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In America and Australia politicians repeatedly refuse to take action stating it will take away jobs, not relazing that jobs would also be taken away by the effects of climate change far worse then if we get rid of coal miners
Why do so many people deny the reality of Climate Change
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Zap Rowsdower
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Tribalism, selfishness, and short term thinking.
StolenMadWolf
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Frankly? It's a combination of different factors leading to different reasonings.
You've got the anti-science folks in all their forms who frankly don't believe anything the scientists say on it. AKA your hyper-conservative nuts who think vaccines are the sign of the devil or think they know best. Or at the very least don't understand it.
There are those who frankly, don't believe climate change exists even if they are okay with science. They comes from a combination of just not trusting or understanding the data as well as just dismissing it as a hoax, a hoax to scare people like the 2012 end of the world stuff.
Then there are those who just write it off as regular Terran climate being silly.
And finally, there are those who might admit it is a thing, but don't do anything about it. These are those people who are that focused on the economy and their own wealth that they are unwilling to change to maintain the bottom line, as well as those who just don't want to change in the first place. And of course, those who read the data before shrugging and saying "Well, I'll be dead by then. So why should I care?". AKA, selfish buggers.
Basically, it boils down to the people in question trying to come up with some bullshit reason not to accept the data or just having such old-fashioned opinions etc that they can't consider it.
You've got the anti-science folks in all their forms who frankly don't believe anything the scientists say on it. AKA your hyper-conservative nuts who think vaccines are the sign of the devil or think they know best. Or at the very least don't understand it.
There are those who frankly, don't believe climate change exists even if they are okay with science. They comes from a combination of just not trusting or understanding the data as well as just dismissing it as a hoax, a hoax to scare people like the 2012 end of the world stuff.
Then there are those who just write it off as regular Terran climate being silly.
And finally, there are those who might admit it is a thing, but don't do anything about it. These are those people who are that focused on the economy and their own wealth that they are unwilling to change to maintain the bottom line, as well as those who just don't want to change in the first place. And of course, those who read the data before shrugging and saying "Well, I'll be dead by then. So why should I care?". AKA, selfish buggers.
Basically, it boils down to the people in question trying to come up with some bullshit reason not to accept the data or just having such old-fashioned opinions etc that they can't consider it.
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Initially a lot of it was due to serious propaganda by rich companies that very much did not want to deal with needing to clean up their act.
this got internalized by a lot of people.
then the right decided to go full-blown insane into the culture war. At this point they are outright denying obvious objective reality if it does not suit the narrative they have decided is true (because they want to believe it). Part of this involved declaring everything to do with climate change as a liberal position, and the american right now hates it by sheer knee-jerk and is entirely impossible to convince.
basically by the time the real-world impact started to become super undeniably obvious the american right had reached the point they were no longer convincible by such things as "facts" and "objective reality".
this got internalized by a lot of people.
then the right decided to go full-blown insane into the culture war. At this point they are outright denying obvious objective reality if it does not suit the narrative they have decided is true (because they want to believe it). Part of this involved declaring everything to do with climate change as a liberal position, and the american right now hates it by sheer knee-jerk and is entirely impossible to convince.
basically by the time the real-world impact started to become super undeniably obvious the american right had reached the point they were no longer convincible by such things as "facts" and "objective reality".
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I'm confused wouldn't damage from Climate change be far more expensive then fossil fuel profits,
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Please do not apply long-term (defined as longer than one fiscal quarter) logic to corporations.
Expensive to who?
The millions about to be displaced, starve etc?
Or the megacorp CEOs that think food is something servants bring or grows in supermarkets?
I've been following this closely and can walk pretty far through the climate debate on both sides. A couple of the major reasons for dissent haven't been mentioned so far.
One is simply that the messengers were not considered trustworthy. There's a long history of cults trying parasitize off of Christian congregations by coming as authority figures - priests or prophets - and claiming that the world is doomed because of their sins - which do not resemble any biblical doctrine of sin - but this can be fixed by giving up the "sinful" behavior and atoned for by participating in the charlatan's rituals and giving him a whole lot of money. They often claim they have some sort of power over the weather, and use weather disasters as evidence they are right. These charlatans have left a long trail of broke people with broken faith throughout the centuries. As a result, we specifically teach our children not to listen to that sort of thing.
Then people acting as different authority figures, scientists, started making claims that were superficially very similar. A lot of Christians dismissed them without consideration, for obvious reasons.
