Blinded By Their Own Bunk
Some of the dead-enders in the climate change & communication debate don’t seem capable of recognizing their own bunk, even after it’s pointed out to them ad nauseum. So here we go again:
we are looking at a bunk tsunami, and the press seems absolutely obsessed with finding little bugs on the other side (a Grist article being a recent cause celebre, for God’s sake) and not pointing to the Mothra sized problems on the side of the so-called skeptics, whom most competent reporters on the beat know to be, for the most part, charlatans.
Yet, based both on the anecdotal evidence of my own ears and the polling evidence I have seen, most of the public doesn’t know this. And it’s not this or that article that is good or bad. It is the totality of the impression they have. Our complaint then is not with any individual reporter, but with the institution of the press in North America.
Never mind who’s being obsessed here. Let’s contrast this canard with an actual science-based perspective. It’s featured in today’s USA Today op-ed page. Here’s a nice sample:
Were hard data and cold logic all that mattered, any number of common personal behaviors would be long gone by now, from smoking to overeating. As any skilled public relations practitioner will attest, successful communication meets people on their own turf–by means that address emotions, fears, and values.
For those with open minds, read the entire column.
Wow, ‘dead enders’? You really want to be using *Rumsfeldian* rhetoric, KK?
Since I gather you actually ‘believe in’ AGW, and think it’s a problem of at least some magnitude, I remain slightly amazed at how often the targets you find worthy are those who actually 1) accept the reality of AGW and think 2) something substantial needs to be done about it. Compared to, say, the length and number of C-A-S posts critical of the blogtastic howler monkeys whose ‘skeptical’ jabber on those scores often ‘informs’ our Republican politicians, op-ed writers (aka ‘oranges’ or is it ‘apples’, according to John Fleck?) and the unfortunately popular gutter media…and yes, even infects the work of dare I say real journalists (again, ‘apples’ or ‘oranges’?, I’m still confused there).
‘Splain to me again, please, what is your intent , if any, with this blog re: global warming and what to do about it? *If* your corollary is that the howler monkeys are doing communication RIGHT — addressing emotions, fears, values, while letting data and logic limp along in the rear futilely muttering ‘but, but’… — what steps will you take beyond scolding the scolds? And if it’s absurd for them to expect to effect change using a repeatedly failed method (Einstein’s definition of insanity, wasn’t it?) , at what point does your own harping on them become absurd too?
As for Glassner’s article, another in the burgeoning ‘it’s not the media, it’s not the public, it’s that the SINETISTS R DOIN IT WRONG’ lineage, what I don’t see there is a mention of what things have changed since the days when scientists didn’t really need to take classes in marketing their work. No acknowledgment, beyond equating right-wing conspiracists with partisan scientists, of factors that have worked to undermine trust in science. Whre did the ‘public relations problem’ *come from*? Apparently it’s mainly because scientists don’t know how to socialize.
Let me help Dr. Glassner:
“Do people deny science because they are too poorly educated to understand the facts right under their noses, as scientists too easily allege?
Wow, ‘too easily’? Well, I guess the evidence for that’s in your published work. Can we at least agree that the public’s scientific illiteracy is certainly a real problem?
“Because scientists are partisan activists, as conservatives claim?”
Well, that certainly turns off some people, typically conservatives/libertarians it seems — some people really don’t think scientists should speak out about on this topic, beyond strict adherence to facts (which according to those people, are in short supply anyway).
But wait, here’s YOU , and Keith Kloor, and Randy Olsen, saying how the problem really IS the scientists (activist or not)..only this time they’re not messaging well enough. Hmmm…
“Or is a right-wing conspiracy to blame, as some on the left contend?”
Yes, that’s certainly part of the problem. Perhaps you could look into that a bit more? It’s an interesting story. But maybe not NEWSY enough?
I’m betting..hoping…Dr. Glassner’s research actually has a lot more nuance and detail than his op-ed.
You seem to have missed the core evidence in favor of my thesis. I have nothing against critiquing an excessive article on Grist; I do the same from time to time. My objection is doing so to the exclusion of examining the excesses and misrepresentations of far higher importance perpetrated by the other side.
John Christy’s testimony to congress was systematically biased. There is a story there. Why is there nobody to tell it? That is the question I asked. I appreciate you quoting the run-up to the question, but would it not have been more fair to me to actually address the question?
