There was talk that the much maligned (but heavily trafficked) Huffington Post gained some journalistic cred after it snagged a Pulitzer Prize this year. We should keep in mind what makes the Huffpo engine run. As the LA Time’s Tim Rutten wrote: The bulk of the site’s content is provided by commentators, who work for…Continue Reading…
UPDATE: 5/7: Climatewire reports that Heartland “faces a mutiny” from donors and its Washington staff over the Institute’s billboard campaign, which it abruptly cancelled one day after it was unveiled. The billboards triggered massive outrage and scorn from across the political spectrum. [UPDATE: 5/5: Widespread condemnation of the Heartland billboard campaign (including from Republican politicians and well-known climate science critics) prompted…Continue Reading…
I know the environmental movement will have truly matured when the leader of a big mainstream green group can say something like this: We won’t meet the carbon targets if nuclear [power] is taken off the table. That’s from Jeff Sachs, director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute. Here’s the opening to the Guardian story: Combating climate…Continue Reading…
Is there an example from human history of a culture taking action with the intended beneficiaries being two or more generations downstream, when there’s no benefit or maybe even sacrifice to the current generation? I haven’t been able to come up with one, and I suspect we’re just not genetically programmed to worry about two…Continue Reading…
When an institution remains wedded to a bygone era and unresponsive to change, It becomes irrelevant to people’s lives. Like the Catholic church. Many Catholics in the West don’t take the church’s anachronistic doctrine to heart. If they did, 98 percent of Catholic women wouldn’t be using birth control. Now when people criticize the Catholic church,…Continue Reading…
And you thought some of the rabid in the climate concerned community had it in for Roger Pielke, Jr. Check out the threat Roger apparently poses to climate skeptics over in this Bishop Hill thread. Fortunately, there is a voice of sanity among the rabble. Ben Pile at first tries to reason with the fire-breathers, who…Continue Reading…
I recently wrote that environmentalism was fading fast as a meaningful movement, and argued that only green modernists could resurrect it. The piece got bounced around a lot on twitter and elicited both praise and barbs. Discover magazine asked if I would do my promised follow-up for them. Here’s a teaser from the opening: If…Continue Reading…
As some might recall, the climate science community split into several camps in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. I think similar fault lines are emerging in the global warming/severe weather debate. In my latest post at the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media, I discuss this in the context of a popular new frame,…Continue Reading…
It’s a testament to James Lovelock’s standing in the science world that one phone conversation can trigger a media tidal wave. In case you’re just tuning in to the news, Lovelock has rejected his own prophecy on global warming, which he previously believed would soon kill off most of humanity and “leave the few survivors living a…Continue Reading…
One of the main points I was making in this recent post is that the shelf life of green catastrophism has expired. But environmentalists don’t want to hear this. Many have responded indignantly to the contrast I set up between what I call green traditionalists and green modernists. In the coming week, I’ll respond in…Continue Reading…