Why anyone was surprised that Congress failed to enact climate change legislation is shocking to me. Similarly (though the data is mixed), why so many Americans refuse to believe the scientific consensus about global warming is extremely frustrating but hardly surprising.
I don't blame Americans for their misguided views about climate change. I also don't blame the environmental and scientific communities or the politicians that favor an environmental agenda for failing to convince Americans that global warming is real and solutions are needed now.
The way to overcome this dismal situation is not with more science but with more effective communication.
Even if you're Al Gore (and maybe especially if you're Al Gore), I caution you against arguing the science of climate change. You cannot change the mind of a global warming skeptic by citing scientific facts. The reason is simple; resistance isn't grounded in facts. Instead, it's grounded in emotion, political ideology and perceived financial self-interest. Let's examine each one:
Emotion
One of my closest friends once said to me, "How do you expect me to believe in global warming if I don't even know how I'm going to put my five-year old kid through college?" My friend is a successful lawyer who runs his own firm. In most areas of his life he's very rational. However, when it comes to global warming, his rationality is superseded by fear. Like many Americans, fear also leads my friend to invoke layman's evidence to counter climate science. Before this summer's heat wave hit, he said to me, "Dude, do you feel how cold it is outside? How could it be this cold if global warming were real?" Naturally, I felt like saying, "How can you can be such an idiot?" but I know it won't do any good. Emotions have the better of him.
Political Ideology
It amazes me how many Americans I encounter who still think environmentalism is somehow sort of Communist and therefore un-American. On top of that, in today's political culture of opposition for opposition's sake, denying the reality of climate change has little to do with climate science and much to do with distrusting and even despising those who favor climate change legislation. "If they're for it," many Americans reason, "Then it's a bad idea whether or not I understand it. Therefore, I'm against it."
Perceived Financial Self-Interest
As a culture we've come to accept as conventional wisdom that "green is too expensive." We take at face value the assertion that tackling climate change will sabotage our quality of life and jeopardize our financial future. Therefore, denying the reality of climate change allows us to shirk our collective financial responsibility for dealing with this mounting threat to our nation and civilization without having to feel guilty.
The good news for those advancing green agendas: None of this matters.
Effective green communication can circumnavigate the entire global warming debate and sway people in favor of almost any environmental agenda. When it comes right down to it, I've learned that you don't have to convince global warming skeptics that global warming is real in order to generate their support for the solutions that solve it. The question we must ask ourselves is, "Is this about winning the debate and being 'right' or is this about getting people enthusiastically on board with the solutions?" Assuming the answer is the latter, here are two green communication tactics to get you started:
1. Frame green solutions in terms of people's self-interest
A few months ago, I wrote about a drag car racer named John "Plasma Boy" Wayland who drives a suped-up 1972 Datsun that runs on electric battery power. Plasma Boy routinely trounces gasoline-powered muscle cars such as Corvettes and Mustangs. He goes zero-to-sixty in about three seconds. He generates eight-hundred pounds of torque using domestically produced energy sources instead of oil imported from foreign, non-democratic regimes. Fast speeds, raw power, and energy independence are great ways to frame eco-friendly cars to an American public that is attracted to those attributes yet still mostly associates eco-friendly cars with anemic power and an unjustifiably high price tag.
In a few months, Honda will begin selling the first hybrid car to be marketed as a fun, sporty driving experience that also delivers excellent fuel economy. It's the new CR-Z and it represents a quantum shift forward in green communication and branding. Instead of touting its "eco-ness," Honda will tout its superior driving experience for a car priced under 20K. That's great news for the planet because a broad segment of the population that doesn't self-identify as environmentalists is going to get excited about this car.
It's precisely the way we must communicate environmental solutions in terms of people's self-interest if we are going to convince Americans that green solutions not only fit but actually improve their lives.
2. Cite specific green success stories, not theoretical studies of future benefits
Often advocates for climate change legislation attempt to garner support for their agenda by citing theoretical studies of all the jobs that will be created, all the communities that will be revitalized and all the greenhouse gases that that will be eliminated one day in the future if legislation is enacted now. The problem with this approach is that Americans don't relate to theories. They relate to hard evidence, which is why specific green success stories are so much more compelling.
Consider the story of formerly unemployed Pennsylvania steelworkers whose jobs disappeared overseas but who are now fully employed with good benefits in a factory that manufactures wind turbines. Or the city of Toledo, Ohio where thousands of manufacturing jobs are returning to this once downtrodden city in order to make next-generation solar panels. Instead of citing fancy studies to try to convince Americans that millions of green jobs will be created from scratch once climate change legislation is passed, highlighting these kinds of real-world success stories presents a much more believable story about how millions of jobs will be created by replicating what's already here and working.
Think of it this way: it's very difficult to believe in a green job that doesn't yet exist, but it's very easy to covet a green job that somebody else already has.
While I'm absolutely in favor of continuing scientific research into climate change, we don't need to rely on it to get Americans on board with the solutions. We just need to communicate more effectively.
Follow Josh Dorfman on Twitter: www.twitter.com/LazyE
You suggest that the past decade has levelled off because the sun's 60 year period of heightened total solar irradiance (TSI) came to an end about 10 years ago.
Before I go on, I would like you to confirm or deny this as I do not want to put words into your mouth. This is important because some scientists have said that the TSI increase did not cause the warming of the 1900s as TSI could only contribute about 0.12 C to global temperatures.
John M Reynolds
Anthropogenic Global Warming relies on a belief system divorced from science. Science has never relied on concensus. Logic and facts matter and the true believers ignore so many facts. I continually see the response to any argument against AGW to be merely that scientists smarter than you believe therefore...
Sounds like a religious argument to me. "The cleric says that this is the way to worship the one true god therefore…"
True believers and politically paid scientists are selling the public on AGW to move money from the government into their own pockets. Getting to the bottom of this scam is really is as easy as following the money.
You should. One of the foundational principles of conservatism is caution about the unintended consequences of our actions. How can you abandon that principle when it comes to changing the composition of our atmosphere?
Some of us have never forgotten, and we actually educated ourselves in the interim. I think of myself as a Conservitive Ecologist. You want to get the average consumer on board? SAVE THEM MONEY! It is just that simple. I figured out how to reduce my energy bill by 50% more than average. Ask me.
You want people to buy "green" houses? Make them drop-dead pretty and traditional. Women make the family housing decisions and they are not going to buy a geodisic dome nestled next to a berm no matter how much energy it does not use.
You want families to buy hybrid vehicles? Make 3 year old used hybrids the most affordable alternative. Good grief, the whole issue hinges on economics and common sense. No wonder Liberals have has such a hard slog trying to convince the country!
Thank you, Josh Dorfman. Now, how do we get your ideas into the mainstream? If we don't, we are looking down a rather grim tunnel with an incredibly diminished American lifestyle at the end.
Genetic Modified Foods - Senate Bill S510
http://batr.org/gulag/082210.html
http://yupfarming.blogspot.com/2010/06/farm-animals-r-us.html
http://www.ellinghuysen.com/news/articles/105625.shtml
There's sufficient evidence to establish the threat from anthropogenic global warming. The solution, upgrading our power supplies, will not lead to the dark, impoverished future that the deniers believe is the goal. That solution is already being implemented, even here in Texas where the free market has finally figured out that wind power is good business.
The science deniers lose again, just as they always have...
It might be costly, especially if we wait too long.
But I disagree that we're asking people to make fundamental changes. Energy will be cheaper and more abundant as we move toward cleaner technologies. Most people won't even notice the difference, because the electricity to your house works the same no matter what the source.
Okay, there might be some fundamental changes in transportation, because right now it's hard to replace the convenience of a gasoline-powered internal combustion engine for getting around town, but I think the clean energy future is going to look a lot like today.
It'll just be cleaner...
When Texas is uninhabitable and the bible belt is a desert, most votes in the US will be in progressive states.
By the way, I am a moderate Conservative-leaning Independent. The far-left needs to listen to Dorfman big-time!
Some argue that this lack of warming is because of natural variability, but that does not cut it. Natural variablilty is used to explain small changes from one year to the next. Larger and longer changes are always explained by weather patterns like El Nino and La Nina or by the influence of volcanoes. The first two have a duration of less than 2 years while volcanoes can have a diminishing cooling effect that lasts up to 7 years. There have been no large volcanic eruptions since 1991, so that cannot explain the lack of warming for 8 years. The logical conclusion is that either something(s) is/are cooling us, or CO2's and the earth's feedbacks effect has been exaggerated by the IPCC, or some combination of the two. Regardless, as the data shows, the IPCC got their forcings wrong.
The 1998 El Nino was supposedly a 'super' El Nino. GISS had its peak anomaly at 0.80 C. Now ( http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-277 ) the 2009-2010 was supposedly worse (GISS: 0.84 C) and our temperatures still did not blow 1998's away over a decade later? Wow. The hits just keep on coming.
John M Reynolds
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090618131402.htm
Around last June, really bright people started predicting, with increasing confidence as we watched the Sun's increasing output, that 2010 would be the warmest year ever, and we're right. CO₂ is responsible for the multi-decadal temperature trend and Solar output, ENSO and other phenomena classified under 'natural variability' cause inter-annual fluctuations. This is all KNOWN to climate experts. You're just confounded by your own confirmation bias.
Will you accept the IPCC as peer reviewed? Beyond that I normally just go right to the data.
They claim that our rising CO2 levels should warm us by between 0.1 and 0.2 C per decade. That is 1 to 2 C over a century. When feedbacks are included, the surface should warm by between 1.1 C and 6.4 C above the year 2000 by 2100. These numbers are from Table SPM.3.
The GISS ( http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt ) global temperature anomaly data shows that the 5 year running mean has levelled off. I dropped their data into a text file and opened it with a spreadsheet program. The average anomoly since 2002 according to the GISS data is 0.547 C. Oddly enough, now that the El Nino is over, July's anomoly was 0.55 C. There has been no warming since 2002 even though CO2 levels have increased as measured by Mauna Loa's monitoring station.
Continued...
Lets say that instead of the 95% that the IOCC says, there is only a 50% chance that there is human caused global warming, that will cause the sorts of problems predicted.
Lets say that if global warming does happen, it will cost the amount that scientists predict, and if we want to stop it, we have to pay the amount scientists are asking for.
The ROI on the investment is about 700% interest per year.
Now if the IOCC is right on all counts, the ROI is much higher.
How can anyone be against doing something if there is any possibility of global warming? Just from a financial perspective?
The revolutions in understanding regarding our physical world include a world view where the changes the tipping point alarmists are predicting are not due to our CO2 but to our sloppy short-sighted resource management and our greed.
Which raises conflicting thoughts.
If it takes a lie to put people on the right/aware path to change their ways …does the end justify the means?
It that is what it takes for us to care about our own and only habitat ….do we deserve it?
Won’t that come back to bite us.
Wouldn’t that define us as incompetent?
There is no living creature on earth living in conflict with its environment and exploiting others to the extent than we humans do.
On the other hand, we are the creature with the greatest learning curve and the most unpredictable and diverse character attributes within a single species.
No other creature is capable of that much kindness and cruelty as we are.
Questions over questions.
My personal hunch is that we won’t get to decide but nature will and that we still have a window open to make case for contingency.
But actions will speak much louder the words.
Great post btw, thanks
My point is that when you frame green approaches in terms of the benefits to people, then people will see that going green serves their self-interest. And if it serves their self-interest, they will be much more in favor of continuing to implement the solutions that are already here and working. If you believe in Global Warming, then this helps drive the solutions that solve it. If you don't believe in Global Warming, then you'll still want these solutions because they'll improve your life, assuming, of course, that you want your life to improve.
If we did it, we can undo it
But if we didn’t do it, we cannot undo…or influence it.
Ergo, passing legislation to change the climate would be futile.
Branding skeptics of MM global warming or cooling as " deniers" is disingenuous without including Man Made in the debate since the issue is not climate change but whether it's man made.
