(Originally published on LinkedIn on 10 Dec 2022)

I am not writing this record to humiliate any particular climate activist. It is just a record of my debate with an experienced “climate officer” in Zürich, die Schweiz under a post written by Prof Volker Quaschning. The original debate was in German (though my German language is far worse than my English).

The reason I put the debate here is to provide some thoughts about the radical climate protesters, e.g. Just Stop Oil and Letzte Generation, and the “climate experts” who are submerged in the “correct” information about climate change. This long debate, in summary, should indicate a principle: forcing everyone to listen to an extreme theory is an act of extremism, not environmentalism; if you want to believe only the alarming figures about the Earth on Twitter, LinkedIn etc published by the stars and activists, but never quote any scientific research showing various predictions, then you are probably an extremist.

A typical reaction of climate extremists is: If you are an environmentalist but don’t think the climate will collapse in 20 years, or you just advise there are different priorities for each individual, they will immediately accuse you of disregarding the billions of deaths due to climate change!

Below are some of the interesting arguments in this debate.

I start presenting this record from the very last argument from that climate officer. When this climate officer found his logic couldn’t sustain the debate anymore, he started boasting that his years of experience as a “climate officer” were solid evidence of his correctness on climate issues.

He: “I own a degree in physics and have 12 years of being a climate officer, but I just can’t get your respect?!”

Actually, this is a common mistake made when choosing whom we should listen to. When someone claims he has years of experience as a “climate promoter”, “climate agent”, “climate officer” etc, people tend to believe he or she must be an authoritative figure in climate change. However, these titles having the word “climate”, on the contrary, make these activists less credible, because their job is to incite the fear of “climate collapse” and promote radical opinions about climate change, not researching the climate objectively.

As such, when someone tries to lecture you that “I have 100 years of experience as a climate agent in a big company”, you should suspect him/her: it probably means he has spent 100 years propagating “climate extremism” and “climate totalitarianism”!

In the debate, the pieces of “evidence” presented by this climate officer were all tweets from radical activists on Twitter. These “online activists” are mostly young people who are indulged in “good morals” and fanatical about “climate justice”, i.e. accusing anyone more successful than them of being “climate criminals”.

A typical piece of “scientific evidence” presented by this climate officer from Switzerland looks like the picture below. This is a tweet from a young climate fanatic. The timeline in this tweet is more like propaganda, as it is only one of the many narratives about our climate in the past half-century.

Alarming tweets and shocking figures from climate alarmists and left-wing media are usually the only information sources for activists such as this climate officer. Is there also information in public media and from environmental scientists showing other aspects of our climate? Yes, but this kind of information, which is not in line with “climate alarmism”, is deliberately ruled out by the alarmists. They assert any dissenting information must be fake information from the far-right.

The climate extremists groups such as Just Stop Oil and Last Generation can exist in a democratic society thanks to the extremists on the Internet.

Additionally, many self-titled “famous environmental scientists” have never had a serious research career in climate science at all. In the messages distributed by climate extremists, they list unsourced information warning that the Earth will be shattered before the UK can strike an ultimate deal with the EU.

However, as I pointed out to this climate officer, these extremists never give any scientific and reliable reference clearly. Their “references” are usually the words from other climate activists/extremists/alarmists and pro-eco media e.g. Greta Thunberg and her fellows, New York Times, the Guardian, Greenpeace and so on — sometimes even these people and groups are not referred; the radical activists just list a series of alarming numbers without telling you who published those numbers!

I replied to this Swiss climate officer saying that his attitude towards climate change was a typical cult. Of course, he was irritated by this description and refuted me by uploading more pieces of “evidence” from Twitter, the Guardian, Facebook and GMX, e.g. the 70s research predicted we would die in 30 years, the air pollution will kill 240,000 children, the historical temperature chart since the 50s on the Guardian etc. You see, without any scientific publications again, his reactions perfectly proved how extremists like him have converted climate change into a cult!

