Global Warming 'Hits the Fan' Within 20 Years (by 2028)
James Lovelock, 2008: 'Enjoy Life While You Can... It's Going to Be 20 Years Before It Hits the Fan'
The Gaia scientist told the Guardian catastrophe was inevitable, offsetting was a joke and about 80% of humanity would be gone by 2100. Four years later he said he had been alarmist.
What was said
“Enjoy life while you can. Because if you're lucky it's going to be 20 years before it hits the fan.”
— James Lovelock (independent scientist, Gaia theory) · said Mar 1, 2008 · due Within 20 years of March 2008
The fine print
From Decca Aitkenhead's Guardian interview. In the same piece he 'expects "about 80%" of the world's population to be wiped out by 2100' and says: 'Prophets have been foretelling Armageddon since time began. But this is the real thing.' The Guardian summarised his book The Revenge of Gaia: 'by 2020 extreme weather will be the norm, causing global devastation; that by 2040 much of Europe will be Saharan.'
Later spin
In April 2012 he told msnbc.com he had been 'alarmist' about the timing of climate change.