ABSTRACT
Whoever said that the more things change, the more they stay the same was right. Martin Luther’s decision to write about indulgences in the language of the people offended members of the religious community: the monks of his acquaintance saw Luther’s action as a betrayal. Five hundred years later journalist David Wallace-Wells’ decision to tell climate change “like it is” in a mainstream magazine scandalized members of the scientific community. Wallace-Wells’ critics seem to have equated giving people the knowledge that they are in danger with telling them there is no hope and that they are doomed. On the contrary, the person who is doomed is the one who has not heard the alarm. Most of us humans are not scientists. If we are to believe a tragedy is in the offing and act in ways that make matters better and not worse, we need lots of David Wallace-Wells-like journalists.
