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For example, having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane because there's scientific consensus on only one sid

For example, having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane because there's scientific consensus on only one side of that debate. Trying to cast equal light on both sides of a topic tips the scale in favor of the minority opinion. Or take some reporting about DT's insane idea to take over Greenland, treating it like a legitimate idea and polling people about their thoughts just further legitimatizes absolute insanity.

pseudo0 2y ago
What's so insane about buying Greenland? Offer the current population $2 million USD each if they vote to join, and it would only cost around $100 billion. That's a steal considering its strategic value.
- bdangubic 2y ago
  or you can offer every Russian $5 to vote to join - cheaper and much bigger strategic value
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
mmooss 2y ago
> having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane I haven't seen such a debate in serious journalism in a long time. I think that's a non-existant problem, but could you point to examples?
tim333 2y ago
>having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane It depends what aspect you are debating. Is it happening is one sided but how fast, what we should do about etc is not.
mike_hearn 2y ago
Finding scientists who disagree with one or more climate change narratives is easy; it's actually the media who decided one day that they must stop talking to such people because there is "consensus", which is obviously doublethink. If there's consensus then you don't need to make an explicit decision to silence one side, because there is only one side to begin with. You yourself admit that this is true when your post goes from talking about a "consensus on only one side" to there being a "minority opinion" i.e. no consensus. But if you simply decide to report the majority opinion on any topic then you're once again engaged in circular reasoning, as the majority opinion will be affected by whatever you report. There isn't any way to do honest journalism on complex topics other than to actually report all sides of the issue, including disagreement by minorities, including if you believe those minorities are wrong. The media used to do "both sides" because that's what it takes to be trusted, when they stopped doing that trust in them started to decline. Ironically, this totally one sided kind of reporting leading to mistrust is what Bezos is now trying to fix. Far too late, but he is at least trying.
- belter 2y ago
  > Finding scientists who disagree with one or more climate change narratives is easy Do you have a reference?
  - rsynnott 2y ago
    If you’re willing to define ‘scientists’ very broadly, and in particular if you’re okay with ‘scientists’ in unrelated fields, it’s very doable.
  - mike_hearn 2y ago
    Just read any skeptics blog to get a daily feed of such scientists. Here some examples but there's an endless stream: Storms not getting worse: "there is no clear trend in most basins, but a significant decrease in power dissipation index has been detected in the South Indian Ocean basin since 1994, which is almost entirely due to a decrease in both tropical cyclone frequency and duration in this basin", https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01683-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01683-2 Pacific islands not drowning: "Results challenge perceptions of island loss, showing islands are dynamic features that will persist as sites for habitation over the next century", https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-02954-1 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-02954-1 Warming in 20th century over-estimated: "correcting the ocean cold bias would result in a more modest early-twentieth-century warming trend", https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08230-1 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08230-1 Or for more direct refutations: Roy Spencer, climatologist, who has written entire books refuting climate change narratives: https://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Skepticism-Busy-People-ebook/dp/B07H57WVYJ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1538663092&sr=1-1&keywords=global+warming+skepticism+for+busy+people https://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Skepticism-Busy-People... Judith Curry, (retired) climatologist, https://judithcurry.com/2024/05/26/fact-checking-the-fact-checkers-on-my-prager-u-video/ https://judithcurry.com/2024/05/26/fact-checking-the-fact-ch... "All things considered, planet earth is doing fine. We are obviously not facing an existential crisis. Anyone who tells you that we are, is not paying attention to the historical data. Instead, they are concerned about what “might” happen in the future, based on predictions from inadequate climate models, driven by unrealistic assumptions." Nicola Scafetta, climatologist, https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/09/scaffeta-on-his-latest-paper-harmonic-climate-model-versus-the-ipcc-general-circulation-climate-models/ https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/09/scaffeta-on-his-lates... "The attempts of some of current climate modelers to explain and solve the failure of their GCMs in properly forecasting the approximate steady climate of the last 10 years are very unsatisfactory for any practical and theoretical purpose." John Clauser, Nobel prize winner in physics, https://clintel.org/nobel-prize-winner-dr-john-f-clauser-signs-the-clintel-world-climate-declaration/ https://clintel.org/nobel-prize-winner-dr-john-f-clauser-sig... "Misguided climate science has metastasized into massive shock-journalistic pseudoscience." The usual response to all this is usually a No True Scotsman argument similar to the one posted by rsynnott, or a claim that "consensus" doesn't mean everyone agrees but only requires some arbitrary threshold in a carefully selected subgroup. Even there, it fails. The famous claim that 99% of climatologists agree with human-driven global warming doesn't replicate: https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/11/11/215 https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/11/11/215 ... and has severe methodological errors.
rsynnott 2y ago
There was a painful period in the run-up to the Irish referendum on same-sex marriage a decade ago where RTE, the state broadcaster, took its obligation to allow equal time on elections a little too literally. A particular highlight was a business program on the radio in which the presenter talked to a hospitality industry representative about the impact of more weddings on the industry; due to RTE’s rules they also had to get on some lunatic to rant for five minutes about how the gays were going to destroy civilisation. (By the time the referendum actually happened, there was all-party support, the church was sitting it out, and there was enough society consensus that RTE really only had a panel of about ten public figures to take the anti side, and most of them were fairly unhinged.)
- BrandoElFollito 2y ago
  We have this in France before the presidential elections. There are usually 20 or so candidates, the top 5 get 90% of the voices. But everyone is entitled to the same media time. You then have a debate with the top 5 at 21 (after the news), and then one or two for the rest between 22:30 and midnight. I find the second one more interesting because you have the unusual ones who push their crazy ideas. The candidates of the premium debate are well known and their ideas as well.
  - rsynnott 2y ago
    Ah, yeah, we have that as well, for party leaders. Any party with at least one TD gets to participate in the first one, so half the parties in it had exactly one TD. It was such a mess that I’m not sure anyone really bothered watching the second one (which just had the real parties); the French sequencing sounds better.

