A BBC radio show is under attack for engaging in “climate denial” after interviewing a noted global warming skeptic who used to work for former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
Former Vice President Al Gore and physicist Brian Cox were among the sharpest critics of BBC Radio 4’s inviting Lord Nigel Lawson to debate global warming science Thursday morning.”It’s shocking how the BBC is engaged in climate denial, isn’t it?” Gore told LBC radio Thursday. “I had a personal experience with it this morning. It’s really shocking.”
Cox argued it was “irresponsible and highly misleading” to give skeptics, like Lawson, air time.
I agree with @jimalkhalili . Irresponsible and highly misleading to give the impression that there is a meaningful debate about the science. https://t.co/HtqJf9sBFW
— Brian Cox (@ProfBrianCox) August 10, 2017
Cox and Gore largely echoed arguments made by many climate scientists, environmental activists, and media personalities who contend that allowing skeptics to speak on global warming in the media feeds a false narrative that there’s a scientific debate on the issue.
Gore cited the alleged 97 percent “consensus” on global warming — a statistic that’s been debunked multiple times.
“If you had chest pains and they increased and you were somehow able to consult with the 100 heart specialists in the world and 97 percent said ‘You need to take this medicine, you need to change your diet, you need to make these other changes’, would you wait to find two or three who said ‘No, everything’s fine, you’ve got nothing to worry about,'” Gore told LBC.
Lawson appeared on BBC Radio 4 on Thursday morning to push back against Gore’s claims. The former vice president has been making the media circle in recent weeks to promote his new film “An Inconvenient Sequel.” The movie, a follow-up to “An Inconvenient Truth,” has been bombing at the box office.
Lawson not only challenged some aspects of climate science, but he also took on Gore’s motivations for pressuring governments to subsidize green energy.
“If it is fully economic, why on earth do we subsidise it and support it by all sorts of government policies which are driving up the cost of energy, particularly in the United Kingdom?” Lawson told BBC Radio 4.
Lawson said people should be more concerned about national security threats, like North Korea and terrorism, than with global warming.
“To begin with you might be a little bit scared but after ten years of him doing that and the end of the world isn’t nigh, then you think ‘maybe we should forget that and concentrate on real problems like North Korea’, like world poverty, like disease and all these other issues which we should be diverting our attention to,” Lawson said.
“International terrorism, Islamic fundamentalism, these are real problems,” he said. “The world is not short of problems, and to devote resources and energy to non-problems is really ridiculous.”
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