Bishop Hill 1970s global cooling alarmism
Mar 1, 2013 Climate: Surface This is a guest post via Andrew at Popular Technology.net. It outlines just how much media hype there was over global cooling in the 1970s.
During the 1970s the media promoted global cooling alarmism with dire threats of a new ice age. Extreme weather events were hyped as signs of the coming apocalypse and man-made pollution was blamed as the cause. Environmental extremists called for everything from outlawing the internal combustion engine to communist style population controls. This media hype was found in newspapers, magazines, books and on television:
1970 - Colder Winters Held Dawn of New Ice Age - Scientists See Ice Age In the Future (The Washington Post, January 11, 1970)
1970 - Is Mankind Manufacturing a New Ice Age for Itself? (L.A. Times, January 15, 1970)
1970 - New Ice Age May Descend On Man (Sumter Daily Item, January 26, 1970)
1970 - Pollution Prospect A Chilling One (Owosso Argus-Press, January 26, 1970)
1970 - Pollution's 2-way 'Freeze' On Society (Middlesboro Daily News, January 28, 1970)
1970 - Cold Facts About Pollution (The Southeast Missourian, January 29, 1970)
1970 - Pollution Could Cause Ice Age, Agency Reports (St. Petersburg Times, March 4, 1970)
1970 - Pollution Called Ice Age Threat (St. Petersburg Times, June 26, 1970)
1970 - Dirt Will .Bring New Ice Age (The Sydney Morning Herald, October 19, 1970)
1971 - Ice Age Refugee Dies Underground (The Montreal Gazette, Febuary 17, 1971)
1971 - U.S. Scientist Sees New Ice Age Coming (The Washington Post, July 9, 1971)
1971 - Ice Age Around the Corner (Chicago Tribune, July 10, 1971)
1971 - New Ice Age Coming - It's Already Getting Colder (L.A. Times, October 24, 1971)
1971 - Another Ice Age? Pollution Blocking Sunlight (The Day, November 1, 1971)
1971 - Air Pollution Could Bring An Ice Age (Harlan Daily Enterprise, November 4, 1971)
1972 - Air pollution may cause ice age (Free-Lance Star, February 3, 1972)
1972 - Scientist Says New ice Age Coming (The Ledger, February 13, 1972)
1972 - Scientist predicts new ice age (Free-Lance Star, September 11, 1972)
1972 - British expert on Climate Change says Says New Ice Age Creeping Over Northern Hemisphere (Lewiston Evening Journal, September 11, 1972)
1972 - Climate Seen Cooling For Return Of Ice Age (Portsmouth Times, September 11, 1972)
1972 - New Ice Age Slipping Over North (Press-Courier, September 11, 1972)
1972 - Ice Age Begins A New Assault In North (The Age, September 12, 1972)
1972 - Weather To Get Colder (Montreal Gazette, September 12, 1972)
1972 - British climate expert predicts new Ice Age (The Christian Science Monitor, September 23, 1972)
1972 - Scientist Sees Chilling Signs of New Ice Age (L.A. Times, September 24, 1972)
1972 - Science: Another Ice Age? (Time Magazine, November 13, 1972)
1973 - The Ice Age Cometh (The Saturday Review, March 24, 1973)
1973 - Weather-watchers think another ice age may be on the way (The Christian Science Monitor, December 11, 1973)
1974 - New evidence indicates ice age here (Eugene Register-Guard, May 29, 1974)
1974 - Another Ice Age? (Time Magazine, June 24, 1974)
1974 - 2 Scientists Think 'Little' Ice Age Near (The Hartford Courant, August 11, 1974)
1974 - Ice Age, worse food crisis seen (The Chicago Tribune, October 30, 1974)
1974 - Believes Pollution Could Bring On Ice Age (Ludington Daily News, December 4, 1974)
1974 - Pollution Could Spur Ice Age, Nasa Says (Beaver Country Times, December 4, 1974)
1974 - Air Pollution May Trigger Ice Age, Scientists Feel (The Telegraph, December 5, 1974)
1974 - More Air Pollution Could Trigger Ice Age Disaster (Daily Sentinel - December 5, 1974)
1974 - Scientists Fear Smog Could Cause Ice Age (Milwaukee Journal, December 5, 1974)
1975 - Climate Changes Called Ominous (The New York Times, January 19, 1975)
