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BBC staff ordered to stop giving equal airtime to climate deniers
- Karunamon 12y agoWere every network to start doing what the BBC is, their unfounded opinions would cease to be heard, Bill Nye wouldn’t have to keep debating them, and maybe, just maybe, they’d all just go away. Not bloody likely. Now you've just put them in the same group as the other conspiracy theorists, and given them the additional (legitimate) ammo that "the establishment is censoring them". Confirmation bias is a hell of a drug.
- tieTYT 12y agoDevil's advocate: When's the last time a fringe* conspiracy theorist's agenda has been able to effect legislature? EDIT: Added the word "fringe". As in, a conspiracy theory that doesn't get media coverage.
- fahadkhan 12y agoI offer Second Iraq War as a lower bound.
- tptacek 12y agoHPV vaccination jumps to mind.
- Karunamon 12y agoThe "vaccines cause autism" crowd have been successful in carving out "personal exemptions" from otherwise evenly-enforced rules.
- tieTYT 12y agoSorry, I meant "fringe" conspiracy theories. Otherwise my point was kind of off topic to bring up. Imagine if that "vaccines cause autism" crowd didn't get air time. Perhaps they wouldn't get personal exemptions.
- Crito 12y agohttp://fluoridealert.org/content/communities/ http://fluoridealert.org/content/communities/ "Communities Which Have Rejected Fluoridation Since 1990" "Satanic Ritual Abuse" aka Satanic Panic also had a field-day in the courts, if not the legislature.
- alexeisadeski3 12y agoSarBox? FATCA?
- sampo 12y agoThe totally over-restrictive GMO regulation in the European Union is based on very efficient, but scientifically unfounded, propaganda by some NGO's.
- jonnathanson 12y agoIn fairness, and quite unfortunately, I don't think we can call climate change deniers a "fringe." A substantial proportion of the American public denies climate change in one way or another, be it denial of anthropogenic climate change, denial of climate change altogether, or dismissal of the significance of climate change. I don't have the latest figures in front of me, but in the not-too-distant past, deniers polled as a slim majority. The tide seems to be turning, but until quite recently, it was an article of faith (literally, on occasion) among many conservatives that climate change was a liberal-media bogeyman. This was true even among the more respectable conservative publications and commentators, and not just the wackos.
- dragonwriter 12y ago> In fairness, and quite unfortunately, I don't think we can call climate change deniers a "fringe." In terms of science we can. In terms of politics or society we can not, but we can distinguish political reporting from science reporting, even on a scientific issue which has political implications.
- jonnathanson 12y agoSure, but I was responding specifically to the idea that the denial camp (amongst laypeople / GenPop) is a "fringe." In some ways it's dangerous to think of it as such. It's a significant movement with some significant capital behind it, from energy companies and other lobbies. By no means am I suggesting it's a legitimate movement or a non-fringe movement amongst scientists, or that it deserves equal airtime. The viewpoint is largely bunk. Its adherents, however, are legion.
- dragonwriter 12y agoAs "fringe" was defined in the context used upthread in the phrase "fringe conspiracy theorists", it means specifically "ones that don't get [presumably, mainstream] media attention". So, the discussion here is largely about making climate change denial into a fringe by that definition. There certainly are other senses of the word "fringe", some of which they fit, others of which they don't.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- div 12y agoPutting them in the same group as other conspiracy theorists is putting them where they belong.
- jarrett 12y agoFor any given fringe view that the media properly marginalizes, some people will go on believing it. But that doesn't mean the number of believers (or undecided people) will stay the same. It's quite possible, and in my view probable, that reducing airtime from fringe views will substantially reduce the number of people who hold or lean towards those views.
- 7952 12y agoClimate change scepticism is not a fringe view, but moderately widely held. It is hard to believe that those people will suddenly support environmentally literate policy. They will just switch to a different set of trite anecdotes to prove why nothing should change.
- tonfa 12y ago> Climate change scepticism is not a fringe view, but moderately widely held. Is it true for the US? That's definitely not my impression for Europe, it always looked to me that was a belief from a tiny minority.
- jarrett 12y ago> Climate change scepticism is not a fringe view, but moderately widely held Amongst 1) the general public, 2) scientists in general, or 3) climate scientists specifically?
- Karunamon 12y agoYou're at least partly right, but I would argue the conspiracy types are already well acquainted with "alternative" news sources (infowars, Coast to Coast, random bloggers...). Additionally, (and this is just a personal feeling), but something about top-down "reducing airtime from fringe views" feels very wrong. Who decides what a "fringe view" is? By that rubric, Creationism is perfectly legitimate since it's widely held. I think we'd all be better served, morally as well as practically, by letting the loons be loons and let people make their own decisions rather then trying to explicitly control who gets airtime. Bring on the denier and let them get annihilated in a debate against someone who knows what they're talking about. This has the benefit of not invoking censorship boogeymen (which may or may not actually exist) and doesn't hand over the "we're being oppressed" card to them.
- skylan_q 12y agoQuelling dissenters! A true victory for science!
- div 12y agoThese people do not participate in science.
- skylan_q 12y agoNext up: muting people who don't agree with the fact that inflation is good because the only people who deny it don't participate in economics.
- nav1 12y agoBut science isn't about someone agreeing with a theory. If you can disprove a theory, great. Otherwise no one really cares about your flawed arguments.
- skylan_q 12y agoBut science isn't about someone agreeing with a theory. Those who advocate blocking dissent with theories in the name of science would disagree. Apparently, it's more important that people agree with a body of work that is largely impenetrable than it is to question it or disagree with it.
- muuh-gnu 12y agoThere is no time left to debate any more, we now have to act or we're all gonna die. Suppressing dissent by a Soviet style thought police is a small price to pay if the future of the human species is at stake. I for one, fully and sincerely and deeply believe in climate change, and I welcome our new bolsheviks in lab coats overlords.
- icebraining 12y agoBut who is talking about blocking dissent? Not giving airtime on the BBC is blocking dissent, now? Should they also give airtime to the flat-earth society? The BBC is not a scientific journal, it's a mass-media organization. It's not its job to promote every little scientific theory.
- pling 12y agoThat sucks. If someone has an opinion, it should be free to be debated. The only way we can fight ignorance in science is with public debate. If someone wants to deny it, fine (otherwise it's not science) but put the hypothesis on the table and let people actually test it and debate it publicly. The proves only that the BBC has various political opinions and agendas and is not an unbiased source (as many people surely quote). For ref, not a denier. I hold no opinion (a perpetual state of 'mu') because I haven't read any papers on the subject. I refuse to confuse media and science. Edit: the down votes proving that rationality doesn't come anywhere near this discussion...
- lemming 12y agoPeople have tested it and debated it publicly, and 97% of those professionally qualified to test it and debate it are of the same opinion.
- pling 12y agoThat doesn't mean they're right or proposing different hypothesis' is suddenly forbidden. That's not science. Aristotelian physics was superseded by Newtonian Physics. That's science. I'm not suggesting that anyone will come up with a different conclusion but there's no excuse for this stupid dogma and religion getting in the way of rationality. Feynman is doing 500rpm in his grave...
- rbanffy 12y ago> That doesn't mean they're right or proposing different hypothesis' is suddenly forbidden. That's not science. While I agree with you on principle, it would be awkward to give precisely 99.93% of the airtime to scientists who agree we have an impact in global climate change and dividing the rest among all the possible explanations (from the "it's a natural phenomenon" to "God is doing it" and even the "we are not sure the climate is actually changing").
- pling 12y ago
- TomGullen 12y agoMisleading title, actual title: "BBC staff ordered to stop giving equal airtime to climate deniers"
- tinkerrr 12y agoWow, that's truly misleading. The 'equal' is hugely important. As they say, Don't let the facts get in the way of a good story.
- ja30278 12y ago"Another sort there be who, when they hear that all things shall be ordered, all things regulated and settled, nothing written but what passes through the custom-house of certain publicans that have the tonnaging and poundaging of all free-spoken truth, will straight give themselves up into your hands, make 'em and cut 'em out what religion ye please: there be delights, there be recreations and jolly pastimes that will fetch the day about from sun to sun, and rock the tedious year as in a delightful dream. What need they torture their heads with that which others have taken so strictly and so unalterably into their own purveying? These are the fruits which a dull ease and cessation of our knowledge will bring forth among the people. How goodly and how to be wished were such an obedient unanimity as this, what a fine conformity would it starch us all into! Doubtless a staunch and solid piece of framework, as any January could freeze together."
- dictum 12y agoSubtle: "climate deniers" instead of "climate change deniers".
- smsm42 12y agoTerms are chosen for emotional impact, not for accuracy.
- xrange 12y agoI guess this dates me as an old guy, but it seems like there could be an interesting back story for the terminalology change from "Global Warming" to "Climate Change". Who was the group that first started advocating for this? When did it first appear in print in a scientific journal? When did it first appear in a newspaper or on a TV show? When did it first in a government or UN document? When did politicians start using it?
