Debating Climate Science: Uncovering the Truth Behind William Happer and the “More CO2 is Better” Claim

Please also see this post as published on Medium.

If you follow news about climate science and politics, you’ve probably heard of William Happer, who is one of the forces behind the Trump Administrations plans to go forward with a panel to “investigate” whether global warming really poses the threats claimed by most scientists; he may also lead the proposed panel. Happer’s views are perhaps best summarized by this quote from an op-ed that he co-authored:¹

“Contrary to what some would have us believe, increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will benefit the increasing population on the planet by increasing agricultural productivity.” — William Happer, Wall Street Journal, 8 May 2013

You might wonder where a view like this comes from, and as it turns out, I recently had the opportunity to gain some insight into the truth behind the “more CO2 is better” claim. This came about because I engaged in a formal debate (hosted by The Soho Forum in New York City) against a guy by the name of Craig Idso, who shares Happer’s views. Indeed, in researching both individuals, I found virtually no daylight between any of their claims. Moreover, it appears likely that two Idso-led groups — the “NIPCC” and the “Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change” (more on those organizations below) — provide the source material behind many or most of Happer’s statements.

Given the potential prominence of the proposed Happer-led panel, I’ve decided to share my insights from the debate in this post. I hope that people of all political persuasions will find these insights enlightening.

An Extremist Position

The live debate didn’t go as well as I had hoped overall (see Postscript 1 below), but we had one exchange that I think is crucial to understanding how truly extreme the views of Idso and Happer are. This exchange came at the point where we were each given the opportunity to ask the other a question. Here’s the question I posed to Mr. Idso (around 43:25 in the debate video):

Suppose that someone were to invent a technology that we could attach to our cars and our power plants that would capture all the carbon dioxide emissions before they get into the air, and it could be installed with essentially no cost, so we could keep living exactly as we are but with no more greenhouse gas going into the atmosphere. Would you be for or against using this technology?

Idso’s somewhat long-winded answer was that he would be against it, going so far as to claim that the “benefits of increasing [atmospheric] carbon dioxide go beyond 2000 ppm.” For context, the current atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide is about 415 ppm, and the pre-industrial level was about 280 ppm, so he is saying he is in favor of raising the carbon dioxide level to many times its pre-industrial level, even if we could avoid doing so at no cost and with no change in our economy or life styles.
This would seem to be an extremist position even if the risks were completely unknown, but in fact the risks are well understood.²

That is why the vast majority of scientists who study the climate believe that continued carbon dioxide emissions pose a serious threat to the future of our civilization. In case you are wondering what “vast majority” means: The commonly cited number is 97% of climate scientists, a percentage consistent with what has been found by multiple, carefully-conducted surveys (see Cook et al, 2016). In fact, this is likely an underestimate of the actual level of scientific consensus on the issue, as a recent literature survey (Powell 2016) found that “the peer-reviewed literature from 1991 to 2015 combine to 54,195 articles with an average consensus of 99.94%.”

To summarize this point, Happer and Idso are advocating for continued release of greenhouse gases even if we have the technology to stop it at no cost, and they are saying this despite the fact that the climate science community is near-unanimous in believing that continued greenhouse emissions pose a great risk to our future. They are, in essence, claiming that all these thousands of climate scientists are wrong, and they alone are right.

The “Greening of the Earth”

This brings us to the question of how Happer and Idso can support such an extreme belief, and their argument basically boils down this: They claim that higher carbon dioxide concentrations will enhance plant growth and therefore enhance agriculture and allow us to grow more food for a growing global population.

There’s a kernel of truth lying beneath this claim, as data show that a “greening of the Earth” has indeed been underway over the past few decades.³ But as I noted in the debate, that doesn’t automatically mean that this greening is beneficial. After all, if I told you that you’ve been gaining a lot more cells in your brain, it might mean you are learning a lot more, but it could also mean you have brain cancer.

Moreover, in the process of preparing for the debate, I spent some time investigating the research that Happer, Idso, and their colleagues cite to support their claim of benefits from increased carbon dioxide. Here’s what I found: The vast majority, and possibly all, of the research that Happer and Idso cite as supporting their beliefs does not actually do so. In other words, the actual research is more consistent with the greening being akin to symptoms of a cancer than of being something that might benefit us.

