[Alex Heartnet]

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/05/28/global-warming-skeptics-know-more-about-science-new-study-claims/

O RLY.  Given all the dire warnings over the years about massive climate changes that never happened, this is a surprise why?

[General Battuta]

I think a larger surprise is that you literally did not read the article you posted

"This study is agnostic on what people ought to believe," he told FoxNews.com. "It just doesn’t follow to say this finding implies anything about what people should believe on this issue."

Kahan said that he thought another finding of the study was more important: That people’s cultural views – how much they value things like individualism and equality -- affect their views on global warming much more than actual knowledge about science. Regardless of how much they know about science, individualists were relatively unconcerned about global warming, whereas those who value equality were very concerned.

Both sides of the global warming debate say the study's findings support their views. Those who worry about global warming say it shows that cultural biases blind even smart people to the “scientific consensus.”

Kahan’s research is so interesting,” Aaron Huertas, a spokesman for the Union of Concerned Scientists, told FoxNews.com. “Over the last few years, the policy issues surrounding climate change have become increasingly politicized, and that’s bleeding over into people’s perceptions of climate science.”

"What we need to remember is that we have a number of excellent non-partisan scientific resources… [They] all tell us that human activity is altering the climate in ways that are disruptive to our economy and way of life."

But some of the 16 scientists who signed a letter this January titled "No Need to Panic About Global Warming" disagree.

Dr. Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at MIT, was one skeptical scientist who signed the letter. He said that the finding that skeptics know as much or more about science surprised him "not at all."

I hope you can see the irony in taking an article about how crap becomes politicized and loses its nuance and then politicizing it to remove its nuance

e: someone please retitle this thread so it says 'New study on public opinion of global warming gives surprising results?' or something that's not hugely misleading about the content

[MP-Ryan]

...Fox News...

[mjn.mixael]

...Fox News...

   I had the exact same thought.

[watsisname]

The opinions and general scientific background of the public is not an indicator of the validity of global warming / climate change, or any field of science for that matter.  If you wanted to discuss the merit of global warming then you could have brought out a paper discussing global temperature trends or some such.   But if you prefer to discuss public perception, then did you know that there is a correlation between the general populace's acceptance of climate change and what news outlet they watch?

Very unfortunate that this subject has become such a political (and bi-partisan) issue.  Imagine if acceptance of quantum mechanics were correlated to whether you're conservative or liberal.

[karajorma]

Or acceptance of evolution.....oh wait.


I'm not surprised. When you ask "Who here is worried about global warming?" you're going to get positive answers from two kinds of people. Those who've read the science and understood it, and hippies. We shouldn't be surprised that hippies know nothing about science.

[NGTM-1R]

Very unfortunate that this subject has become such a political (and bi-partisan) issue.  Imagine if acceptance of quantum mechanics were correlated to whether you're conservative or liberal.

You are assuming it is not.

[watsisname]

[Public Service Announcement]
Turn in your cell phones and computers now, please.  You're no longer allowed to use them.

[Mongoose]

What really staggers me is how a one-point difference in the test results is supposed to represent anything significant.

[watsisname]

Fox doesn't know statistics.  Just check the coverage of any election poll.

[karajorma]

What really staggers me is how a one-point difference in the test results is supposed to represent anything significant.

Well it is significant if you expected there to be a huge disparity in the results. Which to be fair, I suspect a lot of people would have expected. Much more troubling is that over 40% of Americans would have problems with questions like "How long does it take the Earth to go around the Sun? One day, one month, or one year?"

[BrotherBryon]

My bull **** meter tips into the red at just the mere mention of Fox news let alone being the basis of legitimate discussion. It is a damn shame most of my friends and neighbors take everything they shovel out as truth but that is what I get for living in the south.

[666maslo666]

I want to stress that this study seems to be on how WORRIED people are about the effects of global warming, not about global warming denialism. And yes, one only has to look at naturalnews.com to see that its those damned hippies pushing the science literacy score down.. 

[Flipside]

What have lasers and relative atomic size got to do with Meteorology?

Seriously though, the problem isn't really how smart the people who are arguing are, the problem is how much do the people reporting on it understand. I wonder what would happen if you gave that test to various Newsreaders and Media Mouthpieces?

[BlueFlames]

I wonder what would happen if you gave that test to various Newsreaders and Media Mouthpieces?

Some old news relevant to your question.

I keep trying to add a comment to this, but it keeps turning into a rabid rant.  Suffice to say, the media companies in the United States do not have many/any people on their payroll with the scientific acumen to pass a test relating to climate change or any other scientific topic, whatsoever.  The people currently charged with conveying information from the scientific community to the general public are utterly incapable of performing this task, and the heads of the media companies do not feel that finding people more qualified to that task is a worthy expenditure of their resources.

[Grizzly]

O RLY.  Given all the dire warnings over the years about massive climate changes that never happened, this is a surprise why?

All of the dire warnings (define "dire") about massive climate changes (define "massive") have stated that said climate changes are a slow process and that we shall feel the effects in the coming 50 or 100 years - it is too early to say that they have not occured - most of them have been made in the past 20 years.

That being said, climate changes are actually occuring. Take a look at Ocean acidification, for example.

[QuantumDelta]

Permafrost melt too.
Summer Ice-free Arctic ocean
Britains (and to a lesser extent Europes)ridiculous weather patterns over the past few years.
The measured global temp increase already seen.
The retreat of all except one small fraction of the worlds glaciers (A tiny segment of the Himalayas).
The significant loss of bio-diversity across the entire globe.

Worth noting that we have massively effected the atmosphere before in a dramatic fashion, and yet - when all the legislation went through banning CFCs the problem slowly stopped getting worse and even, looks like it's possibly very slowly correcting itself.
Yet, apparently, humanity can't possibly have an effect on the atmosphere, hyuck hyuck hyuck

[watsisname]

Changes in weather patterns is a very hot (har har) topic and should be discussed as a feature of climate change, rather than just global warming.

For global warming you can add stratospheric cooling to the list.   That is one of the most ignored effects, (possibly because it's more counter-intuitive).

[karajorma]

It's one of the main reasons that people prefer the term climate change to global warming now.

[watsisname]

Both terms are fine, it just depends on what aspect of it is being discussed.  Global warming is fairly simple and straightforward; climate change is not.