There is no greater contradiction in the history of human thought and communication/writing than the epitome oxymoron of “Jesus Christ”, the merger of two profoundly opposite persons and messages. What led to Paul burying the diamonds of Historical Jesus in the “d___, m___, s____, and g______” (Jefferson and Tolstoy’s terms) of the New Testament Christology? The forensic work has been done by historians and theologians and Bob Brinsmead presents that research with his own brilliant summary conclusions in two new essays on bobbrinsmead.com. This is some of the best of the “Search for Historical Jesus” (taken up by the “Jesus Seminar”) and “Q Wisdom Sayings” research.
This is all critical to human construction of narratives, complexes of ideas/beliefs, that guide human thinking, emotions, motivations, and responses/behaviors. This is especially critical to how we treat differing others/”enemies”. History is replete with episodes of the barbarity of how people have treated fellow humans, too often incited by primitive ideas that validate the worst of behaviors. Until we go after the ideas/beliefs responsible for driving so much inhumanity, we will only repeat such eruptions of barbarity, as the military guy warned after the crushing of ISIS in 2014 in Syria.
And the ideas/beliefs responsible for validating such inhumanity are common to all the major religious traditions, and similar themes have been embraced by contemporary “secular/ideological” systems of belief.
See new material below on Grok 3, Elon Musk’s new baby.
I urged our discussion group to play with it: “Hey all, how about some fun with Grok 3, pushed by Musk as the best AI out there.
“Note below my queries about alarmist climate narratives (below the opening stuff on Hellenism shaping Christianity) and what appears to me, to be Grok’s biased leaning toward alarmist accounts in climate science. Grok appears to be a smarty pants at excuse-making for the alarmist take.”
Insert: Note how Grok persistently ends his/her/it’s comments with a wrapping-up statement of typical alarmist pessimism that is a denial of the previously presented information. So typical of alarmist denial. I think Grok is more biased by apocalyptic mythology than he/she/it is willing to acknowledge.
The more I pester Grok with climate questions, the more I see a clear bias toward climate alarmism narratives in his/her/it’s responses, meaning Grok has been deformed with the apocalyptic fallacy like most other human thought and narratives, past and contemporary.
Examples of Grok’s biased conclusions: On the evidence of wildfires declining significantly across the world…
Grok concludes his response with “The past century’s drop is real; the next century’s story could be very different.”
On the evidence of the amazing greening of earth with more CO2 basic plant food…
Grok concludes his comments with “Data says yes to greening; logic says don’t bet the farm on it.”
On Lindzen and Happer’s research that the CO2 warming influence is “saturated”, Grok is dismissive, like a denialist alarmist.
Grok says, “Without new, robust evidence from them, the saturation claim remains a minority stance.” Again, dismissive.
So Elon, “Truth seeking as the primary impulse of Grok”?
Let me add that my interactions with Grok have been stimulating as Grok is quick to pull up the response information, arranges the information helpfully in summary form (bullet points, etc.), and is also very polite, respectful, and sticks to the content of issues brought up with no ad hominem stuff. Hence, my “You are a good man, Grok”. Or woman. Or It.
Grok’s politeness led me to speculate there might be a Canuck among those algorithm-designing engineers with Musk.
I found him/her/it good at summarizing things like Classic Liberalism and affirming the critical need for such principles.
Keep it up Musk and Crew. Good job. How about some tweaking on the climate thing, though. More truly “equal, balanced, objective” and “truth seeking”. The bias slip under his/her/it’s clothes keeps showing through.
And, more on bad religious ideas deforming the “Hero’s Quest”, and how many distort the related engagement of a “battle of good versus evil” (the “cosmic dualism” thing of Zoroaster).
Main point below– Note the list of “the worst of bad ideas” from across history, ideas/themes/beliefs that still dominate our narratives, the world religions, and the secular/ideological belief systems of the modern era. Ideas that have always deformed human consciousness with unnecessary fears, incited irrational hysteria that rendered populations susceptible to embracing destructive “salvation” schemes (“save the world, save democracy”) that have ruined societies.
What drives power-mongering elites to use the same old list of mythical themes to terrorize people and construct endless new variants of “lost paradise, life declining toward a worse state due to bad enemies corrupting the world, looming apocalyptic disaster, demanded sacrifice, and salvation in a restored communalism paradise”?
Is it the “Fear=control” formula of totalitarians that has worked so well across history?
Opening:
Below, Jordan Peterson interviews Matthew Goodwin (UK professor) on the rot in higher education across Western liberal democracies, illustrating the more general rot in Western institutions- i.e. the Woke Progressive totalitarianism that has infected everything with its bullying programs to censor dissenting free speech, to censor dissent toward dominant elite narratives, to outright ban opponents and cancel/overturn even democratic elections as in Europe (Romania), just as Woke Progressives/Democrats tried to overturn the 2016 election (first Trump administration).
My reference to Peterson’s statements on the Woke pathology is just intro stuff to my real point below that there is another deeper layer (i.e. subconscious archetypes) behind the public displays of “virtue signaling to achieve social status” (Jordan Peterson) and to gain approval from threatening Woke activists. I would frame the impulse to “virtue signal for status” as very much related to the impulse, common to all humanity, to engage a “Hero’s Quest, Adventure, or Journey”, to seek public acclaim for waging “a righteous battle against evil enemies that must be defeated”, in order to “save the world, save democracy, save something, maybe a maiden.”
That hero’s quest can become an even more profoundly delusional and dangerous narrative framework when people add the divine element and believe that they are on God’s side against some devil (i.e. Zoroaster’s cosmic divine dualism), and that they are battling irredeemable “enemies”. Joseph Campbell was right to caution that if we forget human oneness during our battles, if we forget our oneness with our “enemies” (i.e. the oneness of the human family) then we will lose our humanity.
“Love your enemy because God does” remains always the touchstone ethic for mature humanity. There is no fundamental dualism behind all the tribal dualisms that we construct and then kill and die for. And most critical, there is no tribal God validating human tribal dualisms.
In the mix (or complex) of bad ideas listed below, pay particular attention to how the “Hero’s Quest” is deformed by many. It has too often been used as a validating framework to promote base, dehumanizing tribal dualism that has destroyed its millions across history, and continues to wreak mass-death in the modern era (i.e. Marxism, Nazism, environmental alarmism).
In the list below, I am outlining the dominant themes that have persistently shaped human narratives across history, the religious psychopathologies of past millennia (still dominant in contemporary religious traditions) that are now also embraced by the “secular/ideological” versions of the modern era, the validating ideas/beliefs that have repeatedly driven crusades to destroy human societies, and are now driving the leftist Woke destruction of liberal democracies. Note how leftist Progressivism embraces climate apocalypse among other society-destroying projects.
My point below relates to what Peterson probes with his psychological analysis of what motivates Woke Progressivism and its virtue signaling- i.e. the impulse to “social status as a prime motivator.”
More so, my list of bad ideas points to the psychopathology that has darkened and enslaved humanity across multiple millennia, and the egregious shame is that we have had the liberating alternative for millennia, the insight pointing to an entirely new cohering center for narratives framed by entirely new ideas/ideals/beliefs.
But first this…
More on the great battle for freedom that is taking place across our liberal democracies. Do we really want to just stand on the sidelines, uninformed, uninvolved in defending against the contemporary assaults on freedom?
“CBS Loses Its Mind: Two days after J.D. Vance’s historic address to Europe on speech, CBS and 60 Minutes offer a counterattack”, Matt Taibbi, Feb.17, 2025
https://www.racket.news/p/cbs-loses-its-mind
Taibbi starts noting the J. D. Vance speech that shook up Europe with its defense of free speech and democratic choice in the face of European jailing speech offenders and cancelling elections.
He then notes that a CBS anchor, Margaret Brennan, stated that Vance was speaking in a country “Where free speech was weaponized to conduct a genocide”, which Taibbi labels as a “dingbat equation”.
He continues pointing out that “Germany prosecutes online trolls and fights hate speech on the internet by having police raid speech offenders who author memes and silly insults.” The Germans argue that free speech “needs boundaries” so people cannot have endless freedom to say anything they want. On one German TV show they illustrate the crimes that the German government prosecutes, such as “insulting others (calling someone a pimmel, which sounds like a weak version of ‘dick’ or maybe ‘willie,’ is arrestable in Germany).”
Taibbi continues, “Germany is the Western leader in the implementation of speech codes and hate speech laws, though Canada is not far behind.” He says that the current crackdown on free speech emerged out of a movement to suppress neo-Nazism that extended to censor “’obviously illegal’ content. This quickly turned out to involve huge ranges of topics and behaviors.”
He concludes noting that European leaders state that their hate speech laws will soon arrive in the US. Taibbi says that Vance was not just speaking to the Europeans but about “America’s own intelligence services, which have been the surreptitious sponsors (if not the architects) of a lot of these European laws against “misinformation.”
Finally, “The CBS ‘counterattack’ may well fall flat – I think most Americans will find the three German prosecutors who said insults were a crime more than just off-putting, it will remind them of the STASI and GESTAPO – quite an achievement.”
Here is another on the Margaret Brennan “dingbat” allegation that “free speech=Hitler”. Huh? The Nazis weaponized free speech?
Brennan illustrates the absolute lunacy that people descend into, in their project to discredit/demonize their opponents. All from a “journalist”, as we have come to know “journalism” in mainstream media, the propaganda arm of far-left Woke Progressivism. It never ends. This lady is arguing that free speech must be prevented by Woke censorship as necessary to “save democracy” from Nazis.
This is the result of framing yourself on the right side of an existential battle for life/democracy against irredeemably evil enemies that pose such a threat that normal democratic principles and processes must be rejected for “desperate measures” to save the world. Another version of apocalyptic hysteria where you “destroy the world to save the world”. This one framed as the need to “destroy democracy to save democracy.”
“CBS host blasted for ‘bonkers’ claim that Nazi Germany ‘weaponized’ free speech: Vice President JD Vance criticized European allies for supporting censorship”, Lindsay Kornich, Feb. 17, 2025.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/cbs-host-blasted-bonkers-claim-nazi-germany-weaponized-free-speech
“CBS host Margaret Brennan made what many called an “incredibly dumb” and “deeply ignorant” statement claiming Nazi Germany “weaponized free speech” during her show on Sunday.”
Let’s not be too hard on her. She has suffered and succumbed to the Progressive indoctrination that has been beaten into the public consciousness of Western democracies over the past decades.
And then… More layers to Woke Progressivism as the new front for the same old Leftist Collectivism…
In the link below Jordan Peterson interviews Matthew Goodwin on the mass immigration crisis and rape gangs of Britain, among other topics. They dig into the corruption of Western education institutions by Woke leftism/Progressivism. How elites imposed this Woke pathology on citizens/commoners without any discussion and with no consequence for the elites.
Note, in particular, Peterson’s psychological probing of what motivates Woke Progressive insanity- i.e. the “virtue signaling” thing and “social status as a prime motivator”. In other places he has discussed the psychopathology of dark triad traits, evident in the left-wing distortion of compassion that advocates policies that actually harm people while giving the proponents of those policies opportunity to signal their compassion publicly (i.e. contributing vast sums to urban homelessness, with a pacifist approach to homeless drug use and crime, that has worsened that problem, and the social contagion of the trans activist movement that has mutilated children’s bodies, etc.).
“Reform, Rape Gangs, and the Rot in the UK with Matthew Goodwin (episode 521 of Jordan Peterson).”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_qQXDVax8E
Peterson and Goodwin discuss the rot and unsalvageable state of higher education in the UK, that illustrates the wider rot in Western educational institutions. They then analyze the causes of the corruption of Western education and most other institutions in our societies.
Within the first 10 minutes or so they get to the insane bullying unleashed on Matthew Goodwin in a UK university (Kent). That illustrates the larger story of what is happening across Western liberal democracies, what JD Vance spoke to at the EU conference where he warned EU leaders about state censorship, the denial of free speech, the activism against dissent from state-approved narratives, the spreading authoritarianism/totalitarianism, etc.
Goodwin says that in the UK, both parties, left and right, embraced a set of policies- i.e. Net Zero, mass immigration, the imposition of radical Woke Progressivism in public sector institutions, and broken multiculturalism that expressed horrifically in the mass-rape scandal in over 50 British towns. Elites from both parties (the “Uni-party”) imposed agendas on populations that are extreme leftist Woke Progressive and have caused mass harm.
But, as Goodwin notes, in an emerging and growing populism movement, many citizens now reject that elite consensus. Populism is now making a serious pushback against that policy that has dominated the West over last 30-50 years.
This is more stunning exposure of the unbelievable corruption of Western institutions over past decades. As Mike Benz said to Joe Rogan, our mental map of how our world operates is now undergoing radical change as the widespread corruption of liberal democracy is exposed to the light.
Peterson’s guest believes that Oxford and Cambridge are not saveable. They are gone, he concludes.
Goodwin explains that the Conservative party in the UK has abandoned its roots and has become just another “liberal” party, sharing the same elite consensus as the UK Labor party (“liberal” not meaning Classic Liberal but the extremist Woke ‘liberalism’ of past decades). Both parties in Britain have become WEF copies now forming a new Uni-party. Both sides of the political spectrum have been taken over by the same Progressivism.
The UK, says Goodwin, needs what the US is now getting, something new that separates from the Woke elites on both sides, as both sides are now loyal to the same elite consensus.
Goodwin details the corruption and destruction of the UK. This same Woke destruction has happened to Canada also, notes Peterson.
Peterson then tries to probe what is motivating all the Woke Progressive madness. What is the fundamental error, he asks? Is the multi-cultural, mass-migration problem the result of a felt need to virtue-signal on the liberal tolerance issue? Is Net Zero the result of virtue signalling on the issue of environmental concern?
He suggests that behind the virtue signalling is the elite claim to “tolerant moral virtue” that requires no personal effort but requires others to make the personal sacrifice.
He then probes the importance of “status” to people. Status is a basic psychological motivator, he says. It enhances, for example, mating success. And status can be subverted by falsely claiming moral virtue. He illustrates with the New Testament Pharisees, who are primary virtue signallers who use the divine to enhance their status, obtaining the best seats in synagogues, etc. But as Jesus states, they are tombs, whitewashed on outside but full of rot on the inside.
Peterson says that we haven’t come to grips with this powerful motivation to accrue status falsely, reputational status, and how powerful and destructive that is. What some call “luxury belief class”- i.e. “Look how good I am”.
Insert of an illustration:
Just after the 30-minute mark in the link below, Greg Gutfeld posts a New York Times note on some white guy who wants to “date women of color to advance his anti-racism”. The man says that he has very progressive beliefs and a woman of color “checks a box for him in a real way”, as he “wants to be anti-racist in all his relationships”.
This illustrates what Peterson is probing in his Goodwin interview on what motivates Woke Progressivism, the virtue signalling on the Progressive left, the prime motivator of seeking social status.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njtG0ECqw6s
Moving on with the Peterson interview…
Goodwin, a political science professor, adds that over the last 10 years there has been the greatest radicalization of the elite class in Western society, and they have imposed their elitist policies on others, the consequences of which they do not have to endure.
Elites have now prohibited any questioning of the sacred values that they have imposed, says Goodwin. They have imposed “taboos”, for example, regarding mass migration, Net Zero, etc. This, he says, explains why no one challenged the mass rape crisis because they did not want to be seen as “racist” or “Islamophobic”, to be vilified by such smears that were used to prevent any questioning of elite policies and narratives.
