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climate change

concept · in 108 videos (2007–2026)

Long-term human-driven warming of Earth's climate; specific accords are policy ids.

Videos by year: 2007: 20 · 2008: 2 · 2009: 3 · 2010: 1 · 2011: 2 · 2012: 2 · 2013: 2 · 2014: 6 · 2015: 3 · 2016: 5 · 2017: 7 · 2018: 6 · 2019: 9 · 2020: 5 · 2021: 8 · 2022: 9 · 2023: 4 · 2024: 9 · 2025: 4 · 2026: 1

Also known as: global warming, the biggest crisis humanity has ever faced, carbon emissions

Threads

Also named in the threads: John asks Hank for ideas to further reduce his carbon emissions (2007) · Daniel Biss runs for Illinois state representative (2007) · Hank reviews children's books on global warming for The New York Times Book Review (2007) · Hank: without political will from Congress and the President, US emissions cuts will stall (2017) · Vlogbrothers videos titled with Smash Mouth's All Star lyrics (2020)

Questions

Often together

What comes up in the same parts of the videos; the number is how many parts.

United States (39) · progress (8) · economic inequality (7) · Earth (8) · optimism (4) · extreme poverty (6) · collective action (5) · COVID-19 pandemic (6) · China (5) · United States Congress (6)

What the videos say

The most important statements of each year; all statements.

2007

  • 2007-04-06 · Brotherhood 2.0: April 6: Nerdfighters Never Surrender — John rejects the break: injustice, despair, global warming and suck don't take every eighth week off, and nor will the Nerdfighters, who fight all year except weekends and occasional holidays. (playful) — 00:00:56
  • 2007-04-16 · Brotherhood 2.0: April 16: Brotherhood of Traveling Shirts — announcement: John: For the next week John will use no electricity he doesn't absolutely need: fridge and computer stay on, lights only for reading, no TV except important soccer games, minimal hot water. — 00:00:38
  • 2007-04-17 · April 17th: Stepped Up — Hank says one day without power was pretty hard and more would be much harder; he doesn't know how John will manage it for an entire week. (hedged) — 00:01:46
  • 2007-04-18 · Brotherhood 2.0: April 18th: Prom and Consequences — John: On his carbon-cutting week, John jokes he didn't know reducing his footprint meant eating unheated food and won't do that; he is just not turning on the lights unless he really has to. (playful) — 00:00:57
  • 2007-04-20 · Brotherhood 2.0: Carbon Neutralizing Youtube — John says Brotherhood 2.0, as a video blog, is itself contributing to global warming, and he wants to make it a carbon-neutral video blog. — 00:00:09
  • 2007-06-07 · June 7: Weather and My Pants — Hank: On a call with the Weather Channel Hank asks that his byline not say .com 'because it's .org', then says he is going to be on the Weather Channel; they call again tomorrow. — 00:02:34
  • 2007-06-19 · June 19: GOOD LUCK JOHN — Hank appeared on The Weather Channel's Forecast Earth in an episode about heat that starts with John Kerry; it was his first national TV appearance and he thinks Brotherhood 2.0 was mentioned. (hedged) — 00:02:19
  • 2007-09-25 · September 25th: TMBG and NYT — Hank got a gig reviewing a couple of children's books on global warming and the environment for The New York Times Book Review. — 00:01:57
  • 2007-10-05 · October 5th: Feuding, Goonies and Politics — Hank argues that really good health care in America won't matter much if we can't feed ourselves because we've poisoned the Earth. — 00:02:39
  • 2007-10-09 · October 9th: The Feud Continues — Hank tends to believe the environmental crisis is the biggest problem humanity has ever faced, so he favors the candidate with strong environmental policies, John Edwards; he is 'an Edwards man'. (hedged) — 00:01:17
    • If Edwards loses the primary, Hank will back the next candidate with the strongest environmental record; Obama is up there with good plans but lacks nearly as strong a global warming policy. — 00:01:47
  • 2007-10-12 · October 12th: Carbon Re-Neutralizing Brotherhood 2.0 — John reports that Al Gore, whom he calls a noted American nerdfighter, just won half the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on climate change. — 00:00:14
  • …and 20 statements more in 2007 — all statements of 2007

