Editorial | Climate change - Facts, Uncertainties and Myths

Abstract

Clemenceau, the prime minister of France in the final stages of World War I, is reported to have said, “War is much too serious a thing to be left to the military”. Along these lines, one might say that “Climate change is much too serious to be left to climate scientists”. The point being that the views of technical specialists may be very important when a nation’s future is at stake, but that a purely technical perspective is too limited to decide on the best course of action. Leaving the issue of climate change, or war for that matter, solely to politicians is not wise either. Far too much is at stake for humanity as a whole to either accept uncritically or, alternatively, reject out-of-hand the doomsday message in Al Gore’s An inconvenient truth. This movie presents a dramatic view of the potential impact of climate change on our environment and hence human society.