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Those Opposed To Scientific Consensus Bolstered By 'Illusion of Knowledge' (edmontonjournal.com)
The Edmonton Journal reports:
Recently, researchers asked more than 2,000 American and European adults their thoughts about genetically modified foods. They also asked them how much they thought they understood about GM foods, and a series of 15 true-false questions to test how much they actually knew about genetics and science in general. The researchers were interested in studying a perverse human phenomenon: People tend to be lousy judges of how much they know. Across four studies conducted in three countries -- the U.S., France and Germany -- the researchers found that extreme opponents of genetically modified foods "display a lack of insight into how much they know." They know the least, but think they know the most. "The less people know," the authors conclude, "the more opposed they are to the scientific consensus."
Science communicators have made concerted efforts to educate the public with an eye to bringing their attitudes in line with the experts," they write in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. But people with an inflated sense of what they actually know -- and most in need of education -- are also the ones least likely to be open to new information.... Extreme views often come along with not appreciating the complexity of the subject -- "not realizing how much there is to know," said Philip Fernbach, lead author of the new study and a professor of marketing at the University of Colorado Boulder. "People who don't know very much think they know a lot, and that is the basis for their extreme views."
Slashdot reader Layzej links to Rational Wiki's article on "The Backfire Effect," to illustrate Fernbach's observation that "People double down on their 'counter-scientific consensus attitudes'.
"Epecially when people feel threatened or if they are being treated as if they are stupid."
Science communicators have made concerted efforts to educate the public with an eye to bringing their attitudes in line with the experts," they write in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. But people with an inflated sense of what they actually know -- and most in need of education -- are also the ones least likely to be open to new information.... Extreme views often come along with not appreciating the complexity of the subject -- "not realizing how much there is to know," said Philip Fernbach, lead author of the new study and a professor of marketing at the University of Colorado Boulder. "People who don't know very much think they know a lot, and that is the basis for their extreme views."
Slashdot reader Layzej links to Rational Wiki's article on "The Backfire Effect," to illustrate Fernbach's observation that "People double down on their 'counter-scientific consensus attitudes'.
"Epecially when people feel threatened or if they are being treated as if they are stupid."
"Why Most Published Research Findings Are False"
John P. A. Ioannidis
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
Further reading:
"There is increasing concern that most current published research findings are false. The probability that a research claim is true may depend on study power and bias, the number of other studies on the same question, and, importantly, the ratio of true to no relationships among the relationships probed in each scientific field. In this framework, a research finding is less likely to be true when the studies conducted in a field are smaller; when effect sizes are smaller; when there is a greater number and lesser preselection of tested relationships; where there is greater flexibility in designs, definitions, outcomes, and analytical modes; when there is greater financial and other interest and prejudice; and when more teams are involved in a scientific field in chase of statistical significance. Simulations show that for most study designs and settings, it is more likely for a research claim to be false than true. Moreover, for many current scientific fields, claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias".
- Dr John Ioannidis (“Why Most Published Research Findings Are False”) August 30, 2005 http://journals.plos.org/plosm...
"It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine".
- Dr. Marcia Angell, New York Review of Books January 15, 2009. http://www.nybooks.com/article...
"The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue.
Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness".
- Richard Horton, Editor, “The Lancet” April 11th 2015 http://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/...
"Scientists these days, especially but not only in such blatantly corrupt fields as pharmaceutical research, face a lose-lose choice between basing their own investigations on invalid studies, on the one hand, or having to distrust any experimental results they don’t replicate themselves, on the other. Meanwhile the consumers of the products of scientific research—yes, that would be all of us—have to contend with the fact that we have no way of knowing whether any given claim about the result of research is the product of valid science or not".
- John Michael Greer
http://thearchdruidreport.blog...
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
And the "models" are a straw man argument. There are much more elementary arguments for Global Warming that don't need complicate models. For instance, we can measure the absorption spectrum of Carbon dioxide, and it's even possible to calculate it down to ten digits, and in accordance to the actual measurements. We have the Venus and the Mars (both have about 95% Carbon dioxide in their atmospheres, and we can measure the Greenhouse effect there. Actually, all celestial bodies with an atmosphere have a Greenhouse effect, even the Saturn moon Titan.
We know the development of the Carbon dioxide contents of the atmosphere during the last 120 years. In 1900, it was about 270 ppm, in the 1950ies, it was 300 ppm, in the 1980ies 330 ppm, and it's 410 ppm now. We can easily find out how much additional Carbon dioxide we need to add that much to the atmosphere (about 700 billion metric tons). We also know how much coal and oil we have mined (270 billion metric tons) and burned since the year of 1900, and how much Carbon dioxide it has generated (1000 billion metric tons). So about 70% of all that Carbon dioxide is still in the atmosphere, and 30% has disappeared (e.g. has acidified the ocean waters, increased the plant mass on Earth or formed compounds with minerals in the Earth's crust).
See? No complicated models. Just pure numbers and basic Arithmetics. The models serve a totally other purpose. They try to predict which effects the increased Greenhouse effect has: How much warming will actually happen? How strong will the melting of the glaciers be? How will weather patterns change? What will be the new layout of the climate zones? And when will we experience how much of what effect? And yes, here we have lots of uncertainity, and partly, we have large error bars. But the general statement stays the same: Global temperatures are rising, the ocean levels are rising, coastal areas will experience more flooding and will be lost, conditions for crops will change, and all that will lead to a large amount of resettlements of people, e.g. much more migration than today.