Discussion for article #240880
It would take up a lot less space to just use a term like “knucklehead”.
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I’m happy with “those who reject mainstream climate science”, but I don’t see the improvement of “climate change doubters” over “climate change deniers”. In fact, I kinda heard “climate change deniers” as having almost the same level of stench as “Holocaust denier”.
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Climate Change “Truthers” would be a good one. " The Guardian" has used this before as well as “Climate Cranks”
Last May, though, the Guardian’s policy was to just leave the cranks and obdurates in the dust bin.
For the purposes of our coming coverage, we will assume that the scientific consensus about man-made climate change and its likely effects is overwhelming. We will leave the sceptics and deniers to waste their time challenging the science. The mainstream argument has moved on to the politics and economics.
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Yes, climate change - ACD - global warming is every bit the holocaust that was the Nazi holocaust, but this growing threat is a threat to all life and the entire planet, victimizing all life, no comparison to even WW II and the Holocaust. The nature of the ACD beast we’ve all created is more insidious, sneaky, wide-spread and takes no prisoners. ACD’s effect is now obvious literally everywhere on the planet / above the planet / inside the planet (in the oceans, pollution in aquifers, the earth poisoned by Monsanto / Bayer / etc.).
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Agreed - “deniers” carries more force, since it implies a lack of thought, and a simple, absolutist refusal to accept facts.
I’m glad to see them steering clear of “skeptics.” I’m a skeptic, and proud of it. Skepticism is marked by a refusal to accept things on faith, and to demand solid evidence. When presented with the evidence, the skeptic is more than willing to alter his assessment of the truth. The climate change deniers are almost the complete antithesis of skeptics.
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What took you so long?
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Or, those that reject science; a/k/a dopes!
Well. As a writer, I always try to err on the side of concision - so “those who reject mainstream climate science” is a little wordy.
How about “fucking idiots”??? It’s a lot more accurate.
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Doubt and denial are two very different things. Kind of odd.
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I think that “climate science deniers” is more accurate than “climate change doubters” and more succinct than “those who reject mainstream climate science.” Some of these “doubters” accept that the climate is changing but deny that human activity is the cause. Others deny the climate is changing at all. But both types deny the science.
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I string words together for money too, and concision is always a working ideal, but sometimes it takes those extra words to be accurate, which trumps is more important than brevity. I’m not sure “doubter” is strong enough, or really gets the idea across. Your term “fucking idiots” would be far better. And the Guardian, as Ralph points out, may have the best approach of all—just blow off the cranks. Two plus two does not make five, no matter how loudly you yell that it does. If you don’t believe what 90 percent of scientists say, you don’t deserve bypass surgery or fillings in your teeth or a cell phone or a car or any other technocratic goodies. And you don’t deserve to be taken seriously in media outlets, period.
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The problem with most humans being sufficiently concerned about global warming is that it’s generally a diffuse disaster over time and space. Everyone remembers the 2800 or so folks that died on Sept. 11, but nobody much thinks about the 20K or so that died that year in auto accidents in the US. It sort of takes a Hurricane Sandy every once in while to get people to focus. I have no doubt that you’re right, that in the long term AGW (what’s ACD?) will kill more people than the Holocaust, but that’s an awfully hard concept to wrap one’s head around.
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“doubter” is stronger than “denier”?
The people AP is identifying as doubters don’t practice doubterism. They practice denialism. Climate deniers are easiest to identify when they appear in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, Wattsupwiththat (a denier blog) or Fox News, to name a few. A climate denier is also easy to spot when the same individual finds several different contradictory ways to ignore dealing with global warming: it’s a left wing conspiracy, it’s the fault of the sun, it’s due to cosmic rays, it’s due to underwater volcanoes, it’s an illusion of faulty thermometers, it’s a heat island effect, it’s no different than the Medieval Warming Period and therefore is just natural variation (actually, there was such an event but it was local not global), and on and on.
The role of skeptics is generally honorable and scientific. In fact, science can’t really work without a certain degree of doubt, which means AP is creating a problem, not resolving it. There is no longer scientific doubt about global warming and the CO2 connection and the need to cut CO2 emissions. But there are legitimate skeptics discussing a range of issues that are still unsettled such how much damage will be done if we don’t start cutting emissions more quickly.
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Mrs darr’s term for denying that humans have caused and are causing the climate to change is (and this applies to a wide range of GOP attitudes) “dumbfuckery”.
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“Cynical pricks that promote planet destruction for money” works for me.
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I like what @McBain said: call 'em knuckleheads.
It’s nice and concise and gets the point across w/o being too abusive for general consumption in media. When speaking to other scientists I know the terminology gets quite a bit more …ummm … colorful. Naturally the denier crowd are largely the same ones who are into various other wacky conspiracy theories.
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Exactly. A “doubter” is someone who has doubts, i.e. he holds a sincere belief even if it is incorrect. My guess is this is just more AP Republican-friendly bullshit. Let’s see if they really use the improved term (“those who reject mainstream climate science”) on a regular basis, or more often opt for the new propagandistic term (“climate change doubters”).
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Now now. Wouldn’t be accurate. Many of them aren’t knuckleheads at all. Many of them are corrupt sociopaths.
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