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> Consensus doesn't mean you're right, but it does mean that no one can find a serious flaw. This assumes a very naive view that the average university resear

> Consensus doesn't mean you're right, but it does mean that no one can find a serious flaw. This assumes a very naive view that the average university researcher is trying to challenge prevailing theories on a daily basis. The reality is that challenging prevailing theories of science is near impossible in today's grant-chasing arena called academia. Do you really think a grant proposal that questions some of the prevailing views in climate science is going to get funded? And even if does get funded, good luck getting it published in any mainstream journal.

addicted 5y ago
This is hilarious considering there’s trillions of dollars invested in assuming climate change doesn’t exist.
- slt2021 5y ago
  If you think that the market is wrong, you are free to bet your money in an opposite side and get rich from being right about climate change. Put your money where your beliefs are, so to speak
wolverine876 5y ago
Do you have solid evidence of these claims?
- tasogare 5y ago
  Anybody who had a feet for more than 5 minutes in a lab know he's right. Heck I can't even challenge my own supervisors when they make swallow statements that are in fact contradicted by a bunch of papers, how could I get funding from external entities by submitting socially unpopular ideas? Impossible, especially in highly politicized fields.
  - wolverine876 5y ago
    So, any solid evidence? And even if you did, it wouldn't disprove the consensus on climate change in any way. Or are you also saying that all the research was falsified? Any evidence of that?
  - godelski 5y ago
    Really? I challenge the beliefs of my advisor all the time. There's no ill will between us. In fact, I think he thinks higher of me because I'll challenge him if I think he is wrong. Don't get me wrong, we agree on a lot more than we disagree on, but when we disagree I'm not afraid and we go try to prove who's right. Sometimes it is him, less so me haha.
jpgvm 5y ago
I think your problem here is framing it as "questioning prevailing views". You are setting yourself up for failure by trying to make it about opinions before even doing any science. The correct way to accomplish this is to take something that you think you can disprove, design an experiment that would show that the existing theory may be incorrect and then successfully defend that. Say for instance you hypothesised that methane doesn't in fact act as a greenhouse gas, you design an experiment that shows that increasing the % methane in the upper atmosphere doesn't result in additional heat being captured. You would then need to collect the results, properly show they are consistent with your hypothesis vs your control data and then defend that in peer review. In this case you would most likely be wrong because we are pretty damn sure methane isn't great but if you had an idea that had a chance I am sure you could get funding. It is worth mentioning that the ability to get funding is somewhat correlated with the interestingness and likelihood of a groundbreaking finding. Finding methane is not contributing to greenhouse effect would be a massive finding, however the likelihood it isn't is low because there already exists a huge body of evidence that supports the opposite conclusion. TLDR: You can definitely work on attempting to prove climate change isn't happening but you probably need a very clever idea as everyone else that has looked at it thus far hasn't come up with anything capable of disproving it.
bryanrasmussen 5y ago
>Do you really think a grant proposal that questions some of the prevailing views in climate science is going to get funded? I would assume that there are organizations that try to fund proposals that question some of the prevailing views in climate science otherwise where do all these papers come from that anti-climate change people like to refer to?
crummy 5y ago
> Do you really think a grant proposal that questions some of the prevailing views in climate science is going to get funded? Wouldn't there be a bunch of companies with a lot of wealth and strong incentives to fund that sort of thing?
- slt2021 5y ago
  no company would do this as they would be instantly canceled by their Boards/shareholders driven by "ESG mandates"
  - cycomanic 5y ago
    Are you saying that big oil/tobacco have not funded scientific studies denying climate change?
addicted 5y ago
But here’s the thing. Why does every fossil fuel company accept the science of climate change. Not just that they are unable to get their contrarian studies published in academic papers. No, they literally spend a ton of money in Super Bowl ads trying to convince the world that they are trying to reduce climate change. And they have pages on their websites: BP: https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/sustainability.html https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/sustainability.html Exxon: https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/Sustainability/Environmental-protection/Climate-change https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/Sustainability/Environmenta... There’s almost no organization other than the American right in the world that currently denies the reality of climate change.
deleted 5y ago
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addicted 5y ago

This is hilarious considering there’s trillions of dollars invested in assuming climate change doesn’t exist.

slt2021 5y ago
If you think that the market is wrong, you are free to bet your money in an opposite side and get rich from being right about climate change. Put your money where your beliefs are, so to speak

wolverine876 5y ago

Do you have solid evidence of these claims?

tasogare 5y ago
Anybody who had a feet for more than 5 minutes in a lab know he's right. Heck I can't even challenge my own supervisors when they make swallow statements that are in fact contradicted by a bunch of papers, how could I get funding from external entities by submitting socially unpopular ideas? Impossible, especially in highly politicized fields.
- wolverine876 5y ago
  So, any solid evidence? And even if you did, it wouldn't disprove the consensus on climate change in any way. Or are you also saying that all the research was falsified? Any evidence of that?
- godelski 5y ago
  Really? I challenge the beliefs of my advisor all the time. There's no ill will between us. In fact, I think he thinks higher of me because I'll challenge him if I think he is wrong. Don't get me wrong, we agree on a lot more than we disagree on, but when we disagree I'm not afraid and we go try to prove who's right. Sometimes it is him, less so me haha.

jpgvm 5y ago

I think your problem here is framing it as "questioning prevailing views". You are setting yourself up for failure by trying to make it about opinions before even doing any science. The correct way to accomplish this is to take something that you think you can disprove, design an experiment that would show that the existing theory may be incorrect and then successfully defend that. Say for instance you hypothesised that methane doesn't in fact act as a greenhouse gas, you design an experiment that shows that increasing the % methane in the upper atmosphere doesn't result in additional heat being captured. You would then need to collect the results, properly show they are consistent with your hypothesis vs your control data and then defend that in peer review. In this case you would most likely be wrong because we are pretty damn sure methane isn't great but if you had an idea that had a chance I am sure you could get funding. It is worth mentioning that the ability to get funding is somewhat correlated with the interestingness and likelihood of a groundbreaking finding. Finding methane is not contributing to greenhouse effect would be a massive finding, however the likelihood it isn't is low because there already exists a huge body of evidence that supports the opposite conclusion. TLDR: You can definitely work on attempting to prove climate change isn't happening but you probably need a very clever idea as everyone else that has looked at it thus far hasn't come up with anything capable of disproving it.

bryanrasmussen 5y ago

>Do you really think a grant proposal that questions some of the prevailing views in climate science is going to get funded? I would assume that there are organizations that try to fund proposals that question some of the prevailing views in climate science otherwise where do all these papers come from that anti-climate change people like to refer to?

crummy 5y ago

> Do you really think a grant proposal that questions some of the prevailing views in climate science is going to get funded? Wouldn't there be a bunch of companies with a lot of wealth and strong incentives to fund that sort of thing?

slt2021 5y ago
no company would do this as they would be instantly canceled by their Boards/shareholders driven by "ESG mandates"
- cycomanic 5y ago
  Are you saying that big oil/tobacco have not funded scientific studies denying climate change?

addicted 5y ago

But here’s the thing. Why does every fossil fuel company accept the science of climate change. Not just that they are unable to get their contrarian studies published in academic papers. No, they literally spend a ton of money in Super Bowl ads trying to convince the world that they are trying to reduce climate change. And they have pages on their websites: BP: https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/sustainability.html https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/sustainability.html Exxon: https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/Sustainability/Environmental-protection/Climate-change https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/Sustainability/Environmenta... There’s almost no organization other than the American right in the world that currently denies the reality of climate change.

deleted 5y ago

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