1975 - Climate Change: Chilling Possibilities (Science News, March 1, 1975)
1975 - B-r-r-r-r: New Ice Age on way soon? (The Chicago Tribune, March 2, 1975)
1975 - Cooling Trends Arouse Fear That New Ice Age Coming (Eugene Register-Guard, March 2, 1975)
1975 - Is Another Ice Age Due? Arctic Ice Expands In Last Decade (Youngstown Vindicator - March 2, 1975)
1975 - Is Earth Headed For Another Ice Age? (Reading Eagle, March 2, 1975)
1975 - New Ice Age Dawning? Significant Shift In Climate Seen (Times Daily, March 2, 1975)
1975 - There's Troublesome Weather Ahead (Tri City Herald, March 2, 1975)
1975 - Is Earth Doomed To Live Through Another Ice Age? (The Robesonian, March 3, 1975)
1975 - The Ice Age cometh: the system that controls our climate (The Chicago Tribune, April 13, 1975)
1975 - The Cooling World (Newsweek, April 28, 1975)
1975 - Scientists Ask Why World Climate Is Changing; Major Cooling May Be Ahead (PDF) (The New York Times, May 21, 1975)
1975 - In the Grip of a New Ice Age? (International Wildlife, July-August, 1975)
1975 - Oil Spill Could Cause New Ice Age (Milwaukee Journal, December 11, 1975)
1976 - The Cooling: Has the Next Ice Age Already Begun? [Book] (Lowell Ponte, 1976)
1977 - Blizzard - What Happens if it Doesn't Stop? [Book] (George Stone, 1977)
1977 - The Weather Conspiracy: The Coming of the New Ice Age [Book] (The Impact Team, 1977)
1976 - Worrisome CIA Report; Even U.S. Farms May be Hit by Cooling Trend (U.S. News & World Report, May 31, 1976)
1977 - The Big Freeze (Time Magazine, January 31, 1977)
1977 - We Will Freeze in the Dark (Capital Cities Communications Documentary, Host: Nancy Dickerson, April 12, 1977)
1978 - The New Ice Age [Book] (Henry Gilfond, 1978)
1978 - Little Ice Age: Severe winters and cool summers ahead (Calgary Herald, January 10, 1978)
1978 - Winters Will Get Colder, 'we're Entering Little Ice Age' (Ellensburg Daily Record, January 10, 1978)
1978 - Geologist Says Winters Getting Colder (Middlesboro Daily News, January 16, 1978)
1978 - It's Going To Get Colder (Boca Raton News, January 17, 1978)
1978 - Believe new ice age is coming (The Bryan Times, March 31, 1978)
1978 - The Coming Ice Age (In Search Of TV Show, Season 2, Episode 23, Host: Leonard Nimoy, May 1978)
1978 - An Ice Age Is Coming Weather Expert Fears (Milwaukee Sentinel, November 17, 1978)
1979 - A Choice of Catastrophes - The Disasters That Threaten Our World [Book] (Isaac Asimov, 1979)
1979 - Get Ready to Freeze (Spokane Daily Chronicle, October 12, 1979)
1979 - New ice age almost upon us? (The Christian Science Monitor, November 14, 1979)
While a silent majority of the scientific community may have been more skeptical, you ironically find one of the most outspoken supporters of modern day Al Gore style global warming alarmism was promoting global cooling in the 1970s, the late Dr. Steven Schneider;
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - Life of Reason, George Santayana
Bishop Hill
David Whitehouse sends this cover from the Radio Times in November 1974.
Reader Comments (87)
@Peter C
"Truly vicious" is absolutely right - if anything, it's not strong enough. That site is so vile, it's Julius Streicher material (yeah, "Godwin!" bleat the fascists - yawn). I feel I need a bath for every individual item I read on that site.
The famous Chesterton quotation about God is apparently one he never quoth as it has not been found in print either written by him or in the printed record of any conversation or speech by himself spoken.
I am myself an atheist but find much to like in Chesterton so I shall pay him the backhanded compliment of saying that belief in God is just one of the things, propositions, people come to entertain whilst on this hill of laughter, given sufficient credulity and imagination. In a godless universe theism helps pass the time.
Jack Savage 5:58pm 1/3 - from my reading of the Court records, the Mann case is ongoing and has 2 Motion hearings scheduled for 11th April:
https://www.dccourts.gov/cco/maincase.jsf
A very useful article, bearing in mind that our ecofascist opponents regularly claim that the ice age scare never happened. I have bookmarked it.
I should also like to point out that Santayana said elsewhere something like 'In order to remember past experience we have to change it' - by simplification one assumes.
It's case number 2012 CA 008263 B
@Nigel Calder
Very interesting link, I've only scanned it quickly but will read it more thoroughly tonight. Recommend everyone else to at least have a look at it.
Sandy
Why did the mammoth cross the road?
Because Al Gore hadn't invented chicken yet.
The science was obviously 'settled' in the 1970s, the same as now...
Geoff Chambers: very insightful. There has to be a middle way between founding leper colonies in Africa and doing lasting damage to the same place through blind ideology. But fewer people going to university has to be an option.
TLITB,
I was a teenager either side of 1970, and agree with you about the fear of a nuclear exchange at the time. I can still recall my incredulity when I first understood the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) doctrine - this was the best the collective world leadership could manage? I was also looking down the barrel of conscription to Viet Nam (thankfully averted by the election of Gough Whitlam), and had no desire to become cannon fodder. Those of you here who were born with right-wing genes often appear to me to fail to understand the pressures of the times. Supporting right-wing/conservative governments then was simply out of the question. They threatened our physical safety (through conscription, violent attacks by police - eg Kent State), our personal freedom (incarceration for minor possession charges), our freedom of speech (state-sanctioned harassment of 'trouble-makers'), our environment (rampant development and smog-choked cities, stockpiles of nuclear waste) and our cultural heritage (James Joyce, DH Lawrence, Henry Miller, and hundreds of others were banned). Right-wing governments were the enemy of my generation, because they were clearly on the side of evil. Was I scared? Damned right I was.
That said, 40 years later, as far as MAD goes at least, I can appreciate the extent to which the West's hands were tied. I can even see the other 'evils' as a natural consequence of the mind-set of the war generation when faced with the outrageous personal behaviour and utter insolence of the beatniks and then the hippies. But now, strangely, the enemy is left-wing governments, and guilty of similar charges: attacks on energy security threaten physical health and safety, political correctness and grievance legislation is eroding freedom of speech at a rapid rate, our cultural heritage is distorted through the Marxist prism and CAGW is an environmental disaster of epic proportions. And to add to their evils, they are hopeless economic managers (or worse, deliberately so).
But it's all small fry when compared to the problem of the next ice age.
peterwalsh - great link..! Thank you - I MIGHT just have to quote the contents to one of the muppets at the DECC...
I remember commenting on a warmist site some time ago that I remembered the cooling message in the 70's (I used to take Time, too), but it was roundly rubbished by the assembled company as being a fringe view. Nice to know my memory was not so faulty...
The information Nigel Calder put up on his web page which he referred to in an earlier message on this thread (the link is repeated below) is extremely interesting. I wonder how many politicians are aware of the historical background he outlines there? How many of the civil servants involved with energy policy are aware of it? In fact, it would be interested to know how many modern climate scientists are fully aware of the views of their predecessors of a few decades ago?
http://calderup.wordpress.com/2010/05/14/next-ice-age/#more-782
"Secondly, the majority of climate science in the 60's and 70's predicted warming, not cooling"
Is there a reference list that supports this claim? The bibliography of the 1974 CIA report Omnologos mentioned above looks reasonably comprehensive and their conclusion was that cooling was a threat.
Bibliography pdf p32:
http://www.climatemonitor.it/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/1974.pdf
It's not a matter of majority papers across two decades. Science didn't and shouldn't work like that. There's a history of influential papers describing the state of.the art at the time of publication.
Connolley and friends discovered in their analysis that most if not all scientists agreed in 1972 and up to 1975 that the world was cooling. That's enough to close the argument as far as any honest mind is concerned.
Peterson et al = Connolley and friends, of course
Those over about 50 remember the cooling scare, while alarmists, who are mainly from a younger generation, claim it never happened. Connolley and Schneider fell into a different category, of those who know or knew perfectly well that there had been a cooling scare with plenty of support from so-called climate scientists, but decided the inconvenient truth needed to be buried.
Eurasia has always been at war with Eastasia.
