After two weeks of climate-apocalyptic bombardment in Madrid, the COP25 has ended in failure, like so many of the previous 24 editions (that’s why we are in the 25th, and counting), with activists, media and prophets of the end of times living in an fantasy world detached from reality. In fact, and as could not be otherwise, fossil fuels still today account for 90% of global energy consumption, exactly the same as when the 1992 Rio Summit was held. In fact, since 1992 the demand for fossil fuels has increased by 54% and the primary sources of energy that do not emit carbon dioxide (especially hydroelectric and nuclear, which environmentalism never mentions, in addition to the politically correct solar and wind) have only gone from 12% to 15% worldwide (Smil, 2019). Therefore, any attempt to eliminate in a few decades fossil fuels – which have lifted a large part of Humanity out of poverty – is a chimera. World energy depends on them and that will not change until there is an energy revolution that is most probably not to be found in intermittent and inefficient energies such as solar or wind and, of course, in the use of electric cars, as absurdly they seem to make us believe. The “ecological transition” only serves to restrict freedom, increase the cost of electricity and the price of cars and serve as an alibi to raise taxes once again.
However, this COP25 has served several purposes. Firstly, the selection of extreme left-wing speakers and the image of activists with their fists up (the international Communist symbol) has made it clear to many unsuspecting people that the issue of climate change is more about politics than science, and that climate activism and the radical left share many followers, lots of ideology and all its tactics, such as the abuse of deception and the persecution of dissidents. Secondly, the exaggerations and fallacies of an obsessive media coverage have once again revealed how obedient the media are to the climate change agenda and how unreliable they are in presenting hard data with objectivity in this matter, with some brilliant exceptions. Thirdly, the assertions of Socialist PM Sanchez, whose (truly extreme) track record leads to the assumption that he lies by default, give us a clear indication that it is not true that only “a handful of fanatics” (as he literally said) question the mantra of anthropogenic climate change.
Neither the Nobel Prize in Physics Ivar Giaever, who calls climate change “pseudoscience” and thinks that “it has become a religion”, nor Dr. Kiminori Itoh, of Yokohama University, who claims that we are dealing with “the worst scientific scandal in history”, seem to be fanatics. Neither the Nobel Prize in Physics Robert Laughlin, who calls us to “please remain calm” because “we don’t have the power to control the climate,” nor are the 300 scientists who supported Professor Lindzen (PhD in Physics and Applied Mathematics from Harvard, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at MIT for thirty years and lead author of Chapter 7 of the IPCC’s Third Report) in questioning the scientific basis of the theory of anthropogenic climate change and criticizing the damaging policies proposed to “reverse” it, nor are fanatics the 83 Italian scientists who this summer signed a petition to their government stating that “alarmist predictions are not credible (…) and it is scientifically unrealistic to attribute to man the responsibility for warming”. No doubt, there is fanaticism and hysteria, but not precisely in the skeptics’ side, who do not use children and teenagers.
In a recent international survey (Yougov, 2019), and despite the persistent, intimidating, invasive and grotesque media propaganda, the proportion of the population who think that man is mainly responsible for climate changes is only 35% in Norway or Sweden, 38% in the USA, 40% in Denmark, and 49% in France and Germany. In Spain, a paradise for the gullible (or the uninformed), this percentage rises to 69%, only surpassed by Thailand and India. Asked if climate change will have a great impact on their lives, only 11% of the population of the Nordic countries, 16% of Germans and 24% of Americans think so.
Is there diversity of opinion among scientists? Of course. Contrary to the slogan, it is untrue that there is a “consensus” or that science is settled. Despite enormous pressure not to dissent publicly, a survey by the American Meteorological Society published in 2014 showed that only 52% of its members believed that man was primarily responsible for global warming, while 28% answered that there was still not enough evidence and the rest believed that natural causes had a significant or majority influence. This survey also showed that skeptical scientists were much less likely to see their work published. In 2016, with more biased questions, 29% believed that 80% or more of climate change was anthropic (the use of precise percentages in the questions is laughable), 38% between 60% and 80%, and 33% of respondents were divided between those who believed that the causes were natural or that both factors influenced equally.
Faithful to a political agenda that wants to force pensée unique, climate change activists try to silence the debate to make believe that “everyone thinks the same except you”, an old manipulative tactic that exploits man’s fear of loneliness and ostracism, discovered as an efficient coercive tool in Ancient Greece. This is what the slogan of “consensus” is all about, a concept which belongs to politics and forgets that science has never advanced by vote, but by an often lonely scientist deciding to question the status quo and challenging a generalized belief in his time. For this reason, the famous Nobel Prize in Physics Richard Feynman said that science implied believing “in the ignorance of experts”.
With many people saturated by the catastrophic litany of climate hysteria, it is becoming increasingly evident that climate change is an ideology, a political project hostile to freedom, to economic progress and to man himself, a Trojan horse that wants to impose a syncretic world religion with which to control us through fear and guilt. Its massive use of deception is mind-blowing: as I will repeat over and over again, it is false that hurricanes, droughts of floods have increased; it is false that there is a problem of deforestation on Earth, and it is false that the seas are going to engulf us, because at the current rate it would take between 350 and 700 years for sea levels to rise one single meter. To believe that a slight warming – which is being less than +0.15°C per decade – is going to have apocalyptic consequences is a speculation not sustained by logic or empirical evidence, and to believe that we can forecast and control the planet’s climate within a century when we cannot predict next week’s local weather is as ridiculous as it is arrogant.
By the way, I bet you haven’t read that, according to data from the Spanish Meteorological Agency, 2018 was less hot in Spain than 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2011, 2009, 2006, 2003, 1997, 1995, 1994 and 1989. Hopefully this winter will not be too cold, because cold causes 17 times more deaths than heat worldwide (Guo et al, The Lancet 2015). Cold is certainly much more frightening. Oh, they didn’t tell you about this, either?
Fernando del Pino Calvo-Sotelo
www.fpcs.es