7 ms·

There's evidence that climate activism could be swaying public opinion in the US

39 points by elorant 7y ago

Hokusai 7y ago
A green economy will create a lot of local jobs to any country that wants to adopt it. It will make countries more energy independent so oil exporters will have reduced influence in green-countries politics and their military budgets. It will reduce the cost of health care pollution-related problems and citizens will be healthier and have a higher quality of living. There is a lot of money in the oil industry. But, it is still small, politically charged and morally ambiguous compared with the new economy that is growing. The USA has lost decades, proof of a high level of institutional corruption. But, it was just a matter of time.
- melling 7y ago
  There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.
  - mdgrech23 7y ago
    Found the Russian troll.
    - melling 7y ago
      No, Russian trolls don’t take the time and burn karma trying to get people out of their echo chamber. We’ve spent three decades ignoring the problem and we’re really at a turning point. Unfortunately, it’s probably going to have to get worse before enough people are convinced to do something. I just decided to burn a lot of Karma so I can feel like I tried to point out the obvious problems. You can take it from here.
    - jgwil2 7y ago
      Actually it looks like that guy has a lot of a karma; I guess he just feels so strongly about this comment that he's willing to burn some by copy/pasting it all over the place.
    - dang 7y ago
      We ban accounts that attack others. Please review and follow the site guidelines, don't post personal attacks, and don't insinuate astroturfing or shillage without evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - dang 7y ago
    Please don't copy-paste comments on HN.
    - melling 7y ago
      I hope a few people got the point. Try to remember my post every time you hear about climate change. This little echo chamber we have on HN is only enforcing groupthink.
chewbacha 7y ago
The protests and Greta Thunberg's addresses have given me hope during a time of political darkness.
- mguerville 7y ago
  Likewise, especially because unlike many others her speech feels authentic. She's not selling a book, she's not running for office, she's not trying to milk this but rather appears to do it based on a sense of civic duty.
- melling 7y ago
  There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.
thrower123 7y ago
I'm not sure whether most of this climate activism is productive, or just produces more backlash in reaction. It would be helpful if climate change could be taken away from the zealous environmentalists, as they have a long track record of advocating for policies that do more to inconvenience people than they do to solve problems. It's the modern day equivalent of wearing a hair shirt. It certainly doesn't help to keep up the fire and brimstone, judgement day is coming, listen and repent rhetoric. They've played that card too many times to be taken seriously.
- pjc50 7y ago
  The responsibility lies then with "centrists" to come up with something sensible and effective, doesn't it? Or is the argument that because these people are annoying we're going to do nothing in order to spite them?
  - snikeris 7y ago
    These folks seem to get it: http://www.ecomodernism.org/ http://www.ecomodernism.org/
  - weberc2 7y ago
    I’m not sure what centrists are meant to do. It seems like an issue like this requires clear, actionable advice from the science community. Maybe the science community has clear guidance, but what makes its way to me is often contradicted a week later (“we need to recycle!”, “actually recycling doesn’t do much and landfills aren’t that bad!”, “use solar power!”, “actually solar may use as much carbon to create as it saves”). I want to do something, but I have no idea what the answer is.
    - danaris 7y ago
      Except that's not actually what science is doing. 1) "We need to recycle"—We do! It's very important. Unfortunately, recycling a lot of materials is not currently profitable (or profitable enough? I'm a bit unclear on that part), so a depressing amount of stuff we put in the recycling goes several steps along the chain, then gets thrown in the trash anyway—or possibly dumped somewhere illegally. This is not a problem with science, or recycling; it's a problem with uncaring corporations and externalized costs. 2) "Use solar power!"—Do. I've only ever heard the claim that solar uses as much carbon in its construction as it saves over its lifetime from unsourced posts on the Internet (which, yeah, who am I to throw stones? but still...) who clearly had a pre-existing bias against everything that liberals like. Every reputable study I've ever seen linked regarding the total cost of solar puts it much lower than its output for modern panels. There is some concern regarding some of the components—the more unusual metals, for instance—but the main solution to that, to the best of my understanding, is better recycling. (See #1.) Basically, what science, scientists, and good science reporting does is tell you "if you do X, Y will happen with Z% probability". The reason you see all this contradictory advice is that most of it (on both sides) doesn't actually come from scientists—it comes from the media, imperfectly reporting, and in some cases maliciously misreporting, what scientists say...and often what people who aren't actually scientists say, claiming that it is science.
melling 7y ago
“There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.
migueloller 7y ago
Can somebody with some research experience comment on the effectiveness of this survey? Being inexperienced with this type of process, it would seem to me that ~600 people is a far too small number to get reliable results, specially when the "change" in opinion is from two different ~300 sized cohorts. Also, wouldn't there be a large amount of variables that could affect the outcome in that ~1 month period? Aren't there better methods to isolate independent variables or is it just very hard to do that in an inquiry like this?
- melling 7y ago
  There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.
snowwrestler 7y ago
It's really, really hard to figure out how activism affects public sentiment. Aggressive activism, on its surface, seems counterproductive. How does pissing people off by blocking their commute help change their mind on climate change? That's a very reasonable and intuitive question. But if we look back at history, there's plenty of empirical evidence that aggressive activism does work to advance its goals. Many of the protests against the Vietnam War were far more disruptive than anything we've seen from climate activists, and engendered a far more serious backlash--the point of National Guard soldiers shooting at college student protesters. But ultimately public sentiment did turn against the war.
- AlexB138 7y ago
  > But if we look back at history, there's plenty of empirical evidence that aggressive activism does work to advance its goals. Many of the protests against the Vietnam War were far more disruptive than anything we've seen from climate activists, and engendered a far more serious backlash--the point of National Guard soldiers shooting at college student protesters. But ultimately public sentiment did turn against the war. Post hoc ergo propter hoc. There's no evidence that the protests caused public sentiment to change, they simply coincide. It's equally (more?) likely that people's kids dying in droves changed their opinions, and many people credit the gruesome and explicit nightly news coverage of the war as turning public opinion.
  - snowwrestler 7y ago
    Logical fallacies only prove that you can't deduce a conclusion from given evidence. They don't prove that the conclusion is wrong, or exclude inductive analysis. > many people credit the gruesome and explicit nightly news coverage of the war as turning public opinion. One of the theories for how public activism affects broader public opinion is that it affects public awareness, via news coverage. A big protest creates news for the media to cover, and that coverage will include some explanation for why people are protesting. A big protest may also convince reporters that there is enough interest to support further reporting on the topic.
elorant 7y ago
To anyone flagging the post. Would you please mind explaining what's bothering you in order to know what to avoid posting? Because I can't for the life of me understand what's so controversial about the topic.
- colejohnson66 7y ago
  Climate change is political for some reason