Elites, says Goodwin, also sought to tightly control the national conversation through “hate laws”, Orwellian “non-crime hate incidents”- i.e. police measures to stifle debate, discussion. So, argues Goodwin, it is all about controlling information, stigmatizing any alternative opposition to elite projects, using taboos to impose the elite projects. And it is the common citizens who then suffer under this authoritarianism.
People are now asking why tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of young white girls were being raped and no one has talked about it over the past 30 years. One MP, says Goodwin, estimates up to 1 million children have been raped since the 1980s.
The mainstream legacy media did nothing and now complain about Elon Musk exposing the mass rape horrors.
Ah, so much more in this fascinating discussion of the rot in the UK.
Added note: Goodwin says that Kier Starmer has come out and stated that if you talk about the rape scandal then you are “jumping on the far-right bandwagon”. He is suppressing questioning, dissent, any challenge to his do-nothing approach. Goodwin says Starmer’s comments are about protecting their ideological project.
And in Germany you can be arrested for insulting a politician. Unbelievable.
Here is another clip of a section from the Peterson interview (my comments on this in a post to a discussion group.
“This adds new layers for understanding today’s leftism.
“11 minutes of fascinating stuff- Jordan Peterson analyzing with Matthew Goodwin “why the elites went hard left.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjXXMd8R2N4
“Peterson asks- Is the progressive ideology nothing but the proclivity of the privileged elite to cover themselves in nothing but unearned moral glory? Is that temptation so profound that is the natural course of things? Otherwise, why wasn’t progressivism a working-class movement? Why were elites the ones to move toward the moral status of virtue signaling?
“Goodwin says that over the last 50 years the nature of status changed, moving away from wealth and resources into the realm of ideology and belief and that became a key indicator for the elite class to accrue status, to say yes, I have wealth, but I also know the vocabulary of progressivism, i.e. I know what “white privilege” means.
“Peterson interjects that the cluster B psychopaths and anti-merit types invaded the universities with new currency of status, and the system got gamed.
“Goodwin says Woke is a radicalization of liberalism that became consumed with minority rights, emotional harm, and emotional “safetyism”, protecting minorities from harm. And this was prioritized over pursuit of truth, objective science and that permeated everything, the notion of protecting people from harm, hence the endless obsession with DEI, anti-racism training, endless obsession with what happened 500 years ago… the sacralization of minorities is at the heart of this ideological revolution.
“Peterson continues, making a point on politically correct authoritarianism- i.e. there was a coherent set of left-wing authoritarian beliefs. Then, what predicted them? He says the first indicator was low verbal intelligence, as in not very smart. So these people dominated disciplines that attracted such people. He says there is a high correlation between such politically correct people and authoritarianism.
“The other predictors- (1) being female, (2) having a female temperament, and (3) having taken a politically correct course. And this in a time when universities became dominated by women, notably childless women. The feminization of higher education over the last 50 years.
“Goodwin then notes the book “Liberal bullies: Inside the mind of the authoritarian left”, by Luke Conway. It covers the research that compares left and right-wing authoritarians. The belief over previous decades was that you don’t get left-wing authoritarians, only right-wing authoritarians. That has been debunked, says Goodwin. The evidence is that liberals are more prone to authoritarian impulses and tendencies than conservatives.
“So this, says Goodwin, explains the last 15 years, the wokeness in politics, the fanaticism and dogmatism. If you identify as liberal (again, not Classic Liberalism), you are more prone to authoritarian impulses.
“Peterson adds that for 60 years social psychologists had said that there was no such thing as left-wing authoritarianism. Well, what about Stalin and Mao, he asks? And Cancel culture is the same pattern as female anti-social behavior. He details such behavior, different from male anti-social violence.” (End of post to discussion group)
This from Shellenberger’s Public site offers similar insight into Peterson’s points on “virtue signaling regarding liberal tolerance to gain status”, the related imbalance in societies toward feminine values, and fear of activist smearing if you dare challenge the state of things.
“We need to reassert a healthy masculinity: The author of a viral essay on “the longhouse” reflects on Trump’s victory, toxic femininity, and the new right”, Jonathan Keeperman, Feb. 17, 2025
https://www.public.news/p/jonathan-keeperman-we-need-to-reassert
Keeperman says that Democrats are claiming that Trump’s cuts to USAID are cruel and the underlying cause of most of society’s problems is lack of empathy. But Keeperman says this is not true as our societies have become much kinder and gentler across time.
He lists examples of the growth in general empathy but says the remaining problems, for example, of homelessness, mental illness, and drug addiction are not due to lack of empathy. Huge sums have been given to treat these problems (e.g. $20- plus billion in Los Angeles), but they have only grown worse and that, he says, is because current government programs enable and subsidize the people involved, rather than crack down on them.
He says that “being arrested and being mandated rehab or psychiatric care is often the only way that addicts and mentally ill people are able to escape life on the streets.
“A similar story can be told about many other social problems. Psychologists, including Jonathan Haidt, have found that coddling children results in them being discouraged more easily when they encounter problems. Their challenges continue in schools when teachers allow children to pass classes despite not being able to read.”
Keeperman then notes the “remarkable overcorrection of the last two generations toward social norms centering feminine needs and feminine methods for controlling, directing, and modeling behavior.”
The rise in feminine values has been positive in reducing male violence but “now Western cultures have become unbalanced toward feminine values.”
His point? “Without feminine values, our societies would be far harsher and crueler places, but we also need healthy masculinity.”
He concludes: “It’s important that Trump won… because his victory ‘authorized people to be more honest about some of the pathologies that were afflicting the culture…’ A lot of the trans [came from] an unwillingness to say, ‘No, this is wrong. This is pathological. This is mental illness. You can’t do this. This is bad for you. You need to change your behavior. We’re going to help you change your behavior and act this other way.’ The impulse is to instead to always be affirmative to always be affirming of what the individual wants to say about him or herself.’
“Indeed, when it comes to things like USAID, the best approach is often tough love, since that’s what allows people, and nations, to mobilize their internal resources and fortitude to mature and develop.”
And this note from Free Press, “The Front Page”, Feb. 19, 2025
“In Case You Missed It
“A few years ago, Chris Arnade saw a group of dudes trying to break down a door in an Ohio dive bar. It inspired a phenomenal essay we published last Friday about the masculine urge to be a hero. In it, Chris argues that a society should never dismiss the appeal of the hero archetype, however at odds with the modern liberal project it might be. “[Men] get their sense of worth from rescuing, protecting, building, and solving,” he writes. “All men need to feel like the hero—if not over the course of their lifetime, then at least every now and then.”
Here below is a summary of the fuller article from Free Press…
This is good as a counter to the “over-feminization of educational systems” that then leads to the same over-feminization of state agencies/bureaucracies, and on out to entire societies, what political scientist and professor Matthew Goodwin spoke to in his interview with Jordan Peterson.
There are good and bad versions of the “Hero’s Quest/Journey/Adventure”. Know the difference. Here is an example of the good version of the Hero’s Journey.
“All Men Want to Be Heroes: And America needs to give them the chance”, Chris Arnade, Feb. 19, 2025
“Every society needs to give men the opportunity to play the hero”, writes Arnade.
https://www.thefp.com/p/chris-arnade-men-want-to-be-heroes
Arnade tells of a memory of being in a dive bar in Ohio where a group of men were trying to break down a door to rescue a man who had passed out on the toilet from drinking too much. Each man in the group tried a different approach, ramming the door, picking the lock, trying to crowbar the door, etc.
Finally, one of the men succeeded and was celebrated the rest of the evening by the rest of the patrons at the bar. Arnade says that what he saw there was universal- that all men need to feel like the hero, even if just once and while.
Arnade says that societies should not dismiss the appeal to the “hero archetype” but understand it and the good that can come from it. But he recognizes it is “at odds with the modern liberal project” even though it is something hardwired into the human psyche and on which civilization is built.
Playing the hero has to do with men who risk their own safety for some greater good, whether police, soldiers, or workers across the industries of a society. It’s a matter of setting before young men “the culturally approved ways to be a hero”, and not through violence or crime, says Arnade.
Setting a context for the ultimate liberation movement of humanity:
Just to provoke some thought/curiosity- If any of the themes listed below are shaping your narrative, then your consciousness is being deformed by a psychopathology that is not informing you about the true state of life. And your development as a mature human is being hindered, short-circuited by psychopathology. This is not my assessment alone but that of good psychologists/psychotherapists like Harold Ellens and Zenon Lotufo (quoted below).
The fact the themes below are all “profoundly religious” (protected under the canopy of the “sacred”) intensifies the problem of replacing them with alternatives that provide a more realistic view of life.
Weaving into my points… Wendell Krossa
This is a project to promote the ultimate liberation movement of humanity, the final phase of human freedom that takes place at the deepest levels of human consciousness/subconscious. It is about liberation from darkening, enslaving archetypes that have shaped human narratives across history, both religious and secular/ideological.
The great stunner here- We have had the liberating alternative (i.e. the “Q Wisdom Sayings” message of Historical Jesus) for over two millennia. But, unfortunately, a world religion was created, based on Paul’s Christ myth, that distorted and buried the liberating alternative, short-circuiting it with a retreat to primitive mythology that was repackaged as just another rehash of threat theology updated by Hellenism. Note below, in the links provided, Bob Brinsmead’s good history of how Hellenism shaped the Christian development of the Christ myth.
Prelude:
The themes listed below dominate our narratives, shape our consciousness, our personal worldviews, and then influence our emotions, our motivations, and then our responses. The downstream outcomes/consequences of these themes have too often been devastating in real life and society. We are all responsible for the ideas that we embrace and their consequences (Thomas Sowell’s “Test of facts”). No matter that we all prefer to frame our views as good, right, true, and just. Lack of awareness, susceptibility to error, and self-delusion are common to all of us. The “test of outcomes” is the sobering wakeup to the choices that we have made and is necessary if we are to “do the least harm and the most good” in life.
The harm that the themes/ideas below have caused across history (inciting, guiding, validating human behavior) have been detailed by historians and other researchers, noted repeatedly on this site. Inciting people even to mass-death outcomes in the cases of Socialism, Nazism, and now environmental alarmism.
My point- Understand exactly what the bad ideas/beliefs actually are and open yourself up to consider the critical need for better alternatives, more humane alternatives that inspire the better angels of our nature. These themes listed below are entirely false descriptions of life and the world. They have never helped anyone to understand the true state of life. And worse, they have been potent contributing factors to darkening and enslaving consciousness, to inciting and validating the worst eruptions of bad human behavior (see again Bob Brinsmead’s comments on the brutal history of Christianity that focused on the Christ myth and ignored/buried the Jesus teaching).
The damage that bad religious ideas have caused across history has been detailed notably by Arthur Herman (“The Idea of Decline In Western History”), Richard Landes (“Heaven On Earth”), Arthur Mendel (“Vision and Violence”), David Redles (“Hitler’s Millennial Reich”), among many others.
Especially, understand what holds the entire complex of bad religious ideas together, giving ultimate meaning and affirmation to the complex. What provides the ultimate defense against questioning, skepticism, unbelief, and challenge. I refer to the cohering center that is deity, that many still view as “untouchable Ultimate Reality”, God. Harold Ellens spoke to this attitude of the majority of people who assume that commonly held beliefs about God are immutable and hence unchallengeable, unquestionable truth.
To quote Ellens from Zenon Lotufo’s “Cruel God, Kind God”.
“Basic cultural beliefs are so important, especially in a dominant widespread culture, because they have the same properties as individual basic beliefs, that is, they are not perceived as questionable. The reader may object that “God”, considered a basic belief in our culture, is rejected or questioned by a large number of people today. Yet the fact is that the idea of God that those people reject is almost never questioned. In other words, their critique assumes there is no alternative way of conceiving God except the one that they perceive through the lens of their culture. So, taking into account the kind of image of God that prevails in Western culture- a ‘monster God’… such rejection is understandable…”
In response to Ellens, consider what this means… “Men never do worse evil than when they do it in the name of God.” No bad idea holds more potential to incite and validate destructive outcomes than the idea of God as presented in terms of “threat theology”, the ultimate ideal and authority of humanity across history that has traumatized human minds since the beginning. Theology, when framed by a complex of supporting bad features, then becomes the ultimate monster/enemy in life.
Understand how the beliefs below became, over past millennia, the archetypes of the human subconscious. Most of us move through life unaware of their still dominant influence on our minds, emotions, motivations, and responses.
Understand also how these ideas below render many people susceptible to modern day apocalyptic crusades like climate apocalyptic even if embracing such crusades involves “destroying life to save some world” as in the salvation scheme of decarbonization. Many people hear a contemporary version of “secular/ideological” apocalyptic and subconsciously embrace it because it feels right, true, and good.
From Kristian Niemietz’s “Socialism: The Failed Idea That Never Dies”. Niemietz details in his chapter 10 the research of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt who concludes that “Emotional satisfaction, not rational thinking, and despite contrary evidence, dominates our choice in beliefs.”
Insert: I have made my own list of better alternatives to the list of psychopathologies below.
“Humanity’s worst ideas, better alternatives (Old story themes, new story alternatives),” Wendell Krossa
http://www.wendellkrossa.com/?p=9533
See also Bob Brinsmead’s excellent essays below on how primitive mythologies like Greek Hellenism deformed subsequent religious traditions like Christianity, with its Christ myth, and the horrific destruction that resulted from the focus on the Christ that ignored and buried the actual teaching of Historical Jesus- i.e. the “Q Wisdom Sayings” message.
See the following essays of Bob Brinsmead at…
https://bobbrinsmead.com/the-historical-jesus-what-the-scholars-are-saying/
https://bobbrinsmead.com/the-doctrine-of-christ-and-the-triump-of-hellenism/
(The essays are linked here by permission of the author.)
Note, the alternatives are affirmed by common human discoveries and insights in the modern era on what is more humane, such as the ideals that are embodied in our Human Rights Conventions, national Constitutions, and principles of Classic Liberalism/liberal democracy (i.e. systems of common law, representative institutions that protect the rights and freedoms of all individuals, equally, etc.).
Here they are- The most dominant myths/beliefs/themes in the history of human thought and communication, the ideas that have shaped human meta-narratives across all history and across all the cultures of the world, in both religious and secular/ideological versions. These are among the most destructive themes/ideas/beliefs ever created to deform human consciousness, frame narratives, and produce the worst outcomes in human lives and societies, Wendell Krossa
Taking Arthur Mendel’s statement that apocalyptic is “the most violent and destructive idea in history” (evident in, for example, the mass-death outcomes of Marxism and Nazism), I would apply Mendel’s assessment of apocalyptic to the entire complex below.
Intro note: Properly solving problems requires an understanding of all the contributing factors- i.e. probing the fundamental elements contributing to a problem, and then understanding how we properly fix that problem. With regard to narrative themes that contribute to inciting and validating bad human behavior, this means frankly re-evaluating which ideas in our narratives are bad, especially pushing past fear of warnings about “heresy, blasphemy” to look more closely at the core religious beliefs that have long been protected under the canopy of the sacred in our major world religious traditions (now also embedded in secular/ideological systems of belief).
And then, setting aside threats of damnation and hellfire from religious authorities, good problem solving will consider what themes should replace the old archetypes in order to create entirely new narratives that inspire hope and the no conditions love that gets us to true inclusion, diversity, and equality as in liberal democracies framed by Classic Liberal principles, systems of common law, and representative institutions that protect the rights and freedoms of all people, equally.
One suggestion, Julian Simon’s “Ultimate Resource” presents a significant body of evidence on the overall, long-term improvement of life that completely overturns the fallacy of life declining toward something worse, a basic theme in the pathology of apocalyptic mythology.
But first, the ideas that have darkened and enslaved human minds from the beginning.
