Search Results for ideology
New homebirth statistics show it’s way too dangerous, and Mike Shermer on liberal denialism
Posted by Mark on March 18, 2013 Two links today for denialism blog readers, both are pretty thought provoking. The first, from Amy Tuteur, on the newly-released statistics on homebirth in Oregon. It seems that her crusade to have the midwives share their mortality data is justified, as when they were forced to release this data in Oregon, planned homebirth was about…
The Good, Not So Good, and Long View on Bmail
Posted by Chris Hoofnagle on March 6, 2013 Denialism blog readers, especially those at academic institutions that have/are considering outsourcing email, may be interested in my essay on UC Berkeley’s migration to Gmail. This is cross-posted from the Berkeley Blog. Many campuses have decided to outsource email and other services to “cloud” providers. Berkeley has joined in by migrating student and faculty to…
Abortion can be lifesaving
Posted by Mark on November 14, 2012 While I realize Joe Walsh lost his election bid, it is still worth emphasizing that his infamous statements about abortion are false, especially considering efforts like those in Ohio to pass a “heartbeat bill”. Abortion is sometimes necessary to save the life of the mother. Via the Irish Times we hear the sad story of…
Tribalism, Cultural Cognition, Ideology, we’re all talking about the same thing here
Posted by Mark on November 1, 2012 From Revkin I see yet another attempt to misunderstand the problem of communicating science vs anti-science. The author, Dan Kahan, summarizes his explanation for the science communication problem, as well as 4 other “not so good” explanations in this slide: He then describes “Identity-protective cognition” thus: Identity-protective cognition (a species of motivated reasoning) reflects the…
Scientific American addresses denialism in politics – says it jeopardizes democracy
Posted by Mark on October 19, 2012 Scientific American evaluates the candidates on their answers to Sciencedebate 2012 and evaluates ideology-based denialism as a whole: Today’s denial of inconvenient science comes from partisans on both ends of the political spectrum. Science denialism among Democrats tends to be motivated by unsupported suspicions of hidden dangers to health and the environment. Common examples include…
Environmentalism and anti-science, how GMOs prove any ideological extremity leads to anti-science
Posted by Mark on May 25, 2012 Today I read about two individuals who decided on political defections over perceived anti-science amongst their former political allies- one due to climate change, the other for anti-GMO. From the right, we have Michael Fumento, who in Salon describes his break with the right, spurred by Heartland’s campaign comparing those who believe in climate change…
We need a new denialism category for Obama conspiracies
Posted by Mark on May 24, 2012 Right Wing Watch is a great site to follow to track the latest conspiratorial craziness coming from the right. It seems every single day there is some new bizarre claim about homosexuals trying to enslave America and institute sharia law (that makes sense right?), or how Obama is a muslim, yada yada. But today I…
Hello Scienceblogs Posted by Mark on April 30, 2007 Hello and welcome to denialism blog. Here we will discuss the problem of denialists, their standard arguing techniques, how to identify denialists and/or cranks, and discuss topics of general interest such as skepticism, medicine, law and science. I’ll be taking on denialists in the sciences, while…
Is the holocaust denial/climate change denial comparison apt?
Posted by Mark on May 18, 2012 Many of the climate change denialist sites have been up in arms by comparisons of climate change denial to holocaust denial. In particular Marc Morano at climate depot has had multiple articles attacking and expressing hysterical outrage at these comparisons. We know they don’t like the comparison, but the question is, is it apt?
Huffpo Science – already slipping into anti-science
Posted by Mark on March 22, 2012 Our initial optimism over Huffpo science being a haven for reason in a den of disease-promotion and quackery appears now to be misplaced. It appears the animal rights cranks have made inroads with Bruce Friedrich, a member of PETA and advocate of animal liberation, who has jumped from Huffpo “green” to Huffpo “science”. The science…