pseudo0 2y ago

What's so insane about buying Greenland? Offer the current population $2 million USD each if they vote to join, and it would only cost around $100 billion. That's a steal considering its strategic value.

bdangubic 2y ago
or you can offer every Russian $5 to vote to join - cheaper and much bigger strategic value

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

mmooss 2y ago

> having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane I haven't seen such a debate in serious journalism in a long time. I think that's a non-existant problem, but could you point to examples?

tim333 2y ago

>having a debate about climate change with one scientist from each side of the debate is insane It depends what aspect you are debating. Is it happening is one sided but how fast, what we should do about etc is not.

mike_hearn 2y ago

Finding scientists who disagree with one or more climate change narratives is easy; it's actually the media who decided one day that they must stop talking to such people because there is "consensus", which is obviously doublethink. If there's consensus then you don't need to make an explicit decision to silence one side, because there is only one side to begin with. You yourself admit that this is true when your post goes from talking about a "consensus on only one side" to there being a "minority opinion" i.e. no consensus. But if you simply decide to report the majority opinion on any topic then you're once again engaged in circular reasoning, as the majority opinion will be affected by whatever you report. There isn't any way to do honest journalism on complex topics other than to actually report all sides of the issue, including disagreement by minorities, including if you believe those minorities are wrong. The media used to do "both sides" because that's what it takes to be trusted, when they stopped doing that trust in them started to decline. Ironically, this totally one sided kind of reporting leading to mistrust is what Bezos is now trying to fix. Far too late, but he is at least trying.

