Dear Sabine Hossenfelder, why blame climate scientists for the politicization?

Dear Sabina Hossenfelder, 

I’ve been watching your YouTube videos for a while and for the most part, I enjoy them, because I love the topics, your informative sharp style, and you were refreshingly free of red flags. As I became a fan, I’ll admit I got some weird vicarious kick at discovering you were born in Frankfurt am Main during the time I was living there, during my 3 years in BRD & CH.

Then you started talking about climate scientists, people I’ve enthusiastically followed and learned from since my high school science classes (grad of ’73), and a topic I have closely followed for over a half century since.  Now, listening to you harp on climate scientists, I do see red flags cropping up, which I feel obligated to share as far and wide as my meager efforts will afford, via an email and posting at my blogs.

Your July 20th, “Fossil Fuels Don’t Come From Fossils? Tucker Carlson Fact Check” brought my feelings to a boil.  Now I want to do a little fact checking of your attitude and words, along with their unfortunate implications, in a society where determined willful ignorance runs rampant.

Fossil Fuels Don’t Come From Fossils? Tucker Carlson Fact Check

Sabine Hossenfelder - July 20, 2024 

5:44

“The world is full of untruth and half truth, right that's the whole problem right.”

8:14

"… Dr. Soon then goes on to complain about how climate scientists reacted to the opening statement from Al Jaber at the COP meeting earlier this year.

In the beginning of this cop 28 meeting,  the chairman, …  was saying that ‘there's no scientific reasoning to say that we should phase out fossil fuels.’ “

“He’s right. But then he backed off because of all this, baa-baa. …”

“There's no scientific reasoning to say that we should phase out fossil fuel.”

This isn’t an academic argument.  This is the stuff of rhetorical gamesmanship.    

No parameters, no nuances.  Give it a think Sabina. 

 

The amount of CO2 we’re producing, that is the problem - all the talk about what’s possible to do with it in some future is pipe dreaming.  Acting now to keep as much out of our global heat and moisture distribution engine pipeline as possible, is the top priority.  Dreaming of being saved by future systems is moonshine, the crisis is here!

Human society has entered uncharted territory, and this is only the beginning of a profound climate engine phase transition to a significantly more energetic, read hostile, weather system.  That’s simple physics!  Rhetoric be damned.

I don’t wonder that serious climate scientists, who appreciate the magnitude of our issues reacted with shock, disbelief, and jeers at such a pollyannaish utterance.

It’s stupidly worded and sends the wrong message.  

What does a shallow public and social media hear?  ‘Yippy, no need to scale back on fossil fuels consumption.  Keep that consumption engine humming'.  

8:45

“Everybody is herd mentality.

Unfortunately, on this Dr Soon is entirely right. There is no science behind fossil fuel phaseout. …”

How about the science behind the importance of phasing in significant reduction in fossil fuels burning, along with other CO2 production?  

What the hell are you talking about Sabine?  

Reaching zero fossil fuels usage?  Okay that’s foolish, but we need to start somewhere.

Or not, nature will run its course.

8:55

“Because the problem isn’t fossil fuels. The problem is climate change caused primarily by carbon dioxide and, to a lesser extent methane, in the atmosphere. 

Of course. the primary source of that is currently fossil fuels. …”  

Burying the lead.  Not to mention it is akin to: "The guns aren’t the problems, it’s the bullets."

I mean anyone with the slightest interest in the topic will learn real fast that fossil fuels is but one of a few ways CO2 gets into our atmosphere.  Concrete production huge, agriculture and livestock, human induced permafrost thawing, rain forest degradation, etc.   

EPA Overview of Greenhouse Gases

Causes of Climate Change

European Commission - Causes of Climate Change

9:10

“but if the fossil fuel industry can find a way to avoid carbon dioxide emissions, which is a pretty big if, then that would solve the problem.” 

What have they done to help this past half century?  Lip service and PR projects aren’t enough.  

Sabina why turn a blind eye to the billions they’ve spent waging an amoral ruthless war of slander, out & out character assassination on good scientists and their work.

Have you ever heard of the runway analogy?  

Listening to you one can be lulled into believing we have plenty of runway left for landing this plane, certainly nothing worth panicking about.  

I’ve been witnessing our leaders (and public) squander opportunity after opportunity for over a half century.  Once “plenty of runway” to get humanity’s over-population-over-greed-problem under control, has dissolved like sandcastles in the waves.

9:20

“Now, as I’ve said previously, I don’t believe that this is actually going to happen for various reasons, but that’s another story.”

NO!  The hell it is another story!  That is the big story.  That’s not going to happen so let’s stop with entertaining make-believe.

The climate science is certain, within recognized error margins, and natural uncertainties.  As for what there is in legitimate uncertainly, amounts to chump change, against the backdrop of what we know.  

