Stephen Barlow Profile picture
Naturalist, Conservationist, Environmentalist and Nature Photographer (especially macro). Born at 314ppm. Woke (awake). https://t.co/B7XkkKho07
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May 19 23 tweets 5 min read
"Runaway rice prices spell danger for Japan’s prime minister as elections loom

Attempts to bring down the price of the Japanese staple have had little effect amid a cost-of-living crisis"

This is a glimpse into our climate changed future trajectory.

1/🧵theguardian.com/world/2025/may… I'm not sure how much of the current situation in Japan, is climate related, but let's get this clear, the rice harvest is seriously threatened by climate change.

However, this is not just about rice, but all harvests and food production.

2/actionagainsthunger.org.uk/our-impact/sto…
May 18 9 tweets 2 min read
@DoctorVive Exactly. Let me totally support what you say. Modern humans have been around for 2-300,000, and our close relatives, much longer. But the reason civilizations only emerged within the last 10,000 years (really about 5-6,000 years for the very first) is simple.
1/
@DoctorVive Large, complex societies i.e. civilizations, need a constant supply of grain. In other words, every year, they need a predictable harvest, with a predictable yield. Just one bad year, especially more than one, will lead to the collapse of that civilization, and it did.
2/
May 17 20 tweets 4 min read
"UK government dropped health push after lobbying by ultra-processed food firms"

I think this raises serious questions about the current Starmer, Labour government, and who is driving its policy, which seems very strange for Labour.

1/🧵theguardian.com/society/ng-int… To be quite frank, all Starmer's policy, seems identical to right wing think tank talking points, from its climate policy, or rather lack of it, getting rid of environmental protection Re: development, the attacks on the sick and disabled. Enoch Powell type speeches etc.
2/
May 15 18 tweets 4 min read
The points I made here are not really about AI, but about our culture's false view of reality, which wrongly equates, symbolic representation, such as language, as the same as reality. It is at the heart of the climate crisis.

1/🧵threadreaderapp.com/thread/1922795… As I've repeatedly explained, the climate crisis is not the same as anthropogenic climate change. It's a crisis, because we have the science, that tells us we are in dire trouble, but our governments/leaders, act as if it is not a real emergency.
2/
May 15 9 tweets 2 min read
I think a lot of people totally misunderstand what I said in this thread and why.

To illustrate the difference, I subjected Grok to the Turing Test to find out if it thought like a human or a computer, and sussed it straight away.

See below.

1/threadreaderapp.com/thread/1922795… Most people would make the mistake of asking something complex, which computers (AI) are good at.

What computers cannot grasp, is humour, insult, and joking, or other intentions. They know it exists, but not how to use it, like a human.

2/x.com/i/grok/share/x…
May 14 17 tweets 3 min read
"AI can spontaneously develop human-like communication, study finds"

This is largely stuff and nonsense.

1/theguardian.com/technology/202… Firstly, AI is essentially machine learning all the books and literature written by human beings, so it is pretty obvious that these AI programmes will learn the pattern of how people write and verbally reason, and what they have written.
2/
May 9 20 tweets 4 min read
Before Brexit and the referendum, I repeatedly said I was baffled by Tories pushing for Brexit, as it would be a poison pill for the Conservative Party, and destroy them. Yet another of my accurate political predictions, that was so easy to foresee.

1/🧵theguardian.com/politics/2025/… I could if I search, and spend a lot of time searching, find my online comments, where I made these points.

My reasoning, was very simple. The Conservatives were deeply divided over Europe.
2/
May 7 33 tweets 7 min read
Once again, I need to clarify what the climate crisis is, and what this term means (please take it to include the whole ecological crisis).

It's a crisis, because 33 years ago, world leaders promised to address this crisis, and misled the public.

1/🧵 It is a crisis, not because a thing called anthropogenic climate change just happened, and no one knows what to do about it, because we knew what the solutions were over 40 years ago. It is a crisis, because our politicians, have refused to implement those solutions.
2/
Apr 30 22 tweets 4 min read
This article in the Guardian, in response to Tony Blair's oil industry lobbying nonsense, has made me realize just what a dire situation we're in. There's quite literally no evidence based consensus on what we need to do, to avert climate catastrophe.

1/🧵theguardian.com/environment/20… At one point in time, early after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, there was some sort of consensus about what needed to happen, to greatly reduce emissions and phase out fossil fuels. Yes, politicians were kicking the can down the road at when this would happen.
2/
Apr 29 13 tweets 4 min read
"Climate plan based on phasing out fossil fuels doomed to fail, says Tony Blair"

I've used Blair as evidence, for how the original political pledge to address the climate crisis, made by politicians after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, was a lie.

1/🧵theguardian.com/environment/20… Specifically, I have repeatedly said, that you hardly hear Tony Blair ever mention climate change, after his grandstanding speeches when he was PM.

From 2004:

"Tony Blair has said time is running out for tackling climate change."

