PoliticsScience

This Idiot is Going to Kill Us All Because He Thinks Rocks Make the Sea Levels Rise

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Transcript:

What’s the dumbest thing a Republican lawmaker can say in reference to climate change? Is it Donald Trump saying it’s a Chinese conspiracy theory? Is it Representative John Shimkus saying that it doesn’t matter because God promised us after Noah’s flood that he wouldn’t hurt us again? Is it Senator James Inhofe telling Rachel Maddow that it can’t be true because combatting it would be too expensive? Or is it the latest contender: Representative Mo Brooks, telling an actual climate scientist that the global sea levels are rising because of rocks falling into the ocean?

Hold on, because it’s about to get worse. Brooks had the opportunity to say such a stupid thing because he is on the U.S. House of Representatives Science, Space and Technology Committee, which is like me being on a committee focused on NASCAR, Steven Universe fan fiction, and post-Keynesian economics — in other words, shit I know nothing about. I know, I know, I’m sorry, I’ve been meaning to watch Steven Universe.

The committee was gathered to talk about how technology can be used to combat climate change, but instead it turned out to be a third-grade-level two-hour lesson in which Dr. Philip Duffy of Woods Hole Research Center patiently explained to 70-year old men that no, rocks do not make sea levels rise. And no, the chart that Lamar Smith brought to prove that climate change was fake was not based on actual science just because it’s in chart form. And no, Bill Posey, scientists in the 1970s didn’t think that humans were actually causing the Earth to cool. No, that Time magazine cover is a hoax.

Of all the dumb shit that was said during those two hours, obviously Mo Brooks is the dumbest. Here’s a direct quote from him as he attempted to really sell his idea that rocks falling into the ocean are what’s responsible for sea levels rising:

“Every time you have that soil or rock or whatever it is that is deposited into the seas, that forces the sea levels to rise, because now you have less space in those oceans, because the bottom is moving up.”

Mo Brooks is a 64-year old man and he sounds like an actual child. That is something a child would say in a poorly researched report on what he thinks makes water go up and down.

“Now you have less space in those oceans, because the bottom is moving up.” Jesus fucking Christ.

This is why we’re all going to die, by the way. Yes, the coming nuclear war with North Korea or whoever isn’t going to be pleasant, but some people will survive. No human will survive the coming temperature increase, and it’s going to happen because the science wing of the government of one of the biggest superpowers in the world today can’t talk about technological solutions to the problem because the people running that committee can’t even get past the fact that it’s really happening. It’s as if our house is on fire and when the firemen show up they say, “I’m sorry but we just don’t believe in fire.” And you’re like, “Wait, you what now?” And they say, “We don’t really have any evidence fire is real. What even is it? If it’s a solid then how does my hand pass through it? If it’s a gas why can I see it? How does it grow if it’s not alive? I read a scientific article on 4chan that says that fire is a Chinese conspiracy made up to frighten us into being chilly in the winter.”

When you’re dealing with someone that willfully stupid, your house is just going to burn down because by the time you answer all their stupid questions it will be too late.

Remember this as midterms approach. Please, for the sake of the next generation, and for my own sanity’s sake, please vote these man-children out of office. Before our house burns down.

Rebecca Watson

Rebecca is a writer, speaker, YouTube personality, and unrepentant science nerd. In addition to founding and continuing to run Skepchick, she hosts Quiz-o-Tron, a monthly science-themed quiz show and podcast that pits comedians against nerds. There is an asteroid named in her honor. Twitter @rebeccawatson Mastodon mstdn.social/@rebeccawatson Instagram @actuallyrebeccawatson TikTok @actuallyrebeccawatson YouTube @rebeccawatson BlueSky @rebeccawatson.bsky.social

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5 Comments

  1. “Scientists in the 1970s believed that humans were causing the earth to cool”.

    Let’s see – as an undergraduate in the 70s I recall that there were indeed cooling effects and heating effects but that at that point there was insufficient data to determine which tendency dominated.

    I think that is a fair statement of the facts although I would not mind being corrected by, you know, an ACTUAL CLIMATE SCIENTIST rather than some political hack.

    1. Just to expand on that a bit – the most significant temperature increases occur at the poles and measurement requires remote sensors and satellite data, for which mass production of cheap very large scale integrated circuits was a decade or so away.

      Ah, the good old days, when software was punch cards and paper tape and digital circuits were soldered together manually from individual transistors!

  2. So, Mr. Congresscritter, answer me this…Rocks have been falling into the sea for like forever. So why are we just now seeing this sea level rise?

    1. Do you think we could convince him that the cubic kilometers of ice falling off Antarctica and Greenland are functionally equivalent to bloody big rocks?

  3. Damn! I’m gonna be in San Diego this weekend, and was gonna go swimming, but now I’m worried that I will cause flooding in Kiribati. Wait…I will swim at low tide! Problem solved!

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