The past half century has produced nothing but reinforcement that climate scientists have gotten way more correct than wrong.  And in fact, more often than not mistakes were in underestimations of change rates. 

Sabine defending oil industry’s PR campaigns of misrepresentation and harassment isn’t doing science any good, even if it’s only to entertain your fickle YouTuber crowd.

9:27

“The story here is that Al Jaber’s statement was entirely correct.” 

In what context? 

“There's no scientific reasoning to say that we should phase out fossil fuel?”  

But the refusal to start scaling back oil consumption is a major part of the current record breaking heat problem, and intimately tied into other CO2 producers.  

What science?  How about a little nuance?

That it is unscientific to arrive at zero fossil fuels emissions?

Or

It’s unscientific that we need to seriously cut back on fossil fuels burning?

9:35

“The problem isn’t fossil fuels, per se, the problem is climate change and we shouldn’t lose the goal out of sight.”

“Per se”?  Are you kidding?  Sounds akin to suggesting that the problem isn’t guns, it’s the bullets, and that we shouldn’t lose sight of that.  Seriously?

9:40

“What’s happened however is that a lot of climate scientists have declared the fossil fuel industry an enemy.  This isn’t about science anymore,  

it’s a political movement that is conflating science with politics.”

Sabine, why do you lay blame for the polarizing and politicizing at the feet of scientists?  

Your lines were one straw man too many and triggered my need to write this open letter to you.  What is up with your: Oh pity the poor oil company giants.  It’s all them nasty scientists who are politicizing the issue.  

Lordie, lordie where have you been the past decades?

Why not review the history of the ruthless amoral oil industry’s decades long war of strategic slander; and character assassination against competent professional scientists; plus their ruthless misrepresentation of climate science’s studies and reports.

Stephen Schneider | Climate One montage

Science and Distortion - Stephen Schneider

Posted on 1 January 2012 by Rob Honeycutt

Climate Scientist Attacked At Press Conference In Copenhagen

Graham Winfrey Dec 10, 2009

Renowned climate scientist Dr. Stephen Schneider, was verbally harassed Thursday during a press conference at the United Nations Climate Talks in Copenhagen.

Stephen Schneider: Climate Denier Gate a case of Science as a Contact Sport

Post by Rick Piltz - Government Accountability Project - December 30th, 2009

In Climate Denier Gate (Stephen Schneider’s term for what the deniers call “Climategate”), “the private frustrations of a few climate scientists was turned into an ostensible plot by the entire climate science community in dozens of countries, hundreds of institutions, and hammered out over 40 years of peer reviewed assessment studies—as some kind of fraud.”  

Schneider says, “The big untold story here is how broken the 2009 media is for investigating the wrong folks and giving credibility to a non-event that changes nothing in climate science.” One more episode in the decades-long tension between climate science and public debate, the subject of Schneider’s memoir, Science as a Contact Sport.

Perspectives of Scientists Who Become Targets: Ben Santer

December 26, 2017 By CSLDF - Renee Cho

This series profiles scientists who have been threatened with legal attacks or harassed by politically and ideologically motivated groups. What these researchers experienced, how they responded, and the lessons they learned provide valuable guidance for other scientists, and will help all readers understand the issues climate scientists may encounter because of their work.

Ben Santer on ‘separating’ and his ‘small part’ in understanding of climate science

by BENJAMIN SANTER - OCTOBER 12, 2021 - Yale Climate Connections

A leading scientist’s first-person report on three decades of pioneering climate science research and communication. And tributes from seven of his peers. 

Climate Scientist Michael Mann Wins Defamation Case

02/16/2024 - Science Friday

Climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann won a defamation lawsuit against two conservative writers last week.

The verdict was 12 years in the making. In 2012 writers Rand Simberg and Mark Steyn accused Mann of manipulating his data related to his famous 1998 “hockey stick” graph, which depicts rising global temperatures after the industrial revolution.

How the Fossil Fuel Industry Harassed Climate Scientist Michael Mann

Union of Concerned Scientists - Oct 12, 2017

A Koch-funded think tank tried to harass and discredit prominent climate scientist Michael Mann by suing for access to his private correspondence. Mann defeated the effort—but fears the resulting “chill” could deter young climate scientists.

There was the envelope stuffed with cornstarch, meant to mimic anthrax. There were the thousands of hate-filled emails, laced with warnings and threats. There were the Congressional hearings, where presenting scientific evidence—and fighting off fact-free attacks by hostile members of Congress—was a torturous uphill battle.

Climate scientist Michael Mann hasn’t had it easy since first publishing his pioneering “hockey stick” graph in the 1998. Together with co-authors Raymond S. Bradley and Malcolm Hughes, the research indicated unprecedented global warming in the last century. ...