False Claims in the “NIPCC” Report

Let’s start with what may, unfortunately, be the most widely distributed publication about climate research in the world: a report that was mailed to tens of thousands of school teachers by an organization that calls themselves the “NIPCC.” Mr. Idso is a lead author of this report.

Figure 1. A page from the NIPCC report that was sent to tens of thousands of school teachers and policy makers, on which I’ve highlighted a key sentence that supposedly documents benefits from a rising carbon dioxide concentration. But as shown to the right, none of the three cited studies actually support this claim.

Figure 1 shows a page from the NIPCC Summary for Policy Makers. Look at the sentence I’ve highlighted that claims we are seeing “a remarkable and beneficial greening of the Earth,” and notice that the sentence cites three studies that supposedly support this claim. But they don’t. You can easily look up these studies for yourself (as I did), and you’ll find:

• The first study was sponsored by NASA, and you need look no farther than the NASA press release to learn that the study actually concludes that any benefits of the greening will be overwhelmed by other detrimental effects of climate change.
• For the second study: After learning that their work was being cited to claim benefits from rising carbon dioxide, the authors published a rebuttal in which they wrote: “They referenced our scientific study, but distorted the facts. … the benefits of CO2 are small, [while] the impacts of CO2 to climate are daunting [and] will be felt by all forms of life on this planet, including humans.”
• And for the third study, the opening paragraph (the abstract) states clearly that: “Some vegetation would benefit … however, most would suffer and experience irreversible changes.”⁴

This type of deception is indicative of what you’ll find in the rest of the report. I won’t go into details here, but if you want to read more, I recommend starting with this open letter written by a high school teacher named Brandie Freeman.

It’s also worth a brief note about the “NIPCC” itself. First and most obviously, the name seems clearly chosen to sow confusion between it and the IPCC, the international organization charged with summarizing the state of climate science. But the two groups could hardly be more different.

The IPCC involves thousands of people, including hundreds of active researchers in climate science, all working in a completely open and transparent way. In contrast, the NIPCC keeps many of its major funding sources hidden, and the NIPCC author list shows only a little more than 100 contributors in total. Moreover, I took a bit of time to look up the backgrounds of those contributors, and here’s what I found:

• Only 37 of the NIPCC contributors have any kind of scientific credential at all.
• Only 15 of these have ever engaged in anything that might conceivably be considered original research related to climate.
• 11 of those 15 are retired.
• And in searching the publication lists of the remaining 4 (which include Mr. Idso), I could find no evidence of any publications representing original climate research in at least the past decade, though they have written numerous articles claiming that everyone else is wrong.

In other words, the NIPCC is nothing more than a small group of people who do no actual science for themselves, but love to criticize those who do.

The “CO2 Science” Web Site

Because I was debating Mr. Idso, I focused much of my preparation on the “CO2science.org” web site that he maintains. It didn’t take long to find many more deceptions.

Figure 2. Three screen captures from the web site “CO2science.org.”

Let’s start with the two videos that are featured on the site’s home page (Figure 2, top):

• The first video extolls the supposed benefits of a rising carbon dioxide concentration, but beyond lots of talking, it cites only two studies to support its claims. One is a real scientific study that, like the examples from the NIPCC above, is clearly taken out of context. The other is Mr. Idso’s own set of economic claims — yet the video, which he narrates, never mentions that he is citing himself. That would not be considered acceptable in a high school term paper, let alone in something that purports to be science.
• The second video shows two plants growing in the laboratory, and expects us to be impressed by the fact that the one under a higher CO2 concentration grows faster. But this is not impressive at all, as it’s fairly obvious that for two plants grown under otherwise similar conditions, the one given more nutrients (yes, it’s true that CO2 is “plant food”) would be expected to grow faster. In the real world, there are far more important questions that must be addressed, such as: How will our crops do when they are battered by more extreme weather or drought? What about the fact that weeds will also grow better, and that pests will move into new territories as the climate changes? The fact that such an irrelevant video is even posted suggests that the “CO2 Science” folks are either extremely ignorant or that they believe the public is very easy to fool.