2008

  • 2008-02-04 · Obama Says Subscribe — Hank says Republicans generally don't treat the environment as an issue, and McCain, who does, has a much weaker climate plan than Obama or Clinton. — 00:02:31

Also named in: Happy (Belated) Birthday, Hank

2009

  • 2009-10-13 · Nine Die in Georgia Floods - Kanye is a Jackass — Hank: Relaying his hosts' answer, Hank says climate change is making weather go haywire, so places like the southeast that usually get summer rain get none. — 00:01:54
    • Hank says climate change means much more change than just the climate: 'global everything changes', so get ready. — 00:02:23
    • Hank says summer drought kills trees that need lots of water, and when they die the whole ecosystem of the southeast changes. — 00:02:23
  • 2009-12-16 · Project for Awesome: The Nature Conservancy — Hank sings that three species go extinct every day, and that he is scared of climate change. — 00:02:51
  • …and 1 statement more in 2009 — all statements of 2009

2010

  • 2010-05-26 · How to Be Green Without Being a Prick — Hank says the internet, if it were a country, would have the fifth-largest carbon footprint of all countries. — 00:00:00
    • Hank says this is a long, complicated process, but without being dedicated, smart and informed we are going to kill ourselves, and he is not kidding. — 00:03:18

2011

  • 2011-02-23 · WE ARE 812 YEARS OLD — John: If Nerdfighteria, which most people have never heard of, is responsible for a million pounds of carbon, John says, it shows how huge the problem we face really is. — 00:02:47
  • 2011-04-27 · NASA: Increasing Awesome — Hank: NASA is adding three more climate-monitoring satellites to its fleet to help understand and respond to global climate change. — 00:02:50
  • …and 1 statement more in 2011 — all statements of 2011

2012

  • 2012-11-08 · VOLT! A Dream Comes True. — John calls the Volt perhaps the most politicized car of our time: people ask why buy it over a cheaper Toyota Corolla, assuming he thinks he'll fix global warming. (hedged) — 00:01:42
    • Noting no new car purchase is carbon neutral, John says he bought the Volt not to end global warming but because it's awesome, super fast and fits a car seat. — 00:02:12
  • 2012-12-17 · THE PROJECT FOR AWESOME 2012 IS HERE! Save the Children. — John says poverty is an incredibly complex problem: corrupt governments, malaria and HIV/AIDS, climate change and energy policy hurting food production, malnutrition, poor infrastructure and education, and discrimination all contribute. — 00:00:52

2013

  • 2013-05-31 · Optimism is Not Insane — Hank thinks we see a graph rising toward a disaster point and assume we have only years left, but usually we adapt: capitalism, technology and even Congress adapt. (hedged) — 00:02:04
  • 2013-09-27 · Invalid Arguments: Climate Change — In the description Hank says climate change is here, happening, caused by humanity, and one of the largest problems humanity will ever face. — video description
    • In the description Hank asks that people finally agree climate change is not a conspiracy theory made up to annoy the rich and powerful. — video description
    • In the description Hank says he believes humanity will face climate change with the desperate ingenuity and bravado of its whole history, and survive it. (hedged) — video description
    • Hank says he will probably still be alive in 2060, which is when world population will probably peak at around 10 billion. (hedged) — 00:00:01
    • Hank says 2060 is probably when the really significant effects of global climate change start to be felt, a problem that will not be solved in the next 50 years. (hedged) — 00:00:09
    • Hank feels that before walking that path we have to agree there is a problem, which apparently has not happened yet. (hedged) — 00:00:30
    • To "climate change is natural", Hank says the climate did change in the past, often because of rising carbon dioxide, which clearly indicates more carbon dioxide raises temperatures. — 00:00:43

2014

  • 2014-01-03 · The Golden Gate Bridge Didn't Collapse!! — Hank says global climate change is going to threaten the stability of everything. — 00:03:29
  • 2014-01-10 · Global Warming and the Polar Vortex — Hank says weird weather always makes us talk about global warming, which is exactly the wrong way to think about it; local cold no more disproves it than an absurd non sequitur. — 00:00:57
    • Hank thinks the problem is that 'global warming' is a terrible name for the thing: it makes it sound like things will just get warmer. (hedged) — 00:01:13
    • Hank says a 4 degree Celsius rise for the planet would be a disaster, while the same rise in a town would go unnoticed. — 00:01:30
    • Hank says the real problem is not 'climate change' or 'warming' but 'global': we are terrible at thinking globally, it is impossible. — 00:01:59
    • Hank thinks of global warming as an overall increase in energy trapped in the atmosphere, as water vapour, wind, heat, hurricanes or polar vortices; as it increases the globe warms and the climate changes. — 00:02:44
    • Hank feels people would accept the idea more if it were framed as an energy increase, separate from everyday experience, though 'average global atmospheric energy increase' isn't catchy and he could be wrong. (hedged) — 00:03:09
  • 2014-02-07 · Kill All The Humans — Hank says we are in an environmental crisis (climate change, oil spills, dead zones, garbage patches, meltdowns, mass extinction) whose root is people, created to satisfy human needs or whims. — 00:00:00
  • 2014-09-22 · Bill Gates and John Green Discuss Agriculture — Bill Gates: Gates says climate change is the only thing working against these farmers; every other factor (output, self-sufficiency, storage, amazing seeds, advanced techniques) favours them. — 00:03:09
  • 2014-10-07 · I Kind of Hate Batman — John asks why no one calls Batman out for spending all his resources on crime in Gotham when he could also fight global poverty, habitat destruction or climate change. (hedged) — 00:02:39
  • 2014-12-26 · The Best and Worst of 2014 — Hank says 2014 will very likely have been the warmest year ever recorded. (hedged) — 00:00:28
    • Hank says humans are adaptable and he has faith in us, but growing food as rainfall shifts and replacing infrastructure will be very expensive. — 00:00:31
  • …and 1 statement more in 2014 — all statements of 2014

2015

  • 2015-02-13 · Draw My Life + 16 Other Suggestions — Hank says tar sands are unconventional oil, which should ideally all stay in the ground: there is so much that burning it would be 'game over' for climate change. — 00:02:25
  • 2015-07-03 · Thoughts from Yachts — Hank hopes growing productivity will one day give everyone enough to minimize suffering, but in Cannes and Saint-Tropez he worries no one will ever be satisfied, so wealth keeps concentrating instead of serving global goals like ending poverty, war and climate insecurity. (hedged) — 00:02:08
  • 2015-12-18 · We're All Gonna Die - A Song — Hank reports the world just had its first year in which the global economy grew while global carbon emissions did not. — 00:02:56

2016

  • 2016-01-08 · Who Am I?! - Some thoughts on Personal Identity — Hank says he thinks climate change is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. (hedged) — 00:00:29
  • 2016-01-22 · Why Are Vegetarians Annoying? (An Exploration of a Cultural Rift) — Hank says livestock contribute massively to climate change and are a primary reason for deforestation. — 00:00:37
  • 2016-01-26 · Billionaires and Radical Hope: Thoughts from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland — John: Yet John found Davos wonderful: clear discussions of why climate change is happening and what it will do, and the global goals posted everywhere as reminders of our commitments. — 00:01:41
    • John says that in the coming weeks he will look at big problems he left Davos thinking about: income inequality, climate change, the refugee crisis, and how gender inequality affects poverty. — 00:03:22
  • 2016-02-23 · How Energy and Time Change Everything — John says people without energy are disproportionately hurt by climate change, which is especially unfair since they have gained little from the fossil fuel use that drives it. — 00:01:15
    • John thinks the biggest question of this century is how to get energy to the 1.3 billion people without it while also dramatically reducing carbon emissions. (hedged) — 00:01:33
    • John's answer: lots of people trying lots of solutions, most of which will fail but a few of which will hopefully succeed spectacularly; otherwise we are in big trouble. (hedged) — 00:01:44
  • 2016-11-15 · Good News/Bad News: A Pizzamas Video in Nine Slices — John reports, as underreported good news, that global carbon emissions are expected to be nearly flat in 2016, a third straight year without growth. — 00:00:31
    • John says this is not good enough: emissions are still far too high to limit post-industrial warming to below 2 degrees Celsius. — 00:00:41
    • John says flat emissions show humanity can reach its other goals without increasing emissions: the global economy grew about 3% this year (2016) while poverty and disease burden fell. — 00:00:48
    • John reports that the UN says 2016 will almost certainly be the hottest year in recorded human history. — 00:01:00
    • John says climate change is real, humans are causing it, and people of the future will judge us on how we dealt with it. — 00:01:09
  • …and 1 statement more in 2016 — all statements of 2016

