You know that the fans of WUWT, a climate science denying blog, are a bit potty. Did you know that they are "not nice" people as well?
There's an article today by Eric Worrall (archived here), who is a rather dull bloke from England who moved to Australia a while back. He's found a map of vulnerability to climate change and wrote that most of the countries most vulnerable are "with few exceptions, countries which are neutral to or even hostile to the USA and Western interests". He asks a question:
if we accept the map at face value, why should we care about climate change?
The countries most vulnerable to climate change are, of course, the poorest countries in the world. Unlike the wealthy, CO2-emitting nations, they are least able to afford to adapt. Eric found his map on a blog, which got it from a group known as ND-Gain at the University of Notre Dame in the USA. This is how the index is described:
A country's ND-GAIN index score is composed of a Vulnerability score and a Readiness score. Vulnerability measures a country's exposure, sensitivity and ability to adapt to the negative impact of climate change. ND-GAIN measures the overall vulnerability by considering vulnerability in six life-supporting sectors – food, water, health, ecosystem service, human habitat and infrastructure.
Here is an animation showing the ND Index, vulnerability and readiness as assessed by the ND-Gain team. Click to enlarge it:
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| Source: ND-GAIN |
Are the poorest countries hostile to "Western interests" and the USA? Some may be, many aren't. Most of the people who live in Africa wouldn't be hostile to "Western interests". They are probably too busy trying to clothe and feed themselves to think much about "Western interests".
Take Chad, the country that rank lowest on the ND-Index scale. From Wikipedia:
According to the 2012 U.S. Global Leadership Report, 81% of Chadians approve of U.S. leadership, with 18% disapproving and 1% uncertain, the fourth-highest rating for any surveyed country in Africa.[1]
I'm not really surprised that WUWT-ers are against foreign aid. Money dominates the thinking of many people at WUWT, as you can see from the Wattmeter in the sidebar. Most of them strongly disapprove of giving assistance to people in need. It goes against their ideology.
From the WUWT comments
Louis quite rightly points out that most vulnerable countries are at risk anyway. He's wrong if he thinks that climate change won't make things worse:
January 14, 2015 at 11:07 pm
Right. What difference does climate change make? Those countries would be “at risk” whether there is climate change or not.
Gabriel was the first to use the word "money":
January 14, 2015 at 11:32 pm
Those UK “climate experts” seems to me more socio-economist(with some marxist view). The map show in fact(with some exception) the distribution of wealth on the earth. From the global warming real risk it’s a piece of sh__t.
What want to tell us the “scientist”? the green countries must quickly send a lot of money to th red countries.
Because all it’s about money.
gbaikie followed suit:
January 14, 2015 at 11:45 pm
—All of this poses an obvious question – if we accept the map at face value, why should we care about climate change?—
Because politicians want give the enemies [problem countries] money- I mean tax payer money.
As they accustomed to buying and selling favors- and bonus is they poor and useless countries which therefore *apparently* should be dirt cheap to buy.
andrewmharding doesn't understand the map, and can't make up his mind whether global warming is really happening or not:
January 15, 2015 at 12:18 am
I thought AGW was a global problem, it seems on the Korean peninsula that only harm happens to North Korea!! Why is Malaysia affected and not Northern Australia? UK is at least risk, with USA and China (both with bigger economies and a much bigger land area, with more diverse climate) at greater risk?
It is a crock of sh*t like anything associated with AGW!
Krudd Gillard of the Commondebt of Australia thinks all poor people are terrorists:
January 15, 2015 at 12:24 am
This is something that really needs to be impressed on the voters in western democracies. Your tax dollars for terrorists.
TerryS is a multi-conspiracy theorist who is scared of his own shadow:
January 15, 2015 at 2:27 am
Climate change is being used as a weapon.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it for a One World agenda.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it for more government controls.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it for the de-industrialisation of the West.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it for a socialist agenda.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it for personal gain.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it because of a genuine concern for the environment.
Some of those using climate change as weapon are using it because of a genuine concern for humanity.
Like any weapon, the use it is put to depends upon the motives of the person using it which means some motives will be altruistic, some will be selfish and some will be driven by an agenda.
Jack is another money-mad denier:
January 15, 2015 at 2:08 am
It is a guilt map obscenely used to redistribute money. Would like to know how the nations in central Africa are going to perish from sea rise.
Also notice the Australia map is least risk but our greens convinced the Labor government to have the most onerous carbon tax in the world.
Lastly, there mission to abuse CO2 and fossil fuels as vandalising the world is going to hurt those poor countries even more.
Just airheads that can only handle one idea thrust in there by slogans at a time.
It took a lot of comments before one person decided that enough was enough, and the money-mad deniers were giving the fake sceptics a bad name. Notanist thinks "a lot" of people care, it's just that not a lot of people at WUWT who care:
January 15, 2015 at 4:11 am
I don’t understand the point of saying “why should we care?” while looking at a map of some of the world’s most impoverished countries, or of countries that are clearly and obviously friends (most of Latin America/Caribbean) etc. The last remark in the article plays into the alarmists’ worst stereotypes about skeptics.
Who cares about those countries anyway? I’m betting that quite a lot of us do, some of us even have family and second homes in some of those countries.
Gary Pearse thinks that Eric Worrall is a "very caring person" and wrote the article as a joke, except he gave no indication it was a joke. There was no "sarc" tag and the article wasn't tagged as "humour". So if Eric is a "very caring person" then he hides it well.
January 15, 2015 at 4:55 am
“Why should we care”
Look folks, it was a joke, okay? Eric, put a sarc tag for the sensitive ones. Frequent visitors to WUWT know Eric is a very caring person.
WUWT rates at 0.46 on a scale of 10 on the care index
The sum total of comments that could be classed (generously) as caring about people who live in impoverished, vulnerable countries, was three. Three out of 68 "thoughts" cared. If there was a care index, WUWT would rate as 0.46 on a scale of 10.
I'd say that Notanist is right to be concerned about stereotyping WUWT deniers as money-mad conspiracy theorists who don't give a damn about the rest of the world. Wouldn't you?
