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The transition from traditional Greco-Roman religion to Christianity in late antiquity has often been portrayed in terms of the so-called “triumph of Christianity over paganism.” This is an idea that originates from Christian triumphalist accounts of the era that portray Christianity as having eradicated “paganism” within a single generation.Anti-Christian writers, especially in recent years, have seized upon this propagandistic idea of the “triumph of Christianity” and twisted the Christian propaganda into anti-Christian propaganda by portraying Christians as militant zealots and obscurantists who destroyed classical civilization because it was too great for their small minds. Unfortunately, this story is no more accurate than the story Christians have been telling for centuries; indeed, if anything, it is even less accurate.In reality, the process of the Roman Empire’s “conversion” to Christianity was both far more gradual and far complicated than it has often portrayed. Traditional religions were not so much “eradicated” as transformed. In many ways, Christianity and traditional religions melded so that the “Christianity” that emerged from late antiquity was not the same “Christianity” that had gone in, while “paganism” was more domesticated than vanquished.Early Greek influence on ChristianityThere was never really a “pure” Christianity—or, if there was, it is irretrievable to us. From the very beginning, Christianity has been under Greek philosophical and religious influence. In the Gospel of John, for instance, Jesus is described as the incarnation of the λόγος (lógos), which is a concept that originates in Greek philosophy.The Greek word λόγος literally means “a thing that is spoken.” It can refer to a single word or a whole speech, story, argument, opinion, or explanation. Greek philosophers spent a great deal of time contemplating the nature of λόγος. Starting with the philosopher Herakleitos of Ephesos (lived c. 535 – c. 475 BC), the word became used to refer to the rational basis of speech and the universe as a whole. It is for this reason that the word λόγος has given us our English word logic.The λόγος most likely entered Christianity through Jewish philosophy. The concept was used by the Jewish Middle Platonist philosopher Philon of Alexandria (lived c. 20 BC – c. 50 AD). It is likely on account of Philon and other Jewish thinkers like him that this concept found its way from the pages of Plato into the Gospel of John.I am pointing this out here to demonstrate that the idea of a “pure,” biblical Christianity free from outside influence being “corrupted” through the process of becoming a religion for the whole Roman Empire is a myth; “pagan” influences are already right there in the gospels. These influences would only become more pronounced as the Roman Empire converted to Christianity, bringing old religious ideas with them to the new religion.ABOVE: Heraclitus, painted in 1630 by the Dutch Baroque painter Johannes MoreelseConstantine I and ChristianityThe Christian writer Lactantius (lived c. 250 – c. 325 AD) writes in his treatise On the Deaths of the Persecutors that, on the night of 27 October 312 AD, while the emperor Constantine and his troops were preparing for battle against his rival Maxentius, he had a dream in which he was told that, if he painted a staurogram—a kind of Christian symbol—on the shields of his soldiers, he would win the battle. He did as he was commanded and, the very next day, he won a stunning victory over Maxentius in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge.It’s highly probable in my opinion that this story is made up or at least heavily embellished, but, whatever really happened, for some reason, Constantine came to believe that his victory at Milvian Bridge had been the result of divine intervention by the Christian God.Constantine’s conversion to Christianity has traditionally been portrayed as complete and instantaneous; in reality, it most likely happened gradually over the course of many decades. It’s possible that he may have already had certain Christian sympathies before the Battle of Milvian Bridge, especially since there is some evidence that his mother Helena may have already been a Christian.In any case, regardless of when Constantine really started having Christian sympathies, it is well documented that, after the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, he began taking major public actions to win Christian support. In February 313 AD, Constantine and his co-emperor Licinius officially made Christianity legal through the so-called “Edict of Milan” (which may or may not have been issued in the form of an official edict).ABOVE: The Battle of Milvian Bridge, painted between 1520 and 1524 by the Italian painter Giulio RomanoConstantine subsequently promoted many Christians to important positions in the government, included Christians among his advisors, and gave certain privileges to Christian clergy. He ordered the construction of many Christian churches, including the Old Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, the original Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, and the original Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople.Constantine’s support for Christianity certainly gave the religion a tremendous boost in popularity. While it had previously been unfashionable to be a Christian, after Constantine started promoting it, it started to become seen as normal. It is probably accurate to say that Constantine did far more to promote the spread of Christianity than any other person of his time.On the other hand, contrary to popular belief, Constantine never declared Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, he never attempted to outlaw traditional Greco-Roman religious practices, and he never forced anyone to convert to Christianity against their will.In fact, Constantine does not seem to have ever totally renounced his old pagan beliefs, since he continued to pay public homage to certain traditional deities even long after he began publicly supporting Christianity. Indeed, his understanding of Christianity itself seems to have been very syncretic.In particular, Constantine retained an affinity for the sun god Sol Invictus throughout his entire reign. Sol Invictus continued to appear on Constantine’s coins until around 324 or 325 AD. The Column of Constantine in Constantinople, which was dedicated on 11 May 330 AD, was originally topped with a colossal bronze statue of Constantine himself bearing the traditional iconography of Sol Invictus.ABOVE: Image from Wikimedia Commons of a gold multiple minted by Constantine I in 313 AD, showing Constantine alongside the Roman sun god Sol Invictus, who continued to appear on Constantine’s coins for over a decade after the Battle of Milvian BridgeThere are some indications that Constantine may have seen the Christian God as a form of Sol Invictus. The Christian writer Optatus of Milevis preserves in his book Against the Donatists a portion of a letter that Constantine wrote in 314 AD to the bishops of the city of Arles. In this letter, Constantine describes his Christian faith using solar language. For instance, at one point, Constantine writes this, as translated by Mark Edwards:“The eternal and incomprehensible goodness of our God will by no means allow the human condition to carry on straying in error, nor does it permit the abhorrent wishes of certain men to prevail to such a degree that he fails to open up for them with his most brilliant beams a way of salvation by which they may be converted to the rule of righteousness.”“This indeed I have learnt by many examples, but I measure these by myself. For there were initially in me many obvious defects in righteousness, nor did I believe that the supernal power saw any of those things that I did in the secrecy of my heart.”“So then, what lot awaited these offences of which I have spoken? Obviously that which abounds with all ills. But Almighty God who sits in the vantage-point of heaven bestowed upon me what I did not deserve; it is certainly impossible to tell or enumerate those benefits that his heavenly benevolence has vouchsafed to his servant.”Notice how Constantine says that God has “most brilliant beams” and that he “sits in the vantage-point of heaven.” Both of these are qualities that are traditionally associated with the sun.Constantine was also apparently perfectly happy to let people worship him as a god. A rescript from the town of Spello in Italy dated to between c. 326 and c. 335 AD records that the town requested Constantine to rename their town after a member of his family and grant them permission to build a pagan temple to him. Constantine granted the request. Consequently, the town was renamed Flavia Constans and a new temple to Constantine was constructed.Finally, although Constantine is venerated in many Christian denominations today as a saint, his personal conduct was anything but saintly. He fought many battles and he was brutal towards the people he defeated. His cruelty even extended to his own family; in 326 AD, he executed both his eldest son Crispus and his wife Fausta for unknown reasons and had all official records of their existence expunged.This doesn’t mean that Constantine was a pagan imposter who was merely posing as a Christian (as some Evangelical Protestants have occasionally suggested), but it does mean that his religious beliefs were complicated.