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Scientists Study How Non-Scientists Deny Climate Change (theguardian.com)
A new research paper suggest climate change opponents are "simulating coherence by conspiracism".
Slashdot reader Layzej says the paper "examines this behavior at the aggregate level, but gives many examples where contradictory ideas are held by the same individual, and sometimes are presented within a single publication." From the paper:
Claims that the globe "is cooling" can coexist with claims that the "observed warming is natural" and that "the human influence does not matter because warming is good for us". Coherence between these mutually contradictory opinions can only be achieved at a highly abstract level, namely that "something must be wrong" with the scientific evidence in order to justify a political position against climate change mitigation...
In a nutshell, the opposition to greenhouse gas emission cuts is the unifying and coherent position underlying all manifestations of climate science denial... Climate science denial is therefore perhaps best understood as a rational activity that replaces a coherent body of science with an incoherent and conspiracist body of pseudo-science for political reasons and with considerable political coherence and effectiveness.
"I think that people who deny basic science will continue to do so, no matter how contradictory their arguments may be," says one of the paper's authors, who suggests that the media should be wary of self-contradicting positions.
In a nutshell, the opposition to greenhouse gas emission cuts is the unifying and coherent position underlying all manifestations of climate science denial... Climate science denial is therefore perhaps best understood as a rational activity that replaces a coherent body of science with an incoherent and conspiracist body of pseudo-science for political reasons and with considerable political coherence and effectiveness.
"I think that people who deny basic science will continue to do so, no matter how contradictory their arguments may be," says one of the paper's authors, who suggests that the media should be wary of self-contradicting positions.
Note that holding contradictory beliefs is fairly common of conspiracy theorists (link):
Another study titled Dead and Alive: Beliefs in Contradictory Conspiracy Theories managed to show that, not only will cranks be attracted to and believe in numerous conspiracy theories all at once, but will continue to do so even if the theories in question are completely and utterly incompatible with one another. For instance, the study showed that: "... the more participants believed that Princess Diana faked her own death, the more they believed that she was murdered [and that] ... the more participants believed that Osama Bin Laden was already dead when U.S. special forces raided his compound in Pakistan, the more they believed he is still alive," and that "Hierarchical regression models showed that mutually incompatible conspiracy theories are positively associated because both are associated with the view that the authorities are engaged in a cover-up".
Citation: Wood, Michael J., Karen M. Douglas, and Robbie M. Sutton. "Dead and alive beliefs in contradictory conspiracy theories." Social Psychological and Personality Science 3.6 (2012): 767-773.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Bad Predictions: Claim from the late 20th to early 21st century: Global Warming means that the planet it getting hotter. Temperatures will rise. Life: Record lows in winter Reaction: Change the term from Global Warming to Climate Change.
Actually this prediction was right, the hottest years on record are all recent years. Temperatures did rise, on average. That doesn't mean that there isn't a town where it is colder in one month of the winter.
I've also heard that many of the global warming studies don't include the solar cycles the sun goes through as well.
You mean these cycles?
XKCD produced this graph http://xkcd.com/1732/ to shows how temperature has changed over the last 22,000 years