2017

  • 2017-01-17 · How Young Is History? — John says much of what we think inevitable or natural about humanness isn't: not wealth inequality, climate change or polarization, but not literacy, free speech or a three-hour Rome-Florence trip either. (hedged) — 00:03:02
  • 2017-02-03 · Are We Making Things Worse? — Hank believes global warming is caused by people and will be one of the biggest challenges humanity will ever face together. — 00:00:42
  • 2017-03-17 · Trump's Budget Explained — Hank says 11 blocks would be cut from the State Department: international aid largely gone, UN climate change initiatives defunded and US contributions to UN peacekeeping reduced. — 00:02:21
    • Hank says the budget holds much that many or most think worth fighting for: huge losses in clean-energy and medical research, aid for the elderly and disadvantaged, international aid and climate science. — 00:04:27
  • 2017-06-02 · The Paris Accord: What is it? And What Does it All Mean? — Hank names a second driver of leaving the agreement, a push for countries to care only about their own interests, and calls climate change the best example that this doesn't work, which scares skeptics of globalism. — video description
    • Hank explains that CO2 locked in fossil fuels is being re-released; it lets visible light through but traps infrared, adding energy to atmosphere and oceans and changing the climate. (doubtful: billions of years) — 00:01:03
    • Hank says no one country can handle climate change: even the biggest contributors, the US and China, together make up less than half the emissions; everyone must agree. — 00:01:54
    • Hank says that if Congress's majority party and the President deny human-caused climate change and keep investing in Edison-era energy systems, US progress will stall. — 00:04:48
  • 2017-09-01 · What Everyone Gets Wrong About Global Warming — Hank says talk of a warmer Earth's effect on weather is not about what will happen but about the probability of what will happen. — 00:00:24
    • Hank says the probability distribution, not the individual dots, is how we should always think about how a changing climate affects weather this year (2017). — 00:00:55
    • Hank says a warmer planet does not simply move one year from one dot to another, because global energy is not the only important variable; it shifts the whole curve. — 00:01:49
    • Hank says the models show that more energy in the global system shifts the curves toward stronger, wetter storms. — 00:02:55
  • …and 5 statements more in 2017 — all statements of 2017

2018

  • 2018-02-06 · Sawdust Bread — John says feeling that progress is inevitable also makes him complacent, as if he could sit back while grain yields feed the world, Elon Musk fixes climate change and disease cures itself. (playful) — 00:02:36
  • 2018-05-15 · Seven Maps to Better Understand the World — John: A map of average temperature change between 1965 and 2014 shows red where Earth got warmer, white where unchanged and blue where colder, and there is no blue. — 00:01:45
  • 2018-07-10 · The General Crisis — John: Earth also experienced significant climate change, sometimes called the Little Ice Age: global temperatures dropped on average around one degree Celsius, contributing to famines. — 00:03:16
    • John starts to reassure that the period's climate change is not like today's, then admits that it is. (playful) — 00:03:29
    • It is also a reminder that a changing climate can fuel global instability. — 00:03:46
  • 2018-09-04 · The Eisenhower Matrix — John: The obvious example is climate change, maybe the biggest problem facing humans, yet constantly deprioritized in favor of breaking news. (hedged) — 00:01:15
  • 2018-10-19 · This is the scariest graph I've ever seen — Hank: If we wait until 2100, when the serious sting of climate change is really felt, we will have signed up for much worse. — 00:02:54
  • 2018-12-04 · When it All Seems Like Too Much — Hank says the IPCC's just-released climate change report was full of bad news. — 00:00:20
    • People regularly ask Hank, who knows a fair bit about the situation we are putting ourselves into, whether he has any hope left; he finds the loss of hope terrible because he does not think you can do anything without it. (hedged) — 00:00:29
    • Hank says the world is going to be worse: there will be climate refugees, and the global situation will probably destabilize somewhat as we deal with the problem. (hedged) — 00:01:04
    • Hank says there are many tipping points ahead, but there will always be a spectrum of bad, and our future will be somewhere on it. — 00:01:40
    • Hank's view of climate change, which he knows better than most big problems, gives him more hope for others: like crime, justice, racism or suffering, it has no binary fixed-or-broken state. — 00:01:50
  • …and 1 statement more in 2018 — all statements of 2018

