Someday our descendants will laugh with embarrassment at the people today who pore over weather records prepared to proclaim an existential threat from a fraction-of-1-degree rise in the average global temperature over any previous year “on record,” that is, unless the government spends trillions of dollars on a program of virtually totalitarian control of our lives. “On record” actually means “in the last century and a half” because that’s how far back “the record” goes. And that, by the way, roughly coincides with the beginning of the end of the Little Ice Age in 1850, which continues to this day. The earth of course is 4.5 billion years old.