A couple of other reasons why scientifically literate people oppose climate action have to do with the premature closure of the debate regarding the scientific underpinnings. Sometime around 2013, the matter started to be considered "settled", and anyone that disagreed with the apparent consensus would be dismissed from the debate as ignorant at the most charitable or a paid shill at the least charitable. This lead to two persistent pools of remaining dissenters. One group had open questions that had not been settled to their satisfaction; this group couldn't get actual answers to those open questions because the debate had closed. So they remain unconvinced. The other group saw the treatment of the first group and made adverse inferences. They assumed that if the consensus had to be maintained by shutting dissenters out of the discussion, it must be because the consensus can't win the debate. Therefore, they act under the assumption that the consensus is wrong.
Another factor is that new climate data is gradually being collected, which can be used to check old predictions. The old predictions don't all hold up - climate forecasting is very hard - so points that seemed settled 10 or more years ago are quietly, gradually becoming un-settled by new measurements. Pop culture hasn't caught onto this yet.
And that leads to a final, more general point - climate advocates frequently make claims that go beyond what a close reading of the best available science supports. In a debate with no culture war component, they would sometimes get called on it. So don't assume a dissenter is anti-science; they could instead be following the science too closely for that particular message.
One is simply that the messengers were not considered trustworthy. There's a long history of cults trying parasitize off of Christian congregations by coming as authority figures - priests or prophets - and claiming that the world is doomed because of their sins - which do not resemble any biblical doctrine of sin - but this can be fixed by giving up the "sinful" behavior and atoned for by participating in the charlatan's rituals and giving him a whole lot of money. They often claim they have some sort of power over the weather, and use weather disasters as evidence they are right. These charlatans have left a long trail of broke people with broken faith throughout the centuries. As a result, we specifically teach our children not to listen to that sort of thing.
Then people acting as different authority figures, scientists, started making claims that were superficially very similar. A lot of Christians dismissed them without consideration, for obvious reasons.
A couple of other reasons why scientifically literate people oppose climate action have to do with the premature closure of the debate regarding the scientific underpinnings. Sometime around 2013, the matter started to be considered "settled", and anyone that disagreed with the apparent consensus would be dismissed from the debate as ignorant at the most charitable or a paid shill at the least charitable. This lead to two persistent pools of remaining dissenters. One group had open questions that had not been settled to their satisfaction; this group couldn't get actual answers to those open questions because the debate had closed. So they remain unconvinced. The other group saw the treatment of the first group and made adverse inferences. They assumed that if the consensus had to be maintained by shutting dissenters out of the discussion, it must be because the consensus can't win the debate. Therefore, they act under the assumption that the consensus is wrong.
Another factor is that new climate data is gradually being collected, which can be used to check old predictions. The old predictions don't all hold up - climate forecasting is very hard - so points that seemed settled 10 or more years ago are quietly, gradually becoming un-settled by new measurements. Pop culture hasn't caught onto this yet.
And that leads to a final, more general point - climate advocates frequently make claims that go beyond what a close reading of the best available science supports. In a debate with no culture war component, they would sometimes get called on it. So don't assume a dissenter is anti-science; they could instead be following the science too closely for that particular message.
Rule 4: Don’t Be Disruptive --Apocal
First i will wait till i am home to begin adding my thoughts but y'all are oversimplifying Climate Change TOO MUCH. Its not as simple as what we humans are doing to earth you all also have this really high opinion of ourselves and just what we are actually doing. Like some actual "humanity fuck yay!" Levels of bs on the level of impact we actually have on the earth. The sheer LACK of general knowledge on this subject by the masses should surprise no one but also the sheer gall to presume its all our fault or to blame it on fossil fuels is mind boggling.
Before laying some facts down y'all simpletons let me first just lay down 5 things.
1. Climate change isn't disputed. Except for a very few crackpots here and there, its the CAUSE AND EFFECT thats debated, and they have legitimate points.
2. The earth is more Resiliant than you give the old girl credit for. This is especially true when you look at how life has adapted to our fuck-ups.
3. CO2 is not the biggest enemy of the earth, there are pros and cons to more CO2, ya that's right. Some good points like larger healthier plants which can in turn feed more ppl or help push back deserts.
