Bjorn Lomborg.
Favorite mop top boy wonder denialism. Author of “The Skeptical Environmentalist”, frequent guest on Fox news and corporate gatherings for his “practical” approach to the environment.
Now quoted as saying, “We actually have only one option: we all need to start seriously focusing, right now, on the most effective ways to fix global warming.”
Dmitri Medvedev,
Russian president. Oil soaked Russian leaders have been famously skeptical of climate change, but with last summer’s “Worst Russian Heat wave in 1000 years, he finally came around, saying, “”Unfortunately, what is happening now in our central regions is evidence of this global climate change, because we have never in our history faced such weather conditions in the past.”
Michael Hanlon,
Science editor of the UK’s Daily Mail.
His recent trip to the disintegrating ice sheet in Greenland was “enough to blow a few skeptical cobwebs away…..
“I have long been something of a climate-change sceptic, but my views in recent years have shifted. For me, the most convincing evidence that something worrying is going on lies right here in the Arctic.”
Michael Shermer,
publisher of Skeptic Magazine.
Formerly a fan of Lomborg, Shermer reached a “flipping point’ in 2006.
Now, he writes, “”Because of the complexity of the problem, environmental skepticism was once tenable. No longer. It is time to flip from skepticism to activism.”
Greg Easterbrook,
influential journalist. Pet liberal of Rush Limbaugh for his authoring of a climate skeptical book. “The science has changed from ambiguous to near-unanimous… Based on the data I’m now switching sides regarding global warming, from skeptic to convert.”
Stu Ostro,
Weather Channel senior meteorologist.
Profiled here last week.
Now says, “Skepticism is an important part of the scientific process. It becomes a problem when you are too skeptical, then it becomes unhealthy.”
Send in your guesses on who among the high profile denier community will be next to flip over, and what it will finally take to make that happen.
I don’t believe Lomborg deserves a place on this list. He has not changed his spiel:
> “For nearly 20 years, one group of activists argued – in the face of ever-mounting evidence – that global warming was a fabrication. Their opponents, meanwhile, exaggerated the phenomenon’s likely impact – and, as a consequence, dogmatically fixated on drastic, short-term carbon cuts as the only solution, despite overwhelming evidence that such cuts would be cripplingly expensive and woefully ineffective.” http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/lomborg66/English
And by “their opponents”, he means ‘climate scientists’. He attempts to place the craziest deniers at one end of the scale, climate scientists at the other – and him in the moderate, ‘sensible’ middle.
Lomborg has always followed the same script: “I accept the science (from these low-ball and obsolete cherry-picked data points and some that I made up), but we don’t want to do anything crazy like cutting carbon emissions! Let’s make ourselves wealthier and build a few sea walls in the unlikely event they are needed.”
Of course, it’s good to turn his game against him and quote him as selectively as he does everyone else. 😉
yeah, why not?
Umm. For the reason I just explained? What he says is not what he means.
I think you’ve misunderstood me….
To further clarify: “This chapter accepts the reality of man-made global warming.” The Skeptical Environmentalist, 2001 – http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/30/bjorn-lomborg-climate-change-quotes
Lomborg has *never* been a denier. His claimed acceptance of the science is why his disinformation has been so successful – it provides him with a veneer of credibility which makes his distortions and cherry picks more believable.
Clear enough?
BlueRock, your analysis of Lomborg is right on, especially:
“His claimed acceptance of the science is why his disinformation has been so successful – it provides him with a veneer of credibility which makes his distortions and cherry picks more believable.”
Exactly. I made this point just the other day in a debate with a Lomborg fan.
What’s the story with Burt Rutan?
http://youtu.be/Gm8vaH8LEV0
I didn’t realize that he was such a raving denier…maybe Richard Branson could talk some sense into him?
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS136791820420101206
rabid right winger. who knows?