The home page also prominently features a set of “last 15 postings” that claim to review recent research about benefits of a rising carbon dioxide concentration. This list is updated frequently (though the past postings are either well-hidden or taken down), so I captured the set on a single day in February (Figure 2, left). Of the 15 postings, three were simply references to the site’s own “plant growth database.” The other 12 were legitimate scientific articles, and the posted reviews implied that these articles support the “more CO2 is better” claim. But, again, I looked up the actual articles, and guess what:

• I quickly found that 3 of the 12 articles contained statements directly contradicting any “more carbon dioxide is beneficial” idea.
• The other 9 articles either didn’t take an obvious stance (they seemed simply to be reports of research findings without commentary on implications) or were over my head (remember that I’m an astronomer, not a climate scientist), so I emailed the authors of these articles to ask what they thought about the way their work was being cited. Authors representing 5 of the 9 articles responded, and all 5 said that their work was being misinterpreted. A sample quote: “[The CO2 science site is] taking things entirely out of context. … Where do these weasels come from….?”

Elsewhere on the web site you’ll find a page (Figure 2, right) with a large list of names of “Scientists Whose Work We Cite.” While it doesn’t explicitly say so, this page is clearly trying to imply that all these people support the site’s conclusions about benefits from a rising carbon dioxide concentration. But note that:

• There’s an immediate red flag in the fact that the names are listed without any institutional affiliations or other identifying characteristics. This suggests that Mr. Idso and any other of the web site creators want to make it difficult for you to learn more about these people.
• So I selected a somewhat random sample of the names and looked them up and emailed them. I received replies representing 24 of the people on the list and, again, they were unanimous in stating that they do not support the site’s claims and instead support the scientific consensus that global warming poses a serious threat to our civilization. Sample quotes about being cited on the CO2 Science web site: “This is madness”; “What a travesty.”

The bottom line should by now be clear. Although Happer and Idso claim there is lots of evidence supporting their belief that more carbon dioxide emissions will be good for us, most or all of the studies they cite actually say the opposite.

Final Thoughts on Trump’s Proposed Panel

Although I’ve shown you that the “More CO2 is Better” claim cannot be supported, some readers might still wonder what’s wrong with proposing a panel to double check all the science of climate change. The answer is that there’s nothing wrong with this in principle, but such investigations must be honest and transparent, and the examples I’ve provided make honesty and transparency seem highly unlikely for a panel led by someone like Happer.⁵

More important, we already have lots of “double checking” of the scientific research. As I’ve noted, the entire point of the IPCC is to summarize the findings produced by the hard work and dedication of thousands of individual scientists around the world.

Similar “double checking” is done right here in the United States. Two such “double checks” were even released under the current Administration: the Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in 2017, and the Worldwide Threat Assessment delivered by the Director of National Intelligence, Dan Coats, in January (2019). The proposed panel is targeted largely at trying to refute those two U.S. assessments — but again, there’s already a mechanism by which an Administration or Congress can question such things: They can turn to the National Academies of Sciences, created by congressional charter under President Lincoln in 1864. And, in fact, the National Academies has already reviewed the Fourth National Climate Assessment, concluding that it “accurately describes the science of climate change and impacts occurring and likely to occur this century across the nation.” As far as I can tell, the idea of creating a different panel in an attempt to undercut the conclusions of the National Academies is unprecedented in American history.

The real facts are simple: Human emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are putting the future of our civilization at risk, with potentially catastrophic consequences for our children and grandchildren. This is known through the work of thousands of expert scientists who have each devoted many years of study to this subject and who have conducted the original research necessary to publish tens of thousands of papers, the vast majority of which have been produced through the support of a major university and/or agencies such as NASA, NOAA, the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Department of Defense, or their equivalents in other countries around the world. The only way you can believe that some new panel could find a significant flaw in all this work would be if you believe all these scientists and agencies have been engaged in a mind-boggling conspiracy to deceive the public. The Administration might as well create a panel to find out if Earth is flat.

What we are now doing to the world … by adding greenhouse gases to the air at an unprecedented rate… is new in the experience of the Earth. It is mankind and his activities which are changing the environment of our planet in damaging and dangerous ways.
— Margaret Thatcher, Nov. 8, 1989, in a speech to the United Nations

Footnotes

[1]Happer is perhaps better known for having also made this remarkable statement [which can be seen in this video]: “The demonization of carbon dioxide is just like the demonization of the poor Jews under Hitler.”

