Posted on 11/22/2009 8:30:37 PM PST by Minn
The theft of 1,000 private e-mails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (UEA) shows that deniers have learned lessons from dirty politics and are running a new campaign to undermine public trust in climate scientists. The feeble response from the UEA and the climate science community shows that scientists are still totally underestimating the fragility of that trust and the crucial role it plays in building public belief.
The Importance and fragility of Trust The lay public, when presented with confusing data and competing arguments about climate change deploy the heuristic (a fancy word for a mentalof short cut) of believing the people they most trust. Trust in the communicator is therefore a crucial precondition for belief in climate change.
Unfortunately the three main climate change communicators: politicians, journalists and environmental campaigners, are among the least trusted people in society- fighting it out for bottom place in the ranking with lawyers and car salesmen. No one would pay any attention to them at all if they were not drawing on the aquifer of public trust in scientists.
Climate scientists have always misunderstood the dynamic of public belief and trust. They assume that belief will be built on their data and that public trust is merited by their authority. With the exception of a few outstanding communicators, they often make no attempt to speak to deeper values or make an emotional connection with the public – indeed they see that as contrary to their professional independence.
(Excerpt) Read more at climatedenial.org ...
Have you ever stopped for a minute to consider how much the use of the term “denier” harms your credibility? Or the credibility of anyone that expects us to believe their interest in this is strictly scientific? Show me again which section of thought on the scientific method includes rhetorical devices intended to equate those that disagree with your theory as Nazi like?
“I’m a scientist. My science has led me to political conclusions about tax, energy and fiscal policy. Those that oppose me are like Nazis and radical Islamists that DENY the Holocaust, even though equating the denial of a historical fact, with the denial of the likelihood of a prediction coming true exposes me as somebody too irrational and emotionally invested to comment intelligently at all. So I’ll call you a denier.”
Indeed, and not just that, but the “swiftboating” that occurred with Kerry was legitimate and Kerry was, in fact, an idiot who lied as well as admitted to atrocities he claimed he performed that he was never punished for.
If this author equates GW scientists to someone like Kerry, he’s lost his debate already.
This needs to be posted far and wide.
Arrogance! Contempt! And total stupidity in actually believing that people need to be inculcated with synthetic trust in order to be made to believe in a falsehood and would never be able to understand how to check out data for themselves!
I didn’t read the rest of the article. I am just shaking with disbelief at the assumptions made in the excerpt.
I agree with your analysis.
And for good reason!
The Amway Salesmen are in for CYA mode I see...
The Amway Salesmen are in full CYA mode I see...
Article boiled down: “Just because the proponents of AGW are liars and crooks doesn’t mean they’re wrong!”
Have them eat their dissertations as punishment, be banned from doing any research and shunned by polar bears.
Scientist’s lied, global warming died.
“Although different in context and content, there are marked similarities between the Swift Boat campaign and the hacking of the UEA e-mails. Both were sophisticated strategies to undermine trust. Both identified trust and integrity as a major strength of the opponent and then played carefully chosen story lines to undermine them. At the very least the UEA e-mail campaign is an application of dirty political tactics to climate change campaigning.”
Oh...and they were both revealing the truth!!!
So this bozo wants scientists to join politicians, journalists and used car salesman in being among "the least trusted" in our society??
If you had scientific truth on your side, none of this would matter.
If I were going around telling people that objects fall up when you drop them, it wouldn't matter how otherwise "trustworthy" I was.
Why yes, just as Kerry’s lies were exposed via “Swiftboating” the lies of the “global warming” crowd are exposed here.
Thank you for noticing.
I guess he knows he can't rely on the actual science to make his case.
When one's science is a paraphrase of a Groucho Marx joke (who are you going to believe? Me or your lying, chattering bones?), such a person cannot be taken seriously and the attempt to distort the data is merely the final nail in the coffin of this utterly stupid pseudo science.
Ahhh swiftboating, that’s a good term, that’s a strategy that helped the libs lose. Get ready to lose again green shirt.
The eonomic consequences of this entire global warming fiasco are generally considered the worst outcome of that mess.
But in my opinion, at least as bad and maybe even worse is what this whole scam will do to the reputation of science and the amount of trust the general public is willing to put in it.
Already stupid “New Age” fads and the like have provided signs of a rebirth of superstition and an earth-worship-based neo-Paganism; the damage caused by this politicization of science by warming alarmists will only encourage and accelerate a distrust in rational analysis.
And asshats like Marshall and his ilk will be ones leading the way.
I’m sure that they would have given us the emails and found the lost data if only we’d have asked nicely.
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