[TheClimate.Vote] July 10, 2019 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/July 10, 2019/

[Opinion]
*David Attenborough: We 'cannot be too radical' in tackling climate change*
The natural historian who has spent decades documenting every corner of 
the Earth reveals his support for young protesters.
Wednesday 10 July 2019 08:53, UK
- -
Speaking at the energy select committee in parliament on Tuesday, Sir 
David said: "I am sorry that there are people that are in power 
internationally - notably of course the US - but also in Australia, 
which is extraordinary actually because Australia is already facing 
having to deal with some of the most extreme manifestations of climate 
change.

"In both Australia and America those voices are clearly heard, and one 
hopes that the electorate will actually respond to this."...
more at - 
https://news.sky.com/story/david-attenborough-we-cannot-be-too-radical-in-tackling-climate-change-11759484


[Confused insolubility]
*White House won't review climate science before election*
Scott Waldman, E&E News reporter Climatewire: Tuesday, July 9, 2019
The proposed White House panel that would conduct an "adversarial" 
review of climate science is dead for now, as President Trump grapples 
with negative perceptions of his environmental record at the outset of 
his reelection campaign.

The monthslong push from within the National Security Council to review 
established science on climate change divided White House advisers and 
generated sharp opposition from researchers across the country. The 
effort, led by a physicist overseeing technology issues at the NSC, 
William Happer, stalled indefinitely amid internal disagreements within 
the White House, according to two sources.

"It's been totally stymied by the forces of darkness within the 
administration, but also by the looming election campaign," said Myron 
Ebell, a senior fellow at the conservative Competitive Enterprise 
Institute who led the EPA transition team under Trump.

Happer has consulted conservative groups that attack climate science in 
an attempt to recruit members for the proposed panel. He's spoken with 
policy analysts at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Heartland 
Institute and CO2 Coalition, a group Happer founded and that claims that 
the world would be better off with higher levels of carbon dioxide 
emissions. The theories promoted by those groups are rejected by NASA, 
NOAA and the world's top science academies.

Happer initially wanted Trump to issue an executive order to create the 
"Presidential Committee on Climate Security." He wanted the panel to 
review assertions within the National Climate Assessment related to 
risks from climate change on national security. Happer briefed Trump on 
climate science at least twice (Climatewire, June 24).

The idea to create the panel has caused strife within the White House. 
Among its critics are deputy chief of staff Chris Liddell; Kevin 
Hassett, the outgoing chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers; 
Larry Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council; and Kelvin 
Droegemeier, the president's science adviser. Those supporting the plan 
include Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner and Brooke 
Rollins, assistant to Trump in the Office of American Innovation.
An official at NSC disputed the characterization that the panel was 
dead, even while confirming that it had been indefinitely delayed. The 
plan has suffered several downgrades over the months. It was initially 
proposed as a rapid response team of climate science critics who would 
challenge government publications on human-caused warming. Recent 
discussions have centered on the idea of forcing government climate 
scientists to participate in a debate with critics of their work who 
deny that humans are causing widespread changes on Earth (Climatewire, 
June 6). Most recently, the plan was diminished to creating dueling 
white papers that would elevate climate denialism to the level of 
consensus science...
- -
Trump supporters who want the administration to be more aggressive in 
its rejection of climate science were frustrated that the climate review 
panel had been sidelined. Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute 
sees it as a sign that the Trump campaign is sensitive to Democratic 
attacks on climate change.

"The reelect campaign has been completely taken over by the usual cast 
of Republican establishment consultants who are primarily concerned with 
making very large amounts of money on the campaign," Ebell said.

https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060713373
- - -
[From Center for Climate & Security]
*Report Indicates Adversarial White House Climate Review Panel 
"Indefinitely Delayed"
*Quotes from February 20, 2019 Center for Climate and Security press 
release in response to the Washington Post's story on the White House 
climate review panel.

    "It's important to note the person behind this attempt to chill our
    defense agencies from understanding and managing climate risk is Dr.
    Will Happer.  Dr. Happer testified before Congress in December 2015
    that the world has too little Carbon Dioxide and is too cold - an
    extreme, fringe view even for the tiny number of scientists who call
    themselves climate skeptics. This is a clumsy attempt to force the
    entire federal government to conform to a bizarre view thoroughly
    rejected by the vast majority of scientists." - Rear Admiral David
    Titley, US Navy (Ret), Senior Member of the Advisory Board at the
    Center for Climate and Security and former Oceanographer of the Navy

    "Even if this committee is successful for a year or two suppressing
    the acknowledgment of a changing climate as a security risk, the
    risks will continue to accelerate.  The climate does not care what
    the White House thinks or what Executive Orders are signed - it only
    responds to the laws of physics.  The temperatures will continue to
    warm, the ice will continue to melt and the seas will continue to
    rise.  And our county will be less secure if we prevent our very own
    federal agencies from responding to this threat." - Rear Admiral
    David Titley, US Navy (Ret), Senior Member of the Advisory Board at
    the Center for Climate and Security and former Oceanographer of the Navy

