It can be tempting to think that people who disagree with you are mad, bad or simply stupid. However, not only are such judgements usually wrong, but telling people that they are stupid is unlikely to…
Scientists will be either ineffectual or counter-productive.
EPA
Western liberal democracies believe that in difficult political decisions science serves as a referee and arbiter of truth. Scientific knowledge can indeed inform and narrow the scope of policy choices…
Climate science is right – but it isn’t winning.
NASA
Scientists tell us that the world is warming and greenhouse gas emissions are to blame. Yet climate change framed by scientists, politicians and economists as a straightforward pollution problem will neither…
How to deal with your Typical Climate Change Denier who turns up to the summer barbecue.
Flickr/Andrew Kenworthy
The end of the year is nigh and it’s a time for Christmas and New Year parties and gatherings. In the southern hemisphere that means barbecues and beaches. In the northern hemisphere it’s mulled wine and…
There are many complex reasons why people decide not to accept the science of climate change. The doubters range from the conspiracy theorist to the sceptical scientist, or from the paid lobbyist to the…
It has been five years since an earthquake hit the Italian city of L’Aquila leaving 309 people dead. In the aftermath one public official and six earthquake scientists were charged with multiple counts…
Economic growth is a significant contributor to the climate change crisis.
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The recent US-China climate announcement is a significant development in humanity’s equivocal response to the climate crisis. Despite over four decades of political engagement with climate change, tangible…
Nationals MP George Christensen told Parliament that the hot temperatures of 1896 have been “wiped from the official record”. It’s a bit more complicated than that.
AAP Image/Lukas Coch
“How could it be getting hotter … if it was really hotter 118 years ago? It’s relatively simple: the early years are simply wiped from the official record.” – Nationals MP George Christensen, House of…
As both a word and an idea, ‘medieval’ carries centuries of connotation of a murky and brutal pre-scientific age.
US Fish & Wildlife Service/Swanson Scott
“Medieval” has become the accusation du jour in Australian domestic politics, used with equal conviction across the spectrum to discredit opponents’ views. One debate where this accusation has taken centre…
Conspiracy theories are so hard to debunk because they use science.
Flickr/dexterd
As the United Nations warns of the dire consequences of global warming, the commitment of the current Australian government to the reality of climate change remains unclear, with a history of disturbingly…
If you debate with trolls you soon learn some of their tactics.
Flickr/Kenny Louie
I often like to discuss science online and I’m also rather partial to topics that promote lively discussion, such as climate change, crime statistics and (perhaps surprisingly) the big bang. This inevitably…
Climate change tends to attract some form of protest such as this in 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Flickr/Simon Leufstedt
The debate over climate change is relatively young while nuclear power and pesticides have been heated topics since the 1960s, and fluoridation since the 1950s. So what is it about these scientific controversies…
Dire warnings of imminent human-induced climate disaster are constantly in the news but predictions of the end of the world have been made throughout history and have never yet come true. Even in the brief…
Stephan Lewandowsky, chair of cognitive psychology at the University of Bristol, answered questions posed by the public on Reddit. The Conversation has curated the highlights. Conspiracy theories Under…
New research shows how a climate of uncertainty pushes us towards worse outcomes.
Lukiyanova Natalia/frenta/Shutterstock
If we’re not certain that the problem’s there, then … we shouldn’t take actions which have a high severity the other way. This was the response from David Murray – then chairman of Australia’s Future Fund…
The threat of legal action can have a “chilling effect” on academic freedom.
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In February 2013, the journal Frontiers in Psychology published a peer-reviewed paper which found that people who reject climate science are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. Predictably enough…
Better communication may have saved lives in Italy’s L'Aquila earthquake.
TheWiz83
The importance of clearly communicating science to the public should not be underestimated. Accurately understanding our natural environment and sharing that information can be a matter of life or death…
Facts not enough: the climate message is still not getting through.
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A colleague of mine recently received an invitation to a Climate Council event. The invitation featured this Tim Flannery quote: “An opinion is useless, what we need are more facts.” My first thought was…
Smoking: bad for pretty much everything.
SlapAyoda
What’s the best way to reduce the roughly half a million annual deaths from smoking in the US alone? Nearly half a million lives cut short, often with untold suffering, by a commercial product that has…
Debunking myths requires an understanding of the psychological research into misinformation. But getting your refutation out in front of lots of eyeballs is a whole other matter. Here, I look at two contrasting…
Professor of Management & Organizations; Professor of Environment & Sustainability; Professor of Sustainable Enterprise at the Ross School of Business and School of Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan