How To Talk to a Climate Skeptic

[theclimateblog]

I recently stumbled upon Coby Beck's How to Talk to a Climate Skeptic (not to be confused with World-Changing's in-progress Universal Climate Change Skeptic Response), and I was floored by the level of attention to detail and thoroughness of research that Beck has done to create his "Layman's Guide" to the anthopogenic global warming debate. Beck

Comments

[brdgt]

Sorta off topic, but I wanted to ask you before class tomorrow: how would you describe the role of paleoclimate data on the global warming debate? I have a guess, but I don't want to sound stupid in class! (oh, we're reading a review by Patz from Nature on Climate Change, a chapter in Frumkin's book, and a survey of the work done on cholera)

[theclimateblog]

The paleoclimate data has given us ideas of the "natural" range of climate variability- we know that the climate does vary, on certain timescales (some of which we understand better than others), and we have an idea of the range, but also the rate. For example, recent ice and ocean core data about the Younger Dryas interval (the cold reversal referenced in The Day After Tomorrow) shows that at least the North Atlantic region may have cooled 5-15 degrees C (depending on where you were) within less than 20 years. This showed for the first time that rapid climate change events were really possible, which had been debated before (people thought of climate change as a gradual process). The paleoclimate data have revealed a number of discreet events, which people have then "looked for" in records across the globe to get a better sense of the timing and extent of these events

[brdgt]

That was what I was looking for, especially the last part. I think non-paleoclimate scientists and climate change activists stay away from paleoclimate data because they assume (or have bought into the "skeptics" contention) that if you look at that scale our current warming looks like "just a blip" (this was actually said in class).

We had an interesting discussion about how scientists have almost been "baited" by the skeptics who have monopolized on the idea of uncertainty by responding with assertions of certainty, when we can never have certainty. Perhaps a move to the European style of the "precautionary principle" would be a better response.

We also talked about how the two things that the Bush administration edits out are issues of certainty and health effects - an indication that maybe we should be stressing the health effects because that may be a way to get through to people - why else are they so threatened by that?

[theclimateblog]

Bill Cronon talked about the precautionary principle as it regards to the "we need more data" statement in an interesting way, because it can be used both ways: Skeptics say, "We don't have enough data to support climate change, so we shouldn't do anything until we know more just in case..." While scientists say, "We don't have enough data, so we need to go get MORE data."

It's true that we can't express certainty, but we can express statistical significance!

[mac_davis]

I do not believe I have seen any of those supposed AGW skeptic catch phrases. They sound similiar.

All of those sound like they would be used by people that just don't "believe" in it, and haven't done much research into it.

[theclimateblog]

Some of these are typical "uneducated layperson" responses that get filtered down from actual arguments, and others pop up in the popular media as a "balance" to the AGW scientists. There are others on Beck's site that get more into detail, like talking about growing Antarctic sea ice on the Western shelf, for example. I hear a lot of these in random conversation (or from my family, staunch Republicans) when people ask the "so what do you do?" question, folllwed by variations on "so, is global warming real?" I've occasionally gotten "You believe in that crap?"

I liked Beck's argument not only as a handy list of quick responses to those arguments, but also because I think it's just a good layperson's guide to understanding the issue. I'm hoping I'll get a climate skpetic reader at some point, so we can all have some good debates in comments!

[mac_davis]

Although I just started reading this today, I would like to see reviews on recent and new papers. The Svensmark paper is rather interesting to me. (http://www.journals.royalsoc.ac.uk/(jdlrq1bujsjq22q3fr2mnjzt)/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=parent&backto=issue,15,33;journal,1,134;linkingpublicationresults,1:102023,1... )

[theclimateblog]

This is interesting- I'll have to pass this paper on to my adviser. I'll defintely address more papers if that's of interest to people! As for my thoughts, from what I've heard the link between solar variation and climate is still being pieced together and is somewhat contended, but there are definitely reasons to believe there might be a decadal or centennial-scale climate oscillation that's got a solar origin. For example, the Little Ice Age corresponded with a period known as the Maunder Minimum, when only about 50 sunspots were observed from 1645 to 1715, as opposed to the more typical 50,000-60,000. A lot of people have argued that the influence of the sun in this way would be so small as to be negligible, but this paper seems to provide an interesting mechanism, especially if you increase aerosols (which you do after the Industrial Revolution or any period of intense volcanic activity, so you could even test that empirically). Cool!

[mac_davis]

To make one more comment (heehee), to me there is an apparent "pattern" in the last four hundred or so thousand years.

http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/3616/tempandco2since400000vostokjpghe0.jpg
http://img526.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sawtoothif9.png

[theclimateblog]

Absolutely- the peaks and valleys being the glacials and interglacials, plus the very strong correlation between CO2 and temperature...which is why I find it intensely frustrating when people say there's no known proof that CO2 makes it warmer.

[gamoonbat]

I liked the emphasis in the recent UK report on the economic costs of climate change. I have also seen or heard somewhere a discussion of the oil companies gearing up to explore in the Arctic as ice melts and permafrost thaws. Odd that they are funding "research" that questions global warming while at the same time planning to take advantage of it to increase production.

Perhaps you can provide a clear discussion here of why computer models are used in paleoclimate and climate change studies. I always make a point of introducing some of these to my students so that they understand their proper role in tying together scattered facts with basic physical relationships.