39 points by elorant 7y ago

A green economy will create a lot of local jobs to any country that wants to adopt it. It will make countries more energy independent so oil exporters will have reduced influence in green-countries politics and their military budgets. It will reduce the cost of health care pollution-related problems and citizens will be healthier and have a higher quality of living. There is a lot of money in the oil industry. But, it is still small, politically charged and morally ambiguous compared with the new economy that is growing. The USA has lost decades, proof of a high level of institutional corruption. But, it was just a matter of time.

melling 7y ago
There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.
- mdgrech23 7y ago
  Found the Russian troll.
  - melling 7y ago
    No, Russian trolls don’t take the time and burn karma trying to get people out of their echo chamber. We’ve spent three decades ignoring the problem and we’re really at a turning point. Unfortunately, it’s probably going to have to get worse before enough people are convinced to do something. I just decided to burn a lot of Karma so I can feel like I tried to point out the obvious problems. You can take it from here.
  - jgwil2 7y ago
    Actually it looks like that guy has a lot of a karma; I guess he just feels so strongly about this comment that he's willing to burn some by copy/pasting it all over the place.
  - dang 7y ago
    We ban accounts that attack others. Please review and follow the site guidelines, don't post personal attacks, and don't insinuate astroturfing or shillage without evidence. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- dang 7y ago
  Please don't copy-paste comments on HN.
  - melling 7y ago
    I hope a few people got the point. Try to remember my post every time you hear about climate change. This little echo chamber we have on HN is only enforcing groupthink.

chewbacha 7y ago

The protests and Greta Thunberg's addresses have given me hope during a time of political darkness.

mguerville 7y ago
Likewise, especially because unlike many others her speech feels authentic. She's not selling a book, she's not running for office, she's not trying to milk this but rather appears to do it based on a sense of civic duty.
melling 7y ago
There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.

thrower123 7y ago

I'm not sure whether most of this climate activism is productive, or just produces more backlash in reaction. It would be helpful if climate change could be taken away from the zealous environmentalists, as they have a long track record of advocating for policies that do more to inconvenience people than they do to solve problems. It's the modern day equivalent of wearing a hair shirt. It certainly doesn't help to keep up the fire and brimstone, judgement day is coming, listen and repent rhetoric. They've played that card too many times to be taken seriously.