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of the colossal head of the emperor Constantine I in the Capitoline MuseumsConstantine I and the First Council of NicaeaConstantine I did convene the First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD to resolve the conflict between Arianism and Trinitarianism that was tearing the Christian church apart, but he was present at the council only as an observer and he left the actual decision-making part of the council to the bishops.Furthermore, as I discuss in this article I published in August 2019, contrary to popular belief, neither Constantine I nor the First Council of Nicaea were responsible for determining which books were going to be included in the New Testament canon. In reality, the New Testament canon was mostly established by the end of the second century AD and what lingering questions there were about the canon in Constantine I’s time weren’t resolved until long after his death.Ultimately, the First Council of Nicaea resulted in the verdict that Arianism was heretical and that Trinitarianism was the correct doctrine. The council, however, didn’t bring an end to the conflict between Arians and Trinitarians in any sense. Honestly, it probably just exacerbated the conflict even further.One thing that is worth noting about the council for our purposes is the fact that both the Arians and the Trinitarians relied on both scriptural arguments and philosophical arguments to support their cases. The importance that philosophical arguments held in early Christianity is partly the result of Greek influence.ABOVE: Greek Orthodox icon from the Megalo Meteoron Monastery in Greece, showing the artist’s imagining of Constantine I at the First Council of NicaeaConstantine’s death and successorsConstantine was baptized by the Arian Christian bishop Eusebios of Nikomedeia when he was on his deathbed. He died as a fully baptized Christian on 22 May 337. His body was laid to rest with a Christian burial service in the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople. Perhaps surprisingly, however, he was also posthumously deified in the manner traditional for Roman emperors.He was succeeded by his three sons Constantine II, Constantius II, and Constans. Under their joint rule, traditional religions were tolerated—just as they had been under Constantine I. Constantine II died in 340 AD and Constans was assassinated in 350 AD, leading Constantius II to become sole emperor.After he became sole emperor, Constantius II began to implement some somewhat stricter policies against traditional religions. In 353 AD, he banned public sacrifices to the traditional deities, ordering the death penalty for those who violated this ban. He also prosecuted astrologers, magicians, soothsayers, and those who claimed to possess divination abilities. In 357 AD, Constantius II also ordered the removal of the Altar of Victory from the curia of the Senate.Constantius II’s policies, though, were actually fairly moderate. They were generally not directed towards eradicating traditional religion in general, but rather towards abolishing certain practices that even many practitioners of traditional religion by this time did not approve of. After his death in 361 AD, Constantius II was declared to be a god, just like his father Constantine I.Constantius II’s successor Julian, who had been raised as a Christian but abandoned the religion in adulthood, tried to promote a form of Neoplatonic Hellenism and revive traditional Greek and Roman religious practices. For this reason, he has become known to history as “Julian the Apostate.” Julian gained something of a reputation as a “philosopher king,” but he ultimately died on 23 June 363 AD while campaigning against the Sassanians. His successor Jovian was a Christian, making Julian the last non-Christian emperor of the whole Roman Empire.ABOVE: Julian the Apostate Presiding at a Conference of Sectarians, painted in 1875 by the English Academic painter Edward ArmitageJovian was succeeded by Valentinian I, who appointed his brother Valens, an Arian Christian, as emperor of the eastern Empire. Both Valentinian I and Valens were generally tolerant towards non-Christians. After Valentinian I died in 375 AD, though, he was succeeded by his sixteen-year-old son Gratian and his four-year-old son Valentinian II.Gratian, under the influence of Ambrosius, the bishop of Milan, began to implement more stringent policies against traditional religion. He was the first emperor to refuse the title of pontifex maximus. He also shut down all temples to the traditional deities and confiscated their funds. He removed the Altar of Victory, which had been restored to the curia under Julian.Valens was killed in the Battle of Adrianople on 9 August 378 AD, leading Gratian to become the senior augustus of the whole Roman Empire. In 379 AD, Gratian appointed Theodosius I, who would later become known for his harsh policies against traditional religion, as emperor of the eastern Roman Empire.It was not until over half a century after Constantine I’s death that Nicene Christianity was finally effectively declared the official religion of the Roman Empire through the Edict of Thessalonica, which was issued on 27 February 380 AD as a joint declaration by Gratian, Theodosius I, and Valentinian II. This edict declared Nicene Christianity the One True Religion and denounced those who did not hold to Nicene Christianity as “foolish madmen.”Theodosius I became emperor of the whole Roman Empire upon the death of Valentinian II in 392 AD. He issued decrees reiterating the ban on public sacrifices to the traditional deities and the closure of all temples to the traditional deities. He did nothing to prevent Christians from vandalizing or demolishing the temples that were now officially closed. He also took away money that had been given to temples to the traditional deities, disbanded the Vestal Virgins, ended the Eleusinian Mysteries, and discontinued the Olympic Games.Nonetheless, even Theodosius I did not prohibit people from worshipping the traditional deities in private and many people continued to worship the traditional deities on their own without the public sacrifices and temples that had been so important to worshippers of earlier generations.ABOVE: Photograph of a copy of the Missorium of Theodosius I, a ceremonial silver dish proabbly made in around 388 ADChristian destruction of pagan temples and statues?Some prominent temples to the traditional deities were destroyed during the reign of Theodosius I. For instance, the Temple of Apollon at Delphi was mostly demolished by Christians in 390 AD, although its impressive foundations remain. In 391 AD, a group of Christians led by the bishop Theophilos I of Alexandria demolished the Serapeion, a temple to the Greco-Egyptian god Serapis in the city of Alexandria.Most temples to the traditional deities, though, were either simply abandoned or converted into Christian churches. For instance, the Parthenon in Athens was originally built in the fifth century BC as a temple to the virgin goddess Athena, but, in the late sixth century AD, it was converted into a Christian church to the Virgin Mary.Likewise, the Temple of Hephaistos in the Athenian Agora became a church of Saint Georgios Akamates and even remained in use as a church until the establishment of the modern nation-state of Greece in the nineteenth century.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of the remains of the Temple of Apollon at Delphi, which was mostly demolished by Christians in around 390 ADABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of the ruins of the Serapeion in Alexandria todaySome statues of the traditional deities were destroyed or vandalized. For instance, there is a head of the goddess Aphrodite from the Athenian Agora now on display in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens with a cross chiseled into her forehead. Likewise, when Theophilos I and his followers destroyed the Serapeion, they also destroyed the cult statues it contained.Nonetheless, the vast majority of pagan statues were left alone. In fact, as I discuss in this article from January 2020, Constantine I actually decorated the city of Constantinople with cult statues from various traditional temples. Many of those statues put on display by Constantine I remained on display in the city until it was sacked by the Crusaders in 1204 AD.As I discuss in this article from July 2019, some people have a tendency to blame any damage they see on any ancient sculpture on early Christian vandalism, but the vast majority of the damage we see on ancient sculptures is actually the result of natural wear. Indeed, it is the same kind of wear we see on other sculptures of similar age from other cultures around the world.The reason why we often see statues with missing noses or missing limbs is because parts of statues that stick out are more likely to break off or get damaged if the statue falls over or gets bumped with something heavy. Marble can be a surprisingly brittle material.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of a famous head of Aphrodite from the Athenian Agora with a cross carved into her forehead, one of a handful of surviving examples of ancient sculptures vandalized by early ChristiansHypatia’s murder debunkedThere were isolated instances of violence against practitioners of traditional religion. Most famously, in March 415 AD, the pagan Neoplatonic philosopher Hypatia of Alexandria was brutally murdered by a group of supporters of Cyril, the bishop of Alexandria. As I discuss in this article from August 2018 and this article from February 2020, however, Hypatia’s murder is often misrepresented.In popular culture, Hypatia is usually portrayed as having been murdered because she was a pagan or because she was a philosopher, but, in reality, as far as we can tell from the surviving contemporary sources, Hypatia was actually primarily murdered due to her involvement in a bitter political feud between Cyril and Orestes, the Roman governor of Egypt. In other words, her murder was really more of a political assassination than anything else.Furthermore, Hypatia’s assassination was widely viewed as an atrocity by both Christians and non-Christians alike. Every single Christian writer who wrote about it within a hundred years after it happened deplores it as a horrific crime. The contemporary Christian church historian Sokrates Scholastikos (lived c. 380 – after c. 439 AD) praises Hypatia in his Ecclesiastical History 7.15 as a great intellectual and a shining beacon of virtue to the whole Alexandrian community. This is how he describes the reaction to her murder, as translated by A. C. Zenos:“This affair [i.e. the murder of Hypatia] brought not the least opprobrium, not only upon Cyril, but also upon the whole Alexandrian church. And surely nothing can be farther from the spirit of Christianity than the allowance of massacres, fights, and transactions of that sort.”Although no one was ever punished for Hypatia’s murder, shortly after it happened, a law was amended to expressly forbid violence against non-Christians.ABOVE: Imaginative illustration of the death of Hypatia by Louis Figuier from 1866 depicting how the artist imagined it might have lookedChristians destroying pagan texts?There is a popular notion that early Christians went around destroying pre-Christian texts. The most common version of this story claims that Christians deliberately destroyed the Great Library of Alexandria. This is certainly not true, however. We don’t know exactly when the Library of Alexandria ceased to exist, but there is no way it could have survived any later than the third century AD.In 272 AD, the forces of the emperor Aurelian inadvertently destroyed the entire Brouchion quarter of Alexandria where the Library of Alexandria had been located as part of the emperor’s campaign to recapture the city of Alexandria from the Palmyrene Empire. if the Library of Alexandria