[2]If you’d like a fairly short (less than 100 pages) summary of global warming science, consequences, and solutions, you may wish to see my book A Global Warming Primer, which is posted freely online at globalwarmingprimer.com (select the “primer” link on the top menu).

[3]It’s perhaps also worth noting that the conclusion that a rising carbon dioxide concentration has caused this greening requires the use of models to distinguish the carbon dioxide effects from other effects (such as those of changing agricultural practices). And while there’s nothing wrong with this model-based conclusion, Idso and Happer are dismissive of models in virtually every other case, presumably because those other cases don’t suit their preconceived notions.

[4]As further evidence of the sloppiness of the “NIPCC” folks, note that they cite this paper as “Cheng et al,” when in fact “Cheng” is only part of the lead author’s first name; the correct citation is “Gang et al.”

[5]In case you want even more background into the misleading nature of Happer’s claims, see this detailed rebuttal (by a well-regarded climate scientist) to an article that Happer wrote.

Postscript 1: Comments on the Debate

If you watch the video of the “Oxford style” debate between Mr. Idso and myself, you’ll probably see how he was able to convince a significant portion of the audience to vote his way. He was well-prepared with a great many PowerPoint slides to support his claims, so that if you took him at his word, he seemed to be making a very strong case for his position. Of course, as you’ll know from my discussion above, it would be a huge mistake to take him at his word. I won’t take the time to go through the entire debate in detail, but here I offer a few brief comments that might be of interest if you happen to watch the debate.

First, you’ll notice (throughout the debate, but particularly in his opening statement) that Idso built his case largely around two major ideas: (1) that we will see great benefits from a rising carbon dioxide concentration, and (2) that climate scientists are either ignoring or don’t understand the role of carbon dioxide and the issue of whether it is a cause or effect of rising temperature; he even went so far as to claim that the science community is mistaking correlation for causation. I’ve already addressed point (1) above, so let’s turn to point (2):

• The idea that scientists would ignore contrary data will be patently ridiculous to anyone who has ever met any scientists. Scientists are constant looking for holes in each other’s arguments in hopes of being the first to discover something new.
  The idea that scientists might somehow misunderstand correlation and causation is even more preposterous. Every climate scientist has abundant training in statistics and statistical methods, and no scientist could get away with such a simple mistake without being immediately called out by colleagues.
• Scientists do understand the role of carbon dioxide and why it is a key driver of planetary temperature. I went through the basic science in the debate, and you’ll also find it summarized in Chapter 1 of my Global Warming Primer.
• With regard to the claim that scientists are misunderstanding geological data about past climate change: This is a frequent claim of the “skeptic” community, but it is easily disproven. It’s addressed in my Chapter 2; go to the link to Skeptic Claim 3 and open the answer posted for the question “I heard that the temperature changes in the ice core record precede the carbon dioxide changes. Doesn’t this mean that you have cause and effect backward?” If you want an even deeper understanding of this topic, I highly recommend Spencer Weart’s book The Discovery of Global Warming.
• The rest of his case came down primarily to the large number of graphs and other data that he showed. But if you take a look at these with a critical eye, one of the first things you’ll notice is that many of his graphs are virtually unintelligible. Why would he show such difficult-to-interpret graphs to a nonscientist audience? The only logical explanation is that he was trying (apparently with some success) to snow the audience with data and jargon that could not have any meaning to them.

In fact, just as I’ve already shown with the examples in the main article above, virtually every piece of “evidence” he presented was either misrepresented, taken out of context, cherry-picked, or just plain made up. Here are just a few specific examples:

• [Starting around 56:30] He tries to prove that climate models are unreliable by showing a set of models for sea level rise that have not proven accurate. But this is a clear example of cherry-picking: As I had already explained earlier in the debate, scientists are well aware that they don’t yet have a good way to predict future sea level rise. He chose to show sea level models because if he showed models of other aspects of the climate, they’d show that the models are in fact becoming quite impressive, even though they can never be perfect.
• He cites hurricane data to “prove” that extreme weather events are not in fact increasing. It’s true that hurricane data are somewhat ambiguous, but hurricanes are not the only form of extreme weather, and the data clearly show an increase in extreme weather overall. See, for example, Figure 3.6 in Chapter 3 of my Global Warming Primer, and you’ll find many more studies showing the increase in extreme weather in the Fourth National Climate Assessment.
• He similarly tries to claim that there is no evidence of an increased risk from wildfires, showing a graph (most clearly visible around 51:15 of the debate video) that appears to show a decrease in wildfires with time. As he accurately references on the screen, this graph comes from this peer-reviewed paper. But if you read the paper, you’ll find that, contrary to Idso’s assertion, it includes a clear warning that climate change will likely cause an increase in wildfires.
• There’s far more, but I don’t see much reason to do a point-by-point rebuttal when we already know that he has a track record of disinformation. If you are curious about any particular claim that Mr. Idso made during the debate — or about a graph or data that he showed — you can easily look it up at some of the reputable web sites for climate information, such as Skeptical Science, Climate Central, Real Climate, or Desmog Blog. (Warning: watch out for web sites with similar-sounding names that are instead spreading misinformation.)

The bottom line is that we face a clear and present danger from global warming, and we owe it to our children and grandchildren to do everything in our power to make sure we rapidly end the era in which humans are releasing vast quantities of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere.

Postscript 2: Post-Debate Exchange with the Moderator

The debate moderator was a man by the name of Gene Epstein, who in general appears to be intelligent, thoughtful, and well-meaning. I believe he hoped to be a neutral moderator, yet during the debate (about 53:50 in the video) he asked me a question based on falsehoods propagated by people like Idso, Happer, and others in the small community of climate “skeptics.” Below are the relevant parts of our post-debate email exchange about his question (with minor edits so the exchange flows clearly), as I believe it is enlightening in showing how even thoughtful people are often fooled by the disingenuous tactics of the climate “skeptics.”

Jeff: Hi Gene — Thanks again for hosting me at the Soho Forum. … During the debate, you asked me a question in which you said you remembered reading in 1989 (in the New York Times) about scientists predicting that Manhattan would be underwater by now, and also that the movie An Inconvenient Truth made this same prediction. You’ll recall that I was skeptical of your memory even during the debate, and I have since confirmed that no such prediction was made in An Inconvenient Truth, nor could I find any evidence of such a prediction having ever been made by any reputable scientist or media source. This of course begs the question of where your incorrect memories came from, and at least for your “1989” memory, it appears that you have been duped by a false attribution to James Hansen, which you can read about here. Moreover, you made a larger claim that people like you have been many times fooled by scientists making “alarmist” predictions, and judging from the audience reaction, you had a lot of people believing you. But as I noted, this is simply not the case. With respect to James Hansen in particular, as I stated in the debate, his predictions have been pretty on-target; I’ll point you to this article for a general level discussion, or to this post for a more detailed discussion. …

Gene: I seem to remember a NY Times story [predicting that Manhattan would be underwater by now] — here’s an AP report that would have gone out to all the papers [at that time]. Are you saying it misrepresents the real view of the UN at the time? Also see [this] link to a 1980 report by the Carter Center predicting similar disaster by 2000. Regarding An Inconvenient Truth: I saw the film when it came out, and remember the scenes of flooding over Manhattan [and] according to this account, Gore’s 2006 film tells the audience that, due to global warming, melting ice could release enough water to cause at 20-foot rise in sea level “in the near future.” And in Gore’s sequel, he claims he made a correct forecast by showing flooding from Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Jeff: [With regard to the five main points in your prior email:]

• Regarding the AP story from 1989: Nowhere does the article state a time line for sea level rise. It merely says that we face a future threat from rising sea level “if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” While we could quibble about whether this overstated the level of concern that was justified at the time, it’s certainly NOT a prediction of Manhattan being underwater by now.
• Even if it had made such a prediction, the AP article is quoting a mid-level UN official who was not a scientist. If you want the scientific view of the UN at the time, the place to look would be in the first IPCC report, published in 1990, since the IPCC was created under the auspices of the UN and WMO and charged with assessing the state of the science. Here’s what that report said: “The predicted [sea] rise is about 20 cm by 2030, and 65 cm by the end of the next century.” Although the report also clearly stated the many uncertainties associated with this prediction, it has actually proven to be fairly accurate so far — and again, does not in any way support your claim that scientists were predicting an underwater Manhattan by now.
• For the Carter Center report: I didn’t read carefully, but a word search turned up only one mention in the report of sea level rise due to climate change, and this is what it says: “An increase of 5°- 10°C in polar temperatures could eventually lead to the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice caps and a gradual rise in sea level, forcing abandonment of many coastal cities.” Again, a true statement, given without any time scale.
• An Inconvenient Truth: Although I did not take the time to rewatch the movie, I checked several online transcripts, and all agree: Gore accurately stated that sea level would rise 20 feet if the Greenland ice sheet melted (or “half of Greenland and half of West Antarctica”), but he did NOT say that this would happen “in the near future.” Again, we can quibble about whether it was fair for him to make any statement without discussing the time scale involved or to use the imagery he chose for visual effect, but he most certainly did not predict that Manhattan would be underwater by now.
• As to Gore’s use of the flooding from Hurricane Sandy in the sequel: it’s very difficult to determine the precise role of global warming in any particular weather event, but there is little doubt that the storm surge was exacerbated by the fact that sea level has already risen about a foot over the past century. I’m not clear on how anyone could doubt the rather obvious fact that higher sea level will mean higher storm surge.

Gene: Jeff, I guess you’re right. But on the more general question I raised about alarmist predictions that don’t pan out, I assume you agree that we were given until 2000 to reverse global warming, or else. It’s now 2019, surely well past the tipping point! Now we are variously given 12 to 30 years to reverse global warming, or else. I assume you agree that skeptics like me keep wondering why the forecasters keep pushing back the goal posts! … Apart from that, there is something I didn’t mention. Didn’t the hacked emails of the climate scientists reveal that they were revving each other up to make alarmist predictions in order to scare people into acting? Of course, do that once too often and you sound like the boy who cried wolf.

Jeff: You still haven’t found any evidence of even a single reputable scientist making “alarmist predictions that don’t pan out.” And even if you did (which I highly doubt you will), a single scientist is not necessarily representative of the entire community.

Again, if you want an overall summary that represents general views of the scientific community, read the IPCC or National Climate Assessment reports; after all, the entire point of these reports is to summarize the findings produced by the hard work and dedication of thousands of individual scientists. You will not find in these reports any claims of “2000, or else” or that we’d be “surely past the tipping point” by now; indeed, generally speaking, the past reports have proven to be overly conservative in their assessments.

As to the recent “12 years” from the IPCC, that’s not a prediction of when a tipping point occurs, it’s simply a statement of when the models and past climate data predict we’ll be locked in to an inevitable (but not immediate) 1.5°C increase in temperature.

I confess to being completely mystified as to why you keep quoting false statements from so-called “skeptic” web sites to say that scientists have been “crying wolf” when no such thing has occurred. The actual key facts, which you’ll find in the IPCC and NCA reports (as well as in my book) are the following:

• The basic physics makes clear that a rising greenhouse gas concentration should lead to a warming world, and the evidence is clear that this warming is indeed occurring as expected
• The physics also indicates we should expect serious consequences from this warming, and current evidence shows some of these consequences already to be underway.
• While we can’t predict the exact timing or exact level of danger, the consensus view is that continued warming is very likely (note this is probabilistic, not definitive) to pose significant threats to the future of our civilization.

Given these facts, what rational person would choose to continue running a giant experiment on our planet when, as discussed in chapter 4 of my book, we have readily available alternatives that would not only eliminate the risk but also allow us to have more energy at lower total cost than we have today?

Fyi, with regard to the hacked emails: Those of us who work in science could tell immediately that “climate-gate” was a joke, because the worst that even the hackers could come up with was a handful of emails taken completely out of context. Read the details here: https://skepticalscience.com/Climategate-CRU-emails-hacked.htm. Incidentally, around the same time, there was a different set of leaked emails (see this article) from the Heartland Institute, which among other things revealed that they were paying Mr. Idso nearly $12,000 per month. You’ll note that I did not bring this up in the debate, since I don’t believe that a person’s source of income automatically reveals his motives. But it’s definitely worth noting that while the funding sources of pretty much every scientist in the world are clear and transparent, Idso and his small group of similarly outspoken “skeptic” colleagues have consistently refused to reveal where their funding comes from.

Gene did not respond after this email, hopefully because I finally convinced him that his claims of scientists making “alarmist predictions that don’t pan out” have no basis in reality, and that in fact we face a real, well-understood, and unexaggerated threat…