Quotes by James Hansen

About James Hansen:

James Edward Hansen is an American adjunct professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University. Hansen is best known for his research in the field of climatology, his testimony on climate change to congressional committees in 1988 that helped raise broad awareness of global warming, and his advocacy of action to avoid dangerous climate change. In recent years, Hansen has become a climate activist for action to mitigate the effects of climate change, which on a few occasions has led to his arrest.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

I've tried to be a straight scientist doing the science and reporting it as best I can.

James Hansen

I have been described as the grandfather of climate change. In fact, I am just a grandfather and I do not want my grandchildren to say that grandpa understood what was happening but didn't make it clear.

James Hansen

The evidence for human-made climate change is overwhelming.

James Hansen

Climate change is analogous to Lincoln and slavery or Churchill and Nazism: it's not the kind of thing where you can compromise.

James Hansen

After spending three or four years interacting with the Bush administration, I realized they were not taking any actions to deal with climate change. So, I decided to give one talk, and then it snowballed into another talk and eventually to even prot...

James Hansen

Being at NASA and having the access to both computing capability and satellite observation capability is kind of the ideal research situation to try to understand global climate change.

James Hansen

As a government employee, you can't testify against the government.

James Hansen

Several times in Earth's history, rapid global warming occurred, apparently spurred by amplifying feedbacks. In each case, more than half of plant and animal species became extinct. New species came into being over tens and hundreds of thousands of y...

James Hansen

Consider the perverse effect cap and trade has on altruistic actions. Say you decide to buy a small, high-efficiency car. That reduces your emissions, but not your country's. Instead it allows somebody else to buy a bigger S.U.V. - because the total ...

James Hansen

The trains carrying coal to power plants are death trains. Coal-fired power plants are factories of death.

James Hansen

We need to send a message to Congress and the president that we want them to take the actions that are needed to preserve climate for young people and future generations and all life on the planet.

James Hansen

What we are doing to the future of our children, and the other species on the planet, is a clear moral issue.

James Hansen

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life.

James Hansen

Recent warming coincides with rapid growth of human-made greenhouse gases. The observed rapid warming gives urgency to discussions about how to slow greenhouse gas emissions.

James Hansen

What makes tar sands particularly odious is that the energy you get out in the end, per unit carbon dioxide, is poor. It's equivalent to burning coal in your automobile.

James Hansen

You can't turn on your television without seeing these advertisements about clean coal, clean tar sands and the claim that there's more jobs associated with fossil fuels than other industries. That's of course not true. But they're hammering that int...

James Hansen

Jail threats did not dissuade Martin Luther King - and intergenerational justice is a moral issue of comparable magnitude to civil rights.

James Hansen

Global warming isn't a prediction. It is happening.

James Hansen

You can't tie a rope around the ice sheet. You can't build a wall around the ice sheets.

James Hansen

If your child gets asthma, the fossil fuel industry doesn't pay. Or if there's a natural disaster, the bill is paid by the taxpayer, not the fossil fuel company.

James Hansen

Author Bio

  • NameJames Hansen
  • DescriptionAmerican physicist
  • BornMarch 29, 1941
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionPhysicist
  • AwardsSophie Prize; Carl-Gustaf Rossby Research Medal; AAAS Award For Scientific Freedom And Responsibility