I am pleased that, though he didn’t credit my nagging, Jay Rosen did pick up the gauntlet in a tweet. Quoth he: “Not one major news organization has a reporter on the reality-denial beat: http://jr.ly/7yq9 Mistake. Huge story that says a lot about us.”
Yes. This is exactly the point. You can argue that effective reporting has no influence on public opinion in this area. That is an interesting hypothesis. The thing is, the hypothesis is taken as true despite not having been tested. Please refrain from examining the data until after a couple of years of actually reporting the story.
MT:
Balls
You expect laymen within the press to pass judgment on the testimony of a published scientist and academic????????????? Only other scientists in the same field are QUALIFIED to do it. The whole nub of your reasonable sounding (and unintentionally fascistic) false-balance theory expects journalists to be world-class scientists.
Based on your false-balance theory, please let us know which string theory horse the press should back.
There are scientists passing judgement. It just doesn’t get coverage. And of course, without proper coverage, it all goes down the memory hole. Now that’s Fascistic!
lol
Talk to NYU journalism professor Rosen about your approach, Howard.
I appreciate that you think my so-called “fascism” is unintentional. I guess that means you think I mean well, though you have an odd way of saying it.
If the press cannot make a judgment as to which scientists are reliable, and a major political party can’t either, (whichever party you think that is) we are driving around blind. So what do you propose as an alternative?
People seem to be so attached to incompetent governance that they will defend it with their lives. But suppose there were, you know, something that some people thought was worth worrying about. How do you go about evaluating whether it is worth worrying about if the press isn’t even supposed to investigate?
What I seem to hear from Keith is “telling the truth has no real effect, so there is little reason to get upset when we don’t actually bother”. I’m sure this isn’t what he means to say, but it’s what I hear.
I wish more people could have heard Bruce Sterling’s blistering keynote at SXSW today. I think it will be on video eventually; it’s worth seeking out.
One of his points is the pervasiveness of shabby, unconvincing lies in public discourse in America nowadays, very much like they were in the last days of the Soviet empire. Another is the absolutely shocking protestations of powerlessness among the supposedly powerful. We simply have lost control over our destiny at the moment when we most need it.
If the job of journalism is to cover the public’s ears and say na-na-na-na-na for us, they are doing an absolutely freaking brilliant job. And some people find that an extremely useful service. But it ain’t journalism any more than Pravda was in the 1908s.
The active, deliberate and malicious misrepresentation of science is the story here, and I’m not talking about tree rings. Everyone inside or near the field knows it, including most of the press. And everyone accepts that it has precedents in the tobacco industry. But the press won’t touch the story.
Why the hell not? That’s the question. Until it’s answered, the “false balance” issue is not just a critique of a writing style.
The USAToday piece is a crock.
Does he really see science as a monolithic lump and scientists as synchro-swimmers in white coats all thinking the same thoughts in lockstep?
Does he think that all branches of science are equally important and equally interesting to the public? Does he think all branches of science are equally developed?
Oddly enough, this kind of article is good news for this side of the aisle. It shows that the alarmists are on the back foot and are desperate for excuses.
This seems to miss the point entirely:
“Were hard data and cold logic all that mattered, any number of common personal behaviors would be long gone by now”.
Of course it’s not about the data, it’s the tone and choice of presentation, the spin and insinuations and of course the false balance, which no matter what people claim does exist and is almost inherent in journalism. It’s the drip-drip effect that wins out and pointing to individual examples of good journalism misses this (and pointing to individual examples of excessively bad journalism likewise probably exaggerates the problem).
Non-experts do get their overall impressions of things they don’t have direct experience of from the media, probably more than anywhere else. I have a friend who reads the Daily Mail – don’t ask me how, these things happen to people sometimes. Other than this he is relatively liberal and his social circle is relatively liberal. He has recently started a degree in environmental science and his views are shifting, by evolution, not revolution. He has always had concerns about the environment, but his impressions were that there is significant disagreement amongst scientists about the fundamentals of anthropogenic climate change, he also had the impression, for example, that there was a scientific consensus about global cooling in the ’70s. He wouldn’t be pointing to specific examples of how he knew this, it was the impression he gained over long-term exposure to poor journalism. He’s now in a situation where these impressions are being challenged.
How can this not be blamed on the journalism?
Alarmist’s inability to critically self-evaluate is alarming.
