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Many of those in the 'doubt climate change' camp are deeply suspicious of anything any government body wants to do. I've also widely engaged people who doubt o

Many of those in the 'doubt climate change' camp are deeply suspicious of anything any government body wants to do. I've also widely engaged people who doubt or deny climate change, trying hard to approach in an open handed, friendly way, and mostly succeeding. In my opinion, a big chunk of the people who doubt climate change are and will remain extremely opposed to any kind of geoengineering. Perhaps violently so. In people's minds, there's a huge leap between trusting scientists' saying that the earth is warming fast, fucking things up in the future, and trusting scientists' saying that we need to actively change the world right now in response to climate change. And I appreciate that distinction. In truth, I think quite a few people unconsciously push back against climate change because they are afraid of the possibility of active geoengineering in response.

whamlastxmas 7y ago
I am extremely skeptical of climate change arguments because I overwhelmingly hear it from politicians who lie through their teeth about virtually everything and typically for their own gain. I want to believe but my bullshit meter just goes off so strongly whenever I hear a politician say anything
- lukifer 7y ago
  Look at it this way: if an ideologue, or otherwise motivated actor, can accomplish their goal or spin their story using facts that happen to be true, why wouldn't they? If someone is politically motivated, for example, to tighten border security, it's surely possible they'll fudge numbers about criminal immigrants to tell their story; but if a real, un-p-hacked statistic tells that story, why bother bullshitting when you can shout the truth from the rooftops? I don't trust politicians, but I have some trust in nerds. While scientists and engineers are far from immune to groupthink or perverse incentives, there is so much clout to be gained (not to mention a feel-good pro-growth story), if the case for AGW wasn't strong, I think we'd be seeing a stronger contrarian pushback from within scientific communities (including taking their case to the public through TED talks, podcasts, YouTube, etc) [1]. Be it string theory, or the lipid hypothesis, or OOP-vs-FP, how rare is it to actually get 95%+ of nerds to agree on anything? [1] For an example in action, see physicist Richard Muller, who spent years as a skeptic and founded an organization to debunk climate change, only to change his mind after examining the results: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Earth

whamlastxmas 7y ago

I am extremely skeptical of climate change arguments because I overwhelmingly hear it from politicians who lie through their teeth about virtually everything and typically for their own gain. I want to believe but my bullshit meter just goes off so strongly whenever I hear a politician say anything

lukifer 7y ago
Look at it this way: if an ideologue, or otherwise motivated actor, can accomplish their goal or spin their story using facts that happen to be true, why wouldn't they? If someone is politically motivated, for example, to tighten border security, it's surely possible they'll fudge numbers about criminal immigrants to tell their story; but if a real, un-p-hacked statistic tells that story, why bother bullshitting when you can shout the truth from the rooftops? I don't trust politicians, but I have some trust in nerds. While scientists and engineers are far from immune to groupthink or perverse incentives, there is so much clout to be gained (not to mention a feel-good pro-growth story), if the case for AGW wasn't strong, I think we'd be seeing a stronger contrarian pushback from within scientific communities (including taking their case to the public through TED talks, podcasts, YouTube, etc) [1]. Be it string theory, or the lipid hypothesis, or OOP-vs-FP, how rare is it to actually get 95%+ of nerds to agree on anything? [1] For an example in action, see physicist Richard Muller, who spent years as a skeptic and founded an organization to debunk climate change, only to change his mind after examining the results: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Earth