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I will acknowledge that those forces may be in play. But I will also ask you to acknowledge that oil extraction has and continues to make certain people, compan

I will acknowledge that those forces may be in play. But I will also ask you to acknowledge that oil extraction has and continues to make certain people, companies, and governments immensely wealthy and powerful and that those groups are very interested in keeping the status quo. Those people/companies/governments have the power and resources to finance research into climate change that would support their narrative. And by all accounts they have been doing that. But despite those efforts the scientific consensus supporting climate change has remained. So yeah, science isn't perfect and we have seen cases in the past where group think has held back progress and discovery. But we have also seen plenty of examples of corporations and trade groups bending and influencing the scientific narrative to their benefit (see the low-fat discussion in this thread). And in the case of climate change, the most monetarily interested party is literally the wealthiest industry in the history of the world. So I think it is safe to say that the current consensus is facing plenty of scrutiny.

ckosidows 7y ago
Does this argument prove anything? An enormous industry that wants to disprove man-made climate change science doesn't prove climate science is iron-tight. There are also many vested interests, at this point, in proving popular climate science to be true. This can be companies, politicians, and even just people who are invested in the hypothesis (either professionally or personally). There are industries who oppose the hypothesis that climate change is man-made for personal reasons, but there are people on the other side who have similar interests. There is scrutiny about man-made climate change, but I've often seen such scrutiny lambasted by people who are too vested in the idea that man has solely created climate change. Is it possible that, despite push-back from oil companies, there is still group-think happening with climate change science? As a disclaimer I believe a significant portion of climate change is man-made but also that part of it can be attributed to natural changes. I _definitely_ think we need to act to save ourselves from climate change. Climate change science has a lot of momentum right now and perhaps certain ideas have been given undue recognition or derision due to their conclusions found.
- qqqwerty 7y ago
  The key mechanism that enables 'group think' in academia is access (or lack of access) to funding for research. Generally, funding for research is fairly limited relative to the number of interested researchers (ask any grad student). The control over journal publications and conference speaking slots is only useful in that it enables researchers to increase their odds of receiving future funding. If one is able to get funding without those credentials, say by going to industry players with aligned interests, then the 'academic cabals' really don't have the power and influence to be a 'cabal'. It is worth noting, that part of the reason the Alzheimer 'cabal' existed in the first place was because the pharmaceutical industry was willing to go along with it. And part of the reason the 'cabal' is finally falling apart is because the industry is no longer willing to fund the research. Here is a fun question for you (or anyone who is skeptical). Can you name one example where industry and academics were diametrically opposed on a particular topic, and where it turned out that the academics were wrong? I can point out quite a few examples where the opposite was true, but I am struggling to think of a single example that would qualify the above prompt.
el_cujo 7y ago
Yeah I agree there is a very strong incentive for certain groups to disprove climate change and they're backed by a lot of money and influence. Comparatively, there doesn't really seem like that big of an incentive to sell a "lie" that CO2 is fucking the climate. That being said, it does irk me a bit that I know so many people who smugly demean the moronic science-deniers who don't believe in climate change, even though they themselves don't know any of the data or figures that support climate change. Most people just follow whatever their talking-head of choice on tv tells them to believe.
- Udik 7y ago
  > there doesn't really seem like that big of an incentive to sell a "lie" that CO2 is fucking the climate. The article we're commenting on argues there's been a huge pressure towards researching ways to stop beta amyloid plaques; and yet there's no obvious "incentive" to do so. It's just a catchy hot topic on which many have invested their careers. In the case of climate change, you have to factor in both the scientific pressure, similar in everything to what's been described here; and the media pressure, absent in the alzheimer's case: the media absolutely loves to sell a scare story, and the climate change story is just the perfect one: it's everywhere, it's invisible, it carries an enormous amount of consequences and huge risks. Most of the predictions are decades away in the future, so the story can go on unchecked for decades. And so on. I'm not saying climate change science is wrong (although some of it certainly is: "climate change science" goes from the basic physics of CO2 greenhouse effect to ecology, economy and social and political predictions far away in the future). I'm saying that you must factor in all the inevitable effects of a story everybody just loves to tell.
  - el_cujo 7y ago
    >Most of the predictions are decades away in the future, so the story can go on unchecked for decades. And so on. It's not just the sea level rising stuff in the future though, now basically any adverse weather event is blamed on climate change. Powerful hurricane, big mudslide, wild fires, etc. I'm not saying climate change doesn't play a role in any of these, but the news media plays it a little loose with any of these events and citing them as being caused by/evidence of climate change with 0 proof. But again, if you question any of if then YOU are the one painted as being against science.

