Michael E. Mann > Quotes

“Here’s the four point battle plan, which we’ll return to at the end of the book: Disregard the Doomsayers: The misguided belief that “it’s too late” to act has been co-opted by fossil fuel interests and those advocating for them. It’s just another way of legitimizing business-as-usual and a continued reliance on fossil fuels. We must reject the overt doom and gloom that we increasingly encounter in today’s climate discourse. A Child Shall Lead Them: The youngest generation is fighting tooth and nail to save their planet, and there is a moral authority and clarity in their message that none but the most jaded ears can fail to hear. They are the game-changers that climate advocates have been waiting for. We should model our actions after theirs and learn from their methods and their idealism. Educate, Educate, Educate: Most hard-core climate-change deniers are unmovable. They view climate change through the prism of right-wing ideology and are impervious to facts. Don’t waste your time and effort trying to convince them. But there are many honest, confused folks out there who are caught in the crossfire, victims of the climate-change disinformation campaign. We must help them out. Then they will be in a position to join us in battle. Changing the System Requires Systemic Change: The fossil fuel disinformation machine wants to make it about the car you choose to drive, the food you choose to eat, and the lifestyle you choose to live rather than about the larger system and incentives. We need policies that will incentivize the needed shift away from fossil fuel burning toward a clean, green global economy. So-called leaders who resist the call for action must be removed from office.”
― Michael E. Mann, The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet

“Today, our massive societal infrastructure supports more than eight billion people, an order of magnitude beyond the natural “carrying capacity” of our planet (the resource limit of what our planet can provide in the absence of human technology). The resilience of this infrastructure depends on conditions remaining the same as those that prevailed during its development.”
― Michael E. Mann, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis

“Realness eats raw meat and does not waver He has the staying power of the sun He walks only in his own shoes —Spoon Jackson”
― Michael E. Mann, Heat 2

“Climate change is a crisis, but a solvable crisis.”
― Michael E. Mann, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis

“If we continue to burn fossil fuels, it is likely that the planet will warm beyond the limit of our collective adaptive capacity. How close are we to the edge? In the pages that follow, I set out to answer that question.”
― Michael E. Mann, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis

“Is it a coincidence that she also happens to be the one Democratic candidate who went on record during the primaries to oppose a price on carbon—a position that aligned suspiciously with Putin’s Russia and the Trump administration?”
― Michael E. Mann, The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet

“77 The Republican approach to climate change resembled a person trying to fix a leak in his ceiling with buckets, towels, and mops, but no mention of repair or a handyman.”
― Michael E. Mann, The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet

“The greatest threat to meaningful climate action today is no longer denial, but despair and doomism, premised on the flawed notion that it is too late to do anything. Our review of the paleoclimatic record will tell us otherwise.”
― Michael E. Mann, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis