[zargath]

I am a computer engineer so I know nothing of nature :)

But, it boggles my mind why so many people don't believe global warming can be man-made. I know you can have disagreements, scientists can be wrong, a lot of things can contribute to things heating up, an so forth. But to be 100% sure that its not man-made, I dont get it. Is it because these deniers grow up in a eco system so large that they dont sense human interference, is it pure denial or ?

[intended]

Its the gift of the republican party and the american media.

Man I remember back in the day when they decided to tell their base that this was all a conspiracy - I watched with naive outrage "How could you lie to your people like that!".

But no. They did it, and everyone else barely cared.

Remember that For decades people couldn't be bothered to recycle, or save water. They still barely care.

And then you have people - rich and able to employ talented people, who will spread FUD for their bottom line.

Don't be hard on your country men. They got lied to by the better liars in the world. They were cut from facts, they were given enterntainment instead of news, and cranks were brought onto the same level as scientists.

They never had a chance.

To jog everyones memmories - scientists would never engage with cranks - it gave them too much credibility.

But then a certain news channel started giving them a platform, and the trappings of credibility, till finally in an attempt to reason with the public, scientists came onto this network to argue the facts.

In classic fashion, it was a trap. There was never an actual debate, it was a circus - a spectacle for viewers to see the ivory tower intellectuals trip up on simple questions.

And the audience, presented with this farce, obviously saw what they were nudged to see.

Now after that much effort has been expended to keep things from you, and to "teach the controversy" it is also linked to identity.

Thats how we've reached where we are today.

[eru]

Most people don't engage with the science directly. I know I don't. And your beliefs about climate change don't make a difference in daily life one way or another.

Thus what you get is stated beliefs being entirely driven by appeals to authority and tribal affiliation.

As a small experiment for how hard it is: come up with some good arguments to convince me that earth is actually roughly spherical--without resorting to appeals to authority.

Just using observations and little experiments available to the common layman it's doable, but way harder than you think. And now just extrapolate how much harder climate change is to argue about.

[titzer]

It's not that hard. Watch a lunar eclipse. Watch the sun rise, follow an arc, set, and then watch the stars rise, follow their arcs, and then set. Then travel to a few degrees south and see the whole thing again, except the pole around which everything revolves shifts by exactly the amount you moved south.

[eru]

Yes, that's good evidence. Though I think the flat earthers had some convoluted explanation for it, too.

What's also easy to do in today's world is calling up someone in a different time zone that you trust, and ask them for when their sunset is. (The interactive calling is important, so that it's harder to have a conspiracy delay your messages or fake some news.)

[peoplewindow]

Flat earthers? Who has ever thought the Earth was flat? Even medieval people didn't think that, it's obvious to anyone who ever watched a ship sail over the horizon that the planet is not flat. They used to think the sun revolved around the Earth, which is a lot harder to check with common sense logic.

[eru]

Oh, I didn't want to imply any one particular society though the earth was flat. Flat earthers are just an example to show that it's not trivial to argue against someone with a weird believe that they are motivated to defend.

[jseliger]

But, it boggles my mind why so many people don't believe global warming can be man-made

I used to think the same way, but part of the issue is that most people are not abstract or systems thinkers. They don't perceive abstraction or systems the way many HN readers do or would.

In addition, and related, most people have strong tribal identities that overwhelm their limited intellectual capabilities; Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind is very good on this: https://www.amazon.com/Righteous-Mind-Divided-Politics-Relig... and there are others as well.

Climate change deniers, anti-vaxxers, and other conspiracy theorists share some key underlying traits.

Most of us, including me, also live in our own bubbles. You're likely in a rationalist and data-driven bubble, so you don't see people to whom you'd have explain an entire rationalist and data-driven worldview.

[oldsklgdfth]

I am also confused by these people, but I assume the are the type that have no self-doubt and therefore believe their beliefs to be true.

The problem I face is that I can see it going both ways. I can human pollution to be the cause of climate-change. But I can also see the argument that we don't have the whole picture and this is an over-reaction to the system we have observed and modeled.

I don't know much about the science and am hesitant to accept finding on such a politically hot topic. But if I had to bet I'd say both sides are just polarizing each other.

I can imagine in 100yrs the ocean has not risen and the world climate is the way it is today. But I can also imagine a world with a climate that has become hostile and having a home with "climate control" to keep you alive is necessary and will further increase social disparity in the poor that won't be able to afford such luxuries.

I know this is a lot. But I welcome anyone to provide me some more information on how avoid false claims and to educate myself on this topic.

[virgil_disgr4ce]

AFAICT it's largely a matter of the cultural correlation for evidently many people between "belief in anthropogenic climate change" and "liberalism." I.e., if I were to believe in climate change, I'd be "a liberal," and that is super bad.

Related but different is the extreme right-wing attitude of, "Sure, maybe climate change is a real thing, but who cares, competition for and consumption of natural resources is our God-given right" etc etc. I'd like to say this extreme is rare, but if it's even a few people who happen to be in control of extremely large amounts of pollutants...

[oh_sigh]

Keep in mind that there are many viewpoints which are covered under "climate change denial' - some of which are more reasonable than others.

Some people don't believe that humans can have any impact at all on the larger environment

Some people think maybe humans are having an impact, but it is super tiny and dwarfed by other natural phenomenon

Some people think humans are having an impact, but it isn't worth doing anything about

Some people think humans are having an impact, but are suspicious that any economic response will have the intended effect.

[peoplewindow]

A lot of climate change denial isn't actually complete denial that the climate is changing, but rather the poking of holes in the science and claiming that the confidence level of that science has been grossly overstated by the media for political and ideological ends.

Unfortunately, when viewed from a "who benefits" perspective, global warming theory does not look good to your average libertarian small-government cynic:

- Climate change researchers are virtually all academics.

- Academics are strongly incentivised to make the grandest, scariest claims possible because that is what unlocks large streams of grant money.

- The claim they're making in this case is literally "the world is going to end unless you give us lots of research money".

- They have been wrong before, c.f. global cooling.

- Many of the proposed solutions look suspiciously like excuses for vast government power grabs to monitor and micro-manage every aspect of one's life and business. Such people tend to assume the powerful are always looking for convenient excuses to become even more powerful still, and "we must take away your trucks and your meat against your will to save the world" looks like the ultimate power grab.

These concerns are not entirely meritless. A typical example of the genre can be found here:

https://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/04/ocean-acidification-yet-...

I haven't looked into the claims in depth but they sound plausible, in particular, the notion that certain kinds of papers showing negative results don't get published, the notion that entire fields of study that appear to have hundreds of peer reviewed papers can nonetheless fall apart when subjected to rigorous meta-review. We have seen this in other scientific fields like psychology so it is not implausible that it could happen in climate science as well.

Ocean acidification is not the same thing as regular global warming. But you can see why doubt sets in given the alignment of interests involved. For people who have lost their confidence in the academic establishment, climate change is effectively invisible.

[antisthenes]

The only semi-reasonable viewpoint out of the stuff you listed is #4.

Economic policy on a global scale is obviously going to be hard to get right, so they are right to be skeptical. But to use the "it's hard" as an excuse to do nothing is worse than just being skeptical.