ckosidows 7y ago

Does this argument prove anything? An enormous industry that wants to disprove man-made climate change science doesn't prove climate science is iron-tight. There are also many vested interests, at this point, in proving popular climate science to be true. This can be companies, politicians, and even just people who are invested in the hypothesis (either professionally or personally). There are industries who oppose the hypothesis that climate change is man-made for personal reasons, but there are people on the other side who have similar interests. There is scrutiny about man-made climate change, but I've often seen such scrutiny lambasted by people who are too vested in the idea that man has solely created climate change. Is it possible that, despite push-back from oil companies, there is still group-think happening with climate change science? As a disclaimer I believe a significant portion of climate change is man-made but also that part of it can be attributed to natural changes. I _definitely_ think we need to act to save ourselves from climate change. Climate change science has a lot of momentum right now and perhaps certain ideas have been given undue recognition or derision due to their conclusions found.

qqqwerty 7y ago
The key mechanism that enables 'group think' in academia is access (or lack of access) to funding for research. Generally, funding for research is fairly limited relative to the number of interested researchers (ask any grad student). The control over journal publications and conference speaking slots is only useful in that it enables researchers to increase their odds of receiving future funding. If one is able to get funding without those credentials, say by going to industry players with aligned interests, then the 'academic cabals' really don't have the power and influence to be a 'cabal'. It is worth noting, that part of the reason the Alzheimer 'cabal' existed in the first place was because the pharmaceutical industry was willing to go along with it. And part of the reason the 'cabal' is finally falling apart is because the industry is no longer willing to fund the research. Here is a fun question for you (or anyone who is skeptical). Can you name one example where industry and academics were diametrically opposed on a particular topic, and where it turned out that the academics were wrong? I can point out quite a few examples where the opposite was true, but I am struggling to think of a single example that would qualify the above prompt.

el_cujo 7y ago

Yeah I agree there is a very strong incentive for certain groups to disprove climate change and they're backed by a lot of money and influence. Comparatively, there doesn't really seem like that big of an incentive to sell a "lie" that CO2 is fucking the climate. That being said, it does irk me a bit that I know so many people who smugly demean the moronic science-deniers who don't believe in climate change, even though they themselves don't know any of the data or figures that support climate change. Most people just follow whatever their talking-head of choice on tv tells them to believe.

Udik 7y ago
> there doesn't really seem like that big of an incentive to sell a "lie" that CO2 is fucking the climate. The article we're commenting on argues there's been a huge pressure towards researching ways to stop beta amyloid plaques; and yet there's no obvious "incentive" to do so. It's just a catchy hot topic on which many have invested their careers. In the case of climate change, you have to factor in both the scientific pressure, similar in everything to what's been described here; and the media pressure, absent in the alzheimer's case: the media absolutely loves to sell a scare story, and the climate change story is just the perfect one: it's everywhere, it's invisible, it carries an enormous amount of consequences and huge risks. Most of the predictions are decades away in the future, so the story can go on unchecked for decades. And so on. I'm not saying climate change science is wrong (although some of it certainly is: "climate change science" goes from the basic physics of CO2 greenhouse effect to ecology, economy and social and political predictions far away in the future). I'm saying that you must factor in all the inevitable effects of a story everybody just loves to tell.
- el_cujo 7y ago
  >Most of the predictions are decades away in the future, so the story can go on unchecked for decades. And so on. It's not just the sea level rising stuff in the future though, now basically any adverse weather event is blamed on climate change. Powerful hurricane, big mudslide, wild fires, etc. I'm not saying climate change doesn't play a role in any of these, but the news media plays it a little loose with any of these events and citing them as being caused by/evidence of climate change with 0 proof. But again, if you question any of if then YOU are the one painted as being against science.