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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by EMsmile (talk | contribs) at 13:35, 22 February 2024 (→Merged content from climate change conspiracy theory). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Article milestones
DateProcessResult
August 8, 2007Articles for deletionKept
March 28, 2008Articles for deletionKept
September 4, 2008Articles for deletionKept
March 10, 2010Articles for deletionKept
March 13, 2010Articles for deletionKept
January 9, 2012Articles for deletionKept
November 29, 2014WikiProject approved revisionDiff to current version
March 16, 2016WikiProject approved revisionDiff to current version

Top science publisher withdraws flawed climate study

Top science publisher withdraws flawed climate study

Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:14, 26 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, that looks worthwhile, including the point that two of the paper's authors were "physicists Franco Prodi and Renato Angelo Ricci" who "were named as signatories of the World Climate Declaration, a text that repeated various debunked claims about climate change, an AFP fact check article found." That's Agence France-Presse, Climate 'declaration' recirculates debunked claims | Fact Check, Roland Lloyd Parry, Updated on Friday 09 September 2022. Both are worth adding . . dave souza, talk 19:09, 26 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Go for it. I'm traveling, so it's a bit difficult for me right now. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:37, 26 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hope you have a good journey, I've got to give priority to several other articles so can't take this on for a bit yet.. . . dave souza, talk 15:32, 27 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion about overlapping articles

For those watching this page, please take a look at a related discussion at WikiProject Climate Change here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Climate_change#Update_Scientific_consensus_on_climate_change_with_IPCC_AR6. Over there we are currently discussing there how various similar articles fit together (and which ones may need merging), namely these articles which probably all overlap to some extent:

Your inputs would be welcome. EMsmile (talk) 08:31, 19 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Article too long, needs culling

I think this article has become too long (65 kB (10031 words) "readable prose size"); it needs condensing and culling. There is content here that could be moved to climate change in the United States to make this article less focused on the U.S.. EMsmile (talk) 11:22, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The Table of Contents seems to show the article is well organized and easy to navigate, so it's hard to eliminate any sections altogether. Maybe the older or more microscopically detailed sentences from non-notable people could be removed, per WP:NOTNEWS. But I think this topic is still important enough, and the article viewed enough, to warrant a "long" article (~474 views/day over the past 365 days).
Sadly and embarrassingly, the US is home to a political party that embodies denialism, so that much of the US content is proper in this ~high-level article. Since climate change is a global phenomenon, CC denial also has global importance, so it's not relevant only to Climate change in the United States. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:59, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if the main climate change article can stick to a reasonable length (55 kB), then I think this sub-article should be able to as well. As per WP:TOOBIG, articles over 60 kB "probably should be divided or trimmed, although the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading material". I am particularly concerned given that we might merge some content from climate change conspiracy theory and from global warming controversy to here.
And yes, climate change denial is shocking in the U.S. but it also does exist in a bunch of other countries. Even my home country (Germany) has a fair share of it, amongst the far right (AfD) supporters. Not the main party of the country but still. So I think we should be mindful of not focusing this country on the U.S. more than necessary - making it seem like just (or mainly) a United States problem... EMsmile (talk) 22:26, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the current section sizes, the sections on "history" and on "lobbying" seem overly long maybe. See also related (new-ish) article history of climate change politics which we might be able to interlink with the history section better. (I am not actually sure if the article history of climate change politics is indeed needed or not, see talk page discussion there). EMsmile (talk) 22:28, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The section climate change conspiracy theories

I was just looking at the section on "climate change conspiracy theories". Firstly, this could be replaced by an excerpt from climate change conspiracy theories. Secondly, these last two paragraphs that were added recently are overly specific to the US and could be condensed or moved to climate change conspiracy theories, and grouping them in the respective type of conspiracy theory, i.e. getting rich / dying of CC policies.. I mean these two paragraphs : 

++++++++++

An April 15, 2023 tweet by Republican U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene said climate change was a "scam" and that "fossil fuels are natural and amazing", saying that "there are some very powerful people that are getting rich beyond their wildest dreams convincing many that carbon is the enemy".[1] Her tweet included a chart that omitted carbon dioxide and methane[1]—the two most dominant greenhouse gas emissions.[2]

When a moderator at the August 23, 2023, Republican presidential debate asked the candidates to raise their hands if they believed human behavior is causing climate change, none raised their hands.[3] Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy claimed that "the climate change agenda is a hoax", and also that "more people are dying of climate change policies than they actually are of climate change"; none of his competitors challenged him directly on climate.[3] After investigating Ramaswamy's latter claim, a Washington Post fact check found no supporting evidence.[4] EMsmile (talk) 11:22, 9 November 2023 (UTC) [reply]

Click at right to show/hide references

References

  1. ^ a b Greene, Marjorie Taylor [@RepMTG] (April 15, 2023). "Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸" (Tweet). Hapeville, GA. Archived from the original on April 18, 2023 – via Twitter. described in Al-Arshani, Sarah (April 16, 2023). "Marjorie Taylor Greene says climate change is a 'scam' and that fossil fuels are 'amazing'". Business Insider. Archived from the original on April 18, 2023.
  2. ^ "Overview of Greenhouse Gases". EPA.gov. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. 2016. Archived from the original on April 17, 2023. See pie chart for carbon dioxide and methane emissions totalling more than 90% of greenhouse gas emissions.
  3. ^ a b Peoples, Ssteve (24 August 2023). "Presidential debate shows how GOP candidates are struggling to address concerns about climate change". AP News. Archived from the original on 25 August 2023.
  4. ^ Kessler, Glenn (25 August 2023). "Vivek Ramaswamy says 'hoax' agenda kills more people than climate change". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 25 August 2023. Ramaswamy's staff did not answer our queries on this statement — though it responded to another one. That's often suspicious. It usually means the staff doesn't have data to back up the boss's claim. Despite diligent searching, we could not find any study that accounted for such deaths. ... He earns Four Pinocchios.
EMsmile (talk) 11:22, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
These two paragraphs are specific to the section /* Conspiracy theories */, which is not unduly long. The content shows how conspiracy theories have reached the highest levels of government in the U.S. which emits more GHGs per person than almost all other countries—and is therefore important to this article as a whole. Excerpting always brings the problem of how the excerpted material "fits" into the flow of the article, which in this case is particularly problematic because of the vagueness of the opening paragraphs of Climate change conspiracy theory. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:44, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the article is overly long and bloated (see my comments in the other section of the talk page). Those particular politicians in the U.S. are not that important that these 2 examples should take up that much space and a quote box on the right. After all, this article is called "climate change denial" and not climate change denial in the U.S.. Yes, its per capita emissions are high but so are those of other countries. If we looked we could probably find similarly stupid quotes from all sorts of politicians around the world, they probably exist from politicians in Brazil, China, Hungary, even Germany (e.g. from far right politicians). Let's try to make this article less U.S. centric and move less important examples e.g. to climate change in the United States or its sub-articles. And once the merger is done with Climate change conspiracy theory then the disadvantages of an excerpt become a mute point. EMsmile (talk) 22:21, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not against the principle of shortening this article, but "those particular politicians" are extremely notable because they are the leaders of the dominant party in the highest-emitting-per-capita major nation in the world (see graphic). Greene is effectively a major force in that party, and with Trump, an epicenter of climate stupidity that is epitomized in the Green quotebox. Yes, we "could probably find similar quotes" from others—"If we looked", but it's not about quotes per se; it's about speaker notability and global influence. These two paragraphs aren't among the ones that should be culled. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:40, 11 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Merge global warming controversy into here?

