Opinion : Letter to the Editor: The silliness of “Climate Change," of course it’s changing

Dear Editor,

A recent opinion letter had one paragraph dedicated to CLIMATE CHANGE with the requisite warning of imminent death due to crop failures, relief that fossil fuels are being drastically reduced and the increased government spending on alternatives to the “deadly consumption of unsafe fuels”. This particular brand of silliness seems to have taken over all other narratives because it’s proudly stated as “settled science” . . . that there is a “consensus of scientists” that agree. That . . . that right there should raise an eyebrow or twelve and go a long way towards clearly showing that this is simply NOT SCIENCE. Science is never – ever – ever “settled”.

There are a handful of scientifically defined “constants” - c: the speed of light in vacuum, h: the Planck constant, e: elementary charge, ∆νCs: the hyperfine transition frequency of cesium-133, k: the Boltzmann constant, NA: the Avogadro constant, Kcd: the luminous efficacy of monochromatic radiation of frequency 540 × 1012 hertz. And that’s it as of today. Even these are open to reevaluation and change. But this . . . this right here . . . is all the scientific community has ever formally agreed upon as clearly defined and agreed to . . . nothing else . . . period.

Let’s drill down on the whole – “that’s the way it is, that’s what’s true because I SAID SO!!” – thing. I’ve never accepted that in any arena – math, physics, electronics, chemistry – never. If I can’t see the data, evaluate the data for myself, recreate the experiment or circuit myself, I retain the right to question all I want to. And so do you. The biggest lie in the US – confirmed over and over and over and over – “I’m from the government and I’m here to help you!!” And helping us through climate change is just one more rung in our government’s ever-so-helpful ladder.

A quick detour on doubt and self-verification. I grew up in a Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod home. I was confirmed when I reached 12 and was able to take communion for the first time. It was called the age of awareness at that time. So as part of the process, we were given an unconsecrated host (a communion wafer that’s not been blessed) to eat so we would know what it tasted like. Pretty bland but edible. Of course, we were also taught that once consecrated it became “the body and blood of Christ” and I became just a bit horrified. It would turn into 2,000-year-old jerky??? I ignored the whole “through, with and under the bread” phrase that was added and just imagined what a horrible taste it would be and at the same time I was interested in just how this “magic” occurred.

About a month before my first communion my Mom purchased a Microscope kit for me. Man was that cool. It came with prepared slides of butterfly wings, fly wings, and various plants. Add to that looking at salt, pepper, and water droplets as X400 magnification – I was in heaven. And a plan hatched to just see how a “wafer” could turn into 2,000-year-old Jerky. I saved a piece of my unconsecrated host for a look-see under my microscope. My first communion came and went. I tasted absolutely no difference between a consecrated host and an unconsecrated host – none. What the heck??? So, the next month during communion I saved a very small bite of the consecrated host for “further evaluation”. Just imagine my surprise when I saw no difference between the two samples. None, zero, zip, nada . . .

The first person I challenged in this scandal was my Mom . . . "What the heck Mom???

“You did what???”

So, I explained the experiment more closely. “Of course you did” she said, shaking her head. This led to a much deeper conversation with her, our pastor, and a much deeper understanding of the whole idea of “faith”. Now – 60 years later, my religion is simply a matter of faith. There are no “ah-has”!!! We suspect the location of “The Tomb” but it’s not certain. We believe with all our hearts that “He is risen.” But only a couple handfuls witnessed the Risen Christ 2,000 years ago. We take it on faith. I take it on faith.

The moral here? You should challenge everything – even your strongest beliefs. Yet, with the certain death that awaits us all if we don’t stop driving cars, turn off all our lights and air-conditioning, walk and bike more . . . the world is doomed!!! Doomed I say. Again, this is where the silliness begins.

Let’s take a look at the length of geologic time that’s being evaluated. The typical maximum I’ve found is 80 MILLION years. During that time lifeforms like the Dinosaurs became extinct, their life ended by a massive meteor that struck in the Yucatan Peninsula. Multiple species of plants and animals have come and gone. Various versions of humans have come and gone. Past that, a lot of things are simply unknowable until we learn how to skip through time. The last 500 MILLION years is when most lifeforms developed. There have been 5 defined Ice Ages with the latest being the one we are still emerging from – the “Quaterny”. The Cryogenian – 717 MILLION to 635 MILLION years ago – is thought to have covered the entire earth and that it required an actual shift in the orbit of the earth to break it up. Obviously, the earth has a very long and rich geologic history with humans truly witnessing it over the past couple million years and actual civilizations and defined cultures only coming into existence within the past 5,000 years or so. So how can we scale this to better wrap our head around what we are looking at?

Let’s try this. The age of the earth is roughly 4.5 BILLION years old. 80 MILLION years represents about 1.777% of the life of the earth. Comparing these 80 MILLION years to a part of a single year would look something like this. In a year there are 31,536,000 Seconds. 1.777% of that would be 560,649 seconds, 9,344 minutes, 155.73 hours or 6.49 days. So, assume we are an interstellar traveler, and we land in the middle of Canada on January 1st and stay for a week. Based on our measurements, what decisions would be made about the climate of this planet based on our week’s stay??? What if we landed in the African desert?? Or Iowa??

My point? We are attempting to evaluate a global, long-term climate model based on a profoundly limited data set. A data set that spans 80 MILLION years and represents less than 2% of the geological history of the planet. See why I call it silly???

Then there are the whole “record-breaking temperatures”!!!! meme. In our recorded history, you can find an inventory of Roman wine from grapes grown in northern Scotland – a land unable to support such a thing today because it’s just too cold. You can read ship logs recounting a frozen Thames River in London as well as the canals in the Netherlands (hence the story of “The Silver Skates”). The “little ice age” that plagued the Northeastern US in the late 1700s, the dust bowl years and the prolonged period of heat during that period.

Bottom line . . . the climate is in a continual state of change. The sun’s radiance changes. Our orbit changes. Our tilt along our axis changes. Our CO2 levels change and have been twice as high during the past 80 MILLION years as it is today. The planet changes. The thought that humans could greatly affect the climate is also simply silly. Do we have obligations to be good stewards? Sure – how many remember the weeping Indian? But to believe that 1) – we can replace fossil fuels with batteries when a battery-powered truck only could travel 75 miles between charges 2) – that we can replace the power generated by a nuclear plant with solar panels that only get 4 hours of direct sun on average per day in Iowa 3) – that windmills that are created with carbon-based fuels, mined with carbon-based fuels, have their blades derived from carbon-based fuels, are transported and installed with equipment that can only run on carbon-based fuels – that these windmills can REPLACE carbon-based fuels – THIS . . . THIS RIGHT HERE . . . is past silliness . . . and well into the realm of FOOLISHNESS.

So folks . . . do the math. Dig for facts. Question everything and everyone. Find the truth – the actual, rock bottom, no kiddin’ truth for yourself.

Death by climate change . . . pure silliness . . . just sayin’.

Bill Keller