No, @CNN, an Opinion Piece about ‘Dangerous Climate Feedback Loops’ Doesn’t Qualify as Science
stephenheins.substack.com
No, @CNN, an Opinion Piece about ‘Dangerous Climate Feedback Loops’ Doesn’t Qualify as Science
“An article in CNN claims feedback responses to rising temperatures driven by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations may result in deadly, permanent changes to the Earth’s climate.”
An article in CNN claims feedback responses to rising temperatures driven by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations may result in deadly, permanent changes to the Earth’s climate. The article provides no evidence to support this alarming claim, because there is no real-world data to back it up. The only climate tipping points that we can be certain exist are in the climate models themselves. While cosmic and natural cyclical patterns have made dramatic changes on occasion throughout history, there is no evidence carbon dioxide levels have served as a tipping point for such occurrences.
The problem for CNN’s report begins in the title. The source for CNN’s claims is not a “study,” but rather a “commentary,” titled “Many risky feedback loops amplify the need for climate action,” that published in the online-only journal called One-Earth, seen in the screencap below (yellow highlight by the author):
First, “commentary” is just another word for an opinion piece. Opinions are not science. Second, as is confirmed by the publisher in the screencap below, the article didn’t actuallydo any new science; it produced no new data, no formulas, no methods: