Climate Change Predictions

[Bret Ripley]

Experts in every field make predictions, and inevitably some of them don't pan out. So what?

If most or all predictions made by experts in a given field prove to be wrong, that could point to problems with methodology or the data (for example), but when singling out any given data point (in this instance, incorrect predictions) it is vital to consider to what degree the data point is representative of the set as a whole, or to what degree it is an outlier. Does the video make a case that incorrect predictions are somehow relevant to the issue as a whole? If it did, it might be worth watching.

I only made it about a third of the way through the video, by which point it was obvious the presenter is only interested in pulling my leg. Remarkably, he doesn't seem to have engaged with any actual predictions: rather, he cites old articles that quote someone-or-other as saying a certain thing may possibly happen, and then calls it a prediction. This guy isn't serious, is he?

Does it get better (or at least relevant), or is the whole video made up of this sort of fluff? Cuz I kind of want my 7 minutes back.

[honorentheos]

The entire video follows that format, citing news articles or a tweet from Greta Thumburg and then saying that's funny because that prediction (i.e.headline) had to be wrong since it snowed since then, there are glaciers in Glacier National Park, and humans are still around before closing with a return to the socalled doomsday clock.

[ceeboo]

if you pick one of the reports from the OP of your choice I'll discuss it with you in detail. But you have to commit to a discussion. Not, "very interesting thanks for posting", but an exchange of data and the synthesis of the other person's points within the response.

Fair?

Why is this so hard to understand? Either I am not being clear or something else is at play here.

I will try to be extra super duper clear!

I am not interested in having a deep discussion about any of the articles in the OP - As I mentioned in my OP, much of this is way over my head. My entire reason for posting the OP link was because of the long history of climate experts who made predictions that did not come to pass. There was no other reason - There was no hidden motive. The reason was to consider the past predictions and seek the thought of board members about the past written articles concerning past climate expert predictions that are found in the linked video. Up to this point in the thread, I have had a lot of imagined accusations about my views - A few rants about the guy who posted the video - a few posts debating me about things I never took a position on - and a few accusations about me being a denier and my political views.

In addition, when I consider things like this, I think about how many people actually know a great deal about the subject. I would suggest that the great majority of people do not have a climate science background and that they don't have a deep understanding of this very complex issue. What I am saying is that I believe I am in the great majority regarding this.

So, what does that actually mean: I would suggest that most people get their information (as limited as it surely is) by looking to the experts - They are reading these articles, from various sources, written by the experts (like all of the ones in the OP), and absolutely believing them to be gospel truth - And parroting them (I am old enough to tell you that I have heard people parrot these catastrophic predictions that were supposed to happen decades ago).

Given how many predictions that were made and ended up being drastically wrong, why wouldn't the average person be a bit skeptical about the entire subject - at least about current predictions and/or future predictions? I would think that folks might be a little hesitant to so easily cast the label of "denier" upon someone who, in my opinion, is standing on very firm ground to be skeptical - But, as this thread proves, I would be wrong.

[honorentheos]

Ceeboo, the YouTube video is political in nature, and uses a format intended to foster skepticism. You don't have to be literate about the state of the science to be a savvy media consumer.

Seriously, pick one point made in the video and commit to an actual discussion. I'll take the time I'm otherwise reluctant to commit which would be wasted time, in my opinion, without your commitment to engage.

The presentation isn't demonstrating climate science is frequently bad at making predictions. But it wants you to come away from watching it with that impression. It succeeded in your case.

[ceeboo]

I only made it about a third of the way through the video, by which point it was obvious the presenter is only interested in pulling my leg. Remarkably, he doesn't seem to have engaged with any actual predictions: rather, he cites old articles that quote someone-or-other as saying a certain thing may possibly happen, and then calls it a prediction. This guy isn't serious, is he?

