A tale of two Ramaswamys

This is a tale of two men with the same last name: Ramaswamy.

One of those two men, Vivek Ramaswamy, a biotech entrepreneur, was introduced to a large national audience on the evening of Aug. 23, 2023. The occasion? The first televised debate of eight candidates seeking the nomination of the Republican Party for the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

When asked a question about climate change by the debate moderators, Ramaswamy responded in this way: “Let us be honest as Republicans — I’m the only person on the stage who isn’t bought and paid for, so I can say this — the climate change agenda is a hoax.”

Clearly, “hoax” is a pejorative term. It’s concerning to hear a candidate for president of the United States — who is not a climate scientist — describe well-established science in this derogatory way.

Climate change is not a hoax. It seems strange to have to write this simple truth in August 2023, after massive wildfires in Lahaina, Canada and Europe, off-the-charts warmth in the North Atlantic, record-low Antarctic sea-ice extent, and many other extraordinary extreme events.

For decades, thousands of scientists around the world have studied the nature and causes of climate change. Their work was the subject of dozens of rigorous national and international scientific assessments. These assessments reveal that over the past 150+ years, fossil fuel burning ramped up levels of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere. This increase in greenhouse gases warmed the planet, leading to significant impacts on many things we care about. Human health. Agriculture. Water resources. Ecosystems. The economy.

The scientific evidence for human fingerprints on Earth’s climate system is now incontrovertible. The evidence is in the changing atmosphere, oceans and land surface.

One contributor to this body of scientific evidence is the second Ramaswamy I mentioned: Venkatachalam (“Ram”) Ramaswamy, the director of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory at Princeton. Ram has devoted his illustrious scientific career to the problem of trying to understand human effects on atmospheric temperature. He’s been particularly interested in studying the temperature of Earth’s upper atmosphere.

Please do not confuse these two Ramaswamys. “Ram” Ramaswamy is a brilliant climate scientist, an inspiring leader and a long-time contributor to many influential climate science assessment reports. Vivek Ramaswamy — the participant in the Republican primary debate who so publicly and incorrectly dismissed “the climate change agenda” as a “hoax” — is not a climate scientist.

In the debate, Vivek Ramaswamy adjured his fellow candidates to “be honest as Republicans.” Honesty and factual accuracy would be highly desirable, particularly on the issue of climate change — particularly if you are on a stage where millions are listening intently to each word you say.

Our best scientific understanding is that human-caused climate change is not just a serious problem for future generations — it’s a serious problem now. Using ignorant words like “hoax” to describe this problem does a disservice to all American citizens, Republican and Democrat, who are already dealing with the consequences of living on a rapidly warming planet. The willful ignorance of Vivek Ramaswamy does not only affect Americans, it harms all citizens of this planet.

Such ignorance should be disqualifying. It shows a lack of fitness to be in the running to be leader of the free world.

During the August 2023 debate, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley noted that “the American president needs to have moral clarity, needs to know the difference between right and wrong and know the difference between good and evil.”

Haley’s remarks were made in the context of the war in Ukraine; she was pushing back against calls from several other Republican candidates to curtail U.S. support for Ukraine.

But her remarks are not only applicable to the war in Ukraine. The next American president also needs moral and scientific clarity on climate change. She or he needs to know that it is wrong and dangerous to deny the reality and seriousness of climate change. She or he needs to understand that it is morally repugnant to saddle future generations with climate problems they did not create.

Let’s all hope that all politicians possess — or rapidly discover — such “moral clarity.” Until then, remember not to confuse the two Ramaswamys.

Ben Santer is a climate scientist as well as a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur fellow. He was the lead author of Chapter 8 of the 1995 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and has been a contributor to all six IPCC reports.