From Gabriel Carlyle, St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex, UK
Graham Lawton describes the oft-repeated “fact” that we have 11 years to save the planet as “a subtle misrepresentation of the science” (12 October, p 22). Other misrepresentations are less subtle. For example, Extinction Rebellion co-founder Roger Hallam claimed on the BBC HARDtalk programme in August that “science predicts” that 6 billion people will die this century because of climate change if we continue on our current trajectory. This claim was audited by Climate Feedback, a worldwide network of scientists that sorts fact from fiction in climate change media coverage. It concluded that Hallam’s assertion was “not supported by published research” (bit.ly/2pcKwis).
I agree with Lawton that the current surge in activism around climate change is “a long-overdue outbreak of sanity”. But unfounded, apocalyptic claims risk undermining the long-term health of these movements.
