Doomers

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Scientists Know More Than They Say (www.usatoday.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I am increasingly convinced that climate scientists withhold information vital to understanding how dire Earth's climate situation really is.

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'd frame it along the lines of: Scientists only talk about what they can prove.

This standard is higher than the opposition, which will publish "shower thoughts" as "evidence".

If you talk to scientists (off the record) about what they think is likely the case, that's where you get more dire commentary. They've been trained to hold back, nothing nefarious... but also not helpful in the current media climate.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thank you. Yours may be a less cynical view concerning publicly available scientific thought.

It occurs to me that more realistic study results can lead to fewer funding opportunities.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

There's also the error bars.

Scientists will determine that the temperature will rise by between 1°C and 6°C. That's a big range. Climate change is complicated and it's impossible to account for all of the variables.

To the scientist (and their colleagues) they'll know that 3°C is most likely, and this type of paper reads like a dire warning... but when the news breaks, it goes. One of two ways:

"1-6°C is a huge range, scientists must not know what's going on. What does this even mean?"
"Scientists report that temperature will rise by at least 1°C, the UN Council on Blah Blah says that we should keep under 1.5°C..."

It's maddening, really. Most of the scientists I know are doomers.