7 ms·

It's more that it's an unspoken thing. Those of us who understand these issues aren't going out of our way to provide an excuse for dissonance to the masses or

by edrxty 5y ago

It's more that it's an unspoken thing. Those of us who understand these issues aren't going out of our way to provide an excuse for dissonance to the masses or worse, easily misrepresented ammunition for the talking heads. The underlying systems are obviously complex but the end result is simple and society is currently having a hard time processing things that aren't simple.

coder-3 5y ago
The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. In my opinion, just saying that 'this is the effect that we found, the current consensus is that the effect is minor but more research is needed' is a more honest and a more effective way of getting "the masses" on the side of truth.
- morpheos137 5y ago
  30% increase in carbon consumption by plants is not minor if true.
  - Filligree 5y ago
    It could be. How large is that carbon consumption in the first place?
    - morpheos137 5y ago
      My understanding is that on earth the two main carbon sinks are biomass and the oceans. I believe these sinks make up almost 100% of natural carbon sequestration. So it could be a big amount. I'd check the carbon cycle wiki article.
      - raducu 5y ago
        But is biomass a permanent sink or just a temporary buffer? I mean every year we keep pumping more carbon into the atmosphere, but unless biomass turns into coal, it is just a temporary buffer for carbon, right?
        morpheos137 5y ago
        Everything is temporary on a long enough time scale. If new plants grow to replace those that die it is potentially sustainable.
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        lamontcg 5y ago
        It is temporary. The increase in biomass due to CO2 saturates when the area locally runs out of other constraints like water or nitrogen. The IPCC predicts by 2100 the land is going to convert into a net source rather than sink of carbon -- so the positive feedback loops will exceed the negative feedback stabilizers. The increase in biomass also comes at a decrease in nutrient density as well, so its not like this is magic sauce for croplands.
  - qqqwerty 5y ago
    It would have to be closer to 200-300% in order to solve our problem. You can easily Google search for these numbers. And this would just get us to neutral on CO2. We would still have to deal with methane and water vapor, both of which are more potent greenhouse gases.
- marricks 5y ago
  > The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. That's complete bullshit. What's causing the distrust is lobbying by some of the largest industries in the world and major media companies making money hand over fist selling lies. The fact that scientists disagree on details or some might hedge what they say so folks don't get the wrong idea I imagine has little to no ill effect in comparison.
  - eitland 5y ago
    > That's complete bullshit. What's causing the distrust is lobbying by some of the largest industries in the world and major media companies making money hand over fist selling lies. No. Unless it was lobbyists that made my history books in school. Still whenever I tried in the past to get an answer to why Greenland was so warm 1000 years ago I get labeled a shill. It is somewhat maddening and absolutely not something that helps trust. Same goes with how it is impossible to get raw numbers in any discussion.
    - diordiderot 5y ago
      Well in many US states politicians write the curriculum. Like in Texas and Mississippi, you don't learn that slavery was the cause for the civil war, but states rights. Despite the existence of their succession documents
    - lamontcg 5y ago
      > Still whenever I tried in the past to get an answer to why Greenland was so warm 1000 years ago I get labeled a shill. probably a change in the strength of north atlantic thermohaline circulation. that was a regional shift in local climate and not due to worldwide climate change. it isn't reflected in global proxies like antarctic ice cores. hurricane activity in the atlantic basin increased, and its likely that la nina (cool) conditions persisted across the pacific. it also may have caused draught that caused the collapse of the Maya civilization. you probably get labelled a shill because you use it to cast doubt on anthropogenic causes of climate change and you argue that warmer temperatures benefited northern europe, while ignoring the drought and destruction of a civilization in central america.
- yongjik 5y ago
  > The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. Considering that climate scientists have seen their emails hacked, quote-mined, and used to produce climate FUD (not to mention global harassment campaign), I have to say nah, not really. https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2019/nov/09/climategate-10-years-on-what-lessons-have-we-learned https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2019/nov/09/climateg...
plank_time 5y ago
This is the perfect way to cause complete mistrust in a movement. Look at what happened with covid and masks. Thinking that controlling the narrative and lying for the “greater good” is corruption.
colechristensen 5y ago
What is simple is a lot of people can tell they're being lied to by people driven more by belief than reason (i.e. people like you and those who "understand", I'm disgusted by your attitude) It is very easy to generate an opposition movement by turning a reason-driven effort into moral drum beating nonsense. "Trust the science, and by the way, 'the science' won't ever publish real evidence that contradicts its beliefs" is why you get deniers that have very legitimate reasons to doubt people who tell them what's real and what isn't.
cosmojg 5y ago
> The underlying systems are obviously complex but the end result is simple and society is currently having a hard time processing things that aren't simple. How do we fix this? Why is society having such a hard time processing things that aren't simple?
- colechristensen 5y ago
  People are as dumb as you treat them. You simply have to stop optimizing for the lowest common denominator and push things out that you think some people won't understand. Small children are perfectly capable of understanding very complex things, just ask a kid about pokemon or whatever kids are into these days and you'll be able to find huge pockets of complexity all over the place. Treat people like they're dumb and can't understand anything that doesn't fit into a headline though... and they'll get accustomed to that. The biggest targets should be news room editors trying to sell ads.
AtlasBarfed 5y ago
Ahhhh, and it brings back memories of the astroturfing of 20 years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greening_Earth_Society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greening_Earth_Society
refurb 5y ago
So basically you're intentionally not sharing "silver linings" about global warming because you feel like people won't understand. Is there anything else you're intentionally keeping quiet about? That is going to backfire terribly on you. The only thing worse than sharing information that you deem "unhelpful" is being caught hiding it.
- loopz 5y ago
  Why not investigate starting with IPCC reports: https://www.ipcc.ch/reports/ https://www.ipcc.ch/reports/ These are reports based on peer-reviewed scientific papers, that yes sometimes have to discount and dispute eachother. The presence of conflicting information does not change the overall picture of greenhouse gases like CO2 which can be tested in any simple lab. It does not change how solar input has increased over millions of years, making the planet much more sensitive to warming due to greenhouse effects. Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwtt51gvaJQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwtt51gvaJQ If you put water on the stove and max the temperature, it is not hard to predict you don't want to keep your hand in that water for too long.
  - refurb 5y ago
    This doesn’t answer my question at all. This is not about discounting or disputing information, this is about intentionally hiding it.
    - loopz 5y ago
      That's quite an accusation though. Have you even looked for the information you seek yourself, or do you expect to be spoonfed the information that you currently feel you are missing?
      - refurb 5y ago
        Huh? I replying to the OP comment: "Those of us who understand these issues aren't going out of our way to provide an excuse for dissonance to the masses or worse, easily misrepresented ammunition for the talking heads." They clearly stated they are involved in research and are actively not sharing information.