has been proposed by @EMsmile

In my opinion, denialism is the overarching term here. Things like "skepticism" and "alternative explanations" are just variants of denialism. I think this comes out quite well in global warming controversy and also in climate change conspiracy theories. I do worry though that climate change denial is currently overly long and bloated and would require some trimming before other content could be merged to here. EMsmile (talk) 22:16, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
See also the explanation that we give in our own terminology section to explain that "skepticism" is really just part of denial: Climate change denial#TerminologyEMsmile (talk) 22:35, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, skepticism is fundamental to the scientific method. See Cargo cult science, and in particular read what Feynman said about integrity in his speech. Greglocock (talk) 23:11, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You're confusing things. I think the terminoloy is well described in the first paragraph of our terminology section: "Climate change skepticism" and "climate change denial" refer to denial, dismissal or unwarranted doubt of the scientific consensus on the rate and extent of global warming, its significance, or its connection to human behavior, in whole or in part. Though there is a distinction between skepticism which indicates doubting the truth of an assertion and outright denial of the truth of an assertion, in the public debate phrases such as "climate skepticism" have frequently been used with the same meaning as climate denialism or contrarianism EMsmile (talk) 23:31, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
What you describe is neither the scope of this article currently, nor are those "controversies": They are just discussions, people grappling with difficult decision making processes. You could otherwise likewise have articles called "renewable energy controversies" or "nuclear power controversies" (actually there is an article called Renewable energy debate and one called nuclear power debate). Do you want one called climate change debate? I can't see that to be workable. Actually that term currently redirects to here. - I think those issues around climate change are best discussed in the relevant sub-articles and then linked to from the main article on climate change. I.e. discussions on how to best do climate change mitigation should be at climate change mitigation. Discussions on what individuals can do to help should be at individual action on climate change and so forth. Otherwise what you would be creating is a new list type article which would list all topics that are relevant to climate change and that are being debated & discussed. We already have e.g. Glossary of climate change as well as Index of climate change articles.
I wonder if what you are thinking is needed could instead be shown at climate action. I've just started a section there about the barriers to climate action. Not sure if it'll work like this. EMsmile (talk) 20:45, 13 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Given the comments above about inappropriate naming, would it be better to rename global warming controversy, rather than merging the two articles? Mary Mark Ockerbloom (talk) 18:29, 17 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, if I understood you right then your proposal is similar to one I made yesterday on the talk page of global warming controversy here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Global_warming_controversy#Some_culling_and_updating_(ahead_of_potential_merger). I had written there "An alternative option could be to rework this article to become one that just lists past and ongoing debates (calling it purposefully debates not controversies). It could then be renamed "climate change debates" and contain quite a few excerpts. It could be a bit like a landing page to point people to the right sub-pages. A bit similar to climate change action (but longer). Thoughts?". Sorry for having the same/similar discussion on two talk pages. It's just hard to know who has which page on their watchlist, that's why I thought it's good to write on that talk page as well. EMsmile (talk) 16:19, 18 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
OK, so where do we go from here now? Note on a related discussion that my move proposal at the talk page of global warming controversy was now closed and result was "not moved": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Global_warming_controversy#Requested_move_22_November_2023 . So what's the way forward now or do we just leave everything as it is (not very satisfying)? EMsmile (talk) 22:40, 3 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above arguments that are on-point, favor dismantling the GWControversy article. The issue is that a "controversy" doesn't really exist, so the arguments that don't directly address this issue should not carry weight for consensus. The GWControversy article should be merged out of existence and replaced with a redirect to CCdenial. A fraction of what's still in the GWControversy article might be moved... somewhere, not necessarily here. —RCraig09 (talk) 23:52, 3 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
OK by me. Just not sure if we can say that consensus has been reached. I think I'll copy your comment across to the talk page of global warming controversy and see if final consensus can be declared there. EMsmile (talk) 09:30, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed the merger tags now as there is no content left at that article that could be moved to here. EMsmile (talk) 16:19, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Removed further reading list

I've removed the "further reading" list as I would say it's impossible to curate it on an ongoing basis and making it globally relevant (not just publications about the U.S.).:

EMsmile (talk) 22:46, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Merged content from climate change conspiracy theory

I've just carried out the merger from climate change conspiracy theory to here. More work is required to condense this part and remove repetition. Regarding the current structure, I am wondering if "climate change conspiracy theories" should remain as a main level heading or if it should be moved to be within "categories"? (which is how it was before I carried out the merger). Is "conspiracy theories" simply a type of denial on par with the other types that are listed under "categories"? EMsmile (talk) 10:53, 20 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's a sub-category. —RCraig09 (talk) 23:12, 20 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think so too but I am unsure how to set it up in the current structure: if "conspiracy theories" became a Level-1 heading (instead of a main heading) then it would be a lot bigger than the other sub-sections. So maybe some of the content that is currently under "conspiracy theories" would have to be moved to other sub-sections to create a better balance. Either way, we will have to condense this article as it's too big now (79 kB (12282 words) "readable prose size"). EMsmile (talk) 08:56, 21 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I've condensed the section on conspiracy theories now. EMsmile (talk) 13:35, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Climate obstruction and delay

In recent years there as been published a growing sum of papers and books on the obstruction of climate policy, of which climate change denial is and has been an important part, but only one part. Recent research is broadening its scope to include more means to obstruct meaningful climate policy, for example climate delay. While climate denial is still growing strong (especially ideologically motivated denial), especially business now focuses more on non-denial-delay and disinformation, because it is much more credible than outright denial of facts that have been established for decades. I think Wikipedia should reflect that, because this entry cannot cover the whole action and strategies of the climate change counter movement and is therefore limited. In my opinion, there should be another entry on the various ways of climate obstruction, to bundle every part of it. As many companies drop the hard denial and use softer disinformation with half-truths, strategies of delay, and feigned support for climate mitigation this article on its own becomes increasingly to narrow. I think, currently we lack an overview article that bundles all the different strategies of climate obstruction to guide readers to articles on the different strategies, they search for (such as climate denial, climate delay and so on) Literature for writing that entry could be:

Ekberg et al: Climate Obstruction. How Denial, Delay and Inaction are Heating the Planet. Routledge 2023

Lamb et al: Discourses of climate delay. Global Sustainability 2020, doi:10.1017/sus.2020.13