still existed at that time, it certainly would have been destroyed.As I explain in this article from July 2019, the idea of militant Christians destroying the Library of Alexandria comes from the conflation of the Great Library with the Serapeion, a temple in Alexandria to the god Serapis that at one point had housed some scrolls from the Great Library. The Serapeion was destroyed by a group of Christians in 391 AD. The Roman writer Ammianus Marcellinus (lived c. 330 – after c. 391 AD), however, who wrote about the Serapeion’s collections shortly before the temple’s destruction, speaks of them in the past tense, implying they no longer existed.We also have multiple accounts of the Serapeion’s destruction, including an account by Eunapios, a pagan philosopher who hated Christians, and none of the accounts mention anything at all about scrolls being destroyed when the Serapeion was demolished. If scrolls had been destroyed, we must imagine Eunapios surely would have mentioned this. All the evidence suggests that the Serapeion probably did not contain at large number of scrolls at the time of its destruction.ABOVE: Color illumination from the Alexandrian World Chronicle, dating to the fifth or sixth century AD, illustrating the destruction of the Serapeion in 391 AD. The man on the left is Theophilos, the bishop of Alexandria from 384 until 412.There is also popular legend claiming that Christians intentionally destroyed all the poems of the Greek poetess Sappho because they knew she was a lesbian, but, as I explain in this article from December 2019, this story originated in the Renaissance among classical scholars in western Europe and is not supported by any kind of historical evidence. In fact, all the evidence we have goes against this idea.Early Christians did intentionally destroy some ancient texts, but these were generally of three kinds: esoteric texts dealing with magic and divination, sacred writings of Christian sects that were deemed heretical, and anti-Christian polemics. We have plenty of surviving ancient magical writings, many of which are included in the Greek Magical Papyri, and plenty of surviving heretical Christian texts, such the ones from the Nag Hammadi Library.We don’t have any surviving anti-Christian polemics, but we know a lot about what anti-Christian writers were claiming thanks to Christian apologists who somewhat inadvertently preserved record of many of the accusations that were being made against early Christians by quoting them or summarizing them and arguing against them.ABOVE: Fourth-century AD magical papyrus from Egypt, written in Greek. Despite the censorship efforts of early Christians, we still have reams of this stuff.In general, early Christians were actually admirers of Greek literature and philosophy. The early Christian Church Father Ioustinos Martys (lived c. 100 – c. 165 AD) argued that “τὰ σπέρματα τοῦ λόγου” (tà spérmata toû lógou), or “the seeds of the Word,” had been planted long before the coming of Christ, meaning that Greek philosophers such as Socrates and Plato had, in fact, been unknowing Christians and that their works were divinely inspired.The Church Father Klemes of Alexandria (lived c. 150 – c. 215 AD), who was a Greek-speaking Egyptian convert to Christianity, was such an ardent fan of Greek philosophy that he regarded it as nothing short of a secondary revelation. In his treatise Stromateis 1.5, Klemes gives a famous description of what Christianity is like. He writes, as translated by William Wilson, “The way of truth is therefore one. But into it, as into a perennial river, streams flow from all sides.” The “streams” in this simile represent many different ideas from many different cultures. Certainly, Klemes saw Greek philosophy as one of those streams.The Christian theologian and scholar Origen of Alexandria (lived c. 184 – c. 253 AD) was, like Klemes, deeply learned about Greek philosophy and literature and he taught ideas from all different schools of Greek philosophy to his students. Origenes’s student Gregorios Thaumatourgos writes in his Panegyric 13, as translated by David T. Runia:“Origen considered it right for us to study philosophy in such a way that we read with utmost diligence all that has been written, both by the philosophers and the poets of old, rejecting nothing and repudiating nothing, except only what had been written by the atheists . . . who deny the existence of God or providence.”Jerome (lived c. 347 – 420 AD), the Dalmatian-born translator of the Latin Vulgate, was such an avid reader of Cicero that he tells us he feared that, on Judgement Day, God might turn him away, saying that he was a follower of Cicero, not a follower of Christ.There were a few early Christians who rejected Greek learning. The Christian apologist Tertullian (lived c. 155 – c. 240 AD), a Church Father who lived in North Africa and wrote in the Latin language, was one such individual. Tertullian famously deplored Greek philosophy as a source of heresy in chapter seven of his apologetic treatise De praescriptione haereticorum (“On the Proscription of Heretics”), writing, as translated by Peter Holmes:“Whence spring those ‘fables and endless genealogies,’ and ‘unprofitable questions,’ and ‘words which spread like a cancer?’ From all these, when the apostle would restrain us, he expressly names philosophy as that which he would have us be on our guard against. Writing to the Colossians, he says, ‘See that no one beguile you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, and contrary to the wisdom of the Holy Ghost.’ He had been at Athens, and had in his interviews (with its philosophers) become acquainted with that human wisdom which pretends to know the truth, whilst it only corrupts it, and is itself divided into its own manifold heresies, by the variety of its mutually repugnant sects. What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there between the Academy and the Church? what between heretics and Christians? Our instruction comes from ‘the porch of Solomon,’ who had himself taught that ‘the Lord should be sought in simplicity of heart.’ Away with all attempts to produce a mottled Christianity of Stoic, Platonic, and dialectic composition! We want no curious disputation after possessing Christ Jesus, no inquisition after enjoying the gospel! With our faith, we desire no further belief.”People like Tertullian, though, were a very small minority. In fact, when he wrote this passage, Tertullian was a member of the Montanist sect, which bears a certain resemblance to modern-day fundamentalist Pentecostalism and was widely viewed by other early Christians as extremist. Basically, by the standards of his age, he was a fundamentalist.ABOVE: Jerome in his Study, painted in 1480 by the Italian Renaissance scholar Domenico GhirlandaioA melding of Christianity and paganismNow, we tend to think of people in late antiquity as being either “Christian” or “pagan,” but, in reality, a lot of people were somewhere in between. There were a lot of people who worshipped the Christian God but still believed in or even still worshipped the traditional deities.The Egyptian poet Nonnos of Panopolis, who lived in around the fifth century AD, for instance, is known to have written the Dionysiaka, an massive epic poem about the adventures of the Greek god Dionysos spanning 20,426 lines over the course of forty-eight books, making it the longest surviving epic poem from classical antiquity. He also, however, wrote a poetic Paraphrase of the Gospel of John.It was once assumed that Nonnos was originally a pagan when he wrote the Dionysiaka and that he later converted to Christianity and wrote the Paraphrase of the Gospel of John, but there are indications that he actually wrote the Paraphrase of the Gospel of John first—before writing the Dionysiaka. Why would a Christian be writing a poem about Dionysos? Perhaps because the line between “Christian” and “pagan” is a bit less clear than we’ve been led to imagine.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of a statue of the Greek god Dionysos from the second century ADThen there’s the Chronograph of 354, an illustrated calendar of the year 354 AD made for a wealthy Christian man named Valentinus. The calendar was compiled and illustrated by another Christian man named Furius Dionysius Filocalus, a renowned calligrapher.The original manuscript has been lost, but several copies of it, complete with copies of the original illustrations, have survived. What’s interesting is that thoroughly pagan holidays like Saturnalia and Dies Natalis Solis Invicti are listed alongside thoroughly Christian holidays like Christmas and Easter.(On a side note, as I explain in this article from December 2019, Christmas as we celebrate it today is not “pagan” in any way. Meanwhile, as I explain in this article from April 2017 and this article from April 2020, Easter is not “pagan” either. Both of these holidays were originally Christian and, although some traditions historically associated with these holidays have been influenced by pre-Christian traditions, those traditions by and large died out long ago and most of the Christmas and Easter traditions we know today have only developed in the past two hundred years.)The illustrations in the calendar, meanwhile, are filled with traditional iconography. It contains illustrations of the months with perfectly traditional iconography. The month of December, for instance, is represented by a man in winter garb holding a torch and standing next to a table with dice and a mask hanging on the wall, representing the festival of Saturnalia that was celebrated in this month. We even see the personifications of the cities of Rome, Alexandria, Constantinople, and Trier.ABOVE: Illustration for the month of December from the Berberini Manuscript of the Chronograph of 354, showing a man with a torch, a mask, and a table with dice—all things representing major Saturnalia traditionsPagan and Christian iconographyChristians even adopted some practices from pre-Christian religions. In the traditional religions of the Mediterranean world, it was common for people to worship images of deities. Early Christians adopted this practice wholesale. Even today, in Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism, the veneration of icons representing saints and other holy figures is a common practice.Early Christians didn’t just adopt the custom of venerating images; they also adopted many aspects of the images themselves. As I discuss in this article from March 2020, the icon image of Jesus as a handsome, pale-skinned man with long, flowing hair and beard developed in late antiquity under the direct influence of traditional Greek depictions of male deities like Zeus, Serapis, and