If you’ve paid any attention to the discourse surrounding the weather in the last 30 years, you’ve no doubt heard from some climate change alarmists.
From Greta Thunberg to Bill Gates, “climate change” was the looming, apocalyptic Sword of Damocles threatening to end life as we know it.
As time wore on, however, fewer and fewer people were inclined to believe that these doomsday predictions (whose dates kept getting moved back) were actually rooted in science.
In fact, Thunberg has all but abandoned her original pet cause to move on to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
But Gates? He’s still talking about climate change — but the tune he’s singing may surprise you.
(Of note, keep in mind that Gates was and is a proponent of synthetic, lab-grown beef, because cows are bad for the environment, or something along those lines.)
Here’s the opening paragraph of the New York Times piece on Gates’ sudden change of heart: “Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder who has spent billions of his own money to raise the alarm about the dangers of climate change, is now pushing back against what he calls a ‘doomsday outlook’ and appears to have shifted his stance on the risks posed by a warming planet.”
On his own site, Gates spelled out why his stance was shifting in a piece titled “Three tough truths about the climate.”
Gates wrote (emphasis added) that “There’s a doomsday view of climate change that goes like this:
Do you trust Bill Gates?
“In a few decades, cataclysmic climate change will decimate civilization. The evidence is all around us — just look at all the heat waves and storms caused by rising global temperatures. Nothing matters more than limiting the rise in temperature,” Gates wrote.
“Fortunately for all of us, this view is wrong. Although climate change will have serious consequences — particularly for people in the poorest countries — it will not lead to humanity’s demise. People will be able to live and thrive in most places on Earth for the foreseeable future. Emissions projections have gone down, and with the right policies and investments, innovation will allow us to drive emissions down much further.”
It’s a far cry from the same man who, in a 2021 MIT interview, openly wondered about feeding cows special compounds to reduce their methane emissions:
“In terms of livestock, it’s very difficult. There are all the things where they feed them different food, like there’s this one compound that gives you a 20% reduction [in methane emissions]. But sadly, those bacteria [in their digestive system that produce methane] are a necessary part of breaking down the grass. And so I don’t know if there’ll be some natural approach there. I’m afraid the synthetic [protein alternatives like plant-based burgers] will be required for at least the beef thing.”
Now?
“Unfortunately, the doomsday outlook is causing much of the climate community to focus too much on near-term emissions goals, and it’s diverting resources from the most effective things we should be doing to improve life in a warming world,” Gates said in his recent post.
That sentiment echoes what many climate change neutralists have argued: that while mankind should be good stewards of the environment, it can’t come at the expense of living standards.
Another criticism from that crowd — this one also echoed by Gates — was that the copious amount of money being funneled into climate research was not being spent well.
Gates eventually distilled his wordy piece into three “truths” that he thinks matters most:
- “Climate change is a serious problem, but it will not be the end of civilization.”
- “Temperature is not the best way to measure our progress on climate.” (“The global temperature doesn’t tell us anything about the quality of people’s lives. If droughts kill your crops, can you still afford food? When there’s an extreme heat wave, can you go somewhere with air conditioning?”)
- “Health and prosperity are the best defense against climate change.”
It doesn’t appear Gates will ever fully back off his climate zeal. It was just four scant years ago that he published the very alarmingly titled “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster.”
But at the very least, whether by self-enlightenment or sociopolitical self-preservation, Gates appears ready to hit the brakes on this issue.
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