3. The Amazon is some natural precious resource. Welp, news at 8 its not actually natural. Ya, go figure, the "Rich black soil" that the amazon is known for and seemingly regenerates? Turns it the whole of the amazon is a runaway GARDEN that ancient humans built. Look it up i shit you not.
4. Global Warming: so, not to be confusing but these days ppl use this and climate change as if they are the same and thats a problem. They are not. Global warming stopped being used because it was the stance that humans were entirely at fault with all the negative stuff going on regarding changes in temperature with plenty of POTENTIAL supporting evidence but nothing that couldnt also all be attributed to natural phenomena or some other explinations. In summary nothing concrete but hey politics got involved and now the terms are conjoined which makes speaking about it all the more depressing because i have to talk to simpletons who don't keep up with the lingo.
5. No one considers outside interference. As in from FUCKING SPACE. We have a giagantic ball of FIRE that heats our solar system out to a point with highs and lows of activity nevermind all the other shit that can and HAS disrupted our ecosystems in the past, never mind natural disruptions!
PS,- not calling anyone HERE a simpleton. Yet.
Before laying some facts down y'all simpletons let me first just lay down 5 things.
1. Climate change isn't disputed. Except for a very few crackpots here and there, its the CAUSE AND EFFECT thats debated, and they have legitimate points.
2. The earth is more Resiliant than you give the old girl credit for. This is especially true when you look at how life has adapted to our fuck-ups.
3. CO2 is not the biggest enemy of the earth, there are pros and cons to more CO2, ya that's right. Some good points like larger healthier plants which can in turn feed more ppl or help push back deserts.
3. The Amazon is some natural precious resource. Welp, news at 8 its not actually natural. Ya, go figure, the "Rich black soil" that the amazon is known for and seemingly regenerates? Turns it the whole of the amazon is a runaway GARDEN that ancient humans built. Look it up i shit you not.
4. Global Warming: so, not to be confusing but these days ppl use this and climate change as if they are the same and thats a problem. They are not. Global warming stopped being used because it was the stance that humans were entirely at fault with all the negative stuff going on regarding changes in temperature with plenty of POTENTIAL supporting evidence but nothing that couldnt also all be attributed to natural phenomena or some other explinations. In summary nothing concrete but hey politics got involved and now the terms are conjoined which makes speaking about it all the more depressing because i have to talk to simpletons who don't keep up with the lingo.
5. No one considers outside interference. As in from FUCKING SPACE. We have a giagantic ball of FIRE that heats our solar system out to a point with highs and lows of activity nevermind all the other shit that can and HAS disrupted our ecosystems in the past, never mind natural disruptions!
PS,- not calling anyone HERE a simpleton. Yet.
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First off have an entire paper explaining how each and every one of your points is tired denier points that have been debunked hundreds of times. Climate change—that is not real! A comparative analysis of climate-sceptic think tanks in the USA and Germany
Next: Climate change is still disputed. The number of true deniers has gone down as the evidence gets more and more glaring, though. They do not have any legitimate points.
The Earth will be fine. It's humans we are worried about. The planet surviving does not mean human civilization does. Hell, humans doing so does not mean human civilization does.
CO2 does indeed have good points. Without it we would all die. Unfortunately that's completely beside the point.
That comment about the Amazon is complete bullshit. Not to mention how do you explain every other Jungle on the planet?
Oh fucking yes outside interference was considered. The Sun is on a cooling stage atm. We should be seeing slightly decreased average temperatures right now. We are instead seeing the exact opposite. Why do you think something a layman can come up with in 15 seconds was not already considered and found not a reasonable solution? (This is a staple of the climate denier arsenal. That there is absolutely no science behind it hardly seems to matter)
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Your posted article would please Councilor Sparatus immensely.
The only thing that said was "we have looked at the points brought forward and dismissed them"
*gasp* or, did you miss that?
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I'm amazing you're willing to throw stones at people given just how thin the glass you built your house from is.
All the better to see out of it easier heh
The specific claimed changes to the climate (e.g. that it's now 1.5 degrees warmer than in pre-industrial times) are in fact disputed, unless you're going all the way back to the last glacial period which everyone agrees was colder than now.
That is acquainting global warming to climate change, when people started bringing up and using the term climate change they were referring to both the daily monthly and yearly changes that can occur to the planet in even localized areas.
The planet has ALSO been as much as 10 to 15 degrees WARMER in the past, along with dips that put it under as well.
