Gloom, Despair, and Agony on Me
17 hours ago Charles Rotter
Charles Rotter,
Note the highlighted name.
There was a song that formed a repeated “bit” on the old Hee Haw show that went: “Gloom, despair, and agony on me / deep dark depression, excessive misery.” Every week, the cast would wail it between exaggerated groans before collapsing into laughter. The point was clear: when tragedy is performed loudly enough, it becomes comedy. Reading the 2025 BioScience special report, “The State of the Climate: A Planet on the Brink,” one hears that same tune—only without the laugh track.
“We are hurtling toward climate chaos. The planet’s vital signs are flashing red. The consequences of human-driven alterations of the climate are no longer future threats but are here now.”
That’s the opening line, not of a movie trailer, but of a peer-reviewed paper. If the intent was to conjure images of dashboard lights blinking before the cosmic engine explodes, it succeeded. The trouble is, science is supposed to illuminate, not hallucinate. Instead of laying out data, this report launches straight into revelation. The planet is “on the brink.” Humanity has “failed foresight.” Only collective repentance can save us. Swap “carbon dioxide” for “sin,” and you have Sunday service at the Church of the Imminent Apocalypse.
The document is festooned with what it calls vital signs—thirty-four in all, twenty-two allegedly “at record levels.” This impressive-sounding list includes everything from atmospheric CO₂ to livestock populations, as though the cows were personally responsible for dragging the planet into perdition. The report warns that in 2024, fossil-fuel energy consumption hit a record high, with coal, oil, and gas “all at peak levels,” while solar and wind combined were “31 times lower.” One almost expects the next line to blame humanity for failing to meet its quota in a cosmic game of SimCity: Gaia Edition.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2025/11/01/gloom-despair-and-agony-on-me/