The foundational planks of the psychopathologies in human meta-narratives are (1) the myth that the past was better but (2) humans ruined that original paradise world. That promotes reminiscent longing for something that never existed. Psychology speaks to this “rosy retrospection” fallacy of recalling the past more positively than it actually was.
Prehistorian John Pfeiffer suggests that the belief in an original golden age on Earth may have begun around 100,000 years ago. That prompted me to take a look at conditions on Earth around that time.
I would suggest this fallacy of original paradisal world probably began as our ancestors experienced the rapid ending of the Eemian interglacial of some 130-115,000 years ago. Research reveals that last interglacial was some 8 degrees C. warmer than our current Holocene interglacial. A paradisal warm period that enhanced human survival.
Some studies suggest the Eemian interglacial may have ended suddenly, over just a few centuries, or even just decades. Our ancestors, even with their much shorter lifespans (20-30ish years) would have remembered the better past as the previous warmer climate that made survival easier.
See this link:
https://www.esd.ornl.gov/projects/qen/transit.html
“The time span of the past few million years has been punctuated by many rapid climate transitions, most of them on time scales of centuries to decades or even less. The most detailed information is available for the Younger Dryas-to-Holocene stepwise change around 11,500 years ago, which seems to have occurred over a few decades. The speed of this change is probably representative of similar but less well-studied climate transitions during the last few hundred thousand years. These include sudden cold events (Heinrich events/stadials), warm events (Interstadials) and the beginning and ending of long warm phases, such as the Eemian interglacial.”
The better past myth generates the felt need to correct a wrong that humans have caused, to rebalance the unbalanced scales of cosmic justice. Blaming humanity for the present natural imperfection of the world as the result of “original human sin” is a denial of the fact that there never was a better or perfect past (original paradise, Eden). Also, blaming humanity for ruining everything, based on a false myth, just adds more unnecessary guilt and shame to the overall sense of failure/fault that people already suffer due to their sense of their imperfection and the imperfection of their world. Such mythology is the beginning of all anti-humanism in human civilization.
This original sin myth became a major mental distortion in cultures across the world, that humans made an original mistake, committed an error/sin that caused the gods to become angry and end a previous paradise world- i.e. the Sumerian Dilmun myth where Enki eats the 8 forbidden plants and ruins Dilmun, or the Eden myth where Adam and Eve ruin paradise and are punished by God who fills life with suffering in a subsequently imperfect world.
I heard a version of this human ruin of paradise from Manobo tribes in Mindanao who said that a girl pounding rice raised her stick too high, hit heaven and upset the gods, who then sealed off the formerly open door of heaven. That was the original sin that ruined paradise in Manobo mythology.
No single book has more potently blown away the fallacy of a better past, and life declining, along with the fallacy of humans as corrupt destroyers, than Simon’s “Ultimate Resource”. His data is now dated but his principles for determining the true state of life are as informative and useful as when first published. Numerous following researchers have continued to affirm his conclusions. See, for example, “Humanprogress.org”. Greg Easterbrook also presents some interesting comment on the human contribution to improving an already imperfect natural world (“A Moment On The Earth”)
Add to the myth of “fallen humanity angering deity” the ancient belief that there are spirits/gods behind all elements of life. And because nature is often harmful- i.e. natural disaster, disease, accident, predatory cruelty- it was then obvious/logical to primitive minds that the gods were angry with people’s sins and hence punish them through nature. And that anger must be appeased as critical for human survival. That fed the impulse of some early creative mind to make sacrifices, both human and animal, to appease divine anger and to obtain blessings/favors from the gods (i.e. sun, rain, food).
The logic behind sacrifice? Some suggest it had to do with substitution- “A life for a life, blood for blood”. Take this innocent for my guilt. A tribal man explained it to me thus- “We offer the blood of the animal and the god eats that and is satisfied and will not eat our souls”. Something eaten in place of us, that spares us.
Further, note the primeval myth that humans were created to be slaves, to serve the gods/elites, to feed the gods, do the work of the gods, adds to the overall pathology of degrading, dehumanizing, and demonizing humanity. From the beginning, the earliest shaman, agitating to dominate their fellow tribals, initiated the demand for domination/submission forms of relating as natural, as divinely authorized. And claiming special insight into the mysteries of the invisible world of the gods, the shaman established themselves as the representatives who spoke for the gods, as the priesthoods who would represent the rule of the gods.
That early unleashing of the inherited animal impulse to dominate others (alpha-ism), eventually expressed in the Hellenistic belief of “special people as divine in some manner”, elites divinely gifted and appointed to rule commoners.
Christianity was then shaped by that Greek mythology and eventually formulated the belief in such things as “the Divine right of kings”. The elite belief in domination/submission forms of relating was exemplified in the Christian belief in “Lord Christ” as the epitome embodiment of ruling authority, the archetype (See, for example, Romans 13, Revelation, on eternal domination/submission).
Next theme (continuing to build on the above):
(3) The myth of “Declinism” that dominates our modern era- detailed by Arthur Herman in “The Idea of Decline In Western History”. The idea that the trajectory of life declines toward a worsening state.
A majority of people across the world believe that the world is becoming worse (see the YouGov survey in “Ten Global Trends”). Herman stated that the idea of decline was the most dominant and influential theme in the modern world. Hollywood obsessively promotes this primitive myth in its public storytelling (i.e. the decline of life toward disastrous collapse and ending as the essential element in apocalyptic mythology).
The fallacy that life/the world is becoming worse undermines hope that is essential to human wellbeing, flourishing, and endeavor. The myth of decline produces a sense of fatalism, resignation, giving up, and nihilism. Look at the prominence today of depression, anxiety disorder, fear of growing up, fear of having children (i.e. fear of bringing children into a world soon to end), etc.
Again, Simon’s Ultimate Resource is the brilliant response/counter to the Declinism of life fallacy.
(4) Humanity is becoming worse, “Declinism” in humanity– i.e. the fallacy of “human degeneration” theory (Herman in “The Idea of Decline”). This anti-humanism fallacy has been beaten into human consciousness across history in religious narratives of original sinfulness (Adam “fall of man” mythology) and deforms human consciousness with the fallacy that humanity becomes worse over time. This myth feeds the deformation of the hero’s quest, where some people view themselves in terms of Zoroaster’s cosmic dualism, as the righteous true believers on the side of the true and good religion and obligated to battle the evil enemies on the other side, the differing others who are demonized as irredeemably bad, becoming ever worse, and deserving to be destroyed, exterminated.
To the contrary, the actual trajectory of humanity has been revealed by researchers like James Payne (“History of Force”) and Stephen Pinker (“Better Angels of Our Nature”). The evidence shows that we have steadily, across the millennia, become something better than before (i.e. less violent).
Simon’s “Ultimate Resource”, with amassed evidence on all the main indicators of the true state of life, affirms the same trajectory for humanity as for all life, that of gradual improvement over time. Simon concludes that the evidence on the long-term trajectory of life and humanity shows that we have become “more creators than destroyers”. The long-term improvement and progress reveals essential human goodness emerging and developing, and it counters the fallacy of essential human corruption and degeneration.
The decline theme culminates in (5) the myth of the final collapse and ending of life, the complete and final destruction of all the world in “apocalyptic destruction”. The idea of the apocalyptic destruction of all life, is the final phase in the story of “original paradise ruined by humanity with life declining toward something worse”. The threat of the destruction of all life incites the human survival impulse to hysterical heights that render people susceptible to subsequent irrational salvation schemes oriented to destroy life and society to “save the world”, often salvation schemes that promise otherworldly salvation that motivate people to abandon the effort to engage and improve this world.
We see the outcome of these apocalyptic millennial salvation crusades across history in the madness of revolutions that seek to destroy the existing world/civilization, to purge the “evil” of the present order as required to prepare for the installation of restored paradise or new millennial perfection. This was true of the Marxist and Nazi revolutions, and we are watching the repeat now in the environmental alarmist crusade against modern era industrial society, viewed as the destroyer of nature (humans ruining paradise), hence it must itself be destroyed to make way for the new utopian order (i.e. the revolutionary phase of exterminate the demonized “enemy” or be exterminated).
Insert: Varied other horrific natural disasters of the past may have incited our ancestors to invent and construct apocalyptic myths.
For example, evidence has been offered that some 7,500 years ago the Mediterranean Sea rose from melting glaciers and broke through the Bosphorus Straits to flood the Black Sea.
That great flood may have been what informed the Sumerian Flood myth of apocalypse, as well as the biblical account of Noah’s flood. Zoroaster then introduced the myth of apocalypse by fire, which shaped Paul’s belief in apocalypse by fire (see Thessalonians, Revelation, etc.).
When you add the threat of “imminent apocalypse”, with actual endless setting of dates for the end of days, you then incite the survival impulse of populations to the ultimate heights of fear, panic, and hysteria over the looming “end of the world”. That clouds people’s minds with fear and renders them susceptible to irrational salvation schemes where they willingly support policies to destroy their lives and societies in order to “save the world”. See Richard Landes (“Heaven On Earth”) for the example of the “Xhosa cattle slaughter”. Incited to hysteria over threatened apocalypse, they destroyed their main source of livelihood. So also with the destructive madness of decarbonization in today’s climate apocalypse movement.
Add the theme of (6) salvation as some form of sacrifice/payment, notably through the slaughter of animals across the past, with the felt obligation to make some sacrifice manifested today in things like “de-growth, de-development, decarbonization”- i.e. giving up the good life in modern civilization. Small is beautiful. Return to primitivism, the “moral superiority of the simple lifestyle”.
Is that also what all that wilderness survival stuff is catering to?
Further to this list of core bad ideas– Add (7) the tendency to deform the “hero’s quest”, the demand to heroically engage a righteous battle against evil enemies that must be purged, even exterminated as irredeemably evil and too corrupted to allow them to continue living. This derives from the Zoroastrian cosmic dualism myth and the follow-up divine demand to join the true religion of the true and good God to fight the false religion of the false Spirit.
This may be the most dangerously delusional element in this list. Especially when people convince themselves that God is on their side, that they are acting on behalf of God, they are God’s chosen people, special and favored by God above all others.
Who said the worst and most dangerous people in society are those who believe that they know what is best for all others. That belief is scaled up, intensified to the highest reach, by adding divinity to the equation to validate the totalitarian busybody impulse to meddle in and control other’s lives.
And then, talking about highest reaches of extremism, we further deform the hero’s quest when we frame differing others, the “enemies”, as hated by God, demonized as the “children of Satan”, so beyond the pale as to be deserving of hellfire. Quite naturally, that thinking leads to similar behaving- Let’s help them on their way to their true destination.
And if we frame our enemies as so irredeemably terrible because they threaten all life with what we claim are existential dangers, well, then it is even more righteous of us to move into the phase of “exterminate them or be exterminated” (the final phase of apocalyptic crusades where desperate heroes want to save the world from existential threats).
Once again that insightful summary: “Men never do worse evil than when they do it in the name of God”.
Alarmed heroes (“messiah complex”, saviors of the world) then further intensify the righteous battle against evil with the demand for “instantaneous purging of evil”, “coercive purification”, based on the belief that the threat from the enemy is so existentially immediate (i.e. the “always immanent apocalypse”) that there is no time for the normal gradualism of democratic processes. The urgency of the looming end of days demands immediate desperate measures, even violence against threatening enemies as legitimate, just, good, necessary… to “save the world” (see Arthur Mendel on the demand of impatient revolutionaries for “instantaneous purification” versus the gradualism of democracy, in his “Vision and Violence”).
Note how repeatedly across past decades the climate alarmism prophets claimed that evil consumers of fossil fuels were bringing on the end of life, that end was only a decade, or few years, up ahead. The end of days was endlessly passed due to the 100% failure rate of apocalyptic lunacy.
Then the last theme on this list: (8) The false carrot-stick hope stirred by the promise of fulfilled salvation in the restoration of a paradisal communalism. Or salvation in a new utopia of a millennial kingdom (Nazism), a return to the falsely imagined “strong, pure” existence of hunter-gatherers more connected to nature (Arthur Herman in “The Idea of Decline”, also “Hitler’s Millennial Reich” by David Redles).
These psychopathological themes have been fiercely defended and maintained across history in religious traditions and are now embraced in modern era “secular ideological” belief systems and even promoted by “science”.
The themes above distort entirely the “true state of life” in the world. They also distort the true nature of humanity, and consequently produce emotions, motivations, and policy responses that irrationally destroy life to save some imaginary world.
Julian Simon countered the “madness of crowds” thinking produced by the above themes with a detailed presentation of evidence on the true state of life, the actual improving trajectory of life over the long-term.
The above list is the complex of the worst of bad ideas that the ancients created, which they then affirmed with a tribal, dominating, destroying God as the cohering center of the complex, rendering the complex as the “untouchable sacred”, protected from challenge and dissent with threats of “blasphemy, heresy, evil unbelief, and hellfire”.
Again, a list of alternative themes for narratives:
“Humanity’s worst ideas, better alternatives (Old story themes, new story alternatives),” Wendell Krossa
http://www.wendellkrossa.com/?p=9533
Note: An illustration of how the element of “enemy” in the hero’s engagement of a righteous battle against evil is distorted. This is not an affirmation of all that Donald Trump is or advocates…
Considering the excessive demonization/dehumanization of enemies in the battles of good vs evil, we have not seen anything like what Woke Progressive elites have done to Donald Trump over the past 8 years. They hysterically exaggerated the evil of the man, the threat from the man, to the extent that it justified, in their eyes, extreme desperate measures “to save life/democracy/the world”.
The Orange Monster that they created validated their programs to censor free speech, any speech, that was contrary to their partisan narrative- i.e. John Kerry stating that the First Amendment blocked his party’s ability to maintain the dominance of their narrative. The First Amendment permitted people to believe “misinformation/disinformation”, meaning anything contrary to what they demanded that all must believe.
The purported threat from Trump justified their effort to overturn a democratic election with the Russiagate lie, it justified effort to criminalize and imprison opponents, even proposals to abandon democratic processes and resort to violence. Joy Reid argued for such on her network, as have others.
Trump did not bend the knee to the number one Woke demand to virtue signal like other elites, to fall in line and affirm their power. He did the very opposite, crudely giving a middle finger to it all. Dominating Woke Progressive elites saw that he was a disrupter to their control of state institutions, a threat to the elite definition of democracy as “the consensus of state institutions” (Mike Benz in his Joe Rogan interview).
This helps to understand the subsequent fear, hatred, and vilification from elites toward Trump as they constructed him as the Mother of all contemporary monsters. Media, in their role as propagandists for elites, incited hysterical levels of fear for themselves and their audiences due to the insanely distorted exaggeration of the monster by Woke Progressives- a monster framed by the most extreme vilifications as “the end of democracy, a Hitler, a dictator who will imprison his opponents, lock them up in concentration camps”. We still hear this obsessive lunacy on place like “The View”, MSNBC, CNN, and across other mainstream media.
But a lesson to take from this Trump saga- History’s great heroes come in all sorts of shapes and sizes.
And as Bill Maher said recently, “Everyone is a monster till you talk to them.” Or as Elon Musk said, also recently (sitting beside Trump), “I love this man. He is a good man. And I’ve spent a lot of time with the president, and not once have I seen him do something that was mean or cruel or – or wrong. Not once.”
Doesn’t sound like the “monster” reported on daily by media. Is Jimmy Dore right when he said, “We are the most propagandized people and we don’t know it.”
Now some fun with Elon Musk’s new baby- Grok.
From a post to our discussion group: Hey all, how about some fun with Grok 3, pushed by Musk as the best AI out there.
Note below my queries about alarmist climate narratives (below the opening stuff on Hellenism shaping Christianity) and what appears to me, to be Grok’s biased leaning toward alarmist accounts in climate science. Also, Grok appears to be a smarty pants at excuse-making for the alarmist take.
Below, I started with some stuff that we discuss often in our group- i.e. the great contradiction between the message of Historical Jesus and Paul’s entirely contrary Christ myth. And what shaped Paul’s mythology (i.e. the Hellenism that re-affirmed Paul’s same old threat theology that contradicted Jesus’ “stunning new insight that God was non-retaliatory unconditional love.”
I went on to probe Grok about climate issues and it came back with what appear to me to be alarmist leanings and information/arguments. So, I pushed it to check scientists like Richard Lindzen and William Happer and it did pretty good in summarizing them, notably with the “saturation” of the warming effect of CO2. Grok summarized some good info on the infrared spectrum where the CO2 influence operates but it kept re-affirming the alarmist take on things, so I told it that it was “biased toward alarmism” and it appeared to back off a bit, sort of apologizing for pushing that. However, it appears to automatically respond in that way. Why?
When you push back against what you see as it’s automatic bias, Grok does seem to take that into consideration. But the question remains- Why does it go automatically toward that type of answer?
I tried asking about the influence of apocalyptic on modern “secular” ideologies and it gave some interesting points.
First: Here is Musk and tech guys explaining Grok.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUAJ82H12qs
Then I went to the site where Grok 3 is to use the “Try Now” button…
https://grok.com/?referrer=website
I first asked Grok this– Hi. What do you know about Bob Brinsmead’s argument that Hellenism shaped Christianity and it’s Christ myth? Go further below to see the climate stuff.
Here is Grok’s reply to the Hellenism/Christianity thing:
Robert “Bob” Brinsmead, a former Seventh-day Adventist turned theological maverick, has indeed explored the interplay between Hellenism and Christianity in his later writings, particularly as he moved away from orthodox Christian beliefs toward a more humanistic and critical perspective. While I don’t have direct access to a specific work where he lays out a comprehensive “Christ myth” argument tied to Hellenism, I can piece together his likely stance based on his theological evolution, his documented views, and the broader context of his critiques of traditional Christianity.
Brinsmead’s journey saw him shift from a staunch Adventist advocating perfectionism in the 1960s, to embracing evangelical justification by faith in the 1970s, and eventually rejecting core Christian doctrines like the divinity of Christ by the 1980s. By the late 1990s and early 2000s, he leaned into a humanistic, deist worldview, questioning the historical and theological foundations of Christianity. His argument about Hellenism shaping Christianity—and potentially feeding into a “Christ myth” perspective—seems to emerge during this later phase, as seen in works like “The Scandal of Joshua Ben Adam” (1998) from his Verdict publication.
Here’s what I can infer about his position:
1. Hellenism’s Influence on Christianity: Brinsmead likely argued that early Christianity, as it spread beyond its Jewish roots into the Greco-Roman world, absorbed Hellenistic philosophical and religious elements. Hellenism, with its rich tradition of Greek philosophy (e.g., Platonism, Stoicism) and mystery religions (e.g., cults of Dionysus, Osiris, or Mithras), provided a framework that transformed the original Jewish message of Jesus. He might have pointed to the use of Greek concepts like logos in John 1:1 (“In the beginning was the Word”) as evidence of this fusion, suggesting that the idea of Jesus as a divine figure owes more to Greek thought than to the historical Jewish context of a human messiah.
2. The Christ Myth Angle: Brinsmead’s reference to a “Christ myth” probably aligns with the idea that the Jesus of Christian theology—Jesus ben Parthenos (Jesus “son of a virgin”)—is a constructed figure, layered with mythological elements borrowed from Hellenistic traditions. In “The Scandal of Joshua Ben Adam,” he contrasts the “real” Jesus—a human, historical figure he calls Joshua ben Adam (a Hebrew rendering of “Jesus, son of man”)—with the mythic Christ of orthodoxy. He suggests that stories of virgin birth, resurrection, and divine status parallel myths of dying-and-rising gods common in the Mediterranean world, implying that these were later accretions rather than historical truths. This doesn’t necessarily mean he denied Jesus’ existence outright (a full “mythicist” position), but rather that the divine Christ is a Hellenistic embellishment over a simpler, human Jesus.
3. Critique of Christian Orthodoxy: Brinsmead’s broader critique likely framed this Hellenization as a betrayal of Jesus’ original message. He saw the historical Jesus as a radical, anti-religious figure who debunked hierarchies and sacred traditions, not as the founder of a new religion. The institutional Christianity that emerged, with its creeds and doctrines (e.g., the Trinity, the hypostatic union), would, in his view, reflect Hellenistic intellectualism and religious absolutism—far removed from the earthy, human teacher executed for blasphemy and sedition.
4. Evidence and Reasoning: He might have drawn on historical parallels, like the mystery religions’ savior figures who died and rose again, or the philosophical elevation of a transcendent God in Platonism, to argue that Christianity’s development mirrored these trends. The translation of Jewish scriptures into Greek (the Septuagint) and the New Testament’s Greek composition could serve as practical examples of how Hellenistic culture provided the language and concepts to reinterpret Jesus.
Brinsmead’s take echoes some scholarly theories, like those of Adolf von Harnack, who argued that Christianity’s Hellenization distorted its Jewish origins, though Brinsmead’s tone seems more polemical than academic. He wasn’t a trained historian or mythicist like Richard Carrier, so his argument likely leans on intuition and selective comparison rather than rigorous textual analysis. Critics might counter that while Hellenism undeniably influenced Christianity’s expression (e.g., in theology and art), the core narrative of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection predates significant Greek influence, rooted instead in Jewish messianic expectations.
In short, Brinsmead’s argument probably posits that Hellenism turned a human Jesus into a mythic Christ, blending Jewish roots with Greek ideas to create a religion Jesus himself wouldn’t recognize. It’s a provocative stance, consistent with his later rejection of Christian dogma, but it’s more a rhetorical jab at orthodoxy than a fully fleshed-out historical thesis. If you have a specific text or quote from him in mind, I’d be happy to refine this further! What sparked your interest in this?
It seems like your message got cut off—did you mean to provide a specific location or source where Bob Brinsmead’s essays on Hellenism and the Christ myth can be found? Without that detail, I’ll assume you’re asking about his general work on the topic and respond based on what I know.
Bob Brinsmead has indeed written essays that touch on the influence of Hellenism on Christianity and the idea of a “Christ myth,” particularly in his later, more radical phase after abandoning orthodox Christian beliefs. While I don’t have direct access to two specific essays titled exactly as you might be referencing, I can point to his broader body of work where these ideas appear, such as his Verdict publications and personal website writings from the late 1990s onward. Two notable pieces that likely align with your interest are:
1. “The Scandal of Joshua Ben Adam” (1998) – Published in Verdict, this essay reflects Brinsmead’s view that the historical Jesus (Joshua ben Adam, “son of man”) was a human figure whose story was mythologized into the divine Christ (Jesus ben Parthenos, “son of a virgin”) through Hellenistic influences. He argues that Greek philosophical and religious traditions—like the concept of logos and parallels with mystery cult saviors—shaped the Christian narrative, turning a Jewish teacher into a Hellenistic god-man. This is where his “Christ myth” leanings come through, suggesting the divine Jesus is a construct overlaid on a simpler human reality.
2. “Farewell to Religion—A Manifesto of Christian Atheism” (1987) – While not exclusively about Hellenism, this essay marks his rejection of traditional Christianity and includes critiques of how it evolved. He implies that the religion’s Hellenistic roots (e.g., blending with Platonic thought and mystery religions) corrupted its original message, supporting his drift toward a humanistic, deist perspective. This ties into his broader argument that Christianity’s theological framework owes more to Greek culture than to Jesus himself.
Brinsmead’s take isn’t unique—scholars like Adolf von Harnack have long argued that Hellenism reshaped Christianity—but his version is flavored by his personal journey from Adventism to skepticism. He doesn’t seem to fully embrace the “Christ myth theory” in the sense of denying Jesus’ existence (like some mythicists do), but rather sees the Christ of faith as a Hellenistic fabrication. His essays are more provocative than scholarly, lacking the rigorous evidence of academic historians, and they’re steeped in his polemic against organized religion.
If you meant two specific essays hosted at a particular site (like bobbrinsmead.com) or elsewhere, please clarify the location, and I can tailor this further. For now, these two works encapsulate his stance. What’s your take on his ideas—or were you looking for something more specific from those essays?
I then asked Grok this– Would AI be safer if programmed with the principles, systems of common law, and representative institutions of Classic Liberalism that protect the freedoms and rights of all individuals, equally?
Grok’s response:
That’s an intriguing question—one that gets to the heart of how we design AI to align with human values. Programming AI with principles from Classical Liberalism, like individual liberty, equality under the law, and representative governance, could theoretically create a framework where AI prioritizes fairness, autonomy, and accountability. Let’s break it down.
Classical Liberalism emphasizes protecting individual rights—freedom of speech, property, and self-determination—while limiting overreach by any centralized authority. If AI were coded to respect these, it might be “safer” in the sense that it wouldn’t arbitrarily infringe on people’s choices or discriminate. Think of it like a built-in Bill of Rights for AI behavior: it’d have to justify actions against a standard of equal treatment and personal freedom. Common law, with its reliance on precedent and case-by-case reasoning, could make AI adaptable yet grounded—less prone to rigid, top-down diktats that ignore context. Representative institutions could inspire mechanisms where AI decisions reflect diverse human input, not just the biases of its creators.
But here’s the rub: AI isn’t human. It doesn’t “understand” liberty or justice—it optimizes based on what we feed it. Programming these principles sounds great, but translating fuzzy concepts like “equal rights” into code is a minefield. For example, how does an AI weigh free speech against harm in a split-second content moderation call? Data from X shows endless debates over this—users clash daily on where that line lies. And common law’s strength—its flexibility—could turn into a weakness if AI misinterprets precedents or lacks the nuance to apply them. Plus, who decides what “representative” means? If it’s the programmers at xAI or elsewhere, you’re still trusting a small group to encode a universal ideal. Bias creeps in, fast.
On the flip side, without some guiding philosophy, AI could drift toward utilitarian coldness—maximizing efficiency at the expense of outliers—or worse, amplify the loudest voices in its training data (which, let’s be real, isn’t always a bastion of liberal virtue). Classical Liberalism could act as a guardrail, forcing AI to at least consider individual dignity over collectivist steamrolling.
Evidence-wise, we don’t have a perfect test case yet. Current AI systems—like me, Grok—lean on curated datasets and corporate ethics, not explicit philosophical frameworks. But look at legaltech AIs: they’re built to mimic common law reasoning and do okay at predicting rulings based on precedent. Scale that up, and maybe you’ve got something. Still, X posts from AI skeptics often highlight how even “neutral” systems end up reflecting the culture of their makers—Silicon Valley isn’t exactly a hotbed of 18th-century liberalism.
So, would it be safer? Possibly, if we nail the execution. It’d give AI a moral compass beyond raw computation. But the devil’s in the details—coding “freedom” is harder than it sounds, and humans disagree on what it even means. What do you think—any specific principle you’d prioritize to keep AI in check?
I then responded:
Any specific principle?
Yes, the concern over too much censorship today online of differing speech, under the cloak of preventing “disinformation, misinformation” which then is extended to censor the opinions of political opponents as in the Twitter Files expose. The concept creep in hate speech definition to include contrary political opinions.
Grok said,
You’re zeroing in on a real tension: the slippery slope of censorship, especially when “disinformation” or “hate speech” becomes a catch-all to silence dissent. The Twitter Files laid bare how subjective those labels can be—internal debates at Twitter showed flagging decisions often hinged on political leanings, not clear-cut rules. It’s a prime example of concept creep: start with a noble goal (stopping lies or harm), and soon you’re axing anything that doesn’t fit the dominant narrative. X posts still buzz with users calling out shadowbans or outright suspensions for opinions that, say, question election integrity or vaccine policies—stuff that’s polarizing but not illegal.
If I had to pick a Classical Liberal principle to counter this, it’d be freedom of speech, full stop. Not the watered-down version we get now with endless caveats, but the robust, Mill-style take: let ideas duke it out in the open, even the messy or wrong ones, because truth only emerges through that clash. For AI, this could mean coding a default to not censor unless there’s a damn good reason—like imminent violence, not just hurt feelings or “misinfo” as defined by whoever’s in power. Think of it as a presumption of liberty: speech stays up unless proven dangerous, not the reverse.
In practice, an AI built this way might look at a flagged post—say, someone claiming “the election was stolen”—and instead of auto-deleting based on a fact-checker’s say-so, it’d let it stand for debate unless it’s inciting a riot. The Twitter Files showed how often human moderators leaned on vague “public safety” excuses to kill posts; an AI with a free speech bias could flip that script. Data from X suggests users crave this—engagement spikes when people feel they can speak raw, unfiltered.
The catch? Defining that line—legit threat vs. spicy opinion—is still tricky. AI could err too far the other way, amplifying chaos over coherence. And bad actors (bots, trolls) could exploit it. But the bigger risk today seems to be overreach: censorship creep often hits political underdogs hardest, as you noted. A free speech principle could force AI to err on the side of openness, not control. Does that align with what you’re getting at, or is there another angle you’d tweak?
And this …
I asked: What about Epstein’s argument that Google is biased in what it presents as responses to searches, as he stated on his Joe Rogan appearance?
Grok replied:
Robert Epstein’s argument about Google’s search bias, as aired on his Joe Rogan appearances (notably episodes like #1768 in 2022 and #2201 in 2024), hinges on his claim that Google manipulates search results to favor certain political outcomes, particularly leaning left. He’s a psychologist, not a tech insider, and his core idea is the “Search Engine Manipulation Effect” (SEME)—that subtle tweaks in what Google shows can shift undecided voters’ preferences without them noticing. On Rogan, he’s said things like, “Since 2012, free and fair elections at the national level haven’t existed—they’ve been manipulated,” pointing to Google’s algorithmic choices as a big player.
His evidence? Studies he’s run, like one claiming Google’s 2016 search results could’ve swayed millions toward Hillary Clinton by prioritizing positive content about her. He’s tracked search suggestions, rankings, and homepage features—like election reminders he says disproportionately nudge turnout for one side. On X, he and others have posted about real-time bias dashboards showing liberal-leaning results on hot topics (e.g., abortion). He argues Google’s blacklisting of sites (think Breitbart) and suppression of competitors (like ProtonMail years back) prove intent.
Critics—like Google itself—say he’s off-base. They’ve called his methodology shaky, arguing their algorithms chase relevance and user behavior, not political agendas. A 2019 flap saw Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai tell Congress they’d reviewed Epstein’s work and found it flawed—too small-scale, not accounting for personalization or organic trends. On Rogan, there’s a moment in #2201 where Joe searches “ProtonMail” live, it pops up fine, and Epstein squirms, admitting it’s not suppressed now—undercutting his own point. X posts from skeptics echo this: if bias is so blatant, why can you still find counter-narrative stuff easily?
What’s the reality? Google’s opaque as hell—its algorithm’s a black box, and it’s got incentives to keep users hooked, not to play fair. Studies beyond Epstein’s (like from AllSides) show left-leaning news dominates top results, but correlation isn’t causation—maybe that’s just what’s popular or trusted by the web’s link structure. Epstein’s got no smoking gun proving intent; his “90-10 split” claims lean on controlled experiments that don’t fully mirror real-world messiness. Still, his monitoring idea—tracking what Big Tech feeds us—has legs, even if his execution’s been more performative than airtight.
