“Personal character matters for scientific transparency and honesty. Andrew Dessler does not pass the temperament test in a field of unsettled causality and ambiguous data.”

The intellectual case for CO2/climate optimism in place of doomism and despair is straightforward. As neatly summarized by Steven Koonin (a ‘climate flat earther‘ to Andrew Dessler) in the Wall Street Journal:

• Elevated carbon-dioxide levels enhance plant growth, contributing to global greening and increased agricultural productivity.
• Complex climate models provide limited guidance on the climate’s response to rising carbon-dioxide levels. Overly sensitive models, often using extreme scenarios, have exaggerated future warming projections and consequences.
• Data aggregated over the continental U.S. show no significant longterm trends in most extreme weather events. Claims of more frequent or intense hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and dryness in America aren’t supported by historical records.

“If you’re pushing fossil fuels at this point, you’re anti-human.” – Andrew Dessler (2022)

“Fossil fuels are shredding our democracy.” Andrew Dessler (2024)

The recent election should have thrown climate scientist/alarmist/activist Andrew Dessler into a funk, even toward self-doubt and need to check his anti-CO2 premises. His all-out exaggeration about a climate emergency was resoundingly rejected by the winning party and abandoned as an important talking point by the losing party. [1]

Dessler will not shout (as before) that Americans are dumb and suicidal by rejecting his wise counsel. [2] He will not engage in some flagrant act of defiance like James Hansen getting arrested at a coal mine or Peter Kalmus disrupting a professional meeting of climate scientists. And, of course, he will not light himself on fire like a few climate crazies.…

“… your argument appears to rely on the same tactic you disparage in others: ‘the selective emphasis of certain facts that bolster their stance’…. You omit the abundant and vital array of studies…. You’re also way out of date.” – Andy Revkin to Dessler (below)

Last summer/fall was supposed to be another hurricane season of note, according to climate scientist/alarmist/activist Andrew Dessler. On June 12, 2023, he wrote in “Climate change is making hurricanes more destructive” (Substack):

Because hurricanes are one of the big-ticket weather disasters that humanity has to face, climate misinformers spend a lot of effort muddying the waters on whether climate change is making hurricanes more damaging. With the official start to the 2023 hurricane season in the North Atlantic on June 1, I figured it was time to explain why we can be so confident that hurricanes are indeed more destructive today due to climate change….

“A few days ago, a recent Washington Post article highlighted the growing chorus of scientists who increasingly view climate change as an emergency. I count myself among them. What has shifted my perspective? …” (- Andrew Dessler, last month)

“The worst-case scenarios of climate change are truly terrible, but even middle-of-the-road scenarios portend environmental change without precedent for human society.” (- Andrew Dessler, 2012)

So professor/activist Andrew Dessler now believes we are in a climate emergency? I think not. He has been alarming for many years, if not for decades. Dessler has been exaggerating for so long that he now wants a “it’s-real-this-time” do-over. Buyer beware.

A First Impression

The Andy Dessler I met for lunch on Monday, January 18, 2010, in College Station told the table (Gerald North presiding) that humans would be living underground because of anthropogenic global warming.…