What do you think? --Andol (talk) 17:15, 12 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting idea. I think User:Chidgk1 proposed something similar somewhere: to create an article called climate change misinformation. Personally, I am hesitant to create a new article (they usually linger with low pageviews), I am more active on merging smaller articles together. Note we also have psychology of climate change denial. And by the way the article climate change denial is way too long at the moment and needs to be reworked (see my comment above). EMsmile (talk) 21:03, 12 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This is the related discussion thread that Chidgk1 started at the talk page of WikiProject Climate Change: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Climate_change#Having_the_right_articles_and_redirects_about_misinformation_and_disinformation EMsmile (talk) 08:51, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hm, climate change misinformation could be even better than my suggestion. It's scope would be even broader. Andol (talk) 20:14, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
What would be the structure (table of content) of such an article? EMsmile (talk) 21:50, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just a first thought, but important parts would be "History", "The Climate Change Countermovement (grouped by actors such as corporations, think tanks, contrarian scientists, front groups, astroturfing groups, conservative/right wing politicians, media and blogs, social media (following Dunlap and McCright)" and then the different ways of disinformation, such as denial, delay (following Lamb et al.), lobbyism, greenwashing etc. I think, some parts could be taken from the current article on denial (e.g. the whole part on lobbying), so that the focus here would be stringently on denial. Andol (talk) 22:46, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That sounds like the new article would overlap a lot with climate change denial. Or would you suggest to move sections from climate change denial to the new article? Would climate change misinformation be the daughter article for climate change denial or vice versa? The article climate change denial is currently way too long, so if content could sensibly be moved to a sub-article (or a parent article) that would be good. EMsmile (talk) 09:15, 15 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Use of "unwarranted" doubt in the lead

I previously reverted the use of "unwarranted" in the opening sentence, due to the fact that it seems unnecessary with the use of "pseudoscientific" as a descriptor immediately before. To avoid edit warring and per WP:BRD, I have reverted my restoration of this preferred revision, and am instead opening up discussion here to see what other editors think. Do you believe "unwarranted" belongs in the lead, or would you say it is unnecessary? I think I have stated quite clearly that I fall in the latter category, but what does everyone else think? JeffSpaceman (talk) 15:37, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging @Hob Gadling: and @DVdm: per discussion at User talk:Hob Gadling. JeffSpaceman (talk) 15:38, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I.m.o. the qualifier belongs in the lead, as it is backed by the content in the article body. I agree with Hob Gadlin's reasoning as expressed at User talk:Hob Gadling#"Unwarranted". Doubt is paramount to science. As CC denial flatly contradicts the scientific consensus, the doubt is inherently unwarranted. - DVdm (talk) 15:48, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That is completely correct. My issue is this, though -- it seems like a somewhat unnecessary adjective, given the description of the dismissal and doubt as pseudoscientific immediately before. I'm not arguing against your point: the doubt is very much inherently unwarranted. For me this isn't a question of validity, it's a question of sufficiency -- does unwarranted really belong, when the description of it as pseudoscientific could probably get the job done on its own? JeffSpaceman (talk) 15:54, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with you and think that "unwarranted" can go; also in the interest of readability, for non-native speakers. EMsmile (talk) 18:07, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sigh. This was resolved already, it was stable for three weeks, and now this [1].
Can somebody please explain how warranted doubt constitutes denial? When the data were still viewed as inconclusive, maybe in the 1960s, was that already denial, or was it normal science? --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:08, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think for the purposes of the first sentence of the lead, it is better to use a simple sentence. Whether doubts are warranted or not could be discussed later in the article. (in fact it already is). Also the first sentence actually says "doubt that contradicts the scientific consensus on climate change" which means it is per se unwarranted. This is not the doubt & discussions within the scientific community about some nuances of the processes, e.g. how much methane the thawing permafrost will release and so forth.
Also as is explained later in the article, the deniers purposefully use the word "doubt" and have spread doubt on purpose to sow confusion. So perhaps the term "doubt" is rather loaded. Thinking about it further, perhaps it's not even the ideal word to use in the first sentence at all.
Let's compare with the first sentence in the corresponding German Wikipedia article (translated here with Deepl): Climate change denial (sometimes also referred to as climate denial, climate science denial or denial of man-made global warming) is a form of science denial characterised by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing or fighting the scientific consensus of climate research on current global warming. (the term "doubt" does not appear). EMsmile (talk) 10:21, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've now changed the first sentence accordingly. This removes the need for further discussions on "doubts (warranted/unwarranted)". I've also taken out the emphasis on pseudoscience as I don't think this is key. Rather, I have linked to science denial which I think is better. Pseudoscience is still mentioned later but does not need to be in the first sentence. EMsmile (talk) 13:53, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
which means it is per se unwarranted Now I get it. Thanks. Also, I agree that the new version is better. --Hob Gadling (talk) 14:28, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree with the caption for the image in the lead

