NEW YORK — ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson says fears about climate change, drilling and energy dependence are overblown.

In a speech Wednesday to the Council on Foreign Relations, Tillerson acknowledged that burning of fossil fuels is warming the planet, but said society will adapt. The risks of oil and gas drilling are well understood and can be mitigated, he said. Dependence on other nations for oil is not a concern as long as access to supply is certain, he said.

Tillerson blamed a public he called illiterate in science and math, a lazy press, and advocacy groups that “manufacture fear.”

The oil executive questioned the ability of climate models to predict the magnitude of the impact, and said that people would adapt to rising sea levels and changing climates that may force agricultural production to shift.

“We have spent our entire existence adapting. We’ll adapt,” he said. “It’s an engineering problem and there will be an engineering solution.”

Andrew Weaver, chairman of climate modeling at the University of Victoria in Canada, disagreed with Tillerson’s characterization of climate modeling, warning that adapting to those changes will be much more difficult and disruptive than Tillerson seems to acknowledge.

Steve Coll, author of the recent book “Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power,” said he was surprised Exxon would talk about ways society can adapt to climate change when there is time to try to avoid its worst effects. Coll said research suggests that adapting to climate change could be far more expensive than reducing emissions now. “Moving entire cities would be very expensive,” he said.

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