belter 2y ago
> Finding scientists who disagree with one or more climate change narratives is easy Do you have a reference?
- rsynnott 2y ago
  If you’re willing to define ‘scientists’ very broadly, and in particular if you’re okay with ‘scientists’ in unrelated fields, it’s very doable.
- mike_hearn 2y ago
  Just read any skeptics blog to get a daily feed of such scientists. Here some examples but there's an endless stream: Storms not getting worse: "there is no clear trend in most basins, but a significant decrease in power dissipation index has been detected in the South Indian Ocean basin since 1994, which is almost entirely due to a decrease in both tropical cyclone frequency and duration in this basin", https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01683-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01683-2 Pacific islands not drowning: "Results challenge perceptions of island loss, showing islands are dynamic features that will persist as sites for habitation over the next century", https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-02954-1 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-02954-1 Warming in 20th century over-estimated: "correcting the ocean cold bias would result in a more modest early-twentieth-century warming trend", https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08230-1 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08230-1 Or for more direct refutations: Roy Spencer, climatologist, who has written entire books refuting climate change narratives: https://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Skepticism-Busy-People-ebook/dp/B07H57WVYJ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1538663092&sr=1-1&keywords=global+warming+skepticism+for+busy+people https://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Skepticism-Busy-People... Judith Curry, (retired) climatologist, https://judithcurry.com/2024/05/26/fact-checking-the-fact-checkers-on-my-prager-u-video/ https://judithcurry.com/2024/05/26/fact-checking-the-fact-ch... "All things considered, planet earth is doing fine. We are obviously not facing an existential crisis. Anyone who tells you that we are, is not paying attention to the historical data. Instead, they are concerned about what “might” happen in the future, based on predictions from inadequate climate models, driven by unrealistic assumptions." Nicola Scafetta, climatologist, https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/09/scaffeta-on-his-latest-paper-harmonic-climate-model-versus-the-ipcc-general-circulation-climate-models/ https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/09/scaffeta-on-his-lates... "The attempts of some of current climate modelers to explain and solve the failure of their GCMs in properly forecasting the approximate steady climate of the last 10 years are very unsatisfactory for any practical and theoretical purpose." John Clauser, Nobel prize winner in physics, https://clintel.org/nobel-prize-winner-dr-john-f-clauser-signs-the-clintel-world-climate-declaration/ https://clintel.org/nobel-prize-winner-dr-john-f-clauser-sig... "Misguided climate science has metastasized into massive shock-journalistic pseudoscience." The usual response to all this is usually a No True Scotsman argument similar to the one posted by rsynnott, or a claim that "consensus" doesn't mean everyone agrees but only requires some arbitrary threshold in a carefully selected subgroup. Even there, it fails. The famous claim that 99% of climatologists agree with human-driven global warming doesn't replicate: https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/11/11/215 https://www.mdpi.com/2225-1154/11/11/215 ... and has severe methodological errors.

rsynnott 2y ago

There was a painful period in the run-up to the Irish referendum on same-sex marriage a decade ago where RTE, the state broadcaster, took its obligation to allow equal time on elections a little too literally. A particular highlight was a business program on the radio in which the presenter talked to a hospitality industry representative about the impact of more weddings on the industry; due to RTE’s rules they also had to get on some lunatic to rant for five minutes about how the gays were going to destroy civilisation. (By the time the referendum actually happened, there was all-party support, the church was sitting it out, and there was enough society consensus that RTE really only had a panel of about ten public figures to take the anti side, and most of them were fairly unhinged.)

BrandoElFollito 2y ago
We have this in France before the presidential elections. There are usually 20 or so candidates, the top 5 get 90% of the voices. But everyone is entitled to the same media time. You then have a debate with the top 5 at 21 (after the news), and then one or two for the rest between 22:30 and midnight. I find the second one more interesting because you have the unusual ones who push their crazy ideas. The candidates of the premium debate are well known and their ideas as well.
- rsynnott 2y ago
  Ah, yeah, we have that as well, for party leaders. Any party with at least one TD gets to participate in the first one, so half the parties in it had exactly one TD. It was such a mess that I’m not sure anyone really bothered watching the second one (which just had the real parties); the French sequencing sounds better.