Asklepios, who were depicted in precisely this manner long before Christianity came along. Early Christian artists simply adapted the iconography to already existed and applied it to Jesus.We even have written record that early Christian artists were doing this! A fragment of a lost work written by the early sixth-century AD Greek writer Theodoros Anagnostes records a miracle story about how, in around 465 AD, God supposedly punished an artist who portrayed Jesus in a manner too closely reminiscent of the Greek god Zeus by causing his arm to wither. Theodoros Anagnostes writes, as translated by Joan E. Taylor:“A certain artist painting an image of the Lord Christ lost strength in his hand, and they say that, as instructed by a certain Hellene, he’d painted the work of the image in the appearance of the name of the Saviour, but with the hairs of the head divided in two ways, so the eyes are not covered, since by forms such as this the children of Hellenes paint Zeus, in order for the observers to recognize that instead of the Saviour the adoration is to be assigned (to Zeus), being more truly curly-locked and hairy [than Christ].”Obviously, I don’t really think that any ancient Christian artist was really punished by God for representing Jesus looking too much like Zeus, but this story does confirm what is already perfectly obvious from comparing classical Greek iconography with early Christian iconography, which is that many early Christian artists drew inspiration from older pagan models.As I talk about in this article from December 2017, much of Christian iconography in general is derived from earlier pagan iconography.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of the Otricoli Zeus, a Roman marble copy of a fourth-century BC Greek bust of the god ZeusABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of a plaster cast of a Roman marble copy of a Greek bust of the god Asklepios from the late fourth century BCABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of a Roman marble copy of a fourth-century BC Greek bust of the Greco-Egyptian god Serapis, who is shown with long, flowing hair and a beardABOVE: Christian mural painting of Jesus from the Catacomb of Commodilla, dated to the late fourth century AD, showing Jesus as a man with long, flowing hair, a beard, and a halo behind his headABOVE: Detail of the Byzantine mosaic of Jesus from the Basilica of Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, dating to c. 526 ADThe survival of traditional religionTraditional polytheism remained alive and well throughout most of the fifth century AD. Indeed, even as late as the early sixth century, there were still some people who openly worshipped the traditional deities. Most notably, the Neoplatonic philosophers Damaskios of Syria (lived c. 458 – after c. 538 AD) and Simplikios of Kilikia (lived c. 490 – c. 560 AD) lived roughly two hundred years after Constantine I, but they still openly worshipped the traditional deities.Justinian I (ruled 527 – 565 AD) really cracked down on traditional religion. He defunded the Neoplatonic Academy where Damaskios and Simplikios taught in around 529 AD, forcing the Academy to shut down and the pagan philosophers who taught there to go into exile. In around 532 AD, they sought asylum at the court of King Khosrow I of the Sassanian Empire.The next year, Khosrow I and Justinian I negotiated a peace treaty and, among the many conditions Justinian I agreed to, one was that the philosophers from Athens be allowed to return to the Roman Empire to teach and practice their religion unmolested. Justinian I agreed to this condition.ABOVE: Mosaic of Justinian I from the Basilica di San Vitale in Ravenna, Italy, dating to between 526 and 547 ADReally, though, the story of paganism doesn’t end with Damaskios and Simplikios because the influence of traditional polytheism extends far beyond their lifetimes. In some cases, Christian holy figures came to be imagined as so similar to pagan deities that it was hard to even tell the difference. We have reports that, in the 580s AD, there were pagans who commissioned icons of Jesus that looked like the Greek god Apollon that they used to venerate Apollon. When this practice was discovered, the devotees of Apollon in question were tried and put to death.Likewise, there is a legend that, supposedly, when the city of Constantinople was besieged by the Avars and the Sassanian Persians in 626 AD, the Virgin Mary appeared on the ramparts of the city, arrayed in full battle armor, clutching a spear, giving courage to the Christian inhabitants of the city. This description of Mary as a virgin warrior, though, sounds a lot more like the Greek goddess Athena than the mother of Jesus described in the gospels.Stories like these are enough to make us wonder: when Athenians in the seventh century AD went to the Parthenon to praise “the virgin,” which “virgin” did they think they were praising? Was it Athena the Virgin, the goddess who leads soldiers into battle, or was it the Mary the Virgin, mother of Jesus? Or, maybe, for some people, they were one and the same?This conflation of pagan deities and Christian holy figures continued into the modern era. When the British traveler Richard Chandler visited the site of Eleusis near Athens in around 1765, accompanied by the painter William Pars and the architect Nicholas Revett, he reported that there was ancient statue there, a Caryatid, which the locals venerated, believing it protected the crops.They called the woman the statue represented “Saint Demetra” and held that she was a Christian whose daughter had been abducted by a malicious Turk. This story is remarkable because, in ancient times, Eleusis was the site of the Eleusinian Mysteries, which centered around the story of the goddess Demeter and her daughter Persephone. Demeter was said to control the harvest and Persephone was said to have been abducted by Hades, the god of the Underworld.ABOVE: Photograph from Wikimedia Commons of a fragment of a red-figure ceramic vessel depicting Hades carrying off Persephone by force. (As I note in this article from February 2020, although some modern versions of the story have Persephone going with Hades willingly, in the original myth, Persephone was definitely abducted.)(NOTE: I have also published a version of this article on my website titled “What Was the Conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity Really Like?” Here is a link to the version of the article on my website.)

I wonder if this Question really meant to say “United Kingdom”, but I will presume it is about England in particular. An Answer about another constituent part of the United Kingdom might be different.I should specify that I am a Canadian who has lived in England. English-speaking Canadians do not have all the same issues with the English as many Americans seem too. I lived in London. You could see an American or two flounder.It would be helpful if we could specify what sort of American it is, why they are outside of the USA, what are they doing in England, for how long, do they have accompanying dependants, and how much money the American is going to have? Also, would the American have experience living outside of the USA before?England Isn't The Best Training WheelsFrom the outside, England might seem like a “soft option” for a first live abroad experience. Mostly it is not. Unless you are planning to live there permanently, you are into the Expat world. You can get a taste of Expatting from various Googleable web sites.Having lived elsewhere, away from Canada, alongside Americans, England is not the best option for a stellar American Expat experience. Some countries in the developing world are probably better. Americans get a lot of deference, although some of it is far off being sincere. There are the servants, the drivers, sort of a haze of local people that surround Expats and provide more or less useful services. If you are a single, younger, Expat male or female, you may have good access to various sexual and romantic adventures.And, Americans, in these more exotic environments, sometimes function quite well as a supportive community. Because there are so many Americans living overseas, there are very often enough in any given place to form a fair-sized community. The American Embassy or Consulate may provide some support and leadership, and there are organizations of various kinds.In England, no. Americans do not receive deference unless they are awfully rich. You can't afford servants. If you want services, generally, you have to go out and buy them retail, no helpers. (Unless you have diplomatic privileges.) Sexually and romantically, you are nobody special.And, unless you do a lot of prior research, you may not know what you do not know, and it matters. Democratic, parliamentary monarchies are a different approach to government from the American system. Laws do not get made the same way. The United Kingdom is not a fully federalized country, and England itself has nothing equivalent to states or provinces. A lot of local decisions are made by the national Parliament in London, and routine state-type services are operated by the national government. There isn't any “English constitution”. Rather, there is a partially unwritten one.From experience, English life involves a lot of “pigeon-holing”. The middle class is bigger than it used to be, but it is not the social cornerstone that America's wants to be. Rather, there is still the old-style working class, a lot of poorly-paid service workers, a lot of elderly people, people who live in traditional-type villages, the rich, and the aristocracy. (The aristocracy is not always rich. Some of the richest people in Britain are media company owners, senior bankers, investment brokers, and the owners of big corporations.)In England, I learned that there were complex rules of interaction among and between these different social groups. There isn't a “British dream”. Sometimes you cannot advance as an individual, and, instead, you self-identify with your group, and together with others in the group, seek for ways to advance the group, or defend its privileges. Some of this is seen as a “zero sum” game.The English Can Have Their Prejudices About AmericansIt is not at all an original observation, but the English can at times be insular and sometimes outright xenophobic. They have a long history of fighting with countries they don't like, and mostly winning.Despite their insularity, the English tend to have an awareness of other countries that so many Americans don't, and don't seem to want to have. After all, they historically had some very nasty people quite nearby, and also, got to “own” a bunch of others.This does not make for a calm, rational