Some things are predictable, some thing aren't

2026
King warns COP31 delegates of need to turn ambition into action

The King has urged delegates at the Cop31 climate summit to turn ambition into action, warning the need has never been “more urgent”.

World leaders are meeting in Antalya, Turkey, at the UN’s annual international conference to set out agreements on how to tackle climate change.

2009
100 months to act on climate, warns Charles

The Prince of Wales is to issue a warning that the world has only "100 months to act" before the damage caused by global warming becomes irreversible.

As part of a tour of South America, his speech to business leaders in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday will echo predictions made by climate change experts who believe there are about eight years left to cut C02 emissions. He will warn that failure to act urgently could have catastrophic effects for the planet.

We must mix with the herd

Tories pull five points ahead of Reform

The Conservatives have pulled five points ahead of Reform UK in an opinion poll as the battle for the Right intensifies.

A poll of 2,013 people by More in Common has Kemi Badenoch’s party on 25 per cent – up two percentage points on the previous week – and Reform on 20 per cent, down two.

On Monday, the Tories also overtook Reform in The Telegraph’s poll tracker, which aggregates approved opinion polls, for the first time in almost two years.


Yes! we must mix with the herd; we must enter into their feelings; we must humour their weaknesses; we must sympathise with the sorrows that we do not feel; and share the merriment of fools.

Benjamin Disraeli – Vivian Grey (1826)

A comprehensive framework of actual malice

Florida court rules Donald Trump’s defamation case against BBC can proceed

A Florida court has dismissed the BBC’s attempt to have US President Donald Trump’s 10 billion dollar (£7.5 billion) defamation claim against the broadcaster thrown out.

Mr Trump is seeking substantial damages in a Florida court over the editing of a 2024 Panorama documentary about the US Capitol riots.

The documentary faced criticism for giving the impression Mr Trump had encouraged his supporters to storm the Capitol building on January 6 2021 after he lost the 2020 White House race to Joe Biden.

It is interesting and very common to see politically adverse events toned down by language in the media. This piece is a good example - "The documentary faced criticism". The "criticism" in this case is a £7.5 billion defamation claim. We have the BBC doing it too, in a typically BBC manner -

The BBC had been seeking to have the case thrown out, warning of the “chilling effect” it would have on “robust reporting on public figures and events”.

Again, the “chilling effect” is the prospect of financial annihilation. Fully deserved in my view, but unfortunately an out of court settlement is far more likely.

The court gave another description of this example of "robust reporting" - 

The court documents state: “Trump has plausibly alleged a comprehensive framework of actual malice by alleging the context in which the speech was edited along with a long list of circumstantial evidence to support a showing of actual malice with respect to theedit. [sic]”

How to be Tiresome - Lesson 496

Greta Thunberg warns everything we love is at stake as she arrives at UN climate talks

ANTALYA, Turkey (AP) — Climate activist Greta Thunberg arrived at U.N. climate talks on Tuesday, condemning the annual proceedings as hypocritical and urging leaders to put people and the planet ahead of profits and power.

The COP31 conference is being held in the Turkish resort city of Antalya following a year of deadly climate-related disasters, including heat waves and floods, and another energy shock caused by the Iran war.

“It’s a hypocrisy every year that the host countries are given an opportunity to whitewash themselves and we know that these negotiations are filled with lobbyists, paid by the very destructive industries which are benefiting from our extremely violent status quo,” Thunberg said as she arrived. “Our political and economic systems that have become incompatible with human nature.”


Strewth - the bone-aching tedium of it all, year after year, the impenetrable dullness of the fanatic. Unfortunately this is part of human nature too.

I think I'll wander off into the kitchen for a biscuit and a cup of tea, even two biscuits.

Science Is Becoming Feelings

William M. Briggs has a typically entertaining and incisive piece on the intrusion of emotional responses into science, or what purports to be science. The whole piece is well worth reading as the wider rejection of dispassionate analysis seems to be with us for the foreseeable future.

Science Is Becoming Feelings

Our constant prediction has been Official Science would spend increasing and inordinate time and energy on FEELINGS. Indeed, science would become, in good part, about feelings. Including the feelings of scientists towards other scientists who dare buck The Consensus (whatever the consensus might be in any field).

As proof of this, I bring you this story: “How anxiety over climate change affects students“...

Students ignorant about the physics of fluid flow over a differentially heated rotating sphere were asked about their, I quote, emotional responses to “climate change.” Which are worth as much as an empty soup can. Even less, because the can is metal and can be recycled for money. (This is also the Appeal to Non-Authority Fallacy, as detailed in the upcoming second edition of Everything You Believe Is Wrong. 22 November.)

In any case, these emotional responses were called The Science, and published as if they were science, or had any bearing on science.

Tell you one thing, though, before we continue. It’s that “feeling powerless” to change the weather is the accurate feeling. Get used to it, kiddies. You’ll find these feelings apply to a great many things in life. Nitwits, and more to the point midwits, who tell you do “Do [or imagine] the impossible” ought to be scorned.

Burn Alerts

Air pollution soars as fog traps emissions in England’s urban areas

Air pollution soared to “very high” levels across urban parts of England on Monday as still, foggy weather kept emissions trapped after a weekend of fireworks and bonfires.

Hmm - was a propaganda opportunity lost in the fog?

Nope - 

Larissa Lockwood, the director of campaigns at Global Action Plan, said the high pollution levels were “not surprising at a time of year when people are lighting log burners, having bonfires and lighting fireworks. On top of the normal levels from transport and industry, we see higher levels of air pollution and they’re then unable to disperse because they’re trapped by the fog.”

Domestic burning and transport are the biggest sources of particulate pollution, she said. Lockwood called for a public health campaign on air pollution and “burn alerts”, asking people in towns and cities not to use wood burners when levels are high.

Ed's Antics