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Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Joshua

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I’ll stream it on Netflix and watch – as a peace offering. Let’s see how long this lasts: :-)


Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by SmokinFrog

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+1

Judith, what is your view on the idea that global warming will be a net benefit? Is there a case to be made here?

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by andywest2012

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Appendix 2 of this post describes a pretty similar path to skepticism; along with the opposite path, to climate orthodoxy, and how likelihood for each path will be weighted to initial cultural alignment (though one cannot predict the path for any single individual). Explains the extreme polarization of the ‘science-aware’ on both Republican and Democrat sides, though Kahan does not see it this way.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by RiHo08

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I am sure that none of the social scientists doing research on climate change cognitive dissidence have spoken to my children.

If I say anything “Climate”, to a person, they say: “Oh Dad” and go on to something else. They aren’t interested in discussing climate change, CO2, etc. If a social scientists were to ask them about earth’s climate changing because of man’s hand? They would say yes, of course. And they do their part like recycle, walk, ride bicycles, buy locally and?… drive their SUV. To a person, they all have SUV’s because? SUV’s are the type of vehicle that does the most things they need.

Those children who live on the West Coast earthquake proof their homes, but don’t insulate their attic choosing instead to leave the gas furnace and electric heaters on when it is 52 degrees outside. This Christmas and New Years they left the Christmas lights on all night as a substitute for the outdoor lights they otherwise leave on during the non-holiday times.

What I am trying to point out by using my family as representative of saying one thing about climate change and functionally doing another like buying SUVs, heating when it is cold outside yet not insulating their home’s attic, is that their cognitive dissidence does not cause them any pain at all.

I believe it is the social scientists that study climate change cognitive dissidence are feeling the pain of human reality, and still haven’t figured out that humans are very hard to pigeon hole, at least cognitively.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Jonathan Abbott

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Paul,

That sounds very interesting.

For the record, I should say that it is also possible to read and understand the science and decide CAGW is a real threat – no need for hoaxes, conspiracies or political machinations.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Wagathon

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Here’s the deal: your eyes are bleeding, looking for taillights ahead as you drive through the fog. You know you’re not alone. You feel you’re prepared and safe as can be expected under the circumstances, and you really don’t care who’s ahead, but you feel so much better knowing where they actually are ahead so as to gauge your own behavior accordingly. Seeing others through the fog is a comfort that even allows you to draw close. But then, there’s trepidation with every passing of those ahead, on the road, when again as far as you can see ahead, there’s nothing to see but blind fog. And then, some scientists come along and tell you that, even without actually seeing anything, they can provide you with some very strong clues about what’s going on up ahead, based on an analysis that you can use and rely on with comfort. Now, these scientists are not fellow drivers and they’re not with you or following you, nor are they up ahead of you, warning you of their existence or your proximity to them. They are independent of your experience and are inspired by their own concept of the world as it is and ought to be, “i.e. one not spawned from left-wing or right-wing politics,” but rather an alliance, “personally committed to the belief and cause of man-made Global Warming,” and this alliance commands your allegiance to their beliefs if you want to feels safe driving on their road.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by ordvic

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I saved more than half of it for later viewing prolly tonight.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Joshua

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==> “Appendix 2 of this post describes a pretty similar path to skepticism;”

Where is your evidence that “look[ing] at the science” is anything that somehow describes any significant portion of those who fall along one side of the climate change divide as opposed to the other – and thus is somehow associated with (let alone part of a causal mechanism) as Jonthan describes for any group other than, potentially, an outlier?

The vast majority of the public who identify with a position on climate change have not “look[ed] into the science,” let alone understand the science at any level of sophistication.

Most people (at least in the U.S..) just get their news about climate change from media sources, and filter their choices about that information in accordance with ideological orientation, evaluate the “expertise” of those sources in accordance with ideological orientation, or filter the information itself in accordance with ideological orientation.

If you call that “look[ing] into the science,” and think it is similar to what Jonathan is describing, then think you are mistaken.

By virtue of being here, Jonathan is an outlier. Trying to generalize based on his own experiences is, sorry to say, fundamentally unscientific (and quite beautifully unintentionally ironic).

That isn’t to say that his own experiences should be useful as the foundation for further investigation. If a pattern exist for him, it may well be reflective of a larger pattern. But if you don’t then take the next step to check your own tendency toward confirmation bias – and collect data in a carefully controlled manner – you think it’s cool to instead ask why researchers don’t generalize from you experience in the same manner as you do yourself????

Really?


Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Lucifer

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Most of human evolution took place in small clan like groups.
Cohesion to the group was a highly selected for trait – loners did not succeed.
It is thus in our DNA to approach problems from group think.
Being human means being irrational.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Jaime

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Er, what, exactly? Just out of curiosity.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Don Monfort

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I think I’ll write up a post and send it to Judith on the parallels between the movie “Support Your Local Sheriff ” and Climate Etc. Of course, I am the sheriff and the Danby’s are the trolls. You all can sort out which particular characters you match up with.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by davidsmith651

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Hi, Andy. Suppose I asked you if you believe in communism. On one level you’d answer yes, because it existed/exists. On another level you’d probably answer no, that you do not believe in it as a viable, beneficial political philosophy.

When people are asked if they believe in “global warming”, many hear the implicit question as “do you believe in global warming and all that it implies ( reported/projected catastrophes)?”. A significant number will answer yes, and no.