2/news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politi…
Apr 26 9 tweets 2 min read
It's very likely, the modern society, people in the rich countries are used to, will no longer exist in 25 years time. It will be a miracle, if it still exists, and may have ceased to exist some time in 25 years. If by some miracle it still existed, it wouldn't be for long.
1/🧵 This will be due to the climate and ecological crisis. This is what change is coming, whether you like it or not @GretaThunberg, means

Or "There are now no non-radical futures" - means @KevinClimate

2/bellacaledonia.org.uk/2023/04/18/no-…
Apr 23 16 tweets 4 min read
Whilst this survey showed a huge proportion of the global population want climate action, I'm not sure there's any understanding here about why there has been no climate action, in the last 33 years.
1/🧵 Wind the clock back 33-35 years ago, and there was a similar figure wanting climate action, and action to address the ecological crisis, and that resulted in the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. World leaders, made big speeches, promising action.

2/un.org/en/conferences…
Apr 22 20 tweets 5 min read
"A huge 89% majority of the world’s people want stronger action to fight the climate crisis ..."

I will write a far more in depth thread about this, shortly. However, this is my immediate response.

1/🧵theguardian.com/environment/20… As I have repeatedly explained, it's not the public blocking climate action, but governments, corporate interests, oligarchs, and the wealthiest people, in our societies.

Governments pledged to address the climate crisis 33 years ago, but then did nothing.
2/
Apr 19 25 tweets 5 min read
The reason for my last 2 threads, wasn't to be pessimistic, or even to apportion blame.

Rather, the approach for the last 50+ years, has been to persuade politicians, governments, to act on the climate and ecological crisis. This has proved absolutely fruitless.
1/🧵 Scientists, conservationists, NGOs and activists - and even the UN, have expended a massive amount of energy, in trying to persuade governments to act on the climate and ecological crisis, for nothing. Governments have done nothing to address these crises.
2/
Apr 19 12 tweets 3 min read
I want to clarify what I mean in this thread, when I say, the official fight against climate change was set up to fail.

Nothing agreed to was ever binding. It'd have been very easy to have had a binding agreement to phase out fossil fuels.

1/🧵threadreaderapp.com/thread/1913154… It was clear back in 1992, when the UNFCCC was signed, that the only way to prevent the climate crisis, becoming a climate catastrophe, was to phase out the widespread use of fossil fuels. This was tacit in the UNFCCC.

2/unfccc.int/files/essentia…
Apr 18 26 tweets 6 min read
I want to propose something very serious, that needs to be considered, and widely known.

Was the official "fight" against climate change, deliberately set up to fail i.e. it was fixed, it was never meant to succeed, and it's primary purpose, was to deceive the public?
1/🧵 This is not something I am just saying now, I first proposed this possibility in September/October 1992, just after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, to a leading scientist, who had written the standard textbook on air pollution and climate change.

2/independent.co.uk/arts-entertain…
Apr 14 26 tweets 6 min read
This is horrific. For many years we have been led false narratives, blatant gaslighting, and propaganda, about the successful actions of governments to address climate change. How emissions are plateauing, whilst in reality, atmospheric CO2 levels get steadily higher.
1/🧵 If you look at the Keeling Curve, linked to in @ClimateDad77's excellent post, you will see a continuing climb in atmospheric CO2 levels, which just goes up and up. None of the climate talks, the schemes, the government talk, make one bit of difference.

2/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keeling_C…
Apr 12 33 tweets 6 min read
This point, actually proves my point, it doesn't contradict it. This is why I said the human caused megafauna extinction hypotheses, are a house built on sand. Unless you are going to say early humans directly hunted a species to existence, saying they're the cause is false.
1/🧵 Every ecological event/effect, actually has a myriad of causal factors, in a massive causal chain, not just one. Unless there is an overwhelming single cause like directly killing an animal or a population of them, then ascribing that to a single cause, is at best specious.
2/
Apr 10 19 tweets 4 min read
I find a very common misconception, including with educated, or even scientifically literate people, is that climate change, just means a warmer climate, and we can just adapt to that. When the reality is, it's going to carry on getting warmer and worse for a very long time.
1/ In other words, just letting the climate warm, by not rapidly reducing emissions, would produce an ongoing pattern of increasing adversity, that is going to carry on for a very long time. Not just a transition, and that is it, then.
2/
Apr 9 17 tweets 4 min read
There is a huge problem with this nature hating, and ecologically ignorant, Starmer, Labour government. They act as if the biodiversity crisis and indeed the climate crisis doesn't exist, because they are so firmly fixated on economic growth.

1/🧵theguardian.com/environment/20… However, I must take issue of some of the rhetoric, lacking vision of these heads of NGOs, which are too fixated on promoting their organizations, rather than focusing on the actual nature crisis.
2/
Apr 8 17 tweets 4 min read
I want to contrast government reactions to tobacco smoking as a health hazard, and towards climate change. This is because the threat of both, was first realized at about the same time, in the early 1950s. Climate change was known about prior to 1950, but not as a threat.
1/🧵 "‘Smoking gun proof’: fossil fuel industry knew of climate danger as early as 1954, documents show"

2/theguardian.com/us-news/2024/j…