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People of all stripes have the tendency to weight the believability of the evidence based on how well it matches their beliefs instead of weighing their beliefs

People of all stripes have the tendency to weight the believability of the evidence based on how well it matches their beliefs instead of weighing their beliefs based on how well they match the evidence.

dnautics 11y ago
So, here was something that bothered me this year. This peer-reviewed article was published: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2015/06/05/science.aaa5632.full http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2015/06/05/science.a... Which claims that the 'global warming' hiatus doesn't exist and is a surface measurement artefact. Adjusting a subset of the surface measurement data removes 'this artefact' and shows that global warming has still been on the rise. Sorry, it's paywalled, if you want a review of it perhaps try: http://www.npr.org/2015/06/04/411998275/scientists-cast-doubt-on-an-apparent-hiatus-in-global-warming http://www.npr.org/2015/06/04/411998275/scientists-cast-doub... But when I heard this NPR article, I thought to myself, "Hold on. Aren't there non-surface measurements that have agreed with the existence of the last 10 year 'global warming hiatus'?" Indeed, the various satellite measurements (which do not suffer from as many methodological concerns) agree that the last 10 years have been relatively stagnant in terms of global warming. Adjusting data in this fashion is extremely dangerous, and climate scientists are certainly not immune from the "tendency to weight the believability of the evidence".
- Brakenshire 11y ago
  > Indeed, the various satellite measurements (which do not suffer from as many methodological concerns) agree that the last 10 years have been relatively stagnant in terms of global warming. I can't engage with the rest of what you're saying, but FWIW a 10 year period is just not a reasonable time period to attempt to draw conclusions about changes in temperature. There are multiple ten year periods of falling temperatures which can be taken out of the obvious increases in temperature which have happened over the last 60 years. Looking at a ten year period, you're going to get much more noise than signal.
crimsonalucard 11y ago
Yes, but my question was, how do we get people to change their beliefs? As you stated, evidence is clearly not the answer.
secstate 11y ago
I believe it's called confirmation bias, and no one is immune to it. As long as I'm commenting, I'll note that I'm a climate change skeptic, but only because the reasonable scientist among us is ALWAYS an informed skeptic. The human condition revolves around balancing our beliefs with our observations of reality. I am not skeptical of the impact of CO2 on the environment. I know there are better understood and more imminent ecological disasters that accompany burning coal and oil (tailing ponds, mountaintop removal, air pollution and associated chronic illness). I refuse to be badgered and guilted into choosing a side on guessing what impact CO2 and warming will have on our Spaceship Earth over the next few decades or centuries. Reduce waste for concrete, observable reasons. Individually wrapped dounts in plastic are shitty because it's a waste of energy and resources, not because abstractly plastic is made from oil and oil production is warming our earth. Reduce your usage of electricity so you can invest in novel, more efficient industrial practices, not because Sandy flooded lower Manhattan and you feel guilty about it. If you understand anything about human nature, you must appreciate that it's a fool's errand to try to get everyone to agree, acknowledge, or even understand a single truth, regardless of how "right" that truth is. And it's even worse when your inconvenient truth impacts billions of people who didn't have the luxury of destroying their ecology in ignorance for a few centuries with no one to call them out in the process (Europe/US vs. China/South America). In the meantime, we can make meaningful change NOW by working to clean up the ecological messes that today, this week, or this month will cause someone to develop a chronic illness or destroy their ability to earn a living wage.

dnautics 11y ago

So, here was something that bothered me this year. This peer-reviewed article was published: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2015/06/05/science.aaa5632.full http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2015/06/05/science.a... Which claims that the 'global warming' hiatus doesn't exist and is a surface measurement artefact. Adjusting a subset of the surface measurement data removes 'this artefact' and shows that global warming has still been on the rise. Sorry, it's paywalled, if you want a review of it perhaps try: http://www.npr.org/2015/06/04/411998275/scientists-cast-doubt-on-an-apparent-hiatus-in-global-warming http://www.npr.org/2015/06/04/411998275/scientists-cast-doub... But when I heard this NPR article, I thought to myself, "Hold on. Aren't there non-surface measurements that have agreed with the existence of the last 10 year 'global warming hiatus'?" Indeed, the various satellite measurements (which do not suffer from as many methodological concerns) agree that the last 10 years have been relatively stagnant in terms of global warming. Adjusting data in this fashion is extremely dangerous, and climate scientists are certainly not immune from the "tendency to weight the believability of the evidence".

Brakenshire 11y ago
> Indeed, the various satellite measurements (which do not suffer from as many methodological concerns) agree that the last 10 years have been relatively stagnant in terms of global warming. I can't engage with the rest of what you're saying, but FWIW a 10 year period is just not a reasonable time period to attempt to draw conclusions about changes in temperature. There are multiple ten year periods of falling temperatures which can be taken out of the obvious increases in temperature which have happened over the last 60 years. Looking at a ten year period, you're going to get much more noise than signal.

crimsonalucard 11y ago

Yes, but my question was, how do we get people to change their beliefs? As you stated, evidence is clearly not the answer.

secstate 11y ago

I believe it's called confirmation bias, and no one is immune to it. As long as I'm commenting, I'll note that I'm a climate change skeptic, but only because the reasonable scientist among us is ALWAYS an informed skeptic. The human condition revolves around balancing our beliefs with our observations of reality. I am not skeptical of the impact of CO2 on the environment. I know there are better understood and more imminent ecological disasters that accompany burning coal and oil (tailing ponds, mountaintop removal, air pollution and associated chronic illness). I refuse to be badgered and guilted into choosing a side on guessing what impact CO2 and warming will have on our Spaceship Earth over the next few decades or centuries. Reduce waste for concrete, observable reasons. Individually wrapped dounts in plastic are shitty because it's a waste of energy and resources, not because abstractly plastic is made from oil and oil production is warming our earth. Reduce your usage of electricity so you can invest in novel, more efficient industrial practices, not because Sandy flooded lower Manhattan and you feel guilty about it. If you understand anything about human nature, you must appreciate that it's a fool's errand to try to get everyone to agree, acknowledge, or even understand a single truth, regardless of how "right" that truth is. And it's even worse when your inconvenient truth impacts billions of people who didn't have the luxury of destroying their ecology in ignorance for a few centuries with no one to call them out in the process (Europe/US vs. China/South America). In the meantime, we can make meaningful change NOW by working to clean up the ecological messes that today, this week, or this month will cause someone to develop a chronic illness or destroy their ability to earn a living wage.