I disagree with this recent edit as I think the current version of the caption is not as clear to a global audience as my version was. My proposal was brought a snowball to the U.S. Senate floor in 2015 in the middle of winter to "provide a real life example that the globe is not warming". User:RCraig09 changed it to (how it was previously): displayed a snowball on the U.S. Senate floor, explaining, "so it’s very, very cold out. Very unseasonable". It was February in Washington, D.C.. My thinking:

  • "Brought" is a simpler word than "displayed" but OK, could live with "displayed".
  • That statement about "very cold" is very unclear for anyone who is not into U.S. politics. What was he trying to say? What is the sentence "it was February" meant to say? This is not winter everywhere in the world but middle of summer in the Southern hemisphere.
  • Note that the same image is also used for the lead of Psychology of climate change denial. There my proposed caption was brought a snowball to the U.S. Senate floor in 2015 in the middle of winter to "provide a real life example that the globe is not warming". He seemed to imply with this action that the continued existence of snow in the United States could be used to disprove that climate change is real.
  • By the way, I don't think it's good practice that both articles use the same lead image. EMsmile (talk) 15:52, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Directly quoting the denier is more effective than an oblique reference. Separately, mentioning both February and Washington, D.C. makes it crystal clear that it was winter. We disagree about how intelligent our audience is. Separately, "He seemed to imply..." is blatant editorial commentary. Separately, an image may well be appropriate for use in multiple articles; I'd be interested to see established Wikipedia policies or guidelines that say it's not "good practice", or just another subjective editorial opinion. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:48, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I expected you to disagree with me (as you were the one who chose the image and caption in the first place if I remember right). That statement "so it’s very, very cold out. Very unseasonable" is very unclear. I guess it was sarcastic but this doesn't come out clearly. Remember we are writing for the general public. I only figured out what he meant AFTER reading that CNN article. I don't think we should repeat this statement in the caption for the climate change denial and also for Psychology of climate change denial.
Why do you insist on saying "it was February", why not simply "it was in winter"? Not all readers would know either if snow in winter is typical for that location in the U.S. or not.
Come to think of it, I think it's basically not a suitable photo for either article. Let's brainstorm and come up with a better one.
Regarding the lead image in general, it is meant to tell the reader that they have arrived at the right place. For that reason, in most cases, the lead image is unique to the article title. Show me any featured article where two featured articles use the same lead image? I would argue this is not good practice.
How is this image suitable for Psychology of climate change denial, in which sense does it convey any of the psychology aspects? If it does then why isn't it explained in the caption?
I am curious to also hear from others about this image and caption. EMsmile (talk) 18:05, 31 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm don't know that this is the best image to have in this article, but the point of this anecdote is that Inhofe (a fairly commonly quoted denier in a very public space) has no idea what he's talking about. He was somehow trying to show that because there was snow, there is no global warming. He was not being sarcastic, he was (by all accounts and by impressions based on what he's said elsewhere) totally sincere; he's just an idiot. - Parejkoj (talk) 00:05, 12 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes but this doesn't come out clearly in the caption for someone who is not familiar with US politics. They think here is a senator and here is the U.S. senate so this must be serious/true/sincere. I thought my proposed caption was better but it was reverted as being too editorial: brought a snowball to the U.S. Senate floor in 2015 in the middle of winter to "provide a real life example that the globe is not warming". He seemed to imply with this action that the continued existence of snow in the United States could be used to disprove that climate change is real.. How can we explain to readers who know little about the topic why he brought the snowball and what he was trying to say and how idiotic that was (without being "editorial"?) EMsmile (talk) 08:43, 12 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think we could totally just remove the image: it's a funny and sad anecdote about a prominent denier, but as you say, it rather falls flat for people who don't know who Inhofe is or who don't follow US politics. Having this picture at the top of this article says "here's an example of stupid stuff deniers do", but I don't know that we really need that. - Parejkoj (talk) 18:13, 12 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

