Michael Perkins

In the following video, Peter Sinclair provides a nice high-level overview of what we know about global warming:



Click here for additional videos and other information about global warming.

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Global Warming and Cognitive Dissonance
Denialism
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Beautiful Hubble Images

According to a recent Gallup poll, 74% of liberals but only 30% of conservatives believe that "the effects of global warming are already occurring." This is an interesting statistic because we would not normally expect disagreements of fact to divide along ideological lines. Facts are neither liberal nor conservative. The methods of science are independent of ideology, and the same data are available to both liberals and conservatives.

Note that disagreement about the facts is a different thing altogether from disagreement about what to do about the facts. It is not surprising that liberals and conservatives disagree about what would be an appropriate response to global warming. Liberals are more likely to advocate the regulation of industrial greenhouse gas emissions than conservatives since conservatives are generally opposed to government regulation of business.

So what are we to make of the data that shows an apparent relationship between beliefs about the facts of global warming and political affiliation? Perhaps the best explanation appeals to the notion of cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is a state of tension that occurs when a person holds conflicting beliefs or attitudes. A smoker, for instance, might experience cognitive dissonance that arises from the conflict between his belief that smoking will kill him and his desire to smoke cigarettes. In Mistakes Were Made (but not by me), Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson describe this case as follows:

Dissonance produces mental discomfort, ranging from minor pangs to deep anguish; people don't rest easy until they find a way to reduce it. In this example, the most direct way for a smoker to reduce dissonance is by quitting. But if she has tried to quit and failed, now she must reduce dissonance by convincing herself that smoking isn't really so harmful, or that smoking is worth the risk because it helps her relax or prevents her from gaining weight (and after all, obesity is a health risk, too), and so on. Most smokers manage to reduce dissonance in many such ingenious, if self-deluding, ways.

Similarly, a conservative might experience cognitive dissonance arising from the conflict between her belief in global warming and her aversion to regulating business. Just as a smoker can relieve her dissonance by denying that smoking is harmful, a conservative can relieve her dissonance by denying that global warming is happening. Thus, the theory of cognitive dissonance would predict that people's beliefs about global warming would divide along ideological lines.

In general, cognitive dissonance is a universal and powerful motivator. All of us are prone to various forms of self-delusion when our beliefs and attitudes come into conflict. We should all take special note when groups disagree about the facts along ideological lines. In such cases, there is a good chance that one side or the other is motivated more by cognitive dissonance than by good science.

See Also:
Denialism
Scientists Create First Synthetic Life Form
Beautiful Hubble Images

A team of scientists led by Craig Venter have created a living synthetic bacterium. The following Channel 4 story gives a nice brief overview and contains an interview with Venter.



See Also:
Denialism
Beautiful Hubble Images

A denialist is someone who champions certain beliefs despite clear and overwhelming evidence that the beliefs are false. Holocaust deniers are paradigm examples of denialists. Despite the overwhelming and incontrovertible evidence that the holocaust did indeed occur, Holocaust deniers claim that the genocide of the Jews during World War II was a hoax perpetuated as part of a Jewish conspiracy. Other examples of denialists are those who deny that HIV causes AIDS, those who believe that the U.S. government was complicit in the 9/11 massacre, those who deny that tobacco use causes cancer, and those who deny that Barack Obama is a natural born citizen of the United States. Some commentators also claim that those who deny evolution, those who believe vaccines cause autism, and those who deny global climate change are denialists in this sense.

In his 2009 book, Denialism: How Irrational Thinking Hinders Scientific Progress, Harms the Planet, and Threatens Our Lives, science writer Michael Specter claims that denialism occurs "when an entire segment of society, often struggling with the trauma of change, turns away from reality in favor of a more comfortable lie." The denialist denies the facts because the facts are uncomfortable. One might argue, for instance, that the Holocaust deniers are anti-semites who are faced with the fact that anti-semites were responsible for one of the most horrific crimes in the history of mankind. Their denial of the Holocaust resolves the conflict between their anti-semitism and this uncomfortable truth.

In a recent New Scientist report on denialism, Michael Shermer argues that the denialist's discomfort is usually based on a conflict between the facts and an ideological or religious belief. This discomfort causes the denialist to filter the evidence so that these ideological or religious beliefs need not be discarded.

Denialism is typically driven by ideology or religious belief, where the commitment to the belief takes precedence over the evidence. Belief comes first, reasons for belief follow, and those reasons are winnowed to ensure that the belief survives intact.

In the video below, Michael Specter provides an interesting discussion of denialism and the harm that it causes.



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