When something unusual happens weather-wise, we often hear shrieks of terror that this is all just climate change pressing in on us. And, therefore, as the mantra goes, we should shut down industrial civilization and go back to shivering in the dark beside a caveman’s fire.

As it happens, I’m just fine with the basic idea that climate change is happening, we’re causing it, and something should be done. Further, as someone who has actually gone and read all the reports, I believe we need a carbon tax, and that’s all. This makes me deeply unpopular, as I both agree that something should be done but not that industrial civilization must be shut down – annoying everyone except those who have bothered to read the reports.