Scientists in the 1970s predicted a coming ice age

Scientists in the 1970s predicted a coming ice age
	MISLEADING
	"In the 1970s, the scientific consensus was that the Earth was heading into a new ice age, so today's warnings about global warming are just the latest scare and can be ignored."
Domain	Science & Environment
Tactic	False Context; Manipulation;
Era	Current
First seen	2000
Origin	Commentary by critics of climate science, drawing on a small number of 1970s magazine articles
Last reviewed	2026-10-26
	Further reading: books on Science & Environment

A common argument against climate science holds that scientists in the 1970s predicted a coming ice age, and that because they were wrong then, warnings about global warming today should not be trusted. The argument rests on a handful of popular magazine articles from the 1970s. A review of the scientific literature from that decade found that far more research papers predicted warming than cooling, and that there was no scientific consensus on imminent cooling. The claim has also been supported by doctored images, including a fake Time magazine cover.

The claim

The argument usually runs: "In the 1970s, scientists said we were heading for an ice age. Now they say the Earth is warming. They were wrong before, so why believe them now?"

Where it comes from

In the early 1970s, some scientists did discuss the possibility of global cooling. Global average temperatures had dipped slightly from the 1940s to the 1970s, a pattern later linked largely to sulfate pollution from industry, which reflects sunlight and cools the climate. Some researchers also studied the long-term cycles of ice ages, which suggested that, over thousands of years, Earth would eventually enter another glacial period.

A few popular magazine articles turned these discussions into dramatic predictions. The most famous was a short Newsweek article from 28 April 1975, "The Cooling World," which reported that meteorologists were concerned about a cooling trend and its possible effects on food production. Time magazine published a 1974 article titled "Another Ice Age?" These articles have been quoted ever since. The Newsweek author, Peter Gwynne, later wrote that his article had been misused and that scientists' understanding had advanced greatly.

What the scientific literature actually said

In 2008, the scientists Thomas Peterson, William Connolley and John Fleck published a review in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society of peer-reviewed climate research from 1965 to 1979. They identified 7 papers that predicted cooling, 44 that predicted warming and 20 that were neutral. Even during the period of the cooling scare, the scientific literature was dominated by research anticipating that rising carbon dioxide would warm the planet. A 1975 report by the US National Academy of Sciences concluded that scientists did not know enough to predict climate changes reliably and called for more research, not for preparation for an imminent ice age.

The fake magazine cover

In 2007, Time published a cover story on global warming, illustrated with a lone penguin and the headline "The Global Warming Survival Guide." A doctored version, altered to read "How to Survive the Coming Ice Age" and presented as a 1977 cover, circulated widely online and was shared by some public figures. Time never published such a cover in the 1970s.

What the evidence shows

There was no scientific consensus in the 1970s that an ice age was imminent. Most research of the period predicted warming from greenhouse gases, and that prediction has been borne out. The cooling concern of the early 1970s was a minority view amplified by a few popular articles, and part of the observed cooling was later explained by industrial air pollution that was subsequently reduced by clean-air laws.

The underlying logic of the argument is also flawed. Even if scientists had been wrong in the 1970s, that would not show they are wrong now. Science advances by correcting earlier views with better evidence. Climate science today rests on decades of measurements, physics and multiple independent lines of evidence far beyond what existed in the 1970s.

Bullshitopedia classifies the claim as Misleading: some scientists and some magazine articles in the 1970s did discuss cooling, but the claim of a scientific consensus is false, and it is used to support an invalid conclusion.

Lessons for readers

Magazine articles are not the same as the scientific literature. A few popular stories do not represent a consensus.
Check images of old magazine covers or documents. They are easy to fake.
"Scientists were wrong before" is not evidence that they are wrong now. Ask what evidence has changed.

Sources

Thomas C. Peterson, William M. Connolley and John Fleck, "The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus," Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 89, no. 9 (2008).
Peter Gwynne, "The Cooling World," Newsweek, 28 April 1975.
National Academy of Sciences, Understanding Climatic Change: A Program for Action (1975).
Time, "The Global Warming Survival Guide," 9 April 2007, and subsequent fact checks of the altered cover.