While you are having fun with this, at least he didn't make the following ludicrous claim in 2000 According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”. "Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said. That is the level of stupidity we are dealing with. Greglocock (talk) 20:56, 12 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Since "denial" is an abstraction, it is difficult to find an image of something physical that would represent "denial". But a picture that says "here's an example of stupid stuff deniers do" is exactly what this article needs. The Inhofe picture is the perfect vision of the righteous-but-ignorant denier. Within a few hours, I'll add to the caption a reliable source's response to Inhofe's stunt that should further explain the obvious. (I reverted the earlier caption because it was a Wikipedia editor's explanation, and not a reliable source's explanation.) —RCraig09 (talk) 21:18, 12 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The new image caption is better than before although I do worry that it got rather long now. If we need this many words to explain what the image is showing then this might mean it's not the right image to use. I'd like to brainstorm to find a better one. But in the meantime, I would like to propose to make the caption clearer still. This is because the quote "very unseasonable" is just so confusing. He was meant to be ironic, right? How about like this (in bold the main differences): American Senator Jim Inhofe, a well-known climate change denier, displayed a snowball on the U.S. Senate floor in winter 2015, in a town where snow in winter is normal, saying "it’s very, very cold out"[1] as if to mock predictions of global warming. He also ignored the fact that local weather in a single location is different from global climate change.[2] (with the two refs still to be put back in).
Mentioning that the year 2015 was warmer than previous years is not necessary; because even if that year wasn't a new temperature record, the whole snowball stunt would have still been equally silly.
I think my wording is not "editorial" but it explains what happens to the readers, and is no different to what the CNN article said or implied. EMsmile (talk) 23:09, 13 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Inhofe did not mean it ironically; he was serious in his belief that cold weather refuted global warming. We did not "need" the caption to be longer in the first place, so a longer caption in no way implies that it's the "~wrong image"! Your also-lengthy proposal arguably violates WP:SYNTH by adding wiki-editorial commentary—unnecessarily—to what the present caption makes painfully clear to the reader using reliable sources. —RCraig09 (talk) 23:33, 13 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You seem unable to put yourself into someone else's shoes: What you find "painfully clear" is not clear to me, and possibly others. Why not give it the benefit of the doubt? Also, I am not the only one to suggest that the snowball image is sub-optimal (e.g. scroll up to see the comment by User:Parejkoj). The wording of "very unseasonable" is not clear. And how can you be sure that he was not being ironic/sarcastic? When I read the CNN article I see there "He then resumed his speech with a smile on his face that indicated he was quite pleased with his demonstration." (I don't doubt that he is serious about climate change denial). Anyhow, the information from the CNN article is too short to really know what was going on.
The CNN article also said "as a real life example that the globe is not warming." I think this sentence would be worth quoting and this is what I meant with "as if to mock predictions of global warming" - which I don't think is editorial but saying the same thing as the CNN article but with other words. But if in doubt, then why not quote that sentence word for word? Could be like this: ...displayed a snowball on the U.S. Senate floor in winter 2015, in a town where snow in winter is normal, saying "it’s very, very cold out"[1] which was probably meant to be "a real life example that the globe is not warming." EMsmile (talk) 09:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
NB: this image was not the lead image until 10 December which is when I moved it there, something which I now regret. At that time, the caption was this which in my opinion was very unclear: Republican U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe holds a snowball on the U.S. Senate floor to show that "it's very, very cold out. Very unseasonable." It was February 26.. The new caption is indeed better. The exact same image is also at Psychology of climate change denial so the caption there also needs to be improved in the end. (have changed that now) EMsmile (talk) 09:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Inhofe is a non-scientist. His audience was non-scientists. His message was sarcastic, no ironic, and—putting ourselves in the shoes of a those non-scientists—needed no further explanation.
The image here actually needed no further explanation, especially a wiki-editorial explanation.
The sentence re 2015 being the warmest year globally, puts Inhofe's stunt in perspective: the lead image's caption could show Inhofe was dead wrong. The image is perfect for showing the righteous ignorance of deniers. 17:07, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
For comparison, the Imhofe image also appears in the German Wikipedia article about this topic (but not in the lead). There, the caption is quite simple and rather good, I would say (except it misses out the explanation on who Imhofe is): Jim Inhofe in 2015 during a Senate speech where he used a snowball to argue against the existence of global warming. (translated with Deepl). EMsmile (talk) 10:25, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Options for a different lead image

Data has been cherry picked from short periods to falsely assert that global temperatures are not rising. Blue trendlines show short periods that mask longer-term warming trends (red trendlines). Blue dots show the so-called global warming hiatus.
A cartoon to describe the different stages and behaviours of climate change denial from "what is climate change?" to "nothing is proven!" to "even if it exists...it's a huge opportunity for business!".

