“Climate change - the false religion of the 21st century”

This letter sent to the Star was written by Neville Martin, Castledine Gardens, Sheffield, S9
Youth Climate Strike outside Sheffield Town Hall. Picture Scott MerryleesYouth Climate Strike outside Sheffield Town Hall. Picture Scott Merrylees
Youth Climate Strike outside Sheffield Town Hall. Picture Scott Merrylees

The new religion of the 21st century, “man-made global climate change”, gathers apace, with the numbers of false prophets increasing daily.

The ill-omened shrieks of Sir David Attenborough and Dame Emma Thompson are added to the ever more hysterical contentions of the useful idiots of Extinction Rebellion, endorsing the preposterous conjecture that we have “twelve years to save the planet”. Moreover, adherents to this Godless hypothesis have now uncovered their own ‘Joan of Arc’ figure in the shape of sixteen-year-old Greta Thunberg, whose youthful, pious fervour has gripped the gullibility of the political and media classes alike. (‘St. Greta’ needs to take heed: Joan’s pursuit of a mystical vision didn’t end well.)

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

For the record, I would point out that when God created the multiverse, He troubled to install in every living thing an immune system. The planet Earth, (being a living organism), has its own very effective immune system which is more than capable of dealing with all of mankind’s errant carelessness; (to suggest that He needs help from humanity is simply faithless arrogance).

The evidence of the Earth’s ability to self-heal is all around in the natural and man-made disasters that regularly befall the planet, but hardcore doubters seeking to be further convinced need look no further than the Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Man-made disasters don’t come any bigger than this, when five million barrels of crude oil were spilled into the Gulf in 2010. Scientists documented several plumes of oil drifting in the deep, including one 35 kilometres long, two kilometres wide and 200-metres thick, causing them to declare, (in their wisdom), that it would take 1,000 years to eradicate the catastrophic oily residues.

The recovery operation which was set in place ensured that 17 percent of the spillage was captured at the wellhead, 25 percent evaporated or dissolved and 32 percent was burned, skimmed or dispersed chemically or naturally. This left 210 million gallons of crude oil to be dealt with: a task acknowledged to be beyond all the resources of humanity. But just ONE YEAR LATER, no-one could find or account for what science calls “The Enduring Mystery of the Missing Oil.”

Biologist Christopher D'Elia of Louisiana State University and dean of the School of the Coast and Environment said in 2015: “We didn't know where the oil was, what it was like, where it was going, how it was being dispersed,” whilst biogeochemist Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia simply stated: “The volatiles are gone.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The question of where the oil that spewed from the well ended up is, and will forever remain, a mystery, inexplicable in human terms, other than to concede that the planet dealt with it. Could the virtue signalling of Attenborough, Thunberg, Thompson and the entire combined efforts of Extinction Rebellion do better? I think not.

Comment Guidelines

National World encourages reader discussion on our stories. User feedback, insights and back-and-forth exchanges add a rich layer of context to reporting. Please review our Community Guidelines before commenting.