![]() | ||||
2011-06-08 02:10:58 | Deniers = 76% of TV Guests on EPA GHG Regs - worth a post? | |||
dana1981 Dana Nuccitelli dana1981@yahoo... 69.230.102.37 |
Media Matters put out a report with an accounting of US TV network guests for stories discussing EPA GHG regulations. Turns out the Fox networks did far more stories on the subject than other networks, so not surprisingly, "skeptics" opposing the regulations accounted for 76% of all guests on these shows. This isn't exactly a science story, but John has been considering starting to do some SkS posts on climate science communication. This would be a bit of a new direction for SkS, but I think an important one. We all know the scientific evidence is there; now the challenge is communicating it to the public. And if the public is being bombarded with "skeptics" on TV, that's a major problem. What do you guys think - should we do a post on this story, or is it too political and insufficiently scientific? | |||
2011-06-08 02:27:15 | Fair game | |||
Daniel Bailey Daniel Bailey yooper49855@hotmail... 97.83.150.37 |
Monckton is too political and insufficiently scientific and we have a whole series on him. | |||
2011-06-08 02:38:58 | Monckton | |||
dana1981 Dana Nuccitelli dana1981@yahoo... 69.230.102.37 |
Well yeah, but at least Monckton makes pseudoscience arguments, and we always engaged him on the scientific front. Likewise when we covered the Congressional hearings, we looked at the scientific claims. In this case we can talk about why CO2 limits are important, but it's fundamentally an issue of communication and politics (i.e. deniers being grossly over-represented in the media, particularly on Fox). Like I said, I think it's an important subject, and I'd like to do a post on it. At least there are a lot of numbers involved, so we could mostly just report the stats and then point out it's basically the polar opposite of the numbers with regards to the climate scientist and climate economist consensuses (consensi?). But the root of the post would be communication, not science - i.e. the TV watching public is being presented with a vast majority of anti-CO2 limit opinions when the vast majority of experts (both scientists and economists) support CO2 limits. That's a major problem. | |||
2011-06-08 02:49:13 | ||||
dana1981 Dana Nuccitelli dana1981@yahoo... 69.230.102.37 |
My first thoughts on the article are:
| |||
2011-06-08 03:02:05 | ||||
Daniel Bailey Daniel Bailey yooper49855@hotmail... 97.83.150.37 |
Sounds good. But I think that last bit about holding the media accountable for their appalling coverage of the issues needs to be a mandatory element. This is a manufactured controversy for which they bear equal responsibility. | |||
2011-06-08 03:08:45 | Spreading SkS too thin... | |||
John Hartz John Hartz john.hartz@hotmail... 99.95.221.238 |
I caution against spreading ourselves too thin by getting into theis arena. The (US) League of conservation Voters has just launched an appeal for funds to create a rapid response to stuff like this. SkS should stick to its core mission. Here's the text of the email I just received from thje League of Conservation Voters:
| |||
2011-06-08 03:55:50 | ||||
dana1981 Dana Nuccitelli dana1981@yahoo... 64.129.227.4 |
I wouldn't worry about getting spread too thin, we're just talking about one post on the subject about this Media Matters report. I got the LCV email too - great that they're addressing this, but the more sources draw attention to it, the better. Daniel - agreed, holding the media accountable is really the crux of the post. I'm just trying to think about how to do it without turning the comments into a Fox bitchfest, because frankly, the Fox imbalance is the big problem. | |||
2011-06-08 04:27:09 | Out of curiosity... | |||
John Hartz John Hartz john.hartz@hotmail... 99.95.221.238 |
Is there a Fox News in Australia? If so, does it mimic Fox News USA? | |||
2011-06-08 06:25:59 | ||||
Rob Painting Rob paintingskeri@vodafone.co... 118.92.100.83 |
Badger, if they're anything like NZ, they get the unabashed original version. Fortunately it's on pay tv in NZ, and I don't got pay tv, so there's no chance of accidentally flicking on the channel and getting infected. | |||
2011-06-08 06:26:03 | Not a Fox News channel | |||
John Cook john@skepticalscience... 121.222.9.229 |
We do have Andrew Bolt who is a Glenn Beck/Rush Limbaugh wanna-be. In fact, he just got his own weekly TV show on Channel Ten - presumably due to the assistance of mining billionaire Gina Rinehart who recently bought a substantial share of the channel. | |||
2011-06-08 06:31:24 | SkS core mission | |||
John Cook john@skepticalscience... 121.222.9.229 |
Essentially Dana is asking something I've been asking myself lately. I've been doing a lot of reading about climate communication and human psychology lately and have learnt a lot of lessons that I would like to share with others. So I could hide my light under a bushel and just share it on the SkS forum. Or I could start doing blog posts about climate communication with the intent that SkS authors and other climate communicators could benefit from it. I'm becoming convinced the latter is the better option. It's imperative we understand how people process information, how the human brain works, the broader issues of climate communication - or risk the danger of just throwing science out there and hoping it sticks. That's not a scientific approach because the evidence tells us merely communicating more science is not an effective approach. I think posts on climate communication should still be rooted in science - but it would be social science, not physical science. So I'm for this post - in fact, I'd be quite interested in reading it. | |||
2011-06-08 06:35:25 | ||||
Rob Painting Rob paintingskeri@vodafone.co... 118.92.100.83 |
Go for it Dana! | |||
2011-06-08 07:52:34 | ||||
dana1981 Dana Nuccitelli dana1981@yahoo... 64.129.227.4 |