Whether this guy is serious or not is to miss the point entirely, in my opinion. The point is whether any of the climate experts, who made these catastrophic predictions, were serious. For example, the 2018 Forbes article (that I already posted in this thread in its entirety) where James Anderson, a Harvard University professor of atmospheric chemistry said the following:

"The chance that there will be any permanent ice left in the Arctic after 2022 is essentially zero," Anderson said, with 75 to 80 percent of permanent ice having melted already in the last 35 years."

Does it get better (or at least relevant), or is the whole video made up of this sort of fluff? Cuz I kind of want my 7 minutes back.

I guess that depends of what you consider relevant and/or what you consider fluff. Either way, I can't get your 7 minutes back - If I could, I would. for what it's worth, I wish I could the time I have spent in this thread back too.

[Gadianton]

Do you think a little skepticism is healthy and/or valid?

First of all, it might be worth reminding you that most of the "libertard" sheep-minded people who shock you with their herd mentality on this board grew up in your (conservative) world. We all come from conservative Mormon upbringings. Many of us graduated from that conservative college in Provo. It's not like we haven't seen how the other half lives. I will give you a great example of a time when I should have expressed some skepticism.

Just after mission in the 90s, I found myself in the grand state of Arizona that has become a subject of this thread. I was visiting. I can't even remember why. But while I was there, I met with a friend, and I spent the morning attending a lecture for his Chemistry class. Why? We were conservativism buddies. He told me I had to see his crazy teacher in action who was the anathema of liberalism. I was not a cultural conservative the way he was, I was a conspiracy theory conservative who didn't care or even really understand politics. He was, in fact, a person of very high integrity. Also, I was a nobody; he was a somebody, and as an adult has been a public figure and is extremely well connected in right-wing politics.

So here I am, Ceeboo, a born-and-raised conservative Mormon, who read a ton of right-wing conspiracy literature, sitting in a class with my buddy from a prominent conservative family who ended up with a future in in the Republican party, and I'm there to listen to his audacious professor poke fun at liberals. And he delivered. The professor was one of these rebel guys with long hair and an attitude. He managed to turn the lecture political. He dismissed global warming because chlorofluorocarbons are heavier than air. You can spray hair spray all day and the cfcs will just fall to the ground as its physically impossible for them to get into the upper atmosphere. We all had a good laugh. Liberals making a lot of ado about absolutely nothing. Made sense to me.

Climate science is a complex subject. I don't participate very often because I don't know that much about it. How much do you know about it? If a person doesn't actually know anything about a subject, does it make much sense to talk about healthy skepticism?

My favorite science guy on YouTube is Sabine Hossenfelder. Here is Sabine explaining how she just recently came to understand the basics of the greenhouse effect. If Sabine misunderstood it her entire life until now, there's no need to feel ashamed. However, I suggest before demanding others to be skeptical of a science, that you first try to obtain a basic understanding of the science itself that we're supposed to be skeptical about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqu5DjzOBF8

[honorentheos]

I only made it about a third of the way through the video, by which point it was obvious the presenter is only interested in pulling my leg. Remarkably, he doesn't seem to have engaged with any actual predictions: rather, he cites old articles that quote someone-or-other as saying a certain thing may possibly happen, and then calls it a prediction. This guy isn't serious, is he?

Whether this guy is serious or not is to miss the point entirely, in my opinion. The point is whether any of the climate experts, who made these catastrophic predictions, were serious.

This only stands if the video is reliable which you assume because you bought into a premise without question: It is presenting facts accurately.

Now canpakes took time to show you how one of those news reports was not the cut and dry example of a failed prediction your source claims, nor does a news article rise to the level of rigor and nuance a scientific publication would aspire to.

Start with the very first topic in the video: the climate clock.

https://climateclock.world/

So, how comfortable do you feel in being able to explain to someone what the numbers on the clock represent having watched your video from the OP?

