By Jeffrey Berger
When writing about climate change, the boiled frog analogy serves a useful purpose, and it goes like this: If you place a frog in boiling water, it will immediately jump out. However, if you place the same frog in slowly heated water, it will adjust to gradually rising temperatures and stay put until it boils to death. No frogs were harmed in the writing of this post. Nevertheless, the boiled frog analogy explains a quirk of human nature: How some people ignore a looming threat that unfolds gradually over time.
When writing about climate change, the boiled frog analogy serves a useful purpose, and it goes like this: If you place a frog in boiling water, it will immediately jump out. However, if you place the same frog in slowly heated water, it will adjust to gradually rising temperatures and stay put until it boils to death. No frogs were harmed in the writing of this post. Nevertheless, the boiled frog analogy explains a quirk of human nature: How some people ignore a looming threat that unfolds gradually over time.
Climate change cannot be watched on cable TV with the immediate impact of a tsunami. Climate change may not be felt this year, next year, or for several years. Yet, climate scientists predict a grim future of melting ice caps, rising sea levels, coastal flooding, drought, crop failures, disruptions in global food supplies, famine, refugee crises, and wars. In short, climate change represents an existential threat to future generations. Despite these warnings, there are skeptics, doubters, and boiled frogs.
We understand why the concept of climate change provokes anger among people. The economic, political, and moral implications are troubling; and there are deeply rooted historical and cultural impediments to overcome. Yet, we can no longer afford to dither. The climate bomb is ticking, and time is running out.
Climate change scientists study greenhouse gas emissions, heat retention models, and the complex relationship between variables on a global scale. Decades of careful observations lead to an irrefutable conclusion: Human impacts - especially greenhouse gas emissions - are the leading cause of rising global temperatures.
As we burn energy in our cars, homes, and factories, we release greenhouses gases into the atmosphere. “So what,” croaks the frog. “Everything in nature is flatulent.” Yet, when we examine sources of atmospheric greenhouse gases from natural to manmade, fossil fuels are literally the smoking gun. How do we know? Manmade pollutants have a unique molecular signature, unlike natural emissions.
Imagine two world maps, one superimposed over another. One map shows distributions of human population; another map shows sources of greenhouse gas emissions. These maps overlap with uncanny precision. Satellite data confirm the relationship between human activity and greenhouse gas emissions. How extensive, we ask? An increase of 78% since 1970, and 96% since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Hence, the term ‘anthropogenic,’ meaning ‘caused by human beings.’
Boiled frogs often cite geological history to disprove the anthropogenic cause of climate change. “So what,” croaks the frog. “Everyone knows Mother Earth has mood swings.” Yet, the boiled frog version of earth history omits one all important detail: How the biosphere influences climate.
Before the Carboniferous period, 400 million years ago, earth was uniformly hot and humid due to high levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Plants consume carbon dioxide, and herbivores consume plants. Fossil fuels are the carbon remnants of ancient plants and animals that lived and died millions years ago and became buried underground.
Eons later, an upstart biped learned how to unearth and burn these fossil fuels. Within 12 generations, human beings released thousands of giga-tonnes of long buried carbon into the atmosphere — reversing a four-hundred million year old process in less than 250 years.
Despite decades of record high global temperatures, cold spells bring out the boiled frogs among us. Here is a statistical concept to keep in mind. All data sets — no matter how conclusive — contain some degree of random noise known as ‘statistical outliers.’ Climate change deniers build deceptions and errors of omission on foundations of random noise. In other words, statistical outliers turn boiled frogs into consummate liars.
The definitive scam came to light last year when InsideClimate News interviewed former scientists of Exxon Corporation and released hundreds of pages of internal documents. Decades ago, Exxon’s own research confirmed the consensus of climate scientists. In 1978, Exxon Senior Scientist James Black wrote: "Present thinking holds that man has a time window of five to ten years before the need for hard decisions … become critical.”
In the 1980s, Exxon suspended publication of its findings and embarked upon a campaign to mislead the public. Exxon Mobil is currently under investigation in California and New York for fraud and alleged violations of environmental, public health, and shareholder protection laws. Rivaling the fraudulent practices of asbestos and tobacco producers, Exxon Mobil used deceptive tactics to protect its horde of filthy lucre.
Admittedly, the boiling frog story employs a fanciful metaphor. The definitive experiment was performed in 1869 by Friedrich Goltz, a German physiologist who searched for the location of the soul. His experiment confirmed a fundamental truth: Frogs whose brains have been removed will remain in slowly heated water until they boil to death. Thus, I end my commentary on this note. Unlike their intact amphibian counterparts, the hardboiled frogs of climate change denial and depraved indifference have neither brains nor souls.
(c) 2016
