I think we can learn from this is that people knew what the score was before most of us were born. But knowing about a problem and creating robust organisations to force corporations and states (governments, bureaucracies) to do anything meaningful about it, well those are different things, now aren’t they?
What happened next – the Australian Conservation Foundation got taken over by “radicals” in the early 1970s. “Pollution” became a normalised thing, one of many to worry about. Slowly, we drowned in our own effluents, and set fire to the planet. Ooops.
The specific context was that two Senate Select Committee reports – one on Air Pollution and one on Water Pollution – had come out. Books were being published, magazines launching, groups like “Ecology Action” getting going in June 1971. Elite types making doomsday pronouncements (like this guy in Adelaide).
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.
Sixty years ago today, on Thursday August 26th 1965, Carl W. Borgmann stood in front of hundreds of young Americans in Knoxville. Borgmann, who was the director of the Ford Foundation’s Science and Engineering programme, was there to deliver the commencement address for the University of Tennessee. He probably gave it little thought, but he was doing something unprecedented – he was using a commencement address to warn young people about the threat of carbon dioxide build-up in the atmosphere.
[Update 31/8/2025 – a comprehensive Wikipedia page has been created about Borgmann, in response to this article. It’s really good]
His speech was given the unwieldy title “A Conversation Ethic. Man’s Use of Science: Some Deferred Costs “ when it appeared the following year in the Massachusetts Audubon Society magazine. He began by explaining what he would not talk about.
“I would rather not deal today with new discoveries in science – not because they are not exciting, for they are, nor because I don’t feel quite comfortable with some of them, which is certainly true, but because another topic seems more urgent to me. Even as I contemplate what man may know through science, I am impelled to ask what he will do with this knowledge – not only with his new scientific discoveries, but with his older ones too, and his ingenious technologies.”
Borgmann laid out many of the challenges – physical, social and moral – facing the United States and the world. Then, two thirds of the way through the speech he said the following startlingly prescient phrases.
“Now consider the burning of fossil fuels. If everyone does it at the average we now have achieved, there will be whole new sets of problems; in fact, many American communities face them presently. What shall we do with the inevitable wastes of our energy-producing processes, with our ash heaps, with the smog of Los Angeles, with the unnatural warming of our rivers?”
Borgmann asks the students to imagine that technology will burn fuels more cleanly, before presenting them with the central dilemma.
“But even if we could afford devices which allowed for our fuels to be completely burned to water and carbon dioxide, another change in our environment is likely. Carbon dioxide, as it becomes a greater proportion of the atmosphere, behaves somewhat like the glass of a greenhouse. It traps heat from the sun, and climatic change results – not overnight, but slowly and surely. This process appears to be already under way, in fact.”
Carl Borgmann
Borgman followed this with a critique of nuclear power – “The preparation of the fuel and the handling and storage of the radioactive waste ash are not without dangers to man and his future.”
Borgmann was sixty at this point. Born in Missouri he had graduated from the University of Colorado in 1927 before working on the technical staff of the Bell Telephones Laboratories and gaining a master’s degree in chemical engineering and a PhD from Cambridge University. He had worked at the universities of North Carolina, Colorado and Nebraska before becoming President of University of Vermont in 1952.
In 1958, Borgmann had started working for the Ford Foundation. His job basically involved handing out money in the form of grants in the resource and environment field.
Borgmann was therefore extremely well equipped to understand the carbon dioxide problem.
Where did he get his information? While carbon dioxide build-up had been covered in both the scientific press, and even by President Lyndon Johnson a few months earlier, by far the most likely source of inspiration for Borgmann’s comments lie with a group that the Ford Foundation helped to fund – the Conservation Foundation.
Established in 1948 the Conservation Foundation had organised some of the pivotal meetings of US academics and policymakers in the 1950s and early sixties around environmental problems.
As Rebecca John reported a year ago, the Conservation Foundation’s March 1963 workshop was pivotal in raising awareness within governmental circles.
“The present liberation of such large amounts of fossil carbon in such a short time is unique in the history of the earth,” the report stated, “and there is no guarantee that past buffering mechanisms are really adequate.”
This rise in atmospheric CO2 was “worldwide,” the summary reported, and, while it did not present an immediate threat, would be significant “to the generations to follow.” The document went on to say, “The consumption of fossil fuels has increased to such a pitch within the last half century, that the total atmospheric consequences are matters of concern for the planet as a whole.” Relief was likely “only through the development of some new source of power.”