For comparison: the main climate change article uses this image for the section on denial: EMsmile (talk) 09:39, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For comparison as well: this is the image I have now added to psychology of climate change denial - I think it fits really well there: EMsmile (talk) 09:50, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The cherry-picking image shows one tiny aspect of denial, less suitable for denial as a whole, and is technical in nature.
The cartoon shows broader, non-techy reasoning. However, it has WP:PRIMARY sourcing issues because the sourcing is essentially a caricaturist (Mester)'s representation and not a climate analyst's reliable description of denial. It leaves open the question of how the caption could source the cartoon's content, without resorting to wiki-editorializing.
The Inhofe image is iconic, and should be retained somewhere in this article if not in the lead.
Wherever used, the cartoon's caption should not merely regurgitate the image's content verbatim. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've changed the cartoon's caption at psychology of climate change denial now and also above. Compare also with the caption that is used for this cartoon at the German Wikipedia article: "Cartoon by Gerhard Mester on the different stages of climate change denial" (translated by Deepl) EMsmile (talk) 16:37, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Changing over to long ref style and removing quotes

I am changing over to long ref style because it's just easier for when text is transcribed with excerpts. Also, it's easier to see if one publication is used multiple times. In the process, I have also removed those long quotes from the references. They could be put back in but I would argue that they are not needed and that they make the ref list unnecessarily long and unwieldy. If people want to read up on the details they can just go to the publication in question (unless it's behind a paywall, I guess). EMsmile (talk) 13:56, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I plan to continue along these lines but I should probably wait a few days in case someone objects that I am taking out the quotes from the ref list? In my opinion, those quotes are not needed and don't help the reader much. I don't think they are "standard practice" (anymore (?)). The only argument for keeping them that I can think of is when the source is behind a paywall. But even then, just those few quoted sentences don't help the reader so much either as they cannot verify the context unless they have access to what is behind the paywall. Overall, I think it makes the reference list more manageable without those long quotes. Pinging User:dave souza because I think you might have been an editor who added those quotes in the first place (?). EMsmile (talk) 16:34, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
OK, seems like there are no objections to this, so I'll continue along the same lines. EMsmile (talk) 12:42, 30 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've completed this process now. It's all in long ref style now and without those quotes. EMsmile (talk) 22:40, 5 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sentence on "false flags"

I am not really happy with this sentence that was added earlier this month. What is meant with "false flags" and does it really work for us to have one statement with six references? Should it be broken up into more specific statements rather than all lumped together? I mean this sentence:

False flags and controlling the weather: Extreme weather events, including wildfires and floods, have been attributed by conspiracy theorists to laser beams, deliberate actions by government or the antifa movement, and weather engineering such as cloud seeding.[1][2][3][4][5][6] EMsmile (talk) 21:30, 30 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ Shayan Sardarizadeh and Mike Wendling (2023-08-16). "Hawaii wildfires: 'Directed energy weapon' and other false claims go viral". BBC.
  2. ^ Tiffany Hsu (2023-08-30). "Falsehoods Follow Close Behind This Summer's Natural Disasters". New York Times.
  3. ^ "Pilots get "really violent" threats after online rumors wrongly pin devastating floods on cloud seeding". CBS News. 2022-04-08.
  4. ^ Marco Silva (2022-07-07). "Australia floods: Unfounded cloud seeding claims spread online". BBC News.
  5. ^ Laura Paddison and Paula Newton (2023-01-17). "A climate conspiracy theorist said the government deliberately lit wildfires. He just pleaded guilty to starting 14 himself". CNN.
  6. ^ Jason Wilson (2020-09-20). "Officials baselessly linked 'antifa' to arson before wildfires, documents show". Guardian.

EMsmile (talk) 21:30, 30 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That has nothing to do with false flags, which is about actions by humans blamed on other humans. Laser beams and so on is about naturally caused events (on which humans in general have an influence via climate change) blamed on specific humans. The title sounds like WP:OR. The first source connects the claims to politically motivated activists seeking to downplay the potential impact of climate change, so it is not WP:SYNTH to add it here. (I cannot access the second, and the third makes it difficult for me, so I stopped checking.) That does not mean it is relevant enough to include. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:36, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your response. I've deleted that section now because it's unclear and messy; would take too long to tidy up; likely repetitive with what's there already. EMsmile (talk) 08:31, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Content about climate change denial scientists based on the memoirs of Kevin Trenberth

I plan to add a bit of content about climate change denial scientists based on the memoirs of Kevin Trenberth. Link to his memoirs here (well worth a read): http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7sf3160, see e.g. page 95. This is what Kevin wrote to me by e-mail: "I have a section in my memoir on deniers of climate change: see attached. These are the main ones I encountered although there is much more in memoir about problems when the Denver Post wrote an editorial about me and I was subject of numerous talk-back shows. - The current section on deniers seems much too long. The web site https://skepticalscience.com/ should probably be featured more prominently."