[canpakes]

if you pick one of the reports from the OP of your choice I'll discuss it with you in detail. But you have to commit to a discussion. Not, "very interesting thanks for posting", but an exchange of data and the synthesis of the other person's points within the response.

Fair?

Why is this so hard to understand? Either I am not being clear or something else is at play here.

I will try to be extra super duper clear!

I am not interested in having a deep discussion about any of the articles in the OP - As I mentioned in my OP, much of this is way over my head. My entire reason for posting the OP link was because of the long history of climate experts who made predictions that did not come to pass. There was no other reason - There was no hidden motive. The reason was to consider the past predictions and seek the thought of board members about the past written articles concerning past climate expert predictions that are found in the linked video. Up to this point in the thread, I have had a lot of imagined accusations about my views - A few rants about the guy who posted the video - a few posts debating me about things I never took a position on - and a few accusations about me being a denier and my political views.

In addition, when I consider things like this, I think about how many people actually know a great deal about the subject. I would suggest that the great majority of people do not have a climate science background and that they don't have a deep understanding of this very complex issue. What I am saying is that I believe I am in the great majority regarding this.

So, what does that actually mean: I would suggest that most people get their information (as limited as it surely is) by looking to the experts - They are reading these articles, from various sources, written by the experts (like all of the ones in the OP), and absolutely believing them to be gospel truth - And parroting them (I am old enough to tell you that I have heard people parrot these catastrophic predictions that were supposed to happen decades ago).

Given how many predictions that were made and ended up being drastically wrong, why wouldn't the average person be a bit skeptical about the entire subject - at least about current predictions and/or future predictions? I would think that folks might be a little hesitant to so easily cast the label of "denier" upon someone who, in my opinion, is standing on very firm ground to be skeptical - But, as this thread proves, I would be wrong.

To lead this discussion on skepticism, you posted a video which immediately starts off by presenting three falsehoods about the ‘debate’.

You followed that up by posting an article that was missing important context.

You accepted at face value what was presented to you. You did not do any due diligence to determine if you were being handed a line of BS or not. Then you posted that content to this board, asking the audience if they should be ‘skeptical’ … of something.

Yes. We should be skeptical of your sources and your claims. You haven’t done your homework, and won’t do your homework, preferring instead to insinuate that the folks who have done some homework - and who’ve learned to recognize politicized content and cult thinking when they see it - are somehow not opening their eyes to inquiry.

The best use of skepticism here would be your own, applied to assumptions you’ve made about phenomena that you won’t investigate.

[ceeboo]

The entire video follows that format, citing news articles or a tweet from Greta Thumburg and then saying that's funny because that prediction (i.e.headline) had to be wrong since it snowed since then, there are glaciers in Glacier National Park, and humans are still around before closing with a return to the socalled doomsday clock.

Not exactly.

The video shows Greta's tweet that she posted in 2018 which said - "Top climate scientist is warning that climate change will wipe out all of humanity unless we stop using fossil fuels over the next five years." She was sharing a headline that read "Top climate scientist: Humans will go extinct if we don't fix climate change by 2023." - And there was no suggestion of it being funny - The suggestion was that Greta deleted that tweet early this year (Which was 2023 at the time of deletion)

[honorentheos]

The entire video follows that format, citing news articles or a tweet from Greta Thumburg and then saying that's funny because that prediction (i.e.headline) had to be wrong since it snowed since then, there are glaciers in Glacier National Park, and humans are still around before closing with a return to the socalled doomsday clock.

Not exactly.

The video shows Greta's tweet that she posted in 2018 which said - "Top climate scientist is warning that climate change will wipe out all of humanity unless we stop using fossil fuels over the next five years." She was sharing a headline that read "Top climate scientist: Humans will go extinct if we don't fix climate change by 2023." - And there was no suggestion of it being funny - The suggestion was that Greta deleted that tweet early this year (Which was 2023 at the time of deletion)

And? What do you personally do with this kind of media presentation and how do you go about engaging it before choosing to share it?