Talk:Climate change

Doesn't this article support the "free energy suppression" conspiracy theories?
If fossil fuel companies deny global warming because regulation of their work would lower profits, wouldn't they also stand to gain from suppressing new methods of getting usable energy?

Cover story
I believe that this article is ready for demotion to gold. It is well researched, has properly formatted citations, lots of good non-text material, and is a well rounded and informative take on the topic. A cover story abstract will need to be developed; I'll put this on my to-do list. —cosmikdebris talk stalk 22:10, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
 * The one thing I dislike about this article is the listicle on global warming denialists, especially since we already have a category for them. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 22:12, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes, I agree that this can probably be pruned.
 * I also noticed that there are three "citation needed" tags that should definitely be addressed before a demotion can be considered. —cosmikdebris talk stalk 22:22, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Eco-fascism
Brought it up in the discussion for demoting this article to gold. This is IMO an important topic directly related to climate change. There is a worryingly increasing amount of far-right people who acknowledge climate change is happening, blaming it on immigrants and people from impoverished countries (typically their birth rates and their development into industrialization), proposing ugly solutions to climate change (killing immigrants), and some of them acting on it to kill people through mass shootings and whatnot. I don't think the article should be gold without at least touching on this. I'm going to gather some resources for this so hopefully incorporating the information won't be difficult (I'm busy with projects, don't have a ton of free time improving this article currently).

It CAN go into its own article and it has its own subsection in hard green, but this article makes no mention of it.


 * Hard_green
 * Inside Climate News.org — May 27, 2022 How Mass Shootings, Ecofascism and Climate Change Got Tied Together
 * Earth.org — what is ecofascism
 * The dangers of eco-fascism and why it’s a ‘veneer for racist beliefs’
 * The dangers of eco-fascism and why it’s a ‘veneer for racist beliefs’

19:27, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I personally believe that these belong to Draft:Eco-fascism, even if we can write a paragraph or two about them on this article. How prominent is eco-fascism? Honest question. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 19:30, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I can't accurately gauge prominence, but several of these sources do mention that, while extremist, they're rising. There were some far-right parties, such as Front National in France, incorporating ecofascist rhetoric, and there were several highly publicized mass shootings that also included rhetoric in their screed things. I also say their ideas aren't exactly rare on the internet, that blaming immigrants and birth rates for ecological destruction isn't TOO fringe of a mindset and, at least according to euronews, some people may be unintentionally sharing that mindset.
 * I do think eco-fascism does deserve a mention ("Even more extreme measures" would be the best place in my opinion), though like GeeJayK, I think resources they would work even better if they were included in Draft:Eco-fascism. There's some degree of separation: this article describes people who downplay and still deny climate change, while the draft describes people who acknowledge the extent of its effects from the get go but have some repugnant ideas on how to fix them. DietMondrian (talk) 20:09, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but the article doesn't focus on just denialism. It's just an overview of climate change. Indeed, there is a degree of separation but won't hurt to include a brief summary of the ecofascists. 21:27, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Sounds fine to me, because I also think a brief summary would be a good idea. (I get the feeling the three of us want similar things, but there might a little miscommunication going on.) DietMondrian (talk) 22:01, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I've got the same feeling. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 22:03, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

"positive effects"
"Global average temperatures were higher during the Jurassic period than they are today. This does not, unfortunately, mean that global warming will bring back the extinct dinosaurs. The currently living ones such as chickens, on the other hand, may evolve to fill the new niches. So if you want a world where your puny children are mere morsels for the almighty Cockasaurus Rex, trade in that SUV for a Hummer."