Judging by the blogs of actual nuclear scientists, the “crisis” in Japan is looking like a very useful example of this problem, just as bad as the overhyping of the oil spill (remember the claim that the Gulf oil would “likely” end up on mid-Atlantic beaches?):
Science- there is a bit of radiation leak- dosages about what you’d get from a trans-Atlantic flight or visit to the dentist. It’s amazing actually that a 40-year-old reactor performed this well even when hit with both an unprecedented earthquake and tsunami in the same day. We’ll learn a bit from this, but the reality is the designs are even safer than this now.
Activists- OMG, Like, worst disasta evah! Shut ’em all down, get George Clooney and Leonardo DiCaprio on the tube to compare it to Chernobyl and Hiroshima. Make sure no media pay attention to the massive real humanitarian disaster in the towns leveled in Japan, just keep repeating “radiation” and “meltdown.” We know it will work ’cause nobody really knows anything about radiation anyway and – remember people! – this is about politics! Hey… why are people skeptical about our press releases? We’re the pro-science community! Idiots! Corrupt idiots!
It does indeed look like the “crisis” in Japan is a good example of the problem. Seems to me the media is not coming out of this too well, but then there isn’t a lot of mileage in a ‘let’s wait and see what actually happens’ approach in competetive journalism.
jeffn, are you really blaming the activists for misleading, or is it just leading, the media?
Heraclitus- The activists are the ones who work hard to make sure they are A. in the journalist’s rolodex and B. available. This, I believe, is why the “science experts” on television all weekend were from the “Union of Concerned Scientists.” The UCS is a anti-nuke advocacy group. KK knows this. I do too because I was a journalist for 10 years. It’s Saturday afternoon. How the heck do you persuade someone knowledgeable to come in and talk about the nothing that’s happening all day? You can’t. You can only find activists willing to use the story.
The end result is that all weekend long we’ve been told: “It’s horrible!” “It’s no big deal” “Worst thing Evah” “No, it’s minor and under control” “Run for your lives!” “You’re fine.”
You can actually see the frustration on the journalists faces. “Science” says everyone’s dead and everyone’s fine. Which is it?
The same thing is happening with “climate change” only this time the activists have done a great job convincing the media that they are the ONLY true scientists on the subject.
Fortunately for the activists, only their story line keeps people glued to the set “Disaster any second! Stay Tuned! Live Coverage!” Who wants to watch special coverage of nothing?
jeffn, you seem to be describing exactly the problem with the media that many have been pointing out. If the journalists think that science is saying both everyone’s dead and everyone’s fine then it’s their job to make a sensible and informed decision about which of these is likely to be the more valid reflection of reality. If they really can’t make this decision then they need to explain why they can’t.
Heraclitus – if the journoes knew the answer they would be scientists.
Their job is to tell people the FACTS about what has actually happened and maybe help their audience to understand these FACTS.
No, the journalists’ job is to judge the credibility of their sources and communicate appropriately based on this.
Michael:
I only detest your opinions, not you. Personally, I admire your passion and desire to communicate and respect you achievement of writing one of the top climate-related blogs in the world.
I still don’t understand how anyone expects the press to solve great questions of science in real-time. As for explaining why they can’t, it’s obvious. They are not technical experts.
The danger of having the press as science judges is that there is an inherent fascism in science where the correct views, over time, dominate and crush the nonsense. What Michael and Heraclitus are suggesting is that the press declare that the game is over and select a winner.
Unfortunately, the science is not settled. We are still at the guessing stage in determining natural variability and feedback mechanisms associated with doubling CO2. The frigging ocean thermo-hydraulics are not well described, are not predictible and the field data network is too new and too sparse to answer all the questions.
What we have are a team of government scientists and government funded scientists having an exaggerated influence on prestige peer review and the IPCC feeding policy prescriptions to friendly Washington power brokers. Now you want the press to only report the government approved science side and ignore or ridicule the “Mavericks”.
Will you still want this type of press judgement and filtering of voices in a system dominated by the Tea-Baggers when even NPR looks like Fox News?
I say, have patience because the truth will out.
‘As any skilled public relations practitioner will attest, successful communication meets people on their own turf”“by means that address emotions, fears, and values.’
Back in the days when dinosaurs roamed the earth and Hewlett Packard was considered an outstanding electronics engineering firm engineers were forced to go work in electronics stores so they could understand things like what features were easy sells, and which features irritated people unnecessarily.
Heraclitus:
You are applying the common sense and common experience of police, political and sport reporting to science reporting. It’s a different animal.
How should the different string theories be reported? Are we to now have the press be the arbiters of Science?
One imagines Kloor and Revkin rubbing their hands together with glee (boouuuaaahaahaahaa) with the ultimate power you would grant them.
but Howard, if you give us even a 10% chance of being right, patience is not an option…
Some other points:
I don’t much care for the word “fascism” being thrown about too loosely. It trivializes immensely serious issues about how humans organize ourselves to conflate scientific authority on matters of science with totalitarianism.
That said, there really is something to scientific authority. Now the problem is how to evaluate the scientific authority in question. Is it real or has it gone off the rails? You seem to think the latter, since you apparently value the scientific community at less than ten per cent versus your own formulation of a null hypothesis. But how do you know that? Where do you get that expertise if you deny people like Keith, who are after all professionals on the beat, the capacity to develop such expertise?
A great deal of the confusion abounding (and occasionally deliberately instilled) in these topics is confusion between the in-principle-unknowable, the as-yet-unknown, and the known-but-not-to-me. If you don’t know something that doesn’t make it unknown.
Finally, I am not asking journalists to decide what is known and what is speculative, just to decide who is balanced and who is manipulative. And if there is a group that is being manipulative, to report on that; and if there is more than one such group, to report on all of them in proportion to how effectively they manipulate the debate.
Mainstream scientists are very awkward in this role. The whole process is about accentuating what works and forgiving and forgetting what doesn’t. It doesn’t work in the face of advocacy and doesn’t need to. Advocates like Michaels and Singer can be ignored by practicing scientists for purposes of science; it’s pretty clear that Christy is now going to be included in that group. But for purposes of public discourse they can do a great deal of damage. So to the extent that they are out of touch with science, that is a public issue. I would consider it the job of some institution other than science to say so. Maybe that isn’t “journalism” as journalists construe it. But the function is crucial henceforth. Somebody has to do it.
“How should the different string theories be reported? ”
Well, here’s a thought – perhaps journalists could ask the opinions of other scientists who might be able to make realistic judgements about the validity of the ideas. They could perhaps ask the sceintists to explain their own theories in as simplisitc a way as possible and then maybe give thier interepretations back to the scientists to judge if they catch the essence of their work. If they find that they cannot simplify the ideas into layman’s language they should make this clear and perhaps try to find out why. Maybe they could ask the scientists for their opinions about the implications of their work. All the while they might be judging the credibility of the scientists by considering their motivations, any agendas that might not be obvious or just their enthusiasm for the ideas.
> Well, here’s a thought – perhaps journalists could ask the opinions of other scientists who might be able to make realistic judgements about the validity of the ideas.
Perhaps you mean something like <a href=”http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2011/03/ipcc-and-conflicts-of-interest.html”>this</a>.
Before or after the update?
Do you have a copy of the post before the update?
No. I’m confused by the whole thing, but then I’m tired and should be marking some very tedious statistics.
I’m curious about this whole placing fault equation, or pie, or whatever. From what I’ve seen, scientists all over the world have been speaking out for a long time. But who distributes knowledge to the largest crowd? When Dr. Micheal Tobis speaks on his blog, who’s representing his views to a larger audience? We all know how his views are represented here. Is this this how the rest of the media reacts? How about Lonnie Thompson? Kevin Trenberth? Bart? Do any of the scientists who regularly speak out get the mass media attention that their words actually deserve according to their expertise and scale of the problem? Are they ignored as doomsayers the same way Dr. Tobis is here, and just regarded ‘part of the communication problem’? Is it that the problem isn’t as much the difference in knowledge between the public and experts, but instead the difference in opinion between the media and experts? I don’t understand how the lions-share of blame on a global communications problem can be placed on those without the largest microphones.
Or, perhaps we are looking at the wrong people by blaming trench digging journalists. Who are the people making the decisions about what gets the most attention in any newspaper, on any television broadcast? Should Lonnie Thompson’s message get the same slot that yesterday was reserved for the mouse that was genetically engineered to bark like a dog?
jeffn#16
Golly, you mean THIS overhyped oil spill?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/22/science/22conversation.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=oil%20spill%20plume&st=cse
”
Q. Aside from the plumes, what did your group find?
A. We were able to document the impact of the leak on the seafloor. In the places we sampled, it was devastating. Often you saw this oily mucus, blanketing everything. There are these bacteria in the sea that eat oil. When their oil-laden waste gets heavy, it falls to the floor. And it must have been falling like a blizzard for months, because it covered the sediment.”
”
Q. How would you characterize the seafloor?
A. A graveyard.”