0
billvon

Vaccinating against climate change denial

Recommended Posts

Out of Cambridge University and George Mason University comes an interesting approach towards improving public science understanding - "inoculating" against fake news by educating people on what sort of misinformation they will be exposed to.

From VOX:
===================================
Scientists are testing a “vaccine” against climate change denial

“Inoculating” people against misinformation may give scientific facts a shot at survival.

Michelle Nijhuis
May 31, 2017

In the battle between facts and fake news, facts are at a disadvantage. Researchers have found that facts alone rarely dislodge misperceptions, and in some cases even strengthen mistaken beliefs.

That’s just as true for climate change as it is for any other politically polarized issue in the US. The theory of identity-protective cognition, developed by Yale Law professor Dan Kahan, holds that we subconsciously resist any facts that threaten our defining values — and better reasoning skills may make us even better at resisting. People who are more scientifically literate, for instance, are even more divided about the risks of climate change than those who are less scientifically literate.

Deliberate campaigns against climate change science — like the one launched by the American Petroleum Institute in the late 1990s that’s been much imitated since — have taken advantage of this tendency, encouraging resistance to the facts by exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science.

But two recent, preliminary studies suggest there’s hope for the facts about climate change. Borrowing from the medical lexicon, these studies show that it may be possible to metaphorically “inoculate” people against misinformation about climate change, and by doing so give the facts a boost. What’s more, these researchers suggest, strategic inoculation could create a level of “herd immunity” and undercut the overall effects of fake news.

Psychologists have known for decades that people are more resistant to misinformation if they’re warned about it beforehand. Teens who are warned about the dangers of smoking are less likely to succumb to their friends’ arguments in favor of it; people who are warned about pro-sugar campaigns by soda companies are less likely to fall for them. These “inoculation messages” can even work retroactively, changing the minds of those who have already been influenced by misinformation.

John Cook, a cognitive scientist at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University in Virginia, recently tested the strength of inoculation messages against the notorious Oregon Petition, which uses fake experts to cast doubt on the scientific consensus on climate change.

In the journal PLOS One, Cook and his colleagues reported that when about 100 study participants were presented with the misinformation alone, their views did further polarize along political lines. But when another group of participants were first warned about a general strategy used in misinformation campaigns — in this case, they were told that fake experts had often been used by the tobacco industry to question the scientific consensus about the effects of tobacco on health, and were shown an ad with the text “20,679 physicians say ‘Luckies are less irritating’” — the polarizing effect of the misinformation was completely neutralized.

“Nobody likes to be misled, no matter their politics,” says Cook. He suggests that inoculation messages may serve to put listeners on alert for trickery, making them more likely to scrutinize the information they receive.

Cook’s research complements findings by Sander van der Linden, a psychology professor at Cambridge, who has also tested the strength of inoculation messages against the Oregon Petition. In a study published in the journal Global Challenges earlier this year, van der Linden and his colleagues presented more than 2,000 participants of varying political beliefs with one of two inoculation messages. The first, shorter message stated that “some politically motivated groups use misleading tactics to try to convince the public that there is a lot of disagreement among scientists.” Participants were then told that among climate scientists, there is virtually no disagreement that humans are causing climate change. The longer message specifically debunked the Oregon Petition before informing participants about the scientific consensus.

Both messages were equally effective across the political spectrum; the shorter message protected the effects of the scientific consensus on participants by one-third, while the longer one protected by about two-thirds. Inoculation, in other words, doesn’t insulate the facts from damage, but it does give them a shot at survival.
===========================

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
airdvr

Quote

exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science



Nice to see your congregation admit that the science isn't settled.



Just like with gravity and quantum mechanics, there's always something more to learn.
...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
kallend

***

Quote

exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science



Nice to see your congregation admit that the science isn't settled.



Just like with gravity and quantum mechanics, there's always something more to learn.

And as always, deniers of both.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
airdvr

Quote

exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science



Nice to see your congregation admit that the science isn't settled.

Reminds me of a Christopher Titus joke:

denier: "98% of climate scientists say the evidence supports climate change, but 2% say it doesn't. So, the evidence is inconclusive!"

Titus: "So, if I'm only 98% inside your wife, did she really cheat on you? Or is the evidence inconclusive?"

