Prof Sir David King says he’s been scared by the number of extreme events, and he called for the UK to advance its climate targets by 10 years.
But the UN’s weather chief said using words like “scared” could make young people depressed and anxious.
Campaigners argue that people won’t act unless they feel fearful.
Speaking to the BBC, Prof King, a former chief scientific adviser to the government, said: “It’s appropriate to be scared. We predicted temperatures would rise, but we didn’t foresee these sorts of extreme events we’re getting so soon.”
Several other scientists contacted by the BBC supported his emotive language.
The physicist Prof Jo Haigh from Imperial College London said: “David King is right to be scared – I’m scared too.”
“We do the analysis, we think what’s going to happen, then publish in a very scientific way.
“Then we have a human response to that… and it is scary.”
Petteri Taalas, who is secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said he fully supported UN climate goals, but he criticised radical green campaigners for forecasting the end of the world.
It’s the latest chapter in the long debate over how to communicate climate science to the public.
Will emotive language leave young people depressed?
Dr Taalas agrees polar ice is melting faster than expected, but he’s concerned that public fear could lead to paralysis – and also to mental health problems amongst the young.
“We are fully behind climate science and fully behind the (upcoming) New York climate summit”, he said.
“But I want to stick to the facts, which are quite convincing and dramatic enough. We should avoid interpreting them too much……….
What is the science behind extreme weather events?
The loss of land ice in Antarctica, for instance, is at the upper range of predictions in the IPCC AR5. And there are record ice losses in Greenland
Then there’s this year’s French heatwave.
Dr Friederike Otto from Oxford University is an expert in the attribution of extreme events to climate change.
She told us that in a pre-climate change world, a heatwave like this might strike once in 1,000 years.
In a post-warming world, the heatwave was still a one in 100 year phenomenon. In other words, natural variability is amplifying human-induced climate heating.
“With European heatwaves, we have realised that climate change is a total game-changer,” she said. It has increased the likelihood (of events) by orders of magnitude.
“It’s changing the baseline on which to make decisions. How do we deal with summer? It is very hard to predict,” Dr Otto explained.
Researchers had not yet had time to investigate the links between all of the major extreme weather events and climate change, she said.
With some phenomena such as droughts and floods there was no clear evidence yet of any involvement from climate change. And it was impossible to be sure that the slow progress of Dorian was caused by climate change.
‘We can’t wait for scientific certainty’
Prof King said the world could not wait for scientific certainty on events like Hurricane Dorian. “Scientists like to be certain,” he said.
“But these events are all about probabilities. What is the likelihood that (Dorian) is a climate change event? I’m going to say ‘very high’…….
Should the UK bring climate targets earlier?
Prof King said the situation was so grave that the UK should bring forward its date for cutting emissions of greenhouse gases to almost zero from 2050 to 2040……. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49689018
Faster pace of climate change is ‘scary’, former chief scientist says. BBC, By Roger Harrabin, BBC environment analyst 16 Sept 10, Extreme events linked to climate change, such as the heatwave in Europe this year, are occurring sooner than expected, an ex-chief scientist says.
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