That said, past periods of warming have brought prosperity and well being to man and animals.
Where as cooling and ice ages have been times of severe hardship.
Regarding pressing environmental issues
If we as a species cannot rise to the protection and care of our own and only habitat for our own good without a big fat lie, then we are truly lost and undeserving of this lovely blue ball.
And nature will take care of us.
http://cleanenergystories.org/
However, the MWP deniers, such as the IPCC, US EPA and the UK’s MET Office, will never admit the existence of the MWP because it means that their religious-like belief in AGW is exposed for the steaming pile of junk science that it truly is.
In total, climate change is complex and not well understood.
But this part is simple.
Since the world was warmer when CO2 levels were lower, CO2 cannot be the earth's temperature regulator.
In the past, the Earth was warmer than it is today; before the social and industrial advances that have made modern people the healthiest and most prosperous in history. MWP deniers want us to believe that plant friendly and life giving CO2 is a bad thing to better advance their meglomanical desire to both boss around the developed world and further impoverish the poor while pocketing a lot of taxpayer money along the way.
Useless, misguided attempts to control carbon are not the answer to the ever changing climate.There is only one answer to changes in climate that has ever worked for humanity.
That is adaptation.
One of the many links to the overwhelming Paleoclimate evidence of the global nature of the MWP is below.
http://www.co2science.org/data/mwp/mwpp.php
F & F
But you will undoubtedly incur the attention and wrath of “Rabid Reed”
Go ahead and flag me, the truth is worth it.
I am exited and relate very well to “Green Jobs” success stories.
Look very much forward and support environmentally sounder policies and greater public awareness.
We don’t need MMGW fear mongering bedside stories to care about the environment our fellow men and species living beside us.
Green jobs/ green industry don’t need the MMGW cattle prod.
There is enough hard evidence of the damage already done without resorting to fantasy.
The enormous amount of money and energy spent on the lobby of this theory could have been put to better use….namely those green jobs and the environment.
"Look very much forward and support environmentally sounder policies ..."
Force is the only thing they seem to understand.
The article above states that, "[y]ou cannot change the mind of a global warming skeptic by citing scientific facts." That is an odd statement to be sure. There are very few skeptics that would refute that the globe has been on a general warming trend since the little ice age. If you want to really convince anyone, you can only use data. Anything else is just blowing smoke. I would have thought people would have learned this by now.
John M Reynolds
John: "If you want to really convince anyone, you can only use data. Anything else is just blowing smoke."
The **truth** is that in science, there are rigorous standards about what is still debatable and what is settled. Gravity and the greenhouse effect are both examples of settled science. No, "settled science" is not a misnomer. It happens after diligent study, which I know p2t knows nothing about.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/06/04/1003187107
http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686?paged=130
p2t: "Big oil & other energy mogul hang quietly in backgroundholding hands saying… Please please pass cap and trade, dreaming oftheir billions."
Then please explain the Koch brothers
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer
... and the funding of global warming denial by coal and petroleumin general.
http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/polluterwatch/
I too used to take their word for it as a concerned environmentalist.
It was the ever increasing exaggerations that tipped me of and then the claim that the debate is over (a first in science, where debate is never over).
As I looked closer into the MMGW the more contradictions to these claims and predictions came to light
Another thing I don’t appreciate is the mangling of language between Global Warming and Man Made Global Warming.
Those are two completely different assertions though not mutually exclusive.
And also respectfully disagree with the Author.
It is a Scientific issue and regardless how good the communication/marketing.
It won’t sell without the science.
re: "the claim that the debate is over (a first in science, where debate is never over)"
What do you believe is still debatable about The Law of Gravity?
re: "Another thing I don’t appreciate is the mangling of language between Global Warming and Man Made Global Warming."
That's in the popular press, not in science; scientists refer to the Anthropogenic Climate Change Theory.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/06/04/1003187107.abstract
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-hoggan/new-stanford-study-expose_b_620369.html
Don't deny scientific fact because the corporate media are sloppy. That path leads to believing that Saddam Hussein still had wmd in 2003 which we all know is a fabrication.