approach to foreigners. It leads to stereotypes and, again , pigeon-holing. Unfortunately, this tends to work against Americans. The English can not infrequently see Americans as arrogant, ignorant, prone to pointless violence, loud and grotesquely religious, in a down market sort of way. (When so many Americans insist on not knowing about foreign places, that is asking for it. Also, traditionally, religion in England has been established churches, with hierarchies, tight theology and well educated ministers.) The British media do offer a sizable amount of coverage in the USA. This, however, makes the stereotypes self-promoting, a nasty Senator, dubious presidential advisors, corporate sex criminals, (England has them too, but they are pretty good at keeping the nastier stuff outside of the media.), pistol-packing police, armed with surplus tanks and dressed up like a spearhead attack force, vile border situations, and above all the South. The Confederate accent can act like a trigger for some English people.I have mentioned in previous Answers, that English-speaking Canadians see these type of news feeds as well, but we also see media reports about Americans who are distraught about the situation, and it is very common to have personal interactions with Americans, to the point where you understand that most of them are nice enough people, trying to do their best.A Canadian in England wouldn't face these types of stereotypes. If you are an English-speaker, it is more like, loyal ally, people like us, the same Queen, the wise Canadians copied our parliamentary system, they have national health too, relative gunlessness, my cousin immigrated to Saskatoon, but, despite the incredible cold, he is sitting way prettier than he ever did as a working class tradesman in Huddersfield, etc. They tend to see French-Canadians as Celine Dion, and traditional peasants running around in deep snow. It makes it a lot easier to bond.But, Have A Car, Have Some Money, And It Isn't That BadEven if you are an American in England, it is still a rather civilized country. Knife crime is not a hobby for most English urbanites. There are not huge, no go areas in cities. (It is more of a question of why go. London has some delightful neighbourhoods and some quite low-crime, pleasant suburbs. Most English cities do. Why would you want to visit a run-down working class neighbourhood, or a depressing council estate, that is, a public housing district?)Without wishing to offend English people, England is not as English as it used to be, at least in terms of infrastructure. Decades ago, shopping hours were minced down. Most shopping was done in the “High Street”, the local main street, and some of the shops were aggressively quaint. Even the telephone system was quaint. (When I lived in London in our diplomatic flat with my ex-wife, it seemed like our telephone was tapped. However, at least you could hear the loud clicks and the suspected monitors chatting. But, there were so many crossed lines, so it might have just been communication at random.)It is not like that anymore. England has shopping malls, with parking, and big box stores. The supermarkets are, a lot the same, except, at least for a few more months, there is interesting stuff from Europe. Cell phones work the same, and WiFi is around. The high streets have been modernized, and, you can buy a smartphone or a tablet there. Fast food has very thoroughly arrived. If you go to a doctor or a dentist, the wallpaper might look a bit blander, but, stop worrying about the accent, and it is people with the same equipment, with comparable, reliable qualifications, doing the same thing.So, there your exported American is, in a safe neighbourhood, with reliable police services, lots of human rights, a place to get a pizza not far, and satellite cable channels on the TV. You have a partner and kids, so your own social world. It is February, and there are the English, out there rose gardening. Learn to enjoy not standing out, use your indoor voice, do not speak at all when you do not need to, talk to the folks back home on Skype, and life can be good.It Is Very Possible To Learn A Lot About The EnglishI would say to any American going to live, in any other country, anywhere, if you have that, “I don't need to know about foreign places.” attitude, you have to lose it. England is a foreign place and it is really old. The English not infrequently act and think in their various ways because certain things happened, yes, recently, but sometimes a long time ago.England is loaded up with websites. There is nothing that you cannot learn about the place. If you, the American, know you are going to go there, you can make your new life much, much easier, if you do a lot of reading up first. You can Google anything about England, and you will get the hits. If you know where you are going to live, learn some local history and find out about the local problems. Check how the people there voted in the last national election, and whether or not the locals supported to Brexit.And, cautions to Americans who are more conservative. You are off to a place where a lot of people don't think that religion matters, except maybe the beautiful stained glass windows. You are likely going to meet people who really believe in real socialism, not just some better welfare programmes. And, the English tend to be up front about sex, and a lot of the kids will want to start doing it just as soon as they can. My advice is, judge not. You are foreigners living in foreign world. North Carolina will still be there for you when you go back.And, American progressives, do not get your hopes up. English people who seem well to the left can reject multiculturalism and may not praise diversity. Political correctness has not caught on. Even left-wingers in England can be isolationist, and not feel much if any solidarity with the European mainland left. It is sort of socialism in one country. And, even if you see yourself as very progressive and very respectful, do not expect a lot of dialogue. Working class English-people know if you are middle class, and university educated. They may not be willing to see you as sincere, and may not want to talk with you. The Labour Party to a big extent owns left-progressive thought in England, and sets a lot of the rules. The “space” for progressives who are not party members, is kind of limited.It Takes A Lot of WorkThe English can take an awful lot of time to understand, and socializing is not easy. Before I was married, I had access into English life, and a lot of guidance, via the Jewish community. Otherwise, I am not sure what I would have done.But, it does help an awful lot, if you at least know enough to ask English people informed questions. They will know that you made the effort, and they will like it. In my experience, that is the best way that an American can break free of the negative stereotyping, and have a far better chance to know the English people as individuals.Martin Levine

No there is no such consensus as thousands of leading scientists debunk the theory.The work of the UN IPCC admitted openly is less focused on the environment and real climate science , rather it is more a project in economics and wealth distribution with the fear of global warming the cat’s paw to gain supporters.The Working Group #1 of the UN IPCC failed in 1995 with their first major report to find evidence of anthropogenic climate change that could be discerned apart from natural variability. This is critical to seen that the radical view of human caused warming is not settled science. The full story well documented in Bernie Lewin’s recent book.Why this history of the IPCC machinations is so important. E. Calvin BeisnerCompelling historyReviewed in the United States on January 18, 2020Anyone who thinks the science behind global warming alarmism it's simple, objective, empirically sound science in action needs to read this book. The political and financial forces driving toward alarmist conclusions about climate change have been powerful for generations, and that have resulted in scientific claims that go far beyond the evidence. Those in turn have led to government policies that go far beyond not only the science but also the economics, and threaten to undermine the prospects uplifting the world's remaining poor out of their poverty and suffering.The UN are guilty of a swindle about human made climate change as they doctored the key scientific working group report in 1995. The sordid story is presented objectively by Bernie Lewin in his book SEARCHING FOR THE CATASTROPHE SIGNAL.The UN climate science working group of 2000 experts said this when they made their report in 1995. They said we do not have scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change.In the 1995 2nd Assessment Report of the UN IPCC the scientists included these three statements in the draft:1. “None of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed (climate) changes to the specific cause of increases in greenhouse gases.”2. “No study to date has positively attributed all or part (of observed climate change) to anthropogenic (i.e. man-made) causes.”3. “Any claims of positive detection of significant climate change are likely to remain controversial until uncertainties in the natural variability of the climate system are reducedThe IPCC Working group presented details of the uncertainty about human caused climate that focused mostly on the fact the Co2 thesis is overwhelmed by natural variation and climate history. Here are details in their report where evidence is uncertain.Environment blogClimate changeFriday, December 19, 201497 Articles Refuting The "97% Consensus"The 97% "consensus" study, Cook et al. (2013) has been thoroughly refuted in scholarly peer-reviewed journals, by major news media, public policy organizations and think tanks, highly credentialed scientists and extensively in the climate blogosphere. The shoddy methodology of Cook's study has been shown to be so fatally flawed that well known climate scientists have publicly spoken out against it,"The '97% consensus' article is poorly conceived, poorly designed and poorly executed. It obscures the complexities of the climate issue and it is a sign of the desperately poor level of public and policy debate in this country [UK] that the energy minister should cite it."