In his letter to the EU Commission President, Sir Jim Ratcliffe wrote this piece (my bold)
" I have an intense interest in preserving the environment. I see wildlife being slaughtered in Africa, forests burning all over the world, fish stocks being decimated and I fully believe that we must arrest global warming."
He had no need to put this in, but he must have felt that it helped to burnish his environmental credibility. It seems to be simply a throwaway remark. No mention of how we might achieve this. Note that his letter, quite rightly, dismisses green taxes as completely counter-productive.
Unfortunately Sir Jim is not alone in paying lip-service to the idea of preventing global warming without telling us any idea he has of doing it. In fact I cannot name a single senior executive in a major company who has opposed the idea that combatting global warming is vital.
I am sure that, privately, many of them do share doubts, but dare not express them. There is definitely a culture of fear of expressing any doubts, let alone opposition, to the current hypothesis. Are there any actors, singers, celebrities who have expressed such thoughts? If any readers know of any please let me know their names.
Of course it has been said many times that science does not work by consensus, but what is being played out here is not simply science, but politics. Interestingly there are a few politicians that have been prepared to speak their minds. Some are still serving, such as David TC Davis. However they are rare and of those in high office as far as I know there is only Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, the new president of Brazil.
In fact there is nothing to fear from articulating the case for climate scepticism. President Trump did so before winning the presidency. David TC Davis has been re-elected after making his views very clear. The silent majority of the public may also share those sceptic views, or at least they are not bothered by them.
" I have an intense interest in preserving the environment. I see wildlife being slaughtered in Africa, forests burning all over the world, fish stocks being decimated and I fully believe that we must arrest global warming."
He had no need to put this in, but he must have felt that it helped to burnish his environmental credibility. It seems to be simply a throwaway remark. No mention of how we might achieve this. Note that his letter, quite rightly, dismisses green taxes as completely counter-productive.
Unfortunately Sir Jim is not alone in paying lip-service to the idea of preventing global warming without telling us any idea he has of doing it. In fact I cannot name a single senior executive in a major company who has opposed the idea that combatting global warming is vital.
I am sure that, privately, many of them do share doubts, but dare not express them. There is definitely a culture of fear of expressing any doubts, let alone opposition, to the current hypothesis. Are there any actors, singers, celebrities who have expressed such thoughts? If any readers know of any please let me know their names.
Of course it has been said many times that science does not work by consensus, but what is being played out here is not simply science, but politics. Interestingly there are a few politicians that have been prepared to speak their minds. Some are still serving, such as David TC Davis. However they are rare and of those in high office as far as I know there is only Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, the new president of Brazil.
In fact there is nothing to fear from articulating the case for climate scepticism. President Trump did so before winning the presidency. David TC Davis has been re-elected after making his views very clear. The silent majority of the public may also share those sceptic views, or at least they are not bothered by them.
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