- thaumaturgy 12y agoThere's a paper by Alan Robock titled "Internally and Externally Caused Climate Change", published in the journal of the American Meteorology Society in June 1978, and an earlier paper, "Climate Change Over the Polar Ocean" by Vowinckel and Orvig, published in Meteorology in January 1966, and, best yet, an even earlier paper, "The Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climatic Change", by Plass, published by Johns Hopkins University ca 1955 and funded by the US Office of Naval Research. The latter paper can be read here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2153-3490.1956.tb01206.x/abstract http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2153-3490.1956.... (there is a "get pdf" link on the right.)
- xrange 12y agoHere's a Google n-gram of the two terms: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=climate+change%2Cglobal+warming&year_start=1960&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=1&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cclimate%20change%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cglobal%20warming%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=climate+change... ...I wonder if there is a similar tool for other types of publications besides books.
- onmydesk 12y agoI expect no more religious output from the bbc
- thisjepisje 12y agoNo! There is no climate! There's no such thing!
- sheetjs 12y agoLast Week Tonight with John Oliver had a great bit about this problem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjuGCJJUGsg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjuGCJJUGsg
- xname 12y ago97% is a fake number, read: http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2014/02/david_friedman_14.html http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2014/02/david_friedman_1...
- cratermoon 12y agoClimate change denier denies climate change, film at 11.
- logfromblammo 12y agoI think this is a dangerous precedent for media coverage of science. If there is any doubt in your mind, you never read what Feynman had to say about Millikan's experimental results for measurement of elementary charge. Some scientists cheat at science, so they can be more popular. And this is why we don't trust conclusions until after they are independently repeated. If someone were to produce real, verifiable experimental data that defied the political consensus, they would be blackballed from explaining them on BBC. Bill Nye has to keep debating because the available data are not so unambiguous that princes and paupers could each reach the same conclusion independently, even with all their personal biases. He even debated Ken Ham over the origins of species, after all. True scientists must have the courage to stand up and repeat, over and over, what they have found--via collection and analysis of evidence, defended before their peers, and verified by their rivals--to be the truth, as long as there is even one person that still doubts. And the purpose is not to browbeat that last man into submission, but to assist them in devising an experiment sufficient to quell that doubt. Silencing the ongoing debate, even if one side or the other is obviously delusional, is completely contrary to the spirit of science. With science, anyone is allowed to question anything, and the worth of the question is determined by the evidence gathered, not by an editorial board.
- div 12y agoThe other side is not being completely blackballed, they just get less airtime. Also, some of the dissenters on this particular issue have a vested economic interest in their dissent, and are not really looking for truth.
- logfromblammo 12y agoEveryone has a vested economic interest in his own career. Every industry has participants who are just in it for the money. But that doesn't mean some of those people are not also passionate about research and scientific integrity. On television, truth doesn't matter. All that matters is whether you can command people's attention. Just like advertisements for prescription medication, the goal is not a direct sale. The goal is to convince the viewer to learn more from someone well educated in the field. And then get their money. My hypothesis is that opportunities to challenge establishment thought increase as new sources of funding flow into an industry. For software, more funding means more startup failures, and more disruptive tech that somehow avoided failure. For research, more new funding means less reliance on the university hierarchy or government grant proposals, and enough new publications that not even Elsevier could possibly swallow all of them.
- olouv 12y agoI've always had mixed feelings regarding man-made climate change, seeing it as a marketed mainstream show. For me, this broad, somewhat blind, frightening threat is the ecological equivalent of the idea of terrorism. I can't help myself to think that there are a lot of other ecological issues, even more critical, and affecting our societies today. Water/soil pollution for instance does kill millions of people a year. People are scared by the carbon dioxyde they exhale, while they eat polychlorinated biphenyl and a thousand more toxic chemical compounds on a daily basis. I don't think anyone wins when you remove/censor contrarian views.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- grosslystated 12y ago> I don't think anyone wins when you remove/censor contrarian views. I agree, and I don't think the solution is to silence discourse, but to hold everyone to the same high standard. If you publish a paper that gets citations like the rest of the scientific community, then I heartily defend your bid to be heard on BBC, climate change denier or not.
- thenmar 12y agoDo you think equal time should be given to all opinions on scientific issues that are not backed by evidence? Should we teach Christian creationism next to evolution? Should we teach about the balance of humors next to germ theory?
- vixin 12y agoA rather grubby device for argument! What kind of evidence do you think is provided by a stasis in warming (no one is now denying this stasis!) when all the climate models predict warming? Models provide zero evidence; they only offer predictions. And they have all failed. No one suggests there has been no warming at all and a measure of this will reasonably be due to CO2 emitted by man. The argument is about the extent. It's also about spending billions (follow the money! Who, specifically wants to stop that?) to 'prevent' a rise in temperature. Using IPCC figures, it can be shown that whatever Britain does (to take an example) even if it went back to the stone age, the effect on global temperature would not be measureable. Meanwhile the old and poor die in the winter while their increased charges for power subsidize useless wind turbines.