Q: Was there a consensus about global cooling between 1960 and 1980 among scientists?
A: Yes, at least between 1972 and 1975.
Q: Did they expect an ice age?
A: No but they were worried because the world was cooling and couldn't understand exactly why. So an ice age remained a possibility.
Q: Why did they get all that media attention?
A: Because scare stories always sell.
Q: Why were the media touting ice ages long after 1975?
A: Because there wasn't an alternative scare story as yet.
Q: Why are modern warmists so obsessed on denying history?
A: Because scare stories come and go and destroy each other's credibility
Important addendum - scientists weren't just predicting cooling - they were observing cooling and predicting it as they were expecting as much.
That's different from today when predictions have been adhered to despite observations
Maxim for global warmies: The weather is the tail that wags the climate science dog
I've just looked at the Peterson et al reference and confirm that it is hardly exhaustive or authoritative. They identify 7 papers that deal with global cooling. My first search using PAPERS has identified many references between 1960 and 1979 that they simply ignored!
However, this is not the point, as omnologos points out it is not simply a question of counting papers for and against!
Phil D
You've referenced the Mann case in District of Columbia with Mark Steyn, but the Mann case with Tim Ball that was queried is in the Province of British Columbia.
I was a kid learning abut science in the 70s and I remember the ice age scare well.
When history-rewriters Connolley and Peterson produced their ridiculous paper claiming that it was all a myth, I spent 5 minutes on google scholar and found several papers they had omitted from their 'thorough literature review' and posted them on his blog. His excuse was 'we didnt look at geology journals' iirc.
The only real difference was that the climate models in the 1970's were stored in shoe boxes and took 30 hours to run, but only if a card wasn't bent or a punch hole frayed from over use. Even then they only predicted the climate out 30 hours from the start of the run. The printout took 5 minutes and stated quite clearly "Look out the window".
This did not play well in the media. While the media in the 70's had an attention span considerable longer than the media today, it was still considerably shorter than 30 hours, 5 minutes.
The comments about pseudo-universities and Mickey Mouse degrees are very pertinent. We now have a large number of people who, because they have done media studies or somesuch, believe themselves to be highly educated. Couple this with a perception that their unsubstantiated and uncritical opinions carry merit and you can see where the AGW cannon fodder comes from. As many 'climate scientists' have demonstrated, actual proper science is too difficult for them so they huddle together and hide behind a consensus.
Steve Jones
Precisely my point though in haste I didn't put it quite as well.
Since we have been told virtually since my youth that the degree is the important thing rather than the subject (unless you have a particular relevant career in mind) and that the degree will open doors to commerce and will fast-track you through the police force, etcetera, it is hardly surprising that a lot of people believed it.
40 years ago it was probably true. One of the best salesmen and man managers I knew was recruited on the strength of a degree in geography. But then we started to lower the standard and dilute the product when what the UK needed might well have been experts in Golf Course Management but didn't need people who might (perhaps) have a theoretical knowledge of it and a BSc to prove it but still barely know what a blade of grass actually looks like.
Next time I have a burst pipe I don't need someone with a BSc in Hydrology; I need a plumber, preferably one with a C&G or similar.
The Blizzard of '77 explained.
http://members.shaw.ca/wellandwx/blizzard77.htm
Good to see Nigel Calder posting here. Nigel, if you read this, did you know Sir Patrick Moore and if so was he an AGW sceptic? I was always intrigued if this was him, posting on the infamous Prof Steve Jones anti-sceptic piece here
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/steve-jones/8675729/Scientists-always-anger-those-who-prefer-the-Earth-to-be-flat.html#comment-279494144
But "Artic Summers Ice-Free by 2013" BBC
- Next time BBC editors speak in public please ask these BBC Nostradamuses if they stand by their predictions
And yet, the majority of actual scientists were already warning about manmade global warming.
Coal burning power plant and the nuclear power plant industry is driven by two things. Money and Greed. They can care less about Pollution, our health, or the survival of our planet. This is what happens when money takes control of you instead of you being in control of it because I really think they can care less about Global warming, water pollution, acid rain, high levels of mercury, air pollution, human live or animal life....
http://pollutionx.com/what-is-mercury-and-what-are-the-hazards
The 3 Powerful Reasons All Intelligent People Know Climate Change Is Fake Science
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