Dennis Prager Show - Dennis and Steven Koonin discuss climate change
Aired: 2021-05-06
Duration: 03:03


=== Why We Left Academia (03:03) ===

[00:00:00]  That's how important I consider it.
[00:00:01]  The book is unsettled?
[00:00:04]  What climate science tells us, what it doesn't, why it matters.
[00:00:08]  Stephen Kunin was the top scientist in the Department of Energy in the Obama administration.
[00:00:14]  Former professor of physics at theoretical physics, to be precise, at Caltech.
[00:00:21]  And now a professor, we didn't establish, a professor of what at NYU? Well, you know, when I went to NYU, because I'd been a provost at Caltech, I had kind of been fed up with the academic tribalism.
[00:00:35]  And I said, I don't want to be a professor of anything.
[00:00:37]  I just want to be a professor.
[00:00:40]  And the provost at the time, a nice guy whom I know, well, Dave McLaughlin, said, you've got to be a professor of something.
[00:00:48]  So I'm in the civil engineering department.
[00:00:51]  I'm in the business school in technology and operations, and I've got an appointment in physics as well.
[00:00:58]  Nice.
[00:01:00]  So, the data that you gave at the end of the last segment were staggering.
[00:01:06]  If we did nothing, maybe the temperature of the world would increase one or one and a half degrees Fahrenheit.
[00:01:16]  No, centigrade.
[00:01:18]  Oh, I thought you said Fahrenheit.
[00:01:20]  No, no.
[00:01:21]  So that's about two and a half to three degrees Fahrenheit.
[00:01:25]  Right.
[00:01:25]  And let's say that happened.
[00:01:27]  What would the results be for humanity?
[00:01:32]  Well, you know, given that we've gone up by one degree centigrade or two Fahrenheit already since 1900, roughly, and the world has prospered.
[00:01:45]  It's not such a big deal.
[00:01:47]  Okay?
[00:01:48]  And even the IPCC said that.
[00:01:51]  The official reports say for a temperature rise of even up to 7 or 8 degrees Fahrenheit, the economic impact is minimal for the U.S. and the globe.
[00:02:04]  Okay?
[00:02:05]  Minimal.
[00:02:05]  You know, in the book you can find the exact text.
[00:02:08]  I'll put you on the spot, but you're certainly free to say anything.
[00:02:14]  So when we're told that Manhattan will be underwater, fires will engulf the planet, the Antarctic ice sheet will melt and rise seas seven feet, would you characterize these as lies?
[00:02:33]  I would characterize them as gross exaggerations.
[00:02:38]  You know, with the sea level at the battery in Manhattan, just to take that example.
[00:02:43]  It's going up.
[00:02:45]  It's been going up since 1850. And it's been going up at one foot a century.
[00:02:51]  Now, you know, the IPCC will say, well, in the next 80 years it could be going up a little bit.
[00:02:57]  Listen, I want to thank you for a magnificent hour and a magnificent book.
[00:03:03]  Okay.