2021 Annual GWPF Lecture | Steven E Koonin | Unsettled

Professor Steven E. Koonin, New York University, and former Under Secretary for Science in the US Department of Energy, gives the 2021 Annual GWPF lecture on 'Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters'.

London, Tuesday 16th November

[remkojerphanion]

Excellent presentation! I'm wondering.... How many (mainstream) journalists attended? How many policy makers? How many politicians? How many "green" activists?

[bevanthistlethwaite]

Steven - if there is one criticism that can be levelled at the Climate Sceptic community is that there is too great a willingness to engage in an endless debate about the science when it is plain to see that the climate crisis is politically and more importantly economically motivated by the political and moneyed classes in order to obtain an increasing stake in the public and private purse. You shouldn't need to have to don a deerstalker hat in order to understand the need to "follow the money" is paramount to solving the political problem and hence the climate debate. Bearing in mind that there may be a Moriarty or two at the end of the trail, a deerstalker needs to be well prepared for what he might find and what countermeasures may be necessary. I believe that most intelligent and well-informed people understand that this is indeed the much bigger problem, and really don't know how to deal with it. It's just much easier to keep talking, and that's what everyone seems much more comfortable doing.

[drzman]

I would have liked to have heard the Q&A. There must have been some interesting questions.

[thegeneralist]

Democracy requires freedom of choice, equality of opportunity, and the rule of just law. Simple as that.
“There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.” ― Ayn Rand
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ― JFK

[bsmith]

Not one prediction in the last 40 years has ever come about, and of course everyone's forgotton about them or they get updated every ten years because they havent come true

[deborahgallo]

Would love to hear his thought about the UK and Europe especially Germany from February 2022 the Ukraine issue- until 30 November 2022 regarding power supplies, as they enter their winter. Many thanks for presenting this on this platform. A very knowledgeable and nice man.

[throwaway]

10:40 The only thing he said with which I really take It's not a long game of telephone. At this point I don't see how any reasonable, prudent person could believe it's anything beyond deliberate misinformation.

[johnm]

Even the most ignorant of people must see that he's a real expert in the field and makes a lot of intelligent comments. (Determining the real experts from the self-proclaimed "experts" is a huge problem because the media seems to believe anything that a press release says about the level of expertise of the person or people being quoted.)

[whiteheatherclub]

Just to clarify. Tyndale was not burned for translating the Bible. As for progress over 500 years, yes, people who contradict the conventional wisdom (or whatever term you want to use) are not strangled or executed in any other way. At least not in the USA or the UK. But consider the current treatment of people who contradict the "elite" view on whether or not a man can become a woman. For people in the UK, consider the treatment of J. K. Rowling. Or, probably less well-known, consider the treatment of Kathleen Stock, a professor at Sussex University. Or consider the treatment of people who have refused to bake cakes to celebrate homosexual "weddings". Or consider the treatment of Carolyn Farrow, who has been harassed by a transgender activist and had a gang of police arriving at her house to arrest her. Or the people that lose their jobs because they express the view that a marriage can only be between a man and a woman. Progress?

[philodonoghue]

Tyndall is an excellent example of popularising dense text - not least because it occurred to me as he mentioned searching for a historical analogy

[aarondyer.pianist]

At 22:26, Koonin shows a chart of "Daily Records per Station." I'm not sure I understand it. At first, I thought it was record highs for the station for that date. I'm not sure how to interpret it that way since if you keep having record highs it might depend on what the high was.

[philodonoghue]

Modellers are fortune tellers with PhDs

[ericksonjustinAK]

Has anybody ever found a debate between climate scientists anywhere? I'd love to watch it.

[ShanonT]

I would argue that the climate crisis started back in the 70s and 80s, and not with the IPCC reports. The narrative was decided, and slowly the plan they hatched was executed.

[michaelaregenfuss]

According to the climate scientist Peter Taylor who wrote a book called Chill the earth is just going through natural cyclical cycles.

[genenovak]

Can you comment on the islands in the South Pacific and other areas that seem to be going under water?

[stefan]

Bravo, Professor Koonin! And read the book, folks - it's excellent.

[rod-contracts]

Outstanding on the actual data, and the practicable courses of action that should be taken (not the alarmist shut our civilisation down nonsense).

[kimlibera]

This is in my field. I do believe the debate is more about politics & control by use of fear. It is no different than GWB's use of yellow cake & WMD to launch the Iraq War. My training indicates that it is not some little man behind the curtain that controls something like climate. Indeed the thermodynamics is complex. Natural hazards are determined by the physics, chemistry, biology, geology, ecology, oceans, soils response to processes like forces, energies, thermos, gibbs free energy. Mankind's input is there but is small in comparison to the world at large. Climate is natural. Policies as stated reflect values so to speak but whose? It appears that politicians just want to control people & don't tolerate rejection. Politicians use fear-that is classical poli sci. They act like they are the sole authors of omnipotence. If they were then Hurricane Ian would have never got off the ground. There are some innovative strategies to control carbon which won't shrink the supply side of fossils or create havoc in people's lives. The theme of the politicians in this age is create chaos & then come in like superman to persuade the people they can fix if they say Simon says. Instead it creates more chaos & the goal is the realization by the lawmakers oh we must take over the entire sector of science. I'd like to know Steve, what you think of Salby's, Happer's, Dyson's, Lindzens, Christy & Spencer's work. I am persuaded by their revelations on the complex physics of the atmosphere.

[mcconn]

I write letters to the editor of my newspaper. I am a big fan of Lomborg and Koonin. One problem I have is that they reference something from the IPCC report. I go to that report and find it is many pages long. I looked probably an hour and still did not fine the reference in writing. It would make them more believable if they reference the page in the report so we can confirm it. I sent an email to Lomborg asking for a more detailed reference and did not get a response. They can do better.