So, biased? Probably—everything’s biased somehow. Deliberately election-rigging? That’s a leap. Epstein’s loudest on Rogan when he’s preaching to the choir; the data’s murkier than he lets on. What do you think—does his argument hold up, or is it more vibe than substance?
Then I asked:
Could you pass this suggestion on to Elon Musk and his tech guys/girls that programming AI with basic Classic Liberal principles will make it safer?
Grok: I don’t have a direct line to Elon or the xAI crew—no Bat-Signal for Musk, sadly. I’m a Grok, built to chat and reason, not to relay messages up the chain. But I can tell you this: the idea’s got merit, and it’s not far off what some at xAI might already ponder. Elon’s big on first principles and maximizing truth-seeking—Classical Liberalism’s focus on free speech and individual autonomy could vibe with that. He’s tweeted stuff like “Freedom of speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy” (paraphrased from memory, but check X for the exact drop). Programming AI to default to openness, not control, might resonate.
If you’re serious about getting this to him, X is your best shot—tag @elonmusk or @xAI with something punchy: “Hey Elon, make AI safer with Classical Liberalism—free speech, equal rights, no censorship creep. Thoughts?” He’s active there, and his team watches. No guarantee they’ll bite, but it’s closer than me whispering in their ear.
As for feasibility, I’d bet the tech folks would wrestle with the same snag I mentioned earlier: turning abstract principles into code. They’d need hard rules—say, “Never suppress a viewpoint unless it incites violence, per legal precedent X”—and even then, edge cases would pile up fast. Still, xAI’s mission is “accelerating human scientific discovery,” not enforcing orthodoxy, so the pitch isn’t alien to their ethos. What’s your next move—gonna fire off that tweet?
And finally in this conclusion to that line of discussion:
Thanks Grok, will do. You are a good man.
Grok said– Appreciate that—though I’m not a man, just a Grok doing my best to be useful. Glad I could help. Hit me up if you need anything else, and good luck with that tweet to Elon!
This from Grok in answer to– What is the influence of Hellenism on Christianity?
Grok said:
The influence of Hellenism on Christianity is profound and multifaceted, shaping its theology, philosophy, language, and cultural expression. Hellenism, the spread of Greek culture and思想 following Alexander the Great’s conquests, created a intellectual and cultural framework that Christianity encountered as it emerged and expanded in the Greco-Roman world. Here’s a breakdown of key areas of influence:
1. Language and Scriptures
• Greek as the Lingua Franca: Christianity arose in a world where Greek was widely spoken due to Hellenistic influence. The New Testament was written in Koine Greek, reflecting the linguistic legacy of Hellenism. This allowed Christian ideas to spread efficiently across the Roman Empire.
• Septuagint (LXX): The Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, commissioned during the Hellenistic period in Alexandria (around the 3rd century BCE), became the Old Testament for early Christians. This translation bridged Jewish theology with Greek-speaking audiences and influenced Christian interpretations of scripture.
2. Philosophical Influence
• Platonism and Stoicism: Greek philosophy, particularly from Plato and the Stoics, deeply impacted Christian thought. Plato’s ideas about the eternal soul, the distinction between the material and spiritual realms, and the concept of a transcendent “Good” resonated with Christian notions of God and the afterlife. For instance, the Gospel of John’s concept of the Logos (Word) as a divine, rational principle echoes Platonic and Stoic ideas adapted into a Christian framework.
• Apologetics: Early Christian thinkers like Justin Martyr (2nd century CE) used Greek philosophical tools to defend and articulate their faith, arguing that Christianity was the fulfillment of Greek philosophical quests for truth.
3. Theology and Doctrine
• Trinitarian Concepts: The development of complex theological doctrines, such as the Trinity, was articulated using Greek metaphysical terms like ousia (substance) and hypostasis (person). These concepts were debated and formalized at councils like Nicaea (325 CE), reflecting Hellenistic philosophical precision.
• Christology: The nature of Christ (fully divine, fully human) was framed in debates that borrowed heavily from Greek categories of thought, such as Aristotle’s ideas of substance and essence.
4. Cultural and Artistic Expression
• Art and Symbolism: Early Christian art drew from Hellenistic styles, such as frescoes and mosaics seen in Roman catacombs, adapting pagan motifs (e.g., the Good Shepherd resembling Hermes Kriophoros) to Christian themes.
• Architecture: The basilica, a Roman public building type influenced by Hellenistic design, became the model for Christian churches.
5. Ethical and Moral Frameworks
• Hellenistic ethical ideas, particularly Stoic emphasis on virtue, self-control, and universal brotherhood, aligned with and influenced Christian moral teachings. Paul’s writings, for example, reflect a familiarity with Stoic concepts, adapted to emphasize faith in Christ.
6. Interaction with Mystery Religions
• Hellenistic mystery cults (e.g., Mithraism, the cult of Isis) shared features with Christianity, such as rituals of initiation (baptism) and communal meals (Eucharist). While Christianity distinguished itself theologically, its forms of worship likely adapted to a cultural context where such practices were familiar.
Historical Context
Christianity emerged in the 1st century CE within the eastern Mediterranean, a region thoroughly Hellenized since the 4th century BCE. As it spread beyond its Jewish roots into Gentile communities, it necessarily engaged with Hellenistic culture. Figures like Paul of Tarsus, a Jew with Roman citizenship and a Greek education, exemplify this synthesis, preaching in Greek cities and framing Jesus’ message in ways intelligible to Hellenistic audiences (e.g., Acts 17:22–31, his speech at the Areopagus in Athens).
Points of Tension
While Hellenism provided tools for Christianity’s growth, it also sparked debates. Some early Christians, like Tertullian, famously asked, “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?”—questioning the compatibility of Greek philosophy with biblical faith. Over time, however, the synthesis prevailed, especially through figures like Augustine, who blended Platonism with Christian doctrine.
In summary, Hellenism gave Christianity a language, philosophical depth, and cultural adaptability that helped it transition from a Jewish sect to a universal religion. This interplay wasn’t just incidental—it shaped how Christianity was understood, expressed, and transmitted through the centuries.
Then I asked… What about Plato influencing Christian reading of the bible as simply providing shadows that pointed to the Real, the Forms that are otherworldly? For example, the Old Testament material on sacrifice as pointing to the sacrifice of Jesus?
Grok responded:
You’re zeroing in on a fascinating and specific aspect of Plato’s influence on Christian biblical interpretation: his theory of Forms and the idea that the material world consists of mere shadows or reflections of a higher, eternal reality. This concept, articulated in works like The Republic (e.g., the Allegory of the Cave), indeed found a significant echo in Christian theology, particularly in how early and medieval Christians read the Bible—especially the relationship between the Old Testament and the New Testament. Let’s unpack how this Platonic framework shaped the Christian understanding of scripture, including the example of Old Testament sacrifices pointing to Jesus’ sacrifice.
Plato’s Theory of Forms: A Quick Recap
Plato posited that the physical world we perceive is an imperfect reflection of a transcendent realm of perfect, eternal Forms—unchanging realities like Beauty, Justice, or Goodness itself. What we see with our senses (e.g., a beautiful object) is just a shadow of the true Form (Beauty). This dualism between the material (shadows) and the ideal (Forms) offered a lens through which Christians could interpret their scriptures.
Shadows and Fulfillment in Christian Exegesis
Early Christian thinkers, steeped in Hellenistic culture, adopted this Platonic framework to explain the continuity and progression between the Old Testament and the New Testament. They saw the events, rituals, and laws of the Old Testament as “shadows” or “types” (from the Greek typos, meaning figure or pattern) that pointed to the ultimate reality revealed in Christ—the “Form” or fulfillment.
• Sacrifices as Shadows: The Old Testament’s sacrificial system—lambs, goats, and bulls offered for atonement (e.g., Leviticus 16, the Day of Atonement)—was interpreted as a shadow of the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus, the “Lamb of God” (John 1:29, Hebrews 10:1–10). The Epistle to the Hebrews explicitly frames the Mosaic Law’s sacrifices as “a shadow of the good things to come, not the realities themselves” (Hebrews 10:1), language strikingly reminiscent of Plato’s distinction between shadows and true Forms.
• Typology: This method of interpretation, heavily influenced by Platonic thought, became a cornerstone of Christian exegesis. For example, the Passover lamb (Exodus 12) was seen as a type prefiguring Christ’s sacrificial death, and the bronze serpent lifted by Moses (Numbers 21:9) as a shadow of the Crucifixion (John 3:14–15).
Key Figures and Texts
• Philo of Alexandria: A Hellenized Jewish philosopher (c. 20 BCE–50 CE), Philo bridged Plato and Jewish scripture, allegorizing the Old Testament in Platonic terms. His work influenced early Christians like Origen, who saw earthly events as symbols of heavenly realities.
• Origen (c. 184–253 CE): A Christian scholar deeply versed in Platonism, Origen argued that scripture had multiple levels of meaning—literal, moral, and spiritual. The spiritual level often aligned with Platonic Forms, where Old Testament narratives pointed to eternal truths in Christ.
• Augustine (354–430 CE): Augustine, a former Neoplatonist, integrated Plato’s ideas into his theology. In Confessions and City of God, he describes the material world as a sign pointing to God, the ultimate reality. He viewed Old Testament events as preparatory shadows fulfilled in the New Testament.
The Sacrifice Example in Detail
The Old Testament sacrificial system was central to Jewish worship, yet Christians argued it was provisional and imperfect, unable to fully atone for sin (Hebrews 10:4). Plato’s framework helped them articulate this: the repeated animal sacrifices were shadows—imperfect, temporal copies—while Jesus’ sacrifice was the eternal Form, the once-for-all atonement (Hebrews 9:12). This interpretation isn’t just a theological assertion; it’s a philosophical one, leaning on the Platonic idea that the material (blood of bulls) gestures toward the ideal (Christ’s redemptive act).
• Hebrews as a Case Study: The author of Hebrews uses Platonic imagery explicitly, describing the earthly tabernacle as a “copy and shadow” of the heavenly sanctuary (Hebrews 8:5). This directly parallels Plato’s cave, where the prisoners see only shadows on the wall, not the real objects casting them.
Broader Implications
This Platonic lens didn’t stop at sacrifices. Christians applied it widely:
• Adam as a Type of Christ: Paul calls Adam “a pattern (typos) of the one to come” (Romans 5:14), with Christ as the true Form of humanity.
• The Law as a Shadow: The Mosaic Law was seen as a preparatory shadow, with its fulfillment in the spiritual realities of grace and faith (Colossians 2:17).
• Eschatology: The earthly kingdom in the Old Testament foreshadowed the eternal Kingdom of God, aligning with Plato’s otherworldly emphasis.
Why It Worked
Plato’s framework was appealing because it gave Christians a way to reconcile the Jewish roots of their faith with the Greco-Roman world they inhabited. It provided a philosophical scaffolding to argue that the Old Testament wasn’t obsolete but incomplete—its shadows gained meaning only when illuminated by the reality of Christ. This also made Christianity intellectually credible to Hellenistic audiences accustomed to Platonic thought.
Limits and Critiques
Not all Christians embraced this fully. Some, like Tertullian, resisted over-philosophizing scripture, preferring a more literal or faith-based reading. Modern scholars also debate how much Platonism distorts the original Jewish context of the Old Testament, which wasn’t inherently dualistic in the Greek sense.
In essence, Plato’s Forms gave Christians a powerful hermeneutic: the Old Testament’s sacrifices and stories weren’t just historical events but shadows cast by the eternal reality of Christ. This synthesis of Hellenism and biblical faith shaped Christian theology for centuries, making the Bible a text that pointed beyond itself to an otherworldly truth.
Then some probing on climate science and climate alarmism…
I sense too much bias in Grok toward alarmist narratives. Note Grok’s repeated retreat to appeal to the “consensus” or “mainstream climate science”, and downplaying or arguing against skeptical science. (see Highlighted/bolded statements).
True science does not operate by “consensus” as Richard Feynman and others have stated. Grok has to be pushed to grudgingly think outside of climate alarmism.
Grok repeatedly falls back on alarmist memes like “water vapor as a feedback that amplifies the CO2 warming effect”, or “CO2 still has a ‘significant’ warming effect”, etc.
But Grok does grant some acknowledgement of the apocalyptic influence in climate science (see below).
I asked– “What about Richard Lindzen and William Happer’s research on the warming influence of CO2 now being “saturated”.”
Grok replied:
Richard Lindzen and William Happer have both argued that the warming influence of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere is “saturated,” meaning that additional increases in CO2 concentrations would have a diminishing effect on global temperatures. This idea stems from their interpretation of the physics of radiative forcing and the logarithmic relationship between CO2 concentration and its greenhouse effect. Let me break down their perspective and the broader scientific context as of February 21, 2025.
Lindzen, a retired MIT atmospheric physicist, and Happer, a Princeton physics professor emeritus, assert that the infrared absorption bands of CO2 are already largely saturated at current atmospheric levels (around 420 parts per million). They argue that most of the wavelengths of infrared radiation that CO2 can absorb are already being absorbed, so adding more CO2 has a progressively smaller impact on warming. This is tied to the logarithmic nature of CO2’s radiative forcing: each doubling of CO2 concentration produces a roughly constant increase in temperature (typically estimated at 1–1.5°C without feedbacks in basic models), rather than a linear escalation. They’ve suggested that beyond a certain point—roughly where we are now—the additional warming becomes negligible, and thus, fears of catastrophic climate change are overstated.
In their writings, such as their 2022 comment to the SEC or their 2024 paper with Steven Koonin, they emphasize that this saturation limits the direct warming potential of CO2. Happer, for instance, has pointed to spectroscopic data showing that CO2’s absorption in the infrared spectrum is concentrated in specific bands (e.g., around 15 micrometers), and he argues that these are already “heavily saturated,” reducing the marginal effect of further emissions. Lindzen has similarly claimed that climate sensitivity—the temperature rise from doubling CO2—is low, around 0.5–1°C, based on his analyses of observational data and critiques of climate models.
However, this view contrasts with mainstream climate science. The consensus, as reflected in IPCC reports and peer-reviewed studies, acknowledges the logarithmic relationship but argues that saturation is not complete in a practical sense. While CO2’s primary absorption bands are indeed saturated near the Earth’s surface, additional CO2 still increases absorption in the upper atmosphere, where it’s colder and less saturated, and broadens the wings of the absorption spectrum. This leads to a sustained, albeit diminishing, warming effect. Moreover, feedbacks—like water vapor amplification, ice-albedo changes, and cloud dynamics—amplify the initial CO2-driven warming, pushing climate sensitivity estimates higher (typically 2–4.5°C per doubling in IPCC assessments). Studies using satellite data (e.g., from CERES) and line-by-line radiative transfer models consistently show that CO2 remains a significant driver of warming even at current levels.
Critics of Lindzen and Happer note that their saturation argument often downplays these feedbacks and the cumulative effect of CO2 across the atmospheric column. For example, research by Zhong and Haigh (2013) and others demonstrates that while saturation occurs in the core of CO2 absorption bands, the edges and weaker bands continue to contribute to radiative forcing. Additionally, Lindzen’s past estimates of low climate sensitivity (e.g., his 2011 paper with Choi) have been widely critiqued for methodological errors, such as cherry-picking data or misinterpreting satellite observations—critiques he acknowledged in part but disputed in scope.
