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from the I-don't-want-knowledge-I-want-certainty dept.
Jeremy P. Shapiro, a professor of psychology at Case Western Reserve University, has an article on The Conversation about one of the main cognitive errors at the root of science denial: dichotomous thinking, where entire spectra of possibilities are turned into dichotomies, and the division is usually highly skewed. Either something is perfect or it is a complete failure, either we have perfect knowledge of something or we know nothing.
Currently, there are three important issues on which there is scientific consensus but controversy among laypeople: climate change, biological evolution and childhood vaccination. On all three issues, prominent members of the Trump administration, including the president, have lined up against the conclusions of research.
This widespread rejection of scientific findings presents a perplexing puzzle to those of us who value an evidence-based approach to knowledge and policy.
Yet many science deniers do cite empirical evidence. The problem is that they do so in invalid, misleading ways. Psychological research illuminates these ways.
[...] In my view, science deniers misapply the concept of “proof.”
Proof exists in mathematics and logic but not in science. Research builds knowledge in progressive increments. As empirical evidence accumulates, there are more and more accurate approximations of ultimate truth but no final end point to the process. Deniers exploit the distinction between proof and compelling evidence by categorizing empirically well-supported ideas as “unproven.” Such statements are technically correct but extremely misleading, because there are no proven ideas in science, and evidence-based ideas are the best guides for action we have.
I have observed deniers use a three-step strategy to mislead the scientifically unsophisticated. First, they cite areas of uncertainty or controversy, no matter how minor, within the body of research that invalidates their desired course of action. Second, they categorize the overall scientific status of that body of research as uncertain and controversial. Finally, deniers advocate proceeding as if the research did not exist.
Dr. David "Orac" Gorski has further commentary on the article. Basically, science denialism works by exploiting the very human need for absolute certainty, which science can never truly provide.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday November 14 2019, @02:46PM (5 children)
So, to everyone who stuck around long enough, this person lied to you. No, not by huge er... degrees, but enough to be called a liar who should shut the fuck up.
Let's start with the cherrypicking. 1990 was the second hottest year in the 90s look at the ACTUAL average temperature per decade [wikipedia.org] that the kind folks at wikipedia put together for us. Look at those numbers, then look at the steaming mound of shit he left on your front stoop.
Bearing in mind that the report explicitly makes it clear that temperature anomalies would accelerate and get bigger every decade(as they very clearly fucking have) and that under that scenario you'd expect the beginning of the 21st century to be slower than the end.
If he read the report, he'd fucking know that so either he's lying about having read it, or lying about the content. Either way, stop listening to fucking liars. For god's sake.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @04:27PM (3 children)
Alternatively, you've assumed your own worldwide and just react to anything with overt hostility instead of having any intellectual curiosity whatsoever on what facts substantiate those values and which facts contradict them. In particular I'm certain you've read the IPCC report inside out, but simply forgotten what it said. So as a refresher here is a quote from the paper [archive.ipcc.ch] itself (page XXII/22):
(2025-1990) / 10 * 0.3 = 1.05 or "about 1C". If you don't understand why I'm dividing by 10 it's because the 0.3/decade prediction is a decadal, per decade, measurement.
You might notice, that's not accelerating. As you have presumably just briefly forgotten, the fundamental belief in climate science is that there is a linear relationship between emissions and temperature. You don't see exponential gains in temperature without exponential increases in emissions. Also just so you know, on your always authoritative Wiki graph - you should be looking at the right-side table. I'm currently looking to compare and contrast the figures provided their versus the figures NASA provides on their main page. Do you get anything when you click on the source [nasa.gov] Wiki references for those numbers? It's a dead link for me which is quite curious.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @05:18PM (2 children)
Okay, I found the NASA GISS data page. Here [nasa.gov] is a link to it. I have no idea where the Wiki page got their numbers from. The dataset I am referencing here is "GISTEMP Seasonal Cycle since 1880" -> "Global Annual Mean Surface Air temperature Change". Results:
1990: 0.45 (baseline)
2000: -0.05
2010: +0.32
2018: +0.13
That shows an aggregate +0.4 degree change instead of the other NASA source which showed an increase of 0.36. It's not substantively different.
If you can find a source on NASA's page with numbers that you think are more relevant please do share. Even better if you can explain why you think they're more relevant. No idea whether you'll believe me, but I genuinely have no preconceptions here. Well I mean I obviously think I'm correct, but I'm more than happy to change my view if you can simply provide meaningful and clear evidence. Indeed 2 decades ago I was just as vehement, except on the other side of the fence. The thing that really changed my view was the repeated failure of prediction and arguments I found to be quite disingenuous (as the above poster I engaged with) on why this was.
And as one little aside. I assume you feel strongly about this topic. Should you ever hope to persuade anybody of anything on this topic (rather than just preaching to a choir) it's probably not a hot idea to run straight out of the gate with slurs and various personal attacks. I tend to be abnormally thick skinned, so I'm happy to carry on. But in general you end up persuading nobody of anything. Same reason I'm engaging with you like a human instead of calling you whatever nastiness I can think up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @09:22PM (1 child)
Averaging over a few years will reduce the influence of random fluctuations. This is what the Wikipedia page does by taking decadal averages; you should be able to see that the trend is much steadier, with the last three decades showing increases of 0.137, 0.200, and 0.265°C. This means that the incomplete decade from 2010-2019 was 0.557 or 0.602°C warmer than the decade from 1980-1989. (There's a discrepancy between the value and the delta for the latest decade on the Wikipedia page. My guess is that one of the numbers includes some kind of extrapolation to account for the incomplete data for this decade.) Doing the same averaging exercise with NASA GISS yields a difference of 0.540°C.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 15 2019, @06:55AM
Very fair point! Yeah, I think the argument for using averages is certainly logical with such a small sample of decade points. I just downloaded the CSV for the aforementioned data set here [nasa.gov].
I created 4 sets of averages:
1980-1989 = 0.246
1990-1999 = 0.385
2000-2009 = 0.59
2010-2018 = 0.785
For your convenience if you'd like to double check my work the cell codes I used were:
=AVERAGE(B103:B112)
=AVERAGE(B113:B122)
=AVERAGE(B123:B132)
=AVERAGE(B133:B141)
And so we get:
2000 = +.139
2010 = +.205
2018 = +.195
Total = 0.539
And that definitely is a much bigger number. The problem is that it again falls *far* outside the prediction expectation (0.9) and even outside their entire range (0.6 - 1.5). So we still end up having to get back into the 'adjustment' arguments as per above.
And yeah no idea what's going on with Wiki's 2010-2019 range. It's extremely wrong. Kind of expect as much from that site though. Just checked the history. Looks like IP 50.66.163.181 randomly changed the table back February, and nobody bothered to verify it. Thanks, Canada. Wikipedia: the idea that doesn't work in theory only in practice. Until the internet gets stupid. And then it simply becomes the idea that doesn't work.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Friday November 15 2019, @02:57AM
The problem with using "anomaly" rather than "data" is that what's anomalous depends on your baseline.
Using data, you would see 1936 as a drastic high temperature spike, rather than as a dot on the curve.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.