Trends in American attitudes re: global warming

You're talking about Oprah and Beiber worshiping, American Idol voting, Kardashian and The Bachelor watching public here. Is there a point?
 
Yeah Doc, there is a point. Public attitudes, even if rife with misunderstanding, have a big impact on public policy and even individual behavior. A lot more kids are killed by accidental choking on food than are killed by snatch and grab stangers who sexually molest them, but I'd guess fear and precaution against the latter is about 1,000 greater.
 
I think the lesson science needs to learn is to stop basing their predictions on the absolute worst case scenario. At this point, the public has been inundated with many doomsday scenarios by scientist eager to generate grant money. Doomsday scenarios which never materialized. The real nail in the coffin was when scientist manipulated temperature data to make the effects of global warming seem greater (I’m assuming we are all familiar with this event from a few years ago).

The scientific community itself has the most blame for the weakening public concern over global warming.

I don't think this is a desperate and greedy society who cares less about CO2 because of the economy.
 
yeah, let's not forget climategate as well as a climate that appears to not be participating. but the American public is fickle. this year's high temperatures in America will changed this trend in public opinion, possibly quite a bit. but yeah, for now the bottom has dropped out on the polling in regards to Global Warming. the media and the part of the scientific community that believes in AGW has wildly overplayed their hype card with far too many doomsday scenarios that clearly are not coming to pass.
 
the media and the part of the scientific community that believes in AGW has wildly overplayed their hype card

I can see the media "wildly overplaying the hype card" but do you have any evidence to show that the scientific community has done likewise?

I must say, I doubt that you can. Some scientists, perhaps. But if you're going to group the entire part of that community, that's another claim.

I think that you're wildly overplaying your hype card.
 
The data manipulation was performed by scientists and only by scientists, even some of the most prominent on the issue. You can't reasonably claim innocence for science.
 
so no response to MY points and my links? do you have some compelling reason to believe the number you threw out of 97%? or was that a bit of pseudo-science invading our conversation masquerading as actual scientific data?
 
Pffft.. this big blue marble we call home has endured millenniums of climate and geographic change. Long before the combustion engine, plastic water bottles,etc.. The "smart scientists" of the era have found the God particle - yeah! I hear these renowned PhDs explain how we're all part of a molecular star compound. I putty the fools who buy into the doomsday scenarios. I admit there will be famine, incredible weather changes etc..but, it'll be when The Creator decides. It's all in the Bible - look it up, it's free. Not need to push for $$$$ from the gov and citizens
 
omnipresent, I hear you man, but surely you believe we can do great damage to the earth right? i mean, if we were to let off all of our nuclear warheads, the earth would be in a VERY bad way right? just look at Chernobyl and how that has affected a generation of Russians. It is possible to do great damage to the earth and humans are no doubt capable. i just question whether CO2 is driving the warming that started a Century before CO2 release became very pronounced. at this point, the fact that the rate of rise appears fairly constant over the past 160 years leads me to believe that the rise in temperatures has been largely natural.
 
Mop and Perham, there will be great famine, natural disasters, etc.. global warming may just be a part of His master plan. Mop, the nuclear scenario you mention will never take place - not to the point of human annihilation
 
I think the change in public opinion is directly related to the decrease in coverage MSM has devoted to it over the last year. Let's face it, most of the MSM has moved from reporting the news to being tools of intended influence. And the masses can easily be directed with a little repititous recitation of the "facts".

It's no secret that MSM coverage is driven by hyperbole and pictures. How many times did Fox run that stupid clip of the girl jumping like 15 feet off of a chair lift??? Really.. 15 feet makes national news. Only if you have a video clip. and how many unattractive girls go missing and don't get the natalie hollowell treatment.

Gross exageration and pretty pictures. That's our MSM these days.

On top of that, our current culture is to only mobilize and act when "we are at the brink".
 
