We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Did you know that melting of the permafrost in the arctic tundra has reached a tipping point from which we'll never recover? The release of methane - a dramatically more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide - will create unstoppable global warming, which means that not just you and all your loved ones will be boiled alive, but also the puppies. All of them. Every single puppy in the world is doomed to perish due to man's selfishness and greed.
Well, at least that's what is going to happen if you believe this angry Australian guy here.
It’s getting so that the climate change research is even less depressing and predictable than the reaction to it from the vast, weird coalition of deniers. Some of them sitting in their sandals and socks at the computer in the basement laundry, banging out angry retorts to anyone who dares even suggest there might be any problem at all. And some of them sitting very comfortably indeed, in fine suits, swirling snifters of brandy, in offices and boardrooms atop the highest towers of steel and glass.
Some of you have been wondering what Evil Climate Change Denier (TM) James Delingpole has to make of all this. And the answer is, not much.
The reason I say "not much" is not because I don't care (I do, I DO - especially about the darling puppies, talking of which we still haven't got one yet, though we're currently gravitating towards a Cocker spaniel, maybe a working Cocker that I can train to fetch the pheasants I shoot on the estate) but because I've heard it all before.
Melting permafrost; melting glaciers; the sinking Maldives and Tuvalu; drowning Bangladesh; the Greenland ice shelf; Larsen B; the polar bears ...We've been here before many, MANY times. And you know what? It's rubbish. All of it. Not one of the doomsday scenarios predicted by environmental catastrophists bears any serious correlation with hard data or empirical observation. It's just projection, fantasy.
I cover a lot of this in my book Watermelons: the Green Movement's True Colors. (Which I'd heartily recommend by the way as a Christmas present, either to your kids as a kind of Defence Against Dark Arts or to a Greenie friend to enlighten and annoy them). One of the chapters is expressly dedicated to debunking many of the above claims. But it's a chapter I resented having to write for the simple reason that having to rebut these arguments is such a massive waste of everyone's time. They don't stand up. They never have stood up. There is no evidence to support them.
This permafrost meme is no exception. Heaven knows why this particular zombie argument chose this particular moment to resurface. But if you're worried, here's what the experts say. (I mean real experts - as opposed to "environmentalists").
Note especially what German geoscientist and permafrost expert Georg Delisle has to say on the subject:
"…it is utter imbecility to suppose that the entire permafrost could thaw out by the end of the century. It would take thousands of years."
You got that, Angry Australian Guy? Utter imbecility.
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Comments:
Sep '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
I'd rather die by permafrost melt than by ObamaCare and death panels.
Nov '11
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
You'd think they'd be embarrased by being so wrong so often but one has only to look upon Paul Ehrlich to see that they never are.
Jun '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
They know they're lying. To them, they are lying in a Greater Cause, which allows them to salve their consciences.
Aug '10
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Hey, if the permafrost melts it should be easier to strip mine for gold in Alaska.
Bring it on!
Aug '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
If the irevocable tipping point has been reached, then there is no longer any use in trying futile environmentalist remediation. Learn to ride it.
Aug '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Why don't these enviro-fascists ever discuss how the West is going to get India and China to stop industrializing?
Jun '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Because America is The Focus Of Evil in the modern world, and must be brought to heel.
Sep '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
ConservativeWanderer
Because America is The Focus Of Evil in the modern world, and must be brought to heel. · 27 minutes ago
CW - America, land of Bad Dogs, needing to heel, tugging our leashes.
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Allow me to point you, James, to a particularly obnoxious story in my local paper. Not because this state lionizes Mr. Steger (we're the state of Franken and Ventura, who require far more opprobrium.) Nor for his propagation of Arctic ice alarmism. No, check the picture in the story.
That speech is given in a church sanctuary. A church I attend. Or at least, I have attended. The print version has Steger standing at the lectern from which sermons are given, as well as the Scripture readings.
What conclusions should we draw from this?
Jun '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Becky53
ConservativeWanderer
Because America is The Focus Of Evil in the modern world, and must be brought to heel. · 27 minutes ago
CW - America, land of Bad Dogs, needing to heel, tugging our leashes. · 2 minutes ago
Heh... I don't actually believe that, was just channeling your average leftist.
Jun '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
King Banaian: Allow me to point you, James, to a particularly obnoxious story in my local paper. Not because this state lionizes Mr. Steger (we're the state of Franken and Ventura, who require far more opprobrium.) Nor for his propagation of Arctic ice alarmism. No, check the picture in the story.
That speech is given in a church sanctuary. A church I attend. Or at least, I have attended. The print version has Steger standing at the lectern from which sermons are given, as well as the Scripture readings.
What conclusions should we draw from this? · 0 minutes ago
That's a rhetorical question, right? :)
Dec '10
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
James,
It might be annoying to keep playing wack-a-mole with these arguments that seem to always come back again and again, but THANK YOU for doing it anyway. You are a brave soul and much appreciated by us in the hinterlands who feel like we have no voice. I always catch your podcast and to show my thanks I just bought your book and Elizabeth Nickson's, too. Merry Christmas and keep up the good work. We love you on Ricochet.
Sep '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
ConservativeWanderer
Becky53
ConservativeWanderer
Because America is The Focus Of Evil in the modern world, and must be brought to heel. · 27 minutes ago
CW - America, land of Bad Dogs, needing to heel, tugging our leashes. · 2 minutes ago
Heh... I don't actually believe that, was just channeling your average leftist. · 0 minutes ago
CW -- It was a good visual -- you were very clear to me!
Jul '11
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Good. I can sleep easy now.
Edited on December 4, 2012 at 8:40pmMar '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Given the hysteria, I predict our future is this:
Mar '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Stick it to them, James. And don't let up.
Maybe we can send AlGore on a polar bear round up? Maybe those polar bears can live in a rain forest which is kept up to sell carbon offsets at prohibitive mark ups so that AlGore can live like a minor god at the expense of other peoples' air conditioned misery.
Maybe AlGore can share a house with Chicken Little and the over-heated western orphans they have managed to gather up.
Maybe we can send the Occupy Wall Street crowds to live with them. One group can carp about global warming (or whatever term is being batted about today) and the other group can carp about capitalism; except when AlGore is around showing off the forest for his carbon offset customers.
Aug '10
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Well, I'm incredibly reassured to read that kittens are apparently immune to the impending climate apocalypse.
Apr '11
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Blub . .blub. . . blub . .
We're gonna die alright . . but it's more likely to come due to the economy crippling policies of the alarmists rather than melting tundra.
Check out the reduced sunspot number as our sun reaches solar max:
http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/assets/img/latest/latest_4096_4500.jpg
Reduced solar magnetosphere . . more cosmic rays entering our upper atmosphere . . more clouds . . .
Nov '12
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
So, let's see...from sandal wearing touch typists in the laundry room to Armani clad brandy swirlers in the boardroom - sounds like a pretty broad coalition to me. Personally, I prefer wearing sandals with my Armani suits. And white socks with my sandals. And I can type and swirl brandy at the same time, though I do like to take an occasional break to twirl my mustache and sneer in an appropriately sinister manner.
Jan '11
Re: We're All Going to Die #542: the Melting of the Arctic Permafrost
Peter Robinson says no no on the socks with sandals.