2019

  • 2019-02-26 · The Necessity to Struggle / The Futility of Effort — John: For John the question is not which view is true but which is productive: if despair cut his carbon emissions he'd be for it, but it mostly leaves him empty and inert. — 00:02:26
  • 2019-05-03 · What Game of Thrones is Really About — Hank argues Game of Thrones is ultimately about people fighting for power in the shadow of an external threat that can't be bargained with, and its real-world analog is the geopolitics of global warming. — 00:00:00
    • Climate change is the first global-scale collective problem our species has faced, so it is no surprise we don't know how to face it. — 00:05:10
    • Climate change isn't evil or immoral: we blame fossil fuel companies at conferences we flew to, and any green conversion is possible only thanks to a century of burning ancient sunlight. — 00:06:06
  • 2019-05-07 · How I Read and Why — John strongly favors reviewing: thoughtful analysis of art is vital to making good art, and reading art through a lens (Game of Thrones via climate change, Jane Eyre via gender norms) helps. — 00:01:01
  • 2019-05-24 · The Monterey Bay Aquarium Has a Secret — Hank: Ocean water has warmed over the last 50 years or so, and warm water holds less oxygen, which is bad for many animals. — 00:06:14
  • 2019-05-31 · Uncomfortable Nuance: Natural Gas Edition — Hank says more regulated fracking in Asia could help bring an immediate end to new coal plants in China and India, probably the most important short-term goal for curbing the climate crisis. (hedged) — video description
    • Hank says, as he does over and over, that climate change is like the biggest challenge humanity has ever faced. — 00:02:26
    • Hank says the ways we mitigate climate change will themselves have environmental impacts, which is uncomfortable to think or talk about. — 00:02:26
  • 2019-08-30 · The Earth Shouldn't Have Oxygen — Hank says burning fossil fuels measurably lowers Earth's oxygen, but only by a small share; carbon dioxide, though, is extremely low and we are well on our way to doubling it. — 00:02:51
  • 2019-09-27 · Crisis — Hank: As a climate advocate, Hank says panic would make sense and is a normal emotion given the circumstances, but it is not the most helpful one and solves nothing. — 00:01:15
  • 2019-12-27 · Why I'm Worried about 2020 — Hank says part of it must be that we are starting to feel the real effects of climate change: the climate is actually changing. — 00:00:50
  • …and 10 statements more in 2019 — all statements of 2019