    "This is the equivalent of setting up a committee on nuclear weapons
    proliferation and having someone lead it who doesn't think nuclear
    weapons exist," said Francesco Femia, Chief Executive Officer of the
    Council on Strategic Risks and Co-Founder of the Center for Climate
    and Security in an interview with The Washington Post. "It's
    honestly a blunt force political tool designed to shut the national
    security community up on climate change."

https://climateandsecurity.org/2019/07/09/report-indicates-adversarial-white-house-climate-review-panel-indefinitely-delayed/#more-17691


[Meanwhile before Congress:]
*Democrats aim to declare 'climate emergency'*
A trio of liberal lawmakers unveiled legislation today that would 
declare a climate change "emergency" and put Congress on the record in 
calling for action to confront it.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/stories/1060717381



[Yale study from Anthony Leiserowitz]
*Talking about global warming leads to greater acceptance of climate 
science*

We are pleased to announce the publication of a new research article, 
"Discussing global warming leads to greater acceptance of climate 
science" in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

There is an urgent need to engage Americans in the issue of climate 
change. Social science research has focused on many of the factors that 
influence public engagement, but surprisingly little of this research 
has examined the role of one of the most trusted sources of information: 
friends and family. In our new article, we investigate the role of 
climate conversations with friends and family in changing people's 
beliefs and concern about climate change.

We surveyed a nationally-representative sample of American adults twice 
(N = 1,263), approximately seven months apart, and found that people 
learn important facts about climate change through discussion with 
friends and family. Specifically, discussing climate change with friends 
and family led to enhanced understanding of the extent of scientific 
agreement about human-caused climate change. In turn, better 
understanding of the scientific agreement led to increased belief that 
climate change is happening and is human-caused and to increased worry 
about it. Interestingly, we also found evidence that the link between 
discussion and climate beliefs can operate in the opposite direction. 
That is, increased perceptions of scientific agreement led to increases 
in discussions about climate change - suggesting that climate 
conversations can initiate a positively reinforcing cycle between 
learning, worry, and further conversation.

These findings highlight the importance of climate conversations with 
friends and family, which can engage people more deeply in the issue of 
climate change.

The open access article is available from the Proceedings of the 
National Academy of Sciences. If you are not able to access the article, 
please send an email to climatechange at yale.edu, with the subject line: 
Request GW Discussion Paper.

This project was supported by the 11th Hour Project, the Energy 
Foundation, the Grantham Foundation, and the V. K. Rasmussen Foundation.
https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/
- - -
[the study]
*Discussing global warming leads to greater acceptance of climate science*
Matthew H. Goldberg, Sander van der Linden, Edward Maibach, and Anthony 
Leiserowitz
PNAS first published July 8, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1906589116

*Abstract*

    Climate change is an urgent global issue, with demands for personal,
    collective, and governmental action. Although a large body of
    research has investigated the influence of communication on public
    engagement with climate change, few studies have investigated the
    role of interpersonal discussion. Here we use panel data with 2 time
    points to investigate the role of climate conversations in shaping
    beliefs and feelings about global warming. We find evidence of
    reciprocal causality. That is, discussing global warming with
    friends and family leads people to learn influential facts, such as
    the scientific consensus that human-caused global warming is
    happening. In turn, stronger perceptions of scientific agreement
    increase beliefs that climate change is happening and human-caused,
    as well as worry about climate change. When assessing the reverse
    causal direction, we find that knowing the scientific consensus
    further leads to increases in global warming discussion. These
    findings suggest that climate conversations with friends and family
    enter people into a proclimate social feedback loop.

https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/07/02/1906589116


[Hope]
*Redefining hope in a world threatened by climate change*
Here's what leading thinkers, writers, and educators say about how to 
keep going in troubled times.
By SueEllen Campbell
Perhaps you have read that The Guardian newspaper in the United Kingdom 
has decided to use the terms climate emergency, crisis or breakdown 
instead of climate change in its news stories; and global heating 
instead of global warming. As social and cultural circumstances alter, 
words and their power change their meanings and impact, and the public 
in the end may have to adapt by using new words.

Or sometimes we can try to refine or redefine old words to fit new 
circumstances. For instance, hope, which as verb and noun has long 
implied both desire and expectation: "I hope [desire] that we can solve 
the climate problem" or "I have little hope [don't expect] that our 
civilization will survive this existential climate crisis." But what 
happens when desire outstrips results, and then discouragement leads to 
hopelessness, despair, cynicism, paralysis? When hope starts to sound 
passive and empty?

Here, from some leading thinkers, writers, philosophers, and educators, 
are a few useful, maybe even inspiring, ways to rethink hope:...

