Bill Gates is a bit like Norway. Norway has been a poster child for environmental concerns whilst building its climate credentials on exporting a lot of oil and carbon offshore. Mr Gates has a record as a champion of carbon reduction, built of the massive carbon contribution of computing.

But better a late convert than not one at all. And Mr Gates appears to have converted again, away from the climate and to preventing disease and hunger.

In a post on his Gates Notes site he argues that climate change is less of a threat to humanity than disease, that efforts and money have often been squandered on dubious solutions for climate.

The post reads: “Climate change is serious, but we’ve made great progress. We need to keep backing the breakthroughs that will help the world reach zero emissions. But we can’t cut funding for health and development, programmes that help people stay resilient in the face of climate change, to do it.”

Saying that the idea that cataclysmic climate change will decimate civilization is “wrong” and that people will be able to live and thrive in most places on Earth for the foreseeable future, Gates believes that this doomsday outlook is causing too great a focus on near-term emissions goals and diverting resources from other areas.

Making the statements ahead of COP30, Gates is, to be fair, making the point that a more holistic view of humanities interrelated issues is overdue, and that the question of what will be most effective is at the heart of a greater debate on ethical philosophy and long-term utilitarianism that would keep Hume and Bentham busy. And, soiler alert, there is no one right answer.

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