by edrxty 5y ago

coder-3 5y ago

The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. In my opinion, just saying that 'this is the effect that we found, the current consensus is that the effect is minor but more research is needed' is a more honest and a more effective way of getting "the masses" on the side of truth.

morpheos137 5y ago
30% increase in carbon consumption by plants is not minor if true.
- Filligree 5y ago
  It could be. How large is that carbon consumption in the first place?
  - morpheos137 5y ago
    My understanding is that on earth the two main carbon sinks are biomass and the oceans. I believe these sinks make up almost 100% of natural carbon sequestration. So it could be a big amount. I'd check the carbon cycle wiki article.
    - raducu 5y ago
      But is biomass a permanent sink or just a temporary buffer? I mean every year we keep pumping more carbon into the atmosphere, but unless biomass turns into coal, it is just a temporary buffer for carbon, right?
      - morpheos137 5y ago
        Everything is temporary on a long enough time scale. If new plants grow to replace those that die it is potentially sustainable.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - lamontcg 5y ago
        It is temporary. The increase in biomass due to CO2 saturates when the area locally runs out of other constraints like water or nitrogen. The IPCC predicts by 2100 the land is going to convert into a net source rather than sink of carbon -- so the positive feedback loops will exceed the negative feedback stabilizers. The increase in biomass also comes at a decrease in nutrient density as well, so its not like this is magic sauce for croplands.
- qqqwerty 5y ago
  It would have to be closer to 200-300% in order to solve our problem. You can easily Google search for these numbers. And this would just get us to neutral on CO2. We would still have to deal with methane and water vapor, both of which are more potent greenhouse gases.
marricks 5y ago
> The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. That's complete bullshit. What's causing the distrust is lobbying by some of the largest industries in the world and major media companies making money hand over fist selling lies. The fact that scientists disagree on details or some might hedge what they say so folks don't get the wrong idea I imagine has little to no ill effect in comparison.
- eitland 5y ago
  > That's complete bullshit. What's causing the distrust is lobbying by some of the largest industries in the world and major media companies making money hand over fist selling lies. No. Unless it was lobbyists that made my history books in school. Still whenever I tried in the past to get an answer to why Greenland was so warm 1000 years ago I get labeled a shill. It is somewhat maddening and absolutely not something that helps trust. Same goes with how it is impossible to get raw numbers in any discussion.
  - diordiderot 5y ago
    Well in many US states politicians write the curriculum. Like in Texas and Mississippi, you don't learn that slavery was the cause for the civil war, but states rights. Despite the existence of their succession documents
  - lamontcg 5y ago
    > Still whenever I tried in the past to get an answer to why Greenland was so warm 1000 years ago I get labeled a shill. probably a change in the strength of north atlantic thermohaline circulation. that was a regional shift in local climate and not due to worldwide climate change. it isn't reflected in global proxies like antarctic ice cores. hurricane activity in the atlantic basin increased, and its likely that la nina (cool) conditions persisted across the pacific. it also may have caused draught that caused the collapse of the Maya civilization. you probably get labelled a shill because you use it to cast doubt on anthropogenic causes of climate change and you argue that warmer temperatures benefited northern europe, while ignoring the drought and destruction of a civilization in central america.
yongjik 5y ago
> The lack of openness is transparency is precisely what causes "the masses" to distrust experts about these issues. Considering that climate scientists have seen their emails hacked, quote-mined, and used to produce climate FUD (not to mention global harassment campaign), I have to say nah, not really. https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2019/nov/09/climategate-10-years-on-what-lessons-have-we-learned https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2019/nov/09/climateg...