- Mike Hulme, Ph.D. Professor of Climate Change, University of East Anglia (UEA)The following is a list of 97 articles that refute Cook's (poorly conceived, poorly designed and poorly executed) 97% "consensus" study. The fact that anyone continues to bring up such soundly debunked nonsense like Cook's study is an embarrassment to science.Summary: Cook et al. (2013) attempted to categorize 11,944 abstracts [brief summaries] of papers (not entire papers) to their level of endorsement of AGW and found 7930 (66%) held no position on AGW. While only 64 papers (0.5%) explicitly endorsed and quantified AGW as +50% (humans are the primary cause). A later analysis by Legates et al. (2013) found there to be only 41 papers (0.3%) that supported this definition. Cook et al.'s methodology was so fatally flawed that they falsely classified skeptic papers as endorsing the 97% consensus, apparently believing to know more about the papers than their authors. The second part of Cook et al. (2013), the author self-ratings simply confirmed the worthlessness of their methodology, as they were not representative of the sample since only 4% of the authors (1189 of 29,083) rated their own papers and of these 63% disagreed with the abstract ratings.Methodology: The data (11,944 abstracts) used in Cook et al. (2013) came from searching the Web of Science database for results containing the key phrases "global warming" or "global climate change" regardless of what type of publication they appeared in or the context those phrases were used. Only a small minority of these were actually published in climate science journals, instead the publications included ones like the International Journal Of Vehicle Design, Livestock Science and Waste Management. The results were not even analyzed by scientists but rather amateur environmental activists with credentials such as "zoo volunteer" (co-author Bärbel Winkler) and "scuba diving" (co-author Rob Painting) who were chosen by the lead author John Cook (a cartoonist) because they all comment on his deceptively named, partisan alarmist blog 'Skeptical Science' and could be counted on to push his manufactured talking point.Peer-review: Cook et al. (2013) was published in the journal Environmental Research Letters (ERL) which conveniently has multiple outspoken alarmist scientists on its editorial board (e.g. Peter Gleick and Stefan Rahmstorf) where the paper likely received substandard "pal-review" instead of the more rigorous peer-review.Update: The paper has since been refuted five times in the scholarly literature by Legates et al. (2013), Tol (2014a), Tol (2014b), Dean (2015) and Tol (2016).* All the other "97% consensus" studies: e.g. Doran & Zimmerman (2009), Anderegg et al. (2010) and Oreskes (2004) have been refuted by peer-review.Popular Technology.netThe claim of a 97% consensus on global warming does not stand upConsensus is irrelevant in science. There are plenty of examples in history where everyone agreed and everyone was wrongRichard Tol: 'There is disagreement on the extent to which humans contributed to the observed warming. This is part and parcel of a healthy scientific debate.' Photograph: Frank Augstein/AP Photograph: Frank Augstein/APRichard TolFri 6 Jun 2014 15.59 BST971The claim of a 97% consensus on global warming does not stand up | Richard TolDana Nuccitelli writes that I “accidentally confirm the results of last year’s 97% global warming consensus study”. Nothing could be further from the truth.I show that the 97% consensus claim does not stand up.Cook and co selected some 12,000 papers from the scientific literature to test whether these papers support the hypothesis that humans played a substantial role in the observed warming of the Earth. 12,000 is a strange number. The climate literature is much larger. The number of papers on the detection and attribution of climate change is much, much smaller.Cook’s sample is not representative. Any conclusion they draw is not about “the literature” but rather about the papers they happened to find.Most of the papers they studied are not about climate change and its causes, but many were taken as evidence nonetheless. Papers on carbon taxes naturally assume that carbon dioxide emissions cause global warming – but assumptions are not conclusions. Cook’s claim of an increasing consensus over time is entirely due to an increase of the number of irrelevant papers that Cook and co mistook for evidence.The abstracts of the 12,000 papers were rated, twice, by 24 volunteers. Twelve rapidly dropped out, leaving an enormous task for the rest. This shows. There are patterns in the data that suggest that raters may have fallen asleep with their nose on the keyboard. In July 2013, Mr Cook claimed to have data that showed this is not the case. In May 2014, he claimed that data never existed.The data is also ridden with error. By Cook’s own calculations, 7% of the ratings are wrong. Spot checks suggest a much larger number of errors, up to one-third.Cook tried to validate the results by having authors rate their own papers. In almost two out of three cases, the author disagreed with Cook’s team about the message of the paper in question.Attempts to obtain Cook’s data for independent verification have been in vain. Cook sometimes claims that the raters are interviewees who are entitled to privacy – but the raters were never asked any personal detail. At other times, Cook claims that the raters are not interviewees but interviewers.The 97% consensus paper rests on yet another claim: the raters are incidental, it is the rated papers that matter. If you measure temperature, you make sure that your thermometers are all properly and consistently calibrated. Unfortunately, although he does have the data, Cook does not test whether the raters judge the same paper in the same way.Consensus is irrelevant in science. There are plenty of examples in history where everyone agreed and everyone was wrong. Cook’s consensus is also irrelevant in policy. They try to show that climate change is real and human-made. It is does not follow whether and by how much greenhouse gas emissions should be reduced.The debate on climate policy is polarised, often using discussions about climate science as a proxy. People who want to argue that climate researchers are secretive and incompetent only have to point to the 97% consensus paper.On 29 May, the Committee on Science, Space and Technology of the US House of Representatives examined the procedures of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.Having been active in the IPCC since 1994, serving in various roles in all its three working groups, most recently as a convening lead author for the fifth assessment report of working group II, my testimony to the committee briefly reiterated some of the mistakes made in the fifth assessment report but focused on the structural faults in the IPCC, notably the selection of authors and staff, the weaknesses in the review process, and the competition for attention between chapters. I highlighted that the IPCC is a natural monopoly that is largely unregulated. I recommended that its assessment reports be replaced by an assessment journal.In an article on 2 June, Nuccitelli ignores the subject matter of the hearing, focusing instead on a brief interaction about the 97% consensus paper co-authored by… Nuccitelli. He unfortunately missed the gist of my criticism of his work.Successive literature reviews, including the ones by the IPCC, have time and again established that there has been substantial climate change over the last one and a half centuries and that humans caused a large share of that climate change.There is disagreement, of course, particularly on the extent to which humans contributed to the observed warming. This is part and parcel of a healthy scientific debate. There is widespread agreement, though, that climate change is real and human-made.I believe Nuccitelli and colleagues are wrong about a number of issues. Mistakenly thinking that agreement on the basic facts of climate change would induce agreement on climate policy, Nuccitelli and colleagues tried to quantify the consensus, and failed.In his defence, Nuccitelli argues that I do not dispute their main result. Nuccitelli fundamentally misunderstands research. Science is not a set of results. Science is a method. If the method is wrong, the results are worthless.Nuccitelli’s pieces are two of a series of articles published in the Guardian impugning my character and my work. Nuccitelli falsely accuses me of journal shopping, a despicable practice.The theologist Michael Rosenberger has described climate protection as a new religion, based on a fear for the apocalypse, with dogmas, heretics and inquisitors like Nuccitelli. I prefer my politics secular and my science sound.Richard Tol is a professor of economics at the University of SussexCO2 is too minute, too variable and not correlated with temperature because it lags not precedes temperature rise. CO2 has no climate effect and is essential to plant life through photosynthesis. We need more CO2 for greening the earth not less.Science unlike politics and religion is based on doubt and skepticism therefore the very idea of finding consensus in evaluating a new and controversial theory like AGW is a false and antiscientific. Therefore, when alarmists talk consensus this is a tip off they are covering up disputed and shoddy science by the laughable claim “the science is settled. “Here in Nakamura, we have a highly qualified and experienced climate modeler with impeccable credentials rejecting the unscientific bases of the climate crisis claims. But he’s up against it — activists are winning at the moment, and they’re fronted by scared, crying children; an unstoppable combination, one that’s tricky to discredit without looking like a heartless bastard (I’ve tried).I published an answer to a similar question recently. See - James Matkin's answer to Is there really scientific consensus that man-made climate change is actually happening?Leading scientists around the world are petitioning governments that there is no climate crisis for them to address. 500 scientists signed this European Climate Declaration as one example. 