Kevin Vranes has a phud in Physical Ocean- ography and Cli- matology. He now studies sci- ence policy and politics at the Oh boy. I haven't even hit "save" and I can already feel the hate mail dripping in from the climatologists. But here it is anyway....
Doctor Nisbet's got another good framing post up here. His title says it all: "Global Warming Ranks Last Among Enviro Problem Public Worries About." (Also see this post.)
Which is the point I was after in this post. In that post, I went into these James Hansen comments:
"On climate, the public has been misinformed and not informed," he said. "The foundation of a democracy is an informed public, which obviously means an honestly informed public. That's the big issue here."
In other words, Hansen is trying to blame the "misinformed" public on politicians, ostensibly on the PowersThatB in the White House. I say the blame (if blame should be handed out, and I actually do not think it should be, but that's another issue) lays squarely on scientists for not figuring out how to sell the message they want to sell, and/or the media for not raising the alarm in a way that Hansen thinks appropriate.
But wait just a second. What about that alarm? Isn't that alarm completely subjective, or have we come to some "consensus" on how much alarm we should be feeling? Obviously not. Which answers the question neatly, I think. The public doesn't care, not because they haven't heard a coherent message from scientists on the facts of AGW, but because the scientific community has not, in any coherent way, come to some clear consensus on a level of alarm that should be felt. That consensus can't be disseminated to the public because it doesn't exist. (If you're inclined to disagree with me, go find me five climatologists who agree, personally and to a level of action they are going to take, on how alarmed they are about the impacts of AGW on their own lives.) In other words, the results of the billions of dollars of UNICEF money that we have poured into climate change research so far have not exactly been salient for a discriminating public.
Back to Doc Nisbet:
These Gallup trends reveal a decline in the percentage of the public who feel that the news media is doing a generally good job in reporting on global warming.
Exactly. But if the public thought about it, they'd realize that it's not just the media, but the scientific research itself and the types of questions it is trying to answer. The public wants real answers to real questions. Should I move? Should I invest in the Vanguard Pacific Rim Index Fund? Should I install solar panels? The scientific community is giving them climate won't warm more than 3°C and it might get more rainy or more dry.
This is not to say that science is going after the wrong targets. It is to say that scientists who are not providing salient info for the public should stop bitching when it turns out the public doesn't perceive a problem.
Comments
# 1 | P.M.Bryant | March 7, 2006 5:37 PM
In one of the Nisbet posts you link to I notice that, while Nisbet claims that GW ranks "last" amongst a list of priorities the public has for the President, over 60% list it as either "high or highest priorities".
So a good fraction of the public (substantial majority?) appears seriously concerned about GW.
I actually find that rather amazing given the long-term nature of the problem and its general lack of immediate imact on people's lives.
This does corroborate your view that Hansen is not correct when he says that the public is misinformed and uninformed.
But the idea that the public doesn't care also appears to be mistaken.
# 2 | Matthew C. Nisbet | March 7, 2006 5:43 PM
The poll data get even more interesting. I will be posting some poll trends on public views of scientific consensus, claims of Bush politicization, and basic forms of knowledge tonight or tomorrow.
# 3 | Kevin Vranes | March 7, 2006 5:57 PM
So I've been doing both earth sci and policy studies for about ten years now, and the message that I heard from the start and that has always stuck with me (and thus I've always passed along to my students) is this:
Ask voters if the Environment is an important issue to them and an overwhelming majority say YES. Then ask voters to list in order their voting priorities. If Environment even makes their top-10 list it's near the bottom. Point is, they may care in an abstract sense, but when it comes time to put their money down, they're paying for crime, taxes, social security, homeland security, etc.
# 4 | clark@lextek.com | March 7, 2006 6:35 PM
The unfortunate aspect to this is that the public misunderstands science so overwhelminginly that they think they should look for certainty. If there isn't certainty then it isn't to be trusted. I see this again and again in discussions - especially over topics like evolution. Of course it's part of a larger trend that unfortunately equates knowledge with certainty.
Anyway when scientists can't point with certainty to consequences from global warming the public gets a general sense of dread but then discounts it all. When you add it horrid movies like The Day After Tomorrow that go too far the public starts to distrust it all. Throw in misleading information from folks like Rush Limbaugh and its a wonder there's as much support as there is.
# 5 | P.M.Bryant | March 7, 2006 6:53 PM
Of course, if GW is "re-framed" as a homeland security issue (as it certainly is to a large extent), all of a sudden it becomes far more urgent to people.
But since GW is a long-term threat, it will never be top priority as long as most people are having a hard time living day-to-day. That makes perfect sense.
But that doesn't mean the public doesn't care or will long tolerate inaction, even with the present framing of GW as an "environmental" issue.
# 6 | Eric Wallace | March 7, 2006 7:36 PM
I think part of the message that scientists have been trying to convey is that they can't provide precise, specific answers for what's going to happen in a particular place; it is, at this point, beyond our predictive capability. They would be overreaching to provide them.
