4 ms·
My biggest gripe with that type of argumentation is that it plays into the idea that weather and climate are pretty much the same thing, when they really aren't
by hnarn 7y ago
My biggest gripe with that type of argumentation is that it plays into the idea that weather and climate are pretty much the same thing, when they really aren't.
- whatshisface 7y agoYeah, if you get people used to that kind of argument, get ready for absolutely zero belief in global warming next time we have a cold winter preceeded by no hurricane.
- goatlover 7y agoAlso because correlation isn't causation. An instance of a hurricane or a warmer summer by itself doesn't prove anything. That's poor science journalism. You need trends and models to demonstrate climate change, not an instance of undesirable weather. It's not like hurricanes or warm summers never happened before.
- cos2pi 7y agoAgreed, this has repeatedly been one of the biggest failings in communicating the reality of anthropogenic climate change. Climate change is not a single event, nor a cluster of events, that occur(s) over a summer. Strong hurricanes have occurred well before Dorian [1]. So have heat waves [2]. Extreme weather happens. The change in the frequency of (some) extreme events can be attributed to anthropogenic climate change, but a single event cannot. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1935_Labor_Day_hurricane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1935_Labor_Day_hurricane [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936_North_American_heat_wave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936_North_American_heat_wave
- adj83 7y agoclimate (if it exists at all) is the average of weather data.