:D:D:D
See the upside, and always wear your parachute! -- Christopher Titus

Shut Up & Jump!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
and the science at the defense dept as well... http://archive.defense.gov/pubs/150724-congressional-report-on-national-implications-of-climate-change.pdf?source=govdelivery

If the science is unsettled, that does not make it a falsehood, and that kind of thinking is the thinking of an ideologue with only belief structures to reach their conclusions; not someone that is actually capable of reasonable discussion and critical scientific discovery.

The science is not settled yet on gravity, yet it exists with overwhelming data to support it AND the ability to foresee future events due to that existence.

But I guess you are right....since we cannot define gravity and what it is 100% with absolute certainty, I guess that means that gravity then does not exist. got it.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
An awesome new take on climate change - and a new subcategory of type III deniers! (i.e. "OK the climate might be changing, and it might be our fault, but it will all be good") One GOPer now thinks that man might have something to do with climate change but not to worry - if anything bad happens, God will fix it.

======================
GOP congressman on climate change: God will 'take care of it' if it's real
Eliza Collins, USA TODAY
June 1, 2017

WASHINGTON — Michigan GOP Rep. Tim Walberg isn’t concerned about the effects of climate change — if it exists — because God will “take care of it.”

Walberg was speaking to constituents in Coldwater, Mich., last week when he was asked about climate change.

Walberg, who has previously questioned the existence of global warming, first joked that he could take some global warming at home in Michigan because it was too cold and some global cooling in Washington because of the humidity.

Walberg then conceded that the climate was changing, before adding that wasn't anything new.

“I believe there’s climate change,” Walberg said, according to a video of the exchange obtained first published by the Huffington Post. “I believe there’s been climate change since the beginning of time. I think there are cycles. Do I think man has some impact? Yeah, of course. Can man change the entire universe? No.”

“Why do I believe that?” he continued. “Well, as a Christian, I believe that there is a creator in God who is much bigger than us. And I’m confident that, if there’s a real problem, he can take care of it.”
======================

One wonders why God would do that, but not take care of (for example) the floods that killed ~2 million people in China, or that tsunami that killed 280,000 back in 2004. Or even the million children under 5 who die from pneumonia every year.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
that is not new, that has been around for decades....the rapture and all that crap, and we have been spouting and predicting the end of times for longer than any of us have been on earth.

But the one thing that is for certain....'it' will be taken care of. and it will not likely be pretty. A large chunk of the world's population will eventually die off, mother nature will take its course when we make the planet no longer inhabitable. Not likely to be in our lifetime.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Quote

One wonders why God would do that, but not take care of (for example) the floods that killed ~2 million people in China, or that tsunami that killed 280,000 back in 2004. Or even the million children under 5 who die from pneumonia every year.

He's much too busy watching American sports and picking winners and losers.

Don
_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
winsor

***

Quote

exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science



Nice to see your congregation admit that the science isn't settled.



Heretic.

Indeed; but sadly in this lifetime you are just a heretic. Despite all the years and years of scientific research you and this guy have dedicated, the scientists of this generation just will never be at your level. Hopefully you will leave enough of your research online so your grandchildren may appreciate your work, and will thank you for deciding that we don't need to reduce pollution. Hopefully someday, future generations will praise your noble decision to do nothing, but for now most of the world will think you're just an uneducated layman that the world would be better without.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
skinnay

******

Quote

exaggerating the uncertainty inherent in the science



Nice to see your congregation admit that the science isn't settled.



Heretic.

Indeed; but sadly in this lifetime you are just a heretic. Despite all the years and years of scientific research you and this guy have dedicated, the scientists of this generation just will never be at your level. Hopefully you will leave enough of your research online so your grandchildren may appreciate your work, and will thank you for deciding that we don't need to reduce pollution. Hopefully someday, future generations will praise your noble decision to do nothing, but for now most of the world will think you're just an uneducated layman that the world would be better without.

You figure?

I am, of course, a high school dropout.

My stance is that Climate Change (tm) is but the tip of the iceberg, symptomatic of fundamental issues that doom us regardless of what the thermometer reads.

The planet has been through a lot worse than we are likely to dish out, and will be around a long time after we have wiped ourselves (and various other species) out.

If you want to get into the nuts and bolts of the issue, to include the ramifications of the heat transfer characteristics of our home planet, I can give you a course syllabus that should take you no more than a couple of years if you are already at a graduate level.

If you do so with a solid B average, get back to me. In the meantime, you are dismissed.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

0