Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
myth makers
There is another type of skeptic, which
we might call the pessimistic believer. Peo-
ple in this category believe in the human
connection and may even favor greenhouse
gas reduction, but they also believe that
action is futile or too expensive to pursue.
Some of these skeptics may be viewed as
delayers rather than deniers. If they can
admit the legitimacy of the scientific con-
sensus but cast doubt on whether action
can be effective, they can delay any action
and further benefit their constituents—
the fossil fuel industry. They typically ar-
gue that action to combat global change
will be economically damaging, which is a
valid point, but one should recognize that
it would be particularly damaging to en-
ergy giants such as ExxonMobil and Koch
Industries.
Then there is the philosophical believer
who doesn't deny global climate change but
argues that we are worked up to an unjusti-
fiable pitch of panic, fueled by environmen-
tal ideologues. In an op-ed piece published
in the
New York Times
on 1 January 2010,
the New Zealand philosopher Dennis Dut-
ton compared climate “hysteria” to that sur-
rounding the Y2K computer problem at the
turn of the century: “Apocalyptic projec-
tions are a diversion from real problems—
poverty, terrorism, broken financial sys-
tems . . . this applies, in my view, to the
towering seas, storms, droughts, and mass
extinctions of popular climate catastroph-
ism. Such entertaining visions owe less to
scientific climatology than to eschatology
and that familiar sense that modernity and
Global Climate Coalition.
Funding:
forty- six
corporations and trade associations.
Princi-
pal message:
Global warming is real but it is
too costly to respond.
George Marshall Institute.
Funding:
Exxon-
Mobil.
Principal message:
Variations in solar
radiation cause warming.
Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine.
Funding:
Unknown private sources.
Princi-
pal message:
There is no global warming and
the ipcc is a hoax.
Science and Environmental Policy Project.
Funding:
Conservative foundations and the
Reverend Sun Myung Moon.
Principal mes-
sage:
Climate change is good. Action is not
warranted because of poor science.
Greening Earth Society.
Funding:
Western
Fuels Association (coal and utility com-
panies).
Principal message:
CO
2
is good for
Earth and coal is the best energy source.
Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and
Global Change.
Funding:
Probably Western
Fuels.
Principal message:
Increased CO
2
will
help plants.
The physicist Stefan Rahmstorf recog-
nizes three subspecies among the naysay-
ers: trend skeptics, attribution skeptics,
and impact skeptics. Trend skeptics deny
any trend of global warming altogether. At-
tribution skeptics agree that warming is oc-
curring but argue that you can't attribute it
to human activities. Impact skeptics agree
that warming is occurring but say that its
impact will be mostly positive.
