DOCUMENTARY: Climate skeptic examines what scientists know and how they know it (by Verify Road Trip in Dallas, Texas)

Thanks to David Schechter / Verify Road Trip for permission. 

In addition to climate work in Texas, this video focuses on climate impacts in Alaska along with effects on glaciers, salmon, and permafrost experienced by a climate skeptic willing to meet outdoors with scientists. The skeptic, 38-year-old Justin Fain, is a "politically conservative"  honest and curious Texas roofer with a great sense of humor so the video is fun to watch.  

Included are climate skeptic Dr. John R. Christy, Alabama State Climatologist, and climate scientist, Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, a former Exxon-funded climate scientist whom, in addition to being a co-author on the 2018 Fourth U.S. National Climate Assessment, was noted by Neela Banerjee in the Los Angeles Times as "driven as much by the tenets of her faith [as an evangelical Christian] as the urgency of the science" and is committed to "protecting God’s creation and loving one’s neighbors" clearly suffering climate impacts today in Australia, island nations, and developing nations. While I agree with Dr. Christy "climate has been hotter [and colder] in the past," "ice [has] melted there before" and "sea level [has] risen before," my reading shows the anthropogenic (human-caused) argument is still convincing. Reasons include increased rate of carbon release along with increased rate of global heating, unprecedented rate of global heating in the past 2,000 years according to Chelsea Harvey in the July 25, 2019 E&E News and Scientific American, and widely reported current rate of melting glaciers.. 

For example, in the video, Dr. Jay Banner says "The rate of change happening today is 40,000 times faster [. . . than] our past records of CO₂," and journalist David Schechter, informed by scientist Dr. Brian Brettschneider, says "Whereas glaciers might have receded over hundreds or thousands of years, now it's decades." See former climate skeptic James Balog's trailer for Chasing Ice (2,184,698 views as of today).  

I imagine Dr. Christy noting, regarding CO₂, "correlation is not causation" and I am writing about "thousands of years," while he is speaking about geologic time when, for example, according to ScienceDaily, "alligators thrived in High Arctic 50 million years ago." However, as Dr. Andy Dessler in the above video said, and many other scientists argued, skeptics' main competing climate "suspects" of "Earth's orbit," "sun getting hotter," and "El Niño," are easily discredited while, according to Dessler, "CO₂ is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt."

Native Alaskan Karlin Itchoak, of the Nome Eskimo Community, says "I think we're 10 years behind at least, maybe more [ . . . .] What I'm worried about is by time folks in Texas don't have to question whether or not climate change is happening, we won't be able to reverse it and we'll all just be in survival mode and figure out how we can adapt." Some of my fishing buddies, colleagues, and relatives are serious climate skeptics, but love salmon and fishing, so it would be good for them, and other skeptics, to see this video.