Regarding that website, we currently only have it under "See also" (Skeptical Science). I am trying to think of ways to give the website skepticalscience.com more limelight. What I’d need is a publication about it that talks about its impacts, I guess. I wonder if the title of the website is a bit problematic now: when I see “skeptical”, I equate that with “climate change denier”. But his website is to fight back against climate change denial. Wondering if they've ever thought about changing their name. EMsmile (talk) 10:04, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It is the denialists that should change their moniker from "skeptics" to "denialists". Scientific skeptics have complained about science deniers stealing their word, quite a while ago. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:21, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yea, probably too late though. I think the climate change deniers have done a thorough job of hijacking that term for themselves. We'll probably have to accept that and find a different term to what used to be called "scientific skeptics". Maybe "investigators of science" or "curious scientists" or whatever. EMsmile (talk) 22:16, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Won't fly. It's the accepted name since the 1980s. There have been falied attempts to rename them ("Pseudoskeptics" from opponents, "Brights" from proponents). But this is too far away from improving the article, so, let's stop it. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:46, 1 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
you're right. :-)
If we want to add some statements about the skepticalscience website and work, we could perhaps use these publications (John Cook is a key author and was founder of skepticalscience long ago).
  • Lewandowsky, S., Cook, J., Ecker, U. K. H., Albarracín, D., Amazeen, M. A., Kendeou, P., Lombardi, D., Newman, E. J., Pennycook, G., Porter, E. Rand, D. G., Rapp, D. N., Reifler, J., Roozenbeek, J., Schmid, P., Seifert, C. M., Sinatra, G. M., Swire-Thompson, B., van der Linden, S., Vraga, E. K., Wood, T. J., Zaragoza, M. S. (2020). The Debunking Handbook 2020. Available at https://sks.to/db2020. DOI:10.17910/b7.1182
  • Cook, J. (2020). Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change: How to Understand and Respond to Climate Science Deniers. New York, NY: Citadel Press. EMsmile (talk) 10:22, 1 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've added that content now from Kevin's memoirs where he listed names of well-known climate change scientists who can be labelled as deniers. I think this is useful information. (their climate change denial views are mostly visible in their Wikipedia articles if people click through to that) EMsmile (talk) 10:35, 2 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Moving some content of psychology of climate change denial to here

I know this article is already too long, and I plan to look for ways of condensing and culling in the next week or so. But in the meantime, I've looked at psychology of climate change denial more closely, trying to strip that one back to the pure psychology content. There are two sections where I feel we have a lot of overlap to here and that maybe some of that should be moved to here: the content in this section (conspiracies): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychology_of_climate_change_denial#Conspiratorial_beliefs and this one (which is about terminology and "soft climate change denial" (used to be a separate article but was merged)): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychology_of_climate_change_denial#Soft_climate_change_denial . Thoughts? EMsmile (talk) 22:19, 31 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've brought across some content from the psychology of climate change denial and reworked that one a bit. I think that's probably all that I'd bring over from that article for now. EMsmile (talk) 09:15, 7 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looking for ways to condense this article

The article is now at 72 kB readable prose length. I think we should aim to bring it down to less than 60 kB, maybe aim for 55 kB. Which areas do you think should be condensed? I think the section on conspiracy theories is currently too big and probably a bit repetitive. The section on history is also rather long and detailed but only deals with the situation in the US, really. Some US specific content could be cut or condensed to make space for including more content from other parts of the world (although I don't have publications for that at my fingertips). - Thoughts? EMsmile (talk) 09:18, 7 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Too scattered and newsy, with the usual load of references to conspiracies. Lots of duplications with other articles. It is the typical stage of a collage with some structure which needs to evolve towards a good quality encyclopedic entry with improved structure and focus and better balance. Cutting duplications and news may be a starting strategy. Tytire (talk) 22:35, 9 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Michael Mann wins $1 million judgement against professional deniers - LA Times

https://news.yahoo.com/column-climate-scientist-just-won-110027843.html

The case found you can have opinions and express them, but you can't attack people with known lies and misinformation represented as facts. First Alex Jones, now this.

I post this here in hopes it might be worked into this article. For example a subsection in "Responses to denialism" called "Legal consequences of denialism". -- GreenC 14:55, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Implemented in this edit. Other editors can move it to another section if desired. Thank you for your suggestion. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:00, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for adding that. But it looks like the two bullets above that needs some cleanups; they're very credulous to the denier claims. - Parejkoj (talk) 17:45, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, Parejkoj. Unfortunately, it would be a huge effort for Wikipedia editors to research and explain why each and every denialist claim is wrong. Fortunately, the article's lead is clear that denial is contrary to reality, and as a practical matter, we can hope readers see the false claims in context. —RCraig09 (talk) 18:00, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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