Climate Skeptics: Stubborn, Stupid, and Willfully Blind?

Treehugger.com’s quote of the day comes from Grist.org’s April ’06 interview with Elizabeth Kolbert—the lit. major-turned armchair scientist (or “climate journalist” as the Grist calls her) who published a verbose, 3-part narrative in the New Yorker; her take on the on the coming climate catastrophe. In the Grist interview Liz asserts her theory on why people could possible deny the idea of man-made global warming. The first reason is the “cry-wolf” syndrome: people have heard about the end of the world forever with nothing to show for it. Her second theory is that people think “If this were really as bad as you say, I would feel it by now”. Last, Liz asserts that people find it easier to deny global warming exists than deal with the consequences or the innumerable suggestions for mitigation.

I would argue that one or more of these reasons probably hold true for at least some skepticism (which is large enough that warming proponents feel the need to deal with it), but all of it? Come on Liz, it couldn’t be caused by anything more substantial than that—perhaps scientific evidence? Despite the media’s constant hammering that “the majority of scientists agree,” there doesn’t actually seem to be much of a consensus. According an article posted on Dailytech.com last month, less than half of the scientific community seems to join into a consensus. Elizabeth Kolbert might just argue that those scientists are stubborn, ignorant, or jaded; it’s actually a pretty effective way to avoid honest dialogue about a complicated subject.