I suspect that a lot of the skepticism about the reported/projected catastrophes is rooted in peoples’ life experience. Few complicated changes in life are all good or all bad. Think of marriage as an example of a complicated change – is marriage all good or all bad? Or, is marriage a complicated mix of things beneficial and things not so great. That mix (good and bad) is what people expect from a complicated change like global warming. What people actually hear from science is a chorus of “all terrible”, some of it ridiculous.

That uniform chorus of doom weakens the credibility of climate science in many peoples’ minds, especially science-literate people. The lopsidedness of reported global warming effects has the markings of a sales effort, not science. The lopsidedness triggers peoples’ BS alarm.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Joshua

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Except if you’re a “skeptic.”

A comment of mine from the Kahan post that Andy linked – I think it pretty much explains why social scientists are so confused about “skeptics.”

“Scientific literacy” is associated with “skepticism” among “conservatives” (using that imperfect term for now) because they are unbiased; an unbiased view of the science means that one can see that there is no evidence of any real risk of ACO2 negatively affecting the climate.

“Scientific literacy” is associated with belief that ACO2 does pose a risk among “liberals” (using that imperfect term for now) because they are biased; the only reason that they think that there’s evidence of a risk of significant impact on the climate from ACO2 is because they allow their political orientation to affect their reasoning.

See how simple that is?

Among “conservatives” greater understanding of science means increased clarity in reasoning – hence the association between greater polarization and greater scientific literacy for that group.

Among “liberals” greater understanding of science means decreased clarity in reasoning – hence the association between greater polarization and greater scientific literacy for that group.

The basic mechanism of “motivated reasoning” – you know, how identification mixes with fundamental components of cognition and psychology to influence how people reason – only works with “liberals.” “Conservatives” are immune to such influences.

And all that identity-aggressive and identity-defensive behaviors that are so abundantly found among “skeptics.” That’s just coincidence. Don’t think, in any way, that those behaviors can support a conjecture that motivated reasoning is at play among “conservatives.”

Identity-aggressive and identity-defensive behaviors only indicate motivated reasoning among liberals.

Once you see that human psychology and cognition are completely different among “conservatives” than among “liberals,” everything comes into focus – and you can see how simply all of this can be explained.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Matthew R Marler

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Andy West: In Dan’s case it seems rather ironic that a failure to even consider the effects of a strong (climate) culture, should occur within the online investigation at a site called ‘the cultural cognition project’. And not only is climate culture obvious, it is also self-admitted (see AW2, including the Appendix).

A few other people have noted the asymmetry: exploring cultural/psychological mechanisms for disbelief among skeptics, while ignoring cultural/psychological mechanisms for intense belief among believers in the consensus (despite well-documented holes in the science.) Nothing I have read has addressed the asymmetry as thoroughly as this essay.

Andy West has tried to distinguish between “skepticism” and “disbelief”, but I don’t think the distinction stands up under scrutiny. There are some true believers who try to adopt a “skeptical” stance by exploring limitations of the scientific knowledge that supports the belief, but the really penetrating questions of a “skeptical” nature come mostly from “disbelievers”, or the people called “lukewarmers”.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Don Monfort

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Groupthink is often the most rational option.


Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by popesclimatetheory

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Jushua wrote:

A big problem in the climate change discussion is that people (on both sides) assume “motivations” w/o evidence.

You just nailed it! With or without evidence, often the evidence is the same but it it understood differently.

Many of us Skeptics are not really Skeptics. We have Consensus, with a small group or just with ourselves and we are not open to the traditional consensus group and we are not open to other skeptics with different theories.

I have almost as much trouble getting skeptics with different theories to listen to me as I do the traditional consensus groups. Our last climate study seminar went from 8:45 am to 5:30 pm and I was allowed about 15 minutes of John Nielsen-Gammon’s last session.

We then had a climate study workshop on the following afternoon with a small group that went really well. The right people were there and the wrong people were not there.

I am working on a new page for my website and information for posting that came out of that workshop.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Lucifer

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Most of the emotion comes from the ‘back end’.

Those advocating action fear catastrophic results ( a fear which politicians gladly promote and exploit ).

Those advocating in-action fear government abuse ( a fear which other politicians gladly promote and exploit ).

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Lucifer

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I’m thinking that the unit of thought only occurs only in an individual brain ( at least until scary AI arrives ).

Concepts can be shared, but cognition still occurs one brain at a time.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by nickels

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I hate this but have to agree.
For most travesty’s in humanity one need look no further than the baggage of our biology. The conflict of this and our more evolved side (culture, intelligence, compassion, etc) is the great understated driver of everything.

Comment on Climate psychology’s consensus bias by Joshua

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davidsmith –

==> “When people are asked if they believe in “global warming”, many hear the implicit question as “do you believe in global warming and all that it implies ( reported/projected catastrophes)?”. A significant number will answer yes, and no.”

You should, perhaps, read more of Kahan’s work. You might find it interesting. One of his basic arguments is that asking someone if they “believe” in climate change (similar to a question about whether someone “believes” in evolution), is generally interpreted as the question, “Who are you?”

The answer to the question, in general, tells you more about who someone is as opposed to what they believe. In fact, you can infer little about what someone believes or knows about climate change from asking the question as to whether they believe in climate change.

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