Comments on the latest government produced global warming report.
“If these claims [Summary Findings, Chapter 1] were true then how is it that the US has grown so prosperous since the 1900s? You have just finished stating that massive, historically unprecedented climate changes occurred in the past century, especially in the past few decades. It is a matter of historical record that throughout this period the quality of life in the US just kept going up and up. Now you say that the next increment of warming will be completely different and will lead to ruin across the land. No exceptions, no caveats, no qualifications: you are asking the reader to forget the pattern that held up to now and take your word for it that disaster is coming. If you really believe that, then you owe it to the readers to be convincing, not cartoonish and apocalyptic. As one example, the opening phrase “cascading disruptions and damages in interdependent networks of infrastructure, ecosystems and social systems” reads like a Hollywood disaster flick – i.e. fiction. You have a very evocative style, but it sets a tone at odds with the expectation that this is a serious scientific document.”