Climate change - Ignorance no longer an excuse

BEING a contrarian can sometimes seem attractive, it can even be lucrative. It can feed self-righteousness and encourage an affectation of difference. It may confer the questionable cachet of being apart from the herd.

Equally, being a contrarian is sometimes the right thing to be. All of those wrongfully convicted during the last round of our Troubles – the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four and others – have reason to be thankful that a minority had the courage to confront the establishment to see that justice was done.

As the great preparation for climate change continues, there remains a minority who scoff at the received wisdom of our time even as those who warn of increasingly appalling consequences seem ever more certain of their position.