Climate 411

Teaching Teachers about Climate Change

In my 30 years as a university professor before coming to Environmental Defense (2 years ago today!), I gave a lot of lectures in a lot of classrooms. But last Thursday I had one of the strangest lecture experiences of my professional life.

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TXU Buyout tied to Environmental Agreement

Guest blogger Jim Marston is an attorney, and the Director of the Energy Program in the Texas Office of Environmental Defense.

Who would have thought that, almost a month to the day after the USCAP initiative was announced, coal-enamored TXU would come on board? But today’s big news is victory in Texas, thanks to an unusual buyout agreement.

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A Climate Change Haiku

Glaciers in Andes mountains
frozen for 5000 years
now melting.

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This Week's Ignoratio Elenchi Award

ignoratio elenchi n.
A logical fallacy of presenting an argument that may in itself be valid, but has nothing to do with the proposition it purports to prove. Also known as “irrelevant conclusion”. [Lat. ignorance of refutation.]

On Monday, an article appeared in the Washington Times that offers so many outrageous examples of the logical fallacy of irrelevant conclusion (formally, ignoratio elenchi) that I’m beginning a new series of posts – the Ignoratio Elenchi Awards – for the most flagrantly misleading arguments against curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

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Lincoln’s Little-Known Legacy

This post is dedicated to the two great Americans we will honor on Presidents’ Day this Monday.

Everybody knows about Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation and Gettysburg Address; they are a big part of why Lincoln’s birthday is honored. Most people don’t know that Lincoln also established the National Academy of Sciences (NAS).

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Brrr… this is global warming??

If you live in the Northeast or upper Midwest of the United States, it’s cold outside – very cold. I did a series of radio interviews on global warming yesterday, and I kept getting the same question: “How can there be global warming when it’s so cold outside??” Indeed, some talk radio hosts are now proclaiming that global warming is clearly a myth, given the current cold snap.

The science skeptics are at it again, so let’s go over the facts. Read More »

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