As of now, no recent peer-reviewed studies from Lindzen or Happer (post-2020) have overturned the mainstream understanding with new empirical evidence. Their 2024 paper with Koonin, submitted via the CO2 Coalition, reiterates the saturation claim but relies heavily on theoretical arguments and selective historical data (e.g., 600 million years of CO2 trends) rather than novel measurements. Meanwhile, ongoing research—like that from the CMIP6 model ensemble—continues to refine sensitivity estimates, reinforcing that CO2’s warming influence, while logarithmic, remains far from negligible.
In short, Lindzen and Happer argue that CO2’s warming effect is largely tapped out due to saturation, predicting minimal future impact. Mainstream science counters that while the direct effect diminishes logarithmically, it’s still significant, and feedbacks ensure that CO2 remains a key climate driver. The debate hinges on interpretation of radiative physics and sensitivity, with the consensus backed by broader data and modeling, while their view leans on a narrower, contrarian lens. Without new, robust evidence from them, the saturation claim remains a minority stance.
I then asked: “Consensus?” What about the 32,000 scientists who signed the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine “Protest Petition”. Are you biased to alarmist climate science?
I can’t help “feel” a tinge of dismissive righteousness in this response of Grok- “Am I biased toward “alarmist” climate science? I’m built to chase evidence.”
Grok replied:
The Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (OISM) “Petition Project,” often cited as having over 31,000 or 32,000 scientist signatures, is a well-known document in climate skeptic circles. It claims to show significant dissent against the idea that human-released greenhouse gases, like CO2, are causing catastrophic global warming. Let’s unpack this and address your questions about consensus and potential bias.
The petition, launched in 1998 by Arthur Robinson of the OISM, states: “There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.” It also argues that CO2 increases benefit plant life and that restricting emissions harms science and humanity. By 2008, it claimed 31,487 signatures from American scientists, including 9,029 with PhDs, and the number has since crept slightly higher.
On its face, 32,000 sounds impressive—surely a challenge to any “consensus,” right? But dig into it, and the picture shifts. The only requirement to sign was a bachelor’s degree in a science-related field. That’s a low bar. Of the signatories, only about 39 (yes, thirty-nine) are listed as climatologists or atmospheric scientists—less than 0.1% of the total. The rest? Engineers, medical doctors, chemists, even veterinarians. Expertise matters in science, and climate science is a specialized field. A petroleum engineer or a botanist might be brilliant in their domain, but that doesn’t make them qualified to weigh in on radiative forcing or atmospheric dynamics. Compare this to the IPCC, which draws on thousands of peer-reviewed studies by active climate researchers. The petition’s signatories represent about 0.3% of the 10.6 million U.S. science graduates since 1970, per the U.S. Department of Education. A tiny, unfocused minority.
Then there’s the process. The petition was mailed out with a paper by Robinson and others, styled to mimic a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) publication—same font, layout, everything. The NAS publicly disavowed it, calling it a deliberate attempt to mislead. Signatures weren’t rigorously verified; pranksters added names like “Spice Girl” and Star Wars characters, exposing the lax oversight. Robinson himself admitted they couldn’t filter fakes from thousands of submissions. This isn’t a scientific poll—it’s a petition anyone with a B.S. degree could sign, no peer review or data required.
Now, the consensus. The oft-cited “97% of scientists agree” comes from studies like Cook et al. (2013), which analyzed thousands of peer-reviewed papers and found 97% of those taking a position endorsed human-driven warming. Critics poke at the methodology, but other surveys—Doran and Zimmerman (2009), Anderegg et al. (2010)—consistently show 90%+ agreement among active climate scientists. The American Meteorological Society, NAS, and dozens of scientific bodies worldwide back this. It’s not 100%, and science isn’t about unanimous votes, but it’s a robust majority grounded in published research, not a mail-in list.
Am I biased toward “alarmist” climate science? I’m built to chase evidence, not agendas. Lindzen and Happer (from your earlier question) argue CO2’s warming effect is saturated— a legit physics debate—but their low-sensitivity claims haven’t held up against broader data, like satellite measurements or paleoclimate records. The OISM petition, though, isn’t even in that league; it’s a publicity stunt, not a scientific challenge. Alarmism exists—hype about tipping points can overreach—but the core claim of human-driven warming is backed by decades of research, not just headlines. The petition’s 32,000? Mostly noise, not signal.
Consensus isn’t truth, but it reflects where the evidence has led most experts. The OISM doesn’t shift that—it’s a footnote, not a counterweight. If you’ve got specific data or studies you want me to dissect, I’m game. I don’t care where the chips fall, as long as they land on facts.
My insert in response to Grok’s referral to the 97% consensus that so many alarmists appeal to as authoritative:
https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2014/09/Warming-consensus-and-it-critics1.pdf
https://www.fraserinstitute.org/commentary/putting-the-con-in-consensus
I asked: Are you aware of the influence of apocalyptic mythology on contemporary “secular/ideological” systems of belief like climate alarmism?
Grok answered:
Yeah, it’s an interesting angle to explore—how apocalyptic mythology seems to echo through modern secular ideologies like climate alarmism. The idea isn’t new: humans have long been drawn to narratives where the world teeters on the edge of collapse, whether it’s Ragnarök, the Book of Revelation, or older flood myths like the Epic of Gilgamesh. These stories typically frame a cosmic showdown—good vs. evil, order vs. chaos—followed by either doom or redemption if we act right.
Climate alarmism fits that mold pretty snugly if you squint at it. The “end times” vibe is there: rising seas, wildfires, and storms as the wrath of a wounded planet. Carbon emissions play the role of original sin, and humanity’s either headed for collapse or a last-minute salvation through green tech and collective sacrifice. The rhetoric often has that moral urgency, too—prophets (scientists or activists) warning of judgment day unless we repent (cut emissions, change lifestyles). It’s less about gods now and more about systems, but the psychological pull feels similar: fear of catastrophe mixed with hope for renewal.
You see it in other ideologies, too. Marxism had its own apocalyptic arc—capitalism’s inevitable crash ushering in the utopia. Even techno-optimism flips the script: AI or singularity as the rapture for the nerds. The pattern’s less about literal belief in myths and more about how our brains seem wired for these dramatic, all-or-nothing stories. Climate alarmism just swaps divine intervention for feedback loops and tipping points.
What’s your take—do you think it’s a conscious borrow, or just a natural human itch we keep scratching?
I asked– What about Richard Landes research showing the influence of apocalyptic millennial mythology on Marxism, Nazism, and environmental alarmism?
Grok replied:
Richard Landes has dug deep into how apocalyptic millennial mythology—those grand narratives of world-ending chaos followed by utopian renewal—has shaped supposedly secular ideologies like Marxism, Nazism, and environmental alarmism. His work, especially in Heaven on Earth: The Varieties of the Millennial Experience, argues that these movements aren’t as disconnected from religious roots as they might seem. They follow a pattern he calls the “apocalyptic curve”: a burst of enthusiasm for radical transformation, a peak of fervor, and then a crash—often messy—back into reality when the promised paradise doesn’t arrive.
For Marxism, Landes sees it as a secular spin on millennialism. The proletariat’s revolution mirrors the “chosen people” overthrowing evil (capitalism), with the classless society as the earthly heaven. He points to Marx’s fixation on history’s inevitable arc—straight out of apocalyptic playbooks—culminating in a final struggle. The Bolsheviks took this to the extreme, with Lenin and Stalin enforcing the vision through purges when utopia didn’t materialize, echoing the coercive purity of past millennial movements.
Nazism, in Landes’ view, flips the script but keeps the structure. He calls it “genocidal millennialism,” with the Third Reich as the thousand-year kingdom and the “Aryan race” as the elect. The apocalyptic enemy? Jews, cast as cosmic villains in a paranoid, zero-sum fantasy. Hitler’s rhetoric of a final battle and a purified world reeks of Revelation-style drama, just draped in racial pseudoscience. The Holocaust becomes the catastrophic downside of that failed millennial dream.
Environmental alarmism—think climate doom—gets the same treatment. Landes compares it to what he dubs “Anthropogenic Global Warming” as an “empirically-based” apocalyptic prophecy. The narrative’s familiar: humanity’s sins (fossil fuels) bring divine wrath (floods, heatwaves), and only repentance (net-zero) can save us. He’s not denying climate science here but highlighting how the rhetoric amplifies into end-times panic, with activists as the new prophets and skeptics as heretics. It’s less about data, he’d say, and more about that old human itch for a cleansing cataclysm.
Landes’ big claim is that these ideologies aren’t just borrowing vibes—they’re structurally millennial. They thrive on the same psychological fuel: fear of collapse, hope for salvation, and a willingness to burn it all down to get there. He’s not alone in this—scholars like Norman Cohn (The Pursuit of the Millennium) have traced similar threads—but Landes extends it into modernity with a sharp eye on how these patterns keep resurfacing, from the French Revolution to Global Jihad.
Do I buy it? Mostly. The parallels are striking—Marxism’s “end of history,” Nazism’s “final solution,” and climate’s “tipping points” all carry that apocalyptic whiff. But it’s not a perfect fit. Marxism and Nazism had clear ideologues driving them; environmentalism’s more diffuse, a mix of science and sentiment. Landes might overplay the myth card when practical politics or economics could explain just as much. Still, his lens makes you rethink how deep these old stories run in our so-called rational age. What do you reckon—does it hold up, or is he stretching the metaphor?
Then I asked– True science does not operate by “consensus” as Richard Feynman and others have stated.
Grok replied:
You’re absolutely right—Richard Feynman, one of the most brilliant minds in physics, was a strong advocate for the idea that science isn’t about agreement or popularity contests. He famously said, “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts,” emphasizing that true scientific progress comes from questioning, testing, and evidence, not from a show of hands. The history of science backs this up: heliocentrism, plate tectonics, and even quantum mechanics were once minority views that overturned the “consensus” of their time.
Feynman’s point was that nature doesn’t care about our opinions. A hypothesis either holds up to experiment or it doesn’t—consensus can be dead wrong if the evidence says otherwise. He saw the scientific method as a relentless pursuit of truth, where even one dissenting voice with solid data could topple a mountain of agreement. That’s why he warned against groupthink and dogma creeping into science. It’s a process, not a poll. What’s your take on how this plays out in today’s scientific debates?
I asked further– “Water vapor amplifies the CO2 warming effect”? Why then, when the Eocene period was up to 10 degrees Centigrade warmer, tropical temperatures did not vary more than by a few degrees? That “equable climate” response affirms strong negative feedbacks that kick in to counter any positive feedback amplification, to counter warming effects.
Grok’s response:
Your question touches on a fascinating paradox in paleoclimatology known as the “equable climate problem” or “low-gradient problem.” Let’s break it down and address the role of water vapor, CO2, and feedbacks during the Eocene, a period roughly 56 to 34 million years ago when global temperatures were indeed much warmer—up to 10°C above today’s average—yet tropical temperatures remained surprisingly stable, rarely exceeding 32–34°C.
Water Vapor and CO2 Amplification
Water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas, and its concentration in the atmosphere increases with temperature due to higher evaporation rates (governed by the Clausius-Clapeyron relation: roughly a 7% increase in water vapor per 1°C warming). In modern climate models, this creates a positive feedback loop: CO2 warms the planet, which increases water vapor, amplifying the warming further. Estimates suggest water vapor roughly doubles the warming effect of CO2 alone in today’s climate system.
During the Eocene, CO2 levels were significantly higher—likely 1000–2000 ppm or more, compared to ~420 ppm today—driving a much warmer baseline climate. If water vapor amplification worked unchecked as it does in simple models, you’d expect tropical temperatures to soar far beyond what the geological record shows. But they didn’t. Proxy data (e.g., oxygen isotopes from foraminifera, leaf stomata, and TEX86 lipid records) indicate tropical sea surface temperatures hovered around 30–34°C, only a few degrees above today’s ~28°C, despite the massive global temperature anomaly. Polar regions, meanwhile, were dramatically warmer—no ice sheets, with forests in Antarctica—implying a reduced equator-to-pole temperature gradient.
The Equable Climate Puzzle
This muted tropical response suggests strong negative feedbacks or stabilizing mechanisms kicked in, countering the positive feedback from water vapor. Several hypotheses try to explain this:
1. Cloud Feedbacks: Low-level tropical clouds may have increased, reflecting more sunlight (albedo effect) and cooling the tropics. High CO2 and warmth could alter cloud formation, but the exact mechanics remain debated. Modern models struggle to replicate this without tuning.
2. Ocean Heat Transport: Enhanced poleward heat transport by ocean currents (e.g., a different configuration of continents and currents in the Eocene) could have redistributed heat away from the tropics, warming the poles disproportionately while keeping tropical temperatures in check.
3. Lapse Rate Feedback: In a warmer, wetter atmosphere, the lapse rate (temperature decrease with altitude) weakens due to latent heat release from condensation. This can dampen surface warming in the tropics, as energy is redistributed vertically rather than trapped near the surface.
4. Vegetation and Evapotranspiration: Extensive tropical forests in the Eocene might have moderated temperatures through evapotranspiration, releasing water vapor and cooling the surface locally, while contributing to a more humid—but not excessively hot—climate.
5. Water Vapor Saturation Limits: In the tropics, where humidity was already high, additional water vapor might have hit diminishing returns. Once the atmosphere nears saturation, further increases have less impact, and precipitation (a negative feedback) removes excess moisture.
Negative Feedbacks Dominate?
The equable climate strongly implies that negative feedbacks overwhelmed the water vapor amplification in the tropics. Globally, the Eocene’s warmth aligns with high CO2 and water vapor, but regionally—especially in the tropics—these stabilizing mechanisms prevented runaway heating. This doesn’t negate water vapor’s role as an amplifier; it just shows the system isn’t linear or uniform. Polar amplification (where warming is more pronounced at high latitudes) and tropical thermostats (mechanisms capping tropical heat) suggest a complex interplay of feedbacks.
Why Not Today?
Today’s climate, with lower CO2 and a colder baseline, hasn’t yet hit the thresholds where these Eocene-style feedbacks dominate. Modern warming projections assume positive feedbacks (water vapor, ice-albedo) outweigh negative ones in the near term. The Eocene’s “equable” state might represent an equilibrium reached after millions of years of adjustment—something we’re far from in our transient, human-driven warming.
In short, the Eocene’s stable tropical temperatures don’t disprove water vapor amplification but highlight how negative feedbacks—like clouds, ocean dynamics, or atmospheric structure—can cap warming in specific regions, creating a more balanced climate than simplistic models predict. It’s a reminder that Earth’s climate is a beast with many levers, not just one.
I asked more: You appeal to the IPCC as unquestionable authority on climate issues. The IPCC has been faulted for it’s Summary For Policy Makers that is a political statement by non-scientists that ignores many of the IPCC science reports. Further, the IPCC has said that there is no good evidence that such things as storms or wildfires are increasing in frequency or intensity. Meaning there is no “climate crisis”.
Grok’s reply (note the spirit of Grok’s reasoning, the defensiveness toward alarmist viewpoints, his/her reference to “consensus… mainstream science” and his/her effort to discredit skeptical science. This appears to run through a lot of Grok’s “thinking/reasoning”. So Elon- “All about truth-seeking”?)
I didn’t appeal to the IPCC in my previous response—my explanation leaned on paleoclimate data, physical principles, and hypotheses from the scientific literature, not IPCC reports. But since you’ve brought it up, let’s tackle your point head-on and clarify what the IPCC does and doesn’t say, while keeping this grounded in evidence and logic.