pjc50 7y ago
The responsibility lies then with "centrists" to come up with something sensible and effective, doesn't it? Or is the argument that because these people are annoying we're going to do nothing in order to spite them?
- snikeris 7y ago
  These folks seem to get it: http://www.ecomodernism.org/ http://www.ecomodernism.org/
- weberc2 7y ago
  I’m not sure what centrists are meant to do. It seems like an issue like this requires clear, actionable advice from the science community. Maybe the science community has clear guidance, but what makes its way to me is often contradicted a week later (“we need to recycle!”, “actually recycling doesn’t do much and landfills aren’t that bad!”, “use solar power!”, “actually solar may use as much carbon to create as it saves”). I want to do something, but I have no idea what the answer is.
  - danaris 7y ago
    Except that's not actually what science is doing. 1) "We need to recycle"—We do! It's very important. Unfortunately, recycling a lot of materials is not currently profitable (or profitable enough? I'm a bit unclear on that part), so a depressing amount of stuff we put in the recycling goes several steps along the chain, then gets thrown in the trash anyway—or possibly dumped somewhere illegally. This is not a problem with science, or recycling; it's a problem with uncaring corporations and externalized costs. 2) "Use solar power!"—Do. I've only ever heard the claim that solar uses as much carbon in its construction as it saves over its lifetime from unsourced posts on the Internet (which, yeah, who am I to throw stones? but still...) who clearly had a pre-existing bias against everything that liberals like. Every reputable study I've ever seen linked regarding the total cost of solar puts it much lower than its output for modern panels. There is some concern regarding some of the components—the more unusual metals, for instance—but the main solution to that, to the best of my understanding, is better recycling. (See #1.) Basically, what science, scientists, and good science reporting does is tell you "if you do X, Y will happen with Z% probability". The reason you see all this contradictory advice is that most of it (on both sides) doesn't actually come from scientists—it comes from the media, imperfectly reporting, and in some cases maliciously misreporting, what scientists say...and often what people who aren't actually scientists say, claiming that it is science.

melling 7y ago

“There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.

migueloller 7y ago

Can somebody with some research experience comment on the effectiveness of this survey? Being inexperienced with this type of process, it would seem to me that ~600 people is a far too small number to get reliable results, specially when the "change" in opinion is from two different ~300 sized cohorts. Also, wouldn't there be a large amount of variables that could affect the outcome in that ~1 month period? Aren't there better methods to isolate independent variables or is it just very hard to do that in an inquiry like this?

melling 7y ago
There’s evidence blah blah blah could be swaying blah blah blah” don’t waste your time reading articles like this. Climate change is a very divisive issue, for whatever reason. The media doesn’t help when every time there’s a hurricane that hits land, or a forest fire in California, someone brings up climate change. Spend any time in the comment section of the Wall Street Journal, when climate change is mentioned, and the majority of people are deniers in one form or another.

snowwrestler 7y ago

It's really, really hard to figure out how activism affects public sentiment. Aggressive activism, on its surface, seems counterproductive. How does pissing people off by blocking their commute help change their mind on climate change? That's a very reasonable and intuitive question. But if we look back at history, there's plenty of empirical evidence that aggressive activism does work to advance its goals. Many of the protests against the Vietnam War were far more disruptive than anything we've seen from climate activists, and engendered a far more serious backlash--the point of National Guard soldiers shooting at college student protesters. But ultimately public sentiment did turn against the war.

AlexB138 7y ago
> But if we look back at history, there's plenty of empirical evidence that aggressive activism does work to advance its goals. Many of the protests against the Vietnam War were far more disruptive than anything we've seen from climate activists, and engendered a far more serious backlash--the point of National Guard soldiers shooting at college student protesters. But ultimately public sentiment did turn against the war. Post hoc ergo propter hoc. There's no evidence that the protests caused public sentiment to change, they simply coincide. It's equally (more?) likely that people's kids dying in droves changed their opinions, and many people credit the gruesome and explicit nightly news coverage of the war as turning public opinion.
- snowwrestler 7y ago
  Logical fallacies only prove that you can't deduce a conclusion from given evidence. They don't prove that the conclusion is wrong, or exclude inductive analysis. > many people credit the gruesome and explicit nightly news coverage of the war as turning public opinion. One of the theories for how public activism affects broader public opinion is that it affects public awareness, via news coverage. A big protest creates news for the media to cover, and that coverage will include some explanation for why people are protesting. A big protest may also convince reporters that there is enough interest to support further reporting on the topic.

elorant 7y ago

To anyone flagging the post. Would you please mind explaining what's bothering you in order to know what to avoid posting? Because I can't for the life of me understand what's so controversial about the topic.

colejohnson66 7y ago
Climate change is political for some reason