Peer Review Shows That There Was No Ice Age Scare

9 Responses to Peer Review Shows That There Was No Ice Age Scare

1. omnologos says:

   January 31, 2013 at 7:20 pm

   A point Connolley has always failed to answer is the fact that his AMS paper contradicts itself, as it includes the immortal words:

   By the early 1970s, when Mitchell updated his work (Mitchell 1972), THE NOTION OF A GLOBAL COOLING TREND WAS WIDELY ACCEPTED , albeit poorly understood

   Any idiot and their dog will be able to read papers from the time and understand that the 1970s started with cooling fears and ended in confusion.

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2. More Soylent Green! says:

   January 31, 2013 at 7:34 pm

   I don’t know about the scientific literature, but it was in the popular media. I was there.

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   • daveburton says:

     January 31, 2013 at 10:58 pm

     Me too. In the 1970s the consensus of leading climatologists was that air pollution was causing the Earth to cool dangerously, and a new "little ice age" (or worse) was imminent. Here are a 1975 Newsweek article on climate change, a 1974 Time article on climate change (or here), a 1974 CIA Report on climate change (or here), a three-part 1978 documentary (part 1) (part 2) (part 3) on “The Coming Ice Age” (narrated by a young Leonard Nimoy), and many other similar stories.

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   • Will Nitschke says:

     February 1, 2013 at 3:21 am

     I was there too… and remember the scare. When I pointed this out to a young climate activist he retorted, “Why should I believe an anecdotal story from someone like you!?”

     Good point. My actual life experiences have not undergone proper peer review. Plus, one can’t google readily this information. You’d have to, say, walk to the library…

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3. Eric Simpson says:

   January 31, 2013 at 9:06 pm

   Speaking of the global cooling scare (AGC), physicist Robert Zubrin in his “why we need more carbon” interview puts it this way:

   Antihumanism is a belief that humans are destroyers [whose] activities and aspirations must be severely constrained… In the 1970s there was a global cooling trend going on. So the antihumanists said “look, there is global cooling, which is being driven by industry.. Put us in control.” Then in the 1980s the climate began to warm, so they said “look, there is global warming, which is being driven by industry.. Put us in control.” The problem is always different, the solution is always the same [de-industrialization, and:] – put them in control.

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4. Melody Harpole says:

   February 1, 2013 at 3:18 am

   Yet somehow they used global cooling to scare children in elementary school, because I remember reading about global cooling it in my 3rd grade science textbook.

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5. sunsettommy says:

   February 1, 2013 at 3:25 am

   I remember it too and I was a Teenager at the time.

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6. Brian G Valentine says:

   February 1, 2013 at 3:29 am

   Steve Schneider took his (meaningless) Scheider-Mass “feedback” equation, added a couple of terms for “aerosols” – and got an ice age out of it.

   THIS IS NOT A JOKE

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7. Gary says:

   February 1, 2013 at 10:47 am

   The 1970s global cooling scare was real, I was there, I witnessed it.  At the time, PBS told us the cooling was caused by the “human dust volcano.”

   The 1979 science-fiction film Quintet, starring Paul Newman, was set in a post-apocalyptic new ice age.  When I watched this movie I understood that it was an expression of the cooling fears of the time.  But I have never found anyone else who remembers that movie.

   The 1988 documentary Stopping the Coming Ice Age cited scientists who believed increasing levels of atmospheric CO2 would result in a new ice age.  The film gave examples of record-breaking cold, snow and ice of the previous 15 years as evidence that a new ice age would begin in approximately 7 years.

   The 1990 Channel 4 documentary, The Greenhouse Conspiracy, interviewed Stephen Schneider at NCAR.  On camera a quote from Schneider’s first book was read to him citing the cooling trend and fears of a new Little Ice Age.  Schneider acknowledged that 14 years earlier, he was worried about global cooling.

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