Given the Ford Foundation’s ties with the networks of corporate philanthropy and policy-shaping institutions such as the Conservation Foundation, it seems highly likely that a copy of the report landed on his desk.
In all probability, however, this was not the only source Borgmann had. Through the 1950s, and especially around the time of the 1957-8 “International Geophysical Year,” the possibility of modifying the weather and the climate had been much discussed. Carbon dioxide build-up had appeared in cartoons, public education films and on television programmes. The previous year, in August 1964, Popular Mechanics had run a story about the changing air.
Screengrab Popular Mechanics August 1964
A large portion of Borgmann’s speech appeared the following spring, in the magazine of the Massachusetts Audubon Society. From there, it was approvingly cited in an article entitled “The Future Role of the Biologist in Protecting our Natural Resources“ by the biologist Richard Goodwin in the journal Biological Conservation.
In a February 1968 luncheon speech at the New York Waldorf Astoria called “A Challenging Future”, delivered to extractive metallurgists, Borgmann covered similar ground, trying to explain that there were limits to both resources and the planet’s capacity to cope with the consequences of human ingenuity.
Meanwhile, other, more senior figures were beginning to use commencement addresses to warn students of threats in their future. On June 10, 1966 Glenn Seaborg, head of the Atomic Energy Commission warned students at UC San Diego that “at the rate we are currently adding carbon dioxide to our atmosphere (six billion tonnes a year) within the next few decades the heat balance of that atmosphere could be altered enough to produce marked changes in the climate – changes we might have no means of controlling.” Seaborg continued, saying “I, for one, would prefer to continue to travel toward the equator for my warmer weather than run the risk of melting the polar ice and having some of our coastal areas disappear beneath a rising ocean.”
By 1969 students at commencement addresses were proclaiming that “the future is a cruel hoax”
Borgmann was not, of course, responsible for this upsurge in awareness. What is remarkable though, is that the young people to whom he spoke in 1965 would have very little inkling of global atmospheric threats besides the possibility of nuclear war. Four years later, such threats were far more commonplace.
Borgmann closed his 1965 commencement address by invoking the words of Adlai Stevenson, twice Democratic presidential candidate and ambassador to the United Nations, who had died the previous month.
“We travel together, passengers on a little space ship, dependent on its vulnerable reserves of air and soil; all committed for our safety to its security and peace; preserved from annihilation only by the care, the work and, I will say, the love we give our fragile craft.”
Borgmann lived a long life. He died in 1998. Three years earlier 1995 the IPCC’s Secod Assessment Report had declared that human impact on the atmosphere was already “discernible.” The year before he died, the Kyoto Protocol was agreed (though the US Senate had already signalled its unwillingness to be part of any global deal).
The warnings of carbon dioxide build-up he had given in 1965, when the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was at only 320 parts per million (it is now 430ppm) had come to pass.
Thirty four years ago, on this day, August 26th, 1991, the Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland lays it out
Speaking to the industry at the international Environment Northern Seas Conference (sic.) in Stavanger in 1991, the prime minister stressed the danger of global warming:
“We cannot postpone dealing with global warming. We have enough scientific evidence about causes and probable effects to know that the costs of not acting will be very high and that a further delay of action will increase these costs even more”
.29 ; “Brundtland key note speech,” Environment Northern Seas International Conference and Exhibition, Stavanger, 26-30 August 1991,
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 355ppm. 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 Brundtland had been the poster-child for “development” as we then called it, in the 1980s. The “Our Common Future” process and report had popularised the term “sustainable development.”
The specific context was that the negotiations for a climate treaty were deadlocked because the United States wanted them to be – they were determined that whatever was (or wasn’t) signed in Rio the following year (i.e. June 1992) would be weak, and not place any commitments on the US.
What I think we can learn from this We knew 35 years ago that time was short.
What happened next – the Americans got their way – the UNFCCC contained no time tables or targets for reductions by rich countries. Meanwhile, Norway got rich exporting fossil fuels. Go figure.
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.
Fifty-seven years ago, on this day, August 25th, 1969,the American Meteorological Society and Royal Society Conference
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 324ppm. 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 questions of meteorology and climate were beginning to heat up (sorry). There were concerns about weird weather, local air pollution etc etc.
