An interesting paper in Environmental Research Letters by Cook, Ellerton and Kinkead examines 42 climate change myths and concludes that all involve fallacious reasoning (iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aaa49f/meta). They conclude that people can be educated to recognise the intellectual flaws in the reasoning and this may well enable progress to be made in meeting the challenges raised by human-assisted climate change. I am not so sure. It seems to me a) that climate change denial is far better-funded and appeals to lazy thinking; b) some influential people are probably fully aware of the fallacies but choose to ignore them for economic or political reasons and c) there is good evidence that sections of populations are very resistant to changing their views by exposure to 'facts'.
This blog may help people explore some of the 'hidden' issues involved in certain media treatments of environmental and scientific issues. Using personal digital images, it's also intended to emphasise seasonal (and other) changes in natural history of the Swansea (South Wales) area. The material should help participants in field-based modules and people generally interested in the natural world. The views are wholly those of the author.
Saturday, 10 February 2018
Will Myth Busting Actually Work?
An interesting paper in Environmental Research Letters by Cook, Ellerton and Kinkead examines 42 climate change myths and concludes that all involve fallacious reasoning (iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aaa49f/meta). They conclude that people can be educated to recognise the intellectual flaws in the reasoning and this may well enable progress to be made in meeting the challenges raised by human-assisted climate change. I am not so sure. It seems to me a) that climate change denial is far better-funded and appeals to lazy thinking; b) some influential people are probably fully aware of the fallacies but choose to ignore them for economic or political reasons and c) there is good evidence that sections of populations are very resistant to changing their views by exposure to 'facts'.
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