Point taken and I apologize both for being glib and overly general in my response claiming "the 97%", but it was in response to the comment "the part of the scientific community that believes in AGW" so I was trying to make the point that this is no small splinter group, but instead a significant part of the science community (climate scientists), and by a far greater percentage than the general public (58%). And interesting that the largest percentage of doubters are the petroleum geologists (47%) who both have a stake in AGW not being a result of the burning of fossil fuels and meet my analogy of asking a neurosurgeon to give you the finger wave and then deciding that you won't be needing another colonoscopy for 5 more years.

Though you seem to disagree, I don't think that solar scientists, space scientists, cosmologists, physicists, and astronomers are really much different from petroleum geologists, though they clearly don't have as much at stake in the issue. Solar scientists look at sun spots, coronoal mass ejections, and the such, which have far more effect on space weather than earth climate. Astonomers? They deal with earth climate almost as much as astrologers and cosmologists and space scientists are about the same level. Physiscists deal with particles and the origin of the universe. How does that play into AWG? I admit that the meteorologists response is very curious, but the poll didn't exclude them, it just binned them separately and still reported their 64% agreement that AWG exists, which is curiously higher than the general population that relies on them daily to determine whether to take an umbrella to work in the morning, but clearly not whether to worry about the future of our planet.

And furthermore, the results of the entirety of the community was 82%, again far more than the general public. No, not the 97% often loosely thrown out there by people like me (again I apologize for overstating my case by almost 20%) but still significantly higher than the general population. And don't forget that the scientific process trains scientists to give nuanced answers because of the difference in certainty and hypothesis. After all, gravity is a theory with alternative explanations, but none of us will jump off a building to test that theory...

As for the conduct of the poll question #2, you say it is "significantly vague that MANY skeptics would answer it affirmatively". Do you use the term "significant" here to mean 20% as you later claim would be a reasonable expectation for what would qualify as significant? If the use of this word captures people who think only 20% of the rise in temperature is due to human causes, then the vagueness of the question is only 20% wrong, or 80% correct. You've create a bit of a conundrum here in you logic, and you should try to avoid using the same term in your criticism as the term you are criticizing.

So, why is it that the general public has a lower acceptance of AGW than scientists in general and far lower than scientists who've dedicated their careers to understanding the subject. Does the public have the same acceptance rate for expert opinion in other disciplines like plumbing, medicine, and bridge building? No, and they don't because there isn't a huge lobby of people who have a financial stake in it not being correct. Football coaches get more respect for their expertise in their field than climate scientists do...

Now to Oreskes and Schult. Oreskes states that of those 928 papers reviewed, 25% didn't state a opinion and 75% did. We don't know what the opinion of the 25% was, so they can't be considered. Of those that did state an opinion, 3% disagreed. That's consistent with the 97% reported by the other poll, which could be a mere coincidence, but maybe not. Schult is a Medical researcher whose paper was rejected purportedly because of lack of reader interest. Have you seen that rejection letter to confirm it? At least Oreskes did get published, whether or not it was peer reviewed, which you don't know the answer to. Call me naive if you'd like, but I'm going to put more faith in that one...

And on to my other issue. Did you get to studying those economic cost benefit studies that were requested yet or are you going to wait until you know to a 100% certainty that there's a problem to solve before we address it?
 
no problem man. it is a common error and frankly it is thrown around constantly by the very people you suggest we should trust. the Real Climate folks etc. In other words, the loudest people shouting about global warming are willing to throw their integrity out the window by quoting this incredibly dubious number.

As for meteorologists, they were not included in the poll. Meteorologists actually only believe that humans are primarily to blame for global warming at a rate of 59%. That allows for 41% of Meteorologists who do not believe we are primarily to blame. In addition to that interesting fact, only 38% of those who say it is happening believe it will be harmful in the next 100 years. that means 62% of meteorologists who believe Global Warming is happening (which is 89% of them by the way) believe it will not be harmful in the next 100 years. Of course there are 11% who don't even believe it is happening.

These statistics are all from a recent poll of meteorologists from this year:

Poll of Meteorologists has surprising results

from that piece:

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