90 well known Italian scientists added their further petition.Science is not in the consensus business like politics and religion. Doubt is the engine of science. This means just one brilliant skeptic can undo poor research and conventional wisdom.Here is an example of a cogent attack that debunks anthropogenic climate change.ANOTHER CLIMATE SCIENTIST WITH IMPECCABLE CREDENTIALS BREAKS RANKS: “OUR MODELS ARE MICKEY-MOUSE MOCKERIES OF THE REAL WORLD”kikoukagakushanokokuhaku chikyuuonndannkahamikennshounokasetsu: Confessions of a climate scientist The global warming hypothesis is an unproven hypothesis (Japanese Edition) Kindle EditionbyNakamura Mototaka(Author)ArticlesGSMANOTHER CLIMATE SCIENTIST WITH IMPECCABLE CREDENTIALS BREAKS RANKS: “OUR MODELS ARE MICKEY-MOUSE MOCKERIES OF THE REAL WORLD”SEPTEMBER 26, 2019CAP ALLONDr. Mototaka Nakamura received a Doctorate of Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and for nearly 25 years specialized in abnormal weather and climate change at prestigious institutions that included MIT, Georgia Institute of Technology, NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, JAMSTEC and Duke University.In his bookThe Global Warming Hypothesis is an Unproven Hypothesis, Dr. Nakamura explains why the data foundation underpinning global warming science is “untrustworthy” and cannot be relied on:“Global mean temperatures before 1980 are based on untrustworthy data,” writes Nakamura. “Before full planet surface observation by satellite began in 1980, only a small part of the Earth had been observed for temperatures with only a certain amount of accuracy and frequency. Across the globe, only North America and Western Europe have trustworthy temperature data dating back to the 19th century.”From 1990 to 2014, Nakamura worked on cloud dynamics and forces mixing atmospheric and ocean flows on medium to planetary scales. His bases were MIT (for a Doctor of Science in meteorology), Georgia Institute of Technology, Goddard Space Flight Center, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Duke and Hawaii Universities and the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology.He’s published 20+ climate papers on fluid dynamics.There is no questioning his credibility or knowledge.Today’s ‘global warming science’ is akin to an upside down pyramid which is built on the work of a few climate modelers. These AGW pioneers claim to have demonstrated human-derived CO2 emissions as the cause of recently rising temperatures and have then simply projected that warming forward. Every climate researcher thereafter has taken the results of these original models as a given, and we’re even at the stage now where merely testing their validity is regarded as heresy.Here in Nakamura, we have a highly qualified and experienced climate modeler with impeccable credentials rejecting the unscientific bases of the climate crisis claims. But he’s up against it — activists are winning at the moment, and they’re fronted by scared, crying children; an unstoppable combination, one that’s tricky to discredit without looking like a heartless bastard (I’ve tried).Climate scientist Dr. Mototaka Nakamura’s recent book blasts global warming data as “untrustworthy” and “falsified”.DATA FALSIFICATIONWhen arguing against global warming, the hardest thing I find is convincing people of data falsification, namely temperature fudging. If you don’t pick your words carefully, forget some of the facts, or get your tone wrong then it’s very easy to sound like a conspiracy crank (I’ve been there, too).But now we have Nakamura.The good doctor has accused the orthodox scientists of “data falsification” in the form adjusting historical temperature data down to inflate today’s subtle warming trend — something Tony Heller has been proving for years on his websiterealclimatescience.com.Nakamura writes: “The global surface mean temperature-change data no longer have any scientific value and are nothing except a propaganda tool to the public.”The climate models are useful tools for academic studies, he admits. However: “The models just become useless pieces of junk or worse (as they can produce gravely misleading output) when they are used for climate forecasting.”Climate forecasting is simply not possible, Nakamura concludes, and the impacts of human-caused CO2 can’t be judged with the knowledge and technology we currently possess.The models grossly simplify the way the climate works.As well as ignoring the sun, they also drastically simplify large and small-scale ocean dynamics, aerosol changes that generate clouds (cloud cover is one of the key factors determining whether we have global warming or global cooling), the drivers of ice-albedo: “Without a reasonably accurate representation, it is impossible to make any meaningful predictions of climate variations and changes in the middle and high latitudes and thus the entire planet,” and water vapor.The climate forecasts also suffer from arbitrary “tunings” of key parameters that are simply not understood.NAKAMURA ON CO2He writes:“The real or realistically-simulated climate system is far more complex than an absurdly simple system simulated by the toys that have been used for climate predictions to date, and will be insurmountably difficult for those naive climate researchers who have zero or very limited understanding of geophysical fluid dynamics. The dynamics of the atmosphere and oceans are absolutely critical facets of the climate system if one hopes to ever make any meaningful prediction of climate variation.”Solar input is modeled as a “never changing quantity,” which is absurd.“It has only been several decades since we acquired an ability to accurately monitor the incoming solar energy. In these several decades only, it has varied by one to two watts per square meter. Is it reasonable to assume that it will not vary any more than that in the next hundred years or longer for forecasting purposes? I would say, No.”Read Mototaka Nakamura’s book for free onKindleSUPERB Demolition Of The ‘97% Consensus’ MythPosted: June 10, 2020 | Author: Jamie Spry |It’s time for us all to recognize the 97% con game | CFACT“The data doesn’t matter. We’re not basing our recommendationson the data. We’re basing them on the climate models.”– Prof. Chris Folland,Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research“The models are convenient fictionsthat provide something very useful.”– Dr David Frame,Climate modeller, Oxford University***A must watch demolition of the “97% Consensus” myth. Ping this to anyone claiming that there is a scientific consensus on CO₂ as the primary driver of earth’s climate.Via Clear Energy Alliance :97 Percent of scientists believe in catastrophic human caused climate change? Of course not! But far too many believe this ridiculous statement that defies basic logic and observation. (Can you think of any highly-political issue where you could get even 65% agreement?) The 97% Myth has succeeded in fooling many people because the phony number is repeated over and over again by those who have a financial and/or ideological stake in the outcome. By the way, what any scientist “believes’ doesn’t matter anyway. Science is what happens during rigorous and repeated experimentation.VISIT Clear Energy Alliance https://clearenergyalliance.com/***SALIENT reminders about “consensus” from science legend, Michael Crichton :“There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period.”― Michael Crichton“I would remind you to notice where the claim of consensus is invoked. Consensus is invoked only in situations where the science is not solid enough. Nobody says the consensus of scientists agrees that E=mc2. Nobody says the consensus is that the sun is 93 million miles away. It would never occur to anyone to speak that way.”― Michael Crichton“Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.”― Michael CrichtonMUST READ CRICHTON :Fear, Complexity and Environmental Management in the 21st Century (Michael Crichton) | ClimatismNew lists are published that debunks the notion of any overwhelming scientific consensus and human made global warming.Articles“THE LIST” — SCIENTISTS WHO PUBLICLY DISAGREE WITH THE CURRENT CONSENSUS ON CLIMATE CHANGEDECEMBER 20, 2018 CAP ALLONFor those still blindly banging the 97% drum, here’s an in-no-way-comprehensive list of the SCIENTISTS who publicly disagree with the current consensus on climate change.There are currently 85 names on the list, though it is embryonic and dynamic. Suggestions for omissions and/or additions can be added to the comment section below and, if validated, will –eventually– serve to update the list.SCIENTISTS ARGUING THAT GLOBAL WARMING IS PRIMARILY CAUSED BY NATURAL PROCESSES— scientists that have called the observed warming attributable to natural causes, i.e. the high solar activity witnessed over the last few decades.Khabibullo Abdusamatov, astrophysicist at Pulkovo Observatory of the Russian Academy of Sciences.[81][82]Sallie Baliunas, retired astrophysicist, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.[83][84][85]Timothy Ball, historical climatologist, and retired professor of geography at the University of Winnipeg.[86][87][88]Ian Clark, hydrogeologist, professor, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa.[89][90]Vincent Courtillot, geophysicist, member of the French Academy of Sciences.[91]Doug Edmeades, PhD., soil scientist, officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit.[92]David Dilley, B.S. and M.S. in meteorology, CEO Global Weather Oscillations Inc. [198][199]David Douglass, solid-state physicist, professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester.[93][94]Don Easterbrook, emeritus professor of geology, Western Washington University.[95][96]William Happer, physicist specializing in optics and spectroscopy; emeritus professor, Princeton University.[39][97]Victor Manuel Velasco Herrera, Theoretical Physicist and Researcher, Institute of Geophysics of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.[98]Ole Humlum, professor of geology at the University of Oslo.[99][100]Wibjörn Karlén, professor emeritus of geography and geology at the University of Stockholm.[101][102]William Kininmonth, meteorologist, former Australian delegate to World Meteorological Organization Commission for Climatology.[103][104]David Legates, associate professor of geography and director of the Center for Climatic Research, University of Delaware.[105][106]Anthony Lupo, professor of atmospheric science at the University of Missouri.[107][108]Jennifer Marohasy, an Australian biologist, former director of the Australian Environment Foundation.[109][110]Tad Murty, oceanographer; adjunct professor, Departments of Civil Engineering and Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa.[111][112]Tim Patterson, paleoclimatologist and professor of geology at Carleton University in Canada.[113][114]Ian Plimer, professor emeritus of mining geology, the University of Adelaide.[115][116]Arthur B. Robinson, American politician, biochemist and former faculty member at the University of California, San Diego.[117][118]Murry Salby, atmospheric scientist, former professor at Macquarie University and University of Colorado.[119][120]Nicola Scafetta, research scientist in the physics department at Duke University.[121][122][123]Tom Segalstad, geologist; associate professor at University of Oslo.[124][125]Nedialko (Ned) T. Nikolov, PhD in Ecological Modelling, physical scientist for the U.S. Forest Service [200]Nir Shaviv, professor of physics focusing on astrophysics and climate science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.