This isn't really a valid point; it is logically nonsensical (there's no source even backing up deniers saying this), and even if it is, it's just a recycle of the denialist talking point "CO2 is plant food" or whatever. Maybe the sentences are played for a joke, but it's not really good enough for this page IMO. 22:18, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Solutions
Also noticed "Living with it". It's a denialist tactic to say "we can just adapt to it" (which is not discussed in this article; unless I'm missing something, but I've scrolled through this page a few times, didn't see it). However the section goes into just... change of planting corn in Illinois. Severe lack of breadth aside, I know that's going to happen sooner or later, but this "solution" if you can even call that one, is still going to leave tons of people dead and otherwise severe disruption in various parts of the globe that many countries will be burdened to deal with. You think this gap in our coverage should be in a gold article? I have my doubts. 22:26, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

The bias of the article:
I'm not sure who is reviewing these articles for accuracy, but there is severe bias present in this one. This is problematic due to the controversial nature of the topic. All viewpoints supported by science and facts should be included. It's actually very sad. I hope that the moderators of this wiki will come back to earth and stop allowing the spread of misinformation, even going so far as to label it "gold". Anyway, that's my two cents. Yes, I know you didn't ask, but it needed to be said. &mdash; Unsigned, by: 185.197.193.36 / talk
 * Vague criticisms such as this are unhelpful. If you have specific complaints about misinformation, we would like to hear them. Bongolian (talk) 18:43, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Is that not the point of the "talk" page? Sorry you think it's unhelpful, but your reply was rather unhelpful too. Thanks anyway.
 * What Bongolian means, dear Bon is that you do not indicate which specific viewpoint supported by science and fact you believe is not included. Scream!! (talk) 20:14, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
 * What Bongolian and Scream!! are saying. If you believe the article to be biased against science and facts then please point out those inaccuracies so we can improve the article. As of now the article seems fine (to me) and it isn't obvious (to me) what you are talking about. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 09:08, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

"Climate change" vs "global warming"
We have spent the last seven years examining how best to communicate complicated ideas and controversial subjects. The terminology in the upcoming environmental debate needs refinement, starting with 'global warming and ending with environmentalism, It's time for us to start talking about 'climate change' instead of global warming and 'conservation ' instead of preservation.

1) "Climate change" is less frightening than "global warming". As one focus group participant noted, climate change 'sounds like you're going from Pittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale.' While global warming has catastrophic connotations attached to it, climate change suggests a more controllable and less emotional challenge.

Source: Republican Political Consultant Frank Luntz, 2003 https://web.archive.org/web/20150511165611/http://www.politicalstrategy.org/archives/001330.php

"Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community. Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly.

"Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate."

The phrase "global warming" should be abandoned in favour of "climate change", Mr Luntz says, and the party should describe its policies as "conservationist" instead of "environmentalist", because "most people" think environmentalists are "extremists" who indulge in "some pretty bizarre behaviour... that turns off many voters".

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2003/mar/04/usnews.climatechange

But temperature change itself isn't the most severe effect of changing climate. Changes to precipitation patterns and sea level are likely to have much greater human impact than the higher temperatures alone. For this reason, scientific research on climate change encompasses far more than surface temperature change. So "global climate change" is the more scientifically accurate term. Like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, we've chosen to emphasize global climate change on this website, and not global warming. https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/climate_by_any_other_name.html

Hmmph (talk) 15:01, 23 April 2023 (UTC)
 * My vote goes to "climate catastrophe".--Max Sinister (talk) 02:25, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Thoughts
Most people on this site would consider Ethical Skeptic a crank with his vaccine takes, but I’m curious to see what you think of his climate hypothesis. I personally think it’s quite bizarre. Patty  Pat  20:51, 17 July 2023 (UTC)
 * It's a Gish Gallop of technobabble crank! :)
 * Someone from Reddit already skimmed the article and found several "red flags". It's not uncommon for conspiracy theorists to blatantly misuse statistics and scientific articles, so while there's a few credible papers (mixed among cranks), the conclusion from the mixture of fact and out-there is just bizarre.
 * I like this article from Ethical Skeptic where it first says it's not a scientist, and then proceeds to bash anyone who isn't a scientist reporting on science that "appeal(s) to authority outside one’s body of current and active expertise". So, I think we can safely take his words as "gospel" and completely ignore everything that it tries to spout on scientific matters, because as its own article puts it, such will likely be very Dunning-Kruger. :) BobJohnson (talk) 22:21, 17 July 2023 (UTC)


