This is the opinion of an observer of the man made climate change debate and is subject to revision as evidence presents itself.
The 5 stages of grief are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Dangerous man made climate change is a theory whose paradigm is shifting.Anomalies are accumulating, a crisis impending. Alarmists are in various stages of the grieving process for their cherished CO2 centric theory.
Even as the global meaningless temperature has refused to rise for 18+ years even with many manual adjustments all designed to alter the past and make it cooler while simultaneously warming the present some alarmists remain in DENIAL of this ever more prescient fact.
Extreme weather shows no tendency to increase in either severity or frequency and sea level rise shows no period of recent acceleration over its long term trend. Winters are not becoming warmer and Northern Hemisphere snow cover is increasing.
DENIAL of these facts is a hard position to maintain.
ANGER has followed with those skeptical of man made climate change ironically being branded as DENERS and denigrated in the press. Calls for their heads, calls for them to be jailed, calls for them to be denied access to the press have followed the failure of Mother Nature to uphold their CO2 centric theory. The psychological projection is embarrassingly obvious to those in possession of the facts that Mother Nature provides.
Recently, the BARGAINING step in the grieving process has made an appearance as several walkbacks have been ‘allowed’ by the usual suspects.
The IPCC had to alter their lower bound for climate sensitivity to be more in line with current papers in the scientific journals.
The ‘hottest year ever’ - 2014 - has been downplayed as the error bars for the measurements do not allow such a robust conclusion. Even the manual adjustments applied couldn’t definitively present 2014 with the blue ribbon.
In searching for a reason why the global climate models(GCMs) do not agree with Mother Nature scientists have come up with a plethora of excuses for this mismatch between theory and reality.
This is the BARGAINING that Mother Nature is forcing on those who champion the CO2 centric theory. BARGAINING is a movement to a more realistic position given the emerging evidence. It is a grudging acknowledgement of reality.
We await the appearance of the next two stages in the process of grieving a loss: DEPRESSION and finally, ACCEPTANCE.
How will depression manifest in the man made climate change drama?
Do all scientific paradigm shifts begin in the same way? Those who think they know brand challengers as DENIERS in an ironic bit of psychological projection. Admission of error is difficult for the defenders of the conventional wisdom, the assumed consensus, the settled science. ANGER at challengers follows persistence by the doubters. Only when sufficient anomalies build up and can’t be ignored does a crisis in the discipline emerge. Now BARGAINING(saving face) begins for the champions of the consensus view as they move toward a more reasonable position. DEPRESSION may follow as the realization that portions of their work has been misguided and a waste of time. They should take solace in the knowledge that finding a dark alley is a discovery that will benefit those who come after them. They have been in a dark alley and didn't recognize that they had lost their way.
ACCEPTANCE is the only choice left. Welcome back to the real world.
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