[126][127]Fred Singer, professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia.[128][129][130][131]Willie Soon, astrophysicist, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.[132][133]Roy Spencer, meteorologist; principal research scientist, University of Alabama in Huntsville.[134][135]Henrik Svensmark, physicist, Danish National Space Center.[136][137]George H. Taylor, retired director of the Oregon Climate Service at Oregon State University.[138][139]Jan Veizer, environmental geochemist, professor emeritus from University of Ottawa.[140][141]SCIENTISTS PUBLICLY QUESTIONING THE ACCURACY OF IPCC CLIMATE MODELSDr. Jarl R. Ahlbeck, chemical engineer at Abo Akademi University in Finland, former Greenpeace member. [203][204]David Bellamy, botanist.[19][20][21][22]Lennart Bengtsson, meteorologist, Reading University.[23][24]Piers Corbyn, owner of the business WeatherAction which makes weather forecasts.[25][26]Susan Crockford, Zoologist, adjunct professor in Anthropology at the University of Victoria. [27][28][29]Judith Curry, professor and former chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology.[30][31][32][33]Joseph D’Aleo, past Chairman American Meteorological Society’s Committee on Weather Analysis and Forecasting, former Professor of Meteorology, Lyndon State College.[34][35][36][37]Freeman Dyson, professor emeritus of the School of Natural Sciences, Institute for Advanced Study; Fellow of the Royal Society.[38][39]Ivar Giaever, Norwegian–American physicist and Nobel laureate in physics (1973).[40]Dr. Kiminori Itoh, Ph.D., Industrial Chemistry, University of Tokyo [202]Steven E. Koonin, theoretical physicist and director of the Center for Urban Science and Progress at New York University.[41][42]Richard Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan emeritus professor of atmospheric science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and member of the National Academy of Sciences.[39][43][44][45]Craig Loehle, ecologist and chief scientist at the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement.[46][47][48][49][50][51][52]Sebastian Lüning, geologist, famed for his book The Cold Sun. [201]Ross McKitrick, professor of economics and CBE chair in sustainable commerce, University of Guelph.[53][54]Patrick Moore, former president of Greenpeace Canada.[55][56][57]Nils-Axel Mörner, retired head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics Department at Stockholm University, former chairman of the INQUA Commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution (1999–2003).[58][59]Garth Paltridge, retired chief research scientist, CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research and retired director of the Institute of the Antarctic Cooperative Research Centre, visiting fellow Australian National University.[60][61]Roger A. Pielke, Jr., professor of environmental studies at the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado at Boulder.[62][63]Denis Rancourt, former professor of physics at University of Ottawa, research scientist in condensed matter physics, and in environmental and soil science.[64][65][66][67]Harrison Schmitt, geologist, Apollo 17 astronaut, former US senator.[68][69]Peter Stilbs, professor of physical chemistry at Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm.[70][71]Philip Stott, professor emeritus of biogeography at the University of London.[72][73]Hendrik Tennekes, retired director of research, Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute.[74][75]Anastasios Tsonis, distinguished professor of atmospheric science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.[76][77]Fritz Vahrenholt, German politician and energy executive with a doctorate in chemistry.[78][79]Valentina Zharkova, professor in mathematics at Northumbria University. BSc/MSc in applied mathematics and astronomy, a Ph.D. in astrophysics.SCIENTISTS ARGUING THAT THE CAUSE OF GLOBAL WARMING IS UNKNOWNSyun-Ichi Akasofu, retired professor of geophysics and founding director of the International Arctic Research Center of the University of Alaska Fairbanks.[142][143]Claude Allègre, French politician; geochemist, emeritus professor at Institute of Geophysics (Paris).[144][145]Robert Balling, a professor of geography at Arizona State University.[146][147]Pål Brekke, solar astrophycisist, senior advisor Norwegian Space Centre.[148][149]John Christy, professor of atmospheric science and director of the Earth System Science Center at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, contributor to several IPCC reports.[150][151][152]Petr Chylek, space and remote sensing sciences researcher, Los Alamos National Laboratory.[153][154]David Deming, geology professor at the University of Oklahoma.[155][156]Stanley B. Goldenberg a meteorologist with NOAA/AOML’s Hurricane Research Division.[157][158]Vincent R. Gray, New Zealand physical chemist with expertise in coal ashes.[159][160]Keith E. Idso, botanist, former adjunct professor of biology at Maricopa County Community College District and the vice president of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change.[161][162]Kary Mullis, 1993 Nobel laureate in chemistry, inventor of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method.[163][164][165]Antonino Zichichi, emeritus professor of nuclear physics at the University of Bologna and president of the World Federation of Scientists.[166][167]SCIENTISTS ARGUING THAT GLOBAL WARMING WILL HAVE FEW NEGATIVE CONSEQUENCESIndur M. Goklany, electrical engineer, science and technology policy analyst for the United States Department of the Interior.[168][169][170]Craig D. Idso, geographer, faculty researcher, Office of Climatology, Arizona State University and founder of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change.[171][172]Sherwood B. Idso, former research physicist, USDA Water Conservation Laboratory, and adjunct professor, Arizona State University.[173][174]Patrick Michaels, senior fellow at the Cato Institute and retired research professor of environmental science at the University of Virginia.[175][176]DECEASED SCIENTISTS— who published material indicating their opposition to the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming prior to their deaths.August H. “Augie” Auer Jr. (1940–2007), retired New Zealand MetService meteorologist and past professor of atmospheric science at the University of Wyoming.[177][178]Reid Bryson (1920–2008), emeritus professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences, University of Wisconsin-Madison.[179][180]Robert M. Carter (1942–2016), former head of the School of Earth Sciences at James Cook University.[181][182]Chris de Freitas (1948–2017), associate professor, School of Geography, Geology and Environmental Science, University of Auckland.[183][184]William M. Gray (1929–2016), professor emeritus and head of the Tropical Meteorology Project, Department of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University.[185][186]Yuri Izrael (1930–2014), former chairman, Committee for Hydrometeorology (USSR); former firector, Institute of Global Climate and Ecology (Russian Academy of Science); vice-chairman of IPCC, 2001-2007.[187][188][189]Robert Jastrow (1925–2008), American astronomer, physicist, cosmologist and leading NASA scientist who, together with Fred Seitz and William Nierenberg, established the George C. Marshall Institute.[190][191][192]Harold (“Hal”) Warren Lewis (1923–2011), emeritus professor of physics and former department chairman at the University of California, Santa Barbara.[193][194]Frederick Seitz (1911–2008), solid-state physicist, former president of the National Academy of Sciences and co-founder of the George C. Marshall Institute in 1984.[195][196][197]Joanne Simpson (1923-2010), first woman in the United States to receive a Ph.D. in meteorology, [201]SPEAKING OUTA system is in place that makes it incredibly difficult, almost impossible, for scientists to take a public stance against AGW — their funding and opportunities are shutoff, their credibility and character smeared, and their safety sometimes compromised.Example: In 2014, Lennart Bengtsson and his colleagues submitted a paper to Environmental Research Letters which was rejected for publication for what Bengtsson believed to be “activist” reasons.Bengtsson’s paper disputed the uncertainties surrounding climate sensitivity to increased greenhouse gas concentrations contained in the IPCC’s Fourth and Fifth Assessment Reports.Here is a passage from Bengtsson’s resignation letter from soon after:I have been put under such an enormous group pressure in recent days from all over the world that has become virtually unbearable to me. If this is going to continue I will be unable to conduct my normal work and will even start to worry about my health and safety. I see therefore no other way out therefore than resigning from GWPF. I had not expecting such an enormous world-wide pressure put at me from a community that I have been close to all my active life. Colleagues are withdrawing their support, other colleagues are withdrawing from joint authorship etc.I see no limit and end to what will happen. It is a situation that reminds me about the time of McCarthy. I would never have expecting anything similar in such an original peaceful community as meteorology. Apparently it has been transformed in recent years.Lennart BengtssonAny person or body that holds a dissenting view or presents contradictory evidence is immediately labelled a denier — the classic ad-hominem attack designed to smear and silence those who don’t comply with the preferred wisdom of the day.If you still believe in the 97% consensus then by all means find the list of 2,748 scientist that have zero doubts regarding the IPCC’s catastrophic conclusions on Climate Change (given I’ve found 85 names effectively refuting the claims, that’s the minimum number required to reach the 97% consensus).Or go write your own list — it shouldn’t be that hard to do, if the scientists are out there.Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.Michael CrichtonAnother name I have yet to add to the list:Earth’s natural & minor warming trend (the modern Grand Solar Maximum) appears to have runs its course. The COLD TIMES are returning, the lower-latitudes are REFREEZING, in line with historically low solar activity, cloud-nucleating Cosmic Rays, and a meridional jet stream flow.Even NASA appear to agree, if you read between the lines, with their forecast for this upcoming solar cycle (25) seeing it as “the weakest of the past 200 years,” with the agency correlating previous solar shutdowns to prolonged periods of global cooling here."The List" - Scientists who Publicly Disagree with the Current Consensus on Climate Change - Electroverse