The Many Faces of Climate Change

IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, Working Group 2 For the scientific community, the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a United Nations body, is a major face of climate change.  Especially for those hundreds of otherwise uncelebrated scientists who work hours and hours contributing to these definitive documents. The IPCC has been producing Assessment Reports (AR) on the state of world climate and climate change since 1990.  As far as I can tell, the current numbering system began with AR4 in 2006 and 2007 (each round produces 3 reports over the course of 2 years); AR5 was in 2013 and 2014; the current AR6 began with a report in 2021.  In addition to the three working group reports, a round may produce additional special reports. So the gap between AR5 and AR6 has been about 8 years.  The first of this round's 3 working group reports came out in August of 2021, The Physical Science Basis .  This is where the most knowledgeable climate scientists in the wo...

 Paul Kingsnorth Paul Kingsnorth, author of Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist  was well profiled in the New York Times magazine of Sunday, April 17, 2014, in an article entitled It's the End of the World As We Know It, and He Feels Fine  ( link , behind a paywall). At that time I had a good understanding of climate change but not a lot of active participation in anti-climate-change activism.  Here was a guy who had been very active for decades, and seemed intelligent, and was saying there was essentially no hope.  All the work, all the effort, and no progress, just falling behind farther and farther.  According to the article he came under a fair amount of fire from the remaining legions of activists. My daughter read the same article and said it was "just too sad" to accept what Kingsnorth said.  She has become active in Extinction Rebellion and The Climate Mobilization. I followed up by reading Kingsnorth's article The Witness  in Tri...

Introduction It was a big deal when I turned 70 last July.  Recently I realized that I am closer to my 71st birthday than to my 70th!  I was about to write, "I guess it never stops," but I instantly realized, uhhh, yes it does.  That's the point.  70 is definitely an age when you realize you don't have forever left.  And even less time left with your full health and full mind and whatever skills you have accumulated and whatever people you are close to. It was clear to me that there are two areas I want to devote as much time as possible to in my remaining years.  The first is playing music and singing.  I play several instruments, none at a very high level, and I sing along with my own guitar and ukulele accompaniment.  I want to play much more; to recover certain songs I used to play with ease; and to add to my repertoire and my skill as much as possible; and to play much more with others.  I may start a separate blog on this subject. The s...