The Daily Sceptic – by Chris Morrison
Scientists continue to flock to sign the World Climate Declaration that states there is no climate emergency. Over 200 people have signed the World Climate Declaration (WCD) over the last few weeks, including 20 university professors. A number of the professors and other academics signing the declaration are experts in pure science fields such as chemistry and physics. Over 300 scientists and professionals have signed the WCD since August 18th, when the Daily Sceptic highlighted the project and interest soared across social media. The total signatories, led by the Norwegian physics Nobel Prize winner Professor Ivar Giaever, now number over 1,400.
It would not be an exaggeration to note that the recent publicity given to the WCD has struck terror into the ranks of the established and largely pseudoscientific climate community, whose gravy train of ‘settled’ science is fuelled by almost unlimited amounts of money and provides the political narrative for the command-and-control Net Zero agenda. Fact checks and social media personal attacks have been launched, but the scale of scientific scepticism is becoming increasingly difficult to deny. Nearly 300 professors alone have now signed the declaration.
The WCD states that climate science has degenerated into a discussion based on beliefs, not on sound self-critical science. It continues: “We should free ourselves from the naïve belief in immature climate models. In future, climate research must give significantly more emphasis to empirical science.” Climate models are said to have many shortcomings, “and are not remotely plausible as global policy tools”. They are said to exaggerate or “blow up” the effect of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and “ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial”. There is no statistical evidence that global warming is intensifying natural disasters and there is no climate emergency. Therefore, notes the WCD, there is no cause for panic and alarm.
The latest signatories to these statements include many distinguished scientists and academics:
- Yonatan Dubi, Professor of Theoretical Physics and Chemistry at Ben-Gurion University. Professor Dubi’s recent work includes a paper on “Photothermal nonlinearity plasmon-assisted photocatalysis”. He is the co-founder of the Israeli Forum for Rational Environmentalism.
- A. E. (Ted) Dixon, Emeritus Professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Waterloo in Ontario. Dr. Dixon’s research career has focused on the development and commercial application of scanning laser-imaging technology.
- Eric Verrecchia, Professor at the University of Lausanne, Chair of Biogeochemistry at the Institute of Earth Surface Dynamics, noted to be an expert in the terrestrial carbon cycle of the tropical and temperate zones.
- Majed Chergui, Emeritus Professor of Chemistry and Physics, is a multi-award winning pioneering authority on the use and application of ultrafast X-ray spectroscopy. He has served on a number of Swiss and international committees, and is the founding Editor-in-Chief of Structural Dynamics, published by the American Institute of Physics.
- Jozinus Ploeg is the retired Vice-President of Engineering and Technology at the National Research Council in Canada. His field of expertise is said to be the transfer of energy from the atmosphere to the surface of the ocean and wave mechanics.
- Alain Preat, PhD geology, Emeritus Professor at the University of Brussels.
- Paul Goddard, retired Professor of Radiology at the University of West England.
- Olav Martin Kvalheim, Emeritus Professor, Chemistry, Bergen University.
- Jan de Jager, Emeritus Professor of Geology, University of Amsterdam.
- Gleb Evgenev, Environment Professor, Moscow State Technical University.
- Duncan Veasey, a Canadian psychiatrist with a particular interest in mass hysteria, authoritarianism and social compliance.
- Anthony Janio, former U.K. Conservative leader on Brighton and Hove Council. Now Independent. PhD Physics.
As I have noted before, critics of the list point to a lack of what they term ‘climate scientists’. This term is a fairly recent invention. An understanding of the complexities of climate and atmosphere requires input from many individual science and observational disciplines. All of these disciplines are represented in the WCD list.
Having declared the actual science ‘settled’, most work that travels under the term climate science is actually concerned with putative impacts and geographical observations. Most conclusions and forecasts are produced by models attempting the impossible in trying to predict the complexities of the non-linear atmosphere. Few, if any, predictions are ever proved correct, notably over temperature. Most catastrophic narratives remain figments of overactive imaginations. There is a tendency for those involved in such work to call themselves ‘climate scientists’, suggestive of a closed priesthood that disqualifies all non-believers. The latest hocus-pocus is the attempt to ‘attribute’ single bad weather events to long-term changes in the climate.
Ahead of COP27, this overactive imagination has been in full flow. The Guardian informs us that the world is close to “irreversible” climate breakdown. One of the world “leading climate scientists” tells us that the climate has reached a “really bleak moment”. Collective action is needed to avoid “tipping points”, and, needless to say, time is running out “very, very fast”.
Routine stuff, of course, ahead of a COP, and this time it is supplied by Professor Johan Rockstrom, a Professor of Earth System Science and a Director of the green activist Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. He claimed the collapse of the Greenland ice cap may have already past a so-called tipping point, although recent news from that area suggests the ice sheet might have increased in size of late. Even on the basis of pessimistic annual modelling to August 2022, the melting of the 2.85 quadrillion tonnes may take around 100,000 years to complete.
Professor Rockstrom’s earlier education was supplied by two agricultural colleges. His PhD from Stockholm University was on “Systems Ecology and Natural Resource Management”. All fine stuff, but it is a bit of an ask to take his word, and those of thousands of other climate activists, that the climate is breaking down due to complex scientific interactions. Some might think that such interactions are understood in greater detail by pure science specialists such as chemists and physicists.