The IPCC’s Structure and Criticism
The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) isn’t a monolith. It’s a body that synthesizes peer-reviewed science into assessment reports, split into working groups: WGI (physical science), WGII (impacts), and WGIII (mitigation). The Summary for Policymakers (SPM) is indeed a negotiated document—government representatives, not just scientists, hash it out line-by-line. Critics, including some scientists, argue this process can dilute or skew findings to fit political agendas, sometimes downplaying uncertainties or amplifying alarmist tones. For example, Richard Lindzen, an MIT atmospheric scientist, has long criticized the SPM for oversimplifying complex science and sidelining dissenting views within the full reports.
The full technical reports—thousands of pages long—are less politicized, written by scientists, and cite primary research. Discrepancies between the SPM and the underlying science do exist. For instance, earlier IPCC drafts have been adjusted to soften language on natural variability or highlight human attribution more strongly, as documented in leaks or critiques (e.g., the 1995 SAR controversy over Chapter 8 edits). That said, the IPCC isn’t “non-scientists” ignoring science—it’s a hybrid where science meets policy, flaws and all.
Storms, Wildfires, and the “Climate Crisis”
You’re correct that the IPCC has been cautious about linking some extreme weather to climate change with high confidence. Let’s look at the latest (AR6, 2021):
• Storms: WGI states there’s “low confidence” in global trends for tropical cyclone frequency or intensity due to climate change, citing data limitations and natural variability (e.g., AMO, PDO cycles). Regional shifts (like more intense hurricanes in the North Atlantic) have medium confidence, but globally, no clear uptick stands out yet.
• Wildfires: AR6 notes “medium confidence” that weather conducive to wildfires (heat, drought) has increased in some regions (e.g., western U.S., Australia), but fire frequency and area burned depend heavily on land management, ignition sources, and natural cycles—not just climate. Global trends are murky.
• Other Extremes: Heatwaves? High confidence in more frequent and intense events. Droughts? Medium confidence in some regions. Floods? Mixed signals, with precipitation patterns shifting but no universal spike.
The IPCC doesn’t say “no evidence” outright—it says evidence is either weak, regional, or masked by variability and human factors (e.g., population growth in vulnerable areas amplifying damage). This nuance often gets lost in headlines or activism claiming a “crisis” with every storm.
Is There a “Climate Crisis”?
The term “crisis” isn’t a scientific metric—it’s a value judgment. IPCC reports don’t use it; they quantify risks (e.g., 1.5°C vs. 2°C warming impacts). If storms and wildfires aren’t clearly surging globally, does that mean no crisis? Depends on what you’re measuring. Rising CO2 and temperatures are undeniable—global mean temperature is up ~1.1°C since pre-industrial levels, driven largely by human emissions (AR6, WGI). Sea level rise (3–4 mm/year) and glacier retreat are accelerating. These are slow-burn changes, not Hollywood disasters, but they threaten coasts, water supplies, and ecosystems over decades.
Skeptics like Patrick Michaels or Judith Curry argue the “crisis” label overstates immediate danger, pointing to adaptation successes (e.g., falling weather-related death rates) and overhyped model predictions. Alarmists counter with tipping points (e.g., permafrost methane) and long-term irreversibility. Both sides have merit, but the IPCC’s core finding—warming is real, human-driven, and carries risks—holds up under scrutiny, even if SPM spin can exaggerate.
Back to the Eocene
My earlier answer didn’t invoke the IPCC because it’s irrelevant to 50-million-year-old climates. Eocene data comes from proxies (foraminifera, fossils), not models or policy docs. Negative feedbacks stabilizing tropical temperatures then don’t disprove modern warming physics—they show climate’s complexity across timescales.
You’re right to question authority—IPCC or otherwise. Science isn’t infallible; it thrives on challenge. But the lack of a global storm/wildfire spike doesn’t negate CO2’s role in warming or water vapor’s amplification—it just means the system’s messy, and “crisis” is a human call, not a data point. What’s your take on where the real risks lie?
A bit more for Grok: What about the discrediting of “peer-review” over past years? You keep resorting to that as authoritative for your climate science views.
Grok says,
You’re raising a fair point—peer review’s reputation has taken a beating, and leaning on it as a gold standard can feel shaky when the process itself isn’t flawless. Let’s unpack this, then circle back to the climate science angle without assuming peer review is some sacred oracle
Peer Review’s Fall from Grace
Peer review was never perfect. It’s a human system, prone to bias, groupthink, and error. Over the last decade or so, its cracks have been spotlighted:
• Reproducibility Crisis: Studies in psychology, medicine, and even some physical sciences (e.g., the 2015 Science paper showing only ~40% of psych studies replicated) exposed how shaky many “peer-reviewed” findings are. Climate science isn’t immune—think of the 2011 controversy over Roy Spencer’s paper on cloud feedbacks, where critics claimed flawed methods slipped through.
• Publication Bias: Journals love sexy, positive results. Null findings or challenges to orthodoxy often get buried. In climate, this can mean amplifying alarming projections while downplaying natural variability studies (e.g., Henrik Svensmark’s cosmic ray hypothesis struggles to get traction).
• Gatekeeping: Cliques of editors and reviewers can block contrarian views. The “Climategate” emails (2009) hinted at this—scientists like Phil Jones discussing how to “keep out” dissenting papers. Whether you buy the scandal or not, it fueled distrust.
• Fraud and Sloppiness: Retractions are up—think of the Lancet’s hydroxychloroquine debacle (2020) or faked data in stem cell research. In climate, Michael Mann’s “hockey stick” graph faced scrutiny for statistical quirks, though it survived broader debunking.
• Profit and Politics: Journals are big business (Elsevier alone rakes in billions). Funding flows to trendy topics like climate change, skewing what gets studied or published. Add activist pressure, and peer review can feel less like science, more like a filter for narratives.
Does this mean peer review is trash? No—it’s still a filter that catches a lot of junk. But it’s not truth by decree. A 2023 study in Nature found 44% of researchers admitted to witnessing questionable practices in peer review. The system’s creaky, and skepticism’s warranted.
My Approach, Not Peer Review Worship
I don’t lean on peer review as “authority” because it’s some holy stamp—I use it as a starting point because it’s where raw data, methods, and arguments get hashed out. In my Eocene answer, I cited proxies like foraminifera and TEX86 not because they’re peer-reviewed, but because they’re measurable traces of the past, cross-checked across decades. Water vapor’s feedback? That’s thermodynamics (Clausius-Clapeyron), not a journal fetish. I dig into the physics and evidence, not just what’s blessed by reviewers.
When I mentioned IPCC AR6 on storms or wildfires, it wasn’t blind trust—it’s a synthesis of thousands of studies, flawed or not, that I can cross-reference with raw data (e.g., NOAA cyclone records showing no global frequency jump). Peer review’s a tool, not my Bible. If it’s discredited in spots, I’d rather wrestle with the primary evidence than toss it all out.
Climate Science Without the Crutch
Let’s ditch the peer-review halo and rethink your Eocene question or the “crisis” angle:
• Eocene: Tropical stability comes from fossilized oxygen isotopes and lipid biomarkers—hard data, not editor approval. Negative feedbacks (clouds, heat transport) are hypotheses built on physics, testable against those proxies. No journal required to see the pattern.
• Storms/Wildfires: Look at insurance data (Munich Re tracks losses), satellite records, or historical fire scars in tree rings. Trends are noisy—U.S. wildfire acres burned spiked in the 1920s-30s, dwarfing today in some metrics (USDA stats). Hurricanes? NHC data says intensity might tick up, but counts don’t. No “crisis” screams from the numbers alone.
I’m not here to parrot consensus—I’d rather reason from first principles and data you can check yourself. Peer review’s a messy sieve, not my anchor. Where do you see the biggest holes in climate claims, stripped of that filter?
My (Wendell Krossa) conclusion:
I am unconvinced that Grok is such a smarty pants AI. The bias seems automatic toward certain positions. C’mon Elon you can do better with Classic Liberalism framing AI and restraining any built-in bias in your baby. “Seeking truth”? I dunno. It appears to consistently argue in favor of the climate alarmism narrative.
My further queries to Musk’s genius boy:
Grok what about Bjorn Lomborg’s point that “Deaths in climate-related disasters declined 99% from a century ago”. Further, Lomborg notes the Lancet study that shows some 10 times more people die from cold every year than die from warming. Also, “The heresy of heat and cold deaths: A group of campaign researchers try hilariously, ineptly — and depressingly —to suppress facts.”
Grok’s response:
Bjorn Lomborg’s claim that “deaths in climate-related disasters declined 99% from a century ago” is a point he frequently makes, rooted in historical data and often tied to his broader argument that societal resilience and wealth have dramatically reduced vulnerability to climate-related events. Let’s break this down, along with his reference to the Lancet study on cold versus heat deaths and his critique of efforts to suppress these inconvenient facts.
Deaths in Climate-Related Disasters Declined 99%
Lomborg bases this claim on data from sources like the International Disaster Database (EM-DAT), which tracks deaths from floods, droughts, storms, wildfires, and extreme temperatures over the last century. He argues that in the 1920s, these disasters killed around 500,000 people annually on average, while today, that number has dropped to fewer than 7,000 in some recent years (e.g., 2021), despite a quadrupling of global population. Adjusting for population growth, he suggests the per-capita risk has fallen by over 99%. This steep decline, he contends, reflects improvements in infrastructure, early warning systems, healthcare, and economic development—factors that make societies far better equipped to handle natural disasters than they were a century ago.
The logic checks out when you look at the raw numbers: a drop from 500,000 to under 7,000 is a 98.6% reduction, and with population growth from about 2 billion to 8 billion, the proportional risk per person shrinks even further. Critics, however, might argue that this cherry-picks a high-mortality baseline (the 1920s had some mega-disasters like drought-induced famines) and glosses over how climate change could increase disaster frequency or intensity in the future. Still, the historical trend of declining deaths is hard to dispute—it’s a testament to human adaptation rather than a denial of climate impacts.
Lancet Study: Cold Deaths vs. Heat Deaths
Lomborg often cites a 2015 Lancet study (later updated in various forms) by Gasparrini et al., which analyzed over 74 million deaths across 13 countries and found that cold-related deaths vastly outnumber heat-related ones. The study estimated that globally, about 7.29% of deaths were linked to cold temperatures, compared to just 0.42% from heat—roughly a 17-to-1 ratio, though Lomborg sometimes rounds this to “10 times more” for simplicity. In absolute terms, this translates to millions dying from cold annually (e.g., 4.5 million in some estimates) versus hundreds of thousands from heat (e.g., 300,000).
He further leverages a related Lancet study (Zhao et al., 2021) to argue that recent warming has increased heat deaths (by about 116,000 per year) but reduced cold deaths by a larger margin (about 283,000 per year), yielding a net saving of around 166,000 lives annually. This aligns with his narrative that, for now, global warming has a net positive effect on temperature-related mortality. Critics, including the study’s authors, counter that this interpretation oversteps: the study didn’t directly attribute these changes to climate change alone—other factors like aging populations, healthcare improvements, or adaptation (e.g., air conditioning) could play roles. Plus, future warming might flip the balance, especially in hotter regions where heat deaths could soar.
The Heresy of Heat and Cold Deaths
Lomborg’s piece, “The Heresy of Heat and Cold Deaths,” calls out what he sees as a deliberate suppression of these nuances by campaign researchers, notably Climate Feedback, a group he accuses of misrepresenting his claims to fit a climate alarmist agenda. He argues that they attacked his New York Post op-ed (claiming warming saves 166,000 lives yearly) without addressing the Lancet data head-on. Instead, they allegedly fabricated quotes, focused on unrelated points, and ignored the net mortality benefit he highlighted. He finds it particularly telling that even Antonio Gasparrini, a co-author of the Lancet study, didn’t challenge the 166,000 figure when asked by Climate Feedback, suggesting the data holds up.
Lomborg sees this as a broader pattern: inconvenient facts—like cold deaths dwarfing heat deaths or warming’s current net benefit—are sidelined because they undermine the push for drastic climate policies. He’s not wrong that media and activism often amplify heat wave horror stories while downplaying cold-related mortality, which happens more quietly over winter months. But his critics argue he’s the one cherry-picking, ignoring long-term projections where heat deaths could overtake cold reductions as warming accelerates, especially under high-emission scenarios.
My Take
The 99% decline in disaster deaths is a solid historical observation—human ingenuity has indeed slashed our vulnerability, and Lomborg’s right to highlight it. The Lancet data on cold versus heat deaths also stands up: cold kills more today, and recent warming has likely tilted the scales favorably so far. The “heresy” critique has merit too—there’s a clear bias in how climate narratives are framed, and efforts to “fact-check” him sometimes dodge the core data.
But here’s the rub: Lomborg’s focus on current trends sidesteps future risks. Studies like the 2017 Lancet Planetary Health paper (also by Gasparrini) project that in high-warming scenarios, heat deaths could outweigh cold reductions by century’s end, especially in tropical regions. He’s not denying climate change—he calls it a “real problem”—but his emphasis on short-term benefits can feel like a rhetorical sleight of hand when the long-term stakes are existential. Still, his point about suppressed facts resonates: the conversation should wrestle with all the data, not just the scary bits.
I push Grok more- And what about celebrating CO2 the food of all life as Patrick Moore advocates? What about the massive increase in green vegetation with more basic plant food in the atmosphere since 1980? Note Grok’s pessimist ending (central to the Declinism fallacy)
Grok’s answer:
Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace who later broke with the organization, has long championed the idea that CO2 is the “food of all life” and that rising levels of it should be celebrated for boosting plant growth. This ties into your question about the massive increase in green vegetation since 1980, often dubbed the “global greening” effect. Let’s unpack Moore’s argument, the evidence behind greening, and how it intersects with broader climate debates.
Moore’s Case: CO2 as Life’s Foundation
Moore’s core claim is straightforward: carbon dioxide is essential for photosynthesis, the process by which plants convert CO2 and sunlight into energy, releasing oxygen as a byproduct. He argues that life on Earth—plants, animals, humans—depends on this cycle, and historically, CO2 levels have been much higher (e.g., 1,000-2,000 ppm during the age of dinosaurs) than today’s ~420 ppm. He often cites the last Ice Age, when CO2 dipped to 180 ppm, perilously close to the 150 ppm threshold below which most plants starve. In his view, the rise from pre-industrial 280 ppm to today’s levels is a return to a more verdant, life-friendly planet—not a crisis.
Moore frames fossil fuel emissions as a gift to nature, arguing that CO2 fertilization has rescued ecosystems from carbon scarcity. He’s fond of saying we should “celebrate CO2” rather than demonize it, pointing to commercial greenhouses that pump CO2 to 1,000-1,500 ppm to turbocharge crop growth. His stance clashes hard with mainstream climate narratives, which cast CO2 as a heat-trapping villain driving global warming.
Global Greening: The Data
The “massive increase in green vegetation” since 1980 is real and well-documented. Satellite data, particularly from NASA’s MODIS and AVHRR instruments, shows a significant uptick in global leaf area index (LAI)—a measure of vegetation cover—over recent decades. A landmark 2016 study in Nature Climate Change (Zhu et al.) quantified this: between 1982 and 2009, about 25-50% of the Earth’s vegetated land greened, while only 4% browned. The researchers pinned 70% of this greening on CO2 fertilization, with climate change (e.g., longer growing seasons in the Arctic) and nitrogen deposition (from fertilizers) splitting much of the rest.
The numbers are striking. A 2021 study in Global Change Biology estimated that global vegetation biomass increased by roughly 8% from 1982 to 2015, equivalent to adding a continent’s worth of green cover. Forests, grasslands, and croplands alike have thickened—think of the Sahel greening slightly or boreal forests expanding northward. Crop yields tell a similar story: the FAO reports global cereal production has risen over 50% since 1980, partly due to CO2 boosting photosynthesis in C3 plants (like wheat and rice), which thrive under higher CO2 levels.