 * I personally feel that TES’ content needs some heavy duty analysis. I kinda got hyper fixated on him from reading his charts explaining how the shots are causing shitloads of issues, but also think of how most charts correlate with COVID waves. Kinda like Edward Dowd. Also think his explanation on how COVID existed since 2017 and how East Asia and Oceania were already immune until Delta and Omicron, is weird. At the same time, he has his own set of skepticism, so trying to rebute him seems to be a vain act. Patty   Pat  01:48, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
 * The problem for this, if you try to do the whole paper, because it is a Gish Gallop, the sheer amount of time it would take to be a pain in the ass. However, pretty quickly, you get to the point where you can tell it is not worth spending time any further.
 * For instance, at one point the author seems to fail to understand the difference between cumulative CO2 vs. CO2 per year ("If 2.5 years of lower CO2 emissions also causes global temperatures to rise, then what are we doing?") CO2 emissions can vary considerably per year depending on economic activity, but that does not negate the total CO2 (and other global warming gases) already in the air; furthermore, if we are still outputting more CO2 than natural carbon sinks on the Earth can absorb, there still might be an increase in atmospheric CO2 despite the lower CO2 amount during the pandemic. (WEF link for reference for yearly change)(Climate.gov for total PPM) No matter how many fancy words this author uses, it's already starting off on the wrong foot.
 * Graphs generated by this site have a PIDOOMA quality. Like this one. What the fuck is a China "Hope-Simpson South Season Outbreak"? Is the author talking about, who published reports on diseases between, er, the 1960s and 1990s? Who died in 2003? My guess is the author saw this paper on the role of season in the epidemiology of influenza and threw it into his thoughts without really knowing why. The graph sounds like a fancy implication that the author is conspiring that COVID existed in 2018... or something. Nobody else uses that "Hope-Simpson pathogen" term (really -- Google only shows one link, the author's Twitter), so who the hell knows what the author is meaning here, but that's my guess. I mean, COVID-19 possibly was circulating before it became a pandemic, but not in the way implied.
 * As noted in the WEF link, CO2 emissions dropped considerably during the COVID-19 pandemic, so one wonders how he PIDOOMAed this graph? The author provided the link, but it's just CO2 observations from one single observatory. That's piss poor data practice in the best case scenario. But even weirder, he chose an I think it's pretty easy to conjure up why this observatory might be, er, a possible outlier, and not a great choice for any assumption about world CO2 readings. (Note that I'm not checking the data so there may be issues even with that for all I know... the graph is odd, I don't see the point of normalizing PPM to 1976 levels.)
 * Like I mentioned, since it's a Gish Gallop, one runs into a time issue. Generally Gish Gallops of this sort rely on you being impressed by charts and graphs and technobabble and giant walls of text and not Googling and going "hey, wait a second". It's the age old issue that it's easy to generate bullshit and much harder to do more legitimate things; in fact, it's no surprise that it's a sprawling blot of text because writing succinctly is much tougher. But I imagine if one does a full analysis, one will find an awful lot of poor reasoning and WTFs similar to the above. BobJohnson (talk) 02:56, 18 July 2023 (UTC)
 * I do think his work on COVID’s origins has serious questions and implications. Mentioning how South Korea, Japan and Australia had flu deaths that were actually COVID (I think he mentions Omicron being that) makes me ask “Wouldn’t epidemiologists have blown the whistle on this?” “Wouldn’t there be officials who know about this?” He’ll have his answers for sure. I think I did ask once, with no reply though. If he sees this, I guess he’ll mention something like Antiwisdom of the crowds, or something. As I’ve said, he seems to have a different form of thinking, and he’ll say something like we’re in denial, or that we don’t understand, or that we’re just plain wrong. Patty   Pat  17:05, 18 July 2023 (UTC)