https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/10/opinion/scientist-fired-climate-change-activism.html
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Shortly after the New Year, I was fired from Oak Ridge National Laboratory after urging fellow scientists to take action on climate change. At the American Geophysical Union meeting in December, just before speakers took the stage for a plenary session, my fellow climate scientist Peter Kalmus and I unfurled a banner that read, “Out of the lab & into the streets.” In the few seconds before the banner was ripped from our hands, we implored our colleagues to use their leverage as scientists to wake the public up to the dying planet.
I am just guessing there is more to this story.
6 comments:
So, you were fired for prognosticating about the future of a chaotic system and calling it, “science”? Personally, I’m thrilled to hear it.
This is an odd story as the protest was at a meeting for geo/earth sciences. These meetings already have lots of work on climate change and political engagement so what would be the point in doing a demonstration at such a meeting. The person did some protest at the White House on her own time which does not violate any ORNL policy and would probably more effective. She is claiming that earth/climate/science in gernal is not raising the climate alarm. First of all that is not true as has always been scientists leading this. I am not sure what she wants in go to the streets, have scientists break windows or something? I thin the best thing to do is get hard evidence and show it to the politicians and public.
I did some digging this person also appears to come from a extremely wealthy privileged background so it is not like show is going to on the streets without a job. I have no problems with demonstrations but what she is doing is hurting the cause.
You got fired for being an unprofessional jerk and embarrassing your employer. Good riddance.
Hey 1/13/2023 5:29 PM
Don't judge lest ye be judged !
You may end up thanking him and his kind some day. One planet, limited solutions. What would you do to help save it?
1/14/2023 4:09 PM
I doesn't need "saving," it needs people to accommodate climate change, which has happened throughout the history of the planet and will continue happening no matter what humans do. The human causes of climate change cannot in any way be affected by anything anyone in the US does. Try talking to China, India, and the developing countries whose economic development absolutely depends on fossil fuels.
"public up to the dying planet."
Sorry even climate scientists do not say the earth is dying. Yes the earth could heat up which "could" have major impacts on human life but it is to going to create dying planet and will not even wipe out the human race even in the worse case scenarios. The reality is they do not know what the effects are going to be, there is pretty strong evidence the earth is warming, the exact cause is still not certain but burning fossil fuels is the most likely cause. What they do not know is what the effect is, how much warming and so on. I hear some people talk abut tipping points and feedback loops, but these are very speculative and have to say the climate scientists I know do not really understand what exactly this means in terms of dynamical systems or coupled differential equations or just how unpredictable this type of dynamics is. I am often shocked about how little some of these people know about mathematics, computational stability, thermodynamics and so on. I am not sayin these effects are not possible but I am saying that they cannot make any kind of concrete prediction. To be fair many do understand the uncertainly and will say so. Most of the hype comes from news media but since funding is involved many climate scientists are not going to go out of their way to correct the media what they say something that is speculative
is a fact . If you do not believe that scientists can be at least partially compromised by funding just look at all the hype associated with NIF.
I would think earth or climate scientists would have some knowledge of the temperatures of the earths which in many cases are much higher than the very worst man made global warming and somehow the earth and life survived just fine, so no we are not living in a dying earth. I would guess that this ORNL climate scientists does not even believe this herself but is just trying to make a name for herself.
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