I'm not wild about gotcha journalism. But geez I'd love to ask some of the people writing about climate some basic questions. What are total CO2 emissions per year? What percentage is due to the US? To China? To coal? To power generation?
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How does the impact of methane compare to CO2? How long does CO2 last in the atmosphere (& how do we know)? Etc. When reading I often have the sneaking suspicion that the person writing has no quantitative understanding at all of climate.
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Good intentions + no detailed quantitative understanding is simply a recipe for bad outcomes, in my opinion.
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It's tempting to say "well, people aren't interested in wonkish, number-and-model laden writing". Maybe. But I wonder. In sport, people seem to love it.
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I'm trying to imagine writing about basketball that eschewed all quantitative accounts of last night's big game. Most general climate writing seems a bit like discussing how good or bad LeBron looked on court last night, while ignoring points, rebounds, assists etc.
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Funny thing is: of course, there's a tonne of great books, online classes etc that are full of this stuff. I've found the IPCC report(s) surprisingly readable and interesting. But it all seems sub rosa from the pov of popular culture.
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Replying to @michael_nielsen
It's an unfortunate consequence of the weaponization of climate for political purposes.
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Replying to @speakthelogos
michael_nielsen Retweeted michael_nielsen
Note that in most countries climate hasn't been weaponized for political purposes. The US is something of an outlier.https://twitter.com/michael_nielsen/status/1023024326927245312 …
michael_nielsen added,
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Replying to @michael_nielsen
Has climate skepticism been a significant force in other countries? And what is the state of climate journalism in those countries? Despite US emissions not being as technically significant, the US's skepticism impedes a lot of international progress for complicated reasons.
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My point was that climate coverage in other countries - at least, the countries where I tend to follow media - doesn't seem much better. So your original tweet, blaming poor coverage on politicization, seems implausible.
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Replying to @michael_nielsen
I suppose at this point I would be curious for examples. The IPCC is downplayed by the US right-leaning media for obvious reasons, but it's also downplayed by the US left-leaning media because many of its conclusions actually contradict leftist environmental policy.
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