In a recent episode of the Joe Rogan Experience, Joe Rogan and scientist Gregg Braden directly criticized former Vice President Al Gore’s long-standing climate change narrative.
Rogan brought up Gore’s 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth, calling it wildly inaccurate.
“This film freaked literally everyone out,” Rogan said.
“By this time, the time we’re living in right now, 2025, the Earth is supposed to be unlivable. I mean, I’m exaggerating, but like, Miami is underwater. The coasts moved. Meanwhile, the coasts haven’t moved at all.”
He continued, “Some of the wealthiest, most influential people in the world buy property on the coastline. If the billionaires are buying beach houses, I think it’s going to be okay in that regard.”
Gore’s documentary painted a grim picture of melting ice caps, rising sea levels, and catastrophic climate consequences.
But nearly two decades later, Rogan pointed out that much of what was predicted hasn’t happened.
“We were all freaked out,” he said. “Twenty years later, very little difference.”
A Bigger Industry Than Expected
Rogan and Braden discussed the broader financial ecosystem surrounding climate activism.
Gore, who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his climate advocacy, has also built a fortune in the decades following his political career.
He has a reported net worth of $300 million as of April 2025.
“He made hundreds of millions of dollars,” Rogan said. “He created the carbon credit system. The whole thing is kind of nuts when you’re that wrong and nobody even calls you out on it.”
Gore co-founded Generation Investment Management, a sustainability-focused investment firm that now manages $25 billion in assets.
He also served on Apple’s board from 2003 to 2024, at one point cashing out 59,000 shares for a $30 million payday.
And while Gore has pushed for urgent action against rising sea levels, he reportedly owns at least $25 million worth of real estate, including an $8.9 million ocean-view estate in Montecito, California. The irony wasn’t lost on Rogan.
Braden: Climate Change Is Real, But Cyclical
Gregg Braden, a geologist who began studying climate in 1979, agreed that the Earth is warming but emphasized it’s part of a natural cycle.
“Climate change is a fact, and I want to be on record. It is constantly changing, and Earth is warming,” he said. “If we weren’t, I would be concerned.”
Braden took issue with how carbon has been villainized.
“Our young people are frightened of carbon. They think carbon is bad, carbon is evil. Carbon is what we’re made out of,” he said.
“They have no problem relinquishing their carbon-based, frail, fragile, flawed bodies for the technology because they’ve already been taught that carbon is bad, which is bananas.”
He pointed out that today’s CO2 levels are about 418 to 420 parts per million.
Historically, he said, Earth has seen much higher levels, even up to 2,000 parts per million, and the planet was lush and full of life.
“Is it dangerously high? No. And as a geologist, here’s why I can say that,” Braden said.
The Thorium Argument
Braden also introduced thorium, a lesser-known element that he claims could have powered clean, safe nuclear energy decades ago.
“It cannot melt down like a Fukushima. It cannot be weaponized,” he said.
“The waste can become the new fuel. It can be recycled.”
According to Braden, thorium reactors existed as far back as the 1980s but were abandoned in favor of uranium, largely because uranium produces plutonium, a key ingredient for weapons.
“If we were serious about clean, green, sustainable energy, there are technologies they would have allowed us to have,” he said.
A Misleading Carbon Narrative?
One of Braden’s most pointed claims was about ice core data pulled from Antarctica.
“In those ice cores, the temperature actually rises before the CO2 levels,” he said.
“If the CO2 is causing that rise, that’s a problem because you would expect the CO2 to rise first and then the temperature. And that’s not what the ice cores show.”
Braden said this data challenges the idea that CO2 is the main driver of global warming, suggesting there are likely other forces at play, such as solar activity or magnetic shifts.
Gore’s Wealth Raises Eyebrows
Gore’s rise in wealth since leaving office has drawn criticism, especially from those who see a disconnect between his environmental messaging and personal lifestyle.
Gore’s Nashville mansion once reportedly consumed 34 times more energy than the average American home, and his swimming pool alone used enough energy to power six homes over a year.
While Gore has installed solar panels and offset some emissions, critics still see hypocrisy.
As Rogan put it, “It’s kind of nuts when you’re that wrong and nobody even calls you out on it.”
Climate Change, Profit, and Public Trust
Both Rogan and Braden made clear that climate change is real, but they argued that fear, profit motives, and political agendas have shaped the public conversation in misleading ways.
And with Al Gore sitting on hundreds of millions in wealth, and multiple beachfront properties, Rogan’s point lands with weight:
“If the billionaires are buying beach houses, it’s going to be okay.”