Quote

Politicians think that if matters look difficult, compromise is a good approach. Unfortunately, nature and the laws of physics cannot compromise - they are what they are.

James Hansen

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

James Hansen
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: March 29
Astrophysicist
Environmentalist
Physicist
Professor
University Teacher
Denison
Iowa
James Hansen
James E. Hansen
James E Hansen
J. E. Hansen
J E Hansen
J. Hansen
J Hansen
Hansen
Hansen J
Hansen J.
Hansen J. E.
Hansen JE
Jim Hansen
Looks
Approach
Good
Politics
Unfortunately
Think
Law
Politicians
Thinking
Difficult
Compromise
Nature
Physics
Cannot
Matters
Look
Politician
Matter
Laws

More quotes by James Hansen

Image
We have to, in the next ten years, begin to decrease the rate of carbon dioxide emissions and then flatten it out. If that doesn't happen in ten years, we're going to be passing certain tipping points. If the ice sheets begin to disintegrate, what can you do about it? You can't tie a rope around an ice sheet.
James Hansen
Image
Well, you know what happens to crime when the heat goes up.
James Hansen
Image
'Cap and trade' generates special interests, lobbyists, and trading schemes, yielding non-productive millionaires, all at public expense. The public is fed up with such business. Tax with 100% dividend, in contrast, would spur our economy, while aiding the disadvantaged, the climate, and our national security.
James Hansen
Image
The carbon emissions from tar shale and tar sands would initiate a continual unfolding of climate disasters over the course of this century. We would be miserable stewards of creation. We would rob our own children and grandchildren.
James Hansen
Image
The urgency derives from the nearness of climate tipping points.
James Hansen
Image
Scientists will say we can't blame global warming for any single event. In a sense that's right, but the fact that the frequency and intensity of these events is increasing you can blame on global warming.
James Hansen
Image
What we are doing to the future of our children, and the other species on the planet, is a clear moral issue.
James Hansen
Image
The trains carrying coal to power plants are death trains. Coal-fired power plants are factories of death.
James Hansen
Image
The fact is fossil fuel carbon will stay in the surface climate system for millennia.
James Hansen
Image
CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing and are aware of long-term consequences of continued business as usual. In my opinion, these CEOs should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature.
James Hansen
Image
The last time the world was three degrees warmer than today-which is what we expect later this century-sea levels were 25m higher. So that is what we can look forward to if we don't act soon.
James Hansen
Image
Only in the last few years did the science crystallize, revealing the urgency - our planet really is in peril. If we do not change course soon, we will hand our children a situation that is out of their control.
James Hansen
Image
As a government employee, you can't testify against the government.
James Hansen
Image
'Goals' and 'caps' on carbon emissions are practically worthless, if coal emissions continue, because of the exceedingly long lifetime of carbon dioxide in the air.
James Hansen
Image
How long have we got? We have to stabilize emissions of carbon dioxide within a decade, or temperatures will warm by more than one degree... We don't have much time left.
James Hansen
Image
The greatest danger hanging over our children and grandchildren is initiation of changes that will be irreversible on any time scale that humans can imagine.
James Hansen
Image
Rising carbon price is essential to 'decarbonize' the economy - to remove the nation towards the era beyond fossil fuels.
James Hansen
Image
The five-year mean global temperature has been flat for the last decade
James Hansen
Image
If we drive our fellow species to extinction, we will leave a far more desolate planet for our descendants than the world we inherited from our elders.
James Hansen
Image
Money has too big an influence on our politics in Washington and somehow we need to do something about that.
James Hansen