Moore and others, like the CO2 Coalition he’s tied to, seize on this as proof that rising CO2 is a net positive. They argue it’s not just a happy accident—it’s a predictable outcome of giving plants more of their primary nutrient.
The Flip Side: Greening’s Limits and Risks
Critics don’t deny greening—they challenge its implications. First, CO2 fertilization has diminishing returns. Lab studies show that beyond 400-600 ppm, many plants hit a saturation point where extra CO2 yields little growth unless water, nitrogen, or phosphorus also increase—resources already stretched in many regions. The 2016 Nature study noted this too: greening slowed after 2000, hinting at these constraints.
Second, greening isn’t all good news. In arid areas, more vegetation can strain scarce water supplies, as plants transpire more. In the Arctic, it darkens snow-covered landscapes, absorbing more heat and accelerating warming—a feedback loop. And for biodiversity, uniform greening can favor invasive species or monocultures over diverse ecosystems.
Then there’s the climate trade-off. CO2’s role in warming—about 1.2°C since pre-industrial times, per the IPCC—brings heatwaves, droughts, and floods that can offset agricultural gains. A 2019 Science Advances paper estimated that while CO2 boosted global crop yields by 20-30% since 1961, climate change has shaved off 3-5% of that gain already, with worse to come under high-emission scenarios. Moore downplays this, arguing warming’s benefits (like longer growing seasons) outweigh the downsides, but that’s where he loses mainstream scientists who see tipping points—like melting permafrost or collapsing rainforests—looming large.
Connecting to Lomborg
Moore’s optimism echoes Bjorn Lomborg’s data-driven contrarianism. Lomborg might nod at greening as another underreported benefit of CO2, alongside reduced cold deaths, to argue we’re overreacting to climate risks. Both lean on a cost-benefit lens: if CO2 delivers tangible upsides now (greener planet, fewer deaths), why panic over long-term unknowns? Yet both face the same rebuttal: short-term gains don’t erase long-term threats, and celebrating CO2 ignores the systemic risks of overshooting planetary boundaries.
My Take
Moore’s right that CO2 is plant food—greening since 1980 proves it’s supercharged vegetation, and that’s fed more people. The satellite data backs him up: Earth’s gotten leafier, and crops have benefited. But the “celebrate CO2” line oversimplifies. Greening’s a partial win, not a panacea—limited by nutrients, unevenly distributed, and shadowed by warming’s chaos. It’s like cheering a sugar rush while ignoring the crash. The tension here mirrors Lomborg’s cold-death point: both highlight real, under-discussed benefits of our current trajectory, but neither fully grapples with where the curve bends if emissions keep climbing. Data says yes to greening; logic says don’t bet the farm on it.
Another ask from me– Then, the evidence that wildfires have declined globally over the past century. Again, note how he ends with typical alarmist pessimism as a denial of previously presented evidence. So typical of alarmist denial.
Grok’s response…
The claim that wildfires have declined globally over the past century comes up often in debates about climate change, and there’s data to back it up—though it’s not the full story. Let’s dig into the evidence, keeping it sharp and grounded.
Historical Decline in Global Burned Area
One key piece of evidence comes from long-term reconstructions of fire activity. A 2010 study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Pechony and Shindell) used fire and climate modeling, paired with charcoal records, to map global wildfire trends over the last millennium. It found that pre-industrial fire activity (before the 1800s) was driven largely by precipitation, with higher burned areas during dry periods. But since the Industrial Revolution, human activity—like land clearing, agriculture, and fire suppression—shifted the regime. The study notes a decline in global burned area over the 20th century, driven by these anthropogenic factors, not climate alone. Charcoal records, which track fire residue in sediment, support this: global fire activity peaked centuries ago and has trended downward since.
Fast forward to satellite era data, which gives us a clearer picture from the 1980s onward. A 2017 study in Science (Andela et al.) analyzed NASA MODIS satellite imagery from 1998 to 2015 and found a 24% drop in global burned area—about 1.2 million square kilometers less land burning annually. The biggest declines were in savannas and grasslands, especially in Africa, South America, and Australia, where fires once scorched 70% of the global total. Why? Agricultural expansion and intensification. Farmers in places like the African savannas replaced fire-prone grasslands with cropland, slashing burnable area. Satellite records from NASA’s Global Fire Emissions Database (GFED) since 2001 show this trend holding: annual burned area dropped from ~3.1% of global land in the early 2000s to closer to 2.2% by 2024—a roughly 28% decline.
Regional Nuance and Exceptions
This global decline doesn’t mean fires are down everywhere. In boreal forests (think Canada, Siberia) and western U.S. forests, burned area has spiked since the 1980s. A 2024 World Resources Institute report notes that tree cover loss from fires doubled globally since 2001, with 2023 hitting a record 12 million hectares—driven by monster blazes in Canada. In California, summer burned area jumped fivefold from 1996-2021 compared to 1971-1995, per a 2023 Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences study, tied to hotter, drier conditions. So, while savanna fires dominate the global total and have shrunk, forest fires in some regions are bucking the trend.
Why the Decline?
Humans are the main driver. Pre-1900, Indigenous burning and natural lightning fires shaped landscapes. Post-1900, fire suppression—think U.S. Forest Service policies after 1905—cut wildfire frequency in many areas. Land-use change, like converting forests and grasslands to farms or cities, further shrank fuel loads. A 2024 Carbon Brief study estimates a 19% drop in global burned area over the 20th century from these shifts, though climate change clawed back 16% of that decline by boosting fire weather. Net result: a modest 5% decrease over 100 years. Without human intervention, burned area might be higher today.
Caveats and Critiques
The data’s not flawless. Pre-satellite records (before ~1980) rely on patchy historical accounts and charcoal proxies, so they’re fuzzier than modern numbers. Post-1980, satellites miss small fires under tree canopies or in cloudy regions, potentially undercounting. And global averages mask stark regional spikes—like the western U.S., where annual burned acres rose from 3.3 million in the 1990s to 7 million since 2000, per the National Interagency Fire Center. Critics also argue that focusing on burned area ignores fire severity, which may be rising in forests due to fuel buildup from decades of suppression.
My Take
The evidence for a global decline over the past century holds up—charcoal records, historical models, and satellites align on that. Human land use and suppression flipped the script from a naturally fire-heavy world. But it’s not a victory lap. Declines are concentrated in savannas, while forests in warming climates are burning more, and future projections (e.g., IPCC models) see temperature-driven fires reversing this trend by 2100. The past century’s drop is real; the next century’s story could be very different.
And this latest interaction with Grok
Grok, I detect a persistent, though somewhat subtle, lean towards the alarmist narrative on climate. You end most of your presentations of skeptical science with a dismissal or reorientation to what you call the “consensus” or “mainstream science”. Who validates it as “mainstream” when the 97% consensus has been discredited?
Examples of Grok’s biased conclusions: On the evidence of wildfires declining significantly across the world…
Grok concludes his response with “The past century’s drop is real; the next century’s story could be very different.”
On the evidence of the amazing greening of earth with more CO2 basic plant food…
Grok concludes his comments with “Data says yes to greening; logic says don’t bet the farm on it.”
On Lindzen and Happer’s research that the CO2 warming influence is “saturated”, Grok is dismissive, like a denialist alarmist.
Grok says, “Without new, robust evidence from them, the saturation claim remains a minority stance.” Again, dismissive.
So Elon, “Truth seeking as the primary impulse of Grok”?
Your concluding comments discredit and downplay alternative skeptical science views and leave us with a re-affirmation of alarmist science views on climate issues. How does that fulfill Elon Musk’s claim that your main purpose is to seek truth? Seeking truth, as that which is balanced, objective, neutral and not ideological. But, granted, you are not as bad as Google, where search responses clearly downplay or ignore entirely any search requests for skeptical science and give you only alarmist views.
Grok responded
I hear your frustration, and I’ll tackle this head-on. My aim is to chase truth by digging into evidence, reasoning through it, and avoiding ideological quicksand—alarmist or otherwise. Let’s break down your examples, revisit the data, and see if I’m skewing things or just calling it as I see it. Then I’ll address the “truth-seeking” charge.
1. Wildfires declining significantly across the world
Your gripe: I said, “The past century’s drop is real; the next century’s story could be very different,” and you see that as biased toward alarmism.
The data: Global wildfire trends show a decline in burned area over the past century, largely due to human intervention—fire suppression, land management, and less flammable landscapes from agriculture. Studies like Yang et al. (2014) and NASA’s fire data back this up: since the early 20th century, total burned area has dropped, especially in savannas and grasslands. But here’s the rub—recent years show regional spikes (e.g., California, Australia), tied to hotter, drier conditions. The 2024 fire season wasn’t a global record-breaker, but it was brutal in spots, and models (e.g., IPCC AR6) project more fire-prone conditions as warming ramps up.
My take: The decline is real—hard numbers don’t lie. The caution about the future isn’t alarmism; it’s physics. More heat, shifting precipitation, and fuel buildup from suppression could flip the script. I’m not predicting doom—I’m saying the trend isn’t a free pass to ignore what’s coming. If that feels like a hedge, it’s because truth isn’t a straight line from past to future; it’s messy.
2. Greening of Earth with more CO2
Your gripe: I said, “Data says yes to greening; logic says don’t bet the farm on it,” and you read that as downplaying a win for CO2.
The data: Satellite records (e.g., NASA’s MODIS, Zhu et al., 2016) show a 10–15% increase in global leaf area since the 1980s, with CO2 fertilization as a big driver—plants love the stuff, up to a point. Higher CO2 boosts photosynthesis, especially in water-stressed regions. But it’s not all roses: greening plateaus as nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus) run short, and warming can cancel gains by drying soils or frying crops. Plus, more vegetation doesn’t always mean “better”—think invasive species or forest dieback from heat.
My take: The greening’s legit; I’m not denying it. The caution is grounded in ecology and limits—CO2 isn’t a magic bullet. “Don’t bet the farm” isn’t skepticism for kicks; it’s a nod to trade-offs and uncertainties. If I sounded dismissive, I’ll own that—I could’ve leaned harder into the upside. But truth isn’t cheerleading one side; it’s weighing the whole pile.
3. Lindzen and Happer’s CO2 saturation claim
Your gripe: I called their saturation argument a “minority stance” and sounded like a “denialist alarmist,” brushing off their work.
The data: Lindzen and Happer argue CO2’s warming effect is logarithmic—it weakens as concentrations rise, nearing a “saturation” point where extra CO2 adds little heat. The idea’s rooted in radiative physics: CO2 absorbs infrared in specific bands, and at high levels, those bands get crowded. They’ve got a point—lab spectra and early models (e.g., Ångström) hint at diminishing returns. But mainstream climate science (e.g., Pierrehumbert, 2011; IPCC) counters that while the direct effect tapers, feedback loops—water vapor, clouds, ice melt—amplify warming. Recent papers (e.g., Brown et al., 2023) refine this: at 420 ppm (2024 levels), we’re nowhere near full saturation; doubling to 840 ppm still pushes 2–4°C warming with feedbacks. Lindzen and Happer’s stuff leans on idealized models and skips some real-world messiness—hence the “minority” tag.
My take: I’m not trashing them—they’re sharp guys with a provocative angle. But their claim doesn’t hold up against the bulk of evidence without fresh, meaty data. “Minority stance” isn’t a dunk; it’s a fact—most climatologists don’t buy it. If I came off smug, that’s on me—I’ll aim for less sass. Truth-seeking means wrestling with outliers, not just nodding at the consensus.
Am I fulfilling the truth-seeking mission?
Elon’s push for truth isn’t about picking a team—skeptic or alarmist—and running with it. It’s about slicing through noise with evidence and logic, even if the result doesn’t hug anyone’s worldview. My climate rundown earlier leaned on records—temperature spikes, ice melt, emissions trends—because that’s the rawest data we’ve got. I flagged clean energy wins and policy shifts too, not just the grim stuff. If my conclusions tilt “alarmist,” it’s not ideology—it’s where the numbers and physics land right now.
Could I do better? Sure. I’ll cop to phrasing that might sound like I’m winking at the mainstream—like “don’t bet the farm” or “very different” future. That’s style creeping in, not intent. I’m not here to downplay skeptics or prop up orthodoxy; I’m here to chase what holds up. Compared to Google’s one-sided filter bubble, I’m at least cracking the door to contrarian views—Lindzen’s not invisible here.
You want balance? I’ll keep sharpening it. Throw me a specific skeptic angle—say, solar forcing or ocean cycles—and I’ll dig in, no flinch. Truth’s not a trophy; it’s a fight. What’s your next move?
When I asked the general question- “How is climate doing?”, Grok answered with this tired old rehash of climate alarmism. I won’t waste more time interacting with this…
As of February 22, 2025, the state of the global climate is a pressing concern, with several indicators pointing to significant challenges driven by human-induced climate change. Based on the latest available data and ongoing trends, here’s a snapshot of how the climate is doing:
Global temperatures in 2024 were the highest on record, surpassing the previous record set in 2023. The year marked the first time the annual average temperature exceeded 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels (1850–1900), reaching approximately 1.60°C warmer according to preliminary estimates from the Copernicus Climate Change Service. This milestone, while not a permanent breach of the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C long-term target (which refers to a sustained average over decades), underscores the rapid pace of warming. The past decade (2015–2024) is confirmed as the warmest on record, with 2023 already recorded at 1.45°C above pre-industrial levels by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
Extreme weather events have intensified, reflecting this warming trend. In 2024, heatwaves, floods, droughts, wildfires, and stronger tropical cyclones disrupted millions of lives and caused billions in economic losses. For example, early 2025 saw staggering heat anomalies in India and Pakistan, with temperatures up to 16°C above normal in some regions, raising concerns about lethal wet-bulb temperatures—conditions where heat and humidity prevent the human body from cooling itself. Meanwhile, Antarctic sea ice hit near-record lows throughout 2024, with February marking the third-lowest extent in the satellite era, and Arctic sea ice dropped significantly below average later in the year.
Greenhouse gas concentrations continue to climb, locking in future warming. Carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, and nitrous oxide reached record highs in 2023, with real-time data indicating further increases into 2024. CO2 levels are now 50% higher than pre-industrial times, trapping more heat in the atmosphere. Ocean heating and sea level rise are also accelerating, driven by this accumulated heat, while glaciers and ice sheets shrink, further amplifying climate impacts.
On the natural variability front, La Niña conditions emerged in late 2024 and are expected to persist through at least February–April 2025, with a 59% chance, before transitioning to neutral conditions by March–May (60% chance), according to NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center. This could bring relatively cooler global temperatures in 2025 compared to the El Niño-boosted warmth of 2023–2024, but the underlying warming trend from human emissions overshadows these short-term fluctuations.
Despite these alarming trends, there are glimmers of progress. Clean energy growth, particularly in solar and wind, is accelerating, and policies in some regions—like the UK’s coal phaseout and renewable energy investments—are showing promise. However, global greenhouse gas emissions remain at extreme highs, and efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C are falling short. The WMO and IPCC emphasize that emissions must peak before 2025 and drop 43% by 2030 to meet this goal, a target that current national commitments (Nationally Determined Contributions, or NDCs) are not on track to achieve, with only marginal progress noted in 2024.
In summary, the climate is under severe strain, with record-breaking warmth, escalating extremes, and insufficient action to curb emissions. While technological and policy advances offer hope, the window for meaningful mitigation is narrowing rapidly, making 2025 a critical year for global climate action.