William R McPherson Ph D

Sabotaging the Planet William R McPherson Ph D

Denial of climate change has consequences. As we have seen during the past four years, denial ideology has created a culture of political malfeasance, as politicians use denial to try to delay needed action. While some such as President Barack Obama have pressed ahead with regulations to control carbon emissions, others have sought to stop the international community from taking action by reducing the role of the United States to a foot-dragger in negotiations. Paris heralded a turning point in international negotiations on climate change. With the adoption of the Paris Agreement, 194 nations committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This book records the negotiations and events that led to the Paris agreement, and reveals the forces aligned against it. In the U. S., there is a notable denial movement that uses pseudoscience to deny the evidence of climate science. Politicians who do not favor climate action for whatever reason enlist this denial ideology. The "war on coal," the assertion that the globe is cooling, that climate science is a "hoax," and similar themes are interwoven in the denial ideology. The ideology feeds into opposition to the Paris Agreement, which could sabotage the planet.