'The Cooling World' … NOT!
The Myth of the Global Cooling Consensus
Posted by Ross Pomeroy, January 13, 2014
Newton Blog, RealClearScience.com
By definition, fact and myth are worlds apart. One is a persistent truth; the other is a persistent untruth. Yet we still confuse myth with fact all the time. A myth's pervasiveness serves as its disguise. Repetition and blind acceptance ground it into reality.
One myth that's been hibernating, but has recently resurfaced back into popular discussion, is the idea that back in the 1970s, climate scientists were united in predicting global cooling. Not only does that notion fit in with America's recent cold snap, as well as the so-called "pause" in global warming (which isn't really a pause), it also acts as a convincing rebuttal to the genuine scientific consensus on climate change. Armed with the myth of a global cooling consensus, pundits can argue that those who study the Earth's climate are little more than unscientific, money-grubbing scaremongers.
"Back in the 1970s, all the climate scientists believed an ice age was coming. They thought the world was getting colder. But once the notion of global warming was raised, they immediately recognized the advantages. Global warming creates a crisis, a call to action. A crisis needs to be studied, it needs to be funded..." author Michael Crichton wrote in his controversial anti-climate change novel State of Fear.
(Continued here.)
Posted by Ross Pomeroy, January 13, 2014
Newton Blog, RealClearScience.com
By definition, fact and myth are worlds apart. One is a persistent truth; the other is a persistent untruth. Yet we still confuse myth with fact all the time. A myth's pervasiveness serves as its disguise. Repetition and blind acceptance ground it into reality.
One myth that's been hibernating, but has recently resurfaced back into popular discussion, is the idea that back in the 1970s, climate scientists were united in predicting global cooling. Not only does that notion fit in with America's recent cold snap, as well as the so-called "pause" in global warming (which isn't really a pause), it also acts as a convincing rebuttal to the genuine scientific consensus on climate change. Armed with the myth of a global cooling consensus, pundits can argue that those who study the Earth's climate are little more than unscientific, money-grubbing scaremongers.
"Back in the 1970s, all the climate scientists believed an ice age was coming. They thought the world was getting colder. But once the notion of global warming was raised, they immediately recognized the advantages. Global warming creates a crisis, a call to action. A crisis needs to be studied, it needs to be funded..." author Michael Crichton wrote in his controversial anti-climate change novel State of Fear.
(Continued here.)
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