The specific context was that the previous year the American Association for the Advancement of Science had run a symposium…
What I think we can learn from this – that events like this were important for the emerging “epistemic community”, in the lead up to the Stockholm conference and beyond.
What happened next
Within a few months scientific meetings about manc’s impact on the environment – and then in 1971 a meeting on possible climatic changes – were held. By the late 1970s, the picture was pretty clear. Everything since then has been refinements, really.
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.
The effect of overlapping of atmospheric H2O, CO2 and O3 absorption bands on the radiation budget perturbation caused by CO2 doubling is investigated. Since the effect depends on the amount of gases in the atmosphere as well as on the strength of the absorption bands, we examine the effect associated with the variation of gas abundance using a narrow band representation for the absorption bands. This band representation allows for the absorption band structure and thus accounts for the correlation of the spectral feature of the absorbing gases.
It is found that the presence of H2O and O3 has a relatively small influence on the CO2-induced perturbation of both solar and thermal radiation in the stratosphere. However, in troposphere and surface, the overlapping effect appears to be quite significant and changes the vertical distribution of the CO2-induced radiation energy perturbation. For example, in the infrared, the effect is to reduce the effectiveness for CO2 to emit and in the mean time increases the tropospheric absorption of downward thermal flux from the stratosphere due to CO2 increase; the net effect of the overlapping of gases is to increase the tropospheric warming and decrease the surface warming caused by CO2 increase. It is also found that the overlapping effect exhibits strong seasonal and latitudinal variations due primarily to variations in atmospheric H2O.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 340ppm. 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 by the early 1980s there was a noticeable uptick in the number of scientific papers examining the likely consequences of a lot more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Because we were putting a lot more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and showed no signs of wanting to stop, or even thinking that stopping might be a good idea.
The specific context was – aftermath of the First World Climate Conference, the Global 2000 report etc…
What I think we can learn from this is that we knew plenty, almost 50 years ago.
What happened next – it would be 1988 before the issue “broke through.”
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.
Twenty-five years ago, on this day, August 23rd 2000,
The Government will only implement a mandatory domestic emissions trading scheme if the Kyoto Protocol is ratified by Australia, has entered into force and there is an established international emissions trading regime. This decision does not rule out the subsequent introduction of such a scheme if further analysis demonstrates that this would be in the national interest. Senator the Hon Nick Minchin, Media Release, Government Provides Greater Greenhouse Certainty For Industry, 23 August 2000
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 369ppm. 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 Australian policy elites had been confronted with the idea that you have to put a price on emitting carbon dioxide for over a decade. The first two goes were a carbon tax. These were defeated. Then the attention and “intellectual” energy switched to emissions trading schemes (which offer more scope for avoidance and enrichment by consultants and bankers etc)
The specific context was that the first proposal for a Federal emissions trading scheme had just been defeated in Howards’ Cabinet, with Nick Minchin leading the charge.
What I think we can learn from this is that even the simplest actions were too much for us to contemplate. We are stupid hairless murder apes who will take down pretty much all the other species with us. With luck the planet won’t go full Venus, and in a few (dozen?) million laws the biodiversity will return?
What happened next – in 2003 Howard’s Cabinet was united in favour of an Emissions Trading Scheme. Howard exercised a personal veto, having spoken to a couple of business mates.
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
n mid-1971 Beer was approached by Fernando Flores, then a high-ranking member of the Chilean Production Development Corporation (CORFO) in the newly elected socialist government of Salvador Allende, for advice on applying his cybernetic theories to the management of the state-run sector of the Chilean economy.[9][10]
This led to Beer’s involvement in the never-completed Cybersyn project, which aimed to use computers and a telex-based communication network to allow the government to maximise production while preserving the autonomy of workers and lower management.
Beer also was reported to have read and been influenced by Leon Trotsky‘s critique of the Soviet bureaucracy.[11] According to another senior member of the Cybersyn team, Herman Schwember, Beer’s political background and readings completely derived from works written by Trotsky and Trotskyists. Schwember himself disapproved of Trotsky’s approach.[12]
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 373ppm. 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 Beer was an interesting thinker, and who knows where the experiments in Chile might have led? The whole point is that the technocrats – the “pigs” in the language of Animal Farm, need to stop the chickens and sheep etc from learning to run things for themselves. Experiments in alternatives must be scuppered…
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