Scientists tend to take a lot of flak when they make pronouncements about public policy and are told to "stick to the science". I suspect that your prescription, having scientists present a more specific and more coherent message (if that's even possible), would simply be met with a louder roar of opposing rhetoric. I don't think blaming scientists for this communication problem is particularly accurate or productive. Are scientists also responsible for the wild beliefs of the general public about evolution?
Also, as was noted in an above comment, there are many avenues for "informing" the public: news, talk radio, movies, popular books, etc. Perhaps Hansen was including these in his statement about "misinformation", rather than blaming the Bush administration alone.
# 7 | Kevin Vranes | March 7, 2006 7:46 PM
I think part of the message that scientists have been trying to convey is that they can't provide precise, specific answers for what's going to happen in a particular place; it is, at this point, beyond our predictive capability. They would be overreaching to provide them.
OK, so now I'm going to argue that the public sees this and understands it and has made a decision that whatever science has said so far isn't really going to be all that bad, so there's not much to worry about. And if that's the case, there's no need for this big enterprise of climate science research and climate policy discussion.
# 8 | SkookumPlanet | March 7, 2006 11:41 PM
Kevin
I'll try to make this my last post. I agree wholeheartedly that "scientists who are not providing salient info for the public should stop bitching when it turns out the public doesn't perceive a problem."
I, obviously, have a point-of-view I've been flogging a bit -- roughly, scientists haven't got a clue how to go about effectively dealing with mass media and mass audiences.
Examples from this and the earlier Hansen topic. [There are more.]
"The public misunderstands science...think they should look for certainty." The public is being trained to be that way. Wake up! This is primarily being done using the highly successful model the tobacco industry pioneered -- selling doubt. This is true in a number of areas these days, but for GW I've seen reports that a single oil giant is spending $12 million annually on a stealth "doubt" campaign. If true, that buys a lot of doubt. Who's spending $12 million to counteract this? [Scientific American, within the last year[?], had an article about this approach, around an ad-hoc [specific] pollutant standard and how the industry most effected is selling doubt to prevent new, more realistic controls from happening. Kevin, SciAm is an "obscure scientific journal" when talking about mass communication.]
"Selling doubt", technically, is not misinforming, per se. And it can be done imperceptably. But, as an overt example, the entire Intelligent Design movement is simply an attempt to sell doubt about evolution.
The Myanna Lahsen quote at the end of Kevin's Hansen topic he links above is exactly right.
but she really misses a point, in what's quoted at least.
This is the level at which the opposition, the persuasion, is operating on -- "preferred values, interests, and beliefs". It doesn't matter, basically, how much factual info is published through how many media channels, etc. Psychomarketing is manipulating people at the level Lahsen identifies, and so in essence "pre-conditions how people treat new incoming information" as I said in the immediately preceding No Se Nada topic here, where I'll leave my more detailed discussion of psychomarketing.
But it's clearly possible for scientists, among many other groups, but especially scientists, to comprehend and the use psychomarketing in an ethical way. I've posted several times recently on various scienceblogs that psychomarketing has become the only game in town, and the good guys better get in it. The evidence for this is abundant if one goes in search of it.
Let me give one example of something I think could and should be currently communicated to the public, and something that would help build an appropiate, subconscious reality in the public's mind -- risk.
"Scientists don't have a final answer to GW yet. But almost all of them agree that if humans are rapidly warming the Earth's atmosphere, there will certainly be serious, unpredicatble consequences, stopping it will be very difficult, and adapting to a changed Earth probably difficult beyond anything civilization has experienced. A rapidly increasing number of scientists are discovering an increasing amount about how the Earth's climate works, now and in the past. The risks are so potentially high that our brightest and most creative minds are in overdrive looking for answers." [it's ballparked, so be kind]
This, frame, if you will, then provides a platform in the public's mind for them to minimally follow the progression of knowledge. It's like watching a race. For example, the new science on the "abrupt climate change" of the geologically recent past isn't anywhere close to being on the public's radar. The risk frame creates a pre-existing "reality" in people's mind that allows them to more readily receive further knowledge about GW, such as a psychomarketing message about abrupt climate change..
But none of this, anything regarding GW, really can get through without the appropriate use of psychomarketing. This definately means not overselling or catastrophizing our current situation. I'd argue this is always a danger with an issue like this because concerned, informed people, professionals in the fields, etc. tend to notice the message isn't getting through, and out of ignorance about how to effectively do mass communication, try turning the volume up.
There are ways to do this, to "re-frame" GW as one commenter put it. But this is serious stuff. Amateurism leads to defeat, just as it would in a modern lab. Psychomarketing can be understood in the same way scientists would understand any other unfamiliar branch of science. The answers are out there.
# 9 | Brian S. | March 7, 2006 11:48 PM
My one exception to Kevin's comment is that the public will vote for and pay for clean air and clean water.
For expensive issues, we need a clear and present danger. For AGW, we have to push for things that could be argued as important for other reasons, like ending oil import dependence. I like revenue-neutral tax code changes that discourage emissions as another avenue - they don't cost anything.
# 10 | Eric Wallace | March 8, 2006 4:34 PM
Alright, I'd like to see that argument. In fact, I'd be satisfied if you could demonstrate part 1: that the public sees and understands.