- iterationx 12y agoSoon they'll throw you in jail for questioning it, like they do with the Holocaust. Won't that be progressive!
- skylan_q 12y agoI've known a few people who have actually suggested that we start doing this. People think athiesm is far too prominent, but I think we live in a time in history that will be viewed as more dogmatic than any other. "Science" is no longer a method of discovery. It's now a new God.
- iterationx 12y agoCrichton said it best, https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~scranmer/SPD/crichton.html https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~scranmer/SPD/crichton.html
- Luc 12y agoCrichton was an anti-science loon who, coincidentally, believed in spoon bending. Good fiction writer, though.
- peterashford 12y agoGodwin!
- zeteo 12y agoHmm let's play "recognize the phenomenon": 1. An important truth will cause cataclysmic consequences because it's not recognized by the general populace. 2. The deeper aspects of this truth are in the possession of an elite. 3. Only the elite is qualified to speak about this truth. 4. The elite is self-selected and meets in regular councils that issue binding pronouncements. 5. The only solution is for the populace to recognize, regret and make amends for their past mistakes. 6. Doubters need to be silenced for the greater good. Options: A) The scientific method B) Organized religion.
- ciclano 12y agoLooks like C) a b-movie screenplay.
- scribu 12y agoNitpick: I think organized religion (a group of people) could be more easily compared with "the scientific establishment" (also a group of people) instead of with "the scientific method" (an abstract idea).
- jarrett 12y agoOther than the scientific method, how would you propose humankind gather the information needed to make important decisions?
- RickS 12y ago7. Steps leading to said truth can be reproduced That takes care of that.
- waps 12y agoThis has got to be the stupidest claim in here. What the fuck. But maybe I'm wrong. So ok, so you've made a claim. Do tell how I can reproduce climate change ? I do not have a spare planet to fuck around with. Just so we're clear what will not be accepted as an answer : here is an experiment as to how the greenhouse effect behaves in a gas volume. You see a greenhouse effect starting at zero concentration. 90% of the effect is visiable at 300ppm. 95% of the effect is visible at 350ppm. (co2 forcing is exponentially decreasing, and levels off at around 350ppm to eventually converge (at 100%, or 1000000ppm) to about 6% higher than it is at 350ppm) [1] And yet athmosphere temperature is not behaving like this at all. Warming is accelerating, not slowing down (350ppm was reached in 1990, currently at 415-420). Yet warming is accelerating. Given that this is pretty much the only experiment you can do without a spare planet, and it obviously is very different from observed behavior, this will not be accepted. So do tell : how to reproduce climate change ? Alternatively: what is the conclusion if "steps leading to said truth" cannot, in fact, be reproduced ? [1] IPCC AR3, Chapter 6: Radiative Forcing of Climate Change. (section 6.3.4) Total Well-Mixed Greenhouse Gas Forcing Estimate
- alexeisadeski3 12y agoFunny thing. Everyone here compares climate denial to other left wing bugaboos: 'creationism' 'ancient science' 'earth is the center of the universe' So why not compare to things where the left wing is wrong? Why not say, "if we're not going to give equal time to one thing where science is settled (climate change), we also shouldn't give equal time to..." 1. Economic fact: Minimum wage hurts low earners 2. Economic fact: Free trade is almost always good 3. Economic fact: Unions hurt the poor So is climate change really something you care about, or is it just another tool to be deployed in the left-right debate? The left brings climate change - their settled science - the right brings anti union policies - their settled science. Each side has heterodox scientists, each side has the vast consensus of professionals on their side. Yet only one topic gets a zillion upvotes on HN, only one topic gets extensive coverage on our favorite media aggregators. I wonder why.
- true_religion 12y agoI'm not really sure I'd hold economics to the same standards as physics.
- peterashford 12y agoI've seen argument and published studies against (1) so you're not off to a good start. These are clearly not points of view that would get 97% of economists agreeing on, are they? Also, economics is not a science.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- waps 12y agoPlenty of blogs say climate science is not a science. Climate scientists say otherwise. Plenty of blogs say economics is not a science. Climate scientists say otherwise. What exactly differentiates one statement from the other ? Aside from the fact that one is popular opinion and the other is not (although that's debatable and differs by person and by region).
- sampo 12y ago
- vixin 12y agoAn excellent response here: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/andrewlilico/100027585/lord-lawson-the-climate-and-the-bbc-whos-the-real-expert/ http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/andrewlilico/100027585/...