(According to a piece of “evidence” provided by this climate officer, he should have been killed by a random 50 C summer in Zürich during 2010–2015)

One of the many differences between environmentalists and climate alarmists/extremists/terrorists is: the former tend to think independently when being given a set of figures or “facts” and find different arguments in different academic journals, while the latter group are always choosing the information fitting in their alarmism. Like the other end in what is called the “political spectrum”, these climate extremists are also fond of conspiracy theories that cater to their “extremely good morals”.

Climate extremists and activists are always claiming they block the roads for promoting an idea that saves people in the future. Ironically, they feel perfectly comfortable about damaging innocent individuals just in front of them.

This perverted “moral” is epitomised by the arguments of this climate officer. When I asked him: “How about the seriously ill or injured children dying in ambulances blocked by Last Generation?” A few minutes later, he uploaded a link to a webpage of Universität Basel about 240,000 deaths allegedly because of air pollutants in the next few decades. Now we see a typical mindset of climate extremists: they don’t care about the solid, practical and imminent emergencies in front of them, but only scream for the future deaths which are arguably related to the “climate collapse” in their theory! In other words, they think that you as an individual can be dispensable for a “grand moral”; to promote their extremism of climate change, everyone should be punished to make their extreme voices heard.

The numbers of deaths due to climate issues, which are frequently mentioned by activists and biased environmental scientists, are arguable as well. Certainly, global warming and air/water pollution will lead to shorter life expectancy around the world, especially in the least-developed countries in Africa. Nonetheless, it is a biased and fanatical act by linking deaths due to other causes of climate issues. This climate officer I was debating with liked to upload the online articles linking all deaths to climate change. Many of these “death tolls” are statistical correlations, not necessarily scientific or causal correlations. For instance, Switzerland champions the ranking of the number of Nobel Prize Laureates per 100,000 population, and she also champions the annual chocolate consumption per capita — can we conclude that eating more chocolate leads to better innovation and research?

Like the ecosystem and the climate system, the human body is also a complex system. A phenomenon in the human body is usually caused by several factors. E.g. the life expectancy in Italy is slightly longer than that in Sweden. According to the theory of climate extremists, it must be due to the “less climate change effects” in Italy. But until now I haven’t found a research paper saying Italy has suffered less in climate change than Sweden.

The same mindset exists in the little craniums of those young climate activists/vandalists pouring soups on the arts. Like this climate officer think of the “dispensable patients in ambulances”, they think arts and antiques are worthless compared with their belief in the “climate collapse”. But these climate vandalists are far more stupid than those climate terrorists blocking city streets, as they have never successfully damaged a single painting or sculpture.

OK, I am being funny in this part as the last two sections of a journal paper are usually Conclusion + Future Work.

Again, I am not writing this little record for humiliating Prof Volker Quaschning or this climate officer from Zürich. The purpose of putting this down is to provide more thoughts outside of the day-to-day flood of political correctness, and I would be glad to discuss more of this topic with other professionals on different paths.

It is agonising that climate change has shifted from a scientific topic to a political tactic in the past 50 years, especially in the recent 20 years as the Internet has created convenience for the distribution of extremism. I personally think it should be safe to draw a conclusion after reviewing this debate record: The climate alarmist information on the Internet, which is promoted by some intelligentsia and interest groups, has eaten the critical thinking ability of the public.

As Elon Musk once indicated in a conversation (forget in which one it was), the public media can immediately detect fascism or anti-environmentalism in a message and get it cancelled, but regard the opposite extremism e.g. “climate extremism” and “climate terrorism” as a display of “good moral”. When people, even highly educated people, are willing to receive only one side of information on a topic, this topic will lose its value as a scientific topic; instead, it will become a cult and the fanatics will want to punish the “heretics” to force them to believe in their cult, e.g. blocking the “heretics” travelling in the streets in London, Berlin and Paris.

Regarding the extremism related to climate change, there are still many other elements and factors to be investigated and discussed. Turning climate science into a cult can be a threat to the stability of our society and even to human civilisation. For this particular debate with a climate extremist who calls himself a “climate officer”, we should be aware that the best way to exterminate “climate cult”, “climate extremism”, “climate terrorism” and their fanatics should be presenting more scientific research outcomes. We only have to show them the diversity of research, opinions and information on climate change and ecosystems. But there should be laws protecting the diversity of opinions and information on any topic.