    *Amory Lovins: *"Many of us here stir and strive in the spirit of
    applied hope. We work to make the world better, not from some airy
    theoretical hope, but in the pragmatic and grounded conviction that
    starting with hope and acting out of hope can cultivate a different
    kind of world worth being hopeful about, reinforcing itself in a
    virtuous spiral. Applied hope is not about some vague, far-off
    future but is expressed and created moment by moment through our
    choices. … Applied hope is a deliberate choice of heart and head. …
    Applied hope requires fearlessness."
    *Joanna Macy:* "Active Hope involves identifying the outcomes we
    hope for and then playing an active role in bringing them about. We
    don't wait until we are sure of success. We don't limit our choices
    to the outcomes that seem likely. Instead, we focus on what we
    truly, deeply long for, and then we proceed to take determined steps
    in that direction."
    *Michael P. Nelson:* "I want us to replace 'I hope' with 'I resolve
    to do the work' or 'I will be this kind of person, I will live this
    kind of life' or any sort of utterance that focuses on virtue rather
    than on consequence... I am suggesting … that our obligation to the
    future is most properly satisfied when we act rightly and
    virtuously, and when our motivation stands stubbornly apart from,
    not held hostage to, the consequences of our actions."
    *David W. Orr: *"Optimism has this confident look, feet up on the
    table. Hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up."
    *Maria Popova:* "Today, the soul is in dire need of stewardship and
    protection from cynicism. The best defense against it is vigorous,
    intelligent, sincere hope - not blind optimism, because that too is
    a form of resignation, to believe that everything will work out just
    fine and we need not apply ourselves. I mean hope bolstered by
    critical thinking that is clear-headed in identifying what is
    lacking, in ourselves or the world, but then envisions ways to
    create it and endeavors to do that. In its passivity and
    resignation, cynicism is a hardening, a calcification of the soul.
    Hope is a stretching of its ligaments, a limber reach for something
    greater."
    *Carl Safina:* "Hope is the ability to see how things could be
    better. The world of human affairs has long been a shadowy place,
    but always backlit by the light of hope. Each person can add hope to
    the world. A resigned person subtracts hope. The more people strive,
    the more change becomes likely. Far better, then, that good people
    do the striving."
    *Rebecca Solnit:* "Hope is not about what we expect. It's an embrace
    of the essential unknowability of the world. Hope is not a door but
    a sense that there might be a door"; "It's the belief that what we
    do matters even though how and when it may matter, who and what it
    may impact, are not things we can know beforehand"; "It's important
    to emphasize that hope is only a beginning; it's not a substitute
    for action, only a basis for it."

This series is curated and written by retired Colorado State University 
English professor and close climate change watcher SueEllen Campbell of 
Colorado. To flag works you think warrant attention, send an e-mail to 
her any time. ICYMI at yaleclimateconnections.org Let us hear from you.
https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2019/07/redefining-hope-in-a-world-threatened-by-climate-change/



[revising perceptions]
*Climate mistake reveals Earth warmed more than we thought last century*
Environment 5 July 2019
By Michael Marshall

An oversight in historical weather records means we have underestimated 
how much the climate warmed last century. The finding means we are 0.1C 
closer to passing the internationally-agreed limit of 2C than we thought.

"Global warming has been stronger than we think," says Rasmus Benestad 
of the Norwegian Meteorological Institute in Oslo, who led the analysis.

The problem stems from where the first weather stations were set up 
around the world...
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2208726-climate-mistake-reveals-earth-warmed-more-than-we-thought-last-century/



[It actually makes a noise - 30 mins audio from BBC]
*The Dying of the Ice*
Olafur Eliasson
An audio elegy and a lament for the disappearing sea ice of the north 
pole. The sound of ice melting, thawing and shifting across a year is 
the essence of this tone poem, woven with song, poetry, art and music 
about the ice. This first of three programmes features Andrew McGibbon 
in conversation with Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson who transported 
Greenland-bred ancient ice blocks to the country's old colonial capital 
Copenhagen, in a project titled Ice Watch. The blocks were arranged to 
resemble an ominous clock showing the amount of ice that disappears 
every hundredth of a second due to conditions of global warming.  His 
Weather project became one of Tate Modern's most successful 
installations - with over two million people visiting the exhibition, 
watching themselves reflected on a ceiling mirror while being bathed in 
artificial sunlight and doused in a sweetened atmosphere of humidified 
water and sugar. The programme examines Olafur's relationship with ice, 
growing up in Iceland and how Ice Watch - a piece that fused art, 
reality and environmentalism - brought worldwide attention to the rapid 
loss of the Greenland Ice Shelf. In July 2019, a major survey of 
Olafur's work is mounted at Tate Modern, including around 40 works 
spanning three decades. The Dying of the Ice features the sounds of 
melting and retreating ice in the Arctic and the under-ice creatures 
living in that boundary as an active, low volume soundtrack audible 
throughout the programme. Written and Presented by Andrew McGibbon 
Producers: Louise Morris and Nick Romero A Curtains For Radio production 
for BBC Radio 4
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0006mqv



[Current update on Antarctic ice]
*The Mystery of the Antarctic Sea Ice Puzzle, Sea ice Plummeting Suddenly*
The amount of ice circling Antarctica is suddenly plunging from a record 
high to record lows, baffling scientists. A new NASA study by sea ice 
expert Claire L. Parkinson reveals recent trends in Antarctica's sea ice 
extent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3oBcOD-ofg



*This Day in Climate History - July 10, 2007 - from D.R. Tucker*
July 10, 2007: On MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," Air America 
host Rachel Maddow points out the mainstream media's fetish for false 
balance, specifically citing climate coverage.
http://youtu.be/vcMFwuu_UlA
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