Michael Mann beat his defamers. But climate scientists are still under attack.

by LAUREN KURTZ - FEBRUARY 28, 2024 - Yale Climate Connection

Climate scientists report that death threats and online harassment are causing anxiety, sleeping problems, and loss of productivity .

Exxon’s Climate Denial History: A Timeline

Exxon minimized climate change internally after conceding that fossil fuels cause it

Michael Copley, SEPTEMBER 15, 2023

9:54

“I made a video about this earlier this year, and of course my comments were full of people claiming I get paid by the fossil fuel industry. It’s a classical ad hominem attack – directed at me, not the substance of what I say.”

Okay, let’s look at the substance of what you said in this video.

10:46

“The quote from Allen that I found there was:

“It’s depressing to see the climate establishment reacting so furiously to a perfectly accurate statement by the COP28 President. To limit warming even close to 1.5 degrees, we must both scale down the use of fossil fuels and scale up safe and permanent carbon dioxide disposal.  It's simply not true that to stop global warming we have to stop using fossil fuels: what we have to do is stop dumping the carbon dioxide they generate into the atmosphere.”  

I used that quote because it’s exactly what I was thinking.”

But that bolded sentence makes the paragraph a ludicrous statement from start to finish.  It has nothing to do with science reality.  

We are in no position to discuss “stopping global warming” - nor are we going to “stop using fossil fuels,” both impossibilities in the real world.  So what is he going on about?

It sure sounds like he’s implying we don’t really need to worry about reducing fossil fuels consumption, all we need to do is suck CO2 out of the air.  As if that were simple and doable on the scale required to make any impact.

So of course, in our economic reality, we can’t reduce fossil fuels, but that will have real world physical consequences none of us dare contemplate.  But nature will have its way, regardless of what humans tell themselves.

11:25

“But he’s a climate scientists and I am not. So I thought it’d be good to have a quote from someone, you know, who is a little more suit and tie than pink shirt and fuzzy hair. But when I went back to the website to take a screenshot, the quote was gone. This all happened while the COP meeting was still going on. 

I later heard from people who don’t want to be quoted that several climate scientists gave Allen a hard time about that quote, and he decided to withdraw it.” 

11:59

“I don’t know whether this is true. But it sounds plausible enough doesn’t it?

In hindsight I feel somewhat sorry for drawing attention to the quote even after I saw that it had disappeared.”

“But really this isn’t about Allan or Al Jaber, it’s just a vivid example that illustrates that the community of climate scientists is trying to enforce a narrative that they want their members to play along with. 

You mean, like the narrative that anthropogenic global warming, it is deadly serious, it is our own short sighted fault, and it’s going to be unfathomably destructive, and unless we slow down now, it’s going to be even uglier.

Sabina why are you trying muzzle that scientifically based summary of the geophysical reality?

S.H. I’m not a climate scientist, I don’t give a shit what they want me to say, and this is why you see so many complaints in my comments, people who accuse me of being funded by the fossil fuel industry every time I say something that doesn’t agree with their narrative.” 

I would hope you at least gave a shit about the sum total of the consilience of evidence and the state of our Earth today.

You mean like broadcasting that climate scientists are to blame for the politics and polarization and the confusion that the oil industry has been spending millions, nay billions by now, to create, fuel and broadcast?

12:46

“More seriously. This is a huge problem. That a group develops and enforces a narrative that they require loyal members to conform to is one of the most obvious symptoms of group think, and the climate change community is very deep into this. 

It's bad for one thing because it discourages criticism and increases the risk of mistakes. It’s also bad because people who are not in the group, like Dr. Soon and me, notice it which creates a backlash. Why is it always physicists, tss.”

People who are not in Dr. Soon’s group?  

What group would Soon be in?  

The bribed scientists group?

Climate sceptic Willie Soon received $1m from oil companies, papers show

John Vidal - June 28, 2011 - The Guardian

Documents obtained by Greenpeace show prominent opponent of climate change was funded by ExxonMobil, among others.

Work of prominent climate change denier (Willie Soon) was funded by energy industry

Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent - Feb 15, 2015

Willie Soon is researcher at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

Documents: Koch brothers foundation among groups that gave total of $1.25m

13:19

“So here’s Sabine to climate scientists: Stop censoring your own people. 

And the rest of you, please check out my Patreon so I can continue to complain …”

Sabina, what about your own profit motive driven bias when you're writing these scripts?  

How much is increasing your Patreon total on the top of your mind. How much does provocative and emotionalizing, and a touch of melodrama help that effort.

In my opinion, this video was an example of science by rhetoric, for entertainment sake.  It certainly isn’t healthy for "science".  

We need more sober honesty and less verbosity.  

Why not focus on the Keystone Question everyone ignores?  

Why do humans collectively refuse to consider the need to do with less?  

Less babies, less consumption, less Greenhouse Gas production, coupled with more concern for the global landscapes and biosphere and other creatures that produce and nurture our global collective life support systems?