plank_time 5y ago

This is the perfect way to cause complete mistrust in a movement. Look at what happened with covid and masks. Thinking that controlling the narrative and lying for the “greater good” is corruption.

colechristensen 5y ago

What is simple is a lot of people can tell they're being lied to by people driven more by belief than reason (i.e. people like you and those who "understand", I'm disgusted by your attitude) It is very easy to generate an opposition movement by turning a reason-driven effort into moral drum beating nonsense. "Trust the science, and by the way, 'the science' won't ever publish real evidence that contradicts its beliefs" is why you get deniers that have very legitimate reasons to doubt people who tell them what's real and what isn't.

cosmojg 5y ago

> The underlying systems are obviously complex but the end result is simple and society is currently having a hard time processing things that aren't simple. How do we fix this? Why is society having such a hard time processing things that aren't simple?

colechristensen 5y ago
People are as dumb as you treat them. You simply have to stop optimizing for the lowest common denominator and push things out that you think some people won't understand. Small children are perfectly capable of understanding very complex things, just ask a kid about pokemon or whatever kids are into these days and you'll be able to find huge pockets of complexity all over the place. Treat people like they're dumb and can't understand anything that doesn't fit into a headline though... and they'll get accustomed to that. The biggest targets should be news room editors trying to sell ads.

AtlasBarfed 5y ago

Ahhhh, and it brings back memories of the astroturfing of 20 years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greening_Earth_Society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greening_Earth_Society

refurb 5y ago

So basically you're intentionally not sharing "silver linings" about global warming because you feel like people won't understand. Is there anything else you're intentionally keeping quiet about? That is going to backfire terribly on you. The only thing worse than sharing information that you deem "unhelpful" is being caught hiding it.

loopz 5y ago
Why not investigate starting with IPCC reports: https://www.ipcc.ch/reports/ https://www.ipcc.ch/reports/ These are reports based on peer-reviewed scientific papers, that yes sometimes have to discount and dispute eachother. The presence of conflicting information does not change the overall picture of greenhouse gases like CO2 which can be tested in any simple lab. It does not change how solar input has increased over millions of years, making the planet much more sensitive to warming due to greenhouse effects. Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwtt51gvaJQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwtt51gvaJQ If you put water on the stove and max the temperature, it is not hard to predict you don't want to keep your hand in that water for too long.
- refurb 5y ago
  This doesn’t answer my question at all. This is not about discounting or disputing information, this is about intentionally hiding it.
  - loopz 5y ago
    That's quite an accusation though. Have you even looked for the information you seek yourself, or do you expect to be spoonfed the information that you currently feel you are missing?
    - refurb 5y ago
      Huh? I replying to the OP comment: "Those of us who understand these issues aren't going out of our way to provide an excuse for dissonance to the masses or worse, easily misrepresented ammunition for the talking heads." They clearly stated they are involved in research and are actively not sharing information.