THATS climate change, and no one denighs the planet has a changing climate. Duh.
There's a bit of slight of hand going on here: you are using a correct definition for climate change, but what you are talking about here isn't really the subject that the political debate is about or what the thread topic is. The idea that the Earth's climate changes over time may be relatively uncontroversial, but that's not the subject under discussion. That would more correctly be stated as anthropogenic climate change, which is disputed as you do here. You do also later identify that a change in terminology did take place.
Also, in general you seem to have a pretty poor understanding of the subject matter, so I'd like you to elaborate more on these supposed legitimate points. To address what you've put down: while the earth is very adaptive and over the long run would almost assuredly recover, the long run for the Earth is measured in 10s of thousands of years. That's cold comfort to the people who would have to live in the mean time. Your claim about CO2 shows a more direct misunderstanding of the issue: no reputable climate scientist is claiming that we should climate all CO2 from earth or the atmosphere, so it's unclear why you feel the need to argue against it. The arguments being made are that there is too much CO2 being released, because of the notable downsides in having too much of the substance. And other outside possibilities are considered. Why do you assume that they aren't.
So you're claiming that the current religious right does try and teach children to avoid fools and charlatans? Honestly, if that were true it paints an even more dire picture of the group, since they seem to generally flock to fools and charlatans while spurning expert advice as coming from fools and charlatans. And they have been from the start, which leads me to think that this is more a nice fantasy that you're painting for yourself, as opposed to anything that existed in reality.
Also, refusing to accept the truth isn't wisdom, no matter how much you try and frame it as such. 2013 is actually extremely late for climate change talk to be settled, and given how often I've seen the 'oh, no one is willing to explain X to me, so I have to be anti-X' used to excuse someone's own prejudices I can't really accept is as a completely truthful excuse.
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To everybody.
It's just that the latter think of themselves as invincible and untouchable, think they can just declare reality to be what they want it to be, and are living examples of how the problem with enlightened self interest is the widespread lack of the "enlightened" part. People who spend their lives in bubbles of yes-men tend to have really bad judgement.
Has been for hundreds of years.
It's more "The argument for X looks wrong as step X.3 but whenever I point it out the pro-X people insult me instead of any reasonable answer so I have to conclude X is indeed wrong."
Night
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The religious right teaches the avoidance of people who don't present the right kind of passionate sincerity; whether those people speak truly or not is somewhat irrelevant.
Chloe Sullivan
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I mean this sort of thing does happen, sure. It happens because the pro-X people have been concern-trolled so many times that at this point that don't believe you have a genuine concern rather than being yet another troll.
But like, "I refuse to believe X because my feelings are hurt" is not reasonable. If you think X.3 is questionable, you are perfectly able to research the subject yourself (using reputable academic sources), instead of blaming other people for not providing you the answer that you don't seem to trust them to provide anyway.
NotInventedHere
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So, just to be clear, on the one hand, you dislike how 'the masses' are highly lacking in general knowledge about climate change (presumably in contrast to yourself), and hate how you have to 'talk to simpletons who don't keep up with the lingo'...
But also... You believe that no-one, none of the many many scientists who've been working on this problem for the past 40-50 years, have taken the solar cycle into account? I.E., you have absolutely no actual knowledge of any of the models used, by any climate scientists?
Incidentally, your 'news at 8' about the Amazon?
I did, in fact, look that up. Terra preta comprises approximately 3.2% of the Amazon. The Amazon is not, in any way, "a runaway garden", and terra preta does not even slightly make up 'the whole of the amazon'. Jungles are, in fact, a natural resource, and the destruction of the Amazon rainforest would not be easily reversed on any kind of feasible timescale. (Not to mention that even if terra preta *were* 100% of the Amazon, its destruction would *still* not be easily reversed - have you stopped to think about just how long it takes those massive trees to grow?)
Gears
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I'd call you one though. Or at the very least someone with no risk analysis capacities.
Consider:
If you're right, and we fight climate change relentlessly despite that, all we've done is fatigue ourselves, but we'll be alright as a species.
If we're right and we do what you suggest: we fucking die.
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These were changes that occurred over geological timescales and were often accompanied by mass extinctions. The end of a period of warming during the Paleocene-Eocene optimum led to the Eocene-Oligocene extinction event. We are warming on a scale of decades, not thousands or millions of years, and our agricultural system is far more fragile than the Earth as a whole.