2020

  • 2020-02-14 · Ending The Great Airplane Seat Debate — announcement: Hank lists tour dates: March 9 Columbus, March 10 Carmel, March 11 Hank alone at Albion College on climate change and the internet, March 12 Ann Arbor. — 00:03:33
  • 2020-08-21 · The Water's Getting Warm — Hank recalls that last year's (2019) video on Game of Thrones as a climate-change allegory said climate change is literally the first global-scale collective problem our species has faced. — 00:00:00
    • Often overlooked: overcoming climate change requires prosperity, a world with enough for people to be safe and happy and resources to free ourselves from the carbon economy. — 00:00:29
    • If collective means everyone contributes and can affect it, however slightly, through their actions, then maybe global warming is the first large-scale collective problem the world has faced. (hedged) — 00:00:29
    • The UN's upper estimate of what it would cost to fix climate change is four trillion dollars per year. — 00:01:17
    • So every year we don't tackle climate change, we incur the costs of about one half to one COVID epidemic. — 00:01:44
    • Meanwhile we won't be focused on climate change, understandably, and won't have the resources we otherwise would have had to free ourselves from the carbon economy. — 00:02:14
    • Having seen collective action of the kind, if not the magnitude, climate change needs, Hank is more fearful of a less prosperous world but more hopeful, since people make sacrifices when they see what's on the line. — 00:03:12
  • 2020-10-14 · John Predicts the Future! — Hank adds that it is unseasonably warm most days in most places: 2020 is one of the warmest years of the last hundred, or one of the coolest of the next hundred. (playful) — 00:00:29
    • Hank says our lives and history are governed by unknown unknowns: the rise of social media, climate change and the internal combustion engine all once were. — 00:02:55
  • 2020-10-27 · The time I met Joe Biden — John calls Biden's climate change proposals serious and Trump's literally non-existent. — 00:01:56
    • John rejects that idea of governance: we will not us-versus-them our way out of COVID, climate change or anything else. — 00:02:55
  • …and 3 statements more in 2020 — all statements of 2020

2021

  • 2021-01-05 · SUPERIOR FISH BEINGS — John: As a species, John says, we are too powerful and not powerful enough: able to change the planet's climate but not to choose how we change it. — 00:03:24
  • 2021-03-05 · How Much Hope is OK? — Hank: Given the injustice of this disaster, of future ones and of the world even without pandemics or climate change, Hank worries about the selfishness of his good feelings. — 00:02:43
  • 2021-05-25 · The Anthropocene Reviewed, Animated — John: Above all John wanted to understand the contradiction of human power: we are powerful enough to reshape Earth's climate and biodiversity but not to choose how, to escape the atmosphere but not to save loved ones from suffering. — 00:12:23
  • 2021-07-09 · Wrong on the Internet — The description says we must treat the climate crisis as an emergency; personal action has a small impact, becomes part of your identity and shows others you care. — video description
  • 2021-08-13 · How We Fix the Climate — Hank promises to teach one of the most important things anyone can do to help mitigate climate change; watching will make viewers better at it than almost everyone on Earth. — 00:00:00
    • The IPCC report is clear we are headed the wrong way: avoiding the worst means keeping warming below 2 degrees Celsius, and we are not on target even if all agreements are kept. — 00:00:58
    • Asked if there is hope, Hank says yes, depending on what you mean: there is no hope of escaping negative impacts, which we are already experiencing. — 00:01:39
    • Climate change is going to make life worse, but we do not know how much worse. — 00:01:56
    • Global warming, like almost every issue, is a justice issue: it will hit hardest those least responsible, while relatively affluent people in affluent places will be mostly okay. — 00:02:05
    • Asked what to do, Hank says viewers should do a lot, around their other duties, because climate change is the most important and difficult issue humanity faces. — 00:02:26
  • 2021-10-22 · A Tool with No Blood on It — Hank says global warming was not created by evil but by people solving problems; some fossil-fuel problems will require stopping their use. — 00:02:26
  • 2021-11-12 · Everything a Normal Person Needs to Know About Helium — Hank says the bad news is that the long-term goal is to leave natural gas in the ground, because it and its combustion products are warming the Earth. — 00:02:26
  • …and 6 statements more in 2021 — all statements of 2021

2022

  • 2022-01-21 · How to Be Hopeful About Doomsday — Hank: Reflecting three years of piling-up bad (pandemics, climate change, isolationism, fascism), the clock has stood at 100 seconds to midnight for three years, the closest in its 75 years. — 00:00:00
    • Instead of getting mad, get curious: start with someone who deeply discusses a big problem, like the Prison Policy Initiative on incarceration, David Roberts' Volts on climate, or Fair Fight and Stacey Abrams on voting rights. — 00:02:53
  • 2022-02-18 · You Don't Want a Gas Stovetop — The description says household methane use is a big contributor to climate change that must stop over the next 30 years; attachment to gas ranges is a silly reason to worsen it. — video description
    • Hank concedes cooking does not significantly add to climate change, but household natural gas use is a big contributor, mostly not from the stovetop. — 00:01:11
    • Since induction beats gas, one of the most important things a person concerned about climate change can do is drop the belief that gas stoves are best. — 00:02:39
  • 2022-04-15 · Are You Stuck in The Sad Gap — Hank says that for the first time since the Industrial Revolution we have decoupled economic growth from carbon emissions. — 00:01:57
  • 2022-07-29 · How Climate Change /Actually/ Works...in 4 Minutes — Hank says human infrastructure assumes rainfall and temperature stay as they were; as they change, crop yields might fall and leave people hungry, power grids fail under air conditioning, and forests burn. (hedged) — 00:00:46
  • 2022-08-12 · The Biggest Climate Bill of Your Life - But What does it DO!? — Hank: Burning them releases carbon dioxide, opaque to infrared, so heat stays in the atmosphere, changing weather and increasing droughts, fires, storms and heat waves. — 00:01:35
    • Powerful opponents moved from denying climate change to saying the costs are too great, and Hank expects them to say next that it is too late. — 00:20:04
    • For the first time in decades Hank believes climate change can be tackled, thanks to many people's hard work and effects too real to ignore. — 00:20:33
  • 2022-11-29 · The Weight of Life — John says humans currently have outsized power: their behavior is causing extinctions and reshaping the climate and habitats. — 00:01:56
  • 2022-12-20 · The Best Books Get Better — John describes Parable of the Sower: a young black woman narrates a future America of collapsing systems, a demagogue president, climate havoc and a substance abuse epidemic, things that feel just a little contemporary. (playful) — 00:01:27
  • …and 4 statements more in 2022 — all statements of 2022

2023

  • 2023-03-10 · Is it Good or Bad that we Haven't Met Aliens? — Hank says the great filter could be AI, global warming, nuclear weapons or social media, maybe TikTok; we don't know. (unsure) — 00:01:59
  • 2023-08-04 · The Biggest Science Story of the Week — Hank says humans have been doing reckless, accidental geoengineering for a hundred years, mostly by emitting carbon dioxide, which keeps heat from radiating to space and warms the planet. — 00:00:58
    • Hank says this is bad news: global warming is worse than we thought, and other pollution has been shielding us from some of its effects. — 00:03:22
    • Hank says we are entering the overlap period, when the problem is too big to ignore but can still be solved, so a decades-long natural experiment like this is priceless. — 00:05:09
  • 2023-10-04 · A Messy and Unhinged Introduction to Geoengineering — recommendation: Hank: Out of the field professionally for years, Hank had climate scientists Adam (Climate Adam) and Miriam (Zentouro) talk him through the climate conversation in a new Hank's channel video, which viewers should watch. — 00:00:58
    • Hank urges viewers to follow both scientists' channels, which are accessible and low-lift, joking it would put them among the most informed people on climate change. (playful) — 00:00:58
    • Hank says intent matters: a century of burning fossil fuels warmed the planet accidentally, so it was not geoengineering, though it is no longer really an accident. — 00:01:56
    • Hank says heat is a big part of the problem (not all: ocean acidification would not be helped) and is already making life harder, getting worse decade by decade for a while. — 00:04:06
    • Hank says individuals and societies are acting, but not as fast as he'd like, and not going faster will have tremendous negative consequences. — 00:13:29
  • 2023-10-27 · I Keep Thinking About Taylor Swift — Hank reports a recent BBC piece on fake YouTube content, largely made with AI, watched and believed by many young people including preteens, often about aliens or climate change not being real. — 00:00:55

2024

  • 2024-02-09 · My Favorite Climate Graph — Hank thinks he and John should not be talking about direct air capture now, because removing a pound of CO2 costs far more than not emitting one. — 00:00:00
  • 2024-03-08 · I Believed These Four Lies — Hank's brain read the graph as showing climate change damage, as Twitter did, though neither NOAA nor the article, which was about disaster preparedness, said so. — 00:05:58
  • 2024-06-11 · BEEF DAYS — John says that unless humans dramatically reduce beef consumption it will be impossible to limit post-industrial global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. — 00:00:29
    • John says climate talk tends to focus on technologies like electric cars, solar panels and batteries, which matter, but we don't talk enough about social norms. — 00:00:58
    • John says bigger, more energy-intensive cars and houses are a social-norm problem, not a technological one: limiting climate change needs new technologies and changed social norms. — 00:01:56
    • John says beef days are not a solution to climate change: many technologies and norms must come together to speed the decrease in greenhouse emissions. — 00:04:55
  • 2024-08-02 · My Letter to the Future — Hank thinks the future will figure out climate change, and makes a risky bet that geothermal power will be a big part of it, which people will then call obvious. — 00:01:57
  • 2024-09-13 · My Governor is Weirder than Yours — Ryan Busse: Busse says change is coming whether we like it: coal economics are shifting and climate change is real, and working people must be at the center of the transition. — 00:18:12
    • Ryan Busse: Busse says in the famous Held case 16 young people sued Montana for violating the right to a clean and healthful environment. — 00:40:47
  • 2024-10-03 · Broadly in Favor of Humans — John still thinks humanity will get through the polycrisis of climate change, growing violence and massive inequity, and survive our moment. — 00:04:25
  • 2024-10-04 · Trees are Destroying the Earth (Again) — Hank says the flood happened because our warmer atmosphere carries more water, which happened because we have been digging up old trees and burning them. — 00:04:09
  • 2024-10-04 · October 4, 2024 — Hank says he did the math once: one tree absorbing all the carbon dioxide emitted since the Industrial Revolution would need three or four times the mass of every tree on Earth combined. (hedged) — 00:00:00
  • …and 3 statements more in 2024 — all statements of 2024

2025

  • 2025-02-25 · EVERYTHING IS TUBERCULOSIS — John says the steam engine led to everything from air conditioning to AirPods while releasing over a trillion tons of carbon dioxide and reshaping the climate. — 00:00:00
  • 2025-06-06 · The Secret Inside my MIT Commencement Speech — Hank says the world is getting hotter faster, and the sudden acceleration of AI, communications and biotechnology promises huge opportunities and tremendous disruption. — 00:07:55
    • Hank says feeling a birthday party or a playlist for a friend is insignificant next to climate change, AI or the erosion of democracy alienates you from human existence and your place as a builder of meaning. — 00:18:40
  • 2025-07-04 · This Graph Changed My Life — Hank says the article's comments variously claimed that fossil fuels are not bad for the Earth, that climate change is fake, and that the Earth manufactures fossil fuels. — 00:00:59
    • Hank says that asked whether global warming is happening, roughly four-fifths of Americans say yes. — 00:02:56
    • Hank says that although many Americans accept global warming, we are not doing a great job of adapting to that reality. — 00:02:56
    • The graph changed Hank because it clashed with his perception: before, he would have said about half of Americans thought climate change a scam or hoax. — 00:03:20
    • Hank says the real situation is complex: many people are unsure and even more have other concerns, so they are not very focused on climate change. — 00:03:20
    • Hank says believing this means fighting the wrong fight: not trying to convince people who are mostly convinced, but focused on other problems like the price of eggs. — 00:04:03
    • Hank says 'those people' are not simple, unified or monolithic: four-fifths of them think climate change is real and very few are committed climate skeptics. — 00:04:32
  • 2025-07-25 · The Molecule that Changed Everything — Hank: Asked whether we will escape the effects of climate change, Hank says no: we are experiencing them now and are past the point of no negative impacts. — 00:06:28
    • Hank says he does not know whether this will become a second apocalypse-level event caused by the same trees, and he does not like not knowing. (unsure) — 00:06:40

2026

  • 2026-02-13 · Project for Awesome 2026 Kickoff! — John: Extending the 2027 bit, John says a giant squid came to Earth to hug rather than attack, unifying humanity into a utopia where climate change is past tense and due process is back on the menu. (joke) — 06:43:01