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Carl Sagan testifying before Congress in 1985 on climate change

carlsagandotcom · 4.5M views · 2021-08-19 · 16:54

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Overview

Carl Sagan's December 1985 testimony to Congress on the greenhouse effect, about 15 minutes long. He lays out CO2 warming, the risk of runaway effects and the danger of continued coal burning.

On Hacker News

HN commenters use it as proof that the climate problem was clearly explained decades ago, and as a model of clear communication to a broad audience.

Recommended by 4 HN people across 4 months · HN mentions 2021–2026

Topics

Climate science & climate changeUS politics & elections
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carl sagangreenhouse effectcongress testimonycoalscience communication

What people said

agentultra · 2023-01 · Strong recommendation

The address Carl Sagan made in 1985 is well worth watching for those who remember those times and especially for those who weren't alive back then [0] People knew about this before you were born and decided their best interests were more important and they acted in wilful disregard for your life and the lives of everyone on this planet. They weren't ignorant. No facts were hidden from them that they could be forgiven for being misinformed. They knew with certainty what the science was revealing and spent money to discredit the science, cut funding to their own researchers, bought politicians, funded PR campaigns, and continued building their fossil fuel empires. Everything Carl Sagan said in that address has come to pass. It's wild to watch. [0] [VIDEO]

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melling · 2023-03 · Recommendation

Time to watch Carl Sagan, almost 50 years ago, explain how our coal usage would be a big problem: [VIDEO] A slow train wreck that was avoidable.

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YellowStuDregg · 2022-08 · Recommendation

A quick google search gives us plenty of past published projections and how they fared: [LINK] You can also watch Carl Sagan break it down in front of congress back in 1985 for just 15 minutes of your time [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by carlsagandotcom, played through YouTube.

Data and selection notes

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HN Library: HackerTube